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MONDAY, MARCH 23, 1970

The House met at 2 p.m.

The House proceeded to the Order "Public Bills and Orders."

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 61, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 61, Vancouver General Hospital Act, 1902. The Honourable the Member for Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, I think earlier in this House I indicated the disapproval that I felt at the existing legislation, that a Private Bill governed the Vancouver General Hospital. And, the reasons I pointed out for that objection are based primarily on the fact that it has become a somewhat closed body, with the by-laws so devised by that closed body as to almost rule out any fresh minds, fresh approach from the citizens of the City of Vancouver who might wish to give public service by supporting the Society.

The Private Bill that would be replaced by this Act was one which led to that closed Society becoming unhealthy. Nothing worse than having an unhealthy Society running a hospital. It seems to me that if that was undesirable, and it appears that it was undesirable to the point that the Government has seen fit to intervene by repealing a Private Bill, a Private Bill that was passed at the request of a Society, it follows from that that it must have been unhealthy indeed for Governments to intervene in private statutes. When you consider that this is done, the general rule is that a Private Bill that is repealed, the Bill by which it is repealed should come before the Private Bills Committee of this House, so that representations could have been made by the persons affected who had the original Private Bill passed, or their successors, by a previous Legislature. So this is an extraordinary Bill, just looking at it at face value.

Now I can assume that the Minister has had representations made to him by the Hospital Corporation, which obviously must have been consulted. Nothing appears from the document itself to indicate to this House why the Government is intervening in the affairs of a Society set up by Private Bills.

But the thing that disturbs me most about the Bill is that it does not guarantee within it that wider constituency, that wider democratic control of the hospital affairs that one would expect, when you consider that the Vancouver General Hospital is part of a Hospital District and its affairs are a concern to the greater community than the City of Vancouver. One would have thought that if the Government was going to revise the structure of the Government of this great hospital complex, they would have considered enacting within the terms of this Bill, certain democratizing clauses such as representation by the City of Vancouver itself, either by direct election of some of the Board of Directors or secondly, appointments guaranteed under this Bill, of representatives of the City of Vancouver, and thirdly, guarantees of representation in the Regional Hospital District.

Now, it's well known that the Vancouver General Hospital is a facility of such magnitude and sophistication in the field of medicine that it is utilized by most of the Province of British Columbia, and it follows from that that its affairs are not the narrow and ingrown affair or interest of a small group in this Society. Now, I can hear already the answers of the Minister of Health to that objection. He will say that whatever the by-laws that are promulgated by this Society may be, they will be subject to his approval or indeed approval of the Government. In the provision, presumably, is a safeguard, any by-law is to be approved by the Minister of Health. But, it seems to me that for the sake of local government, for the sake of local responsibility, for the sake of the local taxpayers, they need a greater guarantee of representation on this great hospital board than is provided in the Act. I would suggest that before this passes into Committee stage, that the Minister give consideration to respecting that need for democratic control or democratic representation at the local level and the Regional Hospital level.

Other than that, really, it's a Bill that cannot be measured on its face because the real strength or weakness of the government of the Vancouver General Hospital will be determined by the nature of the by-laws that are passed and approved by the Minister of Health. Secondly, it will be determined by the scope of membership, the scope of membership permitted by that Society under the legislation. If this Society is operated as it has been in the past then I can only express concern, and I say it is the duty of the Minister of Health to see that the by-laws are such that he approves that they allow proper representation by the citizens of Vancouver, by the Regional District citizens, and by the Government.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I just rise very briefly to support this particular Bill and make one or two observations to the House. The first of these is that every great hospital in the world has one thing in common, and that is a Board of Directors totally committed to the furtherance of excellence in that hospital and to no other objectives.

The Vancouver General Hospital has suffered to some extent in the past because it has had a variety of objectives and has attempted to be all things to all people. For one thing, it has a schizophrenic Board of Directors, some appointed by the City of Vancouver, interested in the finances of the City of Vancouver and the possibility that those finances would be drained by the Vancouver General Hospital requiring too much. Other members of the Board of Directors have been appointed by the Provincial Government with loyalties not entirely to the hospital, and still other members have been appointed by the Hospital Society.

But if we are to have greatness in our hospitals, and I submit that there is a useful purpose to be served for each one of us here and every individual citizen of the Province to have that greatness, then we are going to have to allow room for a total and complete devotion on the part of the trustees for the furtherance of objectives of medical excellence. This is not possible if the hospital exists to serve every single doctor and every type of illness that might be requested of it by any citizen. We are going to have to, as we do now, continue to emphasize the distribution of hospitals in British Columbia, and recognize that each hospital does not have to attempt to cover every possibility in the field of health care. So I hope that the result of this Bill will be to give a boost to the Vancouver General Hospital as the largest hospital in British Columbia, and one of the largest hospitals in Canada,

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it will be able to take advantage of its size in order to develop new methods of treatment, to use the great resources that it will have at its disposal to pursue medical skills that would not be pursued in any other hospital, even the teaching and research hospital at the University of British Columbia, which we are hoping will be with us in the next two or three years.

So, Mr. Speaker, we support the Bill, we expect great things from it, and we hope that the Minister will give that hospital the encouragement it deserves.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Minister will close the debate.

HON. R.R. LOFFMARK: Mr. Speaker, the honourable members across have referred to two or three matters which I think deserve recognition. The first one is that in respect to the nature of this Bill, the honourable member is quite right in saying that the pattern of treatment here of a Private Bill is somewhat unusual and may be defended, of course, only on the basis that what at one time, at the time of the passage of the original Bill, was a matter which is justifiably dealt with under a Private Act, being a matter of concern primarily to the community of Vancouver, it's long since changed, and that now we can say that the activities of the Vancouver General have long since passed into the realm of public business rather than private business and therefore it deserves the attention of this House. It should also be recognized that the Vancouver General is now the leading referral hospital in British Columbia, it also has a very significant place in the teaching programme of the University Medical School, and to say nothing of the continuing community service that it renders, not only to the City of Vancouver but to the Regional District of which it is a member. One only needs to look at the activities in the emergency department, the expanding psychiatric section, as well as the proposal for ambulatory care, to recognize the importance of this.

Now, dealing with the one other point which deserves some assurance from me, and that is the subject matter of these by-laws. I think it's proper to advise the members that the Government is concerned about the anomalies that have grown up in the management of the Vancouver General Hospital, and honourable members in questioning me during my Estimates raised this very point, and of particular concern to us is the democratic process that applies not only to the members in the representation from the community, but also among the doctors themselves. It is most important that decisions relating to medical matters in that hospital should be determined upon a broad democratic basis so far as the medical staff is concerned. In that respect I will assure members that the same standard of requirement for the democratization of the medical membership that applies across the rest of the Province must also apply in the Vancouver General. This is a matter of great significance, and it should be to the medical staff in the Vancouver area, because I think it's true to say that, generally speaking, access to the active staff in the hospitals across the Province has generally been good. It's only in one or two hospitals where, such as the Vancouver General, a multiplicity of demands being made upon it has, for one reason or another, resulted in a very much restricted opportunity to the medical profession generally to be admitted to active participation in the management of that hospital. It's the proposal of the Government that in examining the proposed by-laws that this matter be given every consideration, in fact first consideration.

MR. SPEAKER: The question is that Bill No. 61, the Vancouver General Hospital Act, be read a second time now. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 64, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Public Schools Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on the second reading of Bill No. 64. The Honourable Member for Burnaby North.

MRS. E.E. DAILLY: Mr. Speaker, we do not intend to support this Bill on second reading, primarily because inherent in this Bill there is the principle of local taxation for colleges, and we on this side of the House have made it, I think, quite clear, that we believe that colleges should be treated in the same manner in financing as other forms of higher education, our vocational schools and our universities, because we believe that colleges are simply the geographic dispersion of higher education. We do not feel that local taxpayers should be involved financially and locally in the taxation of these colleges, and therefore, as this Bill reaffirms this principle of local taxation, we cannot in the Official Opposition, support the Bill.

We are also concerned about other sections of the Bill involving sick leave, which I understand is causing concern with the Teachers' Federation, and I was hoping when the Minister speaks he would be able to comment on this particular area of the Bill.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver East.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, the Bill, as my colleague has pointed out, includes provisions about sick leave which would retroactively affect all the teachers' settlements and agreements that have been made as of last December. In other words, after an agreement has been arrived at, the Legislature would be coming in and vetting those agreements to a very considerable extent in respect to sick leave. I don't want to say very much about it at this stage. I do hope that before this reaches Committee stage, that the Minister will reconsider, and either withdraw it or repair it possibly to obviate the Court decision, which may not have expressed truly the intention of this Legislature, the decision of Gregory, J. But to leave the section as it is will surely be very unfair to teachers who have accumulated these benefits, who have signed agreements in good faith, and we shouldn't retroactively step into that picture. So I hope the Minister will take another look at this section before Committee stage.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver Centre.

MR. H.P. CAPOZZI: With due respect to the Minister, I have raised the point regarding a section of the treatment of the teachers in the schools. It concerns the fact that the school trustee today, and if the school teacher does not come to school without a reason, in other words just does not come, there's no method for deducting his salary. In other words, I am not talking about this, is there any possibility that that can be included in the amendments to the Act? It seems an unfair principle, or unfair set of circumstances, that

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a school teacher who just decides to take a day off on his own, cannot in any way be deducted or have that amount deducted from his salary. I am not talking about a bona fide reason for being absent, just talking about deciding to take a day off.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Member for North Vancouver–Capilano.

MR. D.M. BROUSSON: Mr. Chairman, this Act is mostly devoted to some considerations and changes to our college system, and I think we are certainly pleased to see this much attention given to it. It certainly is time that all the matters related to our colleges be pulled together, and a more detailed organization and direction be put into the legislation.

But the real pity, from our point of view, is that we are not looking at a completely separate Act for the college system. Our college system is growing up. It is getting further away from the public schools today in objectives and method of operation, and here we are trying to lock them closer to the elementary and high school system, just for administrative convenience, which somehow to us doesn't seem right. Our colleges are beginning to fill a very special and particular role, they are trying to find their own separate identity, and here we are locking them to the elementary and public schools with a different set of objectives.

Our neighbours in Alberta and in Washington have seen fit to pass special College Acts, to set up special Provincial or State Commissions to operate and direct their college system, they give it the status and position which we think the colleges are entitled to. You must remember that the colleges take the first two years of the university system, and certainly they are entitled to the same kind of status, the same kind of position.

Mr. Speaker, I think we should consider some of the items that have been left out, because this is not a separate Bill on colleges. Some of the matters are left in doubt that could be included if it was a separate Bill. For example, the internal government of the college is left very much in doubt. Surely some equivalent of a University Senate is needed to properly direct the academic requirements of the staff, the course development, and so on, of the college system. Remember again, we are considering for probably a half or two-thirds of the pupils in those colleges, people who are in their first two years of university, and they are entitled to the same consideration of curriculum, the same standards of teaching, the same standards of course development, as they have at the university, or they would have at a university.

Arrangements need to be set up for student government, which is a different type of thing from a high school student government. It should be set up on a much more formal and particular basis. In fact, Mr. Speaker, faculty and students are hardly mentioned in this Bill, they are hardly given any recognition, and my understanding is that many of the faculty in the present regional colleges are concerned about this because they wonder what their terms of employment are. Are they going to be hired and fired and directed in exactly the same level as the high school system, or are they going to be treated as the teachers of higher education which they truly are? I think a teacher in the first two years of university is a different kind of teacher than one who teaches high school and elementary school, and should receive different treatment.

Then, Mr. Speaker, there is obviously still no master plan for education in British Columbia. The college system has to be, by its very nature, very close to the university system. It is taking the place of the first two years at the university at U.B.C., Simon Fraser, U. Vic., and so on, and yet we are still trying to somehow within the Department of Education — by whom I am not quite sure, the Act doesn't really say — it finally does talk about co-ordination on a Provincial basis which we have been asking for for several years, but it doesn't really say who is going to do this co-ordination, how it is going to be arrived at, who is going to be involved in making these arrangements. The Academic Advisory Board for example, Mr. Speaker, which does do some work in this area, does not have a single representative on it from the college system, and yet this part of the college system, the accreditation and so on, is handled by the Academic Advisory Board which is a creature of the universities, but now the rest of the college organization is somehow going to be tied to the high school system.

Yet there is a tremendous effect here, Mr. Speaker, because the colleges are taking the first two years of university. Consider first of all the financial implications. This is taking a tremendous load off the university from a financial point of view, and yet we are expecting the local school board to do all the financing for it. Surely this is not correct. On this 40 per cent–60 per cent formula, the local community is financing the first two years of university for many, many students. The universities no longer will have to worry about this large number, but in the case of university financing, it is 100 per cent Provincial Government. And to give you an idea, Mr. Speaker, of the impact that the college system has on the universities, consider what the Registrar of the University of B.C. says, "Student demand for places at the university will become increasingly heavy at the third year level, as students complete two years of study at the regional colleges. In order to accept all qualified students into the third year, it will be necessary to curtail somewhat the intake at the second year level, and at the same time impose a slightly smaller quota on first year admissions. So it is recommended that special studies be made of the effect of all this in September, 1971," and so on.

The University is trying to recognize this problem, but because it doesn't have a direct relationship with the college system, which is now going to be tied even closer to the high schools, how can they possibly do their planning? To the extent, Mr. Speaker, that the Senate of the University of British Columbia is considering a motion, "That be it resolved that the University of B.C. recommends that this University call upon the Provincial Government to establish a representative Province-wide commission on higher education for the purpose of developing an over-all master plan which will make provision for the higher education needs of the Province over the next ten years."

U.B.C., Simon Fraser, U. Vic. don't know where they are going. They don't know what student needs they are going to have to face, and here we are, carrying on under the school board high school system, trying to set up this separate college system, tied to the high school, giving the universities no chance to co-ordinate their planning and their direction. It seems to me that only with a separate Act which would recognize the system and allow the planning, the proper planning to be done, can we really solve the problems of higher education in British Columbia.

Now I think, as I said, Mr. Speaker, we are glad to see these things pulled together into one section of the Public Schools Act, but how much better if we had our own College

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Act to recognize the status and the fine standards that our college system is trying to set up for us. Let's take the colleges away from the high schools and give them their own independence.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Cowichan-Malahat.

MR. R.M. STRACHAN: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. As a part-time student in one of the regional colleges in the Province, I have more than a passing interest in this particular Bill. I am concerned about some aspects of the Bill.

AN HON. MEMBER: College drop-out.

MR. STRACHAN: Well, call me what you like — I do my thing.

Mr. Speaker, I heard the Minister of Education on the air the other day answering a question as to why different school districts had turned down school referenda with regard to operating costs, and somebody says, Hear! Hear! which indicates they think that referenda should be turned down when they are put by the school boards for operating costs. The Minister said, when asked why they were turned down, that there was an indication on the part of the people, and I can't remember the exact words, the indication was that the people were voting against force. Well, that was what I took from your statement. His basic answer was the fact that in this Province we are spending $1,000,000 a day on education, so what have the people got to complain about, and I don't think he will deny that — that was at least part of his answer.

AN HON. MEMBER: Spending $1,000,000 a day and getting nothing but complaints.

MR. STRACHAN: Well, Mr. Speaker, looking at this Bill, one realizes it is going to do a number of things. One, it is supposed to prevent duplication of services in the Province or in any given area, and I understand why this happened, because of a local experience. But it all depends on which way they are going to move to prevent the duplication of services. If it is moved from the regional college to the vocational school, then the Provincial Government will absorb the total cost, but if the responsibility is moved from the vocational school to the regional college, then again we are two-milling the taxpayer to death, because it will mean an increased cost to the local taxpayers for the operation of the regional college. And this is partly why we are opposing this Bill, because of the wrong concept inherent in this particular legislation, that the colleges should be part of the general school set-up with part of the cost being loaded onto the local taxpayer.

But basically we are opposed to this Bill because of the attitude of the Government and the way they seemed to have locked themselves in to operating the educational system. I agree that education is costing us a great deal of money, but a large part of the fault, I think, must be due to the attitude of this Government toward education. I am not one of those who believe that all educational problems can be solved merely by spending money, let me say that to begin with. But I think the Government, in its concentration on the money aspect of education, have lost complete sight of the objectives of education, and you are getting yourself into deeper and deeper trouble all the time. The educational system, because of the mistakes you have made in the past, and you attempt to control, direct, and hold down the development of the educational system in this Province, is costing more and more and more money. You started up the wrong road. And this is one of the reasons why we have Bills such as this which are an attempt to bring more and more of the control and direction of education under this Government.

Under a different government it might be all right, but under this Government which, as I say, started up the wrong road, and has refused and turned back the attempts of school districts and educators in this Province to freely evolve on experimental basis, systems of education that might cost us much less money than it is now costing us. This is the price you pay for the lack of freedom that you allow the educators of this Province to experiment and develop. Because I am quite sure that a superior form of education and a superior kind of education can be made available in this Province at less than it is now costing. But the first thing that is required of education is freedom, and this, because of your initial and prime concern with the dollar aspects of education, and because in the past you have refused the permission to spend money which would have in the long run reduced the cost of education, made a better kind of education, I think we are now paying part of the price.

I went into some of it during your Estimates, I won't go over the ground that I covered then, but we are opposing this Bill largely on the basis that, one — it is not making our educational system any more free than it now is, it is curtailing the freedom of the educational system, and two — it is continuing up that long road that is going to put an additional tax burden on the local taxpayer for the regional colleges.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Revelstoke-Slocan.

MR. B. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, I just want to speak this afternoon briefly to the aspect of the Bill dealing with regional colleges, and in particular with some of the remarks made here this afternoon by the member for Burnaby North and North Vancouver–Capilano. The member for Burnaby North, the education critic for the Official Opposition, stated that her party doesn't believe that the local taxpayer should be involved at all in the operation of regional colleges, in any aspect of post-secondary education. But as an answer filed to a question which I placed on the Order Paper earlier in the Session, it has already been indicated that of the operating costs of regional colleges, the Provincial Government is paying 60 per cent, the local school districts are paying only 22 per cent, and other sources of revenue such as student fees are accounting for 18 per cent. I would suggest that 22 per cent is a very small price to pay to have a say in the type of course that the local college is going to be providing to the regional area which it is set up to serve.

I repeat these figures which I gave earlier in this Session, that in my particular area, in Selkirk Regional College, the two school districts that I have that are participating in that, pay only one penny of every dollar of operating costs, and in the Revelstoke School District with the Okanagan one, 1.72 cents. We have a course at Selkirk, Aviation Technology, offering the only pilot training east of Ontario, in Canada, and a programme such as that undoubtedly would never have been brought into being as quickly as it was, if it had been

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necessary for a higher level of Government to weigh the pros and cons in the expenses involved with it.

You go and talk to anybody in Ontario that's associated with their colleges, or in the Province of Alberta, and they will tell you that they envy the British Columbia system, because they have no say in the operations of those colleges. They're sitting out in hallways with overflowing classes and everything, and they are not able to introduce courses which fit in with the local needs and requirements because of the fact that those who pay the piper call the tune, and their Provincial Governments are clamping down on them in that respect.

The member for North Vancouver–Capilano expressed the point that he didn't like the fact that apparently these colleges are knocked into, as he called it, the elementary and secondary school system through their connection with school boards. Well, the fact of the matter is that who is in a better position to make sure that the students who are leaving our elementary or our secondary school system are moving on into courses that are of advantage to them and that reflects again the local needs in the area? He seemed to concentrate, in his remarks, on the university-bound students, forgetting that these regional colleges offer technological programmes and now, of course, are being melded with the vocational schools.

There's some good aspects in there. One of them which is going to help to stop competition between these colleges in expensive programmes, and when you have one institution, for example, Selkirk, offering Aviation Technology, you certainly don't want at this stage of this Province's development, every other college in the Province getting into that field. The other point, too, is the fact that with the school board being involved, school members, with the dedication that they have, is the activity, of course, in your night school programme and in adults re-training.

This Province has got a good programme in its college aspect and it's making it better all the time, and it's the envy of elsewhere in Canada.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for North Vancouver–Seymour.

MR. B.A. CLARK: Mr. Speaker, I'm always grateful when the members from the opposite side participate in second reading in Bills of this nature, because it makes me more and more determined to vote against the Bill. Quite obviously the member who has just spoken hasn't read the Bill before him. Because if ever there was a Bill that consolidates the power of decision-making in education in our regional colleges, it's this one.

But, Mr. Speaker, that is not what prompts me to oppose this Bill initially. There is a distinct and sharp difference between our group in this Legislature and the Government on education financing, and let me spell it out very clearly once again, Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of the member from Revelstoke who mentioned 22 per cent. This party stands for the principle that education costs should not be borne by the local taxpayer under any circumstances, at the elementary level, at the high school level, nor at the regional college level, that the local taxpayers should not be contributing to education costs through his land taxes. And this Bill preserves the principle that is opposed to that point of view, because it clearly indicates by what it doesn't say, rather than by what it says, that the regional college is now going to be putting more costs on the local land tax, and despite any assurances of the Minister the Bill makes this quite clear.

Mr. Speaker, for that reason and other reasons that I have mentioned I, for one, cannot support these amendments to the Public Schools Act.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Second Member for Vancouver East.

MR. R.A. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, we've just heard from the honourable member from Revelstoke-Slocan, and it started out something like a Roman candle. The point is, you know, he gave us half of the answer of the Minister of Education, he didn't give us the other half, about 40 per cent being borne by the local people, and that's what we object to, on the capital costs of the regional colleges. We object to that. We object to the 22 per cent, and to talk about taking away the educational cost from local taxpayers, I suggest is unrealistic to some extent. That's the direction we've got to move, and that's where this party agrees with the honourable members on our left. We believe that the place to start is at the higher education level. We believe that there's a clear obligation on the part of the Crown, Provincial and Ottawa, to meet all of the costs of higher education in our Province. And we can't support the Bill on that basis.

Mr. Speaker, there's a taxpayers' revolt going on with respect to education in this Province. It's partly brought about by the system that this Government operates on, but I suggest that the further reason is that there's a gut feeling amongst the population that some of these costs shouldn't be theirs to bear, and amongst these costs are the costs of higher education. So that's why, that's why it's reflecting in the rest of the school system. That's why the kids in Nanaimo are going to have to walk a couple of miles further every day to school. That's why the people in West Vancouver have a fantastic dilemma because of the vote in West Vancouver. That's why there's been a defeated referendum in Creston, Kaslo, Burns Lake, Qualicum, Fort St. John, West Vancouver, Nanaimo. In all of these communities the taxpayers have said no. That's just this year. In fact, the "yes" vote was as low as 28 per cent in West Vancouver, but in some of the communities only a minority, 20 per cent of the people, have spoken out. But that's what's happening, and I suggest that the reason is that you're saddling the local people with the costs of higher education unreasonably, that there's no case at all for the costs of the higher education system to be borne at the local level.

It's always very well for the members on the other side to say, well the reason is we want a local say, and we can agree with a local say, but in the very Bill itself you're taking away the local say. The honourable member can say yes, we want this local initiative to determine what courses are going to be given in our local community college, but there's a section in this Bill that can take that away, the section of this Bill puts it back in the hands of the Minister. It's clear that the Government wants it both ways for themselves, they want the burden of costs to rest on the local area and they want the decision making with respect to curriculum to be made in the office here in Victoria. We say you can't have it both ways, you shouldn't have it both ways, that's why we're voting against the Bill.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Burnaby Edmonds.

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MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, the honourable member at the far corner of the House obviously is quite unaware that autonomy is destroyed by the Bill, because no matter what estimates are drawn up of expenditure and income by the local college district board, they are removed by the provision that says it's all subject to the Department of Education. Well now, the fact of the matter, Mr. Speaker, is a provision in the Bill clearly means that there is a shadow board, a shadow board in Victoria that determines what the budget will be, and no other budget will be approved but the budget they say is the proper one, and for the member to stand up and suggest that somehow they preserve local autonomy when the very essence of local autonomy is destroyed by that section, so that a shadow Minister, a shadow board, is in charge, but in the shade, so it's naive to discuss that on the basis of local autonomy. The second point that is clear is that the curriculum of the district college or the regional college is really subject to an over-all control from the bureaucracy outside the district board. With these two things what have you got left except the right to pay taxes at the local level? We say that if this is the way you're running it then it isn't good enough, the Bill should not be supported.

But there's one ironical twist to this, it makes it topsy-turvy, and that is that this Government and this Minister have gone on record in this House to say that they believe in the field of higher education that the universities should not have to justify their budgets or, indeed, publish their budgets, although the Provincial taxpayer and the Government pay a substantial share of the cost of higher education so far as the university is concerned. And you adopt in this proposal here for the college the principle that they must disclose their budget and all their estimates in detail to the Government, and you go a step further than anyone on this side has ever suggested, you insist that they not only disclose their budget, but you must allow the Department of Education and this Government to decide whether that budget will be approved at all.

Now I've never maintained that we should interfere in the autonomy of those who run our universities, but I have said that when we are voting as much as $80,000,000 to the universities, the least that we in this House should know before that vote is passed, what their budget is and what their estimates are, and that we are not supplied with. But you want to go a step further than even that fair and sensible precaution that does not mean control of the universities — it means knowledge of what they're doing — you want to go beyond the stage of knowledge of their budgets, you want to control them now at the local level, thereby making a mockery out of the idea of local autonomy and the right of real participation in the affairs of the regional college. You're taking that away by this provision in the Bill which says that the Department of Education has the final say on the approval of a budget.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, this Bill is another Mickey Mouse measure by the Department of Education, because….

MR. SPEAKER: One moment, please. I think I'd like the member to not use that phrase. I'm not going to ask you to withdraw it, but I'm going to ask other members not to continue the usage of this phrase. I know it's becoming quite current, but it's not good parliamentary language.

MR. McGEER: Well, Mr. Speaker, I don't know quite how to describe it. Let me say, then, that this creates super high schools, because we're not creating colleges at all. All we're doing is providing for Grades 13 and 14, and that's not my concept of an educational advance. You know, the greatest difficulty that the student leaving high school faces — I'm talking about Grade 12, Mr. Speaker — in going to further his education, whether it's at a university here or elsewhere, is the tremendous transition that that person makes from the high school atmosphere to one with a different outlook, preparing the student for a different outlook, preparing the student for a different role, and Grade 13 doesn't do that. No change, really, between Grade 12 and Grade 13, and there'll be no change really between Grade 13 and Grade 14.

AN HON. MEMBER: What about Selkirk College?

MR. McGEER: Yes, and I think it's time you thought of making that a four year institution. Make it a real challenge. But as long as it's under the Public Schools Act, as long as it's under the Public Schools Act, it's a super high school run by school trustees and your appointees financed by the local ratepayers, as the kindergartens and the primary schools and secondary schools and, Mr. Speaker, this is wrong educationally.

You know, it's quite possible to put up buildings, have people go and spend time inside the buildings, hand them pieces of paper after a prescribed length of time, let them carry around the title of whatever degree you want, but it doesn't mean results will be there, Mr. Speaker, and what we should be striving to achieve for all the money that we spend in education is results, and the Minister isn't bringing us results. His policies aren't bringing results.

But more than that, the Bill is wrong financially. We stated as a policy in our party that we think education is a service to people and not a service to land, and that any new burden of education on the land is a retrograde step. They appear to agree with us in Social Credit Alberta, where the regional colleges are financed 100 per cent by the Provincial Government, as they should be. I'm talking now about the portion not covered through fees and other donations. And, you know, universities aren't financed by local taxation, and I think even the member from Revelstoke-Slocan would be prepared to admit that they have quite a bit of autonomy. Too much, says the member from Delta. He wants to interfere. Well that is fine, but you wouldn't say that it requires local taxpayers' contributions to increase the autonomy, he would admit that. And, Mr. Speaker, I daresay the member from Revelstoke-Slocan would admit they've got local autonomy. He may not approve of the autonomy, but he'll admit they have it. So there's absolutely no relationship at all between the idea of local taxation and the idea of autonomy.

Really, what we're doing with this Bill is we're introducing discrimination, educational discrimination, into the Province as deliberate Government policy, because we are breeding inequality, a regional inequality. We're misleading the people, Mr. Speaker, I would submit, by leaving with them the idea that Grades 13 and 14 constitute in some way a college, which they don't in any way, it's merely prolonging high school, and they are paying through the nose for it. They are not getting what residents of areas that are

[ Page 713 ]

fortunate enough to have a university are getting, and the residents of those areas, of course, not needing to finance to the same degree Grades 13 and 14, because universities are available, will pay lower local property taxation, and, Mr. Speaker, it's all wrong.

I agree with the member from Cowichan-Malahat that we can produce a far superior educational system to what we have in British Columbia at a lower cost. In order to do that, we are going to have to bring much more intellectual discipline into our system than we have today. We are going to have to plan it on a total basis so that we distribute that educational system all over the Province. We are going to have to bring in people to British Columbia with a different concept of what regional colleges are. They have to have a completely independent system for regional colleges under their own Act with their own faculties, with their own advisory councils, with good co-ordination with the universities of our Province, and not necessarily that much co-ordination with our high schools. And the lion's share of the financial burden must be borne by the Provincial Government.

This is an educational policy for today, not an educational policy for yesterday, and I would suggest that the Minister withdraw this Bill and introduce next Session something that is more suited to our times.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Kootenay.

MR. L.T. NIMSICK: Mr. Speaker, we hear a great deal in this Province, you know, about the great progress that British Columbia has made in the last 17 years, but this Bill is really a retrograde step. It's a step back instead of a step ahead, and the whole idea that the Department of Education has in regard to regional colleges and the financing of them is a backward step, because years ago, before this Government came to power, it was an accepted fact that higher education was the responsibility of the Provincial Government. It was accepted, and the expenditures were made on that basis, and since this Government got into power there has been one step after another where they have foisted costs of different things onto the local level. When there was a suggestion that we should have regional colleges, I doubt very much whether this Government accepted so much the necessity of regional colleges as they accepted it to foist a further expense onto the local people.

