2011 Legislative Session: Fourth Session, 39th Parliament


SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES


MINUTES AND HANSARD

MINUTES SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES

Wednesday, October 5, 2011


9 a.m.


Douglas Fir Committee Room


Parliament Buildings, Victoria, B.C.


Present: Rob Howard, MLA (Chair); Doug Donaldson, MLA (Deputy Chair); Bill Bennett, MLA; Mable Elmore, MLA; Dave S. Hayer, MLA; Pat Pimm, MLA; Bruce Ralston, MLA; Bill Routley, MLA; Dr. Moira Stilwell, MLA; Jane Thornthwaite, MLA.


1. There not yet being a Chair elected to serve the Committee, the Committee Clerk called the meeting to order at 9:02 a.m.


2. Resolved, that Rob Howard, MLA be elected to serve as Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services. (Doug Donaldson, MLA)


3. Resolved, that Doug Donaldson, MLA be elected to serve as Deputy Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services. (Dave S. Hayer, MLA)


4. Opening statements by Rob Howard, MLA, Chair.


5. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions:


6. The Committee adjourned to the call of the Chair at 11:23 p.m.


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, October 5, 2011


Issue No. 51

ISSN 1499-4178

[ Page 1449 ]

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2011


The committee met at 9:02 a.m.

Election of Chair and Deputy Chair


S. Sourial (Committee Clerk): Good morning, everyone. As this is the first meeting of the fourth session, our first item of business is the election of the Chair.


Do I have any nominations?


D. Donaldson: I nominate Rob Howard.


S. Sourial (Committee Clerk): Doug has nominated Rob. Do you accept?


R. Howard: I do.


S. Sourial (Committee Clerk): Any further nominations? Any further nominations? Any further nominations?


Seeing none, I'll put the question.


Motion approved.


[R. Howard in the chair.]


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Susan.


It's now my pleasure to call for the election of the Deputy Chair. I would ask for nominations.


D. Hayer: I would nominate Doug Donaldson.


R. Howard (Chair): Doug, you've been nominated. Would you accept?


D. Donaldson: Yes, Mr. Chair.


R. Howard (Chair): We'll call for any other nominations. Any other nominations?


There being no other nominations, we'll call for the vote.


Motion approved.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, committee members. We'll now open our session.


My name is Rob Howard. I'm the MLA for Richmond Centre and the Chair of this parliamentary committee. I would like to welcome everyone, and thank you for taking the time to participate in this important process.


Each year, in preparation for next year's budget, the Minister of Finance releases a budget consultation paper which guides the committee's annual consultation process. The budget consultation paper presents a current fiscal economic forecast. It also identifies key issues that need to be addressed in the next budget.


There are well-published global and economic challenges in Europe and the United States. What we are seeing is governments that have not been fiscally responsible are being punished. In B.C. we have maintained our triple-A credit rating and are committed to balancing our budget by 2013-2014. This will serve us well to protect and grow our job base. These challenging circumstances mean there are difficult questions ahead, and we look forward to hearing about your priorities in these challenging times.


Print copies of the Budget 2012 consultation paper are available on the information table in your rooms. The Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services is the parliamentary committee which is responsible for conducting public consultations on the forthcoming provincial budget. Our all-party committee is required to report back to the Legislative Assembly no later than November 15 of this year.


This year we will hold 13 public hearings in each region of the province. We have also scheduled two video conference sessions to hear from residents of rural committees living in more remote areas of British Columbia. This is the third time we have tried this consultation method.


We opened our hearings in Vancouver on September 15 and then travelled to Fort Nelson, Smithers, Prince George, Williams Lake, Kamloops and Courtenay before returning to Victoria. In the week ahead we will be travelling to Surrey, Chilliwack, Cranbrook and Kelowna before ending our hearings in Richmond.


In addition to the public hearings there are a variety of other ways that British Columbians can share their ideas with us. We accept written submissions by letter or e-mail and also video or audio files. Further information on how you may participate using one of these methods is available on our website, www.leg.bc.ca\budgetconsultations.


[0905]

Committee members carefully consider all public input we receive, whether it's an oral presentation made here today or an on-line survey form, a submission in writing or an audio or video clip. Our deadline to receive submissions is Friday, October 14.


At today's meeting each presenter may speak for ten minutes, with up to five additional minutes allotted for members' questions. Today's meeting is a public meeting which will be recorded and transcribed by Hansard Services. A copy of this transcript, along with the minutes of this meeting, will be printed and will be made available on the committee's website.


In addition to the transcript, a live audio webcast of this meeting is also produced and available on the committee's website. This enables interested listeners to hear the proceedings as they occur. An archived copy of the audio broadcast will also be retained on the committee's website.

[ Page 1450 ]

I'll now ask the Finance Committee members to introduce themselves. I think that instead of going back and forth and creating havoc for the cameras, we'll just start with MLA Bennett and go around the table.


B. Bennett: Bill Bennett. MLA for Kootenay East. I come from Cranbrook.


P. Pimm: Pat Pimm. MLA for Peace River North. Welcome.


J. Thornthwaite: Jane Thornthwaite, North Vancouver– Seymour.


M. Stilwell: Moira Stilwell, Vancouver-Langara.


D. Hayer: Good morning. Dave Hayer, MLA for Surrey-Tynehead.


D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Good morning. Doug Donaldson. I'm the Deputy Chair of the committee. I'm MLA for Stikine, and I live in Hazelton.


B. Ralston: Bruce Ralston. I represent Surrey-Whalley.


M. Elmore: Good morning. Mable Elmore, MLA for Vancouver-Kensington.


B. Routley: Good morning. Bill Routley, MLA for the Cowichan Valley.


R. Howard (Chair): Also joining us today, I am pleased to introduce our Clerk, Susan Sourial. We have Byron Plant, our research analyst. We're also joined by Hansard Services staff Monique Goffinet Miller and Jean Medland, who will record and prepare the written transcript of this meeting.


With that, I would like to call our first witness, Andrew Tylosky from Fort St. John and District Chamber of Commerce.


Welcome, Andrew.


Presentations


A. Tylosky: Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity to make this presentation today. I am presenting on behalf of the chamber of commerce. The Fort St. John chamber is one of the largest chambers per capita in the province. We represent over 400 members throughout the entire North Peace area from all different business sectors.


Primarily we aim to provide networking training and advocacy to our members with a collective business voice. We are also a member of the B.C. Chamber of Commerce, and we've been an active participant in the B.C. chamber policy process over the last several years. We have 17 directors on our board of directors and one full-time staff manager.


For those of you that are not as familiar with the northeast part of the province, we really are the powerhouse that powers the province. We've got an overall population of approximately 60,000 people, median age of 31 years.


We're younger than average, but the fastest-growing demographic in our community is seniors, so it's kind of an interesting demographic that way. There were 627 new births at the Fort St. John Hospital in 2009, so obviously growing very fast, and a very high percentage of small businesses per capita, as well, in the North Peace region.


Our primary industry, of course, is the energy industry. It is the single largest source of revenue to the province. In 2008 it brought just over $4 billion to the provincial treasury. Obviously, this industry is growing and an important, stable part of the overall provincial economy.


From our priority as the Fort St. John Chamber of Commerce, what we'd like to see the government consider, as far as the budget process goes — and I know this has been a priority over the last several years for your government — is continued investment in the highway infrastructure. We were very happy to see Minister Lekstrom announce improvements planned along the major northeastern B.C. highway corridors. He made that announcement this past summer.


[0910]

The problem from our perspective is that it's nice to see we're moving forward on this, but as of yet there have not been any budget figures or timelines put in place and associated with these planned improvements. 


For the budget process, I think, in order to give the certainty that we need, that the industry needs in our area, we need to see some timelines and some money set aside for these highway improvements, which are big projects that are going to require a lot of cash. We'd really like to urge the government in the next budget to attach timelines and budget figures in those improvements.


One of the things, another policy, that we put forward and had adopted this year by the B.C. Chamber of Commerce was developing a plan for provincial airport improvements. Right now, traditionally, when investment is made in airport infrastructure, it's done almost on a…. The loudest lobby tends to get the dollars, and we would like to see a plan developed in partnership with the provincial and federal governments as well as the airport authorities to guide strategic investments in the province's airport infrastructures.


It's really important, especially from our perspective at the Fort St. John airport, where we've got a nice airport. It's very well used, but we've got some underlying infrastructure issues that need to be addressed. Right now there doesn't seem to be a pot for those kinds of
[ Page 1451 ]
investments. Really, we need to make sure that we're taking care of the needs of airports and the airport infrastructure before we're taking care of the wants.


Another priority we see — not so much on the budget end, but I'll take this opportunity to make you all aware of it — is that we're looking for some changes to the taxi industry. If you've ever had the pleasure or the displeasure of trying to take a cab in our community, you'll notice that our community doesn't exactly have great cab service.


We'd like to see the Passenger Transportation Board be given the power and abilities to enforce service standards of the taxi operators so that we can, in turn, rely on a professional and reliable taxi service. That's not necessarily a budget implication but something that we'd like to continually remind everybody about.


Another priority from our perspective is telecommunications and data connectivity. The government is, of course, working with TELUS on a long-term telecommunications contract. Our issue right now is that our communications infrastructure, fibre optics lines connecting this region, pretty much all go through Alberta and then come back in through the province, as it were. So there is not, as of right now, a redundant fibre optic connection serving this area of the province from the outside world. We are one of the few regions in North America that does not yet have this.


It is a major capital investment. What it would basically be would be a fibre optic line through the Pine Pass. The government, in your ability to put pressure on your providers and also when looking at communications infrastructure…. We really need to make sure we're having that redundant connectivity so that business interruptions are kept to a minimum. Over the last several years we've had several major data outages in this area because of a lack of that redundant line.


Another thing to keep in mind. I know that the carbon tax has not been getting a whole lot of press in recent terms, but we need to remember and realize that the carbon tax puts an undue burden on northeastern British Columbia, especially when we're compared to our Alberta competitors. When contractors are coming across the border working from Alberta and buying fuel several cents cheaper and doing work on B.C. land with fuel purchased in Alberta because there's no carbon tax, that's putting British Columbia businesses and British Columbia taxpayers at a disadvantage.


We need to recognize that that carbon tax is having an undue burden on our area. Realistically, we haven't come far enough in the technology yet that we've got electric welding trucks that will take us to the patch. We need to understand that that carbon tax is having an impact on us.


[0915]

Another thing that we'd like you to keep in mind is a continued level playing field with Alberta and other jurisdictions. We need to make sure that HST — well, HST not so much anymore — and carbon tax specifically is being paid and remitted by contractors coming from out of province and working in this area.


I think that's also a revenue opportunity for the government, because there's an awful lot of activity going on in this area and there's an awful lot of carbon tax and HST, or the new PST, that's just not being collected right now. I think if your government looks at that as a revenue opportunity, you might find some success there.


