[ Page 7253 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

An Act to Regulate Smoking in Public Places (Bill M203). Mrs. Wallace

Introduction and first reading –– 7253

Oral Questions

Exclusion of Prince George land from ALR.

Hon. Mr. Hewitt replies –– 7253

Mr. Lea

Mr. Barrett

Hon. Mr. Heinrich replies

Tabling Documents

Report under the Legislative Procedure Review Act.

Mr. Speaker –– 7255

Education (Interim) Finance Act (Bill 27). Second reading.

Mr. Howard –– 7255

Mr. Cocke –– 7257

Mr. Brummet –– 7258

Mr. King –– 7262

Mr. Skelly –– 7263

Mr. Mitchell –– 7265

Ms. Sanford –– 7266

Mr. Barber –– 7267

Mrs. Dailly –– 7271

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 7274

Division –– 7276

Tabling Documents

Universities Council of British Columbia funding recommendations, 1982.

Hon. Mr. McGeer –– 7276

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 28, 1982

The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: With us in the House today is a large group of 70 students from the Fraser Valley Christian High School, with their teacher Mr. Pullman. I would ask the House to bid them welcome.

MRS. WALLACE: In the Speaker's gallery today I have a young guest, Karen Malec, who is visiting from Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, on the student exchange program. She is accompanied by Mr. Stan Creelman. While in Lake Cowichan Karen is staying at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Creelman. Mrs. Creelman works at the high-school library; Mr. Creelman is a former member of the school board. I ask the House to welcome Karen and Mr. Creelman.

HON. MR. GARDOM: I ask the members of the assembly to bid a very cordial welcome to Mr. Rogan, British Consul General, situated in Vancouver, and Mr. Arthur Davies, deputy head of the department of the Ministry of Trade dealing with economic and commercial relations with North America; also Miss Vivian Hughes, who occupies a similar position in the North American department of the Foreign and Commonwealth office. They are visiting today in the precinct.

MR. MACDONALD: In the gallery and in the precincts are students from Gladstone Secondary School — precocious students, every one of them, from Vancouver East.

MRS. DAILLY: I notice in the press gallery today a former member of the the press gallery, Mr. Lloyd Mackey, who is now publisher of Burnaby Today.

MR. GABELMANN: I ask the House to welcome a group of students from Southgate Junior Secondary School in Campbell River, together with some exchange students from eastern Canada.

MR. MITCHELL: Mr. Speaker, I'd ask the House to join with me in welcoming two young ladies who met while members of the Canada World Youth on a four-month visit to Mali, Africa. They were giving out some of the B.C. buttons that I managed to scrounge from the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Wolfe) and my good friend, the member for Dewdney (Mr. Mussallem), and I'd like to thank them both. The two, who are in the gallery, are Cynthia Balaberda of Winnipeg and my daughter, Erin.

Introduction of Bills

AN ACT TO REGULATE SMOKING IN PUBLIC PLACES

On a motion by Mrs. Wallace, Bill M203, An Act to Regulate Smoking in Public Places, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Oral Questions

EXCLUSION OF PRINCE GEORGE LAND FROM ALR

HON. MR. HEWITT: Today I want to respond to the question raised yesterday by the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea). He asked the Minister of Agriculture a question regarding land that was excluded from the agricultural land reserve in the Prince George area. Then he said: "I'm talking about land described as in district lot 2014, Cariboo district, within the city of Prince George — application No. 122-N-80-110112." As that is rather a lengthy application number, I wanted to assure myself that I was responding to the proper application. Since that time I have done that, because I wanted to make sure that the member for Prince Rupert had all the facts. Although he had the whole file, I'm sure he wanted all the facts as well from me.

The Environment and Land Use Committee heard the appeal, which was by Mr. Darrell W. Roberts, on behalf of Mr. Ted Moffat et al, under section 13(2) of the Agricultural Land Commission Act, and regarding those lands that I described within lot 2014, Cariboo district. The Land Commission determined that they would allow the appeal for the exclusion of 132.3 acres from the agricultural land reserve. That advice has gone to the Land Commission and they will be dealing with it as of May 5, I understand. So I guess, Mr. Member, if I were to hold you to your comments, the land has technically not yet been excluded.

Because the question has been raised, the land is vacant and in its natural state; the rural zoning in the particular area is single-family dwelling of either two or five acres, depending on the service available. The municipality of Prince George supports the request for exclusion. The land in question is a strip of land between a residential subdivision on one side and the Fraser River on the other. These, and the small size emplacement of the parcel, are factors which could negate any potential for intensified agricultural use of the area, plus the fact that agricultural use could well be incompatible with the surrounding residential area.

Mr. Speaker, I could provide you with a map showing urbanization adjacent to the property.

Finally, the topography of the land is somewhat of a restriction, as it is rolling land and in more than one place very steeply sloped.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I'm attempting to respond to the member for Prince Rupert, who comes from a non-agricultural area. I want him to know the rationale behind the decision of the Environment and Land Use Committee, and I would be prepared to answer any further questions he may have, if I have the material with me today.

MRS. WALLACE: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, on occasion, when a minister has had the courtesy to give a lengthy reply after question period, you have excluded that time from question period. Inasmuch as this minister started before the question period had really begun, I wonder whether you would be good enough to exclude that rather lengthy answer from the question period time.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, questions taken on notice in question period would normally have taken the time of question period for an answer. That has been the general guideline. The times that are excluded from question period are those times when the Speaker interrupts on a point of order. That time is usually not taken out of question period. There have been times when a minister files rather than reads the answer, but that is at the discretion of the minister.

MR. HOWARD: Further to the point of order you've just dealt with, Your Honour on other occasions has ruled just the opposite of what you are now saying. I respectfully submit to you, Mr. Speaker, that the three to four minutes taken by the minister should not be included in question period, because Your Honour has ruled otherwise before.

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MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Questions taken on notice in question period are answered at some time subsequent to that. It is the practice of the House that the time is taken out of question period, and I so rule.

MR. LEA: Mr. Speaker, you were good enough, not too long ago, to give us a list of things that we can or cannot ask during oral question period. It says: "A question oral or written must not ask what advice a minister proposes to give the Crown, but may ask what advice he has given." With that ruling in mind, I'd like to ask the Minister of Agriculture what advice he gave ELUC in regard to the 132 acres in Prince George.

HON. MR. HEWITT: The decision on an appeal is a decision of the committee, and that decision has been made public. Whether or not I gave advice to the committee or participated is irrelevant to the decision.

MR. LEA: The Minister of Agriculture has now informed the House that what advice he gives as Minister of Agriculture to the committee charged with looking after land is irrelevant, which suggests that the minister may be irrelevant.

MR. SPEAKER: The member has a question?

MR. LEA: Yes. I think it is up to the House to decide whether or not it's irrelevant. It's in order, and again I'd like to ask the minister what advice he, as Minister of Agriculture, gave that committee in regard to these 132 acres. If he doesn't care to answer, we know that's a different question; but I'm perfectly in order and I'd like to ask the minister again.

HON. MR. HEWITT: Mr. Speaker, I don't sit on appeals, as a member of the Environment and Land Use Committee, to give advice. I am there to hear the evidence and, along with my colleagues, make a decision whether to exclude or not exclude agricultural land, either to allow the appeal or deny the appeal.

MR. BARRETT: I want to thank the minister for giving us a description of the land — that it is rolling and has steep banks. We are now informed that agricultural land that is rolling is not agricultural land, depending on your point of view. I ask the minister this question: what was the recommendation of the Agricultural Land Commission itself as to the removal of this land? What was the recommendation of the experts — the people who are not politicians, who are appointed by this government to that commission — on this land?

HON. MR. HEWITT: I could give the Agricultural Land Commission's comments, but I am sure if the Leader of the Opposition asked the member for Prince Rupert, who has a copy of the complete file, he could get it from him just as easily.

MR. BARRETT: If I intended to ask the member for Prince Rupert a question, I would do so. I have asked the minister directly, through you, Mr. Speaker: can he inform this House what the recommendation of the Land Commission was? This commission was appointed by this government to have no political role, but to give technical and professional advice based on their expertise. What was their recommendation regarding this land?

HON. MR. HEWITT: In responding, I would advise the Leader of the Opposition that the Agricultural Land Commission acts within its mandate, which is to concern itself with the agricultural capability of the land and not other land uses. As the Leader of the Opposition knows, the Environment and Land Use Committee deals with a wider mandate.

To answer his question, the comments that were made were as follows. A report from the Ministry of Agriculture by the field-crop specialists and horticulturists found that the subject property has soil suitability for various types of crops, including strawberries, potatoes, cabbages, carrots and other vegetables. Adjoining properties were also found to have a similar suitability. I'm not sure where those properties are because on one side, of course, is urbanization — the subdivision — and on the other side is the Fraser River. There is some vacant Crown land to the south and there is a flat terrace to the north of the subject property.

The report also noted the cost and returns of these types of agricultural crops in other regions of the province — not necessarily in the Prince George area, with the cold winters they might have, since figures for the Prince George area were not available. They were indicating that with those types of crops you could generate sufficient revenue to cover your costs of operation, but the Land Commission could not provide us with figures related to the Prince George area. I guess you could say they somewhat qualified their comments by that remark.

MR. HOWARD: Oh, it's their fault.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, what the minister is telling us is that....

HON. MR. HEWITT: Point of order, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. We have two members standing.

HON. MR. HEWITT: On a point of order, the member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) said: "Oh, it's their fault." He tends to imply that it's the Land Commission's fault that this has come out, or that I am pointing the finger at them. I want the record to show....

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

HON. MR. HEWITT: I'm just correcting him, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: That's not a point of order.

The hon. Leader of the Opposition proceeds.

MR. BARRETT: What the minister has said — and I ask him to agree or to deny it — is that there is no technical evidence on file anywhere that disputes that this is not agricultural land, but that he has made a political decision to remove it, for political purposes, from the agricultural land reserve.

MR. SPEAKER: Was there a question there?

MR. LEA: Will the Minister of Labour confirm that his campaign funds in the 1979 election received moneys from members of the Moffat family in Prince George?

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HON. MR. HEINRICH: Mr. Speaker, I question very much whether that question is in order.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members, if we ask a question, we expect an answer. Please proceed.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: I have no idea who contributed funds to my campaign. Every effort is made by me and by those with whom I work to ensure that that knowledge is never communicated.

MR. LEA: I have a supplementary question. The Minister of Labour has been quoted as saying he didn't go to anyone asking one way or the other about this 132 acres in Prince George. He didn't take any position at all. I wonder if the minister can then explain to this House and the people of Prince George why he wanted to be an MLA. One hundred and thirty-two acres of agricultural land was taken out of his own community, and he has no position.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

Interjections.

[Mr. Speaker rose.]

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Perhaps we can continue with an orderly question period.

[Mr. Speaker resumed his seat.]

MR. LEA: Why does the minister want to be an MLA if he has no position on 132 acres of agricultural land in his own community? I think people in Prince George would very much like to have the answer to that. I would also like the minister to tell me to the best of his knowledge whether the member for Prince George South (Mr. Strachan) had anything to do with this 132 acres and whether the member for Prince George South made any representation to him, to a fellow cabinet minister or ELUC with regard to excluding this 132 acres of land in Prince George.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, I rise pursuant to standing order 35 to ask leave to make a motion for the adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance.

MR. SPEAKER: Please state the matter briefly, hon. member.

MR. HOWARD: That matter being the threat against the Vancouver Province contained in Motion 21 standing in today's Orders of the Day and the refusal of the government to call that motion.

MR. SPEAKER: We'll consider the matter and report to the House.

Mr. Speaker tabled a report under the Legislative Procedure Review Act.

MR. COCKE: On a point of order, 24 hours ago I asked leave to enter a debate on health care and I indicated that it was an emergency situation. Mr. Speaker, have you ruled on that yet?

MR. SPEAKER: The ruling will be reported to the House as soon as it has been prepared.

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. GARDOM: Leave to proceed to public bills and orders is requested.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Adjourned debate on Bill 27.

EDUCATION (INTERIM) FINANCE ACT

(continued)

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, I rise to make a few comments about the bill and to put forward some thoughts as to how it will adversely affect the whole northern region of the province of British Columbia. But before I do that, I want to touch upon what in my view is the single most important aspect of the bill. I wouldn't dignify it by calling it a principle of the bill, but it's a provision within it.

Dictators become dictators through a variety of processes. One is by the overthrow of established government, as happened in Chile with the Pinochet coup against the elected government of Salvador Allende; another is the process of demagogic exploitation of situations — witness Adolf Hitler's rise to power; and the third method of becoming a dictator or having dictatorial powers — perhaps one can cite and identify Prime Minister Trudeau as reaching that position — is by intellectual and political prowess. Before us now is the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. Smith), who is seeking to attain dictatorial powers and dictatorial authority by the process of parliamentary democracy.

One can expect certain courses of action from those who become dictators out of a power trip or an overthrow or military activity, and almost be prepared for it. But I want to submit that the dictator with the worst potential for abuse of fundamental rights is the one who attains that position thinking that he knows better than anybody else — the one who is the so-called do-gooder, the one who in his rationalization feels that nobody else has an opinion worth expressing or worth listening to. That's been reflected in the type of overbearing arrogance that we receive from time to time from the Prime Minister of Canada. It's the same type of overbearing arrogance inherent and contained within this particular bill, which gives to the Minister of Education — and it is he who seeks to attain that authority and that power — the right to be overbearing, haughty and supercilious, to be careless about other people's opinions — especially school boards. He's nodding his head in assent that he's seeking to have that dictatorial authority and dictatorial power.

Mr. Speaker, in a political democracy we should not, by any stretch of the imagination, assume that one individual has more brains than any other. We should not assume, because the minister seeks to deal with a question of a division of taxation authority, that he should take along with it the dictatorial authority and the dictatorial power to be the single individual in the province to make determinations about school budgets.

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The Minister of Education has just slunk out the door, unable and unwilling to listen to the debate that's taking place. I don't care about my own self; he can disregard my views if he feels like it. But I think that's an insult on his part to the Legislative Assembly. Oh, he's back again. Welcome back, Mr. Minister — through you, Mr. Speaker. He did the same thing three or four times yesterday.

I want to draw some comparisons between the Prime Minister of Canada — who has a level of appreciation in this country that fluctuates and is currently at a very low ebb as far as western Canada is concerned; who, even by his own admission, is arrogant...

Interjection.

MR.HOWARD: ...and who is a Liberal — and the Minister of Education.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Trudeau's is about as low as the NDP. Did you see the vote in Saskatchewan? It's about the same.

