[ Page 4487 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Budget debate

Mr. Cocke –– 4487

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 4488

Ms. Brown –– 4490

Hon. Mr. Fraser –– 4494

Mr. Hanson –– 4499

THURSDAY, MARCH 12, 1981

The House met at 10 a.m.

ON THE BUDGET
(continued debate)

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I suggested yesterday that the people of B.C. would probably be delighted if the government either repented or resigned. They seem to be in the mood to do neither, so under those circumstances, having discussed as fully as I care to at this time the general tone of the budget, the increase in taxation etc., for my remaining 18 minutes I'd like to go to the area that I have particular responsibility for as an opposition critic; that is, the whole question of health care in our province.

We see in the estimates where there are increases, and certainly needed increases, in the health care budget — an overrun last year in health care of some $200 million. When you take those specific figures, such as an overrun in hospital programs of $140,519,000, and add it to last year's estimate, and then compare it with the increase this year, you're coming up with something in the order of a 5 percent increase. I think that would be something I could applaud in terms of acute hospital care. I know we're spending immense amounts of money in this particular area. From time to time the government hint that they know some of the alternatives; that is, they know some of the ways of getting around the problem that we face.

We're dealing, unfortunately, with a contemporary situation where for example there are 200 cases on the waiting list at Vancouver General Hospital. We see it all over the province. We see it up north and in Kamloops. In Kamloops — I'll deal with that matter in a moment or two — it's probably going to get worse. We see it in Victoria: headline after headline of people waiting for elective surgery. In 1979 in this province the average wait was something in the order of four to six months; in 1980 that rose to an average of five to seven months. Now we all know that one can drown in a stream averaging six inches in depth. Some of those people are waiting 14, 15 and 16 months to bring that average to the point that it is.

We have been studying the alternatives. We know, for example, that the acute-care hospitals across our province are absolutely loaded with people who don't require that level of care. They're called long-term care patients and they're in our acute-care hospital beds, costing us an absolute fortune when the alternative is so clear. You can build a long-term care hospital — extended-care hospital, which is probably the highest level of care in the long-term care process — for something in the order of 50 percent or less of what it costs you to produce an acute-care hospital with the same number of beds. But the significant aspect is that the operating cost of that long-term care hospital is one-fifth of acute care — no more than a quarter, generally one-fifth — and it's the operating costs that are killing us, not the capital cost.

As this government loves to hide their debt, they're going to hide their debt very successfully in building hospitals, because I mean, after all, those debts are amortized in cooperation with the regional districts and they're a mortgage on the future. Frankly, I have no argument with that. But what has happened here has been that over the last five or six years the building program has been slowed down. Oh, I've seen the government papers — the statistics — and what do I find?

We have opened this many hundreds of long-term care beds in this province. And what do I find when I look at what those beds are?

I've gone over the lists and I find, for example, that they include the Queen's Park extended-care hospital. That was opened during the time of the new Socred government, but it was started by the NDP. I see the university hospital has 300 more beds. I see Delta, Kamloops and a number of other major extended- and long-term care facilities that they're taking credit for, but there has been nothing significant done since our initiative. The worst part of it is that this government takes credit for bringing in the long-term care program. Sure, the negotiations that had been going on for a number of years were finally successful and you were able to lower it. You see, we always had an extended-care program in this province, and have had for years. But now the intermediate and the personal care, which had been negotiated for some years — including the time when we were government — was brought in under the umbrella. Having seen that, you would have thought then that the government would have done something about it.

I have in my hand, Mr. Speaker, a study. My heavenly days, we can sure do studies in this country. I won't lay this one on this government. It was done by the federal Treasury Board in 1979 –– I guess it is a study that we should all have a look at from time to time. It's a prognosis for hospitals, including the effects of population change and the need for hospital space up to the year 2031. It's a pretty significant piece of work. Among other things that they say in this paper is a discussion about what we're going to do about unclogging our acute-care beds. Let me quote from it:

"Nearly a decade ago, a task force appointed by the committee on costs of health-care services reported that there are in acute general hospital beds a significant number of patients who could be handled at other levels of care, thereby reducing the cost to the community in the long run."

That statement has been made over and over again. But what does this government decide to do about it? Well, let me tell you what they decided to do about it. On November 10, 1980 — just a few short months ago — the then Minister of Health, now a famed hotliner, put out the following press release. This is the gist of what he said. He said that he'd established a special task force to review the problem of extended-care and long-term care patients occupying acute-care beds. For the sake of heaven, when are we going to stop studying a problem that we now know how to solve? You don't have to set up a task force to study this situation unless you are totally stupid and haven't had any reference to the past whatsoever.

Focus should immediately be put on a building program that will take the heat off the acute-care hospitals. In terms of numbers, I doubt very much if we need one more acute bed in this province. Yes, some need upgrading. Some are being upgraded. But I doubt very much if there is a requirement for one more single, solitary acute bed.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Not at all. But anyway, that member from the north, who had his ears frozen at the time and his mind frozen ever since, can make his comments in good time, and I'm sure that he'll have his opportunity to argue.

[ Page 4488 ]

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: Yes, and we'll come back to resource boards, Mr. Member, quicker than you would like to see.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Let the communities make the decision. Government can't, and you've proven it.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. member, the state of the House at the present time indicates that something has caused it to erupt, and I would ask the hon. member to please address the Chair.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I assure you, my name is not St. Helens, and I will try to do my best to....

HON. MRS. JORDAN: It isn't St-anything.

MR. COCKE: Yes, Madam Minister, we both know.

The establishment of this task force and the results of what they have to say are totally predictable. The task force is going to come along and tell us what we have known for a decade, and that is that we must facilitate the need for long-term care patients — that is, give them the facilities. In place of that, what do we see now? We see, for instance, that 75 long-term care beds in Kamloops, the former Minister of Health's constituency or bailiwick.... We see that they've announced that it's closing down. We're assured by the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) that plans are now being formulated on individual bases to assure that the needs of the residents are met. In tandem with that, we got a release yesterday from the Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops — the acute-care general hospital, and it's not a huge hospital — and they say that they've already got 29 extended-care patients in hospital. We're suffering terribly in terms of our ability to provide for those people requiring acute-care health care. We can't take any of those patients from Mount Paul. Mr. Speaker, we are not seeing the appropriate response to a situation that we all know the answer to.

I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that it's time we stop doing studies and that we turn things around in such a way as to say, very quickly, that we are going to respond, not just with words but actions — and quick actions. The stupid extravagance of wasting acute-care beds, which are not the proper response to the needs of long-term care patients in the first place, has to stop. Long-term care patients require something more than solitary confinement. Yes, acute-care beds are the good response to people requiring that level of care. You're only in the hospital for 6 to 14 days on an average, but you're in a very private situation. There's no socialization; there's no activity in that setting.

One of the responses I heard recently was: "What should we do about the need for chronic-care beds?"

They said: "Well, we're going to phase out St. Mary's Hospital in New Westminster" — which is an acute general hospital, a great community hospital built for surgery and medicine — "and we're going to convert that into a chronic-care facility." I can't believe it. There's no way you could make that hospital into a chronic-care hospital to save your head. You're better to bring a bulldozer along, knock the whole thing down and start all over again. The property isn't the right size anyway. So what are we trying to do?

The kinds of responses that we're getting are shortsighted. Mr. Speaker, there's another response. I wish I had more time. I would like to really get into this matter, but I'll have to do that in the estimates.

We're so proud of our home-care program. Do you know that our home-care program is actually going backwards instead of forwards? There are reduced numbers of people delivering home care. In this country there is something in the order of one home-care person for every 4,000 people. We're a little better in B.C. In areas where they're really responding to the need, such as Europe, there is one home-care worker for every 200 to 300 people. Great difference. You can cut costs if you can keep people out of these expensive facilities, and you're not going to do it going the way we're going. That's all I have to say on that subject. I know that the opposition, or at least the government, feels that's great. But I'm ashamed of them. I'm ashamed of the lack of any kind of response to the real needs of health care and the needs to be economical in the delivery of that service that we've seen from this government over the years.

I want to remark about one other thing — the B.C. rural health corps. After it was announced I went to some of my friends in the Medical Association and elsewhere and asked: "What do you know about it? Have you been consulted?" "No. Looks like a good public relations stunt to us." Anyway, listen to the two descriptions. In the throne speech just last December it said: "The provision of health services to rural or isolated parts of B.C. has been under serious review by my government. During this session this assembly will be provided with details of the creation of a B.C. rural health corps. It will be an agency that will assure primary health care in all areas of the province." Guess what — nothing in the budget but one word or two: "...a number of smaller but important initiatives will also be funded by the ministry. A detoxification unit will be set up under the Alcohol and Drug Commission, and health services to rural communities will be enriched." Is that what we're talking about? It's the closest I could get to anything in the budget relating to anything outside in terms of rural health care. Another bubble that burst. Why isn't there any kind of consultation?

