[ Page 347 ]

CONTENTS

Statement Tribute to Mr. Ray Rickinson. Hon. Mr. Levi — 347

Mr. Chabot — 347

Mr. D.A. Anderson — 347

Mr. Wallace — 347

Routine proceedings

Oral Questions

Plan 7-3-1. Mr. Chabot — 348

Moneys for BCIT Totem League membership. Mr. D.A. Anderson — 348

Work stoppages in elevator industry. Mr. Curtis — 348

Taxation as a bar to land speculation. Mr. Phillips — 348

Area boundaries for new Fraser-mouth industrial park. Mr. D.A. Anderson — 349

Alternative methods of northern oil shipment. Mr. Wallace — 349

Equality in covering education material costs. Mr. Schroeder — 350

Release of Foulkes report. Mr. McGeer — 350

Shortage of cars on B.C. Railway. Mr. Smith — 351

Labour Code of British Columbia Act (Bill 11). Hon. Mr. King.

Introduction and first reading — 351

An Act to Amend the Payment of Wages Act (Bill 40). Hon. Mr. King.

Introduction and first reading — 351

Cyril Morley Shelford Compensation Act (Bill 41). Mr. Richter.

Introduction and first reading — 351

An Act to Amend the Veterinary Medical Act (Bill 3). Second reading.

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 352

Mr. Phillips — 352

Mr. McGeer — 352

Mr. Wallace — 352

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 352

An Act to Amend the Agricultural Land Development Act (Bill 5). Second reading.

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 353

Mr. Phillips — 353

Mr. D.A. Anderson — 353

Mr. McGeer — 353

Mr. Wallace — 354

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 354

An Act to Amend the Milk Industry Act (Bill 7). Second reading.

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 355

Mr. Phillips — 355

Mr. Williams — 355

Mr. Wallace — 356

Ms. Sanford — 356

Mrs. Jordan — 356

Mr. Cummings — 357

Mr. G.H. Anderson — 357

Mr. Richter — 357

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 357

An Act to Amend the Oleomargarine Act (Bill 8). Second reading.

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 358

Mr. Rolston — 359

Farm Income Assurance Act (Bill 9). Second reading.

Hon. Mr. Stupich — 365

Mr. Phillips — 365

Mr. Williams — 370

Mr. Wallace — 373

Division on motion to postpone second reading — 377

Mr. G.H. Anderson — 377

MONDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1973

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. Members, before we proceed I draw your attention to page 4, September 27, Votes and Proceedings. There was a slight typographical error on page 4. The bill on which there was a division was actually Bill 10. And that error I would ask your leave to correct in Votes and Proceedings for the purposes of the Journals of the House. Is that agreed?

I might say that that's only one typographical error, which is better than the Saturday local paper.

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): Mr. Speaker, may I draw to the attention of the House a group of students who are with us today, who have toured the legislative buildings and are now observing the first part of our deliberations this afternoon. The school has had a good association with this House by reason of the provision of Pages in the past — Reynolds Junior Secondary in Saanich. There are 29 students present, accompanied by their supervisors Mr. Dumka, Mrs. Staples, and Mr. Layman. Perhaps the House could join me in welcoming them.

HON. N. LEVI (Minister of Human Resources): Mr. Speaker, I'd like to ask leave to make a statement.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. LEVI: Mr. Speaker, sitting on the floor of the House is Ray Rickinson, the Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources. Ray Rickinson has been with the civil service for 45 years. He joined the civil service in 1929, at a time, I think, when only half of the people in the present Legislature were born, including the Premier. He served under Tolmie, Pattullo, Hart, Johnson, Bennett, and Barrett. He also served under 10 Ministers.

He started his career on January 22, 1929, at $45 a month as a junior clerk in the treasury department. In 1937 he transferred to the audit department, rising to the position of senior auditor. And in 1946 he was appointed chief accountant in the newly-formed Department of Health and Welfare. He was later promoted to comptroller of expenditure, and subsequently to his present position as Deputy Minister in January, 1956. Rick is the longest-serving Deputy in Canada, in this particular department.

Rick is retiring at the end of the year. He sat on the floor of this House on many occasions to assist Ministers during the departmental estimates, as he did with me last year. It takes a lot longer than a year to become a Minister, and he's been part of my training period. But today he's on the floor because he epitomizes the civil servant who loyally serves the people of the Province of British Columbia.

Mrs. Rickinson is sitting in the gallery and I would ask the House to welcome Mr. Rickinson and Mrs. Rickinson, and to thank Ray Rickinson for 45 years in the service of the Province of British Columbia.

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the official opposition we want to join with the Minister in paying tribute to Mr. Rickinson for his devoted service and loyalty to the people of the Province of British Columbia — a man who has worked his way up from a boy, through the ranks, to the highest position in the civil service. I want to assure you that his kind is a vanishing breed in the civil service of British Columbia. He has been a dedicated public servant for 45 years. He has made many, many contributions, not only in the Province of British Columbia but at federal-provincial conferences as well. His contributions and his ability and knowledge have been well recognized in other jurisdictions in this country. He has participated in the many innovations, in the new programmes that have been established in the department of social welfare. He has demonstrated his ability to administer those programmes as well. He has been a tremendous credit to the Province of British Columbia. We as the official opposition certainly have been pleased to have been associated with him in the years we were government, and we want to extend to him best wishes in years ahead.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): Mr. Speaker, I would like on behalf of my party to join with the Minister of Human Resources in expressing our best wishes to Mr. Rickinson in the years ahead, and also to thank him for the lengthy service — 45 years of service — to the people of British Columbia.

When it was mentioned by the Minister that Mr. Rickinson began with the Tolmie regime, we realize how transitory our politicians and administrations are and how permanent the civil service. I think this indicates that over the years, while we have come and gone, people like Mr. Rickinson have carried on the business of the people in a civil service in a very fine way and with an excellent tradition. We certainly agree that this praise is well deserved and we would also like to wish him well in the years ahead.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Conservative Party I would add our warm appreciation of the efforts that Mr. Rickinson has made. I would like to comment in passing that I hope this is something of a tradition which is being established. When men with this length and character

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of service resign that they do gain this kind of recognition right on the floor of the House where the people's business is done. And I like the comment by the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Levi) that Mr. Rickinson has served the people of British Columbia. It is so often mistaken that the civil service serve a particular government of the day. I like to think that this recognition is being given as a little something more than the usual gold watch.

I don't know whether the government's planning a gold watch ceremony or not, but Mr. Rickinson, in my experiences as an MLA, represents all that is good about dedication to public service. His responses to phone calls, to letters go far beyond the usual call of duty of a Deputy Minister. I would like you to know that of all the people in the civil service with whom I have been in contact in my few short years, there is nobody I respect more than Mr. Rickinson, and I would wish you very well, sir, in your retirement.

Oral questions.

PLAN 7-3-1

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Speaker, there is a statement of public importance made this morning by Mrs. Braverman, that there is a strong possibility — it's called Plan 7-3-1 — there is a strong possibility that the Liberal Party will be government after the next election. I'm wondering if the Premier would want to comment as to whether this Plan 7-3-1 is a one-way jet flight to Maui or what is it?

HON. D. BARRETT (Premier): Mr. Speaker, I assure you that this is not a put-up question. But I have been giving some thought to Plan 7-3-1, and I figured it out. It's seven leaders in a few short years; he has three years to wait for an election; then one election and he's out. (Laughter.)

MONEYS FOR BCIT
TOTEM LEAGUE MEMBERSHIP

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: Mr. Speaker, I'm delighted by the tremendous concern of the official opposition and government engendered by this pressing matter of public importance that either would like to comment on today. Mrs. Braverman will be flattered and I am pleased. But I would like to ask a question on a different plan of the Hon. Minister of Education (Hon. Mrs. Dailly), which does have a certain amount of pressing importance.

If BCIT does not get its grant from the Department of Education for extra-curricular sports before tomorrow night, they must drop out of the league. I wonder whether she would indicate when she intends to reply to the correspondence which began, I believe, in July of this year, and whether or not the students there can know whether this money is forthcoming and whether they will indeed be members of the Totem League for the upcoming year?

HON. E.E. DAILLY (Minister of Education): In reply to your question, we have not only had correspondence but we have actually talked with the students over the phone; so there has been communication. The problem is that as BCIT is a provincial institution, different from the colleges and universities in the sense that it still comes under the provincial government directly, there has been a problem in working out how this money would go to them. We quite agree that they should not be denied the right to these student activity funds which the other students in the province have. Today we met on this very matter, and they will be informed today that money will be provided for them.

WORK STOPPAGE IN
ELEVATOR INDUSTRY

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): Mr. Speaker, to the Hon. Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. King): we spoke last week briefly about the possibility of another work stoppage in the elevator industry. Could the Minister update the House on that particular topic this afternoon?

HON. W.S. KING (Minister of Labour): Mr. Speaker, with respect to the elevator dispute that has been going on for a number of months, the parties involved had agreed to be bound by the results of the Ontario arbitration. This award has not been handed down yet, so I am not at liberty to comment on its contents or, indeed, speculate on any different position the parties may take once it is tabled.

MR. CURTIS: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. I find that I am at a loss with respect to the answer last week and the answer again today. Have the Minister or the senior officials of his department offered any assistance or become involved in any way in the possible stoppage of work in this industry within the last few days?

HON. MR. KING: Well, Mr. Speaker, I gave the answer. The parties have agreed to be bound by arbitration, and I am awaiting the arbitration award. It has not been handed down as yet, I think it would be completely speculative to attempt to anticipate any problem that may arise.

TAXATION AS A BAR
TO LAND SPECULATION

MR. D.M. PHILLIPS (South Peace River): I would

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like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich) and, at the same time, welcome the Minister back from his travels in Ottawa. I've had this subject on my mind ever since the morning before he left when he said on the Jack Webster show — and I quote — that he would not expropriate land outside the designated agricultural lands under Bill 42, but would "persuade people by taxation not to buy these lands." I would like the Minister to give me his interpretation of "persuade people by taxation."

HON. D.D. STUPICH (Minister of Agriculture): I'm not sure what the question is, Mr. Speaker. I didn't say that we would persuade people by taxation not to buy land. That is not a direct quotation.

MR. PHILLIPS: A supplementary on the same question. Did the Minister say that he would persuade people to give up land by taxation? Because I have the actual quotation….

MR. SPEAKER: I think the Member has to, first of all, make sure that his quotation is correct. If his quotation is correct the question appears to be in order, although the Minister has differed as to the interpretation. I don't think you can keep asking him what he did say.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: May I point out, Hon. Members, that question period is not a cross-examination; but if the Hon. Minister wants to answer, it is up to him.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Well, Mr. Speaker, I didn't hear the programme. (Laughter.) I have no idea what was broadcast. I do know what was taped. I was there taping. I did say that when the government is aware of a problem, the government has shown that it has the will to act and has shown that it has the determination to act; and when we recognize that this indeed is a problem, we're not beyond using taxation as a means of dealing with this particular problem.

MR. PHILLIPS: A supplementary on the same subject, Mr. Speaker. Has the Minister informed the regional districts, who are supposed to have input on the Land Commission, of his new policy?

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, I was not announcing new policy. The regional districts were informed at the same time as the Hon. Member for South Peace River.

AREA BOUNDARIES FOR NEW
FRASER-MOUTH INDUSTRIAL PARK

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: A question to the Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources (Hon. Mr. Williams) arising out of his statement at Naramata last weekend that some 1,700 acres would be required for a new industrial park at the mouth of the Fraser. May I ask him whether the boundaries of this area have been established for this industrial reserve are, how much of the estuary is involved, how much of the foreshore and, of course, how much farmland presently frozen under the provisions of Bill 42?

HON. R. A. WILLIAMS (Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources): It is clear, Mr. Speaker, that I made no such statement.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: Could I just query further, Mr. Speaker? As I understood it, a statement was made by the Minister concerning the establishment of new port facilities and industrial areas at the mouth of the Fraser to replace the False Creek industries. I wonder whether he could indicate whether perhaps I am wrong in my facts or in some specific fact, or what he precisely said on this point.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: I think, Mr. Speaker, what was indicated at the meeting was that if there were opportunities for the government to consider serving the recreational interests of the central part of the city, then the government would have to seriously consider elbow room in terms of potential industrial sites on the Fraser River so that the areas where most of the people live, in the central part of the city, could benefit. But that would be a matter of study and judgement.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: May I ask the Minister finally, Mr. Speaker, whether or not there have been any changes made in the industrial reserve-designated area which is now farmland and which is presently being used for agriculture behind the Roberts Bank development?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: The land immediately back of Roberts Bank, I believe, is under the jurisdiction of the B.C. Harbours Board and that is in the hands of the Hon. Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer).

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: Would the other Minister like to comment on that?

MR. SPEAKER: Well, I think that we perhaps should give someone else a chance first.

ALTERNATIVE METHODS OF
NORTHERN OIL SHIPMENT

MR. WALLACE: I thought I'd never

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make it. I'd like to ask the Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources (Hon. Mr. Williams): in light of the continuing alarm about the oil tankers coming down the west coast and through the Strait of Juan de Fuca, are there any current initiatives being taken by this government adequately to express its concern to the federal government? Secondly, if there are initiatives being taken, what alternatives to the tanker route are favoured by this government, other than the one that the Premier presented earlier on regarding the shipment of oil by rail.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: I think those are the prime moves by the government, Mr. Speaker: that is, to seriously look at the land approach in terms of moving these materials.

MR. WALLACE: A supplemental question. Could I just ask the Minister to give us some ideas as to what degree he thinks the federal government is actively either discussing or considering this? Or have they given any deadline or date as to when they will at least give us a decision? There seems to be tremendous federal indecision on this very vital public issue.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: I'm afraid I don't have any recent information. I agree with the Hon. Member that indecision is the pattern in the east.

MR. SPEAKER: That is not within the competence of this question period.

EQUALITY IN COVERING
EDUCATION MATERIAL COSTS

MR. H.W. SCHROEDER (Chilliwack): To the Minister of Education. Since a growing number of students are experiencing increased costs while enrolling in various courses, both elective and required — the increased costs in the realm of textbook rentals and art supplies, industrial arts supplies, musical instruments, and so on and so forth — what plans does the Minister have toward ensuring equal opportunity in education?

HON. MRS. DAILLY: We have met with the BCSTA who prepared an excellent brief on that very point. I was pleased to see that they were very concerned about it. All I can say it that I am equally concerned, but I'm afraid I can't give you policy until the budget comes in the spring. I hope then that we will be able to show you the direction in which we will go to alleviate this.

RELEASE OF FOULKES REPORT

MR. P.L. McGEER (Vancouver–Point Grey): Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Health Services and Hospital Insurance (Hon. Mr. Cocke) whether he plans to release any parts of the Foulkes Report to the Legislature during the current session?

HON. D.G. COCKE (Minister of Health Services and Hospital Insurance): Mr. Speaker, as was accurately reported this morning, I have indicated to the Foulkes committee that I'd prefer that they finish the job thoroughly prior to submitting the report. They have another four weeks. If the report is available sooner than four weeks, then there is a possibility that I could table the report. But it is very, very unlikely at this time that it will be ready by the end of the session. I just don't know.

MR. McGEER: A supplemental question, Mr. Speaker. The Minister has had to make some moves already in the absence of that report. But I wonder if he would be willing to table now the report of his Toronto hospital consultants which formed the basis of his decision at the Shaughnessy site.

HON. MR. COCKE: That report was a report not made to me; it was made to the Foulkes committee. It was strictly a consultation; and it wasn't a formal report in any way, shape or form. I would have to discuss the whole question of releasing working papers and consultations. I really don't feel that they would serve Legislature's purpose.

MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I think they would serve a very important purpose. I hope tomorrow the Minister can give us a definite decision.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I think you have made your statement.

HON. MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I'll certainly consider the request.

MR. CHABOT: Will the Foulkes report be made available to the Legislature first, first, or will it be announced at the BCHA annual meeting which is being held, I believe, On October 22, where the Minister and Dr. Foulkes are speaking, or will we have it first here?

HON. MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I don't like the tone of that question. The fact of the matter is that it is not going to be released to the BCHA annual meeting. If it is available for presentation, I indicated to the former questioner that it would be made available here. I'm not taking seven volumes or eight volumes, or whatever it is, to BCHA or any other convention.

MR. CHABOT: The announcement will be made

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here first. Is that right?

MR. SPEAKER: Order. There is no obligation on the Members….

MR. CHABOT: It's a supplementary question….

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Member for North Peace….

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: The Speaker tries to be fair to all the Members, and the Member for North…. Order! The member for North Peace River has the floor and he hasn't had it up until now, but you have.

MR. CHABOT: Closure!

SHORTAGE OF CARS ON
B.C. RAILWAY

MR. D.E. SMITH (North Peace River): Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Premier in his capacity as President of the B.C. Railway. Has the Premier anything further to report regarding the critical rail car and chip car shortage, or would you bring us up to date? It is a very real, very bad and critical problem in all parts of northern B.C.

HON. MR. BARRETT: It is a very serious problem, Mr. Member, and we are doing everything we can to acquire cars.

We had a board meeting of the railway last week. We had a report that our rail car plant at Squamish will be in production in March instead of January. Even at that, they have achieved a very remarkable record in getting that thing together in such a short time. We are doing everything we can, We have just signed a lease agreement — I signed the papers Friday — for an additional 500 cars from the Foss Leasing Company. I'm beginning to suspect, Mr. Member, that both federal railways are not cooperating as well as they should be with the provincial railway. I now have the suspicion that the opposition had some time ago; my suspicions are growing as evidence comes in. If I find this to be a fact, that both the CPR and CNR are deliberately withholding boxcars from BC Rail, then, of course, we will have to take other appropriate action.

MR. PHILLIPS: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker, Will the appropriate action be taken on a per cent of rolling stock?

HON. MR. BARRETT: We won't be threatened by that.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. We can see tomorrow what happens in the next chapter. (Laughter.)

Introduction of bills.

LABOUR CODE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA ACT

Hon. Mr. King presents a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Labour Code of British Columbia Act.

Bill 11 read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Motion approved.

AN ACT TO AMEND THE PAYMENT
OF WAGES ACT

Hon. Mr. King presents a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled An Act to Amend the Payment of Wages Act.

Bill 40 read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Motion approved.

CYRIL MORLEY SHELFORD
COMPENSATION ACT

Mr. Richter moves introduction and first reading of Bill 41 intituled Cyril Morley Shelford Compensation Act.

Bill 41 read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Motion approved.

Orders of the day.

HON. D. BARRETT (Premier): I move we proceed to public bills and orders.

Motion approved.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Second reading of Bill 3, Mr. Speaker.

AN ACT TO AMEND
THE VETERINARY MEDICAL ACT

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HON. D.D. STUPICH (Minister of Agriculture): The Veterinary Medical Act is the legislation which legalizes the Association of Veterinarians and really sets up this self-policing organization. At their request we are making some amendments in that Act, amendments that will not distress anyone, and, presumably, will help that association in their work of policing their own members.

Amendments are twofold. Apparently, there is some legal question as to whether members of the association and/or members of the council of the association may sit on the inquiry board. The bill before us will make it quite clear that the people on that board need not be members of the association, so they might even be lay members, in whole or in part.

Beyond that, the amendment proposes that in the event that costs should be awarded against an offending veterinarian, the association will have the authority to recover those costs from that particular veterinarian.

I move second reading of Bill 3.

MR. D.M. PHILLIPS (South Peace River): Mr. Speaker, we are certainly in favour of this housekeeping bill. We feel, of course, that practical men on boards of inquiries, when they are involved with professional men, can sometimes lend an outside view. We concur with the principle of this Act, and certainly will support it.

MR. P.L. McGEER (Vancouver–Point Grey): Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the Minister of Agriculture, in closing the debate — I don't know what things might be included as appropriate amendments to the Veterinary Medical Act, but in British Columbia, we don't have a veterinary college and I am sure in bringing future amendments before the House that it would be most appropriate if there were a veterinary medical college that could be consulted. The Minister might very well today, while we are discussing the amendments to this bill, give us some indication of the government's policy on a veterinary college here in British Columbia.

As you well know, Sir, we have advocated this in the past on many occasions and we feel that now would be the most appropriate time for the Minister to declare a policy in this respect.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, this party supports the bill, and we like to hear the Minister mention that the amendments are being brought in after dialogue with the veterinary surgeons in the province. The only principle of the bill, which I hope he would reassure me about, is that the cost of the inquiry may be borne by the person being investigated, because it isn't always the fault of the professional — whether he is a veterinarian, or dentist,

or a doctor — who might be called before a board of inquiry for reasons which, really, may be either frivolous or unjustified. I wouldn't like to think that this is just a way whereby the college can routinely put the costs of the inquiry in the hands of the individual who is being inquired into. I notice that the legislation is written in such a way that I don't think this is a legitimate fear, but I would certainly like the Minister's reassurance or, that point.

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister of Agriculture closes the debate.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, I am just not sure how we can talk about the veterinary college under Bill 3, but the spokesman from the Liberal Party seems to have got away with some, so perhaps I can answer his question in the same vein, or at least answer a question.

As he knows well, and I think as most Members are aware, there is one veterinary college in western Canada. The four western provinces do cooperate in maintaining the college to some extent, although most of the cooperation is supplied by the Province of Saskatchewan.

You may also know that the federal government has recently announced an expansion of the veterinary college in Saskatoon to be financed, in part at least, by the federal government. You may also be aware that, at the request of the Saskatchewan government, when we inquired whether it would be possible to get more B.C. students into the college, they told us that admittance to this college is based entirely on the scholastic record of the applicants, that it should really be based on the amount that the sponsoring province is prepared to pay, but they haven't held to this rule, and suggested that B.C. Is one of the provinces that should have been paying more in past years. We are presently negotiating a higher payment towards that.

With respect to the question raised by the Hon. Leader of the Conservative Party (Mr. Wallace), certainly it's my understanding that his query is in line with the legislation. I have the assurance of the people who supplied the information on this bill that it will work that way, but I will check this just to be absolutely certain before the bill comes up at committee stage. I move second reading.

Motion approved.

Bill 3 referred to a Committee of the Whole House at the next sitting after today.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Second reading of Bill 5, Mr. Speaker.

[ Page 353 ]

AN ACT TO AMEND THE
AGRICULTURAL LAND DEVELOPMENT ACT

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, this is a very old Act. It was formerly called Farmers' Land-clearing Assistance Act, one that has been widely used by farmers in the province. It has been even more extensively used since amendments were introduced in the spring session and substantial changes made in the regulations so that it could be used for many more purposes. One of the effects of opening it up in that way has been that there has been a terrific number of applications for assistance under this legislation. It's used for more purposes now, and more money is available. It's doing a great deal of service in the agricultural community. But, as I say, one of the problems is there's a tremendous flow of paper work across my desk. So one of the purposes in introducing this minor amendment is to allow the Minister charged with the responsibility for this Act to delegate to someone the authority to sign some of these documents.

The other is where the Farm Credit Corporation is called on to lend money to a farmer who is borrowing under ALDA, the Agricultural Land Development Act. In the past, Farm Credit has insisted on all obligations being paid off so that they could have a first mortgage on the property. The ALDA rate is generally much lower than the Farm Credit rate, which is to the disservice of the farmer if he has to pay off a low-interest loan to finance everything at a much higher interest.

So what we are saying in this bill before us is that, if a farmer does have an ALDA commitment against his property, and if it is in first place, and if he is successfully applying to Farm Credit for a larger loan, that the provincial government will move into second, or even lower if necessary, place as security on that property, so that the farmer will be able to get maximum benefits from the various lending agencies that lend to farmers. I move second reading of the bill.

MR. PHILLIPS: We in the official opposition concur with the principle of this amendment. We hope that, when the Minister appoints somebody to do the signing for him, that he will ask from that person from time to time, and make available to the House, reports as to the amount of money being used and some idea as to what areas of land development the money is going into. In other words, is there a larger portion going into irrigation, land clearing or other forms of land development? Maybe the Minister would answer that in his closing remarks.

Secondly, Mr. Speaker, we regret that the province, which is supplying the money to the agricultural industry at low rate, has to take a back seat to Ottawa by taking second mortgages. This seems to be typical of the eastern financial interests in Ottawa in wanting to milk the farmer and yet have first refusal on his land. We're disappointed at Ottawa's attitude in this regard.

It is my hope that British Columbia will bring in legislation during this fall session that will make null and void the use of the Farm Credit Corporation; in other words, the legislation we bring in will, I hope, be much better than the federal Farm Credit Act, and the money will be supplied at low-interest rates and will not necessitate a farmer's going to Ottawa for part of his money. So certainly, we will support second reading of this bill, Mr. Speaker.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): We certainly will be supporting this bill, Mr. Speaker, hut a couple of questions come up.

If the Minister does intend to change the position of the province with a special repayment on loans, obviously there is a financial cost involved, and quite obviously his own department must have done some study as to the amount of money involved.

One of the purposes of this legislature is to check on the spending proposals of the Crown and really we haven't heard from him how much this is going to cost. It's not to say it shouldn't be done at all. It's simply one of the questions I thought would be uppermost in the Minister's mind when he closes this debate, that he'll let us know how much this switch in the preferred position is going to cost us. Because clearly, from what he said, the province per se is going down to a much lower position.

One other comment, Mr. Speaker. We quite appreciate the Minister has many things to sign. But once again, the problem with Acts such as this is that we set them up in the Legislature, we assume the Minister will be responsible, we assume we'll be able to get at the Minister during the sessions of the Legislature at least, and yet so often things of this nature are sloughed off onto civil servants later on. We have no objection to this being done in this instance because the Minister, I think properly, explained he has a great burden of correspondence arising out of this particular Act. I wonder, though, whether he'd like to indicate, in the same light as the question I asked about the cost, the amount of time that it actually does involve.

MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, naturally we'd be more than delighted here, as the Liberal leader has said, to do anything possible to help out the Minister of Agriculture. He's had quite a lot of difficulty bringing sensible legislation before the House and, if spending a little more time thinking his legislation out would help him, we'd be very pleased to cooperate.

But there's one detail here that has me quite concerned, and that is that the Minister explained that the intent really was to allow him to designate

[ Page 354 ]

civil servants to handle the routine signing of the many documents that come forward.

The legislation says that the Minister is the man designated by the executive council to be in charge of this Act. I recall, at the end of the last session, receiving a communication from the Minister of Agriculture with regard to land development that came in an envelope from the Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources (Hon. Mr. Williams). One suspects — and how can we on this side really know — that the controversial legislation the Minister of Agriculture introduced last session, that caused him so much difficulty, was really the brainchild of the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water Resources.

While we intend to support this legislation, I'd feel much more comfortable about the Minister of Agriculture's position in the future and his ability to carry his department well, if I thought the management of lands that genuinely were to be used for agriculture would be his responsibility and not those of the Minister of Lands, Forests, and Water Resources.

MR. WALLACE: We just wish to go on record as supporting the bill.

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister closes the debate.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, in answer to the questions raised by the Hon. Member for South Peace River (Mr. Phillips) as to how much money would be used in total and the report on the uses made of the money, well of course the money used in total will be voted by the Legislature. This is one of the votes in the Department of Agriculture and it will continue to be one of the votes. That would be the proper time to ask questions about how the programme is going, how it's being accepted by the farmer, what good it is doing in the province. I think a detailed question, such as how much of it is going into the various agricultural uses into which it might be going, might very well be a question for the order paper rather than simply [illegible] during estimates. I would prefer to have it on the order paper.

Although certainly one of my ambitions, in changing the legislation this way, is that it will give me more time to look over the total application of the programme in the broad spectrum, as opposed to signing innumerable certificates of discharge when a farmer has completed making his payments on the loan. I can't think of anything less interesting, in my office right now, than having to sign these documents that were originally signed in some cases by the Hon. Member for Boundary-Similkameen (Mr. Richter) in his capacity as Minister of Agriculture, and even some before that, and they're finally getting around to paying them off. Certainly this is of great importance perhaps to the chap who has completed making the payments, but not of very much importance to the present Minister of Agriculture.

The question of sliding down on security — the Hon. Member who asked this question is not in his seat — this in itself will not cost, unless of course it's necessary to foreclose, which I can't imagine happening. The record there is extremely good. Farm Credit itself never seems to have to foreclose, and certainly we wouldn't expect to have to foreclose, so that in itself is not going to cost.

However, the question I thought he was going to ask is how much more is being loaned out with the current interest in the programme. I don't mean the interest rates but the interest shown by the farmers, and this is really the question. A good deal more money is going out. We haven't used up the funds that were voted by the Legislature in the spring session this year, but certainly if the activity keeps up at its current rate I expect to be going back to Treasury asking for more funds to finance this programme until the Legislature meets again, and I would hope that Treasury will look on this sympathetically when I make that application.

The question of signing documents. Of course, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Agriculture currently is named by the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council as the one responsible for this legislation. Whether the Minister has the authority to delegate this to someone in his department or not, it is the Minister of Agriculture who will be responsible, and responsible to this House, for what happens in that office, regardless of which member or members of staff do, and whatever they do. The Minister still has to bear the responsibility and this Minister is prepared to accept that responsibility.

The Hon. Member for Vancouver–Point Grey — and I forget whether it is first or second — suggests that there was legislation introduced in the spring session which caused the Minister of Agriculture a great deal of difficulty. I suggest, Mr. Speaker, it caused a great deal more difficulty to the Members in the opposition than it did to the Minister of Agriculture.

I move second reading.

Motion approved.

Bill 5 read a second time and referred to Committee of the Whole House at the next sitting after today.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Second reading of Bill 7, Mr. Speaker.

AN ACT TO AMEND
THE MILK INDUSTRY ACT

[ Page 355 ]

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, Bill 7 includes a number of relatively minor housekeeping changes in the legislation, bringing it up to date. I think the one thing of interest in it is one that one might almost miss in a casual reading of the legislation. It is the one that really is the reason for bringing this bill forward at that time, and that is the authority that it gives to control the movement of retail packaged milk in the province. It's in line with the programme on which this party went to the electorate, and that is that we would do our best to see to it that agriculture had an opportunity to grow all over the province wherever it is practical for agriculture to grow and wherever there is a market for the agricultural produce that can be produced in those areas.

In the case of milk there have been instances in the past — nothing at the moment that this bill is directed against in particular — where a local dairy producing industry or local dairy farmers have found it necessary to bring public pressure to bear in order to get the chain stores in particular in their area to accept a fair proportion of milk from the local area, as opposed to bringing it in from somewhere else. We felt that if we were going to go out on a programme to try to increase the production of agricultural products around the province, in keeping with that and in order to assist should it become necessary, we should have the authority to control the movement of packaged milk in retail cartons or packages of any kind. It's with a view to accomplishing that, as well as the housekeeping changes in the legislation, that I now move second reading of Bill 7.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, I want to say that we in the official opposition agree with the principle of this amendment. We realize that in order to promote the dairy industry in some of the more remote areas of the province there must be local markets, and we also realize, as the Minister says, that probably the most important part of this bill is that if a dairy herd is going to be established there must be a guaranteed tenure of the market. If there's not, the investment in the herd itself, in land, in buildings and everything will not come to being. So we certainly concur with this principle.

