[ Page 27 ]

CONTENTS

Routine proceedings

Throne speech debate

Mr. King — 27

Mr. King (amendment to motion in reply to Speech from the Throne) — 41

Mr. Cocke — 42

Mr. Gibson — 48

Mr. Wallace — 52

Division on motion to adjourn the House — 54

The House met at 10 a.m.

Prayers.

HON. H.A. CURTIS (Minister of Municipal Affairs): Mr. Speaker, in the gallery today, perhaps not at this precise moment but within the next few minutes, we will be honoured by the presence of Mayor Ron Andrews of the District of North Vancouver, who is also chairman of the Greater Vancouver Regional District and the Municipal Finance Authority. I might point out, Mr. Speaker, to you and to members of the House, that the Municipal Finance Authority of British Columbia is holding its annual meeting in Victoria today, and representatives from all regional districts in the province are gathered here for those business sessions, and, indeed, we may have other members of the MFA with us this morning.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouver East): Mr. Speaker, I would like to welcome to the galleries Carl Liden, a once and future member of this assembly.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, pursuant to the words of the Minister of Municipal Affairs, I would like to add my welcome to Mayor Andrews, who is not only the distinguished mayor of one of my municipalities but a very honourable and worthy opponent in two elections.

MR. L.B. KAHL (Esquimalt): Mr. Speaker, I would ask the House to welcome a group of ladies in the gallery this morning. They're from my constituency and they're enrolled in a pre-employment orientation programme for women. They're with their most capable instructor, Gladys Craft.

MR. W.G. STRONGMAN (Vancouver South): Mr. Speaker, I would like to acknowledge the presence of my wife, Judith, and my parents, who have travelled here from California and eastern Canada — not from two different places at one time, but they reside in both areas. I would like to indicate they are in the Speaker's gallery today.

HON. J. DAVIS (Minister of Transport and Communications): Mr. Speaker, I beg leave to present the Price Waterhouse Associates report on the B.C. Ferries, entitled: Review of 1976-77, Estimates of Revenues and Expenditures.

Leave granted.

Orders of the day.

SPEECH FROM THE THRONE
(continued debate)

MR. W.S. KING (Leader of the Opposition): I would at this time like to extend my congratulations to the Premier and his government for their success in the December 11 election. Although indeed it was a hard-fought election, the people have registered their preference. Certainly the official opposition recognizes that fact and congratulates the Premier on his success at the polls.

Indeed, Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate and welcome to the House all the new members and also those who were successful in a return to the House, but particularly the new members during the December 11th election.

I am looking forward with interest to hearing from all the new members. I think one of the interesting things that follows a general election is to learn the style and the approach of all new members, both on the government side and in the opposition. I'm certainly looking forward to that.

I would like to congratulate the mover and seconder on their presentations, their maiden speeches, and I think they gave a good account of themselves. I'll have something to say about the content of what they had to say a little later on, but nevertheless the presentation was very impressive.

I'd also like to acknowledge the fact that our group is extremely disappointed at the loss December 11 of our leader, the former member for Coquitlam, Dave Barrett. We do trust that he'll be back with us again.

We have a by-election that, hopefully, will be coming up, that will be called very expeditiously, because we're certain that now the legal requirements of calling by-elections have been drawn to the Premier's attention there will be no further undue delay. I am sure the Premier and his government would not want to give the impression, as it has got abroad during the election campaign and at other times, that he has any reticence about facing the former member for Coquitlam across the floor of this House. I can understand some anxiety, but I think perhaps he can bolster his courage and call that by-election very soon so that we might have a very worthwhile member of this Legislature back in the House. I think the people of British Columbia deserve that.

I must acknowledge the loss of our second member for Vancouver East, Bob Williams. I view that as a temporary thing. I am sure it will be viewed by the people of British Columbia as simply a sabbatical. He will undoubtedly also be back with us after the next general election.

Mr. Speaker, I recall the former member for Nelson-Creston, good old Wes Black — I'm sure a lot of you know him. He used to use the occasion of a

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new parliament to make some awards. I think it is perhaps propitious that I should emulate that rather esteemed member of this Legislature and make a few awards of my own, because I think some are richly deserved — you know, judging from some of the statements and the actions of new members of the executive branch of government particularly. I'm not going to hand out physical awards as Wes Black used to do, but I would like to at least give acknowledgements with what I think would be appropriate tokens to distinguish certain members of the cabinet.

First and foremost, I regret that the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) is not here this morning. I think he should be because he's No. 1 on the list. I'm concerned about him. I'm concerned about the advice that's going forth throughout the length and breadth of this province that certain foreign bodies should be inserted in the ear of that minister. (Laughter.) That concerns me, and I would suggest that he richly deserves a pair of earmuffs to protect those sensitive ears from the intrusion of objects which the public generally is suggesting should be crammed in his lobes. (Laughter.) I think at the same time he probably deserves a shoe-horn, you know, so he might be able to have some help in extracting his delicate foot from his mouth.

The Premier (Hon. Mr. Bennett) has termed his remarks "unfortunate, " and I wonder about one of the campaign pledges of the Social Credit government in the last election. One profound promise was that the Premier would rotate cabinet ministers. I would suggest that from the performance so far, the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) is going to be rotated very quickly. So there's still hope, I say to the member for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot) and the member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan). There's still hope, there's still hope; stay alert, stay alert.

The member for Surrey, the hon. Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) is high on the list too. I do have a shovel for the Minister. It's a large shovel. I didn't want to present it in the House but I will send it up to his office. I'm going to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that that shovel, which a large group of British Columbia citizens asked me to present to the Minister, still has stuck to the blade of it some of the vestiges of the Social Credit propaganda from the last election campaign; so I think the Minister will recognize it when it arrives. I'm sure he will. And I think it's a token of the kind of foolish statement that the minister made which casts some aspersions on people who are less fortunate than he, and most of us, in the early stages of his administration.

Now the Premier, I think, needs a little help too. I think the Premier needs a little bit of protection, Mr. Speaker, because certain members of his cabinet have indicated that they consider their post just a temporary stepping-stone to the lofty position of his office; and I'm sure that he's going to be watching his back very closely throughout this session. I was considering obtaining for him, if I can locate one, a bullet-proof vest with all of the armour mounted in the back, because I think he's liable to need that too.

MRS. P.J. JORDAN (North Okanagan): This is not the NDP.

MR. KING: The Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy), that sound business administrator, the one that is going to tightly scrutinize and be prudent in the dispensation of public funds, turns out to have a bit of a problem. And I'm thinking of providing her with a new rubber stamp. Apparently the one she has now only reads "Approved". I think she should have another rubber stamp marked "Not Approved" so that she can go about her mechanical duties and protect the interests of the citizens of this province a little more effectively.

I have a couple of crying towels to send down to the Member for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot) and the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf) . I'm sure they were disappointed. And it's quite a slap in the face to long-time loyal members.... Or Skeena — I beg your pardon.

MR. D.D. STUPICH (Nanaimo): Skeena.

MR. KING: The member for Skeena (Mr. Shelford). I feel bad for them and I'm sure that many of the people of...

MRS. JORDAN: You're all mixed up.

MR. KING: ...British Columbia feel bad for them, because it's pretty shabby recognition of their contribution to that party when they are shunted aside by new boys and new girls from the heart of Vancouver. I think they deserve some crying-towels.

MR. G.R. LEA (Prince Rupert): Send them to the Liberal Party. (Laughter.)

MR. KING: The Minister of Health.... That would be the final irony, wouldn't it? — membership in the Liberal Party.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Exchange is fair play, I guess.

The Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland), I think, deserves recognition. I'm thinking of sending to the Minister of Health a nice bright shiny new detective's badge, because he is apparently able to unearth by his unusual sleuthing talents problems in the community of Victoria that even the police

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department is not familiar with — and doesn't believe. So I think, as a recognition of his ability, we should provide him with a new detective's badge.

The Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams), I think he's got something too. He's been demanding apologies of people within the industrial relations world. I think it would be appropriate if we presented him with a nice padded stool so that when they arrive at his office they can kneel and bow and apologize humbly in front of him. I don't know whether he got that apology, Mr. Speaker; but I think the token would be appropriate.

HON. L.A. WILLIAMS (Minister of Labour): Yes.

MR. KING: To go from the less serious things perhaps for a moment and to deal with what is referred to as the throne speech, I don't expect to take too long dealing with this document because there's not really too much in it. It's a flimsy document, I think, generally containing very vague promises and, interestingly enough, only a few of those promises which were put forward during the election campaign by that party. I'd like to browse through it, Mr. Speaker, and simply give some of my reactions and the reactions of my party to certain issues which we think are of significance in the throne speech.

I find it somewhat ironic that members of the Legislative Assembly are apparently facing a cut in their salary while at one and the same time staff employed by ministers, by government in their offices — executive assistants and so on — are apparently remaining at the existing level. Indeed, those levels have been boosted in some respects. I find it rather insulting to members of this assembly when an MLA who is duly elected by the people to represent his constituency and to shoulder all of the problems and all of the workload that goes with representing ridings, many of them rural, many of them a long distance from this capital, many of them spread out, containing more than one community.... I find it insulting when the proposal is to cut that salary from $24,000 a year while at the same time employing such people as Arthur Weeks, whose conduct can certainly not be viewed as exemplary when he acted for that party previously at a salary of $29,000 a year. Some young lad, who has already been embroiled in a controversy over certain improprieties, is apparently placed higher on the scale of values by the Social Credit government than duly elected members of this Legislature.

I say, Mr. Speaker, that not only the opposition but the government backbenchers should be insulted by that kind of assessment of the role that MLAs play in this House. I say they should be insulted and I say that they should speak out and let their views be known on this matter too.

I note in the throne speech, Mr. Speaker, that the government promises to rekindle the provincial economy, provide programmes that will encourage individual enterprise and create new job opportunities. My question is: when is that going to start, Mr. Speaker? Thus far we have seen a government obsessed with continuing to fight an election that was held on December 11, with equivocating about political issues in that election campaign as a justification and as an excuse for not getting on with the job that they were elected to do.

We have seen unemployment rise just this week to the extremely high level — a record level — of 8 per cent in this province.

HON. D.M. PHILLIPS (Minister of Economic Development): More than that last year.

MR. KING: There is nothing in the throne speech that promises....

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Get your facts straight.

MR. KING: There is nothing in the throne speech that promises to ease that burden, to recognize the hardships that thousands — thousands — of British Columbians are facing. Indeed, the converse is true.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You'd better get your facts straight.

MR. KING: Indeed, the converse is true. Steps that have been taken by this government thus far seem more calculated to compound and create more problems of that condition than to ease it in any way.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You'd better get your facts straight.

MR. KING: We have seen, Mr. Speaker, the tremendously inflated increase in the cost of automobile insurance, costs that have escalated so high that many young people throughout the length and breadth of British Columbia have had to tie up their cars rather than purchase insurance and plates. The result has been that, in dozens and dozens of small towns throughout this province, dollars that should have gone into priming the economy — to purchasing merchandise, foodstuffs, clothes, many luxury items — have had to be diverted to that higher, unusual cost of automobile insurance.

This has had a depressing effect upon the economy of the local communities and created more unemployment. Indeed, when we look at the record of policy pronouncements by the government, we find the promise of vastly inflated and vastly increased costs for pretty well all public services, not only automobile insurance: the promise of increases

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in the B.C. Ferry rates, the promise of increases in transit rates, railway fares and so on. Virtually every area where the government is responsible for extending a service to the public is faced with highly inflated costs — this at one and the same time, Mr. Speaker, that this government is asking for the cooperation of trade unions, is asking for the cooperation of the small business community to keep costs down and to ease the fires of inflation. I say that it's a double standard, Mr. Speaker. It's a complete double standard. I think this government should be ashamed of their performance thus far.

I see nothing in the throne speech that comes to grips with or offers any proposition — any encouragement — for programmes which would ease the unusually high level of unemployment in this province now or in the immediate future. I think that's an insensitivity to the suffering of hundreds of thousands of citizens throughout the province, because hundreds of thousands are involved, not only those who are directly unemployed but all of their families too.

