[ Page 1021 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Tabling Documents British Columbia Assessment Authority annual report, 1982.

Hon. Mr. Curtis –– 1021

Oral Questions

Increase in government spending. Mr. Howard –– 1021

Ministry of Finance first quarterly report. Mr. Stupich –– 1022

Absence of lottery funds statement in first quarterly report. Mr. Stupich –– 1022

Termination of community involvement program. Hon. Mrs. McCarthy replies –– 1023

Compensation for expropriation. Mr. Lauk –– 1023

Budget Debate

Mr. Ree –– 1024

Ms. Sanford –– 1025

Hon. Mr. Smith –– 1029

Mr. Mitchell –– 1032

Mr. Veitch –– 1035

Mr. Barrett –– 1038

Hon. Mr. Phillips –– 1043

Appendix –– 1045

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 24, 1983

The House met at 2:06 p.m.

Prayers.

MR. VEITCH: Mr. Speaker, in the members' gallery today is a very good friend of mine, Mr. Larry Terrace, who is the western manager for Constellation Assurance Co. I wish this House would welcome him.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the House will be delighted to extend a warm welcome to Your Honour, who has been away over the last few days due to illness. We're pleased to see you back.

MR. PELTON: Mr. Speaker, in your gallery today is a friend of mine from Maple Ridge, Mrs. Betty Levens, who is a school trustee in School District 42. She and her husband Stuart operate a small business in Maple Ridge. With Betty today, visiting from Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, England, is her sister, Audrey Hill, and her friend, Betty May. I would ask the House to welcome them here.

MR. REYNOLDS: Mr. Speaker, some members of my family, and some future members of my family, are in your gallery this afternoon, and I'd like to introduce them to the House and have them made welcome. My son, Paul, is here on vacation, and with him is his fiancee, Nicole Ryan. Next to them is my younger son Robert. He's the little guy — six foot five inches, 250 pounds and 15 years old. That's why Parks likes him. Also with them is Miss Yvonne Johnson, who, I'm happy to say, will become Mrs. Reynolds on December 3.

MR. PARKS: Mr. Speaker, in your gallery this afternoon we have the family of the acting mayor for the district of Coquitlam. I would ask the House to join with me in making welcome the family of His Worship Bryan Robinson, his wife, Irmgard, and two of their children, Sean and Dean.

MR. MOWAT: I'd like to introduce to the House and have the House welcome Mr. Ross Beggs from Toronto, Ontario. Mr. Begg is an outstanding Canadian in the field of rehabilitation counselling and consultation. I'd ask the House to welcome Mr. Beggs.

Hon. Mr. Curtis tabled the annual report of the British Columbia Assessment Authority for the year ending December 31, 1982.

Oral Questions

INCREASE IN GOVERNMENT SPENDING

MR. HOWARD: I'd like to direct a question to the Minister of Finance. I ask the minister if he will explain to the House if the insertion of restated expenditure figures for the fiscal year 1982-83 in his budget was for the purpose of showing a fictitious increase of 12.3 percent in total government spending this year, when the actual increase over last year's budget was 16.7 percent.

HON. MR. CURTIS: That member has indicated that a portion of a document which is being debated in this chamber at this present time is fictitious. I don't know that I can assist him further.

MR. HOWARD: To tell the truth would help.

MR. SPEAKER: The Chair at this point must ask the hon. member for Skeena to withdraw the remark which had a clear connotation to the Chair. I would ask the member to so do.

MR. HOWARD: No question, Mr. Speaker. If that connotation was thought to be in there, it was not intended that way.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order....

MR. HOWARD: It was not intended, Mr. Speaker, to indicate that the minister does not tell the truth.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Withdraw, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The Chair heard a withdrawal.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, if you heard a withdrawal of the imputation, then I accept your hearing.

[2:15]

MR. HOWARD: I'd like to ask another question of the Minister of Finance. Can the minister confirm that the figures to which I referred earlier were used to hide the fact that government spending has increased by 85 percent, an average of over 21 percent per year since this minister has become Minister of Finance?

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, the budget document is being debated by this House at the present time. Again the member, as is his usual custom, uses phrases such as "hide," and the other statement which he withdrew. If he has a point to make then I'm sure a member of his caucus could make it in debate.

MR. HOWARD: If the minister had been attendant in the House and had listened to the debate instead of being absent from it, he would have heard that information put forward. That information was advanced.

The minister's budget speech goes on to suggest that arbitrary firings are "expected to reduce accommodation costs in 1983-84," that is, payments to B.C. Buildings Corporation. Will the minister explain why the budget estimates, insofar as payments to BCBC are concerned, which corporation provides government accommodation, are not reduced, but are increased by a staggering $18 million?

HON. MR. CURTIS: The adjective is relative in terms of staggering on the total budget for the British Columbia Buildings Corporation. As I recall the thrust of the budget document and the statement, it is not a question of necessarily the reduction of B.C. Buildings Corporation's budget, for which another minister is responsible, but rather the ultimate saving in rental charges to individual ministries and offices in government.

[ Page 1022 ]

MR. HOWARD: If that is the case, then I ask the minister again. Perhaps he didn't listen to what I said. In the budget document he said it is "expected to reduce accommodation costs in 1983-84," when in fact the estimates for payment to B.C. Buildings Corporation by the government for accommodation is increased by $18 million. I'll withdraw the "staggering" part, if that's offensive to the minister. Can he explain to the House why, on the one hand, he said he expects it to be reduced, and yet he presents information to the House which shows that it has been increased?

HON. MR. CURTIS: Insofar as I'm concerned, there is no contradiction.

MR. HOWARD: I can understand that. If I were to explain fully my understanding of it, I'm sure the minister would feel offended.

In view of the minister's complete, absolute and abject failure to control public spending since he took office, would the minister be prepared to admit that he and his colleagues are the worst fiscal managers in this province's history?

MR. SPEAKER: Clearly, hon. members, the question is grossly out of order.

MINISTRY OF FINANCE
FIRST QUARTERLY REPORT

MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, the minister is touchy about words today. But we'll see. If any of the words are offensive, I'll withdraw those and leave the rest of the question.

I'd like to ask a question of the Minister of Finance. Has he decided to make a statement in this House concerning the number of glaring and significant omissions in the first quarterly financial report released last Thursday?

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, I would be assisted by the member — who, unlike the other member, rarely has to resort to offensive language in order to put his question across — if he would refer at this point, or at some other point, to what he considers to be glaring omissions, and I would attempt to deal with them.

MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, the minister must have seen my notes.

Will the minister explain why he has failed or neglected to include budget estimates for the first quarter of 1983-84 in the first quarterly statement, a practice which conceals or withholds information routinely reported on previous occasions?

HON. MR. CURTIS: No, I didn't see the member's notes, but I'm looking forward to the next question.

With respect to the omission to which he has referred, in view of the fact that the budget was presented well into the first quarter of this fiscal year, the usual inclusion of first quarter budgetary figures would have been inappropriate. I explained that quite thoroughly not in the House, Mr. Speaker, but at the time of presenting it to the representatives of the press gallery.

MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, to remind the minister, the budget was actually presented in the second quarter, not well into the first quarter.

I'm wondering why it would be inappropriate. Certainly it would be possible, I should think. The budget must have been prepared well ahead of July 7 and the information must have been available, so why would it be inappropriate, given the certainty that the information was actually available at the time the first quarterly report was printed?

HON. MR. CURTIS: No, Mr. Speaker. I think I've indicated in this House, and certainly outside, that a number of revenue decisions which would have impacted on the budget were not made until relatively close to the presentation of the budget on July 7. I concede the point, incidentally, with respect to the presentation of the budget in the second quarter. But again, to the hon. member for Nanaimo, there were several decisions which were not taken until relatively close to the actual presentation of the budget. I did indicate earlier — and it was the case — that a number of expenditure decisions had been taken earlier on; but then, as the member and most members of the House would know, the revenue measures which complete the budgetary process for any fiscal year are about the last to be put in place.

MR. STUPICH: I think perhaps we will pursue this when we get to estimates — if we get to estimates.

Let's try another example. Will the minister explain why he has neglected to include in this quarterly report a statement of special purpose funds and accounts for the three months ending June 1983?

HON. MR. CURTIS: I believe I dealt with that when I made the presentation of the first quarterly report just last week.

MR. STUPICH: That's another item that perhaps was done while I was representing the province of British Columbia in Manitoba. I was the only one from the province of British Columbia at an otherwise well-attended conference.

ABSENCE OF LOTTERY FUNDS
STATEMENT IN FIRST QUARTERLY REPORT

MR. STUPICH: May I ask a question of the Provincial Secretary along the same lines. Among the items omitted from the special purpose funds and accounts is a statement of the lottery funds. In view of the widespread use of lottery funds by the Social Credit government as a political slush fund — maybe I'd better leave out "slush" — for political purposes during the election period, can the minister explain his role in concealing this information?

MR. SPEAKER: The question, hon. member, is out of order. The question must be a question, not an expression of opinion, representation, argumentation or debate. The question fails on several points.

MR. STUPICH: Will the Provincial Secretary explain why a statement of the lottery funds was not included in the first quarterly report, as is normally the case?

MR. SPEAKER: The question is in order.

[ Page 1023 ]

HON. MR. CHABOT: I'll take that question as notice and bring the answer back to the member at the very earliest opportunity.

MR. STUPICH: My question is not supplementary because the Provincial Secretary has taken it on notice. Since it was omitted, will the minister give us an undertaking to make this information available in a special report at some early date?

HON. MR. CHABOT: Yes, I'm prepared to take that into consideration.

TERMINATION OF
COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT PROGRAM

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: In the last few days I took as notice a question regarding the community involvement program. The hon. first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Barnes) raised the question as to whether or not agreements between our Ministry of Human Resources and those receiving the $50 for volunteer effort would be honoured. The answer to the question is yes, they will be. I have instructed the regional managers throughout the province to review any existing agreements. Any agreements we have with any of our recipients will be honoured, as will any that go beyond the stated policy of ending the total program on August 31. They will be continued if they have an agreement beyond that time. Thank you for the question.

COMPENSATION FOR EXPROPRIATION

MR. LAUK: I have a question to the same minister, who is in charge of the advance light rapid transit system. Last Friday the cabinet issued an order-in-council under the extraordinary powers of expropriation which accompany the construction program. What provisions has the minister made for the elderly and disabled tenants affected under this order? Presently there is no compensation package to assist them in their move or to find new accommodation. Many of the elderly people with whom I've talked have lived in this neighbourhood for generations.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: The member would know that those properties that are being expropriated through the B.C. Transit expropriation facilities.... That expropriation is probably the most favourable to the owner of any expropriation proceedings ever put before anyone in this province. There are 17 parcels, which are a small portion of the 235 properties affected in acquiring the land to build the light rapid transit from Vancouver to New Westminster. Of those 17 parcels which we are trying to acquire, there are not too many that are multi-tenant, as was indicated. I think there are five in total. Of those five it would be up to our negotiators, as they have been so instructed, to work with the owners. It would be the owners who would make compensation to their tenants, but that arrangement and that negotiation is being brought to the attention of the owners so it can be part of the compensation package which they will settle upon. In other words, they will build in the moving of tenants or the disruption to tenants. I have instructed our negotiators to use the fairest and the best negotiation they possibly can in order to ease any of the problems that will arise from an expropriation process.

MR. LAUK: I wonder if some information about the nature of these negotiations could be provided to my office so that we can be of some assistance. It is in our interest....

Interjections.

MR. LAUK: As the minister well knows, there are tenants that are in a situation.... To leave it only in the hands of the landlord could be interpreted as rather callous, unless the minister's indication is that there will be built in, as part of the negotiation package, some provision whereby these tenants can be dealt with. Could we have those details?

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: I want to assure the member that all of the best interests of those involved — because we are all serving the same people — will be taken into consideration in the fairest negotiations possible.

[2:30]

I want you to know that there are seven residential properties; I may have given five as the number. They have a total of 13 tenants. Ten are commercial properties; there are 13 tenants in total. Please let me assure the hon. member that the very best interests of all of those members will be taken into account, but I also want to tell him that neither I nor he can be a part of that negotiation. I think we have to trust those people whom we have ask to negotiate. They have my concerns expressed that they be fair, and I don't want to interfere with the negotiations.

There is a schedule of appeal, and it is very well documented. I know the member is familiar with the legislation, so I won't document it here. It is a very fair expropriation procedure, giving interest, giving appeal and giving that person who is involved in the expropriation the fairest possible opportunity. May I just tell the hon. member that I will convey his concerns to those who will be doing the business of those negotiations.

Hon. Mr. Schroeder tabled answers to questions on the order paper.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, prior to the opening of the proceedings the member for Alberni advised the Chair that he would be seeking the floor under standing order 35.

MR. SKELLY: Mr. Speaker, I rise under the provisions of standing order 35 to seek leave to move adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance. I have a brief statement and a motion to present to Your Honour.

This government's hope for a producer-led recovery is the basis of a harsh attack on everyone who works for a wage or salary in the province of B.C. The government's policies have caused sharp, real declines in wages and salary incomes by increasing taxes, restraining wages and chopping income assistance. It has created unemployment through direct firings, employment program cuts and a failure to stimulate consumer demand in B.C. communities.

It now appears that the so-called producer-led recovery on which the government had pinned its hopes is another illusion. Responsible representatives of the forest industry in this province have expressed alarm about the recent downturn in their primary markets. The government's own B.C. Hydro load forecasts show an alarming picture of the future of our resource industries, including forestry. The 11-year outlook

[ Page 1024 ]

is for no LNG plant, no new coal-mines, and declining growth in the forest industry.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. member, the Chair has more than patiently, I believe, waited for the matter to be discussed and....

MR. SKELLY: There are only two further lines, Mr. Speaker, to assist you in weighing the urgent nature of this proposal.

The Conference Board of Canada has now revised its forecast, as of yesterday; it now says the B.C. lumber industry will slump the rest of the year and decline next year. These developments are a serious blow to the entire basis of the government's economic approach, and in view of the seriousness of this matter, I have a motion to submit for the consideration of the Chair.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. member.... Does the Minister of Forests seek the floor?

HON. MR. WATERLAND: Mr. Speaker, the member is canvassing material that has been canvassed for these number of days in the budget debate, and can be canvassed in days to come. He's completely out of order making that type of speech under standing order 35.

MR. SPEAKER: Hon. members, the motion would not be read in any case; it would be submitted. But I must advise that standing order 35 is very straightforward in its provisions, and also does not allow for debate prior to raising the matter, which must be of urgent and pressing nature.

