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CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

The Truth in Metric Act (Bill M 206). Mr. Smith.

Introduction and first reading –– 833

Groundwater Licensing Act, 1979 (Bill M 207). Mrs. Wallace.

Introduction and first reading –– 833

Automobile Insurance Non-discrimination Act (Bill 33). H — , Mrs. McCarthy.

Introduction and first reading –– 833

Oral questions.

Government policy on nuclear power. Mr. Barrett –– 834

Appointment of S. Douglas Smith. Mr. Barrett –– 834

Sale of Crown land through realtors. Hon. Mr. Chabot replies –– 836

Legal Services Society Act (Bill 27). Hon. Mr. Gardom.

Introduction and first reading –– 836

Committee of Supply: Ministry of Health estimates.

On the amendment to vote 128.

Mr. Cocke –– 836

Hon. Mr. McGeer –– 838

Mr. Cocke –– 839

Mr. Barnes –– 840

Hon. Mr. McClelland –– 842

Mr. Lea –– 845

Mr. Barnes –– 847

Mr. Brummet –– 848

Mrs. Wallace –– 849

Mr. King –– 851

Mr. Hall –– 853

Mr. Mitchell –– 855

Mrs. Jordan –– 856

Presenting Reports

Ministry of the Provincial Secretary and Government Services annual report for the year ending December 31, 1978.

Hon. Mr. Curtis –– 858

WEDNESDAY, JULY 18, 1979

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: I am very pleased to see with us today, for a while at least, Mrs. Vi Jones, of Surrey. Vi's husband is Alderman Dalton Jones of Surrey. With her is her daughter Sandra. Also, Mrs. Mills and Mrs. Brass, Vi's sisters, are here from Surrey, and Molly MacDonald and her daughter Marlene are visiting from Northern Ireland. I would ask the House to bid them welcome.

MR. BARNES: I would like to have the House join us in congratulating the hon. member for Atlin (Mr. Passarell), whose son was in attendance this morning when we had our pictures taken. He's Alan Passarell — "Landslide Junior." I would like the House to welcome the young man to the Legislature.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: There are two visitors to the House today from the constituency of Central Fraser Valley: from the town of Abbotsford, the wife of our member for that constituency, Maude Ritchie, and her daughter, Laura Harrington. I ask the House to welcome them.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: We have in the members' gallery today a founding member of the CCF and NDP Club in Powell River, and his wife, Mr. and Mrs. Bob MacPherson from Powell River. I ask the House to join me in welcoming them.

MRS. JORDAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to assure you first that this is not assumption No. 7, but I'm sure you'll be pleased to know that in the members' gallery today we have Mr. Dave Morris, who is municipal clerk for the municipality of Coldstream. He's a very fine and brilliant young man. I don't know his politics, but I know that as a representative he's excellent for the people and the member to work with. I ask you to give him a warm welcome.

MRS. WALLACE: I would like the House to join me in welcoming three constituents who are in the Speaker's gallery today. They are here from Mill Bay visiting various ministries on a matter of very important local concern. They are Mr. and Mrs. Thurber and Mr. Beech.

MR. SEGARTY: In the members' gallery this afternoon is a constituent of Kootenay, Dave Mutch. Dave is manager of the Woodlands operation for Crows Nest Industries and Alco British Columbia. I'd like the House to welcome him.

Introduction of Bills

THE TRUTH IN METRIC ACT

On a motion by Mr. Smith, Bill M206, The Truth in Metric Act, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

GROUNDWATER LICENSING ACT, 1979

On a motion by Mrs. Wallace, Bill M207, Groundwater Licensing Act, 1979, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE
NON-DISCRIMINATION ACT

Hon. Mrs. McCarthy presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Automobile Insurance Non-discrimination Act.

Bill 33 introduced, read a first time, and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: On a point of order, yesterday I asked a question of the Premier in question period, which you, Mr. Speaker, ruled out of order. In perusing Beauchesne, May, et cetera, I find that the question may well have been in order, and I seek a ruling.

The question I asked of the Premier yesterday was: does the Minister of Environment's (Hon. Mr. Mair's) decision to keep secret reports on the proposed 500-kilovolt Cheekye-Dunsmuir transmission line to Vancouver Island reflect government policy on reports affecting the public of British Columbia? On Monday. February 28, 1977, according to Votes and Proceedings, the Speaker ruled on a supplementary — referring to the sixteenth edition of May, on page 356, relating to questions in general and to item No. 9 on the list of supplementary questions that are in order: "A question to the Prime Minister or the Premier as to whether a statement made by a minister represents the policy of the government is in fact in order."

Mr. Speaker, could you rule on that before question period, so that I may pose the question again to the Premier, now that he's in the House?

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, I appreciate you raising the matter. I have a couple of immediate comments. I do not presume to take the time of the House to teach the rules of the House, but since the member asked the question, first of all, a matter of order must be raised immediately, or it is lost upon the House. The matter to which the gentleman refers, namely subsection 9 of the second main section, "Regulations by Which Questions Shall Be Determined in and out of Order." I read again for the member:

"A question to the Prime Minister or Premier, whether a statement made by a minister represents the policy, is in order: but the basis upon which questions are ruled out of order is whether or not a question plies into the future policy of the government."

We'll review the particular question which this gentleman has raised and seek to bring a ruling on it.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: On a point of order. Mr. Speaker, if you'd heard my question, you would find that I'm not seeking future policy of the government. What I was seeking to establish is whether this government is going to continue to keep secret these many reports that they're sitting on at the moment. This is what I'm trying to find out.

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I would like this government to release some of those reports that they've been sitting on for three and a half solid years.

MR. SPEAKER: Without a question being before the House at this time, I might just suggest that question would be out of order.

Oral Questions

GOVERNMENT POLICY ON NUCLEAR POWER

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Premier. Could the Premier inform this House whether or not continued advocacy of nuclear power for British Columbia by the head of B.C. Hydro, Mr. Robert Bonner, is in accordance with statements made by this government and its current position on nuclear power?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, to make it clear once more to the Leader of the Opposition and the members of this House, the question of what energy alternatives are developed will be a decision of the government. I don't think it's inconsistent for members of Hydro, or those charged with providing energy in this province, to point out the options and those decisions that may have to be made in the future — perhaps by future governments — and to point out that if you have governments that don't act, or if you have leaders who said in the election campaign there are going to be no more hydroelectric development in this province, to find out what the province would be forced to accept.... I've said that our government is prepared to develop those acceptable energy sources. I do not see, either in our term or in our mandate or in future mandates, the need for us to have to use nuclear power. I stay with that statement.

I do say, though, that this government, as part of its energy policy, will be making major announcements on those forms of energy development that are acceptable and which we will be carrying out during our mandate as government. We will announce the policy which will be the cornerstone of our economic development policy that will lead this province in the 1980s.

Mr. Speaker, that statement has been said before, and it's perfectly clear. Those who would try and find some division in what I have said and what this government said would be hard-pressed to find any inconsistency in our policy. But perhaps some of those who have asked the questions and who have said there will be no more hydroelectric development and no more development of other acceptable energy options will say how they're going to power this province in the future. Perhaps by candles, Mr. Speaker.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, since this is question period, I will refrain from entering into debate. I ask a supplementary question of the Premier. Does the Premier distinguish between advocacy of a position — such as Mr. Bonner's advocacy for nuclear power — and a discussion of options? Mr. Bonner is a supporter of nuclear power. He is not discussing options but pushing or advocating that option. The question I ask the Premier is whether he distinguishes between advocacy and a discussion of options.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, the first member for Vancouver East is referring to recent speeches of the chairman of Hydro. I have copies of those speeches in which the chairman of Hydro spoke to energy conferences. He said that Canada will be faced with using nuclear power. He has pointed out that if British Columbia does not develop more acceptable energy options by the year 2000, in his judgment we would be faced with the utilization of nuclear power. That is not advocacy. That is pointing out the facts. If you have political parties or politicians who deny all the other options, that's what our province would be faced with. As long as we were government, they will not be faced with nuclear power, because we are taking measures to make sure that we develop those more acceptable options.

APPOINTMENT OF S. DOUGLAS SMITH

MR. BARRETT: My next question is directed to the Minister of Human Resources. I'd like to ask the Minister of Human Resources, who was the presiding member of the executive council on June 28, 1979, if she signed order-in-council No. 1796 appointing Mr. S. Douglas Smith of 147 St. Paul Street, Kamloops, as a director of the British Columbia Development Corporation. When the minister signed that order-in-council, was she aware that Mr. Smith was the former campaign manager for the member for Kamloops (Hon. Mr. Mair)?

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, all orders that I sign on behalf of the executive council come before me with the direction of the executive council. Such things as appointments are made by the executive council on the basis of ability and service to the province of British Columbia.

MR. BARRETT: The question is: was the minister aware that the order-in-council designatee was the campaign manager for the member for Kamloops? That was the question. Were you aware that Mr. Smith was the campaign manager for the member for Kamloops?

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, I do not know when I was made aware, other than through newspaper reports that I understand are erroneous, of charges that were made against my colleague, the Minister of Environment, in terms of a gentleman named Smith. That's my knowledge of what the Leader of the Opposition is trying to get at. That's my only knowledge.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I am asking a question. When was the minister aware that Mr. Smith was the campaign manager for the member for Kamloops?

Interjections.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, when an allegation has been made in the newspaper, and as you have so well directed us, the information obtained from the newspaper does not form the basis for questions in this House. But that's the answer. It was brought to my attention through an allegation, which I would suggest should be put to my colleague, the Minister of Environment.

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MR. BARRETT: That is coming, Madam Minister.

I have a supplementary. It is a fact undenied by the member for Kamloops (Hon. Mr. Mair) that Mr. Smith was his former campaign manager. I am asking the minister if she was aware, when she signed the order-in-council, that Mr. Smith was the campaign manager for the member for Kamloops.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: I've answered the question, Mr. Speaker.

MR. BARRETT: I have another question now, to the member for Kamloops. I would ask the member for Kamloops if he was present at the cabinet meeting when the order-in-council was signed appointing Mr. Smith, and was aware that, as the minister has said, it was an executive decision. Was he present at the executive council meeting, and was he part and parcel of the executive council decision to agree to Mr. Smith's appointment?

HON. MR. MAIR: Mr. Speaker, I'm afraid I didn't hear the first part of the question.

MR. COCKE: I expect the Premier was busy instructing you on how to answer the question.

HON. MR. MAIR: Well, I'll just sit down and let it be asked again, Mr. Member.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker — if we could hold everybody in the House in order — I would appreciate the opportunity of quietly explaining my question to the minister — including the Premier's attention, which is of short span; nonetheless, I appeal to it.

Mr. Speaker, I asked the minister if he was present at the cabinet meeting when order-in-council No. 1796 was signed, appointing his former campaign manager as a director of the Development Corporation of British Columbia.

HON. MR. MAIR: Mr. Speaker, first of all, let me make it clear that, as did all members of the executive council, I have taken an oath to keep secret proceedings within the bounds of that room. But let me also say, in answer to the first member for Vancouver East, that Mr. Smith's relationship to me in the past two elections has never been kept secret by me from my colleagues. I'm very proud that my colleagues saw fit to place a man of his great ability on the board of the B.C. Development Corporation.

MR. BARRETT: I have a supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Since the minister has now informed us that his colleagues knew that Mr. Smith was his campaign manager, and the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) said she didn't know, are we to understand that the Minister of Human Resources is not a colleague of the minister?

MR. SPEAKER: The question is not in order.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I asked the minister if he was present at the cabinet meeting when the order-in-council was signed.

HON. MR. MAIR: Mr. Speaker, I can only repeat my previous statement that I took an oath of office to keep unto myself that which goes on inside the cabinet room. But let me also say, Mr. Speaker, that I've made it a habit not to go around making malicious false statements to the press about the relationship between one person and another. And I take this opportunity to deny the allegation made by the first member for Vancouver East that Mr. Smith is now or ever was a law partner of mine.

MR. BARRETT': I ask the minister — and this is public information — whether or not he was present at the cabinet meeting when this order-in-council was signed.

AN HON. MEMBER: Answer the question.

HON. MR. MAIR: I've answered that question.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I would ask for a ruling. Is it not public information...?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. BARRETT: I'm asking the minister if he was there. Is that in order?

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. member, it is not in order to rephrase a question — regardless of how slightly — and ask the same question in another way.

MR. BARRETT: My question is now directed to the Minister of Economic Development. The Minister of Economic Development is the co-signator of order-in-council No. 1796 of June 28, 1979, in which the said S. Douglas Smith was appointed to the Development Corporation of British Columbia. When the minister affixed his name to the order-in-council, was he aware that Mr. Smith was the former campaign manager of the member for Kamloops?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I want to inform the first member for Vancouver East that we have been very fortunate in appointing a very good and independent board of directors to the British Columbia Development Corporation. Under their great guidance the corporation made $1 million last year — the largest sum that it has ever made. The rest of the question I will take as notice. [Laughter.]

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, the minister has been trying for several minutes to gain the floor.

MR. BARRETT: That's right, but I have the floor.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I think that is to be determined by the Chair. Please proceed.

MR. BARRETT: I have a supplementary to the Minister of Economic Development. Was he aware, when he signed the order-in-council, that he was signing an order-in-council appointing the former campaign manager of the member for Kamloops to the board of the Development Corporation of British Columbia?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, as I said, we've been very fortunate, and I feel that Mr. Smith fits into the qualifications of being a great contribution to the board of

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directors of the Development Corporation. I'I take the rest of the question as notice.

SALE OF CROWN LAND THROUGH REALTORS

HON. MR. CHABOT: On July 3, the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) asked the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing a question. He said:

The minister went to great lengths to say that when we were in government we had also utilized real estate agents to sell land on a commission basis. Is the minister now saying that we allowed real estate firms to buy land for speculative purposes? Is the minister saying we did that when we were in government?

The minister responded: "The answer is yes."

The member for Prince Rupert said: "Would the minister then be willing to tell me now exactly where that took place?"

Mr. Speaker, in October, 1975, the former government, through its agencies, listed with Multiple Listings Service a property at 1160 Riverside Drive in North Vancouver. It was a multiple listing, and the selling broker was Habitat Realty. The property was purchased by a licensed real estate agent with Habitat Realty.

In June, 1975, there was another listing with Multiple Listing Service. The property was at Fourth and Clarkson in New Westminster. The selling broker was Brimco Realty, and the property was sold subject to a financing and development permit. It subsequently collapsed because of the lack of a down payment, but has since been resold to a developer.

