[ Page 6013 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Ministerial Statement

B.C. Hydro directorships. Hon. Mr. McClelland –– 6013

Mr. D'Arcy –– 6013

Committee of Supply: Ministry of Environment estimates. (Hon. Mr. Rogers)

On vote 76: minister's office –– 6014

Mrs. Wallace

Mr. Lockstead

Mr. Lorimer

Mr. Davis

Mr. Skelly

The House met at 10 a.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement.

MR. SPEAKER: Please proceed.

B.C. HYDRO DIRECTORSHIPS

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: In the past several years in British Columbia many suggestions have been made by the public, in this Legislature and other places, that the people of this province should have more influence on the policy decisions of the British Columbia Hydro and Power Authority. In order to respond to these public demands for more input, the government recently brought Hydro under the full regulation of the British Columbia Utilities Commission. As a second step, which is designed to further that aim and to bring representation of regional interests into the boardroom of B.C.'s largest supplier of energy resources, we have increased the size of Hydro's board of directors from 5 to 15 members. In all, 11 new members have been appointed to the board, and these appointments will add a diversity of interest to the board's deliberations.

For the first time, Norm Olson, Hydro's president and chief executive officer, will be joining the board of directors. The other ten appointments will mean that the board will now have representation from each of the province's main regions. Effective immediately, these are the new appointments.

Charlie Lasser of Chetwynd is now a member of the Assessment Appeal Board and a former mayor of Chetwynd. During his term he served as a member of the Municipal Finance Authority of B.C., and spent two years as vice chairman of the Peace River-Laird Regional District. For two years he also served as vice-chairman of the Northern Lights College board.

Jack Delair of Hope is a farmer and agriculturalist with a 65-acre mixed-farming operation. A conservationist, Mr. Delair single-handedly and on his own time has built a steelhead-rearing pond on the Coquihalla River. Before his retirement, he spent 20 years as a fish and game officer in the eastern Fraser Valley and Fraser Canyon.

Charles Osterloh of Invermere has been a prominent member of that village's business community for 35 years. He has served on the school and hospital boards, and has recently been appointed to Invermere's economic development commission.

Harold Moffat of Prince George, the city's mayor from 1969 to 1978, is an independent businessman. Before becoming mayor he was a school trustee for 25 years.

Guy Rose of Quilchena is a cattle rancher and farm equipment dealer. Mr. Rose has served on the local school board and the board of trade; his ranch has served as a model for combining grazing and reforestation. He is president of the Nicola Stock Breeders' Association, and a director of the B.C. Cattlemen's Association.

Jack Waldie of Victoria is a former B.C. sales manager for General Motors. He is chairman of the board of St. Michaels University School, and a member of the Capital Regional District Safety Committee.

Four members will join the board from Vancouver: Hugh Horne, Archie McGougan, Martin Wedepohl and Sandra Sutherland. Mr. Horne is at present a real estate investment consultant and past-president of the Institute of Internal Auditors, Vancouver chapter, and the director of the city's United Way volunteer bureau in 1976 and 1977. Miss Sutherland is now president of the Vancouver City Savings Credit Union, and a partner in the Vancouver law firm of Freeman & Co., where she specializes in corporate and commercial law. She is a former director of ICBC, and a former public governor of the Vancouver Stock Exchange.

Dr. Wedepohl is dean of applied sciences at UBC. He has extensive experience in power systems and electrical engineering. Before coming to British Columbia, Dean Wedepohl served as dean of engineering at the University of Manitoba and was a member of the Manitoba hydroelectric corporation's board of directors.

Mr. McGougan retired as MacMillan Bloedel's vice president in 1971, but has remained as a forest industry consultant, at least until 1979. He has been a director of the Central City Mission Society in Vancouver since 1969.

Chairman Robert Bonner, Dr. Pat McGeer, Charles Brazier and I will continue in our positions on Hydro's board.

Mr. Speaker, this is a critical time for British Columbia's power and energy future. Hydro is becoming increasingly important because of this — too big and too important not to have the kind of wide public representation at the management level that these appointments provide.

MR. D'ARCY: Mr. Speaker, I would like, from this side of the House, to welcome the announcement of the broadening of Hydro's board of directors, particularly in view of its regional representation. I would make the comment that, in view of the growing role Hydro has relative to the rest of the provincial economy, and particularly in view of its larger financial operations and some of the environmental concerns that many people have expressed, this broader board of directors will hopefully address itself to some of those issues in a most meaningful way.

I would also comment that it is significant that there is some representation from people who at least have had some background in some of the major economic and industrial areas that are affected by Hydro's operations. From the initial list of people — although they are very well qualified — I could say that I would like to see a perhaps heavier representation from those areas of the economy that are particularly affected by B.C. Hydro's electrical generation operations. As well, I would think it might have been appropriate to have a consumer representative. However, it is certainly a step in the right direction.

HON. MR. WOLFE: Mr. Speaker, seated in the gallery this morning is Mr. Jim Pattison, chairman of the board of Transpo '86 Corporation, and I would ask the House to make him welcome.

MR. LORIMER: Mr. Speaker, I have two visitors from Burnaby in the gallery today, and I'd like the House to welcome Sam Nimeck and Lily Czop.

Orders of the Day

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

[ Page 6014 ]

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT
(continued)

On vote 76: minister's office, $218,076.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Mr. Chairman, yesterday at the adjournment hour the member for Cowichan–Malahat (Mrs. Wallace) had been asking some questions about a conference, which grew out of the Canadian Council of Resource and Environment Ministers meeting, which was held at the suggestion of British Columbia, hosted by British Columbia and held in Victoria. Out of that particular conference has come a coastal and estuary management program.

I wonder if I could get the member's attention. The member indicated yesterday that after we had gone through this conference procedure nothing had happened about it. I would refer the member to vote 78, which is not the vote we're discussing now. If you look under vote 78 and the coastal and estuary management program, you'll find that it exists in the ministry, headed up by a Dr. Boydell. I'll just read through some of the objectives as they're outlined in our program: "To develop and deliver a province-wide program of professional and technical environmental advisory services so the decision-makers and the general public may be provided with factual information and educational material regarding coastal and estuarian habitat and resources." We go on to list nine other objectives of that particular group.

Yesterday's suggestion was that this conference had taken place and nothing had particularly been resolved about it. I would recommend that the member, if she's concerned — and I'm sure she is — have a look at that particular vote, and also the program that's outlined under it.

As I said, instead of the first, this program was started at the suggestion of the ministry then headed by the now Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Nielsen), who was also the keynote speaker at that time. This particular program has grown out of that. There is a substantial increase in that particular vote about 30 percent over last year.

MRS. WALLACE: I thank the minister for his response. Sure, the vote is there and the money is supposed to be allocated. He's probably spending it on more studies; I don't know. He is continuing to piece-meal off, with the Cowichan task force, studies on Hatch Point and the Fraser River — all separate — without getting into this overall policy of coming up with some decisions as to what we should be doing and where with the least possible environmental impact. It means that each area is getting a little bit of industry and a little bit of environmental protection and a little bit of this and a little bit of that and no real overall plan as to where we should be going and what we should be doing and where the least environmental impact can come. We have to have a place to boom our logs, a place for ferry landings, a place for all those things, but until we get down and really look overall at where we can do those things with the least environmental damage, the pressure is going to be on to do them in river estuaries, as in the case of the Cowichan, because they are more sheltered and more protected. What we need is an overall plan with some teeth in it that says: "Thou shalt not do this here, and thou shalt do this somewhere else." That's an overall shoreline management policy. All the dollars in the estimates book aren't going to make that come about, unless your ministry comes out with some very positive direction with teeth in it that ensures that that happens.

I checked through Votes and Proceedings and Orders of the Day and discovered that you're quite right, you did answer my question. I apologize for not having picked that up. The answer is that this task force report cost us a fairly hefty sum — $204,750. Last night I read the 12 recommendations that came out of that report, 11 of which were for further studies. The one that recommended that something be done was simply a recommendation to enforce a condition of Doman's contract back in the 1975 agreement and the 1975 task force report. To me, it's a horrendous waste of money to spend over $200,000 and to come up with no recommendations except for 11 more studies and a recommendation to enforce something that was already there. It proves to me beyond a doubt that all we needed to do was simply go ahead and enforce the 1975 agreement. It was all there in that one. We didn't need all this. The costs are going on. We have Mr. Lambertsen stationed up in Duncan trying to do something with this report. What's he going to do? Is he going to initiate 11 more task force studies on the basis of those 11 recommendations? I haven't seen anything happening about the 5.8 hectares. Is he going to be able to enforce that? More dollars are spent and still there's this kind of procrastination and nothing happening.

Examples of it are coming up all the time. We've got the order-in-council that's supposed to ensure that nothing happens in that estuary, and now if this ministry gets it, it's okay. Yet we have a complete conflict. It's a difficult situation, and I know that. There are so many departments involved. We've got a logging dump there which is supposed to be being phased out. The minister writes me a letter saying that there's a condition established that nothing will be dumped there except boomed logs and that it has to be kept open for a little while. They'll dump boomed logs only, and they'll dump them only at such a high tide that they can float away and not get stranded on the bottom. In the first place that's an impossibility unless you're in the middle of the winter with a 20-foot tide, because there's not enough water there to float boomed logs.

He tells me that on April 16, and then on May 14 that's not happening at all. They're dumping single logs and stacking them up there. All you need to do is drive by there, and that's just a hive of industry around there at that particular dump. The bay is full of logs. It's right on the Koksilah River estuary, which is part of the Cowichan estuary. What we're doing is destroying the environment by delay. If you want to make that an industrial site, why don't you be honest and come out and say: "Okay, it's impossible to do anything with this. We're just going to turn it over to industry"? If that's where you're at, Mr. Minister, then that's what you should do. But instead you're pretending that you're all in favour of protecting the environment, and you're doing reports and more reports and sitting by. Because of your agreement to let these things continue to happen, it's continuing to destroy that whole piece of very valuable estuarian land. It just goes on and on.

This ministry is also trying to push off onto the poor little district of North Cowichan the responsibility that they should be taking as far as coming down with an overall program. North Cowichan is in the position where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't, as far as their zoning goes. Whatever zoning they bring in, they're going to wind up in the courts for restrictive zoning from one side or the other. The minister is not fulfilling his responsibility by not taking some action there.

[ Page 6015 ]

I was going to deal with my concerns about chemicals, particularly PCP. My colleague the member for Alberni (Mr. Skelly) has dealt with that at some length. I just want to go on record as saying that I am still extremely concerned about what's happening with the use of PCP in the logging industry. As long as they don't have an alternative they're going to continue to use that PCP. We've got problems with workers' health. As we put more and more treated lumber around our estuaries and as long as we're using those areas for haul-outs, we're getting more and more concentration of PCP in those areas. It's becoming more and more evident that that's another way in which we're destroying our environment.

I have a couple of other quite unrelated items that I want to raise with the minister. I'll do it while I'm on my feet. One has to do with conservation officers under the fish and wildlife branch. There has been quite a cutback in that particular area. The conservation officer simply can't do his job. I have a letter here from Lake Cowichan Fish and Game Club. I'll just read a little bit of it into the record. It says:

"The conservation officer is at best faced with an insurmountable task in attempting proper enforcement. The area is far too large for one man to look after. However, under normal funding, Mr. Broadland and the officers before him have done an admirable job. Our concern is the cutback in funding for the fish and wildlife branch, which severely restricts the functions of the conservation officer to the point where we wonder if it is worthwhile."

So I would strongly urge the minister to make some funding available to ensure that those conservation officers don't have quite such a large area to cover and have the support they need to do the job they're expected to do.

