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CONTENTS

Routine proceedings

Throne speech debate

Mr. Schroeder — 165

Hon. Mr. Lauk — 167

Hon. Mr. Nicolson — 170

Mr. McClelland — 174

Mr. Gibson — 182

Appendix — 188

The House met at 8:30 p.m.

Orders of the day.

SPEECH FROM THE THRONE
(continued debate)

MR. H.W. SCHROEDER (Chilliwack): When we stopped for the break, Mr. Speaker, I was just complimenting the Minister of Education (Hon. Mrs. Dailly) for the fact that she was long on idealism. It seems to me I remember saying, just as she was interrupting me, that it was a good thing she was idealistic because without idealism society would be stagnant. So it's a welcome asset.

Nonetheless, I had to follow up that statement by saying idealism, in itself, seldom brings a satisfactory answer; there must be decision, there must be action and, indeed, there must be continuity. If you embark on a project and abandon it before you even reach the conclusion of phase one, you frustrate not just yourself, not just those in your department, but you frustrate those with whom you must work in society.

I would have to reiterate that if there was a shortcoming of the Minister in working with the school districts, particularly as it pertains to budgeting, it would have to be this: promising three years of continuity in one programme, five years of continuity in another programme, and cutting both programmes short at the conclusion of the first year. The three-year programme was the one in which she guaranteed that we would be reducing the student average, 1.5 each year for a period of three years for a total of 4.5 reduction to a level of 17. That programme has been abandoned after one year.

The second programme upon which we embarked was the reduction of taxation on property for education purposes, which was given a five-year lifespan, over which period property taxes for education purposes were to be removed altogether.

Let's take a look to see what happened. A $30 reduction was offered in the first year. It came very much like a homeowner's grant — you could deduct it from your cheque when you made out your tax cheque. However, this year, in my constituency, because of an abandonment of a programme somewhere down the road and a programme already in progress, the mill rate is going to increase in my constituency by 10 mills. This means that there is a variable as to the amount of extra taxation that is going to be paid, but all for education purposes, depending on whether or not your assessment is high or low. Let's take an assessment on my own home, which is assessed at $17,000, a 10-mill increase for education purposes. I haven't confirmed this, but it looks like my tax increase could be as high as $170. It could be.

This is the result of the kind of a programme which begins well, begins on an idealistic basis, falls into hard times in its very first year, and is thrown back, and subjects us to a taxation heavier than the one we originated with. Why? It seems to me it is because we're long on idealism, short on continuity, and have not enough regard for projected costs.

All of this has happened after one of British Columbia's best years. As a matter of fact, I listened to the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Hall) say: "B.C. has never been in better shape." Ha! Ha! Ha! I want you to know, Mr. Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Macdonald), through you, Mr. Speaker, that's pretty tough to swallow out on the flood plains.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SCHROEDER: That's pretty tough to swallow! We had a $30 reduction and then a $120 increase, or a $170 increase, depending on what your assessment is. It is a pretty tough pill to swallow.

The next area I want to ask about is: what is the new role of the research and development department? It was in December that Hon. Mrs. Dailly, the Minister of Education, it says here, released this news clip:

"The R&D, as it is known, will concentrate on functional literacy, the right to education, and equality of education opportunity. In announcing the completion of the organization of the new section, Mrs. Dailly said: 'We want to examine the strengths of the school system as well as the weaknesses. Local school boards will be invited, but not obliged, to join research and development programmes.' "

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): Mumbo jumbo!

MR. SCHROEDER: It's under the caption: "R&D is ready to go." That was on December 10.

Now we're on January 21...

AN HON. MEMBER: Sounds like the Member for Dewdney (Mr. Rolston).

MR. SCHROEDER: ...and the entire R&D programme collapses with the firing of the director.

AN HON. MEMBER: He wasn't fired.

MR. SCHROEDER: What do you mean, he wasn't fired? Mr. Speaker, it says right here: "Mrs. Dailly said he had no tenure with her department and his firing was a routine Public Service Commission matter." He was fired, make no mistake about it. He was fired.

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But I want you to know, Mr. Speaker, the foresight, the continuity which I've been talking about tonight, that went into this decision, because the night before Mr. Knight learned of his firing, he had a special assignment.

HON. R.M. STRACHAN (Minister of Transport and Communications): He was on approval and he didn't shape up.

MR. D.M. PHILLIPS (South Peace River): Who are you, the Minister of defence?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

Interjections.

MR. D.T. KELLY (Omineca): Have you ever been on probation?

MR. SCHROEDER: The answer is no.

MR. PHILLIPS: The whole crew over there is on probation.

Interjections.

MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for putting the House in order.

The day before he was informed that his services were no longer required — can I put it in that language — Mr. Knight was asked by Mr. Fleming to work with the Washington state education officials to organize an international conference on education, scheduled for the fall. The day before — and they all sat in the room. Everyone knew he was going to get the sack the next day; they knew — and what happened? According to Mr. Knight, at least, they sat and smiled while the assignment was given.

I want you to know, Mr. Speaker, that this department is long on idealism but short on continuity.

What is going to be the new rule — the new rule of the research and development department? It seems to me that when Mr. Bremer came — bless his heart, wherever he is — this entire business of research was going to get a facelift. We were going to get a new look at education. We were now ready for a change because we had the right government.

The minute research and development began to take shape — collapse, no continuity. Along comes Mr. Knight. He heads up the research and development department, and he does what he is asked to do — supposedly not too much because the minute he got involved, he was released.

Now I understand that we are going to go into the new phase, phase three of research and development, and it's simply this — here it is — Mr. Fleming's statement:

"The purpose of this research and development department is to develop the necessary research and development capability in order that the department can respond effectively and efficiently to the government's wish to have a number of major areas of the education system in this province analyzed."

Some more research; some more studies. But the minute any directive comes out, any suggestion comes out of the research development, we hear things like: "They talk too much and don't listen enough." I wonder what's going to be the new rule of the research and development department.

MR. PHILLIPS: Just get the strap out.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Does the Hon. Member want this chorus or do you want me to stop it?

MR. SCHROEDER: As long as it's in harmony, Sir, it's all right. (Laughter.)

HON. MR. STRACHAN: It sounds better than the speech you're making.

MR. SCHROEDER: I notice, as I look at the 6 1/2 lines devoted to education in the throne speech, that if you put them together the way they're supposed to be...Take a look again; there are about 6 1/2 lines of actual material there — the rest of it's in the margin.

I don't see any suggestion here that we can better education by training teachers how to teach. I think that good teachers are more than the lowest possible number of students in a classroom: good teaching is more than an adequate salary; good teaching is more than facilities; and good teaching is more than just a set of ideals.

But you have to know how to teach. I think the kind of a person who is going to do a good job in the classroom as a teacher is one in whom we are going to have to instil some confidence in their own abilities. We are going to have to impart some leadership to that person in the classroom. We are going to have to encourage creativity. We are going to have to establish a dignity of profession, which used to be there. It used to be there. When the teacher walked the streets of his little town or his big city....

MRS. P.J. JORDAN (North Okanagan): Hers.

MR. SCHROEDER: Hers. Yes, ma'am. They held their shoulders back and held their heads high because they were a profession. They were equal with the lawyers and they were equal with the doctors and

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they were equal with the ministers of the area. They were a profession. I think we need to re-establish this dignity again. More than that, they've got to be given not only the responsibility of the classroom but they've got to be given the authority in that classroom to carry out that responsibility. Without that, the result is frustration.

I think the teachers need to be heard when they say what this government has been saying for a long time: "Trust us. Why can't you trust us? Why do you put us into a classroom and impose a whole lot of restrictions on us? After all, we are the ones who have listened to you as you have taught us how to teach. Why don't you let us be in our classrooms and let us be the teachers? Trust us in the classroom."

I also notice no reference to local autonomy. This party, for one, stands strong on a policy of local autonomy. We believe that local autonomy should be exercised in regards to curriculum. It should be exercised as regards innovation; it should be exercised as regards staff; it should be exercised as regards tenure.

What I've just said about teachers can also be said about trustees. Why not make their job a worthwhile job? Give them the responsibility of their job and then give them the authority to carry out their responsibility. Why water it down by a centralist concept, the kind that we are getting under this government?

MR. P.C. ROLSTON (Dewdney): Be more specific.

MR. SCHROEDER: I can be very specific when it comes to Dewdney, very specific. I was just with your crew over there on Saturday night. I don't think you would want me to be that specific.

I see no mention in the Speech from the Throne with reference to standards or competition. I can feel with the child who came to her teacher just this past week and said "How do I know if I am doing well?" With the absence of grading, with only pass or failure, the student feels the same frustration that any person would feel in any society if they don't really know how well they're doing. I hail the return of standards; I hail the return of competition, both in the classroom and outside the classroom. I think that the sooner we have it the better. Without this competition, without the standards, they don't know until too late.

By the way, Mr. Speaker, I'm not saying, as I'm saying these words, that this administration is to blame for what I'm talking about. I'm just saying that the problem exists and that we should be doing something about it. Those who were in power before us need to take as much blame as the ones seated in the places of responsibility now.

Forty per cent of students failed a simple examination at UBC, and why? It was unnecessary. It wasn't that the exam was difficult, Mr. Premier; it wasn't that they didn't have time to prepare. It was that all during those last years of their preparation competition was waning. They didn't have the standards that they needed to know: "Are we doing well or are we not doing well?" I'm with the lady who says: "Let's bring back the standards into our classroom."

If this department has one asset, it has to be that they are long on idealism. If they have one liability, it has to be that they are short on continuity.

HON. D. BARRETT (Premier): How do you spell it?

MR. SCHROEDER: Continuity?

AN HON. MEMBER: B-R-A-I-N-S. (Laughter.)

MR. SCHROEDER: As we have observed the progress, or lack of progress, in this department over the past six or eight months particularly, I think it would be safe to say that the Minister has had to have been an embarrassment to her department. Very certainly she has been an embarrassment to her own government. Now, on an increasing basis, apparently she is an embarrassment to her own party. Some of them applaud, as reported yesterday, the demands for her release.

I personally like the Minister. We disagree philosophically, and that's understandable. But please, please, Mr. Speaker, don't make her subject herself to an expanding barrage of public criticism when she has been victimized by her own indecision. Give her some relief.

Interjections.

HON. G.V. LAUK (Minister of Economic Development): I didn't get that reaction in caucus today.

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased not only to receive such a welcome from all sides of the House, which I might say is well-deserved.... (Laughter.) But I'm very pleased to take my place in the throne speech debate.

MR. PHILLIPS: Hark! What tale is this we hear? (Laughter.)

HON. MR. LAUK: That's what we get, Mr. Speaker, when we have longer than usual supper hours. The Member for South Peace River gets a little frisky. He's eating his own steak tartar. But, as I say, Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to take my place in this debate, and congratulate the Lieutenant-Governor on a very fine throne speech. Now there are some cynics in this House who may

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consider that speech a partisan speech.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: No, no.

HON. MR. LAUK: But that speech, Mr. Speaker, demonstrated clearly, by stating the simple facts, the tremendous record of this little government in a short period of time.

MR. PHILLIPS: No wonder you're blushing.

HON. MR. LAUK: I'm blushing because I'm embarrassed for you, Mr. Member. (Laughter.)