Another example, Mr. Speaker, of the sale was in September, 1975. There was a sale to a developer in Fort St. James, B.C. Lots were sold to Tricon Development Ltd. They were sold by public auction in Fort St. James. Some of the correspondence directed to the Ministry of Housing at the time said: "Excluding village staff, there were seven people present. Unfortunately, only the Tricon Development Ltd. representative was interested in purchasing the R-2 lots. Consequently they sold for the upset price. Each lot was auctioned individually. "

These five lots in Fort St. James were sold to a developer for $4,050 each, and the government of the day, because of the lack of interest in the properties, was not prepared to cancel the auction sale. It was prepared to sell these properties to a developer at the upset price of $4,050 per residential lot. Mr. Speaker, there are many other examples, but these are three examples that I bring to you to respond to the member who made the suggestion that at no time had their government ever been involved in releasing Crown land to developers, or to real estate agents, or to real estate salesmen, or through multiple listing of real estate farms.

Introduction of Bills

LEGAL SERVICES SOCIETY ACT

Hon. Mr. Gardom presented a message from His Honour the Administrator: a bill intituled Legal Services Society Act.

Bill 27 introduced, read a first time, and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Orders of the Day

The House in Committee of Supply; Mr. Rogers in the chair.

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF HEALTH

(continued)

On vote 128; minister's office, $144, 082 — continued.

On the amendment.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, yesterday we heard quite a blast from the minister. He did a little tub-thumping yesterday evening, and among other things he said he denied the fact that there is ministerial priority for the utilization of aircraft, and said that ambulance service gets full priority for the utilization of government aircraft. If there is such a thing as an enterprising reporter in the province, I would like him to check the aircraft logs during the last election. You'll recall that government ministers were told that they may not use the aircraft during the election, and there was a surprising increase during that period of time — and I'm not talking about just a small increase; I'm talking about a very significant increase — in the utilization of the government aircraft for air ambulances during the time that the ministers were not allowed to use the aircraft.

AN HON. MEMBER: Come out and say it.

MR. COCKE: What do you mean, come out and say it? I said it yesterday, and the minister denied it. The fact of the matter is, it is factual.

MR. KEMPF: Garbage-mouth!

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, I've taken enough from that woodsman over there, and I'd like him to withdraw "garbage-mouth." He never stands on his feet in this House to make any kind of comment like that. He sits in his chair, really a disgrace to this House. I'd like him to withdraw it.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. I would ask the member for Omineca to stand in his place and withdraw the remarks.

MR. KEMPF: Mr. Chairman, if the member for New Westminster dislikes the phrase "garbage-mouth," I'll leave it to the people of British Columbia when reading Hansard to decide what it is. I withdraw.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I must ask for an unequivocal withdrawal, please.

MR. KEMPF: I withdraw, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, hon. member.

MR. COCKE: I guess, Mr. Chairman, what happens when they're playing cabinet sweepstakes over there is that everybody gets a little petulant.

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Anyway, Mr. Chairman, I would hope that somebody checks out some of those suggestions.

Another reason that I was pleased to move the motion of a lack of confidence was because of the minister's lack of priority in terms of what deserves a high priority. He has no understanding of the areas that really deserve priority. He is working aggressively; he's working hard to try to put together an absolute loser, and the loser is the Heroin Treatment Program. At the same time as he's spending all that money on that loser, the waiting lists for elective surgery, the hospital people indicate, keep growing and growing. The chaos and the morale within the hospitals is a sign of our times, Mr. Chairman, and it's common knowledge to all the people in the province that there is a real bad situation there.

While that situation is there, let's take a look, for moment or two, at his marvellous Heroin Treatment Program. First and foremost, he has an approval — listen to this — for 350 staff for that drug and alcohol program. Right now he actually has 320 on full-time staff. Ask him, if you will, how many new patients he has. They're scratching around the province trying to find people hooked on heroin. His own report told him three years ago that there is hardly any of the stuff on the street, and what there is so weak that there's hardly anybody hooked. They're trying to move now, Mr. Chairman, into other areas of drug abuse with this loser program. I'm told that they have 104 new patients. That's a fairly significant staff ratio. Wouldn't the hospitals love to have a situation like that? At the same time, the addicts come and go at will, apparently, while this case goes through the courts. There is going to be a great deal of problem in that situation. We all read the headlines the other day about Brannan Lake.

When we finally get down to it, what have they got for a program? Let me use their own words. I happen to have run into some of the material from the drug and alcohol program, and I see here a flow chart of behavioural assessment and modification sequence. My erudite friends over there who know something about behaviour modification and the fact that it is not a proven way of dealing with human behaviour could maybe give us some judgment as to whether or not we should be wasting $12 million on that particular program. Let me read something that might be interesting to you on urge control — this is part of the core program at the alcohol and drug treatment for the heroin addicts. Let me tell you what it says here on the front page:

"Caution: it should be understood that the treatment procedures advocated herein were developed and evaluated using members of the general public as clinical subjects. It is not known how well these procedures will generalize in their clinical efficacy to the subset of the general population which has been involved in drug abuse. To this extent, their application to this population should be considered experimental "

A $12 million dollar experiment! Experimental in their own core program! They cut back on hospitals so that we can have an experimental program.

For those of you who know something about experimental programs, this is a behavioural modification program.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Do you remember the rats at the university? You studied them, and they went through the maze, and so on. Here's the maze. Doctor McGeer has done so many experiments himself over the years. He had real difficulty sexing a whale one time, as I recall.

Mr. Chairman, let me talk about this behavioural modification sequence. The first thing we do here is establish treatment contact with the client — very good — then we list all the client's problems, and select one problem for immediate attention. Aha! I can just see how the addicts are going to be very impressed with the material obtained.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Give me a problem, any problem.

Interjections.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. Perhaps if you addressed the Chair, it would be easier for Hansard to follow you.

MR. COCKE: I hate to be joking about something, but it's a joke when you consider that they're pouring $12 million down the drain on an experimental program. Is it any wonder the opposition has to move a resolution of non-confidence in this minister?

Last night I watched the member for Vancouver South get up and give us the Senator Fogbound trip. What's he going to say today? How is he going to go back to Vancouver South and report that his minister is a spendthrift in areas of absolute experimentation and a skinflint when it comes to dealing with people's real needs?

HON. MR. MAIR: I've been invited by the member for New Westminster to point out to him that to call a member a skinflint is no different that somebody else calling him a garbage-mouth. It seems to me that namecalling begets namecalling.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. members, at a previous time, in order to try and find some harmony in the House, I suggested that members might consider using the mirror technique on their language: they might consider how language they use reflects on themselves before they use it to describe others. Perhaps if all members would consider that when they choose to admonish members across the floor, the House could proceed in a more orderly fashion.

MR. COCKE: Certainly I don't want to upset the Minister of Environment: I'll leave that to the second member for Vancouver East (Mr. Macdonald), who certainly did it the other night.

I just want to give you a couple more suggestions from this maze we have here as to how they treat these patients:

"Obtain concrete examples of the problem, specify target responses, controlling antecedents, negative response consequences, response strength frequency, intensity, duration and latency."

I wonder if it's a good idea to vote for his office vote, or any other vote. I would suggest that the minister is probably on his way out. His long association with the group who have been advocating this loser has really cost this province

[ Page 838 ]

plenty. I think it is about time you backed off, Mr. Minister through you, Mr. Chairman.

Let me read you one other delightful little item out of this core program. The heading is: "On Coercion and Motivation." No wonder they are being attacked in the courts. Even in their own material they are talking about coercion and motivation. Well, motivation is one thing, but coercion is something else. This is what they say.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Listen, Mr. Minister, maybe you haven't even read this material:

"Those who have worked in the field of narcotic dependency for any period of time are fully aware of the lack of normal civil liberties to which the narcotic dependent people have access. In point of fact, the health entry plan is designed to help these individuals reachieve a state where they have the same access to such freedom that most people ordinarily enjoy."

Any lawyer listening to that kind of rationalization for using coercion must surely feel his flesh crawling. In other words, we can rationalize by saying they're prisoners of their drugs, or whatever, and so therefore we can make them a prisoner in order to somehow or other cure them with an experimental program that nobody knows will work. Well, as a matter of fact, we know it won't work. It didn't work in Lexington, Kentucky; it didn't work in California or New York. After billions of dollars have been spent on these kinds of programs, none of them work. Here we are doing it in a Mickey Mouse way. Just because! In 1968 and '69 they were having a lot of trouble down at the Narcotics Addiction Foundation — a great deal of trouble. I've got the history of it here, and I don't want to go through it again.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: That's right, and up to '72, that's when they got into trouble over the LeDain situation. But it's an old-boy thing, and that's where this minister has gone for his help — his dear old friends, his old Social Credit Party buddies. It is not good enough. We've got a loser here and that's part of the reason that I've moved a motion of non-confidence.

If anybody wants to acquaint themselves with what's going on in that program, I would be only too happy to lend them some of this material. I was thinking of going over it a great deal, and I just thought, what's the point. The minister hasn't tried to understand to date, and I suggest that he will not try to understand in the future.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Chairman, these are the easy days of summer; it is an afternoon of brotherly love. Here we are discussing the estimates of the Minister of Health. Of all things, we have a vote of non-confidence in that minister, and, Mr. Chairman, to make the irony complete, we have that motion being put forward by the former Minister of Health. Members of the assembly who have any memory at all will have an opportunity to compare the performance of this minister in office with his predecessor — the one who wishes to put forward the motion of non-confidence. I think the House can be reminded that the member who moves the non-confidence motion entered into government when the treasury was groaning, due to the prudence of those who held office before that little socialist movement....

AN HON. MEMBER: What about your old speeches?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please.

HON. MR. McGEER: I make no apologies for the fact that some of that money, in fact a good deal of it, could have been well spent. Never ever did I stand up in the House, Mr. Chairman, and advocate that the money be wasted — poured down the drain — on senseless planning, silly schemes and inept management. After all, that's what we had for three years.

I'm just prefacing my remarks and contrasting the performance of the present minister and his predecessor who moved the motion of non-confidence. This minister had to work under the worst handicap that any Minister of Health, in the last two or three generations, has had to work under. Whereas the former minister who spoiled, as did many of his colleagues, the golden opportunity they had to manage and plan well to improve the services had yet to see the way in which they squandered the public's money and their own opportunity.

I can remember the early days when that member was the Minister of Health. He really wasn't too sure what to do, so he hired one of his friends, a physician named Foulkes. How many remember the Foulkes report? It cost perhaps $1 million, was a tome that thick and contained perhaps 1,000 recommendations — at least several hundred. Don't you wish you had never made it public? When nothing was happening in that Ministry of Health, we heard day after day after day that this great plan was coming forward, as Foulkes put it forward — a massive $1 million total of wasted money. Then when it finally came in, Mr. Chairman, after we waited for all these months for something to be done, the minister said that he wasn't going to follow the recommendations. At least he showed a little wisdom there, even if he showed no wisdom with the $1 million that was wasted on that plan.

Then, Mr. Chairman, what did we have after that? We had the B.C. Medical Centre. Do you remember that? Not many people remember, Mr. Chairman, that during the whole period that they were in office and hiring people at high prices, all they did was plan and plan and plan. So there was another $10 million wasted on planning. There was no performance at all during that period of office. All we did was raise the costs of running those hospitals enormously, getting no extra service, no planning for better training, no improvement in programs and no increase in the numbers of hospitals. They couldn't do it. All they were doing was hiring so-called experts to plan, and then when they got the plans, they threw them away. That's why they couldn't do anything constructive. All they did was take the money and shovel it out there without bringing services, without bringing education, without bringing planning of any kind.

So what happened, Mr. Chairman, when this government came into office with the treasury empty, with the bills arriving every day? I can remember those early days on Treasury Board. Just when you thought you had a budget planned, a new stack of NDP bills and unpaid promises

[ Page 839 ]

arrived. So we had to make up a completely new budget until we could finally make some sense out of all the expenditures and all the obligations that were coming in, and put together a hospital budget.

But notwithstanding those enormous handicaps, Mr. Chairman, that minister began to go to work and plan for health services that no government previously had been able to provide. Do you realize that we have put — after years and years of promises, including three years of promises under the NDP — a chronic-care program into effect?

I want the new member for Coquitlam to listen very carefully, because you moved in with a group of people and you weren't responsible for the way they squandered money, their lack of planning, their lack of imagination, their lack of introduction of solid programs during the whole term that they were in government. But you're associating yourself with them and you might as well learn what their record is. I hope to heaven that you will be able, in the time you're here, at least to plan sensible debate. One way will be to understand the record of your own members so that when they come in here, as that member did, putting forward a vote of non-confidence, you could think a little bit, ruminate on his record during office, versus the man who presently is the incumbent, and who he has the gall to vote non-confidence in.

Some of us were here when he was performing, and we've been here while the present minister has been performing. I tell you that here we've brought in for the first time in the history of British Columbia something that nobody has asked for more than the NDP in all their years in opposition — namely a chronic-care program. Yet when they had the opportunity, the obligation and the money, did they produce that program? No, Mr. Chairman. Yet this minister has been able to do it while the social services tax in this province is first of all cut from 7 percent to 5 percent, and then 5 percent to 4 percent. Still those extra services have been provided. The reason that these things can be done is because we have a minister and a ministry and a government that does not squander money. When you spend your money well, then you can bring these extra services and cut taxes.

I would like to ask the member opposite who moved that motion of non-confidence to answer this question. As a citizen of British Columbia, where else in the world would he prefer to be if he's sick or if his family is sick? For whose services would he trade in British Columbia the services provided by that minister? Don't tell me the United States. Don't tell me Great Britain. Don't tell me the other provinces in Canada, who have been unable to bring forward the depth and the breadth....

Interjections.

HON. MR. McGEER: All right, let the member for Coquitlam-Moody stand up and tell us where he would rather be if he were sick. He sat in the national parliament. He knows the agreements that were established by the government of Canada, both for medicare and hospital care. He was there, Mr. Chairman, when the federal government terminated those open-ended programs and left a number of provinces in Canada unable to meet their hospital bills. He was there when those actions took place, and he knows what the consequences of this action are going to be in some of the less affluent provinces in Canada. He knows the restrictions that are now being placed in Ontario and in Quebec and in the Maritimes. And he knows that those restrictions are not appearing here in British Columbia, nor will they appear. Why? Because we've got a government that's prudent financially and has a social conscience. These are the things that need to be remembered in debate. What we also need to remember is the performance of that government and that minister when he was in charge of this important portfolio.

No, Mr. Chairman, what we've got is a stunning record from that minister. There is $500 million now being spent, not on planning, not on useless reports, but on building hospital beds. What have we got? Now, for the second year, we have a complete comprehensive chronic-care program in British Columbia — something that no government, no matter how good their will and intentions, has been able to produce before. All these things are happening while taxes in British Columbia are being cut and while we have every confidence in this province that we will be able to meet all the obligations to the people of British Columbia for their health care, despite the actions of the federal government, and despite the terror that lies in the hearts of Ministries of Health in less affluent provinces in this country.

