2009 Legislative Session: First Session, 39th Parliament

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES

MINUTES AND HANSARD

MINUTES SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

10 a.m.

Douglas Fir Committee Room

Parliament Buildings, Victoria, B.C.

Present: John Les, MLA (Chair); Doug Donaldson, MLA (Deputy Chair); Norm Letnick, MLA; Don McRae, MLA; Michelle Mungall, MLA; Bruce Ralston, MLA; Bill Routley, MLA; John Rustad, MLA; Jane Thornthwaite, MLA;
John van Dongen, MLA

1. The Chair called the Committee to order at 10:05 a.m.

2. The Committee reviewed its draft public hearing schedule.

3. Resolved, that the Committee adopt the draft public hearing schedule as presented. (John Rustad, MLA)

4. The Committee adjourned at 10:37 a.m. to the call of the Chair.

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

select standing committee on
Finance and Government Services

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Issue No. 2

ISSN 1499-4178

[ Page 9 ]

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2009

The committee met at 10:05 a.m.

[J. Les in the chair.]

J. Les (Chair): Good morning to all. We have a couple of, I guess, more or less housekeeping issues to attend to this morning before our hearings start next week.

The first item on the agenda is the draft public hearing schedule.

J. Les (Chair): The Clerk's staff have been hard at work in the last few days since we met last and have come up with a proposed agenda, which starts with Vancouver next week on Monday, given some input from Doug, starting at nine in the morning, as opposed to noon, which we had originally proposed — so nine to five next week, Monday, in Vancouver — followed by here in Victoria on October 7 from 8:30 to noon. That is a Wednesday morning.

Then a video conferencing session, again here in Victoria, involving the communities of Cranbrook, Courtenay and Dawson Creek. We initially had tried Fort St. John, but the facilities there were not available, so I think Dawson Creek is a reasonable substitute for that.

B. Ralston: Make that one person drive from Fort St. John to Dawson Creek.

J. Les (Chair): Then the committee would visit the next several communities, starting with the 14th of October in Smithers and Prince George — that is the week of the Thanksgiving break — followed by Kamloops and Kelowna on the Thursday.

Now, Doug had suggested that perhaps we look at Vernon. Staff have done that. Vernon presents some logistical problems, in that we would either have to fly to Kamloops or Kelowna first of all and then drive to Vernon. Also, keep in mind the fact that Hansard staff have a significant amount of work to do to set up and dismantle every time we visit a place.

Given that our time frames are very short, I'm suggesting we leave it at Kelowna. I know there is a desire to visit some of those communities that we haven't visited that often, but given that this year our public consultation process is necessarily very truncated, this might not be the time that we want to try to visit some of those harder-to-get-at places. So I leave that with you.

Then on Friday, October 16, we would visit Surrey for an all-day session. I suspect that's probably at the Sheraton. I think that's what we have in mind. Yeah, Guildford.

Then tentatively, a further video conferencing session on the 21st, Wednesday. The reason I've suggested tentatively so far…. It might be a good idea for us to gauge how the ninth goes in terms of the video conferencing session. We will still have some opportunity then to determine finally whether we should do the one on the 21st as well.

That's the proposed agenda. I'm open to discussion on that.

N. Letnick: In the times that I've used video conferencing for meetings or for teaching, I've found the stumbling block to it was the technology — to make sure that someone was there to reset the technology if it was necessary.

Whatever we can do for our first video conference on October 9 to make it a success from a technological perspective would probably bode well to using it again in the future.

J. Les (Chair): Yes, we're aware that the public may not be too comfortable with the technology. Hansard staff will be on site in each of those locations to assist the public. Obviously, this is new. We want to try to make it work as well as possible, so it won't be for lack of effort on our part.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): A few questions. Where are we going to hold the Vancouver session? Did you say that? I didn't pick it up.

J. Les (Chair): For Monday? That would be at the Wosk Centre.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Oh, at the Wosk. That's right.

