Hey, what's up guys? It's Isaac and today we're going to be talking about self-love. This is a big topic that I wanted to talk about because it seems to be, you know, all throughout our culture, this idea of love yourself, this idea that, you know what, you need to love yourself before you can love other people. And I don't know if you're anything like me, but when you hear any of these kind of statements, it puts my mind into overdrive. I begin to just kind of like, okay, there's some truth to it, but yet it doesn't seem right. So this is kind of my way of thinking through this topic as Christians. Let's talk about it. First, I want to begin by digging into what the Bible says, because I think that's a good place to start. When we talk about being disciples of Christ, it's really easy to just get in our own heads about it and just try to make up answers on our own and what our opinion is. But let's look at what the Bible says. There's one verse here from 1st John 4-7. Dear friends, let us love one another for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Another verse here from Mark 12-31. The second is this, love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these. And then we have another verse here from 1st John 4-19. We love because he first loved us. Okay, I have to be honest in my research and as you probably could tell from those verses, those verses weren't really about loving yourself. They were about loving other people and God. And in my research and in looking and digging into this topic, it became apparent to me that there wasn't a lot of Bible verses on loving yourself. I once heard it put that, you know what, God, Jesus didn't speak a lot on loving yourself because he knew we were good at it. What we're not good at and what we struggle with is loving other people and loving him, which is more important than loving ourselves anyway. And that's why he focused on it because we're really good at loving ourselves. Now, although I think there is some truth and a bunch of truth to that statement that, yeah, we're good at loving ourselves. We have no problem with that. I do think there's some issues that are pushed to the side if we only just like end the conversation there. Things like self-hate, shame, guilt. These are big issues that people deal with. They're in and amidst this conversation of self-love. So I figure, okay, let's talk about this because it would be easy for me to say, okay, you know what, you're plenty good at loving yourself. You know what, you need to focus more about loving others. And there's nothing wrong with loving other people, but in the midst of this conversation, let's talk about when we actually have a hard time understanding ourselves, putting ourselves in proper context to how God sees us. So let's talk a little bit about self-hate. I have to believe that because Jesus said whoever hates his brother is a murderer, you know, he doesn't want us hating other image-bearers. And when we think of ourselves, and if that language is a little bit foreign to you, an image-bearer, we bear God's image. He created us in his image, and we show the world what God is like through our actions, and we image him on this earth. So that's the terminology there. But when we think about, okay, yeah, God doesn't want us hating other image-bearers. That's like murder. Does he want us hating ourselves? No, we're image-bearers too. We shouldn't be hating ourselves. So I have to believe that, look, God is no more for self-hate than he is no more for, you know, hating other people.  I do want to make a little bit of a distinction here and clarification here. Yes, God does not want us hating ourselves, but oftentimes our terminology can get a little bit confused, especially in regard to a verse like this. So let's talk about it. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions.   Now, we need to make a little bit of a distinction there, because our sinful flesh, what we once were, that spiritual side to us, that we were just against God and we were following our own passions. You know, the Bible says don't listen to that. Put that away.  We can hate that, but we're not actually hating ourselves, a new creation. It's an important distinction there to make. God does not advocate self-hate.  No, he says you're a new creation. You were made in my image.  You are bearing God's image. So when we talk about self-love, I think what I want to say is, yes, it's important to love what God created, but it shouldn't be a man focus or a self-centered focus like, oh man, I'm so awesome. I'm so cool. I love this. And I think the proper framing of this conversation is that of thankfulness to God, is identifying stuff that you love about your character or your just your personality and just being thankful to God. Hey, God, thank you for making me this way. Thank you for that. Because when we begin to cast our gaze onto the Creator, it's a lot harder to become prideful or self-centered. Self-love on its own is going to be toxic for us. If we're just like, hey, you know what? I love me. I'm awesome. I'm so cool. I'm the best. You know what? That's not healthy biblical thinking. But when we can say, God, thank you for giving me this personality trait or thank you for giving me the skills that I'm able to use. When we're casting our gaze upon Jesus in thankfulness, that's when we can really be truly healthy disciples. And we're not going to be able to be caught up in this pride and self-centeredness that often self-love on its own. It produces. So that's kind of my perspective on it.  No, it's about looking at what God has created and being thankful to him. There's nothing wrong with that. And that's actually important. Thanks for watching, guys. And if you like this video, give it a like and also subscribe to the channel because we're making new videos all the time. I just want to say thank you to everyone who signed up for Patreon. That is a huge, huge, huge blessing. I just want to give you a little update, though, all the people that were signed up for the tier to get a shout out and to get their name listed at the end of this video. It's going to be a little bit delayed just because I produce these videos like ahead of time. So it's going to be like a month or so before you get that up there. But thank you so much for that support. And I'd love it if you were to join the family as well. You can go to patreon.com daily underscore disciple to sign up for Patreon. There's cool rewards on there. And it honestly just makes it so I can make more videos like this higher quality and just do more for the kingdom of God. So you are assisting in that. And if you want to join this community, please do that. Thanks so much for watching, guys. And I'll see you next time. See ya. Bye soda.


So recently one of our members was sharing a conversation. She had with a man and during this conversation He acted rather critical of her to some degree And I thought it'd be important to talk about Relationship killers things that were destroy relationships whether you're a man or woman in this particular case this Conversation gave her pause and to caused her to take a step back Which is actually a good thing to do when you experience someone being critical with you So today we're gonna lean into the four behaviors that destroy a relationship And this is actually from the Gottman Institute if you're not familiar with John and Julie Gottman I highly recommend googling them checking out their work and they talk about what's known as the four Horsemen of the apocalypse. These are things that destroy Relationships and the first one is criticism when someone is critical of you they they share a criticism about you maybe it's coming from a place of Disappointment about you. Maybe it's triggering something got triggered in their past that causes them to be critical of you When we criticize other people, this is true of your in relationship or not We can act in a very defensive manner. We can get very closed off And certainly whether you're a man or woman doing this relationship And I've noticed that men do this as equally as much as women when we act critical of them when we criticize them That's certainly something that causes us to pull back Ghost or even disappear in relationships when we feel like we are being attacked You know and it's sad because I want to lean into this for a second. It's kind of sad because I think Most people are good people. I don't think most people are evil Okay, I think a lot of women out there think men are absolutely bad And I think most humans are bad or not bad excuse me I think they're certainly flawed and Certainly a significant percentage of people have weak emotional maturity and weak relationship skills But that doesn't make them bad human beings So when someone does act critical when someone Criticizes I would lean into the conversation and not necessarily Criticize or attack them because sometimes we can do a tit for tat I mean if you ever watch politicians when they're debating they do a lot of well You did this and I did this and you did this and I did you know I did this and you did this kind of thing and They're always criticizing the other person and where does that lead us so you can simply in a kind way Express how that felt when you've heard that criticism and dive a little bit deeper Into what triggered them to cause them to be critical of you So that's the first one is criticism and by the way, this is in no particular order today The second one is contempt Now the contempt is basically a feeling of superiority Over another person now from what I understand Narcissists oftentimes operate from a place of contempt. They act like they're superior But another thing that happens for men and women alike is Contempt is also feeling like you're right and the other person is wrong And I want you to think about Disagreements you might have had in previous relationships where you are staunchly rooted in your perspective and And the other person is staunchly rooted in their perspective When two people are in there, I would rather be right than happy. It's actually demonstrating a level of contempt It's not Demonstrating a level of love within the relationship because love would rather be happy than being right I'm gonna repeat that would you rather be happier being right now Let me be clear about something being happy doesn't mean being a doormat being happy doesn't mean compromising yourself But what I'm here to say is remember two people might have a different point of view When it comes to something so if you have a different point of view I think it's important to listen to the other person's point of view Acknowledge their point of view and accept that that person's point of view is true for them And by the way, they should be doing this as well. This is active communication This is active listening when you can lean into the other person's point of view Contempt says your point of view is wrong and my point of view is right Certainly this feeling of superiority I I'm gonna Deviate for a second because I see this a lot in the rhetoric of the alpha male Narratives out there. There's a lot of alpha male coaches teaching men to come from this place of superiority is that they're better than women because they provide and protect because I provide and protect I am in the Superior role I am better than you and when a man starts Leaning into those feelings that I'm better than you they will operate from a place of contempt Now I'm not suggesting all alpha males operate this way But I will tell you there are a lot of people out on YouTube teaching men to Start to treat women with a lot more contempt because they are in that provider protector role and Certainly a lot of women do the same thing when they're in a place of their own superiority I've noticed a lot of women do this as well because they're strong smart and successful They feel a sense of you know, I am almost better than you because I've accomplished all these things And when you operate from a place of I'm better than you from a place of contempt that will certainly destroy a relationship Okay, number three defensiveness Okay, remember earlier. I was talking about when we get triggered. It's natural to get defensive. I am guilty of this I've noticed this behavior when I feel like I'm up against a wall when I feel like I'm attacked My my natural reaction is to put up my walls. This is true for most human beings. This is not an uncommon thing And yet at the same time when we act defensive, I want you to think about this We have walls up defensive We have a wall up and when we have a wall up There's no opportunity to get close to another human being to really lean into what might be causing that Now it's interesting because this happens with my son frequently I do time to sometimes when things happen I go I I either operate from a place of contempt or defensiveness and what's interesting Is he I've also learned that immediately after this happens.  