[ Page 483 ]

CONTENTS

Statement

Restriction of off-work activities of public servants. Hon. Mrs. McCarthy — 483

Mr. Gibson — 484

Routine proceedings

Oral questions

Restriction on off-work activities of public servants. Mr. King — 484

Wage-and-price controls. Mr. Wallace — 485

Allocation of surplus wood chips. Mr. Gibson — 486

Payment of gratuities to public servants. Mrs. Dailly — 486

Criticism of Attorney-General's department by Human Resources minister. Mr. Macdonald — 486

Budget debate.

On the amendment.

Mr.Cocke — 487

Mr. Wallace — 492

Mr. Macdonald — 497

Mr. Barber — 499

Mr. Gibson — 505

Mr. Levi — 507

Ms. Brown — 512

Mr. King — 515

Tabling reports

British Columbia Medical Centre annual report. Hon. Mr. McClelland — 519

Point of order

Tabling of materials cited by members. Mr. Speaker rules — 519

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1977

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. W.R. BENNETT (Premier): Mr. Speaker, quite often during this period we welcome guests to our assembly. Today I'd like to offer some congratulations to that extension of our assembly, the press gallery, on their new election of officers. As legislators, we in the assembly often feel at their mercy.

I'd like to congratulate their new president, Ron Thompson; the vice-president, Charles La Vertu; and Candide Temple as secretary-treasurer. While they are known as the Fourth Estate, I want them to know that they are not going to be subject to any of the estate tax legislation.

MR. D. BARRETT (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, in adding my congratulations, I want to say that the opposition has confirmed the election because we have not been asked for a recount of any ballots.

HON. G.M. McCARTHY (Provincial Secretary and Minister of Travel Industry): Mr. Speaker, I'm very pleased today to ask the members to welcome outstanding citizens of Vancouver who are visiting the gallery today. Halford Wilson served the city of Vancouver as alderman for a record 30 years, and he served it well. I'd ask the House to welcome Mr. and Mrs. Halford Wilson.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, today I have the opportunity of welcoming someone back to the House. I want the House to welcome the first member for Vancouver-Burrard (Ms. Brown) who is back now from an international conference where a group of Canadian citizens represented this whole nation in a very important social and political gathering of black people from all over the world. Ms. Brown was graciously given permission through the Provincial Secretary's motion and the support of the House later, hopefully, to attend this conference on our behalf. All reports indicate that she did an outstanding job for us. I would like the House to welcome her.

HON. R.S. BAWLF (Minister of Recreation and Conservation): Mr. Speaker, I have two special groups to introduce to the House today. I would ask the members to welcome them. First, on behalf of the hon. Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (Hon. Mr. Curtis), who is out of town today, I would ask the House to greet Mr. Vandyke and his students from Saanich Christian School.

Also, Mr. Speaker, I would ask you to please welcome a number of my friends who are visiting from Victoria Silver Threads.

MR. J.J. KEMPF (Omineca): Mr. Speaker, with us in the gallery today is a group of 16 students from my constituency of Omineca. With them is their very able instructor, Nancy Plasway, They are of the band development group from Burns Lake. I would ask the House to make them welcome.

HON. J.J. HEWITT (Minister of Agriculture): Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the House to join me in welcoming an old friend of mine, a former alderman of the city of Penticton, Mr. Lloyd Burgart. Along with him there are a number of interior cattlemen.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to make a statement.

Leave granted.

RESTRICTION ON OFF-WORK
ACTIVITIES OF PUBLIC SERVANTS

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the member for North Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Gibson) asked the Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) a question concerning Mr. Bob Bierman, who is a cartoonist for the Times and who also, is employed in the resource analysis branch of the Ministry of Environment. This question had to do with section 50 of the Public Service Act of 1976 which states: "No employee shall engage ~in remunerative employment with any other employer, or carry on any business, except with the approval of the commission."

Mr. Bierman met with the deputy minister, Mr. Ben E. Marr, on January 17,1977, at which time Mr. Marr brought to Mr. Bierman's attention the requirements under section 50. Although Mr. Bierman was aware of this requirement, he had not made application under the Act. On January 26,1977, Mr. Bierman requested permission from the Public Service Commission to allow him to continue to contribute artwork to publications as a freelance cartoonist under section 50 of the Public Service Act.

A copy of this request was received by Mr. Ben Marr, deputy minister, today, February 1, 1977. The deputy minister has recommended to Mr. A.G. Richardson, chairman of the Public Service Commission, that Mr. Bierman be permitted to continue his freelance assignments outside the public service if such endeavours are not in conflict with any oaths of office, rules and regulations of the Public Service Commission.

I might say, Mr. Speaker, that the government is cognizant of the employment situation at the present

[ Page 484 ]

time, but because of the specialized work of freelancing carried on by Mr. Bierman, it is in agreement with Mr. Marr's recommendation to the chairman of the Public Service Commission. However, the government wants to reiterate that in general terms it does not condone public servants taking on second jobs which will take employment opportunities away from other citizens of this province.

Along with that statement, Mr. Speaker, I would ask leave to file the two letters, which I referred to in the statement, with the House.

Leave granted.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver–Capilano): Mr. Speaker, that being a statement, perhaps a brief reply is in order. I think that the government has done the right thing here after some prodding from the opposition, and I am glad to congratulate them on it.

Oral questions.

RESTRICTION ON OFF-WORK
ACTIVITIES OF PUBLIC SERVANTS

MR. W.S. KING (Revelstoke-Slocan): Yesterday in the question period, in answer to a question by the hon. Liberal leader (Mr. Gibson), the Minister of Environment said he was not aware that Mr. Marr, the deputy minister, was investigating the activities of Mr. Bierman as related to section 50 of the Public Service Act. Immediately after the question period, the minister admitted to reporters outside the House that he had instructed Mr. Marr to conduct such an investigation. I would like to ask the minister this specific question: Would he please clarify — did he in fact know in advance that Mr. Marr was checking with Mr. Richardson of the Public Service Commission? Or did Mr. Marr undertake this action without the knowledge of the Minister of Environment and conduct the investigation without prior knowledge of the minister?

HON. J.A. NIELSEN (Minister of Environment): Mr. Speaker, the member for Revelstoke-Slocan is not correct in his initial statement relative to the question from the member for North Vancouver–Capilano. The statement by the leader of the Liberal Party yesterday — in reading from the Blues — was: "According to reports, he was told recently by the deputy minister of the department to stop his cartooning under authority of the little-used section of the Public Service Act." The member for North Vancouver–Capilano asked of me: "I would ask if the minister was aware in advance of this instruction." The instruction referred to was to have Mr. Bierman stop his cartooning.

MR. BARRETT: Now he's changed his mind.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: The question from the member for North Vancouver–Capilano was very clear, I believe. The answer I gave yesterday was: No, I was not aware that my deputy minister had ordered Mr. Bierman to stop cartooning. I understand, to the best of my knowledge, that still has not been said, and certainly not in advance. I was not aware that Mr. Marr was meeting with Mr. Bierman at all.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, on a supplementary: my question did not relate to whether deputy minister Marr had instructed Mr. Bierman to stop. The question was, purely and simply, did Mr. Marr undertake this discussion with Mr. Bierman — the investigation — with prior knowledge of the minister? That's the simple question. Would the minister answer?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: All right, the simple question that you now ask is quite different from the previous question that was presumably not so simple, in that it reflected on the question offered by the member for North Vancouver–Capilano, of which apparently you either did not have a copy or you had forgotten what the words were.

As I have said a number of times, the work of Mr. Bierman was brought to my attention and I asked my deputy minister to investigate on my behalf with the Public Service Commission. That's hardly in contradiction to the answer given to the member for North Vancouver–Capilano.

MR. KING: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. The minister is very sensitive. I never accused him of being in conflict at all. I simply asked a question.

Mr. Speaker, has the minister, since the present government took office, ever received a blacklist from anyone in the Premier's office identifying any public servants as to their political affiliation?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

HON. MR. NIELSEN: I would have to conduct a very careful search of my files and records to determine if one was ever received, Mr. Member, and officially I'll take your question as notice.

MR. BARRETT: Supplementary to the Premier: has anyone in your office ever forwarded a blacklist of names of public servants to any minister identifying them by their political sympathies?

HON. MR. BENNETT: The answer is: absolutely no.

[ Page 485 ]

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, if such an event took place without the Premier's notice, would he dismiss the person who was responsible for such a list?

Interjections.

MR. BARRETT: If such an event took place.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. BARRETT: But your answer is no — is that right? Thank you.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please! It's conjecture on your part, hon. member.

WAGE-AND-PRICE CONTROLS

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, a question to the Premier: a week ago Thursday in the House during question period, when I asked the Premier about anti-inflation measures, he stated very plainly that the conference last December had reaffirmed the conviction of the federal and provincial governments that anti-inflation measures would be maintained under the existing agreement. Now about a week ago in Toronto, the Finance minister, Donald Macdonald, made a statement that he hoped to see the controls end, perhaps by the end of '77. I understand that at the meeting with Finance ministers in Ottawa today he has, in fact, repeated this decision, or at least the strong feeling that the federal government would like to end the anti-inflation measures much sooner than the agreed date of December, 1978. My question to the Premier is: can he reconfirm the position of this government, as he outlined it in the House a week ago, that regardless of early federal withdrawal of anti-inflation measures, as far as British Columbia is concerned they will be maintained until the termination of the agreement in 1978?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, I still take the Prime Minister and the other provincial Premiers at their face value on the words and the agreement that they made when I was at the meeting in December, and press speculation out of a meeting now as to what Finance minister Macdonald has in mind, and the discussions that the federal government is holding — and we already announced that we were all interested in holding discussions on post-control programmes — don't necessarily indicate to me yet that in two short months the Prime Minister has changed his mind and that the other provincial Premiers have changed their minds,

I can only reiterate to the member, Mr. Speaker, through you, that this government still honours the commitment it made to the Prime Minister and the other Premiers. I have been in discussion with Finance Minister Wolfe, who as head of our anti-inflation programme is in Ottawa. In discussion with him I have the understanding that he has reiterated the British Columbia position in no uncertain terms, and that we stand ready to meet the commitment to show the restraint provincially as part of the federal programme we committed ourselves to when we joined the programme and that was reaffirmed in December at the First Ministers' meeting.

MR. WALLACE: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. I have no wish to debate this; I just want to stick to question and answer because I think there is evidence the federal government is waffling and doesn't know what its position really is. I'm entitled to my position in the same way that the Premier feels he can take the Prime Minister's decision at face value. But that isn't the point.

I want to ask a further question. There is obvious uncertainty about where this country is going regarding anti-inflation measures, and since a bill is required in this House to provide the ongoing funding for the continuing application of the Anti-Inflation Measures Act, which we passed last spring, can I ask the Premier if any decision has been taken to incorporate provincial anti-inflation measures in that bill so this government's stated policy of restraint can be maintained regardless of any federal decision which may be round the corner?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, through you to the member, the provincial government has looked at options but our last discussions, as I said, with the federal government were that the programme would go through to the projected date. As such, the research we've done on an alternative programme has not been developed any further. As you know, we are in the anti-inflation programme until its termination. We don't need additional authority from this House to continue, although we do have the option of removing ourselves from the programme on 90 days' notice. If we had wanted to get out in April, we would have had to give notice in January. By not giving such notice we have maintained ourselves as part of the national fight to beat inflation.

I would just add that the speculation now going on in the east is that the federal government is shifting its policy to creating employment, and it is not incompatible, I don't think, to continue to fight inflation and try and provide employment for our people. Both of them are dangerous, and one programme shouldn't be abandoned while we attack the other. It's possible, I think, for government to do two things at once.

[ Page 486 ]

MR. G.R. LEA (Prince Rupert): I'll bet it is!

ALLOCATION OF SURPLUS WOOD CHIPS

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, a question to the Minister of Forests, Mr. Chips. (Laughter.) In view of the failure of the industry committee, of which I think the minister is well aware, to allocate chip purchases between the major and independent suppliers, and the breakdown of those negotiations, caused, I understand, by the backout of one of the majors, does the minister agree with the principle of fair allocation of excess chips — in other words, a sharing of the surplus, more or less, depending on the production?

HON. T.M. WATERLAND (Minister of Forests): Mr. Speaker, in reply to the member for North Vancouver–Capilano, my name is not "Chips."

I realize that this problem continues to exist. I met last week with the chief executive officer of this particular company that is blamed for the failure of these negotiations. I feel that continued negotiations can take place. I do believe in a fair allocation of chips.

However, there are chip-supply contracts in existence between various sawmills, and it's not the government's function to interfere with contracts between corporations. However, we are continuing to work with the industry in an attempt to overcome this chip surplus problem and to make it as easy as possible for all those who are presently having to stockpile large numbers of chips.

MR. GIBSON: A supplementary question. Could I ask the minister if some of the measures he might propose to take include those currently rumoured in the industry — variable utilization standards, depending upon the cooperation of any particular company?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, I don't think it's a secret at all that the Forest Service has been addressing utilization standards and has been making variations in these with the intention of reducing the production of wood chips. This is one small measure that we can take. I don't think it will have a great effect, although it will help incrementally in controlling the production of chips. But there are other measures we hope to be able to take. We are continuing to work with industry to solve this very serious problem.

PAYMENT OF GRATUITIES
TO PUBLIC SERVANTS

MRS. E.E. DAILLY (Burnaby North): To the hon. Provincial Secretary: why was the honorarium paid to Mr. Broadbent given to him 11 months after his retirement, just a few days before the M.E.L. Paving case was settled out of court, instead of at the time of his retirement in January, 1976? Perhaps when the Provincial Secretary stands to answer that question, she will also answer the question she took as notice yesterday.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, you will recall that yesterday I took as notice that question surrounding the order-in-council. I shall take the further question that has been presented today as notice as well.

CRITICISM OF A-G DEPARTMENT
BY HUMAN RESOURCES MINISTER

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouver East): Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the Minister of Human Resources, who wrote a letter last November attacking the Attorney-General's (Hon. Mr. Gardom's) department, particularly in the provision of assistance in divorce cases.... I think the minister remembers that famous letter. Then it was mysteriously released to the press in January. I want to ask him: did he release and authorize the release of his letter attacking another department of the government? Did he personally authorize the release?

HON. W.N. VANDER ZALM (Minister of Human Resources): The answer is no.

MR. MACDONALD: A supplementary. Did the minister investigate as to why a letter between two departments of the government, one kind of bitterly attacking the other, should be released to the press? Have you made any investigation to find out how that letter came to be released and printed in the paper?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Yes, we did determine how the letter came into the hands of those who published it.

MR. MACDONALD: A final supplementary. How did it come into the public hands? (Laughter.) I'm sure the Attorney-General didn't release it.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, a copy was given to the Law Reform Commission and they apparently forwarded a copy to the party in question.

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, did the minister authorize that letter to go to the Law Reform Commission?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: The letter from me, Mr. Speaker, was addressed to the Attorney-General

[ Page 487 ]

as an interdepartmental thing. However, someone in the department forwarded it to the commission. No, not myself.

Orders of the day.

ON THE BUDGET
(continued debate)

On the amendment.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, before you start, I would just like to inform you, for your own information, that you have 31 minutes left after the adjournment of last evening.

MR. D.G. COCKE (New Westminster): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I find it very interesting that today we are debating a motion of non-confidence in the government, a motion that I will go over in some detail in a few moments, when last night as I was thinking about some of the things I might comment upon today and watching the channel 6 television news I was surprised to hear a report that there had been a motion of non-confidence during the debate — and this is for your information, Mr. Speaker — upon the Speech from the Throne, and that also there was now a motion of non-confidence in the debate on the budget. "Both motions, however," said the commentator, "were swamped by the Socred majority." So it would strike me that the reporter or that commentator kind of took the wind out of our sails. He says we're beaten before we really start.

Really, that mustn't be. We have a succinct, properly worded resolution that appeals to all the backbenchers. I can just tell by the looks on their faces. They know perfectly well that this government is guilty of poor fiscal management. They know perfectly well that it's affected, in a detrimental. way, the human betterment of the majority of the people in the province particularly in respect to taxation, investor confidence, employment opportunities — and it does not protect senior citizens and the handicapped from the effects of inflation. Now they all know that, Mr. Speaker, and I am sure that the majority of them will be voting with us. Surely it goes without saying that the members, even though they're on the government side, must face reality sooner or later. Now's a good time for them to do so.

AN HON. MEMBER: Cyril's going to vote with you.

MR. COCKE: Of course he must. I notice however, Cyril once put on a pair of running shoes, Mr. Member. He hit that door faster than lightning. I would worry somewhat, too, about the member for Delta (Mr. Davidson), because he was even faster than the member for Skeena (Mr. Shelford), if you can remember the debate that was going on that day last year.

Well, Mr. Speaker, let's kind of go over this whole question again. I say to you that the entire direction that this government shows is direction showing its bias. We see mining companies in this province receiving welfare. On the other hand, we see deserving elderly and disabled people being swindled by that government at the present time. You'll recall — and I'll refer back to it later — that letter from the First United Church. We find the evidence in a letter from the First United Church, among many other letters that we've received. At the same time we also see oil companies given carte blanche by that government, knowing that they have legislation in force in this province. They're giving those oil companies carte blanche approval to put the squeeze on every car-driving person in this province with their exorbitant rates for gasoline; particularly exorbitant in the north where we find so many of the great fighters, the freedom fighters, who, obviously, aren't back home paying those prices. If they were, they would be fighting, no doubt, for the people they represent. They certainly aren't fighting in this House. We've had four speakers on a debate already — I'm the fourth — and not a move from the government side. If they don't agree with us, then get up and debate against us and our position. If, on the other hand, they agree with this motion, get up and debate in favour of this motion. A great lack of courage back there. What's the matter? Are they afraid the people back home might hear them?