I ask again — indeed, I challenge the member who brought forward that non-confidence motion — to stand up in this House and say which province he would rather be in, which country he would rather be in, where he could go that he genuinely believes he could get better health care than under that minister, and in this province.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. members, estimates do not afford the opportunity for members to question those people whose estimates are not being discussed. It's my recollection that only members of the executive council have estimates to pass through Committee of Supply.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Chairman, I would like to deal for a moment with the last speaker's advice to the House. He impresses some of his own colleagues, and he might impress somebody out there — if they're not informed. I would like to inform the people of British Columbia, who are interested, on two things that member discussed.

The first was the Medical Centre. The B.C. Medical Centre concept, Mr. Chairman, was the concept that led us to where we are now. Actually, the government tried to reverse everything, but they couldn't manage it. They're still winding up with a Children's Hospital on the Shaughnessy site. They're still winding up with the high-risk maternity on the Shaughnessy site, et cetera. Sure, they destroyed millions of dollars worth of planning and organization, not because of the Minister of Health but because of this minister, the Minister of Education, who wanted to build a monument to himself out at UBC. It's called the UBC Hospital. That hospital is going to cost the people in this province an absolute arm and a leg. I want to hear the Minister of Health stand up today and tell us he's going to be able to run that hospital for less than $400 a day. It's going to cost him more than $400 a day to run that hospital, and that's what the Minister of Education costs this province. Sure, they're throwing down the barrel and throwing down the tube all those plans, the best concepts we could have come up with, and the concept that is working so well now in Quebec city.

[ Page 840 ]

Mr. Chairman, we had Sherbrooke as an example — a university hospital. They couldn't attract the patients, and it's a white elephant. Then we went to Hamilton, just to prove it to ourselves, where they built another one. One of the reasons they've had to close so many beds in Ontario is to force the people to get into that hospital.

Mr. Chairman, one of the best pieces of advice I ever got was from one of the best Ministers of Health I've ever met in this country. Yes, he had the unfortunate experience of being a Liberal, and he had to quit. His name was Claude Castonguay. He also wrote a report, and one of the pieces of advice I sought from him was: "What would you do? Would you take the Laval system, where you incorporate the hospitals and the teaching centres, or would you just go for a university hospital?" He said: "Stay away from a university hospital. They'll kill you." True.

That's what that one is going to do to us. That monument to the Minister of Education.... And he stands up and talks about waste. I can't believe it. He's the mastermind of waste.

Mr. Chairman, I have no excuses. I'm not the least bit ashamed about the Medical Centre. I'm not ashamed of a lot of the things we did. I'm not ashamed of the ambulance service this government boasts about as though they invented it. We brought it in. They know it.

That minister was the guy, when he brought in the new rates for car insurance, who said: "If they can't afford insurance, let them sell their cars." He's saying now: "If they can't afford health care, let them get sick," and whatever. I'm telling you, Mr. Chairman, that's the kind of approach we don't need. The one thing I say to that Minister of Education is he would be better off if he would get back to the university, do his research and quit costing the people of this province an absolute arm and a leg. Because he's sure done it in health care.

MR. BARNES: I have a couple of questions for the minister.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: We're on a motion.

MR. BARNES: I know there is a motion, but I think, Mr. Chairman....

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: What's the motion'?

MR. BARNES: This is what I mean. Before I get out my first statement the minister's expressing his arrogance. The reason there is a non-confidence motion before the House right now is because of the minister's attitude.

Interjection.

MR. BARNES: I wish I could put that in words — look at him over there, moaning and groaning.

I'm not in the mood for acrimony, Mr. Chairman. I'm trying to communicate to the minister some of the concerns that we have on this side of the House, and why we're expressing our dissatisfaction with the minister's performance. I'm trying to deal in specific examples. I just want to indicate two examples of why I, at least, for one, do not have confidence in the minister's sincerity, integrity and commitment to serving not only constituents in his own constituency and the province but in the constituency of Vancouver Centre, where a number of appeals have been made to his office asking for assistance.

Efforts have been made to communicate concerns, especially in the downtown area of Vancouver and Chinatown. I'm sure the minister will recall delegations that have attempted to have an audience with him to discuss the industry of barbecued pork in the Chinatown area. It's a 2,000-year-old-custom, a 2,000-year-old method that has been successful in storing meats for public consumption without incident, only accusations. Despite the things that have been said by the former Ministry of Health official in the city of Vancouver, Mr. Gerald Bonham, who is now one of your field inspectors, I believe.... These people have been persecuted, prosecuted and threatened, and are presently being taken to court by city inspectors because they insist on practising a tradition for which there is no evidence to suggest that they should do otherwise, other than health regulations which say that meats have to be kept at -40 degrees Celsius or above 140 degrees Celsius.

For no other reason than regulations, we have an example of indifference and bureaucratic stubbornness by a government that refuses to negotiate or sit down and discuss the hard facts of an industry that is vital to a community that we benefit from in terms of promoting tourism in this province. It's an industry that hundreds of families depend upon, and that has been successful without incident, generating some $20,000 a day in that sector alone. It's one which I would think — especially when you have a government that is bereft of any kind of initiative of its own in terms of economic development or industrial growth — a government would want to encourage.

So here we have a very small operation in terms of the provincial gross product, I'm sure, but nonetheless vital in that area. It is attractive, and is very successful, and I'm sure the minister himself has benefited on many occasions when he has attended banquets in that area and enjoyed the foods there. I'm sure he suffered from no salmonella or any other kinds of poisoning. There just isn't any evidence, only innuendo, and suggestion, and the possibility and the probability kinds of projections that people have been suggesting may happen, could happen, or might happen. But in 2,000 years not one single case has been proven against the method.

I think that the minister has a duty to take a look at traditional values, as well as those that we concoct in the Legislature and in the councils of this province, when trying to impose upon people without any attempt to communicate with them or understand the daily practical realities that they have to deal with. Instead of the indifference that has existed, I'm sure that even if the minister had shown some concern and care, and attempted to debate some of the problems that his ministry felt were out of his jurisdiction — just had gone and sat and listened, been concerned, made recommendations, had a few pilot projects, to attempt to try and find a solution on an amicable basis there would be no need for the attitude that this side of the House has had to develop in expressing non-confidence. That's an example.

In the whole field of health care, I think the minister has an abominable record in terms of his attitude and concept of where values lie in this province. As the first member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) pointed out last evening, the minister is not committed to resolving the health-care problems; he's committed to balancing his budget, and he's very stringent in pushing the different health-care units in the province to

[ Page 841 ]

hold the line at 5 percent and 7 percent on their costs. There is no question that there is a very rigid attitude about people and about the things that really matter on a daily basis.

Sure, we all have to pay taxes, but, I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, I'm very much concerned about people who expend these taxes, having no time, no ear for listening and no willingness to be flexible in extenuating circumstances. One of the difficulties in any administration is trying to draw across-the-board policy statements and making decisions that are indiscriminate in terms of the realities that exist in different situations. It's sort of similar to the attitude of the former Minister of Human Resources who decided that democracy was too cumbersome, and therefore we should get rid of the Vancouver Resources Board. He felt that it was much easier to operate in the domain of his ministry than to work with elected representatives in the various communities. This is another example of endorsing the rhetoric of a democratic society but, in fact, not being willing to participate in the practical day-to-day basis.

This leads me, Mr. Chairman, to the other point that I wanted to raise. I want to give an example of how this minister's attitude is one that does not instil confidence in terms of his image with the public. The situation deals with the detoxification centre in the city of Vancouver. The North Mount Pleasant community council attempted to consult with his ministry and other officials, including the chairman of the Alcohol and Drug Commission, Mr. Bert Hoskin, who was responsible for consulting in the development of that program. They felt — just as the people feel right now with the multiplex proposal in Vancouver — that they would like to have some input before a decision was made. They attempted to go to the city council to make their representations. Because there is a long-standing problem with detoxification, everyone was in a hurry to get the project underway. Certainly that is with some validity, because it has been a number of years and many aldermen in the city of Vancouver have been frustrated in attempting to resolve the problem.

In this particular case North Mount Pleasant community planners were not opposed to the site which was eventually decided upon in the Great Northern Way in the city of Vancouver. They were not opposed to the site; they merely asked your ministry to give them an opportunity for some assurances that this plan to finally resolve the need for a more acceptable detoxification centre would, in fact, achieve the goals that it was intended to. In other words, those persons who were going to be coming on their 72-hour day would not find themselves in residence, which is a reasonable question. But there were no assurances that it was not going to be a residential treatment centre, but just a centre for 72 hours or less to deal with an immediate problem of drying out. There were no assurances that there wouldn't be other programs associated with detoxification that would spill over into the community, which would have a new impact on the community. It could be like creating a new satellite of a downtown area. I think that the community had a valid right to inquire, without undermining the efforts of well-meaning people who wanted to resolve a serious problem. But my point here is that there was a lack of interest on behalf of your ministry to say: "Look, we don't want to go beyond these people's desires to have dialogue. After we've permitted some time for that, perhaps then we can make a decision agreeable to everyone."

But, Mr. Chairman, the minister threatened city council; he used heavy-handed power and threatened to withdraw the funds if they didn't proceed, notwithstanding the fact that there had been attempts by a local community citizens' organization to have dialogue. That's where the attitude that I'm talking about comes in. The minister said: "Well, if you're not prepared to move, we're not prepared to wait any longer, and we'll spend the money elsewhere. We're not permitting any further opportunity for dialogue or debate. There has been too much delay already."

Was very similar to the mayor standing up in the city and saying he wants to go ahead with the multiplex. "The heck with the dialogue: the heck with the people in the east side of town and all of these problems like traffic and so forth; we want action."

No one, I think, with any experience would suggest that a democratic process is a simple, efficient process. It's a cumbersome, time-consuming process, but if it's going to have any value, then we're going to have to be tolerant and permit it to take its course. When you start circumventing it, as your ministry is doing in attempting to try and get the political kudos that you would like before the next election so you can say you have done this and you have done the other, then you're going to undermine the system that we rely upon, Mr. Chairman. It ensures that everyone has an opportunity for input, dialogue and feedback.

I think you may feel that these are not important considerations when you have, as you pointed out, well over a billion dollars to spend on health care on behalf of the people. You seem to be frustrated by the onerous task that you have before you, and you don't have time for ordinary day-to-day problems that people feel are important. I sympathize with you, but you have the job.

You joined the Social Credit Party because you felt you couldn't wait until the Progressive Conservatives made it, and now that you are in that position.... I don't think you are a true Socred, are you? Very few of your colleagues are. I thought you must have belonged to some other party, but maybe I'm wrong. You'll explain that when you stand up, will you?

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Yes.

MR. BARNES: You'll get your time in a minute.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Well, you told me you wanted an explanation.

MR. BARNES: Sure, in due course.

MR. LEA: He's got a gold Social Credit card.

MR. BARNES: He's got a gold one?

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Right on.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Chairman, I think the minister's motivation may have been well intentioned in his desire to assist in the field of health care, but I think he has some private, personal ambitions which make it difficult for him to do the job properly. In that respect, I think he could do with a course in human relations and maybe understand how important it is to go at the pace of the people that he is affecting.

[ Page 842 ]

I can assure you that we are not trying to stall for time by saying that we have no confidence in you, because I believe that the job you have is a very big job administratively, and is very complex. The extra challenge you have to face is the fact that ordinary people do have something to say and they should be listened to. When you don't have time to listen to them, you're going down the wrong course, Mr. Chairman, and that's exactly why I decided to stand up and make these representations.

As far as the Chinese merchants who depend on the sale of barbequed pork for their livelihood in their community are concerned, they've lost confidence in you simply because you are not listening. You've turned a deaf ear. You are not prepared to resolve a serious problem. These people are being prosecuted daily for violations of the health bylaws in the city of Vancouver, bylaws which shouldn't even be on the books. Even the federal government recognizes that, and you should recognize it, but you're being superbureaucratic and superstubborn, and appearing to be indifferent when you know that there is a wrong being perpetrated on that community.

I'm saying that you should go down and listen, and you should say: "Look, let's resolve this problem in the best interests of the local merchants, the province and the Ministry of Tourism." People don't want to buy bark; they don't want to buy pork that has been under 140 degrees all day long — it's going to dry out. They have a system that has worked for 2,000 years, Mr. Chairman. Why is it that we can't recognize this as a custom, as a tradition that has proven itself to be far greater than some of our scientists think the solutions they have, in the customary sense in other markets, are?

There are other things that can be done. Biochemical improvements in standards could perhaps resolve some of the problems in terms of the bacteria, if that's a concern. There are other ways of coping with the problem besides forcing them to turn their barbequed pork into bark.

The question of communicating with the residents in the North Mount Pleasant area is a similar problem. It's not that anything is perhaps going to change in terms of the plans to construct that detoxification centre on the Great Northern Way, but I think there should be some assurances to that community that the detoxification centre will be within the limits of the design, that it will not be something else. In other words, you get one foot in and you bring the whole horse in: you've got a whole, big master plan that they had no knowledge of, and there's the impact on the community. Give them the assurance that the specifications will be rigidly followed, that the scope of this complex will be no greater than what has been required or specified. These are assurances that I think they have a right to. Unfortunately they don't have any other course, other than to consult an opposition member and ask him to try and intervene or make some representations in the Legislature, which means very little when the minister, as you have demonstrated in the past, is not prepared to respond.

I would say that these people's voices should be heard, and they should be seriously listened to. We could make a very serious mistake in that instance, even though it is a vital and very important facility you are intending to construct.

Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, I would say to the minister: get a clue from what is happening with the multiplex on the PNE site right now, or at least the proposed multiplex. There is an example of some forces pushing for what they feel will be a boon to the sports field and to the different spinoff effects in terms of sales and promotions. I think the example we should get from that is that the people in the community had no idea, until after commitments had been made and we'd brought in the stadium fund Act, and the thing was almost....

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: The stadium fund Act?

MR. BARNES: Well, sure, and a convention centre as well. You know, there's a relationship, because after we create a white elephant and we have the taxpayers' money committed and we find out it isn't resolving a problem, that it is not meeting the needs and we have to do a lot of second-guessing, it's too late. That's why we have the democratic process, Mr. Chairman. That's why we need the time.

Surely you can remember that with your Heroin Treatment Program you've got the same thing. You started off with a program that was going to be comprehensive. You had a $16 million or $18 million commitment. You found out you only needed $8 million, and then you found out all the people in your facility were counsellors. You don't even have any patients, and you're too afraid to enforce the compulsory phase. It's an example of an ambitious idea without much thought, without any communication, without any relationship to the realities of what a program such as that will have on the community.

I suggest to you that there's every reason to question your ability to communicate with the community, as well as to question your administrative ability. I think the two are separate. Perhaps you have overemphasized one without recognizing the importance of the other. I say this not from a political opponent's standpoint, but from one of interest and concern for you, Mr. Minister, and the success of your ministry. I would like to see you do a good job, because we're paying you to do a good job. The public needs to have a good job done in your ministry. Unless you do a good job, then you are going to be criticized. But I don't think it's to my advantage to see you fail — from a non-political standpoint, that is.