My final concern relates to the water rights branch and the drainage problems. The minister mentioned that the emergency program had had a lot of demands on it this year. I don't think he mentioned the Cowichan Valley, but there have certainly been some heavy demands on that program in the Cowichan Valley. Whether or not they have met those demands is another question. It seems that there is always the problem of saying, well, this is a local responsibility. We've had a particularly bad time around the Cowichan River in the city of Duncan. Those people bought lots there in good faith. I'm pleased to know that you're going to take some action to ensure that people buying houses in the future are advised that they are on the floodplain. I hope that happens. I don't have too much faith in that happening in view of some of the other experiences I've had with constituents relative to housing and the purchase of housing.

In the meantime, you have people who have purchased homesites in good faith, and they are on the floodplain. They are going to be flooded. Moving those people out is the only way we're not going to get flooding. When you come out and tell those people that it's a one-shot deal as far as covering any costs for damages relative to flooding.... Well, the minister shakes his head. I hope he has changed his mind, but that certainly was the impression I and a lot of people around this province got when these floods were happening. If you were on the floodplain and you got damage one time, that was it, the government wasn't going to get involved again. I don't know what you were supposed to do — move out, sell your house to some unsuspecting person, or whatever. I would urge the minister not to take that stand, because those people are there, they bought in good faith, and they're going to have continuing problems. If you simply say, "I'm not going to assist them," then it's out, over, done and finished, and those people are not going to be able to cope with the damages they receive.

I'm also a bit concerned about the narrowness of the interpretation of the damage that's done. For example, landscaping. People buy expensive shrubs, bulbs and so on and put them in around their homes, and then find them washed out, find they're not covered under the emergency program. Only buildings, structures and so on are covered. I would urge the minister to consider reviewing that particular policy too, because it's certainly all part of the living environment when a person spends a lot of money on those kinds of things.

HON. MR. ROGERS: I guess I'll go through them in reverse order. We have the most generous government grants for people who have been affected by flood of any jurisdiction in North America that I know of. We don't restrict it to one-time use only. The point I made then, and I would like to make again now, is that we often pay for the same house two or three times over, but it's very seldom the same owner. What happens is that people get flooded, they get the compensation payments, and as soon as the waters have receded and the grass is back to where it once was, up goes the for sale sign and someone else unsuspecting comes along. It's in that regard that I've asked my colleague, the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Hyndman), to see if he can't persuade the real estate boards to ensure that the people buying them know these houses are in the floodplain and that we have compensated for them.

If I can just touch on landscaping, during the floods of the winter before last we received one bill for over a quarter of a million dollars for landscaping for a home that was flooded out in West Vancouver. The difficulty is that if we start getting into that we can start getting into more and more. Where do you want to stop the things we compensate for? That's the problem. The policy has been that we compensate for a primary residence and normal fixtures in a primary residence. If we're to broaden the terms we're going to have to lessen the amount, unless the Legislature decides it's going to have an unlimited vote. Landscaping is one of the things — as are insurable things around the house — that are at risk for which we don't compensate. For example, in Washington state the government will give you a low-interest loan at half-prime — that's hardly even low interest; that would be 10 percent — to compensate you if you've been flooded out, and that's based on your home alone. So I think our program is very generous. If we keep it to the primary residence of the people involved, then we can ensure that with the money available we can help the specific ones that are involved.

Time and time again the argument comes up that conservation officers have no travel money — not enough funds to go around and not enough funds for their vehicles. I don't know where the story starts, because I see the travel budgets, and travel budgets have been increased. As I said yesterday, we have trained three-quarters of the conservation officers through the Justice Institute to make their job a lot easier. They have a higher degree of professional training, we have reuniformed them all this year with a uniform that they designed as a committee, and there has been an increase in their budget. I would like to see more conservation officers. We could use more, because their terms of reference have been broadened from the fish and game wardens that they used to be to being people concerned with all the activities of our ministry.

[ Page 6016 ]

Getting back to the Cowichan for a minute, the regional district of North Cowichan has passed some bylaws which cover the areas which were covered in the order-in-council. What they should have done, and what we recommended they do, if they want to put restrictions in this particular area, is approach us for amendments to the order-in-council. Otherwise, they're going to end up with challenges in the courts, which they have done.

I agree with you, the Cowichan Estuary Task Force report recommends more studies and more studies. There is only one real recommendation, as I read it, about reducing the amount of logs stored there and going to a dryland sort. There are two things that have subsequently come to our attention — we knew at the time, I guess. A lot of the logs in the Cowichan are there on an interim basis, and a lot of them are visitors. That is, they come in and get broken up in a boom, and they pick out the junk logs that they cut in that particular mill, then bundle up the peelers and the pulp logs and tow them back out again. The Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) and I are both concerned about this. We think that kind of log-sorting can go on elsewhere. While their economic activity has to take place at that particular mill, I don't think any log should go up the channel to that mill that isn't destined to go out of that mill as cut lumber, hog fuel or chips.

MRS. WALLACE: Then why don't you stop it?

HON. MR. ROGERS: That's one of the things Ken Lambertsen has been mandated to go and do. That's one of the reasons he is there right now. We have some quarrels with Doman Industries — no question about that. We're working on it to try to bring the acreage down to the desired acreage which they can live with and which we can live with, and also to stop this business of transient logs.

You asked about having an overall estuary plan for the province. Everybody wants industry, but nobody wants it where they are. Everybody wants a garbage dump, but nobody wants it where they are. The trouble is that I don't have dictatorial powers to draw an environmental map and say this, this and this is where this is going to happen. We have to work in concert with the landowners, the local elected politicians, the regional districts and other people. In some cases, as private landowner, we may have decided that private land is the ideal place for an oil tank farm. We all need an oil tank farm, although none of us wants to think about needing it. It may be that the private owner of the land doesn't want to use it for that. Maybe he just wants to keep it as barren rock or whatever it is. We don't have that kind of sweeping power.

With our coastal and estuary management program we want to have it so that people are aware of what they're doing. It wasn't ten years ago that it was the easiest place to build; people just went in and said, "We're going to go ahead and do it here," and they went ahead and did it. People didn't know what wire-grass did. They didn't know the support system of eel-grass. They didn't know that estuaries were critical. When you fly over or walk around the Cowichan, you realize that, with today's knowledge, no one would ever be going in there; but the damage has already been done to a certain extent, and we're trying to minimize it.

One of the problems is that the small loggers in the Cowichan valley.... Many of them are good constituents of yours and they'd be screaming at your door if they didn't have a place to get their logs into the water. One of Ken Lambertsen's first jobs is to find an alternative source for the independent operators to be able to get their wood to water, because they don't get it cut in the area. It always amazes me that logs from one area of the province seem to go by four or five mills before they finally get to the mill where they're cut. I can't fathom that any more than you can, I'm sure. But we have to find a way for these small log operators to get their product into the water. That's the first thing we'd like to do. When we do that, then we can start to eliminate others. But you can't just close the door to the existing traffic and the existing business out of ignorance or just because we'd like to do it. That's where we'd like to go next.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: Mr. Chairman, in this particular debate on these estimates I suppose every member could go on for hours and hours. I'm going to attempt not to repeat many of the items that have already been raised, and to confine most of my remarks to a couple of matters relating to my riding.

I'll start off with a very local matter: last year's flooding in the Bella Coola Valley and the Squamish Valley. It was quite an unusual situation where we had very warm weather, heavy rains and a quick thaw. Consequently, a number of homes in these particular areas were flooded out, some of them severely, bridges washed out, etc. People suffered dislocation to a large extent.

I appreciate that the minister went there after the flooding had taken place and personally viewed these areas. There were a lot of problems in resolving financial settlements for people who had been affected by the flooding. Some people were not happy with their settlements; some were very happy, as it turned out. Hopefully the ministry will be better prepared if this type of situation happens again.

As far as I'm aware, that study has not been forwarded to the regional district, the flood control committee in the valley or to myself. Although it's been requested on a number of occasions, I was always told it wasn't ready. We were told at one point that that study would be completed at least two months ago. Perhaps the minister could tell us what is happening there in terms of that study and when it will be ready, because the people up there — particularly the regional district — are very anxious to get the results of that study.

While we're in the Bella Coola valley, I would ask the minister as well what flood protection measures will be taken this year to prevent further flooding in the area, and how much money will be spent this year. I might add that the board of the regional district asked me to ask the minister that question, and perhaps we can get an answer.

I have one final question in terms of the Bella Coola valley. The regional board would like to know as well if the minister or the ministry has granted approval to B.C. Hydro for the construction of the Hydro dam at Thorsen Creek. You may not have that information on hand, but the regional board would certainly appreciate knowing if approval has been forwarded from the ministry to Hydro on that topic.

In terms of flooding in the Squamish area, I personally viewed that area as well. The problem there was not so much compensation, which was finally granted to most people but not to all. As it turns out, some were ineligible. The main problem there was access to these various subdivisions. I know the minister is aware of the conflict that was taking place among the regional district, the municipality and the provincial government. It was a real mess. Perhaps the minister could explain when he's replying to these questions. There seem to be long delays. People couldn't get back into

[ Page 6017 ]

their homes long after the waters had receded because of access problems in some localities. They were forced to walk along railroad tracks and over bridges while trains were utilizing the same railroad tracks. It was a pretty horrendous situation for a while.

Mainly what I'm on about today is in regard to a relatively new and growing industry in this province, particularly in areas of my riding and on parts of Vancouver Island. That is dealing with the fish farming and aquaculture industry of the coast, which is really just getting underway in this part of the coast as compared to what is happening in other countries, particularly Japan. I've had the opportunity to meet with these people on a number of occasions over the past several months. They asked me to express some of their concerns to the minister. I have written to the ministry and the minister and received replies of one sort or another to some of these concerns.

Before I get into that, I have one other item in regard to the ministry's announcement of commercial kelp harvesting and processing licences that have been issued. I was asked by the Bella Bella Indian band council — a large Indian band of about 1,100 or 1,200 people within my riding — to express their concern to the minister over the issuing of these licences to certain groups. I have a press release here. I won’t really get into it. Their concern was that while these groups are being issued licences, they have applications before the ministry as well. They feel that due to the high unemployment rate within their area this would be one industry that they could be directly involved in. Certain parts of the coast should be reserved for seaweed and kelp-harvesting purposes for native Indian people to provide employment opportunities for these people. Hopefully the minister will take that proposal under advisement. I have to agree with the band council in this particular instance. We have, on occasion, up to 80 or 81 percent unemployment in the Bella Bella area.

Aquaculture itself is an industry that is continuing to grow by leaps and bounds in my riding. I'm always surprised when I visit areas like Okeover, Desolation Sound, Pendrell Sound, St. Vincent Bay and Nelson Island — all areas that the minister is familiar with. It's a high-risk industry, but it must be one of the major industries of the future for the coast of British Columbia. As I said, I think that the minister has some knowledge and information on these matters. I get the publications from the ministry relating to oyster and geoduck growth and population and all of these things. There's a lot of work being done within the ministry.

That is sort of background work, and it is needed, but there are a couple of immediate items of more concern to these people, because people within the industry are considered neither fishermen nor farmers so they don't have access or availability to things such as gasoline price deductions, which are available to fishermen and to farmers. They don't know if they're fishermen or farmers. They don't come under any act. They have problems with obtaining leases for their various proposals for fish farms, oyster-rearing, mussels, or whatever they're going into. Almost any citizen in British Columbia can apply for a recreational lease and very often be successful in obtaining that 15-year lease. Yet here we have people attempting to make a living, in a small way, in a high-risk venture, being able to obtain, in many cases, only leases for one year — if they're successful at all — after a great hassle. Would you believe you have to go through 21 different processes in order to start a fish farm in British Columbia? It's amazing that bureaucratic red tape can take people up to two years just to get through it and be able to start at all in some instances. I have documented examples here which I won't go into.