I just got defensive. I got I went into my righteousness my contempt Usually it's usually I figure it out within 10 minutes. Okay And I'm always calling him back and saying I'm sorry. I apologize. Okay Now he it's gotten to the point where he goes. Yeah, I know dad So he's learned to accept this from me. However, why I'm bringing this up is Awareness of our defensiveness awareness of our triggers those things that cause us and I'm getting so much better at this You know, but I'm still human and I'm flawed Is to if they ideally is to get to a point of catching yourself before this happens or at least Catching it shortly thereafter. And so whether it's a few minutes after whether it's 10 minutes after certainly an hour after I'm always a big proponent of acknowledging That that behavior Certainly apologizing and making amends for it Now we're you're with a partner That does get triggered frequently You have to really get to the root of what causes them to get triggered Many of us have suffered childhood wounds and traumas and adult traumas That makes it so we begin to have these patterns in our life Where we get triggered over and over again And this is the opportunity to start Leaning into what was the root cause of this and this is why I want to recommend a book today um If you haven't read the hoffman process the hoffman process This is a deep dive into healing childhood wounds and traumas that cause us to become defensive These are part of our negative patterns in life And so I want everyone to start to explore what may be the root cause for many of you that get defensive Now not everybody gets defensive, but also i'm not here i'm here to encourage not everyone to be a doormat Okay, because being a doormat is not standing up for yourself One of the reasons why I wrote i'm gonna pitch my book right now What the heck is self-love anyway a journey of personal development self-help and spiritual work Is this to recognize that we have to fill our own love cup first It's like putting the oxygen mask on ourselves first before we can actually Be a value of being benefit to anyone else in our life So by doing this inner work by doing introspective work you become more emotionally mature And more importantly you have the relationship skills to lean into a healthy happy relationship Now before I share the last one I want to recognize late since my audience is women and this is title about men You're experiencing a lot of frustration with men I know many of you are experienced a lot of dysfunctional men out there Which makes it difficult for you to begin to trust Men in fact many of you have reached a point of becoming bitter and jaded And as I said in the beginning of this broadcast I want everyone to know is most human beings are good people. They're not evil only a small percentage Of humans are actually evil. I think most people are good people But at the same time most humans are rather wounded And so I want to encourage everyone to come from a place of compassion not necessarily Crossing boundaries. Okay, not being a doormat being compassion to recognize that wounded people Hurt people not intentionally most often. So when we can actually have this sense of awareness I invite everyone not to focus on the men that did them wrong I want to invite everyone to look at their past relationships and ask themselves What positive things did I learn about myself? In each of my past relationships What positive things did I learn about myself? What was good about each relationship and more importantly? What are you grateful for? See when we operate from a place of gratitude we become more of a magnetic attractor For those who are in a place to appreciate who we are as people My coffee mug says I make the world go around. What do you do? This was a gift from someone. I think it's it's almost a little narcissistic in a way But um, some I'm a leo. So sometimes the world does revolve around me. I get it. That's a I'm saying that tongue-in-cheek but coming back to When we focus on what we do want instead of focusing on what we don't want See we'll actually become more of an attractor to those experiences It's kind of the difference between tigger and eor from winnie the pooh You know eor was the sky is falling my life sucks You know everything sucks and versus tigger was bouncy bouncy bounce bounce So i'm inviting everyone to recognize that yes, there are a lot of men out there that are deeply wounded Okay, just like there are a lot of women out there deeply wounded and what I mean to say is unhealed from these wounds I'd rather you focus on healing yourself So you can catch yourself when you're falling into these four horsemen of the apocalypse and the last one Is something I experienced as a childhood from my mother She would do what's called stonewalling and stonewalling is basically avoiding the difficult conversations avoiding Intimacy avoiding emotional connection And this is how I experienced it as a child and when this happens it triggers me inside it triggers my fear of abandonment And what my mother used to do is when my by the way Can any of you relate to the following whenever my my father my brother my sister myself did something to irritate my mom My mom would get closed off She would get closed off and she would stonewall and avoid like I'd be like this little kid and I'd say Mom I want some love. I want some love and she would you know put up walls Now I am all in favor of Humans taking a little bit of a take a take a break when you might have been triggered Okay, taking a break to to regain oneself is a healthy thing At the same time when we avoid someone else's Desire to connect with us we have an opportunity to say simply I need to take a little bit of space To get back to my center. That's okay to ask from someone But to actually close yourself off and I've seen this with women Frequently and this destroys relationships when when something happens you shut yourself down The person makes a request to connect with you and you immediately close that person off That is a relationship killer that destroys relationships and when we stonewall So again, it's okay to ask for space in a relationship. That's okay And and learning and recognizing that this happens within yourself and giving yourself a time limit Maybe it's an hour I need an hour break to regroup before I can come back to my center and have a conversation with you And by the way, I'm here to encourage everything.  Okay And you're trapped. I mean falling into the pit See by by recognizing, okay folks everyone I just want to share a quick story When I was going through a divorce I sat in divorce court family court, excuse me And when I got there we were fourth on the docket So there were three couples ahead of us And as I'm listening to the couple share their absolute contempt for one another They were criticizing one another. They were getting defensive with one another And I'm witnessing this and I'm listening to going You know what everybody should do is spend some time in family court in divorce court To hear the problems And imagine this if you go well and by the way and I noticed a common thread I actually wish I went back and stayed in family court for a week I think we should all do that before we get into a relationship or get married with someone And I suspect there's a common thread If you can if you can notice the common thread and go let's address these Before this happens to us See we date, you know, most people are dating with these grand assumptions and expectations If we have chemistry for one another it will all magically work out because magic fairy dust always works out Folks you've been around the planet long enough if you've been in midlife you should recognize That most humans are dysfunctional I'm raising my hand. I'm dysfunctional I I still have a ways to go before I'm fully evolved and enlightened to a place where I don't get triggered Okay, this is true for most humans So if you're beginning the dating process be aware of this and go What are the things we can do to avoid the pitfalls? Well, what are the major things to do to avoid the pitfalls is begin a relationship With what I call radical honesty laying your cards on the table And the rules of engagement the rules of engagement are simply establishing your standards right from the get-go So you don't get involved with the person who's not on the same page with you laying your cards on the table is simply Talking about your past experiences to give some insight into how you operate in the future and radical honesty Simply means being vulnerable being authentic and being transparent And I don't mean giving away secrets to a person you don't know But when you start a relationship With us from an understanding that intimacy builds trust Intimacy is into me. You see and so when you begin a relationship By being vulnerable authentic and transparent and both of you are sharing from this place You begin to build the deep roots of trust that establish Hopefully some deeper commitment with one another and deeper trust because when both people feel safe with one Another and they understand the pitfalls especially the four horsemen of the apocalypse They have a greater chance of relationship success. Is this sinking in is this resonating with you? Please let me know I'd like to hear your thoughts these post a comment below if this Resonated with you. Please tell your friends about midlife love mastery. There's a link right here Send them to my website jonathan asley.com have them click the group coaching button so they can join our fantastic group And i'm gonna sign off this videos. I always do first off give myself a big gigantic jonathan marriage of self love I'm gonna reach into the camera and give you a hug of love if that's okay I'm gonna ask you to turn to someone a pet teddy bear pillow and give it or them a hug of love Because hugs are a great source of love and let's face it. We could all use smart love in our lives Thanks a bunch. Bye now. Bye


