[ Page 597 ]

CONTENTS

Orders of the Day

Tobacco Tax Amendment Act, 1983 (Bill 13). Second reading.

Mr. Nicolson –– 597

Introduction of Bills

Regulations Act — 601

Tobacco Tax Amendment Act, 1983 (Bill 13). Second reading.

Mr. Barnes –– 601

Mr. Skelly –– 605

Mr. Michael –– 610

FRIDAY, JULY 29, 1983

The House met at 10:04 a.m.

MR. CLERK: Pursuant to standing order 12, I advise the House of the unavoidable absence of Mr. Speaker.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Prayers.

MRS. JOHNSTON: I'm very pleased to be able to introduce somebody who's in the gallery this morning, a young lady who worked very hard for the British Columbia Social Credit Party in the last election. She's the president of our B.C. Young Socreds, and I'd ask you all to welcome Mary Hemmingsen.

MR. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker, in your gallery today we have the chairman of the St. James School Board, one of my supporters during the last election, Jed and Ruth Astin and their three children Heidi, Jacob and Simon, from Vernon. I'd ask you to make them welcome.

MR. REID: Mr. Speaker, I take pleasure in introducing in your gallery today the president of the B.C. Young Socreds from Surrey, a young gentlemen who represents leadership and good government in the youth. It gives me great pleasure to introduce Joe Webber.

Hon. Mr. Schroeder filed the 1982 annual report of the British Columbia Marketing Board.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask leave of the House to move a motion that will enable a special committee of the Legislature to recommend the appointment of an auditor.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: I move that the Committee of Selection appointed by this House on June 23, 1983, comprising myself and the Hon. J.R. Chabot and Hon. H.W. Schroeder, and Messrs. Ree, Segarty, Veitch, Howard, Cocke and Hanson, be authorized to appoint a special committee of the Legislature to recommend a person to be appointed as auditor-general as provided under section 2 of the Auditor General Act.

MR. HOWARD: On the motion, I'm quite pleased, Your Honour, that we asked the government House Leader this question the other day and jogged his memory about a necessary function. We support the motion. The minister has the right to close debate, and I would, if he wouldn't mind…. While I don't have the motion in front of me and its words, could he indicate that the content of the motion is the same as the motion in 1976 –– I believe it was — when the first committee was established? Can he assure the House that it is the same motion, with the exception of the members' names on it? That would satisfy the initial moves made to deal with the appointment or reappointment, whatever the committee may conclude for the auditor-general.

Interjection.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. I believe there is some understanding?

HON. MR. GARDOM: I would like to assure the hon. House Leader for the official opposition that the motion is parallel. To fully satisfy him, I will read the one of June 22, 1976:

"By leave of the House and on the motion of the Hon. E.M. Wolfe, it was ordered that the Committee of Selection appointed by this House March 17, 1976, comprising Hon. Grace McCarthy, Hon. R.H. McClelland, and Messrs. Chabot, King and Gibson, be authorized to appoint a special committee of the Legislature to recommend a person to be appointed as auditor-general as provided under section 2 of the Auditor General Act."

Motion approved unanimously on a division.

[10:15]

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

HON. MR. GARDOM: I certainly hope that satisfied and assisted the second member for Vancouver Centre.

Orders of the Day

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

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 13.

TOBACCO TAX AMENDMENT ACT, 1983
(continued)

MR. NICOLSON: I rise as a person whose lips have not touched tobacco for some 30 years. I did start smoking when I was in grade 5. However, I saw the light, Mr. Speaker. It came to me one day when I was in grade 10 and my father went to borrow some of my cigarettes. Up to that day I had thought that my mother, who is Italian, had been more genetically responsible for the kind of makeup that I had, but I realized that I did have some very strong Scottish traits; I realized that this was going to hit me in the pocketbook, and I decided to take a different way than my father had in this area.

I have no doubts about the ravages of tobacco. I've heard Linus Pauling speak on a couple of occasions. I even had the pleasure of meeting him on one other occasion at an airport and talking to him for a little while. He's pointed out that studies done way back in the twenties in California indicated that smoking one pack of cigarettes a day increases mortality by 8 years, and two packs can increase it by 16 years. Unfortunately you don't avoid old age; you just get old sooner. No one on this side of the House, either the smokers or the newly reformed smokers, who are usually the most intolerant people, or those of us who reformed even during our high-school years…. When I grew up there was tremendous psychological encouragement to take up smoking. Almost every movie portrayed the hero…unless it was a Roy Rogers movie or something like that.

[ Page 598 ]

MR. REID: The horse didn't smoke.

MR. NICOLSON: No, Roy didn't smoke, Mr. Speaker. Gabby Hayes took a chaw of tobacco, but in the main features, John Wayne would smoke, George Raft would smoke, Humphrey Bogart would smoke, and one wonders where some of those people are today. Most of those people died some rather untimely deaths, but many others that saw the glamourized lifestyle portrayed in the movies adopted this style. I must say that it was probably part of the influence that led kids my age into experimenting with cigarettes. I don't think a day went by that I didn't have one of two when I was a very small child.

HON. MR. GARDOM: One or two what?

MR. NICOLSON: Cigarettes, my friend. They were not filter-tip cigarettes in those days; they were plain cigarettes.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Tailor-made?

MR. NICOLSON: Mostly tailor-made, yes.

We also saw the lifestyle of cigarettes portrayed by war veterans. Many people whom I know took up smoking during the Second World War. Cigarettes were free. Schoolchildren took up collections so they could send not just woollen socks and balaclavas and various things overseas, but cigarettes as well.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Have you ever tried to smoke a woollen sock?

MR. NICOLSON: I don't know on the basis of what experience the Minister of Finance is warning us against the dangers of smoking woollen socks. That is one experience I did not have, but I'll take the minister's word for it that smoking woollen socks can also be very harmful to one's health.

Remember the ads for Camel cigarettes and "Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco" — LSMFT — all those ads that would come over KIRO radio, KOMO and so on? Of course that was a type of lifestyle advertising that glamourized it. Yet this government has been saying that taxing cigarettes, by taxing a group of people who comprise the very poor as well as some of the very rich, is the way to discourage smoking. We've been taxing tobacco for years and years, yet the use of tobacco persists. I think its use by young people is on the increase, particularly by young women as opposed to young men. There are some relative changes in percentages of people using tobacco.

This government recently — I think it was last session — brought in legislation which permitted lifestyle advertising for the companion product we use: that is, alcohol. On the one hand they're deploring the use of tobacco, saying that the secret supposedly is to price it out of reach. But they have brought in lifestyle advertising for alcohol. When we're talking about the principle of this bill…. If they really had any health motivation in this particular bill, and if they weren't just looking for an extra $18 million in the budget this year and an extra $24 million for next year, we could do something absolutely different.

This bill is changing something that the minister brought into this House a couple of years ago. He said: "We're going to a modern system of taxation. We're going to index it." I thought we'd seen the last of the tobacco tax bills in this Legislature, because we went to indexing. We set a base and a formula, and we said, that is the way this tax will grow. As the price of cigarettes goes up, the revenue to the Crown will go up, and instead of just having a fixed cent–value on a package of 20 or 25 cigarettes it will be indexed; this was the last we were going to see of this. That was a couple of short years ago. Here we are again, and we're looking at changing the index.

I know a lot of people who, unfortunately, aren't going to stop smoking. They've already gone from tailor-mades to rolling their own. Because they are on fixed incomes — in many instances their disposable income has been falling behind over the last four years — they are going to be cutting into their disposable income; they're even going to be cutting into the necessities of life. Because they will not give up cigarettes — not for that reason.

Some people may have seen the very small item in this morning's Province; I think it's in the back of the B section. It points out that with people who suffer a heart attack and quit smoking, 16 years later 36 percent of those people will have died; but if they keep on smoking 82 percent will have died. There's a tremendous increase in mortality after suffering a heart attack.

Dr. Linus Pauling uncovered an old study in California, which pointed out that the use of vitamin C helps to increase longevity. He also points out that the use of tobacco is a negative factor in terms of length of life.