Because this Government, while they claim to be out of debt, they have made every effort, any time there was any spending of money, to try and put it on the local level. This starts out by the U.B.C., the Victoria University, and Simon Fraser University. If you believe in the concept that you are proposing in regional colleges, why don't you bring a Bill in that these universities also be financed on local taxpayers' money? Why don't you do it? If you think that this is proper in regard to regional colleges, then why isn't it just as proper in Victoria and Vancouver? What difference is it? Because the higher education that these people get in the regional colleges, or supposed to get, are comparative to the first two years at the university. When Victoria was a college, the local taxpayers didn't have to raise the money to operate that college, and then they raised it to the status of a university and they still don't have to contribute to the university. It is the Provincial Government, the taxpayer throughout the whole Province that contributes to the operation of the university, and I agree with this. I think this is proper.

But if you are going to go into regional colleges to assist the universities due to their overcrowding, and if you are going to have regional colleges throughout this Province, they must be all part and parcel of the higher educational system in the Province, not run by little groups here and there, but they must come under the over-all picture of the university and higher education, the regional colleges. So that a student that goes two years to a regional college should be accepted into a university for the third year, and this to me is the proper way of looking at the regional college system.

The big problem, ever since you adopted the regional college idea, has been the financial problem. This is the reason all the battles have been throughout the Province, over the regional financing of colleges, higher education, because it remains definitely the responsibility of the Provincial Government. I don't think that the people in the areas in the interior of British Columbia would be worried if the Provincial Government took the whole expense, any more than the people of Vancouver are worried when the Provincial Government takes the expense of operating the University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University and the Victoria University.

We are all taxpayers in the Province, and if we are going to pay for higher education, then let's put it into the one pot and take it out of the one pot, not on a restricted basis or discriminatory basis, but on a basis for the whole Province. There is no question about it but this is the policy that you should go ahead with, and the responsibility of setting up regional colleges should be the Provincial Government's responsibility, and not just say to the rural areas that they should foot the bill for the regional colleges for the first two years, but the people in Vancouver and Victoria have the preference. I again say that it should be all one over-all scheme in higher education so that wherever a person goes, whether it is to the regional college or the university, the educational system should be synonymous so that it wouldn't matter where they went they would be accepted in any of the other places at the proper time.

I think that to try and pass the load onto the regional areas and the local taxpayers is just another method of this Government that they have adopted all down the line to pass extra cost on the local level. The same as you did in the case of doubling the amount for social welfare, the regional hospitals, and all this, you passed it on to the property owners, so that they would have to keep financing these, and that's why you set up the regional districts — it's all a pattern. It was as plain when it started as it is today, and I said at that time that this was a pattern that you were following. You were leading the people, and you made a good case for these regional things to the people to sell them on it, but the real idea was for the Provincial Government to escape the costs in this regard. And I say, Mr. Speaker, that this Bill should be opposed at every level.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Delta.

MR. R. WENMAN: Mr. Speaker, speaking briefly to this Bill, I would like to comment first on who receives the benefit of education. I think that the first of the largest benefits of education to our society relates to the society in general, and because that benefit is due to the results of what goes on at these regional colleges, benefits firstly and most importantly the whole society. We have found that where societies are well educated we have higher standards of living, and so it is in the interest and, I believe, the responsibility of the Province to share, certainly to the greatest extent, in the

[ Page 714 ]

cost of regional colleges.

But I think it should be pointed out that there is also a great benefit to the individual regional district where the college is located, there are benefits, be they cultural benefits, academic benefits, and in fact economic benefits, as well. Therefore, if they are going to have these economic benefits, these cultural benefits, and these academic benefits, the community should be willing and be prepared to share a portion of the cost.

The third area of benefit is to the individual student, because this individual will be helped to develop a full life and will be helped to be developed to the maximum of his capacity. Through the regional college set-up we are going to keep more students in school longer and provide more and more opportunities for more and more young people in our Province, and increase in their standard of education, and I think this is good. But let us remember, while the community will benefit, probably the one who will benefit the most is the individual student who receives the education, and I am sure everyone in this Assembly would be in agreement with that point. So I would say that I think there should be a cost-sharing, and it should be shared and the students should pay fees at our regional colleges and at our universities because they, in turn, will receive the maximum of the most benefit from this education. I think also that the community in general — we have talked constantly about community involvement in our regional colleges and our schools, and I think that it is important that they be involved — and certainly the most important way of involving a person is by making a direct taxation on him or a just usage of his money. So to promote this involvement, a direct taxation or a direct cost-sharing, I think, will be beneficial.

One final point on the Bill, while I can support it certainly in principle, because I agree that there should be local sharing and I think, as a matter of fact, the cost-sharing principles in this Bill are most generous, not the other way around. I think one other point that needs to be looked at here, relating further in the Bill, to providing teachers with incentives. If they can possibly attend they should do so, because I think it is very easy to abuse the privilege of sick leave, but if we take it to the point of saying after 250 days you can't accumulate any more, everybody is going to go to the point of 249, or many will, and then they'll just continue taking those sick days because there's no point in saving them anyway, you can't accumulate them. I think we should allow them to accumulate as many days as they can and as they will. This incentive might be further passed on in the reward of sabbatical leave relating to the amount of days that they acquired.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for New Westminster.

MR. D.G. COCKE: I have to be very careful, Mr. Speaker, because I have just heard a condemnation, really, of the Bill more than anything, because the previous speaker brought many points to my attention that I just couldn't help but disagree with.

I think this Government has had an opportunity, a real opportunity to move in the right direction, and they haven't taken advantage of that opportunity, Mr. Speaker. You know, it's pay as little as possible but call the shot, pay as little as possible but call the shot. I think this is the thing that we're talking about here this afternoon, Mr. Speaker, and this Bill is, I think, really a focus on it. What an opportunity! What an opportunity! But you've missed again. You've missed the opportunity and you'll go on missing your opportunities as long as you have that kind of an attitude, waving around.

Mr. Speaker, it's he who benefits, you know, who receives the benefit, and so on, the last speaker was saying. The whole society, it's a great benefit. If the whole society in British Columbia is receiving this benefit, let the whole society of British Columbia begin in this area of financing higher education. That's who should be doing it. And that's precisely what we should be doing, not this 60-40 or 22 per cent or 1.7. Get in there, call the shot if you will, but pay for it, Mr. Speaker.

You know, the student is helped for life, and this student may go to Angora for all we know. That's not the point. The fact of the matter is the student is a citizen of this Province, and for too long now we have had this business of a concentration of taxing in particular areas, and I don't really agree with one speaker who said that Vancouver is getting off completely, because we've got regional colleges in our general area. But just remember this one thing on regional colleges, Mr. Speaker, you've had a capital cost gift, mainly the regional colleges are operated in the schools and that's been a great gift to you. Now isn't that enough? Isn't that enough? I believe that we should get on the right track, Mr. Speaker, and for heaven's sake go in, you know, whole hog.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Minister will close the debate.

HON. D.L. BROTHERS: Mr. Speaker, we are very proud of the college system in the Province of British Columbia. When the members of the Opposition say it is moving slowly I don't think that they are cognizant of the facts. The facts are that recently, in the last few years, we have brought six colleges into being. This coming fall we will have two more colleges coming into being, one in the Fraser Valley, and most of the members over there must be aware of this college, the Douglas College. It will start off with a student population of around 1,500. We also have a college starting up in Kamloops. Well, how can you say that the public aren't supporting these colleges? We also are contemplating a regional college here in the lower Vancouver Island. We're negotiating right now with the Victoria School Board, so that within a period of five to six years from the point of having no colleges in the Province now we'll have ten colleges.

I don't think that the member for North Vancouver–Capilano is really aware of the intent of these colleges. These colleges are not to be a stepping stone to the university, necessarily. We are hopeful that these colleges will be about 50 per cent academic students and 50 per cent technical students. As a matter of fact, if the universities have any failing at all, it is because everybody seems to have the university syndrome, that son or daughter must go to university because they went to university. What we need in British Columbia is more people who have vocational training and technical training. There are lots of jobs for people that have these skills and abilities. And this is what the regional colleges are designed to do, so that if you are not doing well in the college in the academic section you can transfer over into the vocational-technical section, which you cannot do in the universities, and this saves a lot of people from becoming drop-outs.

Now regarding the member, I think it was from Kootenay, who was talking about the difficulty students have

[ Page 715 ]

in transferring from course to course or from university to college or vice versa, we have found, naturally, when we had only one university in the Province, the University of British Columbia, it was very easy to prepare courses, when you are going through the public school system, to line them up with university courses. But with the advent of many colleges who want to go their own way and do their own thing, and have their own courses, naturally you are going to run into some difficulties. Naturally Vancouver City College ran into some difficulties with Simon Fraser, because they had different types of courses, different types of French, for example, whether it was the one method or the all method, it was naturally going to have some difficulties. But over the years, through the Academic Board, many of these confusing difficulties have been straightened out, and I think that you just have to take a look at a study done on the Selkirk students, and the students coming out of the Selkirk College, and incidentally the leader of the Liberal party, the students in that area are going to be pretty annoyed to find that you are calling them glorified high school students. They are pretty proud of being members of the Selkirk College.

Regarding the financing of these colleges, if you look at the Bill you will find one of the purposes of one of the sections is to allow the local school boards to have the most number of members on the college council so that they will have local control of the school boards, and they will have the right to set the direction of where the colleges are going.

Incidentally, we went to California to look at the method of financing colleges because this is really the birthplace of regional colleges and district colleges was in California, and in California in some cases, the local taxpayers have to pay as much as 85 per cent of the operation of the college and the State only pays 15 per cent. When I came back from California I recommended to the Government that we change the finance formula, and now the Government is paying the lion's share of the operational costs of these colleges. I'd like to now move that the Bill be now read a second time, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it.

The motion was agreed to on the following division:-

YEAS — 36

Messieurs

NAYS — 16

Messieurs

PAIR:

Messieurs

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 69, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Regional Hospital Districts Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Bill No. 69. The Honourable the Member for Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, I'm going to defer my remarks on this to the committee stage, and I believe another member is speaking on it.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 70, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 70, An Act to Amend the Elderly Citizens' Housing Aid Act. The Honourable the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, very briefly, we are opposed to this Bill increasing to 15 per cent the cost in respect of boarding homes, low rental housing units. We think this is a dangerous precedent. At a time of inflation in Canada, at a time of high cost money, there should be a move by the Provincial Government to break loose of its surplus fund to create employment and to create housing both at the same time. We feel it's essential for the Provincial Government, in the absence of positive leadership from Ottawa, to give a new approach to housing in British Columbia, to give some relief to the unemployment here in British Columbia, and take a direction in policies that will go contrary to the inflationary attitudes of the Federal Government.

Mr. Speaker, it's hardly worth comment that the Premier attacks Ottawa for tight money, and creates situations that only add to that tight money by asking the communities to pay a greater share for housing that should be provided by the Provincial Government. There is a serious shortage of all kinds of housing, and to add to the cost of boarding home units and self-contained low rental units is not proper. The 10 per cent on the low rental, self-contained units will remain the same, but the 15 per cent on the boarding homes is a prohibitive addition to the development of this programme. I suggest to the Premier, rather than prohibit Provincial initiative, if we really are against what Ottawa is doing in its

[ Page 716 ]

anti-inflationary policies, that we demonstrate that in our legislation, and that's not being demonstrated in this Bill here today.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable Second Member for Vancouver East.

MR. R.A. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, what we need is legislation that clearly puts the responsibility for initiation on the Provincial Government. What we need is some initiative on the Government's side in providing housing that is needed in the Province, and that it shouldn't rely, it shouldn't rely on service clubs and a few do-gooder organizations to get the ball rolling. The initiative must come from the Crown, because there is a tremendous need in all areas of housing within the Province, and it can't be met by small groups around the Province occasionally seeing the need.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it.

The motion was agreed to on the following division:-

YEAS — 42

Messieurs

NAYS — 12

Messieurs

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 63, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Pollution Control Act, 1967)

MR. SPEAKER: Adjourned debate on the second reading of Bill No. 63. The Honourable the Member for Surrey.

MR. E. HALL: Mr. Speaker, this Bill before us — maybe I should wait until everybody leaves — has been the subject of some debate in the House. I think every member that spoke in the Throne Speech debate and in the Budget Speech debate dealt with pollution. During the estimates of the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water Resources, by ruling and by desire most speakers did not deal very much with the question of pollution other than a passing reference.

This Bill, Mr. Speaker, seeks to do in a not exactly acceptable way that which this side attempted to do by amendment on a number of occasions. I remember introducing myself, Mr. Speaker, a number of amendments to start the Government up the road to control air pollution. Those amendments were not accepted, and I think the passage of time has made the problem of clearing our problems up that much worse.

However, now we have the Bill in front of us. The principle of the Bill is again varied. It deals first of all with the question of air pollution, Mr. Speaker, deals with the powers of the Director, and also takes into the Director's sphere of control some actions which were previously held in the Department of Health. No question in my mind but the fact that air pollution has become one of our number one problems, and because of that, Mr. Speaker, we are going to support this Bill. We still feel that the onus of responsibility is not in the right place. We still feel that, as is traditional with the Government opposite to us, they are shifting responsibilities to other areas that are badly equipped to handle them. Other speakers will no doubt comment on the problems in their own areas, problems of policing these laws.

In my own area, Mr. Speaker, we have passed already a municipal by-law regarding air pollution, but because of the money situation in the country, the municipality of Surrey can't afford to buy the actual equipment required to do the work that's required by this Government, either by the press releases by the Minister of Health or, in fact, now by this legislation.

But leaving that alone for the moment, Mr. Speaker, I do want to pass some comments on that section of the Bill and the principle of the Bill that takes into account duties which were hitherto dealt with the Department of Health, and here I think we see, once again, the weakening of the Department of Health and the Minister of Health's position on pollution which has, from time to time in this House, occasioned not only some anger from this side of the House but, of course, the odd facetious comment. You will remember, Mr. Speaker, the remarks in a couple of Sessions ago that related to the shooting of the Minister of Health's horse when he was charging along the road of pollution control, and here we see another bullet in that war in that committee of three that appeared to be scrapping for the total responsibility.

I don't know but what this Bill may eventually produce that which members of the House have asked for, that is one man in charge of the whole of the pollution control business. We've heard the Premier and the Minister say that things are well in this system of ministerial responsibility — Minister of Health, Minister of Lands and Forests, Minister of Municipal Affairs. There seems to me that we are seeing the gradual erosion, and that the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water Resources is definitely winning the fight, definitely winning the fight.

There is one point that I want the Minister to perhaps answer now before committee, and that is the principle of the Bill that deals with the whole question of allowing a permit, or providing a permit to somebody who wants to discharge waste, effluent, etc., etc. It seems to me, Mr. Minister, that the possession of that permit in this new Act is a complete and total defence to any action that may be taken

[ Page 717 ]

by any interested party, and in fact I think, stretching it further, by the Government itself.

As I read the Act, it seems to me that now we've changed the onus on reporting rather than application, that the simple possession, the simple possession of the permit is a complete defence to any further action. In short, that while the section that deals with the permits makes it an offence to pollute without a permit, it is not an offence under the Act once you have got a permit to violate the conditions of the permit. In other words, once you've got a permit, Mr. Speaker, you can violate the conditions of the permit at your pleasure, and if a charge is laid, the ownership, the possession of that permit is a complete defence. And depending on the Minister's reply, I will put an amendment on the Order Paper to alter that particular principle of the Bill.

I think it's serious, because we remember two years ago when we had an amendment to this Bill, the Pollution Control Act, we left out, I think I'm right in saying, we left out some of the penalty section, and whilst I don't want to make the Minister responsible for drafting errors and so on, I do feel that the principle contained in giving a person a permit and then allowing him to do that which he wants appears to be a bad one, and I think some amendment is required.

The Act, Mr. Speaker, definitely widens the control, the observation, the research, the investigation into pollution, and of course that's welcomed, long overdue but welcome. It doesn't however, in my view, deal with the very important question that would be contained in the event that we take positive action as a community, as an industry, etc. Into the whole business of oil exploration and so on.

On Friday last, Mr. Speaker, and I hope you will guide me as far as order is concerned here, we heard the Minister of Mines say that he felt that the Government was taking a view that development of resources could carry on at the same time. A multi-use philosophy was expressed by the Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources. We see no evidence, Mr. Speaker, in the past that this multi-resource development philosophy can work, is even understood by the Cabinet opposite, and when he went on to say that there's no interest in oil exploration, I felt that he was doing less than justice to the facts.

It's been my information, for instance, Mr. Speaker, that we should be looking at this question very seriously, at pollution from such a development, because Canadian Pacific Oil and Gas have this weekend asked for delivery of six electrically operated undersea boats to be delivered to Vancouver, and if that doesn't indicate to me that this industry is interested in taking advantage of the thousands and thousands of acres by permits that have been given ever since the member for Chilliwack was the Minister of Mines, if that doesn't indicate, Mr. Speaker, that the industry is interested, notwithstanding the remarks of the Minister on Friday afternoon, nothing does. For a company to order and receive at some future date from General Dynamics six underwater electrically operated submarines, if that's the correct word — I suppose submarines are something of an exaggeration, let's call them boats, underwater boats — shows to me that this industry is indeed interested in these permits which start, Mr. Speaker, way back in 1957. Whilst there's thousands of acres that have been given to these companies Provincially, there are also thousands of acres being given Federally.

I think that when we are talking about pollution we should have this thing uppermost in our minds, and I think that the exploration that is going on, the fact that sixteen holes have been drilled and are found to be not as fruitful as they would require, still leaves two holes unaccounted for, Mr. Speaker, in oil drilling in this part of the world. And right now I can tell the House that there's a very great interest in Permit No. 1513 which was given, Mr. Speaker, to drill around Hornby Island.

I think the House should be very interested, and should not take on face value that which was indicated on Friday, that there's no interest because the Minister isn't receiving a multitude of phone calls and a multitude of letters. When you've plastered the map, Mr. Speaker, with permits, you don't need any more applications, you don't need any more applications. I certainly feel that the correspondence I've got from Gulf Oil and others indicate that we should be very concerned about the whole question of this particular industry and its presence in our coastal waters.

I suppose that every member in this House, Mr. Speaker, has a file under the sub-heading or under the general heading of the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water Resources, entitled Pollution. I suppose every member of this House has got the letters from the various ratepayers groups, whether it be complaining about a development that's going to put raw sewage into the Gulf Islands, complaints about Utah Mines, complaints of every sort and shape and size, and it's obvious that legislation is only part of the answer, only part of the answer. I think we should take another look at one of the statements that was made again by a Minister vitally concerned in this, namely the Minister of Recreation.

I think it's fair to say, Mr. Speaker, that no legislation such as the Pollution Control Act before us today can do the job that I think every member in the House really wants to do about pollution. There has to be a prior step, Mr. Speaker. The prior step is simply to get a sheet of paper, financial paper, if necessary, that the Minister of Finance knows only too well, and head the paper with the name of the project that's up for discussion, whether it be Utah Mines, whether it be the Elk Valley coal mining, whether it be the Utah Mine Development, whether it be a sub-division on the Gulf Islands, whatever the question before us is. We should put on one side of that piece of paper the benefits that are going to accrue to society in the Province of British Columbia, and on the other side of the piece of paper, Mr. Speaker, we should put on the costs that are going to accrue to the whole of the society of British Columbia.

I think it's fair to say that in case after case after case, if we were putting into that piece of paper the intangible cost, the real cost, the loss of recreation, the spoiling of natural resources in terms of pleasure, bird life, swimming, vacations, leisure time, and all those things that the House only knows too well, we'd find out that a cost-benefit analysis like that, which would then be called social cost accounting, would indicate to this Government that they should say no to some projects, and I think we know what some of those projects are. Pulp mills in the Okanagan. I'm one who firmly believes that Utah Mines should not be allowed to go ahead yet. I'm one that believes that the Elk Valley should not be allowed to be plundered in the way the proposal indicates at this time.

So unless you've got a Government that's involved in social cost accounting in terms of development and use of its resource, the legislation really becomes somewhat meaningless, because the legislation then is just a series of events to take place, the damage that's going to happen once you've failed to do your social cost accounting. So in short, it's not

[ Page 718 ]

just a question of laws — the Attorney-General and his Department, Pollution Control Department, the Health Department, and so on — it's a question of desire, it's a question of looking into the future.

Whilst we can all make the speeches that we made in the Throne Speech debate and in the Budget Speech debate about certain individual questions of pollution, and that would take us ages and ages, Mr. Speaker, and I've no intention of going into that kind of debate, but I want to get across the point to the Government, as indeed indicated in a way only by one Cabinet Minister to date, namely the Minister of Recreation and Conservation, that we are coming to the stage when we are going to have to say, "No." As yet we have not said "No," and I think the House must dwell for some considerable length of time on that proposition.

Mr. Speaker, the powers of the Director, of course, will be dealt with in committee, the efficacy of the law will be dealt with in committee, section by section, but I don't think we can do justice to today or to the future, and to use all the clichés that this House has heard of in years gone by, to the unborn generations. I don't think we can do justice to that until we are prepared to get out a piece of paper with the fine ruled lines and call it social cost accounting. Somebody over there has to have the strength to say "No." Somebody over there. has to have the strength to say to one of the big boys, whether it be C.P., Kaiser, Utah, no matter who, "The answer is no, my friend. The answer is no, my friend." Until. that's done, it doesn't matter how many laws we pass entitled An Act to Amend the Pollution Control Act, they will not be sufficient. I think really, Mr. Speaker, in bending the rules a little today, I've said really what should be said about any Pollution Control Act that's before us, and I thank you for allowing me to do that. We're going to support the Bill because we believe it does strengthen the legislation, but I think without such a statement of policy we're only really dotting the i's and crossing the t's.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for North Vancouver–Capilano.

MR. D.M. BROUSSON: Mr. Speaker, this Bill, like so many that come forward from the Government, is one that we welcome in very large measure and yet one that also disappoints us. It does, as we've asked, bring land and air pollution into the same Act, and really for the very first time recognizes by law that there is land and air pollution in British Columbia, and it recognizes that we do actually have contaminants on our land and air.

As an aside, Mr. Speaker, I can't help questioning the definition of contaminant. I remember three basic states of matter — gaseous, liquid and solid — and I see in this Act we have an odorous state. I'm wondering if this is the fourth state of matter that we haven't heard of before.

Mr. Speaker, this Act does now, as we have asked, bring control of sewage into the Pollution Control Act. So these are good things. But, Mr. Speaker, the policy still is to issue permits to pollute, and the whole effectiveness of this Bill is going to depend on the regulations that are set up by the Minister, the Board, the Director, and the interpretation given those regulations and, most important, the enforcement given the regulations. The Bill therefore has nothing new in this regard.

People of British Columbia have certainly a good deal of respect for the Minister responsible for the administration of this Bill. As the Minister of Forests, he's proven his ability to cut down trees and get that job done well, but again and again we come back to the same point, how can the same Minister who is responsible for the health and well-being of some of B.C.'s greatest industrial empires, also be the effective control on how well these industries treat their environment, their environment that belongs not to the Government, not to the industries, but to the people of British Columbia? How can the same man be the judge, the prosecutor, and the defence lawyer?

Every side of this House has called on the Government for a Department of Environmental Management. What a difference in approach this would make. This Bill talks about pollution. In other words, the approach becomes, for industry, and on the record to date for this Minister and this Government — how much pollution can I get away with? And so far they've been getting away with it. Wouldn't a better approach, a more positive approach, come from a Department of Environmental Management, which would think of the total environment, which would consider the atmosphere, the wildlife, the natural surroundings, whose first responsibility would be to look at each problem as the ecologist does, who would ask how can I improve or maintain the quality of our environment, not how much pollution can I get away with?

Mr. Speaker, I look with envy at Bill No. 52 that's presently before the Legislature in Alberta, and I would like to tell this House about Bill No. 52 from Alberta. It's called An Act Respecting Environment Conservation, and it sets up an Environment Conservation Authority with these objectives, "The following are matters pertaining to environment conservation: (1) The conservation, management and utilization of natural resources. (2) The prevention and control of pollution of natural resources. (3) The control of noise levels. (4) Any operations that adversely affect the quality or quantity of any natural resource or that destroy, disturb, pollute, alter or make use of a natural resource, and (5) The preservation of natural resources for their aesthetic value."

Those are very high objectives and they are objectives that we are not providing in this Bill which says, how much pollution can I get away with in British Columbia? Every side of this House has supported our call for such a Department, but the Government has refused it. However, Mr. Speaker, at least to an extent, some of these effective areas are now being pulled together into one control centre.

We believe there will still be a major problem existing, but surely, Mr. Speaker, because this Minister is so busy, because he has these dual responsibilities that conflict with each other, these conflicts of interest, if the Government will not set up this new Department, perhaps at least the Minister would turn his responsibility over to the Minister of Conservation who theoretically, at least, already has a considerable responsibility to stand up for the rights of the natural surroundings. Here, at least, there should be no conflict of interest, and a strong Minister of Conservation could fight for the conservation and improvement of our environment, and the question would no longer be, how much pollution can I get away with?

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Richmond.

MR. E. LeCOURS: Mr. Speaker, I don't intend to take a lot of time this afternoon, but I do want to bring a few points to the attention of the Minister. I feel that, generally

[ Page 719 ]

speaking, our pollution control legislation is good, and perhaps as good as any in Canada. However, I do feel that there is something lacking in the enforcement of this legislation, and this is the point that I want to deal with.

Now obviously, no one can expect that the Minister or any Ministers of Government are going to go out and investigate any applications for licences to pollute, which a member just mentioned. However, they do have officials that they are expected to rely upon, and I have said in the past, and I repeat, that I think the advice they have been receiving from these officials has not been proper. I think these officials have let the public down in providing either wrong information, or not looking into the situation sufficiently.

I want to refer particularly today to the Iona Island situation, the Iona Treatment Plant, because this treatment plant is now polluting Lulu Island, and Sea Island, the two islands which make up Richmond municipality, and polluting all the foreshore along there, which is known as Sturgeon Bank.

Now just to give you some of the history, I want to run over quickly some of the information I have here, contained in a report from the municipality, concerning Iona Island. In 1957 the Greater Vancouver Sewer Board applied to the Pollution Control Board for a permit to discharge some sewage effluent from the City of Vancouver, from the Iona Treatment Plant, primary treatment plant which by-passes into a trench across Sturgeon Bank. On receiving notice of the public hearing called by the Pollution Control Board, the municipality protested, and appeared and strenuously opposed the application, and as said in this report, largely on the grounds that the method of discharge by open channel was highly objectionable.

As the Rawn Report at page 156 stated, the effluent channel would be designed to control the flow during periods of low tide, when little or no dilution is available on Sturgeon Bank, and all they did, Mr. Speaker, was dig a trench out there, alongside of the treatment plant, and then run the effluent right into this trench. Of course, at low tide this effluent spreads throughout the area, and covers miles of Sturgeon Bank and pollutes it to a very serious degree. The stench around there, particularly in the summer time at low tide, is unbearable, and these are areas which had been used as public beaches by the people of Richmond and other people who had need for public beaches in the summer months.

I think that the trouble in this case was both the Pollution Control Board, and the Cabinet, and the people they obtained who provided them with information. A gentleman by the name of Rawn who prepared a report some 25 years or so ago on the disposal of sewage in the Greater Vancouver Area, and there are other people along with Mr. Rawn, Dr Tulley, and Dr. Hyde, who also gave evidence at the hearings which were held with respect to the Iona Disposal Plant These people obviously were hired, I haven't been able to find out exactly, but obviously they were hired by the City of Vancouver to present their side of the story. That's what they were being paid for, that's what they did. They presented a picture that it would be advantageous to the City of Vancouver, without any concern at all for the neighbouring communities such as Richmond.

AN HON. MEMBER: Dr. Tulley?

MR. LeCOURS: Dr. Tulley, yes.

AN HON. MEMBER: I think he was employed by the Water Department of the City.

MR. LeCOURS: Well, he may have been, he may have been a Federal or Provincial Government employee, I haven't been able to find out exactly what his position was. But I want to run over some of the evidence that was given at the hearing, and here is one referring to cross-examination of Mr. Rawn on page 173, line 28, to page 174.

QUESTION: "I wonder if you could tell us a little more about the experience which you have had in these trenches as part of an outfall system." (This is a trench they were proposing to put out there adjoining the outfall.) And Mr. Rawn's reply, "I have never had any."

QUESTION: "Is this proposed trench, then, the first that you had experience with?" And his answer was, "This is an unique situation. It is designed to meet the conditions which we found there, and the conditions which we found there were that they didn't give a damn about Richmond. Those were the conditions. They were enforcing their will on the people of Richmond and they didn't care what Richmond thought about it."

QUESTION: "I gather, then, the solution in other coastal cities for reasons which I think you touched on earlier, is to pipe it out to deep water." And Mr. Rawn replied, "Yes, as a rule that is the answer."

This, Mr. Speaker, is what I have recommended in this House before, and which I hope the Government will eventually insist upon for the disposal of effluent from Iona and from many other similar areas, because unless we pipe it out to deep water, we are going to have a real problem with pollution of the shoreline.

A further question, "Has there ever been, to your knowledge, any suggestions for constructing this sort of trench in any other community?" And Mr. Rawn replied, "Not to my knowledge."

So although there is no previous experience for this, and although it was pointed out by Richmond municipality that this would be objectionable, they went along with it. The Pollution Control Board went along with it, and eventually the Cabinet went along with it by issuing an Order-in-Council agreeing to the issuing of the permit.

Now this cross-examination here, further on again of Dr. Hyde. I can't identify Dr. Hyde other than to the fact that he was testifying on behalf of the City of Vancouver, and the question is this, "What, in your opinion, is the function of this channel? We spent considerable time about this channel, and I take it from you that it apparently has no function at all." And listen to this for an answer, and it is from one of their witnesses. Dr. Hyde replied, "As I say, I may be a heretic, but I think it isn't worth the money it costs. A channel is absolutely useless. It does nothing to prevent pollution of the area. "

There is further cross-examination here of Dr. Tulley and I would ask you to note how much time Dr. Tulley, or anybody else, spent in studying the situation. It says, Dr. Tulley was asked to comment on the effect of a pipe outfall beyond the edge of Sturgeon Bank. This he was reluctant to do on such short notice. He was subsequently excused as a witness to consider the question. Here is the key sentence. A little later the same afternoon — you can imagine how much study was done — he returned with some rough sketches, and testified that a pipe would produce younger and more dilute effluent at the point of outfall, which is quite logical. The

[ Page 720 ]

pipe would have to go out two or three miles perhaps, but I want you to note now, after knowing that this was the same afternoon and how much study could have been made of the situation in the meantime, I want you to note now what he says.