Those are some of the concerns. Pollution is certainly a major concern. A horrendous example we had last summer in St. Vincent Bay just off the Jervis Inlet concerned an American warship with about 700 people aboard. It was in that area for several days, and there were 700 sailors doing their duty right in St. Vincent Bay, a prime oyster-, clam- and fish-farming area. The appropriate people came along, because of the high coliform count, and put a closure on that area. That's how high the pollution count was after that vessel had been there for a few days. They weren't hollering at me at this particular meeting. There must have been about 30 people at the meeting when this instance was brought to my attention. They said: "For goodness' sake, doesn't the government at least have enough regard for our industry to prevent this type of thing?" That vessel didn't have to cruise around that particular area. It could have gone somewhere else. We've got a whole ocean out there, but they had to come right into the bay where this major, budding industry is taking place.

I raise that as an example. There is also Desolation Sound, which is now automatically closed down every year because of the number of private craft, usually large ones, which congregate there every summer. That area is closed down because of the high coliform counts, and the oyster producers — who are people working hard, barely scratching out a living out of the thing at the present time — have a real problem.

It's my personal belief that areas like Okeover, for example, should be protected from this type of pollution. They really should be. We do have to have priorities. The point I'm making here, and the point that the people in this particular business are attempting to make to me and to our MP, Ray Skelly, who attended those meetings with me....

HON. MR. HEWITT: Who's that?

MR. LOCKSTEAD: Ray Skelly? He's a very fine MP.

In any event, the point that these people were attempting to make to us was that both the federal and provincial governments place such a low priority on this new, budding and extremely valuable industry in British Columbia. It's amazing that some of these growers have to go to the United States and other parts of the world for oyster seed, when we have probably the finest oyster and clam seed-rearing area right here in British Columbia. The minister is very familiar with the area, of course — Pendrell Sound and that area. Yet those areas are not being developed to their potential for a variety of reasons.

Most of what I have here actually was sent to the ministry, with copies to myself. But some individuals, at their own expense and their own time, have done really remarkable studies on the areas I've mentioned in terms of their potential.

One last item is another major problem that these people relate to me. The government is not involved in marketing studies for the products that are produced in the areas I outlined — and Im assuming the same thing is occurring on parts of Vancouver Island, where we have the same type of industry. They suggested that I attempt to get the Minister of Environment along with the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) directly involved in marketing surveys and attempting to develop off-shore markets for their products. With that, Mr. Chairman, I think I've pretty well outlined

[ Page 6018 ]

some of the concerns of these people. Perhaps the minister would reply.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Mr. Chairman, I thank the member for Mackenzie for his questions. First of all, dealing with the Bella Coola valley, if people aren't satisfied with the appraiser, they can go to another appraiser, and there is provision to go to a third. We actually have had very little of that happen. I suppose I get maybe one letter in a hundred or one letter in two hundred from people who aren't totally satisfied with the assessments given them by the appraiser. So I'm sure there are always going to be people who feel they didn't get enough. But, you know, if your house has been burned or even burgled or whatever, you never get completely compensated. It's like an automobile accident — they can never make it perfect again.

The Nusatsum River is a really difficult problem, because that's where people have built on the fan. Once you've had it explained to you, as I've had it explained to me about a year and a half ago by people in the ministry, you appreciate the dangers of building on a river fan. With one particular house which you and I both know and which is built essentially in the middle of an old channel, it's only going to be a matter of time before somewhere up the hill a boulder rolls one way or the other, and the water will be going through his living room again, as it did this year. We actually spent quite a bit of money this year to help Highways build a protective dyke around that particular gentleman's house. We have at least got him saved for now, but I don't think we can do it indefinitely. Nature is too powerful, and that House is going to get washed away, regardless of the amount of money that government puts in.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: There is no doubt in my mind.

HON. MR. ROGERS: I'm glad you agree with me, Mr. Member. However, as you know, the regional district and I have had talks. The study isn't completed, but it will be shortly. We are looking at approximately half a million dollars' worth of work to do that. Once that study is in, I would expect we'll have to make that commitment to do it this fall or next spring. I will be communicating that just as soon as it is done through the regional district, because I know they're anxious to do it. But as you appreciate, our staff have had a considerable backlog after last winter's floods.

The Squamish situation was a bit of a problem, you know. The military went in and took everybody out. Once they'd got them out, people said: "Now that the wife and children are out, we need little generators to go back in and run our deep-freezes. And who's going to feed the cattle and do the rest of it?" The military said: "Oh, no, our policy is that it's a one-way operation." So they would take them out, but they wouldn't take them back in. Well, eventually we made arrangements to do that. But part of the problem is that one whole area in the Squamish valley was serviced by a logging company bridge — it was a private company's bridge, not a Ministry of Highways bridge — which washed out, and they wouldn't allow a bridge of that quality to be replaced. If you're going to do the job, you've got to do it properly. It was a temporary bridge that the locals had lived with for years, and when it was finally washed out — which was very predictable; the Highways engineers knew it was going to go — they had to go the expensive route by doing it properly. I was up there at the time there were problems. People did have difficulty getting in and out to their homesites.

We bring in officers from around the province to train them as best we can to prepare for an emergency, but the emergency prepared for is never the emergency that actually happens, and, of course, time moves very quickly. In one case in Squamish, probably the most effective thing we had was a fellow who is a heavy equipment operator, who went over to his employer's office, kicked the door in, took the keys to a grader and went out and started working on his own. All he really had to do was replace the diesel and pay for the lock. His employer was delighted. He just couldn't find a way of getting into the office at that time in the morning. All sorts of things like that happen during emergencies. That whole Squamish area had some people move fairly quickly.

Fish-farming and aquaculture. We don't have control over navigable waters. If we did, if we could just draw a line saying from now on nothing is going to go on in here except fish-farming, or aquaculture operations or mariculture operations, then I can hear the howls of protest from every other user of the waterway. One of the problems that mariculturalists have is that they are dealing with competing uses. When we viewed the same situation in Japan, we found, of course, there wasn't a problem, because mariculture had been there for so long. Leases had gone from father to son for 15 or 20 generations, and they don't have a pleasure-boat industry or the pleasure-boat phenomenon in Japan. If I recall correctly, in Powell River every home has at least one boat in the driveway and probably one down at the slip as well. You're talking about what are probably the most beautiful cruising waters — in Desolation Sound, Prideaux Haven and Okeover Inlet. The trouble is that people and oysters don't get along all that well, although most of the oyster harvesting takes place in the fall and winter, when recreational use has pretty well disappeared.

I'm surprised that you say people have difficulty getting seed. We run a research station in Pendrell Sound. There was an excellent spatfall this year. Certainly Pacific Oysters are exporting oyster seed from B.C. Last year they were exporting to France. They were exporting very substantial quantities by the plane load. As I said yesterday — I don't know whether you were in the House at the time — we're hoping to have a small provincial oyster demonstration farm, where we will collect some wild seed from either Hawkins Channel or Pendrell Sound and turn that seed loose on public beaches for public harvest, because there hasn't been a substantial restocking of oysters.

If you're talking about a marketing study, at the present time we don't generate enough gallonage of'oysters to handle the British Columbia market. I don't want to get into a great marketing study for a product which we can't supply enough of. Recently I spoke to the oyster growers' convention in Nanaimo. Part of the problem is that as their volume increases, the market increases. If we build expectations on the Prairies and other areas where we could do it, and we don't have the supply for it, then we're really wasting our time in advertising. As far as I know, no oyster producer has had difficulty getting rid of his or her crop, especially through the Oyster Marketing Board. We do see some capital expenditures in new oyster harvesting areas.

We are negotiating with Lands, Parks and Housing to have that foreshore lease turned over to us in those areas which have mariculture possibilities, foreshore lease turned over to us. Any new applications for foreshore leases go through the Ministry of Environment. On recreational lease applications for foreshore, we would say that we prefer it be used for commercial mariculture.

[ Page 6019 ]

One of the problems with mariculture is that it is a very attractive industry to be involved in. It's really very nice. Sure, it involves a lot of work in cold weather and the rest of it, but it's a very pleasant environment in which to work. People go into it with great expectations but often without enough capital. Through the marine resources branch we're trying to give a little more guidance into what sort of an acreage you need and the amount of money involved before you have an operation that will be sufficient to support one family.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

As for tax benefits and concessions by being under Agriculture, they would all rather be under the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture; for technical expertise they would rather be under the Ministry of Environment. That's just a fact of life.

We've gone a long way in fish farming in terms of putting out some pretty interesting pamphlets on what you have to go through to get involved in the fish-farming business. We have one or two potential problems. You don't want to have two people fish farming in the same area. If one person takes fresh water out of a stream, runs it through his fish hatchery and discharges it into the stream, disease transfer becomes very easy. We like people to be aware of that problem. It's a problem that the federal government is now going through with its hatcheries on Vancouver Island. One mistake can result in substantial devastation.

We have people who are successfully involved in the fish farming business, and there are more coming along all the time. We're offering them a lot of technical expertise in getting going — at least I think it's technical expertise. I think the greatest future hope is in the area of blue mussel culture, which Redonda Sea farms are doing, and in the half-shelf oyster, which they are developing also. I think there is a possibility of having a scallop seed operation here, where we could have a scallop-on-string operation. They're not affected by fecal coliform to anything like the extent the others are.

Kelp harvesting. The Bella Coola Indian band did not apply for kelp harvesting permits, although they were advised about it. The permits are very restricted; they are only for areas where there is no traditional kelp harvesting by native Indians. We have asked them to indicate which areas they traditionally use. In our experiments, we found that limited harvesting done in the correct way actually enhances the amount of kelp available. The kelp currently harvested in that area of the coast is known as nori. That's the common word for it. We now have several people who are looking at the harvesting of both nereocystis and macrocystis, as well as a kombu harvest off the coast of Vancouver Island.

The alginate industry worldwide is a single-company monopoly. It's one that several people have tried to penetrate. We've often had people come to us with grandiose ideas about enormous kelp-harvesting programs. We're extremely restrictive in our licences. We're very conservative in what we'll allow people to take. We ensure that it's not in an area where there's a traditional food harvesting. The one criticism I've gotten from people is that we're far too conservative on our harvesting. We did do some experimentation in the last year to find out where the reproductive systems are of the various types of kelp, especially in the major species. We now know what restrictions to harvesting do.

As far as Thorsen Creek is concerned, Bella Coola, as you know has an ageing diesel generator. With the postage stamp rate for hydro it doesn't cost the consumers anything, but it really is a very poor use of energy and efficiency. That particular valley has potential. Admittedly it's going to be a really small operation relative to the other things they do, but I think the people there would prefer to have it as a hydro generation rather than an unreliable or quasi-reliable diesel generation. They haven't applied for a licence so far, but our people are aware of it. I'll make sure you're advised just as soon as that application does come forward. At the present time it looks as if Thorsen Creek is the preferred route to go, or the one that offers the most potential.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: I thank the minister for his answers.

As far as I'm aware, since Thorsen is not a fish-spawning river in any event, there is no criticism of a dam going in there. In fact, this is why the board asked about approval of the licence. They want the job to proceed as soon as possible.

Regarding the minister's answer with regard to river protection this year, if the minister did reply, I missed it. I wonder if the minister knows offhand what river protection work is going to take place in the Bella Coola valley this year, and how much.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Preliminary indications say that the amount will be about half a million dollars, but I'm going to wait until that study is finished so we know what amount we're looking for and then allocate it within the budget that's allowed. We haven't gotten to that stage yet. It's obviously one of our key areas. It's one of the areas with which we had the most difficulty last year. I would anticipate that we will be able to do it, but I can't advise you of that until such time as we finish the study and know what we're looking at.