The members opposite were laughing when I talked about resource boards. Laugh all you like. Government has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that they cannot do it from their vantage point in Victoria. Therefore the communities must be involved. Therefore we must return to that situation.

HON. MR. SMITH: In rising to support the motion and speak in favour of this budget I would point out to you that it is a budget with courage, an up-front budget, and a budget that faces problems of declining revenues in a straightaway fashion. Taxes were raised in a direct way and on the basis of a philosophy that people who were least able to bear the burden of inflation would receive relief. They were also raised on the basis that we would encourage energy conservation, and that we would assist the handicapped people in society by providing relief and rebates for them. It would be very easy to imagine other ways of addressing the revenue shortfall problem which the gentlemen opposite would no doubt have liked more. They would have liked a large deficit. I'm sure they also would have liked to find other imaginative ways of raising revenue, such as succession duties or doubling the corporation tax. We know their solutions.

At the same time as they have been criticizing this budget for the amount of money that's been spent, they have been

[ Page 4489 ]

alluding constantly to ways in which more and more public money should be spent and to more and more things that should be done. I can only conclude that what they had in mind was a deficit budget and reverting to the days of succession duties and higher corporate taxation.

I also note in their speeches that apparently it is Ottawa-bashing if you stand up and fight for the resources of your own province and point out the impact of mindless federal budget practices and natural resource policies; it is not Ottawa-bashing if you lie down and accept all of this without criticism.

Another policy that they would advocate, I gather from their speeches, is to leave the resources in the ground — a kind of commercial Ludditism which characterized their term in office in 1974, so we would have had no resources revenue-sharing to the municipalities. We would have had no money for denticare or for the expansion of long-term care. I gather from listening to the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) today that he was the stepchild who gave birth to that program that was gestating for about three or four years when they were in office but never gave birth in the delivery room.

AN HON. MEMBER: They were going to.

HON. MR. SMITH: That's right.

Mr. Speaker, this budget has to be viewed in a world situation; it has to be viewed in the face of countries where there have been enormous and major cutbacks in social service spending. I think for instance of Britain, where the education budget this year was reduced by 4 percent. Four percent was lopped off a $25 billion budget. In this province the education budget is up 10 percent to 11 percent in schools and 20 percent in post-secondary. In this province social services have not been cut back but, indeed, have been improved and have been made more available for people. In the United States we also hear of massive cutbacks in social services on an almost daily basis, and that has not been the approach that the Minister of Finance is taking here. He's taking the approach that people services are most important, and that in order to expand and improve those people services we will raise taxes in an up-front way.

As a person who shares with the member for New Westminster a particularly filthy habit involving tobacco, I have one small personal criticism that I would make on the budget: I didn't have a chance to stock up beforehand. I don't object to paying more money for tobacco or for liquor, and I think that's the right place to raise revenue.

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the minister also for highlighting in his budget and in his budget address a particular subject that is dear to my heart, and that is the International Year of Disabled Persons. If there was ever a time for the disabled to have their turn, and their motto so aptly puts it that it is their turn, it is this year. Not only have moneys been made available in a $3 million fund for the International Year of Disabled Persons, but many ministries of government are going to have special access initiatives for the disabled. I notice also, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Finance very wisely increased the homeowner's grant for disabled persons and also provided for a full rebate for fuel tax for the disabled and exempted transportation aids for handicapped persons from the sales tax.

This year in the program for the International Year of Disabled Persons there is a provincial committee chaired by Mr. Douglas Mowat, a well-known figure in the Paraplegic Association. He has a number of workers in the handicapped community advising him, as well as people in government who work with handicapped persons. They will be advising government as to the allocation of the $3 million in grant moneys. But the philosophy that I hope will underline this program will be to first of all find ways of increasing public awareness as to the needs of the handicapped. By that I do not mean an advertising campaign; I mean a public information campaign pointing out that money spent to help handicapped people help themselves is a good investment. I hope also that part of that program will include a fair amount of work to increase employment opportunities for handicapped people, that there will be incentives to employers and that employers will be encouraged to give handicapped people access to jobs that have been denied them in the past. What the handicapped of this province really do not want in their international year is handouts; they really want a hand up.

We're also going to have some other initiatives in government in the infant development program, in the area of counselling and in the area of education. There will be some very worthwhile long-term programs that will emerge from the International Year of Disabled Persons. It would be a great tragedy if those programs in that year were only start-up programs with the kind of seed money that fired aspirations and didn't deliver long-term goods. Those sort of approaches, which were so characteristic for a long period of time of another level of government, I hope will not be characteristic of our programs in the International Year of Disabled Persons.

Also I would note that in the budget there is a good emphasis placed on training. The vocational training initiatives this year that we're going to launch for young people will be important. The Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Heinrich) has already launched a critical-skills program, which has put almost a thousand more apprentices into training in the first three months. In the schools we're going to proceed with the very popular career preparation programs, backed up with work experience, which are extremely popular throughout this province.

With those initiatives and with the new initiatives in social services in this budget that have been provided under day care for seniors and young people — an approach which is a preventive approach for young people and an assistance approach for the elderly — we're living up to our social services responsibilities. The budget provides the framework to do that, and the minister is to be congratulated.

I would also like to say that the support the budget provides for local government is impressive. The revenue-sharing grants this year to municipalities are up over 20 percent. In my own constituency I notice that Saanich's grants under revenue-sharing are up over 20 percent as well, and in Oak Bay they are up over 13 percent. Those are very real levels of assistance that the province has given to local government — so much more important, really, than the old per capita grant that was in effect before this program. The minister is to be commended for highlighting and emphasizing those grants. He's also to be commended because as a Minister of Municipal Affairs he initiated that program. That program in a real way defers some of the burden of property taxes.

In the field of education, the province this year will be spending about 66 percent of the entire educational money, exclusive of universities. I notice that the figures often used

[ Page 4490 ]

on the other side of the House talk about amounts like 37 and 33 percent. There may be a little confusion in segments of the Legislature as to how much money the government does spend on education. The members opposite know that it's only the basic program of schools where the government spends roughly 37 or 38 percent of the cost of that basic program. But they also know, although they do not mention the figures, that the province spends considerable sums of additional money on public school education. For instance, it spends money on capital for schools and school building. It spends money on teachers' pension contributions, which were increased this year by almost $40 million. They also know that the homeowner grant vote is a direct vote to defray school taxes. Those are all moneys spent to defray the cost to local taxpayers of public school education. In addition to that, they know that the province pays the entire cost, both operating and capital, of the colleges and institutes and that formerly part of that burden was borne to the maximum limit of two mills by property owners. This government reduced that burden.

So if you examine all those items of education expenditure and look at the figures back in 1975 and compare those with the figures in 1981 you will see that instead of decreasing, the province's share has in fact increased from about 64 to 66 percent. I want to emphasize that message, because it is absolutely wrong and false to charge that this government has in any way placed more burdens for education on the backs of property owners. That is not true.

I also would be remiss if I didn't point out that the great Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) will provide, under his part of the budget, a number of new magnificent double-ended, double-decked ferries which will expand our ferry fleet. They signal the fact that we have a strong commitment in this government to continue to provide first-class ferry transportation between Vancouver Island and the mainland. One of these vessels, the 457-foot ferry Queen of Oak Bay, was recently launched, will be in service in May and will be a great addition to this fleet. It is being built in a local shipyard, with local labour and by a British Columbia company. That is another sign that this government has a commitment to providing local jobs and stimulating the local economy.

It's with great pleasure that I'm able to speak in favour of the budget.

MS. BROWN: I'm not surprised that the Minister of Education found it difficult to speak for more than three minutes on the budget. There's certainly very little in it that is, to comment on, positive. His masterful arithmetic certainly goes in contravention of any arithmetic being done by the school system, the B.C. School Trustees or anyone else, in terms of the provincial government continually shifting the burden of taxes onto the municipalities. I want to quote from a release put out by the B.C. School Trustees. If they're not telling the truth, then maybe the minister should set the record straight. It says here quite clearly that last year the provincial government contributed 37 percent to school board costs. It has dropped this year to 33 percent. It seems to me that more and more of the expense burden is being shifted onto the taxpayers in the municipalities. The minister denies this. His arithmetic is obviously quite different from that being used by anyone else in the province — Social Credit arithmetic.