QUESTION: "Doctor, you have heard testimony here today that a great deal of thought, apparently, has gone into whether or not a pipe could be put in instead of a channel. Have you ever been asked to make this appraisal before today?" And the answer was, "Not in this detail, not in this detail. We have discussed the point." And the question,"And this, you describe as a detailed," and is broken off there, and he says, "It is rather a more detailed." And the detailed meant simply a couple of hours of examining the situation.

This is a detail of the study that they went into, and it is quite obvious, Mr. Speaker, that these people had no concern for people in the surrounding communities. They were only out to satisfy the needs of the City of Vancouver, which was to rid their beaches of pollution and pass them onto someone else, and I think that this is one way in which we will perpetuate pollution rather than overcome it. It says here, obviously English Bay and Spanish Banks were being cleaned up at the expense of Iona Beach, which the witness frankly admitted he had never even considered as a recreation area, because he didn't know that this was the area being used by the people of Richmond.

On April 2, 1958, the Pollution Control Board granted the Greater Vancouver Sewage and Drainage District, Permit No. 23. Now, of course, Richmond was unhappy about this, put up a very strong fight against it, and on April 23rd, the municipality appealed the granting of Permit No. 23 to the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. The appeal was heard on June 9th, 1958, and further written submissions were submitted subsequently. As a result, Order-in-Council No. 2167 was passed in which Permit No. 23 was amended by adding a few conditions, and I think these conditions are important, Mr. Speaker, and I think that this is where we fall down in enforcing the things that we set down in our pollution control legislation.

One of the conditions that they impose is that the plant be adequate in design and appropriately landscaped to prevent impairment of the recreation amenities of Iona Island and Iona Beach. Well, that was quite satisfactory as far as the plant itself was concerned. Another one was that there be no public nuisance by offensive odours from the treatment plant and works, and in this one we fall down very badly, Mr. Speaker. Because the odour, within a mile or two of there, is unbearable on warm summer days at low tide, and that must certainly be considered offensive.

Another condition was that the Greater Vancouver Sewage and Drainage District shall — and this is where I hope the Minister will step in, if required by the Pollution Control Board, and I hope the Pollution Control Board will be more concerned about Richmond than they have been in the past — rectify its method of operation, alter its plant, or otherwise revise its procedures, where necessary, to carry out the intentions and purpose of disposing of sewage in a manner to permit use by the public of the beaches and recreational areas mentioned above. As I say, in order for this to come true, it will be necessary for the Minister to bring to the attention of the Pollution Control Board the need for closer control on Iona Disposal Plant.

I have brought along a couple of samples here, Mr. Speaker, which I want to send down to the Minister that he might see what goes through, and this is what goes through at the best tides. This sample was taken about a month ago, I took it myself one weekend when I was home after a long, dry period when there was no flow through the overflow. When there is a rain, everything goes through the by-pass and goes directly into the channel without going through the plant, because the plant can't handle it when there has been a lot of rain. As a result, this is a very favourable sample. I took it during a dry period and you will see how much stuff goes through it, at that, and you can imagine with this taken at random at the outfall, you can see what would happen to the surrounding area in a very short time. I have another little sample here showing some of the ghuk on the shoreline over half a mile from the outfall. I am not sending these down to embarrass the Minister, but I want him to see for himself what they are pouring on the shore of Richmond, and what must stop if we are going to stop this unnecessary pollution of our beaches. Would you take these down to the Minister please, to Mr. Williston.

Now in the fall of 1969, just last fall, a group of interested citizens of Richmond went down, at the instigation of the Richmond Anti-Pollution Association, and after three-tenths of an inch of rain they noticed the things that were going through and coming out of that outfall. I don't dare tell you about them here, I assure you, but it is incredible that we should allow this. When the by-pass is being used, there is a screen, a one and a quarter inch screen, and anything smaller than an inch and a quarter goes through, and there are some pretty unsightly things that go through there.

But in the fall of 1969, a group of citizens went down there to examine the situation, and reported back to City Council, and the Chairman of the Municipal Health Committee went into the matter, and they made a report to the municipality. It's about 15 lines, and I would like to read it, and I'll end my remarks there.

"Your Health Committee met on the Thursday, November 27, 1969, and discussed the matter of pollution at Iona Island and Sturgeon Bank by the Iona Treatment Plant. The present coloform, count, general turbidity, and sludge accumulation would appear to be in excess of that authorized by the permit relating to the above plant.

"It is noted that legal action can be taken provided that damages could be established, but it was felt by the Committee that the first step would be to register a strong protest to the Pollution Control Board of British Columbia, and ask this Board to require the Greater Vancouver Sewage and Drainage District to improve the operation of the Iona Treatment Plant to ensure that it meets the standards prescribed in the permit, and also to express to the Pollution Control Board concern lest the same errors be repeated at the proposed Annacis Island Plant."

This, I implore you, Mr. Minister, must not happen. Iona must be at least a secondary treatment plant and Annacis Island must be at least a secondary treatment plant, if we are going to have any relief from this degradation of the Fraser River and the area surrounding Richmond.

To conclude the last few lines of the report of the Health Committee, "Your Committee also recommends that any further action should depend upon the results achieved by the Pollution Control Board." As I said, I have been disappointed with the Pollution Control Board, I was disappointed with the former Director of Pollution Control. I hope the present Director is an improvement. I hope the Pollution Control Board has and will be up-graded further, and I hope they will tackle the situation so that they will

[ Page 721 ]

relieve us of any unnecessary pollution of our beaches and other areas surrounding our municipalities.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Cowichan-Malahat.

MR. R.M. STRACHAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The last member who has just finished, drew our attention to a number of items relating to pollution within the Province of British Columbia and as it relates to his local area. He expressed dissatisfaction with the previous Pollution Control Director. He expressed the hope that his successor will be more forceful in enforcing pollution control but, Mr. Speaker, civil servants reflect the policy and the attitude of the Government. Civil servants reflect the policy and the attitude of the Government.

Mr. Speaker, like all the other members of the House, I have been receiving letters, letters from nine and ten year olds in some cases, saying, "Dear Mr. Strachan: Please do something about pollution, otherwise there will be no world left for us to live in when we grow up." I think all the members have been receiving letters of that kind, and letters from adult organizations, drawing attention to specific situations and quoting from documents and specialists in the field, warning us of the dangers and the perils that face us unless we take some definite and positive action.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a column about the week in the Legislature and I said it was an enjoyable week, an enjoyable experience, because of certain things that had happened. I can't say I'm happy about this legislation. Although the words are there, Mr. Speaker, experience has left me with little assurance that the words have any real meaning, that something will happen because of the words in this particular piece of legislation, or because of the principles outlined, because the history of this Department, this Minister, and this Government in the field of pollution control is a sorry history, a sorry history indeed.

I could have brought in the letters, the statements that went back and forth between the Pollution Control Board and the pulp mill up in Prince George, these documents that were tabled by the Minister himself twelve months ago, which gives an indication of the record of the past. We're told that six of the twelve pulp mills are operating without permits, the Minister of Municipal Affairs goes around doing his usual gandy dance about technological potentialities or something with regard to pollution control, and the Minister of Municipal Affairs has a tremendous ability to dodge around the issue and to appear as if he was saying something without actually saying anything, and of course this has been the record of the Government. They've appeared to be in favour of pollution control but they actually haven't been, they actually haven't been.

You know, and I think it was referred to earlier in this House, we can get an idea of the opinions abroad in this country about the attitude of this Government toward pollution control, when we read the statement that the Eddy Company made in Ontario, when the Ontario Government threatened them with stricter pollution control measures, they said that the company was considering moving to British Columbia if the Ontario Government insisted on imposing pollution control measures on that particular pulp company. They'd already discussed with some of their senior employees the possibility of moving to British Columbia, and would they be prepared to move to this Province when they did so. That's the kind of reputation we have in the field of industry.

That's the kind of reputation.

Now, Mr. Speaker, pollution and worry about pollution and a realization of pollution is not something that has come upon us suddenly. As long ago as 1965, the Canadian Institute on Pollution Control laid down a policy — 1965 — and I won't read the whole of that policy statement to the House, but it started off by saying, "Pollution of Canadian water courses, coastal waters, and ground waters is a continuing threat to the national health, comfort, safety and economic welfare." That's five years ago, and in the last five years, despite what's been happening, despite the growing public concern, we've had this Minister and this Government refuse to face up to their responsibilities in this regard. That's why, even though I'm going to vote for this Bill, I'm not sure that we can trust this Government — as a matter of fact I know we can't trust the Government — to carry out the declared intent of this Bill.

This policy, which I say was outlined by the Canadian Institute of Pollution Control in '65, says the administration of pollution control must be firm, it must be effective, and it must be equitable. And in all three of those measures the policy of this Government so far, measured by any standard, has not been firm, we know it hasn't been effective, and it hasn't been equitable because, though it may have been fair to the company it wasn't fair to the people. Unless it's fair to the people it's not equitable or equitable, whichever pronunciation you prefer.

Another paragraph says, "The administration of provincial and inter-provincial pollution control programmes should remain in the hands of the provincial and interprovincial water pollution control agencies. They shouldn't be shoved off to the regional districts or the municipalities which must be supported," and this is important, "which must be supported by appropriate budgets and adequately staffed by well trained and compensated engineers, scientists and other personnel. The rights of provincial and interprovincial agencies to control and protect the water resources must be accompanied by equal responsibilities to perform their functions effectively." Again, taking any one of these measures as a yardstick, this Minister, this Government, has failed to measure up.

Then it says, "While the primary objectives of pollution control must be the protection of the public health, other objectives add impelling reasons for protecting the country's water resources, such as the need for use and re-use of surface and ground waters which must receive and dilute liquid wastes."

Now, Mr. Speaker, we've had experience right in this Province, and this is why I agree with those who say that this Pollution Control Board and this Government's primary interest is not the prevention of pollution, it's to determine or decide how much pollution they're going to allow. Again, unfortunately, as they do in every area of Provincial endeavour, they never look far enough ahead, they always take the short term view. And even the good member from Richmond who just sat down was taking the short term view when he talked about extending the outfall further out into the sea, and thinking that would solve the problem. Because, Mr. Member, Mr. Member, once you accept that philosophy that the answer to the pollution control problem, whether it be from sewage or from mill, is simply to extend the outfall further into the sea to where the water is supposed to be moving faster, the tides move more quickly, or there's a larger body of water, it assumes that there is an unlimited natural capacity to neutralize toxic wastes within the water

[ Page 722 ]

body concerned, and I want to know on what basis we can make that assumption.

What's his name, Heyerdahl, who tried to sail across the Atlantic in that papyrus ship, told us that out in the middle of the Atlantic he found this great sea of pollution where the currents had carried the outfall and the waste of western man all into one huge, concentrated body — a Sargasso Sea of sewage and pollution which is bound to get larger and larger and larger if we adopt this philosophy that all you have to do is pile it further out in the sea.

We just had the people of the Victoria area a year or so ago decide that instead of putting in a sewage treatment plant all we had to do was carry the outfall farther out into the sea. But with the continually expanding population and with the continued growth in industry we have no assurance that the water ways that surround us have an unlimited capacity to neutralize these toxic wastes. It's an assumption that spells danger ahead, and it's on this assumption that most of the pollution control permits are being issued.

And I say, Mr. Speaker, the policy which I read to you emphasized the need for trained staff — engineers, scientists and other personnel. It said the control must be firm, effective and equitable. We've a second instance where the answer was supposed to carry outfall further out, and it was the pulp mill at Crofton. We were sure that the outfall was being carried far enough out that it wouldn't hurt the oyster industry in that area. But we all know it destroyed the oyster industry, and when one of the oyster growers took the case to Court the case was settled out of Court, the case was settled out of Court, and I don't know yet whether or not that particular company has a permit from the Pollution Control Board. I think it's probably one of the six who until now have not been required to have a permit.

We go up north into the Prince Rupert area, and here's a document put out by the Fisheries Association of British Columbia, an employers' organization reporting on what's happening in Prince Rupert, and this is the issue of February 1970, just last month. "Problems at Port Edward. Columbia Cellulose pulp mill at Port Edward continues to have pollution problems. Porpoise Harbour in front of the plant is grossly polluted, and efforts to carry the plant's effluent across Ridley Island to fast-flushing Chatham Sound have been anything but successful. The ill-starred pipeline built for this purpose some two years ago has failed on numerous occasions, resulting in untreated wastes flowing into Porpoise Harbour. The most recent breakdown occurred on January the 12th," that's this year, "and it had still not been corrected when it was reported on January 29th," that's seventeen days later, "by W.R. Richardson, Regional Director of Fisheries, when speaking to the fishing industry in Prince Rupert.

"No doubt Columbia Cellulose has spent large sums of money trying to deliver it's effluent to Chatham Sound. So far the attempt has been a failure. Perhaps the time has come, as it inevitably will, to provide for biological treatment and retention of the effluent before further damage is done to the environment in that area." This is the Fisheries Association of British Columbia warning us of the dangers we face in trying to think that, or adopting the philosophy that all you have to do is build a pipeline further out into the sea out of sight, out of mind, out of danger. That's a suicidal philosophy, an attitude that cannot possibly bring real success to pollution control.

I said the other day, Mr. Speaker, that the only way we can effectively have proper pollution control is when we decide we want it, and when we're prepared to pay for it, and unless we're prepared to do that then this legislation, or any other legislation, is completely meaningless.

I picked up a report the other day as to what's happening in Britain, and sure, there was an area where all of the great rivers had been polluted, the air was polluted, the land was in many cases polluted, and the sea around the island was polluted, but they decided, they decided to take on this battle of pollution. This is a report dated March the 15th, 1970, just a couple of weeks ago, from London, and it says, "Since the Labour Government came to power it has put through eleven national laws. It has seen to it that public authorities spend 250 million a year on sewage and sewage disposal, and it has made industries covered by the Alkali Act spend half that again on capital expenditures and close to 750 million on running costs to keep down pollution. It requires clean exhaust in all trucks," but that's another Bill coming up.

"The picture that emerges is of a nation armed with many controls against pollution and enabled to enact most of the rest it needs. The obstacles to a clean environment are neither technological nor legal, but simple economics. On whom do you saddle the costs?" And the last paragraph says, "Within its economic limits, Britain has decided to go ahead, because they have no option but to pay up." We have been dodging that decision, Mr. Speaker, and in my opinion we have no option but to pay up if we want to prevent, control, and remove pollution from British Columbia, and I don't care what the cost is, there is no cost that can be classified as too high in order to maintain an environment.

So long as we can allow tax-free benefits to major corporations, so long as we say they don't pay any corporation tax for three years after they get into operation, as long as we allow all these depreciation allowances, then there's no reason why industry can't make an adequate expenditure to control pollution. As long as we're able to spend money in many of the ways we now spend money as a people, as a society, and as individuals, as individuals, then we have to face up to the fact that if we want pollution to be controlled and eliminated, we are going to have to pay for it.

I'm hoping, I'm praying, that this legislation means a change of direction for British Columbia. I hope it's not just going to be legislation that's going to be used to determine how much pollution will be allowed, that it will be legislation directed toward cleaning up British Columbia from pollution and keeping it that way.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister of Municipal Matters.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, I wanted to say a few words on this question, because at one time it was not very fashionable to talk about environment, it certainly wasn't very fashionable to talk about pollution control, it wasn't very fashionable to talk about pollution control in British Columbia. I'm going to take your minds back to the first time that pollution control was injected into the political life of British Columbia, because, Mr. Speaker, I sat in this Legislature, along with the member for Cowichan-Malahat before 1966, and if the members who were there, or here, can recall any subject that was less discussed in this Legislature prior to 1966 I would like to know what it was.

AN HON. MEMBER: Speak for yourself now, speak for yourself.

[ Page 723 ]

MR. CAMPBELL: No, I'll have something to say about you, too, my friend before I'm finished. But in 1966, Mr. Speaker, at the initial meeting of a Provincial election campaign in a place called Campbell River, this Government nailed a flag to the mast when no one else was nailing that flag. In that opening of that election campaign in Campbell River, the Premier made it very clear that in the decade of the latter part of the 60's, first of all, the machinery for pollution control would have to be put together — and I'm going to have something to say about that — and that by the year 1970 the number one issue, or one of the number one issues in British Columbia, as it would be across the nation, would be the issue of clean air, pure water, and clean soil. Those were stated, those were stated as fundamental objectives of this Government in 1966. You can talk about the statements made, you can talk about the statements that have been made by the Johnny-come-latelys across the way.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Ohhhhhh!

MR. CAMPBELL: …or, Mr. Speaker, you can talk about the statements now made by the President of the United States in 1970, but the first place where the issue of pollution and environmental management was issued, was on the floor of this Legislature immediately following that statement which was the opening statement of the 1966 election campaign.

You know, Mr. Speaker, it is kind of interesting to have the interruptions by the member opposite from Vancouver East, because I remember as we were bringing together this budget, and I introduced into this Legislature the proposition that there had to be a fundamental local structure on which environmental management would rest in this Province, and in those days the old question of planning — it was planning this, and planning that — was the order of the day. I introduced in the Municipal Act and also placed in the Estimates the issue of environmental management, and I think the member who is laughing now was laughing then, he was laughing then, you'd better believe it, because, Mr. Speaker, at that time he had no more concept of over-all environmental management than he had of putting a man on the moon, because he ridiculed the concept of environmental management. He suggested that this Government was playing with words and now, if you recall the debates in this Session of the Legislature, what was the great word that was coming out all over the place? Environmental management here, environmental management there, environmental management everywhere. Not one word of planning. Where have all the planners gone, my friend, the super planners, the mini planners, the maxi planners — they have all evaporated like the summer dew.

AN HON. MEMBER: Words, just words.

MR. CAMPBELL: And you know, we are talking about environmental management and I am going to tell you, my friend, what it means because you are going to listen for a change because it's been yak, yak, yak, from that side of the House and do, do nothing.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I am going to take objection to several things here this afternoon, and the first thing I'm going to take objection to, I had the experience just about three weeks ago to have brought over a group of school students — they weren't from my area but they were from a particular part of British Columbia which for now will go unnamed — but they were a group of 35 children. I hadn't said anything yet, but I suggested that they toss their questions to me if they would like, and they were accompanied by a school teacher.

Mr. Speaker, after I had finished that conversation I was certainly very depressed about the kind of approach that is being produced throughout our school system on issues such as pollution and issues such as environmental management. I had the first indication of this not too long ago when I got a standard form letter, in this case from one of the parts of my constituency, namely Port Hardy, and here we had a group of Grade 3 students, 35 in all, signing what was a technical letter on the issue of pollution, a complete and utter disregard for the whole process of teaching, if I may be inclined to say so, and I am.

But, Mr. Speaker, on this particular day, during this particular Session of the Legislature, I felt even more depressed about the kind of teaching performance that is going on in this Province, because the misuse of the educational process, to leave a climate of depression in young minds is nothing short of being unethical and, in my view, a completely intolerable situation in the school system, completely intolerable. Because, Mr. Speaker, in reference to pollution, before these youngsters, before these youngsters who are 15 and 16 years of age had an opportunity to ask me questions about the urban environment in which they hope some day to live, their particular teacher said, "These people are depressed." He described them as depressed even before they opened their mouth, Mr. Speaker, and he said, "These people look forward to a world which has a pall of gloom surrounding it. There is no daylight in the minds of these young people."

There is no hope, there is no understanding of the process of stopping this fundamentally bad business of spending all our time on the discussion and the definition of a problem, and not at least 50 per cent of our energy on the definition of a solution. I will tell you, Mr. Speaker, that in the decade of the 60's, if you want to figure out why the young people of this country have been up tight about the environment in which they live, then you don't have to go any further than this constant parade of problem after problem after problem with university professors in their ivory towers, with school teachers in their cubicle classrooms, keeping themselves inside the cubicle and not going out and saying, this world and the human being and the idea of humanism is still fundamentally a good way of operating in this world in which we live.

I'll tell you, Mr. Speaker, that in the decade of the 60's, through the aegis of university professors and school teachers who made it their business to paint the most horrible type of landscape in the hearts and in the minds of young people, have done damage which is going to take, in my opinion, a long time to undo. I say that any school teacher or university professor who wants to enter the decade of the 70's and keep talking about problems and not talking about the day-to-day problems of solving them, is doing exactly zilch, Mr. Speaker, not only for the environment in which they live, but they are doing exactly zilch for the young people who are, you make no mistake about it, Mr. Speaker, the young people of this Province and the young people of Canada won't listen to that kind of thing.

Mr. Speaker, I don't intend to paint a picture of depression in the young minds and the young hearts of young people or anyone else, or anyone else. And if you get a little political comfort, if you find that there is a little bit of

[ Page 724 ]

political mileage in trying to broadcast that kind of philosophy, then you go ahead. While you're talking, we'll be solving problems, my friend.

Now, Mr. Speaker, speaking about the solution of problems because you saw, Mr. Speaker, a very classic example of some of the ingredients that will have to go in to this problem of solving problems of our environment and particularly pollution control as recently as last week, again, in my own constituency of Comox. I will tell you that kind of performance will do 5,000 times more for the young people of this Province and the older adults of this Province than any of the hay-wire statements that I hear from some of the school teachers who play on the minds of the three-year olds, well, the Grade 3's, you know what I meant.

Mr. Speaker, I'll tell you what they did. As a community, as a community, Comox Valley, they saw that there was a fundamental personal responsibility on the part of the young, the old, and anyone else in that community. And Mr. Speaker, what happened there? A community, Mr. Speaker, mobilized itself, they did not wring their hands and say there is litter all over the roads, which there was, they did not say that individuals — and yes, my friend, the litter that was placed there was placed there by individuals like you and me.

AN HON. MEMBER: I didn't do it. I wasn't even up there.

MR. CAMPBELL: Those people in the Comox Valley gave an example of one of the fundamental ingredients that has to come into this question of environmental management, because they did not sit down and mesmerize themselves by the definition of the problem. They defined the problem, yes, but they didn't waste their energy on the constant definition of the problem. They mobilized, Mr. Speaker, the community, the equipment, and on a voluntary basis. They went out, Mr. Speaker, and they did something about their own part of British Columbia. That's what they did. Now, Mr. Speaker….

I'll take my hat off to Mill Bay, too. That's not the point. The point is, Mr. Speaker, that if every community in British Columbia was to make it their business to mobilize themselves for cleanup in those terms, you would very quickly not be talking about a cost commitment, you would be talking about a personal commitment of time.

Now, Mr. Speaker…. oh, stop talking and nit-picking and gandy-dancing about what you've done at Mill Bay, my friend. Now, I listened very carefully to whatever it was you said — there was very little — you just kept reading from little pamphlets here and there, and you quoted the odd statement, as most of you over there would have to do if you ever wanted to make a speech where you didn't have to talk from those clippings you keep in that file cabinet of yours down there, you'd never make a speech at all.

So, Mr. Speaker, the third point I want to make is that there has to be a fundamental personal commitment to certain aspects of environmental management. First of all, that stuff never got there — and I'll tell you something about that stuff, Mr. Speaker — when that committee of S.P.E.C. went around in the Comox Valley two weeks before that stuff was cleaned up as it was last weekend, there were names of very prominent people in the Comox Valley on some of the debris that had been scattered along those side trails and side roads, and you know the cleanup was not until Saturday and Sunday of this week, and you know, mysteriously, because there was a certain amount of publicity given to the activities that this group were going to carry one. You know what happened? Some of the stuff did not even have to wait until the big cleanup drive last weekend. Peculiarly enough, some of that material disappeared in the two week period from when they first went out to inspect and organize where they were going to go and where the routes were, and so on. But I am saying this, I am saying this, that the community did something about their own problem. That is the important thing.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the member for Cowichan-Malahat indicated once, again — and I am going to try and get this as clearly as possible through, not only to him but to the other members there — they have tried to belittle the idea that British Columbia has not embarked upon a contract permit system. Well, Mr. Speaker, I'll make this prediction. There will be no jurisdictions in Canada or in the United States — and remember these words — who won't be following the contract system as we go down this road of environmental management. Now, I want the members of this House to remember that. I am predicting it and we'll come back two or three years from now and we'll see what other jurisdictions are doing. But in the meantime, Mr. Speaker, where does the contract system in its illogical conclusion reach, if it's a contract system? We might as well be specific, because this Government and others are tired of not being specific about this pollution problem….

In 1919 — oh, I've been specific before on this — in 1919, Mr. Speaker, the community of Nelson, B.C. was issued what was the contract permit of that day. They have on file, Mr. Speaker, a letter from the Deputy Minister of Health for the Province of British Columbia dated 1919 and that letter says that effluent from the Nelson sewerage system will be permitted to flow into the Kootenay River. Now, Mr. Speaker, as some of you know…. Now, Mr. Speaker, in 1919 that was considered by that particular municipality as being a contract which was on-going forever. Now, Mr. Speaker, as late as the year 1970, Nelson municipality considers that it has a contract based in the year 1919. Now, Mr. Speaker, I hope the leader of the Liberal party, I hope the Liberal party will agree that that kind of attack on pollution has just got to be 100 per cent wrong.

AN HON. MEMBER: The Minister admits that's the same reasons used by Western Mining, the same reasons.

MR. CAMPBELL: Now, Mr. Speaker, if we come back, if we come back to the permits which have been issued under the Pollution Control Act for the pulp mill at Skookumchuck, for Kamloops, for Prince George, none of those permits, Mr. Speaker, imply any on-going commitment by the Government in any sense of the word. In other words….

AN HON. MEMBER: What do we hear from Port Alice?

MR. CAMPBELL: Oh, Port Alice will be on permit too, my friend.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh….it will be!

MR. CAMPBELL: It will be. And when those permits are issued, Mr. Speaker, none of them, none of them will be contract permits. They will all be technological permits, and in every instance they will imply no on-going or binding commitment by the Province that if technology changes, that

[ Page 725 ]

any standards that are in the initial permits will not have to change, too. I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that to do otherwise is to kid the people, it's to lead them down the garden path that's caused all of the pollution across the North American continent, and it's the kind of situation which has led to the pollution of every major river, it's the kind of permits that were in issuance when the story was started in Lake Erie.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I want to go on and say that it's obvious, as well, that the other side of the House thinks that pollution starts when you have to work from what is happening at the end of a particular outfall that either exists or is about to exist. If you look at this Act you'll see that it provides in the way of moving through the existing effluent outlets, and you'll also see what it requires in the way of those which are to come. But, Mr. Speaker, any policy which is only going to concern itself with what happens when it is finally the responsibility of someone to consider whether there shall be discharge of any kind, and on what basis, is a policy that will surely fail.

Now, we established regional districts in 1965 with this time in mind in terms of environmental management, and you know, Mr. Speaker, it is too late if we just take one part of British Columbia. It is too late on the Gulf Islands to talk about the control of pollution effluent from urban sprawl, if you've permitted that urban sprawl to take place in the first instance. Now, Mr. Speaker, that will interfere with a fundamental private right in terms of the use of land. You know, when the ten acre freeze went on to that particular part of British Columbia as is going on to other parts of British Columbia, you know, Mr. Speaker, who were amongst the first in line to suggest, please don't point your finger at me? My little part of urbanizing, or the little part I'm playing in the urbanizing of British Columbia, surely it's not little old me that you….

AN HON. MEMBER: It was your real estate friend.

MR. CAMPBELL: No, my friend, it wasn't real estate friends. But, I'll tell you this, that the very people who, on the one hand, had some understanding that something they didn't like in terms of urban sprawl and pollution environment was happening to the Gulf Islands, were amongst the first to protest, for goodness sake go somewhere else, please don't touch me.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I wouldn't want to see a regulation apply to the Gulf Islands or anywhere else if I wasn't willing to stand in my own area and say the same thing. You know, Mr. Speaker, it's very interesting that the very people on Hornby Island, Denman Island, Cortes Island, Quadra Island, they have indicated opposition to this question of having a look in terms of land use, because it's too late, Mr. Speaker, when the urban sized lots are all there, it's too late. It's too late in some parts of British Columbia for them to do anything else but put in lateral and trunk sewers and treatment facilities, such as the situation around Langford, Colwood, and View Royal.

But, if you don't want to get into that position, Mr. Speaker, then you have to determine the kind of environment, the kind of land use that you are going to permit in the first place, because it's far too late if you are talking about these islands in terms of five and ten years down the road. You know, Mr. Speaker, that in one instance we had one part of the Gulf Islands theoretically, anyway,.cut up — and get this — cut up into 8,000 not 800, 8,000 urban sized lots, 60 by 120.

Now, Mr. Speaker, if the people on the other side of the House want to limit their remarks to what happens at the other end of a sewer pipe or an effluent pipe of any kind, for that matter, then they don't know the first thing about what they are talking about in terms of land use or environmental management, and they indicate that they've just got a very small and narrow viewpoint when it comes to the question of pollution control in this Province. It's only here on this side of the House that there is any indication at all that there's been a broad look taken at this.

Now, Mr. Speaker, thanks for mentioning a strawman, because we might as well nail another match head, if I might say it, might as well nail it right now. The member for Cowichan-Malahat stood up in this Legislature and put abroad the suggestion that the Eddy Match Company would be welcome in British Columbia because the pollution control standards of British Columbia were going, in some way, to be less than those in the Province of Ontario. Now, Mr. Speaker, before that kind of foolish rumour and before that kind of foolish talk goes one inch from this Chamber let me say, Mr. Speaker, let me say on behalf of the Government of this Province that Eddy Match Company, if they have any such ideas about pollution control requirements in British Columbia, I say stay home, stay home. Because, Mr. Speaker, I say to the Eddy Match Company, that the regulations that they'll face in British Columbia won't, or for any other company, will not be easier, will not be easier, Mr. Speaker, than they are anywhere. They'll be tougher, they'll be tougher.

Oh, Mr. Speaker, if the member for Cowichan-Malahat wants to go through his performance of building up strawmen before anyone else can get up and knock 'em down, it's easy to knock down that kind of strawman, and I repeat, I repeat for emphasis — Eddy Match Company go home, stay home, if you have any idea that British Columbia is going to be in some way softer on pollution than any other part of Canada, any other part of North America and any — will the member for South Peach River go home and say to the former member, any other part of the world.

AN HON. MEMBER: You're hot to go. You're an expert.