MR. LORIMER: Firstly, I would like to express some sympathy to the minister. It's not the most enviable position to be in — Minister of Environment in any Social Credit government. To that extent, I want to pass on my feelings that he needs some assistance. I hope he keeps working on his stated goals, even though his success rate may be somewhat limited through actions by his colleagues.

I thought my colleague, the member for Alberni (Mr. Skelly), gave a very thoughtful talk yesterday on the environment, ecology and so on, discussing the delicate balances. I'm sure the minister understood what he was saying. I'm sure he also had sympathy for the concerns expressed by my colleague. But what concerns me is whether or not those concerns and interests in that type of subject carried through to the minister's colleagues in the cabinet. There's an obvious conflict between the different ministers when it comes to the environment. When there's a conflict between the Minister of Forests, or B.C. Hydro, or the Minister of Transportation and Highways, or the mining industry and the Minister of Environment, the environment always loses. If everything is equal, the environment may have some success. But if it's an argument in which they will have to sacrifice one for the other, we know which one is sacrificed. It is always the environment.

The ministry is really an agency to give out permits for pollution. Generally speaking, the need for a pollution permit is not decided by the Minister of Environment. Those decisions are made in other ministries and he is requested to give a permit. My colleague the member for Alberni ex-

[ Page 6020 ]

pressed the opinion that the Ministry of Environment is really a junior ministry, and it should be a senior ministry. I want to concur in those remarks. As I said at the beginning, I believe the minister may well want to be a senior minister, but I don't think he will be allowed to assume that role under a Social Credit government. I think it's easier to give in than to fight, and we hope that in the days to come the minister will show some fight and look at the environment in the best way possible.

I'd like to briefly mention the Riley Creek affair in the Charlottes as an example where no action was taken by the Ministry of Environment. The only protection we have in this province comes periodically from the federal Department of Fisheries. The Minister of Environment should be very active in making sure that the creeks, streams and general habitat for fish and other life are protected. When the aluminum Co. of Canada reduced the flow of water in the Nechako last summer, who came to the rescue of the fish? It wasn't the Minister of Environment, it was the federal Department of Fisheries. Who takes action about the chemical and other spills into the rivers and creeks in this province? Generally speaking, action is taken through the federal Department of Fisheries. I will say that the Environment ministry has taken some action in recent months in the odd case. But generally speaking, the protection of our fish especially is being conducted through the federal department and not through the British Columbia government.

There's concern about watersheds being logged and about roads being built for the Ministry of Highways, for B.C. Hydro, for mining roads and so on. Unfortunately most of these roads are going through the valley bottoms in the province where the streams are also located. There's a great danger of dumping of debris and the destruction of streams throughout our province.

It's my opinion that all of these different areas can live side by side compatibly and that the forest industry can carry on a good existence with just a little consideration for the environment, like the other agencies. When development occurs, surely we should be looking to see where that development should be in order to reduce the impact on the environment. I don't think we're doing that. In some cases we do have the studies, and that's good; but in a number of cases where development takes place, studies do not take place.

There was a request for a public hearing regarding the effect that the log-booming in Buckley Bay might have. It wasn't the Minister of Environment who answered this request; it was the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. McClelland). He stated that there would be no public hearings. It would seem to me that in a case of this sort the Minister of Environment should have been taking a leading role and should have decided that public hearings should be held to make sure that the environment was properly protected.

A group of environmentalists in the Nanaimo area has filed a report suggesting that log-booming near the mouth of the Nanaimo River could be moved a short distance and could guarantee an increased supply of fish going to the spawning grounds of the river, which used to be one of the major fish-spawning areas on the coast.

We see Riley Creeks occurring throughout the province. In my opinion the minister has to take active remedial action to make sure that these small things are corrected. They may be small in themselves, but an accumulation has quite an effect not only on the environment but on the fish production throughout the province.

The Fraser has been a polluted river for years and years, but it's not getting any better. It's getting worse. Most of our salmon-spawning areas are on the Fraser River or its tributaries. I'd like to know how the minister would like to swim upstream or downstream in the Fraser with his mouth open. Maybe his colleague the member for Dewdney (Mr. Mussallem) would be prepared to do this. The river is not improving in its quality. The fish that are able to get through the debris and the pollution of this river are limited in number. Correspondingly the stocks of salmon are reducing.

The production of salmon has probably been cut in half in the last 40 or 50 years. Part of the reason may not be actions of this province; I can see that the treaties and regulations made by the federal Fisheries department have quite an effect on the depletion of fish stocks in British Columbia. But part of the problem is provincial, and that's the part I'm dealing with: the need to clean up and make sure that our streams are left free for the natural spawning of fish.

The fishery resource in this province used to be probably second to the lumbering industry. Now it's well down the list. It is probably the most important resource we have. It supplies food. It should be a renewable resource, but it won't be without care for the areas in which fish multiply.

There is also the question of inlets and bays and the problems that occur where logging or development operations cause sawdust debris to go into the channels and bays of the coastal regions. It seems to me that there needs to be more policing of what goes on through the industrial sector of our economy and what care is being taken, so that not only the logging industries but also the shellfish industries can survive and the environment will not suffer as a consequence of logging practices.

I would like to suggest to the minister that he go slowly on fish-farming. I think the experiences in the state of Oregon, where it has been in operation quite extensively for some ten years, have indicated that the proponents of those proposals ten years ago now want to see the experiment end. I think mixing wild stock with farm stock can develop into a general loss in fish production in the long term. I would suggest that before the minister does anything very drastic with reference to these new suggestions he give that area a very close study.

I would like the minister to tell us what steps he can take or intends to take with reference to the general policing of the environment. He is the only person in government we can look to to ensure the health of the environment. Up until now I believe that a less than adequate job has been done. I'm sure the minister has plans and is prepared to tell us how he intends to proceed, to assure us and the people of this province that the environment is in good hands.

HON. MR. ROGERS: The member for Burnaby–Willingdon made a case that people applying for a pollution control permit somehow dealt with other ministries of the government and managed to get their permit pushed by without anything but a cursory glance from the Ministry of Environment. Maybe it would help if I explained to the committee exactly what the procedure is for getting a pollution control permit.

Anyone wishing to get a permit has to apply under the Pollution Control Act. The route is very specific. It's not a political decision made by the minister; it's a decision made by the director of the pollution control branch. That decision

[ Page 6021 ]

takes into account input from technical people in other ministries. The decision of the director of the pollution control branch can be appealed to the Pollution Control Board. If you have an example of that system being circumvented, where you think great pressure or even small pressure has been brought on the branch or the board itself to change that, I'd like to know about it. I'm not aware of one.

You mentioned the Nechako and the Skins Lake spillway situation of last summer regarding Alcan. The federal government has responsibility for anadromous salmonids, and we have responsibility for inland fisheries. The comptroller of water rights has always dealt with Alcan since that original Kemano project was finished, in terms of the discharge of water from the Skins Lake spillway into the Nechako River system. When we had a particularly heavy snowpack in any one particular year where there was going to be flooding, it was on the instructions of the comptroller of water rights that Alcan released water early from the Skins Lake spillway to avoid flooding that would normally take place if that snow had run off during the normal runoff time.

It's clearly an area where we would be usurping federal responsibility by telling them what to do. They don't interfere in the area over which they've given us jurisdiction and I don't think it would be wise for us to start interfering in their jurisdiction. I think it would be even more confusing if a company was to say: "Well, we get instructions from both ministries, and since they're both giving us conflicting instructions, we'll just go ahead and do nothing in the meantime."

As it happened, it was the first time that the water temperature in the Nechako River had reached a point where the federal Fisheries officers deemed it imperative that water be spilled from that reservoir. When they were asked to do it, they did so. I don't think we can complain about how that particular system works. We've talked about spills of toxic chemicals or chemicals of any kind in this province, but we have an agreement with the federal government through the federal Ministry of the Environment that they become the lead agency on any water spills and we become the lead agency in land spills. If you look through the history of these particular spills, I think you'll find that in all cases we cooperate quite well together. But we have expertise in certain areas, and they have expertise in other areas. I don't think there is a necessity to duplicate that.

The Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot) was the minister who made the determination on what happens in Buckley Bay. But he's also the minister responsible for that particular area. I can't make determinations on what my colleagues do with areas under their jurisdiction, for the very same reason that no other minister here is going to interfere with other people's ministries. It's not an area of my jurisdiction. It's as simple as that.

MR. HANSON: Environment covers everything.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Well, if environment covers everything, then just elect me the dictator, go home and leave me in charge of the whole operation. If that's your attitude, I can't believe it.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please.

HON. MR. ROGERS: You talked about the Fraser. I regret you weren't here yesterday because we went through a whole process of things in terms of enforcement. We talked about the Fraser River Task Force, the conservation officers, the Environment Management Act, and what we're doing on the Fraser. You say the Fraser is continuing to deteriorate. That's not substantiated by the studies. There are some increases in trace metals, and the major efforts made by my ministry have been to eliminate the trace metals going into that through our task force on the Fraser. Last year they laid some 75 charges against people who were discharging, and those are proceeding through the courts at this time.

I am always reminded by the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) that fish don't drink water, they merely take oxygen from it and proceed on. We haven't reached anything like a point where the deterioration is so bad that the fish can't survive. In fact, we see an increase in some of the factors in the river. I don't know where you get your statistics on the salmon in the thirties. Maybe the salmon from the 1890s have dropped in half, but certainly not from the thirties — not based on the information I have.

I think you're confused in terms of Oregon. There is a substantial difference between fish farming and hatchery operations. Fish farming is a totally enclosed operation, from roe to frozen product going out in a truck, whereas a hatchery operation is a question of assisting nature by rearing fry and then releasing them into the river systems. So far we have not experienced the same difficulties that they have enunciated in their area.

MR. LORIMER: I want to thank the minister for answering the questions. I am quite familiar with the procedures with reference to obtaining the pollution control permits. What bothers me is the input from the other ministries. What I am saying is that the input from the ministries is much heavier than the input from the Minister of Environment. Those are the things that bother me. The fact that the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing was solely responsible for a decision which drastically affects the environment, because it is within his jurisdiction, is not acceptable to me. Why have a Minister of Environment who cannot have input into the problems that have arisen....?

AN. HON. MEMBER: You didn't even have one.

MR. LORIMER: That's right, but you haven't either; that's what we're getting at. You've got a Ministry of Environment which is apt to lead the public to believe that the environment is in safe hands. We have a Ministry of Environment and a Minister of Environment who says he cannot interfere with other ministers even though it's affecting the environment. That's the problem that the member for Omineca (ML Kempf) doesn't understand. I would like him to give us a talk today.

AN HON. MEMBER: No, no, no!

MR. LORIMER: No? Not on the Nechako?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please.

MR. LORIMER: He's chirping away in good form here today.

MR. HANSON: The $4,000 man.

[ Page 6022 ]

MR. LORIMER: Yes, he's called the $4,000 man.

MR; CHAIRMAN: Order, please. I ask the committee to remain orderly, and the member to speak to the vote.

MR. LORIMER: I always speak to the vote. Mr. Chairman. I'm just having a short conversation with the $4,000 man from Omineca.

MR. DAVIS: Mr. Chairman, I think it goes without saying that the Ministry of Environment is one of our most important ministries. It's particularly important at the provincial level because the provinces, under our constitution, are responsible for property and civil rights. They also administer our natural resources and are largely responsible for industrial location. They are therefore responsible for the impacts of municipalities and industries on land, water and air in their local surroundings in the province. In other words, local impacts are matters of local and regional concern, and it's up to our provincial governments, through the Ministries of Environment, to ensure that the quality of life in the province is protected.

