[ Page 287 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

British Columbia Cellulose Company Repeal Act (Bill 29). Hon. Mr. Phillips.

Introduction and first reading –– 287

Ocean Falls Corporation Repeal Act (Bill 30). Hon. Mr. Phillips.

Introduction and first reading –– 287

Tabling Documents

Provincial Capital Commission financial statements, March 31, 1983.

Hon. Mr. Curtis –– 287

Oral Questions

Termination of government employees. Mr. Barnes –– 287

Decreasing staff in Health ministry. Mrs. Dailly –– 288

Washouts on Trans-Canada Highway. Mr. Michael –– 289

Terminations in the Ministry of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. Mr. D'Arcy –– 289

Terminations in the Ministry of Tourism. Mr. Cocke –– 289

Tabling Documents (Hon. Mr. Smith) –– 290

Law Reform Commission annual report.

Justice Development Commission annual report.

Legal Services Society annual report.

Criminal Injury Compensation Board annual report.

Tabling Documents (Hon. Mr. McGeer) –– 290

Science Council of British Columbia annual report.

British Columbia Research Council annual report.

Public Sector Restraint Act (Bill 3). Second reading.

Hon. Mr. Heinrich –– 290

Mr. Howard — 292

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 297

Ms. Brown –– 298

Mr. D'Arcy –– 303

Mr. Reynolds –– 305

Mr. Blencoe –– 309

THURSDAY, JULY 14, 1983

The House met at 2:08 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, leading us in prayers today was the Rev. Cecil Barrier, who has been in this chamber on a number of occasions and is a very good friend of a great many greater Victoria residents and members of this Legislature. Perhaps the House could acknowledge his attendance today.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, visiting from the United States of America is Mr. Chuck Hoffman, member of the House of Representatives of the state legislature in St. Paul, Minnesota, and his wife Karen. His host and hostess in B.C. are Mr. and Mrs. Peter Holuboff. They and their families are visiting us in the gallery today. I hope the House will welcome them all.

MR. R. FRASER: Mr. Speaker, visiting us in the House today are Nita Jack of Port Alberni, who was the campaign manager for Alice Chiko, the Social Credit candidate in Port Alberni. With her is her friend Phillippa Smith from New Zealand. Would the House join me in welcoming those two ladies.

MR. NICOLSON: Also visiting in your gallery today are two former students of mine from L.V. Rogers Senior Secondary School, now in their middle thirties: Mr. Barry Brassington, an air traffic controller, and Mr. Darcy Gunlayson, a published author. I wish we would bid them welcome.

MRS. JOHNSTON: I would like to ask the House to join me in welcoming my aunt and cousin who are visiting from Arborg, Manitoba: Mrs. Minnie Chyzzy and her daughter Marlene. Also Peter and Diane Burok from Wisconsin, U.S.A.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, the education society of the Gitksan-Carrier tribal council in the Hazelton area, in conjunction with the University of Victoria, is sponsoring a program of teacher training of native peoples so that they may be able both to maintain and enhance their culture, and also to obtain what benefits there might accrue from the greater society within which we live. I'd very much like the House to join me in welcoming about 25 of the participants and students of the Hazelton native teachers' training program who are spending the summer at UVic.

MR. MOWAT: I would ask the House to join me in welcoming two British Columbians of notable stature. One is a former businessman in the florist business in Vancouver. A member of the Steelhead Society and active in rehabilitation for many years, he is now living in Richmond: Mr. Cal Wood. The other person is known as the "Squire of Surrey," a very close personal friend of mine, Mr. Tom Anderson.

MR. BLENCOE: I would like to ask the House to welcome grade 11 Victoria High School students who are with us today with one of their teachers, trying to learn a little bit about the parliamentary procedures and how it all works down here. Perhaps the House will welcome them this afternoon.

Also, there are two members from the Victoria constituency office: Miss Chris Jacoy and Clyde Bion. They are here this afternoon. Please welcome them.

Introduction of Bills

[2:15]

BRITISH COLUMBIA CELLULOSE

COMPANY REPEAL ACT

Hon. Mr. Phillips presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled British Columbia Cellulose Company Repeal Act.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to move the first reading of the bill accompanying the message.

MR. SPEAKER: You've heard the motion. Those in favour say aye. Opposed? So ordered.

Bill 29 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

MR. COCKE: On a point of order, I wonder if, when the minister asks for leave, we could be given opportunity to give or deny leave.

MR. SPEAKER: I believe the Chair did ask. If it didn't, then the Chair apologizes for that oversight. We'll check, and if not I'll apologize. If we did, maybe you will.

OCEAN FALLS CORPORATION REPEAL ACT

Hon. Mr. Phillips presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Ocean Falls Corporation Repeal Act.

Bill 30 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.

Hon. Mr. Curtis tabled the financial statements of the Provincial Capital Commission as of March 31, 1983.

Oral Questions

TERMINATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES

MR. BARNES: I had hoped to have the honour of asking a question of the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy). I notice she's not in her seat. Perhaps she has designated someone to whom I could address my question. Is there anyone in the cabinet who would answer the question? I see the hand of the hon. Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland). I see the Premier isn't here. I'd like to address him, but he's away as well. Perhaps the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) would answer my question. If the Provincial Secretary would advise whether the Social Credit reign of terror has continued with....

Interjections.

[ Page 288 ]

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. BARNES: Okay, Mr. Speaker, that's my interpretation of the current situation with the removal of workers from the Ministry of Human Resources, but if that offends any members, then we will just say....

MR. SPEAKER: It offends the Chair, hon. member.

MR. BARNES: It offends the Chair, and I can appreciate that, Mr. Speaker.

To the question....

Interjections.

MR. BARNES: I hope we will be allowed some time for the interruptions. I will repeat: will the minister advise the House whether the government's firing of members of the Vancouver and Fraser Valley child abuse team is taking place?

HON. MR. CHABOT: A very interesting question, Mr. Speaker. First of all, I don't like the extremist comments made at the outset, which might cause me to respond in kind to that member. I don't think those kinds of statements should be a preamble to a question in this House. You might have the latitude to make those extremist-type statements during another speech, during the throne speech debate, or in the debate on Bill 3, or anywhere else, but in the question period I think you should refrain from those extreme comments.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. member. The question?

HON. MR. CHABOT: Now the question. The question is one which can be best addressed by the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy), and in view of the fact that the Minister of Human Resources is absent from the House at this time during the question period, I have no alternative under those circumstances, Mr. Member, but to take that question as notice and bring it to the attention of the Minister of Human Resources at the earliest opportunity so she can respond to you fully, either at the next question period or, possibly with leave of this House, to give you an answer to satisfy your curiosity.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the latitude that you extend to that member, but I would suggest that he is abusing the rules at this time himself.

I would like to ask him if he would take this question as notice as well: Would the ministry confirm that the rehabilitation officers who work in the minister's much-boasted-about Individual Opportunity Plan have also been fired?

HON. MR. CHABOT: I presume the member is talking about notice of termination. Under the circumstances I'll again take the question as notice and refer it to the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) so she can respond at the earliest opportunity.

DECREASING STAFF IN HEALTH MINISTRY

MRS. DAILLY: Can the Minister of Health confirm that his ministry has prepared a hit list of 300 people whom he is in the process of firing from his department without cause?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: No, Mr. Speaker.

MRS. DAILLY: I wonder if I may follow that question with a supplementary based on the minister's answer. How then can he explain that in the Estimates book given to all of us there is a very definite decrease of over 300 in staff? Is he not aware of any decreasing staff procedures taking place in his own ministry?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: It's quite a different question, and I really don't think it's supplementary to the previous one which referred to a hit list.

The manner in which numbers are determined this year for all ministries is somewhat different from last year. This year it's based on full-time equivalents. The Ministry of Health has been conducting its business in the province for the past year or so at approximately a 10 percent vacancy rate. The numbers referred to in the Estimates this year may reflect a more accurate number of people actually on staff and positions available. But I would be pleased to investigate the precise number with respect to the second question offered by that member.

MRS. DAILLY: May I ask the minister if his ministry has been excepted from what is happening to all the other ministries. It was announced by the Premier that there is going to be a slashing of all public servants in all ministries. Are you telling the House that your ministry is going to be excepted from that?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: The Ministry of Health will not be exempted from that; the Ministry of Health will reduce its overall staff component over the next year or so. There will be some reductions in the ministry.

MRS. DAILLY: The minister is being rather obtuse and not at all clear. May I say, Mr. Speaker, for all the hundreds of people in his ministry out there who are now waiting and wondering when the axe is coming, will the minister please be more explicit, and will he confirm that there are at least 300 people who are going to very shortly receive their notices of dismissal from his ministry?

HON. MR. NIELSEN: No.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. member, I have other members on the floor. If there is a supplementary, there is no reason why we cannot come back to the member, but at this point I will recognize the member for Shuswap-Revelstoke.

MRS. DAILLY: Okay.

[ Page 289 ]

WASHOUTS ON TRANS-CANADA HIGHWAY

MR. MICHAEL: I would like to address a question to the hon. Minister of Highways. In view of the serious washout of a bridge on the Trans-Canada Highway located within the boundaries of a federal park east of Revelstoke, and in view of the grave effect this highway closure is having on the travelling public, particularly on those businesses depending on the tourist industry at this peak period, can you advise me if your ministry has had any communication with the Canada parks board, and if so, when it is estimated we might see that highway reopened?

HON. A. FRASER: That was a really good question. I thank the member for it. It is a question of a serious nature and urgent at the present time.

Dealing with the closures of the Trans-Canada Highway in British Columbia, first of all, we have a closure between Chilliwack and Hope. Our ministry hopes to have this section opened to one-way traffic late tonight. The one-way traffic combined with the existing alternative routes using Highways 7 and 9 will provide good service for the public. Highway 1 should be open to two-lane traffic by the weekend.

The other area of the Trans-Canada closed in British Columbia is east of Revelstoke. The washouts and closures are within the federal park on the section of the Trans-Canada built and maintained by Parks Canada. Our ministry have been in touch with Parks Canada in Ottawa and Revelstoke today to obtain up-to-date information and offer assistance from the Ministry of Transportation and Highways. The current status is that the Rogers Pass section Is closed at two locations east of Revelstoke. There are five other locations where culverts are plugged, and if heavy rains continue, more problems could occur. The two locations where the highway is closed are the Lauretta picnic area, where the culvert is plugged and water is running over the road — Parks Canada expects this to be fixed to allow traffic to pass by late afternoon — and Woolsey Creek bridge. Its west abutment has washed out and one six-foot span has collapsed. Parks Canada and the Canadian Army are planning on constructing a detour, which they estimate will take about one week. The senior engineers from our ministry are in Revelstoke today to review the situation with federal officials to determine if provincial highway crews and material could be utilized to assist and speed up the opening of the highway. The sites will be inspected later this afternoon and any necessary arrangements will be made immediately. Federal officials have expressed their thanks for this offer of assistance.

[2:30]

MR. HOWARD: I rise, Mr. Speaker, on a point of order about that question and that answer. I only advise Your Honour of my rising on the question of order, so as not to take up time now but immediately upon the conclusion of question period.

MR. SPEAKER: That is the appropriate procedure, hon. member.

TERMINATIONS IN THE MINISTRY OF

CONSUMER AND CORPORATE AFFAIRS

MR. D'ARCY: I want to compliment the Minister of Highways on doing such a great job of eating his marshmallows.

To the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs: recently many arbitrary and authoritarian firings have taken place in the minister's jurisdiction. Has the minister decided to rescind these firings until such time as authorization has been received from this Legislature?

HON. MR. HEWITT: What the member terms firings are notices of termination. They were given to the employees last week after the budget came down.

MR. D'ARCY: I know of no dictionary difference between notice of termination and firing. However, if it will satisfy the minister's notion of convoluted verbiage, I will substitute the words "notice of termination" for "firings" in my previous question.

HON. MR. HEWITT: In the offices where employees got the notice of termination it indicated that at a point in time their employment would no longer be required, due to the fact that rent controls and rentalsman office activity had ceased and that activities in the consumer offices had ceased as well.

MR. D'ARCY: Mr. Speaker, in the interest of saving time I did not repeat the question, but in neither case did the minister even attempt to apply himself to the question. The question again was: has the minister decided to rescind these firings until such time as he is authorized to do so with some sort of legal authority?

HON. MR. HEWITT: With regard to rescinding the notice of termination, the answer is no, Mr. Speaker.

TERMINATIONS IN THE MINISTRY OF TOURISM

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Tourism (Hon. Mr. Richmond). In view of the Premier's refusal yesterday to answer the question of legal authority, can the minister explain why he.... He's missing! Then I'll ask the Premier. Mr. Speaker, the Premier refused yesterday to answer the question of legal authority with respect to firings or terminations or what have you. Would the first minister tell us why we have had firings or terminations in the Ministry of Tourism, where no programs have been cut?

HON. MR. CURTIS: On behalf of the Minister of Tourism, I'll take the question as notice.

MR. SPEAKER: The member for Skeena rises on a point of order.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, as I indicated earlier, my point of order relates to the question asked by the member for Shuswap-Revelstoke (Mr. Michael) and the answer thereto by the Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. A. Fraser). I consider that Mr. Speaker should look upon both the question and the answer as an abuse of question period, for the reasons that....

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. And the point of order is...?

[ Page 290 ]

MR. HOWARD: The washouts referred to occurred some days ago, and if there had been any interest shown in the subject the member would have picked up the telephone and dealt with it.

Secondly, government back-benchers are forever portraying their close relationship with government, indicating that they should not have the need, for political purposes, to raise questions in the House about spurious matters such as this.

Thirdly....