MR. HOWARD: I can't hear the interruptions from the Minister of Municipal Affairs.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I will ask the hon. Minister of Municipal Affairs not to interrupt the member who has the floor, and I would encourage the member who has the floor to recall that the administrative responsibilities of the minister are in order for debate under his estimates, but in second reading of Bill 27 they are out of order.

MR. HOWARD: As I said at the beginning, I don't see any principle in the point I am seeking to discover; it is an unprincipled position being put forward. The minister is coming to the House and is asking the House to give him supreme authority over school budgets. I am seeking to draw comparisons, because we have in this land another person who has that kind of supreme authority and we detest it, as I think we should detest the request of the minister in this regard.

We have the Prime Minister of Canada, who has a bachelor of arts degree, and we have the Minister of Education, who also has a bachelor of arts degree. We have the Prime Minister of Canada also having obtained a master of arts, and we have the Minister of Education equally the possessor of an MA. We have the Prime Minister of Canada the holder of a doctorate in law, and so does the Minister of Education. Both of them are QCs.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The member is out of order. Please proceed.

MR. HOWARD: The Minister of Education was a lecturer in law, I understand, at a university here. The Prime Minister of Canada fell in the same category. I am only trying to show the similarities between these two individuals and to point out that part of the reason we are in difficulty in Canada is that the Prime Minister of Canada has the same arrogant attitude as does this Minister of Education in seeking to have those powers. That is all I am trying to do.

Let me put forward a viewpoint that is my own but is so beautifully phrased by another individual, Dr. Ling from Kitimat, whom the minister met last week and who is a member of the school board in Kitimat. Dr. Ling has some very thoughtful expressions to put forward which I agree with completely. I only put them forward to indicate that others, who are in elected positions on school boards, have this kind of view. Dr. Ling says that one of the principles of our democratic system of government is local public control of education, exercised through a local board of elected trustees who are accountable to the electorate. This principle, says Dr. Ling, is challenged with the proposed education finance formula of the Social Credit government. The real objective, however, said Dr. Ling, is centralized control of education. That, I think, is the essence of what we are talking about. The bill seeks to make the minister a superpower over anybody else, to enable him to make determinations not only about financing matters but also about what the curriculum will be, about what the children will be taught and about all other aspects of the relationship between school boards who are, locally elected and local residents, attuned to the needs of the localities and communities within which they operate and are elected. The minister seeks to remove that completely and, basically, to destroy the value that school boards have, a value that has been built up over a very long period of time. The process of that will do nothing other than injure and impair the potential education our kids in this province will receive, all because the minister and government are engaged in some blind rush towards centralizing power and authority in their own hands.

I submit to you that it will injure the northern part of the province even more so than other parts. That case has been put to the minister. While the conditions prevalent in one school district vis-à-vis another in the north may vary in their intensity, fundamentally school districts in the northern part of this province are faced with expenses above and beyond expenses of school districts in the southern part of the province.

Snow clearing is a very simple one to examine. It's something that a school district in the area the minister comes from is of no problem, but in the northern part of the province it is a problem. In the Kitimat School District, for argument's sake, for the first three months of this calendar year they had to spend $43,600 on contract snow clearing. That's only the contractual part to people outside the school district. In addition to that, they had to pay for something in excess of 1,200 man-hours to their own employees of the school district for matters such as snow removal.

The grounds are damaged in the winter. Repair costs are higher. Grounds and equipment are damaged by snow, snow removal and spring breakup. These are costs which are not felt by school districts in the lower mainland. Outdoor facilities are not usable in the wintertime. As a consequence, school districts in the north have to employ larger amounts of money to provide indoor gymnasiums and other facilities for the students. Heating costs are higher. The further north one goes in the wintertime, the longer the nights, the shorter the day, the greater the cold and the more the heating costs. These are facts the minister seems to be unaware of, living in the relative seclusion and gentleness of Oak Bay. It's something he would be well advised to pay attention to insofar as northern school districts are concerned.

Transportation of kids to and from school is a greater cost. In School District 88 in Terrace that ranges in distance — just on one side of Terrace up to Hazelton — of up to about 100 miles, and further north to cover communities like Kitsault as well. All of these provide a school district with the necessity

[ Page 7257 ]

of funding additional costs for transportation to get kids back and forth to school. We've got kids in School District 88 that travel 40 to 50 miles one way by bus to get to school, and 40 to 50 miles back again after school is over. That's an additional cost not borne by municipalities further South.

Even the very simple question of finding everything that a school district has to relate to being in the lower mainland is an additional cost. Shortly after the minister made the announcement about his new financing formula, he asked to have the board chairman, superintendent of schools and the secretary treasurer from each school district come to Richmond, I believe it was, and listen to the minister and his departmental officials explain this. School District 80, for example, felt they were unable to afford sending three people. They sent two, but that cost that school district an extra $800 just to come down to listen to the minister and his department officials explain what was going on with respect to that announcement of his. It didn't cost people from school districts in the Surrey area, Langley area or the Lower Fraser Valley area $400 to $500 per person to get to that meeting in Richmond, but it cost school districts in the north that extra money.

There are other cost factors as well which make it most inappropriate for the minister to seek to want: (1) this type of arbitrary division; and (2) the dictatorial powers to enforce his will upon school districts. In the north we'll suffer more financially as a result of the formula and the arbitrariness and universality of it. In addition to that, the children's — our future generation's — education is going to suffer. That's not only my own view. Let me close with a quotation again from Dr. Ling's article which appeared in the Kitimat News-Advertiser on April 13: "So much is at stake. Education will not be the same in the future. Educational services will suffer; our children will suffer." A declaration of that sort should be sufficient attraction for the minister to pull back the bill, rewrite it, and not bring this indignity further into play.

MR. COCKE: When I saw the minister's statement and press release some weeks ago that the provincial government was going to pick up 75 percent of school costs, I thought that maybe something was happening here; then we begin to find out just how they are going to do it. They have robbed municipalities of their commercial base, and in so doing they indicate that they are picking up 75 percent. It is further centralization in every respect, particularly when you read section 57. If Joseph Stalin were still alive, he would be proud of the Social Credit government we've got in British Columbia right now. It is the most centralist bill I've ever seen go through this House, and I've seen some pretty bad stuff since these people have been government. It is entirely the Stalinist principle: keep all the power central, and give none of the power back to the people. School boards have been totally misused. School boards have been totally ignored. What say do the parents, the school boards or other people in school districts have any longer in school matters? None. It's the most ridiculous, reprehensible thing I have ever encountered in terms of school financing and running the school system.

Mr. Speaker, I want to give you the example of New Westminster School District 40. For the last two or three years we have paid 100 percent of our school costs from our local tax base; over and above that, we have contributed to the rest of the province.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Did you hear about Saskatchewan?

MR. COCKE: Did you hear about B.C., Bill? We'd like to see an election right now, baby. You guys would be down the tube.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's irrelevant to the debate.

MR. COCKE: It is rather irrelevant to the debate, but he encouraged me to say that. I made that same statement yesterday, and the Premier and the minister of science and technology acknowledged what I said. We would love to see one right now.

New Westminster School District 40 has an assessment base of $261.6 million, of which $156 million is commercial and $105.1 million is residential; therefore 59.8 percent is commercial and 40.3 percent is residential. What's going to happen? Well, I'll tell you. We're in worse shape than we were when we were helping to finance the rest of the province. We're not going to be helped by this new formula. Our residential taxes are going up $50 this year for education alone.

MR. BRUMMET: Good. It's time you paid your share.

MR. COCKE: "Good," that member said. "About time." Well, Mr. Speaker, let me tell you, his district is getting robbed worse than ours, and he's not even getting off his fat seat and getting up here and telling the minister what he thinks of it. That's the member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet), just in case Hansard didn't notice who it was. The member for North Peace River says "good," when he sees that New Westminster is being robbed; but I'm telling you that his area is being robbed even worse, and he's not even getting up and saying a word about it.

Well, Mr. Speaker, we are not only very tired of carrying the load that we have for the funding of the school system, but we're also becoming extremely tired with the dictatorial powers of the Ministry of Education. I'm not at all sure whether this minister even understands what he is doing. I give him that much credit: there is some doubt whether he knows what he's doing. But somebody — and he's responsible — has placed the whole school system in this province in jeopardy.

The financing and the centralization, Mr. Speaker, are more than we can bear. I have to go home and listen to more of what the parents in New Westminster have to say, and what the school board has to say about this act, and it is not pleasant at all.

We're at a stage in the discussion of this bill where the minister could very easily pull it, go back to cabinet, discuss the gravity of what he has done and what he is in the process of doing, and come back with an entirely new look at the whole question of school financing in B.C.

He's using the heavy hand to totally control the school system. He should have sent a thank-you note to all the school boards in British Columbia, saying: "Thanks for all that work that you've done over the years, but you're no longer needed. I'm going to run everything from Victoria, as this government likes to do with everything." That's not good enough, Mr. Speaker.

When that party first ran in 1975, remember what their emblem was? It was a seagull flying though the air and

[ Page 7258 ]

talking about decentralization and freedom. We have more centralization in the short period of time that these people have been government than we had in all of the days of W.A.C. Bennett. He kept a fairly tight rein on things, but nothing like this lack of the democratic process that we have now.

What has the minister done for himself? Whoever his advisers are who talked him into this, what have they done? They've even said that the Regulation Act does not apply. They are giving him a free hand to do anything he wants — and the member for North Peace River isn't speaking on the bill. For heaven's sake, where is the conscience of the back bench of the Social Credit Party? If they don't speak now, Mr. Speaker, let them forever hold their peace; they have their consciences to live with. Let them once more read this bill. And I ask the minister to read this bill once more, to think about where he's taking education, and pull the bill. Hoist it; go back to cabinet; tell them you were wrong and come back with a decent piece of legislation that we can all support.

Right now, Mr. Speaker, I guarantee there will not be a member of the opposition who will support this bill. And I will further guarantee this: there will be members of the back bench and even members of the cabinet who will be so reluctant on the vote of this bill that it's going to be the hardest thing they ever did in their life. It's going to be difficult, Mr. Speaker, but let their consciences guide them.

I ask that this bill be withdrawn until such time as the minister has had a good chance to think about what he is doing to education in B.C. I will not support this bill, Mr. Speaker.

MR. BRUMMET: Mr. Speaker, until yesterday I had not planned to get involved in the discussion on this bill, because really what we're dealing with here is a strictly political discussion. I know this is a political place. Because I am reluctant to get involved in this partisan political issue over education, then I'm accused over and over again of taking no interest in education. I don't think anything could be further from the truth, Mr. Speaker. I have a genuine interest in education, because I spent 28 years in the field. I do not have a partisan political interest in education, and really that is all that those members have offered.

The member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) stated moments ago that he would guarantee that every member of the opposition would vote against this bill. What a surprise!

MR. SPEAKER: Now to the principle of the bill.

MR. BRUMMET: I support the basic principle of this bill. I am not entirely happy with everything that it does specifically to the people in my constituency. However, I will not accept that I have done nothing simply because I have not got involved in a partisan political debate. I have spent all of my life trying to achieve things. I did not spend my life as a member of a debating society, as though that is what accomplishes things.

I have been working. I have met with each of my school districts; I have discussed exactly what it does to their particular situation. I have talked to the minister. I have met with ministry officials. I have been collecting all the facts possible.

I see this business of what the opposition is saying, that the minister is taking control; that he has not put the specific figures into this bill; that he has left room to make decisions.

They see that as a negative thing, but then of course they see everything as a negative thing. I see that as a very positive thing in this bill, because it does allow the minister the flexibility....

MR. COCKE: To do anything he wants.

MR. BRUMMET: Yes, if you like, it allows the minister to do anything he wants. However, I'll tell you something: this minister and this government are accountable to the people of this province. I don't think he's accountable to the opposition's negative things. He's accountable, as is this government, to the taxpayers and the people of this province. Any decisions that are made will be held accountable. I have great faith that the people of this province will hold us accountable and will hold the opposition accountable. Now you don't seem to think that that is the case, Mr. Member, but they will. What we're talking about here in this....

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. May I ask the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) and the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) not to disrupt the proceedings of the House.

MR. BRUMMET: Mr. Speaker, I see a great deal of necessary flexibility in this bill. I have been working with my school districts and with my boards to try to come up with solutions to the specific problems. I find it rather interesting that sometime in December, when the assessments went up greatly in the metropolitan areas, the opposition had concern about how the existing formula really hurt the people who chose to live in the metropolitan areas, who chose to live in much more expensive houses and in much more favourable circumstances than the people in our northern ridings. They were quite upset with how much those people were going to pay. It's rather interesting now to see the members of the opposition showing their great concern for the northern ridings, because all of a sudden there may be a few votes there.

They prey on dissatisfaction, Mr. Member, and certainly there is dissatisfaction whenever any of us feel that we're paying more than our fair share. So at one point they are saying that the metropolitan areas.... The member for New Westminster just said it a few minutes ago, about subsidizing the rest of the province. Nothing could be further from the truth. You know something, Mr. Speaker, I didn't hear any of these members in the opposition defending the Fort Nelson situation, when the tax collected in the Fort Nelson district was considerably above the total educational costs in those districts. At that time they were concerned with theirs; isn't it amazing how concerned they now are with our ridings? What was their first reaction? Automatic attack before the facts were out — encouraged by those members of the opposition.

I guess you could say they never disregard problems, because in any problem there may possibly be a vote. They foster discontent. They even promote it. They say: "Now look, it's strictly political. Economics has nothing to do with it." Of course, that is great politics, but it does very little to resolve any problems.

Some of our backbenchers have been working diligently to try to resolve some problems instead of to define them. We have definition of problem after definition of problem, but it

[ Page 7259 ]

does very little to resolve them. We're not capitalizing on dissatisfaction or on discontentment; we're looking for solutions, and I think there is a solution in this bill. There is the basic principle of restraint and there is an attempt at equalization. I'm quite prepared to discuss that the intent did not come out quite as it should have because of the calculation, a point that is overlooked time and time and time again in this province. We look at averages, and those average figures, particularly in unique circumstances, are meaningless. But the decisions are based on average figures because that makes more sense.

For instance, I wonder if the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) knows this, to get away from the averages. If you take the standard three-bedroom home of about 1,100 square feet on a representative lot in any community in this province, and then find out from its assessment authorities what the assessment value is, you will find that that standard home in Fort Nelson pays about twice the school taxes as that same home in the metropolitan area. The averages don't show that. We have a lot of above-standard homes in the metropolitan area, and we have a lot of below-standard, so the average is brought down. Mill rates are attached to those assessments, and when you have that lower assessment, you have to have a higher mill rate to raise a comparable amount of money. In the larger communities, in the metropolitan areas, you have that higher assessment, so you can afford a lower mill rate. So that standard house is double taxed in those rural areas. We've gone to great pains to point that out to the ministry people, because it was missed in dealing with averages. We have done a lot of work on that.