I would like to speak longer on the speech itself, Mr. Speaker, but I wish to raise what I consider a very important issue that's facing all British Columbians today. That is the issue of women's rights.

MS. R. BROWN (Vancouver-Burrard): Yea! (Laughter.)

HON. MR. LAUK: There are many women's rights groups in this province and across the country that are arguing that they have a just cause and that there is inequality between the sexes and, in particular, between the sexes in the institutions of society: the economy, the political structure, our schools and hospitals.

Interjection.

HON. MR. LAUK: When all the snide remarks and all the little jokes and the nervous giggles are over, Mr. Speaker, there is a basic issue in this province that is not to be laughed at. It is a reality that we all have to face, but it is only the immature among we men who think it's funny, who crack the snide little sexist jokes and try to waive off a very tremendous injustice to half the population of this province.

Interjection.

HON. MR. LAUK: I don't consider it funny and I don't consider it to be a matter joked about all the time. I like a good joke as well as you do, Mr. Member, but, you know, there is a time when we all have to face the facts and realize that as mature people we have to cope with a situation and try and solve the problem.

It is not that women wish to become men. They wish to become human beings with equal opportunity. I suggest to you that the women's liberation movement will not go away. I suggest to you that its cause, in large measure, is just, and that it will inevitably be successful. The concept that women are not as capable as men is mediaeval. Their relegation by society to a subservient role is feudal. If a woman chooses to enter business, law, medicine, or as a homemaker, or a nurse, or a plumber or a carpenter, she should have, in the clearest possible terms, equal opportunity with men. I think we can all start from the common ground that discrimination against women, denying or limiting as it does their equality of rights with men, is fundamentally unjust and constitutes an offence against human dignity.

When women try to put this principle into practice and push for equal pay for equal work, equal opportunities for promotion, a place in the power structure of institutions in society, their demands are met with disbelief, resistance, and sometimes outright rejection. Because of this attitude, we have to work towards creating a new climate within which to plan for the economic status of the women of this province.

Traditionally, British Columbia is a province where men filled the pioneering jobs in mining, logging, transportation and construction, while women had a much more limited participation in the labour force, taking the primary responsibility for the household. Whatever we have come to believe about role differences and role differentiation, these beliefs, I suggest to you, are no longer functional in the light of present social and economic change.

Much of the recent tension regarding sex roles arises from the laggardly adjustment of law, customs and institutions to these changes. This role of women in the family has been viewed as a role of consumption rather than productivity. In a society where money determines value, homemakers are a group who work outside the money economy. This assumption about the role of women in our culture relegates them to low-paying jobs, both full- and part-time, an absence from almost all power structures, and therefore an inability in planning their economic future and their quality of life in this province.

It also discourages women from investing in higher education or advanced training. It leads to discrepancies in pension plans, mortgage and credit availability and financial protection. It throws most of the responsibility for raising and socializing children on the woman rather than on the total family.

Above all, this assumption about the role of women in our society discourages women from thinking in terms of their own economic security and planning for their economic future on the basis of their own rights and their own ability.

There are many women's groups throughout the province working to change the picture. Change is also taking place through both the development of educational material on women and by the increasing involvement of women in the political process. It is now up to all institutions, both in the government and the private sector, to meet this challenge.

I'm not suggesting for a moment, Mr. Speaker, that there are not exceptions to the rule. There are a

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great many. There are the distinguished Members of this Legislative Assembly: the Member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan); the Member for Vancouver-Burrard (Ms. Brown); the Member for Vancouver South (Mrs. Webster); the distinguished Minister of Consumer Services (Hon. Ms. Young). But these are exceptions to the rule.

AN HON. MEMBER: You forgot Comox.

HON. MR. LAUK: The Member for Comox (Ms. Sanford) — have I left anybody out? — and the Minister of Education (Hon. Mrs. Dailly). These are distinguished exceptions to the rule. There always can be exceptions, but that is no answer to the argument.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

HON. MR. LAUK: I think we can all agree that there is not equal opportunity. That these people have achieved success politically and other women have achieved success in medicine and in law and in the economy is because they are very exceptional people and they had to be twice as good as the men in those fields to overcome the roadblocks that are put up for them because of their sex.

Now all this is leading me to this announcement: that we have instituted in the Department of Economic Development a new branch, the women's economic rights branch. The director is Eileen Caner.

Let me tell you a little story — an interesting story. When I took this portfolio I interviewed a great many people in the department — all of them, as a matter of fact. There were only about 14 professionals. One of them was a person with a great many years of service in British Columbia public service. Her background in education and in private industry, with universities and so on, was a most impressive background. But this lady was in a corner someplace, at the lowest level, as a research assistant and with no opportunity for advancement. She was passed over year after year.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Who did that?

HON. MR. LAUK: I guess the predecessor of my predecessor.

MR. D.A. ANDERSON (Victoria): Mr. Speaker, his predecessor was the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Macdonald).

HON. MR. BARRETT: He said the predecessor of his predecessor. Open your ears. Listen.

HON. MR. LAUK: The Second Member for Victoria is wrong again, and this is because we do leave too much time between our afternoon break and the evening session for the Member to go to the Union Club...

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, Oh!

HON. MR. LAUK: ...and eat too many wheat cakes and it plugs up his ears.

In any event, the research assistant whom I interviewed had very many interesting concepts and ideas. She had obviously been passed over time after time again, and I don't think we should examine who or why, or why the previous administration had this very mediaeval attitude. But this person was soon appointed director of economic analysis and planning within the department, with her own staff. She's done good work for us, and I've asked her to be director of this new branch, and she has accepted it enthusiastically, and by large measure the design and the mandate of the branch is from her own research and on her own suggestion.

The mandate of this branch, Mr. Speaker, will be to examine, plan and recommend on all issues affecting the economic rights, economic development and socio-economic status of women in the province. The branch will report directly to the Deputy Minister and will work under his direction.

The branch will be headed by Mrs. Eileen Caner, as I said earlier, a regular career public servant. Mrs. Caner worked formerly as a research officer, trade development officer and director of economic policies and is therefore completely familiar with the programme policies of the department.

The branch will be staffed by a skilled team with backgrounds in economics, statistics, sociology, commerce or related fields. All its members will have a history of involvement in or awareness of the women's movement in the province.

Its programmes: the women's economics rights branch will be offering input to all programmes and projects of the department in order to constructively suggest how these programmes and projects can be developed to offer equivalent benefits to women and men. Special emphasis will be placed on ensuring that the viewpoint of women forms an integral part in the economic development programmes and studies of the department. Women now have a base from which to influence the economic planning and the quality of life in this province. In this connection the branch will be periodically evaluating consultation procedures and will welcome suggestions for ways to improve the process.

In the business development field, the branch will receive available programmes with the small-business director to ensure the provision of support and advice for women setting up their own businesses. The department is meeting a vastly increased demand from women attempting to enter the business field.

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We are determined that information, programmes and staff will be available to meet this demand.

The branch will produce policy recommendations for the consideration of the Minister and the Deputy for extending the present series of business development and promotional programmes so that these programmes may extend equivalent benefits to women and men. Currently, our business assistance programmes are not being used by women. This means that we have to look at the areas where women are currently entering the business world and extend our programmes to meet the needs in those areas.

In addition the branch, in response to consistent demand from women's groups, will co-ordinate a continuously updated profile of women in British Columbia to produce facts and figures on all aspects of women's life in the British Columbia economy. This will provide women's groups and institutions working for the change that I menttioned the material they need for policy proposals.

There has been insistent demand from many groups in the province to examine the credit and mortgage picture for women in British Columbia. The branch will also provide a contact point to the administrative structure of the department for all women's groups involved with economic development. The necessity for this contact point has been clear for some time.

In addition to providing additional statistical data and consulting services, it will assist in conferences and workshops for women in business. I already should mention, Mr. Speaker, that through the efforts of Mrs. Caner, the British Columbia Development Corp. has included within their programme of seminars and courses throughout the province in business education special emphasis and encouragement for women to enter these courses and seminars so they can become familiar with some expertise in establishing their own business or working in the economy in some different level.

So, Mr. Speaker, we're not suggesting from this department that this is going to be the total answer to the inequality of rights between men and women, but it is our little modest start — a first start — and we hope that with some research and some experience over the next several months and years it will be able to provide some information to the women of this province and to the men to establish clearly what the inequalities are so that we can all work together to try and eliminate those inequalities and try and bring about some equal opportunity.

It is not, as I say, important to solve the problem overnight — we can't do it. But in this modest way we hope that it will be a sufficient start to encourage some women to enter the business community, take their proper place in the boardrooms of the nation, become leaders of national parties...

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Follow the leader of the Conservatives.

HON. MR. LAUK: ...and run for the nomination in the opposition. I have a feeling, Mr. Speaker, that if there were more women in the opposition they would have a much more reasonable approach to legislation that comes in this House, and be much more effective as an opposition.

In all seriousness, Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that I think the jokes have to come to a stop once in a while. I think that the little snide remarks do have to end and we do have to work together to solve a problem for our fellow human beings. Thank you.

HON. L. NICOLSON (Minister of Housing): It is a pleasure to take my place in this debate. The style of the opposition has been that they can't attack what we've done. They can't attack the fact that we've brought splendid new programmes such as the Community Recreational Facilities Fund Act, the sewage treatment plant assistance Act, and housing programmes not just in Vancouver and Victoria but all over the province — programmes taking place in places like Fort Nelson and Fort St. John in the north Peace River, and housing being constructed. Certainly it's very evident, when one goes around an area like my riding, that there has been a great deal done.

The other day we were treated by the Doukhobor choir from Stanley Humphries Secondary School. While that high school is in the riding of the Member for Rossland-Trail (Mr. D'Arcy), many of those students come from Briems, Shoreacres, Glade, and Pass Creek in my riding. I was very proud to see that; I think it signifies something. Although some of these people, from religious conscience, do not vote, unlike the previous government we haven't ignored these people.

In fact, one of the most symbolic gestures or significant achievements was exemplified when we opened up a new bridge which will serve the community of Crescent Valley, Pass Creek, Krestova and Goose Creek. Not only was the local MLA there, but also the Minister of Public Works (Hon. Mr. Hartley) was there, the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr., King) was there, and the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Lea) was there, This is a good, safe, concrete structure, and it means an end to students having to get out of the school bus and walk across that rickety old bridge on which they would be in danger of falling through, because it was unsafe to transport students to school each day. An old wooden bridge has been replaced by a modern, reinforced-concrete structure over 132 feet in length. Mr. Speaker, that was a proud moment. It was a very proud moment for a 96-year-old lady who cut that ribbon and who had looked for that bridge almost all of her life. I held the ribbon.

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Interjection.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: No, that is Social Credit. Many people have talked about the sewage treatment plant assistance Act. Under the former legislation passed only as recently as 1971, if it were in effect, not one cent would have been received by the City of Nelson which has built a rather expensive sewage treatment plant to help enhance the environment of the Kootenay River. But under the fine bill, pioneered by the Minister of Municipal Affairs, there has been an impact and a saving to the City of Nelson of the equivalent of 1.92 mills, a total grant of $36,291.45.

