[ Page 545 ]

CONTENTS

Routine proceedings

Oral questions

Meadow Creek Farms racetrack proposal. Mr. Skelly — 545

Handicapped persons' allowance. Mr. Gibson — 547

Statement

Blacklist naming public servants. Mr. King — 547

Routine proceedings

Budget debate

On the amendment.

Hon. Mr. Bennett — 548

Mr. Stupich — 553

Mr. Veitch — 557

Hon. Mr. McGeer — 561

Mrs. Dailly — 563

Mr. Davidson — 569

Hon. Mr. Mair — 573

Mr. Lockstead — 578

Statement

Blacklist naming public servants. Hon. Mr. Bennett — 580

Mr. King — 582

Mr. Wallace — 582

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1977

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

MR. G.F. GIBSON (North Vancouver–Capilano): Mr. Speaker, in the gallery today is a constituent from North Vancouver–Capilano, Mr. Bill Stevenson. I ask the House to make him welcome.

HON. J.J. HEWITT (Minister of Agriculture): Mr. Speaker, in the gallery today is Mr. Malcolm Young, the new editor and publisher of Country Life magazine, which is the newspaper, really, that provides information and material to the agriculture industry in B.C., and is very well recognized. I would ask the House to welcome Mr. Young.

In the gallery today are the members of the B.C. Broiler Marketing Board: Mr. Dennis Cote, Mr. Bruce McIninch and Mr. Ned Spencer. I would ask the House to welcome them.

MR. A.B. MACDONALD (Vancouver East): Mr. Speaker, in the gallery we have a very distinguished gentleman who is the vice-president of the Vancouver East New Democratic Party Constituency Association, Mr. Ron Wickstrom.

Oral questions

MEADOW CREEK FARMS RACETRACK PROPOSAL

MR. R.E. SKELLY (Alberni): Mr. Speaker, a question directed to the Minister of Environment. Did the minister meet with Captain Harry Terry of Meadow Creek Farms Ltd. last January to discuss his racetrack proposal in the Hazelmere Valley?

HON. J.A. NIELSEN (Minister of Environment): Mr. Speaker, replying to the member, I am not sure of dates when it comes to that. I, along with the chairman of the Land Commission, visited Meadow Creek Farms on one occasion. I can't tell you what the precise date was.

MR. SKELLY: On a supplementary, Mr. Speaker, did the minister make representations to the Land Commission, the chairman, or any other member of the Land Commission, to have the Meadow Creek Farms Ltd. racetrack proposal approved in the appeal procedure?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: The answer is no, Mr. Speaker.

MR. G.S. WALLACE (Oak Bay): I'd like to ask a supplemental to the acting Attorney-General, whoever that might be. Mr. Speaker, perhaps I could be informed by the government who is the acting Attorney-General.

Interjection.

MR. WALLACE: The Minister of Labour?

AN HON. MEMBER: Alex Macdonald.

MR. WALLACE: With regard to the question raised regarding the application for the racetrack, I would like to ask the acting Attorney-General if since the second application by Captain Terry was supported by Surrey council when in fact the first application was not, but the second application followed a meeting between Captain Terry and Surrey council in which Captain Terry agreed to plead guilty to violations of municipal bylaws and, subsequent to that meeting with Surrey council, the council then agreed to support Captain Terry's second application — which, I understand, was essentially no different from the first in its contents. Since this leaves many questions to be answered, I wondered if the Attorney-General would conduct an investigation to ensure that all the dealings in regard to this application for a racetrack are legal and devoid of any corruption.

HON. L.A. WILLIAMS (Minister of Labour): Mr. Speaker, the seriousness of the matters raised by the member and the length of the question obliges me to take it as notice, but I will give the member a response as quickly as I can.

MR. SKELLY: A supplementary, again to the Minister of Environment: I understand that water requirements for the racetrack at Meadow Creek Farms would result in depletion of groundwater and artesian wells in the Hazelmere Valley area which would cost something like $6 million to replace. Has the minister done groundwater studies or has he taken into consideration groundwater studies. In the area that would indicate this to be so, and who is going to compensate farmers in that area for the loss of artesian wells?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Mr. Speaker, to the member: The question with regard to water resources, of course, is one that will be handled by the water resources department. The leave granted under section 11(4) of the Land Commission Act by the Land Commission does not relieve the applicant from any of the other rules and regulations, either by local governments or provincial laws. All of these requirements must be met. If the member would like — obviously in answer to that question — I'd be pleased to take the initial question as notice and check with the water resources department to see if any studies have been made. But, as you may

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appreciate, the application was made to the Land Commission, not to the provincial government.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, with regard to studies, can the minister tell us if the Land Commission, at the time it made its decision last week, had, as part of the material, the three separate studies regarding the soil that were carried out by the Department of Agriculture and the property management branch study, all of which recommended rejection of the application? Did the Land Commission have access to these reports?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Mr. Speaker, I'm not aware of what information the Land Commission had before them during that hearing. I was advised by the Land Commission after the decision had been rendered. If it's the desire of the member for me to ask the chairman, I'll be very pleased to.

MR. WALLACE: Could I just ask very quickly: Is the Minister of Agriculture aware of the fact then that these studies that were so essential to deciding the soil content, et cetera, were made available to the Land Commission? Is the Minister of Agriculture aware of this, since his department provided the recommendations against the application being approved?

HON. J.J. HEWITT: Well, Mr. Speaker, I think, as the Minister of the Environment has said, this has been dealt with at the Land Commission level. I'm sure all the input that was taken into consideration was made available to him at that time. I would check it out if the member would so wish.

MR. SKELLY: The Minister of Environment didn't answer the first question, which was: Did he meet with Captain Harry Terry or discuss with Captain Harry Terry the Meadow Brook Farm proposal? And when he took the tour of the Hazelmere Valley, did he go with Captain Harry Terry?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Some time last year — I am not sure of the precise date — accompanied by the chairman, Mr. Garry Runka, we toured the Meadow Creek installation, and Captain Terry was our host at that time to show us the operation.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Is that improper, Mr. Member?

MR. SKELLY: A supplementary, this time directed to the acting Attorney-General, if I may, concerning the same subject. I understand that parimutuel betting receipts are projected to be $23.8 million in 1980. Had Captain Harry Terry of Meadow Creek Farms made application to the Attorney-General to establish a race track in that area?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, likewise, I will take that question as notice and respond at the earliest moment.

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary to the minister: if he took a tour with Captain Terry and the chairman of the Land Commission to the site of the Meadow Creek racing track that has been proposed and rejected, was this not interference by the minister in the work of the Land Commission?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: The workings of the Land Commission, and perhaps the Land Commission Act itself, may be somewhat confusing to some members of the House. The requirements under the Act in certain circumstances will allow an appeal to go to a committee of cabinet or the cabinet itself. The members of cabinet who make up the Environment and Land Use Committee have toured specific areas of land which has been applied for exclusions, including such areas as Chilliwack and others. It is considered reasonable to respond to the requests of either the chairman of the Land Commission or members of that commission, or appellants Who may have a hearing pending, to view the property under question if you are going to be responsible in making a decision. I don't think that's considered improper in any way.

At the time of the tour, if you wish to call it that, in the Hazelmere Valley, Mr. Runka and I also viewed surrounding lands for which application had at some time been made for exclusion, and some other sections of that valley which were under various forms of application for exclusion or permission of other things. It's a simple matter of doing some homework.

MR. MACDONALD: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker. May I ask the minister who requested this trip? Was it Captain Terry? Was the question of the land being in the land freeze discussed by the three of you — Captain Terry, yourself and the chairman of the Land Commission? Was it discussed on that trip? At whose request was the trip made?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: I can't tell you definitively at this time who requested the trip.

MR. G.V. LAUK (Vancouver Centre): You. Did they buy you lunch?

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HON. MR. NIELSEN: The purpose of the tour, of course, was to look at that specific area, to look at the racetrack installation which is there, as you may know, and the other improvements on that property. This had been a long outstanding problem, one which had been left over from previous days. We had an obligation to try and clean up some of these problems by assisting citizens of the province of British Columbia by showing up once in a while.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. SKELLY: Mr. Speaker, it appears that there have been at least two significant problems left over from the former Land Commission that were cleaned up by the present government: one was 320 acres in Richmond.

Interjections.

MR. SKELLY: It's just a preamble, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member....

MR. SKELLY: That appeal was represented by Robert Bonner; this one, I understand, was represented by Leslie Peterson.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. What is your supplementary question?

MR. SKELLY: Has the minister been in touch with either Robert Bonner or Leslie Peterson, or was he contacted by them on either of those proposals?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: I've had the opportunity of corresponding with solicitors for many, many individuals and organizations in the province. Out of courtesy we respond to them. I have also had the very pleasant opportunities of conversing with Robert Bonner in his role as chairman of B.C. Hydro. It's a pleasure to see someone running Hydro who apparently understands the problems.

MR. N. LEVI (Vancouver-Burrard): Could the Minister of Environment tell us — when he's not sure of the date — if there was an application pending before the Land Commission when he visited the farm? If he doesn't know the answer now would he let us know at the earliest possibility?

HANDICAPPED PERSONS' ALLOWANCE

MR. GIBSON: A question to the Minister of Human Resources: Up until October, 1976, the federal government was contributing $110 per month toward the handicapped persons' allowance in the province, making a total of $265 per month. In

October, the federal government increased its contribution by $22.50 per month. The minister's department, in effect, put that in their pockets to increase their surplus and did not pass it on. Will the minister please justify that?

HON. W.N. VANDER ZALM (Minister of Human Resources): Mr. Speaker, I take exception to the comment that we in this ministry put money in our pockets. Whatever moneys we receive, from wherever we receive them, are for the people. We apply them where there is the greatest need. But certainly I will get the answer for the hon. member with respect to the funding or the sharing of the funding.

MR. D.G. COCKE (New Westminster): In light of the Minister of Education's reply on the order paper yesterday to my question with respect to how much ICBC has invested as recently as possible, the minister replied: $272,481,286.08. Mr. Speaker, my question is this: will he now demand that ICBC reduce their exorbitant rates?

HON. P.L. McGEER (Minister of Education): ICBC has the lowest non-subsidized automobile insurance rates in Canada.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

HON. MR. McGEER: They are a wonderful bargain for the people, Mr. Speaker.

MR. W.S. KING (Revelstoke-Slocan): Mr. Speaker, I would request leave of the House to make a brief statement and file documents.

Leave granted.

ALLEGED PUBLIC SERVICE BLACKLIST

MR. KING: Yesterday, during question period, the Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) took as notice a question relating to whether he had received a political blacklist from the Premier's office. The Premier, on the same occasion, unequivocally denied that such a blacklist had ever been transmitted from his office.

On the basis of certain documents which have come into my hands very recently, I have every reason to believe that such a blacklist was, indeed, transmitted from the Premier's office to the Minister of Environment. Reasonable time and opportunity have been provided for both the Premier and his minister to reflect on a question having grave implications and to honestly provide this House with a full disclosure. Serious conflict is evident between the Premier's denial of a blacklist and the documents which I propose to table today.

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One of these documents is a memorandum from the office of the Premier addressed to the Hon. James Nielsen, over the signature of Dan Campbell. It is dated January 9, 1976, and is underlined "personal and strictly confidential." Attached to the memo are organizational charts of the land management branch. Senior staff noted on the charts are identified as either NDP or Social Credit. A list of names accompanying the memo further identifies a variety of public servants for reasons which are obscure.

A further document, which I shall table with the House, is a letter which accompanied the memo from the Premier's office to the Environment minister. This is a letter over the signature of one Klaus Ohlemann and is addressed simply to "Dan." This letter makes a number of allegations against public servants, many of which are false, and identifies the names of senior land branch staff as being NDP. It is significant that the names contained in the Ohlemann letter coincide precisely with the notations contained on the organizational chart emanating from the Premier's office. One can only conclude that the Minister of Environment was aware of the memo since it was directed to him, marked "personal and strictly confidential." It is also evident that the Premier's answer to this House respecting this question was not in accordance with the facts.

Mr. Speaker, I'll table the statement and the documents.

Orders of the day.

ON THE BUDGET

(continued debate)

On the amendment.

HON. W.R. BENNETT (Premier): Mr. Speaker, yesterday we heard a lot of talk from the opposition — the NDP — concerning this amendment, but I waited, my party waited, my colleagues waited in vain for not only those members to address themselves to the amendment, which is very specific, but to make a case as to why they couldn't support this budget. I must say that I was surprised at the wide latitude you allowed them in speaking to this amendment, which is reasonably specific, but I know that as the government members speak today to this amendment you will allow us the same wide latitude in discussing many items of concern to this province.

I, myself, Mr. Speaker, wish to address myself strictly to the amendment, as I will hopefully be able to take my place in the budget debate later this week. However, I would like to — for those in the House who have forgotten what the amendment was about, because the opposition arguments certainly didn't relate to it — refer to the amendment and the question it places on the budget, because the amendment covers a number of subjects.

The amendment says that the budget fails to make provision for fiscal and human betterment of the majority of the people of the province. I reject that.

It says that the budget, particularly in respect to taxation, didn't make for investor confidence. Mr. Speaker, I reject that.

It said it didn't make provision for employment opportunities. I reject that.

Mr. Speaker, it says the budget does not protect senior citizens and handicapped people from the effects of inflation. With the record of the last government, that of the party now in opposition, and the type of inflation that took place while they were in office, how can anybody say that this government, last year or this year, hasn't taken the fight against inflation in this province?

Now that was the basis of the amendment and non-confidence in the budget — a good budget, a budget for this time, Mr. Speaker. The NDP opposite, those members, roamed everywhere in the world. They roamed everywhere but they didn't deal with their own amendment they recycled. The member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. Levi) recycled some of his old debates. They equated services to people with the amount of dollars the Department of Human Resources spends, and that's the former Minister of Human Resources who tried to justify a $100 million overrun with the argument that it went to the people.

His idea is that as long as you shovel enough money out of the back of the truck, that's good management of the taxpayers' dollars, and you can justify it. He should be the minister of shovels, Mr. Speaker, because that's what he did: he shovelled the money out, money of the taxpayers of this province. He shovelled it out with no regard to it going to those in genuine need. He didn't consider that he had a greater responsibility to the taxpayers of this province to guard their tax dollars. All he wanted to do was shovel the money out and try and buy votes. And your motives were very clear.

He doesn't care about people. He just wants to say: "Shovel it out. Vote for me." We even had him sending out little notices to the pensioners at Christmas time, with the former Premier's picture and his picture, trying to take credit for the benefits — supposedly they were coming from the taxpayers of this province. No accountability. Then he tries to write off a $ 100 million overrun as being concern for people. You're just concerned for getting re-elected, and it might have helped you, but it brought your party down to defeat and you'll never come back in this province.

You roamed and recycled your old speeches, as did many of your colleagues. I must say last night I enjoyed the Leader of the Opposition's performance. It's something like Milton Berle — the material was old, but the performance is always worthwhile. I've

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heard the same speech, the same jokes and it's always entertaining, but I wonder if the taxpayers consider that they have already paid him in years gone by for those same speeches, and certainly he could come up with something relevant to the problems of today in British Columbia. That Leader of the Opposition is an enjoyable person, but he certainly didn't contribute to the debate; he certainly didn't make an argument for the opposition against this budget.

Mr. Speaker, a little later in my remarks I'm going to give the opposition some advice on how this budget could be criticized. Any budget can be criticized, because governments must make hard choices. I'm going to help you, but certainly you didn't help yourselves. For years it was suggested — and certainly when you were government — that you might have been an incompetent government, but, oh, you were a good opposition. Well, this session you've proven that not only were you an incompetent government, but you carry that forward into your role as opposition. Let's destroy that myth once and for all.

While the old-timers of the Legislature — the Leader of the Opposition and the member for Vancouver-Burrard — were recycling their old speeches, too lazy to prepare for the problems of today, we had the first member for Vancouver- Centre (Mr. Lauk) roaming up to the Grizzly Valley, Mr. Speaker. He was roaming up there — not dealing with the points mentioned in the amendment, but roaming up — in what has been a standard for his performance in this Legislature this session. Public credibility in what goes on in this Legislature has never been too good, but his performance this session, with the type of statements he's made, his asides — and certainly some asides he's made recently, which were well reported but don't show up in Hansard, and others that weren't reported — certainly have brought no credibility to this Legislature. And during this debate, unrelated to the amendment, he makes the foolish statement that the pipeline will never be built in the Grizzly Valley.

I want to say, Mr. Speaker, that he's going against the advice of the chairman and the whole staff of the B.C. Petroleum Corporation. I want to say that Mr. Lechmer, the chairman, wasn't an appointee to that B.C. Petroleum Corporation by this party. He was brought to that board when the NDP first formed the Petroleum Corporation.

MR. LAUK: Who was the board?

HON. MR. BENNETT: That's not relevant. I only bring it up to point out that he without question.... Mr. Speaker, in defence of him, in defence of the staff of the Department of Mines and Petroleum Resources, I want to say that I appreciate the advice they've given the government, and I appreciate their research for assessing the reserves. I want to say that on their advice, when they invited Westcoast Transmission, which also analysed the proposal to build a pipeline, they have accepted it and that pipeline will be built.

That member has continued to be irresponsible in this Legislature. He needs no further comment from me, Mr. Speaker, because the people are judging him not only in here but in his own party. I want to say that I had hoped for more from that member and that opposition. That pipeline will be built. But I wonder when that statement and others, in which he is totally wrong and totally irresponsible, are proven to be wrong, whether he'll have the good grace to leave this chamber and resign and let those who want to make constructive suggestions for this province come in and take their place.

I'd comment on the remarks from the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea). He's not here. They're not worth commenting on. I think they're the best ammunition we have for the next election, and I will make sure they are circulated widely as that member's contribution to public debate in this province when next we face the people.

Mr. Speaker, let me say that this budget does do something for people in a year when already the NDP government in Saskatchewan couldn't even wait for the session to be called and bring down a budget. They announced an interim budget to raise taxes in that province, and cut back services arbitrarily to hospitals and health care in communities without any question of what the results would be.