This bill deals with asking for some responsible behaviour generally across this province. You cannot just keep talking to the taxpayers or taking from the taxpayers whatever is going to be spent on the basis of the decisions of government. The taxpayers have to pay the bill.

The opposition has said a great deal about the fact that the provincial government is now going to be paying about 75 percent of the tax bill in general, with those anomalies that I referred to earlier. But what they hesitate to point out is that for years they have suggested that 75 percent of the revenue should come from the province to pay for educational programs. If 75 percent financial contribution under Social Credit means 75 percent control, I would suggest that 75 percent contribution from any government means 75 percent control. So what really are we arguing here? That it's bad for one side to do it after the other sides have done it? Are we kidding the people when we say: "Now we'll pay 100 percent of the cost, but you can keep your entire tax base"? That's the kind of ridiculous conclusion or inference that is made, and it just doesn't add up.

AN HON. MEMBER: They've still got to pay.

MR. BRUMMET: Yes, they pay in one way or another.

I am concerned about this. What is meant by local autonomy? Local autonomy seems to be that decision-making is at the local level. Should that local autonomy then include also the raising of all the funds at the local level? I recall — and I was in the educational system at the time — when we had local referenda on operating expenses for school districts. Many of those were turned down despite our finest sales pitches, saying: "Look, this is something that we need. This is something that is worthwhile. It will only cost you a little bit." In many places those referenda were turned down, because at that point we allowed the taxpayers to make the decisions. And it was difficult to budget, to plan. So I will accept the change made that was that we do not have a referendum on every decision that has to be made about public spending. I can accept that, because from year to year you never knew where you were. I was on some of the budget committees in the school district when the taxpayers said: "No, you can only have so much." We spent a lot of time working on just how to live with that, because we didn't have the option of saying to somebody: "Well, let's just run a big deficit and then somebody will pay the tab."

This is basically what is being said by this government restraint program in this bill. It says that we have to act responsibly. If we simply say, "Here's what we think you should do, but if it happens to cost you twice as much as what's available, don't worry about it, the government will pick it up," we do not let people know that the government is them when it comes to finances. They are the government of this province when it comes to paying the bills. All we do in government is skim a little off the top to handle it and give back what we take from them. Really, we have to tell people that they are the government.

Many of the decisions that are being made now about the cutbacks and where the cutbacks are to be made are being made at the local level. So there is that local autonomy. It is human nature to say: "Look, we need more money." In my own personal financing, as long as I can get more money or have more money on hand, I find that I spend more. It's only when I find that I've run out of money that I quit spending money. This is basically what's happening here. In other words, we're facing a reality.

Let me suggest this: there is an awful lot of criticism about the fact that administrators at the school district level do not have autonomy, that the teachers do not have autonomy. Mr. Speaker, administrators in the schools have always had a great deal of autonomy if they chose to exercise it. If you want to get off the hook for every decision you make, you go to the blue book or some other book to ask for that decision. I spent many years as a teacher in the classroom. I had very good local autonomy. I was handed a textbook and a guideline, say, for teaching mathematics. I didn't spend much of my time, as many people do, saying: "I've been restricted. I've got to teach from page 1 to page 300 and I've got to follow all these hoops and so on." I looked at that program and I thought I would teach mathematics, and where the pages fitted, I used it. Where the pages of the textbook or the workbook didn't fit, I just went ahead and taught mathematics. And I was challenged. They said: "Look, you're not following the program."

The way I acquired local autonomy was by saying that I would stake my job and my reputation. "If you want to test those students at the end of the year to see how they do in mathematics and they fall down, then you have a right to say that my way does not work." But when we're willing — any of us.... There are many teachers in that system who go ahead and teach. They don't feel that restricted by guidelines. In the first page of any guideline from the curriculum department it says that the book shall not be treated as the prescription but as a guideline. People then treat it as a prescription because it's much safer to work within a prescription, and away they go. When you get outside of that prescription, Mr. Speaker, you have to take some chances. The people who are willing to take some chances are the ones who have complete and full autonomy in the educational system.

[ Page 7260 ]

We've had members say that this finance bill, this restraint program, is going to damage our society. I cannot accept that. I think that the more we take away people from doing things for themselves, the more we damage our society, and Lord knows, we've done enough damage.

A lot has been said about quality education. When we hear from the members of the opposition, it seems that quality education has a direct correlation with the amount of money you spend on it. I cannot accept that. You can spend all the money you like, and it does not guarantee you quality education. Let me give you a couple of examples, again, from my personal experience. When we had to cut back in the school system because the taxpayers turned down the referendum, we looked at a number of things. We had to cut out some workbooks and a lot of duplicating of paper in the school system. It resulted in many of the students no longer filling in blanks in the workbooks and no longer just underlining the correct word on a work paper. The teacher was using the blackboard. The chalk was much cheaper than all this paper and workbooks, and the students wrote answers. They didn't have words to underline. I suggest that we did not lose quality of education, but, in fact, we improved it.

As a previous member of the teaching profession and still a great advocate of the teaching system — because I know that there are many good teachers in this province — I was very upset when their federation pushed for and when arbitration boards awarded teachers the right to be paid for noon-hour supervision or any part of it. We had ridiculous situations; teachers were taking 20 minutes each at noon hour and getting $90 among three of them for supervising children — a job I always considered part of the teaching job. I have said so publicly, and I know I have teachers who are mad at me.

As teachers, we can't talk about educating the whole child and our concern about the whole person and then say: "Let's give it to less professional people during that free time between 12 o'clock and 1 o'clock. That is a very significant philosophical point, if you like. Some people in this profession are trying to make good teachers into hourly workers. You cannot be concerned about children and education in this province if it only works between 9 o'clock and 12 o'clock, and 1 o'clock and 3 o'clock. In my opinion you cannot do that. I'm suggesting that if we toss out some of those insidious things that have crept into the educational system by saying that we care more if we get paid more and are paid for the extras.... If we can eliminate some of that thinking, we can do a better job in education than we can by simply pumping more money into it.

Let me give you another analogy about special education. I know it's important. I know the minister has allowed for special consideration for special education, because the people with the greatest needs should be the ones that deserve the greatest consideration. Using a little hyperbole to make the point, I'm going to suggest this: when I first started teaching, we had complete integration and we had mainstreaming, partly because we didn't have any other choice. We had the students in those classes and we were involved. We tried to incorporate them. We didn't do the excellent job that some of the special-education specialists are doing with them, but we included them.

Then we found that we might be able to do a better job in education if we screened out some of these people who needed the most help and dealt with them in a specialized way. I was in favour of that and supported that. What I found though was that because that helped, we then kept tightening the screen. We got more people at the specialized level to keep moving the screen closer together, so we kept screening out more and more of these people. We could theoretically end up with at least 50 percent of the students out of the regular situation in special situations. That helped them, but it also separated them, Mr. Speaker, and it left less attention for the rest. We've done a fairly good job with special education, but I think we're probably around to the point now where we've got to hire special coordinators to assimilate these pupils back into the same situation. We have spent a lot of time and money taking them out, and now we're talking about spending more money to mainstream them back in. So we've gone full cycle. I'm not saying it was all bad — there were some good things — but I think we've got hung up on our own cleverness. We knew exactly how to deal with problems by separating them, and the last thing we should have been doing is separating kids out of that situation, because now we found that the best thing is to assimilate them and to deal with them in there.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

We talked about having to have all this money, etc. Mr. Speaker, when I first started teaching my first assignment was in a small country school with 48 pupils in three grades — grades 4, 5 and 6. It was a horribly difficult assignment, but I learned a great deal from that, and there were other teachers in the same boat. I learned that you couldn't do everything; you couldn't give every pupil an assignment and then correct it. No matter how many hours a day I worked, I could not deal with that; I could not have pupils write paragraphs or essays and correct every one of them. There just wasn't time in addition to preparing the lessons. In self-defence, because I was a very inexperienced teacher at the time, I allowed the pupils to help each other a great deal, and that was a valuable lesson which I kept even when I had smaller classes: if the pupils are helping to teach each other and to learn from each other, you can do a fairly good job of quality education even in difficult circumstances.

Nowhere would I ever want to go back to three grades and 48 pupils in one classroom. If I hadn't been young and enthusiastic, it probably would have killed me. However, I did learn some valuable lessons from that. When I talk about special education, I know a little bit about what I'm speaking of. In addition to being an administrator, for three years I took a special-education group of teenagers. Incidentally, it did not fit into the guidebooks from the ministry. It was the occupational program, and we had to have at least 500 pupils in the school. I was stuck — I only had 50 in the secondary grades — but I was allowed so many teachers. Anyway, we worked it out. I had local autonomy by convincing the people that it would be a better situation if I took a group of students who were going nowhere in the regular program and were making it difficult for everybody. Maybe it sounds as if I'm contradicting myself by saying here I was segregating. I segregated them but worked them back in.

Mr. Speaker, those students did very well academically, and part of it, I think, was because we had to scrounge. We could get the programs, but we didn't get the bucks. We had to scrounge for books, for reading material, for almost anything we needed. I think our budget for extra items was $15, and with that $15 we started and we scrounged and we managed to get a workshop, we managed to get sewing machines, and an awful lot was done. I thought I was helping

[ Page 7261 ]

them just with the vocational skills, but when they started doing that, their reading skills, their math skills, their social studies skills and everything else improved. I wish I knew exactly what I had done, because it would be nice to write a book and say that this will work, but I don't think it will work in every circumstance, Mr. Speaker. That situation worked in that particular system at that time.

A great deal came about because we had to learn to help ourselves. I think we've taken far too much of that away. We've tried to put in front of them whatever is necessary, and we've got to the point in many cases, Mr. Speaker, where in order to teach pupils to write we give them a paragraph or an essay on a sheet of paper, and we say: "Underline the good parts." Then years later we wonder why they cannot write. Because we've got so much available, they don't need to write; all they have to do is put check marks. I'm exaggerating to a point. There are a lot of good teachers who are still asking students to write or to correctly write down the math question before they try to solve it, rather than have it all on a printed worksheet, just filling in the answers underneath. You can get the answers from the answer book. I used to stay to students: "If you want to copy the answers from the answer book, here, you've got it. You won't learn anything, and you might fool me for a while." The students didn't violate that.

I'll go back to one other thing in school. We talk about gymnasiums and playgrounds and other things. We didn't have the money for a softball diamond or a soccer field, so we mooched a disc and a harrow from a local farmer, who roughed up the field; we got rakes and the kids raked the schoolground, and then they had a softball diamond and a soccer field. We wouldn't want our children to have to do that to have playing facilities nowadays. But I can tell you one thing, Mr. Speaker: nobody in that community ever ran a car across those kids' schoolgrounds. I didn't have to police it; no authorities had to police it. If anybody had run a car over all their work, they would have killed them — you know I'm exaggerating there. It was theirs; they had input. They made a contribution, and they valued it that much more. We have taken a great deal of that away from people. We provide things, then we provide the policing and maintenance to fix it up after others have.... Students do not have a vested interest — their labour, their efforts — in what they've accomplished, so it's not their concern if somebody destroys it. That's the government's problem — government at any level, if you like. We have done the same thing with the teachers in our educational system. I feel it has happened very gradually, but it's been accelerating in recent years, and it's very insidious. It's been creeping in. We have convinced more and more teachers that if education isn't going well it's the fault of not enough money from government. That is not true.

I'm not saying that we should starve the educational system. I'm simply saying that money in itself is not the answer. I've always found that when the idea itself is very good, generally the money will flow. We've almost reached the point where they say: "Give us the money, and we'll come up with a good idea." It's difficult. It wouldn't be so bad if we had a magic pot to take this out of, and say: "Here, whatever you need, go to it." But we don't have a magic pot. The only pot we have is the taxpayers and the resource industries of this province, and we need to get the revenue from them.

Speaking of the resource industries, because this government is continuing to spend money on what have been so glibly labelled megaprojects, they've been condemned. It's said they're not interested in people. They're not interested in education and the students in this province because they spend money on industrial development. To use an analogy, I'm going to suggest that if any municipality in this province simply said, "Give us your money, dear taxpayers. We are not going to create an industrial park. We are not going to spend any money on trying to attract industry to this town. We are simply going to give you the best streets and the best schools and the best scenery and the best trees and the best parks, but we're not going to spend any money on industrial parks or industrial development," it would be terrific. Unfortunately we've deluded people into thinking: "The more we get, the greater it is." What we have to realize is that in a very short time that municipality wouldn't have any use for those facilities. The people would not be there because the jobs would not be there because the revenue would not be there, and they couldn't maintain those facilities.

For every $100 million spent in developing B.C. Place, northeast coal and so on, I wish there was another $100 million available for education, health services and so on. We're finding that this government has put a priority on that; they've put all the money into it that they can. But I cannot and will not support the principle that we should take all the money that we have and all the money that we can borrow and create facilities and programs and educational opportunities, or whatever, for our people, and disregard the fact that in the future, to maintain those and keep them up, we've got to have some sources of revenue. Those sources of revenue are going to be our coal projects, our B.C. Place and so on.

We had the ridiculous situation years ago when the Social Credit government decided, finally and at last, to build roads into the northern and isolated communities. I heard the argument over and over again: why waste money on roads? Spend it on people. It's a good thing that government at that time did not listen, because if they hadn't built those roads and provided those links with the resource-producing areas of this province, we would not have....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Perhaps the hon. member could relate to the bill before us, the Education (Interim) Finance Act.

MR. BRUMMET: I'm sorry, Mr. Speaker, I thought I was, because we're on this restraint program. I could say a great deal more. I realize, because of this political forum, anything you say — any item — can be taken out of context and then used. But that's the risk you take, and I'm quite willing to accept that.

I'd like to say one other thing. Well, perhaps it's not related to the bill, so perhaps I'll leave that part out.

In general, I would like to suggest that we would not need to cut a single teacher or a single program out of our schools under the restraint program if we accepted some very basic considerations to get us out of the straitjacket of thinking that we've got ourselves into. For instance, in the educational system at least 75 percent of the budget is taken up in payroll — employee wages, benefits, etc. If even a small percentage reduction in that payroll were accepted by individuals, a considerable amount would be left in that budget. Again, I mention that the payroll is at least 75 percent of the school budget. It varies from district to district.