Hon. members, without prejudice to the member, I will reserve decision on this matter and bring a result of those decisions back to the House at the earliest opportunity.

MR. NICOLSON: I ask leave to make an introduction, Mr. Speaker.

Leave granted.

MR. NICOLSON: Mr. Speaker, my long-distance vision not being what it once was, I have sighted in the galleries a very good friend from Nelson, Mr. Bill Lightfoot, and I would ask the House to make him welcome.

Orders of the Day

ON THE BUDGET

(continued debate)

MR. REE: Mr. Speaker, I welcome you back to the chair. I trust you are feeling better than you were the last few days.

The government has been accused of not letting the public know during the election campaign of its program, what its budget would be, what its restraint program would be. This is a false impression that is being created by the opposition. As far back as a year ago February this government with courage initiated the compensation stabilization plan. It was a first step towards government restraint, with respect to trying to get the budget and finances of this province in line to where the taxpayers of this province can afford it. Since that step the program has been modified and improved.

We were accused of not providing financial information prior to the election. But this government had issued its budget of last year. It had issued first, second and third quarterly financial statements, which all reflected what the net position would be at the end of the fiscal year. The financial information was there. In other words, Mr. Speaker, before the election this government did provide the populace and the opposition, and everyone, with adequate and sufficient information to know the financial position of the government.

During the election campaign we advocated a continuing policy towards further restraint. We intended to go into the program that we have brought forward in this session. We advised the voters that there would be a restraint program. We advised them that hard decisions would have to be made. We advised them that programs would have to be cut, and that certain benefits that they were then receiving would have to be withdrawn because there were not the funds within the province, because of lack of employment, to maintain these benefits without further debt.

Mr. Speaker, during that campaign we let the populace know that we were going to be making hard decisions. We have been making hard decisions, and I'm confident we're going to continue to make further hard decisions, because we still have to get a further handle on the finances of the government. The government has grown over a number of years to a size the people cannot afford. It's part of the reason that I originally ran for elected office four or five years ago. Prior to that time I was practising law, and I had occasion at one time to submit a prospectus to the Securities Commission for them to vet. One of the observations of deficiencies I received from the chartered accountant hired by the commission was that a certain comma should be a semicolon. This is what government had gotten into. It had gotten to a position where we were interfering with business; they were being the guardians and holding the hands of people. Well, people know better for themselves. They don't need government to look after them to that extent. That is why we are into this restraint program now. That is why there are public servants being laid off, because we don't need public servants to tell people where they need a comma or semicolon in a document.

This is maybe an exceptional incident, but it is very common throughout the whole of government. We've promised to reduce the public service by 25 percent. I'm led to believe there are some 40,000 public servants in the aggregate. That would mean about 10,000 public servants. Through attrition and through cancellation of various programs and through the privatization of certain programs, there will be about 10,000 fewer public servants, we hope, within the next year than at the beginning of this year.

Mr. Speaker, in the private sector the cost of an employee is roughly calculated as twice the employee's salary. If an employee is earning $20,000 a year, the cost to the employer is roughly $40,000 when benefits, accommodation, supplies and other factors are taken into consideration. If we took 10,000 employees with an average of $20,000 per year income.... Many of the public employees being laid off were earning considerably in excess, and some were earning less. But if we use an average figure of $20,000, that is a saving to the public of $400 million. That is also a saving to the public equal to roughly 3 to 4 percent on a sales tax. If we did not remove those people from those positions, if we did not cut the public sector back, we would be looking at an

[ Page 1025 ]

additional 3 to 4 percent increase in sales tax. Each percent would not generate the same as it would now, because the higher the tax the less revenue is received per point. The public could not afford a 10 or 11 percent sales tax.

Then there are the other programs that we have cancelled or are downsizing. If you add those additional moneys — we've got $400 million on lost employees, in addition to the cancellation of programs — you can visualize an additional $600 million. We're getting into another 6 percent sales tax. With those few figures I think it's easy to understand the necessity for the cutback or downsizing of government.

We have been bombarded by the opposition and the media saying that our program is not receiving acceptance by the public. A silent minority out there does support this program.

AN HON. MEMBER: Majority.

MR. REE: Thank you, Mr. Member. A silent majority does support this program, and if you look for it you can find this support. It is there. The North Shore News recently did a survey as to support for the government's restraint program, and of the 323 people surveyed, between 59 and 60 percent were in favour of restraint, with 39 to 40 percent against. That's the answer from three out of each four people asked. Interestingly, that is about the same percentage by which I won the election in my constituency — about 60 percent of the voters. In other words, we still have the support of the majority of the populace. Those people voted us in to maintain restraint and to downsize government, and that support is still out there.

Yesterday I received a copy of the British Columbia Chamber of Commerce policy book for 1983-84 and I'd like to read two extracts from it. One is their position on finance and taxation:

"The British Columbia Chamber of Commerce urges the government of British Columbia to continue the process of encouraging efficiency within ministries. We congratulate the government for initiating the user-pay philosophy in some programs, and endorse the extension of this policy. We are vitally concerned about the growth of government expenditures. Only by reducing or holding the line on expenditures may we expect a reduction in taxation. We support the government on the current restraint program. We are concerned that there be an equitable distribution of the burden of taxation between the various sectors of our economy. While the burden should not fall too heavily on individual taxpayers, the policy of taxing business, big or small, must not be such as to drive entrepreneurs to other jurisdictions. The B.C. Chamber of Commerce is interested not only in an equitable distribution of the tax burden, but is also concerned about the sum total of taxes collected and the efficient use of those tax dollars. In that regard, we congratulate the government on the steps it has taken to improve the areas of financial reporting and administration."

[2:45]

That is the policy of the Chamber of Commerce. They also have a position statement, with a recommendation on the provincial restraint program, which I would also like to read:

"All levels of government, as a desirable social policy, must endeavour to maintain expenditures with the tax revenues collected from the citizens in order to preserve the integrity of the economy and to reduce inflation. The provincial government has shown leadership in announcing a restraint program to limit expenditures in the provincial public sector. The private sector is already conducting its own drastic restraint program through economic necessity.

"The British Columbia Chamber of Commerce urges the continuation of the current restraint program by the provincial government to limit expenditures in the public sector."

Those are just two isolated instances of support by the silent majority of this province.

Interjection.

MR. REE: Yes, silent majority. The individual members came out with that statement.

The restraint program is working. There is investor confidence in this province. During the past week I have had the opportunity of speaking to about four different architects from different architectural firms. They advised me, Mr. Speaker, that they are getting more business on their desks now than they had a year ago. There are more people drawing up plans for building, both industrial and residential, than they had a year ago. The restraint program is working. There is incentive for industry within this province, and I think recovery has started, as a result of the initiatives of this government.

MS. SANFORD: It's a little confusing now and again, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday we had the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) on 17 different points of order requesting that he be given permission to speak. Then when the opposition permitted him to speak, saying that we would give unanimous consent to allow the ministers to speak, he didn't want to speak. The first list says the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Smith) is to speak. Suddenly he's not here when it's fine for him to speak.

The opposition have been trying day after day in this House to have the government understand the error of their ways in terms of this budget and the unpalatable package of bills they introduced on July 7. That package, which includes this budget, is having a disastrous effect on the people of this province. The back-benchers keep getting up one after the other, trying to defend this budget. They say that the chamber of commerce favours this budget. Yet every headline we see says that the impact of this budget is indeed damaging, not only to the people who are being adversely affected by the severe cut in services but to the economy as well, because of the narrow, right-wing, extreme approach taken by government since the election on May 5. We all saw what they were up to as a result of the introduction of that budget with its 26 accompanying bills.

We've been trying to convince the government that they're on the wrong track, that they should withdraw not only all of those offensive bills but this budget as well, and start all over again. We are in a mess, Mr. Speaker. This government refuses, because of its narrow approach — its right-wing, extreme approach — to pay notice to anyone bringing to their attention the problems that this particular budget is presenting. But there have been members on the government side get up and defend the budget. Of course, that's what we all expect. Some of them are sincere in what

[ Page 1026 ]

they are saying, Mr. Speaker, because they honestly believe, from their right-wing perspective, that the budget introduced and the direction that the government is headed are the right ones and that they will, in fact, improve the situation in British Columbia. Some of them actually believe that they have a solution in this budget, even though everybody else out there — economists and leaders of various types, whether they're in the Employers' Council, the trade unions or wherever — is pointing out the error of their ways and the damaging effect this has, not only on the people I've mentioned but on the economy itself.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Mr. Speaker, some of them, when they get up to defend this budget, are less comfortable in having to stand here and speak in defence of this package. For instance, I've notice that the Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) seems to be squirming a lot these days as she has to try to defend what is happening. She gives me the impression that she doesn't fully accept the budget, the package and the direction that is being taken. I think the main reason she is not accepting this package is that she's aware — she's probably more aware than most of the people on the government side — of the political backlash to this kind of budget and the political backlash that has built up in opposition to the entire passage, including all those bills. She recognizes that with the elimination of services such as the child-abuse team and the closure of group homes, which were designed to assist those sexually abused children to cope either in their homes or in a foster-home situation.... They are very good programs. She is beginning to recognize that the political backlash from eliminating programs of that type is something that worries her. She's beginning to recognize that it's not a good thing from a political viewpoint. She recognizes that even such a minimum amount as $50 a month going to the handicapped people, who are volunteering their services and in return are given $50 a month, has been a valuable program in that it assists those people to live with a little more dignity because they then have a few more bucks in their pocket each month. It also raises the self-esteem of those people because they feel they're making a valuable contribution to society. That $50 a month has now been eliminated. It's not just those people who are disabled who are lashing back politically at that kind of move; it is everyone in the province who says that a move such as that is a heartless move which cannot be supported in any way, shape or form. Politically it's bad news when that kind of backlash develops against the kinds of programs that this government has decided to cut.

Most people recognize that severely mentally retarded people need a lot of special care. When you eliminate funding for the program which trains the volunteers who assist those mentally retarded people, then people generally recognize that the move is a bad one, and they react adversely politically. That's what worries the Minister of Human Resources. She knows the value and the need for that post partum counselling service; she recognizes that serious problems will develop as a result of the elimination of that service. Time and time again we've been told that one of the problems that develop with post-partum depression is an increase in child abuse and even in suicide. It's a valuable program which provides an excellent service in the province. It's a much needed service. There is a political backlash from the elimination of that program, and that's what worries the Minister of Human Resources. That's why she's uneasy when trying to defend this budget. That's why she squirms when she has to get up and try to answer the questions posed to her about these various program cuts. She knows that the transition houses have provided a great service for those people who have been battered and have needed a place to go for some security, comfort and assistance. She knows they provided a great service.

AN HON. MEMBER: We're listening to you.

MS. SANFORD: I wish you would listen. Withdraw that budget. Withdraw those bills.

MR. MOWAT: Talk to your members....

MS. SANFORD: They've all been saying the same thing. It's you people who aren't listening. Even though every one of my colleagues has spoken time and time again.... In fact, they've been complaining because we've been speaking too much in the House against this kind of thing. The member is complaining that they are not listening to every word. It's that government that's not listening. If those back-benchers listened and spoke to that government, maybe we'd get some action and get some sense of proportion back into this province in terms of the political moves being made.

It's interesting to hear the back-benchers get up and brag about the fact that there's been a 13 percent increase in the budget of the Ministry of Human Resources.

AN HON. MEMBER: We're not bragging. It's a fact.

MS. SANFORD: They are very proud of the fact that there is this 13 percent increase.

Interjection.

MS. SANFORD: Oh, it's 13.9 percent. I have heard one after the other saying that the fact that they've increased that budget by that amount is very good.

I have just listed all the services that they have eliminated. If I were a backbencher, I would not be getting up and bragging about a 13.9 percent increase in the Human Resources budget, because what it means is that they have failed totally economically, and people have to go to welfare for assistance because there's nothing else for them under this government and the approach it's taking. Lay off more people; let them go on UIC for a bit, and then on to welfare. That's why we need a 13.9 percent increase. Yet we have members of the back bench going on TV — we even had a cabinet minister yesterday bragging about that 13.9 percent increase in the Ministry of Human Resources budget. That's the last thing they should be bragging about because it illustrates the total failure of this government.

[3:00]

We've heard many times — and we're getting it from various sources — that the budget is a lie and that the figures and the material presented to us by the government are in error. The credit union is a fairly respected organization in the province; the credit union economists from the B.C. Central Credit Union have told us that this budget is grossly overestimated in terms of expenditure and grossly underestimated in

[ Page 1027 ]

terms of expected revenues. So the figures that we are debating here are in error. That's not what we can anticipate in this province. We cannot anticipate the kind of deficit that the Minister of Finance is predicting for next year because the figures on which the whole budget is predicated are in error. The only back-bencher who has even dealt with this is the MLA for North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis), who did allow that there were probably some — I don't know if he said "errors" — inaccuracies in terms of what the government was predicting as far as revenues and expenditures are concerned. We know that the deficit at the end of the fiscal year is not as great as the Minister of Finance is telling us in his budget as of July 7, which as pointed by the MLA for North Vancouver–Seymour is probably somewhat in error. So the government is going to be able to say — in fact some of them are saying it already — "Look! Our restraint program has worked. The deficit is not as great. The measures that we have taken were really good for the people of British Columbia after all. Look what good boys we are, We have done a great job by bringing in this right-wing legislation and extreme approach and by denying people who need assistance most the basic assistance through the various programs that are being eliminated...." I mentioned only a very few of those being eliminated through centralization of authority and through elimination of services such as the rentalsman and human rights, because they don't want them. It's not part of their philosophy. It's not part of their approach in terms of their own extreme right-wing viewpoint. They don't want these things; they want centralization. In the name of restraint they have brought in all these draconian measures which are so harmful to people and to the economy.

We've spoken by the hour about this, and yet the government has refused to move. It doesn't matter whom you talk to, who talks to them; they still, as a government, are determined to stay on the course on which they are embarked. The Premier ignores most of the advice that is coming to him. He tells us he's going to continue on this course; he's not going to be affected by any of the people who are raising their concerns with him. What is he saying? The Employers' Council of British Columbia has spoken out and said that they think he's on the wrong course, that he's moved too quickly, and that the moves he is taking are damaging the economy. The people who are involved with the trade union movement, whether it's the B.C. Federation of Labour itself, or the various trade unions speaking out, are saying that the approach is wrong and that it is going to damage the economy. The economists — and there are a number of them — are saying that he is on the wrong course, that the approach that he's taking at this point is going to do more damage than good. Even though you have the World Council of Churches expressing concern about the dishonest approach of this government, the Premier says: "We're going to continue. We're going to go on on the course that we have set." Even though headline after headline says: "Budget Hampers Economy," "Pay Curbs and Recession are Linked," "Rosy Outlook Fades for B.C.," "Restraint is Part of the Problem Not the Solution" — even though all of those things are coming in at this stage, the Premier has said we are going to continue on the course that we have established.