Hey, what's up coach? Welcome back to the podcast now today's episode. I'm gonna be answering a question from Coach he's in California. His name is Robert Robert asked he said hey Ben, I'm thinking about partnering with one of my old college basketball teammates and I'm thinking about Setting up a partnership with him so we can go into our training business together instead of me just doing it by myself can you give me some advice and First the short answer is There's a funny commercial that this guy impersonates Dr. Evil from Austin Powers and and he says how about new All right, so my short answer is no You should not Partner with an old teammate and Here's why so first The you have to ask yourself a couple of questions What does what does this person bring to the table that I can't bring to the table? Normally when someone's starting a business of someone else like both people are brand new both people don't know what they're doing both people are trying to figure things out together and a In my opinion by having someone else along this journey with you is going to be a liability at the beginning because What if they don't have as much skin in the game? What if they don't care about as much as you do now? You're constantly thinking about what they're doing right and on top of that if this is a teammate in this scenario that means your friends with them and I can tell you from personal experience because I have already lived through this You don't want to start or go into business with someone that you're friends with Because when money is on the line what happens is your emotions get in the way and Now you're thinking in your head. All right. Well, you know when we start making more money How is this going to be set up? What's the percentage split? And because you're friends with that person you can't make Smart business decisions because your emotions will always get in the way You don't want to hurt that person's feelings. You want to still be friends with them right and really the last thing I'll say about it is When you partner with someone they have to be able to bring something to the table that you just You don't want to do or you just aren't good at and there are a couple of coaches I've taught to that do have partners, but they didn't they didn't start their business with their best buddy from high school They started their business by themselves and then they started bringing on either other coaches or Partners who could do things that the coach the business aren't just simply does not want to do anymore And in my head that makes sense Right makes sense to prove Prove your product Before you start to bring anyone else on to what you do like you have to believe in what you do a thousand percent Right and to start something With someone who might not have the same mindset as you I promise you that's going That's going to be a bigger detriment to your business than you could possibly imagine Right Because I already know how hard it is to run a business by yourself running a business and starting something with someone else Promise you it's going to be a lot more stressful than you think All right, and if you have any sort of equity percentage that you're giving away Well right off the bat, you know a thousand dollars that comes into the business is now split in two right and You know you have to look at your your financial situation Is that something that that you want to be a part of you have to look at your family situation? You know how much money do you need to generate every month? This is why oftentimes it's going to be better To do things by yourself at the beginning and if you do partner with someone They need to be able to do something that you just possibly cannot do Or you do not want to do and they have to be rolled class at that Otherwise you should find somebody else to do it All right, so that's it for today's message. Hopefully this helps Guys any other questions that you have text me at<PHONE_NUMBER> That's where I get these questions. That's how I connect with coaches. That's it. See you later


So yeah, so this talk is about the efficient shuffle arguments. And I would start with a little bit of motivation. So this motivation is electronic voting. So let's say we have some number of voters. Voters send their votes to a polling board. So this is paid to some immutable storage system, either blockchain or something more old fashioned. From polling board, the votes go to a mixed network. And purpose of this component is to basically anonymize the votes or disconnect the sort of the vote from its destination. And from there on, votes go to some sort of a threshold of the encryption service. And we get the tally. So we will focus on this central component in this talk. So as I mentioned before, our goal here is to get anonymity or you may also call it location privacy that essentially don't want to reveal the origin of the ciphertext. And for this, we can use a mixed network. So it consists of a number of mixed servers, like of mixers. So voters send the ciphertext to the first mixer. Mixer permits the ciphertext. Of course, this is not enough because you can still connect just by looking the output. You can connect the input and output. So you also have to blind the ciphertext, meaning that you randomize them. And the following mixers repeat the same process until you get some ciphertext that are untraceable to the original ciphertext, given that at least one of the mixers didn't reveal its secret reputation. But what if one of the mixers is malicious? So it turns out that this mixer can completely rep resist. So for example, you can generate this own ciphertext. In that framework, you would have no way of finding out that something went wrong. And the solution for this is a zero-knowledge argument. So essentially, if we want that each mixer without the proof, that preferably this should be a noninteractive proof that you can verify maybe even a long time after those mixers are gone. So what's a noninteractive argument? So we have two vectors. We have a prove and we have a verifier. Prove generates a proof. And if proof is honest, then that's very fair if it should also accept the proof. So noninteractive argument should be zero-knowledge, meaning that it doesn't leak any information besides the validity of the statement. It should be sound, meaning that proof can't prove any false statements. And sometimes additionally we want the noise soundness, meaning that if verifier accepts the proof, then proofers also know the witness for his statement. You should also choose a security model. Unfortunately, we know that in the standard model, you really cannot get a noninteractive zero-knowledge unless you work with trivial languages, which is not very interesting. You can get a noninteractive zero-knowledge in random model and actually have many efficient shuffle constructions in random model. So this is not very interesting for us. Also, there are some, at least some special, yes it's known, for random model when it breaks down. So instead, we will consider a common reference string model in this talk. So what is this common reference string model? CRS model for short. So we have a proof on verifier. And we have additionally a trusted third party. So this trusted third party generates, for us, common reference string. So this is related to some big string with a very specific distribution. And now using this CRS proofer, first proofer can leak a statement. A proofer also will know a witness for the statement. And now using witness and the CRS proofer will generate the proof and verifier will find and either accept or reject this. OK. And what our research question was here is that how to generate, how to construct an efficient noninteractive shuffle argument in the CRS model? So what's the state of the art at the moment? So least efficiently wise, there are two results. There's a result by Fauci and Lipma from CTRSA that achieves the fastest proofer. And then there's a result from last year's Asia Group by Fauci, Lipma, and Zayac that achieves the fastest verifier. So if you would have to choose by efficiency wise, then you would really have to think which one do you want to be faster, at least currently. Of course, these parameters are not all that matters. Also what's very important is what type of cryptosystem you use. So the CTRSA result used, for example, Eglmal, which is very standard. Whereas Asia Group used Eileen cryptosystem, which is probably another thing if you haven't heard about it, which is also a lifted cryptosystem, at least the way they used it, which means that when you degrade, you also have to complete the discrete logarithm, which in turn means that you can't have very long messages. So what do we achieve? We basically are able to improve on almost all the parameters that we consider here, except for the CRS size, which is somehow in between the two of the results. OK. And also have implementation. So there have been quite several of this CRS model of the shuffle papers now. But as far as we know, there have been no implementation. So you can finally see how it actually performs. But more about that later. So as the title of this session might indicate, we will use Perich. So some basic definitions. So we have three binary groups, g1, g2, gt of size b. b is a prep with respect to generators b1, b2, and bt. We lose additive notation in all groups together with bracket notation. So this you also saw before. So basically, instead of writing a times b1, I will write a bracket 1. And then we have a binary map meaning that bracket a paired with bracket b gives you, gives me a product in the third group, 8hp. So also what you heard just before, and what we also have to use here, is generic binary in a group model. So in this model, we essentially assume that adversaries kind of blind to that concrete structure of the group elements. So he does not look at the individual bits and so on. And he will only do generic operations, meaning that he will do addition, he will do bearing operation, and he will do required checks and nothing more. So what does our shuffle argument look like? Essentially, we have three components. First, we have a fermentation matrix argument. OK, fermentation matrix argument. So essentially, we commit to a fermentation matrix, and this argument will show that that commitment actually contains a fermentation matrix. And this is actually based by square span programs. Over the output, the net is at the top. Then we have a consistency argument which essentially says that the presentation that we committed to was used to shuffle the ciphertext. And this is a result by Grof and Lu, or not quite the result, but it's based on their ideas. So unfortunately, in both of those arguments, we actually need to use different commitment schemes. And to kind of connect them, then we have a same message argument, which essentially tells you that those commitments are to the same message. And in here, we use a recent result by Gilson V, which is a proof for soft linear spaces. So and now a little bit in more detail. So first is the fermentation matrix argument. So what's the fermentation matrix? It's basically a matrix where on each row and each column, we have exactly 1, 1. And all the other entries are 0. And of course, if you multiply this matrix by a vector, then this vector per field of mu. So we will use vector commitment schemes with polynomials. So we have some polynomials, Pi, that are linearly independent. And the commitment will look as you see here. So these Pi polynomials are evaluated at random point. And also this row is some random point. And all of this is in our CRS. And so a commitment to a vector A, that we multiply the respective coordinate of the vector by Pi. And then we have some randomizer that hides the commitment. OK, and then we commit to each row in this fermentation matrix. And so as I mentioned before, what we want to show is that the commitments actually contain a fermentation matrix. And actually, in all those components, these components are actually already well known. So what's actually known in this result is that we take those components for these puzzle pieces and put them together. And it turns out that this gives you a next result. So for example, here, this is actually this Asia Group 2016 result. Or very similar to this one. And similarly, as stated, we will prove it in a generic, but in a group model. Since we also have a new CRS, then we have to prove it again. In very short, essentially what they do is they have a unit vector argument. We choose a square but span programs. And to get a fermentation matrix argument out of this, you basically just need to check that, OK, you have all vectors, a unit vector, and they sum together as an all one vector. And this is actually enough to get a fermentation matrix. So then we have a consistency argument. So the point of this argument is to show that the commitment that we had, this is actually used to