It strikes me that they've been ordered to silence. The Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams) sits there with a bit of a frown on his face, saying to himself: "I wonder what he's going to say next that might get those people up." Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland) talks about irresponsibility in this House. That member, when he sat over on this side, having people fired by virtue of his charges and the kind of irresponsible mess that came from this side of the House, particularly from that member.... He should never ever make that kind of charge, particularly in the face of a charge that he knows is absolutely proper and is absolutely right.

While those oil companies are permitted to squeeze us, what do we get as a reply from the Minister of Health? Triple the ambulance rates to the ordinary sick person in our province. That's what we get for a reply. Mr. Minister, hang your head. We know that you're only a part minister. We know that most of the decisions are made by the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) in your portfolio. Still, I'm sure that this was one area upon which he gave you a little bit of authority. I suggest that that minister, in tripling those ambulance fees and not fighting off the oil companies, did a great disservice

[ Page 488 ]

to the people in this province.

Mr. Speaker, I see at the same time the whole bias, the whole press, the whole government direction. You can see the microcosm in the city of Vancouver. We see services moving west. We see the hospital services moving west. We see an elitist hospital being built on the campus of the university.

I wouldn't be surprised if the Minister of Education doesn't move the ICBC headquarters there, and that'll be to the consternation of the member for Surrey (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) who said: "We're first in line." Then suddenly the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland) said: "Well, Langley wants to get in on this fight too, so Langley is second in line" — after having divested it from New Westminster, which should have had it by geographical rights and which also has the need in that particular area.

Everything we have ever thought about this government is coming true. They are as irresponsible this time as they were their first session of the Legislature. Between those sessions, after passing a piece of legislation that gave them the right to reorganize government, they reorganized it, all right. They reorganized it in such a way as to provide even fewer services to people. They reorganized it in such a way as to give themselves the kind of protection from criticism which they felt was necessary in order to perpetuate their bias, in order to perpetuate their direction.

No, Mr. Speaker, they came waltzing into the House on budget day and announced to the people of B.C.: "No tax increases." After having increased income tax last year, after having given us a 40 per cent increase on our sales tax, after having doubled the ferry rates and tripled the ICBC rates, after having done all the devastating things they could possibly do, then they mince into the House.

The Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Wolfe), who is now down in Ottawa and no doubt making great pleas on behalf of the people of British Columbia, stood up and said: "No increase in taxes." Well, Mr. Speaker, I suggest to you, how could they have possibly increased taxes? How could they? They knew perfectly well they couldn't. They had already gone beyond any reasonable level of increase last year.

Mr. Speaker, in this amendment we talk about other things: we talk about employment, and I'll bet you that's a real headache to the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams). The Minister of Labour indicates that he has a headache right at the present time. Well, he should have a headache, because the leadership provided by that government has been an absolute disgrace with respect to employment.

The Minister of Labour knows better than anyone that the government leading the way, with his colleague who's running the ferry system.... They talk about their Crown corporations: they made all the decisions in the ferry system; they laid off the 800 people who are now looking for work in the job market of B.C.

The ferry system is this bad, Mr. Speaker, and I want to just give you one very easy example to understand. We were on the ferry not long ago. We answered the call and we went down to the deck. I sat in my car and I waited to get off the ferry. We were docked. The buzzer had buzzed and everything was ready to get off the ferry. But the gangplank wouldn't come down — the one that comes from the shore down. And do you know what I saw? I saw one of the ferry personnel — one of the workers on the ferry — shinny up, over and onto the dock, go into the little control room, or whatever it happens to be, and let the dock down. I said to one of the members of the crew: "What's happening here?" He said: "We're so short of help, we can hardly run this system." Yes, that's right.

Mr. Speaker, it's a disgrace — an absolute disgrace. They talk about jobs, particularly the Minister of Mines (Hon. Mr. Chabot) — he's famous for that. I'm sure that he's going to get up in this debate and tell us how they are going to provide jobs for the people in B.C. You haven't yet, and you've been at it a year. You say you're going to put B.C. back on the road, Mr. Minister — back on the rails or whatever. You put it on the rocks, and you'll put those ferries on the rocks too.

Mr. Speaker, with jobs in the public service it's the same thing. I'll bet the Minister of Health is going to stand up and tell us how, since he's been minister, he had been able to take care of the needs of his hospitals. The institutional care in this province is right up to standards — I'm sure he can stand up and say that. It certainly isn't indicated, however, in their staff complement.

Mr. Speaker, not only in health, but in many other areas of government we are short-staffed, and in the face of an unemployment situation in B.C. this is absolutely intolerable. In the face of this yesterday we had the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) stand in this House — Mr. Chips; that was a good one — and what did he tell us? He said that on walking to work the other day he saw one person at a jackhammer and two people standing watching. ) You know, this is the old cry that we always hear: "Nobody is carrying their load except me." This is the kind of suggestion I would expect to come from the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm). With all the shovels in the world, minister, there's no place to put them.

Mr. Speaker, that minister doesn't really understand what he's talking about. I'm talking about the Minister of Forests. If he were to use the same kind of thinking, the same kind of philosophy, about our press gallery for an example.... Were they reporting what he said when he said it? If they

[ Page 489 ]

weren't, then they were being idle. There is often a reason for sitting or standing or whatever — possibly for the moment being idle. Some of those people work very, very hard when they do work.

Mr. Speaker, the trouble in our province is that there is not enough work. I heard a report of a young man the other day who has interviewed 700 potential employers, and he isn't unusual.

HON. R.H. McCLELLAND (Minister of Health): Name names!

MR. COCKE: I suggest to you that general hospitals are dangerously understaffed. The Minister of Health could tell you, if he stood in this House, that there are hospitals in this province that are not providing the level of care that they should, and that there are actually procedures that are not being done, many of them just because of a lack of staff.

So this is the kind of leadership that we receive, a leadership going nowhere but down the tube. The conservative element of that party is so strong, despite the Liberal infusion, that they're squeezing this province for all they can. I think it's unfortunate for the people of B.C.

Mr. Speaker, I think there's a lot more that must be said. I'd just like to think in terms of something else that we're trying to talk about here in this resolution: the protection of the senior citizens and the handicapped of our province. Let me read you just a little note out of The Capital News. This is an occurrence in the interior. This is a charge levelled by a former MLA in this House, a chap by the name of Frank Snowsell. Many of you know him. This is what happened. I'll read the news story and you can gain your own meanings.

"Senior citizens who are obtaining homemaker service under a provincial programme are paying more than double what they were being charged under the NDP government. That charge was levelled by South Okanagan NDP vice-president Frank Snowsell in an address this week to the Peachland NDP club."

lnterjection.

MR. COCKE: Yes, he was NDP. Do you know who he was making his charge against? A Socred, who was a Liberal. (Laughter.) But as you know, Mr. Speaker, he cited the case of a Kelowna couple. This is a real big joke; the Minister of Human Resources is laughing.

"He cited the case of the Kelowna couple, who under the NDP were provided homemaker service for six hours a day, five days a week, with a trained worker paid $4.14 an hour. The wife had had three strokes and would have had to be hospitalized without the service.

"Cost of the homemaker service for one whole month was only slightly over the cost of one day's stay in the hospital, he said. Under the regime of Bennett the Second, and the direction of the Hon. William Vander Zalm, this old couple were charged $30 in 1975 and $64 a month in 1977."

MR. G.V. LAUK (Vancouver Centre): Shame!

MR. COCKE: Sixty-four dollars a month out of their pittance. You know, this is the type of thing that this government's doing to the people in this province. They wonder why we move motions of non-confidence. Mr. Speaker, that's why we move motions of non-confidence.

AN HON. MEMBER: He should have listened.

MR. COCKE: He doesn't listen, because he doesn't dare listen, that Minister of Human Resources. Mr. Speaker, I charge that that Minister of Human Resources would be outclassed at this time in history by his Socred predecessor, Phil Gaglardi, in every way, shape and form. I believe that. I think Phil Gaglardi would have resigned his position in cabinet had he been forced to do the things that that minister has done with a smile on his face. I don't believe that Phil Gaglardi would have cut back on the handicapped the way that minister has; I don't believe that Phil Gaglardi would have cut back on the senior citizens the way that minister has; I don't believe that Phil Gaglardi would have made the outrageous statements that this minister had made about the shovels, about eating tulips and all the rest of it.

Mr. Speaker, we have in our midst a minister whose facade is great: good-looking, he smiles well, he does all those nice things — great personality, I'm told. But, Mr. Speaker, that minister has a heart of ice behind his ribs. Mr. Speaker, who really says so? The First United Church — one of the best organizations for doing charitable work in the city of Vancouver, and always has been. Mr. Speaker, just let me read you a few words of a four-page letter that was sent to the First Minister of this province.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Table it!

MR. COCKE: I'm not tabling anything. I'm going to read it into the record, Mr. Minister. Mr. Speaker, let me start out by saying that this is a quote from the letter from the First United Church, dated January 27, 1977:

"Dear Mr. Bennett:

"The staff team of the First United Church are very concerned with the inadequate and

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discriminatory income assistance rates (also known as welfare or social assistance) as provided under the Guaranteed Available Income for Need Act and the pursuant regulations to this legislation effective from October 1, 1976. We can, without hesitation, support the recipients who are upset with reference to the discriminatory rate changes.

"Also, we fully endorse the positions taken by the Federated Anti-Poverty Groups of B.C., British Columbia Association of Social Workers, PLURA, the Inter-Church Association to Promote Social Justice in Canada, Victoria Community Action Group, SPARC of B.C., and the British Columbia Coalition of the Disabled, in their representation to your government concerning in-adequate income assistance rates."

These are responsible people talking to a government which has had a year to develop some social conscience; a government which has turned a deaf ear on social conscience for a year; a government then which has come into the House when they should have been here last fall, but finally come in this spring because they had to by the constitution, but they've come in here and been surprised. They are surprised that we would have the audacity to put forward a resolution of non-confidence. Who could be confident in such a government? I hope, Mr. Speaker, that the people's memories are such that when this government starts handing out its goodies, its candies and, yes, its tulip bulbs to the next election, some of these things are remembered.

Let me just give you some examples, Mr. Speaker, of what you're doing to people out there. Mr. Speaker, the following table gives examples of reduced payments to handicapped persons with families, or where one parent or spouse is 60 years or older. I'll read you the rates. The rate prior to October, 1976, for two persons — one adult, one child; that's a single-parent family — was $425. We've had inflation since. I'm talking about a disabled person and a child — a person who can't work — $425 prior to October, 1976. The present rate is a disgraceful $355. That's a $70 reduction! We have a 16 per cent reduction for an indefensible person when mining companies are told: "Rip us off!" It's not right!

MRS. B.B. WALLACE (Cowichan-Malahat): That's the great, improved GAIN.

MR. COCKE: That's the improvement! That's GAIN!

MR. LAUK: You know who gains!

MR. COCKE: We know who gains! It's certain now who gains.

MR. LAUK: It's not the senior citizens.

MR. COCKE: The senior citizen does not gain. The mining companies gain. The millionaires gain through a piece of legislation that we'll be talking about, I'm sure, in the not-too-distant future in this House.

Let's look at some others: total family benefits where two parents, or both spouses, are handicapped or are 60 years or older and cannot work, Those two parents, with a child, prior to October, 1976: $690; present rate: 545 disgraceful dollars. That's a $145 reduction — a 21 per cent reduction.

I'd sure hang my head if I was on that side of the House. I'd sure hang my head if I were asked by the Whip, or by whoever does the asking over there, to stand up and argue when the estate tax or the Succession Duty Act is brought forward in our House.

The letter goes on:

"Mr. Vander Zalm, in a press statement on December 29,1976, is reported to have stated that the rates in those categories prior to October 1, 1976, were providing a disincentive."

A disincentive to what? People that are well in this province can't get a job. People that are strong in this province can't get a job, and the minister has the audacity to say that they were providing a disincentive to people who were disabled by caring for their needs. Disincentive, my foot! "That's a major contradiction," this letter goes on to say, "to our minds."

"It is a major contradiction to use the argument of a disincentive when the present criteria to qualify for handicap benefits require that the recipient be in a position where no amount of incentive would contribute to his or her becoming self-sufficient."

These are words that should be remembered. These are words that should ring across this province. Yet, Mr. Speaker, I see an apathy out there. I hope people who are all right themselves aren't saying: "I'm all right, Jack," as this government is obviously saying.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, I must draw your attention to the light. You have three minutes left.

MR. COCKE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I suggest to this House that if anybody on either side hasn't a copy of this letter, they should get a copy and read it with tremendous seriousness. It was mailed to everybody under the sun, to all MLAs, secretaries of the presbytery executive.

AN HON. MEMBER: They care — don't they?

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MR. COCKE: I've had a lot of input from the United Church on this whole issue and I'm proud of the work they are doing and have done for a great number of years in our province. As a matter of fact, First United, I said yesterday and I reiterate today, is particularly strong in my mind because they rarely ever toot their own horns. They do more work than practically any other group in Vancouver.

AN HON. MEMBER: They don't play politics.

MR. COCKE: For that matter, their outreach is across the province and rarely ever do you hear them tooting their horn even slightly, where they could certainly not be frowned upon if they did.

So with that I suggest that there's a reason for the opposition taking time out in the throne debate to once again remind the government or anybody that's interests'.-d that there is trouble in our province today. Mr. Speaker, that trouble includes a lack over there of fiscal policy that would lead us to human betterment. That trouble includes the fact that taxation is working against us. That trouble, Mr. Speaker, is the fact that there is no investor confidence since this group moved in. Employment opportunities are down and senior citizens and handicapped people are being used as pawns because they can't protect themselves.

Mr. Speaker, thank you, and for those who haven't seen it, I'll table the letter from the First United Church, with leave of the House.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: On a point of order, I didn't want to interrupt the speech of the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) as he was talking, but in all fairness to the other members of this House, and in keeping with the decorum that should be established in this House, I would like to ask the Speaker if he would ask the member for New Westminster to withdraw a comment that he made about the government "swindling" people. I don't think that is parliamentary, Mr. Speaker.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I'm afraid I can't withdraw the word. It's not unparliamentary when used in this particular situation and I felt that strongly. I think that the minister, had he listened to what I had to say and what others have had to say, would, deep down, have to agree.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members, speaking to the point of order raised by the hon. Minister of Health, I allowed the phrase to go by because it was a phrase in general and not specific.

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: One moment, please. If it had been specific or directed against an hon. member of the House, the member for New Westminster knows as well as I do that he would have immediately been asked to withdraw. But there is another criterion that becomes involved. That is, if any hon. member of the House feels that a term or a phrase used in debate is unparliamentary and offensive, the standard, accepted practice, hon. member, is to withdraw that statement. Will you kindly do so?

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order, it must be raised at the time the offending word is used, not at the end of a speech, and the Minister of Health knows that.

You know, you become...when the devil was sick, the devil a saint would be. I can remember you sitting over here, and some of the calumny that you were guilty of.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. MACDONALD: But it has to be raised at the time, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, the hon. minister rose on his feet immediately following the speech. It could have been raised immediately by taking a point of order and interrupting your speech, and it wasn't, hon. member. The hon. minister indicates that he feels that's an offensive phrase, and I would say that it would be parliamentary tradition just to withdraw that particular phrase if it's offensive to a member of the House.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I directed that phrase against no one in this House. I did it in general and, Mr. Speaker, you know and I know that that is the accepted practice. Now, Mr. Speaker, if that minister by virtue of this kind of new direction puts us in a position where we cannot speak out in terms that are harsh on subjects that are that important, then he's undone a great deal of parliamentary possibility. I don't really think that I should be called upon to withdraw a general phrase which doesn't even appear in the unparliamentary phrases which we have before us.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, I'd like to say that it's up to the member. I'm just hoping that he will respect the parliamentary traditions which have been built up in this House. On the point that the former Attorney-General made — I did not wish to interrupt the member's speech at that time, Mr. Speaker. I was anxiously waiting for him to raise that matter of urgent public concern that he raised yesterday, and which he failed to even get off his seat about in question period and which he did not mention in his speech today.

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MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. That is not part of a point of order today.

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: I have recognized — the hon. member for Oak Bay, hon. member.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): Mr. Speaker, I would like to offer a few comments, even though the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) mentions that I haven't got the permission of the official opposition to get into this debate.

The amendment, I think, highlights some basic points about any budget, whether it would emanate from this government or from this House. I think these basic points are worth mentioning quickly. Any budget should surely be based on certain recognized goals compatible with the mandate that any government is given to take money from the taxpayer and spend it wisely.

One goal should surely be that the tax measures used to raise revenue should not depress industry or consumer spending and result in unemployment being made worse. Perhaps one of the cardinal elements in any budget should be that there is no unfair penalty applied to any one group or any group of individuals. It should also be a basic goal in any budget to recognize that certain taxes when they are increased can simply be self-defeating. We have had an excellent demonstration of that with the ferry fare increase which greatly reduced the number of persons coming to Vancouver Island and, subsequently, the employment on the island.

We know, Mr. Speaker, that no government can provide all the funding for all the very worthwhile programmes that could benefit society, and therefore surely another fundamental goal in any budget should be at least to determine what funding for services is available and at least make it available to the people in greatest need. Surely — and I'll be quoting from some of the members opposite when they were on this side of the House — this House recognizes, and has done for many years, that elderly citizens who can no longer live in their own homes would have to be the one pre-eminent group in British Columbia today which is getting something less than their fair share of the provincial pie.