AN HON. MEMBER: He's twisting again.

HON. MR. BENNETT: This government has brought down a budget, in what will be a year of tax increases in many jurisdictions across this country, with no tax increases and tax reductions. There are tax reductions for people in need. The most affordable type of housing we have in this province — in a province in which housing has been beyond the reach of many of the elderly and many of our young just starting out — has been mobile homes.

AN HON. MEMBER: Then why are you cutting senior citizen housing from $10 million to $4 million?

HON. MR. BENNETT: This budget cuts the sales tax on mobile homes for the first time. That opposition, when they were government, used to tax those people, Mr. Speaker. The saving will be $500 a unit on average for those mobile homes, the most affordable type of housing. That cuts across age, but deals with those least able to afford the standard type of housing to give some people in this province an opportunity for ownership. I'm proud of that tax cut,

[ Page 550 ]

Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, many people in remote communities in this province have paid a penalty on their fuel for heating and energy because they've been forced to use propane. And again, Mr. Speaker, we've reduced taxes on propane for those people who suffer the penalty only because they happen to be in remote areas, having to develop this province, many of them living in difficult circumstances. They were never cut when that party was government, Mr. Speaker. We've cut those taxes this year.

Mr. Speaker, in a year when other governments are putting up taxes, we're cutting taxes for our people. We're bringing in a realistic budget, a budget that recognizes the revenues available today and a budget that the spending estimate will be able to work within. It is not a budget such as was brought in by the former government — a budget that was brought in by guess and by golly.

We know how they brought in the last budget of their regime, the 1975-1976 budget. They sat around and they couldn't balance the expenditure with the income. So you know what I hear they did? They went to the Finance department and they said: "Let's just add another $300 million to revenue." But they said: "Where will we get it?" They said: "You add a bit here and you add a bit there. We don't know if we'll get it but we hope things will happen." That was a year in which there was a major negotiation going on in the forest industry. No adjustment was made in that budget for the possible effects of a one-month shutdown or a two-month shutdown. We know what happened. That document didn't deserve to be called a budget; it doesn't even deserve to have been called a guesstimate. It was sham from the day it was brought in. They knew it was a sham because within two months they were already trying to, in little places, cut back on civil servants. They knew already that the figures they presented to this Legislature were incorrect. They were not right. They couldn't achieve those revenues. Even then, they were afraid to tell the people.

A lot has been said by that opposition about two sessions a year. Two sessions a year — they say that's a tradition. It's not a tradition anywhere in this country. Saskatchewan doesn't have two sessions. Manitoba doesn't have two sessions. In 1975, the year of the greatest problems facing this province — when ICBC was losing money and they were covering it up with one hand, when the ferries were losing money, when the government was going into debt — did they have a fall session?

HON. J.R. CHABOT (Minister of Mines and Petroleum Resources): No!

HON. MR. BENNETT: One day! They brought us in just to deal with one labour dispute and never shared with this Legislature the coverup that was going on in ICBC, never shared with this Legislature the financial difficulties of this province. They kept the information away from the representatives of the people. Not only that, they sent us home when we wanted to debate other issues because unemployment then, as now, was a problem. They called a sneak election, but even then, Mr. Speaker, the people of this province knew that something was wrong and they booted them out.

They have the nerve to say that two sessions a year is a tradition in this province. The member for Oak Bay (Mr. Wallace) knows that there wasn't a fall session in 1975. You were in this Legislature; so was the member for North Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Gibson) . That was a myth. There was an opportunity for you to speak out because you knew things were wrong in this province, you knew the coverup was going on. We were denied the opportunity. But that party over there still continues to try and spread the myth that they were somehow democratic and held two sessions a year. Yet in their darkest hour, an hour we'll never let this province forget, they covered up. Even when the session was here, they ended it in a hurry, sent us home in a hurry, so we wouldn't have the opportunity to ask questions.

Mr. Speaker, we've given you an early opportunity this year to deal with problems. This is the earliest that what is called the spring session of the Legislature in this province has ever been called. It met and assembled on January 13.

There is a lot to discuss because there are a lot of problems in this province, as there are in this country — a lot of problems that don't allow us the type of revenues or the type of budget to spend all the money that we'd like. We'd like to, do a lot more. But, Mr. Speaker, mortgaging the future to pay for just current account or current expenses today is no answer.

One only has to look at the deficit that was left by that last government to realize what deficit financing does. They talk about a loss of $25 million in us reducing taxation that we hope will encourage investment in this province and allow British Columbians an opportunity to maintain the rewards of their work and their labour and allow them to stay in British Columbia. We hope it will encourage future generations to stay and not sell out to foreign corporations and others who don't face that type of taxation.

The deficit from last year was $400 million. Luckily, earlier governments had put some money aside for a rainy day and there was a continuing budget surplus of $140 million that only made a deficit of around $260 million, in rough figures. But at the 10 per cent interest rates that were going last year, that interest debt, just on that one year, would be $26 million of spending power taken away from

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the people of this province by the way they managed the economy.

One has only to look at other provincial governments who, unable to deal with meeting the needs of the day with the money available during that day, have gone for deficit budget after deficit budget. Let's take a look at Tory Ontario. Today a large part of their budget, because of the way they ran their government in the past, goes to pay interest and is taken away from the opportunity to provide services today, much-needed services for the people of Ontario — millions and millions of dollars. .

In British Columbia, Mr. Speaker, as I say, we'll be paying this year, as we will next year, interest on that debt left to us by the NDP. But we won't compound the problem for future generations. I'm hopeful that we can build the economy and eventually sometime pay off that debt. But we're not trying to pay it off now. That debt will remain and be visible to the people of this province to remind them of that government for many years to come, because we need every available dollar now for services to the people.

If you want to know where some of the money has gone and why $20-some-odd million isn't available for services this year, he shovelled it out of the back of his truck when he was the Human Resources minister, Mr. Speaker, trying to buy favouritism by shovelling it out indiscriminately. He was not caring, just sharing, but not sharing his own — sharing the taxpayers' money to make them think he was someone special.

We have a responsibility in dealing with the taxpayers' dollars: getting value for their money and also meeting the needs of the people. It's a double responsibility. Mr. Speaker, we'll always try to meet that responsibility in this government. I'm proud of that Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), who recognizes his dual responsibility in this province.

Some of the debate on this amendment has been amusing. They had one of their members — I can't remember which one it was; I think it was one of the newer ones — trying to mix up the Legislature, trying to say that in this budget $300 million was taken out for coal development in the northeast and $ 100 million for the Grizzly Valley pipeline. That has nothing to do with this budget. I feel sorry for that member. Maybe his colleagues confused him. But I feel sorry for that member because those dollars don't deal in this budget.

The Grizzly Valley pipeline will be built in the private sector. Any money going for actual coal development will be spent by the private sector. This government, when it unfolds its economic plan for this province to try and get things moving, will only deal in those areas where public funds go to public facilities.

Let's not be fooled by the type of silly argument and silly speeches that took place yesterday in this Legislature. Let's talk about what a budget means and what a budget is all about. It's assessing the ability of the present taxpayer to send dollars to government and it's assessing the essential programmes that must be carried on and given first priority in any given year. I take no comfort in the fact that we only have a limited amount of dollars this year. I would have hoped it would have been higher.

There are some over there who would try and tell this chamber that we've underestimated our revenues. Let me say, Mr. Speaker, that a lot of thought and research went into preparing the budget this year. Do you realize the difficulty of presenting this year's budget? There are many factors out there that can affect the revenues of this province in a very real way, the major one being that, for the first time, we have major labour negotiations taking place in this province: roughly 65 per cent of the organized work force in this province, covering the total forest industry, the total construction industry, transportation, hydro, government employees, the B.C. Railway, and others. Any one of these negotiations ending with a major shutdown will affect the revenues of the province — any one.

If we have a trouble-free year of restraint and of settlements with no shutdowns, I could say the revenue would be higher. But any government that predicated its spending on such wishful thinking would not be worthy of the office, because governments have to be realistic and have to assess the true economic climate and all the variables and possibilities in a given year. At the same time, we're not predicting complete irresponsibility in every negotiation, with resulting chaos this year. We think the answer may lie somewhere in between. That is how we arrived at these revenue figures. But I want to caution this Legislature, and all members on this side of the House and opposite, that major shutdowns, major strikes, will affect the best estimates of this government and our financial advisers. And, yes, a perfect year of responsibility within those negotiations would provide us with more dollars than we have allocated for spending. I hope that happens.

But those dollars won't be lost to the people of B.C. They'll be there for further benefit because, as I said, if there's anything to criticize on this budget there's an area left out, an area of commitment that we've made as a government, and an area to which I have heard various members on all sides of this House refer from time to time, and that is regarding the revenues from non-renewable resources, because in this budget, as we did last year and as has happened in other years, all the revenue from non-renewable resources has gone to pay for services today. That's not fair to our future generations that we take the full value of a non-renewable resource to pay for benefits today. That's like deficit financing.

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We say, and I say, Mr. Speaker, that if there is a surplus, if we have a responsible year with no shutdowns and it creates a surplus, under a formula that we will be advancing later during our mandate to this House, we will be advocating a permanent future citizens' fund, or heritage trust fund if you will, to allocate a proportionate share from the non-renewable resources to be held in trust and used now and for the continuing benefit of those who will come in the future — our children and our children's children.

It's folly, Mr. Speaker, that we continue year after year after year to take all this money and spend greedily, shovelling it out of the back of the truck like that former government used to do, with no regard to the future.

MR. MACDONALD: You're giving it to the oil companies and you know it!

HON. MR. CHABOT: You're jumpy today.

HON. MR. BENNETT: I want to say, and to make this commitment to this House, Mr. Speaker, that this government, given the opportunity of a growth rate that would be exceptional if we could count on full labour-management peace this year, if we could count on responsibility out there in the private sector, if there were no shutdowns, would allocate that money to be the first dollars available for such a fund for future generations and ensuing budgets. We'll quite properly set aside a share of non-renewable resource revenue for future generations. Let me say, Mr. Speaker, that this is something the opposition could have brought up on this budget.

MR. LEA: We did!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

HON. D.M. PHILLIPS (Minister of Economic Development): You're on your way out the door.

HON. MR. BENNETT: They never mentioned the dollars. They're the shovel-out-of-the-back-of-the-truck gang, and never forget it — spend the people's money, not for their benefit but in trying to make believe that they're Santa Claus.

Mr. Speaker, this budget meets all the criteria of responsible government planning. It deals with expected revenue, taking into account the economic climate plus the labour-management situation as it may happen during the coming year. It provides a priority of government services that we can afford this year, and which must be kept at all costs, and they will be met.

In the following year, when I know we'll have labour peace in this government, and we'll have more dollars, many of the things that our members and the members opposite have advocated will become part of the continuing programmes of benefits for people. In this province. You can't deliver everything at once. This year we have dealt within the framework of the existing economy and existing expectations.

There's more than just British Columbia: we are part of the Canadian economy. There have been predictions — not by us, but by economic analysts in the east — that British Columbia will be one of the bright spots in what is a lagging economy in Canada. They predict a very low growth rate — a real growth rate — in Canada this year, and British Columbia and Alberta are predicted to be two of the bright spots.

Those predictions are still not good enough. They deal with growth rates less than 5 per cent, or just over, of the gross provincial product. Our own estimate is that our gross provincial product will grow at something between 5 and 6 per cent. This again is averaging against the most likely amount if disruption in the private sector due to labour disputes this year — disputes that I hope won't happen.

Interjection.

HON. MR. BENNETT: No — disputes that I hope won't happen. I sincerely hope they don't happen. As I say, if they don't happen there will be money there for the non-renewable resource fund, for the heritage, for our future generations. Mr. Speaker, it's important to us that there be no disruption. I hope that no one in the House, and certainly outside it, will use those disputes or inflame them politically for their own advantage, because it's British Columbia's future that's at stake and it's beyond the politics that any side would play — the professions, the unions or management — for their own short-term political benefit in what is a very key year for British Columbia. We've never had a year — as the former Minister of Labour would appreciate — with so many agreements up for negotiation. It's our own best efforts, all of us, to make sure that we don't inflame what will be a very delicate situation.

Someone brought up a point about whether we have an economic plan for this province. Yes, we do. Right now there are major negotiations, in fact six, going on with the government of Canada. Those negotiations have been developed over the last year by this government as part of government policy.

MR. GIBSON: You could have let the House have the information.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Yes, the House would be let known.

Mr. Speaker, as a matter of fact, those negotiations cover the northern transportation corridor, which is port, rail and highway facilities. They cover the

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Northwest Rail Agreement, they cover the northeast coal and they cover a DREE agreement for British Columbia, because everyone knows that under the last government there was very little DREE money made available to build industry and build the economy in British Columbia.

We have an ARDA agreement running out, and which must be renegotiated. An area that was neglected by that previous government, the coastal ferry system — we have a major proposal before the government in Ottawa so they don't abrogate their responsibility, not just on the part they abandoned recently, but on contributing to ferry service on the total Pacific coast, relative to their participation and involvement in the ferry service on the Atlantic coast of this country.

Interjection.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, the former aide to the Prime Minister, who was trained in Ottawa and who is now the Liberal leader and the member for North Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Gibson), says: "File the documents." I want to advise him that I am hopeful, but I can't guarantee it, but when I come back from Ottawa — because I'll be visiting Ottawa next week for a series of meetings concerning some of these agreements — perhaps I may have some good news for this House. If I have conclusive good news, then I would be very pleased to file documents, or table documents, in this House. But that member may know better than I the attitude of his former colleagues in Ottawa.

But, Mr. Speaker, we're not going to Ottawa to be compromised as a junior partner in some political party, or in conflict because we support an opposition party. We are going as the government of British Columbia dealing with the government of Canada. We are going there in a spirit of cooperation at a time when the government of Canada could have an opportunity to make a significant gesture to the people of British Columbia. Many of the concerns we feel that they haven't shown for this province, many of the areas in which they haven't, in our view, dealt fairly with this province in the past, many of the areas that need cooperation can be rectified at a time when they must signal that Confederation works in this country, and that Confederation is for all provinces and all regions, and that British Columbia will be allowed to be a full participant as a contributor and as a recipient of federal programmes.

So hopefully, from my discussions next week in Ottawa, Mr. Speaker — hopefully — I may have some good news or, at least, some good news of good intentions on the government of Canada's part when I come back.

Interjections.

HON. MR. BENNETT: In dealing with that, Mr. Speaker, I'd like to say that as policy, through legislation and with this budget, this government is meeting its obligation to the people of this province. The amendment that was suggested and moved in this House by the opposition hasn't been supported by fact, hasn't been supported by good debate. Mr. Speaker, the arguments of the opposition are just that — argument only, no substance in fact, just a recycling of their old speeches from days gone by.

AN HON. MEMBER: Right on!

HON. MR. BENNETT: This government is meeting, within the framework of revenues available, the needs of people this year. Mr. Speaker, this government is meeting its obligation to correctly and fairly make sure that every taxpayer's dollar is spent wisely and well to the best benefit of the recipient as well as those who pay the taxes in this province. This government, by its action in joining the anti-inflation programme last year, in our cooperation and in the example of restraint we've shown, has certainly done its part to try to control inflation and high prices that have affected all of our citizens, especially our seniors who are on a fixed income.

Mr. Speaker, in this budget this government has outlined areas of trying to meet the high unemployment this province continues to face in the area of summer employment through regulation in the economic plan that we are negotiating with the government of Canada for the betterment of the economy of the people of this province.

It's with this, Mr. Speaker, that I reject the amendment, that this government rejects the amendment. While there are areas in which we'd all like to spend more money, there is no more money this year. But hopefully, with sound financial management next year many of the concerns that we all express about meeting further needs in health care and income support can be met by this Legislature for the benefit of the people of British Columbia.

MR. D.D. STUPICH (Nanaimo): Mr. Speaker, if the Premier's remarks are the best that the government can offer in opposition to this amendment, it's not surprising that they have not entered into the debate until this point. I think the Premier would like perhaps to hear some response.

The best he could offer was some vague promises that there would be something coming some day and this would prove that the opposition was wrong in moving this amendment. Pie in the sky! Maybe you won't have to wait until you die, but someday there will be something to offer in opposition to the amendment offered by the official opposition.

Mr. Speaker, some of the Premier's newspaper interviews, I think, would lead me to believe that he

[ Page 554 ]

would agree that one of the things responsible for the bad year that we have had in the province of British Columbia, the first year under Socred coalition rule, was the political stupidity of that government in introducing the budget speech in the form in which they introduced it a year ago. The rhetoric, the language in that speech, when they tried to tell everyone not only in British Columbia but all over the world that B.C. was in dire financial straits because, as the leader of the Liberal Party (Mr. Gibson) said, this government wanted to take revenge against the people who dared to vote for the New Democratic Party in 1972.... The political stupidity of that speech went around the world and told the people how bad things are in British Columbia. It did a lot to scare people away from British Columbia, did a lot to turn down the economy, in line with keeping the one promise that I can recall the Premier making until he introduced the promise to do away with succession duties: the promise that he would turn the economy around. He then proceeded to turn it down just as quickly as he possibly could.

The economic insanity of the programmes introduced by this government in its first year in office are the things that made the economic conditions in British Columbia so bad last year, and made it necessary for us to move an amendment that points out that the government has failed completely to deal with these questions of fiscal and human betterment.

AN HON. MEMBER: What about our last year?

MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, in their last year in office, t6 New Democratic Party faced the kind of problems that the Premier is anticipating this year and saying that he hopes will not happen. Last year everything was bad because we had had an NDP government. This past year has been bad because of external problems, some internal. There may be labour-management problems. If there are, that, of course, is the fault of labour and management and nothing at all to do with the government. When anything like that happened before, it was the New Democratic Party. But in the past year they've had problems. If they have problems in this year, 1977, obviously they are problems over which the government has no authority to deal — no control. And therefore if anything bad happens it's not their fault. They wash their hands of it. If it was the NDP in office, it would be entirely our responsibility.

