[ Page 6017 ]

CONTENTS

Oral Questions

Northeast coal. Mr. Williams –– 6017

Mr. Lea

Mr. Stupich

Manning Park sale. Mr. Mitchell –– 6018

Bank of B.C. loan policy. Mr. Macdonald –– 6018

British Columbia Transit Amendment Act, 1985 (Bill 17). Second reading

Mr. Cocke –– 6019

Hon. Mr. Gardom –– 6020

Committee of Supply: Ministry of Environment estimates. (Hon. Mr. Pelton)
On vote 26: minister's office –– 6020

Hon. Mr. Pelton

Mrs. Wallace

Mr. Kempf

Mr. Lea

Mr. Davis

Mr. Rose

Mr. Lockstead

Mr. Cocke

Mr. Mitchell

THURSDAY, MAY 9, 1985

The House met at 2:06 p.m.

MR. HOWARD: I'd like the House to join me in welcoming to the precincts Mr. Tom Niemann and Mr. Rob Kyle, representing the public affairs committee of the Association of B.C. Professional Foresters; Prof. Reed of the faculty of forestry of the University of British Columbia; and Mr. Gerry Burch, vice-president of timberlands and forestry for B.C. Forest Products Ltd. They appeared at a hearing this morning with the resources committee of the New Democratic Party to talk about forestry and silviculture. I'd like the House to join me in welcoming them.

I would also draw to the attention of hon. members that on their desks they will find a notation that says: "Please plant this seedling to demonstrate your commitment to future generations." The original hope was that there would be a seedling on each member's desk, but the size of the seedling didn't permit that to be acceptable to Your Honour. So the seedlings, courtesy of the New Democratic Party, were delivered to hon. members' offices. Here is one to display to you what it looks like. Please, to demonstrate your commitment to future generations, go out and plant this where it'll do some good.

MR. REID: We thank the NDP for their commitment to the future growth of the province.

I stand to ask the House to give special welcome to some very special friends of mine that are in the House today. They are formerly from Surrey, but they've taken up residence in Victoria: Mr. Carey Gray and his wife.

HON. MR. SCHROEDER: Mr. Speaker, from Chilliwack and Mount Cheam Christian School are some junior secondary students who are here with their teacher, Mr. Adrian Stoutjesdyk, and I would like you to make them welcome.

Oral Questions

NORTHEAST COAL

MR. WILLIAMS: I have a question to the Premier with respect to northeast coal and the Quintette mine at Tumbler Ridge. Financial journals have indicated that the cost of having the hole in the wrong place and relocating the mine will be $300 million; the Minister of International Trade and Investment (Hon. Mr. Phillips) indicates that he believes the number is more like $100 million to relocate the hole. Can the Premier give us the definitive answer on the cost of relocating the hole?

HON. MR. BENNETT: No, Mr. Speaker. It's not a question for the government to locate new mining sites. That's a private sector matter for the consortium and company that is conducting mining operations in that area.

MR. WILLIAMS: In view of the province itself investing $700 million in infrastructure and other things for the project, is this not a direct concern of the government?

HON. MR. BENNETT: The government is collecting all of the costs in freight and taxes, and is confident that this company — that project — will continue to be a mining operation and therefore doesn't jeopardize the infrastructure that is there. The trains will keep running, the ports will still load coal and the community will grow and flourish. The mining company has a problem of geology and they can solve it. That's why I've mentioned before in this Legislature that it's a good place for the private sector to take the risk. Thank goodness it wasn't the government practising socialism, putting in mines and forest companies. They take the risk, they solve their problems, but right now I'm assured that all the extra taxes and surcharges are being paid, and are up to date.

MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, the former senior provincial geologist for British Columbia warned early, before all these funds were expended, that the hole was going to be in the wrong place. He says, however, that he had no clout. Can the Premier advise us what kind of planning process was involved in this $3 billion project which would allow the government to ignore their chief geologist?