terminate the cyber base. And as I mentioned before, this main idea comes from Grotten-Lew paper, which was the original CRS-based Java paper. But the unfortunate thing is that if you use the same polynomial commitment scheme that we had before, then the suddenness will not quite work out. And so we have a similar commitment scheme. But with a different polynomial we had that we have here. And essentially these have to be linearly dependent to the previous polynomials and there are a few other requirements. And OK, then we again commit to each row. And then we use a similar idea as in Grotten-Lew paper to actually, so basically we have to, in this argument alone, we make the assumption that, OK, suppose that these A hat polynomials or these A hat commitments are to have permutation matrix. And then from that it follows that, OK, this shuffling was done correctly. But finally, we have now these two parts. So first, for each row we have two commitments. For first commitment, we know that this contains permutation matrix. For the second commitment, we know that, OK, if all the commitments together form a permutation matrix, then this was actually used for shuffling. But now we should kind of connect those two. And so here we can nicely use the Kiltzwe result, which is a quasi-adaptive non-directive zero knowledge. The quasi-adaptive means that there's dependency between the CRS and the language. And yeah, so the result is it actually allows you to prove that the rule basically for solve linear space, that's something in a sublinear state. So in our case, this matrix M that we have in here, it would be actually those commitment polynomials together, these raw values. OK, so completeness and zero knowledge in this case follows easily from the Kiltzwe result. So this Kiltzwe is summed under a certain kernel MDH assumption. Unfortunately, the thing is that we also need knowledge and soundness here. So basically, I don't want to go too much into detail here, but this consistency argument achieves a notion called comfortable soundness. And you get rid of this notion for the whole shuffling argument, then we need knowledge and soundness in the same message argument. And here we also will use a generic binary group model. OK. And finally, a little bit about our implementation. So we use for our implementation Lipsnack library. This is also used to implement the synopsis in the Zcash cryptocurrency. It's a C++ implementation. And you see quite practical efficiency number. So in this first column, we see that for 100,000 cipher decks, the prover time is around one minute. And we can also separate both proving and verifying into two phases. So we can have an offline phase, which you can basically do before the voting starts. And then you can have an online phase, which is when the actual votes come in. So then what we see, that this online phase takes only 10 seconds. And for verifier, so time is about one minute and 30 seconds. And the online time is around one minute. And this was all done on my computer page. So in real life voting, you would probably not write on my computer, but I'm quite proud of the server. And this 3,300,000 is interesting, because that's about as many people you have voting in Estonian elections. And if you are interested in checking the implementation out, that's a thing. And this is actually all from me. Thank you. Can you say something about the computational complex for the proven verifier? So first of all, everything is linear, but I guess that you know. So on this very beginning, I had some table. So we basically used some units, which is like we counted the number of explanations and bearings, and gave some rough numbers to somehow compare it. Yeah, so you can kind of see the relative speech here, but I actually don't have, I think in the paper, we have actual numbers that you have this amount of bearings and that in many explanations and so on, but I don't remember them from the memory. OK, so you mentioned this as an alternative to different shuffle arguments. I was wondering what sort of your opinion in terms of security, so you were facing this in the generic group model, compared that to say, El Camaro shuffles and the oracle model or something like that. Which one would you choose? So that's a hard question.  But I mean, there are many things to consider. So one thing, for example, what I hear from practical people is that latency is actually a big problem in this field. Yeah, but I mean, this deficiency is why you can easily use it. So yeah, I mean, I think it's from the implementation, you can see that you get efficiency that is good enough to use in practice. So I mean, I think you could use this easier. Any questions? We don't seem so. Thank you very much.


It is now time for Oral Questions. I recognize the leader of His Majesty's loyal opposition. And good morning, Speaker. This question is for the Premier. The Members Integrity Act obliges MPPs to, quote, arrange their private affairs in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity of each member. Earlier this year, it was reported that developers and lobbyists were sent requests for donations to a stag and doe from people connected to the Premier and who previously worked for him. People who received these donation requests told Global News they felt brow-beaten into buying those tickets. Does the Premier believe such behavior promotes public confidence in his integrity? To reply, the government hosts later. I think the Premier has answered that question on that number of occasions, Mr. Speaker. But to tell you what the Premier does believe in and what, in fact, all progressive conservatives on both sides of the House believe in, Mr. Speaker. And that is making sure that this current generation of Ontarians who are working hard to build a bigger, better, stronger Ontario have all of the same advantages that the previous generations of Ontarians had, including most members who sit in this house, Mr. Speaker. That is, if they contribute, if they help us build a bigger, better, stronger Ontario, they will also have the dream of home ownership. It is the same dream that generations of individuals from across the world came to this country hoping for, Mr. Speaker. And that is what we're building. Every single day in this house, the leader of the opposition can stand in the way of that. We saw them do it over 15 years with their Liberal partners, and we will continue to remove every single one of the obstacles that they put in place that made Ontario one of the most difficult places to own a home, Mr. Speaker. We won't stand for that, and we'll make sure. Speaker, the Premier is very clearly offside with what real Ontarians are feeling and experiencing right now. And just yesterday, I was at an event a couple of days ago in York Centre, and somebody told me, you know, it feels like a return to that kind of old school, who you know, politics. The rules are very clear. A member or a Premier may not accept a gift connected to their duties. Does the Premier agree with this basic ethical principle? And the House Leader. Mr. Speaker, again, this government is singularly focused on improving the lives of the people of the province of Ontario. As I just said, for generations, one of the bargains that was made here in the province of Ontario was that if you came to Ontario to help us build a bigger, better, stronger province in the best country in the world, that there would be a home option available to you. That was what we built this province on. Now, for 15 years, the Liberals and the NDP put obstacle after obstacle after obstacle in the way of building new homes for the people of the province of Ontario. And what are we doing? This Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, this government, is removing every one of those obstacles because we know how important it is, not only for the young generation of this province, to be able to have the same dreams that all of us, that our parents and our grandparents had, and that is the dream of home ownership, Mr. Speaker. So the Leader of the Opposition can say anything she wants. She can continue to try and frustrate those dreams. She can continue to try and put obstacles in the way we will continue to remove every single one of those obstacles. And the final supplementary. Seems like a pretty straightforward question. I'm a little shocked that they couldn't answer that one. Speaker, public confidence in the integrity of NPPs and cabinet ministers and premiers is not just about avoiding actual conflict of interest, but also avoiding the appearance of conflict of interest, just like in every other sector. I mean, these are very simple rules, but clearly sub-in this House are having a hard time understanding them. So to make this even clearer, I'm going to table legislation later today to bring Ontario in line with the Federal Conflict of Interest Act. Does the Premier support a prohibition on gifts that a reasonable person might believe were given in order to influence an NPP or even a Premier? Come on out, Speaker. Again, Mr. Speaker, here's the NPP then. That could have stopped the destruction that was the former Liberal government when they held the balance of power. Did they vote in a non-corporate's motion to remove them when we were dealing with cash for access? No, they propped them up and kept them in power, Mr. Speaker, and continue to put obstacle after obstacle after obstacle in the way of people owning their first home, Mr. Speaker. Now, the NDP, over 150 years, the NDP in parties with them have governed this province once. Once, Mr. Speaker, in the last election, more than 833,000 people turned their back on the NDP, removed 10 of their members that put them on this side of the house and on that side of the house, this progressive conservative. When will the NDP learn, Mr. Speaker, that it doesn't matter how often you change the messenger, it's the message that the people of Ontario are interested in. They're interested in a strong, progressive conservative Ontario and all of the benefits that come with it. Order. Order. Order. Government side, come to order. We start the clock. The next question, leader of the opposition. Thank you, Speaker. This isn't just about maintaining trust in government, it's about accountability. And when it comes to the planned redevelopment of Ontario Place, the lack of accountability and transparency is glaring. The government's plan to hand over extremely valuable public lands on Toronto's waterfront to a private European developer to build a luxury spa and a giant parking lot are not going over very well. And now the Premier is making back of the napkin musings about moving the Ontario Science Centre to the location. Speaker, is this an attempt to distract from the real and growing opposition to the plan to turn Ontario Place into an elite spa? Yes. And to apply for the government, the Minister of Infrastructure. Very much, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the leader of the opposition, official opposition. Mr. Speaker, we have been fully transparent with the public in terms of what our intentions are for the site since 2019. They just don't like it. Mr. Speaker, we are leasing the lands. We have a tenant in place. We have a development application with the City of Toronto. We are proceeding with environmental assessment work that is underway. We have made tremendous progress on the site. But what's most important, Mr. Speaker, is the sentiment of the public. People drive by the site and think, what a waste that we let the site deteriorate to the point of it no longer being safe for people and pedestrians to be able to go there. We are bringing the site back to life. We will make sure it is there for everyone in Ontario to enjoy. It sure seems like they're making it up as they go along, right? And there is so much potential. There is so much potential to make Ontario place a truly vibrant public space again. And, Mr. Speaker, the Ontario Science Centre is a treasured public institution. It's one that sees thousands of visitors every year in a part of the city that really benefits from its presence. It employs hundreds of people, good union jobs, and is an anchor to Flemington Park and Thorncliffe Park. Some of Toronto's priority neighbourhoods, Speaker. To the Premier, has this government consulted with local communities about the plan to relocate the Science Centre, its attractions, and its jobs? Nope. Minister of Infrastructure. I will agree with the member opposite on one thing. The Science Centre is a public treasure, which is why our government, for the last number of years, has been looking at whether or not the option of relocation to preserve the Science Centre should take place. Now, the structure itself has deteriorated as well. As has Ontario Place.  