Taxation was mentioned in the amendment. So were investor confidence and employment opportunities. I have some figures provided by Stats Can. During our term in office we made this kind of information available to Statistics Canada. It's interesting to note, I think, that during the term that we were in office, unemployment in British Columbia steadily decreased, until that last year when there were labour-management problems. In addition to that, there were distressed economic conditions in the whole of the western world. In 1972, the last year under Social Credit administration, there was an average of 74,000 unemployed in the province of British Columbia. In 1973, the first year under NDP administration, the average was reduced to 67,000. In 1974, the average was reduced to 65,000. In 1975 — admittedly a year of difficulties — the average increased to 94,000. But in 1976, the first year under the new administration that was going to set everything so right, the total didn't go down. It went up. It went from 94,000 up to 98,000, on the average — 4,000 extra people unemployed under this government that was going to show us how to run the economy in the province of British Columbia.

The amendment points out that the government does nothing to protect senior citizens and handicapped from the effects of inflation — and that's true, Mr. Speaker. A reading of the budget will make it obvious that this government is not doing anything to protect the interests of the senior citizens and the handicapped in our province. In the case of Mincome, for example: This has been dealt with previously. The Premier said we had no facts, just talk and just rehashing old speeches. Well, the Premier's making it obvious that he is not listening to the facts, the facts that come not only from the opposition side of the House but the facts that are printed in the government's own publications, in budget speeches and in estimates. Mincome is down $20.4 million. And the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) will boast about saving this money, money that is being taken from the pockets of the most needy in the province. This is a boast!

Mr. Speaker, in all conscience, how can anyone stand up and vote against this amendment on that one issue alone, where we accuse the government of doing nothing to protect the interests of the elderly? The government, by its own admission, is spending $20.4 million less on this one programme for the elderly. Then they deny our charge that they're doing nothing to protect the elderly.

It's not necessary to remind you about the ambulance programme — the degree to which training was cut down and the degree to which new ambulances were not made available. The sick, the needy — the government is taking money from the people who need it most. It's necessary that we move this amendment, and it should be obvious to members on the other side of the House that they should consider supporting that portion of the amendment.

They talk about education in the budget. They talk about all the money they're going to spend on education. Mr. Speaker, it's all very well to say that they're spending more money. But if the additional

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money that they are spending is less than the increase in cost — and it obviously is, as the percentage of the total educational budget paid by the provincial government is obviously going down — then it's all very well for the government to say we're not increasing taxes. But if they oblige the school districts to increase taxes at the local level, they can stand up and say: "Our hands are clean. We're not raising taxes." They're living within the AIB guidelines, but they're having to pay for the increased charges levied by this government in many instances.

They're having to pay more for insurance. They're having to pay more for hydro. They're having to pay more for supplies that are supplied by the government. All of these costs that could have been controlled by this government — and were controlled by the previous government, when we controlled even the cost of fuel oil in this province. The minister responsible for energy now says: "It's up to Ottawa. We're not interested. We don't really want to protect the citizens of this province. We don't really want to protect the people who are paying school taxes. Let them worry about the increase in costs, as long as this government cannot be singled out as the organization that is raising those taxes or is increasing these levies." Well, they wash their hands and say: "We're pure. We can't be responsible for what other people are doing to the economy. We can't be responsible for what other people are doing to taxes."

Pharmacare. Remember the throne speech, Mr. Speaker, and promises in the throne speech about what they were going to do to the citizens in the province with respect to Pharmacare. Then when you read the budget, you find that even if they had not changed the programme at all, they're not providing enough money in this vote to have kept on the old programme, let alone to have improved it. If they are, indeed — as the throne speech indicated — going to make some help available to all people who use prescription drugs, then it's obvious that they're taking some of the help away from the people who need it most — the elderly, those unable to pay for these drugs themselves in many instances. They are the ones who are going to be obliged to pay.

Mr. Speaker, the wording of the amendment obviously commands that it be supported by the members of this House. The Premier criticized some of our members for talking about Grizzly Valley: "What does this have to do with the budget?" Well, Mr. Speaker, you'll recall that some $2 million has already gone out. That's money that BCPC could have turned over and would have turned over to the provincial government. That's another $2 million that would have been available to offer the kind of services which the government is now feeling it necessary to squeeze, $2 million that would have been available. But beyond that, Mr. Speaker, it's a case of a $100 million pipeline with no evidence at all that there's going to be sufficient gas to make that pipeline economically viable; $100 million, when the proven gas reserves are only 20 per cent of what the B.C. Energy Commission recommends as the minimum amount necessary before that pipeline be built; $100 million that will be paid for by the taxpayers of this province if that gas is not found — and it has not yet been found — and yet we're going to go ahead and build that pipeline.

While we don't have enough money to maintain Mincome, while we don't have enough,, money to maintain Pharmacare, while we don't have enough money to build up our ambulance programme, we don't have enough money to pay more of the educational costs, more of the hospital costs, we have $ 100 million to offer to some petroleum company to build a pipeline that may not be needed, may not have enough gas to make it worthwhile building that pipeline. This is the government that was going to show us how to fiscally manage the economic affairs of the province of British Columbia.

Mr. Speaker, how can they avoid voting for this amendment that is so much in line with the evidence as provided by the opposition — not the rhetoric that the Premier said? Someday I'll have something to show you that will make you believe that what we're doing is proper. I haven't got it yet, but I may have it when I go to Ottawa, or when I come back. If not, well, I'll go again some other day, and I may have something sometime. Mr. Speaker, we're dealing with hard information, facts, about the mismanagement of the economy of this province by this government.

No tax increases — the Premier boasted about no tax increases. I've already dealt with the fact that the school taxes are bound to go up. The government has already said that the basic mill rate will go from 32.5 up to 37.5 — the highest ever in the history of the province. Municipalities: there was a promise in the throne speech that there would be a revenue-sharing programme — of course, there is one already — but it's voted; it's in the estimates. The amount of money provided for that programme is not even enough to keep pace with what last year's programme was if you take into account increasing population and increasing costs. This is another promise that is not really going to provide any more services at the municipal level but is going to throw back to the municipalities increased costs — the kind of increased costs that this government has been levying on all the people of the province.

I've mentioned Hydro, Mr. Speaker. I hope that some of the members of the government are getting the same kind of letters I'm getting, from people who are already finding it difficult to pay their Hydro bill — old-age pensioners; some of them in apartments some of them in homes. All of them are finding it difficult to keep up with the increasing rates for B.C. Hydro. Now they're to be asked to pay an extra $3

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for B.C. Hydro billing them: "Please send me a bill. Here's $3." Mr. Speaker, I ask you, and they're asking me, and what do I say to them? I can't say to them they voted Social Credit, because I don't believe those people did. I think those people knew when they had a good government. Those people knew when they had a government that was acting in the interests of the elderly, the sick, the handicapped. They know now that they have a government which is acting against the interests of the needy people in this province, and they are now concerned.

Sound fiscal management — the previous government. They weren't going to mortgage the future. You'll recall the B.C. Ferries deal where the previous NDP government had substantially paid for new ferries. As an example of sound fiscal management, this new government sold those ferries and brought that money into current revenue. It's a nice way of making public accounts balance. But when you consider that we're going to be paying for those ferries for the next 20 years and, at the end of that time, buying them back — if we want them back — is that sound fiscal management? Is it sound fiscal management to be paying something like two and a half times what the ferries cost us when you recognize that we had already paid for these ferries, and the deficit — to the extent that there was a deficit — included the paying for those ferries? Sound management, Mr. Speaker?

As well as selling ferries that we had already paid for to quite an extent, this government started cashing in on special funds — funds which had been created for emergencies — and I'm not saying they shouldn't be cashed in. Nevertheless, this government, for the first time, found it necessary to dip into these reserves.

Mr. Speaker, what about ICBC as an example of sound fiscal management? The answer was very revealing — the answer that came out yesterday. At the end of the year, December 31,1976, there were in excess of $272 million in long-term investments. Of that, $181 million came from taxpayers of British Columbia as a direct grant. You'll recall that ICBC was so hard up, according to the minister responsible for ICBC (Hon. Mr. McGeer) at that time, it needed that money to pay salaries, it needed that money to pay claims. From the day that it received that money — whatever day that was; we don't know when that cheque was chased — from the day ICBC received that $181 million that could have been available to this government to provide the kind of services that they have withdrawn from the people of this province....

That $181 million from that day on has been invested by ICBC and has been earning interest. From the very beginning, that $181 million was never needed, and by December 31, 1976, it was still not needed. ICBC still had almost $ 100 million in excess of the gift from the people of British Columbia, still had almost $100 million invested and was at the point of starting to receive premiums on the new year's insurance.

Is it sound fiscal management, Mr. Speaker, to have taken $181 million out of the pockets of the people of British Columbia and said: "You can't have Mincome, you can't have ambulance care, you can't have Pharmacare — at least not as good as they were. You have to scale down your demands. You have to accept less. You have to practice restraint because we want, as a political weapon, to give $181 million of your money to ICBC. They don't need it, but we have political revenge in mind and we have to show you who's boss. We're going to give $181 million to ICBC just to show you that we're running the show right now." It is political revenge, no other reason for it, but the cost of that is going to be paid by the people of British Columbia for some time to come.

Mr. Speaker, we've talked about alternative revenues that the government could have raised, and the Premier made no comment about that. He apparently hasn't listened although a number of us have talked about the possibilities. The fiscal year 1976-1977, on the basis of royalty increases that had already been announced on coal alone, could have brought in another $15 million and production is increasing year by year. The figure for the year ahead, 1977-78, is possibly up to $20 million. Another $15 million to $20 million last year and another $20 million this year was left on the table. The coal companies are ready to pay it, but this government is saying: "We don't want it. We've got money enough to do the things we want to do. We don't want to do anything for the old people. We don't want to do anything for the sick or the handicapped. We've got all the money we need for the things we really want to do. So we don't want the money from coal royalties. Let it sit there."

The gas revenue — the B.C. Energy Commission recommended a 60 cents per thousand cubic feet on old gas. This government, in its generosity to the oil companies — for whatever reason.... They alone know best why they wanted to be so generous to the oil companies. But obviously they had some reason for wanting to feel generous. Although drilling was increasing rapidly, on the basis of the increase recommended by the B.C. Energy Commission and put in place by the NDP administration, and the drilling rigs were already moving into that area, this government interfered with the B.C. Energy Commission recommendation and said: "No, 60 cents isn't good enough for you people. You've been good to us. We'll be good to you. Make it 65 cents." And what's that, Mr. Speaker? Approximately another $15 million thrown away, that they didn't want from the resources. They were quite prepared to take another 2 per cent on sales tax, another $225 million

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from the poor people of the province and from the rich — everybody pays sales tax but a higher proportion is paid by the poor. They were quite prepared to take another $250 million from people paying ICBC premiums. They were quite prepared to take more money in income tax, in hospital co-insurance charges, all of these direct charges, and quite prepared to shut down the tourist industry, if that's what was going to happen on the Island, by more than doubling ferry rates. They were quite prepared to do all those things and also prepared to give to the coal companies an extra $15 million last year and maybe $20 million this year; quite prepared to give to the petroleum companies an extra $15 million last year for old gas, gas for which all of the costs had already been paid; and quite prepared to give to some 200 or 300 rich estates a year — or to forgive — approximately $30 million in succession duties.

Mr. Speaker, I suppose the one figure that I can recall the Premier giving — the one that I noted down — is that he expects the economy to grow at the rate of 5 to 6 per cent. He hopes it will be better, but that's his expectation. He gave lots of promises and lots of hints as to what he hopes he will be able to do after his trip to Ottawa. But the one hard thing was that he expects the economy to grow at the rate of 5 to 6 per cent. But, Mr. Speaker, where is the evidence of that in estimates? The one real barometer of economic activity in the province — sales tax — and the increase there is less than 4 per cent. If he really expects the economy to grow at the rate of 5 per cent or 6 per cent, then why does sales tax not show that kind of an increase?

If he really expects the lumber industry to show the kind of improvement that the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Wolfe) talked about in the budget speech — and the Premier must be counting on an improvement in the forest industry if he's expecting that total growth in the province — then where is the increased revenue for forestry?

Mr. Speaker, the Premier's own reports and the budget speech that we are debating right now all give the lie to the Premier's faith and hope for the future. He's asking the poor people of the province to practise restraint. He's saying to the resource industries and he's saying to those who might pay succession duties: "We don't want you to practise any restraint. We want you to go on doing what you have been doing very well for yourselves in the past and we hope you do better in the future. You look after yourselves. In the meantime, we'll see that the needy people, the poor people, the handicapped people and the elderly people are kept in control, and that they don't get too much of the good things that would have been available to them in this province had this government not have practised the kind of political stupidity that it practised in the budget last year, and the kind of economic insanity that it has practised in the last 13 months that it has been in office in the province of British Columbia.

Mr. Speaker, anyone listening to the arguments on both sides could do nothing less than vote for this amendment.

MR. E.N. VEITCH (Burnaby-Willingdon): Mr. Speaker, I'm glad I followed the member for Nanaimo instead of the Premier. The Premier gave an excellent address, and it would be like a mule entered in the Kentucky Derby, but not quite so with the former Speaker.

MR. LAUK: You shouldn't talk that way about the Premier.

MR. VEITCH: I'm talking that way about myself.

It's always a pleasure to rise in this House, Mr. Speaker, and take my place in this debate. But before doing so, I'd like the House to recognize two people who are in the gallery, and whom I didn't have a chance to have honoured this afternoon. One is Mr. Art Doig, our constituency president for Burnaby-Willingdon, and the other is Mrs. Jerry Richardson, the editor of the Progress from Maple Ridge. I'd like the House to welcome them.

Your Honour, I've sat through hours of debate on this budget amendment. I've listened to speaker after speaker from the opposition describe this document we are debating as a "millionaires' budget." I note with pride that $2.5 billion or 65.2 per cent of the total budget is committed to Education, Health and Human Resources. Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that this budget is designed for all of the people of British Columbia.

I believe that the time when people should be paying taxes to provide services for other people in any jurisdiction should be when they are able and well. This budget recognizes this. It recognizes it in allowing 65.2 per cent of the total revenue to be expended at times when people are unable to help themselves.

Conversely, I was gratified the other evening to hear the hon. Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) explain the method whereby they have tracked down and mitigated those number of people who are, in fact, ripping off the system — not those people who are unable to help themselves, but those people who have found a way to take advantage of the system. You see, Mr. Speaker, what the socialists fail to comprehend, as explained by the famous economist, Dr. Louis O. Kelso, in his two-factor theory "The Economics of Reality," is that there is a profound difference between needism and greedism.

The opposition has stated that we are paying off our friends. Indeed we are paying off our friends. Health care expenditures will total $981 million, an

[ Page 558 ]

increase of $101 million over the 1976-77 budget. The hospital care programme received $63.4 million more. Education expenditures total $948 million, up $94 million from the 1976-77 year.

Your Honour, all sectors of our educational system will receive increased funding this year. Income assistance and other social assistance programmes have been allotted $570 million for the 1977-78 fiscal year. As job-creation measures, $70 million more, for a total of $180 million, has been allotted for highway construction. The total allocation for highways will be $336 million. To help our youth as they go through the summer and look for ways in which they may help themselves to pay, perhaps in some cases, for continuing education when they return to their various schools and institutions the following year, the budget has provided $15 million for youth seasonal employment programmes.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, we are paying off our friends — and our friends are all of the people of British Columbia. Our friends evidenced this at the polls on December 11, 1975, and we intend to keep on doing just that.

MR. LAUK: Are your friends helping themselves?

MR. VEITCH: Your Honour, the socialists have said that we have had a depressing year. I do not believe that. I believe it has been a year of building and consolidation. Of course, I don't blame that previous socialist government for the weather, but we must also make allowances for the difficulties which mark the current economic problems which are evident throughout the free world. Those difficulties can tax the whole morale and physical resources of a united province and, indeed, of a united nation. But this province has been marshaled and guided by a competent government during the past year.

The idea when the socialists were in power, Mr. Speaker, was to break up the unity of the province for the sake of their own political interests. The people of the province decided at the polls that that was not what they wanted.

We've been called a coalition party. Well, perhaps we are. What we've done, rather than divide British Columbia, has been to draw the circle even a little wider and include many people from many political backgrounds. That, sir, is the Social Credit government working for the people in British Columbia — our friends, Mr. Speaker.

Freedom of enterprise and freedom of service are not possible without elaborate safeguards against failure, accidents or misfortune. We have realized in this budget that people do fall upon misfortune and we have taken action to help them. This government does not seek to improvidently pull down the structures of society but to erect balustrades upon the stairway of life which would prevent people from falling into an abyss.

One thing, Mr. Speaker, that this budget does point out is that the bureaucratic management cannot compare in efficiency with that of well-organized private firms.

AN HON. MEMBER: Right on! Repeat that.

MR. VEITCH: We were told that management by officials of government is sometimes disinterested management. That may be true. The bureaucrats suffer no penalties for wrong judgment as long as they attend their offices punctually, do their work honestly and behave in a polite manner towards their political masters. They are sure that their jobs and their pensions will be there. Sometimes, however, they become disinterested in the directness of their judgment,

The ordinary private trader, as you know in your own lives, faces impoverishment or perhaps bankruptcy if he cannot measure things right from day to day. Those who show themselves unable to do this are replaced by more capable persons and organizers. Those key industries which the socialists opposite seek to nationalize cannot be ruled by people who have no interest in being right and suffer no consequences for being wrong.

Mr. Speaker, certainly we require a competent, well-motivated public service. I commend those public servants, most of whom take great interest in their vocation and do their very best within the system. However, the settling of the complicated problems of this province completely by boards or committees, some disinterested, cannot possibly enable British Columbia to live and maintain her present level of expectancy. I firmly believe that nothing less than the complete discrediting and abandoning of socialist conceptions about industry can make our province run efficiently.