In responding to the budget, it had been my intention to make a couple of comments about the way in which the budget affects the constituency of Burnaby-Edmonds. I was just going to talk generally about the way in which school costs are being shifted onto the homeowners in that area. I was also going to bring to the government's attention the problem we're having in Burnaby with the lack of affordable housing and the lack of affordable rental accommodation. I was going to talk about the fact that we need decent public transit in Burnaby, and that really we would prefer to see less and less money being spent on monuments, like the Annacis crossing and B.C. Place, and more and more money put into people services and creating jobs in that area. I was also going to comment on the fact that the budget totally ignored the needs of women and native Indians, and on the impact this budget would have on those two particular groups. That had been my intention.

I had assumed that the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy), in addressing the budget, would outline for us some way in which this really horrendous budget — the blow it would cause and the suffering it would cause to those people who are dependent on her ministry for services — could be softened. I had anticipated that she would outline some means of making it easier for them to deal with some of the tax increases outlined in the budget. You can imagine my horror when the minister rose and spoke for almost 40 minutes. She spent less than 10 percent of her time commenting on her ministry, the entire content of her comments being to read from the budget address itself. I must confess that those remarks were read much more ably by the Minister of Finance on Monday. So not even that was done properly.

Interjection.

MS. BROWN: It is true; she read word for word from the budget — I have the Blues here — and as I said, not nearly as well as the Minister of Finance did on Monday.

Less than 10 percent of her time was spent on her ministry. She waxed warm and she waxed enthusiastic about the convention centre and went on at great length about that and about various and sundry other topics. It was certainly very cynical and very cavalier and very superficial treatment of the people who are most dependent on her and on her ministry for any kind of service — as well as protection from her own government.

Interjection.

MS. BROWN: That's not a sexist remark. I say this more in sorrow than in rage. I have commented a number of times that I really wish the Minister of Human Resources would spend more time concerning herself about the needs of people and less time fighting for that convention centre. I wish she would let the Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Rogers) or somebody else take over responsibility for the convention centre, so that when she stands up in the House to talk about her ministry she doesn't have to rely on notes prepared for her by the Minister of Finance, so that she herself would be able to make some comments on behalf of this particular group of people in our community.

What I find I have to do is abrogate my responsibility to speak on behalf of my constituency or on behalf of other groups such as women and native Indians, who have been

[ Page 4491 ]

clobbered by this budget, and spend all my time talking about the people in receipt of income assistance in this province — children, seniors, the disabled, the handicapped, and other groups who are totally dependent on the whims and fancy of the Minister of Human Resources, and who are being so totally and completely ignored by her. If we are to believe that in fact Human Resources is a priority with this government, we have to have some explanation from them as to why the increase, in terms of the budget, is really only 11 percent and not the 18 percent which we are told it is. In fact, if one compares the budget increases of other ministries — and here I'm reading from a non-NDP newspaper, the Province — we find that in fact there are only two ministries that had lower increases than the Ministry of Human Resources. One was Environment and the other was Forests. Every other ministry had a larger increase than the Ministry of Human Resources, yet we are told that this is a priority area of the government. If we do any kind of calculations, we find that the increase is really only 11 percent and not the 18 percent which is erroneously mentioned in the budget.

The most significant point of the increase is the very small amount of increase in the GAIN program — 7.7 percent of the last year's estimate figures. If we add the overrun which was paid off in warrants on March 4 of this year, we find that there is a real increase of something in the nature of 6 percent. Now, as GAIN makes up half of the ministry's budget, if we deduct half of the amount of the so-called efficiency saving, which is $4 million achieved to control government growth, then we find that the increase is really only 5 percent. That is from a government that lists Human Resources as one of its priorities.

The background paper which accompanied the budget tells us that inflation is projected to be somewhere between 12.5 and 13 percent in 1981. Yet we find that the poorest citizens in our province, the people who are totally dependent on income assistance from the minister who is busy trying to build a convention centre, will be getting an increase of something in the neighbourhood of 5 percent in 1981.

The budget this year has increased the health service component in Human Resources, the Pharmacare program, by something like 2.3 percent. Compare that with the increases which went into some other areas, or even compare that with the increase which we find in the minister's office. The increase there is something in the order of 10.3 percent. I'm sure that GAIN recipients would have been satisfied to settle for that increase, rather than the one they find they're receiving.

The minister tells us that there is going to be an increase in the staffing. We're going to be given 85 new social workers as a result of a saving of $3 million. Maybe I should jog the memory of the members about the memo which became public in September of last year, where the minister negotiated a staff freeze in her ministry, making a commitment to maintain 152 vacancies, which would result in a saving of $3 million. So the department was below staff to the tune of 152 workers to start with, saving $3 million. In this budget, the $3 million is returned but now it hires only 85 workers. So we find that far from increasing the staff component, there is still a shortage of something like 70 workers.

The $32 million to income assistance is no increase at all. Last year when there was an 8 percent increase, that resulted in $24 million. Now if we build into it the inflation factor, we find that $32 million is not meaningful in any way. It certainly is not going to help the people in receipt of social assistance to find the $850 they will need to meet some of the tax increases outlined in the budget brought down by the minister on Monday. It's been computed that each family of four will need $850 just to meet those tax increases outlined in the budget. This does not include increases in hydro and other utility rates; it does not include increases in transportation or anything else. Just to meet the increases outlined in the budget a family of four will need an additional $850, and we find that those people in receipt of income assistance in this province, most of whom are children, if I may again remind this House.... Their increase is going to be less than 5 percent, and they're certainly not going to be able to keep up with it.

Over and over again, whether it's the United Way report, letters from individual income assistance workers, community groups or whether it's surveys which have been done, the one thing that stands out most of all is that the cost of shelter in this province far exceeds the shelter allowance which is allowed by the Ministry of Human Resources. The shelter allowance is not keeping tabs with the increase in rents. Mr. Speaker, if I can read a quote from a survey done by the GVRD, it says: "Rental apartments in the GVRD have increased in terms of 2 1/2 percent in 1980 on a base of 100,000." That is only a quarter of the demand, and that is one of the reasons why, first of all, we have the zero vacancy rate. Then if you add to that the fact that there isn't accommodation, the fact that accommodation that does exist....

Certainly there is a difference between those which are controlled and those which are not controlled.

The only comment the Minister of Human Resources made about rental accommodation was that rent stabilization legislation had dried up the incentive and that was the reason why there was no rental accommodation — that rent control was bad. This is not held up by any of the surveys which are done. The surveys which are done show that there's a very great discrepancy between that accommodation which is covered by rent control and that accommodation which is not.

What the survey also shows is that even the accommodation which is covered by rent control, even that accommodation where the rent has been held down, is not covered and met by the shelter allowance which is paid by the ministry. A study done by the Ministry of Lands, Parks and Housing — this is not an NDP survey — of 23 major urban centres in B.C. showed that the $130-a-month shelter allowance for a single person was totally inadequate to meet the average monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment. It studied places like Dawson Creek, Fort St. John, Kelowna, Kitimat, Terrace, Vancouver, Victoria and Williams Lake and found that the average monthly rent, where there was control, ran in the neighbourhood of $266 a month, and the shelter allowance, as I pointed out, is $130 a month — just about half. Of course, in places like Vancouver and Victoria where there's no control, the same rents run $393 a month in Vancouver, $391 a month in Victoria and $372 a month in Fort St. John.

It seems to me that if the Minister of Human Resources was going to be making some kind of comment about rental accommodation, her comment should have been to outline ways in which the shelter portion of income assistance was going to be raised to make it possible for people in receipt of income assistance to at least be able to afford the rent of their accommodation. In fact, what happens is that a study has shown that the average size of families on welfare runs somewhere between 2.9 and 3 people. So what we're talking about is two-bedroom accommodation, not even one-

[ Page 4492 ]

bedroom accommodation. Again, a survey which was done by the Ministry of Lands, Parks and Housing — not an NDP ministry, if I may point that out again — points out that the shelter allowance is inadequate, that the allowance of $375 for two persons is not adequate in terms of meeting either controlled or decontrolled rents in 9 of the 23 urban areas. Again, it cited — if I can name some disparities — that in Vancouver there was something like $199 difference; Fort St. John, $111; and Victoria, $113.

I have copies of letters which have been sent to the minister from someone living in Thetis Lake who talked about how impossible it was in terms of finding accommodation. A letter which was sent by the St. Christopher's Anglican Church of Vancouver on behalf of a single parent there, signed by the St. Christopher's Club and other concerned persons, pointed out that it just was not possible to find rental accommodation cheap enough that the shelter portion allowed by the ministry would cover the rent. That certainly is something that the minister should have been addressing herself to yesterday rather than talking about the fact that rent controls were responsible for drying up the rental market.

The people who are dependent on her and the services of her ministry want to hear ways and means in which the ministry is planning to relieve them of this burden, because in fact rent has to be paid. What happens, as the United Way report showed, is that money is pulled out of food allowance, clothing allowance, health-care needs, dietary allowance and everywhere else in order to pay the rent, heat, light and utilities. What happens is that the quality of life of these people deteriorates even more, simply because the ministry is not addressing itself to this very basic fact.