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. HOWARD: It's spurious because the washout occurred some days ago, and you finally got around to dealing with it.

Thirdly, Mr. Speaker, the length and the detail of the statement by the Minister of Transportation and Highways would certainly indicate to me that if he had sufficient interest in this subject matter he would have come into the House before this and made a statement on motions. That not only would have been the proper thing to do, but it would have permitted an opportunity to comment thereon. I think if Your Honour looks at that, perhaps you can advise government back-benchers of the propriety of misusing question period.

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, on the same point of order, when you're making your deliberation on the point, I hope that you won't be swayed by the fact that for once a question in this House was in order — because of that unusual aspect — and that you'll consider that the member for Skeena in effect said that there was no interest in the breakdown of the most important highway link in British Columbia, and that's why the opposite members didn't ask any questions.

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. The floor is sought by the member for Rossland-Trail on.... ?

MR. D'ARCY: On the same point of order, I think it needs to be pointed out that all members, especially those in the interior, have washouts and problems in their constituencies, but they inquire directly of the Ministry of Highways without taking up time in the chamber.

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you, hon. member. Hon. members, clearly we're entering close to a point of debate.

MR. REYNOLDS: I have just a comment on the same point of order. When you're making your deliberations.... The member that brought up the point of order knows that other legislatures in this country, including the House that he sat in in Ottawa, allow back-benchers of the government to ask questions, and as a private member in this House I would want to make sure that he respected my right to ask this government a question any time I want to ask one.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. It is the opinion of the Chair that we have canvassed the matter thoroughly. The Chair will bring a written report back to members of the House, but I would caution that if members wished to have question period rules strictly adhered to, we would find that we would have a very short question period, because if the rules of question period were strictly adhered to, most questions could, in the very strictness of their interpretation, be ruled out of order, with the exception of very few. Hon. members, I will undertake to bring back a more complete finding on the matter, and until that time the matter is concluded.

MR. NICOLSON: With respect, Mr. Speaker, on the point of order — and I wish to keep strictly....

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. NICOLSON: I will keep strictly to a point of order. I would just like to draw attention to Beauchesne, if I have permission — and I realize that you've already said that this is our final opportunity; thank you. I would like you to examine the admonishment that the scope of the answer be kept within the scope of the question.

Hon. Mr. Smith tabled the annual reports of the Law Reform Commission, the Justice Development Commission, the Legal Services Society and the Criminal Injury Compensation Board.

Hon. Mr. McGeer tabled the annual reports of the Science Council of British Columbia and the British Columbia Research Council.

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. GARDOM: I ask leave to proceed to public bills and orders.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: I call adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 3.

PUBLIC SECTOR RESTRAINT ACT

(continued)

HON. MR. HEINRICH: I'd like to make reference to some of the comments which were made before lunch, Mr. Speaker, and how it all came to pass. I think perhaps we should refresh our minds on what happened in February 1982. I remember the compensation stabilization program, and I also remember some of the very hot debate which took place in this House at that time. But interestingly enough, it seems to have satisfied the appetite of the public of British Columbia. We note that it became an issue during the election campaign, much to the chagrin of the members opposite. And when it was raised by the Leader of the Opposition, about two weeks into the session, I suspect he wished that he'd never raised it. However, it came, and we found that we'd made a commitment to the people of British Columbia, and that commitment is found in the throne speech and was followed through in the budget speech, and is still followed through under the particular bill which we are debating today.

Reference was made this morning — and it concerns me a great deal, particularly those comments made by the member for Comox — to the matter of human rights. Reference was

[ Page 291 ]

also made to the cartoon published in one of the daily periodicals, showing a couple of hitch-hikers coming to British Columbia. I would just like to remind this House, and particularly the member for Comox, which government introduced the civil rights protection act and the sanctions it contained. The fact of the matter is: it did the job. You will remember the Human Rights Code was not nearly adequate enough to handle that particular problem, and this specific piece of legislation was brought in. I remember the member for Vancouver Centre was very pleased that day, and I don't blame him.

We talked about tenure in the bill, Mr. Speaker, and I make reference to excluded employees working for the government. Do they have tenure? No. Do employees in the private sector have tenure? No. People talk about the fear. What do you think people operate and work under from day to day in the private sector? The people in my riding, every contractor and every mill — it didn't make any difference.... The fact is that they didn't have tenure. How do we ask those people to continually send funds which they don't have, to pay the bills for those who have constant tenure?

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

We made reference to the bill, and this morning I referred to the items in it, and I think they should be referred to again. We were talking about skill, ability and the qualifications of employees — the operational requirements, something called efficiency. With a $1.6 billion deficit, and a carryover from the previous year, for a direct debt of $2.4 billion in the spring of 1984, something has to be done. That message was made abundantly clear on May 5.

The bill makes reference to the seniority of employees and to the seniority provisions in collective agreements, and when the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) introduced and spoke on the bill he made it clear that we want input from people outside. He gave you a date: he said August 8.

Interjections.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: I see: we've got two classes of citizens in British Columbia, those who work in the private sector and those who cannot be touched in the public sector.

It's not the fault of the people in the public sector. They were hired; they were doing their jobs. The fact is that we don't have any money. That's the reason why.

[2:45]

MR. HOWARD: You blew it all. You squandered it all.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: We blew it all, eh?

We talk about rights. Something that has bothered me for a long time in British Columbia is this: I believe everybody should have the fundamental right to belong to a trade union, but I tell you they can't do it. I don't know why somebody with some qualifications and seniority or somebody off the street who is ready, willing and able to work can't go down and be a member of a trade union if he finds himself a job. Is that right? I don't think it's right. The member knows very well what I'm talking about.

Interjection.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: With respect to the bill, I think I've done reasonably well, Mr. Speaker, keeping to it after listening to a number of the speakers to whom you've allowed some degree of latitude. In the matter of education: I raised this morning the problem that school boards have. We give them the opportunity, the authority and the duty to manage, and what happens? They can't do it because their hands are tied. Why are their hands tied? Because of section 153 of the School Act. Anybody who has been teaching in one of our schools for 20 years on a particular program.... If that program is deleted or dropped, then whoever the teacher is is in a difficult position. They could be with the school for 20 years but if a program is out or a school is closed and there's a declining enrolment....

Now what about the people.... We made it clear when we talked to everybody on Tuesday morning in Vancouver that we are looking not only at overall budgets but also at particular parts of budgets. One of those areas is administration. I made it clear when I was talking to them that I've got a great deal of compassion for the teaching profession. I said it on a number of occasions. You don't know what ends up and what comes, and they don't know what they're going to get. But it seems to me there's been a history in the past, with respect to a number of school boards in British Columbia, that it's fine to make the district office good and fat, layer upon layer, and add on at the expense of those who should be in the classroom and teaching. I can tell you that that is exactly what we are looking at. How about some fairness and equity between districts? It can't be justified the way it's moving right now, and they're having this opportunity. Why in the Public Sector Restraint Act? It allows them to manage; that's really what it's for.

One of the areas which seems to be giving some concern is the matter of "without cause." I recognize the concern about the words "without cause." But if you look to the reasoning "for cause" in the legal sense, what it really means is that someone is being terminated for just cause resulting from the failure to perform a function. That's what "cause" means. Today that's not the case. Today the fact of the matter is we've got a significant deficit which we are facing head-on, together with the wishes of the people of British Columbia and those taxpayers who have told us: "Enough is enough."

There's been a lot of comment made in the press. I'm not saying for one moment, Mr. Speaker, that I'm not sensitive to some of those comments. Sometimes we have people who have been in the press for a long period of time who may in fact say: "Just wait a minute." One article, which I'm sure all members have probably read by now, was in the Times-Colonist by Richard Gwyn. In essence what our Premier has done is to bring his government back into the public marketplace. I quote:

"So long as civil servants enjoyed tenure, both individually and collectively — any laid off have always been moved to other jobs in the same government — governments could not be controlled. Those nominally in charge, the politicians and the civil service managers, lack the controlling instruments of being able to hire and fire or to discipline or to promote on merit.... Today, close to one in four working Canadians enjoys tenure. The consequential inefficiencies are just too much for our economy to bear."

[ Page 292 ]

That's self-evident when we examine the financial statements of British Columbia, particularly in industry. Specifically, let's have a good look at the forest industry. Heaven knows, in my riding, I've got six pulp mills, with the twinning of Northwood, ten major sawmills and an oil refinery — and we know exactly what that means. It's just now that the marketplace is starting to pick up, and hopefully they're going to get some of their equity back, because without that equity they're not going to be paying very much corporate tax. What do you think we all live on?

This is from Richard Gwyn's article:

"Further, the burden is no longer bearable politically or socially. Through the 1980s about one in seven Canadians in the private sector will be permanently unemployed, and perhaps one in three will experience some unemployment at some time as their companies close or as technology destroys jobs at the same time as it creates new ones."

I think that's something that we ought to keep very much in mind. At times this is a painful process, and nobody likes doing it. But it seems to me that it's like the marketplace, which from time to time has a major correction. The reason for that correction is that it will be healthy further down the line, that's all.

I have two other comments to make before I sit down. I came across a statement made the other day which I thought might bring the problem home, and I'll paraphrase it. The reference was made to Sweden, the original architect of a modern welfare state based on a forest economy. It appears to be planning an historic turnaround. According to reports, the coalition government wants to propose reductions in subsidies to children, students, pensioners and housing rents. That's draconian, you know, by Swedish standards; but that measure is a response to huge government deficits as the nation flounders in a long-term recession.

MR. BARRETT: What's the date of that document?

HON. MR. HEINRICH: Within the last six months, I would say.

MR. BARRETT: That government was defeated. You're now alluding to a socialist government, because the coalition was defeated.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: I think you've got that turned 180 degrees.

MR. BARRETT: Table the document.

HON. MR. HEINRICH: My point is this: that is the way people are thinking we've got to attack the deficit.

I'd like to make reference to a couple of the comments which the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) made in second reading. I think it's important that we consider this. The Provincial Secretary said this: "As part of this government's commitment to consultation, I have invited the public to comment on what the regulations could include. It is important to finalize this by August 8." I think that indicates what we as a government, realizing that firm measures are required, are still looking for consideration from those who are going to be affected. Mention is made of those people who are not within a bargaining unit. The compensation stabilization program will acknowledge their concerns, and I'm sure they will be treated most fairly.

I support the bill, and I recognize the significance of it. I further recognize that for the long-term health of British Columbia we should not necessarily have two classes of citizens at this time, one subject to the whip in the marketplace and the other having been recession-free.

MR. BARRETT: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, it is a rule of this House under standing orders that documents quoted from are usually tabled with this House. I would ask the minister to table the document.

Interjections.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, would you defend me from interruptions from that minister.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. BARRETT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would ask that the rules of this House be applied and that the minister table the documents. The allusion was that it was a social-democratic government. It was the coalition government that was defeated, and I wouldn't want you to leave that impression with the House. Just table the documents.

MS. BROWN: You're deliberately misleading the House.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Chair rules that in the absence of any indication as to what the document really was, it's not possible to ask that it be tabled.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, I certainly accept your ruling. I hope the minister now understands, when making allusions to documents, that he should name the document and the date, and be prepared to table such document.

MR. HOWARD: I'm sure the Minister of Education knew exactly what he was doing when he quoted from that particular document, because knowing exactly what he was doing permitted him to attempt to mislead the House. It was consciously done; we can understand that. Look what they are trying to do in the legislation.

In approaching this particular bill....

Interjection.

MR. HOWARD: The Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) has just made a comment across the floor to "get back in the gutter." I make no claim for him to withdraw that, but I will tell the minister that I'm going to make some comments about his activities, and I'll have to get in the gutter along with him in order to do that. Just wait and be patient. Pay attention to the rules, Mr. Minister of Forests. Quit yapping away like a puppy dog. If you've got something to say, stand up and say it; get involved in the debate. You're afraid to get involved in the debate. That minister is a gutless wonder, along with a lot of other gutless wonders on that side of the House.

[ Page 293 ]

Interjections.

[3:00]

MR. HOWARD: Listen to these new-found fascists down here. Throw them out!

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, that was an unparliamentary thing to say. The Chair would be pleased if you would proceed speaking to Bill 3.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, I was embarked upon that course until I was interrupted. If Mr. Speaker can keep the hon. members opposite from interrupting, we'll be able to proceed in the usual orderly fashion. We can't look at this bill in isolation from the other bills on the order paper. We can't look at this bill....

MR. REYNOLDS: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I would just like to bring to your attention that the member for Burnaby-Edmonds (Ms. Brown) yelled very loudly across the floor that the Minister of Education was deliberately misleading this House, showing a disrespect for this chamber and the members in it. I would hope that you would ask her to withdraw that remark; it's very unparliamentary.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Chair did not hear the remark being passed; therefore I cannot ask that it be withdrawn.

MR. HOWARD: As I said before that improper interruption, we can't examine this bill just simply as an isolated piece of legislation. We must examine it in light of what the budget itself said, and what other pieces of legislation on the order paper say. The budget and other pieces of legislation and this particular bill itself all head in the direction of having the state control people's lives and interfere in people's lives in the normal course of their employment and their relationships to society. I admit to you, Mr. Speaker, that I am somewhat afraid of what is being proposed in this House. Most members are not usually afraid of something that's proposed in the Legislature. I'm sure most members in this House, in the course of their lives, have had experiences that have made them fear for one thing or another, and have lived through them — made an accommodation with whatever that fear was. I don't think I am probably any different in that regard from other members, or from a great many people in society at large, but I am afraid of where we are headed. I'm afraid, as I suppose one would be afraid of cancer. Cancer may start off and be identified as just affecting a minor part of a person. It may be small. It may be noticed and attempted to be treated, but the tendency of cancer is to grow and grow and grow and kill. I'm reminded of that when I think of this legislation and the other pieces of legislation that are on the order paper. I'm afraid for the damage and the injury that will be caused to people in this society. I'm afraid for others, for what we may be faced with in the future.