MR. CAMPBELL: One final thing, Mr. Speaker, I want to say a word about, I want to say a word about pollution control insofar as municipalities are concerned. Now, Mr. Speaker, I know that the past years it has been fashionable, Mr. Speaker, for municipal leaders in some instances to suggest that it was tough to sell by-laws for sewerage treatment. I have heard, Mr. Speaker, many municipalities indicating that the public were more interested in putting up an arena, were more interested in providing for parks than they were for providing for sewage treatment facilities, or, for that matter, putting lateral pipes in the ground. I have heard many municipal people say, well you know, it's not very glamorous to put a sewer pipe in the ground and cover it up. It's tough to sell, Mr. Speaker.

Well, Mr. Speaker, I can say this, that the Government here has indicated to municipal leaders, and they have been placed on notice in many instances, that the day when there can be a low priority, for whatever reason, placed on the provision of laterals or sewerage treatment is gone, is gone. It may very well have been, Mr. Speaker, that many municipal leaders and councils in fact did find it difficult to sell sewer by-laws to their people.

[ Page 726 ]

We still have examples where sewer by-laws have been turned down, and it may have been one of the facts of life, and I'm not pointing the finger at the municipal leaders in any sense of disdain that they said that. They were probably taking a pretty clear reading on the thinking of their own people and it probably was very true for them to say that it was more fashionable and perhaps more glamorous to sell the arena or something that somebody could see than it was to place sewerage works in the ground. But, Mr. Speaker, I say that day has gone forever, and it's not only gone forever, but it's just about time, Mr. Speaker, that we took a look at at least a little bit of the area of cost that we happen to be talking about.

In the case of sewerage treatment apparently, Mr. Speaker, when municipalities say that this Province has made very little commitment for sewerage treatment plants, what apparently they are saying, Mr. Speaker, is that the product of two mills is somewhere away out around Mars insofar as the commitment that we are asking municipalities to place upon themselves before there is a very major commitment on the part of the Province to share in sewerage treatment plants. Now, Mr. Speaker, if the municipalities of British Columbia are saying that two mills is too high a price to pay for their particular commitment for sewage, then I would suggest that just happens not to be in line with the priorities that are in the minds of most people in British Columbia today.

Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, the commitment by this Government, taking in as it does the principle of equalization, means that a municipality large or small, when the product of two mills is levied against a municipality with a low assessment, then obviously the fact that the Provincial Government is picking up 75 per cent of the excess is a very real commitment to the provision of sewerage treatment in this Province. When you take that one step further, I would suggest that if municipalities feel that that is a very limited commitment, then they should take a further look at what they really consider their priorities are and furthermore, Mr. Speaker, it probably could be argued that $150 is a heavy amount, annual charge, if you are talking about somewhere in the average bull pen for a sewerage treatment and a sewer system. But you know, Mr. Speaker, when you bring down to $150 per day, or $150 per year to the cost of providing sewage, you know what you are talking about. You are talking, Mr. Speaker, about 41 cents a day, 41 cents a day.

Now, Mr. Speaker, in terms of priorities the member for Cowichan-Malahat was good enough to say, and he is right, he was good enough to say that there will be a cost for pollution control in British Columbia. But when we are talking in the main about a commitment by municipal ratepayers of the order of 41 cents a day surely, Mr. Speaker, in most instances — and I know there are exceptions — but in most instances that's not asking for the rearrangement of a person's priorities to any great extent to be able to meet that commitment at the local level.

If we, Mr. Speaker, want to examine some of the municipalities in greater detail we can examine a municipality like the City of New Westminster. Again, Mr. Speaker, I said that we have to get specific, we have to get specific about some of these places. New Westminster is one municipality that has paved almost every street. It has paved almost every back alleyway. It has placed ornamental lighting on almost every street. It has placed flower boxes along Columbia Street.

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you against that?

MR. CAMPBELL: I am. The answer is yes, Mr. Member. I'm against that until they stop putting effluent into the Fraser River.

So, Mr. Speaker, I just say this. We started, Mr. Speaker, in 1969 with a statement on pollution, and I am going to make another one here now. That in the year 1975, and I say it now in 1970, British Columbia is going to be in terms of water, air and soil, the cleanest place on earth.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Chairman, I am sure we've been treated today to a totally new dimension in the definition of the word "contaminant." The Minister well knows that there has been no action by this Government up until this year, no action to control air pollution whatsoever. There has been no prosecutions for all those who are polluting in defiance of the Pollution Control Act itself, and indeed this Government was the one that was fighting off the criticism of the Opposition with regard to the polluting of beautiful lakes like Buttle Lake, years ago, years ago.

Now you know the honourable the Minister, Mr. Speaker, with all respect to him, is suffering from legislative amnesia, legislative amnesia. He knows who put the amendments that are in the Journals of the House. It's too bad we don't have a Hansard, but we have the Journals and you can look back through the Journals to 1965, the questions that were raised, they are in the Journals, on pollution control and the sorry admission by the Government that there had been no prosecutions, there had been no charges laid, by this Government, to try to do something about the polluting of the Province. That was with the skimpy legislation that this Government deemed enough because of their concern — and they expressed it time after time, year after year to our criticisms — their concern that industry should go ahead, free of any restrictions or control over air, water, or land pollution. Incredible.

To hear the Minister today, in effect, saying the Opposition didn't do its job to remind the Government of its duty, and you know, I would say that would be a legitimate criticism of the Opposition if they hadn't reminded the Government of its duty. But implicit in the Minister's remarks, Mr. Chairman, is the confession that the Government hasn't been doing its duty, because he says the Opposition hasn't been reminding the Government of its duty.

AN HON. MEMBER: How did he vote, how did he vote? Read out how he voted.

MR. DOWDING: When you look at the Votes and Proceedings of this House, Mr. Chairman, take in 1966, that is three Legislatures ago, three parliaments ago. At that time they had an Act to Amend the Pollution Control Act — and did the Government open up the Act for amendments, did they welcome the proposals in the Pollution Control Bill put before this House in that year by the Opposition? Certainly not. They didn't want to have it on the Order Paper. Instead of accepting it, they went ahead and had it ruled out of order, and I remember well, the Attorney-General standing on a point of order and saying only the Government can make any amendments to the Pollution Control Act, because it might

[ Page 727 ]

cost money, it might cost money.

Earlier on, there were questions asked on the Order Paper about the failure of this Government on pollution control in 1968, as recently as that year, there was an amendment shown on the Order Paper, by the Opposition, and it was ruled out, that would have included air pollution control. You look back in the Journals of 1968, at page 142, you will find the Government was not willing to deal with that subject. Then you have over the years, example after example of how the Opposition has tried to get this Government to move, not only to amend the law, but to take action to enforce the law, and you have as recently as last year the question of Prince George and the pulp mills there. You had the then leader of the Liberal party, Mr. Perrault, in this House, year after year, trying to get the Government to do something about both water and air pollution in Howe Sound, and many of the older members will recall that, but you know for the Minister, Mr. Speaker, to say that we weren't interested in this subject, is just ridiculous.

I can remember in this House myself, in 1958 and 1959 drawing attention to the Minister of Agriculture at the time, particularly the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Health, the fact that the Pollution Control Act and the measures that the Government were willing to take in the field of pesticides and herbicides were so inadequate that we were facing a dangerous factor, both through the pollution of our fish and our birds, and eventually destruction of the environment. That is back in 1958 and 1959 and I can recall, Mr. Speaker, in this House reciting some of the parts of the book by Rachael Carson, and the honourable the Minister of Agriculture recalls that, "Silent Spring" by Rachael Carson and I believe several other members have raised that over the years about the danger that faces us from the chemical poisoning of our environment. So for the Minister to take this attitude that all the Opposition is concerned about is what comes out of the pipe at the end…. Well, we listened to his vocal pipes today, and we know what comes out and they sure need a tap on that.

But there is another thing I want to talk about in regard to this Bill, and that is, I think that it is totally wrong not to eliminate political intervention from the functions of the Pollution Control Board. The idea that there should be appointed three Ministers to act on what should be a non-political Board shows that there is going to be politics played in the whole field of pollution. It is going to mean that when you get politics, you get expediency. The last thing that you should have, where you are trying to apply the law fairly to industry, is favouritism or expediency or politics.

It is a very dangerous game to have Ministers of the Crown sitting on a Pollution Control Board, and it is even doubly dangerous to have Deputy Ministers involved with Ministers of the Crown in the Pollution Control Act. I think it is a mistake for those appointments to be involved, and the reason is, what are you going to do when the Deputy Ministers disagree with the Ministers of the Crown? Are they supposed to take an opposite view? Are you going to say that the Deputy Ministers can defy their political Ministers? What a mix-up that is going to be. What a mix-up, and no provision is made to avoid that error in this Bill.

Another omission that I think is really vital in this particular age, in view of what has happened with Tory Canyon off the coast of England, the oil tanker that foundered recently off the Atlantic Coast, the damage to a barge in the inland waters of British Columbia, and the prospect of very dangerous shipments of huge tankers down the West Coast, there is absolutely nothing in here to provide for any means of prevention, inspection, or compensation, for any catastrophes that occur off our coast, and I think that is a vital area that should have been explored in this Bill.

Also, I am certainly against the principle in this Bill that the Courts shall have no supervision over the administrative misdeeds that might occur by the Pollution Control Board, and there is an attempt, a very blatant attempt to make this Board so final and conclusive that anyone that may wish to appeal from its administrative error, is confined and prevented by one of the sections in the Bill, I think it is the last section of the Bill, and of course we can refer to that in more detail when we come to it in committee, if it gets to committee. But I do not see why that section is necessary and I think some Minister should justify it, certainly the Minister who introduced the Bill should tell us why this Board should be above the law, why the Courts should not be there to protect those who are seriously affected by the decisions of the Pollution Control Act and the Board, and those that are affected by any administrative error.

Now it appears that all that the Minister has provided is that only in cases of want of, or excess of, jurisdiction may there be any challenge to the conduct of the Board itself. When you realize what happened in the case of the Buttle Lake controversy, where the Courts were required to set straight the Pollution Control Board, you realize how misconduct by the Board can occur, and that proof of it, that demonstration of it should be enough to make it clear that you cannot trust this Board to have administrative integrity above that of any other Board.

I don't know any administrative Board, and many of them made up of laymen, who have not made errors in their procedures that must be rectified. In some cases I can see clearly that those procedural errors will occur, and there will be no way for an appellant to achieve justice with that clause in the Bill, and I would urge the Government to reconsider it, because it is really not necessary to try to bar the Courts, and it doesn't serve a useful purpose to bar the Courts. They are very, very useful in setting straight Boards that go off astray on procedural matters.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The First Member for Vancouver Centre.

MR. H.P. CAPOZZI: Mr. Speaker, I am rather intrigued by the comments and discussion of general policy in regard to pollution, the pollution control policy of the Opposition that has been expressed here today. The question of whether pollution of industry should be permitted and the type of industry that should be permitted, controls and outlines, supposedly, of their basic policies that have existed in the past and which, I suppose, are a part of the national or a part of the N.D.P. policy across the country.

It is rather interesting, Mr. Speaker, because I have here a rather interesting book, it is a very attractive book, and one of the finest I think that I have ever seen. It is a booklet advertising the reason why industries, and industries not just from British Columbia or Canada, but industries from right across the nation, should go to Manitoba. It isn't an old booklet, it is a fairly recent booklet, and in fact it is so recent that it bears inside here a recommendation from the Minister of Industry and Commerce who happens to be Mr. Edward Schreyer, who is the Premier of the Province of Manitoba. For industry, and for people who are concerned with

[ Page 728 ]

pollution, there are some very interesting phrases in here from a Government point of view, from a definite policy.

The opening picture, which is a beautiful picture of the landscape of the Province of Manitoba, has one line in here which says, "We seem to have lots of drinks for the ice." There is something about the sculptured Manitoba geography and all its rain-clear pools that calls great spirit-makers here to build distilleries, twenty million dollars being currently invested by the new distilleries. But then they go on to say, and I think that this is the important part, is that the type of industry that they are going to accept in this great Province. Because he also pictures in here a concept of the way they are going to get along in Manitoba.

We have heard stories here, supposedly, about great controls that are going to be placed on industry. They have here a request for people to come in into the chemical industries, and it says, "We would like to describe the chemical explosion which is increasing the population of Manitoba communities, providing another paradox in a province that keeps contradicting itself. Ever a sign of growth, nestling side by side with peaceful farmsteads our great puffing chemical sets dot the countryside, mixing fertilizer, stirring chemicals, and refining oil, and the neighbours co-exist happily," it says,"in the Province of Manitoba."

But the final one is a final invitation extended on behalf of the Manitoba Government, the great N.D.P. Government — they certainly have spokesmen in the new policies of the N.D.P. — and it is about Manitoba's great steel industry, and a magnificent booklet. It shows a great plant, you should see it, it is interesting because there's a picture of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers — who are losers — on one side, and a picture of a man in a steel plant, and it says here, "One great thing, Manitoba's steel men themselves are on an expansion kick with a $9,000,000 melt plant addition to the latest news from that front. This is a blanket invitation," — now this isn't a controlled invitation — "This is a blanket invitation for all steel driving men to come to use the ample room and fresh air of steel driving Manitoba. Except for the room and the air, it is beginning to look a lot like Pittsburgh."

Now that has got to be a fantastic statement of the great policies of pollution represented by our friends on the opposite side; because when it is down to the final thing, and they say put the clamps on industry in British Columbia, put the clamps and controls on the other side, that same organization, the same representation, I gather the same general policy, is saying, "Come — we don't just want industry, we want you to turn Manitoba into another Pittsburgh, we want to dot our peaceful countryside with puffing chemical plants and the oil industries." And my friend, if that is not hypocrisy, then I would like to know what the name of the game is.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the member withdraw the word "hypocrisy."

MR. CAPOZZI: I said if that is not hypocrisy….

AN HON. MEMBER: I say here we do not approve that programme.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order please. Just one moment. Will the member be seated.

The Member for New Westminster.

MR. D.G. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, Mr. Speaker, this is amazing, absolutely amazing…. The only Minister in this country that's said to stand up to industry is Ed Schreyer and that member, Mr. Speaker, knows it! He stood up to the Swift. Yes he did, and he is not suggesting for one second, Mr. Speaker….

He sat down at the end of his speech, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: ….The member had already spoken, he took his seat, he attempted to make a point of order. I asked him to be seated, and I now recognize the member for New Westminster. Order please. Proceed.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, that sample doesn't say one solid thing against Ed Schreyer. It suggests that he is inviting industry there, but I'll bet you this, that when industry does come to Manitoba it will come there under Manitoba's terms and it will be in the best interests of that Province. Mr. Speaker, the fact of the matter is, that man is jealous of what Mr. Schreyer is doing in Manitoba. He'll shame this Government. That’s what he'll do. In another six months time they'll wish….

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, Order!

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, he's excited, he's excited. He can show me that book tonight. There is a command performance this time, between 6 and 8.

Mr. Speaker, you know there are a lot of things in this Province that are going on and I suggest, Mr. Speaker, I suggest that we are tip-toeing into this fray, we're tip-toeing in here about this pollution business. Well, let's just make sure that we don't upset our friends. You know, up until now environmental defence in this Province has been ineffectual at best, ineffectual at best, and impotent at worst. Pollution is the victor in this Province and I think that we can't hide our shame by pointing a finger at another Province — no way. I suggested, Mr. Speaker, that it has nothing to do with it, I suggest that Schreyer will shame you with those words.

MR. CAPOZZI: Point of order. I think he should withdraw that.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh….

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the member be seated. Will the member be seated. The member does not have a point of order. Will he please be seated.

MR. CAPOZZI: A point of order.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: What is your point of order?

MR. CAPOZZI: He has referred in this House to the Premier of the Province of Manitoba — well, listen to my point of order, Mr. Speaker — and has said that the Premier of the Province of Manitoba is putting out a deliberate lie and is a liar because he is inviting into….

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh…. oh….

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the member be seated. The member had his opportunity to make his speech, and don't abuse the rules of the House again. Proceed.

[ Page 729 ]

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, the member is excited. Forgive him.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the member be silent! He made his speech. Now give somebody else a chance.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, the member is excited, and I can't blame him. You know, he has seen what's happened. He has seen what's happened to the distilleries in this Province and he knows perfectly well that this won't happen in Manitoba, and let's hope, for the sake of B.C., it won't happen here in the future, Mr. Speaker.

Now, I don't subscribe to those who say that this Government won't penalize their financial friends, but I do subscribe to the argument that the free enterprise — and I believe that this is true — will never allow the Socreds to tackle pollution. I hope it is wrong, but I believe it's true, when the chips are down, Mr. Speaker, you retreat.

Our Bill, our Pollution Control Bill that has been in force for the last 14 years, has been completely impotent as far as I can see, completely impotent. Now to try to get this thing out of the context of the Province of B.C., I think, is absolutely the worst thing we can do. That Minister over there that was discussing what we should do with our school children, if he starts dictating the policy of how your children should be taught in school, that's just too bad.

Let's not tip-toe into this fray, Mr. Speaker, let's just get into it with both feet. Let's tell the polluters, whoever they are, whether it be municipalities, whether it be business, Mr. Speaker, let's tell them that they must stop.

You know, this is the same Government, Mr. Speaker, that suggests that primary treatment is enough. The member from Richmond says it's not enough. I've been down to Richmond. I've been down to see that Iona plant, and I've seen the devastation down there, Mr. Speaker. I remember that area when it was a beautiful area, and today it looks like a swamp. It looks like a disgusting, slimy swamp. They put the longer pipes in the ocean. What are they trying to do? Are they trying to kill the ocean? The Gulf of Georgia can't stand it, and phosphates going out into that area, finally to the sea, and we'll have nothing left.

No, Mr. Speaker, we have to get serious about this, and if we have to pay we have to pay, and that's the word. As far as I am concerned, people must make the sacrifice. They must make it now. If we are going to have a world to live in let's toughen up on this Bill. Let's do it right now.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: You know, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Municipal Affairs, and I am sorry he delivered himself of that speech and then left the Chamber, told us that by 1975 — and he made quite a point of this — B.C. was going to be the cleanest place on earth. He has come back. He told us that by 1975 B.C. would be the cleanest place on earth. Mr. Speaker, it was the cleanest place on earth until the Minister and his Government took over, and that's the problem. I think that the Minister — he puts a lot of fire in his speeches — but I think he should put more of those speeches in the fire. He talks straight from the shoulder, but I think his speeches ought to be a little higher up than that.

I am disappointed, Mr. Speaker, that this Bill was brought in by the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water Resources, because we had hoped, and frankly, Mr. Speaker, I expected, after hearing so many Government backbenchers speak in favour of the idea, that we would have this year a Department of Environmental Control. But we're to be denied that, all we've got is the same old Minister of Lands and Forests, the one who has been in charge of that important Department while British Columbia has entered into a programme, Mr. Speaker, that could hardly have been improved upon had our objective been to destroy the Province, to pollute it all we could.

I say that he's a director of the worst corporate citizen in British Columbia, the B.C. Hydro, that has been responsible for more pollution of our environment in the last decade than all the companies in British Columbia in all the time of our history, and this is the man that brings in this Bill to make British Columbia the cleanest place on earth by 1975.

Well, I do say this, Mr. Speaker, that the Bill is a blank cheque. It could be everything or it could be nothing. It's a list of what the Lieutenant-Governor in Council may or may not do, not what the Lieutenant-Governor in Council shall do. No demands placed on that Pollution Control Board to perform, and heaven knows the performance has been pathetic. By your own admission, Mr. Speaker. In answer to the question on the Order Paper, how many people have been prosecuted in the history of the Pollution Control Board? None. A big fat zero.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's a pretty consistent record.

MR. McGEER: No doubt it will continue that way. I think the first prosecution of a pollution offender in British Columbia should become a Provincial holiday, because it will mean that we are finally prepared to do something. But it's going to be a long wait. A lot of fine words, Mr. Speaker, but what everybody has wanted from this Government and what it has never had is performance, even minimal performance.

AN HON. MEMBER: Ran a good election.

MR. McGEER: Ran a good election, oh yes, and the Premier wasn't short on promises. He never is. And neither is the Minister of Municipal Affairs short on promises, and I am not going to go through all the ones he makes every election.

Mr. Speaker, the first member from Vancouver-Burrard drew attention to water samples, and I think that this deserves just a little bit of discussion in this House, Mr. Speaker. I am going to read a little bit into the record as the Minister of Municipal Affairs likes to think he's done, by telling what's been happening over the years in this subject of sewage and pollution. You know, the Minister of Municipal Affairs stood up here for a full half hour telling us about the dreadful situation in the City of Nelson and how they felt they had contract in perpetuity and what a terrible way for the Government to proceed.

Well, you know, we've got a very different way of approaching things, Mr. Speaker, when it comes to such things as Crown grants for minerals, but pollution — my goodness me! The Government treads lightly on those things. How sacred a contract is, and how bound we are by the bad traditions of the past!

But the other night in this House, Mr. Speaker, when it came to honouring contracts made in good faith in this Legislature on bequests to charities, why the Government didn't have a second thought about passing retroactive legislation and changing all the rules, and along the way keeping people who had been abused out of the Courts. And,

[ Page 730 ]

Mr. Speaker, just a contrast to what we see in this legislation and how we have to honour all the bad practices of the past, let me remind the Minister what we just passed the other day in Bill No. 40, the Mineral Act. No problem there dishonoring any contract that had been signed in good faith between an industry and its customers. We can change that without a bit of trouble, and so we should, without any hesitation, when it comes to pollution.

You make these standards as tough as you like and as specific as you like, and if they can be tougher the next time around, bring the Bill into the House and you'll get support from the Opposition side. We don't need to be frightened about those things and talk about people who are putting up strawmen — you sure know how to create them, Mr. Minister, you sure know how to create 'em.

The first member from Vancouver-Burrard said, what about the pollution on the beaches in the Vancouver area? I think it's a tragedy, really, that this Bill places pollution from sewage disposal under the Minister of Lands and Forests, because when the Minister of Health decided to take a tough stand on this matter, who was the first person he crossed swords with? With the Minister of Lands and Forests, and I think the reason, probably, it has been taken out of his hands, is that the Minister of Health had ambitions that ran a little bit too high in cleaning up the pollution of our beaches.

Mr. Speaker, I have a newspaper article here entitled, "City Beach Pollution Worse Than Last Year." It said, "'Unless 50 per cent of samples show less than 2,400 coloforms, I cannot possibly order the beaches reopened for swimming,' Dr. Murray said." The date, April 1959. Before the Iona Island Sewage Treatment Plant was built, Dr. Stewart Murray felt he could not open the beaches if those coloform counts were so high. What happened ten years later? Those same beaches, using the same standards — remember the figure 2,400 — well let me read from the Cypress Creek area. By those same standards, ten years later, March 19,000, May 4,300, June 9,300, September 6,800. Let's move to a beach in the Vancouver area, Lucerne. January 1969 — 9,300, February 1969 — 5,900. Move to another one, Jericho Beach. January 1969 — 15,000, Sunset Beach, 9,300.

This was a year ago, Mr. Speaker, and the figures that I am quoting are figures taken from the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District, and the standards are the same. The figures I am quoting are the same count per hundred millilitres, or rather per thousand millilitres, that Dr. Stewart Murray found essential for closing the beaches a decade before.

Now I am not quoting any samples that I took. I am quoting samples taken by the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District, and what I am saying is this: What happened in that decade? For one thing, we've got a new Medical Health Officer, who's got very different ideas as to what's safe. We've had a sewage treatment plant built, but you heard the member from Richmond say how inadequate that plant was. And who has been responsible all this time for getting the job done? Who's been asleep? You have, Mr. Minister, and the Government, and the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District, and I don't think it's good enough that people in responsible positions fall asleep while sewage gets poured out on the beaches.

What the member says is quite correct, that this plant is inadequate. The plans announced by the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District are inadequate. The programme of the Government is inadequate,

AN HON. MEMBER: You're inadequate.

MR. McGEER: …and it's time that something was done about it, and I'm going to suggest one of the things which we should consider.

I have in front of me a list of the cities of the world that have installed solid waste treatment plants. They make fertilizer with their sewage the way they do in Milwaukee producing that very expensive fertilizer, Milorganite. The list of cities is 101. I haven't totalled up the list of countries but they come from every continent in the world. Stockholm, Sweden; Auckland, New Zealand; Haifa, Israel; Okinawa, Japan; Nagasaki, Japan; Jerusalem; Warsaw, Poland; Edinburgh, Scotland; Helsinki, Finland; Rome, Italy; Manila in the Philippines. Now do all these cities in the world, Mr. Speaker, know something that we don't know? And is it so impossible to take our sewage and convert it into something useful?

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Do you think our rivers are as polluted as the river in front of Milwaukee?

MR. McGEER: Well, let me read, Mr. Speaker, some of the coloform counts from the Fraser River, so the Minister of Municipal Affairs can decide for himself. Annacis Island, and this is the coloform count from Annacis Island, 1,000,000; outside Pacific Coast Packers, 20,000; south side of Pattullo Bridge, 30,000. These are the bacterial counts released by J.W. Maynard, the Senior Public Health Official with the Boundary Health Unit. Well, what he says is that the lower Fraser is no longer safe for swimming or aquatic sports. That's his opinion.

AN HON. MEMBER: What is safe?

MR. McGEER: Well, it depends what your standards are. If you're Dr. Stewart Murray, it's 2,400 per metre or 240 per hundred millilitres. If you're Dr. Bonham, his successor, it's very different, and I'm not sure what his standards are, but I thought that Dr. Stewart Murray was correct.

I think those standards are safe and appropriate and I would only remind the Minister of Health, who should have charge of this important area of jurisdiction, that we've got annual epidemics of hepatitis in British Columbia. Last year it was the number two reported communicable disease with over 2,000 cases, and it's not a disease to be taken lightly. The best you can hope for is about six weeks in bed if you have a case of hepatitis, and the worst you can expect is death.

AN HON. MEMBER: Some of the cases may have come from Toronto.

MR. McGEER: Some of it might have come from Toronto. Well, I'll tell you one thing, Mr. Member from Saanich, that one of the greatest danger areas in British Columbia is right in Saanich, where the open sewers have drained into the Gorge and where one epidemic was strongly suspected. I can't prove it, says the member from Saanich. Well, Mr. Member, this is the whole reason for putting sewerage in.

MR. J.D. TISDALLE: Blanket condemnation.

[ Page 731 ]

MR. McGEER: Blanket condemnation, says the member. Well, sometimes it just isn't as easy as it was to trace the outbreak of typhoid on the Oriana, but it's because things like this happen that you take preventative measures, and that means putting in proper sewerage facilities and having tough laws.

Mr. Speaker, there's no doubt we're falling down in our duty, we're covering up the truth. When I attempted to get the facts from the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District as to what the coloform counts were I had a dreadful time, and these figures are locked away from the public because it would be pretty alarming if the full story were told.

The sewage treatment plant that we have at Iona is inadequate, even today, and when greater laterals are tied in it will be more inadequate. Primary treatment is insufficient. The storm drains in the City of Vancouver must be separated from the sanitary drains. The raw sewage outfall off Brockton Point is an outrage. Twice this year, Mr. Chairman, we've had kills, one, birds and one, fish, from that sewer outfall, which in itself should be an alarming warning to the Minister in charge of Pollution Control.

Mr. Speaker, I move adjournment of the debate until the next sitting of the House.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion, are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it. The motion is carried.

The House adjourned at 5.56 p.m.

The House met at 8 p.m.

The Hon. W.D. Black presented to Mr. Speaker a Message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor, being amendments to Bill (No. 49) intituled An Act to Amend the Municipal Superannuation Act.

The House proceeded to the Order "Public Bills and Orders."

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 65 Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Securities Act, 1967)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 65. The Honourable the Attorney-General.

HON. L.R. PETERSON: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this Bill is to amend the Securities Act. If you look at the explanatory notes you will find that most of the amendments refer to one principle, and that relates to the holding of hearings by the Superintendent or the Commission. Under the existing legislation, these hearings can only be held by the Superintendent, his Deputy or the Commission, and it's felt that at this stage that this is too restrictive and a burdensome provision. In the expansion of staff that we've had and the addition of solicitors as well, we would like that broadened in several of the provisions to include anyone on the staff who is appointed by the Superintendent for this purpose.

Other amendments relate, as well, to hearings in terms of the transcription of the evidence to make provision for the recording of the oral evidence by way of sound recording apparatus. One other provision, which is also an important one, as it relates to the discretionary refusal of registrations which, at the present time, is based on residence of the individuals in the Province. In keeping with changes that have been made elsewhere in Canada, in other Provinces this would be changed to the residents of Canada rather than just residents of the Province of British Columbia.

I think the other amendments are amply described in the explanatory notes and I would move that the Bill be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. The Honourable the Member for Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Chairman, although we don't oppose the forwarding of this Bill through second reading, I feel it's unfortunate that after the unhappy experience by this Government last year, and the year before in regard to Commonwealth Trust, and more particularly the numerous companies that were under the management of Commonwealth Trust, that no provision was made in the Bill for the inspection of and control over trust companies by the Superintendent of Brokers.

As you recall, Mr. Minister, under the Trust Companies Act it specifically excludes that particular area of Government from the supervision of the Superintendent of Brokers, which I think is a serious error. It seems to me that any companies that are doing business and offering to do business with the public should primarily, at all times, in their dealings with the public and the offering of securities be under that regulation of the Superintendent of Brokers. One of the instances where this group got away with what can only be described as an overt act towards the public, was in selling some of their securities despite the fact that the prospectus involved had not been renewed.

I note here that some changes are made in the requirements, as to the financial statements required after a prospectus or before a new one is re-issued, and I think that is a valuable change. The effect of this is not great, except let me at least place this caveat, that to allow others than the Superintendent or Deputy to act, in effect, as a Commission, could be dangerous unless the persons concerned are experienced in the law, experienced in the field, and I would suggest that although this is a wide power it should be exercised most sparingly.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 73, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Summary Convictions Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 73. The Honourable the Attorney-General.

HON. L.R. PETERSON: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of Bill No. 73 is to amend the Summary Convictions Act. There are several amendments to the Summary Convictions Act, none of which are inter-related, and in view of that I think it might be better to deal with the principles of the various amendments when we are in Committee of the Whole, considering the Bill section by section. I therefore move the Bill be now read a second time.