HON. MR. BENNETT: First of all, Mr. Speaker, the government doesn't make the final mine site and mining operation decision. That's a decision made by the mining companies under the rules and regulations under which they're allowed to conduct mining operations, based on advice from many geologists, many technical experts. What you have is a consortium of companies that are involved in international mining, and international financiers who also had to be satisfied. Obviously, when the Quintette company came to its conclusions on its mining program, it was with concurrence and under all the advice that they received. As I say, that decision is theirs, as long as they meet all the criteria of the provincial rules and regulations and the steps they go through under which mining is allowed.

It's easy for people to look with hindsight when a project has problems. I'm confident they'll resolve it. I'm confident that the mining operations will continue. I'm confident that over time additional coal deposits that are there in the northeast will come into production. They'll provide jobs for people. They'll provide jobs on the railway. They'll provide jobs for the hydro and in the port, they'll provide income, needed foreign earnings into our country, and I have every confidence they can be resolved. The problems of the company may have some risk and additional financial problems for their equity shareholders, but the government in its infrastructure is not at risk. We're continuing to be paid all of the charges and all of the surcharges that were levied on that project.

MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, this is a $3 billion project. How could we have a process of approval on the biggest undertaking in the history of British Columbia and ignore the critical factor of our own chief geologist? Has this incredible billion-dollar blunder been corrected? Are geologists now part of the project approval process, unlike in the past?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Again, so many were involved in the planning, and the private sector in mining was dealing with matters of geology and test holes and drilling and technical advice. I just say that they have a problem of geology. There are two mines operating in that area. There's no problem with the Bullmoose mine. There's a problem at the pit, and the opportunity to move to the third stage — which wasn't coming on until 1990 — presents itself as a way of

[ Page 6018 ]

meeting contractual tonnage. That means the company will have to raise additional cash or find ways internally or with their financiers to finance it.

MR. WILLIAMS: The question was: after learning this, has the government changed its method of dealing with questions like that? Mr. Matheson, another government geologist, said: "We were not part of the government's project approval process." Has the government's project approval process changed?

[2:15]

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, because the project coordination was in the hands of the Ministry of Industry and Small Business Development, I'll take that question as notice, to find additional ways in which they evaluate and coordinate projects. It's a legitimate question to ask; therefore I will undertake either to have the minister bring back the answer or to bring it back myself.

MR. LEA: To the Premier, as a supplementary. It's my understanding that principals from Quintette were in Victoria last week meeting with government to discuss some of the problems they're having with their present operation. As I understand it, they have two choices: they can either work in the same pit, by going underground, or move their pit to another location. In either case there are great additional costs to the project. My understanding is that when they came to Victoria, they came down to ask the government to help them resolve this problem in some way. Could the Premier indicate to the House what sort of help they asked for?

HON. MR. BENNETT: No, Mr. Speaker. I did not meet with Quintette officials last week.

MR. LEA: Did anyone else in the Premier's government that he is aware of meet with them last week?

HON. MR. BENNETT: It is highly likely that they are probably going to be conducting a lot of meetings and talking about how to resolve a problem that's important to the province. If you're asking whether there is a proposal before government that is asking for anything beyond the normal government services, there is no proposal; I would see it if it went to committee or to cabinet. The answer is: no such proposal has ever come before either the cabinet committee or the cabinet.

MR. LEA: One final supplementary. If Quintette were to ask the government to back them on a loan — in other words, a co-signing of a loan, guaranteeing of a loan, government backing on a loan — has the government considered whether that would be one of the options that they would approve?

MR. SPEAKER: It's a supposition question, hon. member.

MR. LEA: If the government had considered it, that would be one of the options that they would consider.

HON. MR. BENNETT: If you're saying "had considered," your question is in order. If you say "would consider, " your question is out of order. If you said "had considered," the answer is no.

MR. STUPICH: The Premier tells us that he has been reassured that the government is collecting the various royalties and taxes from the companies involved. I've had a question on the order paper about that for two weeks. I wonder how recently the Premier has been reassured that the Crown is collecting everything due the Crown.