Mr. Speaker, we hear quite often from the opposition about what we supposedly aren't doing for the municipalities. Well, I know that while the mayor of the City of Nelson is not ideologically a socialist, he certainly has welcomed the many moves that have been taken by my colleagues. He openly supported right from the outset the acquisition of Kootenay Forest Products. I have no doubt in my mind that if that were being run by Crestbrook, if it had been allowed to go ahead — as it surely would have if that group were in office — the sawmill would be shut down today.

Somebody over there was talking about how many people were out of work. One of my constituents was in the audience. He was so misled, Mr. Speaker, that he rushed to the telephone. He said that this can't be the case. After listening to that prophet of doom and gloom over there, he thought that everything was closed down. But he was very much reassured when he phoned back and found out that not only was the thing going but that it was going on a couple of shifts. Kootenay Forest Products is going ahead and people are earning their salaries, unlike what would have been the case if that group had been allowed to remain in power for one more year.

You know, Mr. Speaker, there were a lot of concerns in that last provincial election. One of the concerns centred around the City of Nelson power plant. The former Social Credit Minister of Lands, Forests and Water Resources, Mr. Williston, and Mr. Black the MLA, flew in one day and they laid a heavy hand on the City of Nelson. They told them that that power plant just had to go, that they had plans and they were going to put everything under B.C. Hydro. Well, Mr. Speaker, that's no longer an issue in Nelson. That power plant is still operating, and it's still providing support and still helping to supplement the needs and to provide services in the City of Nelson.

Mr. Speaker, another type of assistance which was never given by the previous government was assistance in the tune of $17,330, equivalent to about one mill in the City of Nelson and welcomed greatly.

You know that that sewage treatment plant assistance Act of the former government would only have provided a total of $215,000 of assistance in the entire province, Under our Minister's sweeping reform and legislation, we get assistance to our municipalities in this province of $5.6 million. And, Mr. Speaker, next year it's going to be a lot more.

Another concern in that area was the refusal of the old Public Utilities Commission to allow Inland Natural Gas to build a natural gas pipeline connection between Yahk and China Creek. In the report in Business in B.C., February edition, about KIDA country — that's the Kootenay Industrial Development Association — Austin Fraser says:

"In the service field, Inland Natural Gas Company is constructing a new interline between its pipeline terminus at Rossland and the Albertan Southern Gas Co. line at Yahk to serve Montrose, Fruitvale and Salmo to prevent peak shaving, and B.C. Telephone Co. plans to spend close to $1 million."

Mr. Speaker, previous to this government putting an end to the old PUC and bringing in the B.C. Energy Commission that group, through political interference, prevented the building of this pipeline, and it meant that every winter industry had to shut down. The climate for industrial expansion in the Kootenays was stifled, and sawmills, pulp mills and Cominco itself were forced to curtail production. But the economic climate is better, and many things are happening because of our provincial government's legislation and programmes.

The Department of Agriculture is in the final stages of negotiating a loan guarantee under the Farm Products Industry Improvement Act to build a new packing shed for the fruit growers in Creston: the Creston Co-op Packers Association. Swan Valley Foods has been guaranteed loans and we have a 10 per cent equity. They have a marvelous controlled-atmosphere storage facility, and we will soon be into the stage of building a processing plant that is as revolutionary as the invention of the tin can.

MR. R.H. McCLELLAND (Langley): Name names.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: The people of Nelson have been very pleased with the response of the Department of Recreation and Conservation, its Minister to my left, and its imaginative programme under the Community Recreational Facilities Fund Act. At the conclusion of the last election, there had been two election promises made of a positive nature: $25,000 to the Nelson swimming pool, and $25,000 to Creston.

Under this provincial government programme, our grant to the City of Nelson is $97,700; further grants for renovations of the curling rink, $72,681. Little organizations, such as the Nelson Rowing Club — and they recognized rowing as both a male and female

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sport, a very hard-working group — have been given encouragement for a grant which would be in the order of $3,000. The Nelson Rod and Gun Club, Creston Valley Civic Centre Association, got $80,000, Mr. Speaker, not $25,000. With no election on, the West Creston Hall got $1,000. The Boswell Hall, the Salmo Golf Club, the Salmo Tennis Club, the Salmo Swimming Pool Society, the Salmo Ski Club, in all, almost $1 million...

MR. G.B. GARDOM (Vancouver–Point Grey): Bingo!

HON. MR. NICOLSON: ...in recreational grants — money which I say is well spent, Mr. Speaker, money which is recycled and which created jobs that will create permanent jobs and will create recreational opportunities for the young people, the old people and the middle-aged people.

Very recently I had the pleasure of having the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Levi) in my riding, and we visited the Kootenay Society for the Handicapped. The Minister was very impressed with the sheltered workshop activities which were taking place there, and there will be...

MR. PHILLIPS: What about Dunill?

HON. MR. NICOLSON: ...assistance to the Kootenay Society for the Handicapped as well as to the Nelson Homemakers Society, the Nelson District Child Care Society and the Nelson Youth Activity Centre.

Mr. Speaker, they don't like to hear about these programmes. They can't attack what we're doing. They just say: "Well, what you're doing — yes, well, we would do that but we would do it differently." I'll tell you, Mr., Speaker, they'd do if differently. They would cut the recreational facilities funds back from $1 million to $50,000; that's what they would do over there.

Interjections.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Well, they ask about housing. We're building housing, provincial family housing. We have in progress 444 units, and we have planned 7,373 units.

Senior citizens' housing in progress, that is under sections 40 and 43, 1,402 units. We have in progress, between section 15 of the Elderly Citizens Housing Aid Act, 1,598 self-contained units and 524 care beds. That is in senior citizens' housing alone, Mr. Speaker, in progress, most of which is under construction all over this province, 3,524 units.

If you want a comparison of what they were doing and what we're doing.... I was at the opening of the Rainbow Lodge in Langley. I believe it was 294 units of housing provided by the Kiwanis Society...

Interjection.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: ...Lions.

Mr. Speaker, in the year 1970, the entire budget or the Elderly Citizens Housing Aid Act was $1.5 million. The grant on that one project alone was $1.5 million. In your riding, Mr. Member, it's an amount equal to your party's entire budget for the year 1970 — that's how far we have come. We increased that budget last year six fold because we think that the pioneers of this province have a priority in this province. Are you going to attack that?

I will say, Mr. Speaker, yes, Casa Loma is part of those 3,524 units.

Interjection.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Mr. Speaker, where would they have gotten the money?

Mobile home parks and subdivisions: now it's too bad the Second Member for Victoria (Mr. D.A. Anderson), the leader of the Liberal party, isn't here because I heard him muttering under his breath, at the end of the question period — and it was a good thing it was under his breath because of some of the things he said — but he was saying that Central Mortgage and Housing pays for 90 per cent of all this stuff we are doing.

Mr. Speaker, we pay one-third of the capital costs as a grant for elderly citizens' housing — one-third. They put up a mortgage that the society has to pay back. This province, and I'll touch on this later, is being discriminated against by Central Mortgage and Housing because we are doing more for senior citizens than any other province in this field of self-contained housing. If one doesn't believe that, there is a recent report which bears that out.

Mobile home parks and subdivisions: we have 199 pads in progress in a mobile home park and, in a subdivision 156, for a total of 355. Central Mortgage and Housing does not contribute one cent to those mobile home parks, and we think that Central Mortgage and Housing should find out that mobile homes are a fact of life in this province. We've recognized this under the home acquisition Act, which that group wouldn't recognize, and that is one of the reasons why the grants and the mortgages under the home acquisition Act are way up and have grown by fantastic amounts.

Mr. Speaker, we have in progress 975 par value co-ops, and they say we haven't built anything. Well then, I want you to go to the tip of Gaglardi Way and see the Norman Bethune Co-op. We're trying to do something in the way of neighbourhood improvement. Go out here and see the Rochdale cooperative which we opened a few months ago in

[ Page 173 ]

Victoria.

MR. N.R. MORRISON (Victoria): Look at the price you paid for the land.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: To the City of Victoria....

MR. MORRISON: How much?

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Are you against that — paying a fair dollar to the City of Victoria? I thought you wanted us to be.... You say that we're treating the municipalities badly. Now come on. You can't have it both ways — except you'd like to.

MR. MORRISON: So you want to give it to them that way, eh?

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Mr. Speaker....

MR. MORRISON: You give them grants.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Well, it was supported by appraised prices and you can say what you like.

MR. MORRISON: Oh, come off it.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Residential subdivisions, Mr. Speaker...

MR. McCLELLAND: Dunhill appraisals.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: ...we have 1,097 in progress. Last year, 2,320 lots were serviced. In 1974, Mr. Speaker, 2,320 lots, in just about every part of this province.

MR. PHILLIPS: Ten per cent of the requirements.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: You know, last weekend I was in Cranbrook. We opened 44 units of public housing, and this is one type of housing which nobody would be afraid to say is public housing. It is scattered all over Cranbrook. It consists of single-family, detached dwellings, fourplexes, duplexes, an eleven-unit townhouse. We have housing in Fort Nelson, family housing in Port Alberni. There are many of these examples and types of housing — Penticton and such — to which we've contributed. The programme right now consists of 6,377 involvements in lots, servicing lots, senior citizens' housing, mobile home parks and everything. Yes, and Casa Loma.

MR. McCLELLAND: How many did you start from scratch? None.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Mr. Speaker, we were recently....

MR. H.A. CURTIS (Saanich and the Islands): Tell us about Prince George.

HON. MR. LAUK: How many houses did you build?

HON. MR. NICOLSON: We were recently in Ottawa and we had a chance to look at the 1975 CMHC capital budget. Mr. Speaker, there was an increase of only about 12 per cent, not even enough to keep up with the increase in the cost of building in the CMHC capital budget. Yet there were all of those new programmes that were announced before the election, during the federal election, and in the most recent budget speech. There were new programmes, but there were no new dollars.

So what did they do? They actually reheated, warmed up, a few old, tired Liberal programmes. The limited dividend programme has been increased in the budget this year from $73 million to $200 million at the expense of other social housing programmes. What is the record of that programme?

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): None in B.C.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: In the Colonist of December 25: "Confusion is the only tangible result so far of the federal government's new home ownership assistance programme." Another one of the big plums in their budget.

HON. MR. LAUK: Where's David?

HON. MR. NICOLSON: The Sun:

"Urban Affairs Minister Danson expressed disappointment Wednesday that no Vancouver builders had applied for any of the $50 million available for low-rental accommodation in this year."

MR. GIBSON: Isn't that shocking? That's rent control.

HON. MR. NICOLSON:

"He indicated in an interview that unusually high land costs in the city had caused the city to lose out on the federal funds and expressed the hope that city builders will apply for more money being made available next year. Three Victoria projects were among 18 across Canada."

Eighteen projects in all of Canada, Mr. Speaker.

[ Page 174 ]

HON. MR. LAUK: It's a joke.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: That is a phantom programme, Mr. Speaker, for a phantom government, and it will spend phantom dollars, but it won't result in $200 million being spent because of the bureaucracy which has alienated the private sector from participating.

I have called Mr. Danson and invited him to come out here to British Columbia, and I will convene a meeting with the executive of HUDAC and the executive of the Urban Development Institute. They can tell him why this programme isn't going to fly.