The member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) made an extremely correct and valid point the other day when he said that you don't usually start off being a fascist. It's not something that you conclude you are; it's a step-by-step process. It starts with a little bit of an attempt to do something in a controlling way, rationalizing that control on the basis that it's for the public good. That's what fascism does; it grows step by step. Usually it's unrecognizable by the person, or the group, who is affected by that step-by-step process.

Fascism finds, in the political sense, its most fertile ground in those who have no political philosophy or commitment — who are opportunists who will do anything to advance the immediate cause as they see it, without looking beyond into the future effects of their particular actions. Fascism finds its most nourishing atmosphere where we have politically psychotic people, and that's what we've got in the government of British Columbia today: psychotics.

These are people who are insane insofar as their political ideals are concerned; people who are out of touch with the reality of the direction in which they're going; people who have been — as the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom) was — vacuumed into a coalition on the basis that it would be good for society, without recognizing what was taking place. The Minister of Intergovernmental Relations, perhaps more than anybody else, knows what I'm talking about because he has been moved step by inexorable step towards the concept of state control, something which a number of years ago he would have decried and abhorred. But he's into it. We simply ask, through you, Mr. Speaker, this minister of intergovernmental affairs — or relations, or whatever it is he's having — to recognize where he is, not to walk out of the door.

Let me make some fine comments about what I'm talking about — the rule of law and things like that. I'd like to say a few words about basic principles, basic ethics, basic standards for government-citizen morality. Fifteen hundred years ago, Mr. Speaker, somebody by the name of Justinian gave his definition of law, which was "to live honourably, to injure no other man." Those are fine words — fine declarations. "The only alternative to the rule of law and the democratic way of life is the tyranny of the strongest " Get that. "The only alternative to the rule of law and the democratic way is the tyranny of the strongest." Isn't the "tyranny of the strongest" fascism? Isn't the "tyranny of the strongest" state domination, because the state is all-powerful? Isn't the "tyranny of the strongest" the government that wants to do those things, without regard to human rights, fundamental freedoms and democracy? Isn't the "tyranny of the strongest" what we have today?

I'll read a little further: "If the power can be subject to abuse, the job is to rein it in, not unleash it." Those are fine words. But this government, Mr. Speaker, has moved diametrically opposite to those conventional wisdoms. With this bill they would be creating the surest path to tyranny and the greatest opportunity for ruthless government — oppression — ever experienced in British Columbia. I'm talking about this bill. It's statutory viciousness, Mr. Speaker, whether by accident or design. Once it has started, it's a very difficult thing to check, and even much more difficult to remove.

The hallmark of democracy is the rule of law and the recognition and acceptance by society of order. This bill denies natural justice. It erodes the rights of the individual; it seizes without appeal. There are more words to that effect. Let me go back to that earlier statement: The only alternative to the rule of law and the democratic way of life is the tyranny of the strongest. This bill substitutes something that indeed could amount to tyranny of the strongest.

I'd like to pose a question to the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom) and ask him if he could tell me, before he scuttles away, who said those words. Who espoused those declarations? Those are his words in this chamber when he was a Liberal.

[ Page 294 ]

Interjections.

MR. HOWARD: Now he says: "Bah!" Now he's scuttling out!

HON. MR. GARDOM: Humbug!

MR. HOWARD: Run away! That's the minister's view about his own words which were just quoted to him: "Humbug!"

AN HON. MEMBER: That was when he was a Liberal.

MR. HOWARD: That was before he became an opportunist and took that first long, although easy, step towards the fascist state. He's now embroiled in it, and he doesn't have the intestinal fortitude to stand up in this chamber and say that he was wrong. And he'll support the bill.

Just one set of quotations from members opposite, who for obvious political reasons at that time thought it was wise to say something nice, to use some clichés, knowing full well that they didn't believe them, that they were entering an insane world of Social Credit and are enjoying staying in that particular world. That's the old-timers. Those who have come newly to the chamber or newly to Social Credit, while they may pack cards of other political parties — and I'm sure most of them do — are in the same bag and are moving in the same direction.

When fascism.... Yes, it's an exaggerated word. It has almost an unbelievable context to it, because there is a memory of fascism in this world that dates back just a few years — forty years or so. It involved Hitler and Mussolini; they're whom we think of. It involved Stalin. We think of him. He was a red fascist or a blue fascist; I don't know what colour, but that was fascism. It involves Pinochet. It involves current dictators in other parts of the world. We tend to say: "Oh, that couldn't happen here." We delude ourselves into thinking it couldn't happen here, but it can happen here. We're on the road to its happening here. When it comes, the supporters of it will call it anti-fascism. They'll cloak it in democracy, as members in this chamber have attempted to do with this bill, and as what the Attorney-General — I don't know what he's going to say, but it's what he will probably attempt to do as well.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Fascism comes upon us like a thief in the dark of the night, with soft-soled shoes so he can't be noticed and heard. Fascism moves from those soft-soled sneakers, turning them into hobnailed boots that trample over rights and opportunities and democracies. That's where we're going. The hon. gentlemen and ladies opposite are proud of that movement towards state control of people's lives. I know the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) is proud of it.

HON. MR. HEWITT: I'm not proud of you.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The minister will come to order, please. Perhaps if we have fewer interruptions we can maintain orderly debate; as a matter of fact, I'm sure that will happen.

MR. HOWARD: I don't mind the interruptions, Mr. Speaker. Maybe the Chair does, but usually the interruptions that come from the other side, especially from the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs, are so inane as not to worry about anyhow — and especially those from the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot). But that's their business, and my opinion and my interpretation.

[3:15]

I think the Provincial Secretary, who is the sponsor of this bill, attempted — he may have succeeded with some of his own members — to mislead the House the other day when he introduced the bill. He sought to mislead the House when he introduced the bill.

HON. MR. HEWITT: You walk a fine line.

MR. HOWARD: There's no fine line. I say that he sought to mislead the House when he introduced this bill, and I'll proceed to attempt to prove that contention.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, you may have your opinion, but we cannot offend the honour of another hon. member. I'm sure that the member now speaking is aware of that.

MR. HOWARD: I'm not attempting to offend the honour of the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot). One must be presumed to have something of that nature before it can be offended.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, we are now treading very finely on the rules that apply to all members of this House and that protect all members of this House. Those rules are applied equally. I will ask the hon. member for Skeena to continue his debate with relevance and avoid personal reflections.

MR. HOWARD: When the minister introduced the bill, his attempt to mislead us followed the course........

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'm going to have to ask the hon. member for Skeena to withdraw that statement. I find it offends an hon. member. Would the member, in parliamentary courtesy, please withdraw the statement.

MR. HOWARD: I will. Let me draw Your Honour's attention to something following that. Beauchesne, who is one of the people we look to when we need guidance, says in the fifth edition — which the Chair pulls out and uses from time to time to substantiate the position of the Chair — page 110 thereof, chapter 7, "Rules of Debate." "Since 1958 it has been ruled parliamentary to use the following expressions...." Then it enumerates them in alphabetical order: things like "black sheep", "blackmail", and "dishonest" even — although I'm not using that word. One of the words which is permissible, according to Beauchesne, is "mislead" — all by itself; not deliberately nor consciously mislead; no adjective attached to it to indicate anything other than simply mislead. All I was doing was following Beauchesne's advice. If Your Honour feels that Beauchesne is wrong and that I am not to follow Beauchesne any longer, I will certainly do that.

[ Page 295 ]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The reference to that word "mislead" is, of course, correct as applied to Beauchesne. The Chair's opinion, hon. member, is that using that expression to refer to the action of another hon. member would be unparliamentary.

MR. HOWARD: When the Provincial Secretary introduced the bill, he said — I need to paraphrase it because I don't have the Blues, and if I'm paraphrasing it incorrectly I'm sure he will tell me otherwise — the public endorsed this bill and this concept on May 5. It did no such thing. At no time during that election campaign did any one of those gentlemen or ladies opposite who are in the cabinet or anywhere else have the decency or honesty or forthrightness to come to the public in that campaign and say: "If we are elected we are going to introduce legislation that gives us the right to fire anybody in the public sector without cause." No way did they do that. The Social Credit Party lied about that when the question was posed about people in the public service. The Social Credit Party deliberately, consciously — and effectively — lied about that particular program. For the minister to come in this House and say, after he participated in what the Social Credit Party was doing, that the people endorsed this program on May 5 shows me that he either deliberately did what he was accused of doing earlier or is ignorant of the whole process of political democracy, or careless about it, or both.

This bill has nothing whatever to do with the question of restraint. Public Sector Restraint Act is an improper title, a misleading title. I believe it was the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) who read the explanatory note the other day. He saved me the trouble of reading it again. Nowhere in there does it say anything about restraint. It talks about reducing the size and the complexity of the public service, and increasing their efficiency and effectiveness in providing services to the general public; but it is not a public service restraint act, unless you consider discriminatory action by the government against public servants on the basis of sex, colour, race, political orientation, disagreement with the minister or the deputy minister — any obscure, manufactured reason whatever — to be contained within the concept of restraint. If restraint means discrimination it is correct, and if it doesn't it is misleading. This provides for the opportunity to fire people from their jobs without cause, without reason.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where does it say that?

MR. HOWARD: Well, the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs is now asking questions of me as to what the bill means. I thought he knew what it meant, which is why he is such a lover of it. That's what it says in there: without reason, without cause.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where does it say without reason? You don't even understand.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the minister please come to order. Only one member at a time. The member for Skeena has the floor.

MR. HOWARD: This bill allows for favourites to be played; it does. If it doesn't allow for that, why put it in there? Why do you want the right to fire without cause, if it does not embrace the potential for discrimination and favouritism? Because you're fascists; that's why. Because you're headed in that direction; that's why, Mr. Speaker: it allows them to play political favourites.

HON. MR. HEWITT: On a point of order, I think we on this side of the House have allowed the gentleman a fair amount of latitude. I find the declaration that I'm a fascist offensive, and I ask that member to withdraw.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: If the hon. member for Skeena has imputed any improper motive to the hon. Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs, the Chair will ask the member for Skeena to withdraw such imputation.

MR. HOWARD: I don't know why a condition suddenly becomes a motive.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Did the member impute any improper motive to another hon. member?

MR. HOWARD: No, of course not; I just called him a fascist.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, that is unacceptable, The Chair now finds the language offensive, and I will ask the member to withdraw that word.

MR. HOWARD: I will withdraw the reference to the hon. Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs as a fascist. When I use that word I'll look straight in front of me, with wide peripheral vision to encompass the government itself.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That would still apply to hon. members of the House, hon. member. Just this morning the Chair asked hon. members to withdraw a word that I found offensive: one can find that word in this morning's Hansard; it's a word that had been used; it was withdrawn. I think the Chair does, from time to time, have to find certain expressions offensive if they are applied or implied to other hon. members. I'm sure we are all aware of the terminology and expressions I'm referring to.

MR. HOWARD: Let me give you an example of favouritism. Take a hypothetical case. A bill was introduced on budget day, seeking to take away the authority of regional districts with respect to planning activities insofar as their involvement in municipalities was concerned. [Applause.] Okay, there's applause for that. We can deal with that bill in a substantive way, if and when it ever gets called. Let's assume that that bill had an effect upon the price of shares on the stock market, and that some people in this House had previous knowledge about that particular bill, and said: "Aha! When that bill's introduced, it's going to drive up the shares of company X or Y" or whatever hypothetical company we may be considering. And maybe they didn't go out and buy the shares themselves, but they whispered it to a friend — who knows? — and the subject was raised of the use of insider information, and the superintendent of brokers got into the act and said: "I'd like to examine that." There's nothing whatever, Mr. Speaker, in this particular bill to prevent the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs — whoever might hold that function; I'm not talking about this individual — from leaning on the superintendent of brokers and saying:

[ Page 296 ]

"Look, man, if you're going to investigate what some members in the Social Credit Party are doing, remember Bill 3; we've got the right to fire without cause." That's the type of viciousness that's inherent in the concept contained within this bill. Purely hypothetical, Mr. Speaker.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. I'll ask the Leader of the Opposition and the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs to come to order.

MR. HOWARD: Let's assume.... And it does take place within offices and in the workplace, elsewhere. I've heard that it has taken place in the public service, which is not to put any black marks against people in the public service; they're human beings same as anybody else. But I have heard that sexual harassment takes place in the public service. There's a provision in the collective agreement, I'm told, with the B.C. Government Employees Union and CUPE, and in the other sections of the public service, that prohibits it. They say it shouldn't take place. Now if it didn't take place, it wouldn't be necessary to prohibit it — if they didn't have the foundation for it in the first place. This bill permits that type of sexual harassment to take place under threat of being fired without cause. Either into an investigation of the person who may initiate the sexual harassment or the recipient of the harassment, depending on how far up it reaches....

That's possible. There's a wide, blanket declaration in this bill which says that people can be fired without reason, cause, justification or rationale; that people can be fired on a favouritism, family-friendship or political-party basis, or because they may be native Indians or black or anything else. Full, ranging, wide-open abuse is permitted under this law. That's what the bill does, Mr. Speaker, and it applies to municipalities.