The Victoria session. Being new at this, is Victoria generally fairly well subscribed? Is a morning going to be enough, or is it a question of, well, what the heck else would we do?

[1010]

J. Les (Chair): It's not difficult to attract people to the Victoria hearings.

Kate, I think I'm correct in saying that we could easily schedule more time here if we had it and attract a full agenda. There's no doubt about that.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Just to put it on the record, on the 21st, the communities we had suggested for video conferencing were Nelson, Prince Rupert, and then we had a couple on the Island — Nanaimo and Campbell River. I know that's quite a few for a morning session, but just leave it to the staff to figure out which have the best facilities or the proper facilities or whatever.
[ Page 10 ]

J. Les (Chair): They've already done some work in assessing those.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): A final comment on the Kelowna-Vernon…. Again, I can play my rookie card here. How does it unfold — the travel? I'm just trying to get a sense of how that day would unfold. Where would we be flying from to get to Kamloops in the morning and then Kelowna in the afternoon? Give me a better idea of how we could do Vernon, or if we could do Vernon. How does that unfold?

J. Les (Chair): I'll get Kate to describe that.

Kate, would you?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk Assistant and Committee Clerk): Good morning, Members.

During the week of October 14, as you can see from the proposed schedule, we would be visiting a total of four communities around the province and then returning back to Surrey for Friday. We would be looking into chartering a plane, which we usually do through the Ministry of Forests. It's a small, I think, 15-seat plane, which would enable us to travel from the Lower Mainland on Tuesday evening and fly members up to Smithers.

Then from there we would develop a flight plan that would take the committee from Smithers. After the meeting in Smithers wraps up at noon, we'd have about an hour or so after the meeting to allow Hansard staff to pack up the equipment. We'd take it back to the plane. We'd fly to Prince George, and they need approximately the same amount of time once we arrive in Prince George to set up equipment so that we can open the committee meeting later that day.

We tend to always travel in the evenings to avoid fog and weather conditions in the morning, so the idea would be that we would then continue on after the Prince George meeting, fly into Kamloops that evening, and then wake up for the nine o'clock start the following day. That enables us to have more flexibility than we would with commercial flights. Commercial flight schedules would probably not be feasible with a schedule like this, and it is also more cost-effective, because we'd just sign a contract for the purpose of these four hearings.

The plane is usually based in Vancouver, so after the Kelowna hearing wraps up on the evening of Thursday, we'd all be returning together as a group to the Lower Mainland, and our office would be able to book any arrangements that you would require throughout the week, including Friday evening in Surrey. So we would be taking care of all your travel, accommodation, even ground transportation. Any assistance like that we would be happy to coordinate on your behalf.

The timelines that I have proposed here in your preliminary schedule are relatively ambitious. I still have to check with my colleagues in Hansard to ensure that…. If we are flying wheels up, for example, out of Smithers by about 1:30, what would our arrival time be in Prince George? Would that give them sufficient time to set up for the meeting? It might well be that the time needs to be adjusted to 3:30 or even four o'clock, and we would accommodate those kinds of details in conjunction with their advice.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): We'd be flying, then, from Kamloops to Kelowna.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): That's correct.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): A 15-seat plane. John told me yesterday that staff had investigated. A plane that size can't land in Vernon. Is that right?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): I have been advised that due to the size of the Vernon airport, it may require us some limited access due to the size of the runway and the ability to leave after dark.

[1015]

I did not talk to the officials at the airport directly myself, and I can confirm that information, but it was relayed to us through our contact in the flight centre that it would be more flexible to travel in and out of Kelowna. But I'm pleased to look into those details just to confirm my understanding.

J. Les (Chair): I think the issue, Doug, is that Vernon is visual flight rules. That really limits things a lot.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Using the Smithers airport frequently, I'm pretty aware of those flight rules. Well, just to register again: our preference would be Vernon — how that could happen.