Having done that, I implore him to put those funds which are allocated to British Columbia into the non-profit sector, into the cooperatives and municipalities that want to build housing for families. This government will make a capital grant of 10 per cent in order to lower the rents in the initial five or six years.

Mr. Speaker, this is my challenge to Central Mortgage and Housing: reallocate those funds and do it in such a manner as can be spent in this budget year.

There have been actual decreases in section 43 for public housing, and this is the instrument that most areas depend upon. Most provinces in Canada depend upon section 43 to build senior citizen's housing. But there has actually been a dollar decrease in that section, and the rest of that budget is a juggling with considerable decreases in social housing programmes and a budget for cooperatives for all of Canada which would only meet the needs of British Columbia.

There is one other point which I would like to come back to, and that is some of the changes we have made in sections under the Elderly Citizens' Housing Aid Act and changes which we think should apply in British Columbia to senior citizens' housing built under section 15 of the national Housing Act.

As I said earlier, this province makes a one-third capital grant to housing built under section 15. If this was built under section 43, as it would be done in most other provinces, the provincial government would only have to put up 10 per cent. On top of that, there would be an operating subsidy of 50 per cent from the federal government. We are willing to match that with a grant of 50 per cent from the provincial government.

We feel that municipalities should be able to collect taxes from these projects, as they can from section 40 and 43 projects. It's the responsibility of Central Mortgage and Housing to allow the inclusion and to pay section 44 subsidies to section 15 projects. I think that we are being discriminated against.

I'd like to point out that because of the policies of that previous government, on a per capita basis British Columbia should have received over the past years from 1946 to 1973, if they had done the same job as other provinces had done, $162 million under sections 40 and 43 of the national Housing Act. In fact, the previous government didn't face up to that challenge and we only received $82 million, only half of what was allocated. We failed to pick up funds.

But what is even more important is that by not taking advantage of those programmes we have fallen behind in per capita federal contributions. Based on the 1971 census figure, B.C. received $371 per capita federal contribution under NHA sections 40 and 43 in that period of 1946 to 1973 while Ontario received $1,259 per capita. This is an obvious reversal of regional disparity payments.

I feel that British Columbia is entitled to section 44 subsidies. I have made this position clear to the Minister of Urban Affairs (Hon. Mr. Danson). I know that many municipalities feel that these subsidies should be available so that they can collect their taxes on elderly citizens' housing as it is collected in any other municipality. The whole viability and the future of an aggressive programme for senior citizens' housing hangs in that balance.

I would urge Members of this House to discuss this with their local councils, which are all very much aware of the programme, and to take whatever measures they can. If you are in the Liberal Party, use whatever influence you have. I think this is a principle which goes beyond party lines, and it is something that should be pressed home to Ottawa.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

MR. R.H. McCLELLAND (Langley): I'm pleased to take part in this debate and especially pleased to be following the Minister with portfolio for ribbon-cutting (Hon. Mr. Nicolson).

I'm interested that he should mention one project which is very dear to my heart as the shining example of the socialist government's advances in housing — Rainbow Lodge in Langley. I'm very proud to have been on the council in Langley when that programme was approved under the Social Credit government. Since he takes credit for his government for that kind of programme, I can assume that the rest of his speech was just as accurate.

HON. MR. NICOLSON: Are they going to put the whole budget in your riding?

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, there are a couple of things I'd like to talk about in this throne speech debate and they're very important.

I want briefly first of all to mention just for a moment the problem that has arisen again this year about truth and integrity in government. I'd like to give to you, Mr. Speaker, a couple of quotes which come directly from Hansard.

[ Page 175 ]

The first says: "They were not asked or ordered to do anything." The speaker is the Premier, Dave Barrett — Hansard, February 25, 1974.

The second quote: "I told no one to draft an agreement." Again the Premier, Dave Barrett, in Hansard, February 25, 1974.

The next quote is: "It was a result of the intervention of the Premier that the board entered into an agreement of November 1, 1972, with Kovachich."

HON. W.S. KING (Minister of Labour): Order!

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, that quote is from Mr. Justice E.E. Hinkson in the British Columbia Supreme Court.

MR. CURTIS: Good judge.

MR. G.H. ANDERSON (Kamloops): So what? It doesn't say anything.

MR. McCLELLAND: Then again, Mr. Speaker: "I did not, I have not, I will not order any solution to the egg-and-chicken war in the Province of British Columbia." Again, Mr. D. Barrett, Premier of British Columbia, in Hansard, February 26, 1974 "I did not, have not, I will not order any solution to the egg-and chicken war in the Province of British Columbia."

The next quote, Mr. Speaker: "Mr. Barrett indicated that he had instructed the board to implement the demands set forth in the document that had been prepared on behalf of the northern interior producers." That quote again is from Mr. Justice E.E. Hinkson of the B.C. Supreme Court, Mr. Speaker.

These startling comments, Mr. Speaker, come from two different sources: Hansard and the transcript of a B.C. Supreme Court trial, almost a year apart. And it becomes clear that the Premier of this province has been less than honest with the people of this province...

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. McCLELLAND: ...and with the representatives in the British Columbia Legislature.

[Mr. Speaker rises]

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! I think the Hon. Member knows that he's out of order.

Were you in the House the other day when the Hon. Second Member for Victoria (Mr. D.A. Anderson) was speaking?

Are you being entirely frank with this House in saying that you don't know if you were here on that occasion?

If you were not here on that occasion, then you would not know. The matter was raised in the House by remarks of a similar nature made by that Hon. Member and he was ruled out of order on a couple of occasions for persisting.

For the reason that he violates a very clear rule in our House which deals with that on page 362 of Sir Erskine May, 18th edition.

[Mr. Speaker resumes his seat.]

MR. McCLELLAND: I wonder if you would be good enough to repeat that for me.

MR. SPEAKER: I'd be delighted to do that for you.

MR. McCLELLAND: I wish you would.

MR. SPEAKER: I must say that that also is in Hansard, — those remarks are in Hansard.

Page 361: "Certain matters cannot be debated, save upon a substantive motion which admits of a distinct vote of the House." Then it refers to anything questioning the conduct of Members of the assembly — it says: "They are Members of parliament." And then it goes on to say: "These matters cannot, therefore, be questioned by way of amendment or upon any motion for adjournment." They cannot be in any way questioned in debate as well, as I have already pointed out.

In that case, the Hon. Member was attempting to put an amendment, and he did put an amendment, but it did not relate to any charges or any allegations attacking the integrity of a Member of the House. But what you are doing is to that point and purpose and I ask you to desist, as I asked him, and I will ask any other Member, whether he be attacking you or any other Member of the House.

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, I don't know whether you're calling the quotations that I've made from Hansard incorrect, or the quotations that I've made from the transcripts of the trial incorrect.

MR. SPEAKER: I think you know very well....

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, I have not attempted to make any amendment. I'm speaking in the throne speech debate, in which I have quite wide latitude, as you know, and I'd like to continue with my speech, Mr. Speaker, because I have....

MR. SPEAKER: So long as you do not say the statements that you were making, which were not quotations — they were your own statements.

[ Page 176 ]

MR. McCLELLAND: Oh, Mr. Speaker!

MR. SPEAKER: The statement you were making just a minute ago — you have the paper in front of you and you could probably read it.

MR. McCLELLAND: I think you jumped a little ahead of me, Mr. Speaker. You objected before I made my statement, which is interesting.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, I said, and I will say again, that it appears from the quotes which have been taken from the transcript of the trial and from Hansard of one year ago that the Premier of this province has been less than honest with the people of British Columbia.

MR. SPEAKER: That, of course, is quite unparliamentary and must not be proceeded with at all. You know that and I know it.

MR. McCLELLAND: All right. I shan't proceed then.

MR. SPEAKER: Therefore, for you to say that you hadn't said anything was really begging the question.

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, I only want to spend a moment on this business of the so-called chicken-and-egg war. I've said all along....

HON. A.B. MACDONALD (Attorney-General): Point of order.

MR. SPEAKER: On a point of order, would the Hon. Member be seated?

MR. McCLELLAND: What are you rising on?

MR. PHILLIPS: He's standing up to say whatever he wants to. He doesn't have a point of order.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. A member is entitled at any time, including the Member for South Peace River, to rise on a point of order, What is your point of order?

MR. PHILLIPS: I'm just telling you to make him rise on a point of order....

MR. SPEAKER: Order!

MR. PHILLIPS: He never does rise on a point of order. He doesn't know how to do it properly.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Can I go ahead now?

MR. PHILLIPS: If you do it properly.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: I would ask the Hon. Member who was speaking to withdraw the words "less than honest" which he just used, (Laughter.)

AN HON. MEMBER: He just read from the judgment.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

HON. MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, to those Members who treat the matter so lightly, may I say that it is very clear in the annals of parliament that you cannot stand up in the House and accuse another Member of dishonesty. If you do so, you must withdraw such a charge.

MR. McCLELLAND: I'll allow those quotes which I've given to stand and I know that the people of British Columbia will understand what they mean, and I'll withdraw those words "less than honest."

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you very much.

MR. McCLELLAND: I said last year when we were talking in this same debate that this so-called chicken-and-egg war didn't have anything to do with marketing boards and all of that kind of stuff, even though the Premier tried to fuzz things up quite well, or with eggs or farmers or anybody else. But it did have to do with the question of truth, honesty and integrity in government. Premier Barrett....

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the Hon. Member refer to Members of this House in the proper manner?

MR. McCLELLAND: The Premier of the province, Mr. Speaker, the Member for Coquitlam, refused at that time to accept sworn affidavits by two very prominent and honest people of this province during debates in this Legislature. But I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that he can hardly shrug off the finding of a justice of the British Columbia Supreme Court.

There isn't any doubt now in our minds — and I'm not going to belabour the point — but I just want to make it clear that there isn't any doubt that the Premier of this province did intervene, used the power of his office as a club with which to force an independent board to submit to his will. There isn't any doubt in that any more.

That's not even the most severe indictment of what the Premier did, because we could understand that. If he had done it and stood up in this House and admitted that he did it, that would have been fine. But to tell us in this House that he didn't do it, that's the indictment against the Premier of this province.

[ Page 177 ]

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Member is again proceeding as to be removed.

MR. McCLELLAND: And because he did it for political reasons, the cheapest kind of political reasons, that's the indictment. Because the Premier stepped in to help a political supporter and a campaign contributor, and used his club for that reason-that's the kind of politics which has no place in this province.

MR. SPEAKER: The Hon. Member is again proceeding as to be removed.

MR. McCLELLAND: And because he did it for political reasons, the cheapest kind of political reasons, that's the indictment. Because the Premier stepped in to help a political supporter and a campaign contributor, and used his club for that reason — that's the kind of politics which has no place in this province.

I'm not going to suggest that the Premier should take any action now, because he's refused to. But it's his own conscience and he can do what he wants.

It's also on the Premier's own conscience that he stood up in this House to defend his own throne speech and never said one word, not one word, about the 100,000 people and more who are out of work in this province.

He made a long tirade against Liberals, Social Credit, Conservatives and everybody else — Ottawa, the Americans, the international oil companies, the Japanese and the multinational corporations. He boo-hooed his way through a long speech, but he never once mentioned the 100,000 people and more who are out of work in this province.

