[ Page 1323 ]

CONTENTS

Night sitting. Routine proceedings. Crown Proceedings Act (Bill 6). Amendments.

Hon. Mr. Macdonald — 1323

Committee of Supply: Department of Consumer Services estimates.

On vote 37.

Hon. Ms. Young — 1323

Mrs. Jordan — 1324

Hon. Ms. Young — 1327

Mrs. Jordan — 1329

Hon. Ms. Young — 1329

Mrs. Jordan — 1329

Hon. Ms. Young — 1330

Mr. Schroeder — 1330

Mr. D.A. Anderson — 1331

Mr. Cummings — 1332

Mr. L.A. Williams — 1332

Mrs. Jordan — 1334

Mr. Phillips — 1336

Mr. Chabot — 1342

The House met at 8:30 p.m.

Introduction of bills.

Orders of the day.

CROWN PROCEEDINGS ACT

Hon. Mr. Macdonald presents a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: amendments to Bill 6, intituled Crown Proceedings Act.

HON. A.B. MACDONALD (Attorney-General): Mr. Speaker, I move that the said message and the amendments accompanying the same be referred to the committee of the House having in charge Bill 6.

Motion approved.

The House in Committee of Supply; Mr. G.H. Anderson in the chair.

ESTIMATES: DEPARTMENT OF
CONSUMER SERVICES

On vote 37: Minister's office, $80,184.

HON. P.F. YOUNG (Minister of Consumer Services): Mr. Chairman...

AN HON. MEMBER: It's Phyllis Buster. (Laughter.)

HON. MS. YOUNG: ...it is with a great deal of pleasure that I rise to speak to the estimates of the Department of Consumer Services. I am pleased that this government has officially recognized the needs of the consumers of this province by asking this Legislature in the fall session to establish a full-fledged department devoted to their interests.

The department was officially established by order-in-council on November 15, 1973. On January 1, 1974, the consumers affairs officer, Mr. Michael Hanson, and his very capable staff were transferred from the Attorney-General's department to the Department of Consumer Services.

On November 20, 1973, the department retained the services of Professor William A.W. Neilson as Deputy Minister. Professor Neilson is noted to be one of Canada's outstanding experts on consumerism and consumer law. That's this gentleman over here, the Member for Osgoode Hall.

At the outset we determined our goals and our priorities. We believed that to be effective in protecting the consumer in the marketplace, it was not necessary to have a large staff but one that would be easily accessible. Emphasis would be placed on informing consumers of their rights, educating at different levels and in many forms and resolving complaints by voluntary compliance or conciliation.

In those situations where laws were clearly and knowingly being violated, it would be necessary to provide legal recourse for the aggrieved party or parties.

We believe we have achieved all of these goals in our estimates. The key to the success of our department will lie in the consumer service centres. These will be street level storefront offices in highly visible areas where public transit is good and where there is a maximum of foot traffic. Although attractive, they will not be plush. We want them to be places where people can feel free to drop in, pick up literature, receive answers to questions or file complaints.

At the outset we anticipate establishing four core offices, phasing each in as we are able to obtain the right location and retain and train the necessary staff. If a need is demonstrated later for additional facilities in other areas, we will ask the Legislature to approve them.

The Victoria office will not only contain our storefront, but also the department. Other storefronts will be located in Vancouver, the Interior and in the north. I might add that our Victoria storefront, which will contain our department, will also be our training ground for many of the people that will eventually go into other offices.

Each office will be staffed with a consumer service officer, an investigator and the necessary clerical staff. In addition, legal assistance will be seconded to the offices from the department of the Hon. Attorney-General as required.

In addition, we intend to tap a talented but largely unexploited pool of expertise in the form of home managers and handicapped persons who may be able to devote from 10 to 20 hours a week manning telephones and resolving complaints.

We hope to utilize some of these people in our community programmes branches as well. This will be our public information and education arm. A well-educated consumer is our ultimate goal. Hopefully he or she will have no need for our complaint services.

In our community programmes department we will be working on curricula for the school systems with the aid of the Department of Education, school boards who have already expressed a desire for such programmes, community groups such as the Better Business Bureau, the Consumers' Association of Canada, and many others. We will be approaching community information centres to help us in disseminating information in those areas where we may not have a field office.

Another key function of the department is the Trade Practices Branch. The consumer services centre and trade practice regulations will be administered

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under this department.

Since the government first indicated their intention of establishing a Consumer Services department last spring by appointing me as Minister Without Portfolio, and since the establishment of the full department in the fall, we have received an excellent response from various groups within the business community.

Many responsible business people who have deplored the questionable tactics of the few in their industry have formed trade associations and come to us asking for some kind of regulation of their industry. They realize that those few unethical business firms are downgrading the entire industry and making the innocent pay for the sins of the guilty. I might add that the guilty few are reaping huge profits at the expense of their more numerous ethical colleagues. It is a truism that the unethical business practitioner rips off not only the consumer, but the ethical businessman, too.

To sum up the essence of our department, it is accessibility, information, education and redress. Thank you.

MRS. P.J. JORDAN (North Okanagan): Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to hear the views of the Hon. Minister of Consumer Affairs. She mentioned last week — on Friday, I believe — in defence of the Attorney-General that she and her department were very much the baby of the Attorney-General's department. While we welcome the department, we had come to think, Mr. Chairman, that this was a baby with a physical defect in the form of muteness, because we hadn't heard anything from this Minister or anything from her department of any great significance.

I would like on behalf of our party to welcome Professor Neilson to the staff of the Government of British Columbia, and also to British Columbia itself. We hope that he enjoys it here. We also hope that he's married and his wife sends him shopping so that he's very much aware of some of the practical problems that face the consumer in British Columbia in this time of extraordinary inflation.

Interjection.

MRS. JORDAN: Well, if he can't afford a wife what's wrong with your salary scale over there, Mr. Minister?

The Minister herself, in speaking of this child of hers, leaves us with some concern in the matter of the expense of the child. When we examine the figures required for your office and your vote we find that it's rather high. You mentioned a very small staff and yet you're asking this House on the basis of what must be termed as eight months of inactivity to approve a budget of $1,169,428. Madam Minister, when we examine the estimates in your own office, we find it to be one of the highest office expenses in the government.

You're higher than Agriculture, the Attorney-General's office, Industrial Development, Labour, Mines and Petroleum Resources, Municipal Affairs, the Provincial Secretary, Public Works, Recreation and Conservation and the Department of Travel Industry.

Madam Minister, we don't begrudge this money if the value is there for the taxpayers of this province, but we must seriously question, through you, Mr. Chairman, this extraordinarily high Ministerial expense when the Minister herself has just said that they intend to operate a very small, very efficient and very personal office. Perhaps the Minister would make a comment on this, when she's answering our questions, as to how she justifies this very high expense in her own office.

I am pleased that the Minister states more clearly tonight than she has on any previous occasion the objectives of her department, because to date what we have had from this Minister is an unwarranted and an unfair attack that she withdrew, to her credit, in this House against a very responsible and respected corporation in this province. We also had an unprecedented and, I believe, very irresponsible attack on British Columbia marketing boards in this province as late as last week. I intend to go into that a little later on.

Mr. Chairman, the success of this office and this new department depends not on a Minister who is prone to harbour unfounded criticisms and grudges against various aspects of society, including business and marketing boards, but its success will depend upon the Minister's and the staff's ability to warrant and earn the confidence of the consumer of this province, because the role of a consumer affairs Minister is extremely difficult.

We're surrounded daily when we read the papers, listen to the news or listen to people or business talk by a barrage of rather groundless, useless and senseless clashes, each accusing the other of false representation or improper pricing or improper business practices. We say that the responsibility of this Minister, Mr. Chairman, is to allay some of these false charges and to deal herself, with her department, in fact — well-founded fact. We hope that she will utilize research and research moneys, the universities, consumer groups and commodity groups in this province, as well as business itself, to garner many of these facts.

I think for too long in the whole area of consumer affairs in North America, and probably many parts of the world, we've been evolving in an area of theory without in fact getting down to the actual costs involved in operating a business, and really evolving, in co-operation with business, what the

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responsibilities of large businesses and small businesses are. What too, Madam Minister, through you, Mr. Chairman, are the responsibilities and the rights of a consumer? Certainly along with every area of rights there also comes some elements of responsibility. I'm sure there are times when all of us can recite factual incidents where, in fact, a consumer has proved irresponsible in his action.

We hope, Mr. Chairman, that this Minister will move in this direction. With this thought in mind, I would ask the Minister how many meetings she has initiated with business people in British Columbia in terms of finding out what are the problems of business — large business and small business — and what in fact their costs of operation are in relation to their profit picture, and what they are prepared to do on a responsible basis to meet their obligation to the consumer and a fair marketplace.

Conversely, I would ask her what meetings she has had with the cross-section of the province, speaking of consumers — consumers from the north and the more remote areas, as well as consumers in the metropolitan areas, from all parts of this province — as to what they genuinely think are some of the less talked about but very real concerns on the part of the consumer about business transactions and pricing in the Province of British Columbia. If she hasn't initiated any of these meetings, then I urge her tonight to initiate meetings with small business people, with larger businesses to establish some ground rules through which they are all going to operate in their own and the consumer's best interest and to initiate these meetings with consumers from all across the province and hopefully to have a joint meeting between small businesses and large businesses in representation and consumers to discuss what are their mutual problems and concerns and how much common ground they have in solving some of these sometimes complex and sometimes less complex but very frustrating problems. I would invite the Minister's comments on that. I'd ask if she's willing to do this on a province-wide basis.

I would suggest to the Minister, in speaking of small business, that there is a problem for the small businessman in terms of keeping abreast of more modern business practices and in part his responsibility to the consumers. I would suggest, in the educational programme that the Minister hopefully will be initiating, that there be consideration given to have an opportunity for small business people to meet on common ground, to learn without a great deal of cost how their business practices might be streamlined, how they might incorporate more modern methods of bookkeeping on such a simple matter as whether it is beneficial to them in terms of cost and convenience to plug into a computer service to utilize computerized billing — things that they might not be aware of or might not have time to study because of the necessity of them keeping their nose to the grindstone in trying to keep their businesses operational. There are many business factors which we could discuss which they could learn about or be brought up to date about which would maximize their time, would maximize their own profits and in turn could well lead to a holding of the price line for the consumer.

