P.E.I. legislature's fall sitting comes to a close after 14 days of debate

After just three and a half weeks, the fall sitting of the P.E.I. Legislative Assembly has come to a close.

Lieutenant Governor Antoinette Perry arrived at the Coles Building in Charlottetown late Wednesday to give royal assent to more than 30 bills and wrap up the proceedings. The next scheduled day of sitting is Feb. 27, 2024.

Over the course of the 14 days of business, the biggest financial item on the agenda was the capital budget — which saw $368.8 million budgeted to buy, expand or maintain provincial assets like roads, hospitals, schools, equipment and much more.

That $368.9 million total is 20 per cent more than last year's estimate.

Other than the capital budget, the primary point of debate throughout the fall sitting was overwhelmingly the Community Outreach Centre in Charlottetown and various health care issues from across the province.

Those two topics consumed the bulk of question period over the three weeks, in tandem with the ongoing housing crisis and lack of emergency shelters on P.E.I.

The days of determined collaboration in the legislature are in the past, with Progressive Conservatives fresh from a major victory in the April election commanding all the power.

But that doesn't mean opposition parties aren't making marginal gains. They are just having to give up more ground than they did before the election, when opposition parties made up nearly half of the legislature and were more likely to find common ground with the governing party.

Both the Liberals and the Greens put forward paid sick days bills this fall, and the Liberal version was approved with some heavy amendments from the PCs. Both Karla Bernard, the interim Green leader, and interim Liberal leader Perry said they didn't get what they wanted but they were satisfied that Island workers would get something instead of nothing.

The King government passed several related pieces of legislation around guardian and trusteeship on P.E.I. as well as measures on child protection and the Mental Health Act, which introduced community treatment orders to the province.

A community treatment order allows a patient who might otherwise become an involuntary patient in a psychiatric facility to work with a psychiatrist and mental health team outside of a hospital setting. It didn't come without objections from opposition MLAs, though. 

The Greens felt the rules were too stiff, and wanted to make it easier for a psychiatrist to use a community treatment order to compel a patient to receive treatment against their will.

During the vote on this bill, members of a family in the gallery stood up and cried as the bill passed third reading, after having waged a social media campaign about a relative who could have qualified for an order if the Greens' arguments had prevailed.  

The health minister has said the government is willing to look at changes in the future, however.