I would like, however, the Minister when he closes the debate to assure me that he's not going to go marching into the offices of some of these food chain stores and demand to see their files, like the Gestapo. We don't want any of those tactics. I guess he can subpoena them, but I'd like some assurance that we're not going to do this, because even though they had been moving milk around the markets they have probably in all consciousness been trying to fulfill the demand.

The rest of it, as you say, is strictly bookkeeping. We concur. I know in my own area that we would like to see the dairy herd built up. Other than fresh packaged milk, the majority of the other dairy products are brought in from Edmonton. I have always felt that we in British Columbia, certainly in this regard, should be self-sufficient if it means establishment of more dairies in the north. So we will support the bill, Mr. Speaker.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS (West Vancouver–Howe Sound): Mr. Speaker, the Minister has touched, certainly, upon the essential principle in this amendment which he brings forward. We all understand the problems that the dairy industry has had in this province and the implications that there have been for dairying in outlying regions of the province because of large concentrations of power in the industry, particularly within the Fraser Valley.

We also recognize the problems that have been created in the Creston and Kootenay areas with respect to the availability of milk supplies there, and the proposed change in regulatory power is one approach to the solution of these. We have had the absolutely ludicrous situation this year of fluid milk being shipped from the lower mainland of Vancouver for sale in the stores in the Okanagan, and milk being shipped by the Noca Dairy organization in the Okanagan to the lower mainland and Vancouver Island. When you consider the cost of the transportation of food products, particularly of perishable products, this has got to be an increase in expense or cost to the producer for which there is no logical reason.

However, when we embark upon this particular kind of solution to this problem, I am concerned at the possibility that we may be moving towards a Balkanization of this province in a way in which we have seen a Balkanization of Canada, so far as availability of food stuffs is concerned, and I would be happy if the Minister in closing the debate could put my mind at rest that the application of this regulatory power is not going to result in that kind of Balkanization. It's true, as the Member for South Peace River (Mr. Phillips) says, that in his area the dairy products, certainly the food and milk products, come from Alberta. It's a practical necessity.

The facility there is for the processing of milk is the Alberta Dairy Pool — facilities controlled from outside the province. Now, it would perhaps be possible, by using this regulatory power, to supply milk from within British Columbia to service the needs of Dawson Creek and Fort St. John, but this might be to the serious detriment of the consumer in those areas. While I am all in favour of making certain that we bring about orderly production and marketing within the province, I would like to be assured by the Minister that the use of this regulatory power is not going to result in disorderly consumer practices. This is the one concern that we express, even though approving the legislation in principle.

[ Page 356 ]

I think it is also worthwhile at this stage, Mr. Speaker, that we mention the other changes that the Minister is bringing forward. For too long there has been the use, or maybe abuse, of words denoting a natural product in connection with the product which has no, or scarcely no, natural components at all, and I think that this will assist not only the industry but also the yet-to-be-born Minister of Consumer Affairs' department in making certain that some of the practices which we see carried on in retail food stores and in restaurants and the like will be put an end to once and for all.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, this party supports the bill, but I would just like to enlarge on the point which the Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound (Mr. Williams) just raised about the involvement of a dairy product in an imitation milk product. Since the previous part of the bill also outlines the principle that everything has to be documented and spelled out, I really would like the Minister's comment as to why there is anything wrong with including a natural product with an imitation milk product, provided the consumer has it spelled out in black and white on the label. It would seem to me that you are actually diminishing the potential to use more dairy products, albeit in something which is advertised as an imitation product.

There may be a logical answer, but it seems to me that since we're all trying to give the farmer the widest market for his products, by restricting in any way the inclusion of a dairy product — and perhaps if the Minister wishes to discuss this in committee, I'll be happy to raise it then — but this is a principle that I think goes beyond just this section of the bill, and raises this whole matter of to what degree are farmers able to use their dairy products at the present time and this kind of commodity which he is about to ban.

MS. K. SANFORD (Comox): I just wanted to point out that the dairy farmers in the Courtenay area will certainly welcome this amendment because they were facing severe difficulties in the last few years, difficulties so severe that, at times, the dairymen in our area were considering going out of business.

One of the problems that was happening in our area was that the large supermarkets were importing milk from the lower mainland — that is, the Lucerne product for Safeway and the Foremost product for Super-Valu — and were not devoting much shelf space to the locally-produced milk which was sold under the Dairyland label. Now the dairy farmers in our area, in order to survive, had to sell a large portion of their fluid milk locally in order to get the kind of return that was necessary to keep them in business. What was happening was that the Dairyland products were receiving very small shelf space in our area, and our farmers were forced to ship their milk over to the lower mainland in order to have it processed into products which brought them in less money than the fluid milk sales would. In addition to that, they had to pay the freight costs involved in shipping their milk over to the lower mainland.

Now some time ago — about two years ago as a matter of fact — the farmers in our area got together and discussed the problem and decided that the best thing they could do was to bring this whole matter to the attention of the public. As a result, we had large publicity campaigns, front page stories in our area concerning the problems that these farmers were facing. At that time, the public was convinced that they should support the Dairyland product, that they should be buying the locally-produced milk, and they were demanding from the supermarkets that they devote at least 25 per cent of their shelf space to the Dairyland product. The supermarkets agreed to this and were, for a time, devoting almost 25 per cent of their shelf space to the Dairyland product. But, somehow or other, that was not continued and the farmers again found themselves in a severe bind.

Finally, the farmers asked to meet with me — and this was some time before I was elected — but only as a candidate, and we in our NDP organization up there attempted to help them by leafletting at supermarkets in the area, again requesting that the people support the locally-produced Dairyland milk. I know that the farmers will welcome this legislation because now they can be assured that enough of their milk will be sold locally before other milk is imported. Thank you.

MRS. P.J. JORDAN (North Okanagan): I intend to be brief. I would endorse what my colleague said about our party supporting this bill, and I know the Minister is aware that the milk producers in the Interior of this area, a large group of whom I have the honour to represent, will welcome this legislation.

One point does come to mind, though, which I would ask the Minister to comment on, through you, Mr. Speaker, when he's closing the debate, and that is whether or not there is the authority within this Act, or the government has considered the possibility that in retaliation for this Act and controlling the movement of packaged milk in British Columbia, there is the authority to stop any under pricing that might be done by a chain store in a particular area in order to oversell their own product and try and create an artificial environment where it would look as if there was not a demand for the local product? This is a danger, and it has been done before.

They think that possibly, if the authority isn't in this Act, perhaps an amendment might be in keeping whereby there is no way that a chain store could embark on any type of price cutting on a milk product or a dairy product that would put it below

[ Page 357 ]

the average cost of production in the Province of British Columbia. I'm not convinced, myself, that that would be a suitable deterrent or that it would be workable, but perhaps it's a base from which the Minister and the department might begin, in order to see that we don't have, as I mentioned, an artificial climate created which would, in fact, prove to the detriment of the sales of our milk products from our local area.

MR. R.T. CUMMINGS (Vancouver–Little Mountain): Mr. Speaker, this looks like a very little innocent Act, but it affects the baking industry in British Columbia very, very badly.

For example, in 4(c) — and I know we're not supposed to speak to it now — but if it prevented the use of dried milk in baking preparation, it would drive prices up in baking quite substantially, so I would like assurances from the Minister that this Act won't be handled badly by his bureaucrats.

MR. G.H. ANDERSON (Kamloops): Mr. Speaker, it's certainly a pleasure to get up and support this bill, and I know we're not talking about particular sections. But the whole principle of the bill, of having further control over the distribution of milk in this province, I think has been awaited for many, many years. There have been attempts, for I don't know how many years, to control in some way the production and sale of milk so that the farmer could get a good return and yet guarantee that an essential product such as this would be available in all corners of the province. But, like any other legislation that has been brought in, there are situations which develop that need further attention, and I'm very happy to see these amendments brought in.

Travelling with the agricultural committee in some of the far-away corners of the province, it was so strange to see tanker trucks taking raw milk out of the Kootenays bound for the lower mainland, or the north, or somewhere else — you couldn't tell exactly where — and a few miles later on your travels, to meet an intercity van-type of truck bringing packaged milk back to the area where the raw milk was being removed from. It looked to me as though the milk was being hauled everywhere in the province for miles and miles to be processed and sent back, and the local area producers were suffering because of transportation costs and because so much of their milk had to be put into the processed market instead of the fresh-milk market. It was very, very obvious, as the Hon. Member for Comox (Ms. Sanford) pointed out, that there was a real threat to the industry on Vancouver Island, and I'm hoping that this legislation is going to go a long way to help correct this.

The regulations that have been brought in in the past were supposed to be administered by the board, and in this way they would have some control over the production and consumption of the product, but over the last few years the situation has arisen where the supermarkets are actually the ones who have been deciding board policy. Whether it was in agreement with board policy or not, they were deciding what milk would be sold where, and how, and who would produce it, and not exactly what the price would be, but they made a lot of representation by their intrusion financially into the dairy processing and preparing plants.

I'm very happy to see this come in, Mr. Speaker, and I'm hoping that it will go a long way to correcting some of the bad situations that have arisen in the milk-marketing field in this province.

MR. F.X. RICHTER (Leader of the Opposition): I've had a little experience with the Milk Industry Act, and I recall a few years ago, and I don't know how many Members sitting in the House now remember the squabble that occurred over an imitation product known as Dream Whip. This particular product, particularly in remote areas such as mining areas, logging camps and so on, was a product which one former Minister of Agriculture banned, and another that followed him brought back on the market again for the simple reason that it was the only type of product that, by mixing it with milk, you could have an immediate whipped cream substitute. Now, the fact that the amount of milk required to mix with it was somewhat less than having the real product, the whipping cream, it made it quite possible to have this sort of a topping used in these remote areas. You didn't require the refrigeration for it and so on that you would had you had the fresh product.

I would hope that the Minister (Hon. Mr. Stupich) would give consideration for these types of imitation products to be used in concert with fresh milk permits where it's found impossible to get daily deliveries, or even weekly deliveries out into some of the remote areas. I think the people we have living in those areas, working in those areas, deserve every consideration in this respect. If permission was given or a permit was given, the same as it is for reconstituted milk, well then, I think the legislation deserves support, and I'm prepared to support it on that basis.

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister closes the debate.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, a good deal of the comment has been with respect to one subsection of a subsection of a section, and that's fair enough. The way I read 4(3)(c) is that it will work as a protection for the consumer so that the consumer will know whether or not he or she is purchasing a product that, while it pretends to be one thing, is

[ Page 358 ]

indeed a mixture of other things.

I feel that the proper time to get into a more detailed discussion of this particular subsection would be in committee stage. At the moment, I will simply say that as I understand this and as I read it, it is to protect the consumer. It has some protection for the producer but is mainly for the consumer. We will, I suppose, have more detailed discussion in committee stage.

The only consolation I give the Member for Vancouver–Little Mountain (Mr. Cummings) in his concern that it will be badly handled by bureaucrats is that, in part, it is up to him. When he says "bureaucrats" I understand that he means "civil servants," and when he talks about civil servants badly handling anything I say again that Ministers have to be responsible for what civil servants do; so the best way he can make sure that this will not be badly handled is to make sure that the administration does not change. (Laughter.)

The Hon. Member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan) was asking whether we had given any consideration to controlling the retail price. There is loss-leader legislation on the books right now. I believe it was the previous administration that put it on and found it very difficult to use. I think in the cases where they did try it, it was extremely difficult to prove a case. It was found to be very expensive and not particularly acceptable to anybody in the community as a case to pursue.

We feel by controlling the amount of package milk moving, we can get the control that we want. If they want to move an amount that is limited by us, they can move only that amount. If they want to sell it at giveaway prices, once they have disposed of it then they have to buy their milk locally. Certainly the price at which they buy it is set by the Milk Board so producers will not lose. If they want to give away a limited amount of milk to benefit the consumers or try to upset people locally with their local producers, we don't really have the authority other than the loss-leader legislation and there is no confidence in this legislation. The loss-leader legislation would be the place to control that and, as I say, from my knowledge of it, it didn't work too well. Perhaps your seatmate could tell you more about the applications of that legislation.

The Hon. Member for Oak Bay (Mr. Wallace) raised the same question about section 4(3)(c) and, as I say, we will have further discussion of that.

The Hon. Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound (Mr. Williams) had a question on Balkanization. Whether it may look on first blush that this agricultural legislation is something designed to help the individual farmers and the agricultural industry, what we have in mind ultimately is that this legislation is to help people — and people generally are consumers.

It may very well be that the community as a whole would be better off if this were not applied to stop Alberta milk, for example, coming into the B.C. Peace River. It could be either way; but that is something I think we will want to bear in mind as to whether, in a situation like that, the authority given under this legislation should or should not be used. It might well be that it would be better not to control the movement of milk in a particular area like that.

The possibility that we might go marching into a chain store like some Gestapo is not really appropriate to this particular administration. Secondly, if it is necessary to go marching into a chain store and look at their records to protect the producers ultimately with a view to protecting the consumers then we certainly have the authority under this legislation to do so and we will do so.

I move second reading.

Motion approved, Bill 7 read a second time and referred to Committee of the Whole House at the next sitting after today.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Second reading of Bill 8.

AN ACT TO AMEND
THE OLEOMARGARINE ACT

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, this is a very old Act; it dates back to 1949. It was introduced at that time, I suppose, to protect the public, the users of margarine; to control the conditions under which margarine might be manufactured, stored, or offered for sale. It was also designed to protect the producers. In every instance where margarine was being sold, in every package in which it was contained, in every restaurant where it was used, it had to be indicated on the menus that margarine was being served in that restaurant. If there was no menu, as was the case in some restaurants, then a sign had to be posted to the effect that margarine was used there, and, as I say, all packages had to have it on as well.

In this legislation we are simply admitting that margarine is not used these days as a substitute for butter. Margarine is used by people who choose to use margarine, maybe for some economic reasons, maybe for reasons of health. Whether rightly or wrongly, they choose to use margarine. It is something that goes back 24 years….

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Well, I don't know, I've seen papers on it both ways. My doctor tells me one thing and the people who are doing research for F.V.M.P.A. (Fraser Valley Milk Producers' Association) tell me something else. I choose to

[ Page 359 ]

follow my doctor's advice; that's what I'm paying him for.

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Well, if I choose not to follow his advice then I would quit paying him, but I choose to follow my doctor's advice in matters like that. It is his responsibility to try to keep me healthy.

In any case, the real thing we are doing here is saying: Look, this is out of date. We are the only province in Canada that is out of step; everybody else has followed this direction long ago.

I move second reading of this bill now.

MR. PHILLIPS: We in the official opposition will support this bill. It is a pretty greasy subject and we will just let it slide through. (Laughter.)

MR. P.C. ROLSTON (Dewdney): I guess this is the final phase in a 23-year-old Rolston family project. In 1949 my grandmother first attempted to amend this Act. I am not sure if she was in the government in 1951, but certainly in 1951 was able to make amendments, even if it meant bringing a mixer into the House to convince the male group.

It is long overdue and I'm very proud of this piece of legislation. I think it stops the inference that margarine is inferior in any way. As the Minister said, we really don't need to worry about it being a substitute for butter or any other substance. I am sure it minimizes previous public suspicions about its health values and its other qualities. I support the legislation.