In speaking in terms of big business, small business and the consumer, if the Minister's role is to ensure an open, competitive and fair marketplace and to protect the consumer from improper business practices or unfair practices in the marketplace, then surely, Mr. Chairman, it is this Minister's responsibility to deal in the same manner with big government. I say that the Minister of Consumer Services has a very strong responsibility to apply the same standards to big government as she is willing to and hopefully will be prepared to apply to all aspects of the business community as well as to the consumer.

We must ask you, Madam Minister, through you, Mr. Chairman: where has your voice been in the matter of taxation in this province, which is an utter fiasco and is resulting in increased, unwarranted and unprecedented taxation for the small businessman in this province? He has no alternative but to pass this increase on directly to the consumer. He's squeezed in a programme of inflation which is extremely difficult right across Canada, but is even more severe in British Columbia. The Minister herself is part and parcel, through her affiliation with this government, of some of those inflationary practices which have been initiated by her government and are reflecting themselves in direct consumer prices.

We must ask you, Madam Minister, where is your voice in this matter? Where was your voice? How many meetings did you have with the Minister of Finance regarding the increased assessment and its effect on not only the individual homeowner, if you wish to leave that to the Minister of Housing, but in fact to the small business person and the consumer?

Surely, Mr. Chairman, this Minister must be well aware that there are many small businesses in many parts of this province that have a very limited market potential. They must have a certain volume of business and a certain element of profit in order to survive and in order to pay their wages and in order to serve the people that they're in business to serve. I would cite places like Chase, places like Lumby, places like Pouce Coupe. There are just a limited number of consumers in that area and any direct increase on their cost of business is directly reflected in the cost to the consumer.

Madam Minister, you are part and parcel of an increase of 2 per cent in the corporate tax in this province since taking office. That in itself is reflected directly in the cost to the consumer. What efforts

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have you made to have this matter investigated on how much of this has been passed on to the consumer? How many meetings have you had with the Minister of Finance on this matter? This would also include in those questions the 0.5 per cent on retained capital.

Madam Minister, you can't stand up with your department, no matter how hard they work and no matter how sincere all your intentions, and attack business, and attack the so-called rip-off artists without, in fact, attacking your own government when it indulges in programmes which result in direct increase of costs to the consumer.

I would ask the Minister where her voice was and where it is now in relation to the actions of ICBC. Would this Minister, Mr. Chairman, stand aside and watch a reputable store advertise prices as firm, encourage people to buy ahead of time, announce shortly after that they had overcharged them, announce that they would make no effort to secure refunds for those who had been overcharged, and, on top of that, would refuse to pay any interest on those overcharges?

There is just no question, Mr. Chairman. There is no way, on the basis of the experience we've had with this Minister in this House, that she would stand for this type of nonsense on the part of any legitimate business. And there is no way that the public of British Columbia will stand for a Consumer Services Minister who will not rise to their defence in this same practice just because it's practised by her colleagues and big government.

Madam Minister, you have a very strong obligation to protect the consumer as a whole, and there are many people and many consumers in this province who have been adversely affected by the actions of ICBC. I challenge you to rise to your responsibilities and come to their defence and bring ICBC to heel, and bring it into the position where it will be a good corporate citizen in British Columbia.

MR. D.E. LEWIS (Shuswap): It is now.

MRS. JORDAN: Well, it shows you why he's a chicken farmer.

Is the Minister prepared to stand by and see more and more monopoly in private industry and private business develop in British Columbia as she stood by and watched ICBC become a monopoly industry in this province? It is her comments on this matter that we invite. Are you, Madam Minister, prepared to see other industries develop a monopoly position such as ICBC has in British Columbia?

Interjection.

MRS. JORDAN: Well, the Minister says,"like B.C. Tel." I would say to that Minister that he has a good deal of control over B.C. Tel, if he wants to exercise it, and perhaps with the Premier of this province....

HON. R.M. STRACHAN (Minister of Transport and Communications): I have no control over B.C. Tel. It's all federal.

MRS. JORDAN: Perhaps the Minister of Finance, through the Minister of Consumer Services, Mr. Chairman, would like to announce tonight that ICBC rates will, in future, go before a public board upon which there are consumers sitting in this province to help soften its monopoly position.

Interjections.

MRS. JORDAN: You know, Mr. Chairman, I'm trying to point out some very serious matters of concern to this Minister, but her little pal who keeps quacking may prompt me to tell you, Mr. Chairman, that we don't want the Consumer Services department Minister under the thumb of another Minister who has already displayed....

MR. CHAIRMAN: A point of order.

HON. L. NICOLSON (Minister of Housing): The Member for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot) is speaking out of his seat and is in jeopardy of giving the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Bennett) a bad name in this House.

Mr. Chairman, I ask you to ask him to refrain from doing that. (Laughter.)

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): A point of order, Mr. Chairman. I've always recognized that from the Malahat we had one member who is recognized as Shovelmouth. Now, from the Nelson area, we have Shovelmouth No. 2.

MR. CHAIRMAN: That is not a point of order. Would the Hon. Member for North Okanagan continue, please?

Interjections.

MRS. JORDAN: Obviously everyone has been sampling B.C. products for dinner tonight.

MR. CHAIRMAN: A point of order — the Minister of Transport and Communications.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Shovelmouth was a name given to Mr. Skillings from the time he went to school right on through all his life.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I'm afraid that's not a point of

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order either. Hon. Member, would you continue?

MRS. JORDAN: Mr. Chairman, are these Hon. Members advertising Singer sewing machines with their automatic shuttles?

I am glad that the Minister of Housing is awake tonight, because certainly he is going to be a Minister who is going to have to answer to the Minister of Consumer Services for some of his actions.

I'd like to ask the Minister of Consumer Services what relationship exists now between her department and the federal department of Consumer Affairs, and also what her relationship is with the federal Minister of Consumer Affairs. Is it the intention of the department to establish its own computer service and do its own research, or is the department intending to lease computer service from the federal government and lease research service from the federal government?

I'd like to ask the Minister when she last had a dialogue with the Hon. Mr. Gray, who is the Minister of Consumer Affairs at the federal level? We would like to know the substance of these discussions. Have they related in any way to specific consumer problems in British Columbia as they have been revealed by the federal department? Was the Minister discussing with the federal Minister the problem of the chocolate situation which arose just a short time ago? And on that subject, why didn't we hear from the Minister of Consumer Services? What was your position? Were you, as Minister, concerned that people in British Columbia were buying unsafe chocolate?

I would also like to ask the Minister of Consumer Services to define, within the area of more common concern, who assumes the responsibility for consumer or retail violations in British Columbia as they relate to the federal law and, by their indirect effect, apply to problems in British Columbia.

I would like to ask the Minister to what extent the department is legalistic in terms of its actions, and how far she intends it to go. To what extent is it really going to be storefront window-dressing? Is the Minister prepared to initiate, on behalf of consumers, court action? I would ask her, to date, how many actions she has initiated against any major or minor companies in relation to their offending consumer law — and whether she would give us the names of these initiations and actions and to what subject they related.

Is the Minister going to outline for consumers a legalistic framework emphasizing where her responsibilities lie and advising the consumers themselves as to what they can expect from this department?

The Minister of Consumer Services and her new Deputy have been discussing the tax rebate problem. The Deputy Minister, on his flight home from the east, had an inspiration as he crossed the Rockies and announced a warning to the public, and we commend him for this. But the Minister herself has spoken out against these people. When she was questioned in the House the other day, I was quite surprised to hear her say that she had only had one complaint in relation to tax rebates in British Columbia.

I would ask the Minister, on the basis of that one complaint, the concerns of her Deputy and her own statement, what action she has taken. Are these people bonded? If not, has the Minister a complete file of these companies that are in business in British Columbia today, and the complete list of the shareholders?

Has the Minister called these people into her office and made it clear to them what the position of the government is and is going to be in relation to any debunking on their part?

In other words, Madam Minister, after the statements of your Deputy and yourself, and the complaint, have you taken action? Are you in a position to suggest now that anyone who goes to a tax rebate company and only secures part of that rebate and the company goes defunct...that in fact if they were bonded, that individual would be protected?

Mr. Chairman, I have two or three matters that I want to bring to the Minister's attention in the way of specific cases, but perhaps she would like to answer some of these questions now, and then we can deal with these others as we go along.

HON. MS. YOUNG: In regard to the expense that the Hon. Member mentioned, I assume that she does not appreciate that this was the start-up effort which required leasing premises, buying furniture, getting telephones put in, buying office equipment — filing cabinets, stationery — hiring staff; the whole thing to start up alone is quite an expensive item, I admit.

The Member mentioned what is the responsibility of the consumer. This concerns us too. This is one of the points we wish to emphasize with consumers that when they have a complaint, they try to settle the complaint themselves before they come to us. I think you'll find that other groups advise the same thing.

Nearly all people who contact us have sought to solve their problem with the company or the dealer or the supplier, and only when they have exhausted all remedies, they then contact us and they're very good about this. I must say that easily 95 per cent of the letters we receive have full documentation dating back to day one — photocopies of contracts and sales slips, et cetera. They really outline their cases very, very thoroughly before they bring them to our attention.

From all of the correspondence we receive, the cases we receive, 80 per cent are valid complaints.

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People are basically very responsible in this area. We have very few people who perhaps get a bee in their bonnet about some little thing.

In regard to the education for small businesses, I would assume that this should be directed more to the Department of Industrial Development, Trade and Commerce. I would feel that this would be their area of concern. The areas that we seem to have the largest problems are definitely not at the small businessman level.

We find that the small businessmen, in almost 100 per cent of the cases, are extremely responsible people, mainly because they live in a community and they know they must exist in that community, and they don't take advantage of their customers because their customers are their neighbours and their friends. This is not where the problems lie.