I know, Mr. Speaker, that old radical campaign against exploitation, monopolies, unfair ripoffs and the like is probably a healthy and necessary corrective measure to be taken towards the system of free enterprise. But the grotesque idea of managing vast enterprises by centralized direction from Victoria, Ottawa or anywhere else can only lead to bankruptcy and ruin. Mind you, the loss of these industries is confined not only to those nationalized; that is not the only question. There is also a question that has been evidenced by many of the industries that the NDP bought in their three and a half years in power — the transfer of debt is placed directly upon the shoulders of the taxpayer.

Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, the reason why this government had to increase ICBC rates over the past year was precisely for that reason.

MR. LAUK: Three hundred million dollars in the

[ Page 559 ]

bank, Elwood!

MR. VEITCH: Are you the member for Durntown? You'll have your turn later on. (Laughter.)

Socialist experiments will not work. They can only ferment bitterness, enmity, strife and disillusionment in the societies that undertake these experiments. This is contrary to the nature of the people of British Columbia.

AN HON. MEMBER: Hear, hear!

MR. VEITCH: A very wise man once told me that you can't separate what you are from what you do. As politicians, we cannot practise budgeting and fiscal responsibility in our own homes and our own businesses and then spend the moon, which we do not own, once we are elected to public office. Mr. Speaker, to be successful as home-builders, workers, businessmen and politicians, we cannot afford double standards of value.

Your Honour, we have the capacity for great economic growth, but the rate of growth rests with all segments within our society. A growth society requires a government that, while providing emphasis for growth, leaves the job largely up to the individuals. Conversely, it also provides the duty to stop those individuals who would extract more from the system than they are willing to put into it from executing their deed.

Your Honour, it's up to us as citizens of this province — indeed, of this country — and as legislators to tell that greedy minority that the will and philosophy which gave us the standard of living we have today is here to stay and that we will not allow that philosophy to thwart us on our goal of recovery.

Mr. Speaker, our government has never said that recovery will be swift or easy. The minister, in his budget address, made no extravagant promises. I think it would be a terrible thing to buy power in this point in time by making promises that would be impossible to fulfil without mortgaging our future.

MR. G.H. KERSTER (Coquitlam): Hear, hear!

MR. VEITCH: Mr. Speaker, I believe the average citizens of British Columbia understand this, and they understand one more' 'thing. The hon. members opposite will be told this loud and clear when they go to the polls at some future date. To quote the late Sir Winston Churchill: "How easy to fall; how hard to rise." I know, Your Honour, that the opposition will continue to natter and pound away at us as the government presents its programme for the betterment of the people of British Columbia.

AN HON. MEMBER: They fall, never to rise again.

MR. VEITCH: It reminds me somewhat, hon. members, of a friend of mine who was about my size and has a wife about five feet tall and weighs approximately 100 pounds. The wife continues to literally beat up my friend physically. I asked the big lug one day: "What do you put up with it for?"

"Well," he replied, "it doesn't really matter. It doesn't hurt me much and it seems to give her so much fun."

AN HON. MEMBER: Kiss and battery case.

MR. KEMPF (Omineca): Make a note of that, Gary.

MR. VEITCH: Mr. Speaker, my wants are not unlike most other British Columbians. What I want, sir,, is the right to be able to move ahead of my own volition, and the right of security for my family and myself in times of need. I want the opportunity, if I so desire, to be part of the action and to make things happen in British Columbia. I want this government to succeed, and, somehow, I know that all of these things are inseparable one from the other.

I believe it was Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, who was a French journalist-politician, who many years ago said:

"Many men of goodwill will expect from a political manifesto the key to all their problems. They anticipate it will bring heaven slightly closer to earth. But it is not only the limits of human reason that forbids such an undertaking. There is also respect for life and freedom. Infallible thoughts are closed systems."

Over the last few days I've heard many of the doom-and-gloom boys and girls saying that there is no opportunity, no hope, in British Columbia. My friends, when things are slack, what we would be better off doing, rather than holding back our province, would be to push it ahead. Your Honour, the standards we have today, the huge wonderful cities we have built and the industrial activity throughout our province didn't happen all by itself. It didn't just simply burst forth one sunny day and it didn't come about by an Act of Parliament or the actions of government. No, Your Honour. It came about by people doing things for themselves. People who could see a little farther ahead than the ends of their noses.

Mr. Speaker, hon. members, this government realizes that in a competitive-enterprise society, the innovative wheels of industry must be allowed to run free if we are to progress. That is not only true of our people and industry. It is also true of the fuel that makes things happen — and that is capital.

[ Page 560 ]

For a moment, I'd like to quote from Dr. Kelso and his address to Hubert Humphrey's Senate committee.

"Although income-plan tax policy as it affects estates and gifts is a book-length subject, the basic policy changes needed, primarily and initially at the federal and national level, can be briefly summarized.

"Federal estate and gift taxation in the United States and Canada provides a very minor source of revenue. It has the effect, however, of driving the capital of large estates into tax-exempt foundations. Capital thus impounded can no longer serve the purpose that the factor must serve in a private-property economy. When capital is transferred from individual ownership to foundation ownership, the invisible structure of enterprise in which the foundation owned securities ceases to connect productive capital and the benefits of its ownership with individuals. As a factor of production, capital so diverted becomes non-people-connected. In effect, the capital becomes owned by government. The wealth it produces can no longer be used for the benefit of individuals, but only for the public purpose as they are determined by the ruling bureaucracy.

"On the other hand, individuals who might otherwise acquire ownership of such capital are deprived of the economic opportunity it could provide them in making a productive contribution to the economy.

"On the other hand, the ever-present inadequacy of the purchasing power of individuals to consume wealth that is produced, or potentially for the purchasing power and efficiency to be produced, is' aggravated. Capital is a factor in production. It is just as critical that it be coupled in reasonable-sized holdings with individuals, who are thereby enabled to become both producers or more productive, and consumers or more affluent consumers, as it is that labour power be privately owned by the individuals."

"The transfer of capital ownership to large, general-purpose foundations destroys the possibility of such individual relationships. Not only is the concentration of the philanthropy in the hands of a few a social evil, but because of the ownership concentration process on which it rests, it is a direct cause of non-ownership of capital by millions of families. It is one cause of the evil of poverty to which the philanthropy sometimes addresses itself. It is, in short, an arrangement which prevents millions of families from becoming more productive through capital ownership. It contributes to needless redistribution of the concentrated holdings of capital, both before the capital is trapped in foundations and afterwards.

"We estimate that more than one million new, viable capital estates per year could be created through a single measure if estate taxes were reduced, thus enabling each year over one million more families to increase their affluence-producing power through capital ownership."

That is something a socialist would never understand. Our government is completely cognizant of the fact that taxation is necessary in order to derive the funds that provide necessary services for people. But unlike that former government attempted to do with the mining industry, we are unwilling to kill the goose that lays the golden egg. Mr. Speaker, when we took over as government, that goose was very sick indeed. But I am happy to report that the illness was not terminal, and thanks to sane, proper taxation regulations, the mining industry is now well on its way to recovery.

Capital will become available. Risk capital will become available through the actions we have taken in this budget' There are enough natural risks in the marketplace without having to deal with an administration that will harshly tax you and add to the dilemma.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, there are opportunities in British Columbia today, many opportunities.

MR. LAUK: There's $100 million in personal income tax — the biggest increase in the history of the province.

MR. VEITCH: You'll have your time later, hon. member. There's a story I like to tell, and perhaps this is my text, hon. member, and you should listen to this one. There is a little girl walking along the street, and she held her brother by the hand. The little boy had his eyes closed. A man walked up to her and said: "Little girl, what's the matter with your brother? Is he blind? Is there something wrong with him?" She said: "No. We're going to the picture show. When we start out from home he always closes his eyes, then when we get inside where the theatre is dark, he opens them and finds us a couple of seats."

We have to have a little vision in these times in British Columbia, as men and women have done in the past. I know that we are not in any utopia or any millennium, or whatever that is. We want prosperity, and we want it right now, and we want it quick. But we won't get it that way. What we need is sustained, steady growth. Someone once told me if you want to enjoy the fruits of an orchard, you must have planted it a long time ago.

Mr. Speaker, this government, through the budget, helps provide the thrust for that growth. It is for this reason that I totally reject the amendment.

[ Page 561 ]

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Minister of Education.

HON. MR. McGEER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MS. K.E. SANFORD (Comox): What about all that money ICBC has? Why don't you give it to the people?

HON. MR. McGEER: I see that the opposition is beginning to chirp away about the Crown corporation that is offering to the public of British Columbia the lowest non-subsidized automobile insurance rates in Canada. I might add that as a result of the replacement of the board of directors from cabinet ministers to businessmen, it's also offering the best service in Canada to its customers. But that's the difference between this side of the House and that side of the House. Mr. Speaker, I might say that I didn't write the legislation under which ICBC was set up; it's merely my responsibility to help make it work.

This amendment we are discussing today is, I think, one of the shallowest amendments we've had in years in this House.

MR. LAUK: It's one of your old ones.

HON. MR. McGEER: For example, it talks about investor confidence. I can tell you that when that member was the Minister of Economic Development you might as well have hung a sign on the door saying: "Out to lunch for three years."

MR. KEMPF: He still is.

HON. MR. McGEER: Our biggest problem in building up investor confidence in British Columbia is convincing people from all over the world that this man will never be the Minister of Economic Development again. I can tell you that the best way that we can find, Mr. Speaker, to build up investor confidence in British Columbia would be to have the businessmen who could build this economy come and listen to that opposition for one day in the House, and then they'd know they're never coming back.

MR. LAUK: Tell us about the economic development you're providing for us now. Tell us about the glowing pipeline.

HON. MR. McGEER: I'm going to talk, Mr. Speaker, about some of the long-range plans, as well as the short-range plans, that this government has for putting British Columbia on the road to recovery again. It is impossible to clean up the kind of rubble left behind by the NDP in a single year. They weren't able to do it in Saskatchewan, we aren't able to do it here in British Columbia, and I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, they're a worried and divided NDP in Ontario when the people of that province have the example of British Columbia to look at as something that could happen to them.

HON. K.R. MAIR (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs): Right on!

HON. MR. McGEER: Well, Mr. Speaker, if we're going to cope with employment opportunities in British Columbia for our coming generation, it is essential that we provide them with the kind of education that will give them the skills they need for jobs and that we have the kind of investment that will build the industry to supply those jobs. These are the twin thrusts of this government; these are the two priorities; and this is how we build for our children and our children's children.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

HON. MR. McGEER: It is my responsibility, Mr. Speaker, to help to manage the large spending portfolio in government, when you consider the contributions made by local taxpayers, namely Education. I would like to describe just a few of the things that this department is doing with the funds made available by the Legislature, within the competency of the taxpayers of this province, to provide these opportunities.

As you know, in the past year we've had a number of commissions examining the state of education in British Columbia from top to bottom. At the same time, we've been examining the relationships that this government has had with the federal government with respect to post-secondary education, because the federal Act passed in 1967, in principle at least, indicated that the federal government would contribute one-half of all the post-secondary education costs in lieu of giving tax credits to the provinces.

How has that worked in British Columbia? Mr. Speaker, that programme has turned out to be a nightmare for this province. We face this difficulty in British Columbia. We are the province having the fastest growth in the nation. We are the province — thanks to the wages paid here in British Columbia — that has the highest unit-cost. We were the province further behind, a decade ago when this programme was started, than any other province in terms of maturation of these post-secondary facilities. Yet, despite this, we are the province that now receives the least dollars per capita from the federal government of any province in Canada.

MR, LAUK: What are you doing about it?

HON. MR. McGEER: What we are trying to do,

[ Page 562 ]

Mr. Speaker, is correct difficulties that were partly as a result of the former Social Credit government but, in major part, the result of neglect of the NDP when they held office, because, Mr. Speaker, the greatest shortfall that we've experienced in obtaining money from Ottawa has been in the past three years. That's where we've fallen behind.

MR. LAUK: Nonsense!

HON. MR. McGEER: We have made requests of the federal government which, if granted — and we're still negotiating — will bring to this province over $ 100 million more for post-secondary education.

I want to read what our latest estimates will be for what the individual provinces will receive, per capita of population, from the federal government in this coming year. British Columbia, we estimate, will receive $46; Alberta will receive $71; Saskatchewan, $51; Manitoba, $56; Ontario, $67...

AN HON. MEMBER: Per capita?

HON. MR. McGEER: Per capita of population.

...Quebec, the highest, $73.50; New Brunswick, $48; Nova Scotia, $62; Prince Edward Island, $50; Newfoundland, $47.

These estimates for the coming year, unless there are some changes, show that British Columbia is receiving the least dollars. But it's the cumulative effect of this, Mr. Speaker, which is so painful, because over the past decade we've received $300 million less than we would have obtained from the federal government had this money been distributed on a per capita basis.

But, Mr. Speaker, if one takes into account the higher taxation that the province of British Columbia pays to the federal government, if one takes into account the higher cost of providing any service in this province than most other provinces of Canada, one realizes that had we been given the taxing power to run our own educational system in this province to serve the needs of the growing population here, we would have been able to accomplish a substantial amount more than has been possible to date.

When we talk, as we did, about the need to have the spirit of Confederation, we're talking about the powers to the provinces respected by the federal government, and how each province should have the fiscal powers that are necessary to carry out its constitutional responsibilities. That's not subversion.

MS. SANFORD: Separatism!

HON. MR. McGEER: That's not separatism. Separatism, Madam Member, is when you advocate that one province, such as the province of Quebec, should secede from Canada. Every single member of this government — and I would hope every member of the House — is strongly in favour of Canadian Confederation, including all the provinces, including Quebec.

MR. LAUK: Then don't undermine it.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, how do we undermine it?

Interjections.

HON. MR. McGEER: Yes, that's how Confederation was negotiated. Those who understand the history of this country, as that member obviously doesn't, will realize that this is how Canadian Confederation will stay together.

The member for North Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Gibson) — I'm sorry he's not in his seat today — confuses the policies of his government in Ottawa with what's sound for British Columbia and sound for Canada.

Mr. Speaker, we're hopeful that we'll obtain a substantial amount of money in the coming year or two to give us equity in this post-secondary programme with the other provinces of Canada.

MR. G.R. LEA (Prince Rupert): Nothing but talk.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Member, that characterized your term in office — your talk. You drove industries out of this province, and we're trying to bring them back.

MR. COCKE: Who's driving them out now, Pat? They're going. Last one out turn out the light.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, in addition to carrying on negotiations with the federal government to attempt to bring our share of funds in this programme back to this province, we've had a number of commissions which have been studying the performance of the educational system in British Columbia. Some of their reports will be released in the very near future.

Interjection.

HON. MR. McGEER: Yes, all of them will be released, Mr. Member.

We expect within a few days to make available the Goard commission report, which went into technical and vocational programmes in this province. We also anticipate releasing the Gaudry report, which looked into the post-secondary and university facilities, and made some suggestions with regard to how we could bring greater returns to the province of British Columbia from the technological capabilities of our

[ Page 563 ]

institutions.

We've also been inspecting the primary and secondary programme which we offer here in British Columbia. Members will be aware of the fact that we have announced, that as of September of this coming year there will be a core curriculum in place in British Columbia which will be taught in every public school. It will specify those materials which must be taught in every classroom. It will not limit the amount of material which may be taught — that will be the choice of each school district. The ministry will recommend materials that should be taught in addition to the core curriculum that must be taught; the ministry will monitor the success, district by district, of core curriculum teaching.

Mr. Speaker, the ministry is confident that this programme has the support of the overwhelming majority of teachers in this province, as well as the general public. It may not appeal to some educational theorists, but the experience of country after country in the western world, where firm standards have been abandoned, is to create a situation where there are no standards at all.

MR. LEA: Were there standards when you went to school?

HON. MR. McGEER: We've got some advertisements that have been placed in our local press by the B.C. Teachers Federation. That's their privilege to spend the money that they've collected from their individual members. As they say in this advertisement: "Learning is an individual process." And that's perfectly true, Mr. Speaker.

MR. LAUK: Stick to the amendment like I did.

MR. KEMPF: That's what he's doing.

HON. MR. McGEER: But standards must be set for all to see. I suppose if a fault can be found with our educational system of the past dozen years or so, it's the systematic effort to obscure reasonable standards. Effort and discipline are bound to erode under such circumstances, with performance falling below what it otherwise would be.

The Ministry of Education, Mr. Speaker, is anxious to receive submissions on what should be included in the core curriculum material. That's the material that must be taught in every school. We're anxious to receive suggestions in this respect.

MR. LEA: Why? You said it doesn't matter; they'll do it anyway.

HON. MR. McGEER: It's going to be in place by September. Meetings will be held around the province of British Columbia. I hope they'll be well attended. I hope that the members, along with the general public, will make their views known as to what should be included in that core curriculum — to myself, to the curriculum development branch of the Ministry of Education, to the local school boards.

MR. LAUK: Will you make changes?

HON. MR. McGEER: Of course we'll make changes, Mr. Member. That's the whole idea of public discussion of the core curriculum. But we state that out of these submissions and out of these discussions will emerge a consensus. On the basis of that consensus, the core curriculum will be defined so that it is in place by September, 1977. And while we're flexible on what the content of that core curriculum should be, we have made a decision that there will be a core curriculum. That's the point that I want to make, There will be no compromise on that principle.

MR. LAUK: There always has been.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, these measures that are being brought in to the field of education — the core curriculum for our primary and secondary students to provide the survival skills and to be certain that these survival skills are taught; the changes that we will bring about in post-secondary education and in the technical and vocational sphere as a result of the Goard commission report; the new programmes that we will be introducing in the realm of continuing education as a result of the Faris report; the development of science and technology in British Columbia in cooperation with industry that will come about as a result of the Gaudry commission report — are all designed, Mr. Speaker, to provide the skills and abilities in our future generations. Matched with the great policies of the Minister of Economic Development, the Minister of Finance, and especially the Premier, that will lay the economic base, those jobs will be created and filled by British Columbians and not by people who have to be brought in from outside with those skills, but the best opportunities to our own youngsters. These things are in the future, Mr. Speaker. And the only thing that's holding us back is that those people around the world in whom we need to build- confidence can't be here to see the NDP in action so that they know that this government will remain in power to carry these policies out for the next generation.