MRS. JOHNSTON: You're ignoring the positive headlines.

MS. SANFORD: Positive headlines like "Upturn Dying, Waterland Won't Concede"?

MRS, JOHNSTON: Positive headlines.

MS. SANFORD: I just picked one out. That's the next one I came to.

Mr. Speaker, it doesn't seem to matter. They are embarked on a course based on a philosophic approach which is narrow, extreme and very right-wing.

There was an article recently in Monday Magazine, written by an economist named Martin Levin, titled "Bill Bennett's Holy War." He says this:

"First, let us clear away the smokescreen. What is being done by the Socreds today has little to do with restraint and even less with recovery..."

Are the Premier, the back bench or the government going to listen?

MRS. JOHNSTON: Do you believe that?

MS. SANFORD: Of course, it's very clear to anybody who looks at the budget or the legislation for even two minutes that that's what you’re about.

"...although these are convenient catchwords given the depressed state of the economy."

That's what Martin Levin is saying. It has nothing to do with recovery or restraint. In fact, he says it has less to do with recovery than with restraint.

"In keeping with Socred alliteration, what is being done today in the name of restraint and recovery can better be characterized as revenge: revenge for the alleged indignities suffered by businessmen at the hands of bureaucrats, revenge against big government and big unions. Revenge essentially against the twentieth century."

How true. These people don't belong in this century, They're trying to apply a philosophy and a policy that was thrown out the window a century or more ago. You're trying to bring back an old idea that is worn out and that doesn't work, and that does nothing other than harm people and the economy. So many people are saying it. but they refuse to listen. He says:

"To move us back to the nineteenth century when we are nearing the end of the twentieth, the Social Credit government has centralized power to an unprecedented degree in the hands of the cabinet."

All in the name of restraint, It's dangerous. Martin Levin then goes on and says:

"It has profoundly eroded local government. It has removed basic bargaining rights from the public sector unions. It has radically undermined basic human rights protections.

"The actions by the government have the vindictive cast that they do because the ideology they represent has been on the losing side for most of this century."

And yet they insist on proceeding with this particular approach.

"The Socreds now are determined to wage holy war against the twentieth-century interventionist government, against modern restrictions on property rights, and ultimately against all the opponents of free-market, free-wheeling business. The 'all-new

[ Page 1028 ]

political animal' the pundits have discovered is really a century old, and even in the last century it was having its problems. For it was the failings of rugged individualism and the market mechanism that gave rise in the twentieth century to the managed economy, labour unions and the welfare state."

Those have developed, of course, under the capitalist system.

"It is instructive that John Stuart Mill, the most famous liberal of his age, began as a laissez-faire liberal at the beginning of the nineteenth century and ended as a kind of Social Democrat by the time of his death in 1873.

"Perhaps we should go farther back and return to the eighteenth century, to Adam Smith with his profound faith in the marketplace, his active dislike of government and the primacy of property rights, to truly understand this government. It is poor old Smith who is being brought back from the dead in Victoria these days and whose heart stimulates resonant beatings in the bosoms of our Social Credit leadership. The ideological furnishings of the new government are simply refurbished eighteenth century modern."

That is where they are: back at least a century, trying to convince the people of the province that through centralization, through their love of power here in Victoria, they are somehow going to bring us out of a recession.

The Premier has responded to people like StatsCan, who say the direction this government is taking is damaging the economy. The Premier says: "StatsCan has an eastern bias, because here in B.C. we are not relying on a consumer-stimulated recovery; we are relying on a resource-stimulated recovery."

Interjection.

MS. SANFORD: That is what the Premier said.

So it doesn't really matter if you raise taxes and add these extra burdens on the people of the province, because it is not consumer spending that is going to bring us out of the recession anyway. That is what the Premier is saying. It is not consumer spending that is going to bring us out of the recession; it is the international markets and the resource recovery. It therefore doesn't matter if we take an extra $200 million out of the taxpayers' pockets, it doesn't matter if they don't have that money to spend in the marketplace, because it's not going to affect recovery anyway. It is the resource recovery that we are looking for.

But then today the Conference Board of Canada said that in all likelihood this resource recovery is not going to happen this year. The Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) is gallantly trying to say.... He won't concede that the Conference Board of Canada is correct. He used the Conference Board of Canada's predictions a few months ago, but he now says they are wrong.

Mr. Speaker, I draw your attention to the fact that there is no quorum in this Legislature.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, hon. member. The Chair will ring the division bells, as is custom, and help to draw members who are in the precincts. Time will be stopped and the member may take her place until the quorum is established.

Please proceed hon. member.

MS. SANFORD: I see the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) has arrived; maybe he would like to speak now. Has he changed his mind? We are still ready to give permission, Mr. Speaker, if he wants to speak in this debate.

[3:15]

The Premier has brushed off, dismissed, ignored all of the comments made by economists, church leaders, the Employers' Council, trade unionists, and those people involved in human rights. He has dismissed all of the warnings. He has dismissed the StatsCan warnings. The Conference Board of Canada has been dismissed, at least by the back bench today, and the Minister of Forests too apparently has dismissed it.

George Pedersson, a Vancouver economist, states that because the government has taken this kind of action at this time, unemployment will go up and inflation will be higher. That is what we can expect as a result of the actions they are embarked upon. "Consumer spending will be weaker, and the probability of labour strife has been increased through the actions of this government." There is no doubt about that; we all know about the kind of attitude they have adopted with respect to bringing in a bill such as Bill 3, which allows them to fire without cause.

The other thing that the Premier has done is to brush off the more than 20,000 people who stood out here on the lawn, telling this government they are on the wrong course, pleading with them in a very quiet, reserved way to withdraw this budget, withdraw that legislation and start all over again. The Premier just says, "Oh, I have more than 20,000 at my tea party." He can dismiss it, wave his hand, and it is no concern of his whatsoever.

The Employers' Council doesn't seem to matter either; he has brushed them off. He has brushed off Anglican Archbishop Douglas Hambridge, who has said that we should have consultation. He said: "We should stop at this point, took at the direction that we should take, work together and not embark upon this program of confrontation that this particular government has taken. John O'Neill, president of the B.C. conference of the United Church.... Those are individual appeals made by church leaders in this province saying: "You're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong." Bishop de Roo has been dismissed as a pinko. We all know that the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) has dismissed him with a wave of his hand.

What does it take? Why is it that those people in the back bench...? The member for North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis) did allow that this budget is inaccurate, that the figures that we are being presented with are really not what they will be at the end of the fiscal year and that the government probably should not have added taxes it has added at this time — that 2 percent sales tax.

Interjection.

MS. SANFORD: He did.

None of them have dealt with what the B.C. Credit Union is saying. Why is it that their economists are so wrong? Why is it that you can't analyze what the credit union economists are saying about that budget, and why is it that you can't say in this House why the credit union economists are wrong?

MRS. JOHNSTON: He was an NDP candidate.

[ Page 1029 ]

MS. SANFORD: Oh, the credit union economist. Well, what about the archbishop from the Anglican Church? What about the leader of the conference of the United Church of Canada? What about the economist I have quoted from today? What about the Employers' Council? What about the trade union movement? What about all these people? They're simply being ignored and dismissed by those people.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: What about the taxpayers?

MS. SANFORD: I'm glad they've raised that, Mr. Speaker. When we asked this government how much money they were going to save by these measures that they have adopted, the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis) couldn't tell us. Do the back-benchers have figures about how much money is going to be saved by this? Because I am telling you, Mr. Speaker, it's going to cost the taxpayers far more money with the kind of approach that they have taken through this budget and those bills. We know that. It's going to cost more, but they have used this catchword of "restraint" to implement a philosophy. I feel sorry for those taxpayers, because it's going to cost them more. It hurts the economy, it hurts people and it's going to cost the taxpayers more.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. One at a time. All members will come to order.

MS. SANFORD: As outrageous as the actions are that this government has taken since the introduction of this budget and those accompanying bills, the most outrageous is its decision to take taxpayers' money to advertise their program and to try to sell that rotten program through the airwaves and newspapers of this province. It's most outrageous to take $50 away from those people who are willing to volunteer their time and effort — the disabled and handicapped in this province — take that $50 a month away and use that money to advertise a program that they can't sell to anybody else in this program. It's in the name of restraint. They're talking....

HON. A. FRASER: You're wasting taxpayers' money now with your yack-yack.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'd advise the hon. Minister of Transportation and Highways not to make personal references to another hon. member. That's most unparliamentary. And will the other members of the House please come to order.

MS. SANFORD: We also know that they don't believe in democracy. They would just as soon that we weren't here speaking at all. They would just as soon that we just simply went away and accepted all of this, even though we are elected to stand here and fight the kinds of measures that we think are so harmful to the people, the economy and the taxpayers of this province.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please.

MS. SANFORD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. They are unruly, aren't they'?

The B.C. Central Credit Union suggests that the overestimation of expenditures by this government is between $170 million and $250 million. They also note that the anticipated revenues in this budget year are understated by some $300 million to $400 million. The budget is inaccurate. It's misleading. Why is it that those people are not able to come to grips with those figures? Why is it they cannot at least argue in this House that these figures are wrong? Why is it they stand up one after the other and support this budget in the face of all the opposition that's coming, and in the face of all the headlines that say they're on the wrong track? Why is it they're so stubborn, that they have such tunnel vision, that they are so right-wing and extreme in their approach that they are determined to centralize that power, to grab that power, using restraint as the excuse? It's not restraint. It's not recovery. I have cited here today a number of economists who say that that's the case. Statistics Canada says you're on the wrong track. The Conference Board of Canada says you're on the wrong track. And yet you people are determined to proceed.

Mr. Speaker, they keep trying to say that this program is going to save the taxpayers money. Now they have to go out and sell this, using taxpayers' money. They have to sell this concept to the people of B.C. I don't think the people of B.C. are going to buy it at this stage. I would like to again remind those back-benchers, who are always so unruly, that we in the NDP warned the government three years ago about their profligate spending, about the way in which they were wasting taxpayers' money. We warned them time after time. We moved motion after motion saying: "Cut down your expenses in the purchase of office furniture, in ministerial travel. Cut down your purchase of these fancy rugs and big armchairs. Cut down on advertising. Cut down on all these things and save the taxpayers some money." You know what that government did? They turned down every motion that we made to save the taxpayers' money of this province. We told them that it was time to get involved in restraint. We warned them years ago. Did they accept it? This is all based on a philosophy that is unacceptable.

I say get off the backs of the poor in this province, withdraw this budget, withdraw those bills, have some concern about recovery, have some concern about the economy of this province. We're in a mess. Withdraw it all and start all over again.

HON. MR. SMITH: I've listened to the member for Comox, with whom I from time to time jointly represent a little island in that constituency — and I try myself to make contributions to the recovery of that island by spending a good deal of time...

MS. SANFORD: ...tearing down the lodge.

HON. MR. SMITH: And also by talking to economists and others who are vacationing on that lovely island. I must say that I don't hear the same kind of pessimistic, gloomy things that that member brought before this House. I hear far more positive things than the member does. But the member has every reason to be gloomy, of course, because for four years she's going to have to sit on the other side of the House and be in the critic's role. It's easier to be in the critic's role

[ Page 1030 ]

than to try to do something about the problems that confront us — but it's much gloomier.

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

I don't know why the member couldn't have been a little more kind and charitable about this budget, because it's one of the most important documents in the history of this province. It's a budget for restraint. It's a framework for economic reality. It's the harbinger of government reductions and privatization, and through all these things a blueprint for recovery.

[3:30]

Another thing we've heard is that there was no mandate. This budget is the manifesto of the mandate to reduce the cost and the size of government, and to free up the private sector to encourage it to flourish — freer than it has been from the shackles of government regulation, bereft of expanding technocratic tentacles and saved from new and larger tax burdens. All of those things are put forth in this budget, and the member knows that.

MS. BROWN: Who wrote that?

HON. MR. SMITH: I did. "Technocratic tentacles," Rosemary.

The Finance minister has preserved our essential social services in this budget. He's accepted a limited, transient deficit and delivered strong portents for the future. He's made it very clear that prosperity has to be earned, that prosperity isn't just going to come, to happen, to occur by hand wringing every time a government program is reduced. Every time a program that has been found wanting is eliminated they wring their hands and say: "Oh my goodness! You're reducing this program. You're denying services to people. You're eliminating this program that everyone has become hooked on, and you can't do so." Mr. Speaker, they have opposed the reduction of every single program that we proposed to eliminate, pare down or streamline.

It's true that during the heydays of the seventies and the early eighties, when government revenues were strong, when resource taxation was flowing, when sales abroad were excellent and the international economic climate was good, government embarked on programs that it wanted to get involved in. I think we were the first province in this country to recognize — as we did in 1982 — that that era had ended, that we had to change and reappraise our priorities. We had to look at all these programs, evaluate them, and some good programs would be terminated. We faced that fact and we've done that. On the other side of the House and from the hustings, all they do is refight the election and cry crocodile tears about the elimination of every single program — nothing concrete.

I'm going to speak about a few of the budget revenue measures with which I'm reluctantly in agreement. I must say I find the tobacco tax a very hard penalty for some of us in this House to bear. The member for Mackenzie (Mr. Lockstead) and I have a particular thing about that. But I don't mind paying more taxation for that purpose, nor do I mind paying more taxes in the field of liquor. The increase in sales tax from 6 to 7 percent is a general way of spreading tax burdens and is a way that is not unduly hurtful or unfair on all levels of the economy, including those levels of the economy where there is capital development taking place, because much of the revenue from that tax comes from major capital and equipment acquisitions. I think it's a reasonably fair way to raise revenue.

I would have liked the opposition to propose to us some of the ways in which they could see government being pared down, instead of always making allusions to office furniture and things of that kind, as they did during the last two or three sessions. I would have liked them to have maybe pointed at one of their pet programs or something that they put in place, of which they could say: "This one has now had its day. The sunset has arrived and maybe we could cancel this or maybe we could do it in a different way." But I have never heard them once — Mr. Speaker, I don't know if you have in the three years we've been debating this issue of restraint — propose the elimination of any service of government or the reduction of any service level of government.