I understand the Kelowna Airport is at the north end of Kelowna, closer to Vernon, so potentially it's a 35- or 40-minute drive. If we could maybe set the hearing time back an hour, then that would allow time for staff to get set up and break down afterwards. So our preference would be Vernon — for the good people of the North Okanagan Valley.

B. Ralston: I think Doug said what I wanted to say.

J. Rustad: Just to the question of schedule. I think what we have in place is already very ambitious. Those are going to be very, very long days, and we all want to be very alert for those presentations that come in. Adding two more hours onto the travel time on the day of the 15th to get to Vernon…. I think originally I suggested that we go to Vernon, because it's one of the places that we haven't been in recent years.

Given the tight time frame, it's going to be very difficult for us to actually be able to make sure that we can
[ Page 11 ]
give the proper attention that should be given to the presentations — because I know the presentations will be good. Given the short time frame, I'm leaning more towards the Kelowna option as has been suggested.

The second issue, Mr. Chair. On the 21st with the video conferencing, I think we already have an opportunity in the northwest. We already have an opportunity in the southeast. I'm just hesitant to say that we should add Prince Rupert and Nelson, giving double opportunities to the northwest and southeast, given that there are many other communities such as Williams Lake that are not represented — Quesnel and through that area. There are areas in the South Okanagan that also, I'm sure, would like to have the opportunity to give presentations.

I do believe, though, if we're going to have another video conference opportunity on the 21st, we should consider some areas further up on the Island that haven't had the opportunity. There may be a way to look at some of the other communities that may be able to join in. It's too bad we can't do 17 communities like we did last year and really be able to hop around. But we have a short time frame, so I think we have to try to make sure that we have the right balance in terms of presentations and opportunities for people in all corners of the province to be able to make presentations.

J. Thornthwaite: Just again clarifying. You've got Victoria on October 7 and October 9. But on the October 9 one we won't be seeing anybody from Victoria. It's only going to be video conferencing. Is it in the same room?

J. Les (Chair): Right here.

J. Thornthwaite: So everything happens in the same room, but there won't be any actual physical people on the day of the 9th.

J. Les (Chair): Right.

J. Thornthwaite: Okay. So what you're saying is that on the Tuesday night, the 13th, that's when we stay in Smithers. Okay. And then the next night we're in Kamloops.

J. Les (Chair): Right.

J. Thornthwaite: And then, technically, Surrey or home, if we're in the Lower Mainland?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): It's at your convenience — whichever you would prefer.

J. Thornthwaite: Okay. So as far as transportation from Surrey to home, or Vancouver, do we arrange that?

J. Les (Chair): That'll all be worked out.

J. Thornthwaite: Okay. Thanks.

M. Mungall: I appreciate what John Rustad is saying about.... If we're going to have a second video conference date, maybe we should look to different areas throughout British Columbia. But then I would go back to the first video conference date and say: "Well, is this the most representative of the region?"

[1020]

I think we'd have to play with those locations as well. For instance, my understanding is that the committee has been to Cranbrook several times. So why Cranbrook and not Nelson, for instance? Two of the major centres in the Kootenay region…. So my question would be: why would we select Cranbrook and not Nelson?

I know that Nelson…. There are quite a lot of people who would like to have their input heard at a public hearing. We have various post-secondary institutions in the West Kootenays, as well as health centres and so on and so forth.

So if we're going to look at where to put video conferencing on the 21st, I'd just like us to also go back, then, and analyze if these are the right communities for the 9th.

J. Les (Chair): Let me suggest that we stay with Cranbrook, Courtenay and Dawson Creek on the 9th, and when we evaluate that day, which I hope we would do on that day, I think we'll be in a better position then to select those communities that will give us a better….

Certainly we can do another one in the Kootenay area. I have no difficulty with that. Up-Island has been mentioned, and I think that's a worthwhile suggestion as well. I think your comments are well taken, and we certainly need to take that into consideration for the 21st.