The main concern right now, in this time of strained dollars and hard times and unemployment and the frustrations the people have because of the heavy hand of commercialism and the high pressures of tax collectors and bill collectors and the rising costs of everything you conceivably need, is that we need integrity at least in people in your position. We need compassion, understanding, cooperation, a willingness to be flexible and a desire to appear to be doing a good job. In other words, take the patience to talk to people.

I will be voting in favour of this motion, because I haven't as yet heard anything from the minister indicating that it should be otherwise.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: First of all, I suppose, I should acknowledge, apologize and plead guilty to one of the charges the second member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Barnes) made: I have some ambition; that's true. I know that member wouldn't understand anyone having any kind of personal ambition. That member is incredible. I don't believe what I've just heard here; I just simply don't believe it.

[ Page 843 ]

He stands in here and talks about care and concern and understanding — all those great and humanitarian principles — and about the barbequed-pork merchants. You're a year late. Where were you a year ago when this debate was going on? Where were you when those people were in my office talking to me? The door has not been closed on any of those people. They have met with me, but I sure didn't hear from their MLA. When was the last time you contacted my office about this, Mr. Member? Tell me. When was the last time you ever contacted my office on behalf of any one of your constituents? You've never done it; never once. Now all of a sudden, Mr. Member, you looked back into one of your old files and you recognized one that said "barbequed meat." You came out of hiding on Vancouver Island, and you thought: "I'd better say something about Vancouver Centre, or they're going to get after me." So you said something about Vancouver Centre.

MR. BARNES: What are you getting so frantic about? Deal with the facts.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: What an incredible member! I'm glad, though, that member and the previous member talked about the alcohol programs and the Heroin Treatment Program of the ministry, because it gives me the opportunity to give a short report to the Legislature about those programs. I take a great deal of pride in the achievements we've made in a very short time, in the consistency of growth of the programs dealing with alcoholism and in the increasing capacity to provide support to the individual caught up in an alcohol or other drug dependency. This progress has been achieved in large part because of the dedication of the direct service units of the ministry and the many funded agencies, about 45 of them throughout the province, that are operated by community boards under the direction, financial support and guidance of the ministry and the Alcohol and Drug Commission.

In the field of alcoholism, by the end of fiscal year 1978-79 the Alcohol and Drug Commission had increased its intensive residential treatment beds in the province to 93; supportive home beds to 215; detoxification centre beds to a total of 108; and now has outpatient counselling services operating in 35 communities of this province.

One of the highlights of the year's activities, perhaps of the three years' activities and this year's expansion, was the development of the first native Indian residential treatment centre at Round Lake, with a 24-bed capacity, which I had the pleasure of officially opening on May 25, 1979. This project was achieved though the efforts of the federal and provincial governments, and the Interior Native Alcohol Abuse Society. Hopefully we will be able to increase our facilities for our native people in recognition of their special cultural and other lifestyles. Also, another unique eight-bed residential facility was opened in the Queen Charlotte Islands to serve as a holding unit for assessment purposes and a short-term intervention program.

Two other highlights, Mr. Chairman, are in the field of industrial alcoholism, where the cooperation between management, labour and the ministry — through its professional development division of the Alcohol and Drug Commission — has increasingly provided help to the problem-drinker employee through the employee assistance program, and in the field of preventive education.

The other "first" was in the proclamation of Provincial Alcohol Awareness Week, October 16 to 20. I am proud to say that the Alcohol and Drug Commission's information services promoted an effective awareness week, which will be continued this year. The consultant-designer for the commission won a bronze award from the Graphic Designers of Canada for his creative and very telling alcohol posters during that campaign.

I am pleased to report that the Heroin Treatment Program has been developing quite favourably throughout the province. To date, some 306 individuals have indicated an interest in treatment in this new program. Evaluation panels have been set up all over the province. The recruitment of members for our evaluation panels under the Act has been most encouraging. These panels have been recruited and operate in Kelowna, Victoria, Nanaimo and Vancouver. They are composed of individuals who are highly respected in their professions and in the community. To date there have been 26 physicians, 4 lawyers, 4 psychologists, 12 lay persons and 1 nurse. They also include a hospital board chairman, several ex-school board chairmen, an ex-chairman of the Associated Boards of Health in the province, one ex-Deputy Minister of Health for British Columbia, and, I think, Mr. Chairman, one past-president of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, and possibly two past-presidents of the British Columbia Medical Association. I am quite proud of the calibre of people who have come to those assessment panels, and who have came also to serve us in the Ministry of Health through the Alcohol and Drug Commission in the Heroin Treatment Program itself.

AN HON. MEMBER: How many are being treated in the program?

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, I just gave you that information. Unfortunately that member was not listening.

Out of some 352 inquiries by potential patients, we have had some 97 assessments of the kind that were necessary; 118 have commenced treatment to this point. We have 219 in treatment as special-status treatment programs. So that's just under 350 people in treatment at this time.

MR. COCKE: Oh, come on! You've got the old methadone program thrown in there.

MS. BROWN: You have just more than 100 patients.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: That is the total number of people in treatment at this point.

I am quite proud of the way things have been going, and I must say the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) has talked about addicts coming and going at will at Brannan Lake Centre. Yes, the compulsory aspect of the program is not in place. We would be foolish, to say the least, and somewhat presumptuous, to attempt to introduce that aspect of the program until the constitutional challenge, which is before the courts, is fully discharged. We expect that will be within a matter of days, and certainly within a matter of weeks. We will then be able to continue with the rest of the program.

But, Mr. Chairman, I don't think any thinking person in British Columbia wants us to delay this program or to delay

[ Page 844 ]

treatment of those people who are coming forward to us more and more on their own. The courts are finding increasing favour with the program. The word on the street, among the addicts, is changing considerably about the nature of our program. Many of them have seen Brannan Lake; they know what we have in Brannan Lake. I'd like to invite some of the members of the opposition to show their concern and understanding, and find out. I'd like also to invite some of the members of the opposition — and, in fact, all members of this House, someday — to a seminar in which we can go over our treatment programs in detail. I think the members should meet the people involved in our programs, anyway. I'm sure that, as responsible members of the community and MLAs, they'd be happy to do that. I'd be happy to set it up some time in the future.

We hear a great deal of rhetoric, Mr. Chairman, from that side of the House about the government's Heroin Treatment Program. But, you know, the one thing we still don't hear, and we have never heard in all the years we've discussed this problem, is any kind of suggestion of a positive nature from those humanitarians on the other side of the House about a viable alternative to what we are doing. We've heard not a word, unless you call the Leader of the Opposition's benign neglect some kind of a positive solution to this problem. That's what he says: "Forget the addicts. Benign neglect is the best way to treat heroin addicts." The second member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Barnes) expressed his hope that the plan would backfire and fail.

Interjection.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: That's what you said, Mr. Member, and that's what you want to happen.

Mr. Chairman, maybe that opposition does have a proposal. But we sure haven't heard about it, my staff has never heard about it, the people of British Columbia have never heard about it — unless it's benign neglect. They don't have a proposal to develop their obligations to resolve the misery and degradation of the user, or the medical, social and financial burden that we all bear as citizens of this province.

And, you know, $12 million.... Well, it isn't going to be $12 million for this year; it'll be about $9 million perhaps. But even if it were $12 million or $20 million, would that be too much to pay for a program which is going to alleviate the costs of crime, and the fifth largest industry in this province?

Mr. Chairman, where are the alternatives from that opposition? I don't intend to get into the same debate that we got into when this bill was before the House. The bill has been debated, and that debate is over. The program is continuing and will continue. I make no apologies at all for the fact that this government is doing everything it possibly can to give the individual caught up in chemical dependency, for the first time in his or her life, a real opportunity to achieve a meaningful and rewarding lifestyle, and to be part of the same kind of lifestyle that you and I have.

AN HON. MEMBER: You don't believe that.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Yes, I believe that and yes, it will happen.

[Mr. Rogers in the chair.]

Mr. Chairman, you know, the members opposite can say and do what they want but the general public of this province is with us in this program. I wonder how many of those humanitarians over there ever bothered to think about the anguish of the hundreds of parents and husbands and wives and children who for years have been crying out for help, with nowhere to go.

We've had 50 years of benign neglect in this province, and of philosophical debate about heroin dependency, while we've allowed the destructive force of that drug dependency to eat away at the very fabric of our province. This is a five-year demonstration project, which is the boldest approach ever taken in the world in this regard, and it is an initiative that is unparalleled. Maybe it won't be completely successful, but we think it will help.

I would like to share with the members of this House some indication that maybe it is in fact working. Maybe there's a chance that some people will be helped because of this program. We have had the very first patient to go through detoxification and withdrawal and begin the treatment program at the Brannan Lake intensive-care unit.

MR. LEA: What is the treatment?

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Chairman, I've offered to put on a seminar for those members who have not had the interest, and I would be happy to do that at any time they wish. The treatment program is public, it is available for scrutiny and, if that member had wanted, he could have read about it; but I will be happy to put on a seminar for him at any time.

We have one person that I just want to tell this House about. I think it's important that you hear about this person, who has been through detox and is in treatment at the present time and will be back in his own community and back at work by the end of July. We'll call him Gerry for the purposes of this debate. We can't use his real name, of course. But he says: "For the first time in more than 12 years, I will be completely drug-free and I intend to stay that way." Gerry started using illicit drugs in 1969, and graduated to heroin at the age of 15. He was a volunteer for treatment at Brannan Lake. He had been on the methadone maintenance program but he had found both his life and his health deteriorating from the constant need to rely on that heroin substitute in order to keep working and stay self-supporting.

And, I suppose, the government had in fact contributed in a large way to making him a methadone addict rather than a heroin addict. Employed at a MacMillan-Bloedel pulp mill, Gerry went to his boss and told the boss his problems.

"The boss was great. I told him I wanted to become completely drug-free, and the only way to do it was to volunteer for the three-year Heroin Treatment Program and go to Brannan Lake to withdraw from methadone. He not only gave me the time off, but I've been drawing my pay, under sick leave, during the whole time I was in the residential treatment centre. " Gerry says the fact that MacMillan Bloedel imposed no time limit on his withdrawal and recovery time eased the pressure.

"If they had told me, 'Okay, we'll give you three weeks or a month to get it right,' I would probably have blown it under the pressure to meet

[ Page 845 ]

that deadline. But they told me to take all the time I needed. "

Under the Heroin Treatment Program regulations patients may remain in Brannan Lake for up to six months. Gerry, one of the first patients admitted to the centre, has been there just over three months. On release he will continue to attend the nearest community clinic available, and he will be subject to the treatment rules for the balance of the three-year program. Gerry goes on to say:

"I've already been out several times, making arrangements for a return to work, and for my sessions at the community clinic. I found you have to make a real effort to resist the temptation to return to old hangouts and old friends. You've got to realize you can't afford to allow yourself to slip into your old habits. "

Gerry attributes his rapid progress through the residential treatment centre's program to three things:

"My own desire to be completely drug-free; the tremendous help and attitude of the treatment staff; and the great support I get from my employer. "

A spokesman for MacMillan Bloedel, incidentally — and I think this is important to say as well — says that the attitude displayed by Gerry's boss is not unusual. In fact, it is official company policy. It's a good corporate citizen at work, I would say. They have an in-service alcohol and drug counselling program designed to provide their employees not only with advice but support and guidance as well. They should be congratulated for that.

The point is, Mr. Chairman, without the Heroin Treatment Program in place, Gerry would have been just another junkie looking for help when there was no help available. If that program continues to work in that way, if the success rate is 40 percent, or 30 percent, or 20 percent, over the period of the program, then I'll consider it to have been a great success.

MR. LEA: Mr. Chairman, there have been suggestions since this motion of non-confidence in the Minister of Health that for some unknown reason the Minister of Health doesn't want to give the hospitals enough money to operate in a healthy manner. On the face of it that would have to seem ridiculous. What possible reason could there be for the Minister of Health to have everyone who works in the health industry angry at him? What possible reason could there be that he would want to have the general public angry at him? What possible reason could there be that the minister would want to come into this Legislature and have the members of the opposition, and probably some in the back bench, angry at him? It doesn't make sense. Why would the minister go out of his way to starve the health-care system in order to get himself into trouble? Can anybody think of a reason why the minister would want to do that? The answer, of course, is that there couldn't possibly be a reason why the minister would want to do that. So then the question has to be: if it isn't the minister, then who is it who wants to make that decision, and why? Obviously it's happening. Obviously we have other areas of government getting gigantic increases in the percentage basis on their budget. As somebody pointed out the other day, the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) has had up to a 60 percent increase in his budget in some areas. First of all you have to say: "Here's a government that says, "We must put some sort of austerity program together. either because we want and feel we need it, or at least so the public out there think we're doing something about keeping the cost of everything down, or that we're trying to be responsible and bring austerity to government." Then you have to ask: "If they're going to do that, why would they choose that sensitive area of health care to be the area that they're going to show as an example of a frugal government, by putting an austerity program into being?" Again, it doesn't make sense on the face of it. Why would a government give the Highways ministry a 60 percent increase and hold the health-care system in the province down to 5 percent? Why? I want everyone to think about that. Why would a government do that? Why would they give the hardware departments of government gigantic percentage increases and yet take social services, in terms of health, and impose a 5 percent limitation? It's hard to think of a reason. I suggest to you that, unless there is a political reason somewhere behind the door, there is no reason at all. In fact there are many reasons not to do that.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

So, if we've decided it's a political reason, we have to examine the evidence in front of us and try to decide what that political reason could be that the people receiving health care in this province are suffering, as are the people working in health care, to a degree. They are suffering because of the miserly amount of increase that the government and this minister have put forward as a percentage increase allowed in health care.

What we have to do is examine the man who is responsible for it all, the Premier. The Premier is the man who has the final say on what's going to be happening on the budgetary items of this government. He's the person who had the final say in the Ministry of Highways getting a 60 percent increase, and the Ministry of Health a 5 percent increase. Why? If there is no sensible reason that you can see, then I suggest that it is politics, because oftentimes politics doesn't seem to make a great deal of sense.

First, let's cast our minds back to the nominating convention of the now Premier as leader of the opposition Social Credit Party. We find that the Minister of Health was one of the people who ran against him. We also find that the Minister of Transportation, Communications and Highways was the person who nominated the Minister of Health to run against the present leader of the Social Credit Party. Who are the people within that Social Credit Party that threaten the present Premier and his leadership role? How have they been dealt with one at a time? The Minister of Municipal Affairs, the member for Surrey (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) — was he a threat to the Premier'? What happened to him?

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: He didn't run.