Everybody in every income bracket is feeling the pinch in the housing market, but the people who are most vulnerable are those who are dependent on the Minister of Human Resources. Yesterday was her opportunity to stand up and respond to the United Way report, the letter from St. Christopher's Church, the brief from Skeena-Terrace, the single parents' association, First United Church, SPARC and all of the other groups that say the shelter portion is not enough. The rental situation is crucial, and there's absolutely nothing from the Minister of Human Resources, except to say that housing is tight because the NDP introduced rent controls. That is just not good enough.

The most regressive form of taxation, every economist agrees — even the economist from the Fraser Institute who was quoted by the minister yesterday.... It's interesting that the only institute she quotes is the most right-wing economic institute in existence in North America today. However, even that economist agrees that the most regressive form of taxation is the sales tax. What does this government do when it decides to raise taxes? First we have a pious statement from the Minister of Finance saying that every attempt is being made to see that the people taxed are the people who can afford to pay the taxes. In the next breath he goes and raises the sales tax by 50 percent — the most regressive form of taxation, the taxation that hits the poor harder than it hits anyone else. The sales tax is the one that was raised the most — a 50 percent increase in the sales tax.

You would have expected, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Human Resources would have stood in her place in addressing herself to this budget and said: "To soften the blow of that 50 percent increase in the sales tax to people in receipt of income assistance my ministry has designed the following...." Not a word. The minister stands and reads from the budget. Not one comment about the impact that that 50 percent increase in the sales tax is going to have on people in receipt of income assistance in this province — the seniors, the handicapped, single-parent families and children. That 50 percent increase adds $850 a year to the tax burden of every family of four in this province, and there has been not one word from that minister about how that burden is going to be lightened by any policies or programs in her ministry. It isn't going to be lightened.

This morning the Vancouver food basket prices were released again. What do we find? We find that there is an increase in every form of protein. Eggs have gone up another 6.31 percent. Meats have increased another 6.36 percent. The only meat that has increased reasonably is pork; it has only gone up 4.36 percent. All of the dairy products — cheese, whether it's processed, cheddar or whatever — have gone up 6 percent. Fresh vegetables increased in the vicinity of 38.4 percent. What are we to understand from this? At a time when people do not have sufficient money to meet their housing costs and they have to pull money out of their food budget to pay their rent and utilities, the cost of food is going up. In addition to that the government has added on to that particular group the additional burden of a 50 percent increase in their sales tax.

The Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. Smith) said that he agrees with the tax on cigarettes and alcohol. Sure, those are taxes which you can protect your children against, I suppose. I certainly don't approve of kids smoking and drinking. But there is no way you can protect them against the increases in the sales tax. That is something that the Minister of Human Resources should have addressed herself to — the increase in the cost of housing, food, transportation, utilities and all those things. But she stands in her place for 40 minutes, and for something like 33 or 34 of those minutes she talks about everything else except her ministry and the people who are depending on her not just to serve them but to protect them against her government. But she's not interested — too busy building a convention centre; not interested at all.

The minister received a brief last year from the residents of Skeena-Terrace, who are an articulate group of people living in subsidized housing and in receipt of income assistance, who have pointed out to her that the earnings exemption — these are people who want to work; they want to get off welfare — has not been changed through these many years; it's still $50 for one person, $100 for a family. That's still it, despite the fact that inflation and everything else keep going up year after year. A person in receipt of income assistance who works is still only allowed to keep $50, and after that, deductions left, right and centre off their welfare cheque; or if it's a family, if it's a person with one child or ten children — it makes no difference — they're still only allowed to keep the $100. It's not even modified in that respect.

Then the minister makes big speeches about an opportunities program which is to give people self-esteem so they can go out and find a job. They go out and find a job and, unless the job is able to pay them an incredible amount of money, certainly more than they're getting on income assistance, they're no better off. Their initiative is killed and undermined and destroyed, because the income exemption has not been changed. It is absolutely ridiculous. It's not worth it. In fact, what is happening to these people is that the CIP and VIP workers are being exploited, because they are

[ Page 4493 ]

putting in hours and hours of work and in exchange for it, all that they can get and all that they can receive is either the $50, if it's a single person, or $100 if it's a family.

What about the special dietary allowances for kids with special dietary needs? What about the special dietary allowances for women who are pregnant? What about those kinds of allowances? Do you think that anything has been done to take into account the increase in the cost of proteins which I mentioned earlier? The cost of milk and cheese and eggs and all of these things which we're being told we need if we are to give birth to healthy, normal children, has that been taken into account? Not on your life, Mr. Speaker! That has not been increased through these many years either. The GAIN legislation has a section in it, section 8, which, if it is proclaimed, pegs it to the cost of living, which means that as the cost of living goes up, the income assistance rate goes up. That's never been proclaimed. This government pegs its budget to the cost of living; it pegs its budget to inflation; it goes out and it creates inflation because it says: the more inflation, the more income we get as a government. It's an inflation-conscious government; it loves inflation; it subsidizes inflation; it encourages inflation; it pegs itself to inflation, but totally ignores it where people on income assistance are concerned. They have it both ways; it's as simple as that.

What we find is that a conscious decision has also been made by this government that the cost of northeast coal, the cost of the convention centre, the cost of the Annacis crossing, the cost of Pier B-C and every other monument that this government is going to erect to itself is going to be paid for by the poor people in this province. That's a decision that this government has made, and that's the reason why they raised by 50 percent that most regressive of all taxes, the sales tax.

HON. MR. CHABOT: How much did that suit cost $800, $900?

MS. BROWN: I'll tell you, I didn't earn it by raising the sales tax 50 percent on the backs of the poor. I'll tell you that much about it.

HON. MR. CHABOT: Did you buy it at Madam Runge's?

MS. BROWN: And I also bought it in B.C. I didn't run across to Alberta so that I wouldn't have to pay any sales tax on it either.

Interjections.

MS. BROWN: That's right, so that he doesn't have to pay any tax on it. If you'll look at the label you'll find it was manufactured in B.C. too — manufactured in B.C., bought in B.C., paid for in B.C., without raising the sales tax 50 percent in order to do it either.

Mr. Speaker, the other comment raised in the budget had to do with day care. I honestly don't know where the government gets the gall to ever make any public statements about day care. Absolutely one of the most disgraceful services in this province is the day-care system. The number of children in day care is going down, and licensed, supervised day care is going down, simply because the subsidy is totally inadequate. Most people cannot afford to put their children in good day care because there's no relationship between the cost of the day care and the subsidy. More and more people are having to put their kids in unsupervised, unlicensed, unmonitored day care. And this government has the gall to stand up and make up any comment and put it in writing in their budget that they're doing anything about day care. There is still no money for capital expenditures in day care, still no money for equipment, no money to pay decent salaries and no money for start-up costs in terms of day care. The subsidy way of doing day care is that it's pegged to the child. So when a child is ill for a period of time and doesn't show up in day care, that amount of money is deducted. How do you run a system that way? If you have 3 teachers to 15 kids and 2 children are out for a week, you have to lay off a teacher for a week. Then suddenly the children come back, so you rush out and bring that teacher back in.

There can't be any planning, organization or increases in terms of quality of the day care developed in the province simply because this government has no concept whatsoever, to begin with, about what day care is all about. It's part of the socialization process of the child. It's not a baby-sitting service; it's not someplace you dump your kids just because you have to go to work. It's an important part of the learning experience of the child. You should be able to place your children in a good, decent and well-run child-care system as a means of helping them develop as social human beings. That's part of the process.

All of the studies done show that children who have this kind of social contact early in life grow up to be better citizens. When parents have to place a child with someone who sits them down in front of a television set and leaves them there because they're just baby-sitting — they don't know what else to do with the child — or places a child in some kind of home which they can afford which is unsafe, not monitored, not supervised, not licensed and not checked, we are jeopardizing our children. Yet the federal statistics tell us that there are still over 700,000 children in this country under the age of six whose parents have to work — whether it's a single parent, or both parents have to work — who are being left in baby-sitting situations which aren't being monitored, checked, supervised for safety or anything else. That is an utter disgrace. It certainly is a disgrace for a government that can pay someone $600 a day to monitor the giving away of a natural resource to some foreign interest.

And to have the gall to put in writing that they're going to do anything about day care! The statistics just don't bear it out. We have one of the worst systems for the delivery of child care anywhere in North America right here in British Columbia, and we don't have to have that, because we are not an underdeveloped country or a poor country.