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Minister closes the debate.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, I move second reading.

Motion approved.

Bill 8 referred to the Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting after today.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, second reading of Bill 9.

FARM INCOME ASSURANCE ACT

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, this may take a little longer. When I was asked what I expected the reaction would be from the opposition, I predicted correctly that it would be the same as it was for Bill 42; it would be attacked mainly on the basis that it was vague and that it gave the government too much authority. It wasn't very hard I admit to make that prediction, Mr. Speaker. However, there are two reasons, Mr. Speaker, why it had to be vague, There is ample evidence — and certainly all kinds of comments since the legislation was introduced — that there is really only one way to go in this question of farm-income stabilization, and that is that you have to move commodity by commodity.

Only one province in Canada has introduced legislation of any kind to stabilize farm incomes and that is the Province of Prince Edward Island. They chose another route: they chose to try one particular commodity on for size to see how they got along and so introduced the Hog Prices Stabilization Act.

The Province of P.E.I. isn't very wealthy and has not yet been able to get any federal assistance for this. Fortunately for them, since they introduced the legislation hog prices have done nothing but go up — and go up very markedly — so that the producers who are paying an insurance are paying it at the maximum rate. Prices are up so high for hogs that money is pouring into the fund. So things are going very well with them, and, hopefully, before the fund is called upon for payments of any kind, there will be some federal government participation in this plan. But in any case, the plan is going well for the P.E.I. Hog Stabilization Plan.

But hogs are not that terribly important a product here in the Province of British Columbia. They will be more so, and I hope we will increase our hog production, but it is one of the areas where there haven't even been enough hogs produced in the province to justify setting up a hog marketing board. We had to go commodity by commodity.

Logically, the first one would be the fruit industry, since this is where most of the problems seem to be in agriculture in the province. But even with fruit you have many kinds, and how can you possibly come up with one plan that would satisfy all of them? Possibly you can, but it's something that would have to be worked out with the farmers themselves and/or with their organization, where the details would have to be arrived at only after a great deal of discussion with the leaders in the industry, perhaps with individuals. But certainly it's something that would take a lot of time.

Before we could put that kind of time into a programme like that, before we could say that it should be fruit people only, we felt that we had to have, if you like, enabling legislation - legislation that would show the provincial government is prepared to go ahead with a programme to stabilize farm income for farmers and is prepared to talk with any commodity group in the province that chooses to discuss it with us and to talk about the possibility of arriving at a plan that will suit the particular needs of that special commodity group. In a case like fruit, it might even be that there would be differences in the

[ Page 360 ]

plan dealing with different areas of production or different fruits that are being produced in various fruit-growing areas of the province — "areas" in plural, because there's not just one area. There certainly is one main area. There are other areas outside of that where again it might be necessary to come up with something a little different.

So the legislation is vague. The legislation clearly says, though, that under this Act the government will have the authority to negotiate with the farmers in any commodity group, preferably with their organization, of course, a plan in which the producers themselves would be asked to participate on a premium basis. The government itself is prepared to participate, as we do with the crop insurance plan, And while it's not in the legislation, the legislation does provide, or is vague enough if you like, that it can fit in with almost any programme that the federal government may come up with that would enable them to participate in an income stabilization programme with us. Those are the things we wanted to achieve. We wanted to make it possible that the legislation would enable the government to negotiate for a crop stabilization plan with members of any commodity group, We wanted to make it possible that we could negotiate with the federal government for an income stabilization plan for farmers — again farmers in any group — or whatever way the federal government felt was the best way of achieving this.

The Cattlemen's Association, in a brief presented to the conference that I attended in Ottawa last week, did say at one point, with reference to this commodity by commodity approach:

"Before proceeding further, it is probably necessary to narrow the field to the beef commodity, for it is our view that the question of stabilization of agricultrual. product prices, if it is to be approached at all, must be approached on a commodity by commodity basis. Quite obviously the problems t hat confront the various commodities at any point in time are very different, and it is not only these differences but the characteristics of each commodity sector itself that requires differing responses and different solutions."

And it's with that thinking in mind that the legislation was introduced in the Legislature in what has been described as a very vague form.

Apart from this commodity by commodity approach, there has been the indication, really not much more than that up until last week, that the federal government was prepared to look seriously at this question of stabilizing farm income. At least, under the current Minister of Agriculture from time to time there have been statements to that effect. In Prince Edward Island at the provincial Ministers' conference the Minister made it plain, and previous to that in meetings and again at the Calgary conference he said that he was not prepared to talk about stabilization of farm income unless we were prepared to talk also about orderly marketing and controlled production.

In one recent speech there are just a couple of things that I've underlined. In response to this question that was raised by the Prime Minister very recently as to how we maintain agricultural production at its present levels and how we get increases in production, his answer was, "It takes better returns, better income, and more stability." So in this the federal government is recognizing the need for stability.

He's talking about critics of marketing boards, really, and that's what this particular speech was about, in the main. Describing these critics, or in talking about them: "These same critics have failed completely to see the link between stabilization and planned production and marketing. You can't have one without the other." Certainly, with that in mind, I was determined that B.C. would join the National Egg Marketing Agency before I ever went back to Ottawa last week to discuss any assistance or any cooperation the federal government might offer with respect to stabilization of farm income.

In Ottawa at the same time, some of the Ministers — not all of them and not as many as we all had hoped — did sign an agreement for a national turkey marketing plan. Some of the provinces stayed out because they wanted to talk more about the new feed grains policy and were not prepared to talk about anything else really till there was some further discussion of that. But a number of the provinces, including B.C., signed the national turkey marketing plan. We are prepared in B.C. to talk about the things that Mr. Whelan, the federal Minister of Agriculture, urges us to. talk about before he will consider any plans for stabilization.

A good deal of the conference in Ottawa was about this question of stabilization of income. It was indicated to us in press reports and in the telegram that this would be part of the discussion at the conference in Ottawa. I may say that the conference almost broke down in the morning when these three provinces, in particular the three prairie provinces, wanted to talk about grain policy and nothing else, recognizing that they couldn't possibly change the feed grains policy at that meeting, admitting this quite openly, but still insisting that we discuss it and that we arrive at some common position on it, knowing all the time that it's just impossible to arrive at a common position unless those three Ministers happen to be absent at the time we arrived at it, because everybody else felt one way and the three Ministers from the Prairies felt quite differently about it. But in any case we did in the afternoon finally get onto a discussion of stabilization of farm income.

A paper was presented by an economist from the

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CDA, Canada Department of Agriculture, a Dr. Trant. He discussed in general principles the idea of stabilization of income and raised some questions. I'm going to repeat some of the questions and some of the discussion at Ottawa, not just with a view to telling you about some of our thinking and what will be guiding us in the future, but also during the course of my presentation this afternoon, to raise some questions that I am going to throw at you, with a view to seeking some advice and to see what the reaction is from the opposition to the proposals that were made in Ottawa, to see the proposals that we have, that we will be discussing with the various commodity groups.

In talking about stabilization, and I certainly don't intend to read everything, one of the questions that he raised was that possibly all producers in a specific commodity group have to be involved in a programme. Now, he didn't say under some circumstances. I'm prepared to admit and the legislation is prepared to admit that in some instances it just might be necessary for all the producers in a particular commodity group to be included. I think in other instances it would be better if they weren't all. But he suggested that in some cases it might be, because if all the producers in a commodity group are going to benefit, well then should they not all be part of the plan and should they not all pay premiums in a situation where they are all going to benefit? Not necessarily would they all benefit in every situation, but if in drawing up a plan for a particular commodity group all of them were going to get the benefit, then should they not all contribute?

Secondly, it's possible in some situations, in the case of some commodity groups, that the scheme might fail unless there was 100 per cent participation in it — 100 per cent loosely, but with limits, This again was one of his questions.

Thirdly, quite apart from the producers contributing, in any scheme to stabilize farm income it's not just the farmer that's benefiting but also the consumer. I believe I spoke on this earlier, or perhaps it was outside of the House, when I drew on the experience of the egg situation in British Columbia. I guess that was in the throne speech debate when I gave that example.

So certainly stabilized prices and orderly marketing benefit the consumers, under some circumstances at least. It also benefits the agri-business sector. So if all of those people are going to benefit from any system of stabilizing farm income, this certainly justifies participation in the programme by the senior levels of government, provincial and federal.

Those are some of the things that I noted from Dr. Trant's speech. There's one thing I noted that I didn't agree with and I made a point of saying so. He kept talking about stabilized prices. Mr. Speaker, as far as I'm concerned stabilized prices don't mean anything unless they are stabilized with respect to the costs of production. It's not enough to fix the price that the farmer is getting for produce unless you have some control over his cost of production. So I kept saying we should be talking not about stabilized prices, but about some kind of income assurance, and that is the name of the legislation before us, an Income Assurance Act.

In the afternoon the federal Minister gave us some of his ideas. I was interested in them; some of them sounded very exciting, and I asked him just what status these are. Are these things you thought about in the morning when you were listening to the talk about the feed-grain problems? Are these proposals you have made to cabinet? Are they proposals you have discussed at length in your own department? Just where do we sit on these?

He told us then that they are proposals that he has not made to cabinet yet. They have been discussed in his own department and he likes them, But he told us also that around the room there were a lot of civil servants from the various departments who would be interested in what was happening in agriculture: the Finance department, for example, was there; the director of Regional Economic Expansion was there with some of his staff; some of the staff from Otto Lang's department were there on the feed-grain situation.

And he said: "Unless you Ministers are prepared to give me some backing and show me that you support the proposals that I am going to take to cabinet, I am going to have a pretty hard job selling them to my cabinet colleagues." So I certainly made a point of indicating my support — or otherwise — as he made his points one by one.

There is an Act that does give the federal Minister some authority to help agriculture. The Agricultural Stabilization Act is badly out of date and a long time since it has been used in B.C. I do not think it is used to any great extent in Canada at all right now because it is so badly out of date. Nevertheless, it is still available. He suggested that there should be some changes in this legislation: in some cases, changes by regulation; in some cases, changes in the legislation itself.

The first change he suggested. Currently there is an averaging period of 10 years; it pays on the basis of the 10-year historical average. Now, a 10-year historical average in the face of today's rapidly changing prices and costs really doesn't mean much unless your percentage on top of that is very substantial. Even then, it is of no use except to supply a figure. He is proposing that this be reduced to five years or even three. The point that I made is that unless you relate it to costs of production, it really doesn't mean very much.

The second point. Under the legislation right

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now, the minimum percentage the government might apply to this 10-year average is 80 per cent. He did say that in some cases they go considerably higher. In the case of the milk industry, right now they go 160 per cent for industrial milk. So there is a minimum, but it's been a long time since even that minimum of 80 per cent has been used. Nevertheless, they have to go to cabinet to get approval to go above the 80 per cent. That is the limiting factor. Whereas if that limiting figure were higher and were applicable in any circumstance, then he would not have to go to cabinet to get approval to invoke the provisions of the Agricultural Stabilization Act.

He asked us what we thought about increasing the support level, suggesting that support levels be modified in description so that they would recognize changing costs. Of course, this was one of the exciting things. There is no mention of this in the current legislation that would require a change in the legislation itself. So the price guaranteed under the Agricultural Stabilization Act would be related to costs of production.

It is a new concept altogether, and yet it is one that he felt could be included in this legislation.

There are a restricted number of agricultural products that this Act applies to, and I have the list. His suggestion was that the number of products be increased. The list is now ten; it could go up from 10 to include almost any imaginable product. Again, they can do it for any product at all, but unless it is on the list they would have to go back to the cabinet to get approval to bring in a new product. His suggestion was that they might increase the list.

The next point is another new concept altogether and a very interesting one: we should explore the possibility of a joint federal-provincial programme to participate in the management and financing of the Agricultural Stabilization Act. This was the very thing I wanted to hear when I went back to Ottawa. The federal Minister was prepared to talk about joint federal-provincial participation in a programme to finance and to agree to proposals that would enable us to stabilize farm income commodity by commodity.

I asked him very specifically: if this particular recommendation were accepted by his cabinet colleagues and if it were passed as an amendment to the Agricultural Stabilization Act, would this enable the federal government to enter into an agreement right now with the P.E.I. government on their Hog Stabilization Plan, since that is the only one that is actually in effect? He said that the way he sees it, if he got approval for this it would enable him to do just that even though P.E.I. is one of a group of Atlantic provinces and a situation like that is very hard to control in one small province. He felt that hogs are something that should be controlled at least area by area if not nationally.

But nevertheless, the change that he is going to recommend, assuming that he had received support there — and he did get support; he certainly got support from myself — would enable him to enter into an agreement even with just the one province in a situation like that where likely it would not be in the best interests of the community or the country as a whole to do it province by province. So his authority to do that would be the one thing likely to encourage the producers and government in a group of provinces, if not the whole country, to get together in that particular programme.

That's all to do with the Agricultural Stabilization Act. There is another Act which allows the federal government to make advance payments on wheat, oats and barley within the designated area. Under the agricultural stabilization programme they guarantee the money to a marketing board or some group such as that. The money is available, the federal government guarantees it, so the co-op group, or whatever it is, would actually borrow the money with a federal government guarantee. But then the producers are stuck with paying the interest. Under the advance payment Act, the money is actually made available by the federal government so there is no interest to pay. The community as a whole is paying the interest; the producers of that particular product are not charged with the interest.

He is considering recommending that the products to which the advance payment legislation applied should be extended to include almost any product. Of course, it would have to depend upon the producer delivering it to some common packing house, as in the case of apples. But if the producer did deliver them to the packing house, they are in storage and this can be verified. The federal government would then make available the money to pay advance payments to the producers in that particular situation. This, too, was quite interesting.

There is also the Agricultural Products Co-operative Marketing Act. I'm sorry, I was talking about the Agricultural Stabilization Act; that is not the one where the money is borrowed. It is the Agricultural Products Co-operative Marketing Act where the money is borrowed. Yes, I see everybody nodding. I'm glad I came to that.

Point No. 3. Another programme in his list of goodies, and why he bothered with the new concept under the Agricultural Stabilization Act — as he said, these were just ideas that have been kicked around in his department. This is a separate programme entirely: a federal-provincial producer price stabilization programme — we would develop special plans outside of any existing legislation that will enable the federal government to enter into negotiations with any province for income stabilization — not price but income stabilization — commodity by commodity.

He made the point again that in the case of some products he would insist that there be participation in agreements nationally to control production and marketing. But beyond that, as I

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pointed out in the case of fruit — and he agreed — it is not that easy to control production. He recognized that in that particular situation it would have to be a different proposal altogether, emphasizing, if you like, the idea that it has to be something that is negotiated commodity by commodity.

To those of you who served on the agriculture committee, he discussed the operation of a surtax particularly in the agricultural industry. He raised the problems and said that he would welcome some support for an automatic surtax, something which has been sought time after time for years by the horticultural industry in the Province of British Columbia. Our producers feel, in particular, that they are too often sold out in the interests of getting some sort of a tariff protection for industry back east.

But in any case, he is prepared to push this idea of an automatic surtax. We discussed how it has worked in the past — it is so slow to come into effect. In the case of cherries — I suppose it is history now — the cherries came on the market in Washington state at $8 a crate originally, and they were selling them to us at that price. Then as the volume increased and as the time for ours to come on the market approached, the price dropped from $8 down to $7.50 to $7. When ours finally hit the market, the Washington cherries were being offered to us at $5.90, which, of course, meant that the price for B.C. cherries had to start at that $5.90 figure and then presumably go on down, which would be an intolerable situation. Pressure from the industry, the growers, their organizations and the provincial government, and pressure from the federal Minister of Agriculture — and I certainly give him full marks for this — made it possible to apply that surtax, although, as they said, this is something that still may be questioned by the Americans. They may still come and say that we did damage to their industry.