MR. LEA: Oh, but he was a political threat. He said he wanted to run, and that his ambition was to be the Premier of this province, and he would do anything for his personal ambition. The Minister of Health also says he aspires to this. He says: "I have personal ambition, and I'm not ashamed of that." Well, he's already in the cabinet. Where to now, Mr. Minister'? Where does your personal ambition take you? How better to get rid of a political threat to your backside than to take a minister who may be capable of unseating you, and to do him in in his own portfolio — to

[ Page 846 ]

make that minister look bad, incompetent, cold-hearted and miserly. Let's starve that ministry, and we don't care how it affects the people who look for services in health care. We don't care how it affects the people who are working in health care, as long as we don't have that political threat on our backside called the Minister of Health.

One by one you see them falling off. The former Minister of Human Resources, who was a threat a scant three and a half years ago, is no longer a threat after a couple of demotions and a shove sideways. Now the people who have to go to the government to get services from Human Resources have to deal with the present Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy), whom I wouldn't want to go to if I needed help. Would you? Is that the kind of person you'd want to go to and say: "Look, I'm up against it in this system and I'd like a little help." Would you go to that minister with that kind of plea? Isn't it nice that they're all being sorted out?

What is the responsibility of the Minister of Health? The responsibility of that minister is to represent health care in the cabinet of British Columbia, and then to deliver what he gets from cabinet to the people of British Columbia. Non-confidence? How can people have confidence in a Minister of Health who goes to the Treasury Board and cabinet and comes back with an amount of money that means that we have to close children's wards and general wards, and that we have to have understaffed wards in this province. It also means that we have to cut back on the whole health-care program because that minister cannot get the right amount of money from the government.

The Minister of Highways has no problem. He had no problem getting not only a bigger percentage increase to his regular budget, but he had no problem going back and getting special warrants to spend more money on highways — no problem whatsoever. There was no problem in coming up with $50 million to put a share program together that would give the people of British Columbia something they already owned — no problem getting money for that. There was no problem with money during the last election campaign when you had the Premier even going to church on Sunday morning and handing out a cheque — no problem getting money for that kind of spending. There was no problem in getting a little more money from the lottery fund to members of the Social Credit Party in Port Alberni just prior to an election campaign. Why has there been no problem in every area of government getting a few extra bucks, except where that minister is concerned?

I believe that if the minister was sincere about trying to deliver an adequate health-care system to this province, and knowing the way the Premier feels about him, and knowing that as long as the Premier feels that way, he'll never get any money, because the object is to make that minister look bad to everyone so the Premier gets the threat off his back.... That minister, if he had any self-respect and wished for good health care in this province, would resign so that some other person could go in and take over that portfolio. He then would be the stepping-block out of the way so that we could have an adequate health-care system in this province. That's what would happen.

But that minister, because he is so personally ambitious, doesn't care if people get bad health-care service. He doesn't care as long as his personal ambitions have a chance of being met. That's all it's about. "Why resign and let the people in this province have some adequate health care when I might end up some day having a stab at being the Premier? And my personal ambitions have to be fulfilled; that's the kind of guy I am." Does it matter that people out there are presently suffering under an inadequate health care system because of a lack of funding, when every hardware system in the government is getting 30, 40, 50, 60 percent increases in their budget?

The minister stands up and talks about the heroin addiction program that he has going, knowing full well that there is no recognized treatment for heroin addiction. We've asked the minister over and over again: tell us what the treatment is. You backbenchers, why don't you ask him what the treatment is? He can't tell you. There is no treatment for heroin addiction. There is no recognized scientific treatment for heroin addiction. We know it; the minister knows it. Mr. Chairman, this has to be the worst political chicanery of all. Knowing the concern in the community, knowing the concern of the people he pointed out — husbands worrying about wives who are drug addicted, wives worrying about husbands who are drug addicted, worrying about children who are drug addicted, an addiction in this society of ours that we all abhor — there isn't one of us that has the answer. Not one of us, Mr. Chairman, has the answer for drug addiction when it comes to heroin, and that minister knows it. But to play on that fear he's willing to spend, as he says, $9 million of the taxpayers' money this year.

He knows that when you take a drowning person, he'll grab at a straw. He knows that if you go into death row and say, "Do you believe now, brother?" they're going to say: "Yes, maybe I do." So what he's doing is taking something he knows full well won't work and he puts it out into a bill through this House and assigns it millions of dollars just so people will think that possibly he and the government are doing something. Now if that isn't political chicanery, I've never heard of political chicanery. To actually take advantage of the fears in our society around drug addiction for vote-getting has to be one of the worst acts that I've seen in this House since I've been here — and it's nothing more than that, one of the worst acts. It has to be the lowest of lows of political trickery to do that. Then for the minister to stand up and read out, after three months of the non-treatment plan, that it works! No treatment, three months and the guy's going back home in July.

Interjection.

[Mr. Rogers in the chair.]

MR. LEA: Yes, I hope he is, but it sure as heck won't have anything to do with going to a jail, whether you can walk out at night or whether you don't walk out at night. There are some jails where you have some of those privileges. But for the minister to actually bring a nonsensical idea like he's brought in for heroin addiction, and then for the member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet) to say, "You come forward with an idea," when the whole health-care system and the whole scientific community can't come forward with the idea.... They have no idea how to cure heroin addiction.

Mr. Chairman, the backbenchers down there are saying: "You come forward with an idea." You say, look, I don't know how to do it. They say: "Oh, come forward with an idea. Come on, you, come forward with an idea." Maybe

[ Page 847 ]

they don't know that the scientific health-care community has no known treatment that works for heroin addiction — none. What are you going to do, bleed them?

Yet for the minister, taking advantage of that fear in the community of the problems that we're having around drug addiction, to do nothing more than play political games with it, is unforgivable. That's why this motion of non-confidence should be passed by every member of this House. A minister playing on the fears of people facing a crisis area in our society to do nothing more than get votes is political criminality.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. I must ask you to withdraw the words "that is criminal."

MR. LEA: I said "political criminality."

MR. CHAIRMAN: I am going to ask you to withdraw that comment. Please withdraw.

MR. LEA: I withdraw it. But it doesn't take away from the fact that is what this minister has done.

This minister has gone out and purposefully held up a program that he knows won't work, and for him to continue with this sham is more than the people of this province should have to bear. A minister who is undergunned by his Premier, who is having to face all sorts of political crises in the health-care system around this province.... It isn't doing him any political good, it isn't doing the government any political good, and isn't doing the people of this province any good in terms of health care. He stands up today and says: "It's all worth it because I'm personally ambitious." And he asks the second member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Barnes): "Why don't you be like I am?" Well, I'm glad he's not.

Mr. Chairman, can you think of any reason why there should be any confidence in a minister who obviously doesn't have the confidence of his own leader, the Premier of this province, who obviously doesn't have the confidence of the people who work in the health-care system or of anybody who has had to be a recipient of the health-care system in the last year? I really believe that this motion, were it put to a referendum in this province, would pass with a large majority. There are other ministers in that cabinet, who, if we put this motion to a referendum, would be defeated with a large majority. But, in this case, if it were possible to put this vote of non-confidence in the form of a referendum to the people of this province, that minister would be out of this House within a matter of hours and back on the back bench — and the minister knows it. He knows that he could not stand the test of a referendum in this province, that he has been disgraced as the Minister of Health, and that the people in this province who have to go to health care for service are the victims of that disgrace — the disgrace of having no clout in his own cabinet to get money for the sick. And he wants us not to vote for this motion of non-confidence. Mr. Chairman, if all of us in this House didn't vote a motion of non-confidence in this minister, the people in this province would have every right to vote non-confidence in us as an assembly. The health care in this province is a disgrace and the minister responsible has to accept full responsibility, even though he is the victim of political infighting within the party to which he belongs.

Why doesn't the minister do the right thing and resign? Ask for another portfolio, so that the people of this province can get the kind of health care that they deserve and pay for. Why not resign? The only reason is the one the minister stated himself today — he is personally ambitions, and what's wrong with that? He's proud of it.

AN HON. MEMBER: Pathetic.

MR. LEA: Yes, it is pathetic, and I urge you, Mr. Minister, to plead with your colleagues to be allowed to give up that portfolio, so that once again we can have a health-care delivery system in this province that we can stand up and be proud of.

Mr. Chairman, those backbenchers know full well that the same health-care problems that we are being told about, and that we know from personal experience, are happening in their own communities. The members for Prince George (Messrs. Heinrich and Strachan) know.

Interjection.

MR. LEA: Oh, the member for the North Shore says he doesn't know. He says there are no problems in his community. Boy, that really makes sense, because the Premier himself had to go in there and try to straighten out that mess. That's what happened in there because the minister wasn't capable; the Premier had to go in and try to straighten it out. And now the member says: "No problems in my riding."

I'I tell you, when they finally choose who the new cabinet ministers are going to be, I bet a few of you will find problems then. You would be doing your duty if you were to join us in this motion of non-confidence and put your concern for people in this province ahead of your own personal ambitions. This is a party made up of segments of personal ambition, that they believe, Mr. Chairman, is more holy than anything. To them it's a little prayer. They say: "Please allow me to be personally ambitious because it goes above everything else. It's a good old competitive system where my urge to climb up that ladder of success one rung at a time means more than the people of this province." That's what we have — a minister, who through his own personal ambition, won't give up his portfolio to help the people who need help.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Chairman, I just wanted to correct the records. The minister suggested that I had made no representations on behalf of the Chinese barbecue merchants in my constituency and indicated that the door was not closed during that emergency when we were appealing to have the regulations altered so that they could carry out their industry without having to comply with the present health standards. But I would like to correct the minister. He is incorrect and I would like to quote from a....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. If I might draw the member's attention to standing order 42, which is.... I think I'I read the standing order, if you'I allow me. In fact, I'I read the standing order anyway: "No member may speak twice to a question except in explanation of a material part of his speech which may have been misquoted or misunderstood, but then he is then not to introduce any new matter, and no debate shall be allowed upon such explanation. "

[ Page 848 ]

Now, since we're in committee and since the member has ample opportunity to stand and speak again, please explain to me whether you feel you have been misquoted or misunderstood. You're correcting the statements made by the minister, if I'm not mistaken.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Chairman, I don't intend to make a speech. I just wanted to clarify the record. It's a sequential explanation. In other words, if I were to stand at some later date, it would not be in relation to the most immediate time I had available. Since the minister just spoke about an hour ago, I thought it would be appropriate for me to correct the records at this time.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The most appropriate time would have been, if you had wanted to do that, after the minister....

MR. BARNES: I had to find the information. I didn't have it available.

The minister has, by fabricating my remarks, indicated one of the reasons why he is facing a non-confidence motion at this time. I quote from Victoria Times, January 15, 1979. This is a very short statement, Mr. Chairman:

"The barbecued-meat merchants who have been battling the government for months have been told their goose is cooked and they must comply with government health regulations. Health Minister Bob McClelland told Chinese Benevolent Association Leader Victor Lee that local meat merchants will have to comply with government regulations if they want to sell barbecued meat. 'We can't make any exceptions for one group. You have to comply with the regulation,' Mr. McClelland told Lee at a Social Credit Party mini-convention. Chinatown merchants have been complaining that health regulations requiring them to store meat at temperatures below minus 40 degrees centigrade or above 140 degrees centigrade are unpractical and would both ruin their business and their meats. Mr. Lee said: 'We are very frustrated. I don't know what we will do'."

I won't continue that quote. I just wanted to point out to the minister that when he suggests that I have been asleep in not representing my constituents, that's incorrect. On November 23, 1978, despite what he said, I sent a press release to the minister's office in which I stated that instead of keeping an open mind on the question, Health Minister McClelland said he did not plan to get the province involved. For a government unable to show economic initiatives on its own, I suggested that it was discouraging to hear a minister of the Crown state that the government would not get involved in a dispute that threatened a multimillion dollar industry.

Further, I went on to say that "the conflict is one the government should be most anxious to take part in because clearly there are options that could be pursued."

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate your indulgence. I would just re-emphasize the reason why this minister is faced with a vote of non-confidence. He has misled this House by misdirecting the points that I attempted to make, and I have shown here in his own words, as recently as January of this year, that those merchants were faced with the doors being closed.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. member, if the Chair might just be allowed, your debate is quite in order, and you're quite in order to seek the floor, but hardly on a point of order under standing order 42. Your debate would be quite in order without limitation up to our standard 30-minute limitation.

MR. BRUMMET: I naturally am speaking against the motion of non-confidence, as they say. With reference to the previous speaker, the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea), who got up and accused the Minister of Health of grabbing at straws.... Talk about grabbing at straws! That member stood up and used one remark — "I have ambition" — to try and build a critical speech against the Minister of Health. That seems to me to be a rather striking example of grabbing at straws. That member said that everyone who works in the health services is angry at the minister and that everyone in the general public is angry at him. Where he draws that conclusion from I'm not quite sure. He talked about what happened in a referendum in this province. We just had a referendum fairly recently. When you think of all the attempts by that opposition to use criticism of the Ministry of Health in that election campaign, and still the people of this province returned that minister and returned this government, I think that referendum has already been held.

And then to go on and illustrate the types of inconsistencies that we're getting used to from that side of the House, he lumps the Minister of Health and the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) together as the nominee and the nominator, and then says that the Minister of Highways gets all the money he wants and the other minister does not get the money he wants. I'm still trying to relate to how he can do that.

We have a motion here of non-confidence based, presumably, on the incompetence of the minister. The member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) stood up and said that the reason there are cutbacks is because of the threatening confidence in that minister; there is another inconsistency. I was really intrigued by how he tried to build a speech around one remark, "ambition," through the use of emphasis and histrionics; I marvel at his ability at that, but certainly not against the content.

When this minister introduced the discussion on his estimates, he described some of the health services, some of the new programs, and he praised the people who were delivering those health services to the people of British Columbia. He did mention that the program was not perfect and that he was working on improvements. He mentioned some of the problems that had come to his attention and were being dealt with. Then, as I understand it, in moving this motion of non-confidence, the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) mentioned that the reason he was doing it was because of all the questions that had been asked but were not answered by that minister.

I've been listening to most of this debate — as much of it as I could take from that side. Somehow or other, these questions in this debate were disguised by all the verbiage. What I recognized was a constant barrage of criticism against the Ministry of Health. I did not detect very many questions. Any questions asked were answered very capably by that minister. But how do you answer a constant barrage of criticism based on — whatever? They're certainly not based on factual information.

[ Page 849 ]

In the attempted condemnation of the minister, what I heard in this House was a great condemnation of all the people who are delivering medical services to the people of British Columbia. We were told that the people in the hospitals are not doing anything for the sick — a lot of things of that nature. To me, the people in the medical profession, the people who work in the hospitals, certainly deserve better than the criticism they have been subjected to by members of the opposition in this House.

The statement was made by the member for Burnaby Edmonds (Ms. Brown): "They can't even provide the basic services." Are you saying that they are not providing even the basic services? I don't think there is any basis to that statement whatsoever.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Rather than prolong this debate, I would just like to mention that under this minister this government has been constantly increasing health-care services to the people of British Columbia. That member for Prince Rupert said he defied the backbenchers to stand up and say that we haven't had cutbacks and so on in our areas, and that we have no problems there. Yes, there are problems. We've always had problems in the north; I'm one of the first to mention them. The problems are not the ones they are suggesting.