We are throwing money all over the place so that the Minister of Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) can dig a hole to his memory up in the northeast of British Columbia and pour a billion dollars of poor people's money down it too — $600 a day for someone to supervise that minister's hole to his memory, and we have kids in this province who are in unsupervised day care. We have a daycare supervisor, someone who is in charge, who earns something like $950 a month — $975 a month maximum for a head supervisor. The salary range for a day-care worker starts at $644 a month gross — that's before income tax or anything else comes out. Yet there's money to put out $600 a day...

MR. LEA: Plus a free lunch.

[ Page 4494 ]

MS. BROWN:...and lots of other perks, as far as we can understand, for someone to supervise the Minister of Small Business Development digging his hole to his memory.

There is no adequate after-school day care. They had a scandal in New Westminster recently where they found that the breaking and entering which was being done in that city was being done by ten-year-olds. These were elementary school kids who, on their lunch break, would break in, and after school at 3:30 it started, and they were through their breaking and entering in time to go home for dinner.

There is no after-school day care available for these children. We've even coined a word for it in North America. We call them "latch-key children." These kids who go around with the key to the house hung around their neck, and they have to let themselves in and out and take care of themselves. This is not in an underdeveloped part of the world, if I may remind you again, but in one of the wealthiest provinces and one of the wealthiest nations in the world. There is no part-time day care, no crisis day care. If there's a crisis in the family, there is nowhere that one can take the children immediately and know that they are safe, in safe surroundings and being well supervised. There is no thrust to encourage business to develop day care on their premises, no use of the schools except in very small instances. In Burnaby we are very lucky that we have a community school, Stride Community School, which is used extensively, but this is not true of most places.

The government should never talk about day care until it starts putting its House in order, because it's a shocking indictment of that government and the way in which it regards children.

Interjection.

MS. BROWN: So the infant development program is going to have its budget doubled. I can't believe that! I am so pleased! Thank goodness it finally got through to the Minister of Human Resources what we've been saying to her for years. It costs $500 a month to send a person into the home to work with the parent and the child to keep the child there. If you institutionalize a child it costs $150 a day. Finally the dollars and cents got through to them. Finally they figured it out, and the budget for the infant development program is going to be doubled. Heavens be praised!

It's a super program. It's an excellent program. The only concern about it is that that money doesn't go to hiring a lot of top-ranking bureaucrats, but that it actually goes into the field. I know that there are presently 17 areas. There are six others: Penticton, Prince Rupert, Nanaimo, Fort St. John, Powell River, Grand Forks, Maple Ridge and Mission. I gather that Prince Rupert is also planning and putting in for an infant development program.

AN HON. MEMBER: Cranbrook.

MS. BROWN: Cranbrook already has one. That's one of the 18. There are six more that have submitted budgets to the minister. They're asking that the caseloads be lowered — they're still too high. They're still dealing with 30 to 40 families for one worker. Mr. Speaker, in Alberta it's only 12 families to a worker; the ideal is 12 to 15 families to a worker. But for better or for worse, the dollars and cents finally got through to the ministry, and we understand that the infant development program is going to have an additional $680,000, I hope, or something in that regard so that that program can have its system beefed up.

Everyone talks about the International Year of Disabled Persons. I guess we are relieved that this year is not going to be celebrated with buttons, scrolls and ice cream on the lawn. However, I think that the disabled would have been happier if the government had responded to their requests rather than drawing up some of their own.

I just want to read into the record, Mr. Speaker, what the disabled people have asked for. They've asked for transportation; they need a transportation system. I hope that when the minister responsible gets up to deal with his estimates we will find that, in fact, they do have that transportation system. They've asked for equality in employment in the government service itself. They have pointed out that in the entire workforce of the government there are only 170 disabled people who have been hired. If we were to be fair about it, they should have 5 percent of the workforce, and that would be 2,500 people. So I certainly hope that all the ministers who are here are actively going out and trying to embark on an affirmative action program in terms of the disabled people.

They are asking to be covered by the minimum wage. I think it's wonderful that we are having more achievement centres, but they don't want those achievement centres tied to income assistance. They want to work, and they want to be paid at least the minimum wage. That's what they're asking for. The kind of work they do is worth more than the minimum wage in many instances. This business of income assistance grants or handicapped pension grants — that's not the solution. They want to be paid a wage for the work they do, and then you can keep the income assistance, and you can keep the pensions. They don't want the pensions; they want a wage. That's what they want in terms of their salaries.

Of course there is the old question of housing and accessibility. I know the government buildings have started to do something about accessibility, so that they can get in and out of government buildings. If you tie that in with their request for transportation, they should be able to get to the 2,500 jobs that I know the civil service is going to open up for them now that it's been brought to your attention. If they're doing the job properly, they should be paid the wage that goes with the job. In addition, in terms of their achievement centres, for goodness' sake at least cover them by the minimum wage and cut out all of this pension business. This is what they're asking for.

The Human Rights Code has got to be amended again. It's not good enough just amending the regulations, but amending the code itself is very important.

I'm sorry that my time has run out; I really regret that. I want to say that I can't support the budget, because it really has not addressed itself to the needs of the people in this province with the greatest needs. In fact what it has done is shift the tax burden onto the poor, and I cannot support that.

HON. MR. FRASER: I'm happy to stand here this morning as a member of this government and also as the MLA for Cariboo in the central interior of our great province. I don't get much opportunity to speak, because I have to sit here and listen to that socialist nonsense all the time. Now that I have the opportunity, I'm going to take full advantage of it. While I'm on that subject I would like to draw your attention, sir, to the fact that this House started on Monday and the Leader of the Opposition is spending his second 25 minutes here this

[ Page 4495 ]

week, and I want to welcome him here. I don't want any comments or interjections from him unless he's legal and gets in his own seat. I want you to look after him.

First of all want to congratulate my colleague on bringing in this budget of $6.6 billion. I want to congratulate him on the hard work that he put into it. There were some real hard choices to make, and as far as I'm concerned he made the right choices.

I can just imagine the howls we would have heard from the other side if taxes had remained the same with a shortfall of $625 million. Referring to the last speaker, the member for Burnaby-Edmonds (Ms. Brown), when she was talking about day-care services, and the member before that, the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke), when he was talking about health services, those are what this government protects by the increase in taxation. Furthermore, because of the policies of this government we have prosperity in this province and can afford to pay a little more tax.

It reminds me of the dark days of 1975 when everybody was on strike and the socialist government called the Legislature and ordered everybody back to work. There was nobody at work in 1975. They were all on strike. And what did these great defenders of labour do? They ordered them back to work. Well, the rest is history. They were put down the tube and down there they'll be forever, because they'll never be relied on to govern again in this province.

I haven't any problem at all in defending this budget, and I'm sure our citizens agree that if they want to maintain or increase our services, this is the only option we have open to us. With inflation the way we have it and so on, what are you going to do about it? We have to have the revenue.

I might say that some of the sharp writers in B.C., with all the gafflegoop they feed our poor public, are saying that the Minister of Finance is all wet in his estimates from resource revenue. I'd like to dwell on that for a minute. I don't know who they talk to, but I come from a riding with a resource base where the hewers of wood for the people down on the lower mainland to enjoy all the lovely things they have.... I understand that in the sawmill industry today they can't sell lumber at any price. So why are these smart writers disagreeing with our Minister of Finance that revenue will be down?

Interjection.

HON. MR. FRASER: You bet it will be down from stumpage, and these things all have to be considered. They're serious. It's a world market, an export market, and in the opinion of the government it isn't going to rebound when we thought it would.

Natural gas. You know the story of that. Our good old friend Pierre Elliott Trudeau looks after that; he sets the price of gas. Over there they told us for four years to get the price of gas up. We got it up all right and now nobody will buy it. That's what we told you bunch before. Socialist bunkum! And the press print what they say; that's what I can't believe. They get the front page.

Interjections.

HON. MR. FRASER: Back to the budget.

Health care. Mr Speaker, if your assistant was in the chair.... We know what health care is like in British Columbia; the Speaker and I know. We've got the best health care in the world. Not in Canada, in the world. I'll subscribe to that; I've got proof of that. And I'll be around for a long time yet — don't get excited — thanks to the great health care we've got in this province.

Interjections.

HON. MR. FRASER: Back to the budget.

In this budget 60 cents of every taxpayer's dollar goes to three ministries of government. The priorities of this government are Health, Education and Human Resources. I didn't hear them say that. There are 17 ministries of government left to divide up the remaining 40 cents. They don't understand that.

Interjections.

HON. MR. FRASER: Oh, yes, they want to bring up overruns. I'll gladly deal with overruns. That member over there in the corner shovelled it out of the back of a wagon — gave $100 million away. You didn't even get any butter for the biscuits you gave away for the $100 million. We had a $100 million overrun and even you, if you can see, got a better road to drive on for it.