The amendment deals with the manner in which this government has failed to meet some of these basic criteria. It's quite obvious that the government has a somewhat different set of priorities from the members of the opposition who have spoken. A great deal of emphasis has been placed on unemployment, as indeed it should be.

MR. GIBSON: Not by the government.

MR. WALLACE: The Liberal leader interjects that the emphasis hasn't been placed on unemployment by the government but it certainly has by the official opposition and the other opposition parties.

I was very distressed to hear one member of the back bench toss out the comment that while the people are unemployed they get unemployment insurance, as though that was some kind of adequate and thoroughly desirable way in which to deal with unemployment. The real fact is that unemployed people are unhappy and frustrated and unproductive people who, in the vast majority of cases, would be delighted to be able to find a job. We have 88,000 such persons in British Columbia right now. And if these 88,000 were earning wages and paying income tax and buying consumer goods and taking holidays and doing many other things, there would be a very considerable stream of productive revenue coming back into the coffers of the government, at the federal level in particular.

I think we also make the mistake of putting revenue and expenditures in compartments and saying that such and such a revenue is raised at the federal level. But it certainly all comes out of the same pocket — the pocket of you and me, the taxpayer.

But this government — and it surprises me, since it's looked upon by many people as being a free-enterprise government — seems to have overlooked the old adage that you have to spend a buck to make a buck.

MR. GIBSON: It's passing the buck.

MR. WALLACE: Once again the Liberal leader, who is keeping me on my toes today, says that this government isn't only ignoring that adage, but it's just passing the buck.

In order to create jobs there has to be some capital made available. We've already debated in this House that preferably one would like to see private capital create the jobs, but this is not happening. And the only area of the budget that seems to even imply the creation of jobs is in the Minister of Highways' (Hon. Mr. Fraser's) department. I am delighted that the Minister of Highways is in his place right across from me, Mr. Speaker. He has been a very silent minister so far this session, and we haven't really had too many evening sittings so that we could hear about porcupine pie. But I think that the minister — and I've been watching him very closely because there are many questions about his ministry that I wish to raise during this session — has been very attentive and he's been listening. Perhaps I could start off with the first question, as to how the Premier in his Thanksgiving Day speech announced that $120 million would be made available for highway construction that would create 2,000 new jobs this winter, and how, the next

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day, the $120 million had shrunk to $40 million.

Now we know they're financial wizards over there, Mr. Speaker, but that's quite a performance — from $ 120 million to $40 million overnight. We subsequently were given several versions of the Premier's original statement. Finally, we had a statement by the minister himself that was reported in The Vancouver Sun, November 5. The headline says: "Fraser Says Roadwork Retaining 1,500 Jobs." It seems to me that not only is the programme of funding not providing new jobs, it is simply retaining jobs that would otherwise have disappeared. I think the minister, in his own words, is on record as confirming that.

Mr. Speaker, one of the difficulties in this whole budget is that so many of the figures are meaningless. Rather than just make a blanket statement, I want to quote a specific in regard to highways. The budget states that the 1977-78 appropriation is up by $61.5 million from $274.5 million in 1976-77. But the estimates for highway spending that were presented to us last year were not $274 million; they were $231 million, and it's right there in the estimates. I presume that the $40 million that the Premier was talking about has been added to the $231 million. But the thing is, there's all kinds of jiggery-pokery that goes on in providing columns of figures in the budget. When you start to really dig into them, Mr. Speaker, they don't mean a damn thing.

AN HON. MEMBER: Don't ask Alex.

MR. WALLACE: The government policy is quite clear as far as highways are concerned: It's a tap to be turned on or off, depending on the government's overall decision about spending. "If the revenue's available, fellas, let's toss in another $40 million for a bit of highway to create a few jobs and make the people of B.C. think that the government is concerned about job creation."

AN HON. MEMBER: You're just a faucet, Alex.

MR. WALLACE: On the other hand, where the estimate is to be vastly underspent, we have to wait until public accounts show up a year later to find out what the true financial facts are. The cynicism behind all this is clearly that by the time public accounts come out a year from now to tell us what was actually spent, everybody's forgotten what the estimates were. We have the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), who defended his estimate figures by saying that we on this side of the House didn't understand and we were confused. We were, and we always will be, if some estimate figure from last year is quoted which bears no resemblance to the actual amount of money that's going to be spent in that year. An estimate figure is supposed to be somewhere close to the amount of money that will be spent.

Then we have the Minister of Human Resources, in answering points from this side of the House, saying: "Well, what these members don't know, of course, is that the budget for '76-'77 will be underspent by at least $25 million."

MR. GIBSON: More than that.

MR. WALLACE: It may well be a great deal more than that, judging by the skin-flint approach which that department has been taking since the minister took office.

MR. GIBSON: Ebenezer Vander Zalm!

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: It's good management.

MR. WALLACE: It isn't good management. The figures have been pointed out to you this afternoon. You are being very unfair.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: I'm surprised at you.

MR. WALLACE: I don't care if you are surprised at me. The figures make it quite clear that there's discrimination in providing Human Resources funding. You have two groups of people with exactly the same need. The money they receive depends on when they made the application. Now how can you tell me that that isn't rank injustice?

MR. GIBSON: Hear, hear! Ebenezer Vander Zalm!

MR. WALLACE: If you're surprised that I should get angry at that, you have a few more surprises ahead of you, my friend.

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: The cynicism of the matter is that this minister laughs, and smiles, and jokes, and makes asides when, in fact, he has one of the most sensitive portfolios in this whole government. I don't know if he thinks that the first criterion for him should be to get headlines all the time, and to hell with what happens to the handicapped and the poor, but he's showing a shocking cynicism in this House today!

If this government is prepared to play around with figures in this way, Mr. Speaker, with these two particular portfolios, I think it's quite reasonable for members of this House and the people of British Columbia to wonder how much juggling has gone on with figures in other departments. This government was elected with a very serious commitment, not only

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to get the economy rolling, which it has not done, but on a promise of open government. I would like to suggest that one way in which it could be made more open and more constructive would be that instead of simply staying with estimate figures for the current year in the budget, each ministry should look at the interim financial statement for the nine months of the year completed and come up with a revised estimate column, which would at least give us in the opposition some intelligent kind of basis on which to compare '76-'77 figures with '77-'78 estimates. But in point of fact, what we are faced with is that we have to look at estimate figures for the current year which were put on the table a year ago and which we now know are in many cases far removed either by overspending or underspending from the original estimate.

It really makes something of a mockery of this debate for us to assume that the estimate figures are fairly close to what the actual figures will be, to stand up and try and contribute constructively in this debate, and then have ministers like the Minister of Human Resources stand up and try and just make a fool of the opposition because we don't really have the figures on which to base our criticism. Now if that is what this chamber is all about, just a one-upmanship, gamesmanship kind of approach — and I think we're seeing some of it from the minister this afternoon — then I think it's time the people of British Columbia got some insight into the fact that we don't really accomplish much here, even when we come up with positive, constructive criticism, because ministers such as that minister on the other side laugh and joke and suddenly tell us in debate what the real figures are.

We should have access, as members of the opposition, to the most accurate figures that are available to any member of this House. Otherwise we are just standing here trying to interpret figures which, in many cases, are meaningless.

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: To the interjection from the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams) I know that it is not easy to predict accurately a year ahead, but it must surely be relatively easy at the end of nine months, when X millions of dollars have been spent, for the ministers to provide a revised estimate for the 12 months, for the simple reason, as the minister well knows, that expenditures and revenues don't come in or go out in four equal quarters. Depending on which ministry we are dealing with, revenue may be higher in the summer or winter, and vice versa. Expenditures on highways, for example, are not paid out, I am sure, in four equal quarters.

You know, Mr. Speaker, the Premier himself has not really done any credit to his office as Premier of the province. On two particular occasions I can think of he's quoted vastly inaccurate figures purely for what appeared to be an attempt at a very short-term political game. I have already referred to the $120 million that shrunk to $40 million overnight. At his own convention he waved aloft a bunch of figures which he titled, "the proposed NDP budget had they been returned to power," and which would show a deficit of $1  billion. But a little bit of scouting by the Fourth Estate — to whom the Premier seemed to attach some significance earlier today — showed that this was just the sum total of departmental requests and not the budget.

One of the problems that has been clearly demonstrated in this debate, Mr. Speaker, is that we have to compete with other provinces and countries for expansion of our economy, and there appears to be very little real effort being made by the government in this budget to deal with the problems of high taxation. The Corporation Capital Tax Act, which I mentioned in an earlier debate, is just an additional cost to doing business at a time when profits are very closely governed by the anti-inflation measures. The Corporation Capital Tax Act is a very serious obstacle to the small businessman.

I was very interested to listen to the member for Dewdney (Mr. Mussallem), Mr. Speaker, who made his usual spirited speech yesterday. I had to agree with his concern about the small businessman in British Columbia, but nowhere in his speech did I hear one positive suggestion as to what the government might do to help the businessman. All the member for Dewdney pointed out was that the small businessman is in a lot of trouble.

MR. MUSSALLEM: You weren't listening. You weren't in the House.

MR. WALLACE: No, I was listening. I heard what you said.

Interjections.

MR. WALLACE: The kind of answer which seems to be attractive in other jurisdictions, not the least of which is our American neighbours, is the principle of tax cuts, but all this government seems to believe in is to go on increasing taxes, even if, at a certain point, the whole measure is self-defeating.

The government was elected on a very clear commitment that it would get the economy rolling by attracting capital and by expanding industry and creating new jobs, and I think it's very disappointing, even if there may be some justification to remove succession duties, that that seems to be the one and only serious attempt by the government in this budget to attract investment capital to the province.

Of course, as far as commitments are concerned, I

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suppose we should remember that this party also was elected on a promise that it would not raise taxes, and we know how long it took to break that promise. I think it's worthwhile quoting one of the government members — the member for Skeena (Mr. Shelford).

[Mr. Veitch in the chair.]

MR. G. MUSSALLEM (Dewdney): Here we go again.

MR. WALLACE: Yes, here we go again, George, because it's always nice to know that at least one of the members of the government party is willing to stand up and express his concerns for the people of his riding even if it may, to some degree, embarrass the government of which he's a member. The member for Skeena said:

"So far no major changes in basic direction have been made from the discredited policies of the former administration except a balanced budget and better administration of programmes. Contrary to many reports, the economy of the northwest has got progressively worse since 1973, when logging and mining activities started to go down. There appears to be no overall strategy on which direction the government intends to lead the province during the next three years."

Mr. Speaker, one of the reasons that there's no overall strategy is that the government handcuffs itself at the outset by insisting that, no matter what happens, there must be a balanced budget. The attitude seems to be: "We'll balance the budget and go from there." The harsh truth in the world of economics these days is that contrary to the government's deep concern and reluctance ever to borrow money — at least for the provincial budget — the feeling is that they can balance the budget first and then tackle the problems of unemployment and job creation and industrial expansion in a secondary manner. That's the big problem because when economic times are bad government's have to be much more farsighted than this government obviously is.

We had an excellent critique of that particular philosophy by Frances Russel in The Vancouver Sun just a night or two ago. I thought she delightfully entitled the article: "Victoria Style of Stop and Go — the Ad Hockery of Financial Management." She says that the revenue and expenditure of this government are just looked upon as two columns of figures and, no matter what else happens, they must balance when you get down to the bottom line. This is instead of using the borrowing capacity and initiatives which the government could take as an instrument of long-term strategy to develop diversity of employment in this province and to expand some of the industry that already exists. Again, I would wonder if this government has forgotten the fact that you have to spend a buck to make a buck.

MR. COCKE: I don't think they ever knew.

MR. WALLACE: Of course, the supreme irony of the government's rigid attitude to budgeting lies in the fact that it is engaged in deficit financing by creating two new Crown corporations and then leaving the Crown corporations to do the borrowing. By taking visible borrowing out of the provincial budget and replacing it in the less visible balance sheet of the Crown corporations, I assume that some kind of Social Credit fiscal honour is preserved in the minds of our ultra-conservative Finance minister. But the truth is that the government is in deficit financing, no matter what devices are employed to suggest otherwise.

You know, Mr. Speaker, I am convinced that even the Minister of Finance in his own heart — and I think he has a heart — believes this, because when I was speaking earlier in the debate I heard the minister mutter quite loudly: "But we are already deficit budgeting, you dummy." This was heard by opposition members down the way, and I've no objection to being called a dummy because I know that there are a lot of people who would agree with that. But I don't think that the minister should sit in his place and mutter that the government is deficit financing, then stand up to deliver his budget speech and make ringing pronouncements such as: "This government does not subscribe to deficit financing to underwrite its current operations."

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: That's right. To underwrite its current operations it takes the money required for some of its current operations and raises it through borrowing for two new Crown corporations. Doesn't the Minister of Labour remember...? And I know we'll have to go a step at a time because he seems very agitated and red-faced this afternoon, but I'll try and be slow and logical in answering the queries.

Perhaps the Minister of Labour remembers that in the years he's been in this House there has been a gradually increasing deficit on — shall I say it very softly? — the B.C. Ferries, and that from year to year large hunks of money were taken out of operating funds, revenue of this province, to bolster the deficit of B.C. Ferries. But now nothing has changed; it's still running at a deficit, but the devices, the mechanisms used to hide the deficits are going to be a little different. Now we'll blame the administration of the B.C. Ferry Corporation when it has to put up its rates to close the deficit. Previously the province

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just took $20 million or $30 million, or whatever millions of dollars, out of operating revenue to bolster and close that deficit. The Minister of Labour knows that very well.

The sad part is that deficit financing is a well-recognized technique during times of economic recession. Because, unfortunately, we have a Liberal government in Ottawa that goes completely overboard on borrowing and deficit financing, that surely is no reason to damn the procedure completely, because there are many times when a modest degree of deficit financing creates the jobs, the employment and the peace of mind of the people who have the jobs, rather than have them depend so entirely on a variety of benefits — whether they are unemployment insurance or welfare.

Interjections.

MR. WALLACE: I know the member for Burnaby is trying out the cabinet seat, but what he seems to have missed is the point that I'm trying to demonstrate the absolute hypocrisy of your government, that on one side of its mouth it claims that it is not deficit financing, and that out of the other side of its mouth it does.

MR. GIBSON: There's an eject button on that seat, Ray. Watch out! (Laughter.)

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The hon. member for Oak Bay has the floor.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, I'll quickly touch on the second part of the amendment which relates to the fact that the people who are most in need are getting the least help from the financial measures in this budget. I have already talked about the plight of the elderly citizens who can no longer live in their own homes. Again I have to say how distressed and somewhat disappointed I was at the outburst of the Minister of Human Resources when he talked about our citizens in nursing homes being oversedated by being given too many drugs to keep them quiet. I know that to some degree that happens in our nursing homes, but the Minister of Human Resources completely missed the point.

The reason that happens is that there are generally inadequate facilities and they are understaffed. The staff is underpaid and inadequately trained. You start making all these wild accusations that all of the patients are oversedated, when in point of fact what is required is a modern, well-trained staff in modern facilities providing these nursing-home patients with the same kind of justice and the same share of the provincial pie that is provided for acute care and extended care. One could spend the whole speech on this one topic. Its just very sad that in the eight years

I've been in this House this kind of speech has had to be made year after year after year, and I'm disillusioned enough to think that probably it's going to have to be made for many more years.

I just want to remind the House that away back in 1973 a committee of this House travelled the province to determine the need. The need was already known, and all we did was confirm what was already known. But one of the members on that committee was at that time the member for Langley; he now happens to be the Minister of Health of this province (Hon. Mr. McClelland). I think it's very interesting, Mr. Speaker, to just quickly quote the minority report which the member for Langley submitted on that all-committee report in 1973. It was submitted to this House on Friday, September 28, 1973.

"The second issue with which I wish to disagree is the recommendation that the per diem coverage of all patients in acute care, extended care, or intermediate care should be equitable.

"I believe that the word 'equitable' should be replaced with the word 'equal.' People must be allowed to move from one level of health care to another without suffering any financial penalty. We must have a single level of charges applicable to all levels of care.

"Respectfully submitted,

R.H. McClelland"

Well, it's now 1977. We're four years down the road and it seems we're no further forward. The very man who sits in government today and is the Minister of Health, and who has the authority, if not the responsibility, to recommend to cabinet that this kind of justice be implemented in health-care programmes, has said absolutely nothing to give us any hope at all that this year, at least, some first step will be taken to give nursing-home patients that same kind of equal assistance that he espoused in September, 1973.

You know, once again, even if we bring it down to dollars and cents, Mr. Speaker.... Just let me quote the social worker at the Eric Martin Institute in Victoria. He was quoted in the Colonist on January 29 as saying that many of the 116 patients who stayed more than 60 days in the Eric Martin Institute in 1976 did so because there was no other place for them to go in the community. They accounted for 11,000 patient days at $100 a day. Mr. Pepper, I think, put it very well. He says: "That's about $1 million. It would go a long way towards providing intermediate facilities which don't require the same professional staff, and can handle them at much less cost."

Those senior citizens who can no longer live in their own home are a group suffering perhaps the greatest degree of discrimination of any group in the whole of our society today. Yet we have a

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programme for universal Pharmacare in the wings. Once again, we haven't been given the details so it's difficult to offer intelligent, constructive criticism. But here at a time when elderly people in nursing homes are spending their income and their assets just to stay alive, and sometimes in rather inadequate circumstances with sub-standard care, we have a Pharmacare programme which, it would appear, is destined to provide some government revenue to people regardless of their income. People earning $20,000 of $30,000 a year apparently are going to be at the government trough to obtain some kind of funding for prescription drugs.