The problems lie with the large businesses: financial institutions, credit, autos, appliances. The large items are where we get the bulk of the complaints. I have been accused of attacking business and I've been accused of naming names. Yet I'm quite shocked to find that I am being asked to name the name of every single firm that has been complained against since November 15 — to name the name of every firm that has been complained against, the nature of the complaint and the name of the complainant.

Now I think, in view of those remarks, that's a rather irresponsible thing to do because many of these firms, the vast majority of them, have resolved the problem. Sometimes it was a case of lack of communication. In one case, I recall, it happened that a credit note got lost behind a filing cabinet and that created a great deal of friction between two parties until the credit note was found and the complaint was resolved.

As far as meeting the Hon. Herb Gray, I met him in February. We had about an hour-and-a-quarter chat. We talked about a great many things. We talked about the provincial-federal relationships, what areas that we felt the province could work best in and what areas the federal people could do the most in. We talked about, in very great generalities, what we would like to see — what kind of legislation — at the federal level, and we talked about where we could have co-operation.

We have established very good liaison with the federal people in Vancouver and we keep in touch with them, I'd say, on a weekly basis. There are many areas of concern that are federal in nature that come to our attention. We immediately draw the federal people's attention to the matter and they take it from there.

As a case in point: the case of the chocolate. This is a federal matter. It comes under the Food and Drugs Act and this way it's their responsibility because, of course, chocolate goes country-wide, and thus we avoid costly duplication. I might say that the federal authorities do an extremely thorough job and I think the chocolate manufacturer did a very good job too in co-operating with the federal people — in giving their sources of where they supplied the chocolate.

The cases we have taken: we have resolved a great many complaints, mostly by bringing parties together and by asking for suggested resolutions from them. They have generally resolved it. But there are a great many cases we couldn't take for the simple reason that legislation on the books at the present time is extremely weak.

The Consumer Protection Act is very limited in what it can do for the consumer. We inherited this weak legislation and we will be bringing forward to the attention of the Hon. Members proposed legislation that we hope will remedy this, that will give us some strength whereby we can take action if need be.

In the matter of the tax rebate situation, this is a perennial problem. Around the end of the tax season, the end of April, these complaints begin rolling in. The Vancouver Action Line people will testify to this. We have been in contact with them. They have been very co-operative. That has been their experience too.

To counteract this the federal Minister of the Treasury, Mr. Stanbury, had promised some 10 months ago, closer to a year ago, that he would bring in amendments to the Income Tax Act to preclude tax rebates — to prohibit them, the tax rebate problem as it stands today. Unfortunately this legislation has not been brought in so the problem is with us still.

As a result, what we could do has been very limited, but we have done something; one of the things we have done is to run counter ads in the press in the same section.

"Need cash? Be selfish and sharp. Keep your tax rebates. If you need cash now, borrow after you've compared the cost in dollars and annual percentage terms. This is a counter ad, inserted by B.C. Consumer Services, Victoria."

These ads run every weekend.

MRS. JORDAN: Are they bonded?

HON. MS. YOUNG: The tax people?

MRS. JORDAN: Yes, the rebate people.

HON. MS. YOUNG: Some are; some are not. Most, I believe, are not. Just a few are bonded, or at least they advertise that they're bonded.

MRS. JORDAN: Well, why haven't you insisted that they be bonded so that there's protection? If

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they want to go defunct, you don't have to waste your money on ads; you can just pay the people their money.

HON. MS. YOUNG: Well, there is some doubt as to whether they can be licensed and bonded, because under the Debt Collection Act they are not debt collectors. So there is a question as to the legality of it.

Another thing that we have done is to contact the financial institutions — the credit unions, the banks and other financial institutions. The credit unions, I may say, have come forth and urged their members to contact them with their tax rebate forms before they go to the tax discounters we see advertised in the paper. The B.C. Central Credit Union has been most co-operative in this effort and we've urged people to do this.

I believe that's pretty much up to date.

MRS. JORDAN: Just a supplementary. You say that you don't know whether they're eligible for bonding or not. May I remind you that you have legal expertise at your right; you're surrounded by it from the Attorney-General's department. You should at least be able to give us an answer as to whether they are eligible. If not, you are the government; you bring in Acts holus-bolus in here. All you had to do under this emergency situation — and I'm sure you would have had the support of all Members in this House — was to bring in an Act the first day of this House in which you demand that these people be bonded or demand that they put up a deposit with the government in order to meet their commitments to these people. You could have done it in a matter of one day — certainly at the most in four days. If there is a question now, I suggest you bring in this legislation tomorrow. Let's see that they are bonded and that there is protection for the people.

I appreciate your efforts in running ads. That's all very nice, but it really isn't solving the problem, is it? If people take advantage of this type of business and this business goes defunct, then you're derelict as Minister of Consumer Services when you know about the situation and don't bring in some protective legislation which would be fair to everybody. If they can't afford or their reputation is such that they can't be eligible for some type of financial backing, then I submit to you that they shouldn't be in business. On that basis, you can clear out the foul ones. If there are fair ones, then they can comply with proper business regulations and proper protection for the consumer. Then you've met your commitments and everybody's happy. If there is a legitimate place for them in business, don't drum them out of business, providing they conduct their business on a proper basis.

HON. MS. YOUNG: The Debt Collection Act is under the supervision of the Attorney-General.

AN HON. MEMBER: He already passed the buck to you.

HON. MS. YOUNG: No. Hopefully we will be assuming that responsibility eventually. As I say, we are a child of the Attorney-General's department and we're absorbing those consumer-oriented pieces of legislation as we are able to cope with them and able to retain the necessary staff and handle them.

Actually, this whole problem can be solved at the federal level simply by the federal people amending the Income Tax Act to prevent this. It only takes three weeks to get an income tax rebate back.

MRS. JORDAN: But, Madam Minister, you are asking $80,000 for your office.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. The Minister has the floor. I recognize the Hon. Member for North Okanagan.

MRS. JORDAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You have a Big Daddy, the Attorney-General. If you are his child, you had better phone Daddy right away and tell him you have a problem. With all due respect, he has a bill before the House reacting to what he considers an emergency situation on rent controls which he is going to rush through. Surely, if there are a few cases of gouging in the rent business, and this will have to be discussed — I don't wish to transgress — the situation you describe and the publicity around it is serious enough that you yourself could bring in this interim, emergency legislation now to protect people.

I know the Liberals are slow to catch on to these things. We'll help you wake them up and put them on the hotline to their Big Daddy in Ottawa. But you can't ask us for this type of budget and tell us, when we talk to you on matters of perhaps helping small business, that you shunt that off to the Minister of Industrial Development, Trade and Commerce (Hon. Mr. Lauk), and when you have a serious situation and a specific example on your hands you try and shunt that off to the Attorney-General.

I feel, with all due respect, that you have to initiate some action. You can't just run around as a storefront princess; you've got to deal with some of these legislative problems. This is an acute one and it's one, as I say, that I feel sure all Members of this House would support you in. It would appear there are people practising very poor business practices who should not be in business in this province. You can withdraw the legislation when the feds move. Would you be willing to do this, Madam Minister?

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HON. MS. YOUNG: In our view, they shouldn't be in business at all. The way to get them out of business is at the federal level. By bonding them and licensing them, you're just legitimizing them. I think that is not precisely what we want.

MR. H.W. SCHROEDER (Chilliwack): We welcome the existence of this new department; we welcome the new Minister to the portfolio. I will join the rest of the Members on this side of the House in welcoming the new Deputy, Osgoode Hall representative (Mr. Neilson). I trust the $39,000 salary which has been designated for him will serve as some kind of catalyst to get the boy moving. Being a new department and being a new Minister, I would suggest that this lady is going to need all the help she can get. I trust you will rely heavily on the advice of the Deputy next to you.

I hope you have not construed the department to be only interested in things like price-fixing and legal abuse. I trust you are setting your sights on making sure that the residents of British Columbia are getting value for their dollar.

I hope you haven't conceived of Consumer Services to be somewhat of a super-duper-snooper. I hope it is not going to end up in the development of blacklists and whitelists and that there is not going to be discrimination against producers, manufacturers, distributors and financiers. I hope it is not going to become somewhat like an Eaton's catalogue of places at which you do your business and places where you do not do your business. I hope you will get beyond this, and right soon. I hope you will be interested in other things than just credit references and proper business ethics.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Will the Hon. Member address the Chair?

MR. SCHROEDER: Yes, sir. I'm talking to you; I'm only looking at the lady. I find it easier. (Laughter.)

MR. CHAIRMAN: The "you" sounded feminine. (Laughter.)

MR. SCHROEDER: If we were speaking in Latin or in French I imagine you could tell the "you" was feminine, wouldn't you? But in English it is just "you.”

Let me suggest an area to the Minister. I wanted to say Mr. Minister, but that wouldn't be right; she doesn't have a beard like the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Lea). Madam Minister, I would like to suggest an area of protection in which your department needs to become involved, through you, Mr. Chairman. This area is the protection of the consumer from himself.

I'll cite an example and I think you'll understand what I mean. I have had representation from the grocer. It's not a chain store; this is a small independent grower who has a grocery store in my constituency. If I named it you wouldn't even recognize it as a town. It's Greendale. It's a little store. He has one outlet there; he has another outlet in the constituency of Langley in Clearbrook. Both of these little towns are supposedly the homes of the most law-abiding and most peace-loving citizens in all of British Columbia, according to the Chamber of Commerce from each of those areas. The truth is that the owner and operator of this grocery outlet tells me that he receives on an average three bogus cheques a week. He accepts cheques not because they have no other way of payment; he accepts cheques because they are becoming more and more the acceptable form of exchange. As a result, it's as acceptable to take cheques as it is to take cash.

In the grocery business, as you know, there is no way to recover the goods if you learn that the cheque is bad and it is returned to you 10 days later. There is no way you can go back and recover the goods.

Therefore I would ask your department to come up with some kind of a plan whereby there would be an insurance against the use of bogus cheques. This man tells me that over one year he has suffered losses from NSF cheques and break-ins in excess of — now, don't miss this, Madam Minister, through you, Mr. Chairman...