I think they would have a pretty hard case making it because, as an indirect result of us putting on this automatic surtax and putting, if you like, a floor. price into effect in the Province of British Columbia, the reaction in the American market was to increase the price for their producers — not a great deal, but somewhat. So it is going to be hard to show that we damaged their industry. But the Deputy Minister said that there's still the possibility that there might be some cost as a result of that action.

Another point he made, and he is considering some legislative changes — without getting into any details at all — was the question as to whether there should be greater use of marketing boards and national agencies for the various commodity groups. He is a firm believer in marketing boards; he is a firm believer in the development of the national agencies for the various commodity groups. He welcomes support, as he got it from the various provinces for this, and feels that this is the route to go if we are going to achieve anything in the way of stabilization of income for B.C. producers.

Mr. Speaker, I hope I am adding something to the Members' knowledge of why we chose to go this route; why we chose to come in with vague legislation; why it had to be commodity by commodity; why we were anxious to leave it in a form whereby it would fit in with the federal government.

Representatives of the federal government were almost waiting for us to arrive so that they could get copies of the bill and copies of the notes that we had. Ministers and Deputies from all of the other provinces were making the same request for copies of the legislation and copies of any material that we had. We've done calculations to show how this might apply in the fruit industry in particular. One of the questions that has been asked — and perhaps I could wait and let these questions be asked during the course of this debate, but….

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Well, I won't adjourn it; but if anybody likes to….

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Usually, if anyone wants to adjourn the debate, the matter is….

Interjections.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Well, the House Leader can consider that and I'll now go on for awhile.

Interjections.

HON. MR. STUPICH: I thought I was losing everybody for awhile- but they seem to have had their coffee break and ~ave come back in.

In some notes that I have had prepared by staff on this Farm Income Assurance Act one of the questions raised was just how you do arrive at production costs. This again is one of the reasons for having to do it commodity by commodity. In the case of some commodities it's fairly easy to arrive at some sort of an index, if not the true cost. We have achieved this, for example, in the case of milk to a greater degree of sophistication than we have in any other province in the Dominion of Canada.

I can still use the word "Dominion", can't I? I am not sure in these days.

In any case, you recall, Mr. Speaker, the recently announced federal programme to roll back consumer prices. Provinces have been trying to negotiate with Ottawa as to just how this would take effect in the various provinces in Canada. To date, two provinces

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have reached agreement as to how it would apply: the Province of Quebec and the Province of Saskatchewan.

In the case of Quebec, they rolled back consumer prices by 3 cents, after increasing them just days before by 2 cents. In the case of Saskatchewan, the same thing. They rolled back the price there, I think, 4 cents, but just a matter of days before that they had increased it 3 cents.

Now we don't handle our milk that way in the Province of British Columbia. We are different in British Columbia. Our milk price to the producer changes in accordance with the formula calculation. So when it came to discussing what B.C. would do, it had to be an entirely different concept, a concept which is being considered, I hope, by the federal cabinet today. I haven't had word yet as to whether the federal government has advised us of its decision.

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: …well, not there, no. I would rather…I just feel that I cannot discuss the details until the federal cabinet have had an opportunity to discuss it. As I say, I hope we will know soon. But they recognize that B.C. Is different. So not only do we have differences in commodity groups, but when we are talking about Canada as a whole, we have substantial differences in the way these things are handled province to province.

Okay, in B.C., in trying to calculate costs, we would have to look at an economic unit. Some of our farmers are farming part-time, producing a multiplicity of products, so we have to look at what an economic unit is for a particular commodity. We would have to assume… or, not assume; we would have to to sure, if that particular individual were being used as part of a calculation of the production costs for that commodity group, that he is a reasonably efficient manager — not the best in the province, but that he is efficient.

We would have to be assured that he is using fairly modern technology — again, not someone who has a lot of money to invest and can put in the best and most modern of everything — but that he is making use of modern technology. We would have to be assured that he is growing crops in the quantities that are recommended, crops of the species that are recommended for that area; in other words, that he is prepared to discuss his programme with the Department of Agriculture and with experienced people generally; that he is a reasonably good producer, then, in every way; that he is prepared, of course, to enter into an agreement; that he is prepared to ensure stability of his own income.

In calculating the costs, of course, the direct costs obviously would have to be included.

Then we come to the question of family labour. Now at what rate should family labour be paid: family-labour children, family-labour wife? What about the operator himself? At what rate should an operator who is managing an enterprise, which might be an investment of $50,000 or $250,000…?

AN HON. MEMBER: Farm Credit allowance is $1 an hour.

HON. MR. STUPICH: A dollar an hour, farm credit allowance? Well, I'd welcome some ideas on that now. Do the Members opposite think that the Farm Credit rate of a dollar an hour for a man who is running that enterprise is adequate, is too much or is too little? Should he get something not only for the time that he puts in, but for his managerial ability or otherwise? We are talking about an efficient producer, so it should be ability.

What rate of interest, if any, should be included for the capital, whether he's borrowed it or whether it's his own? Should we include interest on that capital investment in calculating our cost of production? And if we should include it, at what rate should we include it?

The department has done some calculations to show the effect of putting such a programme into effect in the fruit industry. If you used basic minimum figures, if you like…I'm not suggesting for one moment that these are the figures that would be used in any programme. But in arriving at a cost of production for apples — and this is not a costing job that was done in connection with this programme, but it was done fairly recently; and just to give you some idea, it was done by two different groups, DataTech in California and our own people working in British Columbia — interest on investment was calculated.

It varied, depending on which study you took, but they felt that 7 to 8 per cent was a reasonable figure as a return on investment. They argued, contrary to what farm credit says, that skilled labour — and this would be the operator himself — is worth $3 an hour. Now how does that strike you? They said, that unskilled labour should be $2 an hour, the basic minimum wage in the province for unskilled labour.

On top of that they said that there should be a overhead figure of 5 per cent to cover the various costs such as taxes, if you like, and that in addition to, all that there should be a return for management itself at the rate of 5 per cent of his gross sales.

Now these are some of the things. And if you use all those figures, if you take an efficient producer, if you take the 1973 figures….

MR. D.E. SMITH (North Peace River): You've wiped out every farmer in the country.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Pardon me? If you use

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those figures, you come up with a cost of producing apples in the Okanagan — for an efficient producer for 1973 — of 5 cents a pound, and I think there are some who are getting that.

The group of producers that were included in this particular study were getting 81 per cent Extra Fancy or Fancy — or better, of course. So if you load all the costs of production onto those apples, because the ones below that really aren't worth enough to recover any of the costs, then the cost of producing those marketable apples worked out to 6.1 cents a pound.

If you take the Co-operative Products Marketing Act and say that the federal government, if participating in a programme like this, would pay on the basis of an 80 per cent return over a three-year average, then in 1968 the farmer would have received 5.76 cents.

Now with the cost calculated at 5 he would have received 5.76 in 1968; 5.67 in 1969; 4.76 in 1970; 4.05 in 1971 — below the cost of production. In 1972, 4.67; that's working on 80 per cent of the three-year moving average. If you took it on the three-year moving average without reducing it to 80 per cent, in every year he would have received the 5 cents.

Now, I am not suggesting that 5 cents is enough. I gave you some of the basis for calculating that figure and, as I say, I'm not suggesting that it's anywhere near enough. But, using that figure and working on the 3-year average, in 1969 the federal government, if it were going to pay on the basis of 80 per cent of the 3-year average, would have paid $1,912,000 into an income assurance programme; the provincial government, in making up the difference to the 5.76 cent figure, would have $408,763.

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: In that particular year. But, you see, it depends on what the price is.

In 1970, it's the other way around. The federal would have paid $1,130,000, the provincial would have paid $1,940,000, for a total of $3 million. In 1971, the province only would have paid, and the amount involved would have been only $22,646.

In the last five years, 1968-1972 inclusive — and this is just an arithmetical figure; it's not taking into account the total production, but it's taking the average received for each year for Fancy and Extra Fancy or better — but the average price received was 4.956 cents in those years.

You remember we said that the cost of production of that particular kind of apple was 6 cents, So on the average, in the last five years, they have not received even that cost of production.

In some cases, they would not just have received the proposed income stabilization plan we're talking about in this legislation. In some of those years the low returns were the result of crop loss which is insured, so in some of those years there would have been crop insurance payments. In addition, under the proposed legislation, using these figures only, there would have been payments under the income stabilization plan. I don't know if these figures…. They're all available of course and they may be in a better form here. If people want to see them,,they're certainly welcome to them.

I hope, Mr. Speaker, that it has been informative….

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: No, I'm not prepared. I've been watching the clock. I had decided ahead of time just how long I was going to speak on this, and I've reached that time. So I'll just say this, Mr. Speaker, I know the bill is difficult to deal with, the bill as it is. I've said why it is vague, why it is….

Interjection.

HON. MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, there is some distress about this legislation. I have one newspaper clipping. When I got back from Ottawa, there was a whole pile of them on my desk, but there's just one in particular, and just one little clause I'll read out of it: "Growers today were enthusiastic about the income insurance plan." I think that there are some people discouraged about this plan, and those people are confined to the ranks of the opposition. The farmers themselves, from everything I read, are encouraged by the plan, I move second reading.

MR. PHILLIPS: I must say that now I am as confused as the Minister of Agriculture over this legislation, and I'm certainly more convinced than I was before that the Minister of Agriculture really doesn't know where he's going. He doesn't know where he's going on this legislation. He has no idea whatsoever.

AN HON. MEMBER: Are you going to vote against it'?

MR. PHILLIPS: No, as a matter of fact I'm going to commence my remarks by saying, Mr. Minister, that we support the principle of the Farm Income Assurance Act. I stated my position, and the position of this party, on guaranteed income for farmers in the spring session, before Bill 42 and before the Minister started to rush headlong down a path to bring in this bill. We stated our position, stated that it needed to be surveyed, stated certain reasons for it.

When the Minister said that he knew what the reaction of the opposition was going to be, it merely pointed out to me that he knew he was bringing in

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very vague legislation; he knew himself that, at this point in time, he should not have brought in the legislation because he really doesn't know how he's going to implement it. So, by saying that he knew the reaction immediately of the opposition, he was certainly correct. He recognized his own position, and he recognized that he doesn't really know where to go or what direct method to take.

Now it's amazing to me, Mr. Speaker, that the subject of a farm income assurance was not referred to the Standing Committee on Agriculture for study. The only brief that the committee had, in this regard of guaranteed assurance, was a brief submitted from the Peace River–Liard Regional District, and it was submitted to us in essence after the fact because it wasn't within our terms of reference. The only way that you could have done so at all would have been to tie it into our terms of reference which said we should study the agricultural potential of the Peace River area and, by so doing, that we might have said that it would be necessary to guarantee the income of the farmers in order to reach the full potential of that area.

But the committee, from time to time, when certain subjects would come up, and in the absense of the Minister, would for moments talk about guaranteed farm income. But it was our opinion, and I think that the Member for Vancouver–Howe Sound (Mr. Williams) will bear me out on this, that this was too complicated a subject and, until we finished our studies, we couldn't really do justice to it and at any rate it wasn't in our terms of reference.

The matter evidently was referred instead to the B.C. Federation of Agriculture, who were paid a sum of money to come up with recommendations in this regard. I'd like to ask the Minister of Agriculture if he will table the recommendations of the B.C. Federation of Agriculture in this Legislature so that all of us can have an opportunity to look at them.

Now some of it was printed in the Country Life paper, but the section dealing with guaranteed income was not. I would like to ask the Minister to tell us, when he closes debate on this particular bill, if he will table in the House all of the documents that he received from the B.C. Federation of Agriculture, because they might be very enlightening to the rest of the Members of this House. I'm disappointed that they haven't been given to us prior to this so that we could maybe have some idea of what the Minister was saying.

Now this piece of legislation that we have before us is really not legislation at all, and I think the Minister knows that. All that we were told in Bill 9 is the government's position with regard to farm income stabilization and guaranteed income. It really doesn't tell us how the government intends to do this. It's a philosophy. It's a position, and it's a position which the official opposition agrees to.

HON. A.B. MACDONALD (Attorney General): It's enabling legislation.

MR. PHILLIPS: Enabling? Yes, it's enabling. It certainly, Mr. Attorney General, is one of the greatest pieces of enabling legislation that I have ever seen, because it enables the Minister of Agriculture to do almost anything that he wants to do. And that is not the purpose of our coming to Victoria. The purpose of our coming to Victoria is to discuss detailed legislation, not to talk in vague terms about theories and positions.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's deliberately vague.

MR. PHILLIPS: The Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Speaker, says it's deliberately vague.

AN HON. MEMBER: He didn't say that.

MR. PHILLIPS: And he says it's deliberately vague to give him a wide scope of power. It's deliberately vague….

HON. MR. STUPICH: I didn't say that.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, I think that's what you really meant, a wide scope of bargaining….

Interjections.

MR. PHILLIPS: I wish, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Agriculture would tell us exactly what he does mean, because all he did in introducing this bill this afternoon was to introduce a wide-ranging number of questions that have to be answered before this bill can actually function. And he stole a whole lot of my questions, because I had the same things that I was going to ask the Minister to answer when he closed the debate. But the Minister doesn't know the answers. We're going to have to know the answers to some of these questions, Mr. Speaker, before we can vote on this legislation.

There is no mention of what this is going to cost the Province of British Columbia, Mr. Speaker. Now maybe the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich) doesn't know…not maybe he doesn't know; I know the Minister doesn't know. I know full well he doesn't know. So there again, typical of the Minister of Agriculture, he's asking us to sign him a blank cheque on behalf of the taxpayers of the Province of British Columbia to implement a plan that he doesn't know how much is going to cost. Is it going to cost $S million or $100 million?

The Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Barrett) doesn't know how much it's going to cost, yet he's the chief financier of the province — and evidently he doesn't care. Well, this is fine if he wants to implement his

[ Page 367 ]

philosophy. But he's going. to have to care if he's going to protect the rights of the ratepayers and the taxpayers and the citizens of British Columbia not only today, but in the future.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: It will come up in the budget.

MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, it will come up in the budget. After we've already signed the blank cheques, then it will come up in the budget and you'll tell us how much you've spent. Absolutely — after the facts.

I intend to keep my remarks confined and as brief as possible, Mr. Speaker, but I must bring up a couple of points. Mr. Charlie Bernhardt, the president of the B.C. Federation of Agriculture, feels that the programme envisions a formalized negotiating mechanism between producers and the provincial government. Now the Minister of Agriculture didn't say anything about a formalized negotiating mechanism to come up with establishing prices which the producer will receive for his merchandise; he never mentioned a thing about it. Yet evidently this was in the recommendation given him by the B.C. Federation of Agriculture.

I would like the Minister of Agriculture, when closing the debate, to explain to me if he is envisioning a formalized negotiating mechanism — something similar to an arbitration board — or is it to be the B.C. Federation of Agriculture who's to come to the department and say, "This is the cost of producing this particular item." I'd like to know. Because if this organization that he has paid to bring in these recommendations have given this consideration and they envision a formalized negotiating mechanism, then the Minister, in reading these recommendations, must have given it some thought. Yet he didn't mention that this afternoon when he was opening the debate.