Just wrapping up here. The Site C dam is of course on the books and has been through the consultations. We need to recognize the additional strain that this dam is going to have on our community and the infrastructure during the construction period.


Right now the community…. We don't know what the impact of this dam construction, if it goes ahead, is going to be. Will it mean people moving to our community? Will it mean a 5,000-person work camp on the outskirts? We have not been given that information, and in order for our community to grow and plan sustainably we need to get that information as soon as possible.


I know the government has been working through the consultation process and the environmental assessments, but this is something to keep in mind because this dam is just seven kilometres from downtown Fort St. John. It will have an impact, and we need to be clear on what that impact is going to be.


As well, we are a hotbed of innovation in the oil and gas industry. There's technology being used and developed in this region which is leading the worldwide industry. We need to make sure that we're recognizing those opportunities for innovation and commercialization within clean energy technology and in science in northeastern B.C. There's a lot of work that's being done on the ground that's industry-leading, environmentally-leading technology as well, and we need to make sure that we are embracing that and bringing it to commercialization.


That is basically my presentation.


R. Howard (Chair): Excellent, Andrew. Thank you very much for that. We have a few minutes left, and we have a few questions.


P. Pimm: Thank you very much, Andrew, for your presentation. It's very much in line with the stuff I've been looking at down here as well, so I really appreciate that.


The announcement this summer by Minister Lekstrom to twin Highway 97 from the Alberta border right to Fort St. John is going to be huge for our area. Certainly, it's going to be a big project. It's not going to happen all at once. He just announced it this spring so I'm sure you're going to see some money in the budget coming up. But certainly that announcement has already been made, and it'll be great for our area.

[ Page 1452 ]

R. Howard (Chair): Just a reminder to members that this will be for questions.


D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): I'll wait for my two-minute statement in the Legislature.


My question is the highway infrastructure, Pine Pass. I recall the storms in June, the amazing photographs there. We're maybe four months later. Is it still single-lane, pilot-car traffic or single-lane traffic in parts of the Pine Pass?


Second, on the telecommunications. Am I correct in what you said, that your fibre optic, high-speed connection is actually through Alberta and that's why you are pushing for a redundancy system, having a cable up through Pine Pass as well?


A. Tylosky: Yeah. Last time I was through the Pine Pass…. Actually, MLA Pimm might be able to answer that better than I can. Last time I was through it was still significant delays. It has had an impact, obviously, and there was devastation through that Pine Pass this year. It was huge. I think it was a bit of a freak of nature.


The highway improvements that Minister Lekstrom announced were primarily the highway leading from our main kind of corridor between Fort St. John, Dawson Creek and then connecting over to the Alberta border. That was the road that the announcement was made about this summer.


So the Pine Pass devastation has obviously had an impact, when we were cut off from the rest of the province there for the better part of two weeks. It was taking up to nine hours to travel from Prince George to Fort St. John, which is normally just a three and a half, four hour trip.


[0920]

The fibre optic line through the Pine Pass. TELUS has some redundant fibre optic connections through the area, but there are other players than TELUS that have just a single line leading out through Alberta.


I'm not an expert on where the best line should be, but I know that when construction crews have hit that line over the past several years, it's put businesses…. I mean, in my business we had to send everybody home three times in one week because construction crews were hitting the data line. There's some redundancy, but not the redundancy we need to really have reliable and competitive data connections in this area.


So if it's through the Pine Pass or it's another route….


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Andrew. We've run you out of time. Appreciate you taking the time to join us today.


Now, through the miracle of modern technology, we'll switch over to Prince Rupert.


There we are. We're in Prince Rupert now, joined by Joanna Larson.


Joanna, welcome. As you may know, you'll have 15 minutes. At about ten minutes I'll give you a little heads-up, and you can either stop and take some questions or go straight through — your choice.


The microphone is yours.


J. Larson: Okay, thank you.


My name is Joanna Larson. I'm currently the local president of the Prince Rupert District Teachers Union, but I'm not just here in that capacity. I'm also the mother of two young children who I believe deserve the same exemplary education that I received as a child growing up in Canada, the kind of quality education that only can be delivered through the public system and which deserves to be funded fairly so that every child in our province is able to reach their full potential in a rich, robust and joyful classroom.


The throne speech on Monday fell far short of making sure that children in B.C. will be able to have that education in our province.


FTE staffing levels for specialist teachers have decreased steadily over the past decade. There were 1,459 fewer specialist teachers in B.C. schools last year than in 2001. Here in Prince Rupert our teacher-librarians have all been disappeared during the same time frame, having been cut back an extraordinary 72.7 percent. This is the direct result of provincial underfunding of education and a lack of commitment to literacy.


Our special education teachers, a role I've spent much of my career in, have been cut back almost by half in the same time frame, at 42.1 percent. This school year 89 of the classrooms my colleagues are doing their best to teach, challenge and inspire in have four or more students working on individual education plans. One can only imagine how difficult it is to meet the needs of those students, let alone their 20 classmates, with the minuscule resources left after the cuts I have just described.


This would not have been the case in Prince Rupert prior to the passing of the egregious Bills 27 and 28. When Madame Justice Griffin of the Supreme Court, in her decisions on Bills 27 and 28, said that that arbitrary legislation, rather than good-faith collective bargaining, was seen by teachers as a message that the government did not respect them or consider them to be valued contributors to the education system, she could not have been more accurate. That is exactly how I and the vast majority of my colleagues in Prince Rupert felt at the time those bills passed and we have felt every day since.


I've seen the class organization fund framework proposed by government, and it is woefully inadequate of addressing the needs of the students in British Columbia. It does nothing to guarantee, let alone provide universal access to, necessary services for children across our province.


The proposal of tens of millions for this fund is dismal when retroactively we know the government re-
[ Page 1453 ]
moved $275 million a year for ten years from public education in this province. The only reasonable starting point is hundreds of millions of dollars in guaranteed funding, where children will not be pitted against one another.


[0925]

If funding for K-to-12 education in our province were restored to the 2001-2002 percentage of the provincial budget, an additional $1.6 billion would be available to meet the unmet needs of the students in our classrooms. Surely this is what the children of our province deserve — an investment in them and in their future.


Improving the education system in British Columbia means meeting the needs of students with special needs, restoring the illegally stripped class-size and composition language, restoring learning specialist–teacher ratios in caseloads and restoring lost funding.


I implore the select standing committee to recommend that the level of public education funding in British Columbia increase to ensure the restoration of school library programs in our community and services for special needs students so that every student and teacher in our province can flourish in one of the best public education systems in the world.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Joanna. We have a question from MLA Thornthwaite.


J. Thornthwaite: In your presentation you said that you had been aware of the provision of the class organization fund. I'm not sure if you were aware of the ministerial statement yesterday of an extra $165 million from the Minister of Education. One of the points that he had made in his statement was that the Ministry of Education was really looking forward to continuing consultations with the Teachers Federation.


I'm just wondering, with the points that you have made in this presentation, if you have made an effort to continue on with those consultations with the ministry so that you can bring forward your concerns.


J. Larson: I believe that the consultation process at the federation level is still taking place. I actually had the opportunity to speak with Minister Abbott myself when he was visiting Prince Rupert about two weeks ago. What's not being addressed, even in the money that was announced yesterday, is that it's pitting classroom against classroom and child against child across our province.


It's not guaranteed funding. It's not something that children can depend on or schools can depend on. It's sort of a one-off. There's been nothing to address the strict language from Bills 27 and 28, and that needs to be a starting point in all of these discussions.


Interjections.


J. Larson: I'm sorry. I'm hearing all kinds of other noise.


J. Thornthwaite: We are too.


J. Larson: A missed opportunity that I see in the throne speech was addressing Bills 27 and 28. Until that's addressed and that language is restored and that becomes a starting point, it's just not adequate and it's just not going to meet the needs of students or teachers in our schools.


R. Howard (Chair): Thanks, Joanna.


We have one more question, but just before I do, if I could just ask the other locations that are on the video conference if you could please mute your microphones. We're picking up a fair bit of interference here in Victoria. Thank you.


B. Routley: Thank you for your presentation. I was also interested in your perspective on the all-day kindergarten and the fact that we're hearing from parents about the lack of provision for child care, after-school care. Do you have any knowledge about situations where people are having problems with that?


Also, the special needs issue. Do you know of wait-lists or concerns for having adequate supervision and teachers available to deal with kids with special needs?


J. Larson: That's a lot to answer. The first one, around child care. Yes, child care is an issue in our community, and it has been. The problem with full-day K is that most of our child care here is provided in in-home daycares through non-profit organizations. Because of the ratios that those groups have to adhere to, when you take the children from the kindergarten out, it makes it more difficult for them to be able to earn a living providing those services. So that is one of the concerns around the full-day kindergarten.


[0930]

We do have at least one non-profit society that is working in our schools and setting up before- and after-school care to help assist with that. The whole child care issue is a much bigger, broader problem and issue in our community. But certainly, there has been an impact with the all-day K.


As for the special needs, we have had wait-lists for years in terms of getting students identified. In terms of the support, some of the stories I've heard this year are with the lack of support workers in the classroom. We have at least one school where I've had three reports where teachers were actually having to run through the school and chase children outside, because we have students that will run away or can disappear. It really becomes a safety issue, because they don't have that worker that's kind of assigned to them for the full day in their classroom.

[ Page 1454 ]

You can imagine what it's like in a classroom of 20 or 22 kindergarten students and one of your children just runs out into the hallway and disappears on you. It does become a real safety issue, because you have 19 other little children, little beings, in your classroom, and you have one that's down the hall. You just literally can't be in two places at the same time.


We certainly are seeing a lot of students in Prince Rupert going without the supports that they have had in the past.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you for that. We have another question.


D. Hayer: Thank you very much for your presentation, a good presentation. My question is: do you personally think it's a good thing to have all-day kindergarten, or is it a bad thing to have all-day kindergarten? Your personal view of this.


J. Larson: My personal view. Well, from a personal perspective, I would say my son would not have flourished in that environment. I think he needed to be outside and doing a lot actively. I think this is very common with a lot of young boys. I have a daughter that's not yet entered school, and I think it might be a different situation.


I think the full-day K as an option is a good thing, but I really do not believe it is for every child. I have some reports from our kindergarten teachers this year that the children…. Actually, parents I know that have children in kindergarten are talking about the fatigue and how tired the children are. When they come home, they're just exhausted. So I really don't believe that full-day K is a good thing for every child.


Again, going back to the child care issue, I think that's part of the reason a lot of our parents support it, because child care is such an issue, and it's a safe place that you can leave your child. You know that they're cared for and that they're learning and that they're getting some good things. Does it actually replace a robust early care or learning centre? I don't believe it's actually doing that.