As you know, municipal affairs are provincial, forestry is provincial, wildlife is provincial, the administration of our freshwater fisheries is provincial, and so is their protection from pollution of every kind. We've been aware of this for a long time in British Columbia, but concentrating these provincial responsibilities in a single ministry is a recent development. The Ministry of Environment in British Columbia only dates back to 1976. It's barely five years old as compared to ten years in Ontario and 11 years at the federal level.

The term "environment" covers a lot of ground. It means nature to many and pollution to some. It's all-embracing in the sense that it deals with the renewability of our lasting resources and the disposal of our human and industrial wastes. It's healthy, but it's vulnerable. It can be damaged, but it can also be enhanced.

Environmental protection — the main job of the provincial Ministry of Environment, as I see it — is a partnership. It's a partnership between man on the one hand and the protection of his natural surroundings on the other. It's a partnership between municipalities and the Ministry of Environment, and a partnership between industry and government in obtaining well-paid jobs on the one hand and ensuring a sufficient quality of life on the other. Like most partnerships it takes a lot of doing. We're dealing with living things, many forms of life, plant and animal, and this knowledge, largely biological, is in its infancy. Biology as a science is an imperfect one, and we're always trying to assess side effects, particularly from industry, so we have to tread carefully, especially where new chemicals and various waste products are concerned. We have to play it safe. Of course we have to set high standards for ourselves, and we have to monitor our actions with a view to making everything we do more compatible with nature's scheme of things. Reduced to its simplest terms, we therefore have a partnership — or should have a partnership — between the doers and the watchers, between the producers and those who would protect our environment, and between industry turning out useful goods and providing well-paid jobs and government trying to make sure that the fallout from industry and our municipalities doesn't have serious ramifications insofar as our natural surroundings are concerned.

People who do things want to do them right. Most producers want to produce in the most effective way possible. Industry, in fact, abhors waste, because wastefulness has serious repercussions, not only environmentally speaking but economically speaking as well. So it's up to us in government to lay down understandable rules for all to see in advance. Don't give the polluter an advantage over the non-polluter. Don't allow pollution havens to exist in some parts of the country and crack down hard on competing industries in other parts. Be tough. Make the actual polluter pay, but be consistent. Above all, give the potential polluter plenty of notice. Let them know where they stand well in advance of their doing something — spending money on exploration and development, preparing the ground, only to find that a tardy government, finally waking up due to the hue and cry from the general populace, cancels permits and upsets plans which may have been years, or in some cases decades, in the making.

This problem is by no means confined to British Columbia. As governments at all levels and in all provinces and states, we're not always oriented to long-term policy. Unfortunately, we're often wise after the event. We therefore appear to stumble from environmental crisis to environmental crisis. This is true particularly where we are still in the learning process and where the public often lets its emotions override the considered judgment of the experts who, if they were more articulate, could point the way to better practices and better ways of doing things.

I've said that government should be not only oriented to long-term policy but decisive. If it has any doubts about environmental degradation, it should say: "No. Go somewhere else or do something else." We in British Columbia are fortunate. We have alternatives; we have a choice. We have other ways of producing energy, mining minerals, harvesting forests, producing food and providing shelter. The cost of environmental protection isn't high when the need for pollution abatement is recognized at the outset. It's only 1, 2 or at most 3 percent of the selling value of the products of most industries. It's affordable, in other words. It's affordable from a narrow economic point of view, let alone from an overall environmental point of view.

Let me give you a few examples, Mr. Chairman. Let's take Gambier Island on Howe Sound near Vancouver. Gambier Island is one of the islands administered by the Islands Trust. It's special, in other words. It's unique, ecologically speaking. It's close to our main centre of population and industry. It's a recreational haven, very much in the public eye. There will never be a large open-pit mine on Gambier Island. You know that, Mr. Chairman, and I know that. The government in its heart of hearts knows that it can never approve an immense digging, hauling and milling operation in Howe Sound. The public on the lower mainland, and indeed across the Strait of Georgia on Vancouver Island, will not tolerate the thought of tens of millions of tonnes of mineral wastes being discharged into Howe Sound every year. In other words, we'll never have a big copper-molybdenum mine on Gambier Island. So why procrastinate about it? Why say that the company, 20th Century Energy Corp. of Vancouver, must complete its exploratory drilling and present a definitive plan of operations before the Environment ministry, the Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and the government itself can focus on this particular problem?

[ Page 6023 ]

Not only is this problem upsetting to a large number of people who envisage the worst happening there, but it also encourages some investors — potentially a significant number — to put their money into a project which can never and will never go ahead. They're being led up a blind alley, in other words. The politics of the situation, if I can call it that, are too tough. Most people think that the Islands Trust is in fact a trust. The islands in the trust area, in their view, are like parks. They're off limits to large-scale mining. Bowen Island, right next to Gambier Island, was officially declared out of bounds to mining in 1969. Why doesn't the government do the same for all of the Gulf Islands in the Islands Trust now and be done with it?

That's what I mean by drawing up the rules ahead of time: setting high standards, standards of a kind that the public want; unreasonably high perhaps, but high enough and fair enough so that the public won't be misled and investors spending their money in good faith won't be misled also. There are all sorts of alternatives in B.C., as I said before, so why should the government get into a difficult situation of this kind?

I'm told by some that the 20th Century Energy Corp. doesn't really have a potential mine on Gambier Island, so wait them out — so the reasoning goes. In my view, that is the wrong way to deal with industry in this province. As government we should level with industry at the outset. What we do now at this late stage is, however, a difficult question to answer. I think the government now has to buy out the 20th Century Energy Corp. It may cost a few tens of millions of dollars to do so today, but to wait for years is not only to continue to disappoint those investors but to build up a much larger bill for the government in the longer-term future.

What about the rest of Howe Sound? Dome Petroleum of Calgary bought a large acreage at Britannia Beach in 1978. Would Dome be allowed to build a big petrochemical complex there? Would ships and barges carrying chemicals be allowed to come and go? What are our pollution-control guidelines in respect to liquefied natural gas, for example? What are our zoning requirements? It's one thing for an Alberta-based company to buy up a lot of real estate on tidewater near Vancouver; it's another thing for government in this province to stand by while detailed plans are being laid for large industrial complexes to be built a dozen miles — as the crow flies — from downtown Vancouver. Fortunately Dome Petroleum got the message through the media. Any industry which goes into Britannia Beach will have to be very much a clean industry. However, the government didn't tell Dome; the press did. As the minister knows, Dome Petroleum is now actively looking elsewhere.

When I was the federal Minister of Environment in Ottawa we scoured the west coast for a safe port area for off-loading coal, shipping wheat to the Orient and producing petrochemicals for sale abroad. From an overall environmental point of view, the best site turned out to be Ridley Island near Prince Rupert. It was far enough away from the Skeena River estuary to have little or no effect on the salmon runs there. It was close to the open ocean, but protected from the worst weather. The water was deep enough and the winds were brisk enough to deal with the kinds of shipping which would use a port of that kind, and with the pollutants. Fortunately the provincial government has now decided to ship most of the products of northern and central B.C. out through a new port on Ridley Island — not Squamish, which has been favoured all along, as I understand it, by the New Democratic Party, and not out through the limited waters of Howe Sound and across our inland sea between Vancouver and Vancouver Island. Using the long straightaways and easy grades of the CNR out to Prince Rupert, loading ships at the Ridley Island site is going essentially with the grain of nature. It's avoiding congestion in the lower mainland. It's using less energy to do more useful things. It's opening up the north without at the same time doing violence to the estuaries and to the recreational and residential values around Vancouver.

While I'm still on the subject of not informing — indeed, even misleading — industry, let me say a word about the proposed coal-mine in the Quinsam area near Campbell River. Weldwood Ltd. has now spent upwards of $5 million trying to prove to our Environment ministry that it can mount a pollution-free project there. It's tried hard to prove that an open-pit coal-mine wouldn't damage the sport and recreational salmon fisheries downstream of the project itself. It's hired all sorts of consultants and had numerous meetings with various ministries here in Victoria. But still more data is needed. More opinions have to be reduced to fact, newer and higher standards have to be met; costs escalate, and seemingly there is no end in sight.

I think this is a very important question: why does the government lead Weldwood along in this way? I believe there will never be a large open-pit coal-mine in the Campbell River area — at least in my lifetime. It's a high-sulphur coal. Oxidization of quantities of exposed and freshly mined material would present a serious leachate problem above and close to the Quinsam salmon hatchery. A large part of the tourist industry in the area would be in jeopardy. If the provincial government didn't move, then I would expect the federal government to move against a project of this kind. It would protect the local fishery at all costs, and it would do what the great majority of the public has been demanding all along. It would put a stop to an industrial operation which most environmentalists would say shouldn't have been given any encouragement in the first place.

I think I know how the minister will answer — that private enterprise can spend its money any way it sees fit. If it wants to gamble on a development like the Quinsam coal project, then let it take its chances. That isn't the partnership approach. In my view, it isn't even an honest approach. Every one of us, as politicians, knows that the Quinsam coal-mine will never be built. There are too many biological unknowns. There's too large a public bias against it. Who needs a few million tonnes of high-sulphur coal a year anyway? We wouldn't allow it to be burned here in British Columbia. At least, our high pollution standards wouldn't permit it to be burned today. B.C. Hydro rejected the idea because of the cost of pollution abatement alone. So why hasn't the government levelled with Weldwood and said: "Forget it"? Unfortunately, it hasn't done this. It's given the company a few more guidelines to meet. It's asked for more information. In effect, it said maybe. "We'd like to know more. Keep at it, and just maybe you'll get a permit to mine this coal." If I was the management of Weldwood, getting this kind of go-round, I would have given up the chase long ago.

B.C. Hydro's Hat Creek project up near Ashcroft is in a different category entirely. The government, through the Ministry of Environment and its pollution control branch, has announced guidelines for coal-burning power plants. These were announced in 1978. They're tough. They're among the toughest, if not the toughest, in North America. They can, and undoubtedly will, be expensive. If they're

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imposed to the limit on sulphur in the coal, for example, they'll result in many hundreds of millions of dollars or perhaps more than half a billion dollars of expenditure on pollution abatement alone. Actually, the guidelines are presented as a range. Emissions of sulphur dioxide can be as high as 1.3 parts per million and as low as 0.3 parts per million. B.C. Hydro, in its designs, is aiming at 0.6 parts per million. That's a fraction of the concentrations allowed under our new federal regulations for coal-burning power plants. It's a small fraction of the pollutant concentrations actually being emitted by the largest, newest and best-equipped power stations in the eastern United States.

We've got two great advantages at Hat Creek. The coal found in the Hat Creek valley is low in sulphur to start with. Also, the power plant will have dry-belt surroundings. Our dry-belt land tends to be alkaline and not acidic. Anyone who knows the southern interior knows of the alkali lakes that abound there. So there's a natural buffering capacity in the area. Acid rain, as it is sometimes called, will tend to help the soil there — to fertilize it. It will not destroy it from a plant-producing point of view. Notice I said "tend." That's an overall consideration, and there can be local problems. I'm not saying that the conditions are ideal, but they're better than they are in most other parts of the country. By insisting on high standards from the outset, the government is doing the right thing from a pollution-control point of view. B.C. Hydro is doing the right thing from the point of view of the producer.

We'll be using the latest, state-of-the-art technology. Or will we? If I were British Columbia's Minister of Environment, I would be asking myself several questions. First, is fluidized-bed combustion really out? Why can't it be used in the Hat Creek project? Why can't the sulphur and other impurities be captured in the combustion process by mixing the coal with limestone — which, incidentally, exists in tremendous amounts in Hat Creek itself — prior to combustion, and then, during the combustion process. capture the sulphur and other pollutants which otherwise would tend to escape into the atmosphere?