The hydro rate increase, which will be the third in two years and which will average 60 per cent in that period of time, is another incredible hardship to the senior citizen whose only hope for any income increase is the indexing of the old age pension, and that's inadequate enough.

The annual 10.6 per cent automatic increase in rents is another level of financial penalty which senior citizens simply cannot cope with, unless they cut back on their food bills, which in itself is self-defeating if the result is that the elderly citizen winds up in hospital because of poor nutrition.

The sales tax is an unfair tax on low-income groups to start with. When it's increased by 40 per cent the weight of penalty against lower and middle-income groups is very severe.

I just want to say that I thoroughly agree with the quotations and the comments from the United Church of Canada letter which we all received. The way in which the handicapped have had their access to benefits reduced, and the benefits themselves reduced, is just incredible at a time of rising costs. Even though inflation is less now than it was, let us say, a year ago, it is still considerable.

The other kind of distortion of government priorities lies in this announcement which appeared the other day in Monday Magazine that senior government officials of the deputy minister and associate deputy minister level on April 1 of each year are entitled to calculate 17 per cent of their current annual salary and collect payment in cash and fringe benefits. For some, like deputy ministers, this means more than $13,000 in retroactive pay, with another $6,000 payable on April I of this year. I wonder what the old-age pensioners and senior citizens of British Columbia think about that kind of settlement.

Almost worse than that, Mr. Speaker is the optional selection of benefits. I would recite one or two: there is sick-leave entitlement up to a maximum of 250 days, half of which may be collected in cash, if unused, at retirement: reimbursement of up to $2,000 plus all legal costs to cover the real estate agent's fee in connection with selling one's house because of a transfer in job location.

Employees travelling on government business for more than two weeks are entitled to be paid for a trip home every other weekend. One of my friends suggested that could be called the "nooky" allowance, but I wasn't sure what that meant. (Laughter.) Payment of up to six months' salary is made to the survivors of an employee who dies while still employed by the government, regardless of the cause of death.

Now these are some very substantial expenditures for the government. I'm the last one to deny that deputy ministers and associate deputy ministers carry a very high degree of responsibility, but where's the consistency in a budget that calls for restraint, to provide these kinds of increases and these kinds of fringe benefits?

I'm sorry that the Minister of Public Works (Hon. Mr. Fraser) has left, because some of the other elements of government spending that are becoming public knowledge relate to some of the new buildings that the government is putting up in Victoria. I would like to just ask these questions regarding the building on Pandora Street in Victoria that will house, I believe, the staff of the Ministry of Health, and leave the minister to answer them in due course.

I have been told that the kitchen for the staff cafeteria will cost $750,000. It has been said that there will be a coffee dispenser on each floor costing $38,000.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, the three-minute light is on.

MR WALLACE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I understand that the building will provide an employee lounge on each floor from the third to the seventh floor, complete with custom-made furniture.

Now these are some facts that have been published in one of the newspapers, Mr. Speaker. I would hope that, because it seems to be in such utter conflict with the general statement by this government that its policy is one of restraint and efficiency in spending, these last two matters of furnishings and decor for a government office and a very substantial financial settlement with senior civil servants deserve an answer during this debate.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, the reason that I can so readily support the amendment really relates to the fact that all this budget really proves is something that we've all heard many times before: it's very much a matter of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouver East): Mr. Speaker, we're in the middle of the debate and it's sort of the dog hours of the afternoon and I don't want to wake anybody up. But I'm glad that the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon.

[ Page 498 ]

Mr. Mair) has left his corporate affairs — I don't know a whether he knows the difference too well — and is in the House. In speaking to this amendment I want to I join in supporting the point that has been made by the member for New Westminster: that there is a I wonderful want of fortitude in the government ranks when they don't even rise in this debate to defend their position on an amendment that is dealing with s the economy and the fiscal policies and the taxation policies of the government. What we have heard is a deafening silence — silence, silenzio — call it in whatever language you like. We have never seen a government, really, less willing to stand up and defend policies that it has promulgated as it goes along.

Now I'm not going to review the whole thing I again, Mr. Speaker. I'm going to concentrate on just one point, and that's why I say I'm glad the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs is there. We've heard the speeches about how the public of B.C. in 1976 lost maybe $500 million in spending power by reason of the taxation and fare increases of this government. What are they doing now? I'm going to look at one example.

The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs now has, under that very mysterious — in the sense that it wasn't a very parliamentary move — Government Reorganization Act, the liquor. I suppose I could say the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom) can't hold his liquor. (Laughter.) I think that's where it should be, but I won't say that. I said it.

But do you know, Mr. Speaker, what that Minister of Corporate and Consumer Affairs is doing in terms of hidden taxation? In the budget of 1975 ending March 31, the net liquor profits were $118 million. In the 1977-78 period they are going up to $164 million, which means that they have abstracted from the pockets of the ordinary people of the province of British Columbia — and that's the forte of this government: tax the people and let the big guys off. Make no mistake about that. They have sucked up an additional $46 million in liquor profits and now they have the effrontery to announce that on April 1 they will be increasing again the prices of products in the liquor store, including the price of a bottle of scotch by 20 cents.

AN HON. MEMBER: Shame!

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, putting that minister, who is supposed to be consumer protection, in charge of Consumer Affairs is like — and I'm just adapting the remark of the other day of the Liberal leader (Mr. Gibson) — putting a chicken in charge of Colonel Sanders' business. (Laughter.)

Mr. Speaker, analyze, if you will for a moment, what they are doing in terms of the liquor administration branch. The British pound has fallen in the last year from $2.30 Canadian to $1.71 today. I make that a reduction of 25 per cent, and yet what is the minister doing in terms of that reduction? Is he passing it on to the public? Of course he's not. He is not going to give the consumer the benefit of the cost education. No, that extra revenue is going to be secreted away in the interstices of the Minister of Finance's (Hon. Mr. Wolfe's) budget into the public offers, because it's a people tax, a people imposition. And it's a ripoff in terms of the price of Scotch whiskey. It's discrimination against scotch because when you compare that with the price of a bottle of rye today, there is already built-in discrimination, Mr. Speaker. Scotch whiskey is still marked up by the liquor administration at 113.8 per cent, while the mark-up on Canadian rye is 100.36 per cent.

This discrimination in favour of the distillery industry of Canada is, Mr. Speaker, and I say this to the minister, contrary to GATT, the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs. It's contrary to section 3 of that agreement which imposes those obligations upon a provincial government.

Interjection.

MR. MACDONALD: "What is GATT?' says Mr. Chips. It's also contrary to the AIB. But, of course, this government, Mr. Speaker, did a funny little thing when they signed the agreement dated June, 1976, with the federal authorities. They included ICBC, but they excluded the liquor administration. There is a schedule at the end of that agreement where they excluded the liquor administration from the anti-inflation price controls in this country.

Am I not right, Mr. Minister of Labour? Isn't that in the schedule of that agreement? Don't you just nicely exclude the liquor administration...

MR. WALLACE: Along with Hydro.

MR. MACDONALD: ...along with B.C. Hydro? I think the liquor administration is in there. So you give no chance to people to appeal against the kind of discriminatory, inflationary price increases that are imposed on the ordinary people of the province by this government. But you are perfectly willing to protect the distillery industry in Canada, which is not a struggling new business trying to get itself on its feet and needing protection. The distillery industry, at the present time...sales of Canadian whiskey in the Canadian market.... What's its percentage of the Canadian market? It is now at the point where 85 per cent of all whiskey sold in Canada is produced by the distillery companies of Canada. Imported scotch is only 12 per cent of the market. In addition to that, the Canadian distillery industry, which is very powerful politically and which has bottled and

[ Page 499 ]

capped the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Mair), doesn't need that kind of protection. So you increase the price again and make the differential worse?

In the case of Scotch whiskey, the standard scotch case, which is 12 25-oz. bottles, the laid-down cost, after you include the cost of bringing it into the country and the federal duty and the freight and insurance, is $42.16, compared with the laid-down cost to the liquor administration branch of rye, which is $45.02. Here the discrimination comes in, which I say is contrary to GATT and discriminatory against scotch, because then you increase the price of scotch by 113 per cent and make it higher on the shelves of the liquor board. And yet when we sell Canadian rye to Great Britain, do they impose that kind of discrimination upon our Canadian rye products, which are sold extensively in the United Kingdom? Not at all. They're treated on an equal footing. So this is discrimination.

The point I make, Mr. Speaker, in terms of this amendment, is simply here that you have a little case under the liquor administration where the government proposes to take out of the pockets of the people of British Columbia, over a period of two budgets, an additional $46 million in spending power.

I say that is the kind of government we are dealing with: a government that has been consistently favouring people's taxes, impositions of all kinds upon the ordinary people of the province. They could give lessons to King Herod the tax gatherer in, what they have done in the last two years. So I've only given one example, eh? But I support the amendment not on the basis of this example, but because it is a whole picture of imposition upon ordinary people tax increases while at the same time turning the province of British Columbia into a millionaires' playpen.

MR. C. BARBER (Victoria): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Out of a special respect for a member of the press gallery I would like to inform the House of a bit of good news that occurred on the economic front in Victoria. I am informed by a member of that gallery that the president of the Victoria Chamber of Commerce this afternoon has stated that his chamber is willing to enter into discussions toward the creation of a Greater Victoria Economic Development Council, a proposal made by myself in this House last week and released to the public yesterday. I am informed as well by friends of mine in the Victoria Labour Council that that organization as well is willing to enter into the same kind of agreements and is willing to get together on the same basis.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, you have to speak to the amendment. You are making a statement.

MR. BARBER: I'm very much concerned about investor confidence, the treatment of small business and the things that we, as a responsible opposition, through amendments like this can....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, if you're going to make a statement, you must ask leave of the House.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's not a statement. It's a speech.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Proceed please.

MR. BARBER: Thank you, Elwood. Now I'd like to point out that one of the positive steps that can be taken, in the absence of any positives steps taken by the government, is by members on both sides of this House in their own community developing alternate institutions that, in a systematic and intelligent and scientific way, can begin to ask the important questions about the economic circumstances in which their communities find themselves. They can begin to conduct the research and the inventories and the studies necessary to find the answers to those questions. Having found some of those answers, they can put together some of the best minds in their own community to determine where to go with those answers.

What I have specifically proposed is the creation of the Greater Victoria Economic Development Council. The purpose of that organization is to bring together groups such as municipal and regional government, the Chamber of Commerce, the Tourist Bureau, the Victoria Labour Council, the University of Victoria and the British Columbia Ministry of Economic Development. The purpose is to bring them together to talk to one another. The purpose is to bring them together in the most tough and critical fashion they can, to exercise leadership.

I am also pleased to report that I attended a meeting at 8 o'clock this morning of the Tourist Bureau. Again, the response from the organization was, in my view, encouraging. I think we are going to begin to see in Victoria the creation of such a council, the development of a strategy for economic recovery in Greater Victoria, and an attempt made by a number of people in my own community to begin to dig themselves out of the hole in which we found ourselves placed as the result of some of the measures taken by this government in the last year.

I think that's some progress. I think those are some positive steps. I call on the government to recognize both of those phenomena. I call on the government to support them.

I've something else that I'd like to tell the House about and it, too, is most consistent with the amendment at hand. It concerns the fate of

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pensioners living in greater Victoria. Over the last several years a great many people have observed the fact that people now resident in Canada, especially in greater Victoria, as pensioners whose pensions originate in the United Kingdom, were, by virtue of their residence here, cut off from the automatic indexing and increases to which they would otherwise be entitled. If they lived in any of the 21 nations with which the United Kingdom had signed an agreement, they would be protected. Among those 21 nations are Gibraltar, Malta, Spain and Yugoslavia. Canada, up until yesterday, was not on that list.

For the last number of years a great many people, including the Member of Parliament for Victoria, Mr. Allan McKinnon, have been pressing the federal government, in order that we may protect the senior citizens of this province who originate from the United Kingdom, especially in greater Victoria. This is the most important concern, that their pensions be indexed. I'm also pleased to report that yesterday, as a result of that considerable pressure and, in some tiny measure I am sure, as the result of letters written by my own community office over the last several months — as recently as last Wednesday — the Hon. Marc Lalonde stood in the House of Commons and said that the Government of Canada is now willing to sign a protocol with the United Kingdom to provide precisely that protection. I think that's an important step forward. It's a step that this government should have taken, had it been acting in any leadership capacity whatever to protect the seniors of this province whose origins are in the United Kingdom. It's a step that members of this assembly have taken because the government was unwilling to take it. I think those are two positive steps forward that have been taken in the last little while.

They have been taken — referring again to the amendment — in contrast to a history, entering its second year, of some of the most stupid and primitive economic decisions any provincial government has ever taken. The stupid and primitive decisions these people have taken most notoriously include the imposition of a 40 per cent increase in the sales tax, the tripling and quadrupling of ICBC rates and the doubling of B.C. Ferries' rates. The impact of these programmes, the impact of those increases, the impact of that taxation policy, the impact of that stupidity, is felt most desperately by people who are the least well protected of all to withstand those kinds of decisions. Those people include the poor and the working poor, the very young and the very old.

They probably don't include too many members of this Legislature. You and I, Mr. Speaker, get free passes on the B.C. ferries, don't we? We get bus passes all over the province — and rail passes, too. It doesn't cost us a nickel, and we have our meals subsidized in the cafeteria. This year you and I will be voting in favour of a bill to subsidize the cafeteria downstairs to the tune of $50,000. We are subsidizing the cafeteria for $50,000; the seniors have no access to that cafeteria, get no such support.

I want to say it again: the fiscal policies of that government are primitive, stupid, backward and self-defeating. These guys don't have a platform; they have a treadmill. All they know how to do is tax, tax some more and tax again. And having taxed and taxed and taxed again, then they turn to upping the fees and the charges, the rates and costs, and they go back on the treadmill. They run around on that treadmill and the province itself gets nowhere. They think they are going somewhere; in fact, they are caught within the treadmill, the thing they think is a platform, and the province progresses not one whit.

I commented last week, and raised the eyebrows of the Speaker, by saying that in my opinion the government is not just two-faced; it is also two-fisted — they give with one fist what they take with the other. I saw the Speaker's eyebrow raised when I said "two-faced."

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if you recall the ancient Roman god, Janus. Janus was a Roman god who ordinarily functioned in times of war, and was represented symbolically by a mask on the doors of the temples constructed to him. The mask faced both directions simultaneously — the mask had, simultaneously, two faces. The mask said one thing if you approached it from one angle, and quite a different thing from another angle. It was all the same thing; it was all similarly unbelievable. That's where this government has put itself. That's the position in which it finds itself.

Do you remember, Mr. Speaker, that this government campaigned on a promise to abolish all property taxes for senior citizens? You may have made such a promise yourself, Mr. Speaker — I know you ran for them. They promised that. Needless to say, they have delivered nothing of the kind. In fact we have seen, since they took government, a series of attacks upon the pockets and the hearts and the morale of senior citizens, the like of which we've not seen for a long, long time.

I want to tell you about how they've been attacked. I want to tell you how they have been attacked again and again and again by that group of millionaires and hangers-on and opportunists. I want to tell you how they have been attacked, and I want to tell you of some of the ways in which they should have been protected instead. They were attacked when the bus rates went up 45 per cent. They were attacked when the B.C. medical plan went up 40 per cent. They were attacked when the cost of hospital rooms went up 400 per cent. They were attacked on B.C. bus rates, the medical plan and the hospital rooms when they should have been protected.

They were attacked when B.C. Hydro electricity

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charges went up 12 to 22 per cent. They were attacked when B.C. Hydro tacked an extra $3 a month on top of that. They were attacked by B.C. Hydro when they should have been protected. They were hit with a 40 per cent increase in the sales tax. They were hit again by B.C. Hydro when the gas rates went up 8 to 12 per cent, and they have been hit by cutbacks in hospital staff throughout British Columbia when they should have been protected. At the Royal Jubilee Hospital, in calendar 1976, staff has been cut by 112 positions. they were attacked when they should have been protected. At that hospital, in its Memorial Pavilion, they have lost 10 staff in the last year. The seniors and the veterans of this province were attacked again when they should have been protected.

Extended-care hospital construction in British Columbia is virtually at a dead halt. We know the minister would make announcements if he had any to make. Instead, we have had to make announcements for him: that in Surrey on March 4 Cedarhurst Private Hospital, catering to people aged 75 to 90, is closing down because of the failure of that government to honour an election promise, because of the failure of that coalition to deliver the funds necessary to keep it open. People aged 75 to 90, as of March 4, in Surrey, of all ironical places, are going to be out on the streets because that coalition of millionaires has decided not to spend the money necessary to keep its doors open. They've been attacked again!

Senior citizens were attacked when the budget for GAIN was cut $20 million. They should have been protected. They are about to be attacked when the cost for Pharmacare goes up from nothing — because it was their right, they have already contributed — to $25, and everyone else is going to be attacked when it goes up to $75, when the seniors should have been protected.

I predict, Mr. Speaker, that this coalition of millionaires and landlords will abolish rent controls within the year, and when they do so — especially in my riding where more than 60 per cent of the people are tenants — I predict that rents will not increase at the end of that year by 10.6 per cent, they will increase from 15 to 20 per cent. The people who will be least able to bear that are the senior citizens. They will have been attacked once more, when they should have been protected.

They have tripled the ambulance fees — told them to smile and take a taxi. They've tripled the ambulance fees and persuaded the senior citizens of this province, especially in my riding, that they had better watch out because if they are not really sick with a heart attack or a stroke, big bad Bob will get them and he'll triple the fees. In order to avoid that, maybe they won't take it at all because there are a lot of seniors who are proud, Mr. Speaker.