MS. BROWN: Cancel the advertising. Give the $50 back to the disabled.

HON. MR. SMITH: The best form of advertising for this budget is the negativism of the opposition in the face of every proposal that's been made.

In this budget the Finance minister has had the good common sense to basically preserve the health care system, the Human Resources system and the justice system. This has been done in the face of very serious economic restraints, but it has been done by making very good use of holding the line on wages and by doing so without major reductions in services. I know that in my ministry it is difficult to reduce levels of expenditure where most of the activities are activities in which there is growth and not reduction. To do so requires a great deal of effort, care and reorganization.

Another thing that this budget recognizes and, indeed, lays out as a very sensible blueprint is privatization. There is absolutely no earthly reason why a number of functions that have been traditionally provided inside government cannot be provided just as well — in fact, even better — in the private sector and will flourish under competition. I notice that the Finance minister has itemized a number of those. I have not really heard in this House a very impressive critique of the proposed privatizations. I see no reason why the lodge and ski facilities cannot be operated by a private operator. I see no reason why the Pacific Coach Lines routes cannot be taken up by private carriers, very effectively. Greyhound and other private carriers can carry out the major routes of Pacific Coach Lines in a very effective way, just as they can with the service from downtown Victoria to downtown Vancouver.

MR. REID: And save $7 million.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

HON. MR. SMITH: A number of those programs that are meant for privatization will be run in a considerably more inspired way under competition than they are at the present time. They will also be run in a competitive way on the basis of wages, because so many of these activities have been constrained by very large public sector wage increases. That has been another feature of our restraint program and of the budget. The compensation stabilization program, which is going to mean that in the public sector of this province the wage levels, which are going to be held to increases of plus 5 and minus 5 percent, depending on productivity, are not

[ Page 1031 ]

going to be the pacesetters any more, the north star and beacon for the private sector, but instead are going to be models of restraint. The private sector will find that it is leading, not following, the public sector, which is the opposite, of course, of what happened through most of the seventies.

That is the purpose of Bill 2 and Bill 3, and the purpose for the changes in the compensation stabilization program. By highlighting those purposes, the budget makes very clear the directions and incentives to the private sector. It says that you can go out and invest money and capital, and take risks and major strides to create new employment, without looking at the government and saying that the government is making it impossible for you to do business because the government is setting wage levels too high; that government is negotiating collective agreements that are irresponsible and that give up management rights; that government at every level, whether it is a Crown corporation or the province or a municipality or a school board, has abdicated its management responsibilities and is setting an example which has made it impossible for you in the private sector to compete with the wages, and impossible for you to attract equivalent labour, because the government has been the pacesetter.

That is not going to be the case any more in this province. The government is now going to manage its labour relations, assume its responsibilities, and negotiate collective agreements that reflect the economic realities of the day and also preserve those few but important rights which management requires in order to discharge its responsibilities. Many of those rights were given up originally during the period 1972 to 1975, when the most irresponsible public sector wage settlements anywhere in the dominion of Canada were negotiated in this province.

I have also been somewhat disappointed by the lack of any philosophical base from the members opposite or any kind of articulation of what I would consider to be the classic, clear position of the NDP. I would have thought they would have achieved some sort of position on these measures, instead of a general position of being opposed to every single cut and reduction. At the same time they're talking out of the other side of their mouth about believing in restraint and in the economic use of resources, but they're against every measure to achieve those things. I would have thought that they would have returned to their honest philosophical base, that they would have been consistent, that they would have said: "We think, gentlemen, that you're going in the wrong direction. We think that you shouldn't be holding the line. We think you should be priming the pump. We think you should be spending money in tough times to create jobs." We would have thought they might have been a little more honest with us and told us that that was their true position.

MS. SANFORD: We spent all day yesterday talking about the diversification of the economy.

HON. MR. SMITH: No, no. What you talk about is the diversification of the viewpoints on the other side of the House; you don't talk about the diversification of the economy. You talk about restoring every social service program that we're proposing to reduce. You talk about borrowing billions of dollars to put people to work, and then you talk about economies and restraint. You were found out during the election campaign when your leader announced that he was going to dismantle the restraint program. He told everybody what he was going to do, and you were found out. You were also found out for proposing policies to stimulate the economy that would have made Franklin Delano Roosevelt's dog blush. Their policies would have brought back the NRA — national recovery — and put people to work on municipal work-gangs. Franklin Roosevelt's dog wouldn't have espoused policies like that. Those policies were outmoded by 1940, but it's very interesting that the real reactionaries, those that are mired in the past, are not the people on this side of the House but are the NDP who are looking into the rhetoric of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1933 for some kind of answers to the problems of the 1980s and the 1990s. They talk about us as being....

Interjections.

HON. MR. SMITH: I am most amused when they consider that we are somehow right-wing conservatives on this side of the House, because the reactionaryism is really on the part of the NDP. There does not seem to be an espousal of their position. I don't know who speaks for them. I heard Ian Waddell speaking the other morning about provincial issues. It is interesting that all the federal members are talking about provincial issues these days. They're saying that in the Port Moody by-election the issue is the provincial budget. When the Conservatives win that by-election, I wonder if they'll say the same thing: "It was because of provincial issues." Mr. Waddell and Nelson Riis and others seem to be talking about provincial issues. They of course are philosophical small-l liberals. The gentlemen opposite are reactionaries, but there's no espousal of any kind of policy to meet the economic needs or our alternative of restraint. Their answer to restraint is to spend more and more money — shovel it out of the truck and continue to create jobs by putting people to work on borrowed money.

[3:45]

You remember during the campaign, it was the poor beleaguered Petroleum Corporation that was going to create the jobs and the wealth. That corporation that tried to collect a little bit of money from the sale of natural gas was going to borrow the money that was going to put a few thousand people to work for six months on municipal chain-gangs. That's how we were going to have our recovery. Boy, was that ever imaginative. I'll tell you that it really stirred the viscera of the people of my riding to think that they could get jobs in parks. That policy even embarrassed Fella Roosevelt. That was their solution, along with that wonderful mining policy, that blueprint for the future that was going to set up new Crown corporations and new agencies to do everything. That would have been their approach if they'd become government.

My goodness, we'd have had a restraint program. You would have had so many people coming in here from Regina and places east who had had pink slips a year ago, all lining up to get work in Crown agencies. The number of those agencies would have doubled and quadrupled. Can't you see what we would have had? We would have had lumber exploration, development agencies, lumber exploration agencies, marketing agencies for timber, marketing agencies for coal, marketing agencies for molybdenum. We'd have had marketing agencies for everything. Who would have been serving on these agencies? The gentlemen from Regina and other places who would have come out. Boy, would we ever have had restraint. What I say to them is: "Rethink your policies.

[ Page 1032 ]

Don't listen to those small-l liberal federal MPs of yours who are out here. Go back to your roots. If you're going to oppose us, oppose us clearly and philosophically because you think that we should spend more money, prime the pump, restore all these programs and you're prepared to pay the price. Be clean with us."

MR. MITCHELL: When I listen to my good friend from Oak Bay, I can't help but think that if he'd said some of these things when we both appeared before Bill Ostler, the judge, his credibility would have been so downgraded that he would never be allowed to appear in any court. I think if we're going to discuss programs, the credibility of the government should be straightforward and not a lot of rhetoric of garbage. They just seem to open their mouths and anything that comes out becomes the policy of the NDP. I think you, Mr. Speaker, will realize that there's no such thing as socialist economics or capitalist economics. The laws of economics are very basic. You can't create wealth without resources and manpower and a need for a product.

It doesn't matter if it's a government enterprise or a private enterprise. You must use the same laws of economics. The science of economics is very basic. It's just like the science of making gunpowder. If you make gunpowder in Canada, China or Australia, you have to have the same ingredients. The basic science of making gunpowder is identical to the science of economics. The reason we are in the problem we are today is very simple. It's the mismanagement of the Social Credit government for the last 30 years. The mismanagement of this government has been so ridiculous. When historians look back and see a province like British Columbia, one of the richest provinces with all the resources we have, and when we look at the wealth we have produced with our Hydro power and look at the horrible record of what this government has done with it, we realize that we're in this problem today because of that mismanagement. I think it all starts when we talk on Hydro. It all started in the two-river policy of the previous Social Credit government. When they produced the power from the Arrow Dam, or when they held up the water via the Arrow Dam and the Columbia Dam, and they produced the excess power on the American side, and when they had the opportunity to bring that power back to British Columbia, the previous Social Credit government sold it. They sold it for $600 million, but it cost the people of British Columbia $1.2 billion to build those dams. This is the mismanagement of this government. And they call that good government.

But what did the Americans do? Sure, they came into this little Social Credit government, who had the resources of British Columbia, and said: "We'll give you $600 million for the downstream benefits of the power." But what did the Americans do with that power? They built five aluminium companies with the power that we gave away for $600 million — five aluminium companies that could have been built in British Columbia with that power that we gave away. Those jobs would have been British Columbia jobs. The position that we're in today.... What we were trying to say when we were debating the amendment yesterday.... The problems that we're facing today are because we have put all our eggs in one basket. We have not attempted to diversify and create jobs in British Columbia.

It all started with.... When you look at the record of power.... When you look down on the leadership — and I think the leadership should come from the government.... We all agree money is needed when we're setting up new business. When that money is available, what has been the record of this government? Let's look at a few simple examples.

MRS. JOHNSTON: On May 5 the people said they liked what we were doing.

MR. MITCHELL: Mr. Speaker, you make sure before I sit down that I don't forget to go through my notes and get on May 5. A government should give some kind of leadership, and when there is money available for investment, let's create new jobs.

Let's look at the record in British Columbia. Let's take one simple part of the economy, the retail end. Do you remember Fields, the general store? There was a certain amount of a power grab: when Zellers decided they had a lot of extra capital, what did they do? They went out and bought the Fields stores. They escalated the value of those shares and they bought Fields. Did it create one new job? They had excess capital, they had profits to reinvest. But did the government say: "If you have that kind of money, go out and invest it in other companies that are going to create new jobs"? They bought out the Fields stores. Zellers bought it out, then Hudson's Bay bought out Zellers, and then the Thomson chain bought out Hudson's Bay.

That investment hasn't created one new job. All it has done is create an additional cost every time you buy a pair of shoes. You are paying indirectly for the cost of the capital, the money that went in to create a bigger monopoly. If you are going to give leadership in this country you are going to have to create new jobs, not build larger and larger monopolies. This country believes in a free enterprise system, but it doesn't believe in the construction of larger monopolies that do not create new jobs; all they are creating is higher and higher prices for the customer when they go into a store. This little rump group keep on saying: "We must have more power. We must build a larger and larger monopoly so they can raise the prices to the maximum." This is the sort of leadership that this government did not give....

MR. REID: On a point of order, as a member of the back bench I take exception to the reference to a "rump group." I would like the hon. member to please withdraw those comments.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I don't find that unparliamentary, hon. member, used in the context it was used in. I might point out that it is used quite commonly in this House. I guess if it became excessive it could become unparliamentary.

MR. MITCHELL: Some of the areas I have been known to go into might call them the back end of a horse, but I won't say that. If they want to be called behind, they are behind in a lot of progressive ideas — very far behind in understanding the basic economic facts that are facing this province.

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

Let's remember again, when we talk about our great resources.... This is the important part of this budget debate. We have to look at the resources of this province and where they are going. We all know what happened to Mac

[ Page 1033 ]

and Blo, one of the largest forest industries in this province. They have a certain invested capital and on that invested capital there must be a return from our resources. Those resources are based on the investment, but when that particular company became a viable company there was a power struggle among the shareholders. We all know what happened: stock that was selling for $30 or $32 a share all of a sudden became a commodity that was sold.... First BCRIC got into it and started jacking up the price, and then Noranda moved in and bought it for about $70 a share. So the investment from that company from our resources had to produce a return on $70, not on the investment capital of that particular company.

[4:00]

This is what is happening. If the money that Noranda had, or that BCRIC had at the time when they had sold all their shares, had been put into new industries in British Columbia, new job-producing companies creating real jobs, as my friends across the way there would say, we wouldn't have the unemployment that we have today. After 30 years of Social Credit they are so locked in to building monopolies, and they are not looking at producing jobs for the people of this province. This is the leadership we have been suffering from.

The public are asking questions and they are coming to every one of us. I don't think my office is the only one that people come into and say: "Look, I've lost my job, I'm going to lose my house because I can't make the mortgage payments on UIC, I can't make the mortgage payments on welfare." And they don't want welfare or unemployment insurance. I pay life insurance but I don't want to die. I'll pay that life insurance until I'm 250 years of age; I'll be happy to pay it if you can guarantee that I am going to live to be 250 years of age. The vast majority of the unemployed do not want to collect UIC; they want jobs. They feel they have a moral responsibility, as British Columbians and as Canadians, to carry their share of producing all the products that this community needs.

What do people do with the money? We're not looking at government-run services; we're looking at this society, company or country. When we go out and buy we pay a fee for service. What is a fee for service? It can be called money or taxes. If we go to the hospital and are treated there, we're paying a fee for service. Some of it is a return from our income tax via grants from the federal government; some of it is the money paid for hospital premiums; and some of it is our user fee. When we go into that hospital we are paying a fee for service. Granted, under our hospital plans versus the old days, we're paying that fee for service before we need it. When I go into a store and buy some lumber and nails I'm paying a fee for service, a fee that is going to pay the lumber worker who cut the tree down, or the millworker or the clerk in the store. When I buy something it's a fee for service; it's money that I'm putting out.

In society, the community pays for everything. There's nothing given free in this world. The fee that we're paying can be in the form of taxes, money coming back from the federal government. It's a fee for service. It comes out of my wages and is returned to the hospitals, and it treats me when I'm ill. In the economics of the system it doesn't matter if we pay it via the tax service, medical premiums or user fee; we're paying for something that we get. It is ridiculous when you hear this government.... I won't say that rump group of the government, because I think the whole Social Credit government has the same philosophy: that if we privatize something, or if we build a larger monopoly, then it's different. That is ridiculous, because when I buy something I'm paying for the cost of that production. It's a very simple economic formula. When I go to the hospital and I'm sick and they operate on me, I am saying that whatever I pay is an investment. It's money well invested.