I note that the government has a commitment during the term of its mandate — and that's anyone's guess when it will be. It was more specific than that in election promises during the campaign, but all the way through there's some vague promise, during the mandate that they are proposing, to remove taxes from homes for senior citizens aged 65 and over. Well, Mr. Speaker, there's some debate as to the wisdom of that kind of move. I think it was the leader of the Conservative Party who pointed out that this is a provision that would remove a source of public income — quite a considerable source of public income. It would mean that millionaires who are quite able to pay property taxes, quite able to afford homes — indeed, luxury homes — would be relieved of the need to do so and, consequently, the loss of income to the provincial coffers would be significant.

Interjections.

MR. KING: I don't know when this is going to happen, Mr. Speaker. I don't know when this is going to happen. The proposition is that these taxes will come off. But when I look at an advertisement that was carried in the Victoria Times on November 12....

MR. E.N. VEITCH (Burnaby-Willingdon): Which year?

MR. KING: It was '75.

MR. KING: I find this headline curious, Mr. Speaker. It says: "No Property Taxes on Homes of Those 65 and Over" — no property taxes. No provincial income taxes for those 65 and over on incomes up to $5,000. No mention of a means test; no mention of a means test whatsoever. This is what was promised in huge, red headlines to the people of British Columbia.

AN HON. MEMBER: Communists!

MR. KING: I see nothing about that in the throne speech.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's misleading.

MR. KING: I hear talk now about stringent means tests that are going to be applied in almost every department of government before any services to people will be available. I want to ask the Premier, Mr. Speaker, whether or not he considers this a fair kind of election pitch to the people of British Columbia. Indeed, I think perhaps there's a case to be made here for an investigation by the Consumer Services department (laughter) because I'd say this was unfair advertising. I'd say, perhaps, Mr. Speaker, that this was misleading advertising altogether.

HON. W.R. BENNETT (Premier): Twenty-five dollar car insurance.

MR. KING: If that government is serious about protecting the interests of consumers...

HON. MR. BENNETT: Twenty-five dollar car insurance.

MR. KING: ...they will start internally; they will start to be square and honest with the people of this province, and their own minister responsible for that service will enforce it. It's about time. It's about time.

They don't like to be reminded, Mr. Speaker. They're becoming somewhat uncomfortable over there.

AN HON. MEMBER: You've really got us on the hook.

MR. KING: Well, I don't have to worry too much about getting you on the hook because I think you are doing a very adequate job yourselves. I think there's been so many feet in the mouth over there that it's just a matter of reminding you and reminding the people of some of the faux pas that have been made in the early stages of this government's administration.

Now the throne speech also says: "I am pleased to report that the Department of Education has been asked to review the ways in which provincial operational funding can be offered to independent schools."

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MR. G.V. LAUK (Vancouver Centre): We did that already.

MR. KING: This was another thing, Mr. Speaker, that was offered in election material....

MR. LAUK: Give them the money.

MR. KING: This was offered as an absolute.

MR. LAUK: Delaying tactics.

MR. KING: It says: "Social Credit Promises" — carried in The Vancouver Sun. I should read this because I think it is appropriate that the people and the press gallery, and the government themselves, be reminded of all the goodies they were going to bring forward to the people of British Columbia just a few short months ago.

MR. G.R. LEA. (Prince Rupert): Thanks for the memories.

MR. KING: Socred promises, it says, and I quote:

"The pledges of Social Credit in its well-answered call for a return to the free enterprise system of government in British Columbia are so many and varied there is a danger that some may become lost in the maze of work confronting the new administration. They must not be allowed to do so, and it is the intention of this newspaper to attempt to maintain public interest in them with constant reminders of everything that has been promised.

"The list will be at hand at all times, and as the new government gets ready to roll, readers might clip it for easy reference. It was compiled from reports of campaign speeches by Premier-elect Bill Bennett during his travels throughout the province as well as from the official Socred election booklet distributed to many of the electors."

The compilation as presented here is borrowed from The Vancouver Sun.

One of those promises is to place an anti-inflation freeze on taxes. Another one is to return to the merit system in the public service. What a return! There's been a veritable blood bath in the public service of this province.

MR. LAUK: Shame, shame!

MR. KING: They went far beyond the need of any government control of sensitive positions. It was a campaign of revenge — a campaign of political revenge and the flexing of insensitive political muscles, the exercise of raw, new-found power at the expense of many hard-working and well-qualified public servants. I think that's pretty shocking.

Interjection.

MR. KING: They've promised to pay operating costs of independent schools, not capital costs to local school boards. The throne speech doesn't say that.

HON. R.H. McCLELLAND (Minister of Health): It sure does.

MR. KING: The throne speech says that a review will be made. They're equivocating now, Mr. Speaker. When will the review be made? When will this programme be brought forward?

They talk here, Mr. Speaker, about the people achieving ownership of their own house and their own property. They claim that there's going to be a real initiative and a real drive towards increasing and encouraging private ownership of land by releasing more Crown land for home construction and home purposes.

Interjection.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if you might dissipate any reservations that were expressed during your election the other day by maintaining some order in the House. I don't want to end up in a shouting match with the members, because we listened intently as their members presented their views, and I expect the same courtesy.

I want to make this point, Mr. Speaker, with respect to the availability of Crown land in this province, and I think it's an extremely important one.

My concern is that if Crown land is made available in blocks for public bid without any guarantee that British Columbians have some preference, the consequence will be the further incursion of foreign ownership into the land and into the economy of British Columbia. I think that there should be no opening up of Crown land until a bill is passed in this House which prohibits the foreign ownership of British Columbia land. I see nothing in the throne speech that gives any such guarantee. Indeed, under the former Social Credit government, British Columbia land was advertised in the American papers — "British Columbia for Sale" — and I'm afraid we're returning to the same approach. I think it's a real danger, of grave concern to the people.

Mr. Speaker, I would remind the government, and particularly the Premier, that most British Columbians are working people. Most of them are on rather modest incomes. There are not many millionaires and used car dealers out there that can afford to compete with Americans for land, not too

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many. Most of these people are on modest incomes. I can understand why the present government is not sensitive to the problems of obtaining land that our citizens would face if they had to compete with foreign bidders. It's just academic, and I think if the government were to get off their seats in Victoria and get out and communicate with the people, they would understand this.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You know a foreigner can't buy Crown land. You know it.

MR. KING: The suggestion is, Mr. Speaker, that Crown land will be released for bid, and that's a very serious proposition.

The government offers to provide stricter consumer service protection in this province.

Interjection.

MR. KING: The Premier is very vocal this morning. He's not making too much sense, Mr. Speaker, and that's the only thing consistent about him so far. But I'll ask him to contain himself and I promise that I shan't be too long on the throne speech because, as I said at the outset, it really doesn't require too much analysis. It's pretty patently transparent, and there's not much of any encouragement in here to the people of B.C.

Mr. Speaker, the New Democratic Party does, in fact, agree with and congratulate the government on the promise to introduce an ombudsman in the Province of British Columbia. We think that is a welcome step and one which our government planned to introduce also. We do agree with the proposition of an auditor-general, and they're about the only two positive things, I think, in the speech.

The matter of gravest concern to me, I believe, Mr. Speaker....

MR. LAUK: Are you going to use the bill I drew up?

MR. KING: That's right, we did have a bill prepared, and perhaps the government has availed themselves of that draft bill for introduction. We hope so.

MR. LAUK: Yes, but there's no charge. You can use it.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, there are two matters that I am quite concerned with, and our party is quite concerned with, in the throne speech.

There's the offer of a reduction in the age for which the guaranteed annual income will be extended and provided, a reduction in the age from 60 to cover the age 55-59 group. And while we applaud that direction, I must express grave concern and reservations about the kind of need test that is apparently going to be introduced to meet that kind of qualification.

I have found all through the government's statements and indeed in the throne speech, that there sees to be an obsession with sleuthing, with snooping, with the basic assumption that the majority of people are cheats and are prepared to defraud the welfare system of this province. I think that's unfortunate. I think that the citizens of the province react in large measure to the kind of direction and the kind of leadership they get from a government. And I think if one appeals to reason, one is answered with reason. I think if one appeals to intelligence, one receives an intelligent response. I think if one puts forward a moral and decent proposition, one receives that kind of response, too, But when we have a minister operating from the basic assumption that poor people, indigent people, people who need assistance are basically dishonest, then I say that's a pretty unfortunate approach for a minister of the Crown to take.

The minister stated that $40 million can be saved.

AN HON. MEMBER: $80 million.

MR. KING: $80 million saved. Now that indicates to me that he's assuming that the majority of the people on social assistance are dishonest, are defrauding the government. The minister will have the opportunity to speak for himself if the-Premier will allow it. The Premier's already put the muzzle on some of his ministers, and I don't blame him too much. But if the job's going to be too much for you.... You're not quite the stature of the man your dad was. I don't think you're going to be able to speak for all the ministries and handle it. I don't think so.

Interjections.

MR. KING: I'm speaking of physical; I'm speaking of physical.

AN HON. MEMBER: He always liked Russell better.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, we must express our extreme concern about the approach which the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) is taking. I think that we'll have to look forward to his expansion of precisely what he means by this new programme. If the trend holds true to form, we expect that very few people within that reduced age category will qualify for any additional assistance. So before we applaud the approach, we want to have a very close scrutiny of the mechanisms

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which are set up for the administration and extension of that programme to people in need.

You know, there is a problem in terms of people defrauding the system, and that's true of almost any area of public concern. It's true of unemployment insurance, which resides under the federal jurisdiction; it's true in welfare to some extent; in fact, it's true in income tax reports. I think the Attorney-General will concede that some of the citizens of British Columbia once in a while violate the law in other respects. Some of them even go out and commit murder once in a while. But because that occurs we don't take a punitive approach to the rest of the citizens. There's a presumption that people are innocent until proven guilty. I suggest the approach that is being taken by this government is just the reverse. It's punitive against people in need, poor people, because of the assumption that is presently held by some ministers that these people are in the main fraudulent. I think that is reprehensible in the extreme.

Mr. Speaker, the most distressing part of the throne speech, in my view, is contained on the last page; it deals with a paragraph which I will quote:

It is with regret that I advise you that my government is forced to ask your approval to borrow money for current accounts. The advice to my government from the independent auditing firm, Clarkson, Gordon & Co., has indicated what our financial requirements will be. Therefore, for one time only, you will be asked to approve the British Columbia Deficit Repayment Act 1975-76.

I want to point out, Mr. Speaker, that there are statements contained in the throne speech which are patently false and untrue. I think this is a shocking disgrace that His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor is placed in the position of reading an opening speech for this Legislature containing falsehoods, containing lies, Mr. Speaker,

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Order, order!

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, the paragraphs I read....

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member....

MR. KING: Yes.

MR. SPEAKER: You cannot impute improper motives, as you well know....

MR. KING: To whom, Mr. Speaker?

MR. SPEAKER: To any hon. member of this House.

MR. KING: I certainly am not imputing improper motives. I am not sure who is responsible for drafting the throne speech, Mr. Speaker, but I say that the speech contains a falsehood. The fact of the matter is that although this....

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. Member, are you in any way imputing an improper motive to any member of this House?

MR. KING: No, I'm not, Mr. Speaker. I'm simply stating a fact as it's contained in the throne speech.

The speech says, Mr. Speaker, and I shall read it again:

It is with regret that 1, advise you that my government is forced to ask for your approval to borrow money for current accounts. The advice to my government from the independent auditing firm, Clarkson, Gordon & Co. has indicated what our financial requirements will be.

That is the statement, and I read from the Clarkson, Gordon report, Mr. Speaker, on page 9, where they point out that they only counted the grants to ICBC, the transit bureau, B.C. Hydro and the railways as coming from general revenue this year because the government instructed them to do so. They put it this way in the report, and I quote, Mr. Speaker....