MRS. E.E. DAILLY (Burnaby North): Mr. Speaker, just before I start my remarks I wonder if we could have some clarification from you: are we in the educational estimates or the amendment to the budget?

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, we're on the

[ Page 564 ]

amendment which was proposed by the hon. member for Comox (Ms. Sanford) and seconded by the hon. member for Nelson-Creston (Mr. Nicolson).

MRS. DAILLY: Well, I thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, because I understand that the last speaker was supposed to be up defending his government's budget and speaking about the amendment. We still don't know whether he was in support of our amendment or not because he spent his whole time on the Education department, which we all found very interesting but hardly relevant. I could spend a considerable length of time refuting some of the statements which he made in reference to education, but I think that in all fairness to the House we would all prefer to leave that to the Education estimates.

But there is one thing I really feel it necessary to say at this time. The Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) spent a great deal of time on post-secondary education and pointed out that he's going to struggle very hard to get money from the federal government. I wish him well, but the point that should be made quite clearly is that one of the reasons why British Columbia is in the position it is in with the federal government today with reference to educational financing, and the finance formula which exists between Canada, British Columbia and the other provinces, is the policies of the former Social Credit government which that member criticized year after year as a Liberal Party member. Now he is over there with the Social Credit Party.

He criticized over and over again the fact that the former Social Credit government had not done their job in building post-secondary institutions in the years when every other province in Canada was doing so. Because the former Social Credit government did not build those institutions, Mr. Speaker, they were left behind in collecting the federal moneys that were available. They were caught in a squeeze at a time of a very rigid finance formula. So really, it's quite ironic to have that former Liberal Party member stand up and talk about how he's going to get hundreds of millions of dollars back for us, when actually he is faced with a gigantic handicap — the handicap of the party which he now belongs to.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's your legacy.

MR. COCKE: It's your legacy! Don't give us that!

MRS. DAILLY: We are very proud of our legacy, Mr. Speaker.

I won't dwell too long on education, but I want to make one more point. The reason the Minister of Education is in this bind with the federal government is because under the New Democratic Party in the three years we were in office, we expanded the community college system and increased all post-secondary facilities. Now he realizes that because of our massive expansion, which was needed and with which he agrees, he has to get the money from the federal government. So we have given him the opportunity, but he still has a great handicap as a legacy from the government to which he now belongs.

Mr. Speaker, it was a very poor defence of the budget. I listened carefully to find out what the hon. member had to say in defence of this budget. You know, I made a few notes but there is really nothing here to work on. He spoke about the failure of the economy and about businessmen who, if they sat here and listened to our speeches in the opposition, would be so concerned about the NDP ever coming back into government. Mr. Speaker, the businessmen of this province don't even have to come into this House to know what state the economy is in. They are experiencing the failures of this government every day in their businesses outside in the community. They don't need to come in here.

Mr. Speaker, it was interesting listening to the Premier, who stood up and at least spoke to the amendment. But he gave an exceptionally weak defence. Perhaps his mind was not entirely on that particular defence at that time.

Mr. Speaker, we have presented this amendment to the House because of our very great concern for the people of the province, whom we all represent here in this chamber. The budget is a disastrous budget. It's one of the most disastrous that I have ever seen in the I I years that I have been a member of this House. The budget has to be amended. As a matter of fact, it's so bad that even the amendment we've brought in may not bring relief to the people of the province. It should be scrapped entirely and another budget brought in. But we realize that in the parliamentary tradition this is the best attempt we can make to bring to the government's attention how disastrous their budget it.

The Premier, when he spoke, posed the question: "What is a budget?" I made a note of his answer. He had a very simplistic answer. He simply said: "A budget means assessing programmes." So that brings me, Mr. Speaker, to a point I'd like to dwell on for a few minutes, and that is the Social Credit philosophy which underlines this whole disastrous budget. It is that philosophy which has created the disastrous events we've seen in this province since they became the government.

You know, some people claim that they have no philosophy, but they do have a philosophy, Mr. Speaker. Let's examine what the Social Credit philosophy which underlines the preparation of this budget is. Their philosophy is based on the belief that people must help themselves.

[Mr. Schroeder in the chair.]

[ Page 565 ]

We heard that repeated again by the member for Burnaby-Willingdon (Mr. Veitch). We hear it from almost every backbencher who gets up: the people must help themselves, and the government should not be used to help people. Only the wealthy of this province should expect help from the Social Credit government. The rest of the people, Mr. Speaker, I repeat, must help themselves.

You know, Mr. Speaker, they have perpetrated a fraud on the people of this province. They have perpetrated a fraud, because when they were running in the last campaign all their election material made promises upon promises to the people about what they were going to do for the people of this province; not one word about what they were going to do to the people once they became government. So they have created and they have perpetrated a fraud on the citizens of this province. It is shameless, their actions in this budget, and what the budget has produced.

You know, Mr. Speaker, if you watch this government since they have come into office, it becomes quite clear that they apparently just see their roles — particularly the cabinet members — as administrators and efficiency experts whose sole purpose is to produce a balanced budget. At the same time, though, they have another purpose: to look after the wealthy and corporate interests of this province, all at the expense of the average citizen and of those who are in need. The whole thread of this budget, as you go through it, is based on that philosophy.

You know, Mr. Speaker, any government budget must relate to the economy, and any government budget directly determines, to a very marked degree, the performance of our economy. Last night the Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Barrett) referred to the American economy and the actions which have been taken to date by the new American president, President Carter. Now President Carter's economic adviser advised the president, even before he was inaugurated, that there were a certain number of basic precepts which must be followed to revive the sagging American economy. There were two major ones: first, don't worry about a deficit during a recession. I thought it very interesting to hear the Premier drag up that old thing about, "we're not going to leave our grandchildren with huge deficits," when they themselves have just announced a massive borrowing for B.C. Hydro. It's a flim-flam defence of a budget which does have hidden deficits. Unfortunately, this is a period of time where a deficit plan must be brought in in the whole area of the operating costs of the budget, and this is accepted by the top economists of North America.

A steady programme also, Carter's economic advisers stated to him, of government stimulus to the economy is absolutely necessary, because a sustained policy of government stimulus will bring about a sustained recovery. Mr. Speaker, this budget that we have before us follows none of these precepts. It refuses to look at the possibility of a deficit; it is obsessed with balancing the books; it has no policy for a sustained recovery for this province. Somehow all these simplistic economic facts seem to have escaped this government.

But perhaps I'm being too kind to them, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker is nodding his head, so I'll tell you why I'm being too kind to them. I suppose something cannot escape you which you have never had in your possession, and I think it's becoming clearer and clearer every day that the Premier of this province does not have around him any advisers who are going to put this province on the right track economically. There is just one stubborn obsession with balancing the books.

MR. COCKE: And condemning the opposition.

MRS. DAILLY: And condemning the opposition. This is all we hear.

Mr. Speaker, the effects of this budget on the people of this province have been documented over and over again in the House and, at the risk of boring some members, there are some areas of these effects which I want to run over somewhat briefly.

Before I do that, I want to go back again to the fact that the disastrous economic approach this government has taken to the budget is so wrong. It goes against almost every piece of economic advice that has been given to states and provinces and countries today which are in a serious state of recession, which, of course, this province is in right now.

Mr. Speaker, about the only editorial we have seen in a major paper which calls this budget as it really is was in the Victoria Times. I must say that it was most refreshing to find a balanced editorial on this budget, instead of opening up The Vancouver Sun and Province and just reading the usual approval for anything which is brought out by the Social Credit government, and without any analysis whatsoever. The Victoria Times made some excellent points. They were talking about how little this budget has for the average citizen, and they refer, of course, to the fact that the mining interests were certainly being taken care of.

To quote from the Victoria Times: "First royalties were abolished and now a new tax incentive is given to the mining companies." Then they go on to say: "If this coddled industry pays any tax next year, it should hang its head in shame."

Then it refers to the areas where they talk about what there is for people, and as they go through it we find there is very little for the people of this province. As a matter of fact, some of the things they had even last year are being taken away from them this year

[ Page 566 ]

because we find so many areas where this budget has been cut in almost every department — except, rather interestingly, we find an increase in tourism which we will be discussing in detail later.

Before I go into those details, Mr. Speaker, I just want to make a general statement again about the economic situation in this province, as created by this budget. Because of the taxes which Social Credit has imposed on consumers in this province and on small businesses, B.C., in attempting to get out of a recession, starts off with a built-in handicap. If, as a government, you're going to attempt to get out of this recession you already have a built-in handicap because of the taxation policies of the Social Credit government. They have created an annual drop of 4 per cent in the gross provincial product of this province — entirely created by the fiscal policies of that government. So there we are — you start off already with a handicap which has been created by the Premier of this province and whoever his advisers may be.

Moreover, as long as this government tries to balance all the books all at the same time, the costs of producing, the costs of doing business and the costs to families and individuals rises — not only rises, Mr. Speaker, but it rises substantially more than it otherwise would have if this government had not so foolishly and, may I say, stupidly brought in these stringent fiscal policies. As a direct result of the Social Credit policies, B.C. Is the only province in Canada today in which the cost of living, the cost of doing business and the rate of unemployment are all above the national average. That is the accomplishment of the Social Credit government after 15 months in office.

They have placed us in that beautiful position — and let me repeat it again — we are the only province in Canada in which the cost of living, the cost of doing business and the rate of unemployment are all, combined, above the national average, Yet that Premier, his colleagues and his backbenchers have the gall to stand up in this House and say that they know how to run a province, that they are the good managers, they are the people who know how to run the financial and budgetary policies of this province.

Actually, Mr. Speaker, this government is really the most financially inept government this province has ever seen. The results of their mismanagement are facing us and every citizen in this province every day. The people have common sense — they are not fooled — they see it.

You know, Mr. Speaker, the Premier, like the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer), as I said earlier has saddled himself with a self-imposed handicap. His election pledge to the people that he would get the books balanced immediately is leading to the very opposite result, and it's going to take longer, much longer, than it should have to ever get this province back into shape financially. Is this good management?

By deliberately — and it was a deliberate move, either out of direct stupidity or also stupidity combined with a vendetta against the former government — adding to the cost levels in British Columbia, and by implementing a policy of excessive budgetary restraint so unemployment is at a counter-productive level, and in fact is increasing, our cost levels in this province are simply not going to come down fast enough, if they ever come down at all, under this stubborn government.

Mr. Speaker, we all know that the needs of this provincial economy in B.C. are very, very complex. And we know that a blanket policy by government to the effect that absolutely everything will be restrained is guaranteed not to work.

Now I'll spend the latter part of my speech in just talking about some of the specific effects of this government's mismanagement as they relate to the people of our province. I am going to take my own riding of Burnaby North, which is a typical large urban riding. That doesn't mean that I'm not concerned about the rest of the province, but after all, I see the problems that people bring to me every day when I'm in my constituency office. So I look at this budget and I say: "Well, what is this budget going to do for the people of my riding? How is it going to assist them in the many complex problems they face day to day?"

You know, the sad thing is that an awful lot of the government backbenchers don't even seem to realize that this society we are living in today is exceptionally complex. It isn't the society in which their grandparents lived, and yet they want to continue with the same policies that may have worked — and actually didn't — back at the turn of the century.

So how does the budget help the people in my riding? First of all, I look at the young people in the riding. I look at the young mothers with their children. Day care: it is becoming evident every day that it's going to be more and more difficult, through Human Resources restrictions, to get day-care facilities in this province. As a matter of fact, it's going to get to the point again where only the women with money are going to find themselves able to get day care. Or you are going to have to plead on a means test that you have absolutely nothing.

The dignity of the working mother will be taken away from her. So I don't see anything there in the budget to assist in day care. The former Minister of Human Resources had started to move and had built up one of the finest day-care chains in all of Canada. I think that it is a disgrace to see this destroyed.

As far as the young students and our institutions: Burnaby, as you know, has many large educational institutions. It is probably the area that has more

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provincial institutions in it than any other area. We have Simon Fraser University in my own riding of Burnaby North, and then we have BCIT in Burnaby, and the Burnaby Vocational School. What's happened there?

I am glad the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. McGeer) is back. When I make this statement, this does not mean that I think the sky is the limit with educational budgets. I know the minister is quite aware that before I left office, we had already put in some educational-finance restraints ourselves. But the degree to which this new minister and his government have gone is absolutely ridiculous. We are reaching a point where there are going to be programmes that cannot be offered. There is going to be less space for students. Combined with this fact, we've noted that the student aid fund, put in the estimates this year, is even less than it was in the year the NDP left office. On top of that, when we get a chance to hear from the minister, we will ask him why the total estimates put in for student aid were not totally spent last year, when we were having students come to us asking for assistance.

So combined with a smaller student-loan aid programme, combined with lack of programmes and a lack of space because of the restrictive budget given to the minister — or maybe he accepted it, maybe he's happy with it; we'll hear — there is also going to be increased tuition on top of our young people. They have no choice. This is what some of the universities and colleges tell us. Therefore, it will make no difference to any students in this province who are fortunate enough to gain entry to these institutions. Even though they managed to get seats in a university or college, they are going to face many major financial problems to stay there, not only because of the non-availability of aid, but because of the high unemployment rate for students.

So what are we going to get down to? If this trend continues, we will be back to the old days where the universities and higher education will only be for the rich and for the elitist. Does our Minister of Education, who has often been called an elitist himself, have this attitude? Is he not concerned that the average student, or the student of low income, may be denied an opportunity because of his policies, to get to post-secondary education?

MR. WALLACE: Nod your head, Pat.

Interjection.

MRS. DAILLY: I was asked across the floor, Mr. Speaker, to send documents to someone who has been denied.

Interjection.

MRS. DAILLY: I am talking about your philosophy, Mr. Minister. The trend that you are setting in your government in cutting back on facilities in education, in not providing employment and in dropping student loans, means simply that only those with money are going to be able to get back to university. Now you either endorse that or you don't.

AN HON. MEMBER.- That's documentation in itself.

Interjection.

MRS. DAILLY: It's not my responsibility to document this for the minister. If he is concerned, as he seems to be across the floor, you put your staff to work for the documentation, Mr. Minister.

HON. MR. McGEER: Document the wild charges you were talking about.

MRS. DAILLY: I don't have that staff. I am not making wild charges. I am predicting that unless your government changes their whole philosophy on budgeting, this is what is going to happen in this province.

HON. MR. McGEER: If we do give you the examples, will you put them through university yourself?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please! Hon. members, the member who has the floor has been doing exceptionally well in helping me maintain order in the House. Perhaps we should not provoke her to depart from that. Please proceed.

AN HON. MEMBER: Discrimination!

MRS. DAILLY: I would hope, Mr. Speaker, that when the Education estimates come up we can show the Minister of Education that I have not made irresponsible statements.

When it comes to other areas of what's going to happen to the people in Burnaby North, I see that the transit budget has been cut down. Now I use the bus a lot in the riding of Burnaby North, and may I say the service has improved tremendously, all because of the injection of funds by the NDP government. It would be a tragedy to see this excellent service go down, and yet when I look at the transit budget, which will be discussed in more detail in estimates, I think we have to ask the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (Hon. Mr. Curtis) quite a number of questions about what his plans are. It looks very frightening. We will give him an opportunity to tell us if his government has a commitment to keep up the

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superior transit service which was beginning to develop, or are they going to let it slip back down to the way it was in the old Socred days?

Housing, Mr. Speaker, is one of the major problems that any MLA in an urban riding faces today, and I see nothing in this budget to cause me to go back to Burnaby North and tell my constituents that they have hope. It's been said over and over again that housing has been dropped from $10 million to $4 million, and yet these people come into my office day after day and ask what I can do about housing for them.

As the member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) said last night, there are over 8,300 senior citizens waiting for homes, and yet that minister has come to this House with a reduced budget for senior citizens. I'm not looking forward to going back to Burnaby North to tell these senior citizens that things may have been bad last year, but they are going to be even worse for you this year under Social Credit.

AN HON. MEMBER: That would be misleading.

MRS. DAILLY: The minister has said it would be misleading, so we would hope, when he comes, that the minister is going to ensure that those 8,300 people are going to be able to find housing.

But I do accuse the Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs, Mr. Speaker, of gross mismanagement of the housing situation in my riding. There are two areas where I accuse him of gross mismanagement, and one of them is in the whole area of co-op housing. The co-op housing situation in Burnaby had caught on, people were moving and were interested in it, and then suddenly this government makes a decision when they come in that they're going to cut back on an area in Burnaby that was moving ahead into co-op housing. Everything has come to a standstill and the houses are sitting there. I hope that when the minister gets up to speak in his estimates he'll be able to tell me that something has been done to solve that ridiculous situation where the houses are sitting idle.

Secondly, that minister made a decision with another housing project, a large one in Burnaby North, the MacInnes Place — and I remember asking him a number of times last year what his policy, was with that. MacInnes Place, very quickly, Mr. Speaker, was originally, under the NDP government, for rental accommodation, and when this minister came into office he made a decision that it would be primarily sold as condominiums and, I believe, maybe 25 per cent for rental.

I would ask the minister if he has driven in that area recently. Ever since he made his decision, those suites are lying empty. They are empty, and yet at the same time people are coming into my office and asking for rental accommodation. Now what kind of management is that of the housing situation in Burnaby? And this comes from a minister who spent almost half an hour berating the mismanagement of the former Minister of Housing (Mr. Nicolson) . I think he owes the people of Burnaby North an explanation as to why these places are being left idle because of a policy decision made by that minister.

Mr. Speaker, I found it rather ironic to listen to the member, who is very delightful to listen to, the member for Dewdney (Mr. Mussallem). We always enjoy listening to him, but when he made a plea for more grants to small businessmen I wondered if he had looked at the estimate book and noted that the grants have been cut back. How can he possibly then support a government, and a budget, when the main area of his concern is the small businessman and yet his own government has cut back grants to this area? Despite this, he is going to support this government and that budget.