We have taught our people to say that everything is government's responsibility, rather than any individual's re-

[ Page 7262 ]

sponsibility. So we have absolved ourselves of individual responsibility, because we can always put the blame on government, forgetting that government is us. All of us, collectively, are the government of this province, regardless of which party is sitting on which side of the House. We would not need to lose any of those programs. If we moderated some of those salary increases and considered some restructuring.... There are places in the system, in any system, where instead of the pyramid — at the top are the highest paid and at the bottom, where the greatest portion of the pyramid is, are the people who deliver the services.... We put too much emphasis up at the top where we have those people in the decision-making position of recommending where the cuts should be made. They're recommending that the cuts not be made at their level. They want them made down at that other level. Those are the people who are being attacked. That's where the programs have to be cut. They don't need to be cut. I think we have to assume some individual responsibility as well as government responsibility.

I've said that on several occasions now in this House, and I think this bill is responsible in the sense that it says: "We must exercise some restraint." I have, as I said before, a lot of arguments about some individual effects that it has on the metropolitan areas as compared to the rural areas. Those I will deal with in the best form — in a positive way.

MS. BROWN: I ask leave of the House to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

MS. BROWN: Seated in the gallery is a group of students from Burnaby South Senior Secondary School. They're accompanied by their teacher, Heather Mitten. I wonder if the House would join me in bidding them welcome.

MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the last speaker, and quite frankly I'm sorry that he feels that the opposition's objection to this particular bill that's before the House is strictly a political matter. I would hope to disabuse him of that idea before I finish my remarks, but before I get to that point, I'm not sure whether the member has read the bill or not, because the main portion of the bill which the opposition is objecting to is that section that deprives local school boards of a tax base that they have had historically. It's not that they're asking for something new; it's simply that they are being deprived, through this bill, of the right to tax commercial and industrial developments within the community that the board represents. So to that extent it's the theft of taxation power by the provincial government away from the local school boards. I can imagine the cries of anguish from the provincial government if the federal government were to intrude into any of the areas of provincial jurisdiction with respect to taxation. The member over there seems to feel it's just fine for the provincial government to come in with their hands out and make the big tax grab away from the locally elected municipal school boards throughout the province.

I got a charge out of the member who just sat down. I don't want to take him out of context, because that member is a bit accident prone, Mr. Speaker, but he did say, and the record will show, that one of the most insidious things that has crept into the system is the right for school teachers to have a lunch and get paid for it. Now isn't that terribly insidious, Mr. Speaker? I wonder if the member would like to share the plush parliamentary cafeteria, which is subsidized at taxpayer's expense and enjoyed by all members of this House, with other workers in the province of British Columbia. I wonder how he can justify his patronage of that facility in these buildings while referring to a teacher's right to a paid lunch as an insidious thing. Where's the consistency? That's sounds a bit hypocritical to me.

I want to say that my main concerns about the removal of this local taxation are similar to those outlined by my colleague from Skeena (Mr. Howard) when he talked about the high cost involved in a whole variety of matters which are more or less peculiar to rural communities in the province of British Columbia. We in Revelstoke have an average snowfall of around 150 inches. The cost of snow removal in that school district to our municipal council is a matter which is unique and peculiar to that community. It's a matter which imposes a higher cost on that school district than it does in an area like the Fraser Valley, for instance. That's obvious. I think even a former high school principal can understand that equation. We have some higher costs and now the commercial taxation base, which assisted us in offering a similar standard of services to those of other areas of the province, and provided for some special programs in the school system, is being eroded by this tax grab by the provincial government.

We were promised by the Social Credit government some many years ago that the Columbia River Treaty dams that were within the school district would be taxed for local school taxation purposes, which would have brought a great additional source of revenue to the three school districts involved in that particular area. The government has reneged on that promise, depriving those school districts of a source of revenue that should have been available to them. They are not satisfied with removing that source of revenue; under this bill they are deprived of the right to earn revenue from other industrial and commercial developments in the community.

The member says it's political. Mr. Speaker, I have two letters here, one from School District 19 at Revelstoke and one from School District 89 in the Shuswap district. I want to read what they say. The member asked what local autonomy means. Here's what it means to the boards of these two school districts which I have mentioned. From the secretary treasurer of School District 19 in Revelstoke:

"The Board of School Trustees of School District 19, having been advised that the Minister of Municipal Affairs is proposing a county system of local government, inform the Premier, the cabinet and the local MLA that this board believes that any system of local government, county or otherwise, must adhere to the following principles so that the sovereign rights of parents to control the education of their children locally and directly is protected."

School District 89 at Salmon Arm passed this resolution: "The public school system must be governed by people locally elected for the specific and sole task of governing the schools and having taxing authority for that purpose." The member suggests this is political — that the opposition is playing games. Well, Mr. Speaker, maybe that member doesn't know who the chairman of School District 89 is. I want to tell him who that man is: Mr. C.C. (Cliff) Michael, chairman of the board, who is the announced candidate for the Social Credit nomination in my riding. Now if the Social

[ Page 7263 ]

Credit chairman of School District 89 interprets autonomy as being the right of local people to guide and to be responsible for the education of their children and to have taxing authority, it should be pretty clear that people involved in the education system throughout the length and breadth of the province, not only the opposition, are very concerned about the centralist tax grab that this bill constitutes. That's the issue.

Perhaps the Social Credit sitting MLAs, those who are elected to the back bench, should start having a chat with some of the people they have elected or are proposing to nominate throughout the province, so there could be some consistency in the policy that they are advocating for the administration of our school system.

As my colleagues have said, it's a centralist grab for control by the Minister of Education, it is anti-democratic, and it's going to erode the opportunity for equality of education between the rural, less densely populated areas of the province as opposed to North Vancouver and Oak Bay, where the minister comes from, where there's high-density residential population and a tax base can be maintained from that source. Once again he is discriminating against the smaller rural communities throughout the length and breadth of the province of British Columbia, and I oppose that very strongly, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SKELLY: It's a pleasure to take my place in this debate on behalf of the citizens of Port Alberni. Before I go into the principle of the bill, maybe I should outline some of the problems that the people of Port Alberni are facing at the moment, while the minister is leaving the chamber.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

As you know, Port Alberni is almost entirely based on the recovery of forest resources and the manufacture of timber by MacMillan Bloedel Ltd. It's essentially a company town. As the problem in the worldwide market for lumber and forest products has developed, Port Alberni has suffered relatively more than most other communities in the province of British Columbia. Thousands of people are out of work as a result of mill shutdowns and curtailments in the harvesting operations in the forest industry. People on apprenticeship programs have been laid off or terminated and, after years of effort in learning their trade, have no hope that in the future they will be returned to the apprenticeship programs. Many people have been told that they cannot expect ever to be hired back in their jobs again. In some cases, Mr. Speaker, we're talking about people with 5, 10, 15 and 20 years seniority in the same operation.

In a community that's always been proud of the contribution that it has given to this province in the form of resource wealth and the labour that people can apply to the resources of British Columbia to produce wealth for this province, they've always had that pride in their labour, enterprise and creativity and have never stinted in making the wealth produced available to the people of the province. But they have to wonder, when legislation comes down like this, just what kind of thanks they get when times are tough. When they're crushed down, probably more than most other people in the province — certainly more than people in the highly developed urban areas — and when those who work in the forest resource industry and the forest manufacturing industry suffer, then nothing goes out to them.

It's interesting to read in the throne speeches in this province over the ten years that I've been a member of this Legislative Assembly that we always recognize the contributions of those in the forest industry who have given their all to contribute to the economy in this province. We hear about H.R. MacMillan; we hear about the forest giants who have carved industry out of the hinterland of this province; and we hear very little on a day-to-day basis about those people who go out into the forest, cut down the trees, buck the logs and bring the material back to the factory. Their injuries, their deaths, don't really make too much of an impression; their suffering doesn't make much of an impression when it comes to writing the glowing reports in the throne speech.

Morale in Port Alberni is low at this time, Mr. Speaker. When you wonder why people on this side feel negative about the economy of British Columbia, take a visit to Port Alberni. Take a look at some of the mills that are shut down. Take a look at some of the homes in which those forest industry workers were living. They are now having some difficulty and some uncertainty about whether they'll keep those homes for the near future, whether they're going to have jobs to go back to, and whether they'll have boats and cars. There's no certainty as to whether they will be working in the future and whether they will be able to provide for their children some of the assets that their labour has produced over the years.

And then what happens, Mr. Speaker, when the government starts talking about restraint, and it's a question of upon whom this restraint is going to be imposed? Port Alberni, with all of its layoffs, with thousands of people on the streets — thousands of people who have had the dignity to work for their income for 5, 10, 15 and 20 years for the same company, who have had the opportunity to produce that wealth I was talking about for all of the citizens of British Columbia.... Now that they're down, the government takes another kick at them in the form of higher taxes: property taxes have gone up; assessments have increased 90 percent and beyond 100 percent; Hydro rates have gone up by 30 percent. What effect does that have on people whose income has been slashed down to a third or a fourth or even less of their previous income, an income which they now get from sources such as unemployment insurance or welfare?

The one thing that can be called the growth sector in Port Alberni now is the Ministry of Human Resources, which has had to hire additional staff in order to look after the loggers and the millworkers who now have no other source of income, having been out of work for something like 18 months to two years.

They were kicked again with higher medical plan premiums, because after they lose their employment, of course, the employer no longer contributes, and they end up paying on their own. There are higher insurance premiums; higher licence fees; higher gas taxes; higher cigarette, alcohol and tobacco taxes — and on top of that we get this bill.

It was announced last week that the hospital in Port Alberni is going to be cut back by half a million dollars on its current budget. What is it going to mean? It's going to mean a loss of 30 jobs, a lessening of service through that hospital — services desperately needed by the people in Port Alberni, whether they work or not.

They received a kick from the budget speech when they finally figured out that unconditional grants to the municipalities, even after the other grants had been rolled in, will result in a loss to that municipality of over $400,000 in

[ Page 7264 ]

provincial grants. There will be higher taxes inevitably, and a lowering of the services provided by the municipality.

The final blow was when the minister announced that $300,000 would have to be trimmed from a school board budget that was already trimmed to the bone, and that it was going to require staff layoffs this year and in the coming year. Twenty-eight teachers will be gone as a result of the minister's decision, 18 support staff will be gone as a result of the minister's decision, 43 temporary teachers have been informed this month that their services will no longer be required in Port Alberni as a result of the minister's decision, and five community schools will be shut down as a result of the minister's decision. It's those five schools, more than anything else in Port Alberni, that have drawn the anger of the people of Port Alberni away from the school board and directly onto that minister and this government, because those schools in Port Alberni were what we thought the school system was all about.

A lot of people, especially on the other side, criticize the public school system for being too big, for not providing the kind of individual services that some students require and for not serving the student on an individual one-to-one basis. But Port Alberni had the best of both worlds. It had a community school concept based on small schools in community areas that provided that kind of one-to-one education. It provided that kind of innovation and imagination and involved the parents in those schools so that the students were known to every parent and the teachers were known to every parent. Everybody knew the aims and objectives of those individual schools. It was a system you could really understand and get your hands on and get a grasp of.

As a result of the minister's decree, in one stroke those schools were shut down. Twenty-five hundred parents have signed a petition asking the minister to change his mind. At the B.C. Teachers Federation annual general meeting a few weeks ago, the president of the Alberni District Teachers Association approached the minister. He explained the problems in Port Alberni and the minister at that time agreed that the measures appeared to be too harsh. He promised to look into it and report back to the president of the Alberni District Teachers Association, which he did not do.

Yesterday those schools were officially closed by the school board, and as of the end of June those community schools will no longer be operating. The kids that went to those schools — including my kids — will now be forced into larger schools where they'll have less teacher attention and where programs will be curtailed because for logistic reasons they don't offer the variety of programs in larger schools that they could offer in the community schools. Port Alberni will have lost a unique type of education that the school board spent years in developing and perfecting — a type of education that was unique in those schools and that the school trustees, parents and students were uniquely proud of. Now that pride is gone, because, of course, with a stroke of the pen, the minister wiped out that community-school system.

What kind of priorities does this government have? Why would the minister insist on wiping out a system of education that people were proud of and that parents were willing to cooperate in and provide hundreds and thousands of volunteer hours of their time?

The member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet) talked about paying teachers for supervision at lunch-hour. In these schools, the parents were so excited about the way their children were being educated that they provided that volunteer support at lunch-time. They provided volunteer support in the classroom. My wife provided music instruction, because the board wasn't able to finance music teachers. Parents contributed to that type of school system and it was unique for Port Alberni — in fact it was unique for a number of areas of the province. With a stroke of a pen the minister killed it.

The schools are going to be moth-balled at a cost to the taxpayers of Port Alberni. The lights are going to be kept on and the furnaces are going to be kept going and the windows are going to be boarded up. That's not going to stop the vandalism. The money invested by the taxpayers of this province and the people of Port Alberni.... They'll be able to drive by those schools and watch that investment being destroyed. Worst of all is the investment in that type of education that will be very difficult to replace, if ever. The minister has destroyed, without any thought whatsoever and as carelessly as you can sign a piece of paper, an important and unique educational system in Port Alberni which can never be replaced. Certainly he will never attempt to replace it.

Why are these things being destroyed? Why does the government have the kind of priorities that it has in these issues?We look at the television. We look at the newspapers and listen to the radios and hear the government telling us to get the B.C. spirit. Is this the spirit? Crush the type of education system that you have. Is this the spirit? Shut down the hospitals and cancel the services which they provide. Is this the spirit? Deprive municipalities of the services they've been providing. Is that the spirit?

And where is all the money going? I remember 1975, when the Premier was telling us that the government can do nothing with the wealth of this province; that it's all one big pie; that it's a choice of either the government taking more of the pie or the people getting more. It is a big pie, and certain people are getting more of it than certain others. The megaproject in downtown Vancouver — $1.7 billion. The northeast coal project, with its brand new schools, brand new townsites, brand new elementary schools, brand new public services, brand new highways, brand new railways, brand new transmission lines. Yet the people in the rural areas of this province, in the resource areas, who have been producing the wealth of this province for year after year — before your time, Mr. Speaker — are being deprived day by day, bled day by day, denied the services that they have a right to day by day, in order to feed those megaprojects that are being put together by this government, a government trapped into the same kind of megaproject mentality that trapped the Liberal-dominated coalition prior to 1952; trapped into supporting the urban ridings exclusively, the wealthy urban ridings, because of their Liberal-dominated Social Credit government.

Look at who is in the inner circle of this government — not you, Mr. Speaker, but the other ones. Look at who is in the inner circle. When the member from West Vancouver broke party ranks to join the party over there, and when the members for Point Grey broke ranks to joined the party over there, the Socreds didn't absorb them; the Liberals took over what used to be the Social Credit Party and brought with them that mentality of dragging the resource wealth, stealing the resource wealth from the rural areas of the province and expending it in Vancouver and in megaprojects in northeast coal. People in areas like Port Alberni are being robbed of services, robbed of schools, robbed of municipal functions,

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robbed of health services so that those Liberal-dominated Socreds can invest the money in two specific areas of the province.