HON. MR. BENNETT: A point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. A point of order has been raised.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, this member's been asked to withdraw. He's imputed not only the improper motives or incorrect statements to the Lieutenant-Governor but, beyond that, to members of this House. Without qualification, I ask that this member withdraw that there are mis-statements and lies in the throne speech, and I ask him to remember the tradition of the throne speech and the position of the Lieutenant-Governor when he makes such statements.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, to the point of order, if I may, please. I have not as yet been allowed to read the facts upon which I base the statement that the throne speech contains falsehood, and I think this House should be still interested in facts, Mr. Speaker. I responded to your question, Mr. Speaker, that I was not imputing improper motives to any member of this House. I regret that the Lieutenant-Governor, His Honour, has been placed in the position where he had to read a statement which contains an absolute falsehood. I expect to have....

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member....

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MR. KING: I expect to have the courtesy of this House in proceeding to relate that fact to the House, and I have not as yet had that courtesy.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Withdraw!

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, I would suggest to you, sir, that it's very unparliamentary to suggest that words in the throne speech are lies, and I'd ask you to withdraw that imputation.

MR. LAUK: Mr. Speaker, on the same point, it seems to me that to protect the dignity of the Crown and the Lieutenant-Governor that incorrect statement should not have been put in the throne speech in the first place. But it is our every right as members of this House to point out incorrect statements in the throne speech to other members of this House. The statements are incorrect, and the hon. Leader of the Opposition has every right to point them out.

MR. SPEAKER: There may be many opinions as to the correctness or the incorrectness of statements, but it is not for the members of this House, if they're going to conduct themselves in an orderly manner and a proper parliamentary manner, to impute statements that are read by themselves and are interpreted to mean whatever they decide they are to mean.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: He didn't say incorrect statements. He said lies.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I don't want to get embroiled in a controversy on this thing. I will withdraw....

Interjections.

MR. KING: Will the members please remain silent while I address Mr. Speaker? I'm quite prepared to withdraw the word "lie".

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you, Mr. Member.

MR. KING: I must insist, Mr. Speaker, that the paragraph contained in the throne speech is patently untrue. I presume to....

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member....

MR. KING: I propose to demonstrate that to you. Now this is a question of fact....

MR. SPEAKER: As an hon. member you withdrew the remark and then restated it by another means. You know that's not....

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, that is not correct. I suggest to you that an untruth can be put forward without any offence or intent to lie, and I hope that's the case. I would not like to see this government attempt to prostitute the integrity of the Lieutenant-Governor for their political purposes. But I think that I have the right to point out that there is in fact a statement in the throne speech which is patently untrue, and that's what I propose to do.

The Clarkson, Gordon report states: "We have been advised these amounts will be paid prior to March 31." That's what they have been advised. They never gave such information to the government. Indeed, the government gave those figures to Clarkson, Gordon. That is the fact of the matter.

Now, Mr. Speaker, beyond and above that, there is another question....

HON. E.M. WOLFE (Minister of Finance): Mincing words.

MR. KING: Mincing words indeed!

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Are you suggesting a public servant lied?

MR. KING: I'm telling you, Mr. Speaker, that this party is capable of getting up and articulating in plain English what the policy of our group is, and we don't have to mince words or claim being improperly quoted to find an intelligent position and one that we will support.

Mr. Speaker, the only aspect of it that bothers me and I think again gives an improper inference is the statement of the auditing firm of Clarkson, Gordon — the independent auditing firm of Clarkson, Gordon. Mr. Speaker, that gives an inference that an audit of the provincial books was conducted.

HON. MR. BENNETT: An auditing firm is an auditing firm.

MR. KING: "The advice to my government from the independent auditing firm, Clarkson, Gordon & Co. has indicated what our financial requirements will be.

A seedy reference, a seedy inference that there was an audit of the books conducted when, in fact, there was no such audit conducted, as Clarkson, Gordon themselves stated. They stated on page 12 of their report, and this is verbatim from the Clarkson, Gordon report: "We were not requested to perform an audit of the financial information, and we did not do so."

The government has attempted to inject into the throne speech political motives, political inferences, which they wanted to distribute to the public for their edification throughout this province in the most

[ Page 35 ]

unseemly way, most unseemly. This is a new kind of political machination by any government that I am familiar with to compromise the integrity of the Lieutenant-Governor by statements which are politically motivated.

MR. VEITCH: You mean keeping the books differently?

AN HON. MEMBER: Who kept the books?

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, this is about the kind of mentality that we have come to expect from that government. I think it's unfortunate.

In looking at the throne speech and what it offers, though, I am reminded of a factual assessment of what has taken place in this province since December 11, some assessment as to what the status of the economy was under the previous NDP administration as compared to what has happened since December 11. I think it is worthwhile having a look at that.

We have seen what is offered in the throne speech: vague promises of something that may occur in the future if the economy improves. Certainly no evidence that it is improving; in fact, the converse is true. Unemployment is accelerating. The government is cutting services, extending extreme and insensitive need tests to the problems of people. I have little confidence under this kind of economic approach that the people of B.C. can look for any upsurge in the economy in the near future.

Mr. Speaker, let's have a look; let's have a review of what the situation was prior to December 11, 1975. Our government had announced an increase in Mincome from $250 to $265 per month for single persons, which provided couples with a level of income of $530 — that was done last fall.

We had announced the phased increase in the Minimum Wage Act from $2.50 per hour to $3 per hour. I have heard nothing as to whether the new government intends to abide by that announced phased proposition of increase which we introduced.

We had announced the continuation of rent control with a decrease from 10.6 per cent to 8 per cent. We had announced the plan to establish a housing corporation to provide first mortgages at lower interest rates.

We had put a price freeze on all foods and beverage products — the only province in Canada that has taken this kind of action to combat the ravages of inflation. We had put a freeze on all energy prices, including home heating oil, gasoline, propane, natural gas and electricity. We had put a freeze on transportation, including ferry and bus fares.

We had announced new legislation to be introduced on rent control on commercial properties to help small businessmen, small business enterprises.

We had demanded that Ottawa control bank profits, interest rates, mortgage rates and professional incomes.

What has happened since that time under the new administration?

MR. LEA: Nothing.

MR. KING: What has happened since that time? The new administration has increased auto insurance anywhere from 100 per cent to 400 per cent and promised to let the U.S. insurance industry back into the field. This undoubtedly is motivated by a desire to pay off old campaign debts.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. KING: But it's pretty tough for the people of this province to swallow when they are being asked to exercise restraint in terms of their wage demands when they are confronted with increases of from 100 to 400 per cent in auto insurance costs, and the minister says: "Let them sell their cars." Mr. Speaker, the Premier called that minister's statement unfortunate. I think it's unfortunate too. I think the Premier is surrounded by unfortunate ministers, and I hope the rotation commences very quickly.

This new administration has increased electricity and natural gas rates an average of 12 per cent. They have allowed an increase in home and heating oil of 4.54 cents per gallon. Undoubtedly, Mr. Speaker, this is an initiative to pay back the campaign funds that belong to the oil companies at the expense of higher costs to the people of British Columbia.

They eliminated the price freeze on propane and gasoline. They eliminated those controls which protected the people on fixed incomes and the wage-earners of this province from being confronted with restrained wages but accelerating costs.

They allowed an increase in the allowance for residential rents from 8 to 10.6 per cent while, at the same time, asking those people in rental accommodations to moderate their expectations and demands. It's a system of punish the poor and reward the rich that is consistent with Social Credit policy since its inception.

They cancelled the plan to introduce rent control on commercial premises. The small business guy doesn't matter too much; more is owed to the large conglomerates.

They eliminated the price freeze on food, drugs and beverages. All costs to the housewife, to the consumer, are allowed to accelerate, indeed, in staggering proportions while this government is paying lip-service to restraints. Restraints for the average guy; financial rewards for their friends in the big corporations — that's the thread we see running through the whole policy. They even allow price increases on bread and milk, the most fundamental

[ Page 36 ]

basic needs of families and children in this province. I think there was a statement made by the member who moved the Speech from the Throne the other day that perhaps I should read back to him. I think it would be appropriate at this time.

MR. LAUK: Don't do that; he'll be embarrassed.

MR. KING: I don't like to do these things, but, you know, the new Social Credit members have to understand that after years of NDP insistence, we how have a Hansard in this House and we can check back on precise statements made by members. What did I do with that? I've got to find it here.

Interjection.

MR. KING: I know that he doesn't want me to do this. Oh, here it is.

Yes, the member for Burnaby-Willingdon (Mr. Veitch), I believe. He said: "For, yes, Mr. Speaker, there are enemies out there, enemies to the future of British Columbia." That's interesting, Mr. Speaker. That's interesting. It's consistent with my previous statements that there is an assumption over there that people are frauds, cheats, enemies of the state.

MR. VEITCH: You're quoting Adlai Stevenson.

MR. KING: No, I'm quoting you Mr. Member. I'm quoting you. No, Mr. Speaker, I'm quoting the member before he went into his quotes of a politician in a country where I did not want to associate myself, with the style of politics that they have.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Not at all. That was the mentality that justified.... That's exactly the mentality that justified the enemies of the state, witch hunts that got Mr. Nixon in trouble, and all his Watergate sleuths. That's exactly the mentality, Mr. Speaker.

He said that there are enemies of the state out there. I think that member, and this government who agrees, has an obligation and a responsibility to get up in this House and identify those enemies.

AN HON. MEMBER, Hear, hear!

MR. KING: Get up and identify them. Have the courage of your convictions!

Interjections.

MR. KING: What are they enemies for? Are they enemies because they are not Social Credit? Are they enemies because they disagree with the political philosophy of the government?

MR. LEA: Whatever that may be.

MR. KING: How brazen of any citizen of this province to have his own political views! My goodness! This is a rather frightening approach, a rather frightening philosophy for any Member of the Legislative Assembly to hold.

MR. VEITCH: I'm glad you're aware of it.

MR. KING: I'm not going to quote Adlai Stevenson, not at all. I would hope that in British Columbia we can keep an altogether different atmosphere about political life in this province than what has pervaded the United States for the last few years.

If those members are prepared to identify with that, so be it. But when suggestions are made by elected members that enemies of the state reside out there among the citizens of this province, I think that is an absolutely scandalous assertion, and I think the member has a moral obligation to state who he's talking about.

Interjections.

MR. KING: He did quote Adlai Stevenson and he did talk about compassion. I want to ask him if the kind of compassion he's advocating is the kind where this government allows increases in the price of bread and milk. Is that the kind of compassionate society you are advocating — where children and poor families pay more, in fact, possibly can't afford bread and milk? That's the kind of compassionate sensitivity that apparently those backbenchers are prepared to live with, Mr. Speaker. I think that's a pretty sad commentary on the direction of this new government.

He indicated also that increases can be expected in the B.C. Ferry fares, bus fares, freight rates, income tax, hospital co-insurance, and further increases in some heating oil and gasoline prices....

MR. LEA: Inheritance tax.

MR. KING: All of those things have been proffered by various ministers of that government already, while taking off the kind of rent control protection that low-income earners had some........

MR. VEITCH: Nonsense!

Interjections.

MR. KING: You certainly reduced it.

Interjections.

[ Page 37 ]

MR. KING: It was reduced, Mr. Speaker, from a maximum of 8 per cent to 10.6 per cent.

HON. MR. BENNETT: The 10.6 was passed by your government.

MR. KING: No way. It was at 8 per cent, Mr. Speaker...

HON. MR. BENNETT: It was 10.6.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order!

MR. KING: ...and that's the kind of consistent approach we've had from this government.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

Interjections.

AN HON. MEMBER: Call the Premier to order.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, we over here don't have too much trouble with our research. We do a lot of it ourselves. We do most of it ourselves. We don't rely on Dan Campbell and Weeks and people like that who are constantly making errors and embarrassing the ministers. We do our own homework.

HON. G.B. GARDOM (Attorney-General): You're attacking John Wood; that's all you're doing. (Laughter.)

MR. KING: You're just jealous, that's all.

Mr. Speaker, at one and the same time, when employment has risen in this province to 8 per cent, we have a serious tie-up on the British Columbia Railway, and the Premier is running around saying: "Oh, you can expect a boom in the economy of the north." But that's presumably when the strike's over. I wonder what happened, Mr. Speaker....

MR. LEA: Where's Alex?

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I wonder what happened to those fighting members from the north who took their excursion up the railway system when we had a work stoppage on it once before. The member for South Peace (Hon. Mr. Phillips) ; indeed, Mr. Speaker, the member for North Peace (Hon. Mr. Smith) ...