I think we have to look at how we got where we are. We have to look back to some of the attitudes in the early days when we didn't have the health studies. In order to drive out a fever, a physician took a pistol and fired it off by a person's car to drive out the humours and biles and various other things, and to create a balance and so on. That was the practice of medicine. You raise your eyebrows, Mr. Speaker. Two hundred years ago that was very orthodox practice.

[10:30]

When Sir Walter Raleigh brought tobacco from this continent back to Europe, where it found such favour, it inspired a great number of thoughts. In fact, Oscar Wilde, who had something to say about just about everything, said: "A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more could you want?" Of course, that man died rather young in a hospital room, having paid the price of smoking, drinking and other excesses.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Do you know what his last words were?

MR. NICOLSON: I know what his last words were, yes. He looked up at the ugly curtains in the hospital and said, "Either those curtains go, or I go." And then he died.

HON. MR. GARDOM: No, I'll tell you what his last words were. His friends were around him, complaining that they didn't have enough money to bury him. His last words were: "I'm dying beyond my means."

MR. NICOLSON: I believe that was the second to last thing he said.

That was at a time when tobacco was being glamourized, and was thought by some people to be fashionable. Of course, Mark Twain, whom I recall seeing when I was a very

[ Page 599 ]

young man, made the claim that he came into the world asking for a light, and he was going to go out of it blowing smoke rings. He said about tobacco: "So it's been my rule never to smoke when asleep and never to refrain when awake."

You can see the attitude of these people.

AN HON. MEMBER: Your research people really must've used the library over the last few days.

MR. NICOLSON: Some people never read anything except what copy people put before them. They obviously didn't read some of those things very carefully before making some ads that ran for a couple of weeks over the airwaves in Victoria. Perhaps it's good that one should read a few gems from the past and some of the great authors.

Mark Twain also said: "How well I remember my grandmother's asking me not to use tobacco. Good old soul. She said, 'You're at it again, are you, you whelp? Now don't let me ever catch you chewing tobacco before breakfast again, or I'll lay my black snake to you within an inch of your life.'" That is an admonishment that could be taken by the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland), I should think.

Here is one — and I hope it isn't misunderstood — by another famous writer of the nineteenth century:

Tobacco is a dirty weed. I like it.
It satisfies no normal need. I like it.
It makes you thin, it makes you lean,
It takes the hair right off your bean.
It's the worst dam stuff I've ever seen. I like it.

MRS. JOHNSTON: Who said that?

MR. NICOLSON: Graham Hemminger said that in the 1890's.

There were others. Perhaps the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Schroeder) would recall this famous saying: "I want all the hellions to quit puffing that hell-fume in God's clean air." That was said by Carry Nation, after snatching cigars from the mouths of smokers.

MS. BROWN: Now that's leadership!

MR. NICOLSON: The use of tobacco then was, for many years, glamourized. Believe me, my research led me to many comments which would not bear repeating. Some of the comments showed not just attitudes of the day towards smoking, but attitudes of the day toward women, and don't bear repeating in this House. But this does come from a time in which tobacco obviously was a fascination — not just with the…. Well, it shows that tobacco actually was a fascination with everyone. It knew no class boundaries, just as today it knows no class boundaries. Mr. Speaker, what we're talking about here is imposing a tax on a group of people and exempting others; a group of people who are already fairly heavily taxed; a group of people who would see a tax increase every time the price of cigarettes went up if this bill were not brought in. Now we're simply going to see another extra burden placed upon people who smoke.

Mr. Speaker, I think there is a limit to what we can accept. There certainly is a limit to what we can accept when we, as an official opposition, sought to warn the government about the fact that it was expending public funds faster than it was able to collect them; that we were spending beyond our means in this province. Ever since 1980 we've been dipping into the liquid cash deposits in the bank, which totalled, in terms of long-term investments, short-term investments and actual cash on hand, about $2 billion back in 1980. We have seen that money eroded until this year, when we really need that kind of money around, well, there was only about half a billion left, and by the end of this budget we're going to be $1 billion overdrawn at the bank.

Mr. Speaker, government did not heed those warnings of the past, and now we see this as part of a denial of what was said during the past election. We were told there would be no tax increases. Those of us who were involved in politics knew that many taxes were already indexed. Taxes such as gasoline tax are indexed and, therefore, if the price of gasoline goes up we know there will be a tax increase. But we didn't bother to play semantics with the government on that. We knew that tobacco tax was indexed, and we fully expected that when the government was saying that, they were…. Well, they were maybe avoiding being absolutely candid, because, for the sake of simplicity, to talk about indexed taxes just makes things very muddy. So when they made the statement that there would be no tax increases — before the election, Mr. Speaker — one just had to accept it and say: "Yes, a little bit of generalization is necessary, because on an election trail, in a short period of time, you can't get bogged down in detail, and one can speak in some generalities." But certainly a promise that there will be no tax increase means that we would not be changing the base for computation of the tobacco tax. So that's really what is at stake here. The government can talk about hope: "Let's raise the tax and hope that if we raise it, less people will smoke. Let's hope we don't collect as much money under this tax and hope that this will be counter-productive."

Interjection.

MR. NICOLSON: I would hope that. But, Mr. Speaker, those words ring rather hollow from a government that has expressed the same kind of arguments about alcohol. Yet it has done away with all educational aspects in terms of alcohol and has allowed an alcohol-lifestyle advertising, so we see that we now have ads that say: "If you play rugby, and if you're macho, then you have a few beers after the game." That's the kind of thing that we're being exposed to. That is a way to encourage and to push alcohol; the two go hand-in-hand.

One realizes that prohibition would also be another way in which to encourage the use of tobacco, but there are some reasonable measures that can be taken for prohibition. My colleague from Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs. Wallace) has advocated for years in this House the banning of smoking in public places. That could do a lot if you want to use the health argument, because a lot of those health problems, a lot of those lung problems, are not from people who, themselves, are smokers; they're from…. A lot of the health and lung problems that we have to look after…. A lot of the money that is spent on our medicare system in this province goes to treat non-smokers who have to inhale second-hand smoke, smoke that does not come through a filter but just spews off of the end of a cigar or a cigarette — taking this in second-hand. There have been many people — many spouses — found to be suffering from lung cancer which at first glance would appear to have been caused by smoking, but subsequent investigation finds out that, no, this particular person was not

[ Page 600 ]

a smoker but that their spouse was a smoker. If we were to ban smoking in public places, we might save a lot more than $18 million, which is what we are seeking to raise here in a year. We would also remove this type of fascination which grew up in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries with the use of tobacco.

[10:45]

Mr. Speaker, the minister…. Well, the minister will be back; he's probably gone to see whether it was the last thing that Oscar Wilde said or the second last thing.

I say that this particular type of tax is a regressive tax. If there has ever been a question in this House that has caused me some concern in terms of voting, it has been on this particular issue. For years we've come into the House, and most of us have accepted this…. This will be the second time that I've voted against this type of bill — possibly the third — in this House. I am convinced that this is the wrong way. I'm convinced that this takes money out of the hands of people that have an established dependence on smoking and who can ill afford it. I am also convinced that when a government — a government that has been government for seven and a half years, not an opposition group that is out there and doesn't have all of the research and the financial backing that comes with government; not a group that might overestimate or underestimate some particular need and not have complete knowledge of the financial state of things…. I say that a government seeking a third consecutive term of office which says just before an election that there'll be no tax increases and then brings in a piece of legislation like this diminishes parliament.

Parliament is a very fragile system. Those of us who sought to come here — the new members who've sought to come here — probably had a much different view of what this institution does. I know that I've always seen any organization that I have ever joined wrapped in some mystique. When you really get into the heart of, it you find that it is a very human organization with very human failings. It is a very fragile organization, quite often with one or two people just pulling something together and holding it together very tenuously.