[ Page 732 ]

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion, are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Member for Burnaby Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: With regard to the idea in the Bill that persons who are held in custody are entitled to a telephone call,

MR. SPEAKER: Order please. I'm not disallowing the debate on that matter because I know a number of principles are involved, but if we're going to discuss these matters principle by principle, I think the suggestion was well taken that the matter be discussed in the Committee rather than on second reading. However, I'm not forbidding debate.

MR. DOWDING: Well, it's hard to discuss the principles of this Bill without mentioning specific sections in it. I merely want to say on that point, Mr. Speaker, that I would consider that this meets somewhat the demand that was expressed by myself and others in the House that there be something done. I suggested that there be a change in the law requiring a peace officer who has custody of a citizen to permit a telephone call.

It seems rather a coincidence that the Attorney-General proposes that the Bill should read, "in the first twelve hours of his custody," which was the time I said it took for this man to obtain his release, despite the fact that he had ample funds to put up his bail, in the particular case I mentioned of a Seattle citizen who was acquitted. It seems to me there can hardly be an excuse why a twelve hour interval should pass until a person is entitled to seek legal counsel or bail. To place that time limit on is, in effect, to encourage that to become the norm that they will hold, with impunity, any citizen for twelve hours and then allow a telephone call. Now I wouldn't want to see that encouraged, and I hope the Attorney-General will take a good look at that particular principle in the Bill just to see if there can't be a little more in the way of a mandate imposed on the police officer that he do so at an earlier time, but at the limit of twelve hours where there's reasonable excuse.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, the amendments in this Bill, as you've pointed out, probably are better discussed in committee stage, but there is one principle of this Bill, that is lightly touched on, in one section, in terms of allowing telephone calls.

I would like to point out to the Attorney-General through you, Mr. Speaker, that the kind of Summary Convictions Act that would even go a step further, and the principle that should be included in this, along with the telephone call, is maximizing the amount of information that is available to the person who is arrested.

Mr. Speaker, on many occasions people are arrested without fully knowing their rights, and in some instances, are arrested without the arresting officer fully knowing his obligations. Many, many times, I have suggested that problems could have been avoided, had a simple mimeographed sheet been put in the hands of the person who was arrested, listing his rights and his obligations under the Summary Convictions Act, which would actually put in principle the concept that when somebody was arrested they would have, in simple form, a list in front of them of their rights and their obligations under arrest. This would eliminate the kind of hostility that is created in many, many instances, falsely, by the person who is arrested relating that he was not told about his rights or he was kept in the dark about what was happening to him at that particular time.

It would be a very simple method, Mr. Speaker, it would not cost a great deal of money, and it would be one step forward into the whole business of enlightenment around the law. Let's not keep people in the dark, let's let them know exactly what is happening to them at the time of arrest, without any question about it, and without having the officer put in the position of relying on what took place in a conversation, but you have it uniformly in record with a printed sheet handed to the person who is being arrested.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Attorney-General will close the debate.

HON. L.R. PETERSON: Mr. Speaker, in reply to the honourable member, I would only suggest that in many instances where arrests are made the more useful contact, rather than simply in formal way providing them with a piece of paper and read at your leisure sort of thing, when the person may be upset or may not be in any condition to read, that I think it is more useful in terms of the force having instructions as they now do have through the R.C.M.P., to advise them that they have a right to engage counsel. The R.C.M.P. are instructed not to select counsel for the individual but to provide them, where necessary, with a list of counsel. In the larger centres, of course, it is more a matter of giving them a phone book with the number of counsel that are there, but in the more remote centres this is the procedure that obtains.

I would say, as well, in respect to the proposition which is now being formalized and put into legislation, of the prisoner having the right to make a phone call. You will notice, in reading the provision, it is not just a phone call within 12 hours. There had to be good legislation, I think there had to be some outside time limit, but you will see that it reads, "as soon as possible." This is not intended to change the present form of instructions that do issue, that not only do they have a right to make a phone call, but the right to make more than one phone call, in many instances, and to make sure that contact is made.

It is not sufficient, I suggest, just to make a phone call, because they may not make contact with the party. This, of course, is the difficulty that arises, and it only really arises in the major centres where you may have a large influx of prisoners at once, and not that much access to a telephone, but normally, this access is provided immediately, but in the larger centres it does depend on the number of people that are standing in line for the use of the telephone, so there had to be some outside time limitation such as the one imposed at 12 hours. I move second reading, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The question is that Bill No. 73, An Act to Amend the Summary Convictions Act, be read a second time. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 74, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Establish the Municipal Finance Authority of British Columbia)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 74. The

[ Page 733 ]

Honourable the Minister of Municipal Affairs.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, this Bill, which is An Act to Establish the Municipal Finance Authority of British Columbia, essentially speaks for itself, but I do wish to make one or two observations in support of this very unique piece of legislation.

First of all, because of the financial position of the municipalities of British Columbia, I doubt very much whether there would be any jurisdictions either in Canada or in North America, who would pretend that it would be possible to establish, under the complete autonomy of municipalities themselves, a financing authority which would have the effect of making the municipalities themselves a financial holding company for their own obligation. When one considers that essentially the building blocks of this authority are, in effect, the municipalities themselves, that what we have done here is to take the concept of federation one step further in terms of municipal government in British Columbia.

Members of the House will recall that at no time have we ever suggested that there should be a fourth level of government in British Columbia, and indeed we have done everything we can in legislation to discourage that kind of an apparatus from getting into being. But we have suggested that municipalities in British Columbia should either in total or in part, be federations of co-operation, and the regional district concept is really a concept of federation, and it is the concept, certainly, of co-operation.

This Bill seeks, in effect, to mobilize the entire credit of the entire Province, whether it be within municipal boundaries or outside of it, and it is the first time in either Canada or the United States, where an attempt has been made to mobilize the entire tax base of all forms of local government in the Province, to place before both the market and also the prospective individual buyers at the municipal level itself, that whatever bond they assume to buy, will, in fact, have the entire backing of every unit of local government in the Province.

There are two additional observations which, while they don't spell themselves out in the cold language of this statute, I do want to draw them to the attention of the House, because I think in the next few years in finance in the country, they are going to be very fundamental to the question of how municipalities are going to find money for longer term projects. The first one is this; I think we have reached the point in time — and if you will look at this Bill you will see it particularly addresses itself to water pollution and pollution abatement devices that might be required of municipal government — there has come a point in time when we cannot necessarily expect others to put up long term debt money for those requirements that we are going to find required at the local level. In other words, we can't expect people in the United States, we can't expect people in Europe, we can't expect people in eastern Canada to totally finance the long term debt obligations of our own communities, because they have commitments of their own, and certainly they have commitments in the same areas of concern as ourselves, and those are in terms of this Bill — pollution abatement, water, sewerage systems.

While we mobilize the credit of the entire Province in connection with this Bill, we are certainly saying that this is a vehicle — and I think we will have much more to say about this in the next few weeks and the months that lie ahead — this is a vehicle where the people of British Columbia can say, here is a place where I can place my investment on behalf of the priorities that my community sets itself, and one they argue that there are all kinds of arguments about so-called capital monies that are coming from other parts of the world, and there have been, to a very large degree, arguments of that nature.

I say that inherent in this Bill is the vehicle whereby the mobilization of our credit at home may be said to be so much of a guarantee, that people at the local level can be encouraged to invest in the priority requirements of their own municipalities.

Point number two; it is becoming evident that if tight money is to keep going, as certainly perhaps it has in the last little while, that the prospect of paying interest to sources of capital outside our Province, and particularly sources of capital outside our Province which are not national — and I am not talking about the Canadian market, I am talking about the international market and particularly the American market. If we are to be consistent, as some of the members opposite sometimes are not, the interesting thing, and second point on this Bill, is that inherent within it is the prospect, Mr. Speaker, that the prospect of paying 9½ per cent and in some cases over 10 per cent for money on a market other than either our own Canadian market, or a market which is internal to British Columbia, should be viewed with great alarm. Because if interest is to be paid anywhere, surely it is the best of good business to pay it to those who would save in the Province of British Columbia or in Canada, and inherent within this Bill is that kind of an opportunity, and I describe it as an opportunity in those terms.

Finally, in the concept of this Bill, and I introduce it with the full knowledge that British Columbia municipalities, unlike those in other jurisdictions have, since my colleague the former Minister of Municipal Affairs brought to their own way of doing business two very fundamental things. The first one was the encouragement, in 1956, that where the municipalities in British Columbia were in the business of utilities, the provision of utilities in terms of water, and sewerage, my colleague in 1956 made a very important speech. It was not very much looked at in those days, but in 1956 it was almost considered that he was breaking off into the wild blue yonder and some people said so.

But I want to tell you tonight in this House, that in 1956 when my colleague said to the municipalities of British Columbia, place your utility house in order, put them on a self-liquidating basis, water and sewerage on a user charge basis, that was the fundamental change in direction in municipal finance in British Columbia. Tonight I can report that with very few exceptions, and I can count them on the finger of one hand, the municipalities in British Columbia that are not on a pay-as-you-go basis or a self-liquidating basis, insofar as water and sewerage are concerned, can be numbered on the fingers of one hand — fingers, I said, and one thumb, if you like — and that was a very fundamental change of direction. Mr. Speaker, I can say that there is no other jurisdiction in North America, that can say to its people that their finances in terms of utility are on a self-liquidating basis — nowhere.

The second point, Mr. Speaker, is that as a result of that initiation of policy in 1956, the second item I can report to this House tonight is that the municipalities of British Columbia have about 90 millions of dollars in accumulated revenue surpluses of a variety of kinds, and I say this again, without fear of contradiction, there is no area in North America that can make that statement on a per capita basis

[ Page 734 ]

to that extent.

Therefore this Bill, which is a federation of credit, it is a mobilization of credit has, first of all, 90 millions of dollars of revenue surpluses to back it up. It has six billion dollars of the total revenue position or tax base position of the entire Province of British Columbia.

I invite the members of this House, because it is the mobilization of our credit; it is the opportunity to extend the principle of the federation idea of cooperation; it is the opportunity to give us a vehicle to have communities at least, in part, support themselves in terms of long-term debenture financing; it is an opportunity for there to be a municipal financing authority of British Columbia, which can be used for the savings of our own people and to keep the interest payments at home; I invite the support of this House, and I invite your support in second reading, and I move second reading.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Burnaby-Willingdon.

MR. J.G. LORIMER: Mr. Speaker, I was interested in listening to the honourable Minister introduce the Bill. However, I feel that he, in fact, did miss the main point in the whole thing.

This Bill embodies, basically, a proposal made by the honourable Minister at the U.B.C.M. last September in Kamloops, and there is really little difference from what the newspaper accounts at that time stated in it. However, subsequently, I understand he did state that there would be the right for regional districts to opt out if requested, but this is not embodied in the Bill, and I notice that there is no opting out as far as the regional districts are concerned.

Now, what the Bill amounts to is, that each regional district puts their total wealth into a so-called pool and, as the Minister said, the whole resources of this Province are pooled in one area. So what it in fact is, each municipality is guaranteeing the borrowings of every other municipality, and what it comes down to in name would be probably that Saanich is guaranteeing the loans of Golden, and so on and so forth. Saanich is also bound by the borrowings that Golden makes, and the borrowings that Golden makes, of course, is charged against the borrowing power of Saanich. So that probably 75 or 80 per cent of the borrowing in the Province in the municipal field is done through the Greater Vancouver Regional District, and probably 50 per cent of the assets of the Province are located in this particular district. Now, the borrowings are primarily done through the Vancouver Regional District and the capital district would be the next borrowing area.

The other areas, up until now, have had very great difficulty in borrowing money due to the fact that the loans are small, their needs are fairly small, and the borrowing authorities would just as soon give a larger loan than the small loans. Because of the procedures in giving loans, cost wise, there is no real advantage in giving the small loans. So I agree with the Minister that the smaller areas have had a great deal of difficulty in borrowing money, and they have been unable to sell their bonds, and even the regional districts in the Interior, the smaller ones, have been unable to sell their bonds. Now, I think we are all in agreement as to that extent, and we agree that certainly action is required to resolve these problems.

Now for a number of years we on this side of the House have argued that there should be a Provincial authority, a borrowing authority, to look after the needs of these municipalities. The responsibility is certainly not the responsibility of the municipalities to guarantee the loans of other municipalities. The responsibility is clearly a Provincial responsibility, and no matter how you want to argue about a thing, the first in the North American continent, and so on, I can see the reason why it is the first, because in the other areas the senior governments probably treat their offsprings in a better fashion than what has been done here. What it is, is a transfer, Mr. Speaker, a transfer of responsibility from the Provincial Government to the municipal governments and to the cities of this Province, and the additional expenses of looking after this thing is also a transfer of Provincial responsibility to the local governments.

Now, I have mentioned the Government has been urged on many occasions in the past to go into the guaranteeing of municipal financing in order to get a lower percentage rate on their interest, but they have always refused. I think this could be, if they still are not desirous of going into the full borrowing for the local governments, I would suggest that the Government could consider another proposal and that is, if they wanted to leave the Greater Vancouver Regional District out of this proposal and let the Greater Vancouver Regional District look after their own borrowings, and the Government only guarantee the borrowings of the other regional districts. Now in that way…. in that way, the regional districts would have the backing of the Provincial Government behind their borrowings, and would have no difficulty in borrowing money.

The Greater Vancouver Regional District is a larger district, they would be paying probably higher rates for their money than they would be if it was guaranteed by the Province, but they could get by. In this way, I suggest, the benefits to the smaller areas would be greater than it would be under this plan, and I suggest that the benefits to the Greater Vancouver Regional District would be much greater under this plan, and I suggest that consideration be given for a change in this Bill, because the way it is at the present time, certainly we could not support the Bill as it is.

Now, as I mentioned, there is no opting out by the regional districts although cities may opt out. But in actual fact, it is of little advantage to them, due to the fact that the assets of those cities are already going into the pool, so any loans made throughout the Province will have a direct effect on the borrowing capacity of the other cities in the Province and, as a result, it is of little advantage to them to opt out, and it is a detriment to them to stay in.

Now, there is more to this Bill than just a question of municipal borrowing. I suggest that the question of the whole regional function is in question here. There are, I suggest, three things that make the regional governments work and the first is legislation; the second, a feeling of trust between the Provincial Government and the municipalities; the third, the co-operation of the members of the board, of the regional board.

Now we have the legislation. I suggest we have no feeling of trust between the Government and the regional districts, and I suggest that legislation like this, forcing the borrowing powers of certain areas to the detriment of that area, and I suggest that the chances are there will be little co-operation between some of the areas of the regional districts and the Provincial Government. I suggest, also, that a number of areas as not regionally oriented in the first place, and the fact that legislation comes through that is upsetting to them will cause them to stop cooperating with the other members of their

[ Page 735 ]

regional district and, as a result, the regional government as we know it will disappear. It won't work. It would have to have the complete co-operation to make regional districts work.

I would hope that the Minister would take another look at this legislation. I think that what has been suggested is reasonable. I think it solves the problems of both groups, and I don't think it is of any great hardship to the Provincial Government.

Now, the Minister did say that this would be a mobilization of credits of the whole of the Province in the hands of the municipalities. Well, I can advise the Minister that, in my opinion, the municipalities are not anxious to have this power. They would sooner be borrowing on their own regional districts, as far as the larger ones are concerned; and the small ones would far sooner have the backing of the Provincial Government than the backing of the City of Vancouver or the City of Victoria.

The rest of his talk, I think, could be agreed with probably. But the whole question is whether the Provincial Government is going to accept the responsibilities with reference to local governments and regional districts, or whether they are going to palm off this responsibility, as well as many others, to local governments.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, we have always advocated a municipal financing authority, but not this kind of a municipal financing authority. I think that the Minister of Municipal Affairs should be ashamed….

AN HON. MEMBER: Vote against it.

MR. McGEER: You're darn right we'll vote against it, Mr. Speaker!

You should be ashamed of putting this kind of a Bill before the people of British Columbia, and it is the kind of thing that the Minister of Finance would try and put across on the people of this Province. Mr. Speaker, there was a time in British Columbia….

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Order! The honourable member please be seated.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT (Minister of Finance): Mr. Speaker, a point of order. The suggestion that the Minister of Finance would put something across.

MR. SPEAKER: Was the honourable member imputing any improper motive to the Minister of Finance?

MR. McGEER: Absolutely not. He's putting the Bill across. And I want to describe to the House and to the people of British Columbia exactly what this Bill amounts to. There is something like $80,000,000 worth of municipal debentures unsold in British Columbia, and they are unsold because the cities and municipalities of this Province….

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. (Minister's remark not decipherable) is just 100 per cent wrong.

MR. SPEAKER: That is not a point of order. The honourable the Minister may correct a statement after the honourable the member has completed his speech. Please proceed. Order, please.

MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, there was a time in British Columbia when the Province was prepared to guarantee municipal bonds, and if you look through the hoard of pension funds that this Provincial Government manages, you will see debentures of the smaller communities of British Columbia issued to those pension funds. They total today 1.5 billion dollars, and they are going up at the rate of three to four hundred million dollars a year.

The qualification, Mr. Speaker, to have access to these enormous amounts of money at favourable interest rates is Provincial Government guarantee. And when that Provincial Government guarantee was denied to the cities and municipalities of the Province, where does the money go? Why, the money goes to the B.C. Hydro and the P.G.E., that's where it goes. Not to the municipalities and cities. And what are the interest rates, Mr. Speaker? The interest rates are far below what the cities and municipalities pay.

The Canada Pension Plan, which now totals over $400,000,000, is only available to provincially guaranteed corporations. The lowest interest rates in Canada, huge amounts of social capital, and as far as I am concerned, Mr. Speaker, such functions as water and sewage rate in importance with electricity lines and railroads. The cities and municipalities of this Province are just as entitled to that huge hoard of cash as anyone else, and at the same interest rates.

Why should the cities and municipalities be pushed out into the cold of the international money market while the Provincial Crown corporations bask in the sun at more favourable interest rates? Why? Because it is the policy of the treasury benches. Not because it's just, and not because it's right, but because it's the policy of the Provincial Government to play favourites with priorities in this Province, to favour their own monuments and to deny the people in the cities and municipalities of the works that they require for their future.

I say that there is no credit to the Provincial Government in seeing a proper sewage facility built in the City of Nelson, and there may be credit to the Provincial Government to extending the railroad, but it doesn't necessarily make British Columbia a better place to live, and there is only one kind of municipal finance authority that should be established in this Province and that's one unconditionally guaranteed by this Provincial Government.

The cities and municipalities of this Province are children of the Provincial Government and, Mr. Speaker, I don't want my children insuring one another for what they earn and for their credit. If they are my responsibility, I look after them, and that's what this Provincial Government should be doing and, Mr. Speaker, they have the resources to do it, hundreds of millions of dollars a year. The pension funds of the municipal civil servants and the teachers and the savings of everybody in the Canada Pension Plan, and the members of this Legislative Assembly, all denied to the cities and municipalities of this Province, all denied to sewer works, all denied to water works. Are they less important than the B.C. Hydro and the P.G.E.? I say no, Mr. Speaker.

There is no guarantee at all that the formation of this authority will make it possible for this so-called federation of credit that the Municipal Affairs Minister has perpetrated on the people of British Columbia, that they will be able to

[ Page 736 ]

borrow at all, much less at acceptable interest rates. But the B.C. Hydro doesn't have any trouble borrowing.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: That's an irresponsible statement.

MR. McGEER: The B.C. Hydro has no trouble at all. Is that irresponsible? We just increased their borrowing power by $250,000,000 right in this House at this Session.

MR. CAMPBELL: I didn't think you'd go that far.

MR. McGEER: You didn't think I'd go that far! You bet I will. I want to see the cities and municipalities of this Province get a fair deal. You know, Mr. Speaker, you say that the full credit of the Province, six billion dollars, will stand behind this authority, because that's the total value of assessments in the Province. But when the Provincial Government guarantees the bonds, you have the full resources of consolidated revenue — over $1,200,000,000 in taxation, standing behind the bonds, not just local taxation, but all taxation, and that's what counts in the credit markets, and this is what the cities and municipalities should have behind them.

Without going into the details of this particular Bill, Mr. Speaker, I can't help but draw attention to one rather odious feature, and that's that even when member municipalities withdraw and say, "We can go it alone and do better," even deny the huge hoard of savings that the Provincial Government manages, their credit will be dragged down, because through this Bill they will be forced to back the bonds of the participating communities. It doesn't just say in the guarantee section that it will be the assessments of those districts participating. No sir, everybody, whether you participate or not, whether you benefit or not, you guarantee. If that isn't unjustly shoving responsibilities down the local government I'd like to know what is. We can't support this Bill. We think the Minister should withdraw it. We would ask, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister reconsider what his responsibilities to the cities and municipalities are, to reconsider what the responsibilities of the Provincial Government are, to reconsider his priorities as far as developments in British Columbia are concerned. Because it may be the duty of the Minister of Finance to satisfy the needs of the B.C. Hydro and the P.G.E., but it's the responsibility of the Minister of Municipal Affairs to look after the needs of the cities and municipalities of the Province.

What he's doing is, he's acting as the whipping boy for the Minister of Finance, because he's not doing a favour for the cities and municipalities, he's doing a favour for the Minister of Finance. He's making certain that no extra load will be carried by a Provincial Government that sees only the worth of its Crown corporations, not the worth of the communities of this Province. By putting forward this Bill, it's not just a deterrent to the essential works in the years ahead, but it works a hardship on those areas that have been able to achieve something despite the Government, and conceivably could go it alone and go it alone better than with your help.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Member for Cariboo.

MR. A.V. FRASER: Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak in support of Bill No. 74. I am amazed at the remarks coming from the other side of the floor. I would like to deal first with the remarks of the honourable member from Burnaby-Willingdon. I don't think these urban people realize the problems in the rest of the Province, and the fact that we as a Government represent all the Province of British Columbia, not just the more highly populated part of the Province. I guess they could be referred to as the Vancouver party…

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh no, no.

MR. FRASER: …but the facts of life are this in municipal financing — and I just came out of 20 years of day to day experience of it — that because of the tight money situation and the high cost of money it has become very difficult to acquire money. This Authority will make it possible for all municipalities in this Province to go as one group onto the money market, and I am sure that they will be able to acquire money, and at a much cheaper rate of interest than has been able to be done in the past.

A remark was made by the member from Burnaby-Willingdon, I think he was referring to the Greater Vancouver Regional District, and boasting about the fact that they had 50 per cent of the assets going into this Authority. I'll agree with that, Mr. Speaker, but one thing he forgot to tell you, he didn't say anything about the liabilities of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, so I think we should balance one against the other and you'll find out that they more or less balance off. I don't think that the Greater Vancouver Regional District has done a very wonderful job of borrowing money, when you consider they have been on the money market just recently and paid 9¾ per cent interest, and I believe an effective rate of around 10 per cent, and I think this is a shockingly high rate. With this Authority set up I am sure that a percentage point or more will be reduced, and therefore it will certainly help not only the highly populated areas of the Province, but the Interior as well.

Something else that nobody has said here tonight. the Union of B.C. Municipalities are completely in favour of this and they represent all the municipalities of British Columbia. The municipalities, through the Union of B.C. Municipalities, want this Authority set up as fast as possible.

I agree on the terms in this Bill that the borrowing should only be restricted to water, sewer, and pollution, and as the show gets on the road they can widen the scope of this Authority, that's no problem, but we have to start from somewhere. The other thing is that all individual municipalities can opt out of this by July the 2nd. I hope, as a member of this Government, that everybody will elect to opt in by July 2nd, and it'll be unanimous throughout the Province of British Columbia.

I would just say, in regard to the honourable first member from Vancouver–Point Grey, it shows how narrow his party is in their thinking, because of what he proposes, all the municipalities in the Interior would go on with no long-term funds available to them at all, what he is proposing, and I was quite surprised to hear his remarks.

So I'd just conclude my remarks, Mr. Speaker, by asking this entire House to vote unanimously on the second reading of this Bill.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Kootenay.

MR. L.T. NIMSICK: Mr. Speaker, on listening to the debate on this Bill, I'm rather surprised that a person who has been in municipal politics for 20 years would even go so far

[ Page 737 ]

as to suggest that it's a good Bill. I'm surprised at the honourable member for Cariboo in his statements with regard to this Bill. I don't think that a lot of the members over there have read the Bill. The members that are pounding their desks have not read the Bill, and they know nothing about the Bill.

AN HON. MEMBER: You read it.

MR. NIMSICK: I've read it. I understand it too, far better. I've been in municipal politics too. Why, you say that the U.B.C.M. supports this. I think they've been sold a bill of goods. I think that the U.B.C.M., if they support this, have been sold a bill of goods that they don't understand. It puts me in mind when I first came in, when this Government first came into power when they brought the Rossland formula on, and it's a Bill similar to that, it'll probably never get off the ground.

But, Mr. Speaker, the honourable Minister of Municipal Affairs stated that he wanted a broad base, a broad base so that every municipality would get the benefit of the other municipalities. Now we've had municipalities in this Province go into hands of receivership. You're not going to tell me that when they do go in, that other municipalities are going to be responsible for their debts? This Government — the municipalities are creatures of this Government. The municipalities are creatures of this Government, they're children of this Government, and this Government tells the municipalities whether they can borrow on anything, and they've got to okay all the borrowing powers of the municipalities. Whenever there's money to be borrowed, this Government passes on it, but the other municipalities don't pass on it. The Cariboo municipality doesn't pass on the municipalities in my riding.

AN HON. MEMBER: There is no Cariboo municipality.

MR. NIMSICK: No, but I said the municipalities in Cariboo. Prince George — they don't decide whether Kimberley can borrow on a sewage problem or not, but they've got to, they've got to guarantee that the borrowing power is right. Now the Provincial Government, they've put all the say and it's the Provincial Government's responsibility to back the municipalities.

We've heard a great deal about the Provincial guarantees for years. Now why is the Provincial Government trying to get out of guaranteeing the bonds of the municipalities? Why are they trying to do that? To put it on a basis such as this, and say that all municipalities are responsible for each municipality, and the other municipalities have no say as to whether certain things are borrowed for a good purpose or bad, it just doesn't seem possible to me.

If you want a mobilization, and he said a Provincial Government, or this basis, is a mobilization of credit in the Province. The greatest mobilization of credit is the Provincial Government — they're the vehicle of mobilization, the Provincial Government is the vehicle. They're the vehicle that's got all the borrowing power of the Province, they've got everybody under them. So why shouldn't they guarantee the bonds of these municipalities? This is the most ridiculous Bill that I've seen come before this House for a long time….

I don't care what the municipality is, I'm here as a representative of the people of British Columbia, and I don't want to see the municipalities taken down the garden path by this Government. I don't want them to be taken down the garden path by this Government, and I wish that the members over on that side would do a little reading up of the Bill, and understand it as well. I certainly am going to vote against it.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Alberni.

MR. H.R. McDIARMID: Well, Mr. Speaker, I think we've heard some rather incredible positions taken by the Liberals and by the Official Opposition on this Bill. I come from a constituency which has many small municipalities within it, one rather large municipality, and you know when I hear the leader of the Liberal party say that the credit will be dragged down, the credit will be dragged down, I can't help but think of the tremendous lack of faith that this leader must have in the Province of British Columbia. Tremendous lack of faith. I think, also, when you think of the N.D.P. who believe in the closed shop principle, there's a fundamental as far as the labour unions are concerned where everybody believes — well I happen to believe in the closed shop, interestingly enough, yes I do, and I would think that the members on the opposite side do too — and it's simply the question of pooling, it's a question of saying that if good is coming from something that everybody who pools toward that must contribute, must contribute, and that everybody who is going to gain something out of this, must contribute something, and, really, this is the whole basic principle of this Bill.

We have all the municipalities throughout British Columbia, some of them who may have excellent credit ratings, some small ones who may have poor credit ratings. We may find that in some areas you have industries which are expanding and everything is on the up and up and things are going well and these people may be able to do well, but these are British Columbians. We may find that in some other areas that, for one reason or the other, like Elliott Lake, say, in Ontario, that things may go badly, that an industry may find itself in difficult straits. Surely what we're simply doing here is insuring amongst all municipalities in British Columbia that we will all hang together through thick and thin and, as the Province progresses, that no individual municipality will be selected for 15 per cent interest rates, will be selected for 20 per cent interest rates to get water, to get sewer, and to get pollution control devices. I don't think that anything can be any clearer than that.

We have the position here, I think, of the Liberal party, which was mentioned as the Vancouver party, who simply are reiterating a stand made by the majority of the people from the regional district of that City, that never mind what happens in the rest of the Province, I'm all right Jack, I'm all right Jack. I'm not going to buy that for one minute because I want to tell you, Mr. Leader of the Liberal party, that if it weren't for rural British Columbia, Vancouver would not be as prosperous as it is today, not for one minute.

You know, it's a rather interesting thing when you get up and you talk about the gasoline tax and we should be spending it all in Vancouver, that the roads lead out of Vancouver, that it's the hub, that certainly without the prosperity and without the people who are in the bush, the people who are drilling the oil wells, that you wouldn't find the brokers, and you wouldn't find the wholesalers, and you wouldn't find the middle man, and the people who are creaming the wealth of British Columbia in that particular city. I don't think for one minute that you can consider the Province of British Columbia in a parochial context. If we're going to be in the pot, let's all be in the pot together, and

[ Page 738 ]

we'll sink or swim together.

You know, they say, Mr. Speaker, that the Provincial Government should stand behind the guarantees of the municipalities, and what I would like to say to you is simply this, is simply this, that one of the greatest problems facing municipalities today is one of the principles of this Bill, and that's the question of providing sewers, which in itself is a question of pollution.

You know, there was a time when the Federal Government, Mr. Speaker, recognized its responsibility in this direction, and they set up a one-shot deal of a $50,000,000 loan. Fifty million dollars throughout the Provinces of Canada for sewers…. Oh yes, indeed they did. But what I would like to say to you, Mr. Speaker, is there any more reason for the Province to stand behind the municipal bonds in terms of signing than there is for the Government of Canada? Because surely if we're looking, if we're looking…. What they say is for the interest rates to be reduced. I believe that I understand this perfectly well, and we're simply saying, that if we're all a part of the whole, we're all a part of the whole, then is there any reason, is there any reason why the Government of Canada should not stand behind the municipalities and get their rates at an even lower rate than there is for the Provinces?

If that's what they really believe in, then why don't they stand up in the Legislature today and say, Mr. Speaker, that we recognize that if we could get lower rates, if the Government of Canada would stand behind the municipalities throughout Canada for the services of water, sewer and pollution, and we'd all get a better deal.