MR. SPEAKER: Order! (Laughter.)

MR. KING:...and the Member for Cariboo (Hon. Mr. Fraser) all were concerned this work stoppage was going to kill the whole economy of the north. It couldn't be tolerated. The towns were dying. I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that we have a strike right now that is of longer duration, and those members are strangely mute and silent. Strangely mute.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Well, Mr. Speaker, I wonder whether they're going to be moved to some statements and to some advice to the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams) as to what should be done to solve that labour dispute. I've heard nothing from them.

Interjections.

MR. KING: I've heard nothing from them — not a word. I think it's ironic again that it all depends whose ox is being gored, I guess, They're prepared to live with some inconvenience if it's a matter that would reflect in any way on their government.

AN HON. MEMBER: Why didn't you act a year ago?

MR. LAUK: Is that any excuse for you?

MR. KING: I want to turn briefly to a matter which....

MR. LAUK: Rotate, rotate. (Laughter.)

MR. LEA: It's like playing musical chairs on the Titanic. (Laughter.)

MR. KING: I understand the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) is considering establishing a new programme of seeing-eye people for blind dogs, but I don't know when he's going to be rotated. I certainly hope it is before he gets it into place, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the Minister's performance with respect to ICBC, the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer)...

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

MR. KING: ...has been absolutely nothing short of shocking, insensitive, absolutely arrogant.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I hope you won't rule me out of order for characterizing it as arrogant, because I'm borrowing those words from certain

[ Page 38 ]

backbenchers within his own party. They characterized it as arrogant.

MR. LAUK: Who said that?

MR. KING: I'm going to tell you who said that. I don't like to embarrass anyone in this House and I don't want to read back any statements that those members might not like to be reminded of, but there are times, you know, when it's necessary.

MR. VEITCH: Are you sure you're reading the correct statements?

MR. KING: Where is that little article? I've lost it here. No, here we are, here we are.

I think it was the Member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan)...

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. KING: ...and the Member for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot)...

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. KING: ...who said that the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) was arrogant, insensitive and shameful when he came out with his Marie Antoinette statement that if they can't afford insurance, let them sell their cars. They said that they were going to go down to Victoria and they were going to have something to say to the government about the insulting remarks of the Minister of Education.

Indeed, in The Province on January 7 of this year there was a virtual mini-revolution in the government of "Mini" (laughter)...in the "mini-government" (laughter) — a mini-revolution in the back benches of the mini-government, headed by the hon. member for North Okanagan.

The Province had this to say: "Socreds Want Blow Softened."

"If B.C. government backbenchers have their way, motorists will not pay quite as much for car insurance this year as Education minister Pat McGeer had predicted. Almost all Socred MLAs surveyed by the Province say they are unhappy with the method of McGeer's announcement, and most say they want the rates lower than the predicted 100 per cent, or greater, increases."

What a shock they had coming!

"Vancouver South MLA Gerry Strongman" — good old Gerry; what a strong guy he is — "said on Tuesday that B.C. motorists would not object to paying the same rates as other Canadian motorists but that the projected $181 million Insurance Corp. of B.C. debt should not increase the burden."

Interjection.

MR. KING:

" 'ICBC should start from day one as though the corporation was not in debt, ' said Strongman. 'The debt should be paid through gasoline taxes or general revenue.' He termed McGeer's remarks to the effect motorists who couldn't afford the new rates should sell their cars as irresponsible and an insult to all the people of the province."

That's the way to talk, Gerry. That's the kind of backbencher we want to see. That's independent initiative. Boy, oh boy, what a fighting member he is. That's what he said.

MR. LAUK: No cabinet post for him.

MR. KING: He's going to get rotated right out the back door there if he comes out with many more statements like that.

Interjection.

MR. KING: Omineca MLA (Mr. Kempf) said his northern constituents depend heavily on automobiles and feel the proposed rates are far too high. I believe him. He made a tough speech yesterday. He's really interested in protecting all those poor little struggling northern communities, and I know that we haven't heard the last of that member about these exorbitant rates. I just know that. He'll have the courage of his convictions, be consistent and get up and tell it like it is.

Interjection.

MR. KING: He favoured a gasoline tax of 10 cents too. That's what he favoured. Then the member for Skeena (Mr. Shelford), who used to be vocal at one point — he used occasionally to oppose the former government of the father — was a bit more temperate. Perhaps he though he had more to lose.

I think it was the member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan) and the member for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot) who were most vociferous. They were reported on television as characterizing the statement as arrogant, insensitive, irresponsible. They were going to come down here and demand a caucus meeting. Imagine Social Credit backbenchers demanding a caucus meeting. Shame on them! The effrontery to the Premier (Hon. Mr. Bennett) and his ministers of those backbenchers wanting a caucus meeting!

I might have believed that all of these policy decisions were made without any consultation with

[ Page 39 ]

the elected members from the northern part of British Columbia and the interior. Those rates were foisted on those people without even the respect being given of a discussion with the members representing those ridings.

Interjection.

MR. KING: They had an open government. Government of the people! It's a government of the people all right — the big people. The insurance corporations, that's who it's a government for. Pound your desk because that's the way it is.

Mr. Speaker, we are particularly concerned about the unnecessary...

HON. MR. BENNETT: Don't be bitter.

MR. KING: ...aspect of the insurance rates being adjusted to the level that they are. There's absolutely no need for the kind of punitive rates that were established to achieve basically two things, as I see it. Number one, to portray the image that there were great financial problems in this province, and to thus discredit the previous administration. That was the first motivation, and that, I say, is patently untrue. Had our government reacted in the same way in 1972 we would have calculated the debt incident to the Columbia River treaty dams, which was in the area of $800 million. We would have computed the debt incident to the ferry authority and the transit authority, and portrayed that as a huge deficit for which we had to borrow in one budget, and saddle the people with those high costs. We were not so scurrilous. We were not so politically motivated, and we kept accounts on the basis that they had been established in this province for years.

The main criteria and the main objective of that government, with respect to these exorbitant insurance rates, were to open the door to let back into this province their friends in the insurance industry, the large foreign corporations who channeled campaign slush funds into British Columbia to accommodate the re-election of that group over there.

That was the main objective, because with rates like we have in British Columbia at the moment, there is no question but what the private companies can come back and compete — no question whatsoever. This government appears to care little that the average automobile driver in this province is the real loser and the one who is paying through harsh and punitive rates for that kind of insensitive approach.

Mr. Speaker, the third point that we object to most strenuously is the removal of the territorial equality from the plan that our government had introduced — a return to the disparity of territorial ratings. I don't blame those backbench Socreds for speaking out against that approach. I just hope that they will have the courage and the consistency to stand up and condemn these rates during the debates in this House.

One of the most frightful aspects was the very discriminatory action taken against young male drivers under the age of 25. Absolutely punitive and destructive rates to young people, young people who have to either pay insurance costs that in many, many instances are higher than the value of the automobile that they own, or leave the car unlicensed and rotting in some shed or in some back yard, which means that they lack the transportation to accommodate their travel to university, to work and so on, and without any significant recognition from this government. Oh, there is the promise of help down the road; if they remain accident-free, perhaps they'll get a rebate. The point is they are not millionaires; they are not car dealers. They can't afford to pay the rates now. A rebate next year is of little value to them.

Mr. Speaker, we are extremely disappointed with the initial approaches which this government has taken. We are extremely concerned that the start which has been made is going to be consistent throughout the term of this government's administration. I want to remind them that....

MR. LAUK: Here he is.

MR. KING: I want to remind them.... I am glad the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) is back.

MR. LAUK: Just off Air West.

MR. KING: Just off Air West; still no earmuffs. I'll try to obtain them for him. I'm afraid for those ears. (Laughter.)

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I want to....

HON. MR. GARDOM: At least Barrett was funnier. (Laughter.)

MR. KING: Well, perhaps, but I have more to work with than he does at the moment. (Laughter.) I think, Mr. Speaker, if anyone wants to be humorous they have to have some subjects in front of them. When I see the menagerie which I am confronted with across that floor — all former Liberals, both federal and provincial, the odd Conservative thrown in and the odd other kind of dissident too — I find it rather amusing. I think it's good for a chuckle. The only thing I regret is that Agnes never made it. I wish Agnes were here with you; I really do. I think she'd give nice balance, you know, between the two extremes that we have here. But poor old Agnes got turfed out. Somebody was too strong for her, I guess.

[ Page 40 ]

Interjections.

MR. KING: Big money boys from downtown took over the Social Credit Party. No place for the old workhorses; no place for those who worked hard to build that party. It was once rather a grass roots party — too bad what happened to it. Too bad.

Mr. Speaker, I want to remind you of a few statements which were made respecting automobile insurance during and just previous to the last election. We had a statement by Ernie Hall, the former member for Surrey of this Legislature.

AN HON. MEMBER: The Panco man.

MR. KING: He said during the election campaign that a vote for the Socreds on December 11 means that next year alone every motorist in B.C. will have his auto insurance rates at least doubled, and in many cases their rates will be tripled. I say that that has some truth.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order!

Interjections.

MR. KING: He knew, Mr. Speaker....

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. KING: He knew, Mr. Speaker, that there would be a capitulation by that government to their friends in the private companies. He knew that there would be an attempt to pay back all those slush funds. The Premier doesn't like that.

MR. D.G. COCKE (New Westminster): What are you so touchy about over there? What are you so touchy about?

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. KING: The maid doth protest too much, Mr. Speaker.

Interjections.

MR. KING: Don't point your finger at me, Mr. Premier; come over and chin yourself on this one.

Mr. Speaker, I want to remind you of what the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) had to say. He said that premiums....

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, exercise your new-found gavel. (Laughter.)

Mr. Speaker, I'm going to quote the Minister of Education, if I may be forgiven for doing that. He came out with this statement, and it's another gem: "Premiums will be subsidized to a degree. Rates would have to go out of sight to cover the true cost of insuring the male 25-year-old driver. There is no way we are going to make them pay that."

"No way we are going to make them pay that, " he said in The Province on December 24, 1975. Then he turned around and brought in a higher rate.

He was quoted again in The Province on January 3, 1976 — he had changed his position a bit: "I can say quite bluntly that if you can afford a car you can afford insurance for it. If you can't afford insurance for it, sell it." That was on January 3. Talk about arrogance!

Interjections.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, maybe some of them have some qualms at the kind of punitive, profiteering rates that your government has introduced. Maybe that was the problem; maybe it was a psychological problem. Certainly you have had one for some time.

The Premier, when asked to comment on the Minister of Education's interview, said that Mr. McGeer's remark was unfortunate. That's what he said. So I suspect that the Minister of Education is now probably a No. I candidate for rotation. I hope he doesn't meet the same kind of fate as the Marie Antoinette that he reminded everyone of. I hope he doesn't face the guillotine. But I fear for his future on the treasury benches of the government.

Referring to the protest rally of 10,000 people in this province against the ICBC rates, the Minister of Education said that it's only an event. "Let them sell their cars! It's only an event!" My goodness! Is that the new government that's going to be sensitive and going to communicate with the people — going to be accessible? What arrogant statements! A complete lack of understanding. The people all through this province and up in my riding of Revelstoke-Slocan rely on their automobiles to drive 30 and 40 miles to work. It's a complete lack of understanding that people in those areas have to drive 40 and 50 miles to obtain hospital and doctors' services and, indeed, education — regional colleges and so on.

MR. VEITCH: What would it cost if it had been added on to the gasoline?

MR. KING: "Let them sell their cars." No alternate transportation, no transit systems or buses

[ Page 41 ]

in that area. It's fine for the Minister of Education to come out with that kind of callous statement and then fly away to Hawaii to bask in the sun. He even issued a press release from Hawaii, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: Dilettante.

MR. KING: I think he got a phone call from the Premier first.

Interjection.

MR. KING: That is where I saw the hon. member for Kamloops (Hon. Mr. Mair), certainly. But I can tell you this: the ministers in the former government didn't issue press releases from Hawaii. We didn't have a government in exile. We believed that the Province of British Columbia's affairs should be administered here, right here in B.C.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): On a point of order, Mr., Speaker, I would ask the hon. member not to speak against Hawaii. (Laughter.)