I checked with the Fort St. John Hospital and they say that the staff rapport there is very good, and that they are managing, despite higher freight costs, isolation and all of these things. They are managing, thank you. They're managing because.... I'll give you an example: in 1975 the operation allowance to the Fort St. John Hospital was $1,980,689; in 1978 it was $2,867,484, for an increase of 44.8 percent. In Fort Nelson, in 1975 it was $723,540, as compared to $1,141,030 in 1978, an increase of 57.7 percent. Plus there have been additions and improvements to the hospitals, to the facilities there, to the equipment.

Those people somehow or other cannot accept the facts, and say that these increases of 44.8 percent and 57.7 percent are cutbacks. How can they possibly translate that into cutbacks? So they are managing, thank you.

Interjection.

MR. BRUMMET: I was able, in the last couple of days, Mr. Chairman, to resist the urge to listen to that very exciting debate from the other side of the House. I was able to make some notes, so I wrote this speech, thank you.

Anyway, this government has been increasing health care — improving programs, adding new programs and so on — to the people of British Columbia without financially bankrupting this province, which that opposition is suggesting. Some of them might take a quick read of an article by Doug Collins in the Vancouver Courier today, which is entitled: "Today's Promises, Tomorrow's Taxes." This government is conscious of it. That opposition, when they were in government, were not conscious of it at all.

Just to conclude, Mr. Chairman, I might point out that what this government is doing is increasing services, cutting taxes and recognizing that there is not a bottomless pit of money available, unless it costs the people of this province. That is long-range and responsible planning. The people understand this. They have indicated that. The opposition cannot understand this. It is such a basic concept, that long-range planning does pay off in the long run.

MRS. WALLACE: Well, I'm certainly going to support this amendment. My only concern is that it doesn't go far enough. If I'd had my druthers, it would have reduced the minister's salary to $1 rather than just reducing it by $1. I feel we would be better off with no Minister of Health, really, rather than to have this Minister of Health.

I must take just a moment to register my disgust — and that's really the only word for it — at the minister's derogatory remarks relative to the supposed lack of ambition on the part of members on this side of the House. Let me tell you, Mr. Chairman, that the members on this side of the House do have ambition. We have ambition to ensure that the people of this province have an adequate health-care program. That's our ambition, and that's what we're standing here debating today. For that minister to get up and make that kind of a derogatory remark is certainly lowering the standard of debate in this Legislature.

You can look at nearly every sector of the health-care system and you find nothing but problems. The doctors, for example, have been faced with such limited incomes that on the eve of the election we found this minister running out and saying: "Oh, we've settled with the doctors." We found out after that wasn't quite right.

The problem is still not solved, Mr. Chairman. I had a doctor from one of the local practices come into my office. He happens to serve in a small community, a three-person clinic, three doctors in that clinic. It used to be two; then it was even worse. I am sure there are still some two-doctor clinics in this province, but in this particular instance there are three doctors. He brought figures which indicated the number of hours he had been required to work, which included every third weekend, of course, when he had to be on call. He had done a careful calculation of the total number of hours. He brought his income tax receipts, which show the amount of return he had received and the exemptions that he had incurred.

His net income, Mr. Chairman, was much less, say, than a person who was teaching school, who would have a much shorter work year than he would have. He also pointed out the inequalities in the fact that if a doctor were hired by this government on salary, that doctor's salary would have been much higher than was being paid to members of the medical profession who were working on a fee-for-service basis in a small clinic. Those inequalities have not been solved, and as long as we have that kind of situation, we're not going to get qualified medical service in the outlying areas of this province.

That's one of the areas that's a real concern. That's an area that this minister has not resolved, has not even devoted much time to, as far as I can see. That problem is still existing and is one of the major causes for difficulties in getting good medical care in the outlying areas of the province.

Another area that I want to talk about is the extended care, the personal care. Certainly that's an area that has been very well documented over the last few months as to the problems that are occurring. The minister keeps insisting there are no cutbacks. But, you know, when you don't increase rates for a period of over a year and when inflation continues to climb at something like 11 percent or 12 percent, that, in effect, is a cutback. That's the kind of experience that has been facing the operators of personal care homes and intermediate-care homes. Those rates were set and it was agreed by the people that were negotiating for

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the minister and the people who were negotiating for the personal-care homes and the intermediate-care homes that they were probably low. But they agreed that they would accept those rates on the understanding that they would be reviewed and upgraded.

That condition existed for a period of 15 months and then they got the grand increase. No consultation, no nothing, just simply a letter which said that if you have a personal-care home, you can increase the rate by 50 cents a day. That's something less than 4 percent after 15 months with no increase and a rate negotiated in the original contract that was agreed was low.

The minister his failed in providing adequate care to the senior citizens of this province. Who is more deserving than those people who have given their life and their work and their effort to helping this province grow and become the kind of a province that it is today if it isn't those senior citizens? Yet they are being faced with dangers and hazards in those homes because of those very cutbacks by this minister, because of those reductions. They are faced with hazards. They are faced with malnutrition. The meals have been cut back. You check with any dietitian in any personal-care home or any manager of any personal-care home and that's what you'll find. They're having to cut back on the very food that they're serving to those people.

In addition to that — and I hate to refer to it — we did have that situation at Oak Bay Manor where we found two people who were strangled by their harnesses which were holding them in their beds. Now that is only the result of insufficient staff. That's the only reason for that. That has to be laid directly at the door of this minister, Mr. Chairman. He has failed terribly in his responsibilities to the senior citizens in this province in providing them with adequate health care in their last years. That is the biggest disgrace of all, Mr. Chairman.

He's failed to give any consideration to some very reasoned presentation by the chiropractic association, who have moved in an arena that is very difficult to work in. He seems to be really prejudiced against their practising as fully qualified people within this province. There has been a terrific amount of duplication because of the regulation and the resulting extra cost, because what happens is that the patient simply changes his family practitioner and gets another recommendation. All that costs the government and the taxpayers more. Yet this minister failed to take any recognition of their request.

Getting a little closer to home, in my own constituency, every year since I've stood up on the floor of this Legislature that minister has given all sorts of assurances that he's looking into it, and at one point he said that he appreciated my concern, but we have never yet gotten any action as far as a speech therapist goes in the Cowichan Valley. Every year that continues is an additional cost that the taxpayers of this province are going to have to bear because of the lack of training in their early years. Every year that goes up and up and up at a terrific rate, Mr. Chairman. Yet this minister will take no action in providing that speech therapist, in spite of the pleas of his own local people. The central Island health unit have made the plea. The school board has made pleas. The Cowichan Valley children's committee have written extensive letters to that minister. I have written to him. I have raised it on the floor and he takes no action. That's another reason why that minister is not doing his job, because if that's happening in Cowichan, I imagine that is happening all over this province. Those children who need that kind of specialized attention are being disallowed their birthright, really, in not getting that kind of attention, because they are going to go through life handicapped and unable to express themselves, unable to participate fully in the community. That's an additional cost to the taxpayers, but it's a much greater cost to those children and parents who that minister says he is so concerned about when he talks about the parents of young people unfortunate enough to become involved with heroin. If he is so concerned about those children, then he should be a little bit concerned about the parents and the children who have a speech impediment or are deaf and need that speech therapist. There is no action in that area whatsoever.

I want to talk about another item that is very much in the foreground in my community and that is the Cowichan Lake Activity Centre. This is only part of the file, and it goes much longer and deeper. I picked out the relevant points to bring in here.

You may try to tell me, Mr. Chairman, that I should be talking about this under Human Resources, but the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) has indicated that there is no funding for those people who do not fall into the category of needing social assistance, or getting some kind of financial assistance from government. Because this particular activity centre covers a greater area than that, she is not prepared to fund those extra programs that were going on there. Those programs, Mr. Chairman, were specifically related to mental health, and I'm sure that this minister is responsible for mental health. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I see you nodding your head.

This centre has been operating for some length of time in the little village of Lake Cowichan. Up to now it has been funded quite extensively by Human Resources. That budget has been cut by 60 percent. On March 14 of this year there was an article carried in the local paper there regarding a Canadian Mental Health Association meeting which was held in Banff. Do you know what they were discussing and holding up as a prime example of a job well done? The Cowichan Lake Activity Centre. They went into many of the areas where that centre has been doing a good job. "A model of what voluntary action can do for mental health in a small community" is how the Canadian Mental Health Association branch in Lake Cowichan is described by the mental health centres administrator in Duncan. It goes on to talk about the programs; but the part I particularly want to read into the record is:

"Possibly the most significant achievement of the CMHA branch in Lake Cowichan has been the establishment and development of a community activity centre which provides a broad range of services for young mothers, for people with emotional problems, for shift workers, for pensioners, for the physically handicapped, for the mentally retarded, and, in fact, for citizens of all ages to socialize, make friends, learn new skills, receive help, and help others.

"The centre is a major resource in the district for referrals from the mental health centre, from the public health facilities, from the RCMP, from the probation services and from the schools. The centre was started with a LIP grant acquired by the CMHA branch, and has been perpetuated by successful appeals for continuing funds from the Ministry of Human Resources. "

Now that grant is cut by 60 percent.

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I've raised this with the Premier, and I've raised it with the Minister of Health — and he's now saying wrong minister. You, Mr. Minister, are responsible for mental health. The Minister of Human Resources has indicated that she is prepared to fund only those parts of that centre that are involved with Human Resources, and she's cut those grants by 60 percent because of the other services that are provided. And you, Mr. Minister, have written and told me exactly what you're saying now, that because it's Human Resources you're not prepared to put any money in there. If that's the kind of attitude you're going to take, Mr. Minister, then you have no business being in charge of the health care of this province.

That centre is closing its doors because of you, Mr. Minister, and that service is being withdrawn from Cowichan Lake. And that goes right across this province. You can look at the Hazelton Children's Home, and you can look at institutions all around this province where Human Resources have taken that new tack, and you have refused to pick it up. The Premier is just as guilty, because the interministerial committee has not acted on it. It doesn't change the fact that those centres are being closed, that you are remiss in your duties, Mr. Minister, and that this amendment is the only way we have of saying to the people of British Columbia that you are not doing your job.

MR. KING: I am not going to take too long. I just want to make some comments about the motion of non-confidence in the minister, and also about some of the comments which have gone back and forth across the House during the debate this motion.

I want to say, first of all, relating our motion of non-confidence to my own area, that we have had a major problem in Revelstoke. The minister is aware that during the election campaign he had to come into the city of Revelstoke and meet with the hospital board and guarantee them that they are going to be able to survive financially. He had to guarantee that a deficit problem they were facing was going to be picked up and guaranteed. I think it wasn't in their normal budget. I think it was in respect to a program they had set up. I met with the board on this just prior to the minister coming into the area.

My point is simply this: it's very difficult for a public agency, a hospital board or any other agency to budget in a sane and rational way when they don't know where the goalposts are, when they don't know what the guidelines are going to be. I'm not suggesting the guidelines of an arbitrary figure set by the minister are at all appropriate. But it's interesting that the minister, after having done that, then is prepared to change the goalposts when the political heat on him and his colleagues accelerates to the point where it's no longer tolerable in terms of the government's political security.

During the heat of an election campaign, special accommodations are made to regional hospital boards to take off the heat. And, of course, since the election, we have had almost daily tales — they're referred to in the press as horror stories — from hospitals all over the lower mainland and Vancouver Island. Surely one doesn't have to be an expert in hospital administration or health care to understand that there is something seriously wrong in the health-care industry — if I may refer to it as an industry.

Mr. Chairman, I acted as vice-chairman of a hospital board in my own city for a number of years before I was elected to this Legislature. I know something about the functioning of hospital boards. I know something about the responsibility to deliver health care in a community. I know something about the problems that the minister has — or any minister would have — in terms of meeting all the financial demands made on his ministry. Certainly lines have to be drawn at times. But I think it's altogether unacceptable when the minister sets a guideline — I believe it was a 7.5 percent increase — which by any standard does not even meet the increase imposed by the inflation factor in our economy today, and then expects the hospitals of the province to live within that guideline, to meet increasing wage demands, to meet increasing costs in terms of the linen that must be laundered and all the services and supplies which continue to increase, and certainly to increase, Mr. Chairman, at a rate far beyond 7.5 percent.

So the minister has to conclude, and every other citizen has to conclude, that by imposing that guideline for increases in their budget, the minister was, in fact, saying: "You're going to have to cut back because the budget we are guaranteeing does not meet the inflationary factor, does not even maintain the status quo. Obviously there have to be cuts in programs or cuts in staff." And that is precisely what's happening. It amuses me a little bit when the minister gets up and retorts in a very, very angry fashion at the opposition. Some of the other neophyte members on that side of the back bench get up and say: "Oh, our minister is great." And they do the old, traditional, partisan political trip, with not even very many new twists involved, Mr. Chairman — and certainly with none of the refreshing changes of individual MLAs trying to represent their own riding and their own constituency in a bit of an honest way, even if at times that involves clashing with the party they happen to belong to.

It's not the opposition that's making up the problems flowing from the health-care field of British Columbia. If the minister doesn't read the papers, or if he's not cognizant of the criticisms that have been levelled at him and his ministry from doctors, from the RNABC, from the licensed practical nurses, from the Hospital Employees Union, and from virtually every hospital board on the lower mainland, then I have to say, Mr. Chairman, that minister is living in some kind of a shroud somewhere. That minister is totally insensitive to the constituency he is supposed to be serving. That is a fatal flaw in the qualities that have to be evident and available for a man to act as Minister of Health in this province. That's why we have a motion of non-confidence on the floor on that individual today. Instead of meeting the needs of obvious weaknesses in the area that he administers, he reacts by attacking the opposition.

Mr, Chairman, I want to advise the minister that the opposition is not the problem; those problems are going to remain after the House adjourns. Those problems are human problems out in the community. They relate to people who cannot get beds in hospitals. They relate to those who do get beds in over-crowded circumstances, and who are left in hallways, with inadequate facilities, and according to the allegations of many hospital staff, inadequate standard of care.

The minister can dodge; he can twist, and he can name-call and shout all he wants. His servile back bench can get up and defend him. But what we would like to hear as an opposition is something about what he proposes to do

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to guarantee that hospitals can function at a level of care that the professionals in the field regard as the minimum required. They tell us they are below that now.

There are letters to the Victoria daily papers from licensed practical nurses and from registered nurses saying:

"Thank goodness the papers are revealing the dilemma of the hospitals. Thank goodness they are speaking out and telling the community what's going on in these hospitals, because we, as professionals in our field and as employees, have been afraid to do so. We're afraid that in the first instance if we speak out there may be pressure brought to bear on our employment security. We're afraid to speak out in the second instance because it may be dismissed as some personal crank case by an employee of the institution."