I 100% think the public is behind us on this. Yeah, there we go. Speaker, the circumstances around this government's paving over, carve up of the green belt, and this continued lack of transparency by the Premier means that every land use decision by this government is tainted by suspicion. That's the fact. When the Premier muses about massive changes to provincial institutions with no evidence at all, not even pretending to have community involvement, it raises questions. So I have to ask, Speaker, to the Premier again, are any developers with ties to the Conservatives pushing to move the Ontario Science Centre? Mr. Dentner-Stokes. Mr. Speaker, perhaps I was not clear on my previous answer. The Science Centre has been in existence since 1979. Now, very little over the past number of years has been given to the Science Centre in order to rehabilitate it and keep it alive. It is falling apart. During COVID, in fact, we had to close a bridge to make sure that those attending the Science Centre could be safe and the workers could be safe. You said it yourself, Mr. Speaker. It is a treasure and we are doing everything we can to preserve it, such as looking for a new opportunity and new homes so that many children in the future could enjoy this wonderful treasure that we have. Question to the member for University of Rosedale. Thank you, Speaker. My question is to the Premier. This month, the government doubled down on expensive sprawl. Their forced municipalities to open thousands of more hectares of farmland to development. They've eliminated density requirements in new subdivisions and they've eliminated targets to build more housing in areas already zoned for development. My question is this. Why is this minister doubling down on sprawl when there are better ways to build more housing? Minister of municipal affairs and housing. Thanks, Speaker. This allows us to talk about how we have a plan and how our plan is working for Ontarians. The latest data shows that Ontario has seen an 11% increase in 2023 on new housing starts, up nearly 1,200 from last year. Rental starts, so far, Speaker, are double what they were at the same time last year, under jurisdiction for business, jobs, and newcomers. There are more active cranes right now, Speaker. In the city of Toronto, then there are in New York, Chicago, LA, Washington, DC, Seattle, for a grassland plan to build 1.5 million homes by 2031. And let's face it, Speaker. It already sounds like the opposition is looking for a reason to, for the fifth time, vote against more housing in our province. The supplementary question. The conservatives track record on making housing affordable is abysmal. Housing has never been more expensive to rent or buy, and that's your legacy. Across Ontario, homeowners are seeing their property taxes go up, and their services get cut. And these tax hikes are going to continue if this government continues to build sprawl, because sprawl is much more expensive for municipalities to service than building more homes in existing neighborhoods. My question is to the Premier. Why double down on sprawl when there are cheaper and more affordable ways to build the housing that we need? Great question. Minister and the full affairs of housing. Thanks, Speaker. We're always going to stand up to reduce the baseline cost of housing to make it cheaper and faster for affordable homes to be built. The opposition will always stand up for higher taxes and higher housing costs every single time. They have. But again, now we're hearing from the opposition. So here it is after our announcement for the bill 97. Now we're starting to hear some of the real NDP coming forward. So they're standing up against farmers having the opportunity to sever a lot for their son or daughter. That's where the NDP is moving. They're going to stand against hardworking farmers and giving those sons and daughters the opportunity to create larger. Or the opportunity to create housing for workers, something that our government believes is something that we need to move forward on. This is where the NDP are standing. They're standing against farmers. They're standing in favor of NIMBYism. Thank you very much. The next question, the member for Markham Unionville. Thank you, Speaker. My speaker is from the Minister of Education. Ontario's education system must prioritize teaching students the skill they need to succeed. The most fundamental of skills that students must learn are reading and writing. Without a comprehensive understanding of these two subjects, we know that students cannot progress with their learning in a meaningful way. The situation has been made all more serious as an outcome of disruption to in-person learning. This is why it is imperative to help our students gain or regain proficiency in these subjects so they are able to excel in their classrooms and in their lives. Speaker, can the Minister please explain how our government is supporting reading and writing skills development for our students? Great question. To apply for the government, the Minister of Education. Thank you very much. I want to thank the member from Markham Unionville and all members of their House for their support on the work we're doing to boost literacy in this province by lifting standards, by demanding better, and by investing in a plan that goes back to the basics so that our young people can master the skills that matter most, reading, writing, and math. Mr. Speaker, yesterday I was proud to join the parliamentary assistant to announce $180 million of investment to lift standards and outcomes for young people in the province to hire 1,000 frontline reading specialist educators and math educators to double the amount of math coaches. Mr. Speaker, specific to reading, supporting the Ontario Human Rights Commission's right to read report, we are introducing the largest reading screening in the country. Every child senior kindergarten to grade two will be screened this coming September. A new overhaul language curriculum that follows the science of reading, again recommended by Ontario Human Rights Commission, and more staff in place to help those kids that need support to get up to the provincial standard. This is supported by the Cadian Children's Literacy Foundation, by Dyslexia Canada, by Community Literacy of Ontario, and many others who are urging us to move forward. Thank you. The supplementary question. Thank you, Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that exciting response. It is encouraging to hear the actions of our government is taking with respect to reading and writing skills development. However, there are other fundamental skills our students need to learn. As many of the jobs of the future requires an understanding in math and other STEM subjects. Students' math scores are across North America and in Ontario have seen an alarming decline over the past several years. With a return to in-person learning this school year, our governments must have a comprehensive plan to help our students develop their math skills. Speaker, can the Minister please describe how our government is supporting math learning recovery as well as plan to continue improved mathematics understanding for Ontarian students? Minister of Education. It starts with a modern curriculum that mandates financial literacy and coding that's aligned with labour market. Mr. Speaker, it also starts with a plan, a $71 million investment to lift standards in mathematics to provide accountability with more frontline resources. We're going to double the amount of math coaches in our schools. We're going to ensure every school board in Ontario has one senior lead whose singular mission is improvement in their boards. We have a math improvement action team in the ministry for the first time. We're going to deploy to school boards who have historically been underperforming that lower 20% of schools that still need to do better. We now have the means, the investment and the resources to raise those standards. Mr. Speaker, in addition to mandating new curriculum that is relevant to young people like life and job skills, we're investing with over 381 new math educators in the classroom. This is all designed to lift standards for better schools, better outcomes and better jobs for the young people of this province. Next question, the member for Waterloo. Thank you, my questions to the Premier. Last week, this government overrode years of work and consultation by local representatives in Waterloo Region by unilaterally rewriting the local official plan, moving urban boundaries and violating the countryside line to open previously protected lands to development. The Premier went so far as to call this a no-brainer, insulting both the people who worked on the original plan and the people of Waterloo who know it is neither necessary nor wanted and there is zero consultation. My question to the Premier. Why does he think he's so smart than, why does he think he's smarter than the people of Waterloo Region and the people who serve in that community that he's dictating this plan to? Mr. Speaker, under the leadership of Premier Ford, our government has a plan to build 1.5 million homes by 2031. We're pleased to work with councils on their official plan and official plans as those in this chamber who served at the municipal level, just like our guests that are here for good roads, knows that official plans are the most important playbooks for development in their community. We want to ensure that all of the official plans that are before us reflect our government's policies. But don't take my word for it. Let's hear from Waterloo Region Chair Karen Redmond. The regional official plan is not a one and done, said Redmond. We always acknowledge that when you're looking at the kind of rapid growth that we're experiencing, we'd have to revisit the regional official plan over time. We know that we're going to grow. So we need to do it to ensure that it's well thought out of planning, that there are a variety of housing, that we have townhomes, that we have stacked townhomes, that we have rental accommodation for people who are going to come to our community. We agree with Chair Redmond, and that's exactly how we move forward. Let's hear from the supplementary question. Mr. Will know that Waterloo Region relies mostly on an aquifer for drinking water, yet no analysis has been done to determine the threshold for servicing water or wetway systems. This government has gutted the Grand River Conservation Authority, allowing development on wetlands. This government has approved a property in this plan called Big Springs for development that the region has opposed for decades due to hydrological sensitivity. This approval runs counter to groundwater sources protection. It's almost like you've forgotten all about Walkerton. Source water protection is key to our health, is key to our economy and viability. And can this minister then, if he's so proud of this plan, produce the hydrological studies that will reassure our citizens, or are you just so willing to gamble the health and well-being and economy of the people of Waterloo Region? I want to table words from