[3:30]

I am reminded of the comments of one of the champions of municipalities in this House. Let me read what he said. He was talking about another piece of legislation which might or might not have had an effect on municipalities — this one does, clearly and undeniably. He said: "This leads naturally to the very major point" — remember that — "concerning prior consultation with properly elected local and regional governments." Where was the input, the contact with cities and district municipalities? Where was an honest and straightforward attempt to hear what locally based, locally elected people had to say about this type of legislation?

AN HON. MEMBER: Who said that?

MR. HOWARD: I don't know what riding he represented at the time he said it. I don't recall whether he was a Liberal or a Conservative at the time. I only recall that at the time the current Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) called him a traitor and a turncoat and a chickadee — whatever that meant. He's now the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis).

AN HON. MEMBER: You're kidding!

MR. HOWARD: That was the Minister of Finance when he wasn't the Minister of Finance, speaking for political purposes. He said it and he wanted it. He doesn't want it now, because, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance has been caught up in that step-by-step process moving toward — be careful of the word — state control and domination of every walk of life in this province. That's what has happened to the Minister of Finance. Like the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom), he's abandoned whatever passed for principle when they sat in opposition in this House.

Mr. Speaker, this bill really reflects that somebody had to pay for the last election. After all, the government embarked upon it using public funds — I don't know how many hundreds of thousands of dollars — and a pre-election campaign on television programs. Well, public servants, those of you who have either been fired or are going to get fired — those of you who paid attention to that — remember that this is your payment for those particular broadcasts, plus a lot more that you're going to pay for.

The "Build Highways" signs blossomed all over the province. I went to a sign painter in my home town and said: If you had to do those signs, how much would it cost you? And he said: "It depends on the volume." I said: "I don't know about the volume, I assume there's a couple of hundred in the province." He worked out a figure for me, and we went out and looked at the sign, the paint, the quality of the plywood, and put it all together, and he said: "Well, probably around $400 a sign." I counted the signs in my own riding, and other members said they counted so many signs in their ridings. The government produced, Mr. Speaker, something in the neighbourhood of 500 of those particular pre-election signs, at public expense. Multiply that by the $400 it cost to produce them, not counting the man-hours and the posts and the nuts and bolts in the Ministry of Highways district or regional offices, and there's an expenditure of something in the neighbourhood of a couple of hundred thousand dollars of public funds to advance the cause of Social Credit.

Restraint. Public servants are paying for it. That's part of the reason for this bill: to find the money to put back into the till that the government took out, rifling people's purses and their pocketbooks in order to pay for pre-election stuff.

Over the winter so many cabinet ministers came to Skeena at public expense that I thought.... For instance I thought the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) had taken up residence there, he was in and out so many different times. The other day he passed some opinion as to why I got elected. I'll tell him why I got elected: partly because the Minister of Forests came there so often. I got elected because the Minister of Forests and that woman he was running around with, or travelling around with — who was not his wife incidentally — were in Terrace so many times....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Hon. member, that is clearly an imputation of dishonourable motive. I ask the hon. member to withdraw any such imputation.

MR. HOWARD: I meant no imputation. He was travelling with a woman who wasn't his wife. Period. Fact. That helped to get me elected, and I want to thank the minister for that.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That is a very unparliamentary imputation of another member's honour. The member withdraws any imputation of dishonourable motive against....

Interjection.

[ Page 297 ]

MR. HOWARD: I said that from the beginning. There's no imputation there. It's just a straight statement of fact. The minister wants to know who the woman was; he just asked me. Now maybe he's engaging in unparliamentary things.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: If we could proceed to Bill 3.

Mr. Howard moved adjournment of the debate.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Motion negatived on the following division:

YEAS — 21

NAYS — 31

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

HON. MR. WATERLAND: I stand on a point of order. It's with reference to the comments made by the member for Skeena, which had a rather definite inference. The member said that I had been travelling around his riding with a woman who was not my wife. Now that statement in itself, I guess, is quite innocent. But the definite inference with which it was made is rather abhorrent to me. I'm not going to ask the member to withdraw, because the credibility and the morality of that member...

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. member.

HON. MR. WATERLAND: ...are pretty well known to the people in this House. I just want to make it known that I think this is one of the most despicable statements that can be made in this Legislature, especially coming from a member with the background that that member has.

Interjections.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. I'll ask the first member for Vancouver East (Mr. Barrett) to come to order.

MR. HOWARD: On that point of order, I just want to express through the Chair my appreciation to the Minister of Forests for finally disclosing his feelings.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. members. The matter is concluded.

HON. MR. SMITH: I want to congratulate the new member for Maillardville-Coquitlam (Mr. Parks), who took his seat here the other day when I was not here. His landslide victory was hard-fought and it took him two and a half months longer than anyone else to win his way into this House, but he will be a great addition along with a number of our other new members.

[3:45]

First of all I want to talk about the need for the bill. It is something that I don't think has been addressed a great deal in this House. The notion that this bill is something that has been plucked out of the blue, something that we did not have a mandate for or something that's unexpected is something that I find very passing strange. For the five or six weeks that we campaigned, if we heard one message from one end of this province to the other it was that the people expected us to do something about the size and complexity of government — to reduce it, to try to make it more efficient and to try to make it more modern and more effective in the world of 1983 and, in doing that, to reduce the size. I think that the message was received clearly all over this province. People knew that when we were re-elected that is what we were going to do.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

In this House we've had a lot of comments about things that this bill is supposed to do: that it takes away freedoms, takes away rights, it's fascist, it's communist and that it's all sorts of other things which are usually inconsistent. We have not had any analysis of the purpose of the bill and what the bill really does. What the bill really does is that it gets around the restrictions that have been placed on government and managers of government for some years to reduce the size of government, to eliminate duplication and to eliminate programs that are no longer considered to be priority at a time of falling revenues which governments cannot do because over a period of about 10 or 15 years the ability of managers to manage in government has been something that has been gradually eroded by a series of collective agreements. What this bill does is allow a fresh start to be made. This bill doesn't say that thousands and thousands of public servants are going to be laid off. It doesn't necessarily mean that either. What it does say is that employment in government can be terminated without the necessity of finding that the employee is guilty of some sort of wrongdoing in his job. The old rule that during a collective agreement you could only fire someone with cause made it almost impossible to eliminate or reduce the size of your employment complement. Arbitration boards have continuously put very restrictive interpretations on "just-cause" sections for dismissing employees, so it's been virtually impossible to reduce the size of government.

That is not only true at provincial level but also at the local and Crown corporations levels, because multitudes of collective agreements with terms in those collective agreements

[ Page 298 ]

which have eroded management's rights have made it very difficult for the public service at any level to come to grips with the need of controlling and reducing its size. What this bill does after October 31 is to start from scratch — from square one — to allow some new agreements to be negotiated which will allow managers to manage. Another thing that this bill does — and I guess the most revolutionary thing it does — is that it really assails the notion of everlasting tenure in the public sector. In that direction this bill is, I suppose, revolutionary.

In a column in the Ottawa Citizen on Tuesday, which was reproduced in the Times-Colonist, Richard Gwyn gives the government and the Premier very strong praise for launching in that direction and for being the first government in North America that is trying to democratically return to the control and size of government. Everlasting tenure, then, is assailed. But it's not assailed without guidelines. The bill does contain the power to make regulations, and it also contains some guidelines on the sorts of things that those regulations governing termination must take into account.

Things that are to be taken into account in those regulations are skills, abilities and qualifications of employees, something that often in the past could not be considered under seniority clauses, which were held to govern everything else. Another thing that's to be considered, Mr. Speaker, is the operational requirements and efficiency of the employer. It has been absolutely unheard of that the operational requirements and efficiency of employers should be considered. Finally, another item that is a guideline for consideration, and an important one, is the seniority of employees either within or outside of the collective agreement. So seniority will be a factor.

My colleague the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. Heinrich) spoke about the difficulties under the Public Schools Act in section 153. The difficulty was in achieving layoffs in public schools. Those provisions put a strait-jacket on school principals and superintendents to do anything to reduce the school complements except under the numbing provisions of seniority and under the emergency provisions such that if you cancel a program or shut down a school then all the people, regardless of experience and seniority in that program or school, were subject to being laid off, so that much better flexibility can be brought to bear in some new termination regulations under this bill. It will allow not only for a great deal more latitude and fairness but also for people with ability to retain positions in the public service.

The public reaction to this bill is generally favourable. There has been a lot of fear-mongering going on about the bill and what it might do, but the public reaction that I apprehend is that people are saying that finally a government is prepared to take on the job of reducing costs, living within its means, trying to reduce its deficit, and is going to deal at last with the size of government and do something about that. All of us know families in our ridings where one or more breadwinners — who are not in the public service, but are in private life or work for companies who work in the resource industries — have been laid off or have lost their jobs. Why should it be that only the private sector becomes subject to the effect of the economy on employment? The public sector demands must also be susceptible and bear relationship to the marketplace. That's what will happen under this bill.

There is a great deal of public support. There was not just Richard Gwyn's column but also a very favourable column by Charles Lynch which I noticed yesterday, and many people across the country are looking at British Columbia and what we're doing just as they did with the compensation stabilization program, which was the first of its kind in North America. This program is also going to be a beacon to other provinces and other jurisdictions. Nobody would pretend that the bill and the course that we're following is a pleasant or easy one — it is not. It's a difficult one, and it's incumbent upon us to proceed with that course and to endeavour to do so in a fair way. But I must say that I take very grave umbrage to the fear-mongering and the panic syndrome that the opposition have been trying to create around this bill, calling this a reign of terror, describing it as fascism and so on. Not only is that offensive and inaccurate, but it is not helpful to the majority of people in the public sector who will remain in the public service and will be working loyally and dedicatedly in the public service in the years ahead.

People who find that unfortunately the program that they're working in is being eliminated must be encouraged and helped to find the route to some other employment, or back to private life, not brought into the gallery and used as theatrical ploys by the opposition. They should be helped and encouraged and assisted so that they can go out and do other useful things with their talents.

I can remember when we brought in our first restraint program a year ago, and the compensation stabilization program was first introduced. I can remember hearing then charges that certain aspects of the public service were going to be devastated under that program if raises were only going to be permitted to go up by a maximum of 8 percent and if public sector local government budgets were not going to be allowed to increase. We were told, for instance, that education was going to be devastated because the raises that were given to teachers that year were going to be reduced from about 17 percent to something like 13 percent. I've noticed that there have been a few such cries again from some of the public service interest groups, but I think the public understands that you can have a high quality education system and a very effective and sensitive social services deliveries system in Health and Human Resources without pouring endlessly and constantly millions and millions of dollars into the system and maintaining the same level of employment that you have had in very good times economically, everlastingly and always.

What this bill does is provide for a way in which government can trim and slim down, and do so in a way that is credible and fair. We have a very clear mandate to do that, and that is what we're doing. I'm very pleased to join in this House to support this bill.

MS. BROWN: I think maybe the first thing that we should do is remind ourselves that the minister who just took his seat is the Attorney-General of this province — the chief law enforcement officer and the person who is supposed to preside over the delivery of justice in this province. I guess the best thing that can be said is that that pathetic defence of the bill which he just gave probably is an indication that he recognizes that justice is not being done under this piece of legislation; that he recognizes that this bill, contrary to what he tells us it's doing, is really depriving all British Columbians, whether they work for the public sector or not, of some very basic kinds of human rights, which, as the chief law enforcement officer and the person presiding over justice in this province, he should be fighting against. I am surprised,

[ Page 299 ]

first of all, that he is even participating in this debate. I thought that he would be so ashamed and so shamed by his government's action that he would have continued to stay out of the House today, as he has in the past, and not take his place in this debate. But as I said, that very brief and pathetic kind of defence that he gave is the best thing that can be said on his behalf.

[4:00]

He tells us that what the bill does is to allow government to get around restrictions which it has always had in terms of eliminating jobs. What he doesn't say is that the other side of the coin is that it does this by taking away the defences which working people in this province have come to enjoy and accept as a right. He talks about how a person can be terminated now without feeling that they are being guilty of wrongdoing. What is the point? What he is saying is that every job in the public sector is now an auxiliary job; that even if a person is doing their job well, even if they're performing a task that's necessary, even if they have seniority, with everything going exactly the way it should be, they should feel good about the fact that they're terminated, because now when they're terminated it's because there has not been any wrongdoing.

It seems to me that the Attorney-General should have been saying the exact opposite. What the Attorney-General should be saying is that when a person is doing a good job, is carrying out their responsibilities, has seniority and is involved in a program which is essential and necessary, that person's job should at least be protected. Instead, the minister is saying the very opposite. Now he is saying that it's not possible to fire a person because "there has been the notion of tenure in perpetuity." That's a myth. Tenure is a myth, Mr. Speaker. There has never been tenure; it's always been possible to terminate people with cause. That's always been possible. It's always been possible to terminate people as part of a collective agreement. There have always been layoffs; that's always been possible. Every single job comes up for re-evaluation and renegotiation with every collective agreement. The concept of tenure is a myth which this government is now trying to sell to the community at large — that once a person gets hired as a teacher, a nurse, a maintenance worker or a clerical worker in the public sector, that person's job is secure for life.

The Attorney-General is leaving. He doesn't want to hear the rest of what I'm about to say, because he recognizes, Mr. Speaker, that.... I'm not going to say that he deliberately misled the House, because I realize that I'd have to withdraw that, but surely the Attorney-General knew when he was talking about tenure in perpetuity that there is no such thing and has never been any such thing; that, in fact, simply by sitting down at the beginning of each collective agreement every job was up for renegotiation.

HON. MR. CHABOT: Your husband.

MS. BROWN: My husband has tenure? He's got tenure with me. I don't ever intend to terminate his contract. That's one tenure he has, Mr. Speaker.