HON. MR. BENNETT: I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll make an inquiry this afternoon, and report to you the exact date and time I get the answer. But then, again, I hope you wouldn't want daily reports.

MANNING PARK SALE

MR. MITCHELL: A question to the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing. On Thursday, May 2, the minister stated that he was unable to recall the details of a contract whereby assets of Manning Park, which had cost the government $20 million, had been sold for $500,000 –– I ask the minister again: has the $500,000 contract price been paid to the government as of this date?

HON. MR. BRUMMET: I expect I'll have that answer for the member fairly soon.

BANK OF B.C. LOAN POLICY

MR. MACDONALD: I've got a question for the Premier of British Columbia about the Bank of British Columbia — which was begotten of your father and is a major institution. I ask the Premier whether he was consulted or informed — either one of them — about the appointment of Edgar Kaiser as the chairman prior to that appointment.

HON. MR. BENNETT: No, I was not consulted as to having a veto or my opinion making any difference as to who is chosen president of the Bank of British Columbia, which is a private sector bank and not a public institution. That just happens to be the way it is. I became aware of the appointment of Mr. Kaiser as the president, and have been aware of it.... He's very much in the news with the activities he appears to be undertaking on behalf of the bank.

MR. MACDONALD: Mr. Speaker, I take it that the Premier was informed prior to the.... I may be wrong, but I took that from your answer.

In view of the fact that Mr. Kaiser says this bank is to assist in the recovery of businesses in western Canada, is the government making any representations to the bank now that, having raised close to $150 million at $6 a share through public and private placements from the residents of this province, it is advancing a line of credit — which was to be $100 million; it has been cut back to $70 million — to a syndicate of pirates and parasites, headed by T. Boone Pickens, to take over Union Oil Co. of California. Has the government no interest in that, that our savings are going to be used to support greenmailers or takeover artists or both?

HON. MR. BENNETT: Does the member have savings in the bank? Oh, you don't have savings in the bank.

Mr. Speaker, while we're government the government of British Columbia is never going to start interfering and telling banks in the private sector how to operate. They operate

[ Page 6019 ]

under the federal Bank Act. They operate under the rules and regulations. In the case of....

Interjection.

HON. MR. BENNETT: We've heard your story on banks.

Most of the leading banks have international operations in which they operate both within the country and out, for the benefit of their shareholders and for financial strength. I'm not going to start commenting on the activities of every bank, nor would I use this chamber as a means of slandering people by calling them names. I may not approve of transactions taken in the private sector, but I'm not going to come into this House and use this forum and its immunity to make personal references or supply adjectives to people involved in transactions by those sorts of terms. I don't think that's the forum. I think the forum here in question period is for government business. But if the government is running so well that you have no questions about ours, I'm quite prepared to listen to your questions dealing with the private sector, which we've been dealing with.

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. GARDOM: Might I have leave to make an introduction, Mr. Speaker?

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Visiting us today from our great neighbouring province of Alberta is Mrs. Margaret Ranson Leland, a member of the Alberta government's cabinet secretariat. Welcome to Victoria and to B.C.

I call adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 17,

BRITISH COLUMBIA TRANSIT
AMENDMENT ACT, 1985

(continued)

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, we would be very interested in some answers on this entire borrowing bill that we're discussing at the present time. I note that the minister responsible for the bill isn't even here to close debate on second reading.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where is he?

MR. COCKE: Who knows where he is? He's probably flying off to Tokyo to borrow some more money. But whatever he's doing, he's not here to answer the questions that we're asking in second reading about this bill.

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

He's asking us, as legislators in this House, to provide him with a borrowing power of an additional $600 million for ALRT in the city of Vancouver. I just think that we're frustrated over this whole question. We're told on one hand that it's not going to require the additional $600 million, from the highly erudite member from North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis), that engineer of great renown, who wrecked the fisheries in this province as one of his last acts for the federal government, and he says that by 1990 we're going to be laughing, we're going to have a free ride on the ALRT. Those were his words, my colleague: "By the 1990s we're going to be laughing." We're not laughing right now.