D. McRae: Just for clarity, with the number of presentations we have, my guess would be that there would probably be a hundred people at most that would present over the course of the live presentations.

J. Les (Chair): That would be, probably, the top end.

D. McRae: Yeah. And yet there are probably expected to be in the range of 2,500 to 3,000 other means of submission?

J. Les (Chair): It's hard to judge. Last year, of course, when the committee had a lot more time, it took in almost 3,000 submissions by various means — 189, I believe, were presentations at public hearings, and the rest were e-mails, written submissions and what have you. So given that we are having fewer hearings, we won't have as many public presentations, but given the ever-increasing popularity of electronic media, one of which we'll be discussing in a few minutes, there may well be a lot more total presentations than we've had before.
[ Page 12 ]

D. McRae: And whether they're in person or whether they are via electronic means or by mail, they all count the same.

J. Les (Chair): Yes, they do.

D. McRae: So people aren't really being…. Maybe inconvenienced to some degree. But at the same time, whether they live in Pouce Coupe or wherever, they're still able to put their thoughts down, and we will understand it.

J. Les (Chair): Absolutely. Every British Columbian, I'm hoping, will become aware of the fact that they can make submissions individually or in public hearings. With modern media capabilities, everybody can access the opportunity very, very easily.

D. McRae: Right. And the last point I was going to make — because the member to my right is rather shy…. I know he'd be wanting someone to say that Kelowna is very central to the Okanagan and allows people from Osoyoos and the Vernon area to easily come to a centre area. For a person like myself who hates flying, the bigger the airport, the happier I am — and the fewer mountains, far away, even better.

A Voice: You don't want to go to Castlegar.

J. Les (Chair): The roughest flight I ever took was out of the Kelowna airport.

D. McRae: Oh, thanks.

J. Les (Chair): Okay, do we have some consensus, then, that the draft schedule will work for now with the 21st of October, to be revisited in terms of an evaluation after we've completed the ninth? Is that acceptable?

Motion approved.

J. Les (Chair): The second item, then, on the agenda is the meeting on Monday of next week. Staff consulted with both Doug and myself, and we approved staff contacting those people who had made either three or four submissions to the committee in Vancouver previously. There has been significant response to that invitation. I don't think the day is completely full yet, but I'll let Kate explain further how that has come along.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): As you've heard, the public hearing for Monday, September 28, has now been set. It will be held at the Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue in Vancouver in room 320. We'll be contacting each of your offices and LAs by e-mail to ensure that you have these details on your calendar.

[1025]

It begins at nine o'clock, and as the Chair has explained, we did send an invitation by e-mail to groups who had participated in any Lower Mainland hearing consecutively for the past four years. These are folks typically representing large organizations in the province who have come repeatedly, year after year.

As of right now, I believe we have 12 or 13 significant groups who have pre-registered for the Monday meeting. In addition to that, we have about eight other large groups from a variety of different sectors who we would like to contact today by phone just to fill the remainder of the openings for that day. We want to try and make best use of your time that day so we don't have a lot of gaps in the program.

I can share an updated version of this witness list with both Doug and John now, and I'd be happy to forward you a witness list as soon as we have it all confirmed and as many of the spots filled up as we can.

I expect that this will be a good opportunity for folks who want to come and meet with the committee in the Lower Mainland. As you know, there is only going to be one other Lower Mainland public hearing, on October 16, which I think will fill up quite quickly.

Pending your approval just now of the public hearing schedule, our office proposes that registration for all public hearings will open tomorrow, on a first-come, first-served basis. So the folks in Vancouver who have agreed to come on short notice on September 28…. I'm sure we will appreciate their input very much, and the rest of the details will fall into place, I'm sure, very quickly in the next few days.