This Legislature holds together very tenuously, and it only holds together if there is honesty and honour. That's why the mother parliament has held together for many years. When there's a mistake made, such as the invasion of the Falkland Islands, a person of honour like Lord Carrington resigns his position and accepts responsibility. But in this Legislature we are very much in danger of losing the whole thing. The people of British Columbia are in danger of losing the really democratic institution that we have for governing this province. We have seen promises, for instance, that this was the last time that sales tax was going down, and that it was going to stay down. That's when it went down to 4 percent. A little while later it popped back up to 6 percent. Now it's been put up to 7 percent. The same thing here. Just a few short months ago in the first couple of days of May the members opposite were saying there would be no tax increases this year. Here we are, just a couple of months later, facing one bill out of 26 which are doing all the things they were denying they were going to do just before the election. This is a fragile system. It is dependent upon people meaning it when they say something — particularly a government that should have known the answers before the election, a government that did know the answers before the election. The answers that they knew were about some of the things on which they had been polling but weren't telling the people. They had their plans and they knew what they were going to do after the election; but what they were telling the people they were going to do was absolutely opposite in many instances.

We were told there were going to be no increases in health care fees. They came in with this budget, of which this bill is part, and turned their backs on that — an absolute denial, a rejection of interoffice memos concerning tax increases. It was categorically denied by the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Nielsen), but then, as part of this legislative package, of which the tobacco tax is a very insidious example, they turned around and increased the tax.

Was anyone told that if they voted for the Social Credit Party they would increase the tobacco tax, that they'd hold all other taxes, but they'd maybe increase the tobacco tax? You didn't even tell them about the indexing that was in place at that time. As I said at the outset, no, I don't expect people to be quite that fine or candid. But when you say no tax increases it does not mean bringing a new bill into this House in order to increase taxes.

It's been said, even in the budget speech and in the debate on the Speech from the Throne, that you want to lead the rest of Canada. You want to lead the world. I was talking to a person in the Council of Forest Industries the other day about a function which they put on for the government members and the opposition members. One of my colleagues said to them: "You know, really, for all that we had to say tonight and you had to say tonight, we probably could have had this meeting together." And he said: "Well, that would have been true until this year, but those people have a zeal, a mission, and they just lectured us like zealots." He used the word "zeal." These people opposite feel that they have a mission to change not just British Columbia, but the whole world. These people feel so strongly about their mission that they can justify doing anything. They can justify an absolute denial of what they had to say only three short months ago, by bringing in an increased tax on tobacco and all of the other measures that have been brought into this House.

You haven’t just caught the attention of the World Council of Churches by this action. I was surprised when I saw the considerable space devoted to this legislative package in the Wall Street Journal. I was even more surprised when I saw it referred to in the Manchester Guardian, where they point out that this goes way beyond Margaret Thatcher or Ronald Reagan.

They might feel that they have a very important mission, but we feel that we have an important responsibility, and that is that we must defend the democratic system to which we belong — a democratic system that only works if people can be held to their word. If the word of a minister of the Crown is not good for two months, then the system is not going to work.

Interjection.

MR. NICOLSON: I'm glad to hear that the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) agrees with me. He just said: "Agreed." On that note then — perhaps he does agree with me — I would move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion negatived on the following division:

[ Page 601 ]

[11:00]

YEAS –– 15

NAYS — 24

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

Introduction of Bills

REGULATIONS ACT

Hon. Mr. Smith presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Regulations Act.

Bill 31 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.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: We are now into debate on second reading of Bill 13.

TOBACCO TAX AMENDMENT ACT, 1983
(continued)

MR. BARNES: 1, like my colleagues, rise to speak in opposition to Bill 13, the Tobacco Tax Amendment Act.

Mr. Speaker, it seems as though we are having to review all of these pieces of legislation in a similar vein. That is, they seem to all have a common thread of cynicism that provokes one to dig deep to try and find the honest commitment to try to represent and protect the rights of all of the people of British Columbia. I would say that this bill, with respect to taxation of tobacco products, is a bill that probably is getting attention for the first time in such magnitude by the opposition.

The opposition has tipped onto what seems to be a move by the government to take advantage of those people in the community who are unable to defend themselves. Whoever thought we would be defending people who smoke tobacco? But it's about time those of us in the Legislature came clean with ourselves and at least, if for no other reason, be candid about the purposes for which we bring legislation into this chamber.

If I might just for a moment, Mr. Speaker, reflect a little bit on the House Leader's (Hon. Mr. Gardom's) problem, I notice he has a back problem, as I do, and we are both sitting in very straight-backed chairs. I notice he had to leave a few minutes ago. My back problem is from being very active in contact sports over the years, and I'm now paying for it. I don't know what the House Leader's problem is. Perhaps the House Leader is suffering from an overburden of repressive legislation, and he just simply can't take it anymore. I don't know.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just a moment, please. The hon. Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing and Environment is rising on a point of order.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: On a point of order, I know I may not be that swift, but I'm trying to determine the relevance to this bill that's under debate.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The point is well taken. All members are commended, when in debate, to be relevant to the principle of the bill before us, which currently is Bill 13, the Tobacco Tax Amendment Act. I'm sure the hon. first member for Vancouver Centre is well aware of the rules of relevancy and will carry on in fine parliamentary tradition.

MR. BARNES: I appreciate the Minister of Environment's interjecting to give assistance to this member. I certainly do not wish to detract from the objectives of this bill, nor do I wish to pollute the chambers with any irrelevance. I hope the Minister of Environment will do his duty as well to ensure that the environment of British Columbia doesn't become excessively polluted.

[Mr. Veitch in the chair.]

Before I begin, I'd like to reflect a little on this whole question. The tobacco business is perhaps one of the oldest, most established means of trading in society, and I think it's about time we began to look at the role of government with respect to providing services for the public and the strategies used to raise revenues. I would like to relate the smoker to other consumers in society. We use the tobacco smoker because that is a person who inflicts upon himself or herself a health problem. We know quite well that smoking is potentially dangerous to one's health. Why and how does it start, when does it end, and whose job is it to correct these self-inflicted poor health habits?

When I was a very little kid…. I heard one other member reflect on his early years as well, about when he started smoking. It seems as though the industry is all-pervading in all societies; it's such a huge industry that it's somewhat of a conflict for those of us who want to do two things at once. We want to be objective and mind our own business, while at the same time we want to criticize those people who are offending their well-being. I wasn't sure why I started smoking at 14, but when I think back I guess it was to be part of the gang, like my peers who were smoking, and an opportunity to grow up. There was no television in those days that I can recall, but the radio ads and the printed media certainly did all they could to tell me that smoking was one way to gain social prestige and develop some relevance as far as being recognized among the "in" crowd.

These are real problems, and I'm sure the government has contributed to the problem, perhaps inadvertently, by its initiatives over the years. I found it a bit cynical and rather contradictory, for instance, when the Minister of Finance introduced the bill and suggested that "although we're introducing the bill to raise revenue, we would anticipate that

[ Page 602 ]

it will have a discouraging effect, be a disincentive to those people who are smoking. They will perhaps smoke less as a result of the price going up." Is that really the way the government operates? It has fiscal policy that is supposed to address legitimate government requirements in order to provide services for the public, which is supposed to be an objective, carefully devised system to meet the overall expenditures of providing government service, and at the same time it states that it hopes its fiscal initiatives will be unsuccessful? I find that difficult to reconcile in terms of the government's overall program for the public.

[11:15]

When the minister is speaking to close the debate, whenever he gets that opportunity, I hope he will clarify whether this bill, the Tobacco Tax Amendment Act, is a primary piece of social legislation that the government is using to improve the health of the public through the back door. The explanatory note states that the purpose of this bill is to increase the rate of tax on tobacco products. In other words, we seem to have a conflicting objective with respect to the purposes of these taxes.

I was trying to relate this tax to some of the other tax initiatives, and to put things in perspective in terms of how the public is responding to the government's tax measures. For instance, the 7 percent tax on food purchases of $7 and more has caused interesting reactions, an interesting response from people who go to restaurants or places that charge $7 or more for a meal. I find that a possibility with this tobacco tax. Would it not be conceivable for people finally to draw the line and fight back on this, as they are fighting back on your attempt to discourage the restaurant industry with the 7 percent tax on food? As you know, many people are starting to play games when they go for meals; each person gets a separate bill and they are passing the….