When you look through the budget and estimates and listen to the speeches made by the government about how they're going to save money by cutting out services.... They're going to cut out simple things like the rentalsman. And then they're saying: "Yes, if you have any complaints from your landlord you can take it to court." The cost of going to court is going to make a lot of lawyers rich, but it's not going to be a cheaper service to the person having a problem with his landlord, or to a landlord who is having a problem with his tenant. So you're paying a fee for that service, and you're going to pay a fee that is a lot greater than under the present situation.

Under the present Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis), this government had an opportunity to provide low-cost housing, but he wiped out the Housing Corporation when he was Minister of Municipal Affairs. So the people who are really going to suffer are those who need low-cost housing. This is the shortage. The only shortage of housing today is in the market of those on low incomes, on fixed incomes, and of those who cannot afford the $800 or $900 rent for apartments or homes that are now in good supply. The vacancy rate for those in the low-income housing group is still great. These are the people who are going to suffer.

I had a phone call from one particular apartment just last week. This particular apartment rented for $245 a month. They had just received their 10 percent increase this year in May. The rent for that apartment was $245 a month. The lady who was living in it died, so it became vacant. The apartment was repainted, and the rent, which had already been increased by 10 percent, went from $245 to $385. If there's any appeal, you’re going to take it to court and you're going to say that you're restricted to 10 percent. By the time you hire a lawyer to fight it in the courts, it’s going to cost everyone in that apartment more money than they can afford. That apartment has a majority of senior citizens — constituents of mine — who are on fixed incomes. They know that they are going to be faced with the same rent increase in the near future.

I listened to all the members on that side of the House; they laugh and giggle. They think it's funny that people who have worked all their lives — everything they have is invested in their pension or in annuities — are now going to have another $100 dragged out of their pocketbooks to pay a landlord. They think that's funny. The problem didn't start last week; it started when this government shut down the Housing Corporation. It was not designed to build expensive apartments. It was designed to provide sufficient low-cost housing for the citizens of British Columbia.

I know the government laughs and giggles. They think this is great. But the problems we are in today were caused by mismanagement of where we're going and how we're going to get there.

The previous speaker, my good friend the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Smith), said it was the NDP that said "borrow, borrow, borrow." It was not the NDP that said "borrow, borrow, borrow." The NDP fought and fought in this House against the ridiculous borrowing, the ridiculous debt that this government has led us into. In the last seven years this government has tripled the debt of this province; that's more

[ Page 1034 ]

than any other province in Canada. It was this government that stood to a man — and a lady — when, last year and the year before, we went through the budget and we said: "We are facing hard times."

I remember what the second member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) said in 1979, when he was speaking in Vancouver to the Young New Democrats. "In the early eighties this country will be facing a depression." The present Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Ritchie) used to get up when he sat in that — I won't say rump group — back bench, and he laughed and ridiculed and said: "B.C. will never go into a depression, because we have good leadership. We are going to have nothing but prosperity." He laughed at and ridiculed this side of the House because we said at that time there were going to be hard times. And we believed him. And when we went through the budgets of 1981 and 1982, we cut out what we call the fat, the excess new furniture — every ministry seemed to have nothing but new furniture every year. We identified the waste for travel and advertising. We brought this to the attention of the government. The first year we identified — and we don't have the true figures the government has of this restraint; we don't have the true facts and figures that are in the budget — facts that were easily identified. In 1981 we identified over $82 million of savings. We moved motion after motion in ministry after ministry. We moved that we should identify this waste, we should cut it out, we should save that money for a rainy day. But the government — every one to a person — stood up and voted against those amendments. Every one of them said that we were going to live this high life forever.

[4:15]

The second year, I believe, we identified around $79 million. We identified the waste that was going on in government. The ridiculous part is that they all stood up and all voted against those amendments. But at the same time they supported the Broadway Bobs and their trips to New York. They supported cabinet ministers spending a week in Arizona at the taxpayers' expense. Everyone in this House from the government side supported the $2 million of taxpayers' money that was wasted on giving a false impression to the people of this province with the advertising that went on prior to the election. They all supported that waste. They said that it was the NDP who didn't do their homework, didn't do their research, didn't bring these problems to the attention of the government, didn't bring it to the attention of the public. I know they all voted for it, but they don't want to be reminded of it. They don't want to be reminded that they voted against restraint. They don't want to be reminded that they, as a government, wasted $2 million of taxpayers' money for a lot of high-priced, slick advertising that preceded the election.

Let's remember the good lady for Surrey — the first member for Surrey (Mrs. Johnston) ; ladies first. She keeps on saying: "Let's talk about May 5." I would like to talk about May 5. I think it's important that we who have been elected look at where we are today, at the end of August, debating a budget. Let's take that debate to the traditions of parliament, the traditions of political democracy, and put it into its proper perspective. Let's go back to the last time this House sat in September, 1982. We had a special session that was hailed as a job-creation session. We sat for 19 days in September. Then the House was adjourned. Traditionally, in any parliament in Canada, under British democracy, you have a parliament brought back in late January or early February. At that time the government brings in a throne speech, which shows where the government is going to go. The MLAs discuss that speech. Then the budget comes in. The tradition of this budget coming in, in late January or early February is that the budget should come in and be passed before the end of the fiscal year on March 31. This debate that we are having today should have been held in January, February and March. The 28 vicious bills, destructive of British Columbia rights, should have been debated in January, February and March. They should have been out in the open.

This government says: "We have an open government." This is when the debate should have taken place. This is when the impact that's it is going to have on this province should have been revealed. Then we should have had the election on May 5, and we would have run that election debating the bills, the legislation and the budget. The people would have then voted and made their decision in the knowledge of what was going to be facing them. If that knowledge had been brought out prior to May 5, if we had lived within the traditions.... Mr. Speaker, I know that you, as one who has worked in his lifetime within the services, really believes there should be openness and traditions. If this government had received a mandate, then I would have said that they had a mandate. With the knowledge, the discussion and the debate of what we're doing now, they would have had a mandate they could have been proud of. But every one of them knows that if the truth had come out prior to the election they would have been wiped out.

MR. REID: We offered them leadership.

MR. MITCHELL: When you talk about leadership you talk about deception. The party that controls the government has deceived the people for 30 years by saying.... We can go back to hydro. We gave away our six-mill power that was developed in the Columbia River. "We're going to get $600 million. Oh, look at all the money we're going to have." It cost us $1.2 billion to produce it but we sold it for $600 million. We created five new aluminium plants in the States, and still they say that was leadership. The same leadership that was not given by this government in developing our resources and jobs in this province has been the cause of the problems we're facing right now.

When it was revealed that we were going to have user fees in health, the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) denied it. He told our member for New Westminster (Mr. Cocke) that he was a liar.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. MITCHELL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's an unruly group you have here.

I think it's important that we look at where we're at today. Where are we going to go? The money in circulation in this province — and I don't care if it's money from civil servants or money that is earned in the private sector....

MRS. JOHNSTON: They're all people.

MR. MITCHELL: As the first member for Surrey says, they're all people. When they spend that money it goes into the cash register of a small business. When he looks at those dollar bills — $2, $5, $10 or $20 bills — he really can't tell

[ Page 1035 ]

whether that was a dollar earned by a nurse who works in a general hospital, and she got that money via taxes, premiums or prepaid medicine, or whether it was by a nurse who came in from a private veterinary clinic where she got that dollar from a citizen who brought his dog in to get a rabies shot; that dollar looks the same. The important thing is that people are out there working, getting money, and that the community — society as a whole — is paying for everything that we receive.

As members in this House we have a responsibility which cannot be frittered away, as it is in this House at times, coming in here and debating.... We should have a debate that is constructive and positive, a debate that is going to eventually create the opportunity for every British Columbian to have a job. We shouldn't come in here with a great lot of glee and laughter that we're going to wipe out 10,000 jobs here and 10,000 jobs somewhere else. When we are fighting to preserve jobs and build new jobs and to build new industry, we get nothing but ridicule, When leading members of the community like Bishop Remi de Roo stand up and say that everyone has a right to a job, we have one of the senior members for length of service in this Social Credit government, the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot), standing up and saying: "Ah, he is a pinko." This is the approach that is wrong. I think it is important that we look.... Are we, as 57 members, going to debate the problems of British Columbia constructively? Are we going to debate the future of this province or are we going to, like certain members, get up and take a section out of some freely negotiated collective agreement and ridicule somebody because they have in that collective agreement such things as health benefits, sickness leave and maternity leave? Is this the constructive way that we are going to debate the problems of this province, or are we going to look at it in a real light? We are at a serious time in British Columbia. We must accept our responsibilities and the honour that we have of being elected, and it is not something to stay here and ridicule this section of the community or that section of the community.

Constructive debate and new ideas are progress, but ridicule and divisive attitudes are the voice of a bigot. I believe in full employment and I support Remi de Roo and the churches of this province, the working people, the trade unions, the small retired group who want a sense of security. They want a right to be able to live in peace. They don't want to have the fear that next week when the rentalsman is wiped out their rent is going to jump $100 because there is a shortage in low-cost housing. They don't want their standard of living tom down because of the lack of leadership, the lack of compassion that I feel this government is showing by the legislation they have brought in.

If this group had received a mandate, I would accept that mandate if this debate had been done in the fall or in the early spring. I remember back in the late forties I used to sit up in that House....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Your time is up, hon. member.

MR. MITCHELL: Maybe I won't live to see full employment, but I know it is going to come because people are going to be fighting for it forever.

MR. VEITCH: Mr. Speaker, this is my maiden speech in the House. I know the member from Esquimalt–Port Renfrew (Mr. Mitchell) knows how hard it is to be a maiden for the second time. It is pretty difficult.

I want to congratulate you, Mr. Speaker, and of course the elected speaker of the House. I want to congratulate all of the hon. members that have been elected to this assembly. I would like to congratulate the people who ran and were not elected. I have a lot of time for anyone no matter what political stripe, who stands up and lets their views be laid out in the open before the people during an election, to tell them what they stand for and then let the people make up their minds.

[4:30]

My thoughts revert back to the member from Coquitlam Moody (Mr. Rose), who said this is one of the strangest Houses he has ever seen. Sometimes I think I agree with him. The last time I made a speech in this House was in 1979, over on the other side. Sir, I am not lecturing the House. I am merely lecturing to the House — but I don't believe the debate has improved too much in that time. I believe it has become more harsh and more vitriolic. Sometimes, in my opinion, there is far more useless rhetoric than we have ever had before. For instance, the NDP have been constantly telling us in this House that the government went to the people without telling the full story and without the people of British Columbia knowing what they stood for. Nothing could be further from the truth. Anyone that wants to read my election material or anyone that wants to look over it could see exactly what I stand for and exactly that we stood for restraint and we are here today to bring restraint to British Columbia.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

Hon. members, governments are elected to govern; legislators are elected to be the lawmakers in a province. Laws are not made on the streets nor on the front lawn of the Legislature. They're made here in this Legislature.

I have sat here in this Legislature day after day and heard us called everything from "jackboots" to "fascists" to who knows what. I would never in my life call the people on the other side of this House "communists." They're not communists. Some of them are a little way-out socialists, but they're not communists. I don't think it serves this House or this country or this province to work in these extremes. I think it's completely and absolutely wrong, and it lets down the very people who elected you and brought you to this honourable chamber. Everyone in this House is an eminent and honourable member. I'll explain "eminent" to you. In my opinion, a person could be eminent without being competent. That's the difference. I've found that out here in the House from time to time.

In my mind, this place ought to be a forum for organized information. There never before was a time when out on the street the individual knew so much, just plain knew so much about what is going on. What we need to do, in my opinion, is to translate some of that information into understanding. That's what parliaments and legislatures are all about. That's why we elect commoners from among us, people no greater or smaller than ourselves, and send them to this House to represent our views. We don't ask them to check their brains at the door either. We don't ask them to always go back with a plebiscite to the people. We say: "This is what we elected you for; this is the type of program you had when you came in here, and we expect you to carry it out. If we don't like you, we'll throw you out at the next election." That's the way it is in a democracy.

[ Page 1036 ]

Unlike the NDP, I don't believe life is meant to be a bowl of cherries; that somehow or other you turn on a tap and let the money sift out of the public pocket, and it solves every whim, it helps everybody and provides employment from conception to resurrection. I don't believe that at all. I honestly believe that life sometimes is an endurance test for all people, no matter what level of life or type of employment that you're involved in. Someone was telling me the other day about the Great Barrier Reef, using it as an analogy. He said that on the inward side of the reef everything is calm. If you look around you'll see hermit crabs and some little fish, and if you happen to get out there and kick your feet, they'll slither out of the way, but they're never too ambitious. On the other side are the great whales and even some sharks, hon. members. Here is the activity, where the water is the roughest and things the toughest. I think that's where people are made or broken in society. For year after year in Canada, and indeed in North America, we have been heading steadily down a road which I sometimes think has no end — a road where we believe that every good and perfect thing comes from the state, from the benevolence of the public trough. I don't believe that at all.

To add to this organized thinking that I spoke of a while ago, I would like to read, if I could, from an ancient historian who lived some 200 years ago. He was a man of his times then, and I believe he is a man of our times today. His name was Dr. Alexander Tyler and he lived in 1775. One of his most famous writings was this: "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government; it can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury." Tyler said that from that moment on, the majority would always vote for the candidate promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy; and it's always followed by a dictatorship. Tyler continued:

"The average age of the world's greatest civilization has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, and from dependency back again to bondage."

I wonder how many times and how far down that road we've gone in this country, and indeed in this province. That's the reason for this budget: to arrest that slide, to arrest what Tyler spoke of over 200 years ago.

I'm sure at one time or another you've all heard of the term "drug dependency," and I'm sure, Mr. Speaker, that you're familiar with the fact that, for many of those who unfortunately become involved with drugs, renewal is a very difficult task indeed. I think if we want to understand the convulsions that our public life is going through at this point in time we've got to coin a new phrase and put those convulsions into modern-day perspective. The phrase that I think best sums it up is "tax dependency." We have a terrible case of tax dependency in this province, in North America and in the free world. Our society, bit by bit, year by year, has followed the path of least resistance, constantly looking for a quick fix of tax dollars from the public purse to cure every possible ache and pain in society, and in the process our society has developed a very bad case of tax dependency with symptoms very close to drug dependency. It's hard to withdraw from. The more we took the more we wanted, and the larger the dose we needed to make us happy. The more taxes, the more we needed to go back to the public trough, time after time, looking for that largess.