MR. SPEAKER: The Member for Esquimalt.

MR. H.J. BRUCH: Mr. Chairman, just following on what the member for Alberni has said, in four Federal elections the Federal Government promised, the Federal Liberals promised, a Municipal Development Bank on the lines of the Industrial Development Bank, and if this had been provided, then the municipalities would have a proper funding and interest rate structure.

But it's interesting, Mr. Speaker, how attitudes have changed, and I have here a copy of a letter from the Federal Finance Minister where someone suggested to him that low interest capital be made available in this manner, and his reply was, amazingly, to make low interest loans available to municipalities at this time would tend to increase the pressure on the economy and inflationary expectations. It's amazing to hear the Liberals stand up and give us that kind of a line, when their Federal counterparts have reneged on constant promises that could have given the municipalities their capital at a proper rate, and that would not have burdened the people of British Columbia with the interest rates they now have to pay.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that the Minister, in introducing this Bill, announced that he wanted to mobilize the credit of B.C. for the municipalities of B.C.

The member from Alberni says that we have no faith. Mr. Speaker, we have faith in British Columbia, we have faith in British Columbia. If the Minister of Municipal Affairs, if the Minister of Municipal Affairs wants to mobilize the credit for all of British Columbia, then why don't we pool the borrowing of the Provincial Government in with all the municipalities, Mr. Speaker? If there is to be faith in the borrowing market, why do we treat the municipalities as foster children? If the member's argument is valid, and I think it is valid in terms of faith and pooling the credit, then let's do it properly and bring all the credit borrowing power under the Government of British Columbia. Because, Mr. Speaker, the issues are very important, absolutely important. We've already lined up with public schools, that's why we have the School Districts and that's why the borrowing is done centrally. We are not prepared to say that the performance of this Government on those borrowings has been adequate, but we certainly are willing to support the School District system, we are not opposed to that, nor would we ever interfere with it. But I suggest to you that in a matter as important as schools, to destroy that central borrowing by the Provincial Government would be to destroy the approach to better education in British Columbia.

What this Government is really saying by this Bill, Mr. Speaker, is that they do not consider pollution to be a priority issue. That's what they are saying by this Bill. They are saying that the borrowing will be done at the municipal level to control pollution in this Province. After all of their statements about moving into a new field of aggressive pollution control, they bring in a Bill like this that absolves them of responsibility, of the responsibility of borrowing collectively for that pollution control. What is the point of having an adequate public school system if we don't have adequate public health through proper pollution control?

After we heard that gallant speech from the vest pocket Minister of Municipal Affairs, who has reduced his portfolio to almost a meaningless capacity through this kind of legislation, after we heard that speech from him this afternoon right out of the vest pocket over his heart in terms of his commitment, his great personal commitment in the battle against pollution, we find that this Bill is destroying any central borrowing power in that battle. Mr. Speaker, who's kidding who, who's kidding who? The vest pocket message came out, and we got the flying fish, we saw an attempt on leadership by that Minister, we saw him make his first move to appeal to the backbenches, and it was a flop, Mr. Speaker. He was asked to sell — along with that he was asked to sell a policy that was to be interpreted to be pollution control, and we find now that he's not committed to the financing.

You know, Mr. Speaker, why is this such a negative Bill in terms of the needs of Vancouver? It's a further drain on the City of Vancouver to borrow on their credit rating when two years ago in the Throne Speech the Premier of this Province announced as one of his greatest benefits to the Province of British Columbia, he had a Moody triple A rating. We checked that out, Mr. Speaker, and we found that it had nothing to do with motels. A three star rating, and you know, Mr. Speaker, he's not prepared to give the Province's credit rating to his own children, his own creatures, the municipalities. Is he embarrassed by the municipalities or does he lack the faith in the municipalities that the member from Alberni is asking for? What is the answer? The answer is obvious. The Government is willing to take taxes at the local level, the Government is willing to insist upon referendum for hospitals at the local level, the Government is willing to bleed the local level any way they can, then shift the responsibility for borrowing to the local level.

Mr. Speaker, why not really step into the future, why not

[ Page 739 ]

pool all the borrowings of the Province of British Columbia with all of its municipalities on a five year basis. Why not ask the municipalities as you do under the Municipal Act to plan for five years, submit five year cyclical budgets annually to this Government and borrow on every three or five years on the market, one lump sum. Well, Mr. Speaker, what is wrong with going to the great money markets of the world and asking for one huge sum covering all the Provincial Government's needs, all the municipalities' needs, backed by the good name of the credit of all the people of British Columbia, Mr. Speaker, backed by that name. And of course, you are in a better bargaining position when you go to the money markets of the world borrowing one lump sum on a cyclical budget. Why are we confined to 12 month budgeting? What is the commitment in that area?

If the Minister was going to do something courageous and something daring, why not examine the Australian system, the Australian Federal system that asks its member states and its member municipalities to borrow as one nation on the money markets of the world, both internally and externally. But you've taken the germ of a good idea, and you've taken an arm's length approach to the problem.

You know, Mr. Speaker, for a member of this House who I will not name, to stand up and demand that Ottawa, Ottawa give borrowings to the municipalities so that the Province can opt out, that member is not showing his responsibility to his local municipalities. That member is not showing his responsibility, especially, Mr. Speaker, if that member represents on the Government side. Giving that kind of policy while being a Government member indicates that that member has no faith in the Government of the day of British Columbia in trusting itself in borrowing for the development of its own municipalities. To ask Ottawa, to ask Ottawa when you stand in this House and praise yourselves about the big majority you got, to praise yourselves and preen your political feathers about the 38 seats you won, and then to abandon your children in this kind of Bill, and then to stand here and cry poor mouth to borrow from Ottawa, Mr. Speaker, indicates that that member's level of understanding is lower than the level of his voice.

You know, Mr. Speaker, this will spell the defeat of the member from Alberni, this will spell the defeat of the member from Alberni, because instead of getting up in this House and spouting for the municipalities he is, too, pushing the responsibility aside, he's, too, pushing his responsibility for their fund raising aside. You know, Mr. Speaker, this Bill indicates that this Government has lost faith in itself, lost faith in itself to take a step into the future, not prepared to guarantee the borrowings of its own children, the municipalities, Mr. Speaker.

Tonight it's a high water mark for every member of the Opposition, and I agree with the statements made by them because, Mr. Speaker, any member who votes for this Bill indicates that he's lost faith in the great future of British Columbia, and that great future encompassing the plans, the hopes, and the dreams of the municipalities of this Province, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Saanich and the Islands.

MR. J.D. TISDALLE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In respect to the Leader of the Opposition's remarks, I can only say this, that he doesn't believe in the equality of opportunity of municipalities in this Province. We saw enough of that in the olden days when school boards went to the people or went to the money market on their own without equality of opportunity in the financial world, and I believe that this will, by experience, show that the pooling of the resources of the municipalities and the level of finances intended in this Bill, will be one of the most progressive and forward steps that this Province has ever done on behalf of the municipalities.

It's all right to eulogize an Opposition's point of view and to try and make hay on behalf of the few municipalities who have a superior credit rating, and I appreciate that there are municipalities under this Government from 1952 on that have had a tremendous financial growth and economic-wise they can paddle their own canoe or their own battleship, as you may wish to put it. But this is not a go-it-alone Province on behalf of municipalities that are the wealthy ones. I believe that we have to share responsibility in the municipal field, and the growth that has taken place on behalf of those who have been fortunate to be in the real swim of the financial advancement of the policies of this Government deserve to share it with those who have not quite that opportunity.

We take, for instance, the Vancouver people. I realize that Vancouver itself could go to the market and as has been said, probably meet the financial wizards there and come out with a very good rate. But if you take the regional district that has been — that the Regional District of Greater Vancouver — some of those are dwarfed on the money market, and couldn't do that and go it alone, they have enjoyed a superior position because they have associated with the giant financial world of Vancouver. Surely if it is good for that isolated pocket to go as a package deal to the money market, surely it is just as fair for the equality of opportunity of all municipalities to pool our credit position.

This is not something new, and I'm glad the Leader of the Opposition did say that it was the germ of a good idea. Well then, if the germ of a good idea doesn't warrant his support and he uses Australia, another nation, to even fortify his argument, what is wrong with at least supporting the germ of a good idea that will grow. The ideas from this side of the House have shown an ability to grow with the times and provide the kind of an environment that the school boards and the financial people in municipal affairs such as water districts, and so on, have been enjoying on the money market.

I don't think there is any reason to argue forcibly that the credit rating of the Government as a whole or the Province as a whole should be used on any one area exclusively. I believe that we should be able to farm out on the different levels of Government the economic stability and the ability to produce revenues to pay for their financing at that level. There is nothing wrong with that idea, neither is it new or old, it is common sense, and I'm glad to say that the fellows who are on — the aldermen and mayors in my constituency and the people that represent there the people's opinion, are forward enough thinking to see that this is financial equality and opportunity for municipalities. I am glad for the legislation.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, I thought I noticed a trace of embarrassment when the honourable the Minister of Municipal Affairs introduced this Bill this afternoon —

[ Page 740 ]

tonight. Thank you. Embarrassment coupled with a little chagrin, because he is a Minister who understands the problems of municipalities, he knows what the solutions are, he knows where the problem lies and yet he is obliged, in spite of the high-flying leadership speech he made this afternoon, he's obliged to choke that down tonight and bring forth this kind of a Bill for municipalities in British Columbia.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Did you think my speech was okay this afternoon?

MR. WILLIAMS: I thought it was a high-flying speech. You had the arm waving, the whole bit, and tonight the wings were clipped, however. You brought in a finance Bill for the municipalities and that's where the clipping takes place.

MR. CAMPBELL: I'll give you the other one when I get up to speak again.

MR. WILLIAMS: That's fine, that's just dandy. You give us the other half — you fly on the other wing when you close this speech tonight.

But, during the course of the Minister's remarks he talked about the consistency of this Government with regard to its treatment of municipalities, and I think that he should be congratulated on that consistency because consistently year after year they have placed burden upon burden upon the necks of municipalities, and they withhold the financial support that this Government can offer, and they are still doing it.

By this Bill they are being equally consistent, because they are bringing before this Legislature year after year, and again this year, legislation which is forcing the responsibility for sewage treatment and pollution control and abatement upon the municipalities. Just like years gone by, when they bring in this Financing Authority Act, they take away the financial strength of this Provincial Government from the provision of funds which are needed for those same facilities that this Government is forcing upon municipalities. That's consistency all right, and I was shocked and surprised to hear the member from Cariboo rise in his place after 20 years in the municipal service, and make the speech that he made.

This year, in the Budget that was delivered earlier this Session, the honourable the Minister of Finance tabled the figures which proved just how well this Government over the years has treated its municipalities in relation to its other responsibilities. The member for Saanich said no area should be treated any differently. Well, what did the Budget show? For municipalities and other local governments the total guarantee, total net guarantees, $183,000,000. But the other areas of Government responsibility, the Crown corporations, the total net guarantees, Provincial Crown corporations $2,067,000,000.

MR. R.M. STRACHAN: They say that's everybody's problem.

MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, that's right, that's the way we treat all the areas of Government responsibility the same. I wonder if the member from Saanich wouldn't like to reconsider, just wouldn't like to reconsider the remarks that he made.

Our objection to this particular legislation is that the Government has not extended its guarantee for bonds which are financed under this Authority, and I think that the members should realize the significance of this. As the first member from Vancouver–Point Grey has pointed out, when the guarantee is extended, then the bonds qualify as investments in some of the funds which are under the control of the Minister of Finance, and you should understand what that means.

Let's just take any one, and these documents have been filed in this House by the Minister of Finance in response to questions, and they were filed since the 3rd of February. Let's take the Municipal Superannuation Fund. This is the inventory of bonds that were made available to municipalities as of February 3, 1970. Now, they aren't made available any more, but when they were made available what are the rates, what are the rates? Well, let's see, Dawson Creek borrowed at 3¾ per cent, Fort St. John at 4½ per cent, Fruitvale at 4¾ per cent, Houston at 5½ per cent, Quesnel borrowed at 4½ per cent, Quesnel borrowed at 4¼ per cent.

AN HON. MEMBER: When? When?

MR. WILLIAMS: This is at the times when the Government gave its guarantees, but it took them away. You can look at fund, after fund, after fund, and these are the kind of rates that were made available by the Minister of Finance to municipalities when they were borrowing from these special funds which are under his control. But he doesn't….

AN HON. MEMBER: What year?

MR. WILLIAMS: You can look at the material, he doesn't give the dates on which they were borrowed, but he gives the maturities. The maturities are '79, '83, '85, '84, '87. You know, they are all 20 year serials, they are all 20 year serials.

AN HON. MEMBER: Same rates as the B.C. Hydro.

MR. WILLIAMS: Yeah, the same times that B.C. Hydro is borrowing and the same rates that B.C. Hydro is borrowing. These were the guarantees that were given by the Minister of Finance, and the bonds of these various municipalities could go into these funds and get money, but not any longer, no, not any longer, no guarantees now. The bonds of the Municipal Financing Authority can't go into these funds, can't go into Canada Pension. There is only one place they can go, on the open market, on the open market.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's the place for B.C. Hydro.

MR. WILLIAMS: B.C. Hydro won't go there. The Minister of Finance won't force his Crown corporations to go to the open market. No, the P.G.E. doesn't go there. He holds these funds open for them, but he won't extend the same privilege to the municipalities, and this is why we object to this Bill.

Now, if s interesting that the Minister of Municipal Affairs talked about this being a federation of co-operation, a great vehicle for long-term debt financing, a place that we use for the savings of our own people.

Well now, the Minister of Municipal Affairs knows very well what the problem is, and a municipality in this Province which, in 1967, could have gone to the market and placed its waterworks bonds at about 6¾ per cent was refused permission by this Government to do this, and after two years of negotiations they finally got the Department of

[ Page 741 ]

Municipal Affairs to agree that they could go and sell 20-year bonds if they could find people in their own community who would buy them. Well, by golly, Mr. Speaker, they did just that. They were in such a jam for waterworks money that they went to people in their own municipality and they got them to subscribe for $150,000 worth of bonds at a coupon rate of 7¼ to yield 7½.

AN HON. MEMBER: What's wrong with self-help?

MR. WILLIAMS: What's wrong with self-help? Now I am glad you asked that question, because when the municipality had arranged with citizens in the community to buy those bonds, they then came back to the Minister of Finance to get the okay to borrow it, and it was refused, turned down. That's the way the Minister of Municipal and the Minister of Finance work. The Minister of Municipal Affairs sold the deal….

…Yes, I would like you to very much, because I happen to have copies of the correspondence in which members of your Department said, "So sorry, the Minister of Finance won't approve of the arrangements." That's right. Well, I would be happy to be corrected if I am wrong, because the correspondence that I have indicates this is exactly what happened.

Now, this is the kind of opportunity which is today being offered by the Minister of Municipal Affairs to the people in this Province — that's right — invest into your own municipality. But that's not the way this Government plays the game. No, Mr. Speaker, it has been mentioned in the debates this evening that one of the objecting features is that there is some restriction on municipalities opting out of this Municipal Financing Authority, and it's right. There is a restriction on opting out. Because if you opt out, then you're probably cut off from any borrowings that may be available, in the future.

But the tragic part of it all, the tragic part of it all, is that the people who are really opting out, the people who are really opting out of their responsibilities is the Provincial Government. They are the ones who are opting out. They lay the responsibility on the municipalities. As the Minister said this afternoon, it is easy to sell the skating rinks and it is easy to sell the parks, but it is tough to sell those sewers that are under the ground. But nevertheless, this Government is going to make those municipalities put those sewers under the ground, and having made them do that, we are not going to give them a nickel worth of help, when it comes to paying for the shot.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Yale Lillooet.

MR. W.L. HARTLEY: It has been very interesting, Mr. Speaker, to sit back and listen to my neighbour from the Cariboo, and my friend the Minister of Municipal Affairs — everybody is concerned about money, they are all short of money, the municipalities, the cities, the Government is short of money. Why are they short of money? Why are they short of money? Because they sit back there and they are all turned off — even the member for Skeena, he's turned off — sit back instead of listening to our sage advice as to what can be done about money.

You heard our Leader say go to the money markets of the world. Now where should those money markets be? For over 20 years we have been telling this Government to go into the insurance business. Why go into the insurance business? Because every insurance company has to have a reserve dollar for every dollar risked, and by setting up these reserves in British Columbia we move those money markets of the world from Bay Street and Wall Street to Government Street and that's the way it should be. Good government, this Province, huge reserves, and our problems are solved.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Minister will close the debate.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, very quickly, and more in sadness than in anger, I am going to once more call upon the sinners across the way to repentance, and they will get an opportunity to do that in about four minutes. But I just want you, before you do cast your vote, to remember this night, because the first prediction I am going to make is that along the way this night will be remembered on the Votes and Proceedings of this Legislature in exactly the same way as another famous Bill was remembered in later years on the floor of this Legislature, in the home-owner grant. I will predict that not only will this Province live to see the day when this night is remembered, but I will make this prediction, that other jurisdictions in Canada will follow exactly the same course of action that is being indicated here tonight. So, Mr. Speaker, the first observation I want to make is, as I call the sinners to repentance across the way, remember this night. Remember this night.

The second one is, I want the leader of the Liberal party in particular to remember this night, because it has been seldom heard in this Legislature the kind of irresponsible financial statement that one would expect from the respected leader of a party, that at one time had an honoured and a privileged place in this Legislature. That is, that he considers that this Municipal Financing Authority, backed as it is by six billion dollars of every municipality in British Columbia, the total property taxation of the Province, he made the ridiculous statement in this Legislature tonight that he doubted if it could borrow at all. I say, Mr. Member — shame — just as we said when you tried to put a run in your little party — no wonder they have only got five members in this Legislature — when you tried to put a run on the parity bonds of British Columbia in exactly the same way.

Then, Mr. Speaker, when you talk about consistency, then we have the statement again by the same leader. He said, the Greater Vancouver Regional District, having two billion dollars worth of assets, which naturally puts it ahead of the other municipalities or the regions in the Province, obviously it can do a better job on the market by going it alone, because it has two billion dollars worth of assets. He will realize how illogical that is, if it can do better with two billion dollars, certainly it should be able to do better with six billion dollars.

Then, Mr. Speaker, the other principle that is involved in this legislation tonight, and make no mistake about it, is a principle of equalization, and we are going to have on the record in a few minutes a straight vote against equalization. Never mind, you are going to hear this around this Province as well, my friend, before you are much older, you better believe it….

…I don't have to take a breath to tell you this story….

But then, Mr. Speaker, we had one more incredible statement here, Mr. Speaker, we had the stunning statement that Greater Vancouver is going to use 75 per cent of the credit requirements of this Finance Authority — that was a

[ Page 742 ]

good statement — that happens to be a fact. Then he said, you know the Greater Vancouver area has 75 per cent, of the credit requirements, it can do very well, thank you, on two billion dollars worth of the back-up credit. Then he said, Greater Vancouver is going to be resting on this two billion dollars. Thank you very much, thank you Jack I am all right, Jack — but what he neglected to say, and he is 100 per cent right in total projections for the next five years — the Greater Vancouver area would, in fact, require 75 per cent of the projected borrowings from this Authority. Now get that figure, because that 75 per cent of the borrowings is not against the two billion dollars of Greater Vancouver assets, but is against the entire six billion dollars of the rest of the Province.

In other words my friend, it is not the Greater Vancouver Regional District that is carrying anyone, it is the entire Province that is carrying the Greater Vancouver Regional Districts. I think we should put some of these things in perspective before you make statements like that, and in this Province, this Province has a guarantee as no other Province has, against the entire school borrowings, on behalf of local government, the entire hospital borrowings on behalf of local government. As I understand the position of the member opposite, they will wish to totally manacle local government in this Province to the point that the entire credit structure of this Province is totally and utterly and absolutely controlled by the Province of British Columbia making the decisions without any local autonomy, without any financial autonomy, without any financial integrity left whatsoever at the local level.

Now Mr. Speaker, when they vote tonight, they are voting for the complete abdication of local autonomy. They are voting for the complete abdication away from local fiscal integrity, and Mr. Speaker, they are voting, Mr. Speaker, against the opportunity of the local governments in this Province. The local governments in this Province are entitled to a form of autonomy which is going to be preserved in this Bill.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, over the course of the last two years, it has been the responsibility of the Department of Municipal Affairs to discuss in quite a number of ways the prospects for rating, and I am glad someone mentioned rating here tonight, I am glad somebody mentioned it here tonight. We talked about double-A rating, we talked about triple-A rating and the member for Dewdney, the Leader of the Opposition, indicated his complete…. (loud interruptions)…. Coquitlam…. (laughter)…. he mentioned tonight something which should illustrate for all times, how little that member happens to know about finance.

As I wrote down his financial panacea, the member for Coquitlam, the Leader of the Opposition, so that it is on the record — this record, going through there, it is in here and out there — the Leader of the Opposition says that his financial formula is to go on the financial markets in one bundle. Every three to five years you take the entire amount of money required by the school boards, the hospital boards, the Province, the Hydro and you put it on the market in cyclical budgets once or twice every three or four years. Now what a financial genius he has turned out to be. If three years from now the rate is X, no matter what you might expect it to be between now and then, you don't do anything about it because your wheel hasn't turned yet, therefore you don't go on the market.

How financially competent can you get! And you know, Mr. Speaker, it's so incredible a financial position, that I had to write it down, because he said using that kind of a financial rating, there is no question about it that there would be some kind of a rating that would amount to triple-A. Now, Mr. Speaker, there happens to be only three provinces in Canada that has double A, one is Ontario, the other one is Alberta, the other one is British Columbia, and I say that, Mr. Speaker, without fear of contradiction.

AN HON. MEMBER: You're the last speaker. (laughter)

MR. CAMPBELL: That's exactly why I am saying it, that you will have an opportunity across the way, to once more stand up and be wrong, once more to put on the record another fault, another mistake, along the way, another example of your misplaced judgment, in exactly the same way as the home-owner grant. And one of these times, not too far from now, not too long away, you sinners will once more come home to repent. I move second reading.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that Bill No. 74, An Act to Establish the Municipal Finance Authority of British Columbia, be now read a second time. All those in favour signify by saying Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it.

The motion was agreed to on the following division:—

YEAS — 35

Messieurs

NAYS — 17

Messieurs

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 78, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Bill No. 78. An Act to Amend the Hospital Act. The Honourable Minister of Health Services.

HON. R.R. LOFFMARK: Mr. Speaker, earlier in the

[ Page 743 ]

Session, and speaking to the second reading of the Bill to Amend the Regional Hospital Districts Act, I referred to the success with which the regional hospital system has introduced and now under way, and much of what I said in respect would apply with equal force to the proposed amendments to the Hospital Act which you are now considering.

You will find in this Bill, Mr. Speaker, that the Government and the relationship of the regional hospital district to individual hospital boards is made more flexible in respect to representation by the regional district on local hospital boards. Recognizing also the present use of the expression, "extended care and rehabilitation and activation," it is proposed to modify the wording of the Hospital Act to eliminate expressions such as "chronic and convalescent" and so on, and substitute the appropriate words. We are also proposing that the appropriate sections of the Act, as relating to this type of hospital, should be brought in line with the activities and responsibilities of acute care hospitals.

There has been also, in the last year or so, considerable progress made vis-à-vis such things as standardized plans and so on, and also a question has arisen as to the care, custody and disposition of hospital documents. These matters we propose to deal with under the authority of regulations as prescribed by the legislation.

There are two other items that are worthy of note, and that is we propose to modify, somewhat, the rights of the Province and the regional districts vis-à-vis the equity of the Province and the regional districts in hospital property, or property intended for hospital purposes, which is not at this time being used for this purpose, and we would propose in this legislation to extend the equity and the rights of equity both for the Province and the hospital district, to cover those eventualities.

There is also another section which you might like to consider, Mr. Speaker, relating to the appointment of public administrators, and finally a most important provision relating to expropriation. You'll find in the last section there the recognition of a principle which I think all members would agree, and that is that the hospital properties and the use of land for hospital purposes should have a very high priority vis-à-vis expropriation proceedings or the needs, for that matter, of other competing agencies. It is a proposal under this legislation that there should be no higher priority in land use than that, where the property has been designated and assigned to hospital, and for such purpose, With those remarks, Mr. Speaker, I would move that the Bill be now read a second time.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for New Westminster.

MR. D.G. COCKE: Well, Mr. Speaker, as the Minister indicates, this is basically just a housekeeping sort of Bill, Bill No. 78, you know the kind of housekeeping Bill that modifies some things where they require modifying and straightens up some wording and so on and so forth. But believe me, this Bill has one of the biggest clubs I have ever seen in my life, and this club is poised over the head of any hospital that steps out of line a foot, any hospital.

In other words, Mr. Speaker, we are talking about the same kind of thing we have been talking about all day. We want to have all the power in Victoria, and we want to have all the spending in the municipalities, and we are getting fed up with it. Mr. Speaker, I am sorry if I have offended some of the people across the way, you know that is the furthest thing from my mind. I really don't try to do this kind of thing, possibly I am just a little upset, and I will try to modify my comments from here on in. I will modify them by saying that this is a great big club, this is the kind of thing that we have been worrying about in the City of New Westminster. I am sure that the Jubilee has been having some concerns as well.

I suggest, Mr. Speaker, if you want to take over the hospitals in the Province that you take over the hospitals in the Province. Take them over, but don't hold a club over their heads.

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you recommending it?

MR. COCKE: Yes, of course I am recommending it, if that happens to be the way to do it — then do it, but don't stand there with a club poised over their heads…. . That's no club, Mr. Speaker, that is no club at all, because this kind of legislation says that in fact, and these people over there don't obviously understand. They don't obviously understand that this kind of legislation says in effect, that if we don't like, you know if the Government doesn't like what you are doing, the Government will take it over until such time as we put things in line and then we will turn it back to you. It's your responsibility. And I am sure that fair-minded people can't buy this, can't buy it in any way, shape or form.

Here is an example where the Royal Columbian Hospital right now are fighting an operating budget, operating costs in the future, and the Government says you are too high. They say, well we're in line. Well okay, if they are not, there is no such thing as negotiation here. They say that in effect, either you go along the line with this operating cost budget, or else we are going to send in a public administrator, a public administrator. Are you in your seat there, Mr. Richmond?

Anyway, this is a fascinating kind of Bill that we have in front of us, and I do hope that some of the poor old backbenchers will think about this Bill, you know, when they go home We don't answer those kind of remarks, because we do read Bills over here. It is quite obvious where they don't read Bills, and when, and which one.

Anyway, there is no flexibility in this kind of relationship Mr. Speaker, none whatsoever. The flexibility that I would like to see here is either true honest flexibility or, in fact, if you are going to do this kind of thing, step right in and take over the hospitals right from the outset. I notice the chairman of the board of the New Westminster Hospital, for an example, said, "I wish they would take it over, and then they'd understand the kind of pressures that we have." Fine, go ahead, but do it to the whole works. Don't hold clubs over any of their heads. This isn't courageous, this isn't courageous legislation. It's bravado, it really is, and hollow bravado at that.

Anyway, the last altercation that we had with a hospital as far as the New Westminster District is concerned was regarding capital costs. I am sure that had the Legislature sat at that time, with this kind of a majority, there would have been this kind of legislation, and I don't think, Mr. Speaker, that it is fair. I think that this Government should either say what they are going to do out loud, or don't do a thing — negotiate. One or the other, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Oak Bay.

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MR. G.S. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, in this particular Bill, dealing with the Hospital Act, I would have to agree with the previous speaker that I have some uneasiness about the particular section dealing with the authority given to Government to take over a hospital, having appointed an administrator. I am clearly on record, and continue, to feel exactly the same way, that a vital part of a successful hospital system which is sadly lacking in Britain, for example, is the lack of hospital autonomy at the local level, and my colleagues in my party are well aware of the strong feelings I have in this regard, that is if they were awake when we discussed it (laughter)…. Well, I think that kind of comment deserves that kind of answer.

I would just say, Mr. Speaker, that I see the situation in the light of balance in any democratic society, and by balance I mean that I think there should be a reasonable responsibility between the privileges of having local autonomy, and the Provincial responsibility of supervising the wise and prudent expenditure of public money. The situation can exist, and we must face it, whereby a local hospital board may, for reasons best known to itself, insist on a certain budget which, compared to budgets elsewhere in the Province, may be unacceptable to Government. On the other hand, I am very concerned that Government, given this power as spelled out in the Bill, might very well use this in a subtle way, over a period of time, to take over every hospital in the Province. I think this would be disastrous.

The reason that I am prepared to support this Bill, is that I feel — if you will just listen, I will give you my reasons — is that I feel that the Provincial Government which puts up 60 per cent of capital funds for hospitals, and 50 per cent of the operating costs of hospitals, has a responsibility to every voter in the Province to ensure that no one hospital shows any sense of disregard for its public responsibilities in running its own hospital. I agree, and the cause for my uneasiness is the question, who decides when a hospital is behaving in an irresponsible manner…. Again, it is obvious you haven't read the Bill, because the…. would you mind being quiet while I explain the Bill, which you haven't read. The Government sets up a Committee of Inquiry, the Inquiry reports to the Cabinet, and it is the decision of the Government or the Cabinet as a whole. The recommendations of the Minister and the Committee of Inquiry go to Cabinet, and the Cabinet makes the decision.

I have been under some thought for some time, Mr. Speaker, since I came to this House, that paranoia runs rampant in this House, and I rather feel that I am getting confirmation of that clinical impression tonight…. (laughter)

Be that as it may, I would say, Mr. Speaker, that I have given this particular Bill a great deal of thought and tried to determine in my own mind the balance between the amount of autonomy that a local hospital, out of maybe a hundred hospitals in the Province, should have compared to the greater good or the much larger responsibility of the Provincial Government to ensure that money is wisely spent in each hospital budget in the Province.

I feel that the individual interest of each hospital is certainly best served by having strong local representation and strong authority on the hospital board. On the other hand, I feel that the Government certainly has this responsibility to the whole Province to be in a position to act when one hospital, in its judgment, appears to be behaving in an irresponsible fiscal manner.