Interjections.

MR. BARNES: I'm just drawing an analogy, because I think Bill 13 will potentially get a similar reaction.

The restaurant-goer will invariably try to save himself that 7 percent, and I'm sure the restaurateur will hope he finds a way to do it in order to keep him as a customer. Some restaurants are already….

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, we're dealing with Bill 13. I would appreciate it if you would become more relevant.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Speaker, I can appreciate your concern, but you must appreciate what I'm trying to state by comparing one piece of taxation with another. With respect, I feel it's quite relevant. I'm suggesting that the government is provoking the public with taxation measures that are illogical, unfair and regressive, that are a disincentive and are causing considerable reaction on the part of the public, as though they were not willing to go along with the system. When you have people pulling capers in order to avoid the tax, as they are doing in the restaurants, that is not a good tax.

What is to stop the cigarette vendors from selling them one at a time? Have you got a tax system for one cigarette? Isn't it ridiculous? You are picking on these people; you are driving them up against the wall. I suspect some of them will buy cigarettes one at a time, in order to avoid this ridiculous tax. You certainly aren't doing anything to help the economy.

We've come to a point where the government is forcing this side of the House to look at every single action with skepticism and suspicion, and with justified concern that you're undermining the economy. You do not really understand what you're doing, or you are just reckless and irresponsible; I'm not sure what it is. But the negative reaction you are getting indicates to me that you have not really thought out your plan.

As I've said, normally we wouldn't be opposed to this measure. As you know, historically in British Columbia we have had very little debate on amendments to tobacco tax legislation. Like most people, we have accepted this unfair discriminatory measure. We've said people shouldn't smoke, and if they're going to smoke, why not tax them? People shouldn't drink excessively, and if they do, tax them; who cares? So it goes with anything that is socially questionable or unacceptable and for which we feel there isn't much political support. But right is right, wrong is wrong, fair is fair — no matter how you put it. Let's come clean. I'm not saying I do or don't support smoking; that is not the point. The point is, what are we here to do? Are you now saying that the government has taken on the responsibility of determining the lifestyles of the people, and that it will take advantage of those who are in a lifestyle that may not be too popular? I suggest that if you really want to do something about that, you wouldn't bother trying to tax them or frighten them; you would abolish their right to smoke and, if they smoked, jail them. That might be a more direct way of dealing with it, if that's your concern.

When you tell us in this House that your concern is with the possibility of improving people's health as a result of higher taxes on these products, I think you are being dishonest. You claim you expect some $24 million next year from this extra taxation and, I understand, about three-quarters of that amount for the remainder of this year. But the $18 million which you may get this year will probably buy you that much more grief and confusion in the marketplace, because this is an offensive tax. It is unfair, and you have already riled up the ire of just about everyone in the community as a result of your initiatives.

This particular tax is just one more example of a government which is insensitive and indifferent with respect to treating people in the community fairly. It is another form of class discrimination — those people who smoke. It is really quite analogous to your discrimination with respect to people who happen to work for the public service, or with respect to people in any walk of life in society being singled out for irregular and unfair treatment.

What about your real plans for employment in society? What about your real initiatives to improve the economy and stimulate some kind of growth? Why go back? What is the rush to go back? Where are you going back to? What do you want to go back for? We should be moving ahead.

I hope that I'm not going to be out of order, but I would like to ask if the government is on some kind of a holy crusade. The government says that it has to have a great deal of courage to do the things that it's doing, It didn't say that it had to have much gall, just courage. When you say that, it indicates to me that there is a plan of some sort that is much greater than what seems to be on the surface. We on this side of the House are beginning to see all of the bills, and, as you know, there are quite a few that concern us. The Public Sector Restraint Act is one that we debated for a while.

[ Page 603 ]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, we are discussing the principle of Bill 13, and I'm sure you are aware of that.

MR. BARNES: Could I ask, Mr. Speaker, if the principle of this bill has to do with fiscal matters?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, the principle of the bill is contained in the body of the bill, and the Chair can give you no advice on that.

MR. BARNES: Thank you. I'm using my best judgment trying to achieve this…. I hope you will appreciate that sometimes there are different viewpoints as to what is relevant and what isn't, but I can assure you I am endeavouring to be as strictly relevant as I possibly can, and I appreciate your assistance, sir.

The whole list of bills that the government has introduced seems to be taking away the public's opportunity for fair treatment and representation to defend themselves, and to feel that they can be part of the government's strategies and planning. In other words, they're losing the opportunity to advise and consult with the government, and to be part of the whole process of good government.

We're very concerned, for the first time really, on a bill such as this, which normally would have received about a five-minute debate and then been passed. We're saying that if we're going to abandon the cigarette smoker on this major issue, then really we're just allowing the government to suck us into the same kind of discriminatory attitudes it has used in bringing down its other legislation. I think, Mr. Speaker, that you will appreciate that there is a point that I'm making, and you must, I am sure, agree that cigarette smokers are victims of public opinion and attitudes that are probably unfair. What is the difference between a person who smokes cigarettes and takes risks to his health and someone who eats certain foods that are considered to be unhealthy, certainly if they're eaten to excess? Cholesterol foods are known to be potentially dangerous, and, I suppose, salt and sugar. That's true. Certain milks don't have the correct components in them. Some foods have the right vitamins and some do not. All of these are problems that experts are able to identify as potentially dangerous to one's health. Some fast foods are described as unhealthy. Some preservatives are used in them in order to give them long shelf life, and these are unhealthy. So when you start using taxation such as this….

You've found the way to pick out cigarettes, but you could do this on all kinds of things. Why don't you do it? Why aren't you attacking all of the food products as well? I'm not trying to pretend to be an expert, but this seems so illogical. The only thing about it is that in the past it has been politically okay, politically safe, because few people have defended the cigarette smoker. In this case he's not being defended because he smokes cigarettes but because he is being singled out for smoking cigarettes — if you can see the difference. We're saying that while this person may in fact be causing a burden for society as far as health care services go and any kind of assistance he may need as his health begins to deteriorate — and we can anticipate that that may happen — does that require any different treatment of that person than of anyone else who is eating or drinking too much, or causing a problem for society in so many ways? We really should be fair.

Proper taxation policies in modern-day society should be based on those people who have money, not those people who are trying to generate revenue by trading in the open market, the so-called free democratic marketplace, the place that that side of the government feels is the place for free people living in a free and democratic society to make their way and to realize their dreams through fair and open competition.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

But now, when you start to intervene in the marketplace as a free enterprise government the way you are, one has to wonder if this is your confused way of providing social services by taxing the people instead of educating them and improving your communications system and allowing people the free democratic choice to live their lives the way they wish.

These are subjects that perhaps don't draw many headlines or attract that much attention by having any far-reaching value for sale of the news and so forth. The commercial value may not be there, but as a good service to the public it would be far better to be fair. Not smoking makes me feel more qualified to try to speak objectively about this, because I'm not speaking to try to save myself those few pennies per package of cigarettes. I'm merely saying that I can't see any difference between a person offending his health in other ways and doing it with cigarettes.

[11:30]

So why are we taxing cigarettes? That's really the question. Why are we doing it automatically? Why are we retroactively taxing people who smoke cigarettes? It's a blatant disregard for their rights. The legislation is not even enacted. It's not even law. We have yet to vote on the legislation and it has yet to be proclaimed, yet you will retroactively legalize your acts today. It's very similar to the kind of bungling — well, I don't like that word; miscalculation — on the part of the government with respect to the income and renters' tax credits that you disallowed before you had the legislation in place. This is a similar situation, where you're taxing people without the legal authority, and you're doing it unfairly. The question is, why? Well, you can get away with it because the public probably thinks you're doing a good job of taxing. But I think that that's a cynical thing to do, myself.