J. Les (Chair): Okay. Are there any questions on that? I think it's fairly straightforward. I'm actually very pleased that we had a good response to those invitations, at very short notice. I know there's a bit of muttering probably here and there that we didn't give them much advance notice, but that's just the way it works sometimes. So is everybody fine with that?

The next item on the agenda is additional meeting dates. What you had in mind there, Kate, I believe, were the dates for the committee's deliberations.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): That's correct, yes. We've circulated onto members' desks this morning just a list of four proposed dates so we can begin to assemble, with your direction, the basis of a preliminary draft report for consideration following the conclusion of input being received to this committee on Friday, October 23. We had proposed the next Wednesday to begin the process of drafting a report.

J. Les (Chair): Does that work?

J. Thornthwaite: Where are these meetings?

J. Les (Chair): That would be here in Victoria.
[ Page 13 ]

J. Thornthwaite: They're all here?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): Yes.

J. Les (Chair): Okay. Any other business.

Did you want to talk about the webpage?

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Just a question. The ninth is the week of Remembrance Day — right?

J. Les (Chair): That's correct.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): So we're not sitting that week — correct?

J. Les (Chair): We normally would not be here that week. Of course, it's in our hands. If we come to some happy agreements on the 6th of November, we can always cancel the ninth. On the other hand, if we're still mud wrestling….

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Let's put it that we're just deliberating.

J. Les (Chair): Deliberating.

We will be challenged, obviously, as a committee in this very short period of time to come up with a report, so it may well be that as we get closer to the submission date, we might have to pop in a meeting on the 9th of November.

J. Rustad: I'm just wondering in terms of…. I realize that staff need time to be able to do some things, but given that the seventh, eighth or the weekend…. I'd like to suggest it would be far more convenient, if we had to add another meeting, to add it on the seventh, the Saturday. For those of us who have to travel from the north down for the…. We have to stay, first of all, for the sixth and then travel home and then come back down on the Sunday, the eighth, so that we can attend a meeting on the ninth, as opposed to just being able to stay down and do meetings back to back.

So just some consideration that if we do have to go an extra day, if we can maybe consider the seventh instead of the ninth.

B. Routley: The seventh isn't on for me. That's my 39th wedding anniversary. I haven't missed one yet. I've worked very hard at keeping that open. I mean, if you want to be here, go ahead, but I have priority.

J. Les (Chair): The committee has no wish to be involved in any matrimonial discord.

[1030]

I think we can leave the agenda as it is for now. We'll see how we do on the 28th and the fourth. I think there's flexibility as we go along to try and make these things work. If we're here anyway, for example, on the sixth, I don't mind stretching the day, starting earlier in the morning and finishing later in the evening. There are all kinds of things like that we can do.

It's draft. We can approve it as a draft timetable for now, with the thought in mind that we can always manipulate it later to suit the committee's wishes a little better. Okay? Great.

Kate, can you maybe just talk for a minute about the website?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): Yes, we've also circulated onto members' desks this morning just an updated version of the committees website. You'll note that, based on the suggestions and input that we received last week, we have a new option. The third option there is for interested British Columbians to send us a video submission. For the first time, we'll be receiving those.

We are also going to make available on the website some further details of how people can participate. Beginning today we will have a draft news release that we hope to have sign-off from both the Chair and the Deputy Chair announcing the dates of the public hearings. That will be made available on the website.

In addition, each of the hypertext links that are shown on the paper on your desk will contain further information on how people can participate in terms of sending in their responses to the questions that appear at the back of the budget consultation paper, details about how to send a written submission, details of how to send a video submission and how to participate or attend a public hearing.

We hope to be launching a lot more information through the website later today, as well as the news release. We certainly would welcome any assistance from your respective offices in your communities, as well, to get the word out to the public that these meetings are occurring.

One of the challenges that we have is that for the upcoming public hearings, we are going to be purchasing some newspaper advertisements. That is always an expensive thing to do, but we want to ensure that the folks, particularly during the week of October 14, have enough notice, that they are aware of the meetings. We are going to be developing those with the assistance of the Chair and the Deputy Chair.