MR. CHAIRMAN: That's a good boy. (Laughter.)

MR. SCHROEDER: ...$30,000 in the two outlets in one year. So I said to him: "How do you recoup?" He said: "There's only one way — the people who buy the groceries, who pay for them, have to pay a little extra so that at the end of the year there's enough cash left over so that I can draw my salary." So you see what I'm saying — it's time that your department considers at least protecting the consumer from himself.

Another area that I would wish that you would do some research in and come up with some answers is the area of...

Interjection.

MR. SCHROEDER: I'm being interrupted, Mr. Chairman, and I'll try to sort it out here.

...interest on deposits as opposed to interest on mortgages. You know that if you have money on deposit, you gain an interest on that money. The amount of interest that you gain has to be reported on income tax as income, and it's taxable. However, if you have a mortgage payment, the interest which you pay on that mortgage payment — and, by the way, it's the greatest percentage of the mortgage

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payment — is not tax-deductible.

I would like you to take this matter, which is a federal matter, under your wing and to come up for all of Canada with an answer which has been used in the United States for years, that would apply some pressure upon the federals to be fair.

I think this is unfair to consumers. If interest is gained, he pays taxes on it; if interest is paid, it is not tax-deductible. It's an area that needs some scrutiny. Put your super-duper-snoopers to work in this area and gain a fair value for a fair dollar price for all consumers in British Columbia.

I heard you say: "We want to educate the consumer." I trust that your education of the consumer will also involve the management of funds — the handling of budgets, even if they're only family budgets. I trust that you will be more involved in the education of how to handle your money than you're going to be in where to spend your money. I think that we should allow the consumer at least the choice to be able to spend his money where he wishes, as he wishes, without interference from big government. However, if we could educate him how to handle his funds, we could make out of him, I believe, a better citizen.

I would like you to answer how you are going to separate or coordinate the businesses of credit information and credit coordination and credit reference and credit bureau — all of the bureaucracy that's involved in the operation of these through the A-G's department and your department. I'd like to hear how you're going to coordinate these and make them work smoothly so that the people will know which department to approach when they have problems in these areas.

I'd like to hear some answers to the questions that I have posed.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): Mr. Chairman, I'm interested in the Minister's comments about tax rebate lending. I'm curious, however, and I don't think this question has been properly cleared up because it's just not good enough, in the light of previous statements, to blame the federal authorities for their failure to act in this area.

The Minister was quoted in The Province of January 22 of this year:

"'B.C. has become the last happy hunting ground for the companies,' Ms. Young said, 'because other provinces have passed laws controlling the practice.' She said she does not know the details of these laws."

Now, if other provinces have passed laws controlling this practice and if B.C. is the last happy hunting ground, clearly the onus should be in the province's lap to do something about it. I'm quite willing to agree it might be possible to deal with it in some other way, but if all the other provinces have done a better job than we have — in fact, apparently, we've done nothing at all — if they're capable of doing things and we're not, well then surely the answer must be somewhere in the administrative competence of the new department.

The next point I'd like to comment upon is the promise on February 20 of a new consumer bill which was described as being extensive:

"Consumer Affairs Minister Phyllis Young said her now consumer protection bill, to be introduced in the Legislature within two weeks, will be an omnibus bill covering 'just about every deceptive business practice that comes to mind.'"

I would have thought that it would be helpful to us to have had that at the present time. After all, presumably the estimates that we're discussing tonight, Mr. Chairman, are estimates of a department to implement an extensive new bill. It's pretty difficult to discuss the estimates and the need for over a million dollars worth of money when we really don't know what the legislation is they're going to be enforcing.

So I wonder whether the Minister would perhaps comment on this. Why has it been delayed? Has it been delayed simply that we could pass the estimates in the dark, as we're essentially being asked to do? We just don't know what extensive new legislation is coming in and how it will be handled.

Mr. Chairman, the Minister made much of storefront consumer offices, and I think it's a good thing. But she also made some comments this evening, which again I think are perfectly correct, to the effect that the jurisdiction in consumer affairs is totally split — part of it's federal, part of it's provincial and where the dividing line is certainly most consumers don't know and I imagine a good number of people in her own department have to check the books from time to time on various cases as they come up.

Well, the former Minister of Consumer Affairs, Mr. Andres, talked about the division of responsibility. In the Consumer Action League Society Bulletin, Vol. 1, No. 11 of August '73, he was quoted:

"Given the diversity of responsibility under our constitution, neither the federal government nor the provinces acting alone have the necessary powers to enact a comprehensive set of consumer protection laws. Success could only come through a co-operative process involving both levels of government."

What I would like to suggest to the Minister, and perhaps she might be able to tell me whether this suggestion has been already implemented, is that she indeed check with the new Minister of Consumer Affairs, who is no longer Mr. Andras, and find out what opportunities there are to have the storefront itself jointly run. Unless it's jointly run, the consumer

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coming in will have to find in at least 50 per cent of the cases that he's got the wrong office. If the whole purpose of having storefront offices is to have the convenience to the consumer, it's clearly absurd to run it at 50 per cent efficiency, which would be the case were it run either by the federal Department of Consumer Affairs or the provincial Department of Consumer Services.

The programme that I envisage would be a completely joint one. I don't know how you're going to share financing or staffing but I'm sure that those problems are in no way difficult to come to a decision on. The interest of Herb Gray and his predecessor is certainly clear from this newsletter sent out by the Action League. I trust that the Minister will be commenting on how far she has gone in arranging for a joint office because clearly, from what she's said herself and what the federal Minister has said, it could only be 50 per cent effective if it dealt with only one branch or the other. I don't know whether there's a federal storefront office in B.C. but clearly if there isn't, there should be. For the Minister to set up one provincially without their co-operation would be pretty silly.

I was distressed to find that she's in contact with them only about once a week, because that indicates that either we're not getting many complaints, not much is happening or that co-operation simply isn't at the level that it should be.

Perhaps the Minister would like to comment on these three points.

MR. R.T. CUMMINGS (Vancouver–Little Mountain): Mr. Chairman, I'm very pleased to join this debate because I have the honour of sharing Little Mountain with my Phyllis, if you'll forgive me — my Phyllis.

Interjection.

MR. CUMMINGS: I would like to tell those yahoos — is that parliamentary? — that she is going to be the best Minister of Consumer Services that there ever has been. (Laughter.) Actually, Mr. Chairman, I'm wondering if my Minister has the power to investigate the fly-by-night shysters — you know, the old-time lawyers who still exist in this province. It has been about 700 years since they were banned from parliament by an early English king, and I think the ban should still be enforced.

Good businessmen have nothing to fear because a good customer comes back. Phyllis knows it and I know it. That's how good businessmen exist.

Actually, the Hon. Member from the flood plains (Mr. Schroeder) mentioned this merchant who was broken into and had to take NSF cheques. My dad was a small-town merchant. One of the reasons he used to take a lot of NSF cheques was for the simple reason the banks did a very, very bad thing; they closed on the best day of the year — Saturday. My dad and the other merchants had to cash all the cheques because the workers from all over would come in and every merchant had to cash their cheques because that's how it worked.

I would suggest that maybe banks should be forced to be open so they service the public at all hours. Thank you.

MR. L.A. WILLIAMS (West Vancouver–Howe Sound): I'd like to pose a few questions to the Minister of Consumer Services. Before doing so, however, I would like to congratulate her on the selection of her Deputy Minister (Mr. Neilson). He comes to this province with a sound background in matters dealing with consumer affairs and consumer services. I think the Minister will be better able to fulfill her role because of the selection of her Deputy Minister. I only hope he is given the fullest opportunity to fulfill the promise he brings to the Province of British Columbia.

I wonder if the Minister would be good enough to indicate how many of the 42 positions in her department have been filled. I notice there are 42 staff members and, if there are any positions which are vacant, perhaps she could indicate to the committee where those positions might lie.

I would also appreciate it if the Minister could indicate to what extent she expects the staff of 42 will be able to discharge the responsibilities she has today set for her department. An examination of the staff would indicate that, aside from herself and her executive assistant, the Deputy Minister and various administrative officers and research officers, there are only four consumer-service officers, five trade-practices investigators, and two trade-rules officers. That's a total of 11 personnel who would appear to be directly involved on a person-to-person basis with the assessment of consumer practices in the Province of British Columbia and the redress of any of those practices which are found by the Minister to be unsatisfactory.

I would also like to know if the Minister would indicate what is included in the category of temporary assistants. It's significant that of some $600,000 available for staff salaries in her department, 25 per cent of that amount is allocated for temporary assistants without any indication of either the calibre of person who will be sought for those temporary roles, the number of people who will be involved, and the specific tasks that will be assigned to them. If the Minister hasn't noticed it, it's at the bottom of page N-39 in the estimate book. Twenty-five per cent of your total salary bill is for unclassified temporary assistants.

I note with interest that some $225,000 is being expended for consumer education and information. I

[ Page 1333 ]

would most anxiously await hearing from the Minister as to the specific programmes being undertaken with the expenditure of nearly a quarter of a million dollars, to which segment of consumer population the educational programmes will be directed, and if she could somehow or another account for the expenditure of $175,000 for office furniture and equipment.

Those are some technical matters the Minister might care to comment on with the assistance of her Deputy.

I should like now to turn to a matter which might perhaps be of more interest to the people of the Province of British Columbia. Could the Minister indicate to the committee the policies she intends to follow and the programmes she intends to undertake which will result in some relief to the consumers of the Province of British Columbia from the growing increase in prices which those consumers must pay in order to have the things that are necessary to sustain life: food, shelter and clothing?

I trust the Minister has some specific programme or policy in this regard and that we won't hear from her that this is the responsibility of the federal government alone. There's no question that the federal government has a responsibility, just as in the same respect there's no question that the federal government is scarcely fulfilling the role that it has taken on to itself. But we can't in the Province of British Columbia leave these things all to the senior government. With this new Department of Consumer Services I think the people of British Columbia are entitled to know what your policy is in this regard. Do you think you can help the consumers? If so, what programmes will you undertake which will have some meaningful result for consumers?