The wealth can be divided in a fairer and more distributive way. In the middle of an economic recession, the things you do not cut are those things that are going to be the building blocks for future generations of children: the education, health services and basic municipal services that people require in order to go to work on a healthy and well-educated basis from day to day. Those people are the ones who are going to apply their imagination, industry and initiative to bring this economic recession to an end. It's not going to be done by megaprojects, which are part of the problem.

If this government truly believes in exercising restraint, they should exercise some restraint in the cutthroat way they've treated school districts throughout the province. They should exercise some restraint in the cutthroat way they've handled hospital budgets throughout the province. They should exercise some restraint in the cutthroat way they've handled municipalities throughout the province and provide those people with the basic means for ensuring our economic recovery, rather than bleeding them blind in order to build monuments in Vancouver and in the northeast coal sector. Those projects will come, and they can come over a period of time; we don't have to build them all at once so that they will be monuments right there for the next election. We could build them over time and make sure that the wealth of this province is distributed more fairly to the people who have produced it.

I certainly intend to vote against this bill. I think it distributes money in the wrong way, I think it's evidence of a government that has distorted priorities, and I cannot in good conscience support the bill.

MR. MITCHELL: I would like to join with my colleagues in expressing my disgust with this bill and go over a few of the facts that I feel are important, facts that maybe have been missed. For the benefit of the House I'm not going to repeat many of the valid arguments that were put forward by my colleagues, arguments that fit my constituency every bit as well as theirs.

I do have some very deep fears. The main fear that I'm worried about is the lack of democracy, the centralization within the ministry of directives that can be given to a school board. School boards are elected, and they are one of the grassroots organizations within our democracy. The parents, the taxpayers know what type of school budget the community can afford, they know what type of programs are needed, and they know additional facts that no bureaucracy within Victoria can — centralized as it is, burdened down with the work that.... They have to look after the detailed directions that a school board must embark on when they're elected. This bill has a section that gives the minister the power to set directives in secret. How do we in the opposition and people in the school board know that equal educational opportunity throughout the province will be given to each and every child that is born here, each and every child that goes to school, when the open discussion that happens in local school boards, the open input that is received from the taxpayers, from the parents, from the teachers and the school, can be made null and void by some directive of some bureaucrat somewhere in the bureaucracy? This fear is held not only by me and my colleagues but also by many people out in the communities.

We look at it in detail as we go through the bill. It is an awesome bill. The power that is vested in that minister is so awesome. He's a personal friend of mine of long acquaintance, and I have a great respect for him as an individual. But it is not laid down that he will be the member responsible for these decisions: it lies with the Minister of Education, and as you know, the life of a Minister of Education in this province is many times short-lived. The long-term planning, the long-term responsibility of that person is not laid down. It changes with the political winds; it changes with the fighting within cabinet as to who is going to get the plums of a cabinet appointment. Although this minister is a very broad-minded person, a person with a lot of background in the community.... It's interesting to note that when he was in a different position, when he was with the UBCM as mayor of Oak Bay, he had one position. Now that he's sitting as the Minister of Education — under the direction of the cabinet, under the direction of the 31 Social Credit MLAs — he has a different position. This is what I fear; it becomes a political decision. The decision must rest back in the community, it must rest with the elected school boards, and that is the decision that I'm worried about.

Another major thing in this bill that I find, if you like, terrifying is the confiscation — the word has been used — of the industrial and commercial base from the school district and transferal into the hands of the provincial government. For those who have studied history — I know the minister has.... When they brought in the income tax, it was going to be for a short period; it was going to be to help fight World War 1, and we've had the income tax ever since. Although the minister assures us that this bill is only for two years, I feel that once the province gets hold of the industrial and commercial tax base for assessments, it will be a lot harder to get that back out of the province's hands than it is at present. Although it says it's for two years, it is not something that I really believe is the long-range intention of this government.

In my own riding they are going to take 44.4 percent of the assessment base of the Sooke School District. My riding covers both Sooke and Victoria School Districts. The total assessed value at the present time for the Sooke School District is $194,511,575. Of this, the province is attempting by this bill to confiscate the assessed base of $86,294,101. Once this money is taken and it goes into the provincial general revenue, we as taxpayers, MLAs and parents are not guaranteed that it will be returned to our ridings or school districts. It will go into the political whims of the government.

The major press announcement when this particular new financial policy was brought out said that it was going to guarantee 75 percent of the school budget. We've listened to this. We've studied the breakdown they've laid out and how they're going to arrive at that. That figure of 75 percent was taken out of the McMath report — the report the NDP have been fighting for — which said we must guarantee to the school districts 75 percent of the school costs. It has been our policy. If the government is now going to accept our policy, we're all for it as long as it's done in a fair manner.

The original report said this money was to come from general revenue from the natural resources of our province. This is not the way this bill lays it out. It is not laid out at all. They are taking the assessment money of the industrial and commercial base and then are giving it back. This, as the critic for our party said, is a shell game. We, as elected people, can't sit back and play these petty little political shell

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games and expect that our credibility will remain what it is. Many of us have fought to develop credibility. When governments who are supposed to be the leaders of the educational system are playing these games with the school board, what are the impressions people will have of what's going on? They'd laugh at us.

Another part that really bothers me is the power that is given to the Minister of Finance, where he has the power to define such things as: "What are equal payments? What is a monthly payment?" The reason I say I have that fear is the experience I had when I was trying to help the farmers in my community who were trying to establish a simple little tractor called the Bobcat. The Bobcat was used in the farming community on turkey farms, hog farms, etc. For some unknown reason the Minister of Finance decided that a Bobcat was not a farm vehicle. He decided that for farm-vehicle status it had to have two larger wheels at the back, and because the Bobcat only had four wheels all the same size it was not a farm vehicle or tractor. No one ever told the farmers that the Bobcat was not a farm vehicle or tractor. They were using it. The particular vehicle had been designed by a turkey farmer to work within the agricultural industry. But for some unknown reason, in the middle of everything, the Minister of Finance decided that no longer would a Bobcat be a farm vehicle, and they would have to pay sales tax. I've noticed, with the information we brought to this minister and House, that they have brought in some amendments to farm-vehicle classifications. We will see how they interpret Bobcats.

When a Ministry of Finance can take this interpretation of a farm vehicle, what can they do with an equal payment or monthly payments? That has to be laid down in the statute. There has to be better input from the community. The reason I'm worried about this power of the Minister of Finance is that nowhere in the bill does it say they should guarantee 75 percent of the school costs. If this is the important part of this bill, if this is the part that made the headlines throughout the province of British Columbia — that the new financial act for education was going to guarantee 75 percent of the approved school costs — then it should be in the bill so the members of the school boards and the officials can do their planning in advance, knowing where they stand. At the present time they don't. This gets to the position that we in the opposition and those on the school boards who have come to us.... The problem that has arisen — and it's arising every day in the school board offices — is because of the foot-dragging of this government and because this government wouldn't take the advice of the opposition.

Last fall we said to keep the House in session to deal with the legislation that is needed, to deal with the bills that are going to affect the communities that we represent. The government decided to shut down the House and go home. And what's happening? Because this House was not called back at the time when it should have been, school boards out in the community are borrowing money to pay the running expenses of their school district. The Sooke School District, which is part of my riding, is borrowing around $2 million a month to finance the running of the schools: to pay the wages and the upkeep. They're borrowing this money out on the open market at usury rates. Granted, they get prime rate plus, but at the same time the province is sitting on this money. At the same time they are investing this money; they are using it to balance their budget. The day-to-day operation of the school districts is being hindered day by day. Here we are approaching May, and in nearly five months.... Before they get any money it will be five, six, seven or eight months of having to borrow money at usury rates to operate the school districts.

This money will not come out of the grants given by this government. It will be put back on to the taxes of the local community; it will be put back on to the taxes of the homeowner. The taxes that should have gone to education to provide school buses, night school, opportunities for children from rural areas to come in and visit the parliament buildings and the museums, are going to be wasted and will go into the hands of the financial people who are making money because this government would not accept the recommendation that we debated all night: to get to work, to prepare legislation, to prepare bills and to make the presentations. That should have taken place last fall, so that when we got to January 1 the school districts could have gotten their money and known what they were going to have, known how to do their planning, instead of having to go out on a monthly basis and borrow, like they do in Sooke School District, $2 million a month.

This is wrong. It all lands on the government side of the House, because they will not face the economic facts that affect every one of us in the community — the school boards, the people who are working, the taxpayers. Instead, they play games. They travel all around in jets. They waste time at the Legislature, they waste the time of the elected people and, more importantly, they waste the taxpayers' money by frittering it away because they haven't got a program or any planning even to run the Legislature, let alone to run the province.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, I am going to vote against the bill because it is not sound for the community. It's costing the taxpayers a lot of money. It is a makeshift bill. As the minister says: "It's only going to be there for two years." It's only going to be there for less than two years if they call an election. It's going to set a bad precedent in the meantime, because they are confiscating the industrial assessment base of this province.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

MS. SANFORD: Mr. Speaker, I too have a few brief comments that I would like to make with respect to the bill that is under discussion.

I'm really sorry that the minister is not here; I know mention has been made several times of the minister's absence during this debate. I do have some fairly specific issues that apply to the constituency of Comox, and not to most other parts of the province. I hope I don't have to raise them again during committee stage, but I assume that I'll have to if the minister does not arrive.

I am opposed to the grab for authority which this bill represents. First of all, it is typical of the kind of grabbing that the government has been involved in for the last few years: usurping more and more authority and power unto themselves and having less and less rest in the hands of locally elected people. This bill is certainly indicative of that general trend.

The other thing is that there is absolutely no guarantee in this bill of what the minister indicated was going to happen. He said in a press release that there would be a division of the financing for the schools of the province of 60 percent handled through the province directly, 35 percent cost-shared and 5 percent at the local level. But lo and behold there is nothing in the bill that indicates that that finance formula

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announced by the minister is indeed going to happen. I know there are school districts and school boards in the province that are most concerned about the fact that it's not in writing. They've come to expect that if it is not in writing from this government, they must really question whether or not what the minister has indicated in a press release is really what's going to happen. When I spoke to some of the school board members in our area they were certainly concerned about the fact that the finance formula announced is not in the bill. The only thing that's included in the bill is the fact that they are going to usurp the authority for collecting the taxes for commercial and industrial assessments in this province and that the local school boards would no longer have that authority. There is nothing to say that the finance formula that has been announced is indeed going to be followed. I think the bill provides no guarantees whatsoever on that basis.

Like many other members of this Legislature, I would like to raise just a couple of issues with respect to how this program is going to affect the school boards and school districts I represent in the constituency of Comox. So many of the moves of this government make no economic sense whatsoever. I think the fact that they are applying this formula at this time means that it's going to cost more money in the long run to the taxpayers of the province. This happens time and time again.

For instance, one of the school boards in my area was going to hire an energy conservation officer to cut down on the energy costs to the school board. There is no doubt that this is becoming an increasingly large bill in the school districts of the province. This was an education officer who was going to cut the costs to the school district because of the fact that he would be able — based on what has been happening in other school districts in the province — to cut down on the fuel bill for School District 71. But because of this kind of legislation, they are not going to be able to hire that conservation officer and, as a result, will be burning up more fuel and increasing the cost to the taxpayer. As a matter of fact, in other school districts they have found that the cost of hiring this conservation officer was paid for more than four times. They saved over four times the amount that it cost in salary to this energy conservation officer. But because of this they cannot even lay out that initial funding for an energy conservation officer. I know we have had many examples of the kind of cutbacks that are taking place. That is just one other one. Elementary counsellors to assist students with grave emotional problems in the school districts, too, are going to be cut back because of this bill.

There is one particular problem I wanted to raise with the minister. As I said, I am very sorry that he is not here. I had hoped that he might arrive so that he would be able to answer my question on this. I hope he is listening somewhere in the buildings. There is a particular situation that exists within my constituency. Because so many of the students are living on Department of National Defence properties, the parents do not pay any taxes to the provincial government. There was an agreement signed with the government of Canada and the province of B.C. back on August 25, 1972, which came up with a formula to provide for the federal government to pay to the provincial government, and the provincial government in turn to pay to the school boards affected, the amount of money contained in the formula to pay for the costs of the education of those students who are living on Department of National Defence property. This agreement is still in existence even though the basic finance formula has changed. What this means is that the government has proceeded with this legislation prior to altering the agreement with the federal government with respect to the funding for students who are living on DND property.

The formula needs to be changed if, in fact, we are going to obtain the same amount of money from the federal government for these students. The school board in the constituency of Comox, for instance, does not know whether they're going to receive the same amount of money they received last year or whether they are going to receive a lesser amount of money based on the current formula. There's no indication whatsoever that these talks have even started with the federal government. There's no indication of when the talks might be completed or any agreement reached if, in fact, they are able to reach an agreement with the federal government. And it means one of two things: the school district in Comox, particularly, and others as well — North Island is another one that's affected by the DND property at Holberg — do not know whether they are going to have their amount of money through this agreement reduced substantially because of this new formula where the provincial government takes up the commercial and the industrial tax for school purposes or whether the provincial government will, in fact, ensure that those moneys are forthcoming to the school districts and hence subsidize the federal government, because that's what they will, in effect, be doing.

If the federal government pays much less because of the existing formula that's been arrived at with the federal and provincial governments, then the province of British Columbia will probably end up subsidizing Trudeau. I don't think that at this stage this government is prepared to subsidize Trudeau's federal government, but because of the fact they have done nothing about altering the formula and we don't know when those discussions are going to take place or when any new agreement is going to be reached, I assume that the province of British Columbia, because of this bill, will be subsidizing the federal government or the local school districts in those areas that are affected will be subsidizing the federal government.

I would like to know from the minister when he will be meeting with the federal government in order to change the formula that now exists for those students who are sons and daughters of the armed services personnel and living on DND property. School District 71 is going to be affected, because the formula has not been renegotiated. What guarantee is there that School District 71 is going to receive the nearly $1,400 per student that it received in the past? I'm wondering if the minister would answer those questions for me during the windup of the debate.

MR. BARBER: It's nice to see the minister back in his seat. He was absent for most of the last 20 minutes and I wonder where he'll be in the next 20 minutes.

MR. REE: You weren't here the last 20 minutes. How would you know?

MR. BARBER: Who was that? Was that you? Do you have the floor?

Mr. Speaker, the official opposition will vote against this bill because it is a money grab by Social Credit. We will vote against this bill because it is a power grab by Social Credit. We will vote against this bill because it is an assault on quality education engineered by Social Credit.