I would like to reflect again on the holy crusade. I started to talk about it a few minutes ago. The Premier and perhaps other members of his staff before the May 5 election talked about cooperation and no confrontation. I'm sure that most people will remember those slogans and statements that were broadcast throughout the province by the print and electronic media. But the Premier chided 20,000 people who came to this capital city from all over the province of British Columbia to make representations and participate in the government's decisions respecting and affecting their lives and their futures. They came here in good will, in peace, and quietly, and they asked for an audience with the Premier. This is the same Premier, Mr. Speaker, who said: "Cooperation, no confrontation." But he said in this Legislature, unfortunately, as I understand it, under guard and police protection…. It's the first time in the 11 years I've been here that this place had to be guarded against the people who elected the government. It's an interesting turn in history. Nonetheless, the Premier chided those people, admonished them, and told them that if they really wanted to impress him they would have to do much better, because he had had larger crowds at his garden parties. That's why we on this side of the House are

[ Page 604 ]

taking this bill, which normally would be a rather innocuous piece of legislation — and it would have passed….

When we look at the whole package — which I've been discouraged by the Chair from doing, but I think the list is well-known — then we begin to think: "How can we not challenge this government on its overall initiative? What is it really doing?" It seems as though you've decided to have a showdown with us. It seems as though you've got a calling from places unknown, from outer space or from other jurisdictions, or from sources unknown. I'm not sure what it is. I sometimes feel that this government is a putative government. It isn't really the elected government that is committed to helping the people. It seems as though this government is the go-between. There's some other government. There must be something else. I can't understand how this government would have campaigned so vigorously, with such determination, and so impressively and convincingly, to improve its majority in the last election — despite the capers that were pulled by some of those cabinet ministers, despite all the problems that it had with respect to fiscal management and the charges of misuse of funds and the auditor-general's report, which was very condemning of the government's practices in the management of its business…. Yet that government came back with an overwhelming majority. It is as though they know something that others do not know. We've read that Goldfarb report, that poll, very carefully, and we can't see how you twisted it…. You seem to be on some kind of a crusade.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, you're straying quite a bit from the principle of Bill 13. Could the member please return to the bill.

MR. BARNES: I appreciate your interjection, but I would remind the Chair that we are talking about fiscal matters; we're talking about encouraging the public to support the government's projects to stimulate the economy; we're talking about the government's request that the public cooperate and avoid confrontation. Together — the B.C. spirit is the way to go — we can accomplish great things. We can see that everyone — all of us together — protects this fragile recovery of the economy. But the Premier still admonishes 20,000 people who took the time to come across the Georgia strait, at great inconvenience, many of them losing a day's pay, standing in the rain peacefully and quietly, trying to exercise their democratic right without being accused of being offensive or unruly. But what did it get them? It got them a chiding. It got them an admonishment. It got them a challenge. In fact, they were confronted and told: "Go back and do better."

When we look at Bill 13, a simple act having to do with a few pennies more on a package of cigarettes and other tobacco products, we feel that it's about time we stopped allowing the government to do what we know has been wrong for a long time: that's singling out groups for repressive taxation in order to steal a few dollars, when they have no real initiative and no real economic plan. They have no real understanding of the real fragility of the economy. Their plan seems to be to frighten people out of the province by any means. We have had an exodus of British Columbians leaving this province for some time. In fact, one figure I recall — during the May election — was that something like 60,000 had left the province since 1979. Those figures are substantiated by various statistics that indicate people are simply leaving the province; fewer and fewer people are around. You can get that from tax rolls; you'll find that fewer and fewer people are able to pay income tax.

I don't know where these people are going to get the taxes to pay for these cigarettes. Most of the people who are affected by this are going to be the people who are the most nervous, frustrated, uptight and frightened, those who are smoking to fill the space because they are not occupied in a productive way. People who are on low incomes are spending long hours in recreational settings or settings where they can do things other than have a productive job, because the jobs just aren't there. We're looking at at least 200,000 people, with those figures growing every day, who are in need of productive activity. Smoking seems to be some kind of pacifier for many people — a placebo of some sort. It's a part and parcel of society, of the way people seem to be. Drinking is the same thing. But if you don't have too many options, it seems as though there is a correlation. The more stress and frustration you have and the less activities or outlets you have by which you can divert your energies, the easier it is to smoke. So you're going to make them pay.

In other words, those people who need to — and I say that with respect, because I'm not sure what a person really needs…. But those who seem to have the habit of smoking a lot can increase that habit when under stress and in difficulty. So when you take it all into account, you are contributing to the frustrations of society, and you're doing it unfairly. As people begin to suffer the consequences of your restraint program, there is probably an increase in the incidence of smoking among those people you are now going to tax.

I'm not impressed with the turn of events, but I guess we're going to have to live with it. It looks as though this holy crusade, which seems to offend members on that side of the House, is well underway. I say this after giving it quite a bit of thought. It seems to be unyielding to any reasonable attempts by the public for consultation. Professional organizations, people who've never been involved in politics before, school teachers, the police, the clergy and all walks of life have attempted to make representations to the government. I have yet to hear of one single meeting on behalf of the government, the Premier or anyone with the public to say: "We want to listen to you. We want consultation, and we want your advice. Although we are an elected government, we do not feel we have the right to exceed our mandate, and we will do all we can to ensure you that we would not be comfortable in doing so. We do not believe that we would feel very good if we did what we wanted to do and had so many people unhappy." I think that has to be the tenor or the balance that we need.

When you find yourself needing to have guards to protect you in a democratic institution such as this Legislature, I would say that that is an indication that you really should review the direction in which you are going and begin to reach out to the people and ask them to assist. It's strange that you're not doing that in light of what you said during the campaign, but I guess the public has allowed things to go for so long in this province that they had to be shocked. I think the government perhaps took the view that these people were asleep. After all, there were 85 percent working. Even though we were talking 15 to 16 percent unemployed, 85 percent were working. That's pretty good. They're all smug and quite comfortable. And they know we've got a tough job and we're

[ Page 605 ]

going to go ahead and do this. These changes are going to turn the clock back 25 or 30 years and slow things down.

But, Mr. Speaker, I realize my time has terminated. As I say, this kind of debate has taken a turn, and I'm the first to appreciate the difficulty the Chair has in trying to keep members strictly to the legislation. But I don't pretend to be an expert on taxation. My concern is fair taxation. My concern is relevant taxation. My concern is that the government have a complete strategy with respect to the total economy, not a makeshift kind of ad hoc discriminatory selective system that you seem to be using for reasons I cannot put any logic to.

I would just say with regret that I've had to make some strong charges about something that I realize is a social problem. All of these things are social problems. But I cannot see how the government can justify singling out a group such as smokers in a major initiative such as this without recognizing the consequences — especially in this time of a depressed economy when it's practically at a standstill. This again is going to have a similar effect to the 7 percent tax on meals in restaurants and is going to encourage people to play tricky games in trying to avoid paying their taxes. Don't be surprised to find that people will be buying cigarettes one at a time, because I don't think your legislation is designed to deal with that. You're talking about packages and units other than one. I would suspect that that might be a tactic that you may run into, just as you've done in the restaurants.

[11:45]

1 still have some time, and I think that I should use it, so I would suggest to you that people like the second member for Vancouver–Point Grey (Hon. Mr. Gardom) and the first member for Vancouver–Point Grey (Hon. Mr. McGeer) and perhaps some of the others who have been unable to stand up so far and justify the logic for Bill 13 should do so. I found it curious, for instance, yesterday when the first member for Vancouver–Point Grey made a very eloquent speech in describing how important this bill was because it was going to cut down on smokers, when we thought the principle of the bill was strictly to raise revenue. He says he hopes that the bill fails. He hopes that it's so good that we won't raise any money at all. All we want to do is improve people's health, but isn't that cynical? What is it? Is the Minister of Finance right or is the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications right?

I will be opposing this bill when the vote is called. I now move that we adjourn this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion negatived on the following division:

YEAS — 12

NAYS — 25

Division to be recorded in the Journals of the House.