It's very interesting. Would it be the B.C. Federation of Agriculture that would be the mechanism; would it be the farmers union; would it be the agricultural committee, or would it be a group of producers and legislators together? I don't know. I t's very interesting because certainly some mechanism will have to be set up to come up with this very ticklish problem. In my estimation, Mr. Speaker, the whole plan will fail or succeed on this very subject: what is the cost of production and how much return should the farmer have?

We realize on this side of the House, Mr. Speaker, that we must stabilize farm incomes if agriculture is to remain as an industry. We found out in the agricultural committee this summer that young people are just not taking to the plough. They're finding more lucrative jobs elsewhere and, I think, in some instances maybe not more challenging jobs, but certainly jobs that will give them a greater security in the future.

We find that in this province, in a period when food is short in the world, there are vacant farms. We find a lot of farmers who are working only part-time and the rest of the time are taking up jobs which are really putting other people out of work. We in turn pay unemployment insurance to those people displaced. I mentioned this in the spring.

This will have to be taken into consideration: is the part-time farmer going to be put in the position, Mr. Speaker, where he will be able to remain on his farm for 12 months a year? Will he, by legislation or by the method in which this Act is implemented, be forced to remain on his farm and thus stay out of the labour market which is causing problems elsewhere in society?

We know that a lot of families are leaving the country and flocking to the cities. In implementing this Act are we going to go on the principle that the family farm units should remain at all costs, or at partial costs? Is the theory behind implementing this particular Act going to be that, "Yes, we want the family farm to remain as a viable unit whether it is really economically feasible or not in terms of dollars and cents." It might be economically feasible if we think of all the other social aspects of it.

These are just some of the problems that we must work out, Mr. Speaker. They are formidable problems, but certainly not insurmountable if we take an intelligent view and take the time that is going to be needed to work them out. This is where the crux of the whole situation comes in, as far as I'm concerned, Mr. Speaker. We must take the time to work this plan out, because it is the largest plan involving agriculture and the largest piece of legislation that has been brought in in quite some time.

How are we going to deal — and the Minister brought this up himself — with the problem of imported produce from other countries? How are we going to deal with the problem of imported produce from other provinces? Will we have the people of British Columbia paying through taxation while imported products cream the market? I think the Minister mentioned some of these problems when he was introducing this legislation.

There must also be implemented in the workings of this Act incentives to assure a continual search for quality and for better production. Is this legislation going to be tied to a policy of better education for younger farmers — more agricultural facilities in the secondary schools or in the vocational schools throughout the province?

Is Ottawa prepared to increase their grants to experimental farms in Canada? Will there be more research done? We could find that we are paying out large sums of money to implement the Farm Income Assurance Act and not spending any money on

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research, which would be the best place to spend it.

In the communique that came from Ottawa Mr. Whalen stated that, "Farmers must be protected through the slow sales period." Are some of these periods caused by people in the agricultural industry who wish to manipulate the prices, Mr. Speaker? This is just another one of the areas of responsibility that certainly must receive a lot of study.

The thing that really bothers me, and I've spoken about this before, Mr. Speaker, is whether British Columbia and Canada is working toward world food banks to curb the feast-or-famine policies of the past. I mentioned this in the spring session of the Legislature. If we're going to have farm income assurance in Canada then we're going to have to work to make sure that all the food stuffs of the world are controlled, and indeed get rid of some of these feasts or famines that we've known in the past.

Another question that bothers me, Mr. Speaker, is how much this is going to cost the farmer. If all of the profits from the good years go into an insurance policy to pay the premiums for the benefits he will receive in the poor years, he is not going to be in any better position than he is right now. Because this, in essence, is what is happening by himself. There must be an incentive for him to make a profit, and a good profit, during the good years and still be protected. This is where the guarantee comes in. When a surplus of a given product appears, will he be given incentives to produce other products? Or will the guaranteed insurance income work toward producing too much in a given area of a specific product? That's why planning and market surveys are going to be so very, very important, and must be worked in conjunction with this legislation.

Another thing I have to ask myself, Mr. Speaker, is how much input will the ecologists have on the future of agriculture once this plan is implemented? Will we find that land will be taken out of production in British Columbia? Will the ecologists want to preserve the largest portion of British Columbia for their own private hunting domain at the expense of consumers?

HON. MR. BARRETT: Ecologists don't hunt.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well if the ecologists, Mr. Premier, don't hunt, they certainly want to save the privileges for a lot of their friends who do.

Probably this is the biggest piece of legislation dealing with agriculture that has been brought in in a long time.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

HON. MR. BARRETT: And one of the best.

MR. PHILLIPS: One of the vaguest; certainly one of the vaguest.

Mr. Speaker, I think if you will look at the terms of reference of the agricultural committee — and we spent five weeks travelling this summer and would have spent more; we still haven't finished — what were we dealing with? We were dealing with the problem of grazing as it pertains to wildlife; we were to look into the vegetable and fruit marketing industries, the potential of the Peace River area, and a pension plan.

Now overriding all of these, far greater in all of its aspects, far greater in its potential, without any reference whatsoever to the agriculture committee, comes in Bill 9, Farm Income Assurance Act. Now why the great rush to bring this legislation in when we really don't know, and the Minister doesn't really know, how he's going to implement it. He doesn't have any of the answers; he proved here this afternoon he doesn't have any of the answers.

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: Now, let me tell you, what the answer should have been.

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): Some leader; some legislation.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, the Premier comes into the middle of my very important talk and doesn't know the great things I have said about this bill beforehand.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Do you promise this is the middle?

MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, as a matter of fact, it's past the middle. And it's regrettable (Laughter).

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Members must not attack their own speeches. (Laughter.)

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, it is really regrettable, in a bill of this magnitude, that it's very difficult to discuss it because we really don't know how it's going to be implemented. That is a very grave problem with this piece of legislation.

Problems of one area of the province to bring in the Farm Income Assurance Act are going to be far different from problems in another area. We have to consider marketing transportation, capital, taxation, land use, know-how and, as I said before human

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resources, both the social and political aspects of this Act.

This very important matter would have been much better dealt with had the Minister of Agriculture brought it in in the form of a resolution, and asked the House: Do you agree with me? Will you give me the power to negotiate with Ottawa, to negotiate with the other provinces, in trying to come up with a guaranteed farm income assurance?

Then we could have said to him in debate on the motion: Yes, Mr. Minister, we are agreed with that. We give you authority to go ahead and, if necessary, negotiate with Ottawa, negotiate with the other provinces, send it out to committee so that the committee could go around the province and bring back some input into it, and give it, if necessary to the B.C. Federation of Agriculture.

Then, when he was prepared to bring in specific legislation, he could have brought it into this Legislature and, in an intelligent manner, the Members of this House could have exercised the right that they were sent down here to do by the people of British Columbia.

But instead of that, he brings in this vague Act and, as he says, specifically vague, to ask us to give him a blank cheque to spend the British Columbia taxpayers' money. We have not only an obligation to the farmers in this province; we have a specific obligation also to the consumers of this province. And the vagueness of Bill 9 gives me no guarantee that the interests of either group are going to be well protected.

He's going to take this very important matter out of the realm of the Legislature. He's going to pass it over to the civil servants in his committee and let them determine all of the rules and regulations to this very Act. He's going to go to the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Barrett), and he's going to say: Mr. Minister of Finance, I want an as yet unnamed amount of money to implement this Act.

But the Premier will stand up and say: I don't know what it will be, but I assure you it's our philosophy and the money will be there. It'll be in the kitty.

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: I am for this in principle, but you know full well, Mr. Premier, the type of legislation that you continually put before this House. You know full well that you don't know how to draw up decent legislation so that the Members on this side of the House can discuss it in an intelligent manner.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Have you proved that you can discuss it intelligently?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, there's our Premier, the man who goes around the province saying that he introduced democracy into this Legislature. I will prove to the people of this province before the next election that he has taken democracy out of this Legislature.

Mr. Speaker, we support this, as I said. (Laughter.) I said at the very beginning we supported the principle. The Premier of this province can laugh his fool head off, because sometimes, you know, he who laughs first…. In closing I just want to say that we support this with very mixed emotions. But before closing my remarks, I want to go through just a few of the remarks made by the Minister of Agriculture when he was introducing this bill. He said it was vague, and he proved he himself is vague about how he intends to implement it; he himself does not have the answers.

He said it was enabling legislation. Well so far as I'm concerned, it enables him to do too much without coming back to this Legislature. It enables him to spend too much money; it enables him to bring in too many regulations without coming back to this Legislature.

If we're going to continue to have legislation like this, we might as well come down here and the government could bring in a bill from each department enabling the Minister to do just about anything he wants; and we go back home within seven days. Now I think this would make the Premier of this province a very happy boy, because he really doesn't want democracy in this Legislature. He really doesn't want democracy.

HON. MR. BARRETT: I love you!

Interjection.

HON. MR. BARRETT: I'm a rare character.

MR. PHILLIPS: The Minister said commodity by commodity we are going to have to do all of the checking into the costs. This is going to take a long time; it's going to take a great deal of work.

And lie almost made a slip of the tongue by saying that he was in favour of controlling the costs. I'm not sure whether he's in favour of controlling the costs.

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I'm not sure whether he's in favour of controlling the costs or not because one of the costs of production is taxation, and that is one of the costs he and his Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Barrett) can control. I would like him, in closing the debate, to tell me and the rest of the legislators in this chamber whether he is in favour of controlling the costs of production or not.

He asked us to tell him whether we felt the scheme would fail unless all persons participated. I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I'm not prepared to answer that this afternoon. That is going to require a great deal of study, and there again it's going to require a great deal of study commodity by commodity.

Now, is the Minister of Agriculture prepared to let further study go on whereby the legislators in the province can participate in this? If he's not, you might as well throw out the entire work of the agriculture committee and forget that we even existed, because this, in my estimation, overrides everything we have done.

There is just one other thing, Mr. Speaker, that I want to mention before I take my place, and that's with regard to determining costs. I agree with the Minister of Agriculture that costs must be determined over a period, but I think in determining costs you always have to take into consideration the amount of production. I would not be happy if a deal were made with Ottawa to curb the production of certain foodstuffs. We had this happen just a few short years ago where Ottawa came out west and said, "We will pay you to take certain farmland out of the production of wheat." You know what has happened since then. So we must be very, very cautious and, Mr. Speaker, we must be very, very cautious in our dealings with Ottawa to make sure that our particular province, due to its diversification and being small producers of many of these commodities, doesn't get shafted, and I mean that sincerely, Mr. Speaker. I'm not being a separatist, but this government's record of dealing with Ottawa hasn't been that great. In bringing in a farm income assurance, we must make sure that we have aggressive and proper marketing facilities.

I would like to refer you to a news release from the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce, Ottawa. It's dated June 29, 1973. "Details of a new $3 million federal programme to promote improved marketing of Canadian agricultural products were announced today by the Hon. Alastair Gillespie, Minister of Industrial Trade and Commerce."

Will the Minister of Agriculture in his closing remarks tell me if this matter of merchandising agricultural products was discussed at the recent conference? Has the $3 million that Ottawa allocated to this very important programme been spent? And what did Ottawa feel about keeping surpluses of food around in years of high production? Is Ottawa prepared to get together with other countries in the world and build up, pay for and stock large quantities of certain products? Because if they're not, and we go as we have in the past on a short-term basis of food production, this Bill 9, Farm Income Assurance Act, will just not work. It will end up being a bureaucratic financial mess.

Mr. Speaker, as I say, we're going to support this, again I say with mixed emotions. We will have further debate on this clause by clause when it's in committee stage.

MR. WILLIAMS: I've listened very carefully to what the Hon. Member for South Peace River had to say. I made sense out of his middle, but not his beginning or his ending.

We believe in this party that the time has come, in fact long since passed, when the farmers and the agricultural community in British Columbia must be enabled to have a proper economic return for their endeavours. My suggestion to the Hon. Minister, through you, Mr. Speaker, is that he take this bill off the floor of the House and bring us back the bill that will show how he's going to do it. I start my remarks in this simple way: we're going to oppose this bill because it's a snare and a delusion and it only leads the farmer in British Columbia further into the quandary in which he has found himself over the past number of years.

It's interesting — the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich) knows how I feel about this particular subject. We've discussed it privately many times, but private discussions are not for the floor of this House and I won't bring them here. But in June the Minister appeared at a B.C. Cattlemen's Association annual meeting at Smithers, and I have the Country Life from British Columbia report of his comments. He said that it was the government's intention in the fall of this year to place the emphasis on preserving the farmer. The spring session with the Land Commission Act was for the purpose of preserving farmland and now we were going to preserve the farmer. In the middle of the summer we had the Western Economic Opportunities Conference attended by the Premier and other western Premiers and members of the cabinet of British Columbia, including the Minister. When the Minister came back from that conference, he was reported in the press in British Columbia as expressing disappointment that there had been so few concrete policies for agriculture initiated by Ottawa, particularly in the income stabilization field. He said

[ Page 371 ]

that the need for income stabilization programmes, which were basically government-guaranteed prices, had been clearly demonstrated and provincial governments like B.C.'s could show they would work and were practical, Well, Mr. Speaker, we don't have it in this bill before us. The bill is four sections long, but the last two don't really matter. The first one says there'll be a farm income plan and describes it as being any programme that will do anything with regard to farm incomes. It doesn't even go on and say in the section that there shall be a farm income plan, just that there may be. That is the quandary in which the Minister will place the agricultural community in this province.

It would have been better, Mr. Speaker, if the Minister had brought forward a White Paper or a Green Paper indicating quite clearly to this Legislature and the people of this province, and in particular to the agricultural community, precisely what this government intended to do to provide economic relief for the farmers of British Columbia. Instead of that we've had the Minister making promises earlier this year and speeches in the province that something was going to be done at the fall session about farm incomes. Now lie brings a bill which simply says something is going to be done about farm income. That's a sham.

The farmers, the agriculturists in British Columbia, deserve better than this from this government. The farmers have waited for years for government to pay some attention to their economic plight, and they're going to continue to wait, Mr. Speaker, even if this legislation is passed. I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that they would have been happier to wait if the Government of British Columbia, and that's this government, had been frank and honest with the farmers, saying: "Look, it's a difficult problem, but we intend to do something about it. Here is a general outline of what we propose. Will you tell us what you think?" That's what the agriculture committee did in other matters dealing with other subjects, Mr. Speaker, and the farming community responded this past summer to that opportunity and met the challenge. I suggest they would do it again if they were given the opportunity to talk about some specific proposals or even a broad general outline of how this government proposed to solve their economic plight.

No Member in this House, whether he comes from a farming community or not, should be confused about what is happening. It's window dressing. At the same time no Member in this House, Mr. Speaker, should be confused as to the length of time and the amount of work it will take in order to solve this particular problem.

Just one example. The Minister in his opening remarks said that the tree fruit industry was probably the area of major concern in the Province of British Columbia. Well it is a major concern but no greater than that faced by the vegetable producers, however, some of whom in the lower Fraser Valley, in the past few weeks, have suggested that the future for them is so bleak that they should go out of business and stop producing.

Let's look at what is required with regard to the tree fruits producer, just as one single commodity, one example of the enormity of the task which is before this or any other government which attempts to solve this problem.

The Minister was good enough to table a few days ago an economic study of the tree fruit industry in British Columbia by a consulting economist. It is interesting to note that the instructions for this study of this single commodity were given some time early in the month of May of this year.

A comprehensive study was undertaken by special economic consultants into this one commodity in May of this year, and the report for this House was produced in September. And yet, when you look at their conclusions and their recommendations, you come to matters like crop insurance and price stabilization.