It was only after the papers and some of the board spokesmen themselves started to make the case publicly that this minister is allowing the health industry to deteriorate to a serious level and the standard of health care because jeopardized that the employees and the members of the profession felt impelled to speak out in the name of commitment to their profession and in the name of their commitment as citizens of this province to alert the public to the dangerous level health care has fallen under this minister's tender auspices. The minister has to face that reality, and he has to respond to those problems and to those charges. No less an authority than the president of the University of Victoria is condemning the minister. I don't give him any special accolades. He's certainly a competent man, and I would say that he's not a partisan man. He's not involved in the political process; he's not trying to score points for the Social Credit Party or the NDP. He's a man genuinely concerned about the community, and he says that the minister is responsible for the lack of medical training facilities in British Columbia.

How does the minister answer these things? He gets up and goes into a tirade about pie-in-the-sky programs. Maybe the minister has done some good things on programs; I don't know. I wouldn't deny that; perhaps he has. I would certainly hope so. But it's not good enough to be developing new programs to the detriment of the day-to-day standards of care in existing medical facilities; that's not good enough. The minister has an obligation to deal with those day-to-day health-care needs of the community. He has to provide an adequate budget.

Much is said by this particular government about fiscal competence. I don't know about that; I think the real story on the financial and fiscal competence of this government has yet to be assessed and written. They make great claims of being very capable and very prudent in terms of spending the taxpayers' dollar. But it seems to me they have their priorities mixed up in terms of where they are prepared to direct those expenditures, Mr. Chairman. It seems to me, as my colleague has said that they are prepared to build monuments to the career of their own political colleagues at the risk of over-expending, beyond any reason, the dollars available for health care."

I hear grave warnings coming out of Vancouver regarding the ultimate cost of the University Hospital. I hear predictions from people involved on the periphery at least, but who should be in a pretty good position to know that there are going to be major overruns in terms of the estimates for that institution. The minister seems either impotent to deal with that or he seems to place it at some higher elevation on his priority list than the average hospital of the province which is now serving the health needs of our citizens. I have to ask why. Is it because he is interested in erecting this edifice to his colleague, the Minister of Education, Science and Technology (Hon. Mr. McGeer)? Or is it because he's impotent to intervene in that minister's own objective of building a monument to himself? I think it's a valid question. I would like to ask the minister, Mr. Chairman, before his estimates are over, to give an undertaking to this Legislature, to give a commitment, that no change is going to be made in the structure of that university hospital which would allow it to be removed from the Universities Act and thus be able to go into a deficit-financing arrangement. I think the hospital was put forward — the whole idea was put forward — by the minister as a teaching facility of the university. I don't want to see the lack of financial accountability surrounding that edifice to his colleague bailed out at the last minute by some simple amendment to the Universities Act which allows that hospital to come out of that restriction and indulge in deficit-financing to protect the financial incompetence of the government, and to allow a kind of rich budget and rich objective that no other health facility in the province is achieving at the hands of this government. Things of that nature disturb me. They call into question the government's claim of fiscal competence and responsibility — to say nothing of accountability.

[Mr. Rogers in the chair.]

Another point I wanted to remark on, Mr. Chairman. This minister — and some of his colleagues, too, I guess — I've noticed this session they have responded to certain members of the opposition by getting up and saying: "How dare you raise that matter in this House! You've never come to my office. You've never raised it before." And they indulge in this self-righteous claptrap about it being a sin to raise a matter in the Legislature in public debate. They hold it somehow irresponsible to do so. Well, in the first place, Mr. Chairman, let me tell you that in the years 1972 to 1975, do you know how many Socreds I had in my office, the Ministry of Labour? Two. One was the Minster of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) and the other was the member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan). They were the only ones who ever visited me. I think that's fine to have a visit at the office. But I think there is something more important, and that is the principle that we are all sent here to represent out constituencies. That's why we have Hansard, so that our constituents can read the debate and make an impartial assessment of whether or not their members are representing them well; whether or not the opposition is asking appropriate questions, and whether or not the ministers are giving satisfactory responses. That's what the institution of parliament is all about — at least that was my understanding.

For the minister to hold it up as some kind of personal sin for the member or not for Vancouver Centre to raise a matter he hadn't contacted the minister on previously is a new level of arrogance that should be nipped in the bud before it becomes the vogue in this Legislature.

The minister talks a lot about programs. He says he's got a stunning record. I guess I could agree with that to some extent; that's what the Minister of Education said

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about him — a stunning record. I'm sure there are a lot of patients out there — by the letters I read in the paper, by the letters I receive — a lot of stunned people who expected better from the Social Credit government; expected better health treatment; expected a decent priority on the funding.

The Minister of Education said he could manage the budget. Well I guess Ronald Reagan can too. I guess he manages the budget pretty well. And, I guess Doug Collins — I guess he'd manage the budget pretty well. If they are the kinds of authorities you want to identify with and equate your public responsibilities with, so be it, Mr. Chairman. But I wish you'd tell the public about that, both before the election and during the election, so they can make a judgment in terms of what kind of health care and what kind of fiscal policies are going to be pursued by the government. It's not quite honest to go around during the election and say: "Hey, we're tremendously sensitive and concerned about adequate standards of health, and we're going to provide the best." And then come into this Legislature, when the health world is collapsing around the minister's ears, and say: "Well, Doug Collins thinks we're okay." Probably Ronald Reagan does: and probably the guy who devised Proposition 13 does.

AN HON. MEMBER: Erma Bombeck.

MR. KING: Erma Bombeck, yes. Well, the Minister of Bombast.

Mr. Chairman, that's fine, if that's the way they want to go down. But they should be honest enough to put those kinds of programs before the people and not go offering one standard, only to retreat after winning the security of a new mandate from the people — on false pretences to a large degree.

I was going to speak a bit on the drug treatment centre, but I think I'll let that debate go by, except to say that the minister heaped scorn on my colleague, our illustrious leader, the first member for Vancouver East. I thought that was nasty of him. I guess the reason he does that is that he resents my colleague because he's a bit ashamed of his own leader. He sights in on my colleague as a diversion from his own responsibility. He tries to divert attention from his own responsibility by attacking our leader. I think that's a scandalous thing to do.

Mr. Chairman, do you know what he said? He said with great scorn and derision: "All the Leader of the Opposition could offer was a program of benign neglect for the heroin addicts." He said that was terrible. He said there was not one original idea and that was all we could offer.

I want to remind the minister that when we had the debate on this bill, that minister came into this Legislature and was questioned for no less than 40 minutes by the Leader of the Opposition regarding who the staff were and the substance of the program. What is the treatment? Will the minister tell us one expert that he's retained? Will he tell us one new therapeutic approach, psychiatric approach or any other procedure that has been established to justify the $12 million expenditure on the Heroin Treatment Program? That minister sat there like a frozen bump on a log. He couldn't indicate who was being hired to run the program. He couldn't indicate what the program was going to be or what the treatment was going to be. He asked the Legislature to buy a pig in a poke. He said: "Here's my demand for $12 million. I'll tell you about the program after." I ask him to reflect on that, Mr. Chairman. He knows it to be so. If he questions it, all he has to do is read Hansard.

I ask him to compare that kind of approach to the way he is treating the hospitals today. They don't get money up front and then develop the program after. No way. They are lucky if they get the money to satisfy their budgetary requirements, even after demonstrating that they've maintained an optimum level of health care in the community. It's the double standard again.

In terms of challenging the opposition to come forward with one unique or useful idea with respect to the treatment of heroin addicts, I would say to him that there was more intelligent discussion on the particular unique and complex problems surrounding heroin addiction and other chemical dependency than I heard flowing from that side of the House. I would also say to the minister that you are the government. You are the minister. It's your responsibility to devise programs. It's not your responsibility to react in an arrogant fashion. It's your position and your responsibility to be accountable. That's what it's about.

Rather than trying to divert the attention of members of the House and members of the public away from the basic responsibility that minister has, he should be facing the issue. He should be telling us what he's going to do in terms of budget. If the problem is an internal political one, where the Minister of Education, Science and Technology (Hon. Mr. McGeer) has more clout and is able to extract more out of Treasury Board than the Minister of Health, then be man enough to get up and admit it. That's the problem. Maybe we can help, Mr. Minister, if that's your weakness.

If your weakness and your problem is the fact that there is not enough revenue flowing to the government to meet the health-care obligations because you have ruined the economy of British Columbia, then have the honesty to get up and tell us that. But if the problem is that minister is simply so indifferent to fighting for the needs of the people whom he has a mandate to provide for, then I say it's shocking and scandalous. Under those terms, Mr. Chairman, I regretfully endorse and support the motion of non-confidence in that minister.

MR. HALL: This is the first time that the official opposition has moved a motion of non-confidence in this minister since he was appointed at Christmas time 1975. I think it's a significant fact, Mr. Chairman, and one that I would like to elaborate on for a couple of sentences. Having had the opportunity to watch the minister from a slightly different perspective than I have now, I would have said that, for instance, had somebody told me that there would be a motion of non-confidence in this minister in 1976, or even, indeed, in 1977, I would have been surprised. I would have been shocked, because I think it is fair to say that in most quarters the minister got a passing grade, if not a better than passing grade, and, in fact, in many quarters a respect, and from some quarters a grudging admission that not only was he a first-class politician but he was also turning out to be a good minister. And I say that sincerely to the minister, even though he knows that this is a political chamber and we do want to make debating points. I think that makes today's motion a bit more significant than the minister is perhaps prepared to acknowledge. It doesn't mean the minister has necessarily changed; it doesn't mean to say that the minister is any less careful, any less thinking or sincere

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in his efforts — I don't doubt that for a second. What it does mean, however, is that somewhere along the line he's been dropped down the totem pole in terms of the measurement of achievement. That's what is bothering the opposition, and it is bothering the health community. And that is why this motion is before us.

I think it is fair to say, Mr. Chairman, that health care was a factor in the election. I've been interested, as I've been listening to the debate, to note that different members have different viewpoints about the cuts that the minister says don't exist, and that other people produce evidence of. It doesn't necessarily break down on party lines. I know there are members in my party who represent areas that have hospitals where the minister could say quite definitely that things are okay. I happen to represent an area in which it is one of those 50-50 propositions — in one part of the riding the health care position seems to be okay; in the other one it is not. There is no doubt in my mind that the position at Surrey Memorial Hospital and the decisions that had to be made in that hospital, which have included understaffing, made an impact on the election. Because of that we are here today discussing this amendment, which, as I say, I would venture to suggest those members who were here between '75 and '79 would never have expected to debate — some of the others, yes, but not this fellow. And I think that's very important.

The next item that I would like to suggest is evidence that the minister has not now got our full confidence is the question of the delivery of grants and other things to the Cerebral Palsy Association. I stood up in my place way before the minister ever represented Langley — his predecessor and I used to visit the cerebral palsy treatment centres that were being built south of the river — and I made speech after speech about assistance to that group. This disease is one which is entirely predictable and entirely budgetable. There is no reason whatsoever why those people should be cap in hand all the time. For a few short years it is fair to say that the correspondence and the demands and problems associated with the non-arrival of money seemed to have diminished. Now they're back again. While the minister can stand up and be arithmetically correct in saying the grants have increased, the fact of the matter is that the grant per patient has been lowered since the palmy days of '72 to '75.

I think it is fair to say, Mr. Chairman, that when you get letters from the people saying that the funding of centres by the Health ministry is so far below the budget requested that it would be impossible for the Cerebral Palsy Association centres to maintain their present level of service during the coming year, when we know that disease is entirely predictable and budgetable, it is not good enough. The health ministry grant for 1979-80 is almost 30 percent less than requested and doesn't allow for the replacement of full treatment staff terminated last year and not replaced because of a shortage of funds, increased rents in some areas and inflated operating costs. That's a letter that's just been received, I'm sure, by the minister, and it follows up on the presidential report in the annual report for 1978-79, which points out that although the grant was increased, it is substantially below expectation and, again, if you look at the mathematics involved, lower in terms of dollars per patient. As a result, those people have been unable to assist new communities who are seeking to establish new services. I think that at the time of writing the treasurer's report, the Ministry of Health had limited the funding to a 5 percent increase, in spite of several meetings of the executive committee with numerous members of the Ministry of Health over the past year.

That's why we're here today discussing a want of confidence in this minister, whereas, as I say, you'd have made money on a small wager on the arrival of such a motion during debate of this minister's estimates in the years of the last parliament.

The next point I'd like to deal with, Mr. Chairman, is the question of the Boundary-Union Board of Health. Under Vote 130 in the estimates, we again see a diminution of service instead of an increase for speech and hearing services; there are fewer people in that estimate than there were last year. If, on top of that, you add this mysterious recruitment savings we come across from time to time — this ministry is going to save $10 million in salaries, which means people are not working and are not delivering the service — there is a reduction in the actual number of people working. And from the Boundary-Union Board of Health we get a letter which states:

"In terms of audiology, to provide an 80 percent level of service to our population in the Boundary-Union Board of Health area — some 200,000 people strong — we would have to provide three audiologists and two audiometric aids. At present there are none."

Using the criteria of Mr. Zink, who is a director of the division of speech and hearing for the province of B.C., we'd need all sorts of people. I don't want to delay the House in dealing with the numbers involved. A simple, bald, opening statement by the chairman of the Boundary-Union Board of Health, Doctor D.A. Porter, indicates that to provide a level of only 80 percent — and I think that's an acceptable level at this time — we'd have to have five people on staff; at present we've got none. The estimates indicate a reduction in the number of people involved in this department. I agree that there may be job descriptions which may allow the minister to answer that.

But that's the kind of thing we're getting; that's the kind of thing that's happening in the delivery of health services. When you delve into the minister's answers, you start to find out that the minister has either slowed down, or he's been dropped off the list. He's not winning in front of Treasury Board. I've got some experience of that and I know it's a tough game.

Let me deal with the last thing. If this is symptomatic of the minister's attitude and approach to matters in the delivery of health services.... Wherever he goes it's one that should concern him as an individual, as a politician, and as somebody who has to survive in this system. When we request information, he should be prepared to give it. I've asked and asked and asked for that report by Mr. Black — and I fell afoul of the rules in question period. We got an answer from the minister which was less than forthcoming. I don't mind that particularly; that's the kind of thing that happens here. I remember when the minister sat on this side of the House. All I want the minister to do is to think back a little bit and ask himself if he would be satisfied with the kind of answer he gave if he were sitting on this side of the House. You can bet your boots he wouldn't be satisfied. He'd be on to it every day in every way.

[ Page 855 ]

We don't want to offend the rules of the House. In fact, if the reports now being listed by the opposition are deliberately being delayed in production until (a) we're out of here altogether, or (b) your estimates are over, then we're not going to put up with it much longer. I'm simply asking you to squarely remember what you would have done when you sat over here and we sat over there. Please do unto others as you would expect to be done to yourself — it's not a bad rule. I don't mind a few political points being scored in this chamber; after all, that's what we're here for. But don't expect that it's going to go past unnoticed. In the off-session, we're prepared to travel around this province as we always do. I think that we're going to see more than 46 percent of the people declare themselves worried about the minister's performance. I share the viewpoint of the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) that at this particular time you will find a majority of people in this province who are not happy with the performance of this minister. I regret that, but I am going to support the motion.