I think the House should be made aware, if it is not already aware, of the fact that the authority being asked in this Bill is already present in the Municipal Act and in the Public Schools Act for the same reason, that if a municipality or a school district shows an irresponsible behaviour in its budgeting, then the Government has the authority to take action. I think if we take a broad look at the situation we would realize that the vast sums of money involved in capital expenditure and operating expenses of hospitals, that the Government has the same need to preserve this kind of authority.

The important point, I think, is this, that as far as I personally am concerned, I would like it to be well known to everyone that the reason that I am voting for this Bill is based on the thoughts I have tried to convey tonight and that if in the future — and I would like to make this very clear — if in the future Government proceeds to use this Bill in a manner which suggests that the Bill is a subtle means, over a period of time, of controlling all hospitals in the Province, I will certainly be the first to scream the loudest and the longest at the loss of local hospital autonomy across the Province….

…I don't particularly feel that the particular comment from the Kootenays has got anything to do with it. It is about on a par with the usual comments we get from that member.

But I would suggest, that viewed in a general way, rather than trying to zero in on one local hospital, that if this is viewed as a general responsibility of this Government, that it is a Bill which the Government should support as a responsible means of handling hospital financing and as a responsibility to take measures where one hospital is unreasonably behaving in relation to all the other hospitals in the Province, and this is the situation which has arisen and may continue to arise in the future. I think any reasonable person would agree that it is folly to imperil the whole hospital programme across the Province because of the irresponsible action of one hospital.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Name the hospital, Mr. Member, name the hospital. Mr. Speaker, if this is a Bill against one hospital let's have it out in the open right now.

MR. G.S. WALLACE: I did not say that.

MR. BARRETT: The wind-up of the remarks of the member, Mr. Speaker, the wind-up of the remarks, Mr. Speaker, that this Bill is designed to bring one hospital into line and you'll support that Bill. Mr. Speaker, I challenge the Government to name this hospital.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just one moment. The member for Oak Bay.

MR. WALLACE: I carefully stated "if" one hospital.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The honourable member will accept the statement of the member.

MR. BARRETT: Then why didn't he ask if there was one hospital in mind? He said he wouldn't vote for orders, if it meant all the hospitals. What kind of position is that? What kind of position is that, Mr. Speaker, when in this very House, this very House, that Minister stood up and attacked

[ Page 745 ]

the Royal Columbian Hospital. He threatened the Board of the Royal Columbian Hospital. He did not name any individual member of that Board, and he accused that Board of being irresponsible, then he produces this Bill.

Mr. Speaker, if the Minister of Health has got a complaint against the Royal Columbian Hospital, then let him stand up courageously and have it out in public with the Royal Columbian. But to bring in this Bill in this manner, which is a Bill designed — with paranoia, my friend, with paranoia — a Bill designed to hold a club over the head of an unnamed hospital. Is there a hospital in this Province that is acting irresponsibly? Is there?

AN HON. MEMBER: That's not your business.

MR. BARRETT: Is there a hospital that requires this legislation? Was this legislation brought in purely on speculation? What was the reason this Bill was brought in? Who is it aimed for? And what were the pre-conditioning factors that required the Minister to bring it in?

Mr. Speaker, the member tries to say that the Municipal Act and the School Act have clauses like this, but I point out to the member, Mr. Speaker, that you have the right to vote for your municipal aldermen, you have the right to vote for your school board, but this Government denies the Regional Authority the right to vote for the hospital board. What's it going to be, Mr. Speaker, through you to the Chair? Do you trust the people? Do you trust the people? Amend this Bill and let the people who are paying the hospital bills vote for the hospital boards, Mr. Speaker. Let's have democracy.

That Minister has brought in a draft by-law for a hospital in my district and he'll name the hospital board members. Like the Damon Runyon character that shoots dice in a hat and calls out the numbers, Mr. Speaker, that's the way he's operating the hospitals in this Province. In an attempt to avoid his direct responsibility and this Government's direct responsibility for paying for hospital costs, Mr. Speaker, they have dodged behind private hospital boards all these years. Now when there is a move by one hospital board to state in terms of its frame of reference what it needs to spend, the Minister lacks the purpose and direction of a good Minister of Health by coming out publicly and saying no, but brings in this kind of back door legislation in an attempt to threaten people into line.

I want to tell you this, Mr. Speaker, this is an admission by the Minister that he is a failure in his job and he should resign over this Bill. He should resign over this Bill….

…What hospital? What hospital is going wrong? Allegations were made in this House by that very Minister this Session about a hospital misusing their funds. He said that. Over-spending. Don't you trust the people, Mr. Speaker? Doesn't this Government trust the people? Won't you let them have a vote on their own hospital boards? The answer is no. Don't you trust the people you put on the hospital boards? You put them there. The answer is no.

Mr. Speaker, what's more appalling, what's more shocking is that the arrogance runs over their own party nominee. A member of the board in New Westminster was a Social Credit candidate and a respected member of that community, and rather than face the community of New Westminster, rather than face the board members who this Government named, you've brought in this piece of legislation to play Tinkerbell, threatening in the dark.

You know, Mr. Speaker, that Minister should either resign or fight the Cabinet for the authority that should be his as Minister of Health, Either the hospitals are run by that Minister with no dodges behind a hospital board, or else we have public elections for hospitals. But, to have a Minister, a Minister of the Crown, come in and attack good, honest and decent citizens of this Province without giving names, without giving specified instances, and then bring in this kind of legislation, is to besmirch the very good name of the people of this Province, and I'm shocked and appalled.

Mr. Speaker, I believe in democracy, and unlike the member from Oak Bay, I'm not prepared to abdicate one bit of democratic rights on the face of this Government. That member came to this House the great independent. He announced tonight that he was opposed to the concept of this Bill, but flip-flop he did, and said he'd vote for it. You know, Mr. Speaker, that's the kind of rationalization that used to go on to greater things by saying, it's a small price to pay. It's a small price to pay.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Member, I don't believe the Maple Ridge Hospital, I don't believe the Vancouver General Hospital, I don't believe the New Westminster Columbian Hospital, I don't believe there's one public hospital in this Province that should not have a publicly elected hospital board, Mr. Speaker. If we pay the taxes, let the people decide. Let the people decide. To have the Minister, the Minister of Health, who is a member of that Cabinet, that has Cabinet responsibility, come in and attack a community hospital board in a vicious manner, then not come out publicly and say that he will take a direct action on that board, only through this kind of Bill, Mr. Speaker, it's not good enough, not good enough. It's an unhappy night.

AN HON. MEMBER: You're being irresponsible.

MR. BARRETT: I'm being irresponsible, Mr. Member. I say to that member from Victoria, who is not a leadership candidate, I say to that member, Mr. Speaker, that the height of irresponsibility rests in the concept of this Bill, when the Government lacks the purpose, lacks the brass, lacks the fibre to lead its own hospitals in this Province. Who pays for the hospitals, Mr. Speaker? Not the Minister, not the member from Victoria, every citizen in British Columbia pays for those hospitals and every citizen should have a right to the administration of those hospitals through elections, either elections to the Cabinet or elections to the local hospital boards. But to use a blind, to use a dodge, to use a cover, to use a shield through legislation, is designed to avoid the responsibility, Mr. Speaker, that is incumbent on a democratic Government.

The member from Kamloops can yak, yak, yak all he wants, he doesn't understand democracy, he's never been committed to it at any time in any of his statements, any of his statements.

I suggest to you, Mr. Attorney-General, you know full well, you know full well that if you examine this Bill, this is either an example of the Minister not facing up to his responsibility to the City of New Westminster, or the Minister is prepared to hide behind legislation to avoid making decisions in any hospital. You stand up in this House, Mr. Minister, I say to you through you, Mr. Speaker, name the hospitals that have been doing the bad planning, name the hospitals that have been mis-spending their money. Name them, and if that is indeed the case, fire the board, take over the hospital in the name of the people of British Columbia, but don't threaten anyone unless you've got the facts and you're prepared to act on those facts.

[ Page 746 ]

You know, I see this kind of arrogance growing in a Government that thinks it can do whatever it wants because it simply has the majority in this House. What is more important in this Bill is a demonstration that you've abandoned any real commitment to trust in the people. Trust in the people who pay the taxes, trust in the people who labour and who produce the goods in this Province, trust in the people, in the volunteers that support those hospitals, that work in those hospitals, and the hospital staff themselves and most of all, Mr. Speaker, a lack of faith in the good citizens of British Columbia who are prepared to give their time freely on hospital boards.

I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that that is the hallmark, the hallmark of the lack of responsibility. My friend used the word paranoia and I agree, it's the hallmark of paranoia. We have not had a case laid out to us in this House, we have had a vague accusation with no evidence, and one plea of guilty by the Minister of the offending party that he described, and then he produces this Bill. Shame, shame, shame on the Minister, Mr. Speaker. We'll vote against this Bill and we'll watch with interest the member from Oak Bay flip-flop as he will.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, the member from Oak Bay, in speaking to this Bill, gave the reason why the honourable members should vote against it. He gave us rather a revealing glimpse of the caucus, how it sleeps through discussion of the Government legislation before it's brought in, and no doubt this is why….

AN HON. MEMBER: Rubbish.

MR. McGEER: Rubbish? Well, I'm only quoting what the member from Oak Bay said, and I'm glad that the members are awake now, and I hope that they listened to what he said the second time around. The only disappointment to me is that the member from Oak Bay lacks the courage of his convictions, because surely, having presented all those arguments….

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just one moment.

HON. L.R. PETERSON: Will the speaker for the Liberal party be seated? He'll take his seat. Maybe he doesn't know the rules. On a point of order he is required to take his seat.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the member be seated.

MR. PETERSON: Now if I may make my point of order, the leader of the Liberal party has been in this House long enough to know that he cannot attribute such motives, as the person lacks courage.

AN HON. MEMBER: Courage of his own convictions.

MR. PETERSON: Courage of his own convictions, and that's unparliamentary, and I would ask him to withdraw it.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: It is unparliamentary and I ask the member to withdraw that statement, unconditionally.

MR. McGEER: I thank you, Mr. Speaker, I would have hoped that the member from Oak Bay would have been the one to rise, but I'd be happy to withdraw, as the Attorney-General suggests.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, a point of order.

'DEPUTY SPEAKER: What is your point of order?

MR. BARRETT: The member who has been offended is in his seat, he has not asked for a withdrawal, and the member does not have to withdraw.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just one moment. Any member in this Legislature can ask for that type of a withdrawal, and it is quite in order and the member knows it. Will the member proceed.

MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I would submit that the kind of hospital board that would draw the ire from the Minister and from the Lieutenant-Governor in Council would not be the irresponsible board that the responsible hospital board in this question, the hospital board that would refuse to play musical beds with the ill people of the community.

I'll tell you how you can get into that position, and see if it doesn't fit the circumstances for the Royal Columbian Hospital. The way you get into those circumstances is to go to the local ratepayers in your area, the people democratically, and get a mandate from them to do what's required for your hospital, and then to find that that's all cancelled because you're placed in the hands of a Regional Hospital Authority, not elected. Then the Government comes along and tells that Regional Hospital Board to forget all the approvals in principle that have been given by the Provincial Government, which totalled $180,000,000, and substitute instead a referendum for the regional district of $51,000,000.

Then see what happens. Because there is no choice, under those circumstances, but to play musical beds with the hospital. And which hospital board will get out of line most under those circumstances, Mr. Minister, through you, Mr. Speaker? The hospital board that's responsible. That's the one that will get out of line. Despite the fact that they're backed by the ratepayers in their own area. That's when they get threatened, and when the legislation isn't strong enough, when the Minister doesn't have a big enough club to threaten behind closed doors, then you bring in the kind of legislation that allows exactly that to take place.

The objectionable words are in section 9 of this Act, which says that the Lieutenant-Governor in Council may at any time appoint a person as public administrator, at any time. No reference to any investigating committee, no sir. No reference even to recommendations of the Minister, just the Lieutenant-Governor in Council at any time.

What hospital board in British Columbia can stand up to that? Nothing in here about responsibility. Nothing in here about dedication to the hospital itself. The only dedication that's required, Mr. Speaker, is dedication to the policies of the Minister and the policies of the Government. That's the kind of dedication that this Bill demands.

The member from Oak Bay quite rightly pointed out that what was lacking in Great Britain and will be lacking in British Columbia is the commitment of hospital boards to their hospitals, to the excellence of what takes place within the hospital walls, to superior medical service, no matter whether that cost agrees or disagrees with the policies of the Minister of Finance. And that's the reason to oppose this Bill.

[ Page 747 ]

No stronger reason could be given, because the Minister, in introducing this Bill, didn't suggest the kind of limitations that he felt would be placed on either himself or on the Cabinet. Step in whenever the hospital board's policies are out of line with those of the Government, and hang hospital service in British Columbia. No way we can support this Bill, Mr. Speaker, and we ask the Minister to withdraw this offensive section.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Burnaby-Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: Mr. Speaker, one of the interesting things about the objectionable part of the Bill that has been referred to, is that contrary to the impression gained by the member for Oak Bay, there is absolutely no limitation on the power given to the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, no preliminaries are necessary, no board of examiners is required in order that the Lieutenant-Governor in Council can at any time appoint an administrator it if deems it to be in the public interest. That's all it requires. Read the Bill.

AN HON. MEMBER: Why not?

MR. DOWDING: Why shouldn't it be that way? All right, I'll give you an example. The local taxpayers approve of a hospital. They want to build a new wing. They put forward their plans. Then they send them to Victoria, and they wait, and they wait, and how long do they wait? You know, you know.

AN HON. MEMBER: They send it back and forth 15 times.

MR. DOWDING: How many times do they go back and forth? All this time they have authorized the expenditure of a sum of money based upon the calculations at the time the plans were drawn and the advice given by the technical experts, and by the time this Government and this Minister has given them the permission to go ahead, what has happened? The price had gone up 25 per cent or more. Every member knows this.

You know what they should have done, is put a section in here, in this Bill, to appoint an administrator for the Minister of Health. That's what they should have done. He needs an administrator, because half the problems the hospitals have stem from the policies of this Government and the Lieutenant-Governor in Council and the Minister of Health. But you don't notice anything in there appointing anyone to substitute for them when they don't do their fiscal duty. Not a bit. When you look at the provisions that are objectionable to this Bill, it becomes clear that the power given by this Bill to the Lieu tenant-Governor in Council to appoint an administrator over a hospital is far too loose, far too wide, far too vague, and I can only assume that the member for Oak Bay has been somehow confused by a caucus meeting as to what the safeguards were going to be.

Mr. Speaker, why didn't they say — if the hospital is unable to pay its obligations, if the hospital is not prepared to expand its facilities, if it fails to do the planning that is required to expand and meet the problems of the municipality, then maybe, under proper safeguards, take over the hospital.

But you see, all the problems that the hospitals have stem really from this Government's policy, and when a person has to wait three months or four months to get an optional operation, to get an elective operation, should that hospital be taken over? Should an administrator step in and make that hospital take a patient sooner than three or four months? Is it the fault of a hospital board if there are beds in the corridors? Or is it the fault of the Minister? That's the question. That's where the breakdown takes place. And who is responsible for the breakdown in the facilities in hospitals? The Minister, whether it be an acute hospital, whether it be a chronic hospital. It's this Government, which has dragged its heels reluctantly, despite the pleas of hospital board after hospital board.

So what are they trying to do with this section, say that hospitals are inefficient? This Government is inefficient. I would say that it might be useful if the Minister were prepared to spell out what a board must do to retain its powers. But to live with a cloth over your head, without any notion of what the rules of the game are, it's blind legislation, legislation that can only be treated as a whim, legislation that can be used on a pretext. This is the problem with the section that we find objectionable.

I must say there is another section of the Bill that is useful, and that is the one that would draw up — and here again, I hope, with certainty — the terms that will apply to all hospitals on the admission of patients. One of the greatest problems that all of us find, when we get complaints in local areas, is the problem of a patient that is trying to get into a hospital and cannot understand why one doctor can get his patients in the hospital and another doctor can't. What are you supposed to do? Find a doctor who has entree to the hospital? And some hospitals, the doctors who have entree also decide who don't.

AN HON. MEMBER: Not in Victoria.

MR. DOWDING: I don't say in Victoria. Some places this happens.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Name them.

MR. DOWDING: The member for Oak Bay wasn't prepared to. The Minister isn't prepared to. Why should I suddenly be a volunteer?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Come back to the principle of the Bill.

MR. DOWDING: But from a standpoint of the change in policy that would add the power to make regulations governing the admission of patients to hospitals, I am all for that, providing you say that they apply to all hospitals, providing you set out standards of admission that are clear to every doctor, clear to every hospital board, and clear to every hospital administrator, so that the people can be sure that there is no favouritism in how they get admission to a hospital. Then I'd agree with it.

But you know, the fact, Mr. Speaker, that this Government has to put in this section dealing with regulations for admission to hospitals proves the very point, who is at fault, who is at fault where hospitals are unable to service their needs. The fault lies with this Government, and that's why we're having to ration out hospital beds. That's why people are having to wait three months, four months or longer to get into a hospital for a needed operation.

I had one case referred to me — I have got letters on it — where a woman is suffering agony in her back. The doctor

[ Page 748 ]

wants an operation for her. He can't get her into a hospital because they say, "Well it isn't critical, it isn't something needed to save her from paralysis." But her condition of pain is getting worse day by day and week by week and month by month, and she can't get in. What is she to do? She begins to lose faith in her doctor. Should I go to another doctor? Now, what do you tell a woman like that, and her husband, who is nearly driven crazy with the worry, the anxiety, and yet in the Vancouver area how do you get a patient like that into hospital within two or three months? It can't be done.

Then, if it is in the area of New Westminster, the Royal Columbian Hospital, what happens, what happens? If the hospital doesn't get the patient in there, does the Minister say they are not operating in the public interest? That's the way it reads in this Bill, "in the public interest." Well, I say that the Minister is not operating in the public interest when he puts hospitals in the position where they are not able to operate.

For that reason I cannot go along with his Bill. In regard to this section particularly, it is very dangerous, it is too wide, too vague, and it doesn't give the hospitals a clue as to why this section is necessary.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Member for Kootenay.

MR. L.T. NIMSICK: Mr. Speaker, I am just going to have a few words to say. A few minutes ago we passed a Bill here where many of the members of this House were bewailing the fact about local autonomy of the hospitals, and of the municipalities at that time, but I haven't heard any of them say about the autonomy of the hospitals. This Government practically sets up the hospital boards. They place their representative on them. If you brought in a Bill and elected the hospital boards I think you would be doing something towards giving more than lip service to democracy.

The real rulers of the hospitals in this Province, by this Bill, is the Provincial Government, and you have done nothing more or less than reduce the hospital boards to mere puppets of this Government, just like you've got a lot of backbenchers who are in the same position.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Honourable Minister will close the debate.

Is the member rising on a point or order? He cannot speak again. Will the Minister proceed then.

HON. R.R. LOFFMARK: Mr. Speaker, there were two or three observations made during the course of the debate on second reading that deserve some comment.

The first one was perhaps a misunderstanding, or certainly a statement not clearly made, in that the suggestion was that the Province provides 60 per cent of the capital construction and the local government either 40 per cent or 20 per cent, depending on the circumstances. This, of course, is an inaccuracy. It doesn't really reflect the true position of the financing arrangement. Now what happens, Mr. Speaker, is that all of the money, all of the capital for hospital construction is provided by the Provincial Government through the Hospital Financing Authority, and it is only in respect of the discharge of the obligation at a subsequent date the Province shares with the municipal government, either 60-40 or 80-20, depending on the level of assessment and the mill rate which gives rise to the charge.

Now then, the next point is, of course, that in respect of the raising of monies for operating provisions in hospitals, this money is raised by the Provincial Government and the Federal Government together. This being the case times, we must recognize, Mr. Speaker, have changed, and consequently the responsibility and the requirements that the budgetary provisions be maintained is one that falls primarily upon the Provincial and the Federal Government.

Now there is no intention in this Bill, and in introducing this Bill to upset the long-standing programmes of a local responsibility that have been exercised by the hospital boards, and if the honourable members are interested in the circumstances which provoked the introduction of this section, I'll give it to them, and without being specific in respect of the administrator. Incidentally, the responsibilities of our hospital policy is established by the hospital board and by no one else, and this being the case, it seems most unseemly that an administrator of a hospital should ever say that under certain circumstances — and incidentally, at the time the statement was made it was in respect of an issue which had nothing to do with the Provincial Government — a hospital administrator said that under certain circumstances that the hospital would be closed.

I don't want to pursue the matter further. Sufficient to say that no Government could stand idly by and allow an administrator by word or influence to cause a hospital to be closed, no matter what the circumstances were, and even if it involved a difference of opinion with the Provincial Government, and in this instance it was not so. If the honourable members want me to document it, I'll produce the evidence of where a hospital administrator said that a hospital would be closed under certain circumstances. This is completely unacceptable.

Now then, a little later on the question of regional hospital district participation in the affairs of the hospital boards was raised and, of course, I would remind honourable members that the regional hospital districts, where they choose to do so, may be represented on the local hospital board. It is only where this causes an administrative inconvenience to the regional district that there is any question that they should not have representation on the local board and, of course, in addition to that, they have a very dominant position in such things as the location of a hospital, the amount of capital that will be appropriated to a hospital board, the amount of equipment that will be available, and the terms and the times upon which working capital budgetary provisions will be made and altered. So that it is not fair to say, nor is it accurate to lead honourable members to believe, that the regional district has anything less than the dominant position in the planning and the distribution of hospital facilities within the district.

Now, finally, one very significant matter relating to the Vancouver Regional Hospital District, and the suggestion that the British Columbia Government moved at the time of the introduction of the regional hospital district to stop the planning that was then under way. Nothing could be further from the truth, because at that time the chairman of the advisory committee of the Vancouver Regional Hospital District, as well as the regional district itself, was most insistent that all of the hospitals within the area should hold all of their planning in abeyance during the time when the advisory committee reviewed the needs in the district. The whole purpose of introducing the regional district system was to avoid the duplication and the unseemly contest between individual hospitals. With those remarks, I would be pleased to hear you put the question, Mr. Speaker.

[ Page 749 ]

MR. SPEAKER: The question is that Bill No. 78, an Act to Amend the Hospital Act, be read a second time. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it, and the motion is carried.

Honourable Members, some members are reading newspapers in the House. This is contrary to the rules, and I would ask those that are reading newspapers to please put them away.

The motion for the second reading of Bill No. 78 was agreed to on the following division:—

YEAS — 36

Messieurs

NAYS — 17

Messieurs

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 79, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Health Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 79. The Honourable the Minister of Health Services and Hospital Insurance.

HON. R.R. LOFFMARK: Mr. Speaker, this is a short Bill which does three things in principle. First of all, it clarifies the law as it relates to the imposition, levy, and recovery of charges for certain public health services. It also confers upon the Regional Hospital District the right to have representation on Union Boards of Health, and thirdly, permits a relatively high degree of flexibility in authority in bringing in the regionalization of public health boards, and also has in contemplation the possibility of sub-regions within a health board. I move second reading.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion, are you ready for the question? The Honourable Member for Burnaby Edmonds.

MR. G.H. DOWDING: I move adjournment of the debate until the next sitting of the House.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it, and the motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 82, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Motor-vehicle Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 82. The Honourable the Attorney-General.

HON. L.R. PETERSON: Mr. Speaker, Bill No. 82, An Act to Amend the Motor-vehicle Act, contains a number of amendments to the Motor-vehicle Act. Perhaps one of the more important provisions in the Bill is to provide and authorize the Government to provide for pollution control devices in motor-vehicles. There is no question, I suggest, that motor-vehicles do make a significant contribution to air pollution, the subject that has occupied the attention of this House over some period of time. While we don't have the situation obtaining in British Columbia that is as serious as elsewhere, particularly to the south of us in Los Angeles, where traffic congestion, atmospheric conditions, etc. are such as make it a very serious problem there, nevertheless, it is of concern to us in the Province of British Columbia where we have about nearly 1,000,000 motor-vehicles now registered in the Province, growing at the rate of some six per cent per year, which is faster than the national average.

This Bill will enable us, and provide the Government with authority to deal with the problem. It will be handled in several phases, and the amendments supply the authority to make regulations to handle the problem on a progressive basis, to specify the vehicles which would require emission control devices.

The proposal that we are making is similar to that which obtains now in the Province of Ontario following, as they are, the pattern set in the United States of America. The plan is to set a date on and after which newly manufactured motor-vehicles that are offered for sale on the British Columbia market must be equipped with devices to control crank-case exhaust and evaporation emission, and manufacturers will be required to obtain certification in this respect before vehicles with engines which come within the scope of the law can be marketed in the Province.

The details will be set out by regulations. Probably the earliest that we could expect to see these provisions apply, and then only to new motor-vehicles, would be the first of January of next year. That, at this stage of the game, however, is only a target date which we are aiming towards, whether we will achieve it or not is another matter. As the second member from Vancouver Centre pointed out earlier in this Session when he advocated legislation of this sort, new motor-vehicles today do have these devices on. I think those vehicles manufactured in the past four years, at least have a crank-case emission content control, and it's not a difficult matter or an expensive matter to add the exhaust emission control.

Greater difficulties arise when you come to older vehicles, and this is a matter that will have to be set in due course by regulation, but we will be moving first into the area of new vehicles, where it is easier to have these controls established at the time of manufacture. It is, I gather, a very difficult

[ Page 750 ]

matter in terms of old vehicles, but perhaps some technological advances will be made in that respect in the interim.

The other factor which is also provided here in this Bill is the maintenance of these controls, once they are established, to ensure that they are in good working condition. This will be a matter through our testing stations, where we will have to get the necessary equipment to test these controls to make sure they are in good working condition, because unless they are there is not much point in having them installed.

There are other amendments to the Motor-vehicle Act, as well, which are important, but perhaps these can best be dealt with in principle when we consider the Bill in committee. I move the Bill be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver East.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, I move adjournment of the Bill until the next sitting of the House, second reading.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 83, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend and Repeal Certain Provisions of the Statute Law)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 83. The Honourable the Attorney-General.

HON. L.R. PETERSON: Mr. Speaker, this Bill contains a number of amendments to several of the statutes in this Province. Consequently, this is one where traditionally we deal with it in principle at the committee stage, and I move the Bill be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. The Honourable Member from Cowichan-Malahat.

MR. R.M. STRACHAN: Mr. Speaker, the Bill does contain a number of amendments to several statutes…. in total 24 separate statutes, and I haven't had time to track down all the ramifications of the 24 statutes, so I would ask leave to adjourn debate until the next sitting of the House.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill No. 63, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Pollution Control Act, 1967)

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver–Point Grey.

MR. P.L. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, before the dinner hour we were talking about some of the necessary developments in our Province with regard to disposal of sewage, and the disappointment I expressed that the responsibility for this was to be taken away from the Minister of Health and passed on to the Minister who quarrelled with the Minister of Health when he started to take a stiff stand in this particular field.

It's worth noting, Mr. Speaker, that the Federal Government has made, money available in a very generous way for sewage treatment facilities, C.M.H.C. for giving 25 per cent of the total cost of any loan, which goes a long way. I note in the Surrey Riding that some 3.2 million dollars have been saved by that municipality as a direct result of Federal Government loans.

It's been the policy of our party to contribute 50 per cent of the total cost of all primary treatment plants, 75 per cent of the cost of secondary treatment plants, and 90 per cent of the costs of tertiary treatment plants, and this is the only way that we are going to get rid of the raw sewage which is plaguing the waterways all over British Columbia, and amongst other things, has led to a loss of 50 per cent of the oyster industry in this Province. The member from Saanich will buy that. Well, a small triumph, but I'm very happy.

But now we move on to other aspects of this particular Bill that deal with air pollution, and Mr. Speaker, we've never had any controls at all as far as air pollution goes in this Province. Like with the financing of municipal works, the responsibility has been thrust down on local authorities.

The Minister does have some responsibility for air pollution under this Act, but so many important areas are left out that one wonders whether it will be really effective. But I want to start with the leaving out of garbage burning by municipalities. The municipalities 'of the North Shore have been offenders in this regard. Recently I came into the town of Vernon and found the whole of the area under smoke from burning of garbage on the hillside right on the other side of the valley from the City of Vernon, and I don't know why the city councils who burn their garbage don't do it right on the lawn in front of their city hall, because they would find out then how much pollution they create by doing that. I don't think there should be any exception, I don't think there should be any burning of garbage in British Columbia, I don't think any air pollution from that source should be permitted, and yet under this Act it is allowed.

The same applies for the burning of leaves and foliage.

What's different about domestic, commercial and institutional heating, that would allow them to be accepted?

What's different about food and garbage? And what's so special about land clearing? Why isn't the material which is cleared from land trucked away to some disposal site?

Because if they can burn without getting any kind of a permit, then of course we can have any amount of air pollution from this source completely free of any legislation.

The member from Vancouver-Burrard says I'm too young to understand. Well, Mr. Speaker, I think that this is one of the problems that the older generation simply haven't cared to what extent our air has been polluted, our waters polluted, or our land polluted, and that's why we are in the state that we are in today, and it's going to have to fall to another generation and, I suppose, a future Government to take on the kind of responsibilities that will bring an end to this despoilation. We'll do it says the member from Vancouver East. Well, Mr. Member, so will we.

I want to point out some of the difficulties that occur when there isn't adequate enforcement. Recently the City of Vancouver passed a smoke by-law raising the fine from $100 to $1,000, and this is what this change in law caused some of the offenders in the City of Vancouver to do. The Medical Dental Building put a sign up over their incinerators saying, "No garbage burning until after dark. This means you." I thought this was so incredible that I went down and saw that sign with my own eyes. An employee of the American Can Company called up and told me, on an open line radio show,

[ Page 751 ]

that before the fine was increased they went ahead and burned their garbage, but as soon as it was raised to $1,000 the employees of the firm were notified that if any of them burned their garbage before dark they'd be dismissed, but at the same time they were ordered to burn the garbage after dark.

I think we have a problem right here in the City of Victoria with B.C. Forest Products, because I am sure tonight when we leave this building we will smell the smoke from the plant that is just up the way, because the Provincial Government and the City of Victoria were prepared to do nothing about the air pollution from this plant. It took a private individual to take them to Court and gain an injunction, that was three years ago, and ever since then the place is like a surgical theatre during the day, you won't see any smoke around there in daylight. Just go up after dark, as I did when the House adjourned at half past twelve, one day last week. I climbed in my car to see where all the smoke was coming from, and when you got up to the B.C. Forest Products plant you couldn't see three feet in front of you. It's very clear that what these….