They are embarrassed to have to ask anyone for charity, to have to write a letter to the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland) and say: "Dear Mr. Minister: I had to go to the hospital because I was very sick, but I can't afford to pay the rates which you have just tripled. Will you please let me off?" I don't think they're going to do that. I think the pride, the integrity and the self-esteem in which the majority of seniors hold themselves is sufficiently powerful that they won't write such a letter. They'll hesitate, when they shouldn't hesitate for a moment, to call the ambulance they need to. They will have been attacked again when they should have been protected.

In the province of British Columbia this month, there are 8,300 citizens registered with the B.C. Housing Management Commission. Why are they registered? Because they need low-cost accommodation and they can't afford to live where they're presently living. They need the low-cost accommodation. They're registered because they have to have it; they're registered because they need it. Is the message clear? There are 8,300 seniors on the list this month with the B.C. Housing Management Commission because they need low-cost accommodation.

Let me repeat it: 8,300 senior citizens are on the list because they need accommodation. Is the message clear? If the message is clear, why do we find in this budget that the allocation for senior citizens' housing construction has gone from $10 million to $4 million? If they know that 8,300 senior citizens are waiting tonight for accommodation that they can afford, why have they cut the budget from $10 million to $4 million for senior citizens' housing construction? Now maybe we know why the Socreds gave them free campsites, eh, Mr. Speaker?

I'm going to keep saying that throughout the life of this session until this government realizes that they are not going to be able to get away with it. They are not going to be able to get away with a cut of $6 million in housing construction for senior citizens. There are 8,300 seniors on that list tonight; they need that accommodation tonight. You've cut the budget from $10 million to $4 million. Are they proud of that, Mr. Speaker? Is that something they've announced? Did that appear in the budget speech? Have any of them stood up in this amendment debate to defend that action? Not one of them has.

MR. BARRETT: Not a word.

MR. BARBER: None of them has the guts to defend a cut of $6 million in housing construction for senior citizens. No wonder they don't have the guts — it cannot be defended.

AN HON. MEMBER: Withdraw!

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DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, I would suggest that you use another term than "guts."

MR. BARBER: Than "cuts"?

MS. R. BROWN (Vancouver-Burrard): "Stomach" — don't use "guts."

Interjections.

MR. BARBER: Mr. Speaker, what is unparliamentary about pointing out that there's been a budget cut of $6 million?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: There's nothing wrong with pointing that out, but I would suggest you use another term than the word "guts." I would consider that unparliamentary.

MR. BARBER: Oh, I'm sorry. I misunderstood. I thought you said "cuts"; you said "guts."

MR. BARRETT: They don't have the concern.

MR. BARBER: They've neither the concern, nor the compassion, nor the heart to — do what they should have done. They cut the budget from $10 million to $4 million and they gave them free campsites instead. Big deal!

Let's take a look at some of the spending patterns of that coalition of millionaires and opportunists, and those who would be millionaires and who are opportunists. Where do they find the money? What do they spend it on? If they can't find $6 million and more, if they can't at least maintain last year's $ 10 million spending pattern for senior citizens' housing, where can they find money? Well, you know, Mr. Speaker, they found hundreds and thousands of dollars for the secret police. This coalition has found hundreds and thousands of dollars for hundreds and thousands of secret police.

Let me tell you how I know that. I remember very clearly that the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) ran around this province and told the people of British Columbia that the previous government had created a secret police force. She said that that government was arming them with guns.

AN HON. MEMBER: Barrett's brownies.

MR. BARBER: Barrett's brownshirts.

MR. BARRETT: Where are they now?

MR. BARBER: Mr. Speaker, let me, if I may, point out the obvious logic of that position. We know that the Provincial Secretary is an honest woman. She wouldn't lie.

MR. BARRETT: Withdraw!

MR. BARBER: She wouldn't deceive the people; she wouldn't make up stories about secret police for political purposes.

MR. BARRETT: Withdraw!

MR. BARBER: She wouldn't do anything of the sort. When she said that there were secret police, this honest flower vendor was telling the truth, because we know that she is an honest woman and would not deceive the people. Because we observed that she told this House and this province that the NDP government had created a secret police force, it is only reasonable to assume that our government, having created it, would discover upon having been defeated that that force was disbanded. Because surely, she was telling the truth; surely, the day they took office they would disband the secret police force.

Let me point out the next logical step in this observation, Mr. Speaker. It is this: having told the truth that the NDP created a secret policy force, and having taken office on December 22, 1975, no doubt they moved right away to disband that horrible cabal of cops. There's no doubt about it — at least, so you would think, would you not, Mr. Speaker? The problem is, I have searched my files most carefully and I can find no such announcement.

As a matter of fact, I remember asking the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom) in the last debate on estimates whether or not he had discovered in his allocation — because that's where it was; the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) told us so, and we know she wouldn't lie — the budget for the secret police.

The Attorney-General, who is also an honest man — no Robert Bonner he — and who we wish was with us more often, said that he couldn't find it in his budget and he wouldn't pursue the matter any further. We can only presume, therefore, that it must be in someone else's budget, because we know the secret police were there — the Provincial Secretary told us so — and we know that once they took office they would have disbanded it right away and they would have told us where they found the money in the budget. Because they haven't told us, I can only conclude they're still there and the money is still in the budget, and that's why we don't have enough for senior citizens' housing. Isn't it, Mr. Speaker?

It's because these guys are still promoting the secret police.

AN HON. MEMBER: Expanding it!

MR. BARBER: They're buying more guns, more uniforms. They're spending money on secret police

[ Page 503 ]

instead of spending money on senior citizens, because we know the Provincial Secretary wouldn't lie to us. We know that when she told the people there was a secret police force there was, and we know that because they have not announced the disbandment of that secret police force; they are still paying for it. Because they're still paying for it, that's why we don't have enough money for seniors' housing. That's why the budget was cut from $10 million to $4 million. That's why they're giving them free campsites instead.

Let's find out where else they spend the money. Let's find out how come they can't find $6 million — even to equal last year's budget for seniors' housing. We find another announcement. The Premier told us, proudly, there in his brown suit, that they're going to give $300 million to the coal companies — $300 million: one welfare cheque, plus interest, to the coal companies to exploit the natural resources of all the people. They found $300 million for the coal companies. They've cut the budget for seniors' housing from $10 million to $4 million and given them free campsites. They found $300 million for the coal companies and they've cut the seniors from $10 million to $4 million, and not one of them stands up to defend it. Not one of them stands up to defend what they've done to seniors in this province.

They found some other money, Mr. Speaker. They found $ 100 million with which to build a pipeline up the Grizzly Valley to extract natural gas that may not even be there in the amounts they think are there. They found $ 100 million for those guys, Mr. Speaker, and they cut the budget for seniors' housing from $10 million to $4 million and gave them free campsites instead. Where are their priorities? I repeat: $300 million for the coal companies, $100 million for the Grizzly Valley pipeline, and they can't find $10 million for seniors' housing.

MR. BARRETT: Oh, yes, but that's people.

MR. BARBER: Mr. Speaker, let me tell you about another thing they've done. I know you're not part of this. You're one of the good guys in the caucus, which is why you're never going to make it in the cabinet. They've given $30 million to themselves. They've given it to themselves, Mr. Speaker. It isn't enough that they give it to the coal companies. It isn't enough that they give it to a pipeline consortium. They want some of it themselves. By abolishing the succession duties at midnight the night the Finance minister made the announcement, they have made themselves and their millionaire friends a gift this year of $30 million.

MR. BARRETT: Shame!

MR. BARBER: It is not reasonable to ask how the

Premier of this province managed to persuade so many millionaires to run for him? Is it possible to imagine, is it reasonable to conclude, that he got so many of those millionaires to run for him on the promise that when they got in he'd remove succession duties and make them a present of another $30 million? Is that possible?

Is it possible that it's a little more than coincidence? They found $300 million for the coal companies, $100 million for the Grizzly Valley pipeline, they've given themselves $30 million, and they've cut the budget for seniors' housing by $6 million. It's a cabinet riddled with millionaires, Mr. Speaker. There's a baker's dozen of millionaires over there.

In doing what they intend to do to make themselves the present of $30 million, it seems to me possible that they are in conflict with standing order 18. Later on in the session I'll be asking the other Speaker to make a ruling on that. Standing order 18 makes it impossible for a member of this House to vote on a matter in which he has a pecuniary interest. The traditional exception has, of course, been the granting of our own salaries. Apart from that, the vote of any member who votes on a matter in which he has a pecuniary interest must be disallowed by the Chair.

It seems to me, Mr. Speaker, that if they can find $30 million and give themselves a present of that amount, it might be reasonable to ask whether or not such standing order 18 applies — whether or not they have the right to vote on that bill. By my count, there are so many of them to whom it would apply, the bill will inevitably fail. The bill will fail on constitutional grounds. They will not be permitted to do it. They gave themselves $30 million and they cut seniors' housing.

Who else have they found money for, Mr. Speaker? Well, good old Quasar Petroleum was at the trough. Last summer they got $3 million.

AN HON. MEMBER: What for?

MR. BARBER: Yes, what for? They got $3 million to confirm the self-interest that we all know they possessed. They got S3 million to add up a few more figures, to balloon up a few more estimates, and to pretend that there's enough gas up in the Grizzly Valley to justify the investment of the people's money. They got those millions in order that they could proceed with a proposal which is, at best, dubious and, at worst, as we know, has led to the dismissal of five or six people and to the obvious cloud of scandal hanging over that entire administration.

They drilled the wells to confirm their own self-interest. They got millions to do it and they managed to cut the budget for seniors' housing from

[ Page 504 ]

$10 million to $4 million. And, Mr. Speaker, they managed to find some more money. They found $2.5 million with which to settle out of court, Christmas Eve.

Do you remember, Mr. Speaker, the day the hon. Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Barrett) returned to this House? The very first question he asked in question period was of the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom). He asked the Attorney-General whether or not that Attorney-General would do anything to settle the M.E.L. suit against B.C. Rail out of court. The Attorney-General laughed and went "ho, ho, ho," and the audience said: "This is a strange question." We said to ourselves: we know why the question is being asked, because the Attorney-General is on record as answering that June day: "No! Gosh, we wouldn't do that. That will be held in open court. Gosh! You bet we're fair guys. I'm a Lib...I'm a Socred," he said, "and I wouldn't do those things." Christmas Eve, Mr. Speaker — what an odd night to announce anything — they settled out of court for $2.5 million.

AN HON. MEMBER: Did they see that bright light in the sky?

MR. BARBER: On Christmas Eve they found that money for M.E.L. Paving in order to avoid charges of fraud — civil and possibly criminal — against certain individuals in this province. In their budget they could not find enough for senior citizens' housing; they cut it from $ 10 million to $4 million.

Who else have they found money for, Mr. Speaker? Let me tell you the strange saga of Joe Broadbent. Now there's a senior citizen if ever there was one. There's a guy, if ever there was one, who deserved to be looked after. He surely belongs on the GAIN programme; he's contributed — but he's got a little more than the ordinary GAIN, hasn't he? Eleven months after he retired, an obscure section of the Public Service Act — unannounced and discovered only in orders-in-council after the fact — was employed to give Mr. Broadbent a gift of more than $8,000. There is some doubt about whether or not it even applied. They tell us it applies; we don't know.

On some pretext or another, on the basis of some obviously dubious authority, they managed to find $8,000 for a certain special senior citizen who was once charged with fraud himself by the paving company, a man who is on record as having taken instructions from the pre-1972 board of directors of B.C. Rail, a man who has the unique achievement of having presided over one of the most unfortunate railways this province or this country has ever seen, a man who for his pains is paid $8,000-plus 11 months after he retires, on the eve of the settlement with M.E.L. Paving itself, on the eve of Christmas. They found $8,000 for Mr. Broadbent.

Two days in a row we've asked the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) how they managed to do it. Two days in a row she's taken the question as notice. I know she's an honest woman; I'm sure she'll tell us the truth when eventually she gets around to it. She told us the truth about the secret police. I'm sure she'll tell us the truth about this, too.

They gave a Christmas present of $8,000 to Mr. Broadbent, and in the budget that followed Christmas they told the seniors of this province that they were cutting grants for senior citizens' housing construction from $10 million to $4 million and giving them free campsites instead.

What kind of a government is this, Mr. Speaker? Whose side are they on? Let me repeat the list of gifts: $300 million for the coal companies; $100 million for the pipeline; $30 million for themselves and their fellow millionaires; $3 million to Quasar Petroleum; $2.5 million for M.E.L. Paving; $8,000 for Mr. Broadbent. And they cut the budget for seniors' housing from $10 million to $4 million. Whose side are they on, Mr. Speaker? Who do they care about over there? Do they care about the senior citizens of this province?

Alex won't even look me in the eye. Did you vote for that, Alex, when it came up in cabinet? Referring to the Minister of Highways and Public Works, did you vote for that? You are regarded in this House as a pretty decent guy. You are regarded on both sides as a pretty decent guy. Did you vote for that?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, kindly address the Chair.

MR. BARBER: There are people in that coalition, Mr. Speaker, whom as individuals are respected on both sides of this House. There are people in this coalition whom, I would hope, were there a free vote, would not vote for that cut in senior citizens' housing, who in the light of gifts of $300 million for the coal companies, $100 million for the pipeline, $30 million for the millionaires, $3 million for Quasar Petroleum, $2.S million for M.E.L. Paving and $8,000 for Mr. Broadbent, would not in their hearts find it justifiable to cut seniors' housing from $10 million to $4 million.

This month, today, 8,300 senior citizens are on the list at the B.C. Housing Management Commission — how do they justify that to themselves, Mr. Speaker? How do they do that?

There's another guy over there who's regarded by some of us pretty fondly — myself included. It's the member for Chilliwack (Mr. Schroeder). Old Harv, we call him. He's a Christian minister, Mr. Speaker. He's a Christian minister by trade. He's a Christian minister by heart and persuasion. I think he's a sincere guy. I've talked with him; he's not one of the millionaires, he doesn't stand to benefit from any of

[ Page 505 ]

that self-serving legislation. I want to know, through you, Mr. Speaker, how you, the member for Chilliwack, could defend a cut in senior citizens' housing from $ 10 million to $4 million. Did you vote for that in caucus?

MR. BARRETT: He never got a chance.

MR. BARBER: Did you have an opportunity to discuss that with the Minister of Housing (Hon. Mr. Curtis)? Are you going to take any opportunity to defend it, or are we going to witness your apparent attempt to pretend to talk to your seatmate while you know full well what's being asked of you in this House? Let me repeat: there are people over there who we believe still have compassion — they're mostly in the back bench.

MR. BARRETT: You can count them on one hand.

AN HON. MEMBER: You can count them on one finger.

MR. BARBER: They'll mostly stay in the back bench. I think that member is one of them. I don't know how he can defend a cut of $6 million in seniors' housing when tonight — let me repeat for the umpteenth time — 8,300 people are on the list waiting for the low-cost accommodation that they have to have.

I want to know how any of those guys can defend it.

MR. LEA: They won't.

MR. BARBER: If they won't, we'll know why they've remained silent in this debate.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, at the outset of my remarks I would like to take this opportunity to recognize in the gallery a former mayor of the city of Vancouver, a tireless worker for the seniors of this province and a good friend of mine, Tom Alsbury.

Mr. Speaker, I rise with some regret to support this amendment.

MR. N. LEVI (Vancouver-Burrard): Well, sit down and I'll do it for you.

MR. GIBSON: I'll be very brief, Norman.

I support it exactly because of the words of the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) as he concluded his speech yesterday when he called this a "hold-the-line budget." Mr. Speaker, the line the government is holding is not good enough. The line the government is holding, in the exact language of this amendment, pays insufficient attention to the senior citizens and handicapped of this province, and insufficient attention to employment opportunities in this province.

The case on behalf of seniors and the handicapped has been well made by others and, I'm sure, will be made in due course by the hon. member for Burrard who is about to speak. There has been an enormous underspending of funds in the department of the Minister of Human Resources, funds voted by this House for the service of seniors and the handicapped in this province. There's been a blowing up of the surplus in that department by a refusal to pass on to the handicapped in this province an increase in federal funds for the handicapped that are given to the provincial government — given last October and increased by $22.50 a month. That wasn't passed on; it was simply pocketed by that department and that Minister of Human Resources. That is not good enough.

MS. K.E. SANFORD (Comox): That's called GAIN.

MR. GIBSON: That's called GAIN — GAIN spelled "no increase."

MR. BARRETT: Spelled L-E-S-S.

MR. BARBER: They used it to pay off M.E.L. Paving.

MR. GIBSON: Mr. Speaker, I particularly want to concentrate on the other aspect of the amendment, and that relates to the lack of employment opportunity.

In this time of almost 9 per cent unemployment in this province — and the statistics next month are going to be worse because the last survey was taken before the big forestry layoffs — there is hardly a word in the budget on ways to increase employment. There's more money to be spent in the Department of Highways; there's a certain amount for summer student employment, and that's it — with 8.8 per cent unemployment.

Mr. Speaker, I made a couple of specific suggestions, and I'm going to make them again in greater detail. First of all, the government should remove the 7 per cent sales tax on expenditures this coming year on productive plant and equipment. That's not a new idea; it's not a radical idea — Tory Ontario did it a couple of years ago. Their provincial treasurer reviewed the results of that in last November's budget speech in Ontario, found them good and continued the programme for another length of time. We simply must modernize our plant and equipment in this province, particularly in the coastal forest industry. That blanket exemption of the, sales tax should be made in order to create jobs.