This is a billion and a half of borrowing that deserves at least ministerial attention to the fact that we require some answers. I assume, unless a number of my colleagues are going to go on with this debate, that we're going to have to wait for those answers and, as we usually do, Mr. Speaker, we'll get the kind of answers that are vague. We'll go back to our constituency and we'll say to our constituents: "Well, they asked us to give them borrowing power, but we can't quite tell you what it's all about." All they know is that they got us into a very, very expensive, narrow transit proposition that so far will only serve a narrow band of people from New Westminster to Vancouver city –– I see very little park-and-ride anywhere adjacent to that light rapid transit, very little of it indeed. As a matter of fact, the real estate around it is selling like hotcakes to the extent that it's so highly valued that you can't make parking lots out of it. Mr. Speaker, I would agree that now that we're into it to this extent, it should be extended to Surrey and to Coquitlam. Hopefully when it is, there is going to be some park-and-ride there.

But we would just love to have some answers. Now I recognize that the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis) doesn't have those answers. His colleagues come to him and ask for money out of the treasury, and they have difficulty getting it. But when they come to him and ask him to provide a borrowing bill, then they get it. We've been watching the borrowing bills for B.C. Hydro go through this House over the years. I can remember that those borrowing bills were always opposed by that good-looking member from Point Grey, the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom).

MRS. DAILLY: Where is he?

MR. COCKE: Where is he now? He's borrowing us right into the ground, Mr. Speaker.

We have per capita debt in this province, if you include the debt of Crown corporations, that makes the Liberal federal government which sunk us into deficit after deficit look good. So, Mr. Speaker, we would love some answers. We would just like to know what this extravagant government is going to do with another $600 million of borrowing.

We also would like to know who's going to pay for it. We heard the member for North Vancouver– Seymour (Mr. Davis) this morning — the poor guy who didn't qualify for parliamentary secretary — say: "Well, it's not going to cost any more than $800 million to bring it to where it is now. And you've got $900 million of borrowing at the present time. So what's this all about? Some answers, Mr. Speaker, is all we would like to hear.

This extravagant.... They shovel money away from their cabinet room like it was going out of style. We would like some answers.

Interjection.

MR. COCKE: The Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs says he's going to give us some answers. Be specific.

Interjection.

[ Page 6020 ]

MR. COCKE: I'm just waiting for your estimates. I've got a couple of examples for you that you should just hide your head in shame about.

Mr. Speaker, can we have a few answers to this very, very frustrating problem that we face? We want to know why this government is asking us for another $600 million.

Interjections.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I would get finished with this speech if the member for Boundary-Similkameen, the Minister of Interwhatever — no; Consumer and Corporate Affairs — would either take his place in the debate or just keep shush until such time as I'm finished.

[2:30]

AN HON. MEMBER: Is that a commitment or…?

MR. COCKE: That's a commitment.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please, would all members direct their comments through the Chair.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, I'm surprised that the government would reintroduce the bill this afternoon when the minister carrying it isn't even here to answer our questions.

When he opened debate on this bill, he didn't specify where the money was going. It's irresponsible for us to let this bill go without hearing at least that. So, Mr. Speaker, we're going to be sitting here with interest to find out who's going to tell us what's happening.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs to close debate.

HON. MR. GARDOM: A great deal of interesting things are happening, Mr. Member. I do know that you will require the fullest of details, which you shall receive from my colleague the hon. Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Curtis) when he returns to the assembly. That being the case, I now move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

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

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT

On vote 26: minister's office, $169,073.

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

HON. MR. PELTON: Hon. members, it gives me a great deal of pleasure this afternoon to be introducing the estimates of the Ministry of Environment. I would like to preface my remarks by expressing my appreciation to my predecessor, who, during the past two years, has done a most commendable job in this portfolio.