This analogy is illustrated by the strange philosophy in some of the process that we've seen during recent weeks. I call it enlightened self-interest in many cases. Many of those people believe that society owes them perpetual employment, no matter whether society can afford to keep them on the payroll or not. That's what's happening, and it's a sad case. It not only happened in governments throughout the world, but, to some degree, it's happened here in our own government, shamefully so, over the past years. One of the reasons I ran in the last election was that I believed the Premier and I believed what the government was saying when they said they were going to come in with restraint measures and arrest this problem. That's what we're debating here today.

Mr. Speaker, over the past eight years or so that we've been in government thousands and thousands of British Columbians have taken advantage of programs that we have brought through this Legislature. They have become so used to these programs and so tied to tax dependency that they have become completely and absolutely numb. They felt that there was no end to this pile of money and that this would go on and on, no matter who was providing the input from the other side of the funnel. It didn't seem to matter. We're dependent, and we're involved at this point in time in withdrawal. I know that if you tell some people in our society that government cannot afford these items, that we don't have the dollars available to us, you'd better step back very quickly and put on a pair of gloves, because you're in trouble. It would be like putting your hand into a cage of wolverines. They're still there, still looking for the tax dependency, and they're wanting more and more from the public trough. It's a difficult case of withdrawal.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

The irrationality and hysteria which underlies so much of the reaction to the restraint program by the press and various organized groups to the restraint program is frankly frightening. It's not frightening because they're standing out there in numbers, whatever they happen to be; but the concept is frightening to me. I wonder: how far down that road Tyler spoke of in 1775 have we gone, and can we really arrest it and come back? I think the answer is yes, if we have the will and the character, and I believe we have both in this assembly if we'll simply address the problems and get away from the rhetoric. I really believe that.

I'd like to acquaint this House, if it has not already been done, with some very shocking statistics from the provincial budget that was introduced recently. According to Statistics Canada there were 43,458 direct employees of the provincial government in British Columbia in 1982. That sounds like a lot of people, but that's not the surprise. The surprise is that those 43,458 people made up less than 15 percent of the total British Columbia public sector at that time. The province is accused of grabbing power and taking dictatorial action, but the critics lack that realistic perspective. For restraint to be effective in the public sector it has to go far beyond the confines of government ministries, because even when you put all of them together you're only talking about 15 percent

[ Page 1037 ]

of the public sector — of the totally direct tax-dependent employment sector in the province of British Columbia.

Comparisons are interesting. Direct and indirect employees of the federal government in British Columbia in 1982 amounted to a further 51,643 public employees; in fact, the statistic for direct employees of the federal government in British Columbia is within a couple of hundred of the figure for the provincial government employees themselves, The province has no jurisdiction, of course, over the federal scene, and I suppose some restraint has been brought about by their 6-and-5 program after they listened to the Premier last February. Until that time they did nothing, and it just kept on growing and growing.

Direct and indirect employees of municipalities accounted, in 1982, for another 29,725 employees — a smaller number, but even then over 68 percent of the number of direct provincial employees employed in British Columbia.

Another category to look at are the indirect provincial employees: employees of Crown corporations, boards, commissions and so on, excluding, for the moment, if we will, the fields of education and health. All of these various offshoots of government added another 23,521 employees — a group just over 54 percent of the size of the direct provincial government workers themselves. If this were a telethon. Mr. Speaker, we'd have a lot of people around to help us.

I left the real shockers for the end because they relate to a very important point that once again seems to get buried in the rhetoric we hear relative to cutbacks. In the field of health care there were 69,354 public sector employees in British Columbia in 1982. The comparable number in education — and I think this is low, because I don't think they take in all of the colleges and institutes and their offshoots — was 77,500 people. The total of just those two figures is 146,854 people. That's well over three times the size of what we usually call the public service in this province — or 337.92 percent, if anyone's keeping track.

[4:45]

What does all this mean to us? For one thing, 75 to 80 percent of the cost of providing health and education services to the public represents the cost of wages, salaries and various benefits for those employees in those sectors. Typically, teachers negotiated — before the restraint process came into being — in the range of about 18 percent, including their experience increments, and they received those increases at that time. Needless to say, our province's civil servants were not docked 18 percent of their pay in the same period, although something very similar to that did happen in Quebec, which is a socialist province, whether we want to believe it or not. At the same time, however, because of the reality of world markets, over which we have no control — to the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) — as many as 38 percent of the IWA forestry workers in this province received a 100 percent pay decrease at the same time the teachers were receiving 18 percent. But nobody can blame the teachers for receiving 18 percent, for trying to get a good settlement before the recession hit with full force. All that we in government are saying is this: there's a finite limit to what government can afford. We've reached that limit now, and I think we far exceeded it a long time ago.

If I had any complaints about this budget, it would be that we had not gone far enough, early enough. Government has no money of its own; there's no magic money tree. We simply go further and further down that road that Tyler spoke about in 1775. We're competing in a world economy with Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Singapore, West Germany — all either eminent or rising industrial powers in the world — at the same time as we still face the more traditional competition from the United States, some now from Great Britain and lots of it from Australia. This means that as a society we can't afford to rest on our laurels or, to use my analogy, to confuse tax injections with real wealth generated by new production. That's the only place we can get more money. The government can't get money of its own volition without going to the people, and if the people do not have money there's simply no place for it to come from. That's the simple truth.

The grand total of the public sector employees in British Columbia, excluding some of the few that we've talked about in post-secondary education and some of these offshoots that we've not been able to capture — joint boards and boards in some of these areas — in 1982 was 295,201: one out of every four British Columbians worked for the provincial government. And we wonder how we cannot keep so many on and how we cannot afford to pay them more, because 51 percent of the forest industry, who pay most of the wages and taxes into government, are not working and can't afford to keep sending money to government.

Many people, of course, have questioned the value of our job creation initiatives such as British Columbia Place, rapid transit and northeast coal, and have asked if we can afford to spend these dollars. I'm not so much of a laissez-faire capitalist that I would say there is not a place in government, because I believe there is a place in government for these types of things and to bring initiatives for these types of things onstream. I believe we did the right thing at the right time.

In the context of the world economy, we have to ask ourselves if we could afford to spend these dollars given the unemployment scene we have in British Columbia at this time. We look to northeast coal. Where would we be without the people we have working in northeast coal? Where would we be without that sort of economic activity in our province at this point in time?

One of the most important things I noticed about the last election. Mr. Speaker, was the number of young people who voted for the Social Credit Party. I was very surprised when I walked down the street and talked with people and pounded on doors. A number of young people came to our side and said: "I do not believe that I can be effectively represented by the New Democratic Party, because they are not the advocates of free enterprise in this province. I know governments have grown too big." I believe that maybe Mr. Tyler was wrong. I believe the youth of our province have seen the light and have come around to a place where a lot of us who are middle-aged and beyond — where the shadows are coming in from the east — have not quite seen that particular light. Maybe it takes the youth to lead us out of this dilemma, Mr. Speaker. Maybe they understand a heck of a lot of things.

But I believe they got the message, and I think they'll understand what our Finance minister said when he spoke of the need to earn prosperity. The only way we can ever have real prosperity in this province is to earn it. People have said that we've made mistakes. I've heard the opposition here say we've made mistake after mistake. They say we've made a lot of mistakes with this restraint, these bills and in this budget. Well, I accept those comments in this light, that we have never had so darned much government to restrain before. It's tremendous. How can you possibly go about it without making some mistakes? We've literally reached the point where

[ Page 1038 ]

unrestrained benevolence is threatening to permanently disable our long-term economic viability in this province, this country and this world. And if we don't do something about it, we'll be in bad shape again.

I believe our government has made one of the first — and in some ways feeble — courageous steps towards straightening out this problem of rescuing us from the abyss that is certainly ours if we do not do something about it.

We've been called Machiavellian and everything else. Just shortly before closing, I'd like to quote from Micio Machiavelli:

"One should bear in mind that there is nothing more difficult to execute nor more dubious of success, nor more dangerous to administer than to introduce a new system of things. For he who introduces it has all those who profit from the old system as his enemies, and he has only lukewarm allies in those who might profit from the new system."

That's one of the problems that we have. That's one of the problems that any democratic government faces. But that ought not to deter us from the fact that we were elected to government, we were elected on a mandate of restraint and restrain we must. We must fulfil that mandate, for to do other than that would be to go against those people in the various ridings who sent us here.

The NDP can stand up and expound their theories until whatever time they want. We've got lots of time in this House, Mr. Speaker. They can keep on saying it. But the fact is that they were not elected as government, and they were not elected on a program of restraint. This government has to follow through with restraint because that is the program that we were elected under. There is no other honest route for us to take, and honest we are. There's nothing else.

What we need in this country and in this province is less rhetoric about jackboots, fascists and communists and all these things that may be hidden under the right or the left side of the bed. I don't really care. What we need is a renewal of confidence. We need someone to push the positive button. We need people who will go out and sell British Columbia — yes, sell British Columbia, because we can have all of that coal up there in the north, we can have the oil in Alberta, and we can have all the gold. That's potentially valuable, Mr. Speaker, but it's worthless until someone takes it and sells it. Then it becomes valuable and then we employ people.

Governments, buyers, purchasers and those who invest all over the world will not invest in a government that shows no care for its financial restraint and no hold on the economy. They will simply not trust you. One of the reasons that I ran for government is that I'm not one of those guys who happens to think that society owes me a great deal. It doesn't owe me very much. I owe society a lot.

Interjection.

MR. VEITCH: You're right on, Mr. Member, and I'll tell you why. I've had the opportunity in this province and in this country to be involved in business, to attend university and to be elected twice to this chamber. I owe this province a lot; it doesn't owe me very much. I'll tell you that right now.

MR. REID: Hear, hear! That's Dream Whip.

MR. VEITCH: With friends like this, who needs enemies?

What I do owe is a legacy to those who follow after us. We've been entrusted with things, and the legacy is something we've been given which we must build upon and pass on to the generations that follow. If we fail to restrain ourselves now, I wonder how we'll be looked at by history.

We're not involved in a collective in this province; we're involved in a democracy. Democracy is carried out here in this Legislature. At some point in time things have to be debated and then voted upon. That's the way democracy is carried out. It's not carried out out there. If the people didn't like what we talked about to them during the election campaign, they would not have sent us here; they would have sent you here instead. If people don't like us next time around, they've got a choice. The choice is very clear in this province. It's probably designed the way the British parliamentary system was designed to work in the first place. There's a clear alternative: they can take those who are interested in private initiative or they can take those who are interested in state socialism. They'll have that opportunity somewhere down the road; I don't know when — '86 or '87; who knows when? I look forward to running for election to this Legislature at that point in time on the programs of this government and on the budget that this minister has brought forth. I support it 100 percent.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, this opportunity for me to speak in the twenty-second budget debate in which I've participated may indeed be my last, but I would hope that after all these years my words would be listened to with care by the government members, because today I've decided to help them by asking a number of important questions. For example, I want to ask the last member who spoke when he started reading Machiavelli. Was it before, during or after the election campaign? It's very important to know. If it was before, you were looking at how to fib; if it was during, you were practising fibs; if it was after, you're justifying the fibs. That's really where we are.

I was interested in listening to him quote Machiavelli; the most difficult thing to do is to introduce something new; people are going to react to it. I found that very interesting. They are introducing something new. I want to refer to those wonderful statistics that the member spoke of. He said that one in four were at the public payroll trough: people like the first member for Vancouver–Point Grey (Hon. Mr. McGeer), the university professor who is a laissez-faire capitalist if there ever was one, yet he's been at the public trough his whole life, according to your definition. What has he ever produced? What do university professors produce? They know how to wear ascots; they know how to switch political parties. But you're attacking the members of your own group.

But what is more insidious is the "one in four." This is the change that Machiavelli warned about, as you were telling this chamber. It's simply economics under Social Credit. One in four are working in the public sector. You're going to change that through this whole measure. Do you know what they're going to change it to? Instead of one in four working in the public sector they will now be on welfare or on unemployment insurance Who's going to pay that bill?

[5:00]

Did it every occur to that member that when people are working they have money in their pockets? They spend it in wise places and they spend it in foolish places. Among the more foolish places are certain hardware stores in the interior of British Columbia which must go unnamed. But if they are

[ Page 1039 ]

getting a salary and taking that money and buying refrigerators and stoves at that hardware store, that hardware store hires people, brings in more goods and sells them. Under your new economic order, your new Machiavellian approach, how are you going to sell fridges and stoves to people on welfare? Who is going to be working to pay for those goods and services?

It's all very simplistic, my dear friend, to go about laying off people from their jobs, but who's going to pay for the welfare and unemployment insurance? You tell us that you don't owe anything. I want to tell you, you're going to owe plenty, because it's going to cost a lot of money to continue having 30 percent of the age group between 18 and 25 unemployed and drawing welfare, never having the opportunity of working one day in their lives. Under this kind of thinking, Mr. Speaker, we're going to have a whole generation of young people who are underskilled and undereducated. In the formative years of their life, when good working habits should be created, the only experience they have is lining up to get a welfare cheque under Social Credit, because somehow they had bought restraint.

It's stupid to have 30 percent of the people between the ages of 18 and 25 working. If you want to have restraint, Mr. Speaker, why not have a little redistribution of income and allow people at 55 to retire early, let them enjoy life and put that money and those jobs into creating work for young people? Why should we be subsidizing people on welfare and unemployment insurance? That is dumbbell capitalism that only a dumbbell government that's reading Machiavelli from back to front would figure out. You opened one page and found a quote. We've got one-quarter of the working-age population in this province on welfare and unemployment insurance. Is that the success of laissez-faire capitalism? It's a nightmare of the welfare state caused by a capitalist system that simply does not have the social conscience to redistribute a little bit of income.

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

You stand up here and talk about restraint. What do they do for restraint, Mr. Speaker? I'll tell you what they do: they decide to take on the poor. They've got to be the front-line troops in this war. Can you imagine any war where the wounded are sent up to the front line? That's what this war is. They're sending up the wounded to the front line. Fifty bucks off a crippled person every month is going to show restraint; fifty bucks off a handicapped person is somehow winning the battle of restraint. We've had cabinet ministers spend $37.50 on a bottle of wine, Mr. Speaker; that's hardly restraint. They've spent taxpayers' money on meals all over this world. They don't show any restraint when it comes to their spending habits.

MR. REID: What about the Winnipeg excursion?

MR. BARRETT: Be quiet. Somebody from your constituency might hear you.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. members.