All this economist is able to arrive at after a study of this length is this: "Yield and price variability require government assistance in the form of crop insurance and price stabilization schemes." Concerted study, Mr. Speaker, on this one commodity by a special consultant group producing this report, and that's all they can say.

And yet we are offering this legislation apparently as the solution for all the commodity groups in this province. I suggest, as I said before, that the agriculturists in British Columbia and this government and all the taxpayers would be better served if the government would remove this bill and instead give us a broad approach, in as much detail as possible, as to how they propose to resolve these difficulties.

There could then be discussion over the next few months, before bringing in the bill in the spring, with some positive indications to the farming community as to what lies in store for them.

What does lie in store for the economic community? The Minister said in his opening remarks, and mind you, Mr. Speaker, his opening remarks on the bill were very brief — and, if I might turn briefly to another matter, I am rather shocked at the attitude of the House leader in indicating that no adjournment would be accepted in this debate.

It has always been standard practice, and I know this nonetheless is within the authority of the House Leader to indicate his views, but the Minister, having made few brief remarks about Bill 9, then gave this House, for the first time, his report from the recent meetings between the federal Department of Agriculture and the provincial Ministers of Agriculture from all 10 provinces, and he posed, for

[ Page 372 ]

the Members of this House, various questions…

MR. PHILLIPS Problems.

MR. WILLIAMS: …hopeful that we would give him the answers. Mr. Speaker, it seems to me that the Members of this House were at least entitled to the courtesy of having an adjournment so that we might see in Hansard, even in the Hansard blues tomorrow, the full text of the Minister's statement and the questions which he posed. Because it is going to be difficult to debate and to answer, and to give him the input that he so kindly asked for in this limited time.

HON. MR. BARRETT: What's the debate all about?

MR. D.A. ANDERSON: You should have stayed and listened to the Minister.

MR. WILLIAMS: Well, if the Hon. Premier would be in the House when the Minister makes his opening remarks, he might be as confused as the opposition, and then we would know what we are debating. We were specifically invited by the Minister to comment upon his reactions to the federal Minister of Agriculture's proposals at the recent conference….

Interjections.

MR. WILLIAMS: If you don't understand, Mr. Premier, you could go out, because, you know, it's "Nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah…." (Laughter.)

You know, I always enjoy the Premier, but there are only two things wrong: he hasn't got the class of Alan King and he is not as funny as Buddy Hackett. If he could solve those two problems then I would enjoy everything he had to say.

The Hon. Minister said, in the few brief moments he spoke about Bill 9, that one of the things that would have to be considered by him was how the agricultural community would participate on a premium basis in this scheme. You know, I have looked very carefully at the bill, and I know that farmers and ranchers who have had the opportunity of seeing the bill have looked very carefully to see where the provision is for the payment of any premiums by anybody. Even the vague enabling words that are here make no mention of premiums, and yet the Minister mentioned it in opening the debate, it was in his press release when he introduced the legislation but it's not in the bill. Further confusion for people who are engaged in agriculture. He said, "Yes, it's enabling legislation if you like." Well, Mr. Speaker, I don't like this kind of legislation dealing with this serious problem.

Are we to have a situation develop in British Columbia, once having this enabling legislation pass so that the cabinet can establish such farm income plan as it deems necessary, where a particular commodity group comes to the executive council, to the cabinet, and, by the use of whatever means might be available, including political means, encourages the cabinet to include their particular commodity in the farm income plan? Is that what is going to happen? Is it possible that, while the income plan should apply to all of the commodity groups, by some means lobbying can take place whereby only a part of the commodity groups are included in the income plan?

Commodity groups are divided into various segments. And, if I may refer again to Dr. Hudson's report on the tree fruit industry, it is interesting to note, on page 95, that the distinguished consultant speaks about the variation in grower net returns, and he says that the growers fall into three categories.

A substantial group, perhaps a third of the growers, have current returns which cover their operational costs and provide going wages for their labour, together with a reasonable return for capital and management. In other words, there is a third of the industry which makes a proper adequate return on the investment and the labour.

Then there is a second group. "There was a very substantial group, perhaps a third of the growers, whose current returns cover their operational costs and provide going wages for their labour, together with a reasonable return for capital and management." Now, the net returns of the second large group of growers are sufficient only to cover operational costs, including wages for the labour of the farm operator and his family, but provides no return for capital and management. So they're marginal.

There is a third group of growers who were having difficulty in covering even their essential operating expenses, who had to lower their level of family living and, in some cases, to increase their indebtedness. And the distinguished consultant concludes, "It is this group of growers that are most urgently in need of assistance."

Since we have this commodity group divided in this way into three categories: the lowest category urgently in need of assistance; the second in need of some assistance; and the first perhaps in need of no assistance at all, is the Minister trying to suggest to us that for this commodity,100 per cent of these people will be involved in the income farm plan? Does that mean that for the farmer who, by reason of his skill, his experience, and the nature of his investment, is able to make a return in the current situations, that he is going to be obliged under some premium concept to pay into this fund to support those not so fortunate as he, not so skilled as he or not so able? Is that going to be the plan?

[ Page 373 ]

We have had, Mr. Speaker, during the past summer, a confused situation in tree fruits in British Columbia because of dissident groups who were dissatisfied with the marketing programme. I wonder what kind of dissident groups we will have if this farm income plan is to result in the efficient farmer subsidizing the inefficient farmer. But we aren't told this in this bill.

We are also told that in the tree fruit industry one of the significant needs is for better communication between the officials of the Department of Agriculture and better educational programmes for growers so that they may improve their orchards and thereby receive a better return through a higher quality of produce for their labours and hence a better income.

There are suggestions that one of the alternatives of assistance by the government to this commodity group should be to enable them to increase their productivity and hence their income. Is the farm income plan going to be dependent upon those growers taking advantage of whatever programme the government offers? And if they don't take advantage of programmes the government offers with respect to the improvement of their orchards and of their farming operations, will they not benefit from the farm income plan? Is that one way of categorizing growers?

And if that is to be true, and the bill doesn't tell us that it is not, are we approaching the day when the government, through the Department of Agriculture or some board or commission, will dictate to the farmers in any commodity group what they will grow, how much of it they will grow, where they will sell it, and how much they are going to get for their produce? Is that part of the farm income assurance plan? The bill doesn't tell that it is, and it doesn't tell us that it is not. It is drawn in the broadest possible language to cover any programme, and arrangement, and proposal, any plan, any scheme, howsoever described, that "provides in any way for the paying of moneys to, or guaranteeing, or assuring of income for…farmers or classes of farmers," Mr. Speaker.

Are we going to carve up the agricultural community into commodities and sub-commodity groups? No, we are in favour of steps which will relieve the economic circumstances of the farming community. We are prepared to debate and to work and to study and to question as long as may be needed to bring about that end. But we cannot support this kind of legislation which does not give in any one specific way the direction that the government intends to go or to take the agricultural community in arriving at its end.

MR. WALLACE: This bill reminds me of Bill 42 in many ways and the two, of course, are related. The Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich) referred to this fact when he introduced the second reading of the bill.

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: No, I assure the Minister that I have no intention of a vote of confidence in the Minister.

Mr. Speaker, one of the reasons for Bill 42 was clearly to get away from the situation whereby a farmer had to depend on the appreciation and value of his land at a time when he came to retirement or to sell the land, having not been making a reasonable income in the meantime. Nothing could make more sense. Why should a farmer, putting his work into the land or into farming, do so at an annual loss or a pittance of an income, knowing that 5, 10 or 15 years down the road at least he could sell his land at an inflated value and make a large capital gain?

Now, at the time when this party bitterly opposed Bill 42 it is clearly on the records that we supported the principle of the preservation of farmlands. In debating the principle of this bill, Mr. Speaker, I want to make it equally clear that we strongly support the principle of assisting the farmer to obtain a reasonable income from his endeavours. I think the Minister rightly mentioned in his remarks the word "income" rather than "prices" or "cost of production." The price might be right, but if the net result is a pittance of an income to the farmer, it really doesn't, in my view, make much sense to brag that he is getting a good price for his crop or produce.

In comparing again the principle of this bill to the principle of Bill 42, I don't think it is the responsibility of Members of the opposition simply to approve of a govern ment-stated intention of principles without fiscal and other forms of responsibility.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. WALLACE: It is a little bit like being in favour of motherhood. We are, indeed, in favour of giving the farmer justice in the marketplace, a fair return for his efforts, an encouragement by telling him that the government is aware of many of the difficulties in the farming world these days.

I wouldn't attempt to even claim to understand many of the complexities which the Minister has outlined in his remarks. I would certainly say, however, that his clear emphasis on the need for federal-provincial cooperation must stand out as the overriding challenge to any provincial government, since so many of the products cross provincial boundaries and since we frequently, as he pointed out, need rapid federal action when there is a danger of dumping in this province of early crops from another state or another province or another country.

[ Page 374 ]

So if there was any thing in particular with which the party agreed about in the Minister's remarks, it was his encouraging comments on the need for federal-provincial cooperation and for the apparent substantial degree of agreement which was reached at the recent meeting in Ottawa. Or, at least, shall we say, the federal government is actively seeking the voices of the agricultural Ministers from the other provinces and, in many respects, would seem to be on the same wavelength.

However, in debating Bill 9 in principle, I have several serious criticisms to offer. First of all, this bill was introduced to the House four hours after the media had been given a considerable degree of information in detail which is not included in the bill. I take exception, as a Member of this House, to being accosted in the corridors at 6:05 p.m. to comment, as a leader of a party or as an MLA, on a bill that I first got hold of five minutes ago. When I start to respond, the members of the media say, "Oh, but the Minister said this," or "The Minister said that," or "the Minister told us this," or "the Minister told us that." I just think this really isn't a very fair way to function in this whole matter of press releases prior to bills being tabled in the House. I might say that the difficulty in getting copies of the bill that was tabled today doesn't do the system in the House any credit either.

The fact is, Mr. Speaker, that the intent behind this bill I'm sure, and as is obvious from the previous parties that have spoken, is supported. The mechanism by which the Minister and the government are attempting to gain the support of the opposition leaves a lot to be questioned.

We're supporting the principle — and I repeat that point — that the farmer deserves help in a variety of ways. It may not simply be a matter of price support. It's the whole question of educational methods and training methods to increase the quality of production and to help the farmer do a better job, and a vast variety of other mechanisms available.

The fact is that this bill deals very much with the idea of price support by one mechanism or another. As I said, Mr. Speaker, there is absolutely no specific information in the bill to give the opposition a chance to evaluate it critically in the way that I think we are obligated to do in representing the people of our constituencies.

There is not the vaguest statement of the kinds of money that are involved. It just says that a fund will be created and the moneys will be made available and so on. The whole question of it being…for example, as I said earlier, my first comment to the press was that this appeared to be a form of subsidy; whereupon the press immediately corrected me by saying, "Oh well, the Minister tells us it will be a self-sustaining programme where the farmers will pay premiums and the government will put some money in the pot and it will be, in effect, an insurance programme."

I say, Mr. Speaker, if it's that simple and if that is the idea that the Minister wishes to follow, surely without going into a great amount of detail it would at least be reasonable to put that basic mechanism in writing in the bill. If it is an insurance programme where the farmer contributed and the government contributes and there is some mechanism of recompense to the farmer in trouble because of a drop in market prices, surely this could be in the bill.

But as I say, Mr. Speaker, this has been stated quite clearly in a press release, and I would commend the Minister for the clarity of the press release. I'm not being sarcastic, Mr. Minister; I really mean that the press release spells it out very well. It says that under the Act: the farmers will be guaranteed financial returns at a level reflecting the cost of production; assurance plans will be established on an individual basis for each farm commodity; participation will be voluntary but could be made compulsory if a particular commodity is requested by the producers of that commodity and confirmed by plebiscite.

Now these are all the kind of safeguards that, as far as I'm concerned, I would be very happy to support. It goes on to make other good points, clear points, which leave no doubt as to the intent of the legislation. But as my friend from Saanich and the Islands (Mr. Curtis) says, "We're not debating press releases in this House; we're debating Bill 9."

Bill 9 only spells out government intention, but the intention could be carried out in such a way that large sums of money could be spent by a mechanism or through boards or agencies about which this party would strongly be in disagreement, if it even knew the details of such a board or agency.

I just think it would be totally irresponsible of any opposition party in this House to accept this kind of blank-cheque legislation. I know that people around the province looking at this superficially will probably think: "Well, what on earth are these opposition parties thinking about? They profess to want to help the farmer; and when the government brings in a bill, they oppose it."

Mr. Speaker, let me get it again very clearly on the record. It is the firm stated policy of the Conservative Party to support acceptable legislation which will indeed help the farmer. But that does not mean that we will accept any bill. In particular, it does not mean that we will accept such a bill with such tremendous ramifications both from an administrative bureaucratic point of view and, even more importantly, from a financial point of view.

We get back again, I suppose, to comparing it with Bill 42. One of the biggest fears we had about Bill 42 was the tremendous power which government was allocating to non-elected representatives. In this case,

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in Bill 9, we have the potential again for tremendous power to be given to persons or agencies chosen or appointed by the Minister. We don't think that that principle is any better for the people of B.C. today than it was when we debated Bill 42.

The Minister's comments regarding federal-provincial affairs and cooperation, I think, was most welcome. I feel also, as was expressed by other Members of the opposition, that it would have been reasonable to adjourn this debate so that we could read more effectively from Hansard, tomorrow, or even tonight from the pink Hansard if available. Frankly, some of the points the Minister mentioned…and again I'm in no way being sarcastic, but I lost him along the way because of some of the terms I'm not familiar with. I would like the opportunity to become more aware of some of the points he made.

I don't know if he has the information from Ottawa that he said he didn't have around 3:30, but the fact is that we're dealing with…. The Minister shakes his head so I suppose we don't have that information. But it seems to me, since this is one of the two main issues of this session — agriculture and labour relations being the two main ones — and since we're debating a bill with some of the information only made available by the Minister this afternoon, that it would make a great deal of sense if we could adjourn the debate and resume it perhaps tomorrow.

If I have to be more specific, although I hope I've tried to explain why we will oppose this bill, the whole question of control concerns me a little bit. The Minister, Mr. Speaker, expressed some of the various f actors that would be taken into consideration in deciding on cost of production. I was at least relieved that one of the items he mentioned early on was return on investment.

Again, I would equate this with a form of price control. Inevitably, whichever way you look at it, what will the government decide as being a reasonable return on investment in the very fluid marketplace we're presently in with inflation racing ahead and many of the economic factors affecting inflation changing from day to day?

Mr. Speaker, I accept the Minister's arbitrary comment: he was saying "for example"; he wasn't saying this is what it would be. He was stressing that, for example, 8 per cent might be a reasonable return on investment. But supposing that the government, in its wisdom, decides that 5 per cent is adequate — or 6 or 9 or 12? The power, the control which will be involved in such a problem, is very considerable. I'd like the Minister to comment perhaps on to what degree that particular figure would be the result of discussion and negotiation with the producer himself or herself.

That very factor raises another question: who is going to decide that this is an effective, efficient producer anyway? Are you going to classify all the farmers in one bag because they produce one commodity — and some of them produce it more effectively than others? If you bring in an average process, then the good, industrious, diligent farmer is going to receive less than he fairly deserves because of the inefficiency of some of the other farmers in selling the same commodity.

The Minister looks puzzled; but once again it's this question of averaging I'm concerned about. If 8 per cent is a fair average figure on investment — presumably some farmers do a much better job than others. I don't know much about farming, but they're human beings and they're like lawyers or doctors or carpenters: there are good ones and bad ones. If we're going to have some sort of control or some formula to reach a figure as to what is the cost of production, I see tremendous variation in the ways in which this can be decided and tremendous variation as between one farmer and another.