But when the Attorney-General stands on the floor of this House and tries to justify the firing of people without cause, then I say that the Attorney-General should be called before the Bar Association and disciplined, because he is going in direct contravention of what he has been trained to do as a lawyer, and certainly what he knows should be done as the chief law enforcement officer of the province knows should be done. Maybe he should be dragged in front of the international court at the Hague. I don't know where he should go, but I know he should at least retire his position because he cannot be entrusted with supervising or presiding over the delivery of justice in this province.

This Bill 3 is a direct and complete contravention of the basic rights which working people, whether in the public or private sector, have and should have. When you look at the kinds of statements made by the speaker who just took his seat, you begin to understand why we can get away with this kind of legislation.

When the speaker stood up earlier to table a report in this House, he said: "This is the report of the Justice Development Commission, whatever that is." I thought that was a really interesting comment for him to make. The Justice Development Commission has a mandate.... Or at least it had a mandate. The report tells us that it is now terminated; it's disappeared. Its mandate was to develop coordinated plans for the future administration of justice in this province. I think it's interesting that the commission responsible for developing plans for the administration of justice in all its aspects is now to cease being. That's what that one-page annual report told us. It was supposed to promote, establish and supervise, as well as to finance, research respecting all aspects of the administration of justice in this province. That no longer is possible.

When the minister talks about termination notices and eliminating jobs in the civil service, he doesn't talk about the programs that go down the drain at the same time those jobs go down the drain. But when the Justice Development Commission goes down the drain, that certainly is in keeping with the general position to date of that Attorney-General.

That Attorney-General is the same person who told us.... We were told by the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis) in the throne speech that there was going to be a severe cutback in terms of criminal injuries compensation. That's the compensation paid to people who are the victims of crime in this province. That's in the interest of restraint. We're being told that that is going to be curtailed too. Not a word from the Attorney-General in defence of that; just more justification of the disappearance of that particular branch, the termination or elimination of that particular program.

My colleagues, in speaking to this bill in the last couple of days, have expressed surprise at the heartless and cruel way this government has set about implementing this legislation even before it's law. The bill has not been passed. It is not law. They have no jurisdiction under which to make these firings. Yet we are being told that 350 people in Human Resources, 500 people in the Attorney-General's ministry, 300 people in Health...and on and on it goes. The termination slips are going out while the bill is still being debated, and while the government has no mandate whatsoever — not given by this Legislature — to go ahead with those kinds of things.

I'm not surprised that the government is acting in this arbitrary manner. I'm not surprised that the government is behaving in this cruel and uncaring way towards its workers. For the past nine or ten years, as a critic of Human Resources, I have come to see that this is the way the government has always acted. That's the way it has always acted toward the elderly and the poor, towards services to children or to the disabled. What we are beginning to see is the way in which the government has always behaved towards the disadvantaged people in our community. The government is now

[ Page 300 ]

behaving that way towards all working people as well. So I'm not surprised by these actions on the part of the government.

This does not say that I'm not going to continue to speak out against it, because I think that there is something particularly sadistic about the way in which these terminations are taking place. What happens is that a person does not know who is going to be terminated. First of all, there are statements. There are going to be 300 people terminated. Am I going to be one of the 300? Is the person sitting beside me going to be one of the 300? Is the person above or below me? Who? That hangs over a worker's head. Whether you are speaking to people employed in the Ministry of Human Resources, Attorney-General, Health or wherever, everyone is insecure, because they know, if they can read the estimate books, that there are going to be jobs lost. They know, if they can hear statements made by the Ministry of Human Resources and by the Provincial Secretary, that the workforce in the public sector is going to be cut by 25 percent. The Provincial Secretary made that statement yesterday. But they don't know who or which ones are going to be cut. So we have this climate of insecurity. The Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Smith) said that he was upset and angry by the comments of the opposition that there was fear in the community at large. But there is! When people are insecure, a whole different climate develops and some really strange things begin to happen.

We hear, for example, that the rentalsman's office was terminated because the vacancy rate was so high that there was obviously no longer any need for a rentalsman's office. Are we then to conclude that the reason why the child abuse team is being wiped out by the Ministry of Human Resources is that there is no more child abuse, or that the government now accepts child abuse as a way of life and thinks that it's okay — is now legitimizing, condoning and accepting it? By the ministry's own annual report we know that child abuse is on the increase, that there are more children being abused by their parents now than there was a year ago, or the year before that, or the year before that. We have all of the evidence that says that during tough economic times there is an increase in violence within the family. Now what are we supposed to understand then about this government, which would choose now, when violence within the family is at its height, to wipe out its child abuse team? What are we to conclude about a government which would choose now, when incest is on the increase, to wipe out the team that deals with sexual abuse against children? What are we to conclude about a government that chooses now, when violence directed towards women in the community is on the increase, to notify a transition house that its funding is not going to be renewed, and that the women who are battered by their husbands in that community will just have to find somewhere else to go?

You know, when the Attorney-General, who is supposed to be officiating over the delivery of justice in this province, talks about one of the good things in this bill being that it allows you to fire people whom you couldn't fire before.... What about the children who are being abused? What about incest? What about wife-battering? What about those kinds of services which the government has now chosen to eliminate in the interest of restraint, at a time when we are told by their own annual reports that the sexual abuse of children is on the increase? But that service is terminated. The physical abuse of children is on the increase, but that service is terminated. The battering of women is on the increase, but that service is being terminated. And the members over there say: "What about the taxpayers?" Because a child is not a taxpayer it's okay to sexually abuse and batter that child? Is that what the Attorney-General meant when he said that this is a good piece of legislation because it now allows you to wipe out programs which the Provincial Secretary described yesterday as inessential?

[4:15]

"Leave it to the private sector, " he said. What private sector is funding transition houses, rape relief centres, child abuse centres or sexual assault against children centres? If there were such a thing as tenure, the people who work in programs to protect children from physical and sexual abuse should have tenure. Those are the people who should have tenure — the people who work against violence towards women, whether in rape-relief centres or in transition houses — if there were such a thing as tenure. But there is no such thing.

The terrible thing about this piece of legislation is that it doesn't only affect the people who are directly on the government payroll; it has all kinds of spinoff effects. It affects programs funded indirectly through the government — the Attorney-General's ministry, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Human Resources and the Ministry of Education, which has seen fit at this time to start cutting the funds to the native education program. That's what we're talking about when we say we are opposed to this kind of legislation.

I want to quote from a quotation which was used by one of my colleagues earlier this morning, but I'm going to use a different part of it, because the Attorney-General tells us how proud Richard Gwyn is that they have done this great revolutionary thing to the province.

AN HON. MEMBER: Who's Richard Gwyn?

MS. BROWN: Obviously he's someone for whom the Attorney-General has a great deal of respect.

AN HON. MEMBER: Is he an elected official?

MS. BROWN: No. The Toronto Star editorial said:

"Bennett is striking directly at the protection of low- and middle-income British Columbians. It is the relatively weak in society, those lacking in wealth and personal influence, who must most rely on the assistance of such institutions. Bennett proposes to leave them more vulnerable. It is also the weakest who will suffer most from Bennett's increases in already deplorable hospital user fees and from his curbs on welfare, legal aid and student loans. A similar edge of brutality characterizes his approach to reducing the size of the provincial civil service. Given the overall tilt his government is demonstrating, there is every reason to fear that the hardest-hit services will be those that benefit the neediest. Moreover, at a time when some 185,000 British Columbians are already unemployed, to contemplate adding thousands of government workers to the ranks of the jobless is itself an act of social cruelty."

The members on the government side keep saying: "What about the taxpayer?" Public-sector workers pay taxes; as a matter of fact, they pay a larger percentage of their income in taxes than most other workers, because they come

[ Page 301 ]

in that middle- and low-income group that carries the brunt of the taxes.

AN HON. MEMBER: Nonsense!

MS. BROWN: Public-sector workers pay taxes. That's a fact. And because they fall in the category.... In case the new member doesn't know, 66 percent of the public-sector workers making less than $20,000 are women. That's where the brunt of the taxes is borne. They have no tax shelter. They don't have a ferry pass or a bus pass. They don't have an expense account. They have to pay taxes on that. They carry the brunt of the tax burden, these low- and middle-income workers. So when the government members say, "What about the taxpayers?" it's the taxpayers that they're firing. When you talk about services to seniors and to people on income assistance, those people pay taxes. Everybody pays the social service tax. Every time you purchase an item you pay a tax. The most unfair form of taxation hits everybody, whether they are on welfare, on old-age pension, on disability pension, on workers' compensation, or whatever. There isn't anyone in this province who doesn't pay tax of one sort or another. Maybe that's a lesson that the government members need to learn as they sit there and say: "What about the taxpayers?"

Of course, it's true that children don't pay taxes. So if that's the group that the government wants to penalize and punish, they are doing a great job of that when they start cutting family-care workers, child-care workers, sexual assault teams and child abuse teams. If they want to ride in on the backs of the kids, they're doing a super job of that. There isn't any question that the Attorney-General, with his failure to deal with the needs of juveniles in the system, is doing one of the best jobs of riding in on the backs of the kids of this province.

The nurses of British Columbia are not known as a very radical group. They said that the government's message is clear. They issued a statement which says: "Nurses and other public employees must be punished for the crime of being employed taxpayers." I don't think anyone would refer to the Registered Nurses' Association of B.C. as a social democratic organization. The nurses' statement goes on to say: "All of this repressive legislation jeopardizes nursing care. Nurses and other public employees understand all too clearly now what the Solidarity union in Poland.... Like Solidarity, however, we will not give up." That's not a New Democratic Party statement. That's the nurses' statement.

The Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) stated in a press release, when she was introducing the child abuse team: "The protection of children from abuse and neglect is a top priority of the Ministry of Human Resources." What is the first group in the ministry to be cut? The top priority that she talked about. That's the kind of hypocrisy that this piece of legislation introduces.

I want to say something about the seniors, the poor and the disadvantaged people. They don't save their money. They spend it. One of the things that the government people tend to forget is that it's because of the money that they spend — their role as consumers — that a lot of jobs and a lot of small business enterprises are able to succeed. So every time they start talking about feeding at the public trough, I want to remind them that the income assistance recipients are not the ones feeding at the public trough. If anyone is feeding at the public trough it's the elected people in this House.

Do you know what happens with this piece of legislation? What it does is create an atmosphere in which all kinds of anti-social behaviour, which was never accepted before, suddenly becomes acceptable. When you wipe out a Human Rights Commission, what you begin to say — or the message which you as a government are putting out there — is that discrimination against people because of their sex, race or religion is okay, that it's permissible in this province. When you wipe out a Human Rights Commission and wipe out the human rights branch and fire the executive director, what you are saying is that racism is fine in this province. We now have a province that is open and fair game for anyone who wants to discriminate against you because you are disabled or because you're old or because you're female, or whatever.

I want to give you one example of the kind of thing that happens today that couldn't have happened before, and this is no big deal. You've heard of the B.C. Summer Games — we're all very proud of the B.C. Summer Games. My kids participated in those games. I attended the Summer Games in Kelowna. The whole idea of the Summer Games is to get everyone to participate. I have a letter here, and I'll start out by saying although this is no big deal it tells you a little bit about the kinds of things that happen in this province now that everyone knows human rights have gone by the board. This year, the cricket teams that participate in the Summer Games do so by invitation only. I have in my hand a letter to the chairman of the B.C. Summer Games, with a copy to the Provincial Secretary, indicating that the only cricket team in British Columbia not invited to participate in the B.C. Summer Games is the West Indian team. It's the only one. When the team approached the chairman of the Summer Games and asked why they were not included, they were told that this year the decision was made that teams were to be invited; you couldn't just be a part of the games, you had to be invited by the B.C. Cricket Association. And when they approached the president of the B.C. Cricket Association and asked why they were not invited, the president said the decision was made not to invite them. It was pointed out to the president of the B.C. Cricket Association and to the chairman of the B.C. Summer Games that the West Indian team perceived this to be an act of racism because they are the only cricket team in this province not included in that invitation.

As I say, it's no big deal. I don't understand why anybody wants to play cricket anyway. I don't understand it. It's a game I observe because I observe it.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's a man's game.

MS. BROWN: Yes, it's a man's game. Right.

[4:30]

Nonetheless, Mr. Speaker, they have filed — were about to file — a complaint with the Human Rights Commission because the president of the B.C. Cricket Association was unable to give any reason whatsoever for not issuing an invitation to them. There is no Human Rights Commission, no human rights branch, so it's okay now. Any time an association, whether it has to do with the B.C. Summer Games or anything else, decides that it doesn't want to include a group because it doesn't like West Indians, doesn't want them playing cricket, doesn't want them participating in the games, that's okay now. There's not a thing the West Indian cricket team can do.

You think they're going to go to court over this? If they went to court they'd wait two or three years anyway before

[ Page 302 ]

they had a hearing. Under normal circumstances they'd have filed a complaint with the Human Rights Commission. Under normal circumstances they would not have been excluded, because the climate of the province would have been such that whether or not the president of the B.C. Cricket Association likes West Indians, he would not have dared to exclude them. He would have known they would file a complaint with the Human Rights Commission, and there would have been an investigation. But the signal is out. The executive director of the B.C. human rights branch was fired without cause. The Human Rights Commission was terminated without cause. That's what this bill permits you to do.

Now everyone knows the signal is out. It's open season on minority groups. It's open season on anybody who would normally be protected by the Human Rights Commission, by a human rights branch, by human rights legislation. Terminated without cause: the executive director fired without cause, the commission terminated without cause. Now we know in this province it's okay, the only province in Canada where there is no Human Rights Commission, and the Provincial Secretary thinks it's funny. As I said when I raised this issue, this is nothing compared to the kinds of issues and treatment that minority groups are going to begin to get in this province as a direct result of the wiping out of the Human Rights Commission — as a direct result of that government serving notice to the world at large that in British Columbia it's open season on minority groups.