MR. MITCHELL: Before I start, I would like to say to the minister that he does have a few friends on this side of the House. There were some around here who wanted to cut down his salary to a dollar, but I fought like hell just to cut it by a dollar. I say that seriously.

Part of democracy is to be able to bring out the policies and ideas we receive from our constituents. As the first member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) said, it's important that the minister listen to what the people out there are saying on the street.

I was quite disgusted that a minister of the Crown would stand up here at the beginning of this important debate, which dealt with the health care of this province, and start on a tirade against Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, and make the cheap shot that we were the ones who spread fear to the sick. It was not the NDP who cut the purchasing power of the grants that were given to the hospitals. It was not the NDP who told their doctors that they had to cut such things as open-heart surgery, that was designed to do at least 12 operations a week in the Jubilee Hospital. It was running at nine and was cut to six. Then it was cut out for a short period. The minister knows that when the people were waiting out there to go in for open-heart surgery, it was their doctors who were telling them time after time that they were put back on the list, or the list was cut down. It wasn't the NDP who spread these stories. It was because of the lack of the improvement that was needed to service the people of this province. It was the people out on the streets, and I don't think there was one MLA from the greater Victoria area when we campaigned who didn't get time after time the fear that was coming out from the hospitals because of the cuts.

Mr. Minister, if it is wrong for us to stand up in this House and demand the best treatment available for the people of this province, then I am wrong. It is my intention not to sit back and allow the nonsense that goes on about the great sums of money.... It is not the sums of money; it is what those sums provide. We have to be here to stand up and say that, and any MLA who will sit back and take a cut in the services provided should be ashamed. I ask, who is demanding to cut these funds? I don't hear any opposition MLAs asking to cut the funds to the hospitals. I don't hear the public writing letters asking to cut the funds to the hospitals. I remember there wasn't one Social Credit candidate in the greater Victoria area who was asking to cut the funds to the hospitals. I don't know who is asking these funds to be cut.

I am one who believes in prudence, and if there must be savings, let's have savings. If there are problems in the economic part of this province, let the minister stand up and say there is insufficient money in the funds of B.C., that we have to tighten our belts. Stand up and say that. But the greatest Minister of Economic Development stood in this House and said that B.C. was booming. There has never been any hint from the cabinet or from any member of the government that there are insufficient funds to supply the needs of the best hospital plan for British Columbia.

So I ask you, Mr. Minister, through you, Mr. Chairman, if we are going to have a cut, if in any hospital there must be a tightening of the budget, to go to that hospital and set up some committees. Consult those who work in the hospitals.

I'm not going to take any cheap shots at administration like the member for North Okanagan (Mrs. Jordan) did when she complained that the administrator was getting $1,000 a year more than the Premier of the province. I have read and I have seen report after report — and I can read them in this House — of the vast gain and enlargement of the administration part of the hospitals. We have administrators, and assistants to administrators, and secretaries to the assistant administrators. As the budget is cut down, who do we eliminate? Mr. Chairman, we eliminated the nurses, the LPNs and the orderlies. What is happening on the floors of the hospitals? If you study the reports that are coming out of the Hospital Employees Union because of the increased workload of the nurses, you are having a large increase in back injuries. Don't take my word for it.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Okay.

MR. MITCHELL: Don't make snide remarks. Study the compensation reports that are going from the hospitals to the compensation board. Study the reports that are going to the appeal boards. Go to the unions; go to the people who are working there.

I know we have all the great professional people who come in and do all the workload jobs, and what happens? The guy on the bottom who does the work gets eliminated, and those who are left have to do twice as much work. I know the minister and all my friends on the government side say this is economic responsibility. I say to you, Mr. Chairman, and to all the members that the injuries you are causing to the nurses are the result of economic mismanagement. You may be saving a few dollars in your hospital budget, but check again what is happening to our compensation funds. Check what is happening to the people in there.

I know every one of us gets reports and phone calls from people. Well, yesterday the headlines of the Colonist say they closed down another 14 beds. Another 14 beds were closed. And what was the excuse? The excuse was that there were insufficient nurses. Before 9 o'clock in the morning I had a phone call from a father whose daughter is a nurse and who has been on call in the Jubilee hospital for the last year and a half, part-time. Then they say there are not enough nurses.

As the Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Mair) would say in his wisdom: "It's a crock of septic tank sludge." But

[ Page 856 ]

it's not. These are the facts. It's happening. The people are bringing out the problems that exist in the hospitals.

Before I came back to the House last night, when I was home for supper, I received another phone call from a son whose mother is in a nursing home that is funded through the hospital funds. He told me his mother had been dropped because there were insufficient nurses to move her from her wheelchair into her bed. This was the second time she had been dropped in six months.

Again, Mr. Minister, these are the problems that are happening because you are cutting out the purchasing power of the funds that are going to these hospitals. I ask in all sincerity that if we have to tighten up, let's not tighten up to the people who are giving service. Let us go to the hospital employees. Let's go to the unions. Let's go to the people who are doing the work and ask them how we can make these savings. Let's listen. Let's not come out with any great decree that it's going to be 5 percent and stick our heads in the sand. It doesn't work that way. It didn't work that way when you worked in your schools. We have to face the facts of providing service, and if it's only the opposition who is going to stand up and continue to fight to improve hospitals, then I am going to be one of the opposition who will continue to fight.

I listened to that garbage of my friend for Vancouver South (Mr. Hyndman), when he said that in that oil-rich Conservative government of Alberta they were cutting the services to the hospitals. Again, he referred to the Conservative government of Ontario, and said that they were cutting the services to the people, and that this government was so wonderful. It wasn't. I can give one little bit of political advice. The reason the funds and the services of this province are not being cut to the extent that they are in Alberta and Ontario is the proportion of the members sitting on this side of the House. If there were 46 percent of the people voting NDP in Alberta, and if there were 46 percent of the people voting NDP in Ontario the rates would not be cut, and you know it.

It is the job of an opposition in a democracy to bring the problems that exist to the minister, to this Legislature, and we never will neglect to do this job. That is the reason that we campaigned in the last election — to make sure that we continue to have the best service in our hospitals. We will fight, and we will fight continually.

I say in closing, Mr. Chairman, it is with regret that I have to support the motion to cut the minister's salary by $1, but I feet it is the traditional position that we must take. We must bring our position to the minister. You cannot buffalo the people of this province by bandying about large figures and saying that we are giving the most when, at the same time, the money that we are giving is purchasing and providing less and less.

MRS. JORDAN: Mr. Chairman, I think the kindest thing I can say about the former speaker's presentation is that perhaps he leaves the credibility of the police force somewhat in question.

Mr. Chairman, I would like, through you, to pose a question to that member. He talked, I thought, a little lightly and rather glibly, about his mother, and said that she'd been — I think the word was "dropped" — twice. I would pose a question to the minister: Has that incident been reported? Did that member, on both occasions, report this to the hospital administration, and report that incident to the minister himself? Or is there some question around the circumstances?

That member said that he stood with a party that stood for high-quality health care in this province — no cutbacks, and so on. Mr. Chairman, would it be wrong to remind that member, ever so gently, that there have been quoted in this House, in this debate, letters of cutback in 1975 from the then Minister of Health (Mr. Cocke), who was that party's Minister of Health. Those were cutbacks that would never have been necessary had that government, when it came into office, not squandered the resources and the dollar resources of this province on $50,000-a-month architects, had not squandered money in planning, and had not, in fact, virtually drawn to a halt the development of health care in this province.

I speak very advisedly, Mr. Member. List the hospitals that were under construction under the NDP. List the new programs that were brought in under the NDP. Mr. Chairman, you could scratch it on a pinhead. It is this government, in spite of the difficulties left in the financial state of this province by that NDP government and its health cutback program that have been overcome, that has introduced new and imaginative health-care programs.

It has regained the position for British Columbia of being able to afford and offer one of the highest standards of health care in the country. That member said I was complaining about the administrator's salary, which is another classic example of how this member and his colleagues distort the truth. They prey upon the fear that humans have in terms of their health care. I did not complain about the salary of the administrator. I tried to point out something which that side is incapable of understanding. There are only so many resources in this province that can develop the funds to provide the services that we want to provide. If you would look a little further than these buildings even, and perhaps this province, you would come to the startling fact that there is economic concern throughout the world. The economic situation of this world has probably never been more tenuous in recent history, and any government or elected member who ignores these facts, which are beyond our control but influence our daily lives, is completely irresponsible, and certainly that member is.

What I tried to point out is that we have to try and make better use of our dollars in the health care system, as in the rest of the system. I asked if we can afford what we might well want to give that administrator, and I say without any embarrassment that we cannot afford that. I suggest that if we want to counteract unemployment, all of us have to be prepared to make better use of the dollars we have. Perhaps all of us have to be prepared to take just a little bit less in terms of what we want to demand out of the imagination and the economy.

Interjection.

MRS. JORDAN: You mentioned the word "teachers," and you're talking about trying to take a responsible position. In the debates on the estimates in this session that we have just finished, that side, the NDP, the frivolous financiers who outdo the gnomes of Zurich, have advocated more money be spent in education, more in industrial development, more in agriculture and more in tourism. Always more and more. You've created a new disease

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called "morish. " But the thing is, Mr. Chairman, that sort of irresponsible discussion, from supposedly responsible people, is not only unrealistic, it is not only false in its capability to be carried out, but it fosters in younger people and in the public a false conception of what we are capable, as industrialists, as workers and as human beings and legislators of providing for this province and the people in this province.

I mentioned the benefits of health care in Canada and British Columbia yesterday. I won't refer to that debate, but one of the things that concerns a lot of people is that we have a whole generation in this province who enjoy the highest standard of health care. They are having their expectations built even higher by some of the statements that are made in this House, but they have no conception of how that care is provided and how it is financed. It's not their fault. It's our fault. To try and contribute to an artificial line of thinking and artificial expectations is highly irresponsible, and in the terms of health care, I suggest it is cruel.

Members who advocate this are in fact guilty of the cruellest form of misconception, distortion and fear-spreading that is possible in this Legislature. Mr. Chairman, there was talk of fear tactics. Let me remind that member and the other members who have spoken that it was the NDP who in the last election were partners to ads that said there were going to be massive layoffs in the health field; that nurses, cleaners and dietitians were going to be laid off. The NDP, in the area that I have the honour to represent, preyed upon manipulation, the fears of family and psychogeriatric patients in this province. Their candidate got on the air and said patients were going to be thrown out in the street. It was ludicrous, and it was cruel.

This minister has helped his ministry staff to prepare one of the most exciting, imaginative and progressive psychogeriatric programs for this province that you will find anywhere in the world. Perhaps if those members were a little less interested in spreading fear, distorting the truth and manipulating innocent people, they would be look into this program and take a much more positive approach.

Mr. Chairman, they talk about cutbacks. Let me just bring to your attention the situation in the North Okanagan Hospital. First of all, when the NDP were government, they gave assistance in terms of development or assessing future needs. As soon as this minister was in position, he paid for a study for the North Okanagan regional hospital district to assess its future health-care facilities for the next seven to ten years. When that study was completed, they then gave approval for functional planning to bring in the results of that report.

Only today, I am advised that the hospital has now completed a technical functional-planning program which realistically appraises — by the doctors, by the nurses, by the health specialists in the Okanagan region — what our capabilities are in terms of the provision of health service for the future.

I commend the physicians and all the health professionals in that regional district for not trying to build empires, for recognizing what we are capable of doing in terms of developing back-up service over the next five to ten years. This, I have no doubt, will be well received by the ministry.

Mr. Chairman, they talk of cutbacks. In 1975 the budget of the Vernon Jubilee Hospital was $5,837,731. That was before the then Minister of Health's letter of cutbacks went out. In 1978-79 it was $9,040,869. I ask you, is that a cutback? Would the Vernon Jubilee have the budget today that it has, had that minister and those wastrels still been in power? I suggest not.

The patient load for 1975 was 42,000, for 1978, 48,000. Newborns were 3,151; in 1978-79, 3,890. Extended-care in 1975 was 34,296; it was down to 33,964 in 1979, and yet the budget has increased from over $5 million to over $9 million. Is that a cutback?

MR. LAUK: Yes.

MRS. JORDAN: The former industrial development minister says yes. No wonder your government was in problems. You can't even count from five to nine. Let me advise you that staffing in 1975 was 396. In 1978 and 1979, there were 463, and right now there are 459 full-time equivalent staff positions. I ask you, is that a cutback?

MR. COCKE: How many beds?

MRS. JORDAN: I read them to you, Mr. Member.

The patient load in extended-care was down, and the increase in adults, children and newborn was such that we have almost a doubling of the budget for about a 10 percent increase in patients. That's not a cutback.

In the North Okanagan we have a new community health centre in Lumby. We have announced and are now out to tender for a new regional health centre for North Okanagan. We have a new intermediate-care home, MPROC House, opened last year. None of those things would have proceeded, and certainly none of those things, if they had proceeded by a miracle, could have been paid for had that government remained in position.

Mr. Chairman. the distortions, the fear-spreading and the manipulations that have come across this floor in this last few hours are the worst I have ever experienced in my time in this House. It distresses me. The member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) gleefully — I was horrified — talked about the Heroin Treatment Program. That member will be so delighted if that program fails that it's shocking. Mr. Chairman, that member would confine people who are prisoners of their own habits and prisoners of dollars to that life, because he is lacking in intestinal fortitude, because he's strictly a political animal and because he has no real concern for people.

Mr. Chairman, they fight the Heroin Treatment Program on the basis of expenditures of money. You wasted more money on architectural planning that never came to fruition than what this program will cost. You talk about civil liberties of those people. I ask you, what freedom of choice do people have who are addicted to heroin, who are addicted to the need to get the money to buy that heroin? What freedom of choice? You talk about civil liberties. What civil liberties are there for a person who lives morning, noon and night for an addiction? The only answer that you put forth in this House is to make them victims of another drug and transfer their addiction and dependency. Mr. Chairman, I think it's appalling, and that member should hang his head and beard in shame for advocating and taking the position that he did.

Mr. Chairman, I'm proud to vote against this motion of non-confidence. I think it's frivolous, manipulative and really is an insult to their own party. It is an insult to the

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people in the election who did support the NDP. Mr. Chairman, they are part of a philosophy that is trying to create an artificial economy, that is trying to create artificial expectations in people, that is divisive, and which is manipulating every group in society that they possibly can.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

The committee, having reported progress, was granted leave to sit again.

Hon. Mr. Curtis filed the report of the Ministry of the Provincial Secretary and Government Services for the year ending December 31, 1978.

Hon. Mr. Phillips moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:58 p.m.