MR. BARRETT: Look at the expense accounts of these cabinet ministers — up 80 percent in the last three years. What about how they operate? The Premier went on a trip around the province and spent $150,000 on a railcar, to roll up the window every once in a while and wave at the peasants on the way by. They've just hired a firm for $48,000 to set up chairs at meetings. They spent $1.5 million for an advertising campaign to tell people how wonderful it was just prior to the election campaign, and they hired the weatherman. You know about the weatherman. Remember the big sign that was up in Kamloops: "Fred, stick to the weather, where you're only 90 percent wrong."

Mr. Speaker, I can see them moving now into their new advertising campaign. I can see the slogans: "Latremouille for Premier and Bennett for weatherman." I can see it coming. You tell the unemployed that they've got to sacrifice; you tell the handicapped....

Interjection.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, protect me, please, from the savage assaults of the intelligent witticisms from that member who on a hot day bats a 90 IQ, I'm sure. I want to deal with that hot minister. Take a look at his travel accounts. Mr. Speaker, tell us how they travel first-class as their offer for restraint. Tell us how they travel around this province. Watch the cabinet benches empty at five minutes after 6, and seven or eight of them traipse out there, get in a car and jump in their jet to go home. Shush — don't tell the peons what's going on, folks. They use the government aircraft like it was some kind of taxi, every night home. There they are: the member for Point Grey, the member for Richmond.... There they are on the government jet going home every night. It's a model of restraint: restrain themselves to spending a night on the job, fly home and get a hot meal. Fly home in a jet to save a hotel bill. It's incredible how frugal they are. They put every seat in the jet full every night; at least they don't leave it half-empty. That's productivity, Mr. Speaker. We wouldn't want the peasants out there to find out they're riding around in this jet, they're going home every night and eating lavish meals and buying high-class bottles of wine. If a handicapped person found that out, he'd give up his sacrifice.

MRS. JOHNSTON: Disabled.

MR. BARRETT: Disabled person, yes. Fifty bucks a month they're taking out of the pockets of the disabled.

MR. MOWAT: Who bought the airplane?

MR. BARRETT: The taxpayers bought the airplanes, Mr. Member. Our government bought the aircraft and installed the first air ambulance service for the people of this province. Now the aircraft are so busy ferrying around cabinet ministers that they spend more money hiring private aircraft to take people to the hospital. Government aircraft are too busy ferrying around cabinet ministers.

Now we have the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) with us. Everybody take a picture of the Minister of Health, who has deigned to be with us for a few minutes. At five after six, bang, he's in the car, and out to the jet to fly home.

AN HON. MEMBER: At least he lives in his riding. He's not a carpetbagger like you.

MR. BARRETT: Was it not he who used the government jet over 300 times last year just to travel home? That is restraint. Can't you see him up there at 3,000 feet, on his way

[ Page 1040 ]

home every night, looking out the window and saying, "I hope I don't see...."

Interjections.

MR. BARRETT: Appeals to mindlessness have never worked in this House, Mr. Speaker, but I appreciate the try.

Can you see the Minister of Health looking out the window of his jet on his flight home every night, seeing some poor little peon down there and thinking, "My, how I am sacrificing for that peasant, sitting here in this jet flying home every night." Can you just see them sitting around the cabinet table talking about spending a million bucks?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Why don't you say something constructive once in a while?

MR. BARRETT: Is it not true that they fly home every night in the jet? Am I wrong? Am I saying something that is incorrect? If I am wrong, then let not the television cameras stand out in the parking lot every night; let not the television cameras take pictures of cabinet ministers climbing over each other to get into that luxurious jet to fly home; let not the television cameras follow cabinet ministers getting out of the jet and driving on to the racetrack to bet on the horses. Most punters have to take the ferry over to bet on a horse, but not some of the cabinet ministers that we have. It is a wink and a nudge; we know about it, Mr. Speaker. Just get in a jet and go to the races once in a while.

AN HON. MEMBER: Order! Shame!

MR. BARRETT: Ssssh, don't say shame. They are entrepreneur capitalist businessmen; they know how to restrain themselves. They get a roundtrip ticket to come back on a jet too. It's economy that way. Every morning it picks them up, swoosh goes the jet, picks up a busload of cabinet ministers, swoosh, brings them over here. What is a few thousand bucks between friends? We have to come over here and talk about restraint, and as long as the peons don't come and fill the galleries, as long as the peons never understand, everything is going to be all right. Or pick up the phone and call around the world.

MR. MACDONALD: Golden commuters.

MR. BARRETT: Golden commuters; it's the golden fleece.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Who paid your way to Australia?

MR. BARRETT: I didn't mention Australia. Every once in a while, in a mindless interjection, we pick up a nugget. Who paid my way to Australia. Why is he interested in who paid for whose trip to Australia? Is that a question?

Nevertheless, in the midst of this restraint program we have these jets flying back and forth every night, full of cabinet ministers luxuriating in these wonderful jets, suffering on behalf of the people and reading Machiavelli. That is really something. The member comes in with a quote from Machiavelli, which is: "The most difficult thing, said the Prince, is to introduce changes in the state that are radical." And what changes are they introducing in the state? He laments the fact that one in four were in the public sector workforce, so the change is one in four out of the public sector workforce and on to welfare and unemployment. Who is going to pay the welfare bill? Who is going to pay the social havoc bills for the number of people you have driven on to social welfare and unemployment insurance in this province? Unemployment insurance has now become the second biggest employer in B.C. under Social Credit. Come to B.C. and be unemployed; that's the slogan.

Let's talk about their right-wing gurus and the people they believe in — those New York analysts. What did the New York analysts say when they dropped their credit rating? They said this right-wing free enterprise government has not diversified its economy and they would have to drop its credit rating. Was that in Machiavelli, Mr. Member? Why have they dropped your credit rating? Because in the eight years you have been in government you have not done a single thing to diversify the economy and build up the indigenous resources of this province.

You brag about northeast coal, about $450 million spent on a railroad spur line. The minister himself told this House that we have to sell 22 million tonnes of coal a year just to break even and pay the interest. They signed contracts for up to seven million tonnes. The Japanese now want to renegotiate the price, and he's bragging about that deal. I said before and I say again: the last time he went to Japan they put him in a steam bath and really skinned him, gave him a kimono, sent him home, and they got the best possible deal going. He's the most successful Japanese politician outside of Japan. He's the only guy in Canada who could run for mayor of Tokyo and be absolutely unopposed. He's the only guy who's ever put a coalsack on his head and called it a hachi-machi, dib-bansai and hara-kiri all at once.

[5:15]

But who suffers? Why, it is those millions, those peasants, those little people who are all clamouring for some of their taxpayers' money back. To hear them talk, you'd think that the taxpayers had a right to expect their money to be spent on them. How dare they? This government collects money for the government, not for the people. Who pays the money? Well, the people pay the money. Oh, Mr. Speaker, somehow after they collect the money they magically change it; it's not really the taxpayers' money, it's Social Credit's money. Somehow they created the wealth the government must spend every year. Whose money do you think you're spending? And if people aren't working, you can't collect the money you want to spend. What are you going to do about that? What are you going to tell all those unemployed people out there?

Let's deal specifically with some of the areas they talk about in this budget. These are businessmen. These are not airy-fairy socialists — oh, no, siree, Bob. These are hard-nosed, chartered-accountant businessmen who know where every penny is, where it's going, where it's been, how it got there, and even want to find out how some of it gets lost in the garbage. Yes, a brilliant, outstanding, thoughtful, logical, accounting government that's gone on a restraint program. So, Mr. Speaker, the humble opposition asks a simple question: oh, lords of the dollar, masters of the economy, tell us how much money you're going to save in your restraint program. These pencil sharpeners, these rubber-tip savers, these coupon clippers, these paperclip counters can't even tell us how much money they're going to save in their restraint program. "Oh," the minister says, "I've got a ballpark figure." They've caused all this havoc, all this damage,

[ Page 1041 ]

and they can't even tell us how much money they're going to save.

Interjection.

MR. BARRETT: I don't mind personal insults at all. Sometimes they don't even say that I'm as well-dressed as I am. But that's not the point. The point is they don't know what they're talking about. They can't even tell the taxpayers, whose money they're spending, how much money they are going to save.

Mr. Speaker, if you took $50 out of a disabled person's pocket, and you're telling that disabled person, "Please give up this $50 a month because it is going to make or break this government's survival," would you not say to him: "Your $50 and the others are going to total up to some money"? They can't even tell the disabled people how much money they're going to save.

They fired people, some of whom had worked 20 years in jobs such as the vehicle inspection branch, and they said: "We've got to sacrifice your body for restraint." They were just checking cars and doing a public duty of making sure the cars driving down the highways were safe.... Now it's not true, Mr. Member; I can see it lurking in your eyes that because there are 14 used-car dealers over there they didn't want too much inspection of vehicles. That's not true at all, and I want you to scrub that thought from your mind, Mr. Member. Thank you very much.

But why did they scrub the car-testing program that saves people's lives? Why did they fire people who had 20 years' working experience? They wanted to sell them on restraint. "You shouldn't be doing productive work; you should be on welfare so you can contribute to restraint." Of course, they can privatize it, and we all know what that means. People will have to take their cars to car dealers to have them inspected.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, no.

MR. BARRETT: Oh, yes, Mr. Member. I know that you're young, that you're still a political ingenue, but let me tell you: there is not an action without a reaction. Fourteen car dealers eliminate car inspection, force them all to go to the car dealers — $50 a pop for your car inspection — and what better group to go round kicking tires in this province at $50 a pop than a cabinet loaded with car dealers. I can see them going around the province now: "No, it's not going to be $50 to have your car inspected. Oh, no, it's $49.95 — but there's 7 percent tax if you have a meal while you're waiting for your car to get done, and that's going to cost you a little bit of money." A wink and a nudge: "We'll get it one way or the other." Machiavelli's The Prince was quoted. I believe that the government has bought the book by the dozen and handed it out to the dense-pack back there. I can see them burning the midnight candle trying to get into the cabinet, quoting Machiavelli. Can you imagine any other quote that would get them in that cabinet faster than being able to recite Machiavelli by heart? "Hose 'em now, do 'em good later, we'll get votes that way." Can't you see that, Mr. Speaker? It's a good thing that we all have this little humour in here. Don't tell the voters how it works. Put the blocks to them now, make them suffer, and then just a couple of months before the election give them a free car inspection at $29.95. What a deal!

There are even members in the press gallery who are jaded. Yes, there are some jaded members of the press gallery.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Name five.

MR. BARRETT: There goes a Liberal. He used to be a Liberal, remember?

MR. MACDONALD: A vanishing species.

MR. BARRETT: It's about as quick as when they walk across the floor and just change their coats like changing principles.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You forgot to tell them that we'll throw in a rubber duckie.

MR. BARRETT: I love those brilliant, intelligent witticisms from that member, Mr. Speaker.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: That's $29.95 and a rubber duckie.

MR. BARRETT: Those are the kind of interjections that make this whole place a joy to be in. It's that little wise repartee that makes light of this heavy debate in this overintelligent chamber where neanderthal economic ideas would cross a rabbi's eyes, but instead of that we have these wise, spontaneous cracks by the minister of small trade and small minds across the floor.

Let us take a look at the record of this government.

HON. MR. HEWITT: Why don't you look at the budget?

MR. BARRETT: Yes, we're looking at the budget. You can’t even tell us how much you're going to save in the restraint program. How much are you going to save in the restraint program? You tell us. You're the one who's worried more than anyone else, Mr. Member. You are the one guy I could sell hair balm to. You tell us what kind of a municipal balm you've got. How come his motion wasn't supported at Public Accounts?

MR. MACDONALD: I saw it on television. There was no support for it.

MR. BARRETT: There was no support for that minister.

I ask this question: will the Minister of Finance, in closing this debate, tell us how much money they're going to save in the restraint program?

AN HON. MEMBER: He's not in the House.

MR. BARRETT: Does anybody over there know how much money you're going to save? Is there anybody over there? The fact is this whole program has been created out of the results of polls. From the abstract of polls they have extrapolated ideas that they think are going to be popular. For instance, ask a question. Do you think there are too many civil servants? Automatic answer: yes. Do you think there's too much bureaucracy? Automatic answer: yes. Do you think government wastes too much through red tape? Automatic

[ Page 1042 ]

answer: yes. Do you think there's too much welfare? Automatic answer: yes. So they take these poll results and sit down around a lake up in the Okanagan and take them from the abstract into the reality and translate it into an attack upon people's services and jobs, and the destruction of the economy, and then they're surprised that they can't sell their program. Because once they move from the abstract to reality and damage people, threaten security, destabilize society.... They can't even justify the program here in the chamber; they have to announce that they're going to spend $1.5 million to go on television to explain to people why they're getting hosed.

MR. MACDONALD: And the budget goes up 12 percent. Is that restraint?

MR. BARRETT: You're asking logical, thoughtful questions. The budget goes up 12 percent. The history of this government in terms of budgets is very interesting.

MR. MACDONALD: At least the budget is cooked.

MR. BARRETT: It's a hot roast.

Since 1976, according to the government's own figures, they have had overruns in their budget of $1,353,202,650. Who's out of control? Who's running the shop? The debt Mr. Speaker, has gone up to well over $11 billion from $4 billion in the last seven years under this government. Who's responsible for that? We had $552 million in cash in special funds. It's all gone. My colleague the member for Nanaimo (Mr. Stupich) asked in question period today why the first-quarter report did not include the balance in those special funds. I could have saved my colleague the time. The reason the first quarter report didn't include the special funds is because they're all spent. They're gone, blown, dissipated, vanished. Who spent that cash? Where is the accountability?

What about legislative accountability? Here we have this budget and the government can't tell us how much it's going to save. They are completely out of control in terms of fiscal responsibility. For the first time in the history of this province, they actually went past the end of the fiscal year without producing a new budget, but they called an election. That's Machiavellian. They think it's a joke. They think all they have to do is go out and tell those handicapped people, tell the unemployed, tell the small businessman who's going broke that it's all for restraint. They haven't restrained themselves in anything. They can't give factual information on budgets in this House. They bring in a budget with figures that are already being readjusted, and it's only seven weeks. They can't share with this chamber what happened to the $553 million in special funds. It took us over a year to find out what happened to the $45 million they gave to the B.C. Rail in the dying hours of one fiscal year. We're going to have to pay an additional $180 million a year in interest alone on those Crown corporations for the increased debt of this government. You know what they've done, rather than ask questions about the Crown corporations? They're eliminating the Crown Corporations Committee.

MR. HANSON: No questions.