One area that has been discussed in this House recently — and I'm not going to deal with any particular product — but the Minister had some very strong words to say concerning the operation of marketing boards in the Province of British Columbia. We also had from the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich) an indication that he and his department are in support of the marketing board concept. I would like to know precisely what the Minister of Consumer Services has to say about their role and their functions in the Province of British Columbia.

There are those who would suggest that the existence of marketing boards is designed specifically to reduce supply and increase the costs the consumer must pay. On the other hand there are those who say that without the controls that marketing boards can provide, the producer segment in our economy would be left to the whims of the market and suffer the consequences of those whims without being of any long-lasting benefit to the consumers in the Province of British Columbia. I think it's time we addressed ourselves without heat or emotion to the solution of this problem.

I have long believed that the term "marketing board" was wrong. They are not marketing boards at all; they're producers' boards. They have, regardless of what may have been their role at the time of their initiation, become boards concerned only with the problems of the producer. They have not over much given concern what the consumer's position is in the thing. I would like to know from the Minister of Consumer Services the direction she believes these marketing boards should go.

There's no question that orderly marketing, whatever that may mean, and it means different things to consumers than it does to producers, must be an all-encompassing responsibility. It must take into account not only the producer segment but also those who are involved in the distribution and true marketing of the product, and the consumer. Orderly marketing which is contrary to the best interests of the consumer is of no consequence to us. By the same token, orderly marketing which is of no consequence to the producer is no real answer for us.

The Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich), if I understood him correctly, several days ago indicated that he believed marketing boards should be supported and that it was his responsibility and that of the Minister of Consumer Services to educate the people of British Columbia into the true and proper use of marketing boards and how they were necessary in order to protect both the producer and the consumer.

Surely we are not in 1974 coming down to this: that education is to be the sole weapon that must be employed when we are faced with rising prices at the consumer level, and at a time when serious questions are raised as to how much the producer is getting out of the consumer dollar.

In these days, Mr. Chairman, of apparently inexhaustible government revenues, it must come as a concern to the Members in this House and to the consuming public generally that governments seem to have no difficulty in providing millions upon millions of dollars to subsidize the producers while at the same time the consumers, whose tax dollars have contributed to the money required for subsidization, are still paying ever-increasing prices for the products that they must buy.

Have we come to this in Canada, that our national government announces a few days ago a subsidy for beef producers of some $2.75 million a week, while at the same time, with ever-dropping prices for beef cattle, the prices in the stores remain high? Is the taxpayer to subsidize the producer while leaving consumer costs high? Does this only mean that the subsidy is to protect the producer against cheap imports? Is this our technique?

Is the same thing to apply in the subsidization which is to be carried out by our provincial

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government? Are we subsidizing the producer while at the same time maintaining high consumer prices?

It seems to me, Mr. Chairman, to be illogical that we should come to this result; yet unless some action is taken by government and some input into that action by the Minister of Consumer Services, this is the direction we will go.

We seem to have had a very strong agricultural lobby with proper results so far as the agricultural community is concerned. Are we to understand that the consumer lobby is any less strong? Are all the people who are the consumers of goods and services to be ignored, save for their right to pay taxes, to subsidize the producer, while at the same time keeping consumer costs high?

I think that there are serious questions to be asked in this respect. In this fledgling department I think that the Minister of Consumer Services, as the first Minister, must surely have given some attention to a subject so important as this, and to be in a position to indicate the policy direction which she sees for her department, and for the programmes which we may expect to see introduced in the next 12 months, which will make some concerted attack upon the problem as it affects the consuming public.

I know that the Minister has been very actively taking notes during my remarks, and that she will stand now and give us the answers.

No answers.

MRS. JORDAN: No answers, Mr. Member, and this is very disappointing, Madam Minister, through you, Mr. Chairman. I have asked the Minister a number of questions in relation to consumers in this province, specifically her role between government and the consumer, and specifically ICBC and what she's intending to do to protect the consumer in this area. Has she had any meetings with the Minister of Finance?

So I hope, Madam Minister, you will come back to those questions and answer them along with the answers requested by the Member for West Vancouver–Howe Sound (Mr. L.A. Williams) which concern all of us. I would suggest, Madam Minister, that there's no way we can be encouraged to pass a vote as large as this unless we do get some answers.

I would like to return to one or two comments that the Minister made herself in the area of education. My colleague from the north will be commenting on one aspect. I think the whole problem of education in the inflationary world that we have today, for those on limited incomes and for any consumer for that matter, revolves to a large degree around dietary requirements. I would like to know if the Minister is planning, or is prepared to plan, to have dietary consultants — not necessarily full-time — available in many communities, rural communities and particularly the smaller communities.

We ran a programme two or three years ago in which we had a series on the television which went through how to buy selectively, food values and marketing suggestions. This was coordinated with a group in the home with one consultant with them who worked with them as the programme went on and was there to help answer questions for a discussion period following the programme.

This was very useful, and I would suggest to the Minister that there's a great need at this time for more education on the basis of budgeting and in relation to dietary needs. I don't think you have to go out and hire a full-time staff. You have people within your department now. There are people in the agricultural department, and you could certainly hire one or two people to coordinate it.

There are many home economics teachers in the schools. There are many retired home economics teachers or dietitians in the Province of British Columbia who could be brought into a programme like this on a part-time basis, and this would help them in terms of supplementing family income, and it would be a very practical and useful service to people throughout the province.

I would think this is not limited solely to limited-income people. I'm sure there are many of us, perhaps the Minister herself.... Maybe she's shopping more than I am right now. The prices are changing, the foods are changing, so quickly that it's very difficult to keep up with these things. I would suspect there would be a very strong public reaction. Bachelors, single parent fathers, who are having to cope with the extremely high prices of food today could well benefit from tips on how to do selective and nutritional buying and make their money go further.

I would like to bring a couple of matters to the Minister's attention for comment. I was going to, in light of the levity brought forth by the Member for Vancouver–Little Mountain (Mr. Cummings)...and I see he's gone, so I'll save it.

There is a practice in British Columbia at the moment which I think tends, if not to be misleading advertising, to be a nuisance to people and should come under a code of full disclosure in advertising practices.

It involves a company which is sending out little cards in the mail — and I can submit one to the Minister if she wants it. These come in various colours, white for one month, green for the next month, yellow for the next month, and it says:

"Congratulations! You have been selected to receive one of the following fantastic gifts: (1) TV set or stereo system; (2) surprise bonus gift; (3) $5 in cash; (4) quilted blanket; (5) a stuffed poodle dog. To find out which gift you will receive call between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. Phone

[ Page 1335 ]

direct or collect. No purchase necessary."

[Mr. Liden in the chair.]

This is all it says on the card; so someone gets this card in the mail and they think they've won a fantastic gift. They phone the number and, lo and behold, when they phone the number they ask "Who is it?" They say: "Yes, you have certainly won a gift. However, you must subject yourself to a half-hour demonstration by a salesman in your home."

I think this gets to the point and is one particular instance where this is a matter that should be brought under full disclosure. People who are congratulated on winning a fantastic gift should not have to have anyone in their home, and they should not have to be subjected to this type of pressure.

It's a double-edged sword because they have another gimmick. The next card they use says the same thing: "Congratulations! You've won a fantastic gift." But when you phone on this card they say "Oh, yes, now we have a matching key, and we would like to come by your home and see if the key matches."

That's real Jim-dandy because they get out to your home; you're unsuspecting; they come in. The demonstration goes on and it's quite a simple matter: if you buy, the key matches and you get your gift. If you don't buy, lo and behold, the key just doesn't happen to match.

This is going on in Vancouver as late as last week. I would like to give credit to the crusaders who first drew this to my attention. From that time I've followed it up, and I was meeting with some of the ladies who were coming over to meet with you on the ferry the other day, and we discussed this. Two of them had had cards in the last few weeks.

I find that they're still turning up all over Vancouver and I haven't been able to trace them into the Interior yet. I think this sort of thing preys on lonely people, older people and I'm sure it has a kick-back once in a while when somebody invites them down just to have the demonstration and doesn't buy and figures they're getting their own back, and if they use the key-matching programme, they don't get their gift either.

I think also it's a dangerous precedent. We were talking in this House earlier of the problems of offences against women, violence in the home. At this time it's probably not a very good practice for older people or women alone to have casual salesmen in their homes.

Of course, this is an individual choice, but it has been used before as a means of entering into a home, casing a home for future burglaries and at least if it was clearly outlined on the card that you must have a demonstration before you got the gift, then the individual has the right of choice if they want to run this risk or if they want the demonstration.

I really don't advocate banning it, because I think properly done with full disclosure I suppose it's a legitimate form of contact. I would ask the Minister if he is prepared to see that full disclosure is required and in so doing make it very clear that we welcome legitimate business practices, legitimate door-to-door business practices in British Columbia, but British Columbia isn't the lotus land for fast-buck artists such as in this area.

I'd like to bring another matter to the Minister's attention. This involves a company, and frankly I don't mind naming the basis of the information that I have because it appears to me that they've certainly skirted the line of responsible business practices. It's Cigas Propane Company, headquartered in Calgary.

For the interest of the House, I would advise them that this company is in the distribution of propane. They rent out storage tanks and they have a contract which you sign when you make your commitment to this company. It's valid for one year and initially the contract was on a rental basis for one year of $36 that year and thereafter. In their own contract, they outline, and I'd read it for the record, in section 8:

"That the terms of this agreement which is a $36 a year rental for one year and thereafter unless otherwise notified, the terms of this agreement shall unless terminated as herein provided be for 12 consecutive months commencing on the first day of the month immediately following the date of this agreement, and unless sooner terminated as herein provided, this agreement shall continue in effect from year thereafter until terminated by written notice from either party, which notice of termination to be effective shall be given at least 90 days before the anniversary date of this agreement."