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Let me discuss the first part. This is a money grab of massive proportions; this is a money grab which sees the province of British Columbia, as they put it, "assume responsibility for" nearly $850 million worth of revenues that previously were the responsibility of local government. As one of my colleagues said earlier in this debate, when a thief goes to your home and takes your purse, you could, I suppose, describe it as an act of a person assuming responsibility for the contents of your wallet. This is what Social Credit has done in this instance. They are assuming responsibility for the contents of the wallets that previously were the responsibility of locally and democratically elected school boards.

This is a money grab of awesome proportion, the clear purpose and distinct intent of which is to help finance the vast welfare schemes for the Japanese steel industry, which have been proposed so sadly by the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) in the last two and three years. It will go to finance the vast welfare schemes for international travellers who come to Transpo '86. It will go to provide funds for the other welfare schemes that have been endlessly put forward by Social Credit since they resumed office, when their regime began six years ago. The purpose of grabbing $850 million through this bill is to subsidize the welfare schemes that Social Credit has put together for its friends in business over the last six years.

If the purpose were to assist education, they could surely do it in some other way. They could, for instance, offer school boards greater, rather than fewer, revenues. They could offer school boards greater claim on assets, rather than a lesser claim on fewer assets. They could do any number of things, including directly increasing the moneys available through the provincial purse for local purposes. But no, Mr. Speaker, they do none of these things. Instead, through this bill, a money grab of colossal proportions, they intend, as they put it, to assume responsibility for — or as others might put it, pinch — $850 million that formerly was the responsibility and made available to the benefit of local school districts.

We oppose this bill because it is a colossal money grab and it cannot be justified. Secondly, we oppose this bill because it is a power grab. From now on the Minister of Education will personally have the power to set school board budgets.

Interjections.

MR. BARBER: "Good," one of the backward members in the back bench opposite says. Well, it may be good from the standard and from the point of view of people who are not fundamentally committed to the democratic process. But it is not good from the point of view of those who do believe in local freedom, local choice, local autonomy and local responsibility. The members opposite say "good," and they do so at least in a moment of rare candour. The candour reveals their hand and the hand is the heavy hand of state government imposing its will from Victoria on local school boards across British Columbia.

We in the New Democratic Party believe in local government, local autonomy and local freedom. We believe in the principle of school boards. We believe that they must be granted the authority to set and determine their own budgets, and to rise or fall according to the view of the local electors. But the government says "good," when we describe it as a power grab by a Minister of Education who will now have the personal authority to set budgets for school boards. One of the dangers of this is that he was not elected to do so. The Minister of Education was not elected to any school board in this province. He should not presume he has the right to act on behalf of those school boards in setting local school board budgets. He has neither the business nor the skill to do so. He apparently has the inclination to do so, but this is understandable because he is a Socred. Because he is a Socred, power grab; because he is a Socred, centralism is a fundamental tenet of his philosophy, if philosophy is the word for this.

We oppose the bill because it is a money grab; we oppose the bill because it is a power grab. In regard to grabbing power away from local government and centralizing it in Victoria, this at least is a pattern consistent with what the coalition opposite has done since they assumed authority. May I remind you briefly, Mr. Speaker, by way of allusion, that the government which proposes the power grab in this bill is the same government that put forward the Financial Control Act, the purpose of which was to grab power from regional governments, local governments, hospital boards, water boards and any number of other civic authorities. The same government of opportunists that put forward the grab implicit in the Financial Control Act now puts forward this bill. They do so in the unspoken name of centralism. The government that assumed provincial authority over the direction of regional colleges by changing fundamentally the structure and makeup of those boards did so in the unnamed interest of centralism. The government that took over regional colleges now proposes to take over school boards. That is the second example of the dangerous trend towards centralism for which Social Credit is responsible.

The same government of opportunists shut down resource boards all across British Columbia. These were locally elected, freely chosen groups of citizens who wished to volunteer their time to help upgrade and rehumanize the delivery of social and health services in British Columbia. The government that centralized resource boards and denied freedom of choice at the local level is the government that now presents this bill today. That's the third but not the last example of the heavy hand of state centralism under Social Credit.

There is a fourth example. This is the government that has cut back profoundly on the role and the responsibilities of justice councils. These justice councils were created during our administration to help advise upon and shape the direction of the delivery of the criminal justice system in the province of British Columbia, and to give other advice on other topics as well. The heavy hand of state centralism under Social Credit has significantly cut back the role and the responsibility of justice councils and will one day — sooner rather than later — cut them out altogether. That's the fourth example of state centralism under Social Credit.

Mr. Speaker, there is a fifth example, and it tells us once again why we must oppose this bill — it is a power grab. When we were in office we set up an Alcohol and Drug Commission, the purpose of which was to keep government at arm's length from the role and the responsibility of a representative group of persons interested in and knowledgeable about the field of alcohol and drug abuse in British Columbia. This government has once again shut down that body of detached and disinterested opinion and has incorporated it within the public service and within the political bureaucracies that this coalition opposite established. The government that shut down the valuable arm's-length, non-

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partisan advice and role of the Alcohol and Drug Commission now proposes to shut down many of the responsibilities of school boards.

There is a sixth example, Mr. Speaker. You may recall Bill 42 some years ago, in which for the first time in the history of this province the Minister of Municipal Affairs gave himself the personal authority to write and to rewrite any municipal bylaw in British Columbia. Never before in the field of local government had we seen such a heavy hand of state centralism as we saw in that bill — I'll get to the Land Use Act itself in a minute. Nonetheless, we see in that sixth example once more the pattern of state control which Social Credit has always imposed on local governments that were once free, that were once autonomous and that were once responsible, but under Social Credit are no longer.

This is the government which has emasculated the Agricultural Land Commission in British Columbia. This is a commission that was established, once again, to give non-partisan, disinterested advice to the government of the day. This is the commission which has been taken over by Social Credit, and whose role and work has been prostituted for the political gain of Social Credit and its friends, which pattern we now see replicated here today in the bill we're currently debating. The government that has for all practical purposes shut down the independence and responsibilities of the Land Commission now proposes to do the same to school boards. We oppose this bill for the same reason we opposed the seven previous instances of a massive power grab by the government opposite.

Mr. Speaker, we oppose this bill because of attempts to put into the office of one man, elected by no school board electors across this province, the power to decide what their school boards may or may not spend money on. This is a power to which he is not entitled. This is an authority which he is not competent to use. That's a level of jurisdiction which no other Minister of Education in all of Canada has. He is, in our view, therefore not entitled to ask for it and most certainly not entitled to receive it.

There are a couple of other examples I wish to offer for a moment in regard to the clear proof, over the six years this group has been in power, of the pattern of their intent — and the pattern of their unhappy achievement — to impose the heavy hand of Social Credit from Victoria on local institutions that once upon a time were free, independent and responsible to their own electors. This is the government which has assumed for itself authority over the lotteries. This is the government which has now denied to local institutions — the charitable groups, the non-profit societies, the churches — the opportunity to act freely and independently and to make a profit for the charitable purposes they represent. This government is now in the process of shutting that down too and once more imposing the heavy hand of state centralism on them. The innocent, the harmless and the worthwhile community groups that used to be able to exercise some kind of independence and make a bit of money for their good purposes have now been told by Social Credit that they will lose that authority and have been denied that independence and have to exist for one year on a promise of charity from Social Credit. They don't want charity; they want freedom. They don't want charity; they want the right to earn. They don't want charity; they want the right to be independent and free agents of the popular will. Just like school boards.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. member. In debating the principle of Bill 27, certainly the citing of examples would be in order. But to debate the merits of the example itself is out of order. I trust the member will keep his remarks relevant to the principle of the bill itself.

MR. BARBER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I completely agree.

Let me give two final examples. This government is also the author of the Land Use Act, which I shall not debate other than to indicate that it is an attempt to place local government in political receivership across British Columbia. That debate is for another day.

I have illustrated nine. Let me move to the tenth example of the heavy hand of state centralism that Social Credit has always imposed on local institutions that used to be free, independent and responsible. Let me briefly rename them. We have seen the Financial Control Act, and we know what that means. We see what they did to regional colleges, and we know what that implies. We know that they shut down resource boards in order to deny and kill local democracy. We know what they are doing to justice councils. We know what they have done to the Alcohol and Drug Commission, and we know what they did in Bill 42, some years back, in regard to local governments. We most certainly know what they have done to the Agricultural Land Commission, and we know what they have done to the Lottery Fund and the political purposes to which that fund has been put in an absolutely politically corrupt way. We know what the Land Use Act does, and today we see what the educational finance act itself does.

This bill puts school districts into political receivership. It makes them wards of the Minister of Education. We are supposed to believe that when the wardship ends, two or three years from now — if we are to believe anything of the sort, and we are skeptical — somehow school boards will once again be allowed to be responsible for their own affairs. Frankly, we don't believe the minister. The pattern through the ten examples I've cited is so powerful and overwhelming in its consistency that we predict that two years from now this government will be back asking for an extension of these emergency powers and asking, once more, that this Legislature allow the Minister of Education personally to exercise the authority formerly exercised by school districts in the establishment of their budgets.

We oppose this bill because it is a money grab. We oppose the bill because it is a power grab. We also oppose the bill because it will damage — perhaps irreparably — the quality of education that young people would otherwise receive.

Let me read into the record a couple of telegrams we received today. The first is from a Mr. Wylie, president of the Vancouver Island West Teachers Association. He says in his telegram:

GOVERNMENT SPENDING CUTS TO HAVE TREMENDOUS NEGATIVE IMPACT ON EDUCATION IN VANCOUVER ISLAND WEST SCHOOL DISTRICT. THIS UNDER-PRIVILEGED DISTRICT TO REMAIN UNDER-PRIVILEGED IN TERMS OF EQUIPMENT, RESOURCES, FIELD TRIPS. SPECIAL EDUCATION PROGRAMS AND CULTURAL ACTIVITIES. HAD TO CUT A VARIETY OF NECESSARY PROGRAMS DESIGNED TO ACHIEVE EQUAL EDUCATION. CUTS DANGEROUSLY NEGATE ABILITY TO DELIVER EQUAL EDUCATION IN WIDELY DISPERSED AND ISOLATED SCHOOLS IN A DISTRICT WITH HIGH BUSINESS COSTS. NEW FINANCE FORMULA ON DISTRICT PROMOTES: (1) HIGH TAXES ON

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EQUAL EDUCATION, (2) DISTRICT SECOND TO LAST POOREST OF ALL DISTRICTS, (3) GOVERNMENT REMOVES RICH INDUSTRIAL TAX BASE LEAVES US DESTITUTE. (4) FEW RESIDENTIAL UNITS TO RAISE HIGH FORMULA EVOKED SHARE. URGE YOU TO QUASH BILLS 27 AND 28.

Professional teachers in the field, most of whom we respect — even the occasional former principal; former for good reasons — have told us that they, like us, don't believe the assurances of the minister that the additional programs, more than just the three hours, will in fact be guaranteed funding and will be guaranteed an opportunity to continue at all. We also don't believe the assurance that two years from now local governments will be given back their power. It is the pattern of power-grabbing regimes that once they have grabbed power they never give it up. It is the pattern here in British Columbia under Social Credit. It is the pattern under other right-wing regimes across North America.

As of today's date, the Kimberley District Teachers Association sent a wire, originally to the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot), and we received a copy. It reads as follows:

KIMBERLEY TEACHERS ARE OPPOSED TO THE INTRODUCTION OF THE NEW EDUCATION (INTERIM) FINANCE ACT FOR THE FOLLOWING REASONS: THE INCREASE ON THE KIMBERLEY AVERAGE HOMEOWNER OF APPROXIMATELY $66 SCHOOL TAX BETWEEN THE OLD AND NEW FINANCE FORMULAS, AND THE PROVISION FOR EXCESSIVE CONTROL OF THE B.C. EDUCATION SYSTEM BY THE MINISTER OF EDUCATION; THE REMOVAL OF 79 PERCENT OF THE TAX BASE FOR KIMBERLEY SCHOOLS BY THE GOVERNMENT'S CONFISCATION OF THE COMMERCIAL-INDUSTRIAL TAX BASE. WE URGE YOU, ON BEHALF OF THE TEACHERS, STUDENTS AND RESIDENTIAL HOMEOWNERS OF KIMBERLEY, TO SPEAK AGAINST THIS BILL.

SIGNED,

THE KIMBERLEY DISTRICT TEACHERS ASSOCIATION.

Professional teachers, in example after example since this debate began on Friday last, have indicated that they do not accept, they do not take seriously even for a moment the reassurances — for what they may be worth — from the Minister of Education that education will not suffer as a result of this money and power grab. School boards do not believe the government either. We've also read into the record since Friday last example upon example of school boards across British Columbia who resent and reject the money grab and the power grab implicit in this bill. This bill is a crude attempt to impose the political will of Social Credit on freely elected school districts. This bill is a crude attempt to give awesome authority to one man, elected by no school district elector for the purpose, to control the quality, the future and the direction of local education.

This is a crude attempt, but crudity is not unusual when you look at power grabs by Social Credit. When they wiped out resource boards, that was the crudest darn thing you ever saw. It's also stupid, and stupid isn't novel either when you look at the pattern of Social Credit legislation. The same stupid government that wiped out the Princess Marguerite and wiped out Seaboard now brings in this and thinks they can get away with it. Crudity is not unusual when it comes to Social Credit, nor is stupid; each of them is a recurring pattern. Each of them we've seen time and time again.

But crudity and stupidity aside as part of the pattern of preference that Social Credit has always shown in its legislative programs, there is another danger here. The Minister of Education would have us believe he is personally competent and fit to exercise the vast new powers he will be granted under this bill. For a moment, let's grant that he may be right. Let's grant for a moment that the member for Oak Bay is a decent fellow, honest and true. Well, he just may be. As it happens, his late father, Doug, was my homeroom teacher at Vic High and I've known his family for years and years. Let's presume this guy is a nice guy and he's personally fit to exercise the vast autocratic power that this bill gives him.

MR. SPEAKER: I must remind the hon. member, as I have on at least one other occasion today, that the administration of the minister is up for debate perhaps on his estimates, but not under the principle of his bill.

MR. BARBER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker; I agree entirely.