He talked about stupid contracts that other people had signed in this province, stupid contracts. He talked about sellouts to foreign countries. Talk about sell outs! Who sold out to the Middle East nations for a loan at the highest interest possible? Who sold out to that? Who signed the contract? He won't even tell us what nations he is dealing with. Who signed the contracts in New York with a black marketeer to market our pulp products? Who signed that stupid contract, Mr. Speaker?

He talks about the promises to the municipalities. He's going to give the municipalities all his extra money that he is going to get from this increased oil prices.

The Member for Delta (Mr. Liden), I recall, was in a Delta council. He went to them and said, "I'd like you to tell me how you would like us to spend this extra money that we're going to get from this increased oil." He said, "It would be really nice if you'd tell us how to spend that money."

But there wasn't any extra money. There's going to be a $25 million loss, I wonder if he's going to go and see whether the municipalities will share in that loss with him. That would be good. How do you spend the loss? It's not good enough to try and shift the blame, as the government has attempted to do. Make excuses; take every opportunity to blame it on somebody else. I don't care who it is, whether it's the old government or the federal government or the Americans or all of these other people we've talked about. Employees of Hydro, sure.

It's no good to shift the blame any longer. This government has been in power for about 30 months, I think, and it's about time they started admitting some of their own mistakes and to be accountable for overruns and everything else. What's $100 million?

The Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. King) stood up and talked about all the jobs he has created in the civil service. That's fine — in 30 months 15,000 new civil service jobs. That doesn't help those industries.

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: A 50 per cent increase. Right on. It doesn't help those industries that you've driven into the ground with your policies of socialism and ideology.

AN HON. MEMBER: Commotion Creek.

MR. McCLELLAND: There are 1,800 new employees in ICBC while you destroyed an entire industry. Some record!

In British Columbia Hydro there are 1,900 new employees. There were only 1,800 new employees in Hydro in the last 10 years. We've added 1,900 in one year, And while that Labour Minister tells us about all the jobs he is creating in this province, I'll tell you right now that there are personnel committees of B.C. Hydro going to Calgary and Edmonton, recruiting people in Calgary and Edmonton to come to British Columbia and work in this province while we are telling people to go to Alberta and work there. What kind of sense does that make?

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: Well, sure, Mr. Speaker, they've run out of NDP friends in this province.

We talked about restraint. The Premier has a press release in which he says we are going to restrain ourselves from spending so much money in the next little while. The next day: $74 million in special warrants. The Premier was in for a minute. A couple of days later: 50 jobs in the Finance department, after the Premier said there was going to be a leveling off of hiring and restraint in spending.

[ Page 178 ]

Well, Mr. Speaker, we've solved the unemployment problem in this province all right — for Dunsky Advertising to whom we gave almost $800,000 last year for government departments alone, and that doesn't count ICBC and all of those kinds of things.

Yes, I suppose that one of those accounts was "Sing Along with Graham Lea." "Aren't you glad that somebody finally cares? Aren't you glad he doesn't care for me?" (Laughter.)

This government sits here and talks about restraint. It's so arrogant; it was so arrogant of the Premier of this province to be down in Ottawa not long ago, telling the federal government to cut back and restrain themselves, when he's guiding that cabinet over there through the wildest spending spree in this province's history. What arrogance!

There was a piece in the paper the other day, Mr. Speaker...

MR. R.T. CUMMINGS (Vancouver–Little Mountain): Watch your back.

MR. McCLELLAND: ...a new version of an old line, which says, "And so, children, the end of the story is that the NDP found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow — and spent it." That's this government. Some restraint! Well, you talk about spending for the people.

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: Casa Loma. Dunhill Development. You paid $6 million for a defunct company which was worth $3 million the day before you bought it. What kind of business sense is that? What kind of any kind of sense is that? Ripoff.

MR. G.H. ANDERSON: Jealousy will get you nowhere.

MR. McCLELLAND: There is one other item with which I wish to deal, and that has to do with a problem in my own constituency. It's probably one of the most serious indictments against this government, and that's the complete disregard, total disregard for the wishes of local government and for the wishes of the local community.

I know the tiny Minister of Economic Development (Hon. Mr. Lauk) will be very interested in this because I am going to talk about an oil refinery. I know they didn't take you to China with them, Mr. Minister. I know that you're still burning about that. I know that you're sorry that no one talks to you, but nevertheless....

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: Seven per cent Lauk. But nevertheless, Mr. tiny Minister of Economic Development, I wish to talk about this refinery for just a moment.

This government has taken the wishes of local government and taken the wishes of the local communities and just trod them into the ground.

On the Burke Mountain thing in Coquitlam, which I won't go into this evening and on, of course, the Surrey refinery this government is shoving its ideological urges down the throats of local government.

The Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. Nimsick), who you would think would be in charge of developing a refinery — that's who I would have thought would have had some input — wrote a letter to the municipality of Surrey when they asked what he knew about this refinery that was going into Surrey, a multi-billion dollar refinery and petrochemical complex which was going to change the whole face of the area, and the Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources said, "I don't think I have any information to offer you." Yes, he's looking right now. "I don't think I have any information to offer you. But Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!"

HON. MR. LAUK: What have you got against Christmas?

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, the government has apparently decided that it wants to put a refinery complex into the Surrey area, one of the most ecologically sensitive and aesthetically beautiful parts of British Columbia. And they're going to do it whether or not the people of that community want it or not. They intend to shove it right down their throats.

There are a lot of reasons why that refinery shouldn't go in that area, and I'd like to outline some of them. First of all, there are some serious pollution and environmental problems. I'm going to quote from a text, written by some concerned citizens in the community which I represent, which points out that regardless of all of the most advanced technological programmes that they might put into that refinery, there is no doubt that some pollution will occur. There isn't any doubt about that. Every technician who you can ever hire will tell you that, because humans are humans and mistakes do happen. There will be pollution from that refinery.

If even the most stringent regulations are adhered to, a 100,000-barrel-a-day refinery — and they're talking now of between an 80,000- and 200,000-barrel-a-day refinery — will be allowed to discharge oil and grease in the amount of 300 pounds per day. That's approximately 130,000 pounds a year of oil and grease discharge. No consideration is given to any kind of accidents; that's just the normal discharge — 130,000 pounds a year without

[ Page 179 ]

accidents.

There was a recent incident in Japan in which human error caused the contamination of many square miles of the ocean there with over 10 million gallons of oil. Ten million, not a few hundred thousand. If that kind of effluent enters the streams which are in that area — Campbell Creek, the Nicomekl and Serpentine Rivers, or the ocean at Boundary Bay, which many people in this province have been attempting to save for a lot of years, including some of the people on that side of the House — by direct discharge into the rivers (and that's what the B.C. Petroleum Corp is advocating — direct discharge into the Nicomekl River), the result could be the decimation of one of the finest fish populations and salmon spawning grounds in North America. Decimation.

The Attorney-General doesn't care. He smirks on the other side of the House.

Destruction of a wildfowl resting area, breeding areas, contamination of the beaches and pollution of the groundwater supplies for that whole urbanizing area of Hazelmere, Brookswood, White Rock, Surrey and Delta.

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: I'd like the little Minister of Economic Development (Hon. Mr. Lauk) to stand up and say that for the record: "What nonsense!" That Minister doesn't even care that that kind of pollution could occur in that kind of area in British Columbia. That's sick; that's really sick, Mr. Speaker.

Interjections.

MR. McCLELLAND: Do you know that whole Campbell highland and the Hazelmere Valley? Do you know anything about it at all?

AN HON. MEMBER: No.

MR. McCLELLAND: Not a thing!

Combining that with a heavy rainfall and the slow-moving nature of the rivers there, if you place a petrochemical complex on that highland, you'll be creating, as this brief says, an ecological time-bomb. You're about to destroy a whole area of British Columbia, and you don't even care.

Interjections.

MR. McCLELLAND: That has nothing to do with all of the pollutants which might come in the air, given the westerly flow of wind there. That whole area is relatively free of smog now, but it sure won't be, given the kind of development this government wants to put there.

Not only that, but the Fraser Valley now provides 70 per cent of the farm produce of this whole province, and you know that only 6 per cent of this province is arable. Any reduction or contamination of farmland, and almost every bit of that land is in the land reserve, is unthinkable.

AN HON. MEMBER: He spends hours attacking the land.

MR. PHILLIPS: And you watered it down.

MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, what hypocrisy from that Attorney-General who stood in this House....

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I don't think the Hon. Member should use the word "hypocrisy" towards any other Member. It's unparliamentary. It has been ruled out many times, despite the attitudes that may be expressed by one Member.

MR. McCLELLAND: What a strange attitude, Mr. Speaker, from that Attorney-General. Is "strange" okay, or is that on your list too?

MR. SPEAKER: That's much better, much better. Thank you.

MR. McCLELLAND: What a strange attitude from that Attorney-General who delivered a land bill to this House and hadn't even read it, didn't even know what was in it, and after it was amended he wasn't sure what was in it.

Nevertheless, Mr. Speaker, that Attorney-General would sit there and say that it's perfectly okay to have land which is in a land reserve under the Land Commission confiscated for a petrochemical complex without having any reference to any local government body. That's what you are doing today, Mr. Attorney-General, and if you don't know that you are doing that, now is your opportunity to stand up, get out, go out and contact your officials in the B.C. Petroleum Corp. and find out what they're doing to the farmland of this province. I think you have a duty to do that. It's about time you found out what is happening in this province.

Mr. Speaker, every bit of the lower mainland will feel the impact of this oil complex if it is allowed to go in, every bit of it.

I was interested when the Member for Dewdney (Mr. Rolston) stood up in this House...

MR. PHILLIPS: The three musketeers.

MR. McCLELLAND: ...with his charts and maps

[ Page 180 ]

and everything else and criticized the submarines in Washington state. I suppose that was admirable of him. But he's willing to stand in this House while his own government fouls its own nest. He'll stand up against the subs and the United States, but what does he say about the fouling of British, Columbia, and the ecological time-bomb that you are planting in the lower Fraser Valley? He doesn't even say anything about it, and neither does any other Member of this government.

The Little Campbell River and the Nicomekl River both support Coho and chum salmon, cut-throat trout and steelhead. At this time those stocks are growing, the spawning beds are becoming more productive. There are also beaver, raccoon and deer — it's a beautiful part of British Columbia. Waterfowl, many wild birds in that same area.... But I'm telling you, Mr. Speaker, if this government allows the kind of development they are talking about to go ahead in that area, none of that will be left. Nothing will be able to survive, and the recreational needs of the lower mainland of British Columbia will be in danger and destroyed.

HON. MR. LAUK: Do you think we could talk Logo into running again?

MR. McCLELLAND: We haven't heard about any kind of pollution control in this whole development that is talked about by this government. And you know, Mr. Speaker, they talked about pollution control. How on earth can the government be its own pollution control agent? We've seen what happened in some of the mills which the government has bought. There is no pollution control there, because the government says: "Those are our mills; we don't need to have pollution control there. You do it over there, but our mills are sacred."

What do you think will happen with this refinery. How on earth can the government, which runs the refinery, be, at the same time, the pollution control agent? It just doesn't work, and it won't work. The government runs the pollution control board; the government runs the refinery. That's pretty tidy, but it sure doesn't do much for ecological protection of the lower mainland. The government is on both sides of the fence, Mr. Speaker. Unless the government maintains an adversary position on behalf of the pollution control board, you might as well forget about the pollution control in this province.