MR. BARRETT: No questions. No Crown Corporations Committee. No information. They don't know themselves what's going on, but on the basis of polls, they're willing to live or die.

Well, Mr. Speaker, look what's happening in their own constituency. This is not from shrill critics or socialists, but from brokers, investors, and those people who are idols to this group. Some of them have held brokers as life-long idols. One or two of the members over there have been latter-day converts to capitalism. There's nothing like a convert to take the new religion further than those born into it. Some people call it scabbing — not me, Mr. Speaker — but that's a different area.

I want to quote Mr. George A. Pedersson in the Western Commentary, who is a representative of Pemberton, Houston, Willoughby Ltd. Here are some quotations from this capitalist spokesperson's group:

"There are some problems with the implementation procedures" — that is, of the new restraint program — "and the period of adjustment could exact a greater toll on the B.C. economy than might normally be expected."

He's saying what some NDPers are saying.

"In a similar vein, the budget is having a strong negative effect on the labour relations climate. The province is being further polarized. This could be dangerous and destructive.

"By government estimates, taxes will rise by $173 million in the current fiscal year, $170 million attributed just to sales tax measures. The tobacco tax increases amount to another $18 million. These taxes amount to roughly 0.5 percent of personal disposable income. Consequently retail sales are likely to suffer. Most affected will be the large-ticket items."

If you can't sell those stoves and fridges, even hardware stores may be in tough times. But if you don't have to borrow money in the business you're in, you can weather it. The article goes on:

[5:30]

"While the real side of the economy the tax increases are likely to retard growth, they will also have an adverse impact. Inflation will be given a boost as the tax increases are heavily concentrated in items in the consumer price index.

"The act will be challenged in the courts...."

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

"The polarization of the industrial relations climate is a backward step, the severity of which will depend on the positions taken by labour and government. Closer to home the 170,000 provincial public sector employees can hardly feel confident about their jobs. Moreover the restraint of wages adjustments to minus 5 to plus 5 or minus throughout.... The higher unemployment and job insecurity coupled with no wage increase in the current year will reduce the economic recovery potential in the province."

The very programs that this government is initiating are helping to destroy any kind of recovery that we've had.

They ask: where will you get the money? That is a very good question. It is my guess that the total cost of the program that the government has brought in, in terms of its restraint — and this is my ballpark figure — is about $50 million. Out of a budget of over $8 billion, they're willing to sacrifice the social fabric of this province for the political game that

[ Page 1043 ]

they're playing, based on Machiavelli as quoted by that member, to save $50 million.

Where would we get the $50 million from, Mr. Speaker? We would copy the state of California or the policy of W.A.C. Bennett, who had a philosophical belief that those who were super-rich and became super-rich in this province paid a succession duty when they passed on. So we would give a $3 million exemption, and rather than take $50 a month from the handicapped people, we would go back to W.A.C. Bennett's program that produced an average of $40 million a year from very wealthy estates. If restraint is going to work, the rich should pay too. There is absolutely nothing in this budget that asks the rich to pay one penny. You're willing, you cheapos, to take 50 bucks a month out of the pocket of the handicapped while you fly over in planes, but you haven't put one penny onto the super-rich of this province, who are your biggest backers. If the state of California can ask those people to leave $20 million, $30 million and $40 million, if they can tax it in California, we can leave a $3 million exemption for widows and children who will never have to go on welfare or unemployment insurance, tax the rest of those estates, and collect $40 million that should be redistributed to the people of this province.

The largest estate we had when we were in government was $27 million. We taxed it and taxed it, and all we left for that widow and her family of five children after we finished taxing it — shed a tear, Mr. Speaker, for that widow and those five children — was $21 million. They had to get by on the $21 million. I think they're getting by; I haven't heard from them.

MR. LEA: It killed her husband's incentive.

MR. BARRETT: Yes, Mr. Member, it did kill her husband's incentive to work.

Is there anybody who believes that the super-rich should escape at a time of restraint? Is there anybody who says that we've got to sell the restraint program but not touch the superrich? Is there anybody who believes that this government means it when people have to sacrifice and the super-rich are being protected by them every single day?

The Minister of Human Resources (Hon. Mrs. McCarthy) talks about voluntary help to the handicapped, voluntary help to relocate people, the elimination of the child abuse program. Mr. Speaker, do you know how much it costs us to keep one person in jail every year? About $30,000. What is this government doing in terms of rehabilitation programs? It's spending $38 million to refurbish an oldjail out there, but cutting off probation programs. Is that smart? It's stupid! Any preventive work we can do with children or young offenders will save us money. They're building a luxury hotel for prisoners out there, but cutting off probation services. Does that make sense?

Well, my time has run out — in more ways than one. As I draw to my concluding remarks on this budget, let me say that we have had an honest comment from a government member about it when he quotes Machiavelli: "The hardest thing to introduce is change." So instead of introducing change, instead of introducing fairness, all they did was pull a switch: protect the rich, attack the poor, and put the wounded up on the front lines in the war on poverty.

Mr. Speaker, they're going to regret — all of us are going to regret — that this government embarked on this program. It has done nothing good for this province. We have hurt our elan. There is very little joy left in British Columbia. They have depressed hopes for the future in this province, and they have divided the communities between the haves and the have-nots. And all along they fly above it every night. British Columbia used to be a happy place. It has never been as unhappy a place, as a community, as it is today because of this government.

They have a mandate; but you never interpret a mandate as one to punish people. You never interpret a mandate as a licence to hurt. If you're going to cut, cut fairly, cut justly and cut the rich a bit too. But, no, they haven't done that. Protect the rich. hit the poor, create unemployment and hope for the best. It's not going to work, and as long as these members are here in this chamber there will be a voice for the poor, the handicapped and the unemployed.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Mr. Speaker, the member who just sat down stated, I believe correctly, that he'd been in the Legislature for 22 years. Well, I've only been here 17, but I've heard that same speech since the first day I arrived: how to redistribute the wealth. I remember when he had the opportunity to redistribute the wealth, and it's a good thing that in those days we had inspectors, because he went out and bought a great big truck. He got four of his cabinet ministers, and the tires weren't big enough to carry the money that he was going to distribute so he put big balloon tires on it and filled each one up with hot air. Then he got the Minister of Human Resources a great big shovel and he said: "Now, listen, I'm going to fill these tires up with hot air and we're going to distribute lots of hot air and you stand on the back and shovel out the money because we're in Lotusland. There's all kinds of it and we've got to redistribute it." Then he had his Minister of — that fellow they paid $60,000 to step down....

AN HON. MEMBER: Eighty thousand.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Eighty thousand dollars they paid him to step down. He got him to phone ahead, and he said: "Now, look, you run around the province and find a mining company here, a mining company there, and when my colleague the Minister of Human Resources gets all the money shovelled out the back end of this big truck with these big hot-air tires on it, then you tell us where to go and we'll come." And the driver, you see — the then Minister of Finance — would drive up to this mine, go in, they'd load up all the money out of the safe, and they'd go and redistribute it. All the time he's telling the great people of this province: "Oh, we're not going to kill the goose that laid the golden egg. No way. We're just going to pluck it until it quits laying."

So anyway, they had the Minister of Energy, the guy from Vancouver East, who should have worked for a movie theatre, because he created more ghost towns in this province than you can shake a stick at. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer should have hired him. They'd never have to put up any props. Just send him in and he'd create some.... "Go find some oil companies. I'll tell you, those guys are making too much money, and sales are too good to the United States. We'll run this little truck with these big balloon tires full of hot air, and we'll get another load." They went here and they went there and they went to every industry. Pretty soon they distributed so much wealth that there was nothing else to distribute. The hot air's all gone, the money is all distributed, and what does

[ Page 1044 ]

that guy do? He jumped out of the truck, let it go down the road, and let the member for Nanaimo (Mr. Stupich) try to rescue the ship. But there was no air in the tires, and the poor truck ran aground.

That is basically what we heard from the.... He says it's the last speech from the lame-duck Leader of the Opposition. But I've listened to that speech in the House....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I find that term offensive too, and I think the Chair has called that to the members' attention.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: What's that?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The term — the expression with reference to the other member.

MR. BARRETT: I don't mind, Mr. Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I do.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I'm sorry, Mr. Speaker. If the terminology "lame-duck leader" is not in the parliamentary book, I'll certainly withdraw it, but I understood that it was a perfectly legitimate term. It's like "used-car dealer" or "hardware dealer" or anything that he wants to call us guys, but don't call him a social worker. Don't call him a "lameduck leader" because it's anti-parliamentary.

I have a lot to say here, because I want to get into it, but I want to remark on a couple more statements that the goodbye leader of the socialists laid before the House. He said people will buy if they have money. So we just keep on taxing the producers....

MR. BARRETT: Just put them on welfare.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You don't seem to understand, my friend, that this government is interested in producing money and taxes so that we can have, and do have and will have, the best social services of any province in Canada. Make no mistake about it.

You talk about us being against the poor, when the budgets for Human Resources, Health, Education.... The Attorney-General's department is up 10 percent this year. The Ministry of Human Resources is up almost 23 percent. How dare you stand in this Legislature and say we're against the poor people? I'll tell you, it's the taxpayers and the producers in this province who pay those taxes and look after those who can't look after themselves.

Over the years this government brought in policies that would produce wealth and started projects that would produce employment. During the recession, had it not been for our number one industry, the lumber industry certainly would have fared better than any other jurisdiction in North America.

We on this side of the House are interested in creating wealth so that those more needy will indeed have the benefits of a growing economy. That is why today we have and are able to maintain the best social services of any jurisdiction in Canada.

[5:45]

You know, every time the Leader of the Opposition stands in the Legislature and talks about employment I have to remember about two years after I had this portfolio when the Leader of the Opposition stood on the floor of this Legislature and chastised me because I had authorized some 23 foreign investments in this province. He said: "We don't want foreign investment. We don't want money coming into this province. We don't want the resultant jobs." Basically that's what he said. Well, we haven't heard him talk in the last two or three years about foreign investment. Go back in Hansard; it's all there. He chastised this little minister for inviting foreign investment into this province.

MS. SANFORD: B.C.'s not for sale, says your Premier.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Well, if the lady over there had her way the state would own everything in the province, including all the land, because she doesn't even believe in the private ownership of land and has stated so on many occasions. We believe in freedom in this province. We believe in the freedom to create, the freedom to make money, the freedom to pay taxes and the freedom to go broke.

I don't want to spend too much time on this, but I do want to tell the House that last Sunday I had the opportunity to be at a historic event in this province when the Table Tunnel on the Anzac line holed through. I would say again in this Legislature, for the record, as I said Sunday afternoon, that that was a tribute to the labourers, to the management, to the engineers, to every person who played a part in that historic event.

I am going to talk in just a few moments about the international marketplace, and I want to relate a remark to that now. The eyes of the world have been watching this northeast coal project. Financiers around the world who have looked at that project have told me that they have never seen a project so well coordinated, so well executed and so well brought under construction. That really tells the world that right here in little British Columbia and in western Canada indeed we have the expertise, the workforce and the determination to do things when other jurisdictions are falling by the wayside.

That is a good way for us to sell British Columbia for people to come in and invest, and it is also a credit to our engineering services, of which we export a lot. We call them invisible exports; British Columbia does indeed export a lot of invisible expertise. One of our firms, as you know, builds ports around the world. We have expertise....

Interjection.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: There is that little member from Victoria who never worked a day in his life who doesn't understand the international marketplace but gets a lot of information from reading socialist books and then stands up in this Legislature and tries to espouse the theory. Anyway, it was certainly a great credit to the management and the engineering staff of the British Columbia Railway. I know when we started that project there were a lot of people, including the opposition, who said: "The costs will double, or triple, or quadruple; you'll never finish it on time." We did finish it on time and we're within budget.

Today, on that project — on the various aspects of northeast coal, including Ridley Terminals, CN Rail upgrading, B.C. Rail upgrading, Transportation and Highways, construction of the town of Tumbler Ridge, construction of the Bullmoose and Quintette mines — there are 4,938 people directly employed. Depending on what area of economics you come from, you could use a multiplier of three or four. If

[ Page 1045 ]

we use four, it means that today there are approximately 20,000 people employed in this province, who would otherwise be unemployed, as a direct result of the northeast coal development project.

Interjection.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: No, it's not coal-dust; it's factual.

Interjection.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, it does hold up.

MR. LEA: It only holds up in a closed economy.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Well, there's the expert from Prince Rupert.

You know, when we were putting the project together and I want to advise the House of this — we had a specific arm of our development office in Vancouver look after personnel, because we were concerned that we would not be able to hire the specific people we needed. And the economist told me: "You really won't create anything, because those people would be gainfully employed and a lot of them will have to come into the province anyway." Such was not the case. The people who are working today on this project would not be employed had it not been for the project.

MR. LEA: Non-union from Alberta.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Oh, from Alberta! I won't even respond to that statement. Certainly there are some heavy construction people who travel across Canada, and they're a mobile workforce.

MR. LEA: Do they move around?

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Yes, they move around.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, I want to say that I support this budget because it is a budget designed for the long-term recovery of the economy of this province. It's a budget that will bring people back to basics; a budget that will teach people that the world really doesn't owe them a living; a budget that will restore confidence to the international marketplace.

Mr. Speaker, before I get into my deliberations and discussions on the international marketplace and trade — which is the basis for our well-being and our economy, and provides services to those who need them — I think I will adjourn this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Nielsen moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:53 p.m.

Appendix

WRITTEN ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS

51 Mr. Reynolds asked the Hon. the Minister of Agriculture and Food the following questions:

1. On July 27, did any members of the Public Service in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food leave their positions to attend a rally at the Parliament Buildings, and if so, how many?

2. In reference to No. 1, how many of these public servants will be paid for: (a) the whole day and (b) for part of the day?

3. Will any money be saved by Government as a result of No. 2, and if so, how much?

The Hon. H. W. Schroeder replied as follows:

"1. 34.

"2. (a) Nil and (b) 34.

"3. $672.56."

69 Mr. Reynolds asked the Hon. the Minister of Agriculture and Food the following questions:

1. On August 10, did any members of the Public Service in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food leave their positions to attend a rally at Empire Stadium, and if so, how many?

[ Page 1046 ]

2. In reference to No. 1, how many of these public servants will be paid for: (a) the whole day and (b) for part of the day?

3. Will any money be saved by Government as a result of No. 2, and if so, how much?

The Hon. H. W. Schroeder replied as follows:

"1. 66.

"2. (a) Nil and (b) 66.

"3. $5,502.62."