Let's remember that there are areas upon areas I could run through that are affecting the people of Burnaby North — health care, ambulances. Mr. Speaker, I remember the days of the old Socred government, when people needed an ambulance — senior citizens — and before they got into the ambulance they actually had to produce the money. When we brought in the $5 ambulance fee I had people phone up and say to me that this was one of the best things that ever happened to us, and particularly to old people. Now this government has tripled it. Now what's going to happen? Are they going to have to hand over that money again before they step into the ambulance, even though they may be suffering a stroke? Those things actually happen, Mr. Speaker. It looks like we're heading right back into that. It is shameful to move back on that.

If I can go back to the Premier, since he's in the House, I thought it was most ironic that he actually stated that this government is controlling inflation when every major step they have taken since they came into government has been to increase inflation in this province. There was a very excellent letter to the editor, if I can find it, in one of the Victoria papers the other day where a writer had done a tremendous amount of research on the cost of his hydro bill, and how much it had gone up. It was fascinating to read. I wouldn't go into the details now because it was full of figures, but the main point he was making was what it was costing him for his hydro now: the $3 surtax; remember we also have to pay a 7 per cent sales tax on our hydro bill. He said:

"I'm paying more money today for hydro and I'm getting less for it. I cannot keep up with this. My budget will not allow it.

"On top of that, what am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to conserve, put down the heat to save money? Because I won't save money. I can't afford not to have hydro and I can't

[ Page 569 ]

afford to have it. And on top of that, whatever hydro saves, the surplus is sold to the United States."

So here is a man expressing utter frustration at another Socred policy of increased costs. Yet the Premier stands up and tells us, Mr. Speaker, that this government has actually done something to curb inflation. I think we should challenge someone on that other side to give us some evidence of where this government has curbed inflation. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, we really challenge the whole budget but at this time I am taking the only position which is open to us at this time; I'm asking the members of the House to support us in our amendment.

MR. W. DAVIDSON (Delta): Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to take my place in this debate, speaking in favour of the budget speech and against the amendment before this House. But before those remarks, may I first state my regret in learning of the forthcoming resignation of Mr. John Reynolds, the Member of Parliament.for Burnaby-Richmond-Delta. On behalf of the people of Delta, I would like to thank Mr. Reynolds for his service to our municipality over the past five years. I'm sure this view is shared by members of my neighbouring municipality, Richmond.

Too often, Mr. Speaker, the electorate really has no idea of the sacrifices made by those who dedicate themselves to many forms of public service. They forget the long hours, the days and weeks on end away from home. They fail to understand the loss of not watching your family grow up, of working up to seven days a week and having virtually no life of your own. On behalf of the people in my riding whom Mr. Reynolds has served so well for the past five years, I thank him for those years, for his efforts, and wish him well in his new career. The 19,000-vote majority he received in the last federal election says more for him than these few words, and I can only add that I too shall miss a long-time friend.

Now, Mr. Speaker, may I continue the debate against the amendment. Contrary to what the opposition would have us believe, the budget as presented on January 24 is a most responsible document. Unfortunately, there are those who still feel that unless a budget contains massive amounts of deficit financing, huge giveaways and double-digit increases in current spending programmes, it is not in keeping with the times. Mr. Speaker, nothing could be further from the truth.

The people of this province, and indeed, the people of this country, are looking to governments more than ever before to lead by example, and to curb their insatiable appetites for spending. With inflation still the No. I problem in the country, and with government spending still the No. I cause of inflation, obviously a cutback in expenditures of all levels of government will clearly result in a lessening of the inflationary pressures. That clearly is the intent of this budget. There is an increase of only 5.9 per cent over last year's budget, with projected revenues up $243 million to again provide for a balanced budget.

Mr. Speaker, there are thousands of families in this province who know that they simply cannot spend more money than they make. They carefully balance their own budgets, and they expect no less of their elected representatives. Unfortunately too, there are those families — and I'm sure we all know some of them — who cannot balance their budgets, who consistently spend more than they make, who fail to practise any kind of restraint even in the face of the clear understanding and knowledge that they will eventually face financial disaster.

Mr. Speaker, the Lender of the Opposition continues to claim that this budget could never be construed as an election budget — never. Again, the NDP have failed to realize that the people of this province are looking for responsible leadership, and that the people have elected a responsible government, and as long as we continue to demonstrate this responsibility, particularly as outlined in the budget speech, we shall continue to receive the support of the people of British Columbia.

A careful analysis of the budget reveals some interesting facts. For example, $2.5 billion, or almost two-thirds of the total budget, is committed to Education, Health and Human Resources. That seems rather inconsistent with a government which all too often has been so falsely labelled as bottom line.

Almost $1 billion for health.

An increase in the homeowner grant for senior citizens now has raised the level of assistance there to $430.

An increase of 11.7 per cent in provincial revenue-sharing to local government and regional districts.

A $15 million allotment for youth seasonal employment in the Department of Labour.

A total Highways allocation of $336 million.

An 85 per cent reduction in taxation on propane gas for home heating.

Mr. Speaker, this is a responsible budget, a budget which I would be prepared to present to the people of this province at any time.

There can be no mistake that at the present time the people of British Columbia are fighting to sell our products in a fiercely competitive national and international marketplace. We are also fighting just as fiercely for investment dollars from the international marketplace. Each positive step we take now will be returned to us manyfold. Practising restraint and adhering to sound fiscal policies such as presenting consistently sound and balanced budgets can mean a return in our competitive stature and an attraction of

[ Page 570 ]

job-creating capital to our province. This is exactly what the budget proposes and this is exactly what this budget will accomplish.

Mr. Speaker, permit me now to share with you the results of this government's first year as it relates specifically to the people in my riding, the people of Delta, Surrey and White Rock. In the municipality of Delta, this Social Credit government approved grants in excess of $1.3 million for four major recreational projects. Two new ice arenas and two new swimming pools are now under construction and will soon be in use in both north and south Delta. Also in north Delta this government has approved the first phase of the Scott Road widening project, and to the credit of this Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) the installation of bus bays and sidewalks were included in the programme.

In south Delta, the Ladner Trunk Road reconstruction programme, as well as the construction of the Chullukthen Slough Bridge were both negotiated with the municipality, and this project is now in the final planning stages and well underway towards an immediate start. This long-awaited project will tie in with the Ladner beautification project, and the oft-neglected Ladner area appears to be heading into a most promising period in its very long history.

Quite clearly, Mr. Speaker, this is a dramatic illustration of what can happen when there is cooperation between the municipal and provincial levels of government, and with input from the local business community.

Of significant effect is the $4 million programme for upgrading the dikes and straightening River Road to provide more serviceable access to what can be described as one of the most potentially desirable industrial sites anywhere in the lower mainland. This will mean greatly improved potential for the BCDC industrial park and the adjacent industrial area. This development will go a long way towards increasing jobs and revenue for the municipality of Delta.

Referring to the Tilbury Island industrial park, hopefully phase I of this project will be available to prospective employers on either a sale or lease basis later this spring. Projected costs appear to be in the neighbourhood of $50,000 to $60,000 an acre, and since this is approximately one-third of similar and current industrial sites numerous applications should be received in the very near future.

Mr. Speaker, the province also made available a $20,000 grant for lighting at Mackie Park, and this is certainly one of the most worthwhile examples of maximizing taxpayers' dollars for the best possible value. But the real credit here is to the many people who worked so hard at raising private money so this project could go ahead for the people of Delta.

The most important development anywhere in my riding was one which took place last Friday. On January 28 the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland) officiated at the opening of the Delta Centennial 100-bed extended-care facility. This project marked the completion of years of work by many volunteers who gave of their time and energy freely so that this project would become a reality. Not only does this mark another health-care facility, it also stands as a tribute to community involvement, community concern and community achievement. The highlight of the day was the minister's announcement of a commitment to a 75-bed acute-care facility at this location. Mr. Speaker, this can only be described as a dream come true, not only for myself but for all those who have been striving for this commitment from the government for a long, long time.

Credit must go to the chairman and members of the hospital board and a great deal of credit especially to the women's auxiliary. Their work was invaluable in this project. Mayor Tom Goode Jr. and his council and countless citizens and members of the medical community lent their total and complete support to this project. This government's policies of decentralization of health-care facilities could not have come at a better time for the people of Delta. On behalf of all of them, I wish to express to the Minister of Health our deep and sincere appreciation for his commitment on the Delta acute-care hospital.

One of the most significant developments for the municipality of Surrey, Mr. Speaker, had to be the takeover by the province of the administration of welfare — a move, Mr. Speaker, that will save the municipality of Surrey approximately $350,000 in 1976, $600,000 in 1977, and even greater amounts in the years thereafter. This budget's increased revenue sharing, along with Mayor McKitka's commitment to Surrey, has meant that Surrey will be able, again, to hold the line on tax increases. The appointment of a representative of the British Columbia Land Commission who is from Surrey will also have the effect of giving a more direct voice to the agricultural community as well as providing in-depth input into resolving the flooding problems so adversely affecting that municipality.

The fact, also, Mr. Speaker, that the Bridgeview drainage and sewage project was moved ahead from 1980 to 1978 must also be considered a positive step in the same direction. Negotiations with the Minister of Highways and Public Works (Hon. Mr. Fraser) are now seriously underway and look promising for a widening of the King George Highway from 96th Avenue to 56th Avenue. For the many motorists and residents of Surrey using this road, this is welcome news indeed.

Provincial funding assistance for the construction of the Guildford Community Centre was also seen in the past year. The proposal to the municipality on a cost-sharing proposal for the Nicomelct River Bridge

[ Page 571 ]

at 152nd is now under consideration and the approval of this programme will greatly benefit the citizens of both White Rock and Surrey.

The $40,000 grant to the White Rock Library has enabled the city of White Rock to complete that excellent facility and the library is certainly one of which all White Rock residents can be justifiably proud.

A $4,000 grant to the White Rock Summer Theatre Company and a $4,500 grant to the White Rock Community Arts Council were also announced. The Crescent Housing Society senior citizens complex is also underway, and approval has been given to the Evergreen Baptist Home for their 11 0-unit construction programme.

For the constituents of my riding, it has been a most successful first year in these many vital areas.

Mr. Speaker, I would now like to dwell, for just a moment, on the fishing industry in my riding, an industry vital to the livelihood of many of my constituents. One of the most welcome decisions of last year to this body of men was that of the Workers' Compensation Board to remove itself from fishing boat approval procedures and return that authority totally to the Ministry of Energy, Transport and Communications. An additional welcome step, indeed, was the provincial-federal $300 million salmon-enhancement programme, which will go a long way toward returning this natural resource to its once great level. We join in looking forward to the success of this ongoing programme.

It's also appropriate, Mr. Speaker, to comment at this time on the air ambulance service. The commitment by this government on the new policies regarding air ambulance service can affect no greater number of people more directly than our fishermen. The knowledge that the air ambulance service is to be streamlined and the maximum amount payable is to be reduced to fractions of the previous costs — that were borne by these men in particular — is a most positive commitment.

However, Mr. Speaker, I would trust that increased pressure can be brought on the federal government to dramatically increase the search-and-rescue facilities along our coastline. The federal commitment to provide the west coast with two helicopters and one additional rescue vehicle in two years is simply not acceptable, particularly in view of the comparable services afforded to the east coast. In this same vein, Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the many individuals who have worked so diligently in establishing Delta's Coastguard Auxiliary. It can only be hoped that this will serve as a model for other communities with equally civic-minded citizens. Only with such groups of organized volunteers can we ever hope to make even a small dent in the needed requirements for both the pleasure and professional boating public.

The whole area of air-sea rescue as it relates to this province should, however, be the subject of a British Columbia-Ottawa discussion, as the current levels of both funding and service provided is nothing short of a national disgrace.

There is another area of real concern in my constituency, Mr. Speaker, and that is of agriculture. This one-time great vegetable industry in British Columbia, which still contributes over $35 million in cash receipts to farmers, is in a desperate fight for its very survival. At one time, Mr. Speaker, British Columbia produced asparagus, cucumbers, carrots, beets and processing tomatoes. Today these crops are virtually non-existent. Today we are, in fact, heading in the same direction in our pea, bean and berry crops. Ridiculously low import tariffs and restrictive export taxes are making it increasingly impossible for the agricultural community to compete, let alone survive. It is not uncommon that every dollar invested grosses a return of only 50 to 60 cents. Unless we as a government recognize the severity of the economic problems facing the Fraser Valley vegetable producers, there simply won't be any producers left. There is no doubt, Mr. Speaker, that the agricultural community shares the frustration of the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) for British Columbia in his dealings with the central government, but the fact remains that unless income assurance or some facsimile thereof is continued to an even greater degree, then we will look at many vegetable producers who will not even be able to plant a spring crop.

Mr. Speaker, we cannot lightly use the term of saving agricultural land if we are, in fact, prepared to do nothing to protect and encourage our farmers. How are we to rationalize, for example, a philosophy of freedom in the marketplace, a philosophy of open competition and at the same time try and discourage and dissuade our own citizens from shopping for their groceries in the United States when they can save a percentage of their food budget? This is a very real problem, Mr. Speaker, which must be addressed at the earliest possible moment by the minister and his staff and, indeed, by this entire assembly. The federal government must be made aware of problems in this area, and what is equally important, Mr. Speaker, they must join with us in providing alternate solutions. In all too many cases, British Columbia has become the dumping spot for surplus U.S. crops, and were it in any other industry than agriculture, anti-dumping regulations would have been broken on every conceivable front. Can we expect less than equal treatment if this industry so vital to our future food needs is to at all survive?

Much has been said, Mr. Speaker, about the juvenile delinquency problem throughout this province. Remarkable progress has been made in

[ Page 572 ]

Delta with new approaches in this area. I would like at this time, Mr. Speaker, to offer my congratulations on behalf of the people of Delta to those involved in the very successful Delta family court volunteer programme. So encouraging have been the results of this programme that our community has been visited by officials across Canada and from the United States to view this success. Once again, credit is due to the many volunteers in the municipality who have so unselfishly dedicated themselves to ensuring the success of this programme. The members of the Delta Police Force particularly have earned the respect and gratitude of all the citizens of Delta in giving freely of their time and energy in supporting this programme. Without the support of members of the Delta police force, this programme would not enjoy its success, and the youth within our community would not have the alternatives they do when coming into conflict with the law. I trust, Mr. Speaker, that the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom) will approve the grant request to continue this most worthwhile diversion programme and take advantage of the many community-minded citizens who are offering new directions in the field of juveniles coming into conflict with the law.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I have already dealt with the need for a third crossing, the need for redistribution, and the growing alienation of my communities from the Greater Vancouver Regional District, when I replied to the throne speech. What I did not deal with then and would now like to spend a few minutes on is a matter affecting each and every Canadian. That is, of course, the growing movement towards separatist thinking in this province.

MR. KING: Do you agree with McGeer?

MR. DAVIDSON: Yes. Now, Mr. Speaker, I do not pretend to be a constitutional expert, nor do I pretend to have full and complete knowledge of the ramifications and implications of the British North America Act. But you don't have to be an expert in either of these fields to detect the growing alienation between the people of this province and Ottawa, nor do you have to be that same constitutional expert to know that this growing problem is not going to go away by simply ignoring the fact, nor by hiding under a blanket of charged emotional nationalism. The simplest and easiest course, but the most dangerous one, would simply be to blame the separatist phenomenon, a minority of francophone radicals who call themselves the Parti Quebecois and who simply happen to be in the right place at the right time, and are not representative of the people of that province. The fact of the matter is that people in every province are fed up with inequities, waste, and total financial and economical mismanagement. They see the growth of a mammoth federal bureaucracy, which simply filters ever-increasing amounts of tax dollars, grabs for more and more provincial rights and responsibilities, invades areas which have previously been the sole taxation domain of the province and offers virtually nothing in return.

They see massive building projects undertaken to house more and more civil servants and they see continued interference in the marketplace, continued interference in both the boardrooms and the union halls, and they see little value for their money.

Here in British Columbia our influence in deciding matters that relate directly to us is virtually non-existent. We have no input on the very boards whose decisions we must live with. We face inequities in transportation rates, fright rates and almost every government programme that is available to other provinces, particularly DREE. Year after year we go hat in hand, asking for subsidies for our ferries. Not only are we continually turned down in those requests, but the latest Northland Navigation fiasco has served to heap even more coals on the fire.

The bilingual programme which has resulted in making nine provinces bilingual and one province unilingual is another glaring example. This country, Mr. Speaker, is too great to be torn apart by individuals so frustrated with events of our time that they see no other direction in which to go. They see a federal government apparently totally insensitive to the needs of anything but central Canada. They have watched the presses turn out more and more money, and they have watched our national debt spiral to somewhere between $40 billion and $60 billion. They have watched our rate of borrowing go up to 22 per cent of our gross national product, 2 per cent over that of Great Britain, and they have seen how the equalization programme benefits a provincial bureaucracy but does little for its people.

If this country is to retain its greatness and achieve its rightful place in the world community, then, Mr. Speaker, the constitution which presently governs this country must be amended. The federal government must give up some, indeed many, of its present powers. And, Mr. Speaker, nothing could be more irresponsible, nothing could be more damaging than the attempt by any individual to try and gain political marks and cheap sensational publicity by attacking any individual member of this assembly or any assembly when that member suggests that British Columbia, as a province, seeks to wrest some of that power from Ottawa.

No more dramatic illustration took place in this House than the recent Liberal leader's attack on the Minister of Education (Hon, Mr. McGeer) when he put forward that suggestion in his remarks in this House. It is intolerable and abhorrent to think that any elected representative of the people would attempt that kind of irresponsible and divisive nonsense.