[Mr. Dent in the chair.]

The government cannot act as a pollution control agent against its own refinery. Not only can it not, it will not, because that has been proven with regard to its own mills, and the government will destroy that vital adversary position.

We saw the same kind of an example with the Labour Minister (Hon. Mr. King) and the British Columbia Railway. The same thing: the government can't be the Labour Minister and the boss at the same time. They can't be the pollution control agent and the refinery at the same time. It is the same thing. It looks fine on paper, Mr. Speaker, but it just doesn't work.

You know, Mr. Speaker, there isn't any doubt in the whole world that that 1,500 acres, or 3,000 acres, or whatever it ends up to be in the Surrey-Langley area which is being bought up for this refinery complex.... That's not all that's going to be affected, because the whole of the lower mainland has to be affected — from Hope, to Chilliwack, to Abbotsford, to the Hazelmere Valley, to Whiterock, to Delta, to Semiahmoo, to Tsawwassen. That whole lower mainland area, which is a vital part of this vibrant province, is going to be altered and altered drastically because of this government's intentions to put a multi-billion dollar petrochemical complex in that area. And why do they want it? Why do they want that petrochemical complex in there, Mr. Speaker? The petroleum products originating within the boundaries of B.C. right now are not sufficient to operate at the existing refinery capacity that we already have in this province. We don't have enough.

One or two years ago, to build a new refinery would cost about $1,000 per barrel per day. An economic installation, we're told, is about a 100,000 barrel per day refinery today. That's a cost of $100 million one or two years ago, but today, Mr. Speaker, with inflation, the additional cost of pollution control and other costs, to build a new refinery of the kind we're talking about in this area would cost $4,000 to $5,000 per barrel per day. If we talk about a 10,000 barrel per day refinery, we're talking about $500 million.

However, Mr. Speaker, if we add now.... What if we put that $500 million into housing, or that $500 million into intermediate care beds, or into picking up five of Mr. Levi's overruns? That's where that money should go, Mr. Speaker, to pick up the social needs of this province, not to satisfy some ideological urge that this government happens to have.

If we had to add right now, or if we add to the existing refineries in this province to bring their capacity up to their maximum potential, it would cost us $2,000 per barrel per day today — half as much, Mr. Speaker, as the pie-in-the-sky pipedream being advanced by the B.C. Petroleum Corp.

You know, we had another letter in our community, Mr. Speaker, to one of the local councils from the chairman of the British Columbia Petroleum Corp., Mr. James Rhodes.

MR. CHABOT: The Premier's old roommate.

MR. McCLELLAND: Yes, the Premier's old

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roommate. They used to live in the Queen Vic together and share sausages and spaghetti. He got himself a $40,000 job out of that deal.

Interjections.

MR. McCLELLAND: He's had a pie-in-the-sky dream about some kind of a refinery for years and years. The Premier's old roommate, anyway, wrote to Langley council, Mr. Speaker. I know you're listening, Mr. Speaker. The Premier's old roommate wrote in answer to a request from the council to come and meet with them and tell them all about this refinery, because they were kind of interested. You see, I don't know whether you know this or not, Mr. Speaker, but the government never went to the local council. They never went. They were buying up 1,500 acres, 2,000 acres in the local community, but they never went to the local council to tell them about that. I don't think you knew that because you'd be shocked if you knew that. It's terrible that they never went once to the local council So the local council, in a fit of naivety, decided to write to Mr. Rhodes, and they said: "Mr. Rhodes, we hear you're buying all kinds of land in our community. We hear you want to put in a petrochemical complex and it's going to cost $500 million, and you are going to get rid of all our houses, you're going to put smoke in our community, and you're going to pollute our streams, and you are going to kill our fish, and you're going to destroy our groundwater system. We think it would be nice if you told us about it so we can all move to Alberta or something."

MR. CHABOT: Take the tunnel to Terrace.

MR. McCLELLAND: Yes, that's right, take the tunnel to Terrace, or whatever. (Laughter.)

Interjection.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's beyond your imagination.

MR. McCLELLAND: Anyway, the chairman of the petroleum corporation wrote back and said: "Well, folks, you are a little premature, because I know we're buying all this land and we're going to put in this complex, but I don't want to meet with you. What's the point?" Then he says: "The government has had some reports and I expect the government will make a decision whether to proceed or not with the construction of a refinery." Not whether or not it's going to be in Surrey or Merritt, or Roberts Bank, or some other place, but whether or not to proceed with the construction of a refinery, It must then make a further decision if the answer is in the affirmative as to the site.

Not only, Mr. Speaker, have they not decided where the damned refinery is going to be, they haven't even decided whether or not we need a refinery. So why are they buying 1,500 acres of land in Surrey? Can you answer that, Mr. Speaker? Why are they buying the land? It's because they have again an ideological urge to buy all of the land that's left in British Columbia and take it out of private ownership.

Mr. Speaker, there isn't any doubt that this government has embarked on an irreversible course that will have a tremendous impact in one of the finest, most ecologically precious and most beautiful parts of this province.

The government, without a doubt, is forcing a new lifestyle on thousands of British Columbians without any consultation or concern for their feelings. the government, Mr. Speaker, is pursuing a programme that will alter a wide area of the lower mainland with no discussion with the municipalities affected.

The Speaker, in his role of Member for Skeena (Mr. Dent), told us that one of this government's proudest achievements was its consultation with the people of the province. It was a beautiful speech, Mr. Speaker — I enjoyed it very much. I noticed that in your own area the Premier came and said: "We're going to have a public hearing on the problems of Rim Forest Products." You remember that — he was on the radio up there. He said: "We're going to have a public hearing on the problems of Rim Forest Products, and we want everybody to come and tell us their problems."

AN HON. MEMBER: Did they hold it in Trail?

MR. McCLELLAND: No, they held it in the area, Mr. Member. Now be fair. They held it in the same area that the Member for Skeena represents.

So everybody came. People who had sold equipment to Rim Forest Products and thought they had a case wanted to come — they hadn't been paid for their equipment. Bankers who had loans thought they would come because they hadn't been paid back yet. People who were interested, who were out of work because they used to work for Rim Forest Products and didn't have a job any more, all came to that public meeting. Mr. Speaker, I think you were there. And when they got to the door, what happened? They said: "You can't come in — you haven't any interest. But if you have an NDP membership card, come on in, folks, and we'll talk about it." That's the kind of consultation your government believes in, Mr. Speaker, and that's what happened. That's what happened with Rim Forest Products in your area, and you know it.

Mr. Speaker, even though they're going to alter that whole area of British Columbia they never

[ Page 182 ]

consulted once — not once — with the municipality of Surrey. They never consulted once, Mr. Speaker, with the Greater Vancouver Regional District, and they never consulted once with their own Land Commission. The Land Commission that this government so proudly set up and which said it was going to save the farmland....

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: That's the same one they overruled in Richmond — right.

Mr. Speaker, that whole area which is being purchased is in the land reserve, and yet they're going to put a petrochemical complex in there without ever consulting with the Land Commission. Now is that fair? No, it's not fair.

Interjection.

MR. McCLELLAND: Double standard. The Member for Saanich (Mr. Curtis) reminds me that this is the government that told us they're going to return some responsibility to local government. Mr. Speaker, this government intends to ride roughshod over the concerns of local government, and they don't really care whatever happens in the local community.

Mr. Speaker, I think that all activity in relation to this whole land purchase deal and the refinery complex should be halted right now until some certain points are cleared up.

First of all, why has Surrey been given a number one priority site for the refinery, despite the total opposition of the council and the people in the area? Answer that question.

Why is the B.C. Petroleum Corp. considering the relocation of the Burlington Northern Railway through the Hazelmere Valley of British Columbia, despite the objection of Surrey council and all of the residents of that area? Those are questions that need to be answered.

The government must answer questions, Mr. Speaker, concerning the proposed source of crude oil for that refinery. Will new pipeline corridors be cut through the narrow Fraser Valley, and will the refinery receive crude from supertankers coming up and down our coast?

If the refinery is not to be built in Surrey, Mr. Speaker, will the option on land already taken be dropped and will that land be returned to the private ownership to which it belongs, or will the government continue to act as a land speculator? That kind of question should be answered too, Mr. Speaker.

And will the government answer the question why it allowed those land negotiations to be done in complete secrecy, opening the door to possibilities of under-the-counter deals and insider deals? And most importantly, will that people's government...?

Did you want to interrupt, Mr. Speaker? I bow to your wisdom.

MR. SPEAKER: I was going to ask the Hon. Minister if he would tell me whether a "narc" is an unparliamentary term.

MR. McCLELLAND: He doesn't know what it is, and neither does anybody else.

MR. SPEAKER: Would the Hon. Member for Langley please proceed?

MR. McCLELLAND: The Minister doesn't know what he said; he never knows what he says and we don't care, so it doesn't matter.

Mr. Speaker, most importantly, and I must address this most seriously to the government, will this government, in the name of all decency and honesty, table in this House...?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I would draw to the attention of the Hon. Member that his time is now up. If he could just wind it up with a sentence....

MR. McCLELLAND: Well, they kept interrupting, Mr. Speaker. I'll be 30 seconds, then I'm finished. I just want to ask the government, in all decency, to please table today all feasibility studies, marketing studies, engineering studies, environmental studies and any studies which detail the social impact which such a refinery complex will have on the areas in question, and they should be detailed forthwith. In other words, Mr. Speaker, it's time the government laid its cards on the table and began to level with the people of British Columbia.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): The opening speech on which we are commenting here has a good deal to do with government policy, but we haven't heard very much about that in the debate tonight.

We heard the Minister of Economic Development (Hon. Mr. Lauk) talk to us about an important subject, but he didn't say a word about his department. He didn't say a word about economic development. Oh, indeed, I'm talking about the economic development in this province and the creation of jobs, and we didn't hear that from the Minister at all. That's been the focus of this debate. I was very disappointed.

Then the Minister of Housing gladdened us a bit later with his news of his department. He told us he had 7,000 units of housing on stream. He didn't say what year they were going to be built. He didn't say anything about the 15,000 units that aren't being built in the present year. He was careful not to

[ Page 183 ]

mention that.

But he did devote half of his speech, the opening half of his speech, to questions such as a bridge, a wooden bridge. I was distressed that he seemed to be calling down wooden bridges because we have good cause to advance the cause of wood in our province. But in any event, he was talking about the replacement of that wooden bridge with a 132-foot concrete bridge. I was most impressed because it's the first living example I've ever seen of the old political joke where the campaigner comes to town and tells the assembled townspeople: "I will see you get a new bridge." The townspeople say: "We have no river." The campaigner says: "I'll see you get a river, too." That was sort of standard for the Minister of Housing. It's good; it's recycled. We recycle things these days, Mr. Minister.

Now the throne speech on which we are commenting, naturally, contains a lot of good things. It's awfully hard to spend $2.5 billion a year and not do some good things. There are some good suggestions mentioned in this document — that's the nature of a throne speech. The government puts its best foot forward. I want to talk about some of those things in a few minutes.