MR. KING: I enjoyed it very much. I didn't stay at the Liberal leader's father's resort, but I did enjoy my brief holiday.

I think it was rather insensitive for the Minister of Education to come out with a statement as arrogant as the one that he made and then travel off to Hawaii, from which location he subsequently issued a press release saying he was sorry that it was an insensitive remark. The minister said he was unfortunate. The minister suggested that the minister of recreation and conservation was unfortunate, too, when he wanted to sell ICBC to some foreign control. He has quite a number of unfortunate ministers over there.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Not as many as the last government.

MR. KING: And I can understand that; he's rather an unfortunate Premier. I can understand that. But all of these things, Mr. Speaker, and all of these approaches — the unwillingness of that government to recognize the hardship they are imposing on the people of British Columbia, their unwillingness to be sensitive enough to take a second look and to respond to....

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouver East): Not as many as the first one? Who are they? Who are the bad ones?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Who?

MR. MACDONALD: You said not as many as the last.

Interjections.

MR. KING: He's thinking of Waldo Skillings, I think. But old Waldo wasn't too bad. After all, he usually asked the Premier before he came out with the kind of statements the present Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) is making.

Mr. Speaker, seriously, I regret that this government hasn't given any indication that they are prepared to respond in a sensitive, meaningful way to the literally hundreds and thousands of citizens in this province who have indicated their displeasure, indeed, their inability to live with the exorbitant ICBC rates. A group was here and presented petitions with over 200,000 signatures protesting the extremely high ICBC rates.

I, myself, Mr. Speaker, have a file; and I don't want to alarm anyone. I'm not going to read it all. But I have a file here of dozens and dozens of letters and petitions from ridings other than my own. Many of the ridings are represented by Social Credit members. They are asking that something be done. They are desperate because their car is not a luxury, as the member for Vancouver–Point Grey (Hon. Mr. McGeer) seems to feel. It's fine for him where he has air service, where he has a transit bus service, where the level of income and the style of life is relatively higher than it is in the Nakusp area of my riding, or the Kaslo area, or in the north, or in the Kootenays. I regret that this government has given no indication that they are sensitive to and intend to respond in a positive way to these pleas and appeals by, I would say, the majority of citizens in this province.

So accordingly, Mr. Speaker, I wish to move, seconded by the hon. member for New Westminster, (Mr. Cocke) a motion...

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.

MR. KING: ...that the motion in reply to the opening speech of His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor be amended by adding the words: "But this House regrets that the speech fails to relieve the motoring public from oppressive auto insurance rates, fails to offer fair treatment for northern and interior drivers and fails to end discrimination against drivers under 25."

Interjection.

MR. KING: No, the people of the province thought it up.

[ Page 42 ]

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, the amendment appears to be in order.

MR. J.R. CHABOT (Columbia River): On a point of order and on a point of correction: while the member for Revelstoke-Slocan (Mr. King) was speaking, Mr. Speaker, he attributed certain erroneous statements to the member for Columbia River. He suggested that I had been on television castigating...and attributed harsh words to the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) regarding the ICBC situation, and that statement is untrue. He suggested as well that I had stated that the Minister of Education was arrogant in his approach to the ICBC situation, another untrue statement, He suggested that I supported the 10 cents a gallon subsidy on gasoline for ICBC, another untrue statement. Mr. Speaker, he suggested that I demanded a caucus meeting, which was untrue. The member for Revelstoke-Slocan, Mr. Speaker, is confused as usual.

HON. MR. BENNETT: But he's consistent.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The member for Columbia River made an explanation, as one hon. member to another hon. member is entitled to do in this House.

MR. KING: On a point of order and clarification, Mr. Speaker, I said: "The Member was reported on television as making these statements."

MR. D.G. COCKE (New Westminster): Mr. Speaker, I bring you greetings from that great riding of New Westminster, the former home of this House, the royal city — a great city with a great imagination, and a city that is asking the new government for the same kind of service that they had from the last government for the last three and a half years. That's all I ask, Mr. Speaker, and I am sure that this new government will do everything they can to acquiesce to that kind of request, if they can.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, it strikes me today that the member for South Okanagan, the Premier of this province, is nervous. He reacts very quickly to almost every statement made.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: And, Mr. Speaker, I wonder why.

AN HON. MEMBER: You're a busy man! (Laughter.)

MR. COCKE: I would think that I would be somewhat nervous too. I would be somewhat nervous too, Mr. Speaker, if everything I did was rendered ashes in the eyes of the public, if everything my ministers did began to fall apart.

But, Mr. Speaker, getting back to that wonderful riding with or without a strong member in the eyes of the Premier...I don't really think that they asked his advice during the election particularly, and it strikes me that they'll not be asking his advice in the future.

But we have all the problems. We're a microcosm of this province, basically. We have all the problems of urban B.C., and sitting on the Fraser as we do, we have a real touch with not only the lumber industry and the fishing industry, but much of the kind of industry that goes on in this province. But people in New Westminster are just far enough away from Victoria that they can be a little bit dispassionate. They can be a little bit objective, and so some of them are viewing this new government and its antics in a dispassionate and objective way, and I wonder if the government knows what these dispassionate and objective people are thinking and saying about them.

There are those in our towns that refrain from being over impressed by this government. They aren't even really impressed by this government despite the fact that it strikes me that some of the media seem to be having a bit of a honeymoon. I wonder how long it will last. Even Webster will capitulate.

AN HON. MEMBER: Who?

MR. COCKE: Even Webster eventually will capitulate and begin to see through what's happening over there.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Are you attacking the media as usual?

MR. COCKE: Oh, yes, as usual. That member for South Peace River (Hon. Mr. Phillips) — I wondered why it was that he got a cabinet position. Then I started going over the Socred promises, and they promised a minister from the north. Fair enough. You have to do something to fulfil this particular promise. You couldn't fulfil a lot of the others.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: That's your criterion. That was in the election promises.

Mr. Speaker, there are many in this province who have deep concern, and they're wondering what this new government is doing, wondering what their direction is. They're saying: "What are they doing to our great province?"

I've heard the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Phillips) on a number of other things; I've heard him

[ Page 43 ]

talking in terms of our great province. What are you doing with our province, Mr. Minister, through you, Mr. Speaker?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Trying to get it back on the road. Digging it out of the ditch.

MR. COCKE: They're saying they've never seen such concerted efforts to wreck the economy of a province as they've seen from this government. Wreck the economy!

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Yes, Mr. Speaker, ruin our provincial economy. That's what the people of British Columbia are saying. In the eyes of the rest of the world this government is doing that very thing.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: They have expended all this effort, Mr. Speaker, to see to it that people out there, these great business people that they keep talking about, won't have any confidence in our economy, and they're doing it for political purposes, Mr. Speaker, and that's unfortunate.

AN HON. MEMBER: Never!

MR. COCKE: Never — oh, Mr. Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) .

Mr. Speaker, never has such an effort been made to create distrust, never in our history, and believe me our history is a little bit wavy when you consider where our government's been over the past 24 years.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the Premier will have callouses all over his hands by the time this session is over. He can bang on his desk for the weakest of reasons.

Mr. Speaker, no opposition party, given the normal course of events, would have done the kinds of things that this government has done — the callous, shallow efforts to present the former government in such a light as to present our own economy in such a way as to wreak disaster. Even in the throne speech — referring to restoration of a sound economy as though it may or may not occur, because they go into that, the length of time. It may not even occur in this parliament.

Mr. Speaker, think in terms of the high unemployment we inherited from the Socreds...come on, get off that hobby horse — 10.11! It's 8.9 right now.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: High anyway — 10 per cent during the last Socred regime.

Mr. Speaker, even in that throne speech they indicate a lack of confidence in our own province, and that's unfortunate. But do you know why they did that, Mr. Speaker? For another political reason. They have to explain to the municipalities that "you ain't going to get that sharing, babies." That's really what you are saying in that throne speech.

MR. LEA: That's right.

MR. COCKE: Don't look forward to it with a great feeling of anticipation, Mr. Phillips over there, in Vancouver, because things aren’t right.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where did the money go?

MR. COCKE: "Where did the money go?" the member says. The money went to people services when we were government; where is it going now?

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: And it's going faster now than it ever went. They are spending so much money in the last fiscal year just so they could get it into the last fiscal year. Shocking! Shocking, Mr. Premier, through you, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: Prove it!

MR. COCKE: This business-oriented government....

MR. LEA: I can prove it to you.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, this business-oriented government, this business-dominated government, it's not doing business in a businesslike way.

MR. LEA: Where's Bonner these days?

AN HON. MEMBER: He's doing a great job.

MR. LAUK: Like he did for MacMillan Bloedel?

MR. COCKE: Yes, where's Jimmy Rhodes? Wouldn't you love to have him? Yes, wouldn't you love to have him? Jimmy Pattison took him up.

AN HON. MEMBER: A good public servant.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, they're not doing business in a businesslike way. Creating distrust is not businesslike. Confidence will never grow in this

[ Page 44 ]

province around a vindictive game — playing a childish game.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I can understand that if that man were the Premier, but he ain't. (Laughter.)

Let's get back to earth, Mr. Speaker. Let's no longer insult the Department of Finance by bringing in outside auditors to lend their names to something other than an audit. What nonsense! Not even a review, I've been told by many competent accountants.

Remember, most of the people in the Department of Finance were there prior to the last government, and what an insult they got from this present government. We all know how embarrassed you must have been when the original appointment of an accountant was found to be an officer in the Social Credit Party. A bit shocking, wouldn't you say, Mr. Minister? Just a bit shocking,

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: That's pretty weak, Dennis.

MR. COCKE: Is that pretty weak?

Mr. Speaker, B.C. deserves more. B.C. deserves more from this government. Smarten up!

Beyond the present arguments over the economy, I have a particular hang up, a particular soft spot for health care in B.C. Presently we have a House divided, a minister giving pronouncements regarding the streets of Victoria, much of it poorly researched, but good headline material — and we can always depend on that minister for that. Good headline material, sensationalist. It gains the kind of ink that he feels is worth it.

MR. STUPICH: Does the Attorney-General know about this?

MR. COCKE: And the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) calling the shots, calling the shots on the future delivery of health training in British Columbia and in hospitals. People ask. (Now they're both gone.) But they are asking: now will the real Minister of Health please stand up? People ask assurance for their children and them. They want assurance that they are assured of life-saving facilities when the need arises, and we all know the condition of some of the life-saving facilities in this province. People want assurance that it's the Minister of Health that makes these decisions, makes the decisions about hospitals — and I hate to say this — not some elitist academic who's interfered in order to serve his colleagues.

Mr. Speaker, that's the only way I can describe this kind of interference, and I can't imagine how it occurred. If I were the Minister of Health I would be most embarrassed. We on this side of the House are sure that the member for Langley, named Minister of Health, would love to fill that role. He would be delighted to perform that function. Is it because he ran for leader, or is it because he wasn't a Liberal or a Conservative to start with that he is denied the right to take charge? We certainly see that.

So we would ask one question of the government: could you change the seating plan? Move the Minister of Health and the Minister of Education together so that they can confer while we're asking questions in the House, and give us quick answers to the kinds of questions we might ask in the future.

There's a possibility that they could double up. They haven't been in the House much this morning, I can tell you; not really wanting to face any kind of criticism, I would presume.

Mr. Speaker, how can the health professionals and all those interested volunteers in the health business in B.C. deal with a will o' the wisp? That's the way it's spelt out there; I know it and the people in this House know I know it. It's embarrassing, and it's embarrassing to all sides of this House.

First an announcement of BCMC by the Minister of Health. Out of that announcement came this shining, great announcement about a child-care unit — out of the ashes, somewhere, sometime. He said within the next three years. Having ripped up all the plans, I don't know how he's going to do it; I'm going to be very interested to see how he does it. No relationship; this new unit is going to have no relationship to high-risk maternity. Do you know what the Minister said about that? "I've been informed by the medical profession that it's not necessary."

I would like him to present who from the medical profession made that kind of a suggestion.

MR. MACDONALD: Dr. Richards.