Kitchener Mayor Barry Verbanek today. His quote, I think the main parts of the regional official plan have been adopted, and that includes things like protecting the countryside line, things like protecting things like the major transit areas in the city of Kitchener. It also recognizes that there were some areas that we felt, for example, in Southwest Kitchener, that those lands should be, in fact, included. I think the decision of the minister recognizes there are lots of strong arguments about why those lands needed to be included. We're going to continue to stand with Mayor Verbanek and Chair Redmond as we move forward to build 1.5 million ohms by 2031. Next question, member for Renfrew, Nipissing Pembroke. Thank you. My question is for the Minister of Energy. Since our government was first elected in 2018, we have been laser focused on making life more affordable for all Ontarians. Under the previous Liberal government, energy costs skyrocketed, forcing individuals and families to make difficult financial decisions. That is why it is essential that our government address energy costs by placing a strong emphasis on choice for consumers and providing all Ontarians with options to reduce their energy expenses. Our government must continue to respect the people of Ontario by implementing affordable energy policies. I understand that last week, our government announced a new program that will give families and small businesses more ways to save on their energy bills. Speaker, can the minister please explain how this new electricity price plan will help Ontarians going forward? Minister of Energy. Very much, Mr. Speaker. And thanks to the member from Renfrew, Nipissing Pembroke. I appreciate it, Speaker. He is quite correct. We've been hard at work putting families back in charge of their energy bills since we formed the government back in 2018. We started by introducing customer choice on electricity plans, allowing Ontarians to choose a price plan that makes sense for them, either a time of use or tiered rate, Mr. Speaker. We also introduced the green button program, which is being rolled out right across Ontario as we speak. Mr. Speaker will be in full implementation in November. And now we've taken the next step. Last week down at Toronto Hydro, I had the opportunity to inform the public about our ultra-low overnight electricity rate, which starting on May 1st, customers in the member's own riding in Renfrew and in Toronto and London and Centre Wellington and with Saga. I'm sure it was a great weekend at the beach up there, Mr. Speaker. They can opt in on this new plan, the ultra low overnight rate that's going to be available province-wide in the coming months. That's fantastic. The supplementary question. Thank you, Speaker, and thank you to the minister for that response. It is encouraging news to hear that our government has introduced yet another way for consumers to keep costs down, save money, and take control of their energy bills. I know that my constituents, along with people all across Ontario, are looking for financial relief on their electricity bills. And we'll want to know if this new price program will work best for them. As with any new initiative, it is necessary that our government provides information to the people of Ontario about how to opt into this program and how this will help them to save money on their electricity bills. Speaker, can the minister please explain the benefits that this program will bring to the consumers and to Ontario's energy system? Mr. Benerjee. Thanks again to the great member. This new rate plan is going to help families. It's going to help small businesses who use more electricity during the overnight period. With an ultra-low off-peak rate of 2.4 cents a kilowatt hour, shift workers or those who heat their homes using electricity, or people charging an electric vehicle. And we know there's going to be more of them as we continue to build up to 400,000 here by the end of the decade in Ontario. They'll be able to save up to $90 a year on their bills using this rate. And unlike the former Liberal government, Mr. Speaker, which sold clean nighttime power to neighboring jurisdictions, sometimes and many times at a loss, Mr. Speaker, our government's coming up with innovative ways to use that power and shift demand in the province in the overnight period, which will make our grid more efficient. Saving our electricity grid up to $5.7 million, which at the end of the day, Mr. Speaker, isn't just going to save those folks who adopt the ultra-low overnight rate. It's going to save every electricity customer in the province money on their bills, Mr. Speaker. Wow. Next question, the member for Kiwetanon. Miigwech, Speaker, my question is to the Premier. In the North, we have a crisis of people without homes in Kenora and across Northwestern Ontario. Without 24-7 support, there will be more needless deaths of First Nations people living outside. What is this government doing to give municipalities and advocates the resources they need to help people without homes? Minister of Indigenous Affairs. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I want to thank the Honourable Member for his question. In fact, in this last budget under the leadership of our Premier, we recognize the urgent need for adequate housing to meet the basic needs of many First Nations who are moving from their communities into towns and cities like Kenora, like Dryden, and like Sulukko. That's why we invested significant resources, Mr. Speaker, to ensure that the Homeless Prevention Program moving forward provides those additional housing. This is sensitive, Mr. Speaker, to the nuances of housing requirements for Indigenous peoples displaced from their home communities and are at risk of homelessness and require wraparound services from community support organizations. It's a fully integrated model, Mr. Speaker, and we're endeavoring to address those matters. Thank you very much. The supplementary question. When we move off the North or First Nations communities reserves is a marker of how colonialism works to get people off our traditional territories. And homelessness, Mr. Speaker, is a marker of a bigger issue. And I'm talking about addictions. I know there is a need for healing. There is a need for treatment in the North that is not being met. Again, we have to send out people to urban centers to get treatment. Speaker, today, First Nations people are dying. What is this government doing to address the addiction crisis? Associate Minister of Mental Health and Addictions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the member opposite for that question. It's a very important question. And our government is taking the issue very, very seriously in terms of the investments that are being made in Northern communities and remote communities and, of course, in Indigenous communities. There is no exception. We are following through and making the investments. In October of 2021, we announced $36 million for community-led Indigenous mental health and addiction service organizations, including supports for students' victim services and Indigenous-driven anti-opioid strategy. Our addiction recovery fund was designed to boost capacity in communities of the greatest need. 400 beds, 7,000 spaces, 56% of them in Northern and Indigenous communities. In addition to $7 million for land-based care, because we know that culturally safe services need to be delivered to the people where and where they are. Thank you. Next question, the member for Don Valley West. Thank you, Speaker. The housing crisis is making life unaffordable in Ontario and driving young workers out of the province. This government claims to understand the issue, but their actions say otherwise. They commissioned an expert task force to address the problem, yet they've ignored the experts in one of their most important recommendations, to build density in our towns and cities not to expand their boundaries outward. And yet the province last week ordered cities to do just that and destroy neighboring farmland. This attack on farmers will reduce the supply of local food, raising food prices, and create more sprawl which undermines our carbon reduction goals. Farmers are against this decision, cities and regions are against it, and the government's own experts are against it. My question to the Premier, who is telling the Premier that he should pave over our farmland and are they the same people who will benefit from this decision? APPLAUSE Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. It's pretty rich coming from the Liberals who basically did nothing on housing for 15 years to now try to be the champion for farmers, right? Almost every budget that I sat in opposition on, the word agriculture never appeared in a liberal budget. Never. So now we have a policy that actually recognises that a farm can now have the opportunity to sever a lot for a son or daughter. A farm that if they decided that they wanted to provide housing, quality housing for workers on the site, they could sever a lot. So now we know again where the Liberals are at, just like they were at for 15 years when they were in government, they stand against agriculture, they stand against farmers, and they stand against housing in rural areas. APPLAUSE Speaker, this government says they represent farmers and the minister across the road seems to feel that as well. In fact, the Premier said he loves our farmers and told them in 2018 that help is on the way, but farmers are not feeling the love as the Premier paves over more and more of their farmland. We know this because the great riding of Haldeman Norfolk in the heart of farm country elected an independent over a pro-developer candidate supported by this government. The member for Haldeman Norfolk introduced a bill to protect our farmland from development, and it was supported by the Ontario Federation of Agriculture and all MPPs, except those on the government side. This government is being very clear. They want to pave over farmland. Speaker, my question to the Premier. Can the Premier please explain how paving over their farmland helps farmers? I'd come to order to reply Minister of Agriculture Food and Rural Affairs. I would attach because for the last number of weeks we've been making historic announcements. We're investing over $2 billion in Ontario's agri-food industry from the laneway through to processing, and farmers are buoyed, they're energized, they know they have a government in Premier Ford and all of us in caucus that actually understand the business of producing food. For instance, we have introduced a soil health study that RBC noted as a hidden gem in the budget. It's $9.5 million that is going to look at the health apps show this past weekend, and people are applauding the fact that we actually get it and are demonstrating that we are moving on priorities that truly matter to farmers that are working so hard to produce good quality food in Ontario. Thank you very much. Order. Restart the clock. The next question, Member for Ajax. My question is for the Attorney General. I've heard from many of my constituents both tenants and landlord concerning the delays they're experiencing when they engage with the landlord tenant board. There are many reports of the long delays when it comes to hearings to resolve tenants and disputes causing uncertainty and confusion to both tenants and landlords. The consensus is that the timeframes are way too long. The case loads are too heavy and service standards needs to be strengthened. As a government, we must put forward the resolutions that will make wait time shorter and results much faster for those involved. Speaker, can the Attorney General please explain how our government has taken action to address and resolve disputes at the landlord tenant board? Great question. Speaker, and I appreciate the question from the Member for Ajax. It's no secret that our government has been making historical