Now there is a family in this province who brought this to the attention of a number of people who signed this agreement and in the mid-term of the agreement received a notice that their rent had gone up another $12 for that year, and that the reason for this was the increased costs of labour and distribution and trucking and servicing, et cetera.

This was in essence, in a number of people's view, including mine, the breaking of a contract in mid-term. Now this was looked into by a number of people including the Crusaders and they phoned the management of this company in British Columbia and the sales manager in Calgary and were told that yes, they agreed that this was in fact the breaking of a contract in mid-term and the company was in error and the man would no longer be charged his $12, and he would receive his proper notification 90 days prior to the end of their agreement for any increase.

So this was conveyed back to the family who felt that they were all right and went ahead. But in fact this didn't happen and they were billed again for their

[ Page 1336 ]

$12 for this rent that was breaking the mid-term agreement to all intents and purposes.

Now when the president of the company, a Mr. Hefner, was phoned in Calgary — and this is where I think there is a matter of extreme concern — and asked about this he said, yes, it was and he implied that he had received the green light from the Consumer Affairs department, he thought, in Ottawa, to actually involve themselves in the breaking of this contract in mid-term.

Contact was made with the department, the federal Department of Consumer Affairs, to the Hon. Herb Gray, and he wrote back and said that to his knowledge, no one in his department, including himself, had given this company the green light to break their contract in mid-term.

But he implied in that letter that in fact Mr. Hanson from the provincial Consumer Services department might well have given this green light. When the manager was contacted again, he thought this might be what had happened, that it was the provincial consumer affairs department.

Now I don't feel for one moment, Mr. Chairman, that Mr. Hanson or the department would involve themselves in this type of underhanded play. This is why I had no hesitation in mentioning the company's name or the man's name, because they did in essence use or infer that the federal Consumer Affairs department and then the provincial consumer affairs department had given them the green light to break their contract in mid-term.

What's more interesting, Mr. Chairman, and I'm sure will interest the Minister and she may well know about this, and I think perhaps she does, is that when the manager of this company, Cigas, was confronted with the fact that they were breaking their contract in mid-term, and then advised that they should give this rebate to the family, they said well no, that would be discriminatory, in fact over 2,000 customers in British Columbia had acceded to their request to increase the charges in the middle of the contract.

So in essence it would appear that there are over 2,000 people in British Columbia who didn't complain, but in fact have been the victims of a broken contract by a company and need not have paid this money.

It's not, Madam Minister, the amount of money involved. But it is in fact the principle involved that we should have operating in this province — if my facts are correct, and I believe they are, and they have been used on the air by the Crusaders, and they have been investigated further by myself — if in fact we have a company operating in British Columbia that would dare to make reference to our own consumer affairs department improperly or if in fact they are going to indulge in breaking contracts in mid-term, then I feel that this matter should be stopped immediately.

The disappointing point in this, Madam Minister, in relation to your department is that when this matter was referred to you, to the best of my knowledge, and I checked this two or three days ago, you indicated there was nothing you could do and in fact that you'd referred the matter to the Energy Commission.

I question this very seriously, and I think that your department must assume more responsibility than this if this is the case. In the meantime the family are still under the impression — the specific family that complained — are still under the impression that they owe this money and that they in fact have broken their commitment, and this is worrying them.

The only satisfaction we're getting at the moment is that this has been referred to the Energy Commission. I'd like to ask you, Madam Minister, as well as commenting on this, did you at any time have any word from the Hon. Herb Gray himself, or his officials in relation to this case? In other words, this is a specific instance of very questionable action taking place in British Columbia referred to the federal Minister of Consumer Affairs and yet should have been referred to the provincial Minister of Consumer Services.

I'd like to know if you heard from him or his officials, because I think this is indicative of the type of relationship that should be developed, and in fact well may not be and if so then I think that Mr. Gray should be taken to task for this.

Then I'd like to ask if in fact their action was illegal why did not the Minister initiate any action through her department instead of referring it to the Energy Commission? I well appreciate there might be other factors that this company is involving itself in that warrant an overview by the Energy Commission, but in the case of this specific instance, I feel that the Minister should have taken action.

I'd like to know also what she intends to do about the other 2,000 customers who have overpaid, and if she will insist that the company initiate notification to these people and that they get their refunds.

I hope that the Minister will comment on these two cases and will outline answers to the questions I asked her about what she feels her role is going to be in relation to protecting the consumer from big business, big government, specifically big government, and what she is doing about the problems with ICBC in relation to protecting the consumer.

MR. D.M. PHILLIPS (South Peace River): Mr. Chairman, it's a very interesting department.

MR. G.B. GARDOM (Vancouver–Point Grey): Were you ever in the battle of the Nile? (Laughter.)

MR. PHILLIPS: I went home, Mr. Chairman, to

[ Page 1337 ]

make dinner for myself in my apartment tonight and I was out in the kitchen cooking up some meat and I had a phone call. So I went to the phone, Mr. Chairman, through you to the Minister of Consumer Services, and there was a lovely young lady on the phone.

MR. GARDOM: Probably a wrong number. (Laughter).

MR. PHILLIPS: No, no! And I was quite amazed that a young lady would be phoning me during my brief dinner hour.

HON. W.S. KING (Minister of Labour): So are we!

MR. PHILLIPS: So I asked her what I could do for her. Half an hour later she informed me, Mr. Chairman, that I had just won a Chatelaine Cook Book. (Laughter.)

HON. MR. KING: Well, you've got to be good at something.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, I'm interested in the culinary arts. I like to putter around the kitchen and make bread once in a while, cook the odd steak, and so I said, "this is very interesting. When are you going to come up to my apartment and demonstrate this cookbook?"

"Well," she said, "I really don't demonstrate it. I want to tell you about it over the phone."

So we went on in conversation for a little while and finally I said: "If I won it, why don't you just send it to me?" And she said, "Well, really you haven't won it. It's worth $14.95, if you buy a subscription to Maclean's Magazine for several years we'll send it to you for $1.14."

Now I've been in business for a while and I told the young lady, I said, "Thank you, yes, but no. Because I take Maclean's Magazine at home and I'm only in the capital city several months out of the year so my wife has provided me with several recipes, particular ones that I like and that I'm able to make, and so I don't really need a cookbook."

HON. D. BARRETT (Premier): Did you end up selling her a car?

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, no, that's later. (Laughter.)

But the point is, Mr. Chairman, through you to the Minister of Consumer Services, I found nothing wrong with this conversation. Here was a young lady who was trying to project herself into the business world. She had probably been tutored by somebody back in Toronto, and there is nothing wrong with selling what she thought probably was a single man a cookbook, so they could learn to look after themselves. With things the way they are today, why....

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, I don't know how she got my phone number. Now that's the question I want to ask the Minister of Consumer Services. Maybe she just went through the phone book until a number came into her mind. I don't know. But anyway I see nothing wrong with that, and I think that if I had the opportunity to say no to this young lady and she didn't pursue the situation.

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, it's a good thing I said no.

HON. A.B. MACDONALD (Attorney-General): It's a good thing you did.

MR. PHILLIPS: However, in Consumer Services we find many different situations. And supposing that instead of receiving a phone call from this young lady I had looked at The Victoria Express dated February 21, 1974. I would have seen an ad in there, a full page ad, which said, "If you have any problems with Autoplan — call 665-2800. We will be happy to answer your questions." Which, had I had a problem, I would have done.

But it goes on to say, which this young lady didn't say to me — she didn't try and mislead me in any way — this ad goes to say: "We'll be happy to answer your questions because you are the boss." Now am I led to believe that I'm the boss in my own home? Am I the boss in my business? Am I the boss in this Legislature? Am I the boss in my caucus? Or am I the boss when I'm home alone in my apartment?

MR. G.H. ANDERSON (Kamloops): All noes so far. (Laughter.)

MR. PHILLIPS: Unless the Legislature would advise me differently, I would suggest that this ad would lead me to believe that I am the boss of the sponsor of this particular ad, Mr. Chairman, you'd never guess who sponsored and paid for this ad.

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: You're right, Mr. Chairman. It was Autoplan. The Insurance Corporation of British Columbia. Your insurance company.

[ Page 1338 ]

MR. G.H. ANDERSON: Yours too.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, there are approximately 1.2 million purchasers of Autoplan in British Columbia. I've been in business for a while and I find it difficult with one boss in business and two or three sort of department heads, well I can hardly imagine running a business where there were over a million bosses. I would find it, I would think, to be a very unwieldy business, very difficult to run. What would you think, Mr. Chairman? Do you think you could run a business where there were over a million bosses?

So I would think, Mr. Chairman, through you to the Minister of Consumer Services, that this ad could be misleading advertising. Because I've had some of these ads come back to me and say, well, if I'm the boss, tell them to sell the business. Well, there you are. It says "you're the boss." Okay, if this guy is the boss he wants the business sold.

HON. MR. BARRETT: We'll give you the business.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, I know you've been trying to for years, but, you know.... As a matter of fact, Mr. Chairman, the Premier's been giving the people of this province the business ever since he came to power.

HON. MR. BARRETT: You bet your life — they deserve the business. We don't give it to Wenner-Gren.

MR. PHILLIPS: Oh, you want me to talk about Wenner-Gren do you? Oh.

I'm really concerned about this type of advertising by a corporation belonging to the Government of British Columbia, particularly when we are asked this evening to vote $1 million plus to the Department of Consumer Services, to protect the individual.

I think that this particular ad, I don't know what it would cost in The Victoria Express, but in the Province or the Sun I am sure it would be $1,500 plus to place the ad. Would I be unparliamentary, Mr. Chairman, if I called this ad a farce? Would I, Mr. Chairman, be unparliamentary if I called this ad a sham?

What I would like to know is what action our Minister of Consumer Services is going to take against the company that placed this ad, which is, in my estimation, completely misleading, because there is no way, in Heaven's name, that everybody who buys insurance from ICBC....

HON. G.R. LEA (Minister of Highways): Honest Don!

MR. PHILLIPS: That's what they call me — satisfaction guaranteed or money gladly refunded.

There's no way that even the Premier could run a business with 1,200 or over 1 million bosses. He had trouble doing it with 17.