MR. SKELLY: I guess I'll wait until the House clears, and then we can get down to debate, while the cabinet ministers go back to their offices and back to the golf course.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: Ten of you are gone. May I proceed now, Mr. Speaker?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: By all means.

MR. SKELLY: Oh, my time is running at this point. Now that there's nine Social Credit members in their seats, I guess I can begin this debate.

First of all….

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: Seven in their seats? Six, five, four….

First of all, I'd like to say that I'm standing to oppose this bill for a number of reasons. As a number of other speakers have indicated, this government, the Social Credit Party, when it was campaigning during the last election, said that they would not be increasing any taxes. Now, as in other ways that they have been a bit dishonest with the electorate, they've turned around and they have, in fact, increased taxes. This is one of those examples of a tax increase that this government promised not to bring into effect.

This is an interesting tax, though. It's interesting the way this government raises revenue. This is the eighth or ninth largest tax, in terms of the dollar value to government revenues, that we collect. It's even larger than all of the money we collect from the mining industry in the form of taxes and royalties.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: Are you going to shut them down again?

MR. SKELLY: They are shut down, Mr. Minister, in case you haven't noticed.

It's larger, Mr. Speaker, than the money we collect from the forest industry in terms of stumpage, timber sales and other revenues. This year in the province of B.C., we are going to get more revenue from smokers than from all the revenues we receive directly from the forest industry, so it's a fairly important tax in terms of the total revenue of the government of British Columbia. It's the ninth largest tax, in dollar terms, that we collect.

[ Page 606 ]

The government promised that they wouldn't increase taxes, but they….

Interjections.

MR. SKELLY: Is this the way the Social Credit Party carries on its caucus meetings? We do know that the cabinet doesn't talk to the back bench, but surely the cabinet could talk to cabinet in some other part of the building.

As I was pointing out, Mr. Speaker, this is the ninth largest tax that this government collects. This year they estimate they'll get $132 million from cigars, cigarettes and tobacco taxes. They'll get $108 million from motor vehicle licences. They will get only $85 million from natural gas and petroleum royalties. This is 400 percent, four times, the revenues we collect directly from the mining industry.

[12:00]

AN HON. MEMBER: Do you want us to tax them higher?

MR. SKELLY: You do tax them higher through water rates, but you do it under the table. It's 400 percent of all the revenues you collect from them directly.

As I was pointing out, it's a large tax. We tax smokers and they pay a large percentage of the operating revenues of this provincial government,

HON. MR. BRUMMET: And you're against it?

MR. SKELLY: Oh, no, I'm not necessarily against that. In fact, in some other form of taxation it may be a good idea, but I'm against this form. That's why I'm voting against this bill.

According to the 1982 report of the Finance ministry, there is a social policy branch in Treasury Board whose purpose is to advise Treasury Board on how taxes should be collected. The branch provides advice to Treasury Board on alternative funding options for the social ministries, particularly during the preparation of provincial estimates and the budget. All legislation and submissions to the Cabinet Committee on Social Services are reviewed by the branch for their financial implications and to ensure consistency with other government policy initiatives. Mr. Speaker, since the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis) isn't in the House, I wonder if, when he reads Hansard, he might consider tabling some of the documents from the Treasury Board's social policy branch that comment on this piece of legislation, how it integrates with other aspects of the government's social policy, and what alternative forms of fund-raising were considered when the government was considering raising the tax on tobacco under the Tobacco Tax Act.

HON. A. FRASER: Give us a progress report on the leadership.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. members, in this Legislative Assembly it's one at a time.

MR. SKELLY: But time is not a problem for us in this Legislature, Mr. Speaker. It is interesting to hear the comments; it's cheaper than calling Ladbroke's or something to find out what the odds are.

In any case, the minister failed to table any of the documents that would support increasing the tobacco tax and show how this act relates to other aspects of the social policy of the government ministries. So we really don't know what the options are to raising the tobacco tax. I thought maybe I would make a suggestion to the government.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's something new.

MR. SKELLY: No, it's not something new. If you'll look back in Hansard….

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: A government should be able to take criticism, Mr. Minister. A mature person should be able to understand criticism. After all, what's the role of the opposition in a legislature, Mr. Speaker? Its role is to criticize legislation, to propose alternatives and to keep that criticism and that opposition off the streets, because in a democratic system it should be in the Legislature, carried on by the people's representatives. We have a duty to oppose in whatever form it takes, provided it's acceptable in a parliamentary democracy.

Mr. Minister, through you, Mr. Speaker, I want to make a positive suggestion. Let's see how well this positive suggestion will be received by a government that seldom takes any advice at all but its own, and gets into trouble a great deal because of that. It seems that this government is always at its worst when it's taking its own advice. So I'm going to assist the government a little bit by offering some advice.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: This is leadership!

MR. SKELLY: I'm sure that when we change sides, I'll be willing to take advice from the members who are left in the House after the next election.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: You never took any advice from the electorate, did you?

MR. SKELLY: We certainly did. We always listen to the electorate. I'm here. I got 58 percent of the vote. I listen to the advice of my constituents, and as a result, I guess, I'm here.

They're trying to prevent me from giving them some good, solid, concrete, valuable advice. They're trying to stifle the opposition in this Legislature.

AN HON. MEMBER: Did you read the letter from the mayor of Port Alberni the other day?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I think we've had quite enough interjections, please.

MR. SKELLY: I would be only too happy to discuss the mayor of Port Alberni with anybody. I don't know how you guys found that guy. He doesn't even live in the city.

AN HON. MEMBER: He was elected by your people.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'll ask the hon. members not to interject, and the member to return to the bill. Please proceed,

[ Page 607 ]

MR. SKELLY: That mayor is something to behold. Even the Socreds didn't want him, but I guess he's all they've got left now in Port Alberni.

I'm going to offer some concrete suggestions for the minister, even though he's not in the House. The suggestion is that instead of taxing tobacco and taxing it in the regressive form that it's being taxed in under this legislation, we should consider adding an additional medicare premium to each package of cigarettes, cigars, tobacco or whatever.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: Is that a user fee?

MR. SKELLY: No, this is an insurance premium, because we all know — and there have been studies that show it conclusively — that smoking is related to health problems. We can all go back to the 1966 surgeon-general's report in the United States, where he says that, among other problems, smoking contributes to peptic ulcers. It causes ulcers. It even causes dimness of vision, but the Socreds can't blame that on smoking — not in all cases. It even contributes to cirrhosis of the liver, and I'm sure most members won't blame that entirely on smoking either. It contributes to lower birth weights for women who smoke during pregnancy. It's associated with accidents and fires, causing loss of life and damage to property.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: How much tax? I'm jotting this down.

MR. SKELLY: Okay. Well, I'm just giving you the underpinnings of the argument, so I think you should listen carefully, and I appreciate the fact that you are listening and taking notes. I'm willing to provide a copy of Hansard free of charge to the minister once it's printed.

Mr. Speaker, here are the reasons why we should attach a health premium to each package of cigarettes, cigars, tobacco or whatever, rather than a direct tax. Cigarette smoking is causally related to lung cancer in men. It's related to cancer of the lip, larynx, esophagus, and urinary bladder. It's one of the most dangerous things that a person can do, to smoke. People who do not smoke and who are in a room full of tobacco smoke caused by other smokers can also be affected by those same problems. That's why I support the private member's bill that was presented by the member for Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs. Wallace), and I hope it comes up for debate in the House and receives support from all sides of the House.

Just an interesting anecdote here, Mr. Speaker: I have a cousin who is the assistant chief investigator for the district attorney's office in Orange County, California. His name is Robert Skelly. We should have that kind of a guy up here, because when I went down to see him a few years ago, he had every one of the county commissioners — or supervisors, as they call them down there — except one up before the grand jury on various dirty tricks charges. It would be nice if we could have that up here.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: Is your relative like that down there too?

MR. SKELLY: No, he had the politicians up before the grand jury.

AN HON. MEMBER: What were they up for?