So I've got mixed feelings about it, I guess, would be the short answer.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Joanna. That wraps us up for today. We want to thank you for taking the time to be with us this morning.


Now, committee members, we will switch back to Fort St. John.


Welcome, Fort St. John. We have with us the North Peace Seniors Housing Society, including Kimberley Wilson and some others.


For the record, if we can have you identify who else you have at the table. I'll just remind you, Kimberley, that you have a total of 15 minutes. At about ten minutes I'll give you a heads-up, and you can stop and take some questions or go straight through — your choice.


[0935]

G. Weber: Kimberley Wilson is not with us. She is our CEO in the office. I'm Gail Weber. With us are Stella Hamilton and Marion Ewasiuk. We are directors of the North Peace Seniors Housing.


R. Howard (Chair): Welcome. So as I said, you've got 15 minutes in total. I'll give you a heads-up around ten. Over to you.


G. Weber: The North Peace Seniors Housing Society is a charitable, non-profit housing society that has been providing affordable housing and support services for the senior citizens of Fort St. John and area since 1967. We are run by a volunteer board of directors. Our mission statement is to provide affordable housing for seniors.


We currently own and operate two seniors housing facilities: Peace Lutheran Apartments 1 and 2, each containing 50 units, some one-bedroom apartments and some studio apartments.


For the past few years we have been aware of the need for more seniors housing in Fort St. John and have been exploring the idea of building a new seniors apartment complex. We have been working with a professional consultant from Victoria on a business plan. We have met many challenges, and it is quite evident that to make this become a reality, our society needs to find extra moneys in order to keep the rents affordable.


In general, the elderly are living longer, healthier and more active lives. Many seniors requiring assistance are remaining in their own homes longer. This is not always through choice but is due to a lack of safe, affordable alternatives. They want to maintain their social connections with as much independence as possible.


While the majority of seniors will live out their lives in their own homes with support from family, informal caregivers and available home supports, many seniors continue to choose options that make life a little easier to manage as they age. Seniors, for the most part, prefer to remain in their home community.


Public policy around provision of seniors care is endeavouring to respond to these realities while anticipating the huge potential demands of the aging baby boomer population. The economies of scale of larger facilities located in larger centres compete with the desires of seniors to remain in their home communities and of family caregivers to have their family members close by. For many seniors in the area, Fort St. John has long been their commercial and service centre, and that is where they would like to remain for housing and support as they age.


Figure 1, which was attached in our mailout, illustrates the overall population growth in Peace River South and
[ Page 1455 ]
Peace River North from 2001 to 2006, from census data, and then projected to 2030 using the PEOPLE 35 projection, the most recent subregion population projections prepared by B.C. Stats.


Figure 2 shows that although Peace River South will grow at a pace slower than the provincial overall, Peace River North will continue to grow at a much more rapid pace.


Figure 3, which was sent yesterday with our apologies, as it was missed in the initial submission, shows the percentage of total senior population in the North Peace in 2010. This has been inserted to show the need for housing as of last year.


According to this graph from B.C. Stats, we have 10,000 seniors between the ages of 65 and 74. Some of these people are already looking for alternate accommodations.


So 4,500 seniors between the ages of 75 and 84 are either trying to find accommodation that will service their needs or have opted to live at home as accommodation is not available. And 1,750 seniors are 85 or older. These people are in dire need of housing with amenities as they are not safe living, mainly alone, in their own homes. This type of accommodation should be their due, and as the charts show, the numbers are rising.


As people age and find it more difficult to look after their homes, they are searching for other living alternatives. As we proceed with the plans for another seniors apartment, we have been considering many different options that the board feels should be included in the apartment complex.


We realize that it is important to look at the big picture. It is well known that diet, exercise and socialization play a big part in seniors overall health. As the population ages and demands are placed on the health care system, it would be beneficial to have the amenities required for seniors to remain healthy. These amenities should include one or two meals a day, an exercise room, library and area for socialization.


[0940]

Providing these amenities is very expensive. There are no supportive independent living options available for seniors in the North Peace area, either in the private market, often referred to as congregate living complexes, or in the non-profit sector.


The North Peace Seniors Housing Society undertook a resident survey at the April 2011 CKNL trade show. Over 350 responses were received. The survey was completed by the Fort St. John and area residents over the age of 55. One hundred and eighty-six, or 54 percent of respondents, were between the ages of 55 and 64; 107, or 31 percent, were between 65 and 74; 52, or 15 percent, were between 75 and 84; and seven, or 2 percent of respondents, were over the age of 85.


One hundred and fifty-six, or 45 percent of respondents, indicated that they would be likely to move due to aging in the next five years or less. The remaining 192 thought they would not likely move within the next five years.


A broad range of income levels was reported among respondents, ranging from 26, or 8 percent of individuals, who reported income of less than $15,000 per year to 79, or 26 percent of people, reporting income over $70,000 per year.


Ninety-one percent of respondents currently own their own home. Most respondents said they would like to move to a one- or two-bedroom unit, preferably with a balcony, with housekeeping and at least two meals a day. Preferred amenities include an emergency call system, underground parking and a craft room.


There were nearly equal numbers of people who would prefer to rent or own the place they moved into due to aging, and the majority of respondents, 61 percent, felt that a mix of owned and rental units would be acceptable.


Survey results would indicate that there is a high level of interest in moving into a seniors independent living project that has some supports.


There is sufficient evidence to suggest that a seniors housing facility with supports is merited, and the project needs to be affordable for seniors with a range of incomes. Providing a community atmosphere that would include the amenities allowing our seniors to live a healthy lifestyle in an affordable complex is very difficult. It is therefore our recommendation that the provincial government set aside funding to assist societies with necessary seniors housing.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you for that presentation. We have a few questions, but just before I do, if I could get, for the record…. Once again, could I have your names, please?


S. Hamilton: Stella Hamilton.


G. Weber: Gail Weber.


M. Ewasiuk: Marion Ewasiuk. 


P. Pimm: Thank you very much for your presentation. It's a very good presentation.


Just following up on your recommendation, do you have a specific amount that you think should be set aside or what you're asking for from the government for your specific model?


M. Ewasiuk: Right now we've had a consultant working with us. The amount that we're looking for, for a new complex is $10 million.


B. Ralston: Sometimes in these kinds of proposals organizations work with the city, and the city is sometimes
[ Page 1456 ]
prepared to give land at little cost or no cost. My question is: do you have room on the site where you presently operate the two apartments, or would you require further land? If so, has your consultant advised you on how you might get land at little or no cost?


S. Hamilton: We presently own the land where we want to put the future development. We also own the Peace Lutheran 1 and Peace Lutheran 2 apartments.


We haven't approached the city, but we're hoping to approach the city for grants-in-kind assistance with water, sewer lines, that type of thing. They do give us a break on our taxes.


[0945]

R. Howard (Chair): Excellent. Thank you, all three of you, very much. We appreciate you taking the time to present to us today.


Now we will switch back to Prince Rupert. We'll just give ourselves a minute while we wait for Jenny Reid to show up at the microphone.


Is there anybody in Prince Rupert? Anybody in Prince Rupert that's looking to present to the Finance Committee?


What we might do, then, is although we are a few minutes early, we could try to jump over to Dawson Creek and see if Dawson Creek is ready.


Welcome, Dawson Creek. Have I got either Dan, Rick or Paul?


Dawson Creek, I don't know if you can hear us, but we can't hear you.


A Voice: Yes, we're here.


R. Howard (Chair): Excellent. Thank you. We're a little ahead of schedule. We thought we'd drop in and just see if you guys are ready to go.


Is this the Citizens for Agricultural Reform — Dan McLeod, Rick Pavlis and Paul Gevatkoff?


A Voice: We have two of the three here. Paul Gevatkoff isn't here yet, but we have Dan McLeod and Rick Pavlis.


R. Howard (Chair): Are you prepared to start?


D. McLeod: Yeah, we're good to go.


R. Howard (Chair): Okay. Excellent. Gentlemen, thank you for joining us today. As you probably know, you'll have 15 minutes. At about ten minutes I'll give you a heads-up, and you can either stop and take some questions or push right through — your choice. The microphone is yours.


D. McLeod: Good morning, fellows. My name is Dan McLeod, and this is Rick Pavlis with me today. We're here as members of the Citizens for Agricultural Land Reform. We are a registered B.C. society, formed in 2009 specifically to work with the province of B.C. to review the Agricultural Land Commission Act. We currently have 49 members, each of whom has voluntarily paid a $20 membership fee. Our members are from both the North and South Peace and predominantly from the agricultural community.


We've been working away at this for the past two years, with the aim of having the rules for the ALR amended for northeast B.C. Our initiative, along with requests from various other organizations and members of the public, resulted in a comprehensive, provincewide review of the ALC Act being announced in August 2010.


We made our first formal, full-length presentation to the review committee, chaired by Richard Bullock, early in the fall of 2010. Since that time, working in conjunction with our MLAs, we have made presentations to 15 various cabinet ministers, including the past and present Agriculture Ministers and the past and present Premiers of B.C.


Our message is focused on the negative impact the ALR has on landowners and entrepreneurs, specifically those wishing to combine non-farm income with farming operations and those having trouble finding a base from which to establish a business in our region.


We feel that northeast B.C. is a unique region with unique challenges and resources and that our provincial government must have a wider focus than simply generating royalty payments. We need to foster local small business growth as well.


The province is currently in the process of determining how the ALR in our region will be administered. This brings us to the focus of our presentation today: the current administrators of the ALR — the unelected bureaucrats who form the Agricultural Land Commission, also known as the ALC, which has such a negative impact on land use decisions and therefore the economic productivity of our region.


In his on-line appeal to British Columbians for input on the upcoming budget, Finance Minister Kevin Falcon writes: "We're looking at ways to reduce costs and manage spending pressures across all ministries, agencies and Crown corporations. With our 2012 budget consultation paper, we want to hear your ideas."


[0950]

Well, that's why we're here today. We're here to submit some cost reduction and revenue-increasing ideas for your consideration.


The Auditor General's report of September 2010 reveals that the ALC has an annual budget in excess of $2 million. In effect, the province is spending over $2 million per year through the ALC to stifle business growth. The Auditor General's report goes on to state that the ALC is currently underfunded to the point where it is unable to administer the ALR correctly across the province.

[ Page 1457 ]

Yet ALC commissioners have stated to our group that they spend over 50 percent of their budget in the north, this in a region where there is so little pressure on agricultural land that every year less ALR land within our region is actively farmed but rather left fallow or grown up with willows and poplars.


In fact, in our region, with one-third of the province's land mass, there are only 60,000 residents. There is no pressure on our vast ALR lands, yet we continue to be the focus of unwanted ALC attention.