The domestics and farmworkers have been knocking themselves out for years asking for some protection under the Labour Code. They got it. Now there's nowhere for them to go. Fired without due cause. Why should anyone want to hire or care about hiring or even give an explanation for not hiring a minority group person? What are you going to do about it? When my daughter applies for a job somewhere and someone says, "I don't want to hire you; I'm not hiring blacks today, " what's she going to do? Where is she going to go? Did the Attorney-General stand up and make one single statement about that? That Attorney-General defended legislation that allowed this government to fire without cause the executive director of the human rights branch and to wipe out and fire without cause the Human Rights Commission, and leave every single minority group person in this province, every single person who needs the protection of a Human Rights Commission, vulnerable. That's what this is all about. The climate has now been set. Nobody in this province is safe.

AN HON. MEMBER: No job is safe.

MS. BROWN: Your job's not safe — you're not safe! No child is safe from sexual or physical abuse, because that's been wiped out. Women in Nelson have just received notice that their transition house.... You can batter them until they're black and blue and you have nothing to worry about, because they have been told that their transition house is not going to get any funding because in the interest of restraint there isn't any money to protect them. What this government has done through this piece of legislation and through its actions since it took office is to ensure that nobody — and no child — is safe in this province. That's what this legislation is all about.

There is no need for me to re-use the words used in the past to describe this government's actions and what it's doing, but when you start cutting out programs and services that protect the vulnerable members of your society, Mr. Speaker, then you return to barbarism; that's what you do. This is no longer a civilized society that we're living in in this province. This government has served notice that it is okay to sexually abuse and batter children, to batter women, to discriminate against people because of their race, sex, age, disability or whatever.

That's what this government has served notice of under this piece of legislation. Why am I even bothering to ask that this government withdraw this piece of legislation? I would be wasting my time. But in all conscience I cannot terminate what I'm about to say without making that one last plea. Whether it is by amendment or by withdrawing the entire bill and taking a second look at the whole situation, I think that to deprive the working people, either in the public or private sector, of due cause — to wipe out a Human Rights Commission, to fire people who work in the area of sexual abuse against children and battered women — is barbaric.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to move adjournment of this debate.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Motion negatived on the following division:

YEAS — 22

NAYS — 29

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

MS. BROWN: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, when the hon. Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Smith) tabled the Justice Development Commission report, he stated that he wanted to "table the annual report of the Justice Development Commission, whatever that is." I have just received a copy of the Blues, and am a little bit surprised to find that it reads that he is tabling the annual report of the Justice Development Commission, but there is no mention of his comment "whatever that is." I'm wondering whether the Speaker would like to find out whether there was a breakdown in the machinery or precisely what happened, because I know that the Attorney General will agree with me that he actually did say that.

[ Page 303 ]

MR. SPEAKER: Thank you, hon. member. The Chair will undertake to review the matter.

MR. D'ARCY: In this debate on second reading of Bill 3, I want to make the point that the government really has no need or desire to do what they say they want to do, and that they have other motives in bringing this bill in. The effect of this bill on people who work in the public service in British Columbia.... I want to emphasize, because the apologists for the government like to make the point that we are only dealing with the public service of the B.C. government — which is certainly not the case at all — that we are dealing with every person employed under provincial jurisdiction in any public job anywhere in the province.

[4:45]

1 have considerable concern about the effect this bill is going to have on professionals and others employed in the public service who are expected to give an impartial analysis and recommendation based on their professional judgments. What happens if an employee of the fire marshal's office is investigating a fire and happens to suspect that possibly something strange has gone on, but that possibly that building or piece of property is owned by a prominent supporter of the party in power — in this case the Social Credit Party? What happens with assessors employed by the B.C. Assessment Authority when they appraise an assessed property for property taxation purposes in this province? What about liquor administration branch inspectors when they investigate liquor licence violations or applications? What about the people who grant liquor licences, if they reject those applications when those persons happen to be known friends of the government? What about health inspectors when they are making inspections of community care facilities — private or public — as well as inspections of restaurants and sewage installations, subdivisions and that sort of thing? All of those professionals in this province are going to be under a cloud. What about building inspectors and Workers' Compensation Board inspectors responsible for the safety of the public and the working people in this province?

The government doesn't need this act to accomplish what they say they want to accomplish. There are at most — and this is a very generous estimate — 25,000 people who are covered by a very generous interpretation of the definition of tenure. This means there are at least 225,000 people covered under this bill who do not have tenure today, and have never had it and have never asked for it. Tell me, Mr. Speaker, if anybody on the government side can get up and assure this House that there are workers in B.C. Hydro who have tenure? Can the member for North Vancouver-Seymour (Mr. Davis) tell us that? Workers in B.C. Hydro don't have tenure. Can any of you members who live up and down the B.C. Railway get up in this House and tell us whether any of those workers have or have ever had tenure? They haven't, they don't have it, they've never asked for it and they've never needed it. Because they're loyal to the people they have worked for — up to this point — and they have been faithful to their employers.

Let's find out if there was anybody in Crown corporations such as the Ferry Corporation or the Buildings Corporation, who have or ever had tenure. They don't, Mr. Speaker. The bus drivers of this province working for Metro Transit, the hospital workers, the municipal workers, the university workers — other than those fat-cat professors — none of them have ever had tenure. If the government really believes in what they're saying, that they're opposed to tenure, then they should simply bring in a bill affecting those 25,000 people within the provincial civil service, and a handful of university professors, who in fact do have tenure. And they should deliberately exclude all of these quarter of a million people from any mention of the fact that anybody can have his job terminated without cause.

The private sector does not do this; it never has. Those members on the opposite side who are employers themselves in their private lives, and those members who are from management and know something about personnel operations, know that the private sector respects its employees, and they know that with or without union contracts the private sector does not fire people indiscriminately. When layoffs come because a department is closed, because of technological change or because of economic adversity, those layoffs take place in some reasoned, logical way, with consultation with the employees involved; and when a plant or department closes, everything possible is done within the private sector to find jobs elsewhere — sometimes elsewhere on the continent, sometimes even in another country, but the private sector finds jobs for those employees.

The member for Kamloops (Hon. Mr. Richmond) isn't in the House now, but he knows that when that Gulf refinery shut down a month or so ago, some of those employees were even sent to South America. Gulf Canada found jobs for them; they didn't just send them pink slips and say: "You're gone. Ho, ho, ho!" When MacMillan Bloedel closes a plant they find jobs, if possible, for those employees. The Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) himself, who is not in the House, is a CPR employee. How would he feel if, instead of working for that corporation, he worked for the CNR and the federal government brought in a law that simply said he could be fired indiscriminately, simply because he was a member of the Social Credit Party? We also know that, with or without any contract that he may have been under, when the CPR terminated his job in Invermere they would have found him another job somewhere else — in Regina, Winnipeg, Montreal, possibly even here in Victoria, but they would have found him a job. If he ever has to go back to the private sector, they would probably still find him a job.

What about the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. Rogers)? He's not in the House either. Before he came here he was an airline pilot. He may even have worked for a Crown corporation. Does he believe that it's fair that that Crown corporation or that federal government, which has the ultimate jurisdiction, could simply tell him that he is fired, that he is an incompetent person, simply because they don't like his politics, or anything else about him.

This bill goes beyond totalitarian governments. We have seen totalitarian governments in developed, industrialized countries within the last generation. None of them had laws on the books such as this one. We have seen very right-wing governments elected in various jurisdictions among our neighbours to the south. None of them have ever enacted legislation like this. I believe that even that great arch-conservative, Jesse Helms, would be shocked by this type of legislation. We did not see legislation like this in the colonels' Greece, in Salazar's Portugal, in Franco's Spain, in Peron's Argentina — the list goes on. I want to reiterate, Mr. Speaker: there is not now, nor has there ever been, a shred of evidence given by any speaker on behalf of the government as to why they need this legislation.

[ Page 304 ]

Thirty percent — far more than the government says it wants to reduce the provincial civil service by — of the provincial civil service does not have tenure today, even without this bill. The employees of the Crown corporations, the hospitals, the school boards, the community care facilities and the municipalities do not have tenure and have never had it. The government simply cannot show a shred of reason why they need this legislation. And they know it. But they keep coming up with these fatuous, specious arguments as to why we should have this sort of thing in the province of British Columbia.

I'd like to talk particularly to those members opposite who have their own business or are part of a business. You know very well that you do not, never have and never would treat your own employees this way. Because for the operations of your businesses you require the loyalty, faith and competence of the people who work with you. You know that if you abrogate that loyalty it will hurt your business interests. So you wouldn't treat people that way. But you're prepared, in the public sector, to see people treated that way, because you don't care about the public sector; you don't care about how money is spent in this province.

You don't care about how taxpayers' funds are spent. You don't care about what the international banking and business community thinks of you. That's why Moody's has lowered the credit rating of this province. Moody's looked at this bill, Mr. Speaker, and decided it was restraint for the B.C. economy but not restraint for the government. That's what they decided, and that's why they lowered the credit rating. Moody's have sent you a message over there, and if you don't hear it you're not going to be there next time.

The international business community has looked at the fact that 70 percent of the debt of this province was acquired by this government over the last seven years, and that another $4 billion is supposed to be borrowed in this year. They've said: "You're not getting that as cheaply as you did in the past." And they're going to charge us more for it because of the profligacy of this government.

The reason they need this bill is that the people across the way don't really care about the economy; they only care about the opportunities that their friends have.

A number of people in my riding have expressed concern about this, and they aren't all working people. Many of them are employers. A number have written or phoned who are definitely not supporters of the New Democratic Party. They're not even Liberals. Many people who have expressed concern are honourable people who say that they are Conservative Party supporters and they used to be Social Credit supporters; they're not going to be Social Credit supporters any more, because it's the Tories who are the most shocked — the true Tories, the honourable Tories — by this kind of legislation. They would not support this kind of legislation in the federal jurisdiction, in Ontario, in Alberta or anywhere else.

The government knows that they made a serious tactical error six days ago when they fired 500 people. Mr. Speaker, they want this bill passed as soon as possible. They don't want people out there to realize that the bell tolls for them. They don't want the employees of B.C. Hydro, B.C. Rail, B.C. Ferry, B.C. Assessment Authority, the people who work for universities, school boards, municipalities, in hospitals and community care facilities to realize that we're not just talking about some mythical, so-called civil servant somewhere who isn't doing his job. The government doesn't want the public to realize that, so they want this bill through fast. The government really wish they hadn't made that terrible tactical error last week of sending out those dismissal notices. That's what got the public shocked, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, there was a shock wave from the budget itself. And yes, there was a shock wave from the tabling of this legislation. But it was the actual firing notices and the method of enforcement that really got the public's attention.

So the government has interrupted the traditions of parliament, which give the debate on the budget precedence over all other business. It has used its authoritarianism to get this bill jammed through the House before the public realizes what's really in it.

[5:00]

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

If they really believed what they say they do as the need for this bill, they would not have the provisions for arbitrary, authoritarian firing in it. They would simply have a simple bill that removed tenure from civil servants with more than three years in the public service and from university professors — 25,000 people at the most — and they'd have no need, even for them, to have a provision for firing without, cause.

I am not surprised at the kind of logical-rational argument we're hearing on this side of the House. What does disturb me, though, is the kind of idiotic rationale and crazy arguments I'm hearing from across the way in justification of this bill. I would really like to hear a single member across the way get up and provide some direct, logical, sensible rationale as to why this bill is needed. Even if one of them got up and said, "I agree with you — we're doing it because we want to scare the heck out of everybody in the public service in this province, and everybody who works in the private sector as well, " I would respect them more. But with these specious, fatuous arguments, this talk about tenure when no tenure exists or ever has existed, they insult the intelligence of everyone in this province and in this country.

If those members of the treasury benches who had such a good time down on Broadway last year and the year before and the year before that went back there this year, they would find that they're not being taken very seriously down there. They would find that they're being laughed at down there; that's what they would find.

I thought we had a number of people in this House who cared about the economy here. I thought even you, Mr. Speaker, cared about public sector employees in the Prince George area, especially those who may work for B.C. Rail or the provincial government. Obviously, since the government is jamming this through, not a single member on the government side cares one whit about public sector or Crown corporation employees anywhere in this province. Not a single member over there.

I believe that all the charges that have been made, all the innuendo over the years and all the statements that have been made outside this House by editorial writers and columnists about the true motives of this government are now being proved to be correct. The motivations of this government are anti-societal, are to hurt the economy, and are to throw a roadblock before any reasonable development of a proper, sane, rational, comfortable society in this province. I think this government should be thrown out of office at the first possible opportunity.

[ Page 305 ]

Before I sit down, I would like to move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion negatived on the following division:

YEAS — 20

NAYS — 29

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

MR. REYNOLDS: I hadn't planned to speak in this debate but after listening to all the nonsense from the party across, I felt I had to get up and speak. It's unfortunate that the second member for Vancouver-Centre (Mr. Lauk) is leaving, because I told him I only had a ten-minute speech. If he would sit here I could probably turn it into a 40-minute one. Maybe he'll come back and listen to some of the reasons. I see the member for Burnaby-Edmonds (Ms. Brown) is leaving, too. She likes to get up and talk about a lot of nonsense, but she's really afraid to listen to the truth of the matter.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

I thought that it might be interesting at this stage in the debate, after listening to some of these members of the NDP, to read the explanatory notes of the bill. I was reading them myself this afternoon. I hadn't paid much attention to that part of it until I kept on listening to their speeches. I've read the rest of the bill, but....