[ Page 573 ]

There is nothing unpatriotic in suggesting alternatives to make this country function better, whether those changes be in everyday terms or in terms of long-range constitutional change. Canada is in no way the same country as it was 100 years ago, and the very size of our nation precludes the total central control which is fast pushing us to a breaking point. We are a nation of five distinct regions and we in British Columbia have our individual culture and heritage, just as do the francophones of la belle province. An amending formula must be determined, returning to the provinces their right of self-determination and self-ad ministration, responsive to their own particular needs and requirements and at the same time retaining our national economic bonds, our national cultures and our national traditions.

As a province within Confederation and without constitutional change, our future shall be one of struggle and conflict with the central government. Our First Ministers' conferences shall succeed only in pitting one region against the other to the benefit of none of its citizens. But, Mr. Speaker, under a new federal concept, under a new constitutional make-up, this province and this country shall prosper and dwell in harmony. The central government's continuing course in pressing for even more central power and encouraging even greater federal spending programmes and its pitting of region against region can only result in the eventual disintegration of this nation.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Both provincial traditional taxation rights and provincial self-determination must be regained, and massive double-digit federal deficits must be curbed. Neither as individuals nor collectively as a province or a nation can we borrow ourselves into prosperity. While we, in this assembly, wrestle with the everyday problems which are so clearly apparent to us, I believe that it is our responsibility to just as clearly recognize that the greatest issue facing the people of this province, and indeed of all Canada, is the successful negotiation of a constitutional amending formula. Mr. Speaker, success at these negotiations will mean success for our province, for our people and for our country.

In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I would only like to say that the amendment before us warrants no consideration in light of the responsible budget that has been presented in this House, and I join in rejecting the amendment.

HON. K.R. MAIR (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs): I have been wondering what one says to a motley plate of leftovers that doesn't seem to be able to pose a question to be answered and then raises hob with us for not answering the questions they didn't ask. But I'll try very hard, Mr. Speaker, to....

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Run that one past us again.

HON. MR. MAIR: Sure, I'll throw that one past you again, Don. They want us very much to answer questions they haven't asked.

MR. LAUK: It went past you, too.

HON. MR. MAIR: Fair enough. Well it still passed you too, Gary. Mr. Speaker, I'm very concerned with the....

MR. LAUK: You've got five minutes, Rafe.

HON. MR. MAIR: Five minutes? Thank you very much, Gary. I won't need that much. The first member for Vancouver East (Mr. Macdonald) is very concerned about the price of liquor. He made quite a to-do about it in the House yesterday.

MR. LAUK: Second member.

HON. MR. MAIR: Second member? No, he's the third member. Sorry. I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that it's too bad that the first member for Vancouver East isn't more concerned about liquor consumption, because I can assure you that my colleague and friend, the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. McClelland), my friend and colleague, the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), and my friend and colleague, the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom), are very concerned about the cost of consumption of alcohol. I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that there is no profit to British Columbia from the sale of alcohol in this province. There is a dead loss. There is a loss of considerable millions of dollars every year, and to come into this House and suggest, as he was yesterday, that any windfall profits were somehow accruing to the people of British Columbia as a benefit is just pure whimsy at best and misleading at worst. I wish the first member for Vancouver East were in his place. Undoubtedly he is probably playing tennis, I would imagine. It's a nice day out.

HON. MR. CHABOT: Squash.

HON. MR. MAIR: Squash. That's it. Thank you, Mr. Member.

MR. LAUK: You could use a game.

HON. MR. MAIR: And I think I could beat you, young fellow. (Laughter.) Mr. Speaker, he made quite a to-do about the price of Scotch whiskey, and he

[ Page 574 ]

made quite a to-do about the fact that the value of the British pound fell considerably last year and that therefore somehow the Province of British Columbia had ripped off the people by taking advantage of that situation. Now, Mr. Speaker, at first blush that might appear to be so. However, I have it on the very best authority that the first member for Vancouver East, in the first recorded instance of him checking out the facts beforehand, did in fact phone the liquor distribution branch to find out what the true state of affairs was. He found out that in March, 1976, the liquor distribution branch purchased 200,000 cases of Scotch whiskey at a time when the pound was $1.88, not the $ 1.54 that it fell to later. At the time that the pound had been devalued to $1.54, virtually all the Scotch whiskey requirements for the province of British Columbia had been purchased.

MR. LAUK: Be careful, Rafe.

HON. MR. MAIR: Oh, I don't have to be careful.

MR. LAUK: Deal with wine.

HON. MR. MAIR: We'll deal with wine later, Mr. Member, but I am going to deal with you before I get to the wine. It would be a shame to have the wine before you. (Laughter.) I wouldn't want to spoil the taste, Mr. Member.

Interjections.

HON. MR. MAIR: But, Mr. Speaker, the point is that the first member for Vancouver East came into this chamber alleging some sort of a ripoff when, in fact, if there were any windfall to the province, it would only go part way to offset the cost of alcohol in terms of social destruction in this province. He did not tell the House that he had the true facts at his disposal.

Now, Mr. Speaker, the first member for Vancouver East, also with humour, and with a great deal of piety, spoke about the Scotch whiskey distillers and how they were somehow discriminated against by the Province of British Columbia in their dealings with them in terms of price. Well, Mr. Speaker, there has been, in effect, a subsidy to Canadian whiskey distillers since time immemorial in this province. Now it may very well be that this ought not to be so. It may very well be that the Canadian whiskey distillers no longer need this effective subsidy. But if this was such an offensive thing, why did the first member for Vancouver East do nothing about it during his three and a half years as Attorney-General? Come to think of it, Mr. Speaker, what did he do during those three and a half years as Attorney-General?

HON. MR. CHABOT: He played squash.

HON. MR. MAIR: Squash, yes, and put on kilts and played tennis with Bobby Riggs on the lawn. He passed two liquor Acts. I forgot about that. Of course, he didn't proclaim them — just passed them. He drew up regulations, which he didn't proclaim, because he hadn't proclaimed the Acts which gave rise to the regulations in the first place.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: Oh, because he's never here, just like you. You should be out with the member for North Vancouver–Capilano (Mr. Gibson) — I understand he is practising law today. That's where you should be.

MR. LAUK: I don't need the practice.

HON. MR.MAIR: Oh, that's not what your colleagues say. That's not what your clients say either. (Laughter.)

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: No, most of them are presently in jail. At least I left them in freedom. (Laughter.)

Mr. Speaker, he did do a couple of interesting things, though, and I hope he's listening on his squawkbox, although that's highly unlikely at this hour.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: It's all lawyer talk. Yes, it is, Mr. Member. He, I understand, gave a stirring speech to the real-estate men. He told them that they should all join a union, told them they should all have a guaranteed annual wage, and he told them that they're all parasites on the commercial community. That endeared him very much to the commercial community of real estate. Then, after having accomplished that for the economy of the province, I understand he went to Wimbledon.

Now, Mr. Speaker — and I hope you are listening, wherever you are, Mr. First Member — you now want me to do in the liquor administration in three months what you couldn't do in three and a half years. I'm here to tell you, Mr. Speaker and members of this House, that in a very short period of time the province of British Columbia is going to have a responsible liquor policy, one that makes sense in the 20th century and one that we can live with, and that's more than any previous Attorney-General can say.

Once again, there doesn't seem to be anybody over there, which is probably a tribute to the speaker. But I would like to address one or two remarks to the member for Rossland-Trail (Mr. D'Arcy) . The

[ Page 575 ]

member for Rossland-Trail....

Interjection

HON. MR. MAIR: The Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom) is sick, yes.

Interjection

HON. MR. MAIR: No, I'm not. No, I'd be responsible for the legal profession, and I couldn't undertake that responsibility as long as you're in it, Mr. Member.

The member for Rossland-Trail, Mr. Speaker, is a very nice man, and it's the first time I've ever heard him err in his facts. I've heard him err in his philosophy and err in his interpretation, but he said yesterday in the House, Mr. Speaker, that he had a friend in the liquor business, presumably in his constituency, that couldn't have a happy hour, and he couldn't have a happy hour because the Liquor Administration Board said they were against happy hours.

Well, I'm going to tell you, Mr. Speaker, that the Liquor Administration is against a happy hour which gives double martinis for the price of one and puts you in your car to drive home, or gives you half-price liquor and puts you in your car to drive home. But we very much encourage, Mr. Speaker, the serving of food, and if the publicans in this province wish to have a happy hour and wish to serve food with drinks at a regular price, then we're delighted to have them do so:

But, Mr. Speaker, the member made another classical error, as did the second member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) until I corrected him the other night. He alleged that the 5 per cent tax on the liquor to the publican, to the cocktail lounge, was on the gross sales. This is not so. It is on the purchase. Now if you look at any reasonably successful cocktail lounge, Mr. Speaker, the raise of 2 per cent to 5 per cent would represent two or three pennies for every cocktail. Even if it represents more, Mr. Speaker, this is small enough price for us to pay for the social disease — and that's what alcohol is, a social disease — that is visited upon us by this liquid.

Mr. Speaker, I know that my friends opposite will think to themselves: "He perhaps has tippled one himself." That is true. I've tippled more than one. But I can say, Mr. Speaker, that we must recognize that we who have anything to do with the distribution and sale of alcohol are dealing in a narcotic, in a drug, and one of the most dangerous drugs that man has ever invented.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. minister, may I just interrupt you briefly? At the hour of adjournment last evening the Premier indicated there would be a sitting of the House this evening when he was adjourning the debate. I would just like to ask the House Leader if that's the intention of the House, to sit this evening. If so, that would defer the question on this motion until a maximum of 10:30 this evening.

HON. R.H. McCLELLAND (Minister of Health): Mr. Speaker, it is the intention to sit later this evening, and I assume that the debate will be required to be completed by 10:30 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. The hon. first member for Vancouver Centre on a point of order.

MR. LAUK: Mr. Speaker, from my reading of the rules, it's clear to me that the standing order — as soon as I find it — on the budget debate....

MR. SPEAKER: It's on page 16, hon. member.

MR. LAUK: Standing order 45A(2) says that the ordinary hour of adjournment after eight days when an amendment is still before the House...it shall be put to the House one half-hour before the ordinary time of adjournment.

I submit to the Speaker that the ordinary time for adjournment is 6 p.m.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: That's so.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I'm listening to the hon. member's remarks.

MR. LAUK: In view of that fact, the question should now be put.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, I'd refer you to the Journals of the House, March 23, 1976. At that time we were engaged in the throne speech debate and it was brought to the attention of the Speaker that the hour was approaching 5:30 p.m. The leader of the Liberal Party (Mr. Gibson) rose in his place on a point of order to inquire as to whether the House would sit in the evening or not. I put that question to the House Leader who indicated there would be an evening sitting.

The rules that we have to go by would indicate that we sit two distinct sittings on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, 2 p.m. to 6 p.m., 8 p.m. to 11 p.m., unless otherwise ordered. I believe you've got the point, hon. member. (Laughter.)

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: That's better than most.

Interjection.

[ Page 576 ]

HON. MR. MAIR: I just commented on that, Mr. Premier, thank you.

Mr. Speaker, now that the member for Rossland-Trail (Mr. D'Arcy) is back, I hope he will read the Blues tomorrow, because I didn't mean to be unkind. Obviously he had not researched his subject matter, and he didn't think about the consequences of the distribution of alcohol in this province when he made his comments.

I am tempted to follow the lead of the Premier and not comment on the remarks made by the hon. member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea), but I find myself unable to do so. It seemed to me, Mr. Speaker, that there were two themes that arose out of his remarks: first of all, that somehow it is not proper for the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Gardom) to be ill, a proposition I find difficult to understand, and secondly, that somehow the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Williams) ought to be censured for joining the majority of people of British Columbia in throwing out of office the most incompetent government that ever sat in British Columbia.

Somehow, Mr. Speaker, it's all right for the cooperative Commonwealth Federation to join in a coalition with labour and other people, and yet it is not proper for those who believe in free and private enterprise to join forces together to throw out incompetence. Mr. Speaker, there is an obvious theme that runs through the petulance on the other side, and it's leadership. It's leadership, isn't it? It's leadership.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: Sure it is. Rosemary's planning her coup d'etat back there, isn't she, eh? We know that. We know that. Yes, Gary's gang of one is vying for the top, isn't it, eh? We know all about that.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: Everybody is hoping, you know, that someone else gets Len Guy's support, eh? (Laughter.) Sure.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. minister, would you refer to hon. members by their constituency, and not their names?

HON. MR. MAIR: Oh, certainly, Mr. Speaker. I apologize. I apologize.

Interjections.

HON. MR. MAIR: Oh, God forbid! Mr. Speaker, you know, it's too bad that we don't have those problems on this side of the House, even though they would like the press to believe it. They are a little jealous, Mr. Speaker, that we have a leader who, when leadership was put at issue by the now Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Barrett), whopped them and won the election. They are jealous, Mr. Speaker. They are jealous because everybody on this side of the House is 100 per cent behind the leader, one of the greatest Premiers this province has ever seen.

Mr. Speaker, let me deal with my learned friend the first member for Vancouver Centre.

AN HON. MEMBER: The next Attorney-General.

HON. MR. MAIR: The next Attorney-General! Well, I very much doubt that. Even crossing the floor wouldn't accomplish that, Mr. Member. Mr. Speaker, you know, he not only lives in this big home that I've described many times, with his two big incomes, and his Mercedes Benz. But, you wouldn't believe it, he now dines in the Union Club.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, no!

HON. MR. MAIR: You wouldn't believe it. With the first member for Vancouver East (Mr. Macdonald), he is now dining in the Union Club.

AN HON. MEMBER: Which local?

HON. MR. MAIR: Yes, which local!

Mr. Speaker, like many lawyers he loves old cases. He loves old cases. He likes cases like M.E.L. Paving, the Sommers case, and I expect, you know, that we'll be blamed in due course for the Profumo scandal, the Pacific scandal, horses on payrolls, Watergate, Teapot Dome — goodness knows where it'll all end. I would suggest to the member that what we ought to do in this House is go back and investigate some of the scandals of Sir Richard McBride. Let us clear the air for all time of these ancient scandals. Why not investigate all these things? If we are going to waste the people's time, if the opposition is going to waste the people's time, let's at least have a little merriment and a little history with it.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: I'm going to deal with that too. I'm going to deal with that too.

Interjections.

HON. MR. MAIR: Sure, why not? Why not? It's wide open, Mr. Member, it's wide open. Goodness knows, you didn't come up with anything.

Mr. Speaker, let's deal with M.E.L. Paving for a moment. That seems that, curiously enough, it has something to do with the budget. I don't know how it does but, curiously enough, it does. The former

[ Page 577 ]

Attorney-General, who is not in his place — playing tennis or squash — said that when he investigated this matter, back in the dark days, he formed the opinion that there was no criminal fraud, just civil fraud.

AN HON. MEMBER: No, he didn't, No, he didn't.

HON. MR. MAIR: That's what he said. That's what he said, and the record will show it. And he said the BCR was in a lawsuit, it was a civil lawsuit, and he said it should go through to its logical conclusion so that the whole thing would be exposed. But, Mr. Speaker, and I ask any lawyers who may still be practising law, or still entitled to practise law — or not playing squash — to tell this House and join me in saying that 95 per cent of all civil cases are settled. But not this one, not this one, says the former Attorney-General, because it's worth about $10 million of the people's money to take the thing through to trial and expose not criminal fraud, but some civil fraud.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: Wait a minute. Let's leave it to the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) . Let's hear what he has to say about it. He's got a little different view. He says: "You shouldn't have settled it, because our lawyers said we would have won it. We might have won it." So now there was no fraud. There's criminal fraud; there isn't criminal fraud. There's civil fraud; there isn't civil fraud. Now we're going to win the case.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: You know, it seems to me, Mr. Speaker, that even for that motley crew of leftovers, that leaves a little bit to be desired in the sense of consistency.

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: Oh, don't plead guilty in open court — you know better than that, Mr. Member. Don't plead guilty in open court.

You know, the directors of B.C. Railway, having watched, I'm sure, the members opposite fumble this ball for three and a half years, said: "We've had enough of it; we'll settle it." In settling it they compromised a law suit that could have cost the taxpayers three, four, five times as much as it did. I say, Mr. Speaker, he who comes to equity should come with clean hands. I'd like to see your hands, Mr. Member, because you have....

Show them again, because they look like they need a washing.

MR. LAUK: I'll hold them up in front of the people of this province.

HON. MR. MAIR: You already did and look what happened to you. I wouldn't play that game again.

Mr. Speaker, I watched with great interest last night and — he's not in his seat either; perhaps he's out playing with the first member for Vancouver East (Mr. Macdonald) — the clown prince himself gave one of his stirring renditions. You know, the bouncy buffoon, the travelling minstrel who travelled from Coquitlam to Vancouver East. Not one constructive suggestion did we see in that minstrel show did we see last night. Great show, great vaudeville, great humour....

Interjection.

HON. MR. MAIR: No, not great. You're right — just good.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Vaudeville died — now we know why.

HON. MR. MAIR: Vaudeville died, and now we know why vaudeville died.

There was not one constructive suggestion with respect to the budget — not one. Singing the same old songs. We heard them for 39 days, didn't we, during the last election? We heard them for three and a half years before that, and many years before that in opposition. The same old thing: impose taxes that you can't collect. That's the answer to your problems.

Mr. Speaker, to the members here, that's what you should do when you have budgetary problems — go and make sure that you budget for $125 million in forestry revenues when you're not going to get it, when you're only going to get $25 million. When in doubt, if there's any doubt in your mind, what you do is bring out the old rhetoric: it's the bad old oil companies; they're the cause of it all. The bad old oil companies, the bad old mining companies, the bad old forestry companies — that's our problem. All we have to do is tax them so they won't come here and won't provide jobs and won't provide revenue, and all our problems will be solved. The same old song and dance. What a sorry spectacle.

No wonder they're across there. No wonder they're the leftovers, and a sorry lot of leftovers they are, Mr. Speaker. How the mighty have fallen, and now the lion — not in his seat this afternoon — is losing his claws...

MR. R.L. LOEWEN (Burnaby-Edmonds): Pussycat.

HON. MR. MAIR: ...losing his teeth, and all the

[ Page 578 ]

jackals are snapping around wanting his spot, aren't they? All the jackals are snapping around wanting his spot.