AN HON. MEMBER: Not very clear at all.

MR. McGEER: …these firms are doing is waiting until the sun sets and doing their air polluting then, and we are going to have to obviously produce tough Provincial laws with round-the-clock supervision of those who….

AN HON. MEMBER: How can we?

MR. McGEER: How can we, says the member. Well, maybe we need infrared photography. We need to find ways of being certain that the air polluters of this Province are watched 24 hours a day.

Further on in the Act, we give tremendous powers to the Director of the Pollution Control Board. These are spelled out to determine qualities of water, land, and air pollution, to require this and to demand that, and, if this Director used those powers he could do a great deal to clear up the pollution. But the second member from Vancouver East says he'd be fired, and I think that may be true, because it was last spring that I was visiting a pulp mill in the central part of British Columbia, and made the casual comment to the superintendent of that mill that there was a staggering amount of air pollution emitting from the stack. Free car washes, all right, to protect the paint of the employees' cars, but nothing to protect the people in the surrounding municipality, and the superintendent of that mill was very candid. He said this….

AN HON. MEMBER: You told us this before.

MR. McGEER: I know, and it bears repeating, because it didn't get across. He said that they would put in equipment when they were told what standards they had to meet, and when an air pollution by-law, or an air pollution law was passed by the Provincial Government, and not before, because it would be a waste of money. This Director who has all the powers under section 10, was the man who said that very weekend that the approach of the Provincial Government was to go soft, and depend on the voluntary co-operation of industry. Yet the industry took a quite pragmatic view. When they knew the standards they had to meet and when the Provincial Government demanded that they meet those standards, then they would spend the money, then they would clear up the problem. But there is no point, Mr. Speaker, no point at all.

…The mirage, Mr. Minister, is the performance of you and your Government, because all these powers are given to the Director of Pollution Control, and his public statement is that his policy is to go soft, and I am merely telling you, Mr. Minister, what happens when you go soft — nothing happens.

Mr. Speaker, I want to move on a little bit, to the people who can object, to the Director, and to the laws and regulations that are passed by him. It is interesting to note that the people who may raise objections are people who are resident within five miles of the proposed or existing point of discharge or emission of the contaminant into the air. Mr. Speaker, it appears as though this section is written to get rid of all kinds of pesky organizations in British Columbia, like the B.C. Wildlife Federation, and S.P.E.C., and all the other people who have begun to speak out for all the people of the Province and for future generations about the quality of the environment in British Columbia. You don't want to hear from them, and you specifically exclude their presence at any hearings that you might be disposed to hold with respect to polluters who are going to be licensed by your Government and the Director of Pollution Control.

Lastly, Mr. Speaker, the fines proposed under section 12 are entirely inadequate. There are many circumstances where a fine of $1,000 would be well worth the risk for a company to commit a single act of pollution. We had a circumstance in Burnaby not too long ago, where one of the largest retail stores in the Province, Woodwards Stores, was fined the staggering sum of $100 for violating a local anti-smoke by-law. I am sure they are still stinging from that financial set-back, $100. And when you take huge organizations like an oil company that might have a disaster in a tanker moving into Burrard Inlet….

AN HON. MEMBER: The east coast.

MR. McGEER: The east coast. All right, we are going to lash those people with a shoelace. A $1,000 fine, that is not going to terrify any large organization, that is not going to terrify any big plant, that probably wouldn't even terrify a fairly small sawmill, because if they were holding all kinds of wood waste, and they were suddenly going to release it into the harbour or into a river, it would be worth the gamble. If they get caught, well it's only $1,000, and when you consider that one small firm in Vancouver that has a sawmill on False Creek is now paying $3,000 per month to truck all its wood waste away — and this is Nalos Lumber, doing it voluntarily — why, it becomes fairly cheap to run the risk of getting caught and paying a $1,000 fine. Not every day, but you don't need to commit an act like that every day, you just have to do it once and you can destroy a large beach area.

I will give another example, again last spring, I was telephoned by a fisherman from Nanoose Bay, and his complaint was that a scow from the MacMillan Bloedel Company had loaded up all the waste wood from the operation in that bay with a front-end loader, the scow had been towed out to the middle of Nanoose Bay and the front-end loader had just pushed everything over the side. This fellow happened to be fishing in the area, and he had to quit, you couldn't troll a line. Then all the wood waste began to distribute itself all over the beaches in Nanoose Bay, and in a high rage he went in and he said, "Who gave permission for that?" He found out that the local Federal Fisheries man

[ Page 752 ]

had given permission — why he could give permission, I don't know and he said, "Yeah, I gave permission, but I told them to take it out around behind the island where it wouldn't be seen." It's worth a $1,000 gamble, to clean up an operation like that.

I might say that there is a barge and a cat kept on standby all the time at Powell River, to pick up the logs from that booming ground, the sinkers in the debris, and take it out into the middle of Malaspina Strait and dump it into the water — that's regular practice. Oh, you can go up and see the barge right there, and the bulldozers right there in front of everybody, yeah ask them what it is for, and anyone….

AN HON. MEMBER: I guess you reported that incident.

MR. McGEER: Pardon? Yes I did, you're darn rights I did.

AN HON. MEMBER: What did they do about it?

MR. McGEER: Well, to my knowledge it hasn't happened since, but what have you been doing about it? That's the point. That's what we are debating about here.

HON. D.R.J. CAMPBELL: It's a Fisheries problem.

MR. McGEER: Is it really a Fisheries problem when all the beaches of Nanoose Bay are littered with refuse? Is it really? Is it really a Fisheries problem when the Fraser River is spewing debris out? All over the recreational areas of the Gulf? No, Mr. Speaker, that is not a Fisheries problem — it is a general problem for all the people of British Columbia, because it is ruining our recreational areas all along the coast.

But, since the Minister of Municipal Affairs has drawn attention to the Federal Fisheries people, I might say that they are the only ones that have taken any firm stands against all of the pulp mills that have been polluting the waterways of British Columbia for years. It is all very well for the Minister to stand up there as he did and start thundering about, "We are going to demand standards." All the standards that are meaningful have been set by the Federal Government. They are the ones who do the testing, and they are the only ones that have been prepared to take the unpopular stand which is going to be so essential, if we are to get anywhere at all in this matter of pulp mill population.

Well, I can see the Minister of Finance is very keen to get this pollution debate over with, and I must say it has come in early this year. Mr. Speaker, I recall last year it was about four in the morning when we got to discuss this very sensitive subject. I am just extremely disappointed in the quality of the Bill, and the fact that it shows no indication that we are going to get after this problem in British Columbia.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable Member for Kootenay.

MR. L.T. NIMSICK: Mr. Speaker, in regard to pollution, I think that this Bill probably could be written down as some pious platitudes like we have had in the past. This Government has come out so often about their tough fight against pollution, but what has really been done about pollution in the Province of British Columbia? Nothing. Nothing has been done, and what is it all about?

"Pollution is a defilement and contamination, the abuse of our natural resources, when you start making the good earth a garbage dump unfit for human habitation. It is largely the result of the too fast population and industrial growth in the modern world, with no foresight, no preventative or curative measures taken. It is our daily dose of poison. It's everything. It's catching up to us and we can't escape it." That was in the Dogwood Trails.

'Now, Mr. Speaker, you have done one thing in this Bill. You've done something that we advocated back in 1966, and practically every municipality in the Province backed us on our Bill to add air to the Pollution Control Board, and this Government refused to accept it. Now it is 1970, and the only reason they are accepting it today, is because public pressure has been put on, and the fear has been running riot.

Positive pollution control. Pollution control in the past has been mostly corrective. In the future it must be preventative. Gross pollution is an offense to human decency and it can be corrected only by positive methods and controls.

We have got to prevent pollution. It isn't enough for the Minister to wait until the Minister of Mines gets that oil rig going out there in Georgia Straits, and after it has busted loose or something, then the Minister of Pollution will go and say something about it. It is time that this Minister that is responsible for pollution stepped into the picture, and state definitely to the people of British Columbia, that there will not be any drilling for oil in the Georgia Straits, or there will not be any drilling for oil around the shores of this Island or around the Province.

When we need that oil it'll be time enough, when we are in dire need of it, but we don't need to be drilling out there and taking the chances of destroying the recreational values and the fishing values and the birds, as has been done in so many places. Like it is down in the Gulf of Mexico. "Trail of oil running free from blown-out offshore well in the Gulf of Mexico has touched land on a wildlife refuge, Breton Island, off Louisiana, and could become the largest oil pollution yet for the United States." They, too, probably were warned about the drilling in that place, many times. But the almighty dollar, and the worshipping of the golden calf has prevented them from seeing in the right way, and it is preventing this Government from looking at pollution in the proper way.

They say that it can't be done. In this Bill you've got within five miles. In the City of Trail, when the Americans sued the smelter for polluting 25 miles down into the United States, they sued the company for it and they made it stick. Now, when you put this only five miles for air pollution, air pollution can travel a mighty long distance. We say we can't do it, we don't want to make them do it as much.

Germans show it can be done, and this is what it says, "But industrial pollution can be greatly reduced if not entirely eliminated by a strong public outcry, reflected in tough, no-nonsense laws. This is happening today in many parts of the world. Russia has been a leader in pollution control every since the Communists set out to create their worker's paradise. Many countries of Western Europe police industrial pollution with a considerable success. West Germany is now implementing a new law which sets strict ground rules for the nation's 200,000 industrial plants." This was done in 1965. "Germany has already demonstrated that industry can be clean. The Germans are most fastidious and possibly over-enlightened of the European peoples, " Howard said, "consequently they have the most stringent anti-pollution laws. The most striking evidence of the working of this law is when you travel through the Ruhr, where some 20 industrial cities are concentrated in an area of about 50

[ Page 753 ]

square miles. From thousands of smoke-stacks and furnaces, only a wisp of smoke emerge. The sky is bright blue and free from smog."

When you talk of air pollution in my area, and talking about how tough you are going to get, I listened to the Minister of Municipal Affairs on how tough we are going to be, and I listened to somebody else blame the Pollution Control Board, the civil servants, for not taking the right attitude. One doctor in Castlegar took the right attitude as a Public Health Officer, and he was fired. Dr. McNulty was fired because he said he didn't want any more open sewage lagoons, and now you are going to stop open sewage lagoons, but he was fired. Then this very Government talks about how long ago it was when they started, and nobody else ever started it before them. Why you have been dragged, struggling, and kicking, and everything else, into the arena of pollution control and you know it, every one of you.

In my area, in Natal, last summer I went there, you couldn't see up the street. A fellow washed his car and he had a half an inch of coal dust on it, in one day. Twenty tons of coal dust on one square mile, every day. I've talked to the company, to the Kaiser Resources, in that plant there, the coking plant. He said they can put a plant in there that will correct it, and they hope to do it sometime in the future, but this Government has never told them go ahead and do it. They have no regard for the clean air of that area. They have no regard for the people who have lived under those conditions. You didn't need this Bill to correct these situations. I went to the Health Officer last summer, to find out if he couldn't get the company to stop the emission of this terrific dust, and he said there was no law on the statute books that would allow him to do it, that he could force the company to do it, no law on the statute books. We know that they can do it. Why doesn't the Government then set those guidelines?

This Act here, it's attacking the municipalities, attacking the sewage, attacking the things that you've got, your own creatures, but there's no big attack upon companies or industrial plants in that Bill. It's like the honourable member for Point Grey said, the fine of $1,000 means nothing to a big company, and anyway, you don't intend to fine them. So the $1,000 that you've got in that Act there is just window dressing, an eyewash for the public of British Columbia, for the people that are crying for pollution control. Just show me how many places have been charged under the Pollution Control Act.

AN HON. MEMBER: Two.

MR. NIMSICK: Yeah, two of them probably in the whole time. In 1965 there was a question on the Order Paper, there was none prior to 1965. You're not going to tell me that you've got any intention of doing anything about it.

I get letters like this. I get letters like this, "I'm becoming increasingly concerned about pollution. No doubt you can realize how frustrating it is for the average voting citizen to see how the present Government is short-sightedly allowing this beautiful Province to be despoiled by inadequate sewage disposal methods, by big business being allowed to disregard the most elemental standards of health and cleanliness, all because of the dollar.

"I read recently that a mining company located on north east of Vancouver Island has applied for permission to dump daily prodigious amounts of mining wastes into the Straits. As far as I know there has been little opposition to this, and it is probably a foregone conclusion that they will be allowed to do this, if they are not already doing so. What a tragedy. Now the oil companies are in the process of applying for permission to drill off shore in those very Straits. Surely this cannot be allowed, especially in light of the tragic events off shore at Santa Barbara, California.

"Mr. Nimsick it is my suggestion to you that you oppose this latest proposal of potential pollution in the fullest extent of your office."

Now, Mr. Speaker, there is just an ordinary citizen way back in the Interior worried about the pollution, and he realizes that this Government has been giving lip service, because he lives right in an area where a company had been dumping waste into Mark Creek and into St. Mary's River, and what has this Government done about it? Nothing. Sure, they've used the Pollution Control Act to license people to pollute, but they've never used the Pollution Control Act to stop people or to limit them on polluting, and I don't think it's good enough that we have a Pollution Control Act just for a place for somebody to come and apply for a licence to pollute.

There's no guidelines set down, they don't set down the real guidelines, and it's just like the honourable member stated, that these companies would abide by it, they would abide by it. I'm sure that in Natal-Michel they could clean up the pollution there in very short order. I'm sure that in Kimberley, Cominco, with all the years that they've been operating that mine and polluting as much as they wanted to do, last summer they put in some control. But they could control the whole thing if they had some guidelines, some guidance from this Government, some limit set upon them, some time limit so that they know that at a certain time they would have to have it done. But this Government hasn't done anything in that regard.

Another letter I've got, "We wish to request that the Opposition in the Legislature exert all the pressure possible on the Government to have it put forth some meaningful anti-pollution legislation at this sitting of the House. This must be legislation with some teeth in it, otherwise it is absolutely useless. In the area in which we live, Cominco is the prime defiler of our biosphere, and they appear to be doing nothing about it. Therefore it appears as though stringent legislation is the only answer."

This Act here, $1,000 fine — that's only wishful thinking. You won't even fine them $1,000, you wouldn't even go in and check them up on it. All your Act is dealing mostly with is forcing somebody that wants to put in a septic tank to live up to certain regulations. The raw sewage — it's the detergents and that that goes out in the raw sewage that's the worst offender in regards to the rivers and the streams. Kimberley went in and put their sewage plant in, but the rest of them are still allowed to continue on.

Here's another one, "Dear Mr. Nimsick: From the various news media we learn that the legislators are having a large number of words on the subject of pollution, both air and water, plus air ecology. Tonight, February the 5th, over the C.B.C. network from 10 p.m. to 11 they dealt at great length on the subject of pesticides, and what effects and possible future effects this showed, what has happened to farmers in the Grand Forks area in B.C., plus some in Ontario?"

Pesticides are one of the prime dangerous pollutants of the country. Oil pollution, sewage disposal, industrial waste, and detergents and pesticides are all dangerous pollutants. I know that you spend time on picking up empty cans, but I think these are the things that have got to be considered in

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the light of pollution.

I think there's very little in this Act in regards to industrial pollution, and this is where the great amount of your pollution comes from. The greatest amount of pollution comes from these plants that use 50,000 gallons of water every hour and more, so there must be a great deal of pollution coming from those plants. I say that when you consider that in one area, one square mile, so many tons are spread over, out in the air in a very small area, there's something. When you see this, an estimated 15,236,000 fish perished in the United States as a result of water pollution during 1968, an increase of 31 per cent over 1967, according to the Ninth Annual Report on Pollution Caused Fish Kills. And this is going on in British Columbia, it's going on through Canada.

Here we bring in a Bill that, as I said before, with the amount of fines, with the rubber teeth that's in the Bill, it's not going to really hurt anybody. It's only pious platitudes on the part of this Government to try and salve over the concern that the people have shown in the last few months.

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable Member for Yale Lillooet.

MR. W.L. HARTLEY: Yes, Mr. Speaker, it would certainly be a shame to let legislation like this slip through at such an early hour in the evening after it had such a grand billing in the Throne Speech right on the opening day. That was really the height of the Throne Speech when the Premier said he was going to bring in effective pollution control legislation, and this is certainly a terrific disappointment.

It does absolutely nothing to spell out the type of control, the study that should be made before a permit is granted to anyone. It lays out no regulations to cover the Province, and I think these are very basic necessities in any pollution control legislation. What good is it leaving it to the municipalities and the City of Prince George or the City of Kamloops to dump effluent into the Thompson River or into the Fraser River when it's going to not just affect themselves, but affect people all up and down the Fraser, the Thompson and throughout the Province.

You know, we are in a different era today than what we were one hundred years ago. They tell me that in the great cities in Europe, and I imagine the same thing held true in America, that a hundred years ago when you went to bed there was a container called the chamber and you had that under the bed, and if you had to make use of that during the night well you made use of it, and in the morning you opened the window and you threw this out into the street.

MR. SPEAKER: Order please! I've allowed a great deal of latitude in this debate, for the simple reason that members didn't have the opportunity to have a discussion on pollution during the time of the Minister's Estimates because the Bill was on the Order Paper, but this type of debate is not fitting to be heard in the Legislature in this country.

MR. HARTLEY: Well, Mr. Speaker, from there we've moved to the so-called modern sewer, to the modern sewer disposal system, and what has happened? What happened in London? They went from the stage of pollution I was telling you about, the old-fashioned type, to the modern type and what happened? They polluted the Thames River, so that the fish ceased to use that river. The point that I made earlier was just to indicate how serious and how slow this Government is in acting in an effective way to control pollution.

This business of extending the sewers a little further into the Straits of Georgia or the Straits of Juan de Fuca, this isn't good enough. This business of allowing Kamloops Pulp and Paper to increase their effluent by another 60,000,000 imperial gallons every 24 hours when the Minister said he didn't know whether we knew or he knew what an ecological study of the Thompson River meant, and for the Minister to say that and for us to be discussing legislation when we know that the legislation just, as the member from Kootenay said, doesn't even have rubber teeth. We're just not taking this matter seriously.

I'm glad the Premier did get the message that I was sending out, that we are still trying to live in a modern day and age, with archaic methods of disposing of our effluent. When we disbanded the old street method we started dumping it into rivers, but in Europe they are cleaning up those rivers today. But we are still allowing industry to dump effluent into our major rivers without permits, and those that have permits, well, it's no problem, they get a permit, and another permit, to increase the effluent, and no real serious studies are being made of the damage that is being done and the damage that will be done as times change.

Now I was really quite surprised when I heard the Minister of Municipal Affairs speaking this afternoon, how he flapped both wings and flew at great heights and called how this was the greatest Government, the first Government to bring in pollution control legislation. So I, too, looked up the Journals and found where that Minister, along with every other member of the Government here at that time, when Tony Gargrave, the then member for Mackenzie brought in an amendment to the Pollution Control Act so that both air and land would be included, the member that was so pious this afternoon, the Minister of Municipal Affairs, voted against that proposition four years ago. When we realize this, we realize, Mr. Speaker, just how empty his words were this afternoon.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Minister will close the debate.

HON. R.G. WILLISTON: Well, Mr. Speaker, this debate has covered much ground but really it has had very little to do with the Act which is before the members to vote on, or the principles that are contained within the Act.

It has been a wide-ranging discussion on pollution, and many of the matters raised by the honourable members have been difficult to cope with, for the simple reason, to give you one example, the member from North Vancouver–Capilano this afternoon when he was speaking, brought up Bill No. 52, the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, and he read to the House where he wished that a similar Bill to this would be introduced in British Columbia. He read some objectives about the Bill and then put it down and didn't go any further. I think had he been completely fair in his presentation he would have indicated that this was a committee approach, again without basic staff other than a secretary, in the over-all piece. We had for many years gone through this type of approach with the many departments listed, as was here, and have had to move on to a more effective type of administration than they are just getting to the first steps in Alberta, which we were, over here, at about ten years ago. So when you get into this kind of thing in debate in the

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House, and somebody waves this and says, this is what we should be doing, which is something we passed by about ten years ago, you have a great difficulty in coming to grips with many of the topics.

The member from Burnaby-Edmonds isn't here. He was talking about Rachael Carson and about the book, "The Silent Spring" and I wrote down his notes about it, and how, when he was debating this matter back in '58 and '59, and about '58 to '59 when he was…. and she wrote the book in '62, that's right. As soon as he said it, I said, "Now there's something the matter here," so I went back to the library and took a look at the date in the library, and she didn't write the book until '62. But he had a lot of forewarning in here, and he debated her book back here in '58 to '59 in this House, and I thought this was one of the things that puts this business of pollution in here today.

But, Mr. Speaker, I think there are one or two points that we should be cognizant of here as we're moving through, because it's quite obvious that the members don't recognize the Pollution Control Act as it works at the present time, or the various functions of myself, and I am the particular object insofar as the Liberal group is concerned here, and they don't really understand the method by which pollution control operates in British Columbia.

First of all, the Act and the administration of the Act and the issue of permits and all of this material comes within the Director of Pollution Control. The policies under which the Director of Pollution Control works are set by the Pollution Control Board, and the appeals from the Director of Pollution are to the Pollution Control Board, of which I happen to sit as one of the members.

Insofar as the operation of that Act is concerned, and the representation that has to be made on the part of that Act, it's the widest possible representation of interests taken in, and it does not, I say with deference to all members of the House, this is the one Act which was specifically set up, that that direct administrative control of the Minister and the direction of the Minister down through the Director and so on, just doesn't happen. It comes within the administrative matters insofar as paying the bills and handling the administrative matters, but the actual direction of the pollution control in British Columbia is from the Director of Pollution Control to the Pollution Control Board, and there's not that normal Ministerial direction to that. I think every member of this House actually recognizes that fact except when it becomes a matter for debate within the Legislative Assembly.

We get many flippant remarks made, for example, again this evening, or this afternoon, when the member from Point Grey got up about Vancouver, and he said that if we were very serious about this and the thing that should come first in the City of Vancouver is to separate the storm flow from the sewerage, and this should be done first. Now, we are all partly responsible, I think, in this House and for the suggestions we make in this House. I went back tonight to take a look at this one, too, because the City of Vancouver, in its five-year plan, has just completed the complete handling of its sewage, the gathering of its sewage in its next five-year plan in the False Creek area, and all of it, so that it has taken it completely without the beach areas, and so on, all of the sewage matter insofar as Vancouver is concerned. This five year programme is a fairly intensive programme and a heavy one insofar as finance is concerned. I think every man in this House will recognize that they recognize their responsibilities and they are working there, too.

But then we have a leader of a group this afternoon that comes up and said they should separate the storm water from the rest of the sewage. I took a fast reading on it tonight. The first, the lowest figure I got to do that was $50,000,000 and the higher figure I got was $100,000,000 to do that one particular job, over and above the five-year programme which we are moving towards, even over and beyond the Iona Island and New Westminster and the rest of the material that is going, the five-year plan, and so on.

I think as was pointed out to you this afternoon, as we are working towards the practical 1975 deadline, where every community on the Fraser River, for example, and its tributaries, by 1975 has its sewage treatment plants actually in operation, which means they have gathered all the sewage in every one of those communities, taken the sewage and have placed it into a plant, and coming out of that plant the effluent there has to meet the standards set by the Department of Health, and the Department of Health is charged with the administrative responsibility of seeing that they meet those standards.

The members of this House laugh about technological permits, as were explained again today. That job that's done has to be done to the changing standards as they may be set by the Department of Health for water. The permit you get is never a permanent permit and it must be up-graded to meet those standards in the receiving waters which are set by the Department of Health. As I have moved across this country, maybe some of the other honourable members have seen how this is handled, but I have seen no more effective administrative set-up with checks and balances interlacing the responsibilities of pollution control, health, and the other bodies — a better method than is coming right here. It is being examined almost from coast to coast as we are moving at the present time. Because you've got these what you've given to us from Alberta, where they are taking step one, and they realize we are over step one and we are on to step two, and we are proceeding at the present time.

But this Act, bringing in the air pollution, which is the main part of this Act this time, it has taken since 1967, the administrative procedures, to move them out across the Province, to get people who are adequately and properly trained. If you go through your estimates you will find that we are working right back at the university, and assisting the university in developing programmes in the university to train personnel, so we've got personnel coming back to insert and to use in the pollution control apparatus that has been developed in the Province, people who have skills and have some background of knowledge to do these particular jobs at the present time.

The way people wave wands around and they think by passing a paper Act you can suddenly install that type of administrative procedure in the Province as a whole, and quickly attain those particular results, just are not with it insofar as the problems in this field happen to be concerned. Listening to the last member speak tonight as he said, for instance, all we give is licence to pollute and no guidelines, no guidelines. We have been working on all new industry in the Province and there is nobody in this House in a responsible position more than that member who knows, and all he'd have to do is to go and look at the pollution control permit in the Skookumchuck pulp mill, and he'd give you the tightest pollution control permit that's being issued right in the continent at the present time insofar as those pulp mills are concerned. They wonder why people are confused. We've admitted we've been on the new, and he comes in here and

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pounds the thing and says there's been no guidelines and nobody is doing anything. If he can't see for himself in his own areas, well then I don't believe people, why they should become confused.

The next thing he said was all we are going to diddle around with was a few septic tanks. Well, he should know from the Health Act, he's been here long enough, that under 5,000 gallons it's within the Health Department and it doesn't come within the Pollution Control Act. So I mean these are the types of confusing businesses that are engendered by people who take an interest in debates in the House and try to bring clarification.

But be that as it may, Mr. Speaker, as we move into the committee reading on this, I think some particular points will become evident, and I move second reading.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Division, Mr. Speaker.

The motion was agreed to on the following division:—

YEAS — 52

Messieurs

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Private Bill No. 50, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Fruit Growers Mutual Insurance Company Act)

MR. SPEAKER: Private Bill No. 50. The Honourable the Member for Revelstoke-Slocan.

MR. B. CAMPBELL: I move that Bill No. 50, intituled An Act to Amend the Fruit Growers Mutual Insurance Company Act, be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You have heard the motion. Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 51, Mr. Speaker. (An Act to Amend the Vancouver Charter)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 51. The Honourable the Second Member for Vancouver Centre.

MR. E. WOLFE: I move that Bill No. 51, intituled An Act to Amend the Vancouver Charter, be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You have heard the motion. Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C.BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 52, Mr. Speaker. (An Act Respecting Montreal Trust Company)

MR. SPEAKER: The Honourable the Second Member for Vancouver Centre.

MR. E. WOLFE: Mr. Speaker, I move that Bill No. 52, An Act Respecting the Montreal Trust Company, be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You have heard the motion. Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I intend to cast no aspersions on this particular trust company, but I have deep concern about these Private Bills without a clear cut statement from this Government, after the disastrous experience with the Commonwealth Trust.

MR. SPEAKER: Order please. The matter of Commonwealth Trust cannot be debated under this Bill.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the member who is guiding this Bill through the House, what guarantees he can provide the people of British Columbia that the money will be secure in this particular trust company, that the citizens of British Columbia, in going to this trust company, will have the backing of the Government and an awareness that this Legislature is indeed dealing with a Bill governing their business. I think it is a matter of deep concern, and I would like to hear the member's commitment in that regard. Otherwise, what's the point in him guiding the Bill through the House.

AN HON. MEMBER: The Bill is self-explanatory.

MR. BARRETT: Well, Mr. Speaker, I didn't ask the second member from Vancouver Centre, I asked the first member from Vancouver Centre….

If you consider the matter of a trust company Bill going through this House as a very humourous matter, I don't think that it is, considering other experiences, and I want to hear an explanation as to why we should give support to this Bill. Does the member know? I think I am quite entitled to ask those questions, and I would like to hear from the member.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Second Member for Vancouver-Burrard.

MR. B. PRICE: Mr. Speaker, this Bill, of course, was referred to the Select Standing Committee on the Standing

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Orders and Private Bills. We discussed this Bill very thoroughly, some changes were made, and we found out, among other things, that this Bill came into this House as a result of recommendation from the Inspector of Trust Companies for the Province of British Columbia, and as far as the committee is concerned, the Bill is in order.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. The motion is carried.

HON. W.A.C. BENNETT: Second reading of Bill No. 54, Mr. Speaker. (An Act Respecting Yorkshire Trust Company)

MR. SPEAKER: Second reading of Bill No. 54. The Honourable the First Member for Vancouver-Burrard.

MR. H.J. MERILEES: Mr. Speaker, I move that Bill No. 54, An Act Respecting the Yorkshire Trust Company, be now read a second time.

MR. SPEAKER: You have heard the motion. Are you ready for the question? The Honourable the Leader of the Opposition.

MR. D. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, again, I see no answer to my basic questions or no indication that the method of piloting these trust company Bills through the House has altered. I am sure that the committee was appraised by the appropriate Government officials of the current financial condition of this Company, but what further checks have been made? Have the members themselves investigated? What confidence must we have? And I don't think this is a very light matter. These are very serious Bills and there has been no change in the method of handling these Bills.

I don't wish to reflect on the past, but certainly the concerns that have developed around other legislation must apply to this Bill, and we have seen no indication by the Government that any different method of appraising the companies that are coming through for Private Bills now exists in this Province. And it is a matter of deep concern, very deep concern. I don't think the Bills can be handled lightly. We must know what additional safeguards have been applied to these Bills, and we haven't had an indication of that.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? The Honourable Member for Langley.

MR. H.B. VOGEL: Well, Mr. Chairman, as a member of the Select Standing Committee that has charge of these Bills, I think it's rather surprising that the Leader of the party who has three very competent people sitting on this Committee, and I have noticed that the work, that the contributions that they make are very considerable.

This particular application, this particular Bill was canvassed very, very carefully, and I think the simplest explanation is this; that this is a matter of consolidation and it is the type of thing, the simplification of structure, that makes it much easier to police this type of a financial organization, and is exactly the opposite of the type of financial organization of the same character that was referred to a while ago, and could be criticized.

I think this is an excellent Bill, and I have no hesitation at all in suggesting to the honourable members that the Committee looked at this very, very carefully and that it came to a proper conclusion.

MR. SPEAKER: Are you ready for the question? All those in favour say Aye. Contrary minded, No. I think the Ayes have it. The motion is carried.

The House continued to sit after midnight.

The House adjourned at 12.02 a.m.