Why is the ALC spending so much time and taxpayer money in the north when, according to the Auditor General, they do not have the finances to adequately administer the ALR provincewide? As taxpayers, we certainly cannot afford to give more operating dollars to the ALC.


We respectfully submit that our local governments are quite capable of administering the land base east of the Rockies and that the ALC would be more effective and demonstrate better financial austerity if it were focused on the south, where there is some pressure on the agricultural land base.


We submit that there are financial savings to be found within the ALC budget. According to the Auditor General, there are over two million good reasons to take a good look at our proposal and to suspend ALC activities within our region and let local government do its job.


The Agricultural Land Commission does not just work hard to enforce the ALR in our province. They take it a step further by focusing extraordinary time and effort on our region, the financial breadbasket of B.C., where we have rapid economic growth in the oil and gas and mining sectors.


How does the ALC take things a step further? By actively seeking out and shutting down entrepreneurial efforts where a landowner on ALR land makes an effort to supplement his income with off-farm work and by refusing to respect local community-planning efforts and the community development plans of locally elected officials.


This brings us to the second key point of our presentation today. The ALC does not only drain the provincial coffers of over $2 million a year, but far more troubling is the way it restricts the economic growth in entrepreneurial efforts in our busy region.


It is a fact that small business provides the bulk of the jobs in our province. It is a fact that this government has stated many times that it wishes to foster good jobs and put families first. Yet this government spends over $2 million a year to restrict small businesses working from ALR land, as the ALC shuts down the very businesses that we as a province need to create.


I'm talking about entrepreneurs: family-run small businesses, run with our own two hands and our own resources, which do provide good-paying jobs and do put families first and do promote economic growth and do provide revenue to the provincial government in the form of payroll, income and property taxes.


Let me be clear. Our group is not looking for any special program, any type of subsidy or bailout from the government. In fact, we are looking for just the opposite. We are willing to contribute to the economic success of our province. We are simply asking for the government to get the ALR out of the way and let us get to work.


The equation is very simple. Lost revenue to small business equals lost revenue to provincial coffers in the form of lost payroll tax, lost income tax and lost property tax. Those who wish to run a small business from their own land are either shut down, scared off or simply pack up and move ten minutes away across the border into Alberta, taking their small business and tax dollars with them.


Our group recently took Agriculture Minister Don McRae on a helicopter tour of our region, during which the group flew over the Peace country on both the B.C. and Alberta sides. From the air Minister McRae and our members could see that the agricultural industry is alive and flourishing on the Alberta side of the border — this in spite of the fact that Alberta does not have an ALR, does not have ALC commissioners cracking down on landowners and puts locally elected government in charge of local decision-making.


In dramatic contrast to the B.C. model of stifling small businesses that wish to operate from or acquire ALR land is Saddle Hills county, ten minutes east of Dawson Creek. Local land use legislation recognizes that they have an economic advantage over us in B.C. and encourages small business owners to move to their county in order to serve B.C. Peace country industry.


Let me repeat that point. The Alberta model actually encourages and promotes entrepreneurs to operate off their own land in Saddle Hills county, Alberta, and to travel daily to B.C. to serve B.C. industry from an Alberta land base.


[0955]

Saddle Hills county has recognized the economic opportunity within the inequities created by the ALC and has made a pointed effort to exploit it in a written land use plan to the benefit of Alberta's provincial coffers. Why, then, can we as British Columbians, with a common goal of fiscal prudence, not recognize and support our small businesses in the same way?


Again, revenue lost to Alberta-based entrepreneurs equals revenue lost to the B.C. government.


The lost-revenue story, as Sherlock Holmes would say, is the story of the dog that didn't bark. Lost revenue is very difficult to measure because it is a measure of lost opportunity — businesses and jobs that didn't happen, families that did not move to B.C. and revenue to the province that just did not flow in.

[ Page 1458 ]

Although it is difficult to measure, it is very easy to witness. All one has to do is take the short drive down Highway 49 across the B.C. border. Ten minutes from Dawson Creek on the Alberta side the entrepreneurs are not hard to spot. They are lined up neatly on both sides of the highway, running their family businesses from home, creating jobs and tax revenue, unfettered by any such institution as the ALC, which does not exist in Alberta. Make no mistake. They are not bothered at all by being on the other side of the border. They happily travel to B.C. to serve B.C. industry from their own land every day.


Although summer is long behind us now, the RV parks in Dawson Creek are full. Every single space in every single park is taken. Why, then, are we such a destination for campers? The answer is quite simply that these people are not camping. They will stay in those RV parks all winter. They are, in fact, here to work in B.C., take advantage of our booming resource-based economy, and then leave, taking their tax dollars with them.


Every time we fail to encourage a small business to establish in B.C., we lose far more than the taxes that small business generates. We lose the spending power of each employee. We lose the business generated by the home that should have been built for that employee in the Peace country. We lose the tax revenue on the dollars the employee would spend in our local economy. That is why it is the story of the dog that didn't bark. It is the story of lost opportunity, and it is happening all around us every day.


The basic principle….


R. Howard (Chair): Gentlemen, just so you know, you're at about 11 minutes, so you've got four left.


D. McLeod: I'll just conclude by saying that as landowners and entrepreneurs, we are not asking for any subsidy, grant, bailout or special program. We are simply asking that the government remove the barrier to progress that is the ALR, allow us conservative and practical use of our own land, a level playing field with Alberta. As a province we will all reap the economic benefits of better land use — better jobs, stronger family businesses and increased tax revenue to the province.


Thanks for your time today, and we'll take the time now to answer any questions you might have.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, gentlemen. We have a few questions.


B. Bennett: Good morning, guys. I've got a two-part question.


The first part is that I'd like you to tell me whether or not what you're asking for is to essentially get rid of the agricultural land reserve in the Peace permanently, or are you asking for the boundaries to be looked at and the land to be taken out that's not good agricultural land. We all know that there is lots of land within the reserve in rural B.C. that shouldn't have been there in the first place.


D. McLeod: When we started this process, we were after completely getting rid of the ALR altogether. We have since tempered that to either suspending the ALR legislation for the region east of the Rockies or perhaps delegating the authority to administrate the ALR to a local elected government.


B. Bennett: Okay. If this committee were to make a recommendation around the agricultural land reserve and commission, a recommendation that was provincial, what would that recommendation be for you folks? What would the recommendation sound like, if you got what you wanted?


D. McLeod: Our first choice would be a pilot project that suspended the ALR legislation east of the Rockies. Our second choice would be delegation of administration of the ALR to our local government.


B. Bennett: Okay, thanks.


R. Howard (Chair): We're running out of time.


B. Ralston: I just had a question for you about the type of business that you're talking about. You mentioned an RV park.


[1000]

Can you give me some examples of businesses that exist on the Alberta side that you would see as suitable for land on the B.C. side that is currently not permitted by the agricultural land reserve rules?


P. Gevatkoff: To start with, there are several trucking companies set up ten or 15 minutes away from us on Highway 49, just across the border, that are working here daily on the B.C. side. For example, I have an oilfield trucking company property on the purpose-built dangerous goods route here in Dawson Creek. We're trying to get land out of the ALR, and have been rejected, so that we can enhance our business.


Christy Clark is trying to promote economic development and investment in the province. I'd love to invest in my province, if I could get some land out of the ALR to expand my business.


D. McLeod: There are a number of oil and gas and mining service companies that are just across the border operating off their own land, which compete with us on a daily basis in different aspects of servicing the oil and gas industry.

[ Page 1459 ]

R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, gentlemen. We've run you out of time. I really appreciate you taking the time to be with us this morning.


We will now switch back to Prince Rupert. It looks like we don't have Jenny Reid in Prince Rupert, so what we can do is jump over to Fort St. John, where we have presenter Jim Inkster with us. Jim, can you hear us?


R. Bannerman: Okay, but it's not Jim. My name is Ross Bannerman.


R. Howard (Chair): Okay. We're going to start you off a little earlier than scheduled, but we can do that. Ross, as you probably know, you've got 15 minutes. At about ten minutes I'll give you a heads-up. You can go straight through, or you can stop and take some questions, your choice. The microphone is all yours.


R. Bannerman: Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. I'm not an economist or a statistician, and I'm definitely not a politician. I'm a struggling business owner in Fort St. John who owns a Canadian Tire store.


I'm here because our community needs your help. We need workers desperately, and we need a long-term solution, not a temporary solution. I want to be clear from the outset that we do not need your money. The solution we need is foreign workers — skilled and unskilled and, really, across all industries. We need a process that is less restrictive and less cumbersome and much more efficient.


The problem that northeast B.C. faces is very different in the employment challenges from the rest of B.C. We have a desperate shortage of labour consistent through all of our economic swings. When it's incredibly busy, we have way more jobs than we have people. When we slow down, everybody goes home, so we don't have workers then either.


I pulled some unemployment data from Statistics Canada as of August of this year, where it shows that the B.C. total unemployment rate is 7.6 percent. Our neighbours to the north in the Yukon have an unemployment rate of 6 percent. To the east, Alberta, an area everybody knows is always crying for workers, has an unemployment rate of 5.8 percent. In northeast B.C. our unemployment rate is 4.2 percent. We are significantly lower than Alberta in our unemployment numbers, and we are almost half of what it is in B.C.


I also looked at the B.C. labour market summary that was recently published, where it shows that in each of the next five years, demand for workers exceeds supply for anywhere from 270 to 730 jobs. I can't imagine what will happen if Site C is given a go-ahead. It scares me.


[1005]

I must say, the report says that this year we actually have more workers than we do jobs, and I have to strongly disagree with that position in the report. I don't know where they got that information. As an employer in the community, I don't know a single other business that isn't looking for workers. We all are.


I also looked at the CAPP report produced by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. It was published in September of this year. It indicates that oil patch jobs in northeast B.C. are going to double in the coming year. They can't fill the jobs they have this year, and next year it's going to double.


But I'm here today to present you a proposed solution and not just a problem. You already know, probably, about the problems.


Back to my original statement. You cannot buy workers by throwing incentives at them. Incentives do not work. They're only temporary. We live with transient workers coming for the cash and going home. For Canadians, this won't change. That's life in the north. People have to want to live here to stay here. We urge you to accept this fact.


My colleague who owns a Canadian Tire in Whitehorse praises their provincial nominee program in the Yukon. We urge you to establish a regional provincial nominee program for northeast B.C. similar to that in the Yukon. If it has to be a pilot project, we would ask that it be at least for five years.


In that program you would identify skilled-worker trades and critical impact workers. I would need you to include retail. With the program, you would allow us to identify our foreign worker candidates and submit them for entry into Canada directly to a PNP process group, bypassing our current labour market opinion and Service Canada process.