AN HON. MEMBER: You could say that's the cat's meow.

HON. MR. MAIR: Mee-ow, that's right. They all want a last chance in the wheelhouse of the Titanic, every one of them. Well, Mr. Speaker, let me say this: if that's the best they can do, if that's the best Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition could do in this House....

HON. MR. CHABOT: It's the best they could do, the motley crew.

HON. MR. MAIR: It's the best they could do, the motley crew — thank you very much. You know, I fancy myself as a poet.

If that's the best they can do, we are indeed for sorry times because, Mr. Speaker, this budget is a budget for the times. It is a realistic budget, and it is deserving of the support of this House 100 per cent. The motion is a frivolous motion, says nothing. The speeches said nothing; the opposition says nothing. I join with my colleagues in standing against the amendment.

MR. D.F. LOCKSTEAD (Mackenzie): Mr. Speaker, I have a few notes and I'd like to take my place in this debate on the amendment which I expect to be supporting. But I must say before I start that I'm a bit disappointed in the previous speaker and some of his remarks, some of his arrogant statements regarding the loss by the NDP in the last election. You know, Mr. Speaker, it took a coalition of all of the right-wing parties to defeat this government, plus an economic boycott. In spite of that, in spite of all those conditions we were faced with in this province over three years and two months, we still gained in excess of 40 per cent of the confidence of the people of this province — in spite of all those obstacles. Let me assure you that we'll be back as the government after the next election.

As I said, I will be supporting this amendment primarily because of the lack of economic policies put forward in this budget by that government. In my riding alone 15 to 18 per cent is the current rate of unemployment, and I've said that before in this House. We have loggers, miners, fishermen, pulp workers, ferry workers, young people, and people involved in the tourist industry in my riding, many of these people unemployed — as I said, about 15 to 18 per cent. That percentage of unemployment is unacceptable to me.

Interjections.

AN HON. MEMBER: Mr. Speaker, the noise from that corner down there is just contempt.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The hon. member for Mackenzie has the floor.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: Just a few brief words on the unemployment situation. You know that this column was quoted before but I think it is very significant, in view of some of the remarks that we've heard this afternoon. This one particular section, in regard to the situation here in Victoria in November, says that when there were fewer than 100 jobs offered at the local Manpower office, more than 1,200 people came out for those jobs. Yet across the floor, Mr. Speaker, we hear occasionally references to these people as being burns and not really wanting work and wanting to live on unemployment insurance, and go north and the rest of it. But the fact is that most of these people are honestly and genuinely looking for a job and they can't find it.

Last night in the Legislature, Mr. Speaker, the hon. Leader of the Opposition discussed an article which appeared in the Vancouver Province yesterday. He discussed the article and the context of it and said that if this mine closure had taken place under a New Democratic Party government it would have made headlines and that there would have been speeches up and down this province — "The NDP Closed Down The Mine." You know that type of thing. The fact is the we did know that that mine was going to close for some time.

I would just like to discuss briefly a few of the economic impacts that the closure of that operation is having on Texada Island at the moment. It's not quite so visible yet. People are staying — some people at least. Wives are staying in their homes, although many of these homes are up for sale. The article quotes 32 or something, but I think it's more than that. In any event, people are staying on the island until their children complete their school year. Many people had built up some cash reserves, so they're not really actively looking for jobs.

I must say that Canada Manpower assisted those people who required work immediately. They did assist and they were of great assistance. I would suspect that about 40 people have now found employment at other mines in British Columbia. But I think, Mr. Speaker, that we have to look at the morality of a situation where a foreign corporation, coming into this country and extracting this non-renewable resource, leaves us with nothing to show for this extraction but a hole in the ground. The dislocation that a closure of this magnitude can cause is extremely horrendous, in my opinion. People have had to leave their homes and to find work or employment elsewhere. Families are separated, and all these homes are for sale, as I said. Think of the

[ Page 579 ]

economic impact to the small business community in an area like Texada Island. Many of these people will be suffering economically, and I understand that two businesses have gone up for sale since the mine has closed.

I think we must ask some questions in regard to this. I think we should ask ourselves some questions. For instance, we have to ask: was all the ore that was mineable taken out of the ground, or did the company cease operations because of a poor contract with the buyer in Japan? The minister says the answer is "no." How does he know? He hasn't been in his office long enough to memorize the phone number, so how does he know? That mine has been there for over 20 years.

Was the reason world market conditions? I think we should ask that. I think the former opposition — the now government — used to accuse us of closing out all the mining in British Columbia, which was a bunch of hogwash. Now they're saying it was world market conditions and not their fiscal policies at all. How much ore was left in the ground in that particular mine? Was there mineable ore left in that mine, left in the operation? There is good reason to think that there may have been a great deal of mineable ore left in that operation. But once that mine closes, will anybody go back down? Will anybody be able to go back and extract that ore at some future date? Not very likely. I'd like to have a few answers.

Last but not least, Mr. Speaker, did that company make over $100 million in profits over 20 years? As a matter of fact they probably made considerably more. And how much of that $100 million plus was reinvested in the community and in British Columbia? As far as I'm aware it was a very small percentage.

Interjections.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: I agree. Some jobs were provided for our people and some taxes were paid. But it's well known that these large multinational foreign corporations escaped their fair share of taxation, particularly in this province under this kind of government.

Anyway, I thought I would bring this closure to the attention of this House because it was raised last night. I hope to discuss it further, Mr. Speaker, under the minister's estimates, because I would like some answers to these very serious questions.

Interjection.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: The answer from that minister is always no. I'd like to change the topic a bit, just to give this House an indication of how I feel about the financial policies of this government. This is a relatively small item, I suppose, in the eyes of most people, but in The Vancouver Sun on February 1,1977, there was an article buried in the back pages headlined: "Tribal Village Closes Door After Hunt For New Site Fails." I happen to know some people who, because of the economic condition of this province, Mr. Speaker, had to use that facility — not by choice, but they were extremely happy it was there. That facility provided a place for young men between the ages of 16 and 22 to go to cat, sleep and have a home for a few days so that they would be looked after and not have to go out in the street and mingle, as the quote in the article here says, "with burns and tramps."

But my question is: under this government, what has happened? I would like to know if this government and this minister made any attempt at all to relocate the site of this tribal village, or if they made any overtures in terms of financial aid. I understand the reverse is true, Mr. Speaker. I understand that funds were actually withdrawn, not offered. That indicates the type of thinking of the government that we have before us today.

In my riding, Mr. Speaker, there is considerable concern over the ambulance rate increases. I have an article here that I extracted from the Powell River Progress, January 26, 1977. In this article, the employees.... I'll quote the article, Mr. Speaker.

I want the House to understand that in a large rural riding like mine — not downtown where it may be 10 or 15 blocks to the hospital in an urban. area — people have to be, in some cases, transported 80, 90 or up to 100 miles if they have to go to the Vancouver General for special operations or special treatment.

I think I should quote this article because I think it's very significant of the way that some of the people in my riding feel. "A new ambulance programme announced last week by the Minister of Health has elicited a response of grave concern from members of the local ambulance employees union. The ambulance employees union, Local 873, has already advised the Minister of Health of our grave concern that he considers it necessary to increase the direct charge to the patient."

Mr. Speaker, coming into effect on February 1 of this year there will be an increase in the basic ambulance charge from $5 to $15 for the first 25 miles, and a further charge of 20 cents per mile thereafter, up to a maximum of $100. I've had the occasion, as you well know, to ride back and forth on the ferries coming to Victoria and the rest of it. On those trips I see people being transported by ambulance on many occasions from Powell River General to the Vancouver General or whatever treatment centre they have to go to. Most of these people are people who cannot afford to pay this $100; they really cannot afford to pay it. It's this

[ Page 580 ]

government extracting more money out of the pockets of the poor — that's really the point I'm making here. This is the type of government that we are faced with at the moment.

Mr. Speaker, I'm going to launch into a new topic which will take, I think, a bit longer than five minutes.

Mr. Lockstead moves adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to respond to a statement made by the member for Revelstoke-Slocan (Mr. King) at the start of proceedings today.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, at the commencement of today's sitting the member for Revelstoke-Slocan made what appeared to be very serious charges in this Legislature concerning a blacklist in government. I've since had an opportunity to review the documents on which he based his allegation and tabled in this Legislature. I would like to say to the House that I reject the allegation and believe that the member has collected unrelated documents and put them together in order to try and make a case that doesn't exist.

I want to say that the member for Revelstoke-Slocan included a letter that was sent December 23, 1975, unsolicited by this government or any member of my office, as all mail that comes into my office is unsolicited, and I can't be responsible for the contents. Mr. Speaker, that letter, as all letters that come to my office or to members of my office, where it refers to a department, is automatically diverted to that department without comment — without editorial comment and without censorship. I must point out an obvious fact here, Mr. Speaker. My office receives, in the course of a day, many letters offering advice, many letters that could be classified as hate mail telling me where to go, many of them classified as hate mail telling me where to tell the opposition to go, many of them making constructive suggestions. All of them are uncensored by my office or my personnel, and are diverted to ministers, when they relate to a portfolio, as I say, without comment or without censorship.

That letter was sent on automatically to the offices of the Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) . Enclosed with that letter was a chart dealing with the structure within the department. I must say that that letter was sent by a Mr. Klaus Ohlemann, who is unknown to me but has been identified to me by the press as being a member of what was the Department of Lands and Forests. He sent along with that letter an organizational chart of the department on which he had penciled in obviously — because it wasn't done in our department on request — very lightly the political affiliation of two people. That chart wasn't sent with the letter, but was kept as part of the restructuring, or attempted structuring, of government by my department as we were setting up ministries, but was used along with notations put on by a member of my staff dealing with changes in the bureaucracy, not of people, that would be suggested to the new minister with a memorandum — not together, but separately.

I wish to read that memorandum, because this is the memorandum that has been suggested is a blacklist — the only memorandum signed by a member of my office:

"To the Hon. Jim Nielsen, Minister of Environment, January 9, 1976:

"The enclosed chart indicates three things:

1. Regional units may have been heading in the direction of becoming top-heavy in bureaucracy."

Does anyone question that?

"In the old system, these regions were adequately serviced by regional land inspectors and district land inspectors who are still in place.

2. The lot development unit requires co-ordinated action between the Environment and Housing ministers."

Does anyone disagree with that?

"3. Environmental services unit appears to be a fifth wheel in view of the environment and land use secretariat, and two apparently recent appointments by contract should be questioned.

"The enclosed chart is a general outline.

(Signed)

Dan Campbell"

I'm sure that most people realize that the new government intended to deal with what is a heavy bureaucratic structure and make such changes. I reject that that is a blacklist.

Enclosed with this, and unrelated to either of these two pieces of correspondence, is part of a list from another document entirely taken off what the minister advises me was a four-page list of government deputies that government required. This was sent by my office but was there as part of all government ministries getting information — new ministers — as to who was who in government. We also had complete lists of all government Crown corporations and who the directors were so we would know who we were dealing with as a new government. This was not included in this letter. It was not included with this letter. It's just part of another document that's unrelated.

I seriously question, then, that member continuing

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what has been a very serious abuse of this House and, in particular, the way in which these documents were put together. However frivolous I consider that to be, there is a much more serious point here, Mr. Speaker, on which I wish to comment. That is the abuse of the oath of office dealing with information in government. Earlier this year, Mr. Speaker — in fact, late last year — I dealt with abuse of confidential information in government as it dealt with someone attempting to achieve financial gain. Equally abhorrent is somebody abusing that oath for political gain and power. I'm not to judge what value people put on dollars or power or politics, but the oath is the same, and that is the confidence of government documents. Documents, no matter what they contain, whether it's correspondence...no matter what the content, once they are in ministerial files and in a ministerial office, they are the property of the people of the province of British Columbia. All public servants and order-in-council employees are asked to take an oath respecting that information that comes into their hands from misuse in any way.

If this was an isolated incident from the Department of Environment I should not be as concerned as I am today, but last session there were documents tabled in this Legislature, again from that department. I might point out to the member for Revelstoke-Slocan (Mr. King) that when use of documents such as this are made, it casts a reflection on every public servant in this province, every civil servant in this province.

As such, if there is a breakdown in a department, then all of us must be concerned for the reputation of those others in the public service, but more than that. Because while I consider this a frivolous use of documents, there may be other documents taken in what appears to be a major leak in this one department, other documents taken that someone may be using — not just this type of use, but for financial gain. Because in every ministry there are documents of a sensitive nature that allow all sorts of possibilities.

In the case of the Grizzly Valley, when information was used on a charge — that is yet to be dealt with — of abuse of information by government employees, this government immediately dealt with the employee in question because identification was made in the charge (as there isn't in this case) and asked the Attorney-General's department to make an investigation. That in-house investigation was quiet but it was broad. Subsequently it led to further information and a full public inquiry. I'm not suggesting that in this case. But I'm suggesting that the minister, in his concern, and my concern for the sensitivity of this oath, and the public service through the minister, has today been asked to give such documents as have been identified as missing or taken from that office to the Attorney-General for the same type of investigation that took place preceding the judicial inquiry in the Grizzly Valley affair.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Premier for making his statement to the House on a matter which, as I indicated earlier, I think is extremely grave and serious in its implication. I'm sorry I wasn't in the House at the beginning of the Premier's statement but I am advised that he alleged that I had assembled the documents that were tabled in the House. I want to say that if that was the Premier's statement or if that was an inference contained in the Premier's remarks, it is absolutely false. I unqualifiedly deny that I, in any way, tampered with the documents that were recently received by me.

Indeed, it is my understanding that the documents were all contained in the same material transmitted at he same time to the Minister of Environment's office. That is the advice I have. I am pleased to hear, Mr. Speaker, that the Premier is concerned about the security of confidential material. I'm pleased to find hat he is very concerned about these documents falling into the hands of the opposition. He seemed to have no compunction a few short months ago about accepting secret documents, relating to the development of B.C. Rail, that were delivered into his custody and, rather than placing those documents before the House as I had done, releasing them publicly during an election campaign. His remarks regarding the obligation to the security and welfare of the province, as opposed to narrow political usage, I think, is well taken and perhaps he'll reflect on his own conduct.

Mr. Speaker, the most serious thing about the documents the Premier avoided, and that was the identification of public servants by political persuasion, and that is clearly contained in the documents — people noted NDP, Social Credit. Mr. Speaker, that is the most serious inference.

I have to wonder, Mr. Speaker, about one other aspect of the proposition that the Premier put forward, and that is his explanation of the need for analysing bureaucracies built up in the previous administration. If that were the case, Mr. Speaker, surely one could expect that such an analysis would have come from the office of the Provincial Secretary, who is the minister responsible for the public service in this province, rather than from the Premier's office with political affiliations of individuals noted on the data. So I question the explanation that the Premier puts forward.

Mr. Speaker, I think this is the kind of situation that people have to judge for themselves. I must say that my fears and my concerns are not allayed by the Premier's explanation in the House this evening. I want to say further that an investigation by the Attorney-General's department is fine. I welcome

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that, and I hope that within the terms of reference for investigation, the Attorney-General's department will make the human rights branch of the Ministry of Labour a party to that investigation, Mr. Speaker, so that this House can be assured that no worker in this province, be he a public servant or anyone else, is suffering harassment or having his economic security in any way compromised by political identification. I welcome a wide-ranging investigation.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I think you're extending the matter before the House far beyond the parameters that it should be contained within, hon. member, and almost engaging in another debate altogether.

MR. KING: Well, Mr. Speaker, you may well have interrupted my previous remarks with that observation, but hardly the latter ones. I am accepting and certainly supporting the investigation that the Premier announced. I am offering to the House the observation and support for broadening the terms of reference of that investigation, because the conclusion I have drawn — and I am also a member of the Legislature — is that very possibly certain people are having their security of employment jeopardized by being identified as belonging to a certain political party. I think that is a matter of human rights, and I think it is one that the government would want to include in any investigation.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, when a statement is made by either side of the House, we've established the custom that other parties can respond, and I just hope that I can make a few comments at this time.

MR. SPEAKER: I'm certainly at the direction of the House. Proceed, hon. member.

MR. WALLACE: Mr. Speaker, I've appreciated the comments from both the Premier and the member for Revelstoke-Slocan. The one lingering doubt that I would have in my mind is based on the old phrase that justice must be seen to be done. While I welcome the Premier's commitment to have an in-house inquiry, the public reaction and the media reaction — and I'm not talking just about this government; I'm talking about any government that does an in-house investigation — tends to question the depth and complete nature of such an investigation.

In this case — since indeed the issues have been dearly articulated by both the Premier and the member for Revelstoke-Slocan as to the basic principle that is at stake, one, a breach of oath by public servants and secondly, the doubt and suspicion under which all civil servants fall because of the actions of a few — I would like to leave the House and the Premier with the thought that surely the most appropriate route to follow in this case would be an all-party committee of this House to investigate the situation, and not leave it entirely to the Attorney-General's department.

This, I must say in the strongest of terms, is not in any way to suggest that the Attorney-General will not do the best job he can to investigate. All I'm saying is that in the kind of society in which we live and in the aftermath of many other supposed investigations in other jurisdictions which were subsequently shown to be less than complete, I think it would make reasonable sense, as long as we recognize that we're not impugning the Attorney-General or his department, to try and establish what is so crucial, and that is credibility in the eyes of the public. Whether you convince me or convince the opposition is less important than convincing everyone in the province that in fact the light can shine into this investigation.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. member for Revelstoke-Slocan on a point of order.

MR. KING: I would like to make a request. The Premier referred to incomplete material and documents that some of the documents tabled were excerpted from. I would request that he table those incomplete documents in the House.

Presenting petitions.

MR. VEITCH: Mr. Speaker, I beg leave to present a petition.

Leave granted.

MR. VEITCH: It is a petition of Trinity Western College praying for the passing of an Act intituled An Act to Amend the Trinity Western College Act. I move that the rules be suspended and the petition of Trinity Western College be received.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Williams moves adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 6:15 p.m.