MR. COCKE: I heard time after time after time that if you don't tic them together you haven't got a proper facility. Medical advice says that they need to be together. What kind of medical advice did that Minister get? High-risk newborns, Mr. Speaker, need immediate access.

Mr. Speaker, if we want to be fundamentally businesslike, how come we're duplicating? Because you're going to have to have facilities within your high-risk maternity facilities for high-risk newborns. So why duplicate? It's not very businesslike, but then you can't expect very much more when it was so poorly researched. You didn't have time to make that kind of an important decision, no time at all.

MR. LAUK: Dr. Kelly.

[ Page 45 ]

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, that's right, Dr. Kelly. When he was hired, Mr. Kelly, the former chairman of GVRD I was suspicious that the kind of thing that occurred might occur. Obviously it was destined, right from the outset. Where did they get the kind of research that was necessary, the kind of really deep thinking that must go into making these kinds of long-range decisions?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Weren't the files here?

MR. COCKE: Sure, the files were here; the files were at BCMC, but you couldn't have possibly read them; you couldn't have digested them in that length of time.

We needed that Shaughnessy central location, Mr. Speaker. It's been suggested that it will be used for long-term care. What's the matter with this government? Have they looked at that hospital; have they seen that it's an acute-care facility? That's what it was originally built for, an acute-care facility. Putting long-term patients in there.... . surely the department must be going mad, thinking of that kind of prospect for a fantastic facility. But just so that they can look after the needs of the Minister of Education, who made a commitment out at UBC, they're thumbing their noses at Shaughnessy. It's a disgrace!

AN HON. MEMBER: And the medical profession.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, you listen to the medical profession.

AN HON. MEMBER: Academic elitists.

MR. COCKE: What do we hear about prevention? What do we hear about research? Very little. Just a pronouncement from on high, from the Minister of Education, that we're going out to UBC.

I know that there was some consultation there — not with the doctors, not with the hospitals, not with the teaching hospitals. But what kind of research and what kind of consultation was there with the children's facility? Do you know what the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland) said in that statement? He had consulted with the Variety Club.

Now, reporters, I have nothing against the Variety Club; I think that they are a great organization. But I don't think the Variety Club are people that should be making decisions around the direction of the delivery of health care in our province. I think that the people involved directly in the profession and directly in the delivery of health care are the people that should be consulted, and they weren't, Mr. Speaker.

Are we going back to the old tactic — the old Socred tactic? "Change is delay." Change your plans — change your direction — and you delay having to put out the bucks. You know, that's cost us multi-millions and millions in this province over the years.

MR. LAUK: Bureaucratic.

MR. COCKE: Look at Ontario now. They're in a luxurious position; they're able to close down a few beds. McMaster's in place now running about 40 per cent. There's a big political ruckus down there, but they're able to close beds down because they did a job in the '60s. They created a fine climate for the delivery of services to people in that province. That's why they're able to do it now. We've never been in that luxurious position. If you don't believe me, my smiling friends, go down to the VGH — the Vancouver General. But you don't even have to go that far. Take a look at the services available in Victoria. I suggest to you: don't get sick in this town.

Always changes of plan, always changing.... You know, you don't build a hospital in a day. If you ever get up to this side of the treasury benches, you might find that out, You don't do anything in a day, but there was good planning going on. For that matter — I'll tell you in a minute just where we got the short shrift. We got the short shrift, Mr. Speaker. Many thousands of first-class volunteer hours went down the drain in that planning situation.

Talk of budgets — we were talking of budgets of BCMC. Six million dollars, they said. How come they let that money be spent and then not use it? But they didn't go on to say that half of that $6 million was health education — 28 of the 36 staff were education. And $1.5 million was wasted by this government on plans that were drawn, developed and dumped, Mr. Speaker — plans developed by a fine group of architects, and probably the very best that could do the job because they put that group together from all over the countryside, architects and engineers. It will take years and years again to put together another consortium like that.

Construction was to start on that centre in May of this year, and they knew it. That is the most shocking part of the whole thing. If they had delayed the construction so that they could have studied it and announced that kind of a delay, I could have bought it, Mr. Speaker. Let them study it; they're the government. But to say "down the drain with everything" without so much as a by-your-leave was just a little bit too much.

Well, millions were wasted because of that minister of ICBC fame and his promises. He promised to get rid of the medical centre and he did. It's a shocking situation.

I just want to draw to your attention some of the people — presidents of forest companies, people with

[ Page 46 ]

a great deal of provincial relevance, people who have dealt with other aspects of business in this province, people who have been involved in education and made tremendous contributions, people who have been involved in medicine and other areas of health care — all giving voluntarily. Not one cent was paid to the directors of BCMC for their contributions. What a slap in the face, Mr. Speaker, to people like Jack Christensen! What a slap in the face!

Recent pronouncements regarding the university hospital made by the Minister of Education are something else again. They are moving clinical training to the campus. The government asks that the plans be ready in 60 days. They want to dig up their old plans 10 years old. I happen to know what those plans are like, too — 2,500 feet per bed. It's an archaic plan being used in western Ontario right now. In this day and age surely we can bring our plans up to date; surely we had the vehicle to do it. But no, Mr. Speaker, to get that hospital out to the university, not where the people are but where the academics are, we are throwing it all away. Out goes the baby with the bathwater!

Mr. Speaker, what a statement — what a cudgel — for the Minister of Education to use. A club over the heads of the people in health care: "The medical school plans must be ready in 60 days or we'll move to UVic." You know, if they move to UVic can you imagine how long it would be? Can you imagine just developing the basic sciences at UVic for a medical centre? Mr. Doctor, can you imagine that? That's not to say that there shouldn't be a medical school here ultimately.

MR. WALLACE: Five years.

MR. COCKE: But, my goodness gracious, to make a statement like that is just a little bit much for any of us that have any kind of information whatsoever to accept.

Mr. Speaker, if the resources are available, if there's a need for a hospital at UVic, don't play one against the other. Announce that you're going to build a hospital at UVic, but don't play one against the other. That is not fair ball.

MR. WALLACE: Political poker.

MR. COCKE: Political poker; hanky panky, Mr. Speaker, used as a threat, a threat to club the profession, and the profession are reacting. They understand what's happening out there, and they're not very happy, Mr. Speaker, with good reason.

My advice to the Minister of Health is: don't let the Minister of Education ruin your relationship with the medical profession. It's late, Mr. Speaker; it may be later than he thinks.

Last fall, that great teaching hospital, the VGH, was under threat of losing its accreditation to teach. Why aren't we working there with the medical centre who are to do the job? But no, Mr. Speaker, we put our efforts into the university campus. There's still time to get back to the medical centre concept. Remember that your loss becomes a major loss to the health care in B.C. if we don't.

In other speeches and in other areas I'll be discussing other aspects of health care, but I just wanted to point out two areas very quickly. One is the cancer programme. That's an important programme in this province. It now has fine leadership. It now has great potential to serve, and it was to be serving under the cancer control agency under the B.C. Medical Centre. I'm not sure how they're going to work it now, but it's to serve the whole province. We've been very fortunate in attracting Dr. Hall for the cancer programme. He was developing screening programmes. Prevention programmes are being worked out — not the kind of screening programmes that we heard about the last few days, but real ones, Mr. Speaker. I suggest that they protect that programme because it's so very important. We must be more than a province who can say: "Well, we have pretty fair radiology." We've got to go further. We have to get into chemotherapy and all the other areas, and certainly into detection.

We're now dealing with an amendment, and an amendment that says that the people in this province have lost confidence in this government because of their total insensitivity with respect to their actions around ICBC, and you fellows up north know it better than anybody, don't you? Early in the term of this government most people got a rude awakening. Using the Minister of Consumer Services' (Hon. Mr. Mair's) phraseology, scaled down some, they were kicked in the hindquarters by this government — by an insensitive government, Mr. Speaker.

MR. WALLACE: You're being very polite now.

MR. COCKE: Yes, this is my polite day. (Laughter.)

This is a group who were campaigning just a few scant weeks ago, indicating by inference and oftentimes directly, that those bad old NDPers are going to charge you 19 per cent more. Holy Hanna! As a matter of fact, they said they're not even staying within the guidelines. Poor people in B.C. got the wrong impression. They thought that these people were saying that they were going to give them a better break than 19 per cent.

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Consumer Services is quite right. A group who were campaigning should have thought in terms of what they were campaigning about. They campaigned for competition; they campaigned that there would be no government rate-setting, but they did it all in spades, They did it

[ Page 47 ]

all up in spades. They ignored the people's need for transportation to and from work, to school or play. They ignored less painful methods of funding — and those methods were available. The Minister of Education knows it; whether the Premier does or not is not particularly significant, because he is saying to people: "I'm sorry for you. I didn't know Pat was going to be so tough, or the Minister of Education was going to be so tough, but I'm sorry for you." But that Premier let the government sharpen up their stilettos, and they skewered the drivers of B.C. They skewered the drivers of this province by going the route of territorial disparity.

It was going the other way, remember. It was really going the other way with ICBC. There was a feeling of sharing. There was a feeling that people who lived up in the north, who had to face black ice and other things that were not their fault, should be in a position similar to the rest of the people in the province. That's the way that parity was beginning to emerge, and it really emerged. Anybody from the north knows that the first ICBC rates gave them a real break. They had a good break until the last few weeks.

Gas tax could make the difference, Mr. Speaker, and don't tell me the nonsense. I read a little bit of nonsense a while ago; I'll allude to it in a second. Don't tell me the nonsense about we didn't use it so therefore didn't intend to. You saw; you were sitting in this House, Mr. Premier, through you, Mr. Speaker, when that legislation was put forward and passed, so you knew perfectly well the intention was there to use that portion of the gas tax that was necessary.

HON. T.M. WATERLAND (Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources): But there was no money.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, oh, there's no money. We'll hear all sorts of things about the "no money." You know, just in one area alone we picked up $150 million that was thrown across the border in the loss of profits being kept here in this province from our natural gas giveaway. Don't tell me about the "no money" business.

Mr. Speaker, vague references — vague references to sinister forces yesterday. Vague references to sinister forces. Ask yourself, Mr. Speaker, is it a sinister force to provide fair play in premiums for auto insurance? Have you an alternative in the works; have you got transit up there? Don't hold your breath. Don't hold your breath, Mr. Member, through you, Mr. Speaker. You'll wait a long time for this government.

We're too busy keeping our friends happy, and it's more than just a provincial affair. Those of us who've been around the insurance business know just exactly what's at stake. It's a North American affair, Mr. Speaker. It's a defense by this British Columbia Social Credit government of the whole North American casualty insurance business. Because what's happening to that business? People in Quebec are watching. People in Ontario are watching. People in Massachusetts are watching. Yes, Mr. Member, people all over this continent are watching what's going on in these jurisdictions.

Mr. Speaker, the only place they've got left to watch is Saskatchewan and Manitoba where fair play still prevails, but not so in this province. Not so in this province, Mr. Speaker, and it's unfortunate. Campaign promises: "Thanks for the memories." That's right, we're saying it all over again. Thanks for the memories. It was a great concept that went sour in the hands of the inept. A great concept in the hands of the inept went sour.

Mr. Speaker, this is the kind of reply. This is a man and a woman that live some way from here. They wrote a letter telling the Premier that they weren't particularly satisfied with the way he was doing his job. Look what they get back. Pages and pages and pages and pages. Now, if that isn't the most defensive thing I've ever seen....

MR. GIBSON: Are they satisfied now?

MR. COCKE: They're not the least bit satisfied. That's why they sent the whole works to me and said: "It's garbage."

"Here's an excerpt from Hansard," they say. It must have cost this province to send this letter and to have it typed and all the words....

HON. MR. BENNETT: Don't you answer your letters?

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, nothing wrong with the Premier answering letters, but what a defensive way to answer a letter.

HON. MR. BENNETT: You don't want answers.

AN HON. MEMBER: Is it signed?

MR. COCKE: Yes, it's signed. Mr. Speaker, it's interesting to note how defensive he gets. What a difference a day makes. One of the lowest rates in the country and December 11.... The difference the day made was that now we go from the lowest to the very highest in the country.