There was the major omission: the omission about which I just taxed the Minister of Economic Development, the omission of economic questions in British Columbia. I discussed this yesterday and I won't repeat those remarks today, but British Columbia is living on its capital as far as its economy is concerned. It is not generating new jobs for the future. The 9.6 per cent unemployed we see now, unfortunately, is just a way-station on the way down unless that new investment is coming in. The Hon. Member for ice cream stands should know that better than anyone else in this House. He's a small businessman; he should understand that. The future has not been provided for.

I do want to comment on some of the selected contents of this speech. The forest employment idea is a good idea. But where are the details, and why isn't it in place right now, Mr. Speaker? We suggested this three or four months ago in this House. We said: "Get out there and build some roads with those men, that equipment, those 16,000 who aren't occupied." Why haven't we got the details right now? Why isn't the government going ahead with it right now? Why do we have to wait for all this talk?

The idea of a financial institution for British Columbia — I'll wait for details on that one, too, but in principle it's a good thought because the banks need competition. There's no question about that because we need local headquarters for financial institutions — not,  I might say, like that sham local head office of the Canada Development Corp., which is supposed to be in Vancouver, and which the head man, the chief executive officer, scarcely ever visits.

We need genuine head offices here in British Columbia.

The province needs a local fiscal agent. Instead of giving a lot of the share of our financing to foreign fiscal agents, we should be able to do it through a local British Columbia agent. But I want to suggest to the government that if it is going to have this financial institution get into social areas, remember that someone is paying for that.

If the government is going to get into 6 per cent mortgages, be sure and make that cost clear. Don't try and tell people that some depositor is going to lend their money to the government bank or whatever it is for 4 per cent in order that they can lend it out at 6 per cent. The taxpayers are going to be paying for that social programme. In other words, it's most important that whatever this legislation contains, it contains complete financial disclosure clauses.

The elections Act suggestions I was glad to see. I want to make one minor point which I made to the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Hall) last year, and I hope he will include in the Act that from now on election Act lists should be done geographically, by blocks — in the polls by blocks, instead of alphabetically. It's much easier to work with.

Much more importantly, the financial limits which I presume will be in that Act with respect to expenditures in campaigns must include not only money but they must include gifts in kind and services. That must be controlled as well.

On the same topic, the redistribution absolutely must be done in such a way as to be seen to be impartial. The government, Mr. Speaker, must not bring into this Legislature a map and say: "There it is." It has to set up some kind of an impartial commission to go through it, with room for public testimony and with room for adjustment of whatever limits are decided on.

Now the throne speech provides for a committee to be set up on a forest inquiry. The government will be looking at the terms of reference of that committee, and I suggest, Mr. Speaker, they should be very broad. It has to include the whole subject of competition and the small logger, who is more and more getting squeezed out by the large integrated and even the large independent operators in this province. It has to include the possibility of a reduction of Ministerial power because the Minister, as I've said often before, can squeeze any forest company until it says "Uncle;" and he could do that for things that were not in the interest of the province (as has been done before, for personal interest). I'm not saying this Minister; I'm saying some Minister, some day.

An examination of the current sustained yield has to be part of those terms of reference, because I think we could be cutting much more in our forest industry. Reforestation has to be considered because

[ Page 184 ]

we aren't planting as many trees every year in British Columbia with 20 times the land as the Weyerhaeuser Co. Is in Washington.

The question of world demand and world supply in competition for British Columbia has to be in those terms of reference — not just industry tenure, but industry competition. How do we keep up with the world? Our resources are not that high-grade, as I was explaining yesterday.

The committee should look at ways of evening out the cycles in the forest industry — the huge swings. We're so dependent on the construction industry, not just in this country but in the rest of the world. What kind of counter-cyclical measures can we take?

Appropriate resource rents and other taxes, research and development in the forest sector — all of these should be part of the terms of reference of that committee. It shouldn't be narrowly limited to the question of tenures.

The liquor Act, again, badly needs amendment. I congratulate the government for making plans on that and I ask the Attorney-General to focus on reducing the areas of discretion.

The government in the throne speech did its fair share of blowing its own horn, which is fair enough, but it bragged a good deal about the British Columbia Petroleum Corp. and about Can-Cel, and I want to say just a word on that.

The B.C. Petroleum Corp., Mr. Speaker, was and is a good concept. It is the best way, in the circumstances, to capture that additional natural resource rent implicit in our natural gas industry. But after that, some of the gas moves start to look pretty stupid. Why are we still burning gas in British Columbia to generate power? I know B.C. Hydro's trying to cut back on that, but the fact of the matter is that the provision is still there and it is still being burned for power. Gas is too precious for that. Natural gas: it's highest and best use should be a petrochemical feedstock. I ask the government to make clear what its plans are on the price of natural gas in British Columbia — not just to the Americans but here in Canada, because energy has to rise to its proper price or else it's going to be used wastefully, by B.C. Hydro as well as others.

As to Can-Cel, speaker after speaker in this debate has used this as an example of how the government is one of the finest big businessmen in this province. Mr. Speaker, all I'll say about that is that every pulp mill in this province is making money; even a company like Ocean Falls is making money. So let them brag after the turndown about the performance of Can-Cel.

MR. D.E. LEWIS (Shuswap): Aren't they paying too much for the chips?

MR. GIBSON: Can-Cel was paying far too little for chips, Mr. Member, until very recently, until the Minister got embarrassed.

Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the government for recognizing the world food crisis. Generally, provincial legislatures in this country leave that up to the federal government. I think it's a problem for every Canadian, and I congratulate the government for looking at it.

In North America as compared to the rest of the world, if you put things in terms of cereal equivalents, because all of our food in the end comes from cereals — apart from fish, and some fruit and nuts and so on, basically it's cereal — the average person in the world consumes something like 400 pounds of cereals per year. Here in North America we consume in excess of 2,000 pounds per capita per year. We are very expensive consumers of food.

The population has to be the basis of the problem all over the world. But there are encouraging signs, not just in the developed part of the world. There are ways of encouraging — what would be the right word? — population sanity that we can do from Canada and from British Columbia. I refer to things as simple as literacy. It has been found in study after study that literacy tends to cut down the growth in population rates. It has been found that things like good health care and good social services tend to cut down the population growth rate, as does a sensible system of family planning. Authors such as Harrison Brown, the author of a fine book called "By Bread Alone," which I commend to every Member of this House, have come up with, in global terms, very low figures for getting at these questions — something like, I think, $1.8 billion a year for five years to make a significant dent on the world literacy problem, for example. These are all things we could be doing through the Government of Canada and, in part, through the Government of British Columbia as well, On the supply side, what's the solution in the world food crisis? Land? There's not much can be done there. New lands can be brought into production but, generally speaking, the arable, low-cost land is in production. Fertilizer? Definitely, yes. There can be a great deal done in that case.

I am sad to report to you, Mr. Speaker, that the Arab countries of this world are now flaring into the air every day enough natural gas to create double the amount of fertilizer that's being used in the world right now. That is a tragic waste which should be put into production for the Third World. In North America we use on our lawns and golf courses enough fertilizer to grow the cereals required to feed 60 million people in this world, So we have to look at our priorities a little bit. The same thing with energy.

Is the price mechanism the answer to determine the cost of energy, when to us it means an extra gallon of gas to drive our car somewhere and to someone else it may mean the energy to pump the

[ Page 185 ]

water to grow the food to stay alive? Is the price mechanism really the way to allocate these scarce resources?

We can't solve these questions finally in this House, obviously — but they are things we should think about.

I want to quote the Dean of Agriculture of the University of British Columbia, Dean Shaw. He says that the major contribution his faculty can make to the world food problem is to train food experts. I suggest that the major contribution this province can make is to train expert personnel to advise other parts of the world, if they wish it, on increasing agricultural production. I commend that to the government, as well as sponsoring research such as developing nitrogen-fixing cereals that would be of great assistance to the Third World as well.

Now, Mr. Speaker, there are some extraordinary omissions in this throne speech. The word mining isn't mentioned in the throne speech, which I find very strange. Perhaps that's the result of a quote from the Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. Nimsick). I was astonished to see: "Mining Problems in B.C. on Way Out, Nimsick Says." I don't know if the Minister of Mines really believes that, Mr. Speaker. I hope he will speak in that debate.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: He's on the way out, says the Member for Oak Bay (Mr. Wallace).

Indian claims are not mentioned in this speech — a disgrace to the NDP. They have been mouthing slogans about Indian claims for years. There was the Kelly report.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: I'll send you a copy, Mr. Minister. There's nothing about Indian claims in this speech.

Rent control — nothing about that in this speech The commission that the government has appointed on rent control is to report in September. What are going to be the problems by then when there is no rental housing being built in this province?

Because of the time limitations we now have in this debate, I have to pass on some of the items in the throne speech and move on to local issues because there are problems important to my riding which I want to put on record.

First and foremost in North Vancouver is the continuing problem of transportation. I am glad the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Lea) is here because I want to renew my representations to him for the construction of grade separated interchanges at the very dangerous crossings of the Upper Levels Highway at Lonsdale Avenue and Westview Avenue. I want to suggest to him as well that the time has come to move ahead on the Lower Level Road, which requires the cooperation of three municipalities and which is required as a feeder route to the new ferry terminal.

I very much commend that new ferry. I just wish the Minister of Municipal Affairs could get it going even quicker, designate a specific site for a ferry terminal at both ends, and award the contracts. Let's get that ferry moving across the inlet. I hope he will have good things to report as this session goes on.

The third crossing. I will simply note that it is inevitable with the growth patterns we have in British Columbia. There are going to be more people living on the North Shore. I will have more to say about that in the estimates of the Minister of Highways.

With respect to municipal affairs in general terms, I suggest to the government that municipalities simply must have greater financial resources. They must have a greater classification of tax revenues to draw on, not simply the property-tax revenues. They have services to provide which go far beyond services to property.

Now in specific matters related to North Vancouver, I wish the Minister of Public Works (Hon. Mr. Hartley) were here, but the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Lorimer) can listen as well. Seventeen acres of the land in the core of North Vancouver city was expropriated last year, with about the same acreage in water lots as well. This is right in the middle of North Vancouver city, The planning of that city can't go on without knowledge of what the provincial government plans to do with this crucial land. Won't they consult with the people? There's going to be a ferry terminal there, obviously. Is there going to be a BCR passenger terminal? Is there perhaps going to be the BCR headquarters building? That might contain 300 or 400 people. It's important for us to know just how this land is going to be used so we can get on with the business of the intelligent planning of the rest of the City of North Vancouver. It's important that, in making those plans, the municipal government be consulted. The British Columbia Railway simply must begin paying taxes to this District of North Vancouver this year and to the city as well.

AN HON. MEMBER: It doesn't earn any money.

MR. GIBSON: "It doesn't earn any money," the Member says. But that's not the problem of the District of North Vancouver; it's the problem of the provincial government. The municipality shouldn't be asked to pay for that.

I make a representation to the Minister of Municipal Affairs on the matter of amalgamation. As he knows, there is a long-term suggestion of amalgamation on the North Shore. The people may

[ Page 186 ]

or may not be for it or against it, but the fact of the matter is that under the present Municipal Act an overwhelming majority in one of the municipalities could force an amalgamation against the wishes of the other. I ask the Minister again to consider the case, and I will bring in a private Member's bill on this particular matter. There should be a double majority if and when any amalgamation is sought; there should be a majority in each section.