AN HON. MEMBER: Tell us about the Marguerite, Alex.

HON. MR. FRASER: I'll tell you about the Marguerite, but at another time and place.

Interjections.

HON. MR. FRASER: Yes, and here's something else we don't hear. I wish some of these members would be in the House on health care. In 1973, when they had command of all the money in the world and when they had inherited a surplus and started shovelling it out of the back of the truck Human Resources.... Do you know what the percentage of health care was when they were government? Twenty-two percent. Today it's 30 percent. There are our priorities,

Yes, we have great prosperity in this province, and we take credit for part of it but not all of it. We created the climate for the investments here. I want to tell you a story about mining. These great mining experts over there.... I wish the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) was here. He ended up in their administration as the Minister of Mines. And do you know the record he made for himself in all the world books? The best Minister of Mines the Yukon ever had, because he drove them all out to the Yukon. Now do you know what their mining policy is? "After we get elected, come to the Premier's office." Well, they won't ever have that opportunity.

AN HON. MEMBER: "Make a Deal" Barrett.

HON. MR. FRASER: Yes, that's their mining policy.

Interjection.

HON. MR. FRASER: I lost all my notes; I had some copious notes here.

Nobody can deny that the economy of this province has turned around. Yes, we have prosperity, and prosperity causes problems.

[ Page 4496 ]

MR. BARRETT: You just said that you can't sell our lumber even.

HON. MR. FRASER: That's right. Lumber is hard to sell. We have these cycles.

The other thing I might inform the House and the smart guys who write in the business pages about is the metal market. They're saying it's buoyant. Well, I don't know who they're talking to but I've got mines in my riding and they can't sell copper or molybdenum today. But they're saying: "The budget cut down revenue from minerals, and it's not justified." I say in defence of this budget that it certainly is. We want to maintain the level of service, and that's the policy of this government.

MR. LEA: Name one thing that's selling well.

HON. MR. FRASER: Mr. Speaker, I don't like to be a pessimist like those Johnnys-come-lately over there. I like to be an optimist. I've lived here all my life and contributed a little, I hope. Yes, there is something selling well: pulp and paper. But two other big items aren't: lumber and metals. Check it out yourself. Again, in defence of the budget, that's why the Minister of Finance budgeted for reduced revenue from those particular resources.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. The Minister of Transportation and Highways has the floor. I'll ask the hon. Premier and the Leader of the Opposition to come to order, please.

HON. MR. FRASER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don't think any of these members should be disrupting my great speech here,

We'll survive and everything will be fine. I want to reiterate that the philosophy involved in arriving at this budget was to maintain the level of service that our people are entitled to and will receive, through to March 1982.

I want to mention an item here — this is really interesting, Mr. Speaker; I know I have your attention — about the housing shortage. Those people over there talk about the housing shortage. Of course the facts of life are that we had more housing starts in British Columbia in 1980 than any other province in Canada. Sure, there's still a shortage and we're trying to do something about it. They're hollering about that all the time. I just want to really show where they don't practise what they preach. The NDP has joined what they call — not I — the fat-cat ripoff developer sector. I refer to the grand palace they're building in Nanaimo. You know, it's going to qualify under the new 8 percent tax because I understand the rooms are going to be about $80 a night. They spout off here about low-cost housing. Why didn't they put their money into low-cost housing? Yes, Mr. Speaker, they're a great bunch. They say one thing and do another; they don't practise what they preach.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

MR. BARRETT: They're also building a senior citizens' project and they're saving a room just for you.

HON. MR. FRASER: Mr. Speaker, I'm glad you're back. Will you tell the Leader of the Opposition to sit down and shut up. I've got the floor and he'll have lots of chances to rebut.

I just want to emphasize this, and it's all I'll say about it this time. They're involved in a 17-storey hotel in Nanaimo. They had to have zoning bylaws changed to accommodate it; it didn't even agree with the zoning bylaws of Nanaimo. You know, it's going to block the waterfront view. Then we have this big socialist mayor of Vancouver saying: "You can't do it in Vancouver." It's double-talk all the way up and down.

I was hoping the member for Nanaimo (Mr. Stupich) would be here because I understand that he's the head honcho in it representing the party. I'm going to tell you, colleagues over there in the opposition, the way that member interprets the budget you are going to have an overrun of about $70 million in that hotel if he practises the same kind of arithmetic. I'd sure put somebody there to help him, because he's pretty bad at arithmetic.

He is something like the member for Mackenzie (Mr. Lockstead). He said in the House the other day that we were going to spend $350 million to put roads into northeast coal. That's enough to put a road over the top of Tumbler Ridge and over into Alberta for a ways. We have no plans to do that. Where do you get your figures? By the way, while he's there, somebody told me he's a critic of this ministry, and I appreciate that — I heard that.

The other day he was on Oatmeal Savage's program — Jack Webster — and the subject came up about ferry service to the Queen Charlotte Islands. He's my critic, you know. He said: "Well, there's no ferry service to the Queen Charlotte Islands." We'd already hauled about 10,000 people on a regular service for two months. The first ferry service they've had over there and the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) is against it. I want to make that abundantly clear. We're delighted that he's against it, because the people of the Queen Charlotte Islands, 6,000 strong, deserve transportation and we delivered it to them. Now they're going to tell the member for Prince Rupert in the next election, which probably won't be until 1985 or 1986.... Well, I read the paper the other day. You know, they were going to have an election three months after the last one. We've got along so far. I think the next prediction is June or July or something....

I'll tell you something about elections, though, Mr. Speaker and members — this government was elected in 1979 with a five-year mandate and we intend to fulfil that mandate in spite of all the columnists' gossip.

I want to deal for a minute with what great B.C. people they are — Canadians — across here. I know you'll permit me to digress a little from the budget. I don't like dealing with the figures, because I can't get them to balance either. I want to deal a little bit with where their great national party is on the constitution. Where is it? I'll tell you my version of where it is. We have seven provinces against it, including the very able Premier of Saskatchewan and his government. Seven provinces against Pierre Elliott Trudeau's constitutional package — the Liberal government of Ottawa. You know, Premier Blakeney is against it and so are four NDP MPs from Saskatchewan. We've got 12 of those NDP MPs in B.C., and I want to know as a citizen of British Columbia and as a Canadian, how are they going to vote? Because they were all elected in a fluke. Apart from that, they weren't elected to go down there and get in bed with Pierre Elliott Trudeau.

[ Page 4497 ]

I have a few more words on this because I consider it a large item, as a born Canadian who has lived here all my life. I want to quote what a responsible MP says about these people. I'm quoting from Dr. Lorne Greenaway — my MP —Cariboo-Chilcotin.

"I have written several columns on the topic of the constitution and unfortunately I'm once again compelled to address the subject. I'm sure you're as sick of hearing about the BNA Act as I am. However, there are certain issues which affect everyone to such an extent that they cannot be ignored. The right to own property is one such issue. Mr. Kaplan, the Solicitor General, had accepted a Tory amendment to the constitutional resolution which would have infringed the rights of Canadians to own property. This right is already in the Diefenbaker bill of rights. A week later, however, Mr. Chretien reversed this decision under pressure from the New Democratic Party. The NDP had threatened to withdraw their support for the package if the PC amendment was included.

"The NDP felt that if the right to own property was entrenched it would become very difficult for government to expropriate land from both citizens and corporations. They pointed out that the nationalization of Saskatchewan's potash industry would have been very difficult with a right-to-own property clause in the constitution.

"While I must say that I do agree that expropriation would be tougher, I also feel that it is a positive feature of the clause. I do not look forward to the day when governments can take over the property of private citizens with great ease. The debacle at Mirabel airport, that great white elephant outside of Montreal....

"Unfortunately in the interest of political expediency, the Liberals supported the NDP policy on this issue, and Canadians are now being denied the right to own their own property."

I just want to say that I can stand in this House today and be proud of my MP. He was sent back there as a Conservative MP, and he won't vote with Pierre Elliott Trudeau for political expediency or any other reason, I'll tell you that. I want just to conclude by saying that if they continue — and I throw this challenge out to the 12 NDP MPs for British Columbia — and if they vote with Pierre Elliott Trudeau, as one citizen of British Columbia, I'd like them to resign the day after.

Mr. Speaker, I want to deal for a few minutes with something I'm very interested in, and that is this northeast coal discussion. It's really amazing. I know a lot of these people weren't here and don't know how this province was built, but I'm going to give them a little history. Northeast coal opened up a section of this province that was sitting there waiting to be opened up. What's wrong with that?

Interjections.

HON. MR. FRASER: You know, we've got experts over there. I guess the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) is at his law practice this morning and the other one is probably practising law.