There's suspicion out there, Mr. Speaker, that something's wrong in Victoria. "ICBC is death to your politics." So says Jes Odam, that great student of the subject. What does your own actuary say? He says the rates are too high, and he also goes on to say: "Change the structure." Do you listen? No. So early in office, and yet you're not listening.

The Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer)

[ Page 48 ]

went back and said: "We're going to make it a little better, " and he made it a little worse. Mr. Speaker, shocking! Do you listen to petitioners? No, you don't. Mr. Speaker, the Premier wouldn't even accept 170,000 signatures in his office a few weeks ago. So what did they do, Mr. Speaker? They wouldn't even accept 170,000 signatures in the office of the Premier; so, Mr. Speaker.... Oh, you weren't there? Well, we'll see about that.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where were you, in Palm Springs?

MR. COCKE: The fact is, you have all sorts of back-up people. If you don't trust them, tell us now. Either that or drop some of your backbenchers, but you should have had somebody there. You knew they were coming.

Mr. Speaker, right now there is something approaching a quarter of a million signatures in our office, over 200,000...

MR. LAUK: Growing every day.

MR. COCKE: ...and people in this province are saying to this government: "We don't like your discriminatory method of doing business."

Mr. Speaker, those in the government don't own ICBC. You're the trustees for ICBC.

AN HON. MEMBER: The directors have always held public office.

MR. COCKE: Careful thought and not vindictive action could be a remedy for a lot that is wrong with this new government.

Mr. Speaker, I suggest to this government — go now and repent your wrongdoings; go now and repent your wrongdoings. People in our province are broad-minded, Mr. Speaker, and they'll accept an apology.

AN HON. MEMBER: You apologize.

MR. COCKE: They'll accept an apology, Mr. Speaker.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, for heaven's sake, I'd like to ask this government to change their ways, even that sleepy member in the back row.

Mr. Speaker, thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member for North Vancouver-Capilano (Mr. Gibson). But before the hon. member starts, I would just like to remind the members of the House that we are now on an amendment to the main motion, and that while the mover and seconder are given some latitude in speaking, because they do not again speak in the main debate, the same latitude is not extended to speakers beyond the mover and the seconder. I would remind hon. members that participate in the debate that they'll be asked to keep to the actual amendment that is before the House.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver-Capilano): Mr. Speaker, I'll attempt to remain strictly relevant to the motion on the floor. We are limited at this point, but I'll have more to say on this later. But I would just at the outset join in the general good wishes to members on all sides of the House, as the hon. Leader of the Opposition (Mr. King) expressed at the beginning of his "remarks.

I would say one thing to the hon. House Leader of the Opposition: I'm not sure that he should have chastised or tweaked the hon. members for Columbia River (Mr. Chabot) and North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan) for allegedly having called the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) arrogant and insensitive and irresponsible. Because after all, hon. members, he used to say that to them all the time when he sat over here, so that's only giving them a bit of exchange.

The basic situation of the ICBC, Mr. Speaker, should have been known in this province as of December 11, the date of the last election. I think it would have been far preferable to all citizens of this province if the debate we are going to have today had been had before December 11th in the knowledge of some of the facts we have today. I say that without necessarily forecasting which way the votes would have changed, because I think that while some of the facts should have been apparent, at the same time some of the moves that have been taken by the new government in the light of those facts have been less than popular.

One of the first things that was done by the minister was to appoint Mr. Byron Straight of West Vancouver to undertake what became known as the Straight report. Mr. Straight did a rapid and excellent job of looking at the books of ICBC, an incredible job within the time-frame allotted, which was about a week.

He revealed a situation where, quite apart from the cash flows of previous years, in the coming year, in the fiscal year 1976-1977, we would have had to expect, under the contingent rates set by the then board of directors, a deficiency of premiums as compared to payments of somewhere in the neighborhood of $150 million. That made it obvious that some kind of remedy had to be obtained.

There were three basic options. One option was the option which had been advocated by the former government, namely to take from existing revenues

[ Page 49 ]

sufficient funds to make up most of that balance, and the previous board of directors had followed exactly that plan.

AN HON. MEMBER: What funds?

MR. GIBSON: Funds from consolidated revenue, Mr. Minister.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: No, just let's leave that aside for the moment, Mr. Minister.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: It is. It is. I'm giving you three clear theoretical options.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Will you allow me to set them out before you comment on them?

AN HON. MEMBER: What was No. 1 again?

MR. GIBSON: Option No. 1 was to take from existing revenues $83 million from the motor fuel tax revenue and $42 million from licence fees, for a total of $125 million.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: Plus an increase in premiums, that's correct, of 19 per cent on the average.

Option No. 2 was to take everything out of premiums, to raise premiums by an extraordinary amount by what in the event turned out to be 139 per cent on the average — a doubling for most people under the same kind of coverage and a tripling for many.

A third option, which was not spelled out so explicitly in the Straight report but nevertheless was clearly before the government, was the option of a new gasoline tax, a gasoline tax of from zero to, say, 23 cents.

Twenty-three cents, I think, would have covered the whole deficiency. Some lesser amount with an increase in premiums would have done the same thing. The object of the exercise, it seems to me, had to be to balance the outgo and the income in the coming fiscal year. It's quite possible to overlook, for the time being, what happened in the previous fiscal year, but the next fiscal year the flow of blood could not be continued.

The government, in my opinion, took the wrong way. They didn't take the most attractive alternative that Mr. Straight suggested. And I want it put into the record a little bit of what Mr. Straight said about gasoline taxes.

He has been a courageous consultant to the government, Mr. Speaker. He has not hesitated to put on the record some things which the government might perhaps rather not hear. And one of those has been the merit of gasoline taxes in the matter of public insurance. Here are some of the points he lists as for:

"Such taxes are paid only by motorists, the owner, the renter or the driver. They are easy to collect and require no agent's commission. They are convenient to pay. One pays as he drives instead of in a lump sum once a year."

And I might say, Mr. Speaker, that this is a tremendously important thing to people who find it difficult to raise a couple of hundred dollars in February of which they had notice only in mid-January. Mr. Straight continues:

"The greater the mileage and accident exposure the more the motorist pays in premiums. The heavier the vehicle and the greater the horsepower, the greater the gas consumption and therefore the contribution to premium revenue."

And here's a judgment statement and an important one:

"It is an appropriate device for pooling revenue to pay for no-fault, death and disability benefits and even for third-party bodily injury and property damage claims, provided there is an additional personal premium which can be modified to reflect personal responsibility or the absence for it."

Those are the things Mr. Straight cited as being for the gasoline tax. He did not mention, but I would add myself, the important conservation effect of a gasoline tax in a society that is increasingly concerned about the conservation of energy. An additional gasoline tax more truly reflects the social costs of the private automobile and gives a truer incentive to people to take public transit where it is available, and there are ways and means of making compensation to those who do not have access to public transit.

Mr. Straight did not suggest that the argument was all pro — that it was all for gasoline taxes. He mentioned three points that are against it but which can be provided for in such a way as to eliminate their negative arguments. He says:

"If the taxes are used to provide all of the premiums, there is no medium available to vary the charge to the individual to reflect his personal driving record or to allow the use of a particular vehicle in a particular way."

That, I think, never has been the proposition before the government. It has always been the proposition that there should be sufficient premium available to reflect personal responsibility. He says

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secondly that insurance to cover damage to one's own vehicle; i.e., one's own responsibility — so-called collision insurance — should be purchased privately by each owner on his own policy.

As it happens, Mr. Speaker, with the appropriate level of the gasoline tax it works out almost exactly so that the specific insurance purchased by the driver — by the individual — reflects exactly the collision coverage.

Finally, he notes that the fuel tax does not directly reflect variations in vehicles as to the damageability. In other words, I suppose a Volkswagen and a Ferrari might conceivably consume the same amount of gas, but the one might be much more expensive to repair than the other — or whatever is the right vehicle; I don't know what the right comparison is. And this is true, and this, too, must be or could be reflected in the individual premium.

Mr. Straight gives that important rundown, and then on the following page, and the minister will be familiar with his report, he gives further philosophical underpinning towards directing elements of the gasoline tax towards the payment of insurance in our province.

Irrespective, Mr. Speaker, of whether that is the right answer in the long run, I submit that there were important arguments for using the gasoline tax in the short run for this coming year. Because with the very limited time available it was the only means available to prevent the very significant wrench in the private lives of British Columbians in the hundreds of thousands, and in our economy. The government took what I believe to have been the wrong way, and that wrench took place.

I mentioned before the difficulty to the ordinary family of finding some hundreds of dollars extra with a month's notice. It's not easy, Mr. Minister and members of the cabinet.

I would note that a group that prides themselves on good management of the economy were able to take such an enormous amount of money out of the income stream in one month that there was a significant drop in retail sales during the month of February and in the first two weeks of March. This is hardly a contribution to economic stability in the Province of British Columbia. It's all because of that tremendous lump-sum ICBC premium — that quick change within one year — that didn't have to be done. Because that additional money which had to be found could have been found at the gas pumps every day of the year during 1976.

It could have been found in a relatively painless way to those driving, at the same time paying the entirety of the bill and at the same time giving a person an option so that they don't have to say: "I either drive or I don't drive because I can't afford the insurance on February 28." It allows them to say: "I either drive a little bit more this weekend or a little less because of the extra price of gas."

HON. P.L. McGEER (Minister of Education): The same number of vehicles this year.

MR. GIBSON: The same number of vehicles this year, Mr. Minister? It seems a little bit puzzling that the public transit ridership took such an enormous jump as of March 1 if there are the same number of persons using their private motor vehicles.

MR. WALLACE: It just proves that you're not using your car, for crying out loud.

MR. GIBSON: The proof is clear you have switched people's habits by your choice, not theirs.

AN HON. MEMBER: Don't confuse the issue.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the hon. member please address the Chair?

MR. GIBSON: I try to, Mr. Speaker, but sometimes the individuals on that side of the House give rise to spurious notions which must be set right quickly.

The proper answer, Mr. Speaker, I am satisfied, was a new gas tax, not the old gas tax, because that was taking revenue from social programmes. It was built into revenue for a long, long time; it didn't even pay the bill for the Department of Highways.

Any taking away of funds from the old gas tax would have been taking from Peter to pay Paul. But a new gas tax would have balanced the books correctly. It is my calculation that a 15-cent surcharge a gallon plus a 30 per cent premium rise, which would have been stiff but affordable compared to what we have, was the right answer.

Mr. Speaker, the government knew all about this; they'd had the suggestion. I ask you why they decline to take this more sensible, more humane route. The only answer I am able to divine is that they wished to teach a lesson to British Columbians. They wished, by a sufficiently severe, noticeable kick in the pocketbook, to draw to their mind in no avoidable way the proposition that the previous government had gotten this province into financial difficulty and that for their sin of having had the previous government, British Columbians were to be made to pay in 1976. I suggest, in other words, that the choice was made on that political motive. That's the overall cash-flow question.

There were two further moves of interest, strange moves when looked at in political terms, because the new rate structure, when it became apparent, had some very severe changes for two categories of people — northerners and single males under 25. Both of these groups are fairly large and politically important,

[ Page 51 ]

and a person has to ask himself why a government would alienate their affections unnecessarily — jumps of several hundred per cent for single males under 25; the elimination of the territorial discount for those who live in the north.

These were progressive moves that had been made by the ICBC in the years before, Mr. Speaker. One of the things that a public monopoly can do in insurance is to treat people in equal ways, and we have a public monopoly at least for the next year. Therefore for the next year we should afford the citizens of British Columbia the theoretical benefits of a public monopoly.

Because there is no worry about skimming of one category of drivers by one particular insurer, a public monopoly can base rates strictly on factors that the individual driver can control, rather than things that they cannot control. In other words, it is not necessary to charge people more or less because of where they live, a factor that generally speaking they cannot control. They must pretty well live where their house and their job are.

It avoids the necessity of charging people more or less because of their age and sex, a factor they cannot control. Rather it makes it possible to charge people insurance based on those actions which contribute to the cost of insurance, based on, first and foremost, the accident record of the individual concerned, secondly, the damageability of the type of car they choose to drive and the cost of repairing that type of car and, thirdly, the distance that they choose to drive in any given year. These are the proper determinants of the cost of insurance. These are the things that determine risk to the insurer, rather than the question of where you live or what your age or sex is.