I'd like to be a little more assured that the good farmer is not going to be compromised in the income he received because of an averaging effect from the poor farmer or the inefficient farmer. For example, the Minister asked; should interest on capital be included? Of course it should be included; how can you do business without borrowing money these days and paying the going interest rate?

There again, interest rates have gone up steadily. Certainly in my experience — even on a private loan at the bank — in the last eight weeks I've had three separate raises, the last one by three-quarters of a per cent. I'm not in the farming business, but I assume that farmers can't exist without borrowing money these days. With the rapidly changing interest on capital borrowed from week to week, how is this going to work?

To what degree can the Minister even hope to come close, again arbitrarily, to $3 an hour for a skilled operator? Again, with the wage situation and the rapidity with which wages and costs are rising, I see this as a tremendous barrier.

Despite all these difficulties, I agree with the Minister that this kind of attempt is well worthwhile and I wouldn't let these immense practical difficulties in deciding a fair figure for the cost of production, great as they are, prevent the intent of this bill from being brought about.

At the same time, regretfully, it is so complicated; there are so many ramifications in terms of government power; government control is so great; the sums of money involved could be very substantial; we could conceivably, in the vague, general terms of this bill, be creating another large bureaucracy. We all know that when bureaucracies are created the net effect to the recipient, despite all the good intentions of the government when they first bring in legislation — and I am talking about legislation generally; I'm not picking on this House or

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any other one — is to very often create intermediary layers of people trying to help the farmer who is often the last person who ends up getting very much.

I cannot but repeat that we strongly support its efforts to give the farmer a fair income, compatible with similar work and hours and other jobs in our present society.

The Minister agreed that the bill was vague and he gave reasons why it had to be vague. I regret very much that whenever I get up in this House and really start getting critical and voting against things, it always seems to be the Minister of Agriculture who is on the other end. I assure the Minister that there is no personal vendetta that I am trying to sustain between him and myself.

I am simply repeating, Mr. Speaker, that the intent of this legislation is good. We strongly support the intent, but there is no way that we, as a responsible opposition part, can take such a vague, general, diffuse outline of intention as being responsible legislation. Before we can support the intent behind the bill, we have to have a great deal more specific detail in the legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the government might consider, in the light of the debate and the points expressed by the Minister and the three opposition parties, whether it would not be reasonable to consider hoisting the bill for six months so that some of the amendments could be added. After all, we have repeatedly compared this bill to Bill 42. The ultimate Bill 42 was a vast improvement over the original bill.

There must be one of two mechanisms that can be followed here: we can either hoist this bill for six months or the Minister can tell the House that he will consider the kind of amendments that, while still preserving the intention of the bill, would meet with the very considerable anxieties which all three opposition parties expressed about lack of detail.

If it is in order, I would move an amendment to the Minister's motion. The motion was for second reading of Bill 9; I would move an amendment to the effect that Bill 9 be read six months hence.

MR. SPEAKER: Well, I'll have to consider the motion for a minute. I think, if I remember rightly, that motion is made at third reading. I would like some advice on the subject.

Thank you, I have before me a motion: the motion that the bill be read a second time now be amended to read that it be read six months hence. I believe that the motion is in order at this stage, so you have the amendment before you. Is there any debate on the amendment?

AN HON. MEMBER: Does it need a seconder?

MR. SPEAKER: No, I don't believe so. We have done away with that.

MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, if a motion doesn't require a seconder, is that a debatable motion then?

MR. SPEAKER: I believe so. Yes, this motion is debatable. Nobody has offered to debate it and I'm putting the question.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, may I be recognized?

MR. SPEAKER: Yes, certainly. You are now speaking on the amendment.

MR. WALLACE: Yes on the amendment. The reason I was slow to rise was that I did anticipate some comment on the idea that I am trying to put before the House.

HON. E. HALL (Provincial Secretary): Point of order. He spoke for quite some time, telling us why he is not going to support the bill and why he wants it hoisted for six months. He moved the motion and sat down. I fail to see now how he can be speaking again to the same point. It is thrashing straw a little fine.

MR. SPEAKER: I think, in a way, the Hon. Member is right. Once you make your motion and sit down, you, in effect, have already debated it. It would be out of order to commence a second debate on it.

Is there any other further debate on the motion before taking the vote? The question is called.

While the Hon Members are waiting, in view of what the Hon. Member for Oak Bay said a minute ago, may I advise the House that the Chair has no knowledge of what bills will come in on a certain day. Therefore, if there is a run on that particular bill, as soon as I appreciate that fact I immediately order more from the Queen's Printer. I have done so with respect to this bill that was introduced by message today. That is the only thing I can do unless the Ministers advise the Speaker that there may be an anticipated demand greater than the normal number that are printed each day.

MR. McGEER: I wonder if I could request through you, Sir, that at all times when a bill is introduced, particularly by message, a sufficient number of those bills be set aside so each Member of this Legislature will have a copy and will be able to study it that very afternoon.

It's embarrassing, to say the very least, for elected Members of the assembly not to have bills before them when guests of the Legislature, members of the press and so on, have these bills and when Members are thereafter invited to comment on bills they've never seen. The very least we should request is that

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55 copies of every bill that is introduced be set aside and that every Member of the Legislature who goes to the Sergeant-at-Arms' office to request one be given one.

MR. SPEAKER: I'm rather puzzled by that remark. I thought that 55 were being set aside. I understand that some asked for more than one and this has also caused difficulty, but I put in train the demand for more from the Queen's Printer immediately I found that out.

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): Mr. Speaker, further to your comment, we were provided with one copy of the bill, and we waited 90 minutes or more to get to the Xerox machine to make additional copies. One copy for our office.

MR. SPEAKER: You see, you can understand the difficulties the Speaker has because there are only 200 printed to start with when any bill is printed. I have no way of anticipating that a bill is going to have a large demand until that supply is exhausted.

MR. R.H. McCLELLAND (Langley): Mr. Speaker, on the same point, I wonder what the difficulty would be in having a copy of each of these bills delivered right to our desks at the time that the bill is introduced. We would then have them; there would be no problem.

MR. SPEAKER: Certainly, I'll try to do that from henceforth.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, we've heard about the difficulties encountered in getting bills last year. We complained about it in the spring session. Now, surely to goodness, any government that says they can go out and conquer the world and solve all the problems should be able to get enough bills into this House so every Member can have a copy as soon as it is introduced into the House. I leave it with you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Well, nobody tells me how popular a bill will be until I hear from all of you.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, if you had any confidence in the government, you'd know that all the bills would be popular.

MR. McGEER: It's the unpopular ones that have the biggest run. (Laughter.)

MR. SPEAKER: Now if the Members of the opposition will make up their minds which it is, I'll be able to decide without any advance knowledge at all. Is everyone now prepared to conduct the vote?

All those who support the motion of the Hon. Member for Oak Bay (Mr. Wallace) that Bill 9 be read a second time six months hence, please stand.

Motion negatived on the following division:

YEAS — 5

NAYS — 44

MR. G.H. ANDERSON (Kamloops): Mr. Speaker, I certainly enjoy rising to my feet to support this bill. I feel that, had there been this type of legislation on the books in the province where I was raised, our family would probably still be on the farm.

One of the greatest problems as I see it in the farm support bills that that have come in the past, by all governments in various parts of Canada, is the very limiting factor on what the bill is supposed to do. In our own province, we had a bill called the Farmers' Land-clearing Assistance Act which, in its time, was excellent for the purpose which it was intended. It was very specific and was not in the least bit vague.

If you decided to settle anywhere on land in the province — it didn't matter whether it was the Peace River or the Bulkley Valley — that was heavily covered with brush, you could borrow money at fair terms, under this government assistance plan, to clear the land. And, in the case of the Peace River area with the large acreage, you perhaps might be involved in clearing several hundred, perhaps 1,000 acres, if you were fortunate enough to get that much land.

Then, after you cleared it, what could you do with it? There was no provision for any assistance to seed it, to buy equipment to work it, to put irrigation equipment onto it, all of which would assist in the production of food. But there was assistance if you wanted to clear it.

The problems of agriculture have been tackled by

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almost every party in Canada in the various provinces over the last 75 years, because agriculture has always had problems. The problems have not been solved; they're still there. It isn't that new ones have cropped up, it's the old problem of the income for the farmer that's still there.

One of the things I enjoy in this bill is that it is the Farm Income Assurance Act. In no way do I see any intent in the bill, as I read it, to put on some kind of subsidy at the consumer level.

Some of the previous speakers we heard — in fact I believe all three — are engaged in one profession or another of business. When they have a problem with a return of income for work performed, it is simply a matter of adjusting the price for their services. With the farmer, the situation is entirely different, in that he has so many people who handle the service and the food he produces before it reaches the consumer: it has to be processed in some type of a packing house, whether it's fruit or vegetables; it quite often has to be transported; it has to be handled by a wholesaler; and it has to be handled by a retailer before it finally gets to the consumer.

The wholesaler and the retailer and the transporter all have it within their abilities to increase their income, a privilege that is denied to the primary producer, who is the one who should have the guarantee. For this reason, Mr. Speaker, I'm glad to see that it is the farm income assurance, not the retail assurance or the wholesale assurance or the transportation company assurance. It is mentioned quite clearly in the title, the Farm Income Assurance Act. In looking at it, I would like to introduce one myself, I think, that is an MLA's income assurance Act, and average it over 20 years. I think that all the new Members in the House would certainly be very satisfied with that. Perhaps some of the older ones.

But in the past we have seen plans to assist people to settle in the Peace River, people who found themselves settled up there and wondering why. The same thing in the Bulkley Valley, the Kispiox Valley. Land was made available, and nothing else.

We have said, or it has been said from the government benches, the Cabinet benches, that the thrust in this session of the House is to be on labour and agriculture. Frankly, I don't believe that this is going to be the government's agricultural programme. There was a step taken, in amending the Farmers' Land-clearing Assistance Act, to include irrigation. And in this session we see a bill introduced for farm income assurance. It's my hope that there are going to be other bills introduced to cover other specific areas of agriculture, because they are so varied, so different in every part of this province, that it is impossible to bring in, in my opinion, one bill of any kind that would solve the problems in agriculture.

When the committee was travelling this summer, we found that there was quite a bit of conversation put to us in that "this particular producer gets assisted, or that particular producer gets assisted, and we do not." That is why I welcome the Minister's remarks that commodity groups are going to be studied commodity by commodity. I would assume, Mr. Minister, that consideration would also be given to different areas where the same commodities are produced because the conditions aren't exactly the same.

I was very surprised to hear my hon. friend from West Vancouver–Howe Sound remark that under this bill farmers could be told what to grow, when to grow it, where to sell it. I see no reference in it to that. Perhaps he knows better. I remember last year the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. King) referred to him as "the Hon. Member from that great industrial riding of West Vancouver–Howe Sound," but perhaps it is an agricultural riding.

I see nothing in this bill that says that anyone is going to be told what to grow, or how to grow it. It seems to be very clear, very clear indeed, that combined with the remarks the Minister made, the different groups are going to be considered differently, and be treated differently, with whatever particular income assurance plan comes in for their division of agriculture.

We have seen in past years, under federal plans, where groups on the Prairies were paid to reduce their acreage of a certain farm commodity. The result was that only one or two commodities were picked out and the bigger farmers concentrated on better fertilizing methods, and so forth, that they could afford, and ended up by producing more on less acreage, and also being paid for the acreage they took out of production. And this was a bill that was very specific in all of its terms.

It's my estimation that under a bill like this the Minister is going to be responsible, as he always has been under the British parliamentary system, for all the actions of his department; and that once a year at least, a report will be tabled in the House — always has been — of all the actions of every Minister's department. At the time the report is filed by the Minister of Agriculture, which I believe will be filed at the next session, according to custom, if this bill is passed we will have an idea what it is doing, if it is working well, if it is being abused; if not at that session certainly at a later one, when the bill has been put into use and we all have a better idea of how the practical workings of it will be.

It isn't any good to say to a dairy farmer on Vancouver Island that we are going to write a bill, and we are going to set out in the bill a specific amount that will subsidize feed for his operation on the island, if we are going to allow competing products to come in from anywhere else at a cheaper price. A bill such as this has got to be flexible. It has got to be flexible and, yes, it has got to be a bit

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vague.

I don't like the term vague. It looks to me more like flexibility rather than vagueness.

I don't think the term "vague" applies to this bill; I think the term "flexible" would be better. (Laughter.) But, if the Minister used the term vague, then I'll suggest that he use the term flexible rather than vague.

I think we find, Mr. Minister, that the opposition can usually find their own words. I don't think we need to supply them with any. They very seldom find the right ones.

There is no way that we can write one bill that will help the farmers in the Fraser Valley and also help the farmers of the Okanagan. There isn't any way we can write a bill that will help the farmers in the Peace River, on an income assurance plan that will apply equally to the farmers in the Bella Coola area.

The problems are different and I would hope, Mr. Minister, when consideration is made for different products, that these areas such as Bella Coola would be taken into consideration. This was once one of the very high-producing areas of this province. Products were shipped to Prince Rupert, to Ocean Falls and to the Queen Charlotte Islands, a steady market. But, with the breakdown of the transportation system on this coast, the main market, which was Prince Rupert, disappeared, I have talked to people from there who would have preferred to stay in agriculture, but took to industry or to commercial fishing instead. When I was commercial fishing myself, I met several from Bella Coola who had been raised on farms and had left because of the loss of the markets and the problem that they could not compete with people who were supplying the market in Vancouver. This is why I feel that there should be special consideration for people in these areas.

The same with people of Grand Forks. In the committee's tour we observed that close to half of the Grand Forks valley was lying idle, it was not in use. And the principle reason we got wasn't weather, it wasn't soil conditions, it was income, income only to the man who was trying to grow crops in the soil and make a living.

We now, as they say, have the same situation in the Bella Coola valley. There is going to have to be very special consideration given to the people in these areas, that I don't feel could be written into a bill. You can't help everyone in every situation in the same way.

I would hope that the terms would not be too strict. It's my opinion, Mr. Minister, that this province is over 80 per cent industrial, and the income that this province enjoys in general over the past 15 or 20 years has been considerable. I see absolutely no reason why this province cannot afford to assist the agricultural industry. I would hope that there were bills to follow this, and I would hope that in this bill, if the government has to put in more money than they thought necessary, it is my hope that it will be put in. Because we can afford it. With only 3.5 per cent of the land in British Columbia suitable for agriculture, this province can have a very powerful growing dynamic agriculture industry instead of one that is withering on the vine as it is now.

I find it difficult to understand how we can receive so much criticism on a bill of this type, when so much legislation over the past 60 to 70 years has failed. Despite every effort made, despite millions of dollars poured in by the federal government, in many cases money by provincial governments, all of these efforts have failed and agriculture is going down the drain.

Problems have been solved in egg producing, a lot of them have been solved in milk production, and I know that my friend from Shuswap (Mr. Lewis) may complain a little about this, but a lot of the problems were solved in broiler and turkey marketing also — and I am hoping that he will get a part of the action in his area fairly soon.

But, Mr. Speaker, I feel that this is the only way a bill of this kind could be drawn up. There is no way that we can cut down narrow little channels of assistance to the agricultural industry without getting problems everywhere you try to apply it. It's a good bill. I intend to support it and I hope there is a lot more debate on it. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Barrett moves adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:48 p.m.