The structure would then have the PNP process, the application, approve it and then automatically forward that application, and work with Canadian immigration to approve all applicants for permanent residency into Canada. These recruits would then not only be new employees, but they would be permanent employees, allowing employers to fully commit to training programs and long-term career incentives for these new employees.


The benefits of this program would be many. First of all, it's a permanent solution and not temporary. We would have huge savings in the administrative burden on employers today with the process we now have, and a quicker entry, for sure, for getting workers here to satisfy the need.


In the Yukon their process lasts, in the majority of cases, less than a month to get approval. I currently have an LMO that's been approved by Service Canada for eight foreign workers. I started it last January, and in October I sit here today and I have no idea when I'm going to see any employees. I'm concerned that I'm not going to see anybody before Christmas. It's a very lengthy process.

[ Page 1460 ]

It also eliminates the reapplication process where we have to start over every year. Service Canada will only give us an LMO and a work permit for one-year intervals now. One year is clearly not a business solution. It takes a year to get people here, and then in another year we're looking at sending them back.


It reduces foreign-worker churn. It eliminates the current process leaving employers and employees in the dark, never knowing whether employees will be here next year or not. Imagine. We would be able to plan and manage our business.


By the way, it just doesn't impact the foreign workers. It impacts all the rest of our employees in the store who work with them, because they don't know either whether they're going to have workers beside them and whether the relationship they're building will last.


It reduces the cost of business, business operations. Every one of these steps that we go through costs money, including the transport back and forth. The less cumbersome process that this efficient one has in the Yukon would be effective for small businesses also. There is no way a small business today can work themselves through and have the time to do the process that we have in place with Service Canada today — just can't do it. And of course, having long-term employees would improve our business execution, and I would love to be able to deliver the improved customer service from having longer-term staff.


[1010]

If you'd like another example, Saskatchewan has a different but similar program. They call it the Saskatchewan immigrant nominee program. Employers there do not apply for temporary workers. Employees apply for permanent Canadian residence. They back it up with a job offer, housing guarantees, training and job security. With that program, all of those factors go into creating the points that Immigration Canada needs to give them permanent resident status. They actually would then be approved, and they can bring their family members over. They can't actually approve for final permanent resident status till after they've been here for six months, but they can commit to building their new life.


I'll conclude. I've been in Fort St. John for 15 years running my business. My goal is to have 75, maybe 80, staff at my peaks through the year. I have never, one day in 15 years — not one day — had a full staff. Today I run with 54 employees. My low I had this year was 48.


I am just one of many. My competitor, Wal-Mart in town, busses staff in from Prince George. They put them up in hotels to see if they can man their store. Wal-Mart has deeper pockets than I do.


Three years ago Canadian Tire approved building a new store in Fort St. John, double the size that I have, and had a building plan approved for the whole thing. It's never been built. Our real estate department talks to all the other retailer businesses. Wal-Mart, Loblaws, Home Depot and Costco all said no to new development, because they're not going to expand or build in Fort St. John because there are not enough workers to run the business. A number of years ago Zellers also closed because they couldn't have staff.


Our current LMO process is slow, cumbersome and incredibly restrictive. It is not a business solution. The now-expired B.C. provincial nominee program for the hospitality industry was successful for businesses in the northeast. We need it broader and more efficient.


We urge you to recognize this as a different region, with special needs, and to implement the Yukon program for our region only. Give us a program that provides us a building block for our strong future growth. And please, do it quickly.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Ross. Good timing. We've got about five minutes left, and we have some questions.


P. Pimm: Thank you very much, Ross, for the presentation. I know I spoke with you before. But can you just explain a little more for me the difference between the LMO system — or if they have an LMO system — in the Yukon compared to ours in British Columbia?


R. Bannerman: Yes. Of course, I'm not intimately familiar with the history in the Yukon, but I believe they had the LMO system similar to ours, working through Service Canada. It was the business and the community that rallied to their government with the strong message that it doesn't work. They have needs for resource workers just as we do.


So they worked closely with the chamber of commerce, actually, in lobbying the government and putting this new process together to address the areas of concern — the industry who were suffering a significant challenge for what they do.


The labour market opinion is the process in B.C. where, first, an employer has to substantiate the fact that there is a need for that classification of worker in your community. We have to apply and demonstrate that we have sufficiently advertised in the area, and over a certain period of time, for the job and matching the job description according to the federal NOC work classification.


Once we've demonstrated to them that we have not been able to find a Canadian worker to fill that position, then they will consider approving a foreign worker's application. That process takes time, and the application is rather lengthy. I guess the plea that we're making here today is that we shouldn't have to prove that we're short of workers because it's all over everything you read.


[1015]

It's clear as anything, and if the government could step up and recognize that with us and work with our community, I think we can make the process a lot quicker.

[ Page 1461 ]

M. Elmore: Thanks very much for your presentation, Ross. We've heard this story. It's not only specific to your area but right across the province, as well, in terms of delays with the LMO process and just the difficulties around it.


But I was surprised, actually — it's news to me — that the work permit length has been shortened to one year. Certainly, that adds to a lot of the paperwork.


Ross, I'm interested in your perspective. I know you're in the retail sector. The issue of skilled workers and training programs and the provision of those opportunities — is that an issue in your area?


R. Bannerman: I hesitate to speak for an industry that I'm not a part of, but I know I speak with a lot of individuals who are in that industry. It's the life in B.C. There is a definite need of workers. Like in Alberta, they're flying workers in here to cover the jobs that are here.


If you could just understand from a business perspective, the more skilled the trade, the more important it is that an employer has time to train the staff that they bring in. If they can fill workers who have skilled-trades background but still have a length of a work permit in front of them that gives them time to add and train and develop them to what they need them to be in the long term, then the program, for them, can be far more useful.


M. Elmore: Ross, do you have any temporary foreign workers currently now amongst your staff?


R. Bannerman: Yes, I have six, and the last four I just brought in started with me in May of this year. They've been wonderful workers, a great addition to our team. Here I am now, about four months away from not knowing whether I'll be able to keep them again, and I have to start that process over again.


We have an application, as a matter of fact, on the eight that I had. I'll just add this. For the eight that are approved and in process, another frustration has been that when Immigration Canada rejects one, I can't go back and refill for my eight that were approved. I have to start over on the entire process, and one of my workers of the eight so far has been rejected.


M. Elmore: Where are they from, Ross? Which country are they coming from?


R. Bannerman: The Philippines.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Ross. We've run you out of time. We really appreciate you taking advantage of the opportunity to present to us this morning.


R. Bannerman: Well, thank you very much, and we'll be forwarding along our written submission following my presentation.


R. Howard (Chair): Excellent. Thank you.


Now, committee, we are going to jump back and try Prince Rupert again and see if Jenny Reid has managed to catch up with us.


Prince Rupert — is that Louisa? Welcome, Louisa Sanchez. As you probably know, you have 15 minutes. At about ten minutes, I'll give you a heads-up, and you can either stop and take some questions or go all the way through. Your choice. The microphone is all yours.


[1020]

L. Sanchez: Thank you for allowing me to make this presentation regarding Invest More in Children. I am a member of First Call: B.C. Youth Advocacy Coalition, and because I live in the north, this is very dear to my heart.


I'll start with Invest More in Children, and I have an executive summary. First Call: B.C. Child and Youth Advocacy Coalition is a coalition of provincial and regional organizations, individuals and local community networks who share the belief that children and youth should have first call on our nation's resources.


Our 90 partner organizations are committed to achieving the following four keys to success for B.C.'s children and youth: a strong commitment to early childhood development, support in transitions from childhood to youth to adulthood, increased economic equality and safe and caring communities.


Our coalition is pleased to respond to the Finance Committee's invitation for advice on how to achieve sustained economic recovery, as investments in children's healthy growth and development form the foundation of any society's social and economic sustainability.


Similarly, we are pleased to share our recommendations to the committee for budget measures that will help ensure shared prosperity and a high standard of living for all.


This submission makes three recommendations for the committee's consideration with regards to the preparation of the 2012 federal budget:


(1) Place a high priority on increasing Canada's annual investments in early childhood care and learning from our current 0.25 percent of GDP to the recommended UNICEF benchmark of 1 percent of GDP.


(2) Focus spending and redesign federal tax policy with the aim of reversing the growth of income inequality in Canada.


(3) Submit all budget decisions to the scrutiny of a child impact assessment, especially for impacts on members of particularly vulnerable groups, such as aboriginal children, children with disabilities, recent immigrant children and children in lone-parent, female-led families in order to ensure that we do no harm.


Accomplishing the first two broad policy objectives — supporting early childhood development and reducing income inequality — is fundamental to creating a health-
[ Page 1462 ]
ier, more sustainable path of social and economic development for our country.


The third recommendation provides a process with little or no cost that will reduce the risks for negative, unintended consequences. Our future depends on the ability of today's young people to achieve their fullest potential, and we know that living in poverty or going without crucial early childhood supports undermines that potential.


Human capital investments must start early. Canada's public expenditures on early childhood services are extremely low in comparison to other OECD countries, as I found out in the 2008 report.


[1025]

We know from extensive research on human development that the early years represent the unique window in the human life course during which citizens' physical, socioemotional and cognitive potential are especially malleable to the positive effects of nurturing environments and strategic human capital investments.


In a report prepared for the B.C. Business Council by the human early learning partnership at the University of British Columbia, they noted that "developing the full potential of every child in Canada is a good economic investment in the context of an aging population as well as the right thing to do." So "governments, businesses, bankers and citizens have ten times as much reason to worry today about the early child vulnerability debt as we have reason to worry about the fiscal debt."


Canada's failure to properly support young children and their families through more effective social policy, such as more generous and inclusive parental leave, adequate income supports for those in need and universal access to quality early care and learning for all young children, is resulting in high rates of vulnerability in children. This vulnerability translates into weakened educational outcomes, health inequities and long-term loss of productive potential. This, I believe, is a recipe for unsustainability and rising social costs.


If we are truly interested in increasing productivity and ensuring that the next generation is equipped to compete in an international, knowledge-based economy, the starting place is to increase Canada's public investments in early child development and education.


Shared prosperity for all. Inequality between the rich and poor in Canada has grown more than in any OECD country during the last decade, with the exception of Germany, of course. The recent commentary by the Conference Board of Canada provides additional evidence that the economic benefits in the good times over the past 15 years have not been shared equitably, producing an increasingly divided society.


High child and family poverty rates, increasing housing insecurity and food bank use for families with children, and a rising tide of working parents raising children in poverty are all indicators of the urgent need for action to reduce inequities through thoughtful public spending and public policy.


The 2012 federal budget must reflect the will of parliament as expressed in the unanimous House of Commons resolution in November 2009 to develop an immediate plan to eliminate poverty in Canada for all by addressing the serious and avoidable inequities that have been allowed to develop in the health and well-being of Canadians.


