My life in Trinity Spadina

My family moved into our community when I was nine years old.  Like many Italians, my father worked in construction while my mother stayed at home, and politics was never discussed at the dinner table.

Even after I had achieved a BA in English, French and Philosophy, I was not attracted to politics.  After graduating from U of T, I went on to become a teacher of English and French. 

It wasn’t until my first child was born, that I began to care about politics.  I understood that legislation other people were creating would directly affect the future of my children.  I also understood how it affected my father who worked long hours, was paid very little and had no benefits.

It was at this time that I decided to make a career change.

In 1982 I was elected as a Trustee for our community, where I served until 1990.  During this time I also volunteered as a Vice-President of the National Congress of Italian Canadians (Toronto), a Toronto Public Library Board trustee and as the Chair of the Multilingual Literacy Centre.

In 1990 I was elected as a Member of Provincial Parliament for the riding of Trinity-Spadina in Toronto, where I served as the Minister of Culture.  In this role, I provided the largest funding increase to artists through the Ontario Arts Council and increased government support to the film and publishing industries. 

I have always held a passion for culture and languages and am fluent in English, Italian and French and am conversant in Portuguese and Spanish.

I have continued to be supported by our com

munity and was re-elected in 1995, 1999, 2003 and 2007.

I feel a great deal of passion for the work I do and for the community I represent.  I always welcome new insights and ideas – regardless of whether they fall under my critic portfolios.  I can be a testament to the fact that it’s never too late to get involved in politics.  If you have any ideas to strengthen our community or the province of Ontario, I would be happy to work with you.

My life in the Legislature

I currently sit in the Ontario Legislature as an opposition member.  In this role, I hold critic portfolios, or areas of special interest.

Critic portfolios are designed to mirror the portfolios of government Ministers.  This enables my office to design focused legislation and to thoroughly monitor government legislation that Ministers introduce.

The members of my party have different critic portfolios so that together we can cover the full expanse of what the government is doing.  While I don’t introduce environmental legislation, I strongly support the legislation that our environmental critic is doing and so on. 

My critic portfolios are:

• Education (elementary and secondary)
• Colleges, Training and Universities
• GTA Issues
• Condominiums