My second question, in addition to the question about fluidized-bed combustion, is: why can't the Hat Creek power plant use air-cooling, as opposed to water-cooling? Granted, the power plant would not be able to run flat out on the hottest days of the year. But it's on a very high ridge and there's a lot of cold air up around Hat Creek most of the time. This air-cooling approach would avoid pumping large quantities of water up several thousand feet from the Thompson River. It would avoid pollutants seeping back into the streams there.

Thirdly and finally, what about converting the coal to a low-grade gas first? The pollutants could be stripped out more effectively this way; there is less volume to deal with, in other words. The gas would be clean-burning and air emissions would be a tiny fraction of the volume of pollutants, which we're bound to get from a conventional coal-burning plant of the kind being designed for Hat Creek today.

These are possibilities, Mr. Chairman. I would have a competent firm of consultants look at them independently of B.C. Hydro and report in, say, six months' time. Otherwise many of us are going to have lingering doubts about burning coal in the old-fashioned way and cleaning up the power plant's discharges expensively, indeed by brute force. It seems to me that an Environment ministry that leads instead of follows would take initiatives of this kind. Instead of commenting after the event, it could shape things more positively in this way.

I could go on at length, Mr. Chairman, but I'll limit my remarks to a few other unrelated matters — matters which, however, are important at this time. One is the utilization of waste products in our cities and towns and from industry in B.C. We can burn garbage and make electricity; we can burn wood wastes and make power; we can clean up our act and produce energy in its highest, cleanest and most useful form. Why don't we do more of this sort of thing? One of the reasons is that B.C. Hydro won't pay enough for this surplus power. I think we should do what many other countries and a number of states in the United States do: we should require our major power utility, B.C. Hydro, to take all of the surplus energy which our municipalities and our industries can generate, and pay them a price equal to Hydro's average system cost of generation and transmission — one might even argue Hydro's average cost of generation and transmission from its latest and most expensive sources of power. Those prices, of course, are much higher than Hydro has been offering to pay industry, particularly the pulp and paper industry in this province. But industry and municipalities — with this kind of encouragement of a high price comparable to the price that Hydro is really going to have to charge the rest of us for its new sources — can make a go of things; wastes can be turned into useful products and pollution can be limited thereby.

My main message, Mr. Chairman, is that there is a need for leadership in environmental matters not just here in British Columbia but across the nation and around the world. It's a matter of attitude more than anything else. We've got competent people in our Environment ministry; our standards are high and our approach is quite specific — that's all to the good. But for this competence and these policies to be really effective, our environmental ministry and its agencies must act as if they're in partnership with industry, municipalities and Crown corporations like B.C. Hydro, helping them plan ahead and not hitting them after the event. In other words, be a participant in forward planning; be positive and, where possible, be imaginative as well. This is the partnership approach, which I would like to see our government follow in environment matters in the future; it's obviously upbeat rather than downbeat; it can protect our environment much more effectively than any arm's length approach to new projects and developments could ever accomplish. It's one which, if I heard the hon. minister right yesterday, he's prepared to follow also. I congratulate him on that score. I might add that if the federal fisheries department had tried to lead Amax rather than follow it into its present dilemma, the trouble which that company, the Nishga Indians and government are experiencing on Alice Arm would never have come to pass.

Positive, Mr. Chairman, is the word; partnership is the approach. Pollution can be minimized in this way. In my opinion, this is the only way to go for a healthy environment and the best possible quality of life for our citizens.

MR. HALL: Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask permission of the House to introduce some guests.

Leave granted.

MR. HALL: Mr. Chairman, I'm very pleased to ask the House to welcome to Victoria two visitors from overseas seated in the Speaker's gallery: Dr. Sidney Rose and Mr. Chris Muir, who are directors of the Manchester City football club. They are visiting Victoria and the southern part of

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Vancouver Island following the soccer game last Wednesday in the city of Vancouver. They are accompanied today on their visit to Victoria by Dr. Alan Robinson, who is also from my home town of Manchester, but is now of Maple Bay. He is also a friend of the member for Cowichan–Malahat (Mrs. Wallace). I'd like to ask the House to welcome these visitors from Manchester, England.

HON. MR. ROGERS: The member for Burnaby–Willingdon (Mr. Lorimer) asked a question that I want to clear up before I deal with the remarks of the member for North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis). In terms of the Pollution Control Act, 90 percent of the applications which come before the board receive no comment from other ministries. The only other ministries which have any influence at all are the ministries circulated, which are Agriculture and Health. Perhaps, when the members opposite see the member for Burnaby–Willingdon, they will advise him of that and perhaps that will allay some of his fears.

I thank the member for his comments. If we could take a great felt pen to the map of the province and draw a line and say these areas are environmentally sensitive and we are not going to allow operations to go on in them, I think that everybody in the province would have input to the extent that the felt-pen line would go around the borders of the entire province. We have set up a set of guidelines for applications to go forward for linear developments, for coal developments and for mineral developments. I don't feel competent, and I don't think many others would if they were in this position, to be able to say in advance to any corporation or any entrepreneur or anyone who wants to develop in this province: "You can't do it here until you've looked at it." They would ask me: "What's that based on?" I would say: "I just don't want you to do a development here." "Based on what"" "Based on what facts you can give us." And that's the difficulty we have.

There's no question about it, the Quinsam coal-mine, and the 20th Century Energy Corp.'s proposal for a mine on Gambier Island have enormous public dissatisfaction connected with them. Dome had the same thing. Dome reacted sooner than the others have. But how can we go and say to them that, because there's some heat from the local area, there's some heat from environmental groups, because the local member or mayor or municipality doesn't want them to do it, they can't do it? Based on what? Well, we have to base it on something, and so we set up a guidelines process which is not strictly technical, but which also involves the public.

In the case of Weldwood we did not lead anyone, and I want to make that quite clear. The company knew from the outset what the requirements were. What they chose to do was avoid the difficult areas. They chose not to go into the area and involve themselves with public hearings. When they submitted their stage 2 guidelines, what was deficient? The one where they knew they'd have some deficiencies. They knew at the outset what they were doing.

I must say that before the guideline system was in place, companies would come along, stake a claim, begin to do their operation and spend enormous amounts of capital before getting their permits. Permits were done as an afterthought. Now that the guidelines process is in place, yes, the companies do have to spend some money prior to getting approval. But they don't have to spend the massive sums of capital they once had to spend, with the inherent risk of being turned down. What really happened was that once they had spent that money, government was more or less obliged to say yes. I think the guidelines have worked well in the case of Quinsam, and I'm not prepared to say that, had Weldwood and Lusgar come to see me or my predecessor when they first decided to develop this thing, I would have had the judgment to be able to say no, you can't proceed with it.

I know what the feelings of the local people are going to be. It sure wouldn't take me long to find out what federal Fisheries wanted to do; but it wouldn't take the company long to do that either. I'm sure they have some pretty good people, and they would have known that. They chose instead to go the alternative route. Maybe they thought government would solve their problems for them. Maybe they thought government would override the opinions of the technical people within the branch and the ministry and also override the local opinion.

We have gone with the one-window approach, where all nine of the ministries involved get involved with the guidelines process to the extent that it's necessary. I'm not prepared to accept being the environmental czar and being able to say to somebody no, you can't, or yes, you can based on no technical information. I would have to base that opinion on fact and not on anything else.

I share your concern about Gambier Island. I'm sure the company must be aware of it. However, we have a guideline system in place, and it's functioning reasonably well. Nowhere in that system does it say that the companies can't reassess their particular situation. If they just close their minds to the bad news or the inevitable difficulties they are going to face with other groups, then that's to their own detriment. It's to the detriment of their investors. Maybe for reasons of their own they don't wish to go ahead and find out what the local public consideration is.

I don't know where we draw a line in Howe Sound. Do we draw it at the top of the mountain in the drainage for that area, or do we just include the islands in Howe Sound? When I travel up Howe Sound I have a hard time distinguishing why we should treat the islands any differently than we treat the mainland. The whole area is one that's widely used by boaters, and this member is suggesting that if the ore body had been discovered on the mainland at Port Mellon, or between Port Mellon and Woodfibre, it would be all right to operate it there. No, it wouldn't. You've got to expand the boundaries. And where do you expand the boundaries? To the top of the drainage area. Well, we haven't done these things.

As you said, this ministry is only just over five years old, and we have had mines in the area of the Islands Trust. Admittedly they are not major mines, but these areas have taken part. We had a mine on Saturna Island. It wasn't very long ago that that mine closed, and I would venture to say that if a mine wanted to reopen on Satuma Island, the public outcry would be enormous. There wasn't one when the mine existed some time ago, but there certainly would be now. You say: "Level with them at the outset." Well, level with them based on what information? I could give them a bit of common-sense off the record and let them know what they face, or point them in the direction of some people that have tried to go through the same thing before. We have a set of guidelines and rules for people to try. If they don't wish to take that advice, that's up to them.

You make some interesting suggestions about Hat Creek. The state-of-the-art about a fluidized bed is still doubtful. The Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) is very enthusiastic about it. He's a

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member of the board of Hydro, reconfirmed as recently as this morning by my colleague the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. McClelland). I would imagine that's the place that kind of decision should be made. There is a great risk involved in going into a project of this size and going into a totally new scope on a scale that big.

I want to talk about burning garbage to make electricity, and what the experiments have been before in Sydney, Australia, and a whole host of other areas in the world — Copenhagen and several on the east coast of the United States. They've all suffered the same problems, and the one that exists in Sydney is shut down. When you incinerate garbage you only reduce the mass to about 40 percent, so you're still left with a landfill problem, and you're left with a problem in terms of air pollution. What we're burning in the first case is garbage, and garbage doesn't have the same calorific value per truckload. There isn't a consistent calorific value per truckload. While we can salvage the cullets of the glass and metal that come out of the bottom, what's happened is that in every place one of these incineration operations has operated it's operated at a massive cost to the taxpayer. Environmentally it doesn't make all that much sense. All you do is reduce some of the mass of the stuff that's going into the landfill, and end up having to subsidize the operation. You can control the burner temperature with natural gas or oil, and I'm not sure that's a wise way to do it. It's been tried in other areas. When it becomes cost-effective in terms of waste distribution, I think it's something we should attack here.

In terms of B.C. Hydro and their purchase of energy from alternate sources, I'm reminded that it wasn't very long ago when we reviewed our sources of energy in this province and found that wood-waste ends up being one of the major sources of energy. Since being the minister I've had the opportunity to visit more than a few garbage dumps, and I think that if people went and looked at the feedstock we're working with, then these ideas of incineration, salvage and recovery of some of the feedstock we're working with would fade pretty quickly. We do have a recovery program, and we do encourage people to recycle. In fact paper and metal recycling is very much encouraged by the ministry. We have seen industries grow up out of the fact that recycled materials are available, but again there's a limit to what can be done, because there's a limited market for the product.

I thank the member for his comments and look forward to continued debate.

MR. SKELLY: On this side we also appreciate the comments from the member for North Vancouver–Seymour. I think it's refreshing to see any backbencher on that side of the House get up and discuss environmental concerns as this member has done. We congratulate him for doing that. It's very seldom that you see a Social Credit member get up and express those kinds of concerns. Unfortunately he is receiving the same response in terms of negative responses as this side of the House receives whenever they make some positive suggestions. I very much appreciated the member's comments about developers. He talked about the vagueness of the environmental planning process when a developer seeks to come into British Columbia to develop a mine or some other industry. It doesn't really get a firm impression of what the environmental law is with respect to the development process. At what stage must he present a prospectus by law? At which stage must there be public involvement and this type of thing? The process is fairly vague. It's still ad hoc and catch as catch can. The minister talks about guidelines. Guidelines are nothing more than guidelines. They vary. Some people are excluded from some parts of some guidelines. We brought up an issue in this House a few years ago about the Cheekye-Dunsmuir power project where a section of the guidelines requires a cost-benefit analysis of the project from the total provincial point of view. Hydro had done one which deviated from the guideline requirement. They had done one from the corporate point of view. The Environment and Land Use Committee secretariat, which the minister fired, indicated that there was a difference in the requirements and that Hydro did not do what they were required to do under the guidelines.