This bill allows him to exercise power, and when anyone asks for such awesome personal authority to be granted him, he no doubt does it in the personal good faith and self-confidence that would suggest he personally can do so. So I don't challenge that, Mr. Speaker, nor do I challenge your most recent ruling; but I ask the government to apply the Gaglardi test: if the member for Oak Bay is personally fit to administer this bill, and we presume that he is, would you want the same power exercised personally by P.A. Gaglardi? If the answer to that is no, or if you are doubtful that you would want this same personal authority exercised by the Reverend — as he calls himself — P.A. Gaglardi, then why should we entrust it to any other individual at all? If this bill cannot pass the Gaglardi test, you have no business trying to pass the bill at all. If this bill cannot pass the Gaglardi test, you have no business asking us to give any individual the personal authority to exercise the power that this bill would confer on him. If you wouldn't trust Phil Gaglardi with the powers this bill creates, neither would we.

If neither you nor we would trust a character like that with such authority, why then do you introduce such a dangerous principle in this dangerous bill? Apply the Gaglardi test, and you will see one more reason why we don't want anyone to have the personal power that this bill would grant the Minister of Education.

We oppose the bill because it is a power grab, we oppose it because it is a money grab, and we oppose it because it will undermine the quality of education available to young people in British Columbia.

Let me offer three other illustrations of what's wrong with it. Briefly, here's what the bill allows: (1) he does what he wants — you find that in section 12; (2) he does it in secrecy — you find that in section 88; (3) he can do it retroactively — you find that in section 60. What kind of a government thinks it can get away with this rubbish? He can do what he wants, he can do it in secrecy, and he can do it retroactively. Does any other government in this whole dominion expect that any legislature would give it that kind of power? Not even in Alberta and Ontario, where the same kind of right-wing nonsense has dominated public life for so many years, can you expect one of those governments to ask for this kind of power. A money grab it is most certainly; an attack on the quality of education that young people will have to put up with, it is most certainly; but a personal power grab it is indisputably.

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Let me reiterate. Section 12 allows the Minister of Education to do what he wants — period; no appeal, no challenge, no debate. Section 12 means he can do it all on his own. Section 88 allows him to do whatever it is he wants to do, in total secrecy. He is not required to publish any of the material that he receives; he is not required to account in public in any way at all for the decisions he makes.

Section 60 is perhaps the most sublimely dangerous of all; it allows the Minister of Education to do any of these things retroactively. Even the most right-wing regime in North America — and Social Credit certainly figures in that reactionary galaxy — wouldn't ask for such retroactive powers. Can you imagine what these right-wingers opposite would have done if our government had attempted to bring in something of that order? We can do it in secrecy; we can do whatever we like without appeal; and we can do it all retroactively. Can you imagine what these opportunists opposite would have said if we had attempted such a bill? They would have screamed and ranted and raved and taken out ads and flown on PWA without paying for their tickets. They would have run all around this province saying what a terrible thing the socialists had done. Well, the socialists never did it because they don't believe in that sort of thing; they believe in local freedom, local choice and local responsibility.

This bill represents the heavy hand of state centralism, and we reject it. It represents the heavy hand of state centralism, and the taxpayers resent it. It represents the heavy hand of state centralism, and we predict the voters will reject you for it in the next election, which, as an aside, we hope comes darn quick.

MRS. DAILLY: I think the applause from the other side is because they realize I'm perhaps the last speaker. I am the windup speaker for the official opposition on this new, long awaited finance bill presented by the Social Credit government. I have sat through almost the entire debate, and I made particular note of the fact that only three — I could be corrected, but to my knowledge only three — Social Credit members have taken part in this debate. Perhaps we may hear from one more, the minister, in the windup.

It was interesting to note that the entire speech of the member for Central Fraser Valley (Mr. Ritchie), who took part in this debate, was on the independent schools of British Columbia. There was not one mention of the public schools of British Columbia, yet we were debating a public schools bill. I find it rather interesting that the member for Central Fraser Valley apparently doesn't have any public schools in his riding, because to date we have heard no concern expressed by that member. That was the contribution from one backbencher. We'll leave the independent school debate to another more fitting time, hopefully.

The other member we heard from was the hon. member for Dewdney (Mr. Mussallem). I regret to say that I have no comment on that speech.

Then we heard from the member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet). At least give him credit; he did speak at length. He obviously attempted to show that there was one person in the government who understood something about education. But unfortunately — I say this with some sadness, because I think that member basically is committed to education — he seems to have failed to understand the true intent of this bill. I cannot understand how any member of this House, particularly a man who spent his years in education, could not see that this is one of the most dangerous political bills to come before this House.

We — not only the opposition — waited with great interest to hear from the Social Credit government on this great new financial bill. Unfortunately what came forward was a political bill, a crass political statement of that government simply to get them out of some troubles they were having with the taxpayers of British Columbia on the costs of schools. The whole intent of this bill is to place the whole blame for any future tax increases on the local taxpayer.

What I found rather sad about the member for North Peace River.... I am particularly using his speech — there were so few over there to react to — because he symbolized, to my mind, a complete lack of understanding of the dangerous qualities of that bill. I can't believe that a man with his innate decency would actually sit here and approve a bill that strips the school boards of this province of their local autonomy. I cannot believe that he would approve of a bill that does not and will not meet the education and financial needs of the children of this province. No matter how you cut it, this bill will not meet those objectives. Any financial bill which any government presents to this Legislature should have those two main purposes: it should be meeting the financial and educational needs of our children. This bill fails on both counts.

The other thing that concerned me was that the member for North Peace River did not seem to be concerned that the accountability and the right of the school boards to be accountable to their own taxpayers has been stripped away from them. There was also an implication in his remarks that the school boards of this province are unable to handle their own financing. I think this is one of the most dangerous things about this bill. The Social Credit government have taken it upon themselves, by giving all these powers to the minister, to set budgets, to move in secret on regulations and directives. They are really saying to the school boards of this province: "We cannot trust you. You are unable to handle your own budgets, so we are going to take over." The interesting thing is that while they are taking over the functions of the school boards they are still leaving the school boards. But what for? I think the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm) finally got his way with cabinet. He has been advocating the county system for a number of years. We all know that the county system means no more school boards in this province. This bill removes the school boards in their present position and takes away their power. What do we need them for? No matter how you cut it, you have stripped the school boards of their function.

Do you know what I find most interesting? The Burnaby School Board — I want to make this quite clear — is not an NDP board, as I always used to hear across the floor in past years whenever we tried to bring up any criticism from the board. At the moment there is perhaps one NDP member on that board. I happen to know that there are Social Credit members on that board. The interesting thing is that that board actually sent some form of letter to the minister. The motion states that "they strongly protest the implementation of the new finance formula being imposed by the provincial government. The board feels that the formula confiscates an essential part of the district's tax base, resulting in a drastic reduction in local autonomy." That is from a board that is not NDP.

You know, when the member for Peace River said a few moments ago that the opposition is being strictly political, he was suggesting that we are the only ones protesting against this bill. The interesting thing is that all the members of our

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side have received complaints about this bill from people of all political stripes.

MR. LEA: It's almost like a death wish.

MRS. DAILLY: It appears to be.

Mr. Speaker, while I'm on this subject of how the complaints are coming from people of all different political stripes, just today a letter was received from School District 55, Burns Lake. I can tell by the expression on the face of the member who represents that area that he's very unhappy about that letter, and so he should be. What I find interesting is that he received this letter today, but there is no representation made. Why are you not up on the floor of the House speaking on behalf of your constituents and your school board? Why is the member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet) not on his feet expressing the feelings of his area.? Do you know why? We hear: "We'll do it on our own." They think all they have to do is to go quietly to the minister and complain, and they've done their job. They don't understand, Mr. Speaker, that this is the forum for political debate right here, and they are not using it. By not using this forum to debate a major bill, you are abrogating your responsibilities as members of this Legislature.

I know everyone is probably rather weary at this stage of the day, but I do feel I must read this, Mr. Speaker. This is to the minister, from Burns Lake School District 55. He has the letter, surely. I'll read it for the member, because apparently he was unable to read it into the record here himself:

"The trustees of School District 55 are not in accord with your proposed bill in its entirety. Specifically, the board would like to register their extreme discomfort" — and I'd like the House to listen to this — "both with the erosion of the authority and autonomy of the board of school trustees and with the finance formula that would be effected with the passing of Bill 27."

That's exactly what our critic and all the NDP speakers who have been speaking on this bill since Friday have been trying to put across to the minister.

Mr. Speaker, this is a letter from a non-political group, from a school board probably made up of Social Credit members — I don't know — but the fact is they have sent this expression of disapproval. Now if he does not want to listen to our concerns, surely he will listen to a school board:

" It is the opinion of the Burns Lake board that boards of school trustees must retain their existing powers, and they should remain responsible to their local electorate."

Can you imagine a school district having to point out that basic premise to the Minister of Education?

MR. BARBER: Yes, in British Columbia.

MRS. DAILLY: Yes, only in British Columbia and only with the Social Credit government.

"The proposed legislation gravely erodes the autonomy of the local boards. Boards, while responsible for education, no longer have effective controls over resources necessary to fulfill educational responsibility."

It takes the school trustees, who deal with this every day, to be able to articulate this in this fine manner.

"The trustees believe that the local electorate have lost their democratic rights to govern the quality of education that they desire for their children. This loss of democratic right is reinforced by the introduction of legislation in Bill 27 last week, that allows yourself" — and remember, they're talking to the minister — "to directly control school district budgets without approval of the cabinet."

When the minister gets up to answer, let us hope he can explain that not only to us but to the School District 55. As far as I'm concerned, Mr. Speaker, the only way he can assure them that what they're saying is not true is to withdraw that bill.

They continue to say:

"It is the opinion of our board that the new finance formula is inequitable and will not afford all school districts in British Columbia the opportunity to offer equal education programs."

They go on to point out to the minister that every district is different. This is a big concern, particularly to the rural areas, that this new finance formula does not allow those differences. Yet how many Social Credit backbenchers have stood on the floor of this House to fight for their constituents over this debate? We haven't heard a word.

They have expressed it beautifully. They say:

"Finally, the board wishes to express their deep regrets that the tax resources from the non-residential sector that heretofore had been exclusively available as education funds are hereinafter deemed to be part of general revenue."

I know that in my own district of Burnaby, the tax base has eroded by 54 percent. That's only one district.

We not only have a bill that is highly centralized, that takes away local autonomy, that doesn't meet the education needs of the children of this province, but we have a bill that has given unknown powers to a minister. Some of us won't even know how many powers, because the bill is so vague. His power is there, power that no Minister of Education has ever had before.

Interjection.

MRS. DAILLY: Wait until we see the regulations, if we ever do. I would be so upset if the House Leader (Hon. Mr. Gardom) didn't call that across to me just once during every debate. It wouldn't be quite natural.

HON. MR. GARDOM: I used to send you nice, rosy red apples.

MRS. DAILLY: Yes, I remember that.

I think it is the duplicity of this government in the handling of this finance formula.... On that issue alone they deserve to be taken out of office. I want to back up my statement about duplicity by showing the House the latest B.C. Government News, which most of us on this side of the House usually throw away because we know it is straight Social Credit propaganda paid for by the taxpayers of British Columbia. Fortunately I did not throw it away this time, because something caught my eye. This has gone to thousands of homes in British Columbia. The headline says: "Education Costs Stabilized." Remember, we've all paid for this to go out. Just listen to what it says: "Restraint has declared a quick dividend. Only three weeks after Premier

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Bennett announced the restraint on government programs, the provincial government promised British Columbia schools an extra quarter of a billion dollars over the next two years beyond previous commitments and beyond the inflation factor." Listen to this next line: "Too good to be true? Not really."

That is in this government propaganda sheet, paid for by all of us. Can you imagine? The statement in here is a lie. I want the minister to stand up afterwards and tell me that he would dissociate himself from this article. I'm going to have difficulty getting that from him, because right beside me I have the minister's own newsletter that he sends out, Education Today: "Province to Pay 75 Percent of All School Costs." Of course it isn't until you turn to the next page that you find the details: millions of dollars have been taken from the school boards so they can pay 75 percent, so they say. We don't even know if they're going to pay 75 percent anyway. He can do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, under this bill.

This comes out of the Minister of Education's office. It's straight misrepresentation. Here again, this is paid for by the taxpayers of B.C. It's bad enough having to have government programs flogged all over the province, but now we have to listen to straight misrepresentation and lies regarding the new education finance formula.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. member. Perhaps more temperate language would be in order. I must ask the hon. member if she has impugned the minister by accusing him of lying. I must ask for a retraction.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I'm dealing with the member.

Interjection.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Would the member please be seated. I am dealing with a member on a point of order. I will deal with the first member for Vancouver Centre in a few moments. I would just remind the hon. member for Burnaby North that more temperate language is in order. If there is any impugning of the character of the minister....

MRS. DAILLY: No, I have respect for the Minister of Education as a man, and I simply want to say that I had no intention of impugning him or calling him a liar. But I must say that I am very upset that misstatements, which one could not consider anything but lies, have been put out in this sheet — by whom, I don't know.

MR. SPEAKER: Now, if the hon. member would defer, I have a point of order by the first member for Vancouver Centre.

MR. LAUK: Following the hon. member's speech, it was clear what she was referring to. I wish to ask the Speaker, if he is going to interrupt an hon. member in her remarks.... If the Speaker were following the speech, he would know that she was not referring to the hon. minister or any other hon. member of this House. It's inadvertent, I know, on the part of the Speaker to do this, but the effect of that is to dull the point that the members are trying to make in their speeches. Interrupting them and giving the impression that they've done something improper in debate is, in my view, Mr. Speaker, a most unfortunate way to use that standing order that no hon. member shall accuse another of lying.

MR. SPEAKER: I accept the hon. member's opinion on the point of order, and it is well taken. It is not the intent of the Speaker at any time to interrupt the ebb and flow of debate. In most instances the Speaker waits — and waits too long. In any event, the Speaker has the responsibility of maintaining order and must intervene immediately, according to the authorities.

Now I must ask the hon. first member for Vancouver Centre to retract the statement that the Speaker is dealing in a high-handed fashion.

MR. LAUK: Without hesitation.

MRS. DAILLY: I was making the point, Mr. Speaker, that we find it very disturbing — and I'm sure not only the members of the official opposition, but the people of B.C. who receive a paper such as this which does not have correct statements in it.

I want to point out another statement in here. It actually gets worse as one goes along. It says: "But the restraint program announced by Premier Bennett, limiting increases in expenditures by all provincial public bodies to 12 percent over 1981, did set the guidelines that made the extra contribution of the government to the school taxes possible."

There is a statement here that the government's restraint program and guidelines gave the opportunity to the Ministry of Education to produce all this extra money. Now that is false, Mr. Speaker. The way the Ministry of Education has managed to get its hands on all this money is by taking it from the taxpayers of the school districts of British Columbia, through taking unto themselves all the assessments from the commercial and industrial property.