When I assumed the office just two months ago, I was fully aware of the great responsibility that goes with that particular portfolio, and I know that each of you shares my concern for the wise management of the wealth of resources which are the mainstay of this very unique and beautiful province. In today's world, environmental matters have the deep interest of all British Columbians, and managing them is a very complex and demanding task. The greatest challenge will be to balance the preservation and conservation issues with the economic development programs in such a fashion as to ensure the best quality of life for all of our citizens.

All of us here in this House share a common interest, not only in the enhancement of our vast natural resources but in making this province the most productive and economically viable province in Canada. I'm convinced that by working together we can accomplish that goal. Certainly this will be my main objective as the minister responsible for the direction of this province's environmental policy. Our mandate deals not only with preserving a quality environment for plants and animals, but includes the preservation of these resources for people — today's citizens and those future generations that will take our place. It is my intention to maintain the high standards established by my predecessors and to encourage new initiatives in those areas where improvements have been identified as needed.

During the past few weeks I have personally visited many of the 700-plus employees who work in the ministry in the Victoria area. From having met these people, I can assure you that our environmental standards are in excellent hands. The staff are professional, dedicated and efficient, and the people of British Columbia are indeed well served by ministry staff. It is my intention to visit other areas of the province as well, and I am sure that I will find our regional staff equally committed to preserving a quality environment.

As this House knows, environmental management involves a large number of activities, many of which are interrelated. The ministry acts in concert with other provincial and federal government agencies in carrying out many of its tasks. Our management strategies of the future will reflect the growing dependence of one resource upon the other, and our decisions will image the government's intentions to protect this inheritance of a rich and diverse natural environment in order that it may be passed on to future generations of British Columbians.

However, environmental management must also be accommodating. Shorter-term decisions will have to be made from time to time for the advantage of specific economic or social policies, but the philosophy of the ministry is that longer-term goals must guide our decision-making process. Our activities are regularly evaluated. They will always be subject to some change over time. However, our goals will be selected on the basis of their environmental, economic and social impact, and on the issues that have a high degree of public concern. The public is becoming more knowledgeable about environmental issues and expects an increasing input to ministry policies and decisions. I am pleased to report to this House today that my ministry's estimates include a number of initiatives that will reflect maintained or improved environmental quality. These programs will have a spinoff effect on our valuable tourist industry by maintaining or enhancing our air and water quality.

Diking construction programs will provide job opportunities by improving our ability to reduce the impact of environmental emergencies.

Mr. Chairman, as you will recall, the province recently entered into a formal fisheries agreement with the federal government. This first-ever general agreement will facilitate better-integrated resource management of this very valuable

[ Page 6021 ]

resource. The agreement will ensure that programs achieve maximum public benefits and avoid duplication of effort.

I would like to say a few words about provincial fisheries. It is expected that this year British Columbia's fisheries resource will have a value in excess of $1 billion. Our freshwater fishery alone will host over 425,000 anglers. Many will be tourists visiting the province because of the many recreational opportunities. I am pleased to report to this assembly that these estimates include additional funds to increase fish production in fish hatcheries beyond current levels.

As I have already indicated, I will continue to actively cooperate with the federal government to maintain the salmonid enhancement program to rehabilitate the salmon and sea-running trout of British Columbia.

Mariculture in British Columbia is in a formative stage, even though the industry has been in existence since the 1920s. New technology and product demand indicate substantial growth is possible over the next few years. We will take full advantage of the current interest in commercial fish farming. We will assess our ability to accommodate an environmentally safe industry that will provide many additional job opportunities. This will call for a combined effort by several ministries. Agriculture and Food will take the lead role in making available to the mariculture industry the assistance programs and marketing advice it now provides to the agriculture industry; Industry and Small Business Development will provide a range of programs for small business; and the Environment ministry will offer technical expertise through its fishery program and its joint programs with the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

During my visit to the ministry's water management department I was impressed with the array of programs this government supports to ensure quality water to the many users of this very abundant resource. From the allocation of water for hydro development to maintaining water supplies for the small farmer, from conserving water supplies in water short areas to protecting communities from the ravages of floods, these programs are fundamental to the social and economic well-being of the province.