I won't even ask the Minister to accept that principle all across the province. I'm just saying that in this particular area of the North Shore it's important. I should tell the Minster that the councils of both the municipalities strongly agree with that. I've consulted them on that, and that's what they believe. I wish you would write to the councils and ask them for their official word. They'll tell you that that is what they believe.

HON. J.G. LORIMER (Minister of Municipal Affairs): They tell you a different story than they tell me.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, the education costs on the North Shore District 44 could be going up by 10 to 13 mills the way the financial situation is this year. That could be $80 to $200 per household. That is not good enough, and the government must come through on that.

I spoke about Indian claims. I want to talk about some particular Indian claims. There is in my riding 132 acres of so-called cutoff lands in the Capilano reserve No. 5. This question of cutoff lands is an enduring disgrace to the Province of British Columbia and to every government that allows another year to pass without solving it. It has to be solved during 1975, and you can start with the Capilano reserve No. 5 because that land is mostly in public use. With certain modifications it can be turned back to the Indian band the day after tomorrow. You can't keep this one quiet much longer and swept under the rug. It has to be solved this year, Mr. Minister.

Many other items in the throne speech, Mr. Speaker. The leader of my party gave a long list, including the repeal of Bill 3 I to start with, a phasing out of rent control, ombudsman, an auditor-general and many other items. I want to add a few to it.

The role of resources in our economy is so basic to employment, to Crown revenue, the general question of the upgrading of resources within British Columbia, their further manufacture, the question of the timing of the exploitation of resources. When do you dig that ore out or when do you leave it in the ground? When do you produce the gas? Do you produce it or do you keep it for a petrochemical factory, and so on? The questions of world supply and demand — all of these things are so complex that I think we need from this government a clarification of its thinking.

Therefore, I suggest that we need a resources policy White Paper out of this government sometime during this session in order that this Legislature can see if there's really a coherent philosophy behind the resource exploitation doctrine of this group.

On the question of land, our basic natural resource, the Land Commission, I think, is doing a good job. But in common with the Hon. Member for Langley (Mr. McClelland) I ask why they are buying up everything. What is their intention here? Obviously they are purchasing a great deal more land than can be used for any particular government project we know of. Is it the plan of this government to gradually accumulate more and more land around the Province of British Columbia? If that is the case, can we know the grand master plan? It is the people's money that is being used and it is the people's land that is being bought up.

Another point on land is the continuing problem of foreign land ownership. We brought in last year in this House and passed a law to provide that new land transfers had to be registered as to the nationality of the beneficial owner. That was a good thing, but it was only a start, I would like to see this year legislation providing for the complete registration of the nationality of land ownership in this province so that sometime this year we would begin to see the exact dimensions of who owns what in British Columbia. We would know whether there is a genuine problem of foreign land ownership or not, and thereby have the information base necessary to know whether further measures are required.

There's a question of other foreign ownership in this province. What is this government's policy? All through this throne debate I have heard Members of the NDP railing against the multinational corporations who were the all-time bad guys of the ladies and gentlemen opposite. If that's the case, I'd ask the Minister of Economic Development: what is the attitude of his government to proclamation of part 11 of the Foreign Investment Review Act?

Every other province in this country is making representations to the federal government that this part 11 should not be proclaimed. That's the part that calls for control of the expansion of existing foreign-owned companies within Canada. What is the policy of this government? It hasn't spoken up on that.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: It's on the fence, says the Hon. Member for Oak Bay (Mr. Wallace), It may be on the fence, or it may have no policy at all; it may simply not have thought of it, I think that is the more likely thing.

Growth remains the central problem in the

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Province of British Columbia — over 3.5 per cent per year. We need this government to show that they're doing some thinking about the patterns of growth in this province, some forecasting as to numbers, some forecasting as to where those people are likely to locate or want to locate, and some potential ways and means as to guiding the development of growth around this province by incentives and encouragement to live there and not here, or whatever it may be. In other words, we need a White Paper on growth to indicate that, indeed, the provincial government has been thinking, has some plans on it.

Mr. Speaker, we need a strong provincial submission to Ottawa on the subject of immigration. The immigration laws are to be changed this year. The Minister of Housing was down in Ottawa a couple of weeks ago talking about this very subject, but that's not good enough. We need an official government position on the subject — a strong submission to Ottawa, hopefully one that would be debated in this House, because immigration is providing a great deal of that growth we're talking about, something like 40 per cent in the greater Vancouver region alone.

I want to say a word about housing. There were something like 38,000 housing units built in British Columbia in 1973, and something like 30,000 in 1974. Mr. Speaker, there is a prediction of the Employers Council of British Columbia of 22,000 for 1975. The curve is just going down. That Minister of Housing we had talking here a while ago — what are his targets? How can we measure his performance? He doesn't say: "I would like to see X number of houses being built in this province in a year." He just waves his arms and says: "We're doing this and that." He doesn't say when.

He gave us an inventory of a few thousand houses, and didn't say when they were going to be completed. He didn't say when they were going to be completed — one year, two years, three years. It is a lot of pie in the sky. People can't live in the pie in the sky; people have to live in existing houses, and it not happening. There are a lot of ideas around on this subject of housing.

The problem basically is land, and the government knows that. There's lots of land physically available. It's a case of making it available for building. One of those things that should be done — and I'll be elaborating on this in the budget debate — is financial encouragement to municipalities to make it attractive to them to take new people within their boundaries so we don't ask municipalities to bear themselves the burden, the cost, of new growth within their limits.

Mr. Speaker, in the general field of economics in this province we currently have to rely on vested interests for almost all of our economic analysis. We have to rely on corporations or unions or trade associations or banks or governments, and they all have an axe of some kind to grind. We need a group to which we can refer problems and also to report on their own independent initiative on things like: an annual report on the B.C. economy; on things like resource economics; the question of B.C. In Confederation and what are the economic advantages and disadvantages; the question of the cost of tariffs to this province; agricultural economics and marketing boards; what our secondary industrial strategy should be in British Columbia; the cost of living in British Columbia and northern British Columbia. These are the kinds of questions that could be and should be referred to an economic council of British Columbia, appointed by government but independent of the government and all other bodies and representative of all other bodies, to give impartial advice on this.

This government must work with other governments in the country on inflation, which is one of the most debilitating forces in our society. It's particularly important in British Columbia where we have a cost of living higher than the rest of the country.

Mr. Speaker, the British Columbia government is the largest employer in this province — over 42,000 employees. The wages for this employer set a pattern around this province, whether we like it or not.

I ask the government why the wage settlements for this year, the ones that have already been made, should be kept a secret. The Minister says that he has to deal with the various component leaders of the public service to keep them secret until they are all settled. This, I'm sure, isn't so that the government can play one component off against another, Mr. Speaker. It is not the case, in fact, anyway because they all know what is going on. The only people who don't know what is going on are the public. Why don't the public and this House have a chance to monitor the settlements that are being made? The stories that are going around, and in the newspapers, say that the wage hikes are running up 40 per cent on the settlements that have been made so far, and the average is running over 20 per cent plus a COLA clause.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

AN HON. MEMBER: Pure speculation.

MR. GIBSON: Pure speculation, says one of the government Members. Of course it's pure speculation, because the government won't give us the facts, and that leads me to a point that bears directly on this.

Mr. Speaker, the most consequential thing we can discuss in this House, I believe, is what I would head under the general category of democratic institutions. Let me commence that subject by giving credit to the

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present government in that area for the introduction of a question period, a Hansard, various services to the Members and so on. I commend them in that area. But there are more things to do, Mr. Speaker.

We've discussed briefly an election Act.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: You'd expect there would be more things to do, Mr. Minister. You'd expect it.

We need, Mr. Speaker, laws in this province providing for open government — laws of the kind that the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Macdonald) used to introduce when he was a private Member, like the old "sunshine law."

MR. LEWIS: He's still introducing them.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, why should the people of British Columbia pay for expensive consultant studies on topics on every department of the government, on controversial topics, that they never get to see? Mr. Speaker, that is wrong.

Why should government and commission decisions on various questions be handed down from high with no back up and no reasons to the citizenry as to why these decisions are made.

Why should it take this House so long to see the detailed government accounts? Why did we have the Premier of this province tell the chairman of the public accounts committee, the Hon. Member for Cariboo (Mr. Fraser), that he didn't have to worry about the $100 million Human Resources overrun because he would see it in his committee in due course — over a year later? What good is that? We need laws to look after that kind of open government and to improve it.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Minister, we can't get inside the detailed government accounts, and you know it. We can't get inside the ICBC accounts, and you know it.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: I can tell you about the federal Auditor-General, Mr. Premier. The federal Auditor-General causes a lot of trouble every year to the federal government, and he should. We should have that kind of auditor-general here in British Columbia. That's one of the kinds of democratic institutions I'm talking about.

Interjections.

HON. MR. BARRETT: What happened to Maxwell? You tell us what happened to Maxwell.

Interjections.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, in the present circumstances I might call attention to the clock.

MR. SPEAKER: I wonder if the Hon. Member would instead adjourn the debate until the next sitting of the House.

Mr. Gibson moves adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. Members, I've looked at the point of order that was raised this afternoon by the Hon. Member for South Peace River (Mr. Phillips), and in view of what happened to the sound system last Thursday when I gave an explanation of prorogation, I thought it might be fitting to merely put it in the Votes and Proceedings and take it as read, unless you insist. Do I have leave to do that?

Leave granted.

Hon. Mr. Lorimer files answers to questions. (See appendix.)

Hon. Mrs. Dailly moves adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 11:03 p.m.

APPENDIX

48 Mr. Curtis asked the Hon. the Minister of Municipal Affairs the following questions:

1. Did the Minister of Municipal Affairs travel to Europe in 1974 for the purpose of reviewing the operation of urban transit systems?
2. If the answer to No. 1 is yes, how many persons accompanied the Minister on this visit and who were those persons?
3. What was the total cost to the Provincial Government of the trip referred to above?

The Hon. J. G. Lorimer replied as follows:

"1. Yes.

"2. Thirteen persons: Mrs. James G. Lorimer; Miss L. Lorimer; Miss Y. Lorimer; Mr. D. Jantzen, Executive Assistant to Minister; Mrs. D. Jantzen; Mr. V. J. Parker, Director of Transit Services; Mrs. V. J. Parker; Mr. B. Sullivan, Assistant Director of Transit Services; Mr. James Campbell, Chairman, Capital Regional District; Mrs. James Campbell; Mayor W. N. Vander Zalm, representing Greater Vancouver Regional District; Alderman W. Hardwick, representing Greater Vancouver Regional District and City of Vancouver; and Mr. B. Wallace, staff of City of Vancouver.

"3, Total cost to Provincial Government, $7,642.64. Mrs. James G. Lorimer, Miss L. Lorimer, Miss Y. Lorimer, Mrs. D. Jantzen, Mrs. V. J. Parker paid their own expenses. The Provincial Government has no record of the expenses of Mr. James Campbell, Mrs. James Campbell, Mayor W. N. Vander Zalm. Alderman W. Hardwick, Mr. B. Wallace, nor of how they were paid."