progress when it comes to solving the housing crisis right here in Ontario. Our efforts are more than just building homes. That's why I was really proud to stand with my colleague, Minister Clark in London earlier this month to announce that we're doubling the number of adjudicators. The delays around the landlord tenant board have been frustrating for people across this province both for landlords and for tenants. But it's been our government that has been the ones getting it done when it comes to improving services here in Ontario and that includes the landlord tenant board and by doubling the number of adjudicators Mr. Speaker, more Ontarians will have their cases heard in an efficient manner. And the supplementary question. Thank you Speaker and thank you to the Attorney General for that response. I know that the landlord tenant board capacities is holding more hearings and seeing more improvements. Increasing the number of adjudicators is a positive step towards speeding up decisions. The landlord tenant board is part of our province tribunal system that plays an important role in providing accessible resolution to thousands of Ontarians. It is essential that our government continues to make investments that will modernize services so that people of our province and our tribunal Speaker, can the Attorney General please explain further how our government is making investments to improve access. The Attorney General She's correct we've been making necessary investments at the landlord tenant board over time and as I mentioned previously we're doubling the number of full-time adjudicators by adding 40 full-time members plus additional support staff for a total of six and a half million dollars of our historic housing strategy. With this announcement the board will have 80 full-time adjudicators and to help Ontarians appear before them we're also making the processes easier and that's why in this budget an investment of over 24 million dollars over three years was made of course the NDP voted against it and well we made an investment of 6 million for additional recruitment at the landlord tenant board and the NDP voted against that. These investments follow a 28 and a half million funding arrangement under the justice accelerated strategy to improve processes in the digital case management process. Mr. Speaker the NDP voted against that. Now unfortunately they keep saying no but fortunately we keep passing it and we keep moving forward Mr. Speaker so I look forward to continuously improving the process and making the wait time shorter and making the process more efficient. Thank you Mr. Speaker. Thank you Mr. Speaker. Thank you Mr. Speaker. For the premium the natural gas price in northern Ontario is unbearable. Residents have no surplus in their budget. Businesses and non nonprofits have face difficulties. We are using the north is much higher than because of our longer winters than in the south. The government does not reflect our needs it's completely unjust. The greenhouse someone who past 2080 been after using new equipment for the premier. What is your government help people in the north with their electricity and organizations with the costs and energy Thank you for the question it's difficult to understand the question by the member because Mr. Speaker the member opposite is saying he wants more affordable energy for people in the north that's exactly what we've been providing since we took government back in 28 Mr. Speaker but the member opposite and his party was all about supporting the Liberals Green Energy Act when they were in power Mr. Speaker during the Green Energy Act we saw hydro bills rising by 10-12% each year Mr. Speaker in 2018 that came to an end we ordered the madness Mr. Speaker but you know what the NDP wanted to do while the Liberals were doing that they wanted them to go faster Mr. Speaker we saw more over market renewable contracts on the grid Mr. Speaker since we've come into power we flattened those increases in the electricity sector and I'll have more to say about natural gas in my supplementary the supplementary question the member for him I'm just going to go back to the premier because the words that I would have to say to that are terribly unparliamentary seniors unfixed incomes are struggling the most when it comes to the cost of utilities and natural gas the premier from Hamilton Mountain shared with me that her utility bills are so high she had to wear coats and use two to three blankets overnight just to be able to keep warm in her own home Speaker this is absolutely disgraceful maybe the member from Niagara West Glenbrook doesn't have these problems in Niagara West I'm not quite sure but the government needs to be ashamed I'm not sure any of these members across the aisle were using coats I think it's in their homes to stay warm can the premier explain why seniors like my constituent are supposed to survive this affordability crisis when they are being priced out of basic necessities a senior will come to order to reply the minister of energy Mr. Speaker it's impossible to take this member seriously when she talks about affordability because it was this party in 2018 that ended the liberals cap and trade and fought the carbon tax all the way to the supreme court that was the premier that led that charge Mr. Speaker the NDP won a bigger carbon tax the premier and our minister of energy at the time warned the people of Ontario that the carbon tax wasn't going to just drive up the cost of utilities higher it was going to drive up the cost of everything including groceries in our grocery stores Mr. Speaker and you know what that is exactly what has happened life in Ontario is more unaffordable today because of the federal carbon tax which that member and her party supports stand with us and fight the member for Ottawa south come to order the member for Waterloo come to order the member for Nippeen come to order the member for Ottawa south come to order the member for Kitchener Conestoga come to order start the clock the member for Peterborough Corridor next question this morning I have a question for the minister of labour, immigration, training and skill development the important work that our minors do is vital to building a strong Ontario not just in the mining industry but other industries as well as just one example mineral resources are needed for our manufacturing sector and making electric vehicles and over the next decade critical minerals will be needed in many more areas for our expanding economic markets workplace safety in this sector is also a condition for success in developing the critical minerals industry for the future of our province minors have been the back point of Ontario's economy for generations and we owe it to them and our families to do more to keep them safe Speaker can the minister please explain what our government is doing to protect the minors of Ontario reply the minister of labour immigration training and skills development Speaker and thank you to the member for Peterborough Corridor for that important question Speaker on Monday of last week I had the pleasure to join my good friend the minister of mines in Sudbury with the president of the United Steel Workers Union Local 6500 to announce new measures that the government is taking to keep Ontario's more than 29,000 minors safe lowering exposure limits to diesel exhaust is something that minors and their unions have been calling for four years and we're listening working closely with the United Steel Workers we have acted quickly on their concerns concerns the previous Liberal government left unanswered our government under the leadership of our premier is proposing new regulations that bring Ontario's exposure limits to oil and gas in Canada down to the most protective in all of North America Speaker we know there's more work to be done and working together with our labour partners and employers we will keep the men and women in Ontario's minors safe Thank you Mr. Speaker I'd like to thank the minister for that response but I'm going to pivot a little bit so my supplementary question is to the minister of mines as the minister is well aware of the extensive career in the mining industry there are many occupational risks that workers face every time they start to shift underground this announcement by the minister of labour immigration training and skill development is another milestone for workplace safety for minors their province can be proud of however there's always more work to be done when it comes to ensuring workplace safety in this sector Speaker can the minister of mines please describe the importance of this announcement in the context that it is possible to strengthen Ontario's critical mineral supply chain That's a good question Reply the minister of mine Thank you for the member of the question and the minister for a great announcement last week Speaker I come from a very proud mining family that's been in the industry for over 100 years I lived and worked in the communities the mining communities safety continues to be our top priority but we can always do better that's why this announcement is so important because we are improving workplace safety for minors Speaker as our government works to build more mines to supply the EV revolution we need the world's best and brightest to join our industry this announcement sends a strong message that you can find safe rewarding careers in Ontario's mining industry I am proud to be a part of a government that puts people first and sets them up for exciting jobs that will make them part of a growing supply chain for electric vehicles in this province Next question Thank you Mr. Speaker for the premier It has been three long years since this government introduced bill 124 Does the premier think freezing the wages of healthcare workers during a pandemic helped with the recruitment helped with the retention in hindsight does the premier think it was a good idea President of the Treasury Board Thank you very much Mr. Speaker this government has launched the largest healthcare recruitment strategy in the history of this province and the members opposite on the opposition side have voted against that in fact this year alone Mr. Speaker over 12,000 nurses were registered that is the largest number of registered nurses in the history of this province we put over $342 million in last year's fall economic statement to support the upskilling of certain nurses and healthcare professionals across this province and every single time that we have put forward measures investments billions of dollars in recruitment the members opposite have voted against it every single time Thank you Speaker although the premier does not think that our healthcare heroes deserve a raise it turns out that both employers and employees agree on retroactive pay and are for work done during the pandemic with nurses and paramedics we have awarded back pay as we speak the time has come for this premier to start working for workers to treat our healthcare workers as heroes will the premier withdraw his appeal of bill 124 Good bye for the government the premier Thank you Mr. Speaker I'll tell you what we did for the healthcare workers we gave the nurses a $5,000 bonus which was equivalent to a 7.6% increase the highest in the entire country and guess what the NDP and the Liberals voted against it Mr. Speaker we gave the PSW the largest increase they've ever seen at $3 per hour but guess what Mr. Speaker the NDP and Liberals voted against it we made sure we paid for the tuition for the nurses all expenses if they worked in a rural community the NDP voted against it we have the highest minimum wage in the entire country Mr. Speaker the NDP and Liberals voted against it we're making sure we put money back into people's pockets 60,000 new nurses have been registered since we took office as a president of the treasury said 12,000 new nurses came on the job that is a record we have 30,000 in the queue at the