I am pleased to report that in addition to maintaining our water management program, these estimates include an additional $4 million that will provide employment opportunities in meeting diking needs in many areas of the province.

In collaboration with the federal government, the ministry will continue to establish a network of surface water quality trend-monitoring stations throughout the province. This will ensure the early detection of any significant trends in water quality in order to prevent detrimental changes.

The wildlife program this year will again receive the support of this government. The ministry will continue to assess and exercise, as required, controls over land use and vegetation change in order to protect wildlife habitat. This province contains the greatest diversity of wildlife species in the western countries, and the protection and management of wildlife will remain a high priority.

I would now like to take a moment to address the reorganization of the conservation officers' service. In order to place greater emphasis on field operations rather than office administration, the ministry has concentrated officers in multi-manned offices. This has created major physical moves away from single-office areas. Communities have severely criticized this initiative and have expressed disappointment at the loss of their conservation officers. However, records to date indicate that there has been a 65 percent increase in the number of sportsmen checked. Further, I am pleased to note that the compliance rate for hunters was 82 percent and for fishermen 94 percent. We are actively reviewing our new conservation officer procedures, and welcome new initiatives from the public to assist us in controlling wildlife violations,

[2:45]

Now I would like to touch just very briefly on the habitat conservation fund. Since 1981, when the fund was started, more than $3.8 million has been spent to finance various habitat enhancement projects in all regions of our province. This year a further budget of $1.8 million is to be spent on approximately 80 projects. As you may know, this fund is financed by the fishermen and hunters of this province, who have gladly contributed an extra $3, a surcharge, to their licences to support the purposes of the fund. Revenue from these surcharges in 1984-85 was about $1.4 million.

The air quality in our province is generally very good. Recently we have found slight increases in air pollution in the lower mainland and southern sections of Vancouver Island. The ministry staff have identified automobile exhaust as a major contributor to air pollution in heavily populated areas. The ministry has taken a leadership role in identifying solutions available which will address this air pollution problem. Federal pollution regulations on automobile exhaust emission will help greatly in reducing this problem.

Any discussion of the environment would be incomplete without mention of the control and management of pollutants and wastes both under controlled situations by permit and regulation and during emergencies. Several programs have been undertaken to reduce the potential for environmental emergencies under the Waste Management Act. The ministry has commenced a program requiring spill prevention improvements and spill contingency planning from industrial operations. The ministry maintains a 24-hour spill-reporting system and is coordinating response planning between the various levels of government — municipal, provincial and federal.

Our provincial emergency teams performed in an exemplary manner in solving the disaster problems of the people in the Pemberton area during the last major flood. I would like to emphasize that the mandate of my ministry allows only for assistance in the form of emergency accommodation and reimbursement for those items essential to relieve hardship. When hazardous waste emergencies occur, we have the power to act under the Environment Management Act. Our staff are trained to respond promptly and effectively.

We, as well as other jurisdictions across the continent, are wrestling with the problem of the disposal of special and hazardous wastes. While our initial efforts have not yet led to a solution, I can assure you that discussions continue with industry and interested groups. A major concern is the option for recycling and the reuse of waste available to smaller operations. To assist in seeking solutions to this problem, we are sponsoring technology transfer seminars in cooperation with a coalition of concerned groups, professional associations and industry.

My ministry maintains a vigorous and closely supervised inspection service regarding pesticides, The issuance of pesticide use permits is very stringently controlled from the Victoria office. There is, of course, an Environmental Appeal Board which has the task of examining any complaints against not only pesticide applications but also wildlife, waste and water management matters.

[ Page 6022 ]

Dealing with the lower mainland's solid waste disposal problem is an indication of the ministry's intention to encourage the development of waste management plan strategies for the province. These plans are designed and are to be developed by local jurisdictions for handling refuse, sewage and other wastes. Under this type of planning, a local government may seek to authorize waste discharges by means of such a plan instead of having to apply for permits. My ministry is working in close cooperation with a number