To ensure economic growth and prosperity in a knowledge economy requires a well-educated workforce. Investments making early childhood education and care available to all families are fundamental to increasing the availability of skilled workers and ensuring that increasing prosperity is equitably shared among all sectors of our society.


[1030]

We also draw your attention to the costs of not dealing with the social and economic deficit caused by continuing high rates of child and family poverty. Recent studies estimate the cost of poverty to be between $8.1 and $9.2 billion in British Columbia alone. Nationally, the costs of lost revenue and remedial expenditures are even higher. The annual cost of child or intergenerational poverty is very high, and if child poverty were eliminated, the extra income tax revenues nationally would be between $3.1 billion and $3.8 billion. That I got from The Cost of Poverty: An Analysis of The Economic Costs of Poverty in Ontario, which was in 2008.


For the best interests of the child, we remind the committee that Canada is a signatory to the UN convention on the rights of the child and has therefore committed to make the best interests of the child a primary consideration in all legislative, judicial and administrative decision-making.


We urge government to make sure that attempts to reduce government spending, for whatever reason, do not adversely affect the well-being of children. In practice, this requires the application of a child impact assessment to government's budget decision-making process, with particular attention to vulnerable populations of children who are already underserved, living in poverty or otherwise disadvantaged.


R. Howard (Chair): Louisa, just so you know, you have about three minutes left. 


L. Sanchez: Oh. Okay, I'll go fast.


We are looking for the 2012 federal budget to demonstrate the wisdom of long-term thinking which judges every tax and program spending measure from the view of its impact on the well-being of Canada's youngest and most vulnerable children and families and places child and youth rights at the top of the priority lists.


Recommendations. First Call recommends to the committee that the 2012 federal budget (1) place a high pri-
[ Page 1463 ]
ority on increasing Canada's annual investments in early childhood care and learning from our current 0.25 percent of GDP to the recommended UNICEF benchmark of 1 percent of GDP; (2) focus spending and redesign federal tax policy with the aim of reversing the growth of income inequality in Canada; and (3) submit all budget decisions to the scrutiny of a child impact assessment, especially for impacts on members of particularly vulnerable groups such as aboriginal children; children with disabilities; recent immigrant children; and children in lone-parent, female-led families, to ensure that we do no harm.


In conclusion, accomplishing the first two broad policy objectives, supporting early childhood development and reducing income inequality, is fundamental to creating a healthier, more sustainable path of social and economic development for our country. The third recommendation provides a process with little or no costs that would reduce the risk for negative unintended consequences.


The obsession with tax cuts as the best solution, no matter what the problem, has differentially benefited those at the high end of the income scale and has gutted the ability of government to respond to collective social needs. This translates, in practice, into a violation of children's right to adequate care and education if they happen to live in low-income families or fall into another vulnerable group. Necessary services are rationed, wait-lists are long, and families struggle individually to make up these deficits to support.


[1035]

The current situation highlights the lack of political will at the leadership level to champion children's best interests and give them the priority they deserve. However, the cost of political inaction is steep. Our future depends on the ability of today's young people to achieve their fullest potential, and we know that living in poverty or going into crucial early childhood supports undermines that potential.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Louisa. Very good. You've consumed all your time, however. We did have a few questions. MLA Donaldson and MLA Thornthwaite will have to catch up with you outside of this committee. Thank you for showing an interest and presenting to us this morning.


L. Sanchez: Okay. Thank you very much for your listening ears.


R. Howard (Chair): You're welcome.


Now, committee members, we're going to jump back to Prince Rupert, where we're expecting Jenny Reid.


Louisa, is there anybody there with you? Is Jenny Reid in the room with you?


L. Sanchez: She's not here yet.


R. Howard (Chair): Okay. We'll try jumping back to Fort St. John. In Fort St. John we had two possibilities. Jim Inkster….


A Voice: Jim Inkster is in Dawson Creek.


R. Howard (Chair): Okay. Let's go to Dawson Creek and see if Jim is actually there.


J. Inkster: Yes, I'm here, and I'd like to thank the committee for hearing me. It appears as though I was not on the agenda. I hope that you have some documentation that was forwarded down just earlier this morning.


R. Howard (Chair): Sorry, Jim. We do have that from you. I think it's been distributed to committee members. As you probably know, you have 15 minutes. At about the ten-minute mark I'll give you a little warning. You can stop and take questions or push straight through — your choice.


L. Sanchez: Sorry to interrupt, but the lady from Prince Rupert is here. I just wanted to let you know, after you finish.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you.


So back to Dawson Creek we go, with Mr. Jim Inkster.


J. Inkster: I am actually addressing you as the chairman of the New Car Dealers Association of British Columbia. I am an operating dealer in Dawson Creek and area and have been since 1972.


Anyway, thank you for allowing me to appear on such short notice today to discuss various issues currently confronting British Columbia's automotive industry.


Before I go into some of the issues at hand, I would like to begin by providing you with a brief overview of the new car dealers and truck dealers of British Columbia. I have provided you, in the package that I sent, a copy of the executive summary of a recent economic impact study on B.C.'s new car dealers prepared by MNP. There are highlights, and I'll go into them. This saw the light of day September 19 of this year.


There are some 382 new car and truck dealers in 54 communities throughout British Columbia. Total retail sales of the new car dealers of B.C. are $9.4 billion, which represents 16.2 percent of all provincial retail sales. There were a total of 156,656 vehicles sold in B.C. in 2010 — 43.6 percent passenger cars and 56.4 percent trucks.


The new car dealers support 33,755 direct and indirect full-time jobs, and the average new car dealer in B.C. employs 40 full-time employees and seven part-time or casual or contract staff. The average weekly earnings of B.C. automobile dealership employees are
[ Page 1464 ]
about $488 more than the average weekly retail earnings in the province.


The net provincial GDP generated by new car dealers in B.C. is $1.8 billion. One in seven jobs in Canada is tied to the automotive sector. The spending by new car dealers in B.C. generated a total of $443.4 million in tax revenues in 2010.


[1040]

The New Car Dealers Association members donate an estimated $13 million to charitable organizations in B.C. on an annual basis. Dealers have made an investment in buildings and infrastructure in excess of $30 billion around the province. For each particular dealer, that represents about $7.3 million on average in investment in buildings and infrastructure in each dealership.


Given the economic and environmental challenges continuing to face us locally, nationally and internationally, it is essential that we work with our provincial government to keep the B.C. economy as strong as possible and to protect our industry and its valuable jobs.


In addition, it's imperative to have government in Victoria that has sound economic and tax policies in place and one that can provide the strong leadership we need through these difficult and unusual times. As many of you may be aware, over the years the government has assisted our B.C. dealer network by raising the threshold for the luxury tax on new vehicles, reducing useless regulations and amending the vicarious liability regulations that are so important and so treacherous in our business.


In addition, the B.C. government reduced corporate income taxes by 44 percent and last year alone cut small business taxes by 33 percent. The new car dealers have always promoted the need for a strong and vibrant economy because a strong economy provides a healthy business sector. And a healthy business sector provides employment, which is a vital part of any thriving economy. By providing jobs and purchasing goods from local suppliers, competitive enterprises make an enormous contribution to the tax base that governments rely on to pay for our programs and services that British Columbians use on a day-to-day basis.


So 12 percent GST-and-PST taxes on private sales is one of the requests. We are especially pleased to finally see the removal of the luxury tax last year and the leveling of the playing field for dealers with non-licensed curbers through the introduction of 12 percent GST-and-PST taxes on private sales.


Since the inception of the GST in 1991 the retail automobile industry has been at a significant disadvantage in the sale of used vehicles when compared to private sales. Prior to July 1, 2010, a used vehicle sale at a new car dealer was taxed with a 7 percent PST and a 5 percent GST, while the private sale was taxed only at the 7 percent PST rate. The 12 percent GST-PST tax on private vehicle sales introduced in 2010 corrected this almost-two-decade-long imbalance between licensed professional vehicle dealers and unregulated private individuals, including those who make a living selling vehicles to consumers, pretending they are private citizens when in fact they are unregulated dealers, known in the industry as curbers.


B.C. is not the only jurisdiction to have leveled the playing field. You need not to go any further than Ontario and the Atlantic provinces to find a similar tax. The overriding principle here is a very simple one. If you buy a vehicle from a private seller, you pay tax. If you buy the same vehicle from a licensed dealer, you should pay the same tax. Why should any transfer of a vehicle between two parties not be identical?


With the purchase from a dealer, the consumer gets a vehicle that has been safety-checked and with a warranty not only on the operation but, more importantly, on the title of that vehicle. Under the old regime prior to July of 2010, private sellers were not paying their fair share, and the implementation of the full tax eliminated these tax-exempt transactions, providing much better consumer protection, and the cash-strapped B.C. government gained additional revenue from these transactions.


The SCRAP-IT program. New car dealers of British Columbia want to join our franchised manufacturers as well as our customers to play their respective role in combatting climate change in B.C. and beyond. Given that B.C. has the oldest vehicle fleet in Canada, it is even more critical to continue the support of the homegrown B.C. program that has made major strides in the renewal of the fleet, and that is the B.C. SCRAP-IT program. Last year SCRAP-IT celebrated the scrapping of the program's 25,000th vehicle.


[1045]

Unfortunately, because of the overwhelming positive demand from British Columbian consumers to scrap their old polluting vehicles for more fuel-efficient, environmentally clean vehicles, transit passes and even bikes, the SCRAP-IT program fund is nearly depleted. As a result, today we are asking the government to continue to provide financial support to the SCRAP-IT program.


Feebate programs. However, the New Car Dealers Association also believes that it's time for us to work together and to look at all of the feebate program offers and assess them to determine if they are still achieving their original objectives or if they can be eliminated for a more efficient and effective program such as the B.C. SCRAP-IT program.


We look forward to continuing to work with government to ensure that the incentive programs actually produce the desired results.


Introduction of electric vehicles to the province. Furthermore, we would welcome the opportunity to work with government and B.C. Hydro on preparations for the infrastructure necessary to the introduction of electric
[ Page 1465 ]
vehicles to the province and to help educate consumers in the technology and the necessary charging facilities and so forth.


Again, thank you for the opportunity to present on short notice the views of the membership this morning, and I look forward to future discussions.


R. Howard (Chair): Well, thank you, Jim. We're glad to be able to squeeze you in. We're going to jump back to Prince Rupert now. We left somebody there who was on the list, but thank you very much for joining us. We're going to jump back to Prince Rupert. 


J. Reid: Good morning.


R. Howard (Chair): Good morning, Prince Rupert. Do we have Jenny Reid?


J. Reid: Yes, I'm here, thank you.


R. Howard (Chair): Jenny, we had you on the schedule a little earlier. We've jumped back and forth a few times looking for you. We're glad you finally made it. We understand you just have a few minutes.