I could continue and say that this sheet talking about the new educational bill in B.C. Government News is full of lies. It is a disgrace that any government would allow such a sheet to go out. If we're going to talk about fairness, the only way to correct the error would be to allow the official opposition, at public expense, to send out their retraction and a copy of some of their debates.

The government has been clever. Whoever devised this formula is almost Machiavellian, because they have created an impression that this government is actually giving lots more money to the school boards of British Columbia. Because they know that school formulas are difficult to comprehend, they know that the taxpayers may turn their anger on the school boards, and they are making use of both those factors.

Let me put it as simply as I can, and in the way I intend to explain it, when I have the opportunity, to people who are concerned about this bill. It is just as if you and I, Mr. Speaker, both had a problem in meeting our grocery bills. Maybe we do today, like most people. Let us say that I have a grocery bill every month of $200, and I have a friend who has come along each month and offered to pay at least 30 percent of that because she felt sorry for me. Then my friend comes along and says to me: "I want to tell you that I am going to help you out of your difficulties. Instead of just taking care of 30 percent of that $200 grocery bill, I am going to pay 75 percent of it." Naturally I would be delighted. But then she

[ Page 7274 ]

turns to me and says: "But before I pay the 75 percent, I would like half of your monthly cheque." That is it.

To think that we have a government that is actually trying to suggest to the people of British Columbia how good they are, that they have presented an excellent new bill in finance! It has been elaborated very well by our education critic, who stood on his feet here for seven hours in debate, five of those hours almost nonstop, and made some excellent points, to show what kind of a Machiavellian game this government is playing with the taxpayers of British Columbia.

I notice that the Premier has come in, and I just hope that as the first minister he will do something about this government propaganda sheet that is going out with lies in it.

Almost every member on this side of the House has spoken on this bill. I want to repeat that to date only three members on the other side of the House have taken part in one of the most major debates that should be taking place in this House. I find it absolutely shocking that so few members on that side of the House have taken any interest. The Premier himself has not taken part in this debate — or the budget debate. But there is nothing more important than what happens to the children of our province. That is why every member on this side of the House, barring two or three members, has taken part in this debate. When I hear someone accusing us of just using this debate for purely political reasons, I want to point out to you again that what we're saying is nothing compared to what some of your own Social Credit trustees are saying about this bill.

Mr. Speaker, the point is that this bill has put complete power and authority over the school boards in the hands of the Minister of Education. The Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), who always wanted a county system, has found his way with the Premier and the cabinet. The school boards of this province are being destroyed. They're being destroyed by a government that pays lip service to local autonomy and decentralization. In the last election I recall that the Premier himself, on platforms, kept repeating: "We believe in decentralization. We believe in local autonomy in schools." I could spend an hour detailing to the members of this House the number of policies brought in by the NDP reestablishing decentralization and local autonomy for the school boards of this province. To have that government over there take office and send us back over 20 years in education by stripping the school boards of their powers is indeed sad.

Mr. Speaker, it is a sad day that we have this bill presented to us with obviously no hope of withdrawal. We have asked for that, but maybe the Minister of Education, in attempting to reply to the points we have made today, will realize he cannot reasonably answer the legitimate concerns not only of the opposition but also of many trustees and teachers in this province who are also vitally concerned.

We are very happy at the moment, though, as somebody has drawn it to my attention that the sun is suddenly shining on the Minister of Education. Mr. Speaker, with the hope that he has seen the light from my speech and the rest of the members, I now take my seat and hope that he will continue.

HON. MR. SMITH: I always enjoy the remarks made by the member for Burnaby North (Mrs. Dailly). I also enjoyed the speeches that were made by many members of this House, but I found difficulty in equating those speeches with the bill that was before the House. We heard all sorts of dire predictions of things that were going to happen: centralization, I would become a sun king — although I notice that the sun has apparently passed by today; local autonomy would be eroded; the quality of education would disappear; and so on. I could not for the life of me understand which bill they were debating.

The major address on the other side was the speech made by the House comedian, the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk), who made a lengthy and outrageous speech in this chamber, which, of course, he had to make, because when the financial formula that are in this bill were first announced in March of this year — by himself — he wasn't critical of them. He thought they were wonderful. He had nothing major or critical to say about this program when it was first announced. He got in so much trouble with his educational constituents and the special interest groups that he represents and speaks for that they told them that unless he spoke on this bill for a long time and made some of their telling points, he was finished with that constituency. Therefore, that is what he did for two and a half days.

To deal with some of the criticism that has been made about the bill.... I would have hoped that in the course of the criticism there would have been some acknowledgement of the tax reductions that are taking place under this bill, actual reductions in residential property tax in 50 school districts. We have heard nothing about that. In 50 school districts overall, under this bill and formula, residential property-tax payers will pay less than they would have under the old system. There has been no acknowledgement of that. The member opposite me who represents Terrace spoke about the bill at great length as well. Yet in his school district, in Terrace, the average homeowner receives actual reductions in tax and is $114 better off than he would have been under the old system. There's no acknowledgement of that at all. Absolutely none. Then there were many charges made that the school system was being devastated, that there would be massive cutbacks and that the quality of education was going to be eroded. These speakers always equate, of course, more and more dollars as being absolutely, intricately equivalent to the quality of education. These speakers also always overlook that under the financial formula and restraint program before the House, all that is occurring is that a reduction in the last quarter of this year of existing school board budgets is taking place and that next year those budgets will be restrained at the same time that wages and salaries are restrained under a compensation program.

Mr. Speaker, we had examples given in the legislative chamber about school closures. No one who has gone through a school closure in their own municipality or district considers that to be a very happy event. It is not; it is an emotional event. I can tell you that the school boards that have discussed school closures with me have discussed them and presented them as closures that would have taken place. They are closures they would like to have taken place as a result of declining enrolments, and they are quite apart from this program.

The other occurrence, of course, is that not only have enrolments been going down across this province in many school districts, but the numbers of teachers in some of those same districts have not been going down and the pupil-teacher ratio has, in fact, been reduced.

Another criticism that was made by the opposition was that this measure was adrift to an elitist school system and all the old saws and arguments were trotted out about how our approach to education was elitist. Comparisons were made with the independent school system and how their funding

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was going up 40 percent and the public school funding wasn't going up nearly as fast.

The first member for Victoria (Mr. Barber) very humorously made the charge that my children were being chauffeured to their independent school in a limousine — I don't think it was a Cadillac — or what. That, of course, is a totally false statement, because I don't have any children at present in independent schools. I'm proud of the fact, though, that my children attended both the independent and the public school systems. My daughter went through the entire public school system and my son has been in both systems. Unlike the members opposite, particularly the first member for Victoria, I like both systems and I do not put down the independent school system. In his examples and by his humour, he shows his contempt and dislike for the principle of funding independent schools.

Another criticism of this bill is that local autonomy is being eroded. The major example given was that the new financial formula was going to remove the commercial and industrial tax base. How many crocodile tears did we hear shed in this House by members opposite for the loss of the commercial-industrial tax base from local school boards, as if they were putting forward to us a proposition that that tax base should not be used for the benefit of all the school children of this province, but only for a district that happened to be lucky enough to have a mill within its boundaries. My opposition critic talks about elitism in education. Is there anything more elitist — short of, perhaps, the inheritance of titles — than providing one child with richly funded educational opportunities because he just happens to live near a mill or a business or an industrial plant, and condemning another child to a threadbare educational existence because he happens to live in a part of the province that has no industry and modest residential homes? If there's any elitism, that's the elitism.

To suggest also that removing the commercial and industrial tax base from school boards is a centralizing tendency, or that it in some way denies local control over education, is an absurd proposition. That tax base, of course, is still available for municipal purposes, and it is now being spread around the province for the benefit of the education of all children, not just for the education of children in that district.

I might add that the money is all being used for education — the commercial-industrial tax base money — and that the province will in many cases pay, in districts which have lost that base, over 80 percent and up to 90 percent of the cost of the public school system in those districts. I recognize, of course, from speeches of members opposite that there are some districts that have a very small residential tax base, where there may be some difficulties in raising that final local amount of revenue for local purposes. I think that one of the major features of this formula is that it does have flexibility and that it does allow us, during the two years of the restraint program, to examine this operation and to make adjustments that may be needed to benefit districts that do not have an adequate residential tax base. This year under the formula we are giving special aid to districts that do not have a large residential tax base.

Mr. Speaker, I find it somewhat amusing for them to argue that there is no new money being placed in the education system under this formula, that all we're doing is moving revenue around. I happen to think that a quarter of a billion dollars additional money over the next two years — as wel1 as the grant lifts that were in the system before — in addition to the commercial and residential tax base, is a very significant contribution and the first real addition to the education system that we have seen in many a year.

HON. MR. BENNETT: How much was that?

HON. MR. SMITH: A quarter of a billion dollars. I think they overlooked it.

Another outrageous claim that was made by the opposition critic, Mr. Speaker, was that residential property taxes were going to up this year by some 32 percent — and he used that figure a number of times. The argument was that we were claiming that residential property taxes were going to go down all over the province, while in fact they were going up by 32 percent. He said that he had that figure from my ministry. That figure, wherever he got it, is not a correct figure, because the residential property taxes will go down in certain districts. But overall, the increase in residential property taxes will be slightly under 5 percent.

HON. MR. BENNETT: How much did he say?

HON. MR. SMITH: Thirty-two. It's the new math. Mr. Speaker, I don't think that he understood the bill, and he certainly didn't understand those features from the estimates that he tried to use in the debate, because he claimed that special education was increasing by only 7 percent this year although it was being protected under this bill. Special education is being increased in restrained school board budgets by approximately 23 percent this year overall. Money being allocated to school districts for special education is going up considerably more than their restrained budgets. I challenge anyone, Mr. Speaker, to show this House a government that has shown a greater commitment to the field of special education than this government has during the period of my predecessor and my own.

The attack on this bill is largely based on fear tactics. It's an attempt to spread around the province some notion that educational quality is going to suffer, that schools are going to be closed, that there are going to be massive layoffs. Another example is that English-as-a-second-language programs are going to be massively cut in Vancouver and other places. Mr. Speaker, from the information we've obtained from school boards, that is not what is occurring and is not what has gone on under this bill.

This bill provides a framework for restraint for two years. It also provides an opportunity for the re-examination of a number of priorities, and it will allow — under a new school act at the end of restraint — the finalization of a formula which will embrace the permanent costs and the quantities of funds that are provided for school programs, which programs the province will pay totally, which programs the province will share in and which programs will be locally funded. It also will allow in that School Act a chance to develop a formula that will be sensitive and individual to the various needs of the region, much more so, in my estimation, than the old financial formula was. The very problems that northern communities endure, with additional costs from transportation, construction and weather, are ones that should be sensitively addressed in a formula that can allow an index to apply to these special conditions they have to put up with in addition to the amounts that are provided in districts that don't have those additional costs.

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The act is a measure that has been brought in for two restrained budget years. It has a sunset clause. Its only interference with local autonomy is to restrain the amounts of the budgets, not to say what must go into those budgets. It does not purport to take over the governance of local school boards, but it does allow local school boards to pause and to re-evaluate their spending within these restraint guidelines. That is very important, and that is what the taxpayers of this province expect this government and school boards to do. They do not expect budgets to continue to increase by 20 percent, and they do not expect to see the cost of education rapidly escalating at a time when school populations are continuing to decline. What they do expect is good management, good planning and quality education, which is not equivalent to endless truckloads of new dollars being poured indiscriminately into the system.

The bill is a reasonable and a flexible measure. It is one that the people of this province expect the government to introduce and to champion and to act on. I have great pleasure, as minister, to move second reading of the bill.

MR. LAUK: On a point of order under standing order 42(l). The minister made an allegation that I wish to correct about something I had said in the body of my speech during the debate on the bill. He claims that I spoke at one time in favour of the financial formula. I did not do so at any time. That statement is not correct. The minister has been saying that to other people outside of this House. I thought I corrected him on one or two occasions but I guess maybe he wasn't listening. I do want to correct the record: at no time would I be in favour of this disastrous bill designed to destroy the education system.

MR. SPEAKER: Lest standing order 42 fall into abuse, may I read it for hon. members so that they would understand the purpose of it. "No member may speak twice to a question except in an explanation of a material part of his speech which may have been misquoted or misunderstood, but then he is not to introduce any new matter, and no debate shall be allowed upon such explanation." I am sure the House will abide the explanation of the first member, but I wish to caution against the abuse of that standing order.

The question is second reading of Bill 27.

Motion approved on the following division:

YEAS — 29

NAYS 25

Division ordered to be recorded in the Journals of the House.

Bill 27, Education (Interim) Finance Act, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the report of the Universities Council of British Columbia with respect to funding recommendations for the Legislative Assembly for the fiscal year beginning April 1, 1982, and the requests of the University of Victoria, Simon Fraser University and the University of British Columbia for funds this year.

May I say that these reports are tabled annually in the Legislature and that every year the government has been able to come extremely close to funding all the requests of the universities. Last year it actually gave the universities more than was requested. Over 90 percent of all the money has been given. Can you believe that? Over 97.5 percent of all that the Universities Council has ever requested.

[Mr. Speaker rose.]

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. The first member for Vancouver Centre.

[Mr. Speaker resumed his seat.]

MR. LAUK: May I reply to the ministerial statement?

MR. SPEAKER: The statement was not in order nor was it accepted, and neither is the reply. Would the member please be seated. Hon. members, the hour is late but I do have two decisions and I'd rather not wait any longer. If it is agreed, we will have them now.

Yesterday the member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) sought leave of the House to move adjournment pursuant to standing order 35 to discuss a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely levels of funding for hospitals. I note that the debate on the budget has been concluded and the House has appointed for its consideration the estimates of expenditure in Committee of Supply, thereby affording a normal parliamentary opportunity to discuss the matter. See page 365 of the seventeenth edition of Sir Erskine May's Parliamentary Practice. While the foregoing ground in itself would be sufficient to determine the matter, I note also that the subject matter of the motion would appear to be within the category referred to by May as being of a continuing nature. Therefore it does not come within the confines of standing order 35.

A second decision: On Thursday, April 22, the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) rose under the provisions of standing order 35 to move a motion to adjourn the House for the purpose of discussing a matter relating to federal subsidies for the operation of certain British Columbia ferry routes. At the time the hon. member made his statement, I indicated that I had some reservations about the propriety of his motion in view of the fact that the House was then engaged in the budget debate and an early opportunity was then at hand to discuss the matter raised. An examination of May's seventeenth edition at page 365 confirms my view as expressed, and it is accordingly my opinion, on the authority quoted, that the hon. member's motion does not qualify under the general restrictions relating to standing order 35.

Hon. Mr. Williams moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:59 p.m.