colleges and universities that's what we're doing for our frontline workers Order Orderaround Remember for Waterloo come to Order the Minister of Labor come to Order the next question start the clock Member for Renfrough Nipasing Pembroke Thank you for my question for the minister of development Our province like the rest of the world experience the impacts of global economic uncertainty high interest rates and inflation this current economic climate barriers and burdens that are disproportionately affecting communities in remote, rural and northern regions more profoundly. These barriers are hindering opportunities for job creation, education and business development in the north. Because the previous Liberal government ignored the needs of Northern Ontario, it is vitally important that our government takes action to keep the north competitive and improve the quality of life for all northerners. Speaker, can the Minister please explain how our government is supporting opportunities and prosperity in the north? Minister of Northern Development. Thank you Mr. Speaker. There's a number of ways and under the leadership of this Premier we've made it very clear that we're building Ontario and that means building Northern Ontario. Maybe I'll start Mr. Speaker with an ode to Good Roads Conference this week and mention that we started out with a couple of key announcements from the Manitoba border. Niewit Wendemek limited highway twinning Mr. Speaker not only has it been extended but we work cooperatively with an indigenous owned and operated business who play a substantial in fact a majority role in the construction of that twinned highway as well. We were in Dryden to announce the Grand Trunk Avenue which is also the Trans-Canada highway leads right into Dryden under major reconstruction and planning and design resources for Fort Francis 3rd Street West which is also Trans-Canada. Highways are important connections Mr. Speaker for our vast region but they get goods and people across Northern Ontario and we're committed to making sure that Northern Ontario roads are safe and efficient. Thank you Mr. Speaker. And the supplementary question. Thank you Speaker and thank you to the Minister for that response. It is encouraging news that our government is making meaningful investments to support economic development and growth in the North. We know that the strength of Ontario's economy is built on the knowledge, skills and expertise of our workers. Education is the key in preparing workers to take on the jobs of the future especially in view of increasing labour shortages and the urgent need to fill job vacancies across many sectors. Our government must continue to do all that we can to work with our Northern partners to foster innovation in order to build strong and prosperous businesses and communities. Speaker can the Minister please expand on how our government is investing in the North and creating opportunities for future generations. Minister of Northern Development. Just a great opportunity Mr. Speaker in the week prior to last and last week to travel from Sudbury to Pecanjicum and spend some time in Canora and Dryden Mr. Speaker making the kinds of investments that transform the lives of people in our Northern communities. Whether we're upgrading the facilities at the Dryden Public Library Mr. Speaker or investing in a recreational facilitator program in Vermillion Bay Mr. Speaker or investing in a youth wellness hub in Pecanjicum First Nations and seeing for the first time in more than 30 years of being a part of that community Mr. Speaker a sawmill. These are exciting opportunities that range from skills development to quality of life in our small Northern towns and cities Mr. Speaker. We're looking forward to a dynamic vibrant Northern Ontario Mr. Speaker which can join Southern Ontario in one of the most exciting economic periods in its history. Northern Ontario Mr. Speaker is ready. My question this morning is to the Premier of Ontario as reported in the Hamilton spectator 2100 kids are waiting for surgery at McMaster's Children's Hospital. It's the worst weight in the province for pediatric surgery. No child should have to live in pain pain that is entirely preventable.  McMaster is doing everything they can and the federal government has stepped in to help as well. When will your government step up and do your part to help these children? Good job. Deputy Premier and Minister of Health. You're speaking of a member opposite is absolutely right McMaster is doing incredible work and in fact it is because of the work and innovation that's happening there that we were able to in the fall add an additional six bed ICU capacity because we know that parents children should not have to wait for these needed surgeries. It speaks to the investments that we continue to make and working with those partners. Recently last month I was at the Ron Joyce Centre and seeing the incredible work that they are able to do when they get a government and a partner just speaks to how we can improve the system if we work together and that's exactly what we're doing with McMaster. Thank you. Premier things aren't getting better under your government they're getting worse and this is an emergency all across Ontario there's 12,000 Ontario children waiting for surgery right now. Bruce Squires the president of McMaster's Children's Hospital shared his deep concern that 1,400 children have already missed optimal window for surgery and they now risk life altering consequences life long consequences because they're missing surgeries. Our children urgently need your help Premier. Your government has fixed the power you can fix this today Premier will you help these children. Minister of Health. Perhaps the member opposite didn't hear me clearly we have been making investments we have been working in particular with our Children's Hospital partnerships in fact we've made permanent investments increasing the number of critical beds in Children's Hospital in Eastern Ontario, Master Children's Hospital of course in Hamilton London health sciences the hospitals for sick children and of course Kingston health sciences we've made those investments permanent because as we saw the need we increase and we ensure that those capacities are improving it it continues to amaze me that the member opposite is not actually encouraging and working and talking to the hospitals to CEOs to see the kind of innovation that is happening in their community hospitals because it truly is world renowned and working. Thank you. The next question the member for Durham. Thank you Mr. Speaker. My question Mr. Speaker is for the Associate Minister of Transportation. Mr. Speaker the people in my great riding of Durham and across the GTHA have public transit as their primary form of transportation but many riders within Durham and across the GTHA using a host of different agencies can get confused by the various fare systems and payment methods under different municipal transit services. My constituents have been asking for simpler ways to pay the fare especially first time transit users who may not always carry cash. Mr. Speaker therefore can the Minister please share with this house how our government is making it easier and more convenient to take transit in my riding and across the greater Toronto Hamilton area. And to respond the Associate Minister of Transportation. Well thank you Speaker and the members right it should be easier to tap and get down to watch the Leafs win the cup this year. That's what we're doing through last summer and this winter we introduced credit card tap on the Presto across go and the 905 and Speaker I'm glad to say that across participating agencies riders have now tapped with their credit card one million times. Doesn't stop there those Speaker Metrolinx is now also working to implement debit card tap very soon in the 905 and across the go network and what's more Speaker Metrolinx on behalf of our government has done great work with the TTC to update Presto devices so both credit card and debit tap payment features can be brought to the hard working people of the six later this year. Speaker it's not enough just to build record transit which we're doing under the leadership of this response we're bringing game changing initiatives making it easier for connecting to the grid and getting down to watch our boys in blue. Mr. Speaker thank you to the Associate Minister for his response it is great to see our government provide transit riders with more choices that make it easier for them to travel. Mr. Speaker Ontarians have seen a rise in their cost of living and this is due to global inflation and economic instability of course for many of them transit fares add to the financial burden they're already bearing. Our government must continue to remove barriers to ridership and make life more affordable for the hard working individuals and families in my riding of Durham and across Ontario. Mr. Speaker therefore can the Associate Minister explain how our government is offering Ontarians cost effective ways to travel particularly on public transit. The Associate Minister of Transportation. Speaker the member is absolutely right as we get back to normal times and navigate economic uncertainty we have to make sure that we are putting money back into people's pockets that accrues our transit riders. In contrast to the previous Liberal government with its transit hikes over six straight years when they were in power Metrolinx under our government has not increased transit fares for the past four years. What's more Speaker our Go Affordability Pilot provided a 50% reimbursement for applicable Go riders in Peel region. We're also delivering for the hard working youth and students of this province because no matter where you're enrolled or if you're between the ages of 13 and 19 we nearly doubled the youth and post-secondary discount to 40% off the standard fare on Go and Up Express. Speaker let's not forget we eliminated double fares for riders connecting to Go Transit and Major 905 Transit Agency saving up to $1800 a year making it more affordable to get down and watch our Jays in action this summer wherever you need to go. Next question the member for London Morris Center. Thank you Speaker my question is to the Premier. In the middle of the night inside a local shelter Olivia's makeshift tent went up in flames. The shelter beds inside weren't available because provincial funding had run out. Olivia suffered severe burns nearly half of her body she's now fighting for her life. I want to send strength to Olivia's parents Sean and Stephanie as well as her friends and the service providers who knew her so well. The City of London has doubled the number of unhoused people compared to two years ago. Double. 1,868 lives hanging in the balance and the provinces is ignoring it. Will this government do the right thing invest in affordable and supportive housing, wrap around supports, rent expand rent supplement programs and fund municipalities properly to ensure that shelters don't have to close when the need is so high. The Minister of Missile Affairs and Housing. I'm not sure where their question is coming from. We made a historic investment under the leadership of Premier Ford and Minister Beth and Falvey. 202 million additional for the homeless prevention program. Members were in their writings last week for a break week and some of the announcements that have come out of our municipal partners have been amazing. Now Speaker with this extra 202 million dollars our homelessness prevention program now provides funding of almost $700 million to provide service managers like the one that the member opposite just talked about additional funds to keep shelters open, to build capacity. So you know definitely we'll be reaching out on what the City of London will be doing with the extra dollars that the government just gave them and that the member opposite voted against. That concludes our question period.