HON. MR. BARRETT: I've been married for 19 years, partner. I know how to take orders.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, you know, Mr. Premier, you may know how to take orders, but you sure as the devil haven't learned how to obey them.

HON. MR. BARRETT: You'd better check with my wife.

MR. PHILLIPS: You know, you're not like the Egg Marketing Board. They know how to obey orders, but you haven't learned like they have. But really, I'm sincere about this. What is the Minister of Consumer Services going to do on behalf of those persons who have had accidents since ICBC came into operation? They have had to pay a surcharge at body shops.

Mr. Chairman, is this a rip-off on behalf of the body shops who are supposed to have joined the plan? Has the Minister of Consumer Services received any letters from people?

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: Not one. Well, maybe the Minister of Consumer Services isn't effective in her job. Maybe the people of British Columbia have no faith in her.

Oh, but they have complaints. You want to hear them when they have to pay $250 to ICBC.

Mr. Chairman, this type of misleading advertising must cease. If this were an individual company — one of those rip-off automobile companies or insurance companies or mining companies that David Lewis is always talking about — it would hit the fan!

HON. MR. BARRETT: Watch your language!

MR. PHILLIPS: It's time the people of British Columbia realized how their dollars are being spent on misleading advertising by a Crown corporation.

Interjections.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, through you to the Minister, the Minister must be impartial.

[ Page 1339 ]

AN HON. MEMBER: Or appear to be.

MR. PHILLIPS: Or appear to be. Justice must be done, or appear to be done.

You know, in view of some of the statements that the Minister has made since becoming Minister of Consumer Services, it is going to be difficult for her to be impartial. On several occasions during a recent debate she has taken her place in this chamber to protect Ministers of the cabinet. I heard her protect the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Stupich).

HON. MR. BARRETT: Shame!

MR. PHILLIPS: She was trying to protect — she doesn't know the difference between cutting out the legs and protecting. She rose to protect the Attorney-General.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Shame!

MR. PHILLIPS: I'm not sure whether she rose to protect the Premier when he was under fire or not, but I'm sure she would have, had she been given the opportunity.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Shame!

MR. PHILLIPS: If she is going to be effective, Mr. Chairman, she must be impartial, because basically she is sort of like a semi-ombudsman.

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, she's got to be, Mr. Chairman, because the government is going into business. Mr. Chairman, the government's in the lumber business.

Suppose one of these lumber magnates that the government owns and operates rips off somebody in the retail business selling them lumber. If they go to the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer) with a complaint that they feel they have been ripped off by this Crown corporation selling two-by-fours, is the Minister of Consumer Services going to be completely independent? I have my doubts, Mr. Chairman — I have my doubts.

If somebody has a complaint with ICBC and they go to the Minister of Consumer Services, is she going to be completely independent? That's the question we have to ask ourselves, Mr. Chairman, when we're discussing a $1 million-plus budget for the Minister of Consumer Services.

Interjections.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, the total budget is $1 million-plus. That's a lot of money. Suppose that somebody feels that they have not been properly done by the British Columbia Railway. The freight rates haven't been properly done....

HON. MR. BARRETT: Order.

MR. PHILLIPS: I'm glad you remind everybody in the chamber that I'm in order, Mr. Premier. Certainly I'm in order.

Suppose that some lumber company feels that their freight rates are not properly done by British Columbia Railway and they go to the Minister of Consumer Services. Is she going to be completely and totally independent?

HON. MR. BARRETT: Come on out — I'll explain it to you in the hall.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, as I said before she's got to be an ombudslady.

Suppose that somebody feels they're being ripped off or they have a complaint against B.C. Hydro, Mr. Chairman, and they go to the Minister of Consumer Services with their complaint.

MR. G.H. ANDERSON: Or the Ford Motor Company.

MR. PHILLIPS: Or the Ford Motor Company — that's right — or Chrysler Corporation. Is the Minister of Consumer Services going to be completely and totally independent? Is she going to be independent of the cabinet? Is she going to be independent of the Premier, who is the president of the British Columbia Railway? Is she going to be totally and completely independent of the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer), who is a director of B.C. Hydro? Is she going to be totally and completely independent of the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Macdonald), who is in charge of energy?

HON. MR. BARRETT: She'll be totally independent of the opposition.

MR. PHILLIPS: Certainly she's going to be totally and completely independent of the opposition — absolutely.

HON. MR. BARRETT: You're all mixed up.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, that's possibly true. However, these are the questions that the people of British Columbia are going to ask me as a legislator when I go back into the great beyond away from this fantasy land of the Legislature. They are going to ask me these questions. I want to know the answers.

HON. MR. BARRETT: And you be fair with your

[ Page 1340 ]

answers.

MR. PHILLIPS: Certainly I'll be fair with my answers. But here we have the Attorney-General in charge of energy, and he's going to increase the rates for natural gas in the Interior. Mr. Chairman, I understand that these rates are going to increase for natural gas in the Interior by some 30 per cent.

Mr. Chairman, is this a rip-off? Are consumers going to get fair treatment from that lady Minister of Consumer Services? She stood in the Legislature the other day and said what a great man the Attorney-General was and he's in charge of energy.

I feel, Mr. Chairman, that the Minister of Consumer Services is wrapped up in the cabinet. She's wrapped up in the cabinet and she won't be independent.

HON. MR. BARRETT: You've been in the wrong boat all the time.

MR. PHILLIPS: How can she be independent? Her Deputy says that consumer protectors have lost their zing. That is the attitude of her Deputy Minister. If her Deputy considers that consumer affairs branches have lost their zing, well, is he going to put some zing back into the Minister of Consumer Services? What bothers me is — and I've said this before in this Legislature — that we must not have any built-in biases in the Minister or in the department. They must be completely, totally, absolutely independent of everybody in the cabinet and they must have no built-in biases against any particular product, any particular company, any particular branch of retail trade or wholesale trade, or those in the finance business. They must look at things without any bias — automotive dealers, you name it, yes sir. "Buy from us and your money gladly refunded if not completely and totally satisfied."

Well, it's too bad that the Minister of ICBC wasn't in here when I was talking about the ad that he placed that said I was the boss.

I don't want to read this entire article, Mr. Chairman, but it's from the Victoria Colonist, dated March 25, 1973. It's datelined Toronto, Canadian Press, and it says:

"'Canadian consumers are not adequately served or protected by government agencies, and have no real power or budgets,' a specialist in consumer affairs and in consumer law, William Neilson, Toronto law professor said. 'Consumer protection departments have never been encouraged or allowed to challenge big business interests that are so frequently behind unfair market practices.'"

Mr. Chairman, does this man have a built-in bias? He goes on to say,

"Neilson specifically mentioned magazine subscription rackets."

Was that what I was confronted with tonight?

AN HON. MEMBER: Point of order. Point of order.

MR. PHILLIPS: I'm not attacking the Deputy. No, no, Mr. Chairman. Far from attacking the Deputy.... Oh, Mr. Chairman, I'm trying to make a point, and the point is, and I've said it in this Legislature before....

HON. MR. BARRETT: Take your hat off and make a point.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, I've given the cabinet advice in the past; some of it they've taken, some they haven't. I hope tonight they will take my advice, because it's there that Neilson specifically mentioned magazine subscription rackets. Car dealers....

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh! (Laughter.)

Interjections.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, if I may be allowed to continue. It says "...car dealers with fine print contracts that are unfair to the consumer."

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. PHILLIPS: I want to mention just for a moment something about the automobile industry. And I want to say that I feel quite strongly about this because a few years ago, several years ago, I feel that the manufacturers of North American automobiles were not doing justice by the consumer, and there were complaints. The warranties weren't up to what they should be, and I voiced this very strongly in Oakville when I was a member of the dealer council.

But the independent industry recognized their problems. They didn't need any prodding from consumer affairs branches, either in Ottawa or Washington. So what did they do?

One company in particular — and I don't want to mention any names, because I might be considered to have a little bias — were on television, and they said, "If you have a problem or are unsatisfied, write us a letter," and they got thousands of letters. Yes, they did.

Mr. Chairman, they paid attention to those letters because they weren't the government. They were an independent business organization that relied on the consumer in North America for all of their business.

Interjection.

[ Page 1341 ]

MR. PHILLIPS: They had no protection...no, I'll talk to you about Ralph Nader. I can talk to you for half an hour on Ralph Nader, Mr. Chairman. Yes, you'd better believe it.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Go outside and tell them.

MR. PHILLIPS: These were what Mr. Lewis calls "one of the rip-off artists in North America." They, through their own consumer branches, answered those letters, listened to the people of North America and, indeed, paid attention to the recommendations that were given to them. Today, without government interference...

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: ...Mr. Chairman, without government regulations...

HON. MR. BARRETT: Firenza. Let's be Firenza.

MR. PHILLIPS: ...they've brought into North America new automobiles that are better built with more value for their money to the consumer. They didn't need....

AN HON. MEMBER: Firenza. Firenza.

MR. PHILLIPS: Oh, there's nothing wrong with the Firenza, I'm telling you. And now, Mr. Chairman, the Premier's brought up the Firenza. I could tell you a story about the Firenza.

HON. MR. BARRETT: Okay, do it please.

MR. PHILLIPS: It was the inability of General Motors to recognize a problem when it came up on the horizon, to solve that problem, because the Firenza is a good car.

HON. MR. BARRETT: But the wheels wouldn't go around.

MR. PHILLIPS: There's nothing wrong with the Firenza. The fact is that where the Firenza was built there were labourers in that particular factory who were bound and determined to sabotage that car. I'm telling you today, you could buy a Firenza and if you've got one that's had these kinks taken out of it.... Don't tell me! I'll tell you.

HON. MR. BARRETT: You've made your point; get on with it.

MR. PHILLIPS: Well, I'll go on to the next one then. Mr. Chairman, the question I'm asking is: how far do we have to go with government regulations into the retail business, into the manufacturing business? Here we get a company that is owned by the government which, so far as I am concerned, has been misleading the people of this province.