MR. BLENCOE: He hadn't read it.

MR. REYNOLDS: I don't think you've read it. I think the second member for Victoria should read it. I'm going to read it for him; maybe he can't read that well:

"The purpose of this act is to permit public-sector employers to terminate employees for the purpose of decreasing the size and complexity of public-sector operations and to increase their efficiency and effectiveness in providing services to the public. In addition the act provides that the government may establish an equitable and consistent scheme for compensating senior management in the public sector."

I can't see anything in that explanatory note that reaches the statements that these hon. members from the NDP are making.

Interjection.

MR. REYNOLDS: I'm going to get back to some of the things you've been talking about.

This morning I heard on the radio that the coordinating committee of the unions is going to put up $250,000 for an advertising campaign against this bill. I couldn't help but think that here the unions of this province are putting up $250,000 when these members are talking about the poor people who are going to be out of work. The member for Burnaby-Edmonds talks about Rape Relief and other child abuse programs, and here's a union that is going to blow $250,000 for the CBC and the CTV and the Vancouver Sun, and the Vancouver Province.

MR. SKELLY: It's not the taxpayers' money.

MR. REYNOLDS: Listen! We could hire Fred Latremouille any time. It's just like Jimmy Pattison can hire the Leader of the Opposition any time he wants to make a little more money than he is making here. If the rest of his group don't start making a little more sense in some of the statements they're making, I suggest he go. You'll have a lot of fun at it.

I've had a number of calls today from some people in the financial community, not the big rich guys that you want to talk about. I'm talking about stockbrokers who aren't making fortunes. They're hard-working guys out in the field, and they are saying: "What's wrong with these guys on the other side? Don't they understand that the government has to have the power and has to get rid of some of these civil servants and some of the jobs that are unnecessary?" I would suggest to some of these members that the rentalsman's office is an expense that the government doesn't need and cannot afford at this time. I'm not ashamed to see it go. I'm not ashamed to see the testing stations go down. To hear the nonsense that we hear, Mr. Speaker....

The first member for Vancouver-Centre (Mr. Barnes) said it was a reign of terror in the province. My god, I was getting afraid to walk from here down to the Royal Scot last night because of the reign of terror that was taking over this province. It's still the freest country in the world and the greatest province in Canada, and these guys think it's a reign of terror.

They talk about the Human Rights Commission and the abolishment of it. Why don't they read the bill closely and they'll see that there is going to be up to a five-man group that will sit there and look at the problems in this province. Human rights have not been abolished in this province.

Interjection.

MR. REYNOLDS: Five-man or five-woman. Would you like to put it that way?

They don't want to look at that aspect of the bill because they don't want to tell the people of this province the truth. They just want to yell and scream and make lots of noise because the unions are telling them to. They've got the message from the groups who run this party — the labour movement in this province. This party here were not really

[ Page 306 ]

attending that well until the unions got onto their backs last week and now they're here in great numbers every day.

[5:15]

The member for Burnaby-Edmonds made a great issue in her speech about this bill having an effect on wife-beating, child abuses and sexual assault. One of their members said: "Put it in the private sector." They must understand that a lot of these issues are already looked after in the private sector. Maybe they don't like the private sector getting involved, because it doesn't involve government; it doesn't involve a bureaucracy that they could control if they were government. This government believes in private enterprise and believes that there are sources of information and help that people can go to in this province. I can list a number of them. There's the Salvation Army, which does great work in this province and across Canada; the ministers and all the churches across this province — the good work they do aiding and assisting people; Big Brothers; Uncles at Large and Big Sisters — if she wants to talk about child abuse and all the problems with children. They are people who give of their own free time to go out and work with children in this province who have some problems. They don't need a government bureaucrat to look after the children; we can look after our own children.

What's wrong with clubs like Rotary, Kinsmen, Lions, Kiwanis and the Optimists, who do a lot of work with children? Also the Business and Professional Women's Club, to the member for Burnaby-Edmonds; she should join it; they do a lot of good work for poor and underdeveloped children all around this country. She should look a lot more closely at those things and stop complaining about a government that's taking responsible action in this province to eliminate a number of civil servants. The hon. member said we're trying to scare civil servants. Well, when times are tough people should be a little scared. I'm a little scared for my companies, and I make darned sure that my employees work hard; they know that if they don't work hard and we don't make money they're not going to have a job. There's no reason why civil servants shouldn't think the same way.

The member for Burnaby-Edmonds talked about how racism is fine in this province, indicating that this government believes in racism. I would just suggest to her that it is hypocritical of her to say that in this province. I withdraw that, if it's offensive to her to say that it's hypocritical, but she made the statement that racism is fine in this province. As a member on the other side, I take exception to a member of the NDP saying that about my party.

AN HON. MEMBER: Which party?

MR. REYNOLDS: What party? The Social Credit Party, the party that I got elected with.

MR. BARRETT: Keegstra!

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Please cease the interjections.

MR. REYNOLDS: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition in his interjections is yelling out a name of a member of the Social Credit Party of Alberta, which has no connection at all with the Social Credit Party in British Columbia. Certainly I don't know one member on this side who supported that member's statements in Alberta or supported his cause. The people of this province understand that that's the kind of nonsense coming from the NDP. That's why they didn't elect them in the last election, and that's what is so frustrating to these members across the table.

The member for Burnaby-Edmonds talked about the B.C. Summer Games and how human rights have gone by the board because cricket teams are invited by invitation only. She said that the only team not invited was the West Indian team, and that they had to be invited by the B.C. Cricket Association. Only so many teams can compete. Most cricket clubs in this province have West Indian players on them. There's been no discrimination against the West Indian team. Other cricket teams in this province have West Indians on them; they're playing in the Summer Games. But only so many teams can compete. There is an association. For her to indicate that we need the B.C. Human Rights Commission to decide whether a cricket team should go in the B.C. Summer Games I think shows the people of this province the nonsense we're hearing from the NDP. She would waste the public purse in having some public officials look into this type of complaint. If it were the case, the cricket team could write to any member of this Legislature. I wouldn't care what party he's in; we would look into that problem. If there were racism we would make sure it stopped.

The member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) talked about the morality, the ethics. He also got into the stock market comments; he indicated that members of my party could talk to the superintendent of brokers and say don't investigate something. Again I say to the people of this province: don't believe it. They elected the Social Credit government because of the integrity of the government; they liked it, they voted for it, and that's why we are here. I think he also talked about the one stock that went up a dime and 20 cents. It's obvious that he knows very little about the stock market. Stocks go up; stocks go down. Nobody in this House is going to have much influence on what's happening on that stock market.

The member for Rossland-Trail (Mr. D'Arcy) talked about Pero's government. They've mentioned other leaders. They said that we don't care about the economy, that we just care about our friends. We care about the people of British Columbia; that's why the people of British Columbia returned us to this Legislature with a bigger majority. I think that member should understand that.

They talk about cutbacks in Bill 3 and how it is so terrible. I just have to quote the former Premier of this province, who is sitting here. This is what he said back a few years ago when he was trying to stay in government, trying to convince the people of this province that he was responsible. I'm quoting from the Vancouver Sun, September 18, 1975: " 'The provincial government will cut back on services if necessary in order to balance its budget, ' Premier Dave Barrett said here Wednesday." This is the man who can get up in this House and talk about us cutting back because these things are necessary. "Barrett has pledged in recent weeks that the government will hold the line on services, but has not yet suggested that cutbacks might be necessary. 'We've been spoiled in this country, ' he said. 'We've had it too easy, and we've been led to believe that things come too easy.'" The former Premier of this province said on September 18, 1975: "I'm going to have a balanced budget, and if I have to make cuts I will cut." Yet he can stand in this chamber and criticize this government for making cuts when they're necessary.

Interjections.

[ Page 307 ]

MR. REYNOLDS: Oh, he talks about firing without cause. Well, just hold your seat, Mr. Second Member for Victoria (Mr. Blencoe), because I'll give you a couple of examples — maybe you're too young to remember, but you'll hear about them very shortly — about your famous Leader of the Opposition and how he fired people without cause, and how your Minister of Education fired people without cause. We'll tell you about those. We'll tell you the truth so you can learn to debate well in this House.

I have to stress again that the new Human Rights Act does away with the commission, but it replaces it with a new human rights council. I have to keep on reminding the members next to us that there will be a council, an avenue for people to go. It's a refined system. We don't need the bureaucracy. We don't have the Human Rights Commission, but we will have the council, and there'll be respected people in this province sitting on it who will solve some of the problems. But there won't be the large bureaucracy.

I just have to quote the former Premier again. On September 20, 1975.... I see he's left — but I guess he couldn't take the last one. It's a little tough to swallow when you have to listen to somebody tell you what you did back in 1975, and you're trying to criticize it in 1983.

In Cranbrook in 1975 he said he "would cut services to people if needed to balance this year's budget." That Premier said he would cut services to people if needed. This party, the Social Credit government, did not cut services to people in this budget. We increased them. The Health ministry will spend $2.4 billion this year, up 7.3 percent. This is a government that cares about people.

The second member for Victoria talks about child-care workers. The Human Resources ministry budget of $1.4 billion is up 14 percent. This is government that cares about people. We won't cut those serious things. Education is at $1.4 billion, up 7 percent. This is a government that cares about people. We've shown it in the way this budget was done, because we've increased services to people and are cutting the unnecessary fat out of the civil service in this province.

The second member for Victoria talks about dismissal without cause. Let me give him a couple of examples of what his government did in the past. I'm quoting from January 10, 1974. Premier Barrett was being interviewed on the CBC public affairs program "Hourglass." The interviewer asked a question about NDP action in the education field and the role being played by education commissioner John Bremer. Barrett replied: "His programs are a bit of a flop." "Bremer?" asked the interviewer. "He's a bit of a failure, " replied the Premier. The Premier of this province was saying something about his commissioner of education right on the 6 o'clock television news. Everybody's watching. The poor guy's probably watching himself with his wife and kids. Can you believe that this NDP government would talk about one of their employees that way on television in front of all the people?

It goes on. The statement hit the front page of every provincial newspaper, and caught Education Minister Eileen Dailly and Bremer by complete surprise. As one NDP official later described it, at 8 a.m. Dailly gets off a plane and tells reporters: "All I know is what I've read in the newspapers." At 10 she meets with Barrett, at 4 she announces Bremer is fired, and at 5 there was a call from Bremer up north asking what was going on. It was a comedy of errors, Mr. Speaker. It was the first time in B.C. history that a civil servant had been fired over television.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just a moment, please. Members cannot do by one device what they would not be allowed to do by another. Even when reading a newspaper report, we should not mention the name of a member of this House. Just refer to them by their title or riding.

MR. REYNOLDS: The former Premier of this province, the Leader of the Opposition, fired one of his Education people over television. Is that the party, the NDP, that can criticize this government for the way it has handled its employees in these dismissal cases? I suggest to you that the people of this province see the hypocrisy in what is happening in this debate right now, the hypocrisy in what is happening right now with the labour unions and the civil servants in this province.

I have another quote from the Vancouver Sun: "Whether Bremer should have been chopped is one thing; the way he got the word that his employers were unhappy with his performance is quite another. He heard the same time you did if you were watching the former Premier during a TV interview. He got his first formal notice sometime after the first commercial break."

Mr. Speaker, I bring that up to suggest to the members of the NDP that their party can certainly make mistakes. Certainly, later on the leader of their party apologized. In fact, he lost a lawsuit to Mr. Bremer over this case. The Premier of their party got sued for it. When dismissals happen, maybe somebody gets it when they're sitting down having dessert. But this government was trying its best to make sure the people being laid off found out about their dismissals before they saw it on television or heard it on the radio. We were trying in the best possible way to let these people know that their jobs were being discontinued; we were trying to do it in a way that had some dignity. Unfortunately, they can play it up the other way, but I hope, now that they've listened to what they do to people in a much worse way....

Nobody in this government has lost a libel suit to public employees or fired them on television, Mr. Speaker. I would just like to put that on the record. I'll read this story again from the Vancouver Sun of January 13, 1976:

"Former Premier David Barrett has made a satisfactory financial arrangement' to settle a libel action brought against him by former education commissioner John Bremer."

The exact terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

"The settlement was announced in B.C. Supreme Court today, along with a letter of apology from Barrett which was accepted by Bremer.

"Lawyer Allan McEachern, acting for Mr. Bremer, told Mr. Justice H. E. Hutcheon: 'I can advise you that Mr. Barrett has made a proposal of settlement which has been accepted by Mr. Bremer. The terms of the settlement include a satisfactory financial arrangement.'"

Interjection.

[5:30]

MR. REYNOLDS: The member from the other side, the

[ Page 308 ]

Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips), mentions a former member of this House, Mr. Williams, who resigned and took a nice-paying job to let the present Leader of the Opposition get back into this House. That cost the taxpayers a fair bit of money.

The man hired to pick up where the former commissioner of education, John Bremer, left off was also fired a little later on by this government. Dr. Stanley Knight, the director of research and development in the B.C. Education department, said he was dismissed without severance pay, Mr. Speaker. Now here's a man who was hired very shortly after Mr. Bremer was fired. He gets on the payroll and they fire him without severance pay. I suggest to you that the NDP really should hang their heads in shame when they get up and make these speeches in this debate in this House, because I could go on and on talking about how they handled things when they formed the government and the number of friends that they put into government jobs. In fact I talked about that in the throne speech debate. They filled the payroll with friends, and the member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) was one of them. Other members and friends of their party got jobs because they wanted to have some of their friends in office. I really see nothing wrong with that, but I wish they wouldn't be so hypocritical when they talk about other parties.