We went down to the office of the minister of the day. I believe the member for Boundary–Similkameen (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) was the Minister of Energy at that time. I suppose he was as good as any Minister of Energy we've had on that side. The member for Kamloops of the day was the Minister of Environment. He was probably better than any Minister of Environment they've had on that side. We went down to the office and said that under the guidelines Hydro is required to produce some kind of justification for this project and go through the public review procedure with public hearings, etc. The ministers told us: "Forget the guidelines. We've already made the decision in cabinet. Hydro has been exempted from the guidelines, and guidelines are just guidelines." They aren't a legally structured environmental assessment and review procedure. That's the problem faced by the 20th Century Energy Corp. and by Weldwood-Lusgar; they really don't know. If they present a slipshod prospectus and second-stage analysis, they may get through because, politically, cabinet can accept it.

The problem in this province is that we don't have a legally structured environmental impact and assessment procedure. It's all done by guidelines, and it's all done behind the door. Sometimes it will be accepted if it deviates from the guidelines and sometimes it won't. Northeast coal is the perfect example. All of those studies were done but done away from the public view and public comment. Agreements were entered into without the value of public review and assessment of those studies and effective public comment on those studies. As far as I'm concerned, the member for North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis) was right on. In the case of the mine to be developed within the Islands Trust, the people that the minister should be listening to are the people from the island and the people who represent those people from the island on the Islands Trust. This is still a democracy. It's not a government where you consult with your technicians and your experts, come to a conclusion and impose that on the people regardless of whether they want it or not. Regardless of how technically proficient your advisers are, the people may still not want what you feel they should have. In a democracy the people are the ones who have the right to decide.

I hear from the people in the Islands Trust that they do not want an open-pit mine on Gambier Island. They've ruled against it. They've got bylaws against it. Those people have the right to decide whether or not they want mines within their jurisdiction. It's like any zoning bylaw anywhere else in the province. If you don't want a piggery here and the zoning says you don't have to have one, you don't get one, because that's the will of the people. It may be technically feasible to install a piggery there, but the will of the people has been

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expressed in their local bylaws. It's the will of the people that we should be listening to. I support the member for North Vancouver–Seymour when he says that the minister should come out and say that that mine is out because the people have made their wishes known. That's all there is to it.

He mentioned the Weldwood-Lusgar proposal on Vancouver Island. I don't think that proposal could pass your technical or political requirements in a million years. Everything is going against that proposal. So I'm pleased to see that that proposal has been rejected at the stage that it's at now. The minister should simply stand up and say: "That proposal is out. The people are against it. The technical problems have not been adequately examined. Therefore the proposal is out." But first and foremost what is required is a legal framework — not guidelines, but a framework spelled out in legislation and regulation, which says: "This is how the planning procedure takes place in the province of British Columbia, and this is how the environmental assessment and review procedure takes place in the province of British Columbia. In legal detail this is how those developments take place." A developer looking at the province of British Columbia as a prospective place to develop will know precisely in law how he must begin, how he must proceed, before what tribunals he must appear and, finally, the fact that the people of this province have the right to decide what the economy of this province is going to be like, what the development in their specific area is going to be like and which developments they would like to exclude — because the people in this province are sovereign.

That's the principle that we should be dealing with in this Legislature: the people are sovereign — not the technicians in this ministry, the Ministry of Mines or the Ministry of Forests. The people of this province, who elect us, have a right to decide what the development in this province is going to be like. This ministry has — and I mentioned this yesterday — consistently excluded the public from the right to effective involvement in the environmental decision-making process and the resource development decision-making process. That's an attack on democracy. That's an attack on the sovereignty of the people of this province.

You should be ashamed, specifically, of the way you handle public involvement in environmental decision-making. It's obvious that yesterday you missed that point of the debate where I suggested in a reasonable way that you involve the Select Standing Committee on Environment and Resources in this Legislature and that you develop a citizens' advisory committee. All of those reasoned proposals presented across the floor to the Minister of Environment were totally ignored, as far as I can see. There was no commitment even to say: "Okay, we'll take a look at these proposals. I'll come back to you with a report, maybe later on in the session, maybe next year, and see what we can do about these things." You just said: "I'll take note." So as far as I'm concerned, those reasonable proposals have been rejected by this minister. I'm not even sure he can accept them. I'm not even sure he has the power to accept them. I'm not even sure what went on in the discussions with his ministry and with cabinet prior to the presentation of these estimates in the Legislature. They told him to agree to nothing, to stand there and stonewall. Is that what happened?

The member for North Vancouver–Seymour made a number of serious, reasoned proposals to the minister. As any serious and reasoned proposals that come from any side of this House, they were stonewalled and rejected out of hand. On the issue of Hat Creek and co-generation, I'm pleased to hear the former minister from North Vancouver–Seymour.... He has been involved in the Hat Creek proposal for decades. He was working for the B.C. Electric Co., and part of his responsibility was the analysis of the Hat Creek deposit for possible future thermal generation to augment B.C. Electric's generation requirements. He has long-standing familiarity with that project. When a gentleman such as the member for North Vancouver–Seymour comes into the House and questions the direction that the government is going now, questions the possible environmental impacts of this project, questions the way B.C. Hydro is going.... He is a former Minister of Energy for the province of British Columbia. When that gentleman stands up and questions the project in this House, I would expect this minister, a rookie in comparison, to take some cognizance of what that gentleman was saying.

What about the issue of fluidized-bed combustion? It has been examined. In fact it's in use in other parts of the world. It's in use in smaller projects, and that's what Hydro doesn't want. They don't want small projects. They want huge, monolithic projects. That's what Hydro is after. The director for that project in B.C. Hydro's hierarchy wants his name on the door of the biggest thermal generating project in the world. That's how it appears to us across the floor and to the public: they don't care about the environmental impacts, they don't care about the cost to the province, they don't care about how it's going to affect Hydro's internal operations. For example, we're told that if Hat Creek is built, to the tune of $5 billion of the taxpayers' money.... It's not the taxpayers' money, because we're going to borrow it; it's the money of future generations so far into time that it's foggy for us to even comprehend — $5 billion in debt. We're told that if this plant is built on the credit ratings of the people of British Columbia now and in the future, there will be an obligation on B.C. Hydro, because of the labour component in this thermal generating plant, to keep this plant running in preference to hydroelectric dams — because labour will have some power to keep the thermal plant operating, whereas the dams don't have that much of a labour component. They will let water spill over the dams, with a loss of cheap energy, and will continue producing expensive energy from the Hat Creek thermal generation project. It's going to distort the whole economic picture in B.C. Hydro, not to mention the environmental problems it's going to create, so that we will be shutting down renewable cheap power sources with a low labour component, in order to operate this project because of the high labour component and the pressure labour will be able to exert on the corporation to keep that plant running even when it doesn't make economic sense. We're concerned about that as well.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

This member had a lot to say. He developed very important issues about the Hat Creek plant. Hydro, in its mindless way.... And you said that this is an issue that should be dealt with at the board of directors level in B.C. Hydro. No, sir, Mr. Minister, the buck tops here. That's been the problem with you all along: you've shuffled it off onto the federal government when it's a question of uranium transportation in this province; you shuffle it off onto the federal government when you're talking about budgets for dyking and draining in the Fraser Valley; you shuffle the blame onto the federal

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government when it's a question of money being delayed and taken out of the salmonid enhancement program. The buck finally stops with you. You're going to have to make some decisions on this project. It has tremendous economic and environmental implications for the province of British Columbia, and you are solely responsible. For one time in your career as Minister of Environment, you're going to have to stand up and say: "No, the project has got to be stopped — not permanently — and reconsidered." You're going to have to exercise your power.

I've been listening to this minister over the last few days — over the last few years — and watching his performance as the Minister of Environment. This minister seems impotent to get anything done in cabinet. He seems impotent even to get a budget that's greater than last year's, without padding and adding things that shouldn't be in the budget. He seems to be a ministerial eunuch, as far as we can see. What's the use of a Minister of Environment in this province if he can't do anything and if he's unwilling to do anything? It's not enough to slough off these questions.

We have made reasonable presentations across the floor. We're getting frustrated in making reasonable presentations. The member for North Vancouver–Seymour has made reasonable presentations, and every one of them was sloughed off. "Well, that's B.C. Hydro's responsibility. I can't invade the jurisdiction of another minister. The federal government is to blame." The buck stops with you, Mr. Minister. You're going to have to start answering some of these questions yourself. Don't call another task force and ask the polluters to decide how they want to pollute. Don't call another task force to decide how the people who are dividing up the Fraser estuary want to divide what remains of the Fraser estuary. The buck has got to stop with you.

We're simply not getting answers from this minister. We're not convinced that he has the power to give them. First of all, he hasn't taken the power personally. The former minister, Rafe Mair — we can mention him by name now — at least did take the power. The ministry sacked the Environment and Land Use Committee secretariat while he was cloistered in a Social Credit caucus policy meeting out in the Richmond Inn. You might remember that event yourself. They neglected to tell the minister that they had. When he came out of there he was outraged and he reinstated it. Of course, he said that they hadn't been fired in the first place.

This minister is even a prisoner of his own ministry. He's like the national parks service in British Columbia. You go out to the park and ask them what the weather is like. They phone Ottawa, and then they're able to tell you. You ask this guy a question about the environment, and he has to go back to his ministry. Then he answers the question or gets somebody in the ministry to answer the question. Why was this minister appointed? Is he a tabula rasa? He's a blank space. Nothing is written on him, unless his ministry chooses to write. Does he have no opinions on the environment of his own? What kind of a ministry do we have here? What kind of a minister do we have here? Is he a eunuch? Is he impotent? What we expect from him is to get things done. Let the buck stop with the minister. Let the minister make the decisions. That's what we're after here in the Legislature.

Speaking of the bucks, I'd like to change the subject momentarily here, and talk a little bit about the budget of the Minister of Environment.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Mr. Chairman, I ask leave to introduce some people.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: I'd like the House to welcome about 25 students from the Seacliff Christian School in Richmond. Accompanying the students to Victoria today is their teacher, Mr. Harris, a friend of mine; Mr. Al Campbell, the father of Mr. Harris; and Mrs. Van Bruksvoort. I'd like the House to welcome them.

MR. SKELLY: I don't like attacking this minister, because I like him personally, but you must understand, Mr. Chairman, that it gets pretty frustrating in this House when you stand up time after time — when his own members stand up time after time — and make reasonable suggestions and they're totally stonewalled in the House. We get the feeling that his ministry won't let him make any commitments to members across this floor, and it gets pretty frustrating, as I say.

I'd now like to talk a little bit about the budget of the Ministry of Environment. We took a look at the budget when it first came down in estimates, and the minister's budget had gone up something like $10 million this year — it's gone up to $81 million. But when you take a close look at the budget, it has actually declined from previous years. When you look at the padding in the budget and the things that should have been spent elsewhere or possibly under other budgets, when you look at the change in the budgeting procedure, then you have to come to the conclusion, Mr. Chairman — and I'm sure you have — that this budget is much lower than it was last year. First of all, by dropping off some of the padding, you end up with $71 million, which was roughly the budget last year. When you account for inflation at about 12.6 percent over the year, you end up with less spending ability in this ministry now than we had before. The minister in some of his previous remarks was talking about how in the dyking program on the Fraser River the federal government had cut back on their participation and also extended the terms of the program, which made it even more vulnerable to inflation. Well, okay, that's blaming the federal government.