If this ad or an ad similar to this had been put in the paper by one of the car manufacturers or one of the food distributors, there would have been an uproar in this government. But a government institution puts this misleading advertising in the papers. That's why I'm asking the Minister of Consumer Affairs: is she going to be totally and completely independent?

MR. CHABOT: No.

MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, so far as I am concerned, the taxpayers of the Province of British Columbia are consumers, and the taxpayers of British Columbia, Mr. Chairman, when they pay their taxes to this government, are paying them to receive certain services.

Mr. Chairman, the taxes in British Columbia are increasing this year, regardless of whether the Premier tries to tell us that they are or not. The taxes in the Province of British Columbia are going to increase on the provincial level, they are going to increase on the municipal level, and they are going to increase on the federal level.

MR. G.H. ANDERSON: Gloom and doom.

MR. PHILLIPS: When the people in Canada or in this province or in the municipalities pay their taxes, they are actually purchasing from this government a service. My question to the Minister of Consumer Services is: if they are dissatisfied with the service they purchase from the provincial government, and they go to the Minister of Consumer Services, are they going to indeed receive justice?

Are they going to receive justice, or is this million-plus dollars that we are asked as legislators to vote to her department going to do them a million-plus dollars worth of good? What protection, what service, are they going to receive for this amount of money?

I'd like to ask the Minister, except she's left the House.... I can see that she has to leave the House once in a while, but I have some specific questions. Maybe her Deputy could make a note of them.

How many complaints has the Minister of Consumer Services received since assuming her Minister Without Portfolio position approximately 10 months ago? How many complaints has she received from consumers in the Province of British Columbia?

What positive steps has this Minister of Consumer Services taken to improve the position of the consumer in British Columbia? Has she gone to any

[ Page 1342 ]

specific company, any specific manufacturer, any specific retailer? Has she gone to them and improved the service in companies — and how many? What positive steps has this lady Minister taken? How many of the complaints, Mr. Chairman, that this lady Minister has received have resulted in positive convictions or rectifications of the complaints?

How many convictions to consumers — or as she mentioned, unorthodox businessmen in this province — how many of them have resulted in convictions in the province? In other words, what I'm really trying to determine, Mr. Chairman, is what really this Minister has accomplished since becoming a Minister.

Interjection.

MR. PHILLIPS: There are in British Columbia many items for which we do not have marketing boards. Does she intend to set up marketing boards for the remainder of agricultural products in the province?

We have marketing boards for milk. We have marketing boards for eggs. We have marketing boards for fruit. But the rest of the agricultural products in British Columbia that do not have marketing boards to represent them — does she intend to bring in such marketing boards?

Has the Minister of Consumer Services indeed made representation to cabinet to have the 5 per cent sales tax taken off building materials? We are in British Columbia today facing a tremendous housing crisis. We are facing a tremendous shortage of rental accommodation. Much of which is brought about by several factors, one of which is the high cost plus the 5 per cent sales tax on building materials. Has the Minister of Consumer Services made representation to the Minister of Finance? Has, indeed, the new Minister of Consumer Services made representation to Ottawa and to their Minister of Finance to have the sales tax removed from building materials?

HON. MR. BARRETT: Why don't you talk to your Whip?

MR. PHILLIPS: My Whip? What has my Whip got to do with the sales tax on building materials?

AN HON. MEMBER: He has a message for you.

MR. PHILLIPS: Oh, well, he's going to tell me that, indeed, the Minister of Consumer Services has made representation. Because I don't know whether she'll answer it before....

HON. MR. BARRETT: When she makes a representation, she'll pick the right person.

MR. PHILLIPS: Have you gone to Ottawa? Now you have in your vote travelling expenses of $7,000. Mr. Chairman, through you, to the Minister: if she has not used any portion of that $7,000 to go to Ottawa, I would suggest that the Minister of Consumer Services go to Ottawa. Make a trip tomorrow; the crisis is here and now.

We have a bill on the books, which we're going to talk about, that outlines the crisis we have in rental accommodation in British Columbia. It's a crisis.

Will the Minister go to Ottawa? Will she go to the cabinet? Will she have these punitive taxes removed from building materials so that the Province of British Columbia and the people in it can go on and build their own houses, build their own rental accommodation — get us out of the problems we're having?

Mr. Chairman, I have posed a few questions to the Minister of Consumer Services, and I know that being the conscientious Minister that she is, she has listened intently to the questions I have posed. I know when I take my place in this Legislature, fighting for the taxpayers of British Columbia, I know that being the conscientious lady she is, she's going to stand up in her place as a Minister of the Crown and she's going to give me some positive replies to the questions I posed here this evening on behalf of all the people of British Columbia.

I know that because, indeed, this lady Minister is conscientious. I know she wants to do a good job, and I know she has good health. I know she will do a good job, providing she listens to the Member for South Peace River.

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Chairman, there aren't too many minutes left until the House has reached the hour in which we customarily adjourn, but in the short time I left I do want to ask a few questions of the Minister of consumer affairs.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's services.

MR. CHABOT: That's right, she prefers Consumer Services.

In November, shortly after she became a Minister, she was interviewed and did quite a job in public relations in portraying herself as of the simple world, one who eats simple foods as well, because it said that her lifestyle was simple, she eats bacon and beans and that she does on very rare occasions splurge for a luxury like a tin of crabs or shrimps. Well, I don't know, I've come to the conclusion myself that bacon is high in calories, and so are beans. So, I refrain from eating those foods because they're not really the type of nutrition that a Minister of Consumer Services should be eating.

There are a few points that I want to make to the Minister of Consumer Services. One that keeps

[ Page 1343 ]

haunting me is the statement made by a man who has been a Member of this House for 20 years and has been a Minister of the Crown for 18 months, ineffective as he has been.

As a Minister of the Crown he stood in this House and suggested that the lumber operators of this province, because of the fact they were charging on the domestic level the same prices for lumber as have been charged on the international level, they were criminally irresponsible.

I want to ask you, Madam Minister, tonight to stand up in your place and say whether you support that Minister or not. We have the Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources and condominiums (Hon. R.A. Williams) over there who has seen fit not only to wheel and deal in condominiums, but to get involved in the purchase of sawmills within British Columbia.

He has an opportunity.... Well, there's the Premier and he says, "I have a phone call from Senator Lawson."

Now, I want to say this about that remark, Mr. Chairman: I stood in court on my integrity. At no time has my integrity, my honesty, ever been challenged in any court of this land. At no time! Certainly I have been found guilty of slander in the court, but my integrity has never been challenged such as has been this Minister of the Crown, and the Speaker of this House, because the chief justice of the Supreme Court of British Columbia stated that the Speaker of this House believes in smears and innuendoes, and the Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! Order!

MR. CHABOT: Just one moment, Mr. Chairman, just one moment...that the Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources simply does not tell the truth. In other words, he's a dishonest man. That's what they say about him. At no time have I ever been accused of that in any court of this land, I'll tell you that right now.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! There is a Member making a point of order.

HON. W.L. HARTLEY (Minister of Public Works): Mr. Chairman, no Minister of this House has been found guilty of anything before the courts as to what's been said in this House. The Member must withdraw. He must withdraw that statement.

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Chairman, that's not a point of order.

HON. MR. HARTLEY: Certainly it is. He cannot make a charge; he's just a wildman shooting off at the lip. A typical blabbermouth.

AN HON. MEMBER: Better withdraw that.

HON. MR. HARTLEY: You withdraw. Last year he was making wild statements about the Glenshiel and he's not getting away with this. He's going to withdraw or he'll sit down.

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Chairman, will you stop that foggy, irresponsible Minister from making those vague and insignificant accusations?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please!

HON. MR. HARTLEY: Withdraw!

MR. CHABOT: I wouldn't withdraw anything from that two-bit Minister, I'll tell you that right now.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! I'm going to ask the Member for Columbia River to withdraw the last statement he made.

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Chairman, prior to withdrawing that statement, I want to tell you to have that Minister withdraw what he's had to say about me. I want to tell you that right now.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order!

MR. CHABOT: You better be fair to both sides, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order!

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Chairman, you better be fair to both sides.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! I want you both to take your seats.

MR. CHABOT: Thank you very much.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! First of all, the Member who was on his feet made some criticism of the Chair, that the Chair was not being fair to both sides. I want that statement withdrawn first of all.

MR. CHABOT: MR. Chairman, I'll gladly withdraw the statement if you'll have the Minister withdraw the statements he's made about me. Because, Mr. Chairman....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! Order! If you want to

[ Page 1344 ]

raise a point of order on some statement the Minister made....

MR. CHABOT: A point of order....

MR. CHAIRMAN: I've got one other one I want to deal with in your case, and I don't think that one is dependent on the other.

MR. CHABOT: On your point of order, Mr. Chairman, I want to relate to you the sequence of events here tonight. The sequence of events are: you suggested that I withdraw a statement....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! You made one statement about "a two-bit Minister" which I think you should withdraw. If you want to make a point of order about something someone else said, then you do that, but....

MR. CHABOT: You've asked me to withdraw.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I've asked you to withdraw.

MR. CHABOT: You were listening previously to my statement about the Minister being a two-bit Minister....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Will you withdraw that statement?

MR. CHABOT: Just one moment, Mr. Chairman!

MR. CHAIRMAN: I want to remind you that it is not your place to argue....

MR. CHABOT: Mr. Chairman, I'll withdraw it, providing the Minister withdraws his statements he made about me. You make that Minister withdraw and I'll withdraw my statement.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order! You've withdrawn your statement and I will ask the Minister of Public Works (Hon. Mr. Hartley) to withdraw the statements that he made as well. There are no conditions attached to either one. I'm asking the Minister of Public Works also to withdraw his statements.

HON. MR. HARTLEY: I would be pleased to withdraw, but my friend hasn't withdrawn unconditionally.

MR. GARDOM: Point of order. I draw your attention to standing order 3.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Speaker, my attention has been drawn to the clock. The committee reports progress and asks leave to sit again.

Leave granted.

Hon. Mr. Barrett moves adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 11:02 p.m.