J. Les (Chair): Any comments?

N. Letnick: Just to pass on my thanks to staff for looking into the video. I think it's going to be a great addition, with all the camcorders people have now, the webcams. But as I was looking at this, I was wondering: what if people wanted to send us an audio submission — people who don't have webcams but still have a microphone on
[ Page 14 ]
their computers or some other way? Can we change it from video to digital or video and audio submissions?

J. Les (Chair): Good point. Just in terms of those kinds of submissions, if they are not in keeping with the appropriate decorum and protocol and that kind of thing, how would that be handled by Hansard — or, indeed, by the committee?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): Well, we would certainly ensure that any submissions received by the committee would be, you know, relevant to the terms of reference that you've been asked to work under from the House and also contain complete contact information for all citizens who want to participate. For verification purposes, we always ask people to provide us with their name and contact information.

In the past sometimes we've had anonymous submissions or submissions under a false name or this kind of thing, so we try to cull those and, with the help of the Chair and the Deputy Chair, we can make a final determination whether or not something would be formally received or not.

As John mentioned, we would also be asking our Hansard colleagues for assistance in transcribing any video or audio presentations that are sent to the committee, just to ensure that you have the ability to review the text of those submissions rather than sitting and watching perhaps many of them on your screen — for convenience.

B. Ralston: Will there be a time limit for video submissions? I was just thinking of the staff time. If you have to watch them in real time, it's different from a written submission where you can get to the chase sometimes a little faster.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): I don't believe that we've recommended a time limitation on video submissions. However, we have developed some technical guidelines. There is a limit to the size of the file that can be sent, so I'm not sure what the takeup might be on this new opportunity. We'll have to assess that. If we have a very lengthy submission, we will perhaps contact that person and perhaps ask them to re-send something that, you know, is a bit briefer, if it was excessive in any way.

But we certainly welcome extending a new opportunity for people to get involved and, perhaps, reaching new a demographic. So we'll have to assess and offer some recommendations at the end of this year's process.

[1035]

J. Les (Chair): It strikes me that with the parameters for a public hearing, they've got 15 minutes to make a presentation. If you just left it open-ended for the video presentations, I can see where some people might be motivated to just take an hour. Somehow, that's not exactly fair to those people who actually show up physically at public hearings. So it's something, I think, to keep in mind. Set the parameters for the size of the file at about 15 minutes’ worth.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): I think it's great. I mean, the video and the audio are going to be just another tool. I'm wondering how we're going to…. You've mentioned the transcript. How are we going to deal as a committee with the video? Are we each going to be sent, through your office, the video clips that come in?

J. Les (Chair): Transcripts.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Oh, the transcripts. What about the actual video clips?

J. Les (Chair): If you want them, I'm sure you could get them.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): I didn't know if we were going to view them or how we're going to work that.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): It's always our practice to try and provide members with full and complete information. At the end each year's process we have in our office the ability to provide the full text to each of you of every submission that has been received by the committee. In addition to that, you may also have the option to review the detailed summaries, which would be developed under Josie's guidance, of each submission.

What we've done in the past is develop thematic summaries. Some of them are at a very high level, based on the questions that are on the budget consultation paper, which identifies at the outset some key themes for the consultation this year.

But we're always pleased to assist you in any way, any format, you would like receive this information, whether it's electronic or print — in any way. We'll do the best to get it to you in whatever mode you prefer.

D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Thanks for that. I think Norm wants podcasting, but anyway…. The other question I had…. The hyperlink to participate in a public hearing — that will open tomorrow for people wanting to get on a submission list?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Committee Clerk): Yes.

J. Les (Chair): Is there any other business? If not, a motion to adjourn would be nice.

Motion approved.

J. Les (Chair): We're done. See you next Monday.

The committee adjourned at 10:37 a.m.

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