J. Reid: I do. I work in the courthouse here in Prince Rupert. We're short one body already, and I lost another one this morning. I'm the only body in my office, so I apologize for not being here on time. The person that was presenting with me from Fairview Management had a crisis in his office, and he's the only body, so he's not here.


I don't have a lot to say except that I work in the justice system, and I've been working in the justice system for 25 years almost. I have lived in seven jurisdictions, and I've been in British Columbia for the last two years.


Prince Rupert, like a lot of the north, is pretty unique in its circumstances. We have a lot of people who are high-needs, low-functioning, often high-risk. What I've been seeing progressively since the time I've been here is erosion of the social safety net. I'm not just talking about funding cuts to social services, but all the agencies.


What has happened over the last number of months is the shuffle of dollars from one social service agency to another, leaving the other social service agency without. When we're dealing with this type of clientele….


Most of them are aboriginal. In Prince Rupert we have a large number of people from the communities. We service a lot of smaller villages, including Haida Gwaii. They come here, and Prince Rupert becomes the dumping ground.


When we have cuts to the social services that support things like Fairview Management and some of the other programs around town that support those individuals, a lot of them then end up with other problems — health problems, problems of housing, problems with the law, child welfare. All of those kinds of things play out, because basically when we don't have those supports for them, everybody pays for it.


Although we're cutting money at the front end, and it looks like it makes sense, if you look at the pool effect in terms of how those cuts play out, if you cut one social service agency here, that impacts on a whole pile of others.


We do a lot with a little here. We feel like Hans Brinker some days when we're putting our fingers in the dike trying to hold things together, and the justice system is that as well. What happens when we don't have people to support a lot of the individuals that we're dealing with is that we lose our humanity and our compassion and our ability to deal with people as human beings. I guess that that's what I'm seeing.


[1050]

We're short Crowns. We're short judges. We're short sheriffs. Our closest remand centre is eight hours away.


People aren't getting the services that they need, and they're ending up being dumped into the justice system because there's nothing else.


A lot of our clients, again, are FAS, and they go undiagnosed. We don't have the ability to assess them, or there is not funding for the assessments, which we require to, again, deal with them effectively. It gives us some direction about where the deficits are and where we can put supports in place that might keep the person from reoffending in the future or from staying out of the revolving door.


I guess that's what I'm mainly concerned about. I've been watching the shuffle of cuts in different places. I know it's hard when you're trying to balance the justice system and health and education and all of those kinds of things.


I know there are only so many dollars to go around, but I guess I'm saying that when we lose things that are fundamental to a lot of our clients here, a lot of our population here, the effects are far more widespread than it looks like at the front end.


That's pretty much what I have to say this morning.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Jenny. We have a question.


B. Bennett: Good morning. I'm a recovering lawyer. I used to practise before I got into politics. There's another lawyer on this committee. We obviously, I would assume, are both interested in this topic. If this committee were to make a recommendation to the Finance Minister, putting it in your own words — I know I'm putting you on the spot — what would it be?


J. Reid: That they continue to fund effectively things like community support living, things like Fairview Management, individualized support programs for people. 

[ Page 1466 ]

Basically, Fairview Management babysits. They have 24-7 supervision for a number of our high-risk, high-needs people, and without that, either those people would be in psychiatric care or they would be in jail. We could double them and still not have enough to go around, but at least….


Their services are being cut, and some of the other agencies around mental health services are being cut. Those are things that keep people out of the system. I guess what would be my biggest recommendation is that we need to leave those social services in place and in fact provide more there, because when we put it in the front end, we save at the back end.


I know you're in office for only three years, but if you look long term, it's like putting the money into children in the schools, and things like that. It's prevention. I guess that that's what I'm asking for. We are only doing band-aids. The justice system is not equipped to deal with 90 percent of the people that are in it.


D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Thanks for the presentation. You had a very good description of the ripple effect of not funding certain areas.


You said 25 years in the justice system. I didn't quite catch what your role is in Prince Rupert.


Also, we heard from the B.C. bar association earlier about self-representation in the courts and how that does not lead to plea bargains and therefore jams the courts up.


"Eight of the ten times with a client being represented you can get a plea bargain," was what they told us. Without that representation, you don't have that ability, usually, to get plea bargains. Therefore, more court time is being used up. Have you witnessed that in Prince Rupert — the increase in self-representation?


J. Reid: Yes, we have. I am here in my own capacity, just to be clear. I am a Crown counsel. We are put in a very difficult situation on a regular basis.


I have a trial next week where I have a doctor who has moved out of the jurisdiction. We had admissions when this person had counsel. They are no longer qualified for counsel. I don't have admissions anymore. We were trying to figure out how we could get the doctor's evidence — either in a video conference or we have to bring him back. Because we can't reach the client, who's somewhere in Alberta, we can't get those admissions, and so we're looking at two days of trial versus one.


[1055]

Then it may very well just resolve on the day, once we get there. But the person who doesn't understand the evidentiary issues that they're dealing with…. They don't understand what it means — say, on an assault causing bodily harm — to admit the bodily harm, to admit the injuries and know that because the doctor can say "I saw those injuries," it has nothing to do with how they happened. They can just say, "Yeah, I treated this person in the emergency. I put stitches in their arm," but they can't say anything about how it happened. In the end, other than to prove the bodily harm, it doesn't impact on who did it. So the whole question of who did it is still out in the open.


The other thing that you're dealing with is having discussions around pleading somebody to charges when they don't understand whether they're getting a good deal or a bad deal. So you feel like you're shooting fish in a barrel because you want to be fair. That's our job. Our job is to see that justice is done, and you don't want to be taking advantage of somebody. Although the judge is there to keep the balance, that's really not their role.


We often don't have duty counsel here. They're looking at cutting the legal aid office in Terrace, which is our closest legal aid office. We're down to one defence counsel. All of them are coming from out of town now. Our legal aid office here got shut some time ago with the other cutbacks. So it's an ongoing problem, and fairness is missing, I guess.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Jenny. I hope we haven't made you too late for work this morning, but we appreciate you taking the time to present to us.


J. Reid: I appreciate you hearing me, and I apologize. I would have liked to have something more prepared, but we're doing a lot on the fly these days. Thank you so much.


R. Howard (Chair): That's okay. You did fine.


Now we're off to Fort St. John. Fort St. John, we have you on picture. We're looking for Mayor Bruce Lantz.


Good morning, Mr. Mayor.


B. Lantz: Good morning, and thanks for taking time to do this process. I know I can speak for probably every municipality in the province when I say it's much appreciated that we have the opportunity to have input into the budgeting process.


R. Howard (Chair): We're happy to be here, Mayor. As I'm sure you know, you have 15 minutes. At about ten minutes I'll give you a heads-up, and you can either stop for some questions or push straight through — your choice. Over to you.


B. Lantz: Actually, we submitted a written presentation, which perhaps you've had a chance to review.


R. Howard (Chair): We have it.


B. Lantz: Okay, you have that. Then I'm not going to bore you all with reading over that presentation. I will hit a couple of the highlights, and then perhaps we can get into some dialogue.

[ Page 1467 ]

I think the key thing that we face here in the northeast is that the growth of the industry up here, which of course is vital to provincial revenues, also puts extreme pressure on local government. We face rising expectations for a wide range of services that we have to provide to industry and to their employees well beyond the core services that municipalities offer of water, sewer, transportation and the like. For example, policing and public safety, in general, are the fastest-growing items in our budget.


The city's funding sources are limited. We have property taxes, and we have user fees. Thanks to government, we also have Fair Share — I don't want to gloss over that — and occasionally we have the opportunity to apply for various grants, both provincial and federal, that may come along.


You can understand, of course, that the difficulty with the grant program is that they are not assured. We have to roll out budgets over three- or five-year spectrums, but we don't know year over year whether grants are going to be available and, if they are, whether or not we're going to be successful in achieving them. So that makes budgeting somewhat challenging, as you can imagine.


Like most, if not all, municipalities across B.C. and Canada, we face a huge infrastructure deficit. In our case, it tops $78 million and is growing at the rate of $6 million a year. Now, that is not infrastructure, let me make it clear; that pertains to new development.


[1100]

We have development cost charges in place that enable us to keep pace with new development, but that is the result of many years of pipes being in the ground. In our case, we've GIS'd all our piping and all our infrastructure. We see that many of those are hitting the end of their 60-to-70-year life span, and they need to be replaced. So when we talk about a deficit, that's what we're talking about. It's playing catch-up with those things.


If we were to erase that deficit, you can imagine the kinds of tax hikes it would require under the present system. We believe that we need access to a broader range of revenue sources. I'll talk more about that, perhaps, in the question period.


Also, and it's related, we have a concern about funding to non-profits in our community that has come for some time from the B.C. Lottery Corporation. Now the province is cutting back on the funds provided through this mechanism, and those organizations, quite understandably, then come to the city seeking financial support.


These non-profits provide good services to the city and our residents. But again, without the provincial funding that sustained them in the past, it falls to local government to pick that up. That places burdens on taxpayers, and on we go.


Another aspect is changes to services that must be provided by local governments, changes that are driven by provincial and federal priorities. You don't have to look any further than the province's relatively recent green initiatives. Many of those roll down toward us.


That's difficult in the sense that we communicate with our residents, we establish priorities, we create a vision based on what our residents want, and then all of a sudden that has to change because of a shift in provincial priorities. Again, there are costs attached to many of these provincial initiatives, some of which are funded initially. But the funding rolls out pretty quickly, and then it's left up to the municipalities to carry it on.


Finally, most cities or towns — and certainly, Fort St. John is one — provide a variety of services, infrastructural, recreational and cultural, that are used by our rural neighbours. You can look at potable water, sewage treatment, libraries, recreation facilities, recreation and cultural programming, and on it goes.


Sometimes there are partnerships with the surrounding regional district that help fund these, particularly when it comes to capital costs and in some cases operational costs. But in many, certainly most cases there is no funding, either operationally or on the capital side. So the rural neighbours receive the benefit of city services without paying the same cost as municipal residents. We would like to see that addressed.


So three solutions to three problems. We recognize and appreciate the Fair Share agreement. However, this agreement has a sunset clause and is not viewed strictly as permanent funding. We would like to look at a way to make that more permanent as a source of secure funding so that we can meet the demands of our community and the needs of the growing energy sector.


With longer-term planning and advance notice, the city can incorporate provincial and federal initiatives in community planning and visioning without struggling to meet these expectations along with the expectations of our citizens. 


We'd like to see consultation between municipal government and senior governments as these initiatives are being contemplated prior to having them rolled out and perhaps continuing with commensurate funding over a period of, say, ten years rather than a much shorter time from the province, allowing us to plan and allocate the funding needed to participate effectively.