MR. SKELLY: They were up for graft and corruption; they were up for the same kinds of dirty tricks that the Socreds get involved in on occasion. They were involved in dirty tricks, letter-writing and Lettergate kinds of things. You know the things that they were involved in.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. To the bill, please.

MR. SKELLY: The citizens of Orange County had a referendum. You can get an issue put on the ballot in Orange County — it's quite a democratic society they have down there, in some cases. They had a referendum that said there should be no smoking in public buildings, Now unfortunately all of those judges, county commissioners, district attorneys and sheriff's officers in the courthouse in Orange County ignored the wishes of the citizens and the legislation. So the citizens had to come in and arrest them all. The day I went down to visit my cousin, the judges and sheriff's officers and some of the district attorney's staff and even a few criminals got arrested by the citizens and charged with smoking in a public place. So it's good to have that kind of legislation to protect the rights of non-smokers in society.

But let me get back to the bill, which also relates to cigarettes and taxes on cigarettes. We all know through successive reports of the United States surgeon-general Department of Health, Education and Welfare and through the investigations of the federal Ministry of Health in Canada here that cigarette smoking is an extremely dangerous habit and does contribute to some fairly serious health problems. It costs all of us money through the health system which we finance through the provincial government. It is a serious problem, and people who increase their risk of sickness or of dying through some of these dread diseases which are caused by smoking are actually becoming a greater drain on our health system than the average person who engages in healthful activities and doesn't smoke. So there should be an additional premium charged for smokers. And probably the best way….

HON. MR. BRUMMET: But not an additional tax?

MR. SKELLY: No, this is an insurance premium, because it's based on the risk.

AN HON. MEMBER: Does the premium cost money?

MR. SKELLY: The premium costs money. It's like any insurance premium, but it is not a tax. You would not call your automobile insurance premium a tax.

AN HON. MEMBER: A user fee.

MR. SKELLY: Nor is it a user fee, because whether you park the vehicle or not, you still pay the insurance premium. It is a premium I'm talking about, and it's based on risk. So I'm saying that the premium attached to a package of cigarettes or some unit of tobacco should be related to the risk that the person who uses that substance incurs in damaging his health.

Interjections.

MR. SKELLY: No, it's not a means-test, because it's strictly a voluntary premium, is it not, Mr. Speaker? I can

[ Page 608 ]

walk past a cigarette machine every hour of the day. I don't have to put $2 or $1 or whatever into it, because I don't smoke. So I don't increase the risk to my health that way, and I don't cause any increase in the amount of money that has to be paid out through our health system because of increasing the risk to my own health by smoking. I may increase the risk by other means, and perhaps we should attach premiums to those other means of increasing the risk to health. So instead of having a tax, we should have people understand perfectly how the additional money that they are paying relates to the additional risk that they are causing to their own health, and how through the additional money they are paying they will understand that that is required by the government in order to fund the health system of the province; in order to fund the medicare system.

The Socred government is talking about increasing user fees for the system — perhaps additional billing by doctors; we don't really know exactly what the plans are.

MR. MICHAEL: Bring that up under the Health estimates.

MR. SKELLY: Did somebody speak over there out of turn?

MR. MICHAEL: Yes, let's get on with the job.

MR. SKELLY: We're getting on with the job; we're making a positive suggestion here.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Will all members will come to order, please.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: No, we're not talking about a tax, Mr. Speaker; we're talking about a voluntary insurance premium, because it's based on insurance principles.

[12:15]

We know that the medicare plan in B.C. is funded by premiums paid by individuals. Sometimes those premiums are paid by employers on behalf of individuals. Thirty five percent are paid by individuals; 65 percent of health insurance premiums are paid under collective agreements or by employers on behalf of their employees. In 1982-83 the Medical Services Plan collected $310 million in premium revenues, or approximately 38.1 percent of the total cost of the Medical Services Plan. Sixty-one percent, or $505 million, came from consolidated revenue, including federal transfer payments, Of the $310 million — and this is the part that I'm talking about — approximately 35 percent is paid directly by subscribers and 65 percent is paid through employers. But we all pay the same. Every individual or family group pays exactly the same amount regardless of the risk they incur through their habits or their lifestyles. This is probably one of the few areas where a user-fee approach is justified in terms of medical premiums. By smoking you increase your health risk; therefore you should pay a higher premium.

HON. A. FRASER: You're advocating that we soak the sick; that's what you're doing.

MR. SKELLY: No, I'm soaking people who make themselves sick. You guys are advocating soaking the sick by user fees for health services, and that's the difference, Mr. Speaker, as you can clearly recognize. These guys want to charge additional fees when a person goes into the hospital, regardless of how he came by the disease in the first place. I'm saying that somebody who voluntarily incurs the risk of disease from smoking or from some other unhealthful habit should pay the risk at the time he buys the unhealthy substance.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's known as a tobacco tax.

MR. SKELLY: No, that's known as the health premium. The health branch said that $505 million was paid out of general revenue and into the Medical Services Plan of British Columbia. About 61 percent of the operations of the Medical Services Plan is subsidized by the taxpayer. I'm suggesting that a good percentage of that $505 million paid by the provincial government should be paid by a premium on cigarette smoking, by a premium charged to each smoker every time he buys a package of cigarettes, because we all know that the risk increases with the amount smoked. Somebody who smokes three packages of cigarettes a day will pay the premium three times; somebody who smokes six packages of cigarettes a day will pay the premium six times.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: The minister doesn't really understand. He thinks it's just a difference in semantics, but it isn't. People do not relate the term "taxes" to health services, but they do relate the term "premium" to health services. If a person buys a package of cigarettes and is told the cost of that package of cigarettes and is then charged an additional health premium, he's being told directly that he's making himself sick by smoking those cigarettes.

The member for Vancouver–Point Grey who spoke yesterday said that maybe we should raise the tax on cigarettes so high that people will stop buying them and that we will completely phase out the habit. Well, it doesn't work.

AN HON. MEMBER: How much have you got left?

MR. SKELLY: I'm going to take all of the 40 minutes, and then I'm going to move adjournment.

First, I'd like to get this very positive suggestion across to the government, if that's possible. This is the kind of government that will never listen to positive suggestions. We've made a number of them over the years. What we're talking about is a principle.

First, the government has done no analysis of the Tobacco Tax Act as to how it relates to social policy in the province. If they have done that analysis, they haven't tabled that information in the House. According to the annual report of the Ministry of Finance, he has a group of Treasury Board staff to give him advice on alternative means of raising money and how they affect social policy, yet he hasn't tabled the information in the House. He hasn't given us any good background information on how raising the cigarette tax affects the health of people in the province, which also affects the expenditures of the province. But we do know from successive studies that simply raising the price of substances like

[ Page 609 ]

cigarettes or liquor does not prevent people from buying those substances, because there's an addiction involved.

Information should be gotten across to the people who buy those substances, not in the form of a tax — nobody likes taxes — but in the form of a health insurance premium, so that every time you buy a package of cigarettes you have to pay a health insurance premium. Perhaps we're just changing the name from a tax to a premium, but there's a lot in a name. People will realize directly that they have to pay that additional premium, because they are incurring an additional risk. That is a positive suggestion for the government. I realize that positive suggestions to this government don't go very far, but that's a suggestion — to change the name to "premium."

Now I think we should take a look at the cost to the people of British Columbia of the Medical Services Plan. I believe a large part of that cost should be transferred over to income tax and ability to pay. The unfortunate part of that is that people who incur additional risks aren't additionally penalized in that system. Changing the tax on tobacco and liquor to a health insurance premium is, I think, a good way to make those people understand that by incurring additional health problems they should be paying for them.

Mr. Speaker, another problem was identified by the U.S. surgeon-general in the department of Health, Education and Welfare in the United States; the problem was that smokers incur about 20 percent more hospital days than non-smokers. Smokers take 20 percent more time off work than non-smokers, and they cause a significant decline in the productivity of industry in Canada and the United States. They spend 20 percent more of their time disabled, or unable to perform their regular functions. We are talking about a large group of people in our society who are reducing the productivity of our society as a whole, are reducing the productivity of industry and, in fact, are a drain on society. As a result of that they should be forced to pay more. I agree that additional money should be raised from smokers and that they should be forced to pay more. But we should call it by a different name; we should call it a health insurance premium.