I know very well, Mr. Speaker, that the statistics for single males under 25 show that they have more accidents, but this is quite adequately taken into account on the individual record of the driver concerned. Like any age group, some are good drivers, some are bad drivers.

After a lot of pushing the minister finally agreed, and the announcement was made by the Premier, that there should be some sort of rebate for single males under 25 who proved to be accident-free drivers during the year. Mr. Speaker, this is elementary and should have been built into the programme from the beginning and, furthermore, should be extended across the entire risk category of motorists in this province. It's done in many other countries. It should be done again in British Columbia where, by your experience, where you show that your accident rate is higher and the cost to the insurer is higher, a surcharge is put on. Where there is no such additional risk, a rebate is given.

So why were these moves taken? Why did we return the old rate categories in the same year that all of the other tremendous changes were being made, piling one change on top of the other and making them almost unbearable for certain categories of people in this province? There's only one purpose, Mr. Speaker, and that is that a decision has been made by this government which has not yet been announced by this government. I challenge the Minister of Education to make that announcement today. That is that this government has clearly determined that across the full range of insurance in this province, private competition will be brought back next year. That is the clear message given to us by the rate structure. It will be very interesting, in view of this kind of evidence, Mr. Speaker, to hear the participation of the minister in this debate.

Because of the brutal way that this programme was brought in, because of the less than judicious statements of the minister at the outset, in particular, there has been widespread unrest in the public with the government's handling of the matter. Members who have been in this House longer than I may have other instances to cite. But I can recall of no issue in this province for many years that has given rise to a quarter of a million signatures on a petition, a most unusual development in the political life of this province.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. GIBSON: I can recall very few issues that have given rise to rallies which I think totaled some 10,000 in the Agrodome, I think some 3,000 a couple of weeks before that in Surrey, and grew from a tiny meeting of a few hundred in White Rock, an enormous spontaneous growth within a period of a very few weeks.

That should have brought some message to the government, Mr. Speaker, but it apparently didn't, because they carried on. Of course, in the end, people obeyed the law where they could afford to, and where they could not afford to obey the law, they simply aren't driving their cars. The government could have made it easier for them. It chose not to for its own political reasons.

Mr. Speaker, I am not one who believes that everything the government has done is wrong. I believe that there are some excellent suggestions in the throne speech, but that is not what we are debating under the rules of this House at this time. We are debating the specific situation of the handling of this government of the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia.

I say that the initial concept was right, that it had to be put on a basis that the payments to motorists each year were financed by motorists each year. Well, that principle was right. The implementation beyond that was unnecessarily, deliberately brutal to the ordinary motorist in British Columbia, entirely

[ Page 52 ]

unfeeling and entirely unworthy of the government of the day, which should say — given the legacy of the past, whatever they think of it, whatever bad marks they give the past government for that legacy — "It is our job to make the best of that situation for the people of British Columbia, not the worst of it." The worst, Mr. Speaker, is what they did.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): It reminds me of old times when I used to get up to speak; the Premier walked out. But I notice today I got up to speak and the minister concerned walked out. I hope this isn't a shadow of things to come, but this was the greeting I always received from the former Premier when I rose to speak from this side of the House.

MR. GIBSON: They're afraid of you, Scott,

AN HON. MEMBER: Which former Premier?

MR. WALLACE: Like the Liberal leader, I will try to stick very closely to the amendment.

HON. MR. McGEER: The minister is back again.

MR. WALLACE: Oh, it's nice to see the minister back in his place. He well remembers the many occasions that I just referred to when he was sitting over here on this side of the House.

The amendment deals with three main elements of the ICBC — disputed deals with oppressive rates; it deals with premiums for northern and interior drivers, and it deals with the under-25 driver.

One of the main reasons, if not the main reason, why the Social Credit government fell from power in 1972 was a clear indication that it was insensitive to ordinary people's problems. It showed a lack of awareness of many of the day-to-day simple needs and reasonable aspirations of the people of British Columbia.

Although the Social Credit party was re-elected, largely on a commitment to bring about sound management and better administration of the affairs of this province, many people who were concerned about the government's lack of sensitivity — or that party's lack of sensitivity — had made it very plain that they were re-electing this government with some apprehension because they were not sure that the new, or the so-called new, Social Credit party would show any more heart than it had in the years preceding its defeat. We were promised in the election campaign a government primarily composed of hard-nosed businessmen, men who knew the value of a dollar and who, in the minds of some people, knew the value of little else.

AN HON. MEMBER: The value of the dollar is about 25 cents.

MR. WALLACE: Regardless of the economic issue in ICBC — and there certainly is a serious economic issue to be debated, in this House, there's no doubt about that — regardless of the strictly financial aspect of the issue, the manner in which this government handled the ICBC situation must have been a very rude dash of cold water in the faces of many people in British Columbia who had re-elected this government hoping that during the NDP regime the Social Credit Party had learned a little bit about people.

In fact, it proved more than ever that this government is no more sensitive to the basic feelings of the ordinary man and woman in the street now than it was in 1972.

The manner in which the minister concerned handled himself publicly and made statements, apart from being very distressing to many people, was almost incredible from a person who has served in public life the number of years that he has and who time after time after time stood on this side of the House and berated and castigated the Social Credit Party in years gone by for that same lack of feeling for people.

HON. MR. McGEER: People, not automobiles.

MR. WALLACE: People use automobiles sometimes to survive economically, in case the minister doesn't know.

But, at any rate, Mr. Speaker, I won't belabor it. We all know the announcement the minister made that if you can't afford it, sell your car. I think one of the parts of the record that should be set straight also is the very unbecoming way in which, even under these circumstances, the minister sought to wriggle out from under a very clear statement that he had made — and had the audacity to refer to his statement as having been off-hand.

The record shows very clearly that when he made that statement on Hourglass he was given at least one other opportunity to repeat the answer to the first question. In fact, the interviewer was so thunderstruck that he couldn't believe his ears at the completely insensitive and callous and heartless way in which the minister had said: "Well, if you can't afford insurance, sell your car." And the interviewer records in his column in The Vancouver Sun on January 3, and I quote:

"Consider McGeer himself, who told me on Hourglass Friday night that anyone who couldn't afford the new premiums should sell his car. I asked him if he wished to reconsider the statement which will undoubtedly win him the label of the Marie Antoinette of the cabinet. He stuck by his guns explaining that the most important thing was for ICBC to be self-supporting."

[ Page 53 ]

On that latter point I agree that our policy and our belief is that the biggest challenge to governments is to select their priorities and allocate government revenue on the basis of that kind of selection. But I want to make my position very plain that, indeed, the challenge to this government as to any modern government is to choose wisely as to the priorities and the ways and means in which money should not only be spent but should be raised in the first place. So our concern in the initial instance was the same as the government's — to see that the economic and financial mess in ICBC be corrected.

But we are very unhappy at the abrupt and premature and heartless way in which the matter was dealt with simply in terms of dollars without any apparent consideration whatever for the fact that although it's insurance on automobiles we are talking about, these automobiles don't drive themselves. They need people to drive them for a wide variety of purposes, and some of these purposes are anything but luxurious.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. WALLACE: They are the very way in which a person may remain employed, and here we have a government in the throne speech telling us, quite rightly, that unemployment is a very big problem in this country and this province, and I welcome that acknowledgement and the commitment to do something about it.

But the suggestion that it is simply a matter of selling your car if you can't afford the insurance is very much out of keeping with the real truth as far as many breadwinners in this province are concerned.

Reference has been made to the fact that anything that might raise the cost of insurance would encourage the use of public transit. But the minister in this House knows very well that there are only certain parts of this province where there is public transit, and it really doesn't make sense to penalize the person who can only get to work by using his automobile in an area where there is no public transit.

Strangely enough, not long before this issue arose publicly, I was driving in the lower mainland one day and picked up a hitchhiker — at least he was going to work — and this man worked out at the coal-loading facility at Roberts Bank. This was months before this issue of the ICBC deficit arose and quite a few months prior to the election. Here was an example of a young man with a wife and two children, as I recall, whose shift work was not of regular hours of 8 to 4 or 4 to midnight or whatever. There was just no way he could get to work.

On this particular occasion his car had broken down and he was thumbing a ride to work. This is not in some more remote part of the province; this is in the Municipality of Richmond.

The other area in which we take issue with the action of this government, even though we acknowledge the deficit that had to be corrected, was that even the expert asked by the government to carry out the inquiry — and the Liberal leader referred to the excellent work down by Byron Straight — is quoted in the newspaper, January 27, 1976, that the rates are too high. He states they were based on the most pessimistic estimates available. He says: "The other three ICBC directors opted unnecessarily to make their decision on the most pessimistic estimates."

It seems that regardless of the precise facts and figures of the situation, this government again, apparently unaware of the tremendous hardship that it would work on many people, decided to paint the worst possible picture of ICBC.

It is up to each person in British Columbia to decide for himself or herself why, when a large deficit existed which would cause hardships however it was solved, the government first of all tried to take the worst possible interpretation of the figures and, second, attempted to solve the problem all in one harsh complete and total move.

It doesn't seem a reasonable argument to me, Mr. Speaker, even on the basis of arithmetic — and that this problem took three years to accumulate — that however justified the government was in trying to put this situation back on its own financial self-sustaining feet, it was really anything other than a total and purely financial decision to try and solve the whole problem in one complete move.

As we know, the government initially decided to include the existing deficit and suggested it should be paid out of premiums over 10 years. When there was a dramatic and justifiable outcry by the public, at least the government backed off from that first decision and decided to find revenue from other sources by borrowing or other means to wipe out the already-existing deficit. At least in that one small part of the total situation the government did listen to public feeling. As the Liberal leader has said, it is an issue of tremendous concern to many people as witnessed by the large public rallies which were called and were very well attended.

I would just interject in passing that in taking part in these rallies — as I felt any political party leader should do when invited — I'm somewhat amazed that in a supposedly enlightened age I was castigated for sharing a public platform with people of other political persuasions, on the apparent misunderstanding that because I share a platform with them on the ICBC issue I necessarily share their views on the ICBC issue.

I have the greatest admiration for the political tenacity of Harry Rankin, but apparently some people in British Columbia think that a Progressive Conservative leader, or a Liberal leader, or some other

[ Page 54 ]

political leader on a public issue of this importance shouldn't even place himself on a public platform with leaders or public figures of other political persuasion.

I just want to make one thing very, very clear: as long as I am in this House or in public life and a member of a political party, and I am asked to take part in discussions on public issues, I'll sit on a public platform with anyone; and I think it's a very dangerous thing that there's any feeling, when the public is upset about an issue, that the appearance of a political leader should in any way be a political commitment.

Mr. Wallace moves adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, I move that the House at its rising do stand adjourned until 2 p.m. this afternoon.

Motion approved on the following division:

YEAS — 33

NAYS — 18

Division ordered to be recorded in the Journals of the House.

Presenting reports.

Hon. Mr. Wolfe presents reports as follows: The returns submitted in accordance with section 46 (2) of the Revenue Act, Revised Statutes of British Columbia (1960). Refunds and remissions made under section 46(1) of the Revenue Act, Revised Statutes of British Columbia (1960) during the calendar year 1975. Returns submitted in accordance with section 85 (4) of the Taxation Act. Remissions and refunds made under authority of section 85(1), (2) and (3) of the Taxation Act, Revised Statutes of British Columbia, 1960 during the calendar year 1975.

First annual report July 2, 1974, to December 31, 1974, British Columbia Assessment Authority.

The annual report of the Assessment Appeal Board for the year ended December 31, 1975.

Statement of unclaimed money deposits under authority of the Unclaimed Money Deposits Act, Revised Statutes of British Columbia, 1960, for the fiscal year ended March 31, 1975.

Annual report of the Purchasing Commission, January 1, 1975 to December 31, 1975.

The annual return for the calendar year 1975, submitted in accordance with section 53 of the Administration Act, Revised Statutes of British Columbia, 1960.

Hon. Mr. Waterland presents the annual report for 1974 of the B.C. Forest Service.

Hon. Mrs. McCarthy moves adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 1:06 p.m.