But, you know, to open up Tumbler Ridge and all that area for coal and transportation in every sphere of life now is really important. I'm glad to find that out. Everybody is getting concerned except the NDP, and the only thing they approved in the budget was taking the tax off bicycles. They want everybody on bicycles, but the citizens don't want that. Back to northeast coal. Sure it's a good deal for our province. You have to have leadership, and we've got leadership here in our Premier. We have to develop jobs for the future and, yes, it's going to cost some public money, but so did it cost money to develop Mackenzie and Elkford. What kind of bunkum have you and a few of the dollies in the press come up with to think that it had never happened before? I'll tell you what's never happened before in this province: a surcharge put on to get some of the money back. I never heard you say that. But I know what they did do when they were government. I don't want anybody ever to forget those three horrible years, 1972 to 1975. I know you'll remember it; you were in the Legislature at that time — but I don't want anybody to forget it. They talk about overruns and everything, and practically all the overruns on construction of the BCR, of the Dease line, took place during their term of government.

You know, they're talking now about having to have everything on a profit basis before it starts. They never even looked to see if there was a tree stump or a rock to haul out if they did get the damn railroad built. That's the kind of managers they are.

Their Minister of Labour, the now member for Shuswap-Revelstoke (Mr. King), all he was doing was blowing the whistle and putting his engineer's cap on, playing hoghead while he was a minister of the Crown.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. members. Let's not interrupt the member.

HON. MR. FRASER: For the information of the House, I've lived in the central interior of British Columbia all my life. I lived at the terminus of the railroad in the great community of Quesnel, where it used to terminate until the late W.A.C. Bennett picked it up and made a railroad out of it — took it to Prince George and down into North Vancouver and then up to the Peace River. These people weren't even here when that happened, I know that. That's why I wanted to relate the story about it.

You know, this is where I don't agree with accountants. I see in our books that BCR owes the province $700 million. Well, that's good chartered accountant talk. But I'm going to tell you, it's just a straight investment, and they've got it back tenfold; but the accountants didn't put it in the right column when it came back. That's what I've got against accountants. That's actually what happened.

We have viable, well-established communities. That railroad is the lifeline of those communities. The member for Shuswap-Revelstoke wouldn't even talk to me when it was on strike in '75. He wouldn't let me in his office. No problem, let them suffer. I'm referring to the communities of Pemberton, Lillooet, 100 Mile House, Williams Lake and Quesnel. I'm not referring to that fat-cat Prince George, because they've got another railroad.

There are 100,000 permanent jobs right there on that line. That's the most wonderful incident we've got. We're going to take it now and get some of our natural resources out to the markets of the world — create jobs. What's wrong with that? They all holler: "How much are you losing"? Well, why

[ Page 4498 ]

don't they go back and do their research and find out how much it cost to put the road into Elkford from Sparwood, or into Mackenzie — the power in there? But they don't understand that philosophy. They're sure against everything; I haven't yet found anything they're for. I've got a list of the things you're against.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the member for Maillardville-Coquitlam (Mr. Levi) come to order.

HON. MR. FRASER: Yes, Mr. Speaker, they're against practically anything that is progress, that will guarantee a future for our great citizens of the province, and that's most unfortunate. I only wish somebody would get to them to give them the message that maybe that stance on their part isn't really good for our province and certainly not good for them. You know, I shouldn't be telling them how to campaign; but I only wish they'd keep their stance up. That's what I say.

The things they're against that they've just pronounced in the last.... Here are just a few of the things they're against: northeast coal, B.C. Place, an improved highway system, the Annacis crossing — they're afraid of that. Oh, and while I'm on that, there are more politics going on on that. I want to thank the member for Delta (Mr. Davidson), if he's around — yes, he is — for the strong support he's given me on that. We're building the Annacis crossing. The socialists still think they can stop us. Well, we're building it now. We spent $16 million on the Annacis crossing as of today. So, sure, we're having our problems with access, but we're building it.

You know, we're not listening to the nonsense from those people over there. They're against the trade and convention centre, but they're against it, and the mayor, Mike Harcourt, is against it, because it'll block the view. But the NDP Party will go and build one in Nanaimo and block the view right out, and get the zoning and go to city council and gerrymander their bylaws to accommodate it.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

HON. MR. FRASER: They're against Transpo '86, Mr. Speaker, against mining development, against provision of suitable land for the development of housing, and they are definitely against ferry service for the good citizens of the Queen Charlotte Islands. They're on record against that. It's already there. We don't have to make promises there. There will be a day when that will be appreciated.

They're against the exploration of gas and oil. They want to control this, that and everything, and it's just.... They're against everybody — an individual or an organization — who wants to work and make a profit. That's a swearword in their vocabulary.

I'm not sure, Mr. Speaker, what they are for, but I'm going to suggest.... You know, when the member for Prince Rupert was the Minister of Highways, he told the tourists: "Go home!" I'll bet you they're going to have a policy change in that party, because how are they going to fill those $80-a-night rooms in Nanaimo if they don't get tourists? Yes, I predict a change of policy over there.

I haven't said very much about transportation. I just want to say briefly that transportation is a worry and a problem not only in British Columbia, but in all of Canada. It even gets the attention of the press now. It never did before; it was always in the legal section. It's of interest and concern to all citizens how they go back and forth to work. Mr. Speaker, this year alone this budget provides a $63 million subsidy for B.C. Ferries. After all the so-called high rates that they complain about are paid, that's what all of the citizens of British Columbia put into the ferry system. Our government is proud that we've got the funds to do it. We've got the best ferry system in the world. It was just written up in the London Observer, and it said so. Go and take a trip and find out for yourself.

I'd like to make another comment regarding the budget and transportation. Mr. Speaker, the government made the policy decision to increase gas taxes. I want to tell you something; I've said it before. Number one, never forget that the people of British Columbia own the highway system. Number two, it generates this revenue from taxation. It not only does that — this is the unfair thing, Mr. Speaker. I'm using the approximate figures for 1979-1980. In 1979-1980 the province of British Columbia got $180 million out of the gas taxes. You know what our citizens don't know when they go to the gas pump? Pierre Elliott Trudeau put an excise tax on in 1975. Now you know how he's giving it to us in the ear! This went on in 1975 — it's still there. In 1980 it generated $125 million from our British Columbia highway system — nice deal. Okay, what's he doing? I'll tell you what he does with it. He takes it back to Ottawa and gets lost in the $14 billion deficit that the NDP supports back there. Not a dime comes back to this province for looking after the highway system. We've tried, but they say: "Get lost."

I just want to remind you of another thing on this subject. When they were government in 1975 when an excise tax was imposed, there wasn't so much as a whimper from them. They were the government of British Columbia. That's what they tell us now when we go back and say: "Give us some of this back." They say that the government we had then never complained at all; they thought everybody was happy with it. But don't forget that the federal government has nothing to do with all these figures on world oil prices the press is playing around with. That's been there since 1975. And of course they've stacked on top of that since, to pay for all their socialism back there. You know, there's so much debt involved....

I'm glad to see the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) back here. His law practice must have closed down early this morning.

I wanted to put that on the record so that our citizens understand. Yes, we still don't get enough revenue. I'm not saying that British Columbia should. But the revenue that's generated by that highway system — it costs us a lot more money than that. It would be a way different picture if Pierre Elliott hadn't siphoned it off in 1975 and taken it back there to keep it.

Interjection.

HON. MR. FRASER: No, I'm not a bit afraid, Mr. Speaker.

I just want to say it's a great budget. We'll be able to keep up with the best level of health care.... They love that item. They really love playing games with that one, but we still have the best health-care system in the world. The one thing I didn't mention is that we've got the largest hospital building program that we've ever had. Do you know that in

[ Page 4499 ]

Ontario they are are closing them? That's a little different. We never hear that. Gee, I hope the press doesn't write anything about that; I don't want to see that.

I say that I'm proud to be part of this government. With this budget we're going to have a bigger and better province. Everybody can rest assured now; I've announced the next election date and I don't think we need any more election speculation.

Thank you very much for listening.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, before we recognize the next member, because of the style of debate of the member who has just taken his seat I notice that the House has tolerated quite a high level of noise. I would like to remind us, though, that we do have the same red book, regardless of who is debating.

MR. HANSON: Mr. Speaker, a great deal of hot air comes from the other side of the House, but what is clear in the mind of the public of British Columbia is that this is a pyramid-sales government. Those at the top get their beaks in the trough. Those at the top, close to the cabinet, get all sorts of political favours and the ordinary people of the province suffer. They don't want senior citizens to be able to ride the buses for free or for a nickel, as they do in other jurisdictions. But they're quite happy to have the George Spetifores, the Joan and Sepp Wengers and the Eldon Ungers make a big buck off the public in this province.

