When George Gershwin penned the lyrics "summertime, and the livin' is easy," he was definitely not writing about the upcoming schedule of Dufferin- Caledon MPP Sylvia Jones.

The Progressive Conservative Community and Social Services critic has just completed a tour across the province as a member of the Select Committee on Mental Health and Addictions, as well as launching a petition drive against the McGuinty government's proposed Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) and campaigning for the removal of Health and Long Term Care Minister David Caplan over the e-Health Ontario scandal.

The all-party select committee is focussing on the mental health issues of children, the increase of suicide among young people, the mental health and addiction problems facing the homeless, the delivery of programs across the province, access to services among aboriginal communities, and the needs of those in long-term care facilities.

"We've been working since March listening to experts in the field," said Ms. Jones. "One of things we're learning is there's a huge discrepancy across Ontario about the type and amount of mental health services available."

The select committee has been struck specifically to investigate mental health issues, she says, and has been given some timelines to offer up solutions. The committee will report back to the legislature, not just a particular ministry.

This week, the committee will visit Windsor, St. Thomas, Hamilton and Kingston.

"We were talking to a former health minister and he mentioned that select committees generally bring forth recommendations that actually get implemented," she said. "There's much less party affiliation. It's much more about seeking solutions."

As far as the e-health issue is concerned, Ms. Jones is much more to the point. David Caplan "should be fired. Is there anything else that should be done?

"I'm very angry about this whole e-health issue. He's pinning it all on the e-health board and he's taking no responsibility for the fact that the board is under his (authority)."

Premier Dalton McGuinty did shuffle his cabinet this week, but Mr. Caplan kept his health portfolio.

Sarah Kramer, the CEO of eHealth Ontario who was fired two weeks ago, was given $317,000 in severance, in addition to the $114,000 bonus she had collected five months into her job.

Despite the outcry that the e-health scandal is an example of bureaucracy run amuck, Ms. Jones is confident the Canada's commitment to a universal health care system will remain strong. She also feels the e-health concept is a good one.

"I think that electronic health records will come. I don't believe they will come in with David Caplan as the minister.

"Electronic health records will become part of the Ontario health system because we need them to. Patients need to have the confidence to know that when they go to their specialist, their records will come back in a timely and accurate way to their general practitioner, and viceversa."

As for the HST petition being circulated via her website and her constituency office, she says the Liberals should be more accountable as to their true motives.

"If (McGuinty) is bringing in the harmonized sales tax to collect more tax, than he should have been up front and honest about that," says Ms. Jones. "He said it was all about making life easier and nothing like: 'By the way, we get more money into our coffers.'"

The HST, she says, will even bring the province more revenue than when the combined GST and Ontario PST totalled 15 per cent.

"The feds are collecting less money now, not the province.

"Without a doubt, Dalton McGuinty will be collecting more. The whole point of the petition is show how many additional products and services will be captured under the HST."

Ms. Jones says she decided to come up with the petition because "they present a different kind of reality. When I stand up every day in the legislature with ten more pages of petitions, there is a different kind of credibility."