Mr. Speaker, this government, in tabling legislation such as this, never gives the House or the opposition sufficient explanation as to why this revenue needs to be generated. Twenty-four million dollars will do virtually nothing to reduce the deficit that this government has incurred, or the deficit it's accumulated over the last four years. It will do very little in terms of balancing the budget; in fact, it raises very little revenue in terms of what the government actually spends. It does very little to encourage people to protect their health, which would actually save the government money. Perhaps that's the direction we should be going, rather than just generating more revenue by encouraging people to smoke

The government really has no policy basis behind the things that it does. You can't relate one aspect of government legislation to any other aspect. It looks totally chaotic over there. What we're asking for is some type of relationship, some type of justification from the government as to why they want to raise this tax at this time, and what they hope to accomplish in terms of social policy. Yet we have absolutely no information coming from the government's side which relates or explains these things adequately to the public and to the opposition.

HON. A. FRASER: That's a poor leadership speech. You're going to run fifth.

MR. SKELLY: But I have another speech on the Annacis crossing. Remember, they promised a six-lane bridge or a two-span bridge, and now they've cut it down and put in traffic lights — totally reneged on their promise.

This is terrible. I have to continue for how many more minutes?

Interjections.

MR. SKELLY: Eight more minutes? In any case, all I wanted to do was get that positive suggestion over to the remaining minister in the House. Oh, there are two ministers in the House — two ministers and a maverick, and a couple of newcomers. Six Social Credit members in the House. Well, it's very difficult….

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The House will come to order. To the bill please.

MR. SKELLY: Okay, I'm getting back to the bill here. Let me recap what I've said before. I should be able to recap what I've said before in eight minutes.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: Well, the people in the gallery should know why we're doing this. The government has presented some of the most unbelievably retrograde legislation that's ever been introduced in this province. In order to prevent the passage of that legislation, we intend to discuss these bills to the maximum extent possible, to the extent that we have a right to discuss them in this Legislature. The government's bills, which are totally retrograde, threaten to undermine and destroy democratic government in this province. That's what we're concerned about. This is a government that brings in a budget, then eliminates debate on the budget speech, brings forward legislation that can fire people without cause, and undermines individual, civil and human rights in the province of British Columbia. Not one of its members will stand up and speak on these issues. They want to ram this legislation down the throats of this Legislature, and somebody has to stand and block it. That's the mandate that we have from the people of British Columbia — to prevent that type of legislation going through, which moves civilization in this province back decades beyond decades. That's why we're standing here preventing the passage of this legislation.

Ultimately the power of the government will have its way, but it's an obligation on the part of the opposition to prevent the passage of that type of legislation, which tens of thousands of people on the streets have indicated they do not want; legislation that was not presented to the public during the last election so that they could make a proper decision as to how to vote. We have an obligation here to prevent the passage of that legislation, and that's why we're here and speaking on this bill.

[12:30]

HON. MR. FRASER: Are you saying they didn't make the proper decision on May 5? That's what you just said.

[ Page 610 ]

MR. SKELLY: What I am saying is that if you don't tell the people the truth, and then come in with legislation that you didn't tell the people about, you have no mandate for that legislation. If he's trying to divert this Legislature from debate on these critical issues, what we're saying to that minister, through you, Mr. Speaker, is that you have no right to do that — absolutely no right. You did not tell the people to this province the truth before May 5, and you have no right to present legislation without going to an election again and telling the people what your real intentions are with respect to what you plan to do in this province. You do not have a mandate.

HON. A. FRASER: You sure don't like the defeat you got on May 5. You don't accept it, do you?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The minister will come to order.

MR. SKELLY: Mr. Speaker, there are tens of thousands of people on the streets out there who don't like the kind of legislation that this government has presented, and who wish that the clock could be turned back at this time to before May 5, because they were lied to and deceived. For that reason they do not feel that this government has a mandate to present the type of legislation they're presenting today. That is why we feel obliged, as an opposition, in respect to the wishes of those people, to prevent the passage of this legislation, even if it means taking up a great deal of time in this Legislature and giving the government some time to think over its legislative program and the actions it's taken and to reconsider some of the harsh anti-individual and anti-human rights legislation that it has presented in conjunction with the budget speech.

So, Mr. Speaker, I've made a positive suggestion. The minister wasn't here, but I'm sure he can read it in Hansard.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: That's right: the aspect of having a premium will discourage smokers, because they'll relate it more directly to the health effects of smoking.

Mr. Speaker, I've almost come to the end of my 40 minutes. It's been a great pleasure to stand up in this House and to address the seven Social Credit members who are here. I'm sure that they'll carry away with them a great deal of wisdom, and a great deal of information, and even some positive suggestions as to what the intentions of this opposition are. There were some positive suggestions as to how they should structure the tax — or the premium — on cigarettes, and some kernels of information as to the health effects of smoking. I think 40 minutes is a small price to pay for the weight of that valuable information.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: Only 38 minutes? Was it only 38 minutes, Mr. Speaker? Three minutes. In that case. I'm going to wind up.

HON. MR. HEWITT: In conclusion, let me say this about that.

MR. SKELLY: You took the words right out of my mouth.

In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, in order to give the government additional time to look over the legislation that they've presented, and to take that famous second look…. I don't know why they're so famous for the second look, because they very seldom do it, if ever. But in order to give them a little extra time, Mr. Speaker, I will move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion negatived on the following division:

YEAS — 11

NAYS — 25

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

MR. MICHAEL: Mr. Speaker, I rise to support the motion to pass Bill 13. I disagree with the members of the opposition who allude that this government made promises to the electorate in the last election campaign that there would be no tax increases. The cabinet ministers who visited my constituency during the election campaign, and the Premier, made no such reference to there being no tax increases if we were re-elected. If anybody has any evidence of that, then I would indeed like to see it. It certainly escapes my recollection as to the issues and items that were debated during the election campaign in April and early May of this year.

[12:45]

The thing I do recollect, Mr. Speaker, is promising my constituents that there would be a lot of tough decisions, hard decisions, and a further restraint program if this government was re-elected. I have very vivid recollections of promising that if we were re-elected we would give encouragement to the private sector rather than the public sector in pulling this province through its economic recovery period. I further recollect promises that we would give strong support to Crow rate revisions, contrary to the opposition, to bring about massive development in the interior of British Columbia. I recollect making promises that there would be amendments to the labour code; I recollect standing on the past practice of support for the northeast coal development, B.C. Place, rapid transit and very many other issues in the last election campaign. We stood on those, and we should perhaps remind the opposition that we won the last election on that campaign and that program. They lost.

I listen to the opposition debating this bill, and hear suggestions that we should increase services and decrease revenue. How those two could mix when we're budgeting for

[ Page 611 ]

a $1.6 billion deficit, how we expect to pull this province through this economic recovery program without cutting government services of the government and increasing taxes, I don't know. It's the only way I know to work towards a balanced budget, as this party and government is committed to in future years.

The opposition should not get carried away with that rally that was held here earlier this week. I suggest that when they go home to their constituencies on this long weekend, they should have a lot of broad discussion with their constituents. I expect they will find, as I am certainly finding, that by a ratio of about 20 to I we have solid support back in the constituency for the economic recovery program of this government. I suggest that we all go home this weekend and have a deep thought-process within ourselves about where we're going. Let's think about the amount of time being wasted in this House day after day. Let's think of all the opportunities over the future weeks of debating all the bills that are on the table, all the estimates that are going to be brought forward by the various departments in the ministries. Let's think of all the opportunities we'll have to get into a really good debate in these areas. Let's think of the amount of time that we are wasting here, and the taxpayers' money — valuable dollars — that could well be spent on social services as the opposition claims. Let's get on with the job next week.

Mr. Speaker, I move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Gardom moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 12:48 p.m.