[ Page 506 ]

Beyond that, something more direct should be done: we should get another pulp mill going in this province, and it has to be done with provincial government leadership.

Interjection.

MR. GIBSON: The wood supply is there, Mr. Member.

MR. LEA: We have to help the pulp mills that are there now.

MR. GIBSON: That's right, we have to modernize the ones that are there, but we need more. The wood supply is there; the workers are there, needing the jobs. The markets will be there — they are soft now, but by the time a mill comes on stream the markets will be there. The government has to help and has to show leadership.

Mr. Speaker, there is only one pulp mill currently building in Canada, and that's in the province of Quebec. It's being headed up by a British Columbia company, B.C. Forest Products. I commend them for their initiative on building another pulp mill, but how can we get another one building in this province?

Let me describe a little bit of the financing of that particular pulp mill. I'm quoting here from the Province of January 29. It's a $300 million project, Mr. Speaker. Here's what the article says:

"The financing of the $300 million project represents a classic insight into future forest industry initiatives. Example: the cost of bleached softwood pulping has escalated from $110,000 per daily ton to about $258,000 per daily ton, the expected cost of the Quebec mill."

I might add parenthetically that judging by the comments of the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) yesterday, he's estimating something like $400,000 per daily ton. I don't know if it's quite that high yet in British Columbia, but he was perhaps working from the Pemberton Securities report that was given to the truck-loggers' association meeting recently.

Carrying on with the quote:

"The days when one company alone can handle the massive expense of a new pulp mill are numbered, and the route BCFP has taken looks to be the route of the future. For BCFPs 40 per cent share in Donohue's St. Felicien, the company put up $28 million and Donohue's 60 per cent position cost $42 million.

"The additional financiers are the governments of Quebec and Canada and the international money markets. Together the two governments have pledged $50 million — $30 million federally and the rest from Quebec. A further $135 million will be raised through long-term bonds. The government's interest in the project can be explained by the excessively high unemployment in the St. Felicien area, which should be eased by the 1,000 new jobs the development is expected to create.

"Partly because of the Quebec government's 43 per cent interest in Donohue, the Quebec Legislature gave unanimous support to a bill which provided Donohue's St. Felicien with a $25 million long-term loan at 6 per cent interest, and no repayment on the principal for 10 years.

"The legislation also included a completion agreement covering capital cost overruns as well as a guarantee of the first mortgage bonds. The remaining $20 million will come from cash-flow and bank borrowing."

Mr. Speaker, there is an example of a particular deal which succeeded in getting a pulp mill going. I would say it should be done in a slightly different way in British Columbia, but with some of the same elements.

First of all, I think it's entirely proper that in a deal of this kind where the government is going to give help, the government should take a share. It should be a good share. Then those shares should be spun off, either to the B.C. Development Corporation or to B.C. Cellulose, after the management of B.C. Cellulose is changed, I might say, Mr. Speaker, rather than headed up by the man who currently gave the sweetheart deal to M & B as per the Pearse report. But you needn't worry about the ownership of those particular shares. The government should hold them one way or another.

There should be assistance from the federal government. Negotiations have been underway for quite some time concerning the possibility of DREE agreements in various parts of British Columbia. That's the same kind of agreement on which this $30 million federal money I cited was available to the Quebec mill.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, this suggestion I made of an exemption of the 7 per cent sales tax would give general assistance not just to this mill but to all plant and equipment modernizations in the province. If this mill in particular is going to cost $300 million, it should be something like $20 million.

That kind of a package would be enough to put something together in terms of a new pulp mill for British Columbia. That kind of a package could produce another 1,000 jobs, and utilize the wood chips that are available, the workers that are available, and the markets that will be available by the time it comes on stream. It's just a question of government leadership.

Mr. Speaker, this could be had for something like 10 per cent of what this Legislature, this province and

[ Page 507 ]

the people of this province are going to be pouring into the British Columbia Railway Dease Lake extension this year. Last year an increase in debt of over $100 million and next year an increase in debt of over $200 million for an extension that.... It is very questionable how many jobs that's going to create once it's there. It appears to be in the wrong place, even for the haulage of minerals. Here, for 10 per cent of that, we could be talking about an imaginative government, if we had one in this province, giving some leadership and getting a new pulp mill, partially owned by the people in return for the guarantees in equity they gave, with new jobs in this province.

Mr. Speaker, this is the kind of imagination that should be in this budget. The government, I think, spent one line in the budget saying that unemployment was unfortunate. Beyond that they've done virtually nothing. It is a duty of any government of this province to say: "We are going to do something about the lack of jobs. We are not just going to sit back and, in the words of the Minister of Forests, put in a hold-the-line budget." I say it has to be an imagination budget; I say that job opportunities are needed. Therefore I support this amendment.

MR. N. LEVI (Vancouver-Burrard): The House this afternoon has an atmosphere of deja vu. I'm sure the Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. Chabot) can explain to his colleagues what it means. It seems that we've all been there before.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

I'd like to talk for a minute about the situation, particularly in relation to this amendment of the senior citizens in the province, as it was almost five years ago to the day in this Legislature, on February 11, when there was a debate in this House on a subamendment moved by the present Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Barrett). That amendment read, "that the Speaker do now leave the chair," and in amending it, "...for the provision of a guaranteed minimum income of $200 per month for senior citizens over the age of 65 with five years' residence in the province." The second part was the supply of medical drugs under the British Columbia Medical Plan, free of charge, for senior citizens. The third part was the elimination of all fees for coverage under the British Columbia Medical Plan for all British Columbia citizens over the age of 65. Four was the establishment of intermediate and chronic care under British Columbia hospital insurance. There was a vote.

First of all, the then Attorney-General said it was out of order, but eventually it was put to a vote and it was defeated by 16 votes to 32. We don't have too many survivors, Mr. Speaker, from that House, but there are, among us the names mentioned who voted nay, the present Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. Chabot). He's there, having voted against the $200 guaranteed income for seniors. There is the member for Skeena (Mr. Shelford) — who is not presently in the House — he voted against it.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, I would just draw to your attention that it is not parliamentary to reflect upon a vote which has been previously decided by the House.

MR. LEVI: I'm not reflecting on it. I'm just reporting it.

MR. SPEAKER: You're certainly reflecting on it when you read into the record a vote that was previously settled by a previous parliament, hon. member.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, that rule, I'm sure, refers to the parliament in which we are engaged, or the session in which we are engaged, certainly not the history. This is an historical fact being brought up by the hon. member for Burrard. I suggest to you that it's not reflecting on a vote of this House.

MS. BROWN: That's right.

MR. SPEAKER: It's not, hon. member, reflecting on a vote of this House taken during this session of parliament, but it is reflecting on a vote of this House which was taken during a previous parliament.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, that's not this House. This House is composed of the members presently in the House, elected December 11, 1975.

MR. SPEAKER: I'm not suggesting to the hon. member that he should refrain completely from reflecting on that vote, but I am bringing to your attention that it would be, in my opinion, improper to use it as the main thrust of your debate.

MR. LEVI: Well, no, it's not the main thrust, Mr. Speaker, thank you very much. But surely we're going to be able in this House to reflect on previous governments' records — or previous individuals, sometimes, who happen to be members of the government — in respect to what they do for senior citizens. But if it transgresses, then I'll just make reference to the fact that there are members sitting on the other side of the House who voted against the guaranteed minimum income for senior citizens. They voted against it. In 1972, when the previous government came to power and they introduced the

[ Page 508 ]

Mincome programme, I don't recall that anybody voted against it. I suppose what I could do is read out all the people who voted for it, because that's really casting no reflection on anybody because nobody opposed it. Everybody was in favour of Mincome then, and in 1973 they were in favour of the 60-to-64 Mincome, and in 1974 they were in favour of Pharmacare.

In 1974 there was a letter in The Chilliwack Progress which is in the riding where the Deputy Speaker (Mr. Schroeder) lives. It was one of these well-informed letters, written to the member, which appeared in the paper. It goes like this, Mr. Speaker. This is with respect to senior citizens and Mincome. He says:

"Dear Mr. Schroeder:

"I would like to speak for several recipients of Mincome. Our December cheques were accompanied by a letter from the Human Resources department signed by Norm Levi. Included in the latter were pictures of the Premier and the minister. The message in the letter was one of good wishes for the Christmas season and a promotional sketch on the merits of Mincome. It said the programme was designed so that recipients could live in security and independence and dignity."

And that was true, but that made this particular individual say:

"But that's what makes me boil. How can these individuals, with their $50,000 salaries, talk about living in dignity on $228 a month? My expenses are $140 for rent, $35 for utilities, leaving me $53 a month, or $13 per week for groceries. If that's dignity, what audacity.

(Signed)

Chilliwack."

There was a reply in the same paper, Mr. Speaker, from someone called H.W. Schroeder. I presume that's the member for Chilliwack, and he goes on to say:

"Dear Chilliwack:

"When Mincome was introduced there was much publicity about the increased income it would afford for those who could prove need. What it did mean, for the most needy category, was an increase of approximately $8 a month...."

That's what the letter says, Mr. Speaker: "an increase from $192 to $200."

"Increases since that time have brought the guaranteed income to its present level."

In 1974 it was $228. And this is the well-informed member addressing "Dear Chilliwack":

"The fact of the matter is that the cost of living has risen by 14 per cent and 12 per cent, compounded over two years since Mincome came into effect. On the basis of $200 that means that there should have been an increase of $28 in the first year and $27 in the second year, to give you dear people the same buying power you had two years ago, which is $255. That's what you should have got.

"That amount may still not represent dignity but at least it represents equity, and I will struggle to have the base established for you. After all, it is you folk who have already invested 65 years of effort and who have given us the beautiful British Columbia we have today. Many thanks. Merry Christmas.

H.W. Schroeder."

It's a delightful letter — a really delightful letter — written by the member for Chilliwack. The only thing is that there are some slight inaccuracies in the letter. You know, he says, for instance — and this is the interesting part of the letter:

"What it did mean for most needy categories was an increase of approximately $8 a month, from $192 to $200."

That's what Mincome meant to the needy. I notice, Mr. Speaker, that the member is nodding his head because he really believes what he said.

Well, now I've got to be very careful here because I'm going to quote from the Journals of the House. I hope I don't get ruled out of order, because if I do, I'm going to sit down.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, just on that point. I have looked at our rule. It's contained in rule No. 40, as a third subsection to rule No. 40, and it's a matter that was discussed at a current session, not a past session.

MR. LEVI: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Now on February 15, 1972, Mrs. Dailly asked the hon. Minister of Rehabilitation and Social Improvement the following question.

MR. LAUK: Who was that?

MR. LEVI: Oh, that was Flying Phil. That was Phil.

"With respect to payments of supplementary social allowance, how many persons are in receipt of this allowance?"

Now remember, this was the previous Social Credit government's claim that they had invented Mincome. So the member for Burnaby North asked: "How many persons are in receipt of this allowance?"

The minister replied: "There are presently 16,645 persons receiving supplementary social allowance." Now at that time in the province, there were 205,000 senior citizens over the age of 65.

The next question that the member for Burnaby North asked was: "How many persons received the maximum allowance of $38.59?" That, with the

[ Page 509 ]

guaranteed income supplement and the old-age pension, would have brought them to just under $192. I'll repeat the question just in case the members didn't hear, Mr. Speaker: "How many persons received the maximum allowance of $38.59" to bring them up to what the member for Chilliwack said was $192? The minister replied: 1,283 people."

Now the member, Mr. Speaker, when he wrote about his concern for the seniors in his letter, said that all Mincome did was to increase those people in need by $8 from $192 to $200. What was interesting was that we had 1,283 people receiving $192.

In October, 1972, we passed the Mincome Act. On December 18, 108,000 cheques were sent out to senior citizens and the handicapped: 108,000 people in this province qualified for Mincome because they were in need. Yet under the previous government, prior to 1972, they only found some 16,000 who needed to be supplemented, and only 1,200 got the maximum of $38. We even have such figures as $1 to $10 for some 5,000 people. That was their generous kind of support. Then there were 2,000 people receiving $11. There were 1,300 people receiving $21. Yet by December of that year 108,000 people, including the handicapped, demonstrated their need in such a way that the government of the day made the Mincome programme available to them.

Now during the last election we all remember the kind of ads that were in the paper about Mincome. "It's not true," they said in the paper, "that if we are elected to government we are going to take it away. We're not going to take it away; we're going to make it even better. We're going to make Pharmacare even better. We are going to make day care even better. In fact, your lives are going to even be better. Just vote for us and put us in." So they voted for them; they got elected — and what happened? The people over the age of 65 still get the quarterly increases, but the people 60 to 64, well, they haven't received any increase since April 1, 1976. The handicapped haven't received any increase since April 1, 1976 either, because they have a new definition of need over there. It's called dire need, and that's supposed to demonstrate that the only time you can get assistance is if you really need it. "In dire need" means that you really have to be in a very bad way.

Now on December 11, 1975, there were some 10,000 people on the handicapped pension. There were some 108,000 people on the Mincome programme. Since then, because they haven't passed on the quarterly increase to the handicapped or the 60 to 64, that government has saved pretty close to $3.5 million. What they are saying to the public and to the handicapped is: "You don't need any more assistance. You don't need to keep up with the cost of living so we won't give it to you." This is 13 months after they had their last increase. They don't need it; they have been told by the government that they don't need this money.

Okay, so you have the Pharmacare programme. Now the Pharmacare programme was brought in to make it possible for people to complete the kind of medical treatment they had been getting when they were in hospital, or from their doctors on a prolonged basis. We found many people, some 40 per cent of the seniors over the age of 65 in this province, could not afford to pay for the prescriptions that had been given to them by their doctors. So when we brought in the Mincome programme on January 1,1974, we also made it possible, Mr. Speaker, for people to have more disposable income simply because they were not spending their money on drugs.

Now we have a promise in the throne speech that there will be a universal Pharmacare programme. It's going to be a universal Pharmacare programme — everybody is going to benefit. But there are going to be no free lunches — no more of that free stuff for the people over the age of 65, no more of that free stuff for the people on welfare — just a little free stuff for the people who really can afford it.

We don't know yet; we don't have the particulars of what kind of a Pharmacare programme we are going to have. But we have a pretty good idea because the budget, Mr. Speaker, shows only an increase of $1.5 million over last year. If they are going to do a Pharmacare programme for the whole province on $1.5 million, that probably works out at about a quarter of a prescription per person — that's if they only have one prescription a year, and most people need five, six or seven. So where is the money going to come from? The money is going to come from the people who are going to have to pay for the programme: the senior citizens are going to have to pay for it, the average citizen is going to have to pay for it. And once they have paid their deterrent fee — and I would suspect that the deterrent fee would amount to $25 for seniors, and the deterrent fee for the rest of the people will be $75 — when you lay out all your money and you'll get 80 per cent of it back. But the key thing is that low-income people, people on fixed incomes, are going to have to lay out the money before they can get the money back.

The tragedy is that we are going right back to where we were in 1972 where lower-income people and senior citizens will not be purchasing drugs because they simply won't be able to afford them. We are going to waste millions of dollars on medical care because these people will not have the wherewithal to complete the treatment that they have been given; they won't be able to purchase the drugs.

I sat through the throne speech and the budget speech and I listened, frankly, with some anguish to the kinds of statements made from across the way about how they have to tighten up, how they have to save money so they can get things moving. But the

[ Page 510 ]

basic victims of all their policies have been the low-income people, and now what's happened is that the basic victims are going to be the old people — again the perennial victims in this province — always the old people. That party over there, Mr. Speaker, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in publicity trying to convince the senior citizens that everything will be okay. "We will introduce programmes that are better." So they destroyed the Mincome programme, and they brought in the GAIN programme.

Now senior citizens are faced with the frustrating, embarrassing situation of having $1.33 or $1.24 per month deducted from their cheque because they have a little bit too much money in the bank. I know one case of a woman who has $470 in the bank — they took $1.27 off her cheque. That's sound, sharp-pencil humanistic feeling!

I notice that the member for Esquimalt (Mr. Kahl) looks. I'm sure he has had — as has everyone in this chamber — the same kind of letters from senior citizens who are going through that frustrating, embarrassing nonsense of having small amounts of money taken off their cheques.

Then we have the Minister of Human Resources standing up in the House and bragging that he has underspent his budget. Deja vu — we've been there before, and it looks like we're going back to where we were before. There's no consideration whatsoever; everything is going to be the bottom line. Later on, Mr. Speaker, we will be debating the succession duty bill, and presumably we will have more comparisons to draw than we have had because of the inequity of that kind of situation.

The member for Chilliwack (Mr. Schroeder) was concerned about equity. He said that it must be more; you must take into account the cost of living. It must be better. But it is not better. It isn't better for the thousands of senior citizens in this province. It's getting worse; it's getting much worse now than it ever was. And coupled with that is this tremendous blanket of fear that's still over the province, where nobody wants to speak up, nobody wants to say anything. This isn't an open government or an open society any more; people are terrorized. As my colleague, the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk), often says, it is a jackboot government. It really is, because they have people so scared here. And who are these people who are scared? Well, it certainly was not the 233 people who attended the dinner at the Empress the other night. They were not scared. They had to buy some insurance; they forked over $23,000 from the dinner, but they were not scared.

Who is going to speak for the senior citizens? Nobody speaks for them over there. Through two debates we had nobody get up and say one word on behalf of senior citizens, people on fixed income. Nobody. Nobody said anything. When they sat over on this side their basic argument was that they're not getting enough. Now they sit on that side and are taking it away from people, nobody says anything.