I also want to talk about another closure when the NDP were in office. They wanted to close the B.C. Houses in Los Angeles and San Francisco. On October 2, 1972, Travel Industry minister Ernie Hall announced that the government would keep the two offices. He said that the government liked the idea of them, but wanted to improve their operations. That was in October 1972. In December 1972 the Industrial Development minister, the second member for Vancouver East (Mr. Macdonald), announced that the two houses would be closed and their staffs dismissed. Here's a government that takes over power.... Two missions that we had operating in California.... I've spoken in this House about them before, and the fact that they produced so many millions of dollars of value to the province of British Columbia, and what did this NDP government do? They dismissed them. There was a little fight between the two ministers as to whether they should be kept or not.

Assistant Trade minister Steve Turbis, who was in charge of the office at that time, was not very happy, but he was a married man with four children. I just want to give you a quote, Mr. Speaker, of what the second member for Vancouver East said to him: "When the minister came down here he told me about it and he asked if I could find another job in San Francisco." Here's the second member for Vancouver East going down to a man on the government payroll of this province, who's done a great job for this province, and saying to him: "Can you find another job in San Francisco?" That, Mr. Speaker, is really looking after your civil servants. He said that the second member for Vancouver East indicated there were no positions in the trade department in Victoria. "In fact, he said they were going to do away with a number of other positions in that department and there were no other positions in the civil service at my level, so he suggested that I go to private industry." Well, Mr. Speaker, that to a man who had spent a number of years in the public service, promoting this province in California, doing a great job for his province; he is told by this NDP government at the time to find another job in San Francisco. Well, if I were to stand in this House and tell the unions to take their $250,000 and buy some airplane tickets to socialist Manitoba, wouldn't they love to quote that in the House, saying: "The Socreds are saying: 'All you socialists go back to Manitoba'"? But that's what they told one of the civil servants when they were in power: "Just find a job in San Francisco." I find that unacceptable. I just hope that the members in the NDP listen to those messages.

I think another point that we have to look at in this debate on Bill 3, when we're talking about the civil servants, is: is it the government that's the problem? This government has taken a position to weed out the unnecessary civil servants — to weed out the waste.

I would like to read from a letter sent to a member in this House. It's to do with the corrections branch.

"Further to our discussion in your office in Salmon Arm last month about the state of the corrections branch. After studying the annual report of April 1, 1981, to March 31, 1982, my mind is boggled. It is a very cleverly designed document full of meaningless statistics that tells one absolutely nothing about the true picture of the corrections branch and what is really going on. The financial statements are designed so that unless one really knew the system from the inside, they would never spot the abuses.

"If the government is really serious about saving money, and not just playing politics, at least $10 million could be saved without affecting the present corrections services. These savings are found by eliminating politically created positions that have no function whatsoever. Along with these positions go a lot of cars, secretaries, travelling expenses, hotel bills, etc. The majority of these positions are non-union, so there is no need for a confrontation with the BCGEU.

"Another area where tremendous amounts of money are virtually wasted is staff training. At present we send staff from all over the province to the Justice Institute for three weeks at a time, put them in hotels, pay their wages. The waste is that the courses, though, have nothing at all to do with the job of caring for inmates. They are taught by politically appointed instructors who wouldn't know an inmate if he fell through the roof. The courses mostly taught are about how to play mid-management games and are useless for dealing with inmates on a day-to-day basis.

"Somewhere along the way we have lost sight of the very reason why we are all here — inmates. Staff training should take place where the action is, in Oakalla. If a staff can function at Oakalla, he can handle any other centre in this province. Our correctional centres right this minute are time-bombs, not only because of overcrowding but because of non-employment of inmates. The east wing in Oakalla, for example, has a count of about 200 inmates, of which about 40 are working — half of them only one or one and a half hours a day. The devil indeed takes idle hands. It is not because we don't have the staff. We do. It's just the distribution that's screwed up. We're up to our necks in local, regional and district directors — all over $40,000 a year, and no contact with inmates. We've become an inverted pyramid, with only the tip working with the inmates. Our centres are nothing more than people's warehouses, and there's no need for it. We have the land, the staff and the resources to be almost self-sufficient.

[ Page 309 ]

"Our overcrowding is caused by non-payment of fines, mostly from drinking-driving offences. These people are not criminals in the usual sense, and are certainly not a custody problem. There is a lot of talent in our centres doing absolutely nothing. What a waste of a very talented workforce. We could so very easily be building provincial parks for tourists, and making money, not spending it."

I could go on with the gentleman's work records here, but I don't want to read that because it would probably reveal to some people who he is. He says: "I would dearly love to talk to someone who could change the situation, and would be willing to pay my own way to Victoria to do so." He says again: "Please treat my letter with discretion, as I have a wife and four children who depend on my working steadily." Mr. Speaker, my point is that this man is not afraid of the government; he's afraid of the bureaucracy that's been created above him that he feels is wasting the taxpayers' money.

I'm sure even members of the NDP would agree that we are wasting a lot of money in the corrections field. I know the member for Skeena (Mr. Howard), who knows a lot about that area and has spoken about it in the House of Commons, would like to see a lot of major changes in the corrections field. I would hope that that type of letter would indicate to these members of the NDP that there is a lot of waste in the public service these days. And don't, Mr. Speaker, as the NDP members do, bow down to the demands of your unions to stay in this House and fight, fight, fight for some of their rights. This government is taking responsible decisions that are supported by a majority even larger than the majority that elected us in the last election. I would plead with these members of the NDP not to get on their high horse about some of the unions that have supported them, but to think about what is right for all the citizens of British Columbia and the tax dollars that this government is trying to save for those citizens, and also to cut back the size.... The size of the bureaucracy in this country and in the United States is just phenomenal. This government will go down in the future....

One of the members showed me a Maclean's magazine a while ago which said: "Bennett takes Socreds to the right." Well, Mr. Speaker, the left-wing magazines and newspapers in this province aren't going to sway this government away from doing what they know is right and proper. The course that this government has just started.... I say just started, Mr. Speaker, because you've heard me talk about how I think the ombudsman's department should disappear and how other aspects of the public service should be reduced in this province. Nobody is going to convince me that I'm wrong when I say that the civil service needs to be pared, and we've got to get back to more private enterprise and put more people to work in the private enterprise field. It's this type of budget and bill that is going to put people back to work in this province in the sector that they should be in, which is the private sector.

I plead with these NDP members to be responsible. Stop talking your nonsense about the jackboots and fascism and the quotes from Germany. It's nonsense that the people of this province don't appreciate. You lower the level of this Legislature. I'm surprised that their two members from the federal legislature wouldn't be talking to the members of this party to say: "Come on. Let's bring up the level of the debate in this Legislature to a level that would be appreciated by the people of British Columbia and not lower it to the gutter like we heard in some of the cases this afternoon." Let's bring up the level of debate. Tell us what you would do. Don't just tell us that you're here to shout, because the unions tell you to, about their jobs. Tell us what you would do with the budget. Give us one of your budgets in this province. Tell us how you would balance the budget without cutting services. The leader of your party would have cut services in 1975, and said so in his speeches. It's less than honest for him to get up at this time and say this government shouldn't be doing it.

MR. BLENCOE: The member for West Vancouver-Howe Sound (Mr. Reynolds) decided to attack this party for wishing to support working people, working families, men and women all across this province for what's happening and what they're threatened with by this government. I say, and I think my colleagues say, that we are proud to stand up for working men and women in this province, because we know the kind of legislation that's coming down from this government. We know the sort of things they're up to. We see with this Bill 3 the contempt that they hold for basic human rights, and we know that we have to fight on behalf of those men and women — those working families — against this government.

This last week, particularly these last few days, have indeed been a sad few days for British Columbia. I don't think anyone ever believed we'd have the kind of legislation we have before us today. We have brought — this government has brought — incredible shame, in my estimation, on all British Columbians. We are not only getting local, provincial and national attention, but international attention for the kind of legislation that you are bringing down in terms of violation of human rights, human dignity, human worth.

AN HON. MEMBER: Good leadership. That's good government. We're recognized around the world as a good government.

MR. BLENCOE: I would like to have a little education for these members. Many of them have, I'm sure, over the years talked about the United Nations and human rights, and have espoused in some form that they believe some of those principles. I'll later get on to some of those principles they personally talk about. I'd like to remind some of those members of some of the principles of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. I think those are the things that should be talked about on the floor of this House, because they are certainly being forgotten about by that side of the House.

[5:45]

The preamble of the universal declaration of human rights says:

"Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world; whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people.... "

I think those members should take a look at some of those words when they bring down legislation such as this that we have before us.

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1 would remind those speakers of some of the pertinent articles of that UN declaration which I think are extremely important. Think about them in terms of the bill before us when you say you are going to fire public servants without cause.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Charlie trained you well.

MR. BLENCOE: Mr. Speaker, perhaps you can control the hon. member. He needs a lot of control. The Premier isn't here to do it.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: All members will come to order.

MR. BLENCOE: If I could refer to Article 7: "All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law." There is no law in this bill for ordinary people and public servants; it's being disbanded, thrown away. I would suggest those members take a look at some of these basic principles that millions of people endorse and support, but no longer in British Columbia by this government.

Interjections.

MR. BLENCOE: Again, Mr. Speaker, perhaps you could control this member over here. He's always getting out of control. We all know that.

Article 10: "Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal in the determination of his rights and obligations...." Those are important words: fair and public hearing; independent and impartial tribunal. There's no longer any fair or impartial tribunal in this act. It's all gone in the name of political opportunism, in the name of this thing called restraint — restraint only for the poor and the unemployed and the people who can't defend themselves against this arrogant and despicable government.

In my estimation this bill is anti-Canadian. It violates fundamental Canadian principles which this country was founded upon, and that people have lived and died for. Fundamental principles that our democratic system has endorsed, but which this government in this province seems bent and determined to eradicate, totally once and for all.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is shameful. I think many of us in the House this morning were very moved by the member for Comox (Ms. Sanford) as she reflected upon her father, and what he remembered, what he stood for, and what he went to war for. She reflected well, because there are many British Columbians and Canadians who went to defend the very principles and ideals and fundamental rights that this government wishes to eradicate in this bill.

HON. MR. HEWITT: Socreds went to war too.

MR. BLENCOE: Indeed, that's true.

MR. KEMPF: Where have you ever worked in your life?

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order. Please proceed, if the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr.

Phillips) and the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf) would contain their comments until they leave the chamber.

MR. BLENCOE: We're quite used to them, Mr. Speaker. The Minister of Industry and Small Business Development is probably one of the rudest members of this House.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That must be withdrawn.

MR. BLENCOE: Mr. Speaker, it happens to be fairly accurate, but I will withdraw that remark.

This bill has no semblance of justice. It has no semblance or recognition of due process. It certainly has no recognition of human rights, and it has no semblance or recognition of fairness and equity. It has nothing to preserve democratic values and principles, Mr. Speaker. Where else in the free, democratic western world would you have a government that would allow people to be fired without cause? Well we all know where it is now and it's known across Canada and it's certainly going to become known internationally that this government believes in firing without cause; doesn't believe in fair tribunals; doesn't believe in appeals to firing without cause.

Mr. Speaker, in my estimation this government has set out on a course that will destroy procedures and rights that have been established to protect human dignity and human worth — very important aspects — and this government has no regard for them at all.

I mentioned some key words, Mr. Speaker, and I think again I'll give a little lesson to these members over here. Key words; descriptions of some — I think and we think — important aspects of the democratic system: justice — how does the Oxford dictionary define "justice"? Go back and look at it, I suggest to some of these members. "Justice — the quality of being just." Quality — you don't know about quality. "The principle of just dealing." How about another one? "The quality of being morally just." There's no semblance of morality in this act. How about the word "equity"? Let's define "equity": "the quality of being equal or fair." Think about those words. How about another definition of equity: "even-handed dealing." You don't believe in that. If you did, you wouldn't bring this disgusting piece of legislation into this House. You wouldn't bring it here.

Mr. Speaker, here's another definition of equity: "the recourse to general principles of justice, to correct or supplement the provisions of the law." "Recourse to general principles of justice...." In this bill there is no recourse to general principles of justice and law. It is thrown out. It has gone. I would suggest that this government is not going to start here with this piece of legislation. We know they've moved on human rights. Now they're moving on public servants. Who's next?

MS. BROWN: They're moving on children.

MR. BLENCOE: They certainly are.

The method being used by the the current Socred government is the ancient one of divide-and-conquer — conquest, I might add, Mr. Speaker, over other British Columbians. Before this election we had the former Minister of Education set the scene for publicly scapegoating particular people in our community, and I refer to the teachers. He scapegoated the teachers for their inadequacy in their financial management of under this province.

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Interjection.

MR. BLENCOE: That section of our society was singled out for special Socred treatment. A leaner education system could be produced by getting rid of hundreds of teachers and therefore jeopardizing the education system, under the name of political opportunism and restraint, and the suffering of the children in our school systems.

But today, Mr. Speaker, they've gone further than that.... I was going to say "gentlemen".... I will say "gentlemen, " but my instinct is to go beyond that. Today this government has gone far beyond scapegoating one particular segment. It is now going to scapegoat and attack 250,000 public servants and their families. The Premier said the other day that the reason they're doing this to the public servants is that they're not doing their jobs. Then he comes in here and says: "Oh, no, I didn't quite mean that; that's not what I said, but maybe I did say it a little bit." But did he apologize to those 250,000 public servants who work diligently for the province of British Columbia? No, he didn't do that.

Mr. Speaker, at this point I would like to move adjournment of the debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Nielsen moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:59 p.m.