Talking about the salmonid enhancement program, recently people in this province and people associated with the ministry have complained that the federal contribution for that program has also been cut back and the program has been extended. As a result it's more vulnerable to inflation and less can be done now under the program than was predicted in the agreement signed between the federal and provincial governments. Yet the minister's own budget has been virtually frozen this year. It's not the federal government that's at fault here; there are no other people at fault here. The minister's own budget has been frozen. I know the minister would like to blame the feds or Treasury Board, but again it relates back to a question of the minister's own impotence in persuading cabinet and Treasury Board to assign adequate funds to fulfill the mandate of his ministry. He says he wins a lot of arguments in cabinet. It appears to me that the only argument he's won with respect to this budget is how to cover up the losses.

Obviously one approach was in the provincial disaster fund. Ordinarily, under the estimates for the provincial disaster fund, they assign a nominal sum of about $10. You don't know if there's going to be a disaster from one year to the next — unless a Social Credit government is elected, Mr. Chairman. But we're talking about natural disasters, not unnatural disasters. Every year in the past, a nominal sum of $10 has been allocated to the provincial disaster fund or to the flood

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relief fund, because we don't know if there are going to be flood relief requirements. We don't know if there's going to be a problem with landslides, or another Port Alice problem on northern Vancouver Island, or another Bella Bella problem, or the heavy rainfalls that we had last December 24 and December 25. We don't know that those things are going to happen, so we don't budget any specific amount.

This year we budgeted about $6 million for provincial disasters, and the minister in the formal budget speech debate stood up and said the expenditure was required in this year because of flood damage which had taken place last year. Actually we've budgeted money for this year to pay for damage that had taken place last year. This is a violation of the trend that has taken place over the years — that the government should generally take those moneys out of other budgets or emergency funds to provide compensation for flood relief.

Also, legally, Mr. Chairman, we are dealing with next year's estimates — the requirements for money for next year, not the requirements for last year. Compensation for those problems should have been paid in the last year or attributed to the last fiscal year, but not to the next year. That's why we budgeted in that manner for the past several years. So the minister has padded his budget to the tune of $6 million on provincial disaster programs in order to make it appear that his budget this year is higher than ever, because of course there's been some criticism of this minister for not being able to get, from Treasury Board and cabinet, the finances he requires to keep his ministry going at the level of last year or even to expand the ministry's function so they can adequately fulfill their mandate. He's padded the budget.

After you get the budget all prepared, there's a little statement that says they took off $2.5 million as "efficiencies achieved to control government growth." Where does that money come off? Do you pad the budget by $6 million and then deduct the $2.5 million from it? Is it all just tricks, gimmicks and sleight of hand? The budget has been padded, and all we actually have in this budget is the $71 million we had last year.

I'd like to talk a little bit about the way the budget is developed and how budgets for certain sections of the ministry are developed.

Interjections.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. Hon. members, we have been conducting a most orderly debate up to this point. I would ask both the House Leader (Hon. Mr. Gardom) and the second member for Vancouver East (Mr. Barnes) to come to order and let this meaningful debate continue.

MR. SKELLY: For example, the minister in his opening remarks said that he had developed a new habitat conservation fund to be endowed out of an additional $3 for every hunting licence in the province. That's not a bad thing; I'm not opposed to that. It doesn't provide very much money. Of course, it puts on the hunters and the fishermen, I suppose, the obligation to provide additional habitat. The same requirement is not right across the board. As I mentioned yesterday, the polluters in this province don't have to pay a similar assessment for their right to destroy certain resources in the province.

We took a look through the minister's most recent annual report as to the number of pollution control permits in effect in the province. In the 1979 calendar year there were 506 new pollution control permits issued to give a total of 3,036 permits in force in the province. The cost of issuing, maintaining and monitoring these permits during fiscal 1979 and 1980 was approximately $4.4 million after you deduct the cost of Project SAM. The average cost of administering a licence given to an operation in the province, which allows that operation to degrade the quality of a life-sustaining resource, is about $1,450 per year. Right now this amount is completely subsidized by the taxpayer. The taxpayers are subsidizing even the issuing of licences in this province.

At one time under a former Minister of Recreation and Conservation, Ken Kiernan, there were complaints from the outdoors community and the fish and wildlife people that they were spending more in fishing and hunting licence fees than the previous social Credit government was spending on the cost of protecting the fish and wildlife resources of the province. Steps were taken — especially under the NDP government — to reverse that situation. In the case of pollution control, the taxpayers are totally subsidizing pollution in this province to the tune of $1,450 per year for every polluter.

I'd like to make this suggestion to the minister. I'd like to put him on notice that during debate on that vote of the minister's estimates we are going to move to reduce the waste management branch vote by $4 million. We feel that he should be making up that $4 million by charging the cost of a pollution control permit to the polluter. When I look at the companies involved — for example, Amax in Alice Ann — the minister can't tell me that an additional $1,400 a year, or roughly $100 a month, is going to be a significant economically disruptive factor for Amax of Canada Ltd. They should at least be able to pay the cost of issuing, monitoring and administering a pollution control permit — $1,450 a year is not a lot to ask.

I'd like the minister's response to that proposal, and I'd like to recommend a book to the minister. He recommended an article in Harper's magazine, which I'd already read. This book — the title is a little embarrassing — is called The Way Out. It was developed for the Institute for Research on Public Policy, and it discusses how certain departments of government should be placed on a revenue-based financing system. One of the most likely areas of this minister's jurisdiction to be placed under this revenue-based financing system is the waste management branch. I'd like to recommend this book to the minister, and I'd like his response to that positive, constructive suggestion that the waste management branch at least be placed on the same type of revenue-dependent basis as the habitat protection section of Fish and Wildlife.

HON. MR. ROGERS: First, I want to deal with the accusation that I'm a eunuch. After I went to the trouble of introducing you to my children last Sunday I thought that question was clearly answered, but I'll get a note from my wife.

MR. SKELLY: Nothing personal.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Clearly, it's neither federal nor the responsibility of any other minister, and I appreciate that it's nothing personal.

AN HON. MEMBER: Wise guy.

[ Page 6030 ]

HON. MR. ROGERS: You don't know how wise he is. You should hear what he says about you. He's very young, but he's got you figured out already — which didn't take too much work.

I always thought that the people elected to this body had a lot to do with representing the people of the province. When you discuss whether or not other people should be involved.... I thought the first people who got to do it were the people who were elected here. You went on about that for a while, and then you discussed legislation, which we're not allowed to talk about. The Chairman either wasn't listening or decided to let you go; but I won't discuss the legislation, having once had the opportunity of ruling on those matters.

We don't have the legal right to say no to people just based on nothing. I don't have it, and it would require legislation to give the minister some rather sweeping powers to say no for no good, documented reason.

MR. SKELLY: What do you mean, "for no good reason"?

HON. MR. ROGERS: Ah, you may have a personal reason that you want to stop it for and you may feel in your heart that you've got the facts; but if you don't have the facts, I don't think you have the right to say no. We'll disagree on that. Coincidentally, most developers who have been through the guidelines process say that they're tough but they're fair. They don't have complaints about it. I think the guideline system, which hasn't been in place all that long, is working well. I think it will probably need to be fine-tuned as more companies go through it, but we haven't had the complaints that you have.

Your colleague, the member for Cowichan–Malahat (Mrs. Wallace), gave a scathing attack on the Environment and Land Use Committee secretariat yesterday. Then you got up and accused me of having sacked a wonderful group.

MR. SKELLY: You had nothing to do with it. Your ministry sacked it. You're the eunuch.

HON. MR. ROGERS: No, you're dead wrong that the ministry sacked it. It was a decision made by the Environment and Land Use Committee.

The secretariat was started out to look after environmental matters by your government when you were in power. You didn't have a Ministry of Environment. They're tending to twin the work that was being done. There were some very talented people in the Environment and Land Use Committee secretariat, many of whom were locked in there. They had no opportunity for promotion. Dennis O'Gorman was young, healthy and was head of it. Their mandate hadn't been increased. I saw no reason why we should continue to duplicate the facilities in two particular organizations. They weren't all sacked. In fact, if you go and have a look at where the people are now....

I got a kick out of it last night. You said that we didn't send anybody to this CCREM meeting. Not only did we send the same person consistently, but he was the same person you sent — Dr. John O'Riordan. Let's be a little bit consistent in our criticism. It is the same person you sent both times.

MR. SKELLY: Get what I said straight first.

HON. MR. ROGERS: It sounded good if you said it. I'll agree with that. But you should remember who you sent when you had the opportunity. You did have the opportunity as a government to form a Ministry of Environment. I know you were encouraged to do so by your colleagues.

MR. SKELLY: Who are you passing the buck to now?

HON. MR. ROGERS: I'm not passing the buck to anybody.

You seem to think that I'm the minister responsible for Hydro. You talked about the economics of Hydro projects as if that's what we are to deal with. We deal with the environmental problems of the Hydro projects. B.C. Hydro's Hat Creek project has only been received by us within the last two weeks.

MR. SKELLY: I'm talking about the ELUC guidelines. Who's the chairman of ELUC?

HON. MR. ROGERS: Maybe if you'd just wait your turn. I was so polite and listened. I know you're interrupted by the various House Leaders and his friend across the way who is back from his appearance in town.

The other thing I wanted to talk about is the budget. You said that we put the $6 million in the budget and that that's false. That's not correct. Under any $10 vote, if your known expenditures are in excess of that — and admittedly the expenditures were incurred last year but will be made this year — you must, by the law we have, show those expenditures. We know that there will be a $6 million expenditure. I'm not fooling anybody. My budget hasn't been increased by the great, massive amount of $6 million over last year's budget. It's not a $10 vote, which it will probably be next year unless we have a disaster in the wintertime again.

There are two things you got confused on. One is that we get $1,225,000 from the Crown Land Fund for habitat acquisition. The $3 surcharge in fishing and hunting licences goes for habitat improvement, and this year that will amount to about $750,000. I really do like your idea of charging for pollution control permits, and I think it has some merit. I had never thought of the pollution control branch being a profit centre — that's the word industry would use for it — but I think that has real merit. But I think that if you were going to charge for the permit, you wouldn't charge based on a whole number of permits divided up for an average cost; you would charge based on the amount of work that's gone into the permit. Some of the permits don't need an awful lot of work; they're fairly routine matters, and they're municipal permits which would come right back to you through your municipal taxes as an additional cost. Others are industrial permits.

I'm going to take a serious look at that, because it's a valid point. But I think what I'd like to look at is a charge for the permit and a charge for the volume too, because the incentive has to be to reduce the volume. I think that's right, and I think you'd probably agree with me that we shouldn't have it on the basis of just taking the number of permits and dividing that by the cost of operating the ministry. I don't know that in government we ever really get down to being totally honest about our cost, because we don't have a charge-out rate like industry would do on our cost, and it may be even higher. In fact, if we could take the pollution control branch and waste management branch and put it on a profit-making basis, then

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we could have more money to try to alleviate some of the problems that were created in other areas of the ministry.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

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

HON. MR. GARDOM: Mr. Speaker, with leave of the House I would like to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of all of the members I would like to very much welcome to the assembly 11 grade 7 students from Southlands school in Vancouver. They are with their teachers Dr. Bailey, Mrs. Kelso and Ms. Gentny. They've been witnessing debates this morning.

Hon. Mr. Gardom moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 12:46 p.m.