I remember the tremendous irony of 1972 when over here the former Premier of this province, W.A.C. Bennett, introduced a bill. At the same time as we introduced Mincome for $200, he wanted to go $25 better and introduced it for $225, and that was six weeks after he finished being Premier of the province.

That's what the member for Chilliwack was talking about, Mr. Speaker — that you really have to take into account the cost of living and you really should give them the kind of money they can live on. So what do they do? They take it away from the handicapped, they take it away from the 60-to-64 people. That's what they've done, and not a word. Not a word from anybody on that side of the House. No proposals about employment, no proposals about the economic situation. Just no defence of their policy of taking money away from people. But it's all okay because it's in the name of the sharp pencil, the balanced budget.

What do they answer in their letters from people who say to them that the government has taken money away? How do they answer them? Do they turn around and they say to them: "These are tough times, everybody has to make a sacrifice. You are a citizen of the province; you have to make a sacrifice"?

There is one case that I know of, as of yesterday — she makes a sacrifice: $1.27 a month she has deducted from her cheque. That's the kind of sacrifice that that government is extracting from people. In three weeks we're going to see another sacrifice: the people are going to sacrifice $30 million to the millionaires. That member for Chilliwack talks about equity. Well, they're rewriting the rules about equity: those that have keep it; those that don't have it aren't going to get any. Equity — that's the kind of situation.

Mr. Speaker, when can we have, just once, from over there either the Premier who will get up and tell us why it is his government is doing what it is to senior citizens? Why are they doing it? Will he get up and explain it to us? Or the Minister of Finance, will he get up and explain it to us? Nobody wants to say anything. What they want to do is hope that by Friday everything will be finished, they won't have to say anything, then they can go home and then they can forget about it. Nobody wants to defend the government's policy. Well, if nobody wants to defend it, then it has to be a bad policy. Employment — no policy. Saving money, that's the policy; you gouge the senior citizens. That's what we have to do: gouge the senior citizens.

I just want to cover one other area in terms of employment, Mr. Speaker, because they have made no provision for creating employment. What they've

[ Page 511 ]

done is to make provision for creating unemployment. In the budget, for instance, they have taken the day-care budget from $15 million down to $10 million. The suggestion in that is that things are fine, that we don't need any more day care because everybody that needed it is probably now working. We have 100,000 people unemployed, but we can cut back on the day-care budget. We can cut back on day care so that the people that work in the day-care centres won't have any jobs. We can cut back on day care so that the women who have been working, who have put their children in day-care, can now go on unemployment insurance because they've got nobody to look after their children. But no, the great freedom fighters over there, Mr. Speaker, will say that we have to rely on the private sector and we have to rely on the voluntary sector.

Now and in the future, we will see repeated again the monstrous crimes against children that used to happen in this province before a proper day-care centre...where children were placed in the most unhealthy and the most violent kinds of situations because parents needed to go to work. That's all gone, the business of formal day care. Now we are going to go back to the ad hoc arrangements. That's their programme for creating unemployment — not employment, but unemployment.

Future costs, they're not interested in future costs. I talked about this before, but the future-cost aspect is important. If you have children who are irreparably damaged, they become charges to the state forever. They are part of that high cost that goes on in this province today with all of the children that we inherited from previous governments who were prepared to do nothing for these children. They become continuing costs in this province. But for the first time in this province there were very specific attempts made at preventive programmes — that's what day care is; it's a preventive programme.

They talked on this side of the House when they were here about needing preventive programmes. So they take the $4 million from the day-care budget — almost $5 million. Now what are they going to spend that money on? Well, presumably they need the money to build the jails to put the juveniles in, because we've been promised by the Attorney-General that we're going to have two 20-bed units, holding facilities — which is a euphemism for a jail — and that's where they are going to get the money to pay for the building of the jails. Then they have to scrape up another $2.5 million to operate it.

We are going from prevention to the status quo — to the business of holding people — and just answering the political demands and not the needs of people. If we're going to start anywhere in attempting to cut down on the heavy social costs in respect to children, in respect to old people, you have to have preventive programmes, because if you don't have that, you are going to pay, and you are going to pay, and you are going to pay, and eventually you'll come to the realization that there isn't enough money in the revenue to pay for this kind of thing. There is no real plan from that government, other than to move towards the next election and to somehow find themselves a surplus. They want a surplus. They need that surplus because that's what keeps them going towards the next election.

But you know, the way they've carried on in the last 14 months, they've made a lot of enemies out there. They've made an enormous number of enemies among the business people, particularly the business sector. You know, the confidence that the business sector has in that government has slipped very badly. It's slipped badly because of the $500 million that was taken out of the economy. It slips badly because of their behaviour in things like M.E.L. Paving and the Grizzly pipeline. All of this erodes the confidence of the business sector.

We get plaintive pleas from that side of the House to the business community that you have to invest in the province. Yet they have no plan, no economic plan whatsoever — no response, for instance, from the suggestion by the member for North Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Gibson), no response whatsoever. What they are getting ready to do is to unload a large amount of the people's money into private enterprise, into the pipelines, into the coal mine development. They are going to tell us that that's going to create an enormous number of jobs. They have not specified how many jobs; they haven't told us the upper limit of the money that the government is going to commit itself to. Everything is very vague.

Mr. Speaker, we brought in the amendment because we wanted to be able to go over the ground that we covered in the budget debate itself, some of the serious misgivings that the people of this province have to have about the failure of this government to provide for senior citizens, for the betterment of senior citizens, for the betterment of children, for the provision of jobs. We had to do that, and we will be doing it because more speakers will be emphasizing this, and constantly repeating it. You know, it's this whole principle, this whole atmosphere in this House of everything that that government is doing; it seems that it's all been done before by the previous Social Credit government. No new power, no new pattern just the way it used to be.

The unfortunate part about it is that the victims are really the old people and the children, and the people on fixed incomes, the people who in 1972 to 1975 were given a glimpse of what it was like to live like human beings. Now they're being told:

"That's finished. We're going back to the sharp pencil. You'll do what we need; you'll help provide the money. And

[ Page 512 ]

if you have to pay your way, you'll pay your way."

"There are no free rides for anybody any more in this province," they're saying to them. Everybody will pay their way; 65; 75; 80-year-old people will pay their way if they want drugs. If they can't afford it, then they won't have it. That's okay for them too, because they want to be able to save money.

That's the state of affairs in the province today, Mr. Speaker. It's exactly the same as it was almost five years ago to the day when the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Barrett) moved his amendment to get guaranteed minimum income, which was introduced and has been destroyed. Free drugs for people was introduced as a programme and has been destroyed; programmes for children were introduced and are now being destroyed. We've been there before, Mr. Speaker, and that's the tragedy of it.

MS. R. BROWN (Vancouver-Burrard): First of all, I'd like to say that it's really good to be back and to see that really nothing has changed. It's as though I haven't been away.

I want to comment, though, on a couple of cosmetic changes that have taken place: first of all, the elevation of Hansard to a glass-enclosed booth in the balconies. Now you, Mr. Speaker, have been put in charge of the light, so instead of looking down at the hon. government Whip as I'm speaking, I am forced to look at you. That's fine; I have no objections to doing just that.

I would have hoped, though, that some more basic changes would have taken place in my absence; I would have thought that my absence from the House would have had a salutary effect on the government. But in fact, I find, as I return after three weeks' absence, that the women of this province are still getting it in the neck from this government. When j one looks at the budget, whether it is at what happens to the handicapped, or the senior citizens, or the lack of creation of employment, or whatever, one thing that comes through extremely exceedingly clearly is that the women of British Columbia are still getting it in the neck from this government.

Now while I was in Nigeria, the High Commission there made it their business to get for me some newspaper clippings on the throne speech. I was really pretty impressed by the throne speech and the promises that were made in the throne speech, so much so that I said to Mr. Kidd, the High Commissioner, that he had made a mistake, that in fact those clippings couldn't have come from British Columbia and from the Social Credit government. I came back anticipating a budget that was going to implement some of those social programmes and social promises made in the throne speech.

To no one's surprise, I discovered that the throne speech was really empty rhetoric, and that in fact the budget does what the Downtown Eastside Residents' newspaper says: "It pampers the greedy and plunders the needy."

Who are the needy in British Columbia, Mr. Speaker, as they are in terms of all of Canada? Over and over again when one looks at the statistics whether it's Senator Croll's report on poverty or whether it's the report brought down by the Council on Social Development, who constitutes the bulk of the poor in this country? It's the women, whether it's your senior-citizen woman, your single-parent woman, your handicapped woman, or whoever.

Who are the people, Mr. Speaker, who serve to benefit least from the goodies handed out by this government? How many women in this province are going to benefit from the abolition of succession duties? How many of us do you really think leave estates in excess of $200,000? How many women in this province are going to benefit from what the budget boasts of as the "flexibility" which the mining companies now have in terms of writing off the costs of their explorations? How many women are going to benefit from any of the goodies handed out by this government? One will maybe, or maybe even two, but not very many more than that.

I tell you what's going to happen to the women of this province. Let's look at the business of creating employment. Once upon a time there was in the Department of Economic Development, that great department which is responsible for creating employment in this province, a section known as the women's economic rights section. What this section was supposed to do was to help those women who were interested in creating employment for themselves and creating employment for others, because we all recognize that part of the liberation process is economic liberation. You know, it is not just a matter of handouts, it's a matter of being able to take care of yourself financially. It was in recognition of that that the women's economic rights department was established in the first place.

This department made it its business to conduct workshops, to print material, to send people around the province helping women who wanted to start a business, get training, go into a business, but didn't know how to do it themselves. And it did a good job. You know, it was not possible to criticize what that particular section of that department did. Right here in Victoria we have groups like Circle Craft, In the Okanagan Valley there are the handicraft groups that benefited from the advice. The minister's own Peace River area — there are a number of women there who benefited from the workshops and from the advice that came out of that section.

Well, I've been going through the estimates book and the women's economic rights branch has disappeared. Now maybe it's become a victim of the Change of Name Act. Maybe it's still there but under a different name. I don't know. But it certainly isn't

[ Page 513 ]

and nowhere in the estimates is there a budget for its continued existence. You know, its continuation and the job that it was doing would have been of much more benefit to us, who constitute more than 50 per cent of the population of this province, than the abolition of succession duties. So you're not going to create any employment, and you're not going to help us create any employment. The Minister of Economic Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) sits there reading the comic books or something when I'm trying to attract his attention.

MR. BARRETT: That's above his level.

MS. BROWN: What is the other thing that's happened to the women of this province? The funding to community programmes: who do you think received the services of these community programmes? Who do you think received the services of transition houses (that were funded on the community programmes), rape relief centres, women's health collectives, crisis centres? Who received the services that were funded through those community programmes as administered by the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm)? He's the same minister who stood up in this House in the last session and agreed to fund rape on a fee-for-service basis. We still haven't been able to figure out how you fund rape on a fee-for-service basis. What's happened to his budget? What's happened to the funding for community services programmes under his budget?

MR. COCKE: They think it's a joke over there.

MS. BROWN: Of course it's a joke over there, and that's all they care about. It's always been a government that looked after its constituency. It's always taken care of the corporate interest and big business and the mining interests. That's all they care about because that's all they know. What do they know about want and about poverty? But the programme — the allotment — was cut by $2 million. The funding that would go into crisis centres, information centres, family life counselling, transition houses, rape relief centres, women's health collective, youth services and other services, was cut by $2 million.

What is $2 million when you've just wiped out a $30-million income that you used to get by wiping out succession duties? So it's the women and the children and the poor and the handicapped who are going to have to go without, so that those of you who can leave estates of over $200,000 can make sure that your heirs don't have to pay any duty on those estates.

Interjection.

MS. BROWN: Yes, nothing's changed. Nothing's changed except for the worst. But before, everybody was being hurt. Now the people who least can afford it are being hurt even more, and the women of British Columbia continue to get it in the neck from that government over there.

What about the child-care programme? You know, that Minister of Human Resources is a great lover of the family. He wants to counsel people before they get married. Then he wants to counsel them so that they stay married. And he want to counsel the family so that it will live happily ever after. That's right. And you know what he does? I'm going to tell you because I don't think you know. For the one group in this province that does what he wants it to do, he turns around and he cuts off their funding of a lousy $60,000. Now what is he talking about? I mean, does he support the family or doesn't he? What kind of family is he supporting? He stands up and he makes a speech that says that this is the greatest organization ever — a superb organization — and then he turns around and he cuts off their funding. I mean, with a friend like that, who needs enemies?

And who is hurt when the family is undercut and undermined and destroyed? Who is hurt? The children are hurt and the women are hurt. And so we see that the women of British Columbia continue to get it in the neck from that government over there.

There are no more child-care programmes; this programme, we are now told, is going to provide services for children up to the age of 12 during a prolonged family illness or some such other crisis, or to enable parents to attend work or an educational institution.

How are you going to do that when you've cut it by $4 million? How are you going to expand something at a period of inflation when you're cutting it back? If that were possible, you know, why did you have to make funding more flexible for the mining companies? Why didn't you allow that kind of flexibility to the women of this province, to the senior citizens, to the handicapped? Why don't you extend that kind of concern and that kind of flexibility to them?

You know, I would like to believe that it's not necessary for you to be a woman to understand what it is like. I would like to believe that, but I'm in doubt, you know. I'm having real problems with that, because every time your government brings a budget down we hurt more under that budget. You say you care about people, yet who do you deprive under your budget? Not the corporations, not industry, not the millionaires, not the mining companies, but people — that's who you deprive. Then you tell us you care. You care about what?

MR. COCKE: Boats!

[ Page 514 ]

MS. BROWN: You certainly don't care about who. You certainly don't care about people. When you start to penalize a family that has a handicapped member, do you know what you're doing? What happens to families with handicapped children? What happens to families with mentally retarded children? What happens to those families as a result of the cut in your budget? The total cut of the Department of Human Resources is exactly the same amount of money that the budget is going to be deprived of as a result of this gift which you have given to yourself and your millionaire colleagues when you wipe out succession duties.

MR. COCKE: Let them eat highways!

MS. BROWN: I am willing to accept that you didn't understand what you were doing when you did it. I am willing to accept that it was a mistake, that in fact there was nobody over there who could speak to you and to your Minister of Finance on behalf of the handicapped, and the senior citizens, and the youth and the children of this province. I am willing to accept that. But now you've heard it, not just from the bleeding-heart socialists of the NDP; you've heard it from the hard-headed businessman who leads the Liberal Party (Mr. Gibson) and the dour Scot who leads the Conservative Party (Mr. Wallace). You've heard it in black and white.

MR. BARRETT: He wouldn't spend a nickel unless it was worthwhile!

MS. BROWN: He's even humourless. Are you willing to accept, then, that you should support this amendment; that in fact your minister should be chastised and that a new budget should be introduced?

AN HON. MEMBER: If Scotty says so, I do.

MS. BROWN: I mean, how can you stand to tolerate a budget when the fact book on poverty tells us that the senior citizens of British Columbia live below the poverty line as calculated both by the special Senate committee on poverty and by the Canadian Council on Social Development?

This is not an underdeveloped country, you know. This is not even a poor province. Any province that can afford to wipe out succession duties is not a poor province, Why is it therefore necessary for our senior citizens to have to live below the poverty line? It is our shame. The size of the deprivation in this province is our shame. It is our shame. That services to children in this province are as poor as they are is our shame; that services to the handicapped are as poor as they are is our shame; that our senior citizens live below the poverty line is our shame; that so many of the women in this province live below the poverty line is our shame.

We have nothing to be proud of — a province with the resources that this province has, a province with the ability to generate income that this province has. The government should feel nothing but shame to have these kinds of facts reported.

Mr. Speaker, I want to state specifically some of the issues affecting the children in this province which I think really have to be brought to the attention of this House, and to the Premier since his minister is not here. When I speak about the services to the children in this province, Mr. Speaker, I'm not speaking as a social worker necessarily, nor even as a member of government. I'm speaking just as another human being who believes — as has been stated so often by the Minister of Human Resources and even by other people in the government — that children are a pretty valuable and special resource to all of us. How can we say those kinds of things and justify the kind of budget cuts that are now going to be called for by that department as a result of the budget that this government has just brought down?

Listen to some of the programmes that are going to be cut. Programmes that provide special treatment for children with behavioural and emotional problems are going to drop from $226,000 to $51,000. The adoption programme is going to drop. And this is the thing: they are such chintzy cuts. Listen to this. A cut of $9,000! Chintzy! Cheap! Irrelevant kinds of things! You call that putting a budget together? And an adoption programme is going to be cut by $9,000. Special services to children which give counselling to children in an attempt to keep the family together — that is going to be decreased by over $2 million. So instead of the counselling, we're going to have institutions built instead with that money to lock the kids up. That's what the difference is. Parent-encouragement programmes, the craft-therapy programme.... Let me tell you about the craft-therapy programme, Mr. Premier, since unlike the members of your back bench, you are listening. Children in this province who have neurological diseases — epilepsy, for example — find....

Interjection.

MS. BROWN: That's okay. The member is not interested; he shouldn't listen. After all, I'm talking about children. Children in this province with epilepsy, Mr. Premier, through you, Mr. Speaker, who cannot hold down jobs are often trained through this craft-therapy programme to make various craft objects which are sold through a store known as Handicraft from the Emotionally Handicapped, and in that way they generate some kind of income to subsidize their handicap pension. That's all that the craft-therapy programme does. It means that instead

[ Page 515 ]

of sitting at home and collecting their handicap pension and not doing anything, they are taught how to use their hands and to do a craft so they have some kind of respect for themselves and their ability to survive in the world. This is the programme, Mr. Speaker, and listen to this: this is a programme that used to cost the department the massive sum of $3,600. That's what it used to cost — $3,600. And that programme is now being cut to $1,850. I mean, what kind of cheap, chintzy budgeting has been going on over there at the expense of the children of this province? Instead of expanding the programme, instead of making it larger so that more of these children could benefit from it, the government is cutting it to less than $2,000, if my arithmetic is right.