There is a case today, for example, that has come to our attention. It is very analogous to the Agricultural Land Commission. It is the case in Chilliwack, concerning the Heritage Advisory Board that sits and advises the government on decisions relating to heritage in this province. They had a study done by the late Jack Herbert — spent a few thousand dollars on it — and he was looking at a particular piece of property in the Fraser Valley. That particular piece of property was what they call the Edenbank Farm. The Edenbank Farm, as you know, Mr. Speaker, was the first dairy co-op in B.C. It had the talents of a very famous architect also. The house wasn't too much, but there were a number of other buildings there. It was the finest example of early dairy farming in British Columbia, and the idea of the Heritage Advisory Board was to have the provincial government purchase this farm and have the Fraser Valley College keep it as a living farm. It wasn't supposed to be dead artifacts. It was supposed to be an early dairy farming operation at which the students could learn and which the citizens of the province — not only provincially but nationally — could benefit from.

The interesting thing is that the Heritage Trust, which is a creation of this government chaired by Mr. J. V. Clyne.... He was very much in favour of the purchase of this. The terms of the sale were extremely favourable. The owners were going to allow the government to buy it for a reasonable price and they were going to give $200,000 of the money from the sale back to the province for the development of this farm. Isn't that good? Well, guess what? A prominent friend of the Social Credit Party came in with a development proposal for condominiums and the cabinet overruled the Heritage Advisory Board and the Heritage Trust when the money was available. The local heritage advisory committee wanted it; they weren't asking for a handout — they had the money. There was Woodward money in there. And guess what happened? For political purposes, because the person was a prominent Socred, he got the land. He's going to have a development of condominiums on that land. That is what the public understands, not that kind of hot air that we just heard.

HON. MR. FRASER: Where'd you get the $70 million for the hotel? Tell us about that.

MR. HANSON: This is a new one. This is a current one and I think there must be members on that side who used to sit on this side who are a little bit embarrassed by that. It's only seven acres. There's lots more outside of the ALR to be dealt with. But seven acres — it's a non-renewable heritage resource, it's a functioning museum, it ties in with a college. The people wanted it. The money was there, but the politics is what's killing this government, which is fine with me.

Take another one: the Windermere gravel pit. You're aware of that one, Mr. Speaker. There are 33 acres over there in Windermere right along the highway. It's beautiful farmland that used to be vegetable-producing land. It was owned by an elderly couple who are residing in the Okanagan. They'd applied for it to be taken out of the land reserve years before in 1976 and it was turned down. They are Joan and Sepp Wenger, who were very close political associates of the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot).

They put an option on these 33 acres subject to it coming out of the Agricultural Land Commission. It was turned down. A request for reconsideration came from the minister to the Land Commission, they corresponded back to the Wengers and said: "The Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing, your MLA, has asked us to reconsider this proposal. We've reviewed it again at his instruction and we still find that it is agricultural land. It is food-producing land and therefore we will not recommend that it come out of the land reserve."

What happens then? They do a setup. They do a setup through the regional district. The regional district officials later on said: "The instructions came from Victoria; we were just doing what Victoria told us to do. They recommended the land come out for gravel which they really needed." There is gravel everywhere in that valley. The Columbia Windermere study, as the member knows, points out that there is gravel everywhere. But the interesting thing is that when you control the source of the gravel, you have money in the bank. You have tons of cash in the bank because gravel is like gold. Gravel sells for $4 or $5 a cubic yard. Hay land is just a few thousand dollars an acre.

The member is very embarrassed about this because his political backside is being roasted over it in that riding. They haven't forgotten, and they won't forget it later on either.

So the Wengers then put an option on the land subject to it coming out of the ALR. They then feed it through the regional district, and guess what? They leave it in the ALR, but they allow a gravel pit to be used on that site. There is no possibility for reclamation. It would affect the drainage of the Elkhorn Ranch and the other ranches around it. With the steep slopes there is no possibility of reclamation whatsoever. They don't care. You know why? The Wengers paid $110,000 for that land — a lot of money for farmland, a lot of money for ALR land. But overnight that land has a paper value of over $5 million. That is a dandy payoff, isn't it?

HON. MR. CHABOT: How much?

MR. HANSON: Over $5 million, even by secretariat documents — $5 million overnight, minimum.

[ Page 4500 ]

That is what the public sees. They know they can't ride on the bus. As seniors, they know what they're getting in their monthly cheques. They know what their transportation costs are. They know that their school taxes are going up. But they see friends of this government...attempts being made....

They keep getting stymied because, guess what — the conclusion of this — they had forgotten that the Agricultural Land Commission controls the Soil Conservation Act, and it would not give a permit for the removal of the soil. Guess what? The Wengers got caught paying $110,000 for that land, and they can't even take the gravel out of it to make their $5 million to $7 million — the regional district planner's own figures. Incredible! They got caught again. They got caught in the Gloucester. They got caught on the Wenger thing. And they're going to get caught on the Spetifore one. They tried to set that up too. Incredible! They've been going on for years and years, and I know, Mr. Speaker, when you read the clippings in the Provincial Library here.... Which prominent Social Credit people have been involved in that case? Robert Bonner, Leslie Peterson, Peter Hyndman and Walter Davidson have all been involved. It's the who's who of the Social Credit party. He is a central Social Credit person. Okay, fine.

The Agricultural Land Commission was there to protect farmland. They tried to pull a fast one there. They set it up. Mr. Spetifore hired expensive consultants — the same people who did the Gloucester property. They made glossy reports with acetate overlays — nice, fancy little maps and all kinds of stuff — and spent a bundle on it. They managed to stickhandle it through quickly at a public hearing just a few days after the notice came out of the Delta council. Very few people knew about it. They stick-handled it through Social Credit members on the Delta council, and had it referred over to ELUC, had a quick secret meeting over at the Laurel Point Inn with the MLA for Delta (Mr. Davidson), where they checked their scripts. Mr. Boyd Ferris gave them two minutes each — "you speak for two minutes, you speak for two minutes, this is what the line is, you shut up." They met at a quick 22-minute ELUC meeting, which the Minister of Environment (Hon. Mr. Rogers), who chaired the meeting, called a technical hearing. It wasn't a technical hearing; it was just a set-up — just a quick "You've got it, George" — $50 million, maybe $100 million. Incredible! No concern about the farmland. And all of a sudden Walter Davidson, who to my understanding was a former policeman, is now a soil scientist. He's an agrologist, an agronomist — he knows what farmland is.

The so-called park was tidal marshland — a couple of early Crown grants. But Mr. Spetifore filled in that tidal marsh himself. He built a dike across the end, filled it in, dumped stuff.... You read the early clippings in the 1970s and in the early 1960s, and the residents were complaining of the stench created by organic material and salt water all mixed in together creating that rotten-egg smell. You know, you smelled it in elementary school when they had that apple blossom and took the lid off — that kind of smell, same chemical, hydrosulphuric acid. They filled in that land.

Do you know that to develop that land for houses would involve dumping 50 tonnes of lime per acre per year to sweeten it so that the acid wouldn't eat your house, or that they'd have to put preformed concrete pillars into the ground, specially treated so it wouldn't eat the foundations? It was virtually undevelopable land. He filled it in. And we don't know the legality of all that. We saw early 1959 letters from the lands branch giving him permission to build the dike across Crown land, but the Crown could retrieve that land anytime and he would be responsible for any desecration, destruction or inconvenience to the public. That is the carrot to get his 523 acres out of the land reserve. How could you go for that? Because you don't give a damn about farmland, that's why. You don't care. You'd rather pay off your big, fat buddies. It's sickening.

Interjection.

MR. HANSON: Yes, you go ahead. You get on your feet when you get a chance.

There are things that I wanted to see desperately in this budget for my own constituency. There are great needs here in the health-care area and in looking after the seniors, who are a major component of the population here. I'm not going to go into them now. I'm going to talk about these things later in estimates.

The general picture that the public has of this government is that you are a bunch of political payoff artists for your buddies. It's a pyramid-sales government: those down at the bottom are the losers; the people up at the top have their beaks in the trough. Edgar Kaiser got the Denver Broncos off the backs of the public of British Columbia. He paid $40 million for them; he got $40 million out of the BCRIC-Kaiser coal deal. It's really sickening. The Sepp Wenger Windermere gravel-pit episode, the George Spetifore thing and now this Eldon Unger carry-on out in Chilliwack — it's really disgusting.

I would think that any fair-minded person in British Columbia, looking at the record of this government, is not going to be snowed by this nonsense in this glossy booklet on your budget. They know what they're having to pay and they see the kinds of rewards that people close to you are reaping. That did not occur between 1972 and 1975. There was a redistribution of wealth at that time and you didn't like it. You didn't like the people getting a fair share.

Mr. Hanson moved adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Gardom moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 12:18 p.m.