We also believe that adjoining local governments will function more effectively if funding allocation formulas are developed with the assistance of the province with mandated cooperation between overlapping jurisdictions on overlapping services. We ask that the province undertake a full analysis of the regional district legislation, approvals and funding models, and that provincial funding for projects be based on a model that rewards services based on a cooperative or regional basis with costs then being shared.


[1105]

That is my submission. I appreciate you taking time to listen to it. If I can just summarize a little bit, I think
[ Page 1468 ]
overall we see that there are inequities in how municipal governments are funded. We don't have the option of carrying deficits, and some of those…. I don't want to call them luxuries because I know how you feel about deficit financing. But you know, there are inequities, and we think it's time to take a look at the funding formulas that apply to municipalities.


We would like to see a task force that would examine that, and we would like municipal government to participate in that task force. Instead of putting band-aids on historic ways of handling funding, perhaps we can come up with a new and better formula.


For example, under Fair Share. I know everybody is going to say: "Well, you should be thankful you have Fair Share." And we are. Don't get me wrong. But really, in fairness to the provincial government, I mean, the money that comes out of the land sales associated with the energy sector should go into general revenues for the province, if the province can establish a mechanism whereby industry pays for the infrastructure that they have in our area and they pay that to the municipalities that have to provide housing and services for the industry and their workers.


I find it interesting that Spectra Energy — the biggest pipeline company in British Columbia, I believe, and certainly up here — pays huge taxes to communities in the Lower Mainland because their pipes run through parts of the community. Those communities don't see Spectra as a major player in their community, but there are some in which Spectra is actually the biggest taxpayer.


Because their pipelines bypass Fort St. John, even though they are located here and in the immediate area — their people live here — Fort St. John gets not one dime of revenue from Spectra Energy. The list encompasses all the oil and gas industries. So if there was a tax on them…. They're getting away quite nicely with a very low operating cost.


Level the funding streams between the city and the regional district for mutually beneficial projects. I think getting that into a balance that is more equitable would be desirable.


Really, it's all about inequities. Now that we have solved all your problems, you might have some questions or comments.


R. Howard (Chair): Thank you, Mayor. We have a question from MLA Pimm.


P. Pimm: Thanks for the presentation, Mayor Lantz. You know, I'm certainly aware of Fair Share. As we go around the province, we hear more folks talking about Fair Share and how that might work in different areas.


That's not the point that I want to go to. I want to go to your point more around the regional district aspect and the communities on the outskirts of the cities not paying their fair shares.


How would you recommend that we resolve that? Fort Nelson, as you know, has gone to a regional municipality. Is that something that you would consider?


B. Lantz: Well, that's been a discussion point in Fort St. John, as you know, Pat, for a number of years. I don't think the concept is going to go away. I think eventually, ultimately, that is something that will have to be given serious consideration again.


I think if we were able to perhaps work with the regional districts and the province in the interim, before that happens, to ensure that when there are projects going forward in the city that benefit rural residents, they are mandated to come to the table with some funding, that would also be good.


I want to recognize that they do fund a portion of our swimming pool. They fund a portion of the operating costs of our library. Just to take that as a case in point, they fund…. I think it's $20,000 a year for our library coming from the regional district, and 30 percent of the library users are documented as being from the regional district. So there's inequity in the funding there. We'd like to see that rationalized a little bit more.


Ultimately, Pat, yes. I think regional municipalities need to be looked at. It wasn't done, perhaps, as well as it could have been the last time. There was a lot of controversy. There still would be. But I think, ultimately, it's the only fair way to approach it.


R. Howard (Chair): I have another question from MLA Donaldson.


D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Thanks very much for the presentation, Your Honour. It was good to see you last week at UBCM.


[1110]

Two quick questions, if I may. One is on Fair Share, just a technical question about the mechanism. I understand it's a grant in lieu of property tax. In the current form, if a property assessment goes up, does the Fair Share go up in reflection of the property tax value that's been lost?


Secondly, regarding funding formulas, I'm not sure what your citizens have to pay for RCMP costs. But have you been involved in negotiations with the input into the provincial government in order to look at the funding formula proportionally for your city?


B. Lantz: Thank you for those questions. MLA Pimm, who was integral in the process of developing the Fair Share agreement, can probably give you chapter and verse on that much better than I.


It is my understanding that the formula that results in the payment of Fair Share is reviewed at the provincial level on a regular basis and goes up accordingly. But it is not a line item where we can say: "Okay, assessments
[ Page 1469 ]
have gone up this much. Therefore, we're going to get that much more money." We wait for the determination from the province as to how much money is going to be forthcoming.


I'm glad you asked about RCMP services. I don't think you can say that I've been involved in the negotiations. As you know, municipal input into these negotiations is minimal and only recently coming through some participation by UBCM representatives, of which I am not one.


However, I can tell you that we pay 90 percent of the policing costs in our community. We pay 90 percent of those costs, and we get precious little say of any kind in how that money is used. With all due respect to our police force, we're very happy with the RCMP in Fort St. John. They respond to the direction of mayor and council in terms of local policing initiatives.


The greater concern is accountability overall of the RCMP as a force and the lack of ability for municipalities, either through UBCM or individually, to have some consultation before initiatives are implemented by the RCMP. You don't have to look any further than PRIME, their spanking new computer system. When they implemented it, we were told just after we'd finalized our annual budget that, by the way, we'd be paying $500 per RCMP member in that year for PRIME. We weren't asked about it. We weren't warned about it. We were just told.


Then the very next year they doubled that to $1,000, and guess what. The notice for that came out just after we'd finalized that budget. That gives our financial people grey hairs, as you could imagine, not to mention the dedicated folks on council that have to answer public questions about their budget. So the model needs to be worked on.


R. Howard (Chair): That's great. Mr. Mayor, we've run you out of time. I'm sorry for that, but thank you very much for taking the time to present to us today.


B. Lantz: That's great. Thank you very much for the opportunity, and good luck with your deliberations.


R. Howard (Chair): Next up we have the North Peace Justice Society — Michelle Laboucane, also in Fort St. John. As you know, you've got 15 minutes. At about ten minutes I'll give you a heads-up. You can take some questions or push straight through — your choice. The microphone is all yours.


M. Laboucane: Hello, my name is Michelle Laboucane, and I represent the North Peace Justice Society. I want to thank you for allowing me to present to you today.


The North Peace Justice Society manages the restorative justice program in Fort St. John and the outlying areas. We have one paid employee and over 20 volunteer facilitators and board members.


The restorative justice program is a diversion program that can be used instead of or with the traditional court system. As we all know, the traditional court system is costly and time-consuming. Victims leave feeling excluded from the process, and offenders don't have to face the victims.


[1115]

Our focus is on offender accountability and an equal voice for victims. We use the community justice forum model where we bring together victims, offenders and their supporters to discuss the harm that's been done and how everyone has been affected. Once everyone has had the opportunity to discuss the offence and the effects, the discussion turns on how to repair the harm. It sometimes takes the form of letters of apology to the victims, restitution or community service hours. By using this program, there are lower recidivism rates, the balance is restored for the victims, and there is community reintegration for the offender.


Our current financial situation is bleak. The city of Fort St. John has shouldered the burden of this program since 1994, at the cost of $25,000 per year. The province of B.C. provides us with $2,500 for volunteer training and appreciation. These are grants that we have to apply for every year, and there's no guarantee that we will receive them. The $2,500 barely covers the cost of having the trainer come to Fort St. John to work with our volunteers, due to the cost of travelling to our community.


It's estimated that we save the justice system over $400,000 a year in Fort St. John alone. Compare the savings to the cost of our program, including wages and other operational expenses, at $68,000.


We average about five hours spent on an individual file. If the file goes through the court system, it would cost about $7,405 in wages alone. This does not include things like communication costs, hydro, etc., and it would cost about $1,437 for the restorative justice program, including operational costs.


This program is a crime prevention program that helps the community. We've had many businesses, large and small, use our program. In the past ten months we have returned over $4,000 in restitution for local businesses and have had over 1,000 hours of community service completed at various not-for-profit organizations. There are 60 different restorative justice programs in the province, and we're all trying to find sustainable funding.


Thank you for your time today.


P. Pimm: Thanks, Michelle, for your presentation. I'm certainly aware of your program, and you do good work. You say that there are 60 similar criminal justice programs around the province?


M. Laboucane: Restorative justice programs.

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P. Pimm: Oh. Restorative justice. I'm sorry. So what do you think is the total cost they save to the overall picture in savings to the government through those programs?


M. Laboucane: Well, you take a look at our community. We're under $20,000 just for the city of Fort St. John alone, and I mean that's not including the outlying areas that the court and the justice system actually feed into. If you take a look at those 60 — and they're all around $300,000 or $400,000 per program — we're looking at over $2 million or $3 million a year in savings to the province by having these go through these programs.


D. Donaldson (Deputy Chair): Thanks for the presentation. I'm familiar with the restorative justice program in our area, but I wasn't knowledgable that there are 60 different programs in the province. Are they run mostly through non-profit societies like yours? And if so, do you have a group presentation around the amount of funding that would be needed to ramp up or at least maintain the existing services on a provincial scale?


It's obvious that it saves money and time in the justice system, and that's of concern. So it's an absolutely vital part of the justice system. Do you have an overall number for us, or can you point us to that?


M. Laboucane: We're just slowly starting to come together as a group in the province. A website was just started. It's called rjbc.ca, and there's the directory of all the different restorative justice programs in the communities.


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Some are run through non-profits. Some are run out of RCMP detachments. Some are on the side of desks of just volunteers. Dawson Creek right now is trying to develop their restorative justice program. We are helping them at this point because they do not have any certified facilitators, so we're helping them get their program up and running in the community. We're all kind of scattered.


B. Bennett: Morning, Michelle. I'm from Cranbrook, and I've found money for our restorative justice program on numerous occasions over the past ten years. I support what you're saying. The program obviously not only saves the justice system money but stops young people in particular from having to go through the justice system, and you end up with a better result most times. That's certainly been the experience that we've had.


The question that I like to ask witnesses: if you were going to make the recommendation that we will have the opportunity to make to the Finance Minister, what would that recommendation be?


M. Laboucane: I honestly would make the recommendation to take a look at the Alberta model. What they have done is that the Alberta province funds the restorative justice program. They set aside over $350,000 a year to give each restorative justice program in their communities, their jurisdictions, some seed money to run their base program. They expect to do fundraising and do the requests for gaming grants as well. That would be my recommendation.


R. Howard (Chair): Excellent. Thank you, Michelle. A very nice presentation, and we thank you for being with us this morning.


Committee members, that ends our session for today. We'll adjourn for today, and we'll reconvene Friday in Victoria here for our next public hearing. Thank you.


The committee adjourned at 11:23 a.m.

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