Services to children. There are 12 programmes facing the social spending axe, we are told, most of which programmes deal with services to children. Of course, the handicapped programme, in which the children were getting subsidies for their prosthetics and other things that they need, is another one that came under attack too.

I honestly don't see how anybody with any kind of concern about human beings could sit over there and not stand up in support of this amendment which was moved by the member for Comox (Ms. Sanford). It is true that the human betterment of the majority of the people of this province is going to suffer as a result of this budget, it you accept the statistical fact that says that the majority of the people of this province are women and children and the budget has injured us through the excessive cut in the Department of Human Resources, through the wiping out of the women's economic rights branch — or at least nowhere in the budget does it show that it still exists. As I said, maybe it still exists but I don't see any funding for it anywhere in the estimates. And by the attack on the senior citizens and the handicapped....

The rumour, of course, is going around about the $25 surcharge which is going to be tacked onto Pharmacare. I hope it's a rumour. You know, I refuse to believe that on top of all the other terrible things that have been done to the needy, to the senior citizens, the handicapped and to the poor in this province, that that would be added to it.

So the bill dealing with the wiping out of the succession and death duties is not yet law, which means that it's not too late to do anything about it. The promises you made to the senior citizens of this province to raise their benefits to the highest level in Canada...

MR. BARBER: And abolish property taxes.

MS. BROWN: ...and abolish property taxes — it's not too late to do that either.

Now I've brought of your attention a report, which I know you're much too busy to read, called "Golden Years in British Columbia," how they are seen by the senior citizens, and which states very clearly that far from being the highest level in Canada, the senior citizens of this province are living below the poverty line, as are the women in this province and, unfortunately, as are the children.

Dealing with delinquents, dealing with potentially delinquent children, dealing with your retarded, your youth programmes dealing with people, what you need, Mr. Speaker — through you to the Premier, since the Minister of Finance is not in the House — is not a cutback in these programmes, but an increase.

So I stand to support this amendment. I stand to support it out of concern that the women of this province continue to get it in the neck from this government — concern about the cuts to the child-care programme on which we are so dependent, and the cuts to the community grant programmes on which we are so dependent, on the cuts to the Vancouver Resource Board's services on which we are so dependent, and the cuts to GAIN for the senior citizens and to the income-assistance programme, on all of which we are so dependent.

Given a time when unemployment rates in this province are on the increase — away over 88,000 and rising — when fewer children than ever are being placed in child care because of the behaviour and the deductions being made by the Department of Human Resources, it seems to me that the women of this province are under attack by that government, and that someone has to speak up in their support. The $30 million in revenue which this government is writing off when it wipes out the succession duties could have reinstated all of these programmes. It could have been used as revenue to create jobs for everyone. It could have been used to move our senior citizens from living below the poverty line in this country.

The more things change, the more they remain the same, Mr. Speaker, and the thing that remains the same about this government, and that is the most painful to live with, is its total and complete unconcern for people.

MR. W.S. KING (Revelstoke-Slocan): I want to express my deep concern at the government attitude, Mr. Speaker. We in the official opposition have moved two amendments — one to the throne speech and now one to the budget speech — highlighting our concern, as the official opposition, for the plight of the province at the moment, for the serious economic ills that face the province and its people. We have moved amendments to highlight not only our objections to the thrust of the government's policy as contained in the throne speech, and certainly the thrust of their economic policy as contained in the

[ Page 516 ]

budget speech, but we have also sought, through debate in this chamber — which is the role of the official opposition — to offer alternatives. The most alarming thing is the fact that the government does not deign to participate in any of these debates on motions. It indicates to me a rather alarming trend — a rather alarming psychology, a rather alarming attitude by the government of the day.

We recall, Mr. Speaker, that the government seemed even reluctant to call a session of this House. Indeed, they moved from the normal two sessions that were held and last fall when the economy was slowing down, when the effects of their centralization of funds was already starting to injure the economy of the province and creating massive unemployment, they refused to convene the House to debate and deal with these serious implications, to listen to the opposition and their views. Then when they finally do convene the House for their one session a year, reverting back to the dark old days of the former W.A.C. Bennett government, they are not prepared to enter into debate.

The Premier observed in the last session, Mr. Speaker, that it took two weeks to train his dogs. Well, he seems to have trained the backbenchers awfully well in less time, because he has a tight muzzle on them this session. They're not allowed to get to their feet; they're not allowed to speak for their constituents. They sit there in mute silence and offer nothing — no observations, no defence of the budgetary thrust of the government. Apparently they do not support it very strongly; otherwise they would have something to say. They would object to the attitude of the opposition. But no, they sit there mute in stony silence, or smirk and make jokes as the opposition tries to outline the serious problems facing our people.

I think it's a rather dangerous trend. It indicates a contempt, in my view, for the parliamentary process. It indicates a contempt for the role of the official opposition, which is certainly to come before this House and examine not only the policy of the government but the spending estimates and allocation priorities of the government.

I wonder, quite frankly, when we get to the estimates if the ministers responsible for each department are going to deign to come into the House and account for their spending and their administration over the past year. Certainly they are not prepared to answer this assembly, and that is the traditional function of this assembly under the British parliamentary system. The Premier has learned well from his father, presumably. He's put the muzzle on his gang over there, Mr. Speaker. They, in subservient fashion, sit and gesticulate wildly, come up with hyena laughs, but contribute not one rational voice to the debate which affects the serious economic ills of this province. I have never seen such a sorry performance in the history of this House, Mr. Speaker. I would hope that someone would get on his or her feet and start defending the government and trying to justify their policy or lack thereof, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Could I suggest to the hon. member who has possession of the floor at this particular time that the matter of the conduct and the entry into this debate by other members of the House is not part of the amendment that is before us at the moment?

MR. KING: I submit that it is, Mr. Speaker. Nevertheless, that was just a preamble of my remarks; I intend to get into more....

MR. LAUK: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. With the greatest of respect, gratuitous remarks from the Chair are uncalled for.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. That is not a point of order.

MR. LAUK: I am in order, and I am going to speak to a point of order.

MR. SPEAKER: Well, let's hear it then.

MR. LAUK: It is perfectly incumbent upon this side of the House when there is no response to the debate on an amendment to call for a response. That is not out of order, and that has to do with the amendment.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. LAUK: These gratuitous protections of that side of the House...

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. LAUK: ...are completely uncalled for on the part of the Speaker.

[Mr. Speaker rises.]

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, it is not a matter of gratuitous protection or anything like that. It is a matter that in the debate at the present time we are on an amendment which is before the House. Now all I have suggested to the hon. member who had possession of the floor is that he relate his remarks to the amendment.

[Mr. Speaker resumes his seat.]

[ Page 517 ]

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, if I might suggest, it would be advisable, in my view, to ask members who are speaking how they intend to relate their remarks to the issue at hand, to the precise amendment. Quite frankly, sir, I am more than prepared to do precisely that, because I am suggesting that the lack of feeling, the lack of participation and the the lack of respect for this institution is directly related to the policies which are, in fact, creating stagnation in the economy and hurting people.

I was interested in the remarks by the hon. Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) when he spoke yesterday. At least that little minister got to his feet yesterday on the budget and he attempted to outline some of the policies of his department. He attempted even to justify the budget in some way. He came out with some gems, Mr. Speaker, during the course of his dissertation in this House.

AN HON. MEMBER: He always does.

MR. KING: I would like to review a few of them. Perhaps, then, we can start to understand why the government has such a fixation with profits to the corporations and the millionaires, and cuts in services to the people in virtually every social area. The minister had this observation to make. He said: "Our government has a rather unique way of budgeting." (Laughter.) Isn't that quaint? He's a quaint little minister, Mr. Speaker. It is indeed a quaint way of budgeting when $30 million is slashed from the revenue of this province to provide sustenance and benefit to the millionaire club, well represented by that government and their friends in the British Properties. And almost precisely that amount is trimmed from social services that are needed because whenever you have 92,000 workers unemployed in this great province, there is naturally going to be a greater demand on social services. Of course there is.

There is a clear alternative. You do one thing or the other, Mr. Speaker. Either you provide sustenance and comfort to the tune of $30 million tax free to your friends in the millionaire club, or you punish people. This government has set their priority. They have shown their true colours.

AN HON. MEMBER: You're not a millionaire, Alec.

MR. KING: I want to say that that, indeed, is a unique way of budgeting because certainly the previous Social Credit government did have a social conscience. It did have a populist base and some regard for human needs in the province. I see no such indication with the present tribe.

Perhaps another reason the economy is in trouble, another reason that we are unable to direct and attract investment into this province to develop jobs, is because the ministers are ignorant of the statutes. They're ignorant of the law in the province, and here they are, ministers of the Crown, Mr. Speaker. That little, unique Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) went on to justify the succession duty abolition. He said:

"The succession duties were, too, very good news to most business people in British Columbia. Now they don't have to start thinking about liquidating their business as they grow older and near retirement."

Mr. Speaker, I want to support the former Social Credit Premier of this province, the Hon. W.A.C. Bennett, when he said:

"If people who have earned their money in this province through the sweat and muscle of working people and through the resource base of this province have such little regard and commitment to our province that they would sell out, liquidate their assets and flee the province to escape taxes, let them go. They are not the kind of citizens we need in this province."

But this gang, Mr. Speaker, understands that kind of fly-by-night grab for millions. They identify with that kind of philosophy, rather than the needs of people

AN HON. MEMBER: Stuff your profits.

MR. KING: He went on, this little quaint minister, and he came up with this dissertation on a situation that obtained in his own riding. He said:

"A very good friend and constituent of mine in the Nicola Valley has a ranch. This ranch has been in his family for four generations, and each generation has added to the value of that ranch and the agricultural community of British Columbia. This ranch has grown and is a good industry, employs many people and adds tremendously to the agricultural community in the Nicola Valley. During the term of the previous government, this ranch was on the block."

AN HON. MEMBER: False!

MR. KING: He says:

"They wanted to sell it out and move to Alberta, for they couldn't see any way that they could carry on under that type of government and they couldn't see any way they could maintain that ranch if they had to pay the tremendous succession duties that would be required when the elder member of the family passed on."

Interjection.

[ Page 518 ]

MR. KING: Now, Mr. Speaker, there is a minister of the Crown abysmally ignorant of the law in the province of British Columbia, because, under the New Democratic Party government, we eliminated the need for farms and ranches to pay succession duties. We provided that benefit to the agricultural sector in British Columbia, which was never done under the previous Social Credit administration. I would hope, with all humility and with all seriousness...

AN HON. MEMBER: He doesn't even know what he's talking about.

MR. KING: ...that perhaps the Premier could talk to his ministers in his cabinet and say: "Look, the first thing you better do when I appoint you is do a bit of homework. Study the law, try to familiarize yourselves with the statutes of this province before you go into the House and open your mouth and make it appear that you're a fool — worse still, before you say something and prove that you are." (Laughter.)

This is a terrible performance. And here a minister to the Crown spent a good portion of his speech trying to justify the abolition of succession duties, based on complete misinterpretation and ignorance of the law. I think we should expect more from our ministers of the Crown in this province. Ineptitude, Mr. Speaker.

MR. BARRETT: Right there in Hansard. Fire your speech writer.

MR. KING: Yes, Mr. Speaker, it's on page 495-1 of the Blues, and I trust that the Hansard staff haven't misquoted the minister. I trust that he hasn't been misquoted. He came out with some other gems. I just want to browse through briefly and refer to a couple of other remarks he made. He talked about profits. First of all he attributed to our party a complete hostility towards profits, which is absolute nonsense and he knows it.

I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the stimulus that was available to small business under our administration — the development of the Economic Development Corporation — was positive inducement and encouragement to industry and jobs in the province. But we don't have a fixation with profit; we're not married to it. We believe there has to be a balance between profit and between social responsibility and people's needs. I want to say that is not a peculiar attitude to democratic socialists. Even the right-wing administrations in the deep south have recognized that a couple of generations ago. It hasn't filtered up here to this right-wing coalition yet, but I have some hope, Mr. Speaker. I have some hope of that.

But listen to what the minister said about it. He said: "I was very happy to read last week that the profits of Crown-Zellerbach Corporation, Weldwood Corporation and the British Columbia Forest Products Corporation are up substantially this year. I think that's a beautiful thing." Just a beautiful thing! I don't think the senior citizens of the province and the women that my colleague from Burrard talked about think it's a very beautiful thing when profits soar at the expense of human programmes.

The minister went on to offer gratuitous comments about the obligations of labour. He gave a rather shallow, rather superficial dissertation in the form of a sidewalk superintendent assessment of the obligations of working people to produce more and ask for less. Mr. Speaker, he talked about the....

Interjection.

MR. KING: I've got two minutes yet; I've got one more line to get off here, and then we'll see if the government will adjourn.

He talked about the cost of production in British Columbia. He talked about productivity, and of course we're all concerned with productivity. But I find it peculiar how the Minister of Forests — the custodian of the basic resource in this province — completely ignores the total cost of production in terms of assessing the competitive position of the forest industry. I want to tell Mr. Chips that there is more to the cost of producing a log and a 2-by-4 than the labour element. You know, there's a whole fabric of factors which do in fact affect very dramatically the cost of the industry. And I want to ask him to be a bit more impartial in terms of making that kind of assessment.

Mr. Speaker, I'm going to have some more to say on this question after the dinner hour, which I understand the Hon. Minister of Labour (Hon.Mr. Williams), as the new House Leader, filling in for the ailing Attorney-General, is prepared to grant until 8:30 p.m. this evening. Is that correct?

Interjection.

MR. KING: Well, Mr. Speaker, if that's the spirit of cooperation the Minister of Labour brings in the absence of the Attorney-General, I would have to, I guess, draw your attention to the....

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. KING: No, no.

Mr. King moves adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

Mr. Cocke tables documents.

[ Page 519 ]

Hon. Mr. McGeer files answers to questions.

Hon. Mr. McClelland tables the annual report of the British Columbia Medical Centre.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, just before we adjourn, I would like to comment on a matter that was raised yesterday in the House.

The hon. Leader of the Opposition yesterday rose on a point of order and requested that the hon. Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) table a memorandum from a member of his department to which he had referred in answering a question during the oral question period. The hon. minister later tabled the report, but it is appropriate to clarify the practice in such cases.

At page 421 of the 18th edition of May, the rule regarding the citing of documents is stated as follows: "A minister of the Crown is not at liberty to read or quote from a dispatch or other state paper not before the House unless he is prepared to lay it upon the table."

Also, in the same edition of May, a little further down: "The rule for the laying of cited documents cannot be held to apply to private letters or memoranda." This rule has been held to apply to public documents only. A reference there is the parliamentary Debates at Westminster, 1965, volume 179, page 489:

"... and confidential documents or documents of a private nature passing between officers of a department and the department are not necessarily laid on the table of the House, especially if the minister declares that they are of a confidential nature."

In a Speaker's ruling of December 11, 1957, cited in May at page 421, it says as follows:

"For the House to be able to demand that documents should be laid upon the table, three conditions must be fulfilled.

"In the first place, the minister must have quoted from the document. It is not sufficient that he should have referred to it, or even to have summarized or paraphrased it in part or in whole.

"Secondly, the document must be a dispatch or other state paper. The rule cannot be applied to private documents.

"Thirdly, the rule cannot be applied to documents which are stated by the minister to be of such a nature that their disclosure would be inconsistent with the public interest." I have examined the Speakers' decisions referred to in the footnotes in May and would point out to the members that the following documents have been held to be not public documents and, therefore, not subject to the rule:

First, a transcript of a B.B.C. radio broadcast.

Secondly, a letter from an ambassador to his minister.

Thirdly, a memorandum prepared by departmental staff for a minister to assist in the answer of questions.

Fourth, a report declared by a minister to contain confidential material.

Fifth, briefs to be used by other governmental departments marked "confidential," circulated to heads of departments.

These examples are not exhaustive but should serve to illustrate the nature of a confidential or private document.

The only Speaker's ruling in this assembly that I have found is that of Speaker Pooley, volume 1, page 86, wherein it was said:

"There is no rule requiring the production to the House of any private letters, memoranda or documents which had been cited or quoted from during debate."

The general practice of this House, at least in recent years, has been less strict in that any papers or documents — whether they are technically public documents or not — cited in debate have been laid upon the table when a request for tabling them has been made. Whether this is to continue or not is for the House to decide. This practice does not preclude a claim of privilege where, as May indicates, a minister has stated that a document is of such a nature that its disclosure would be inconsistent with the public interest.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order that you've raised, I appreciate the thoroughness with which you have responded to the point of order and I note that the description of document that is exempt from the rule in May that calls for tabling is largely defined by being confidential. Therefore I would suggest, to avoid any confusion in the statements in May and the rule of the House, that it would be appropriate for a minister who is quoting from a confidential document to so notify the House at the time the quote takes place to avoid the request by members of the House, regardless of which side, that the document be tabled.

This situation would have been avoided had the minister informed the House that it was a confidential memo of which he was citing only one section.

We do appreciate that the minister did table the document and we hope, in the spirit of this ruling, that if there are to be excerpts read in the House, we will be informed before the excerpt is read that it is either a confidential document or a dispatch to that minister from an ambassador. (Laughter.)

Hon. Mr. Williams moves adjournment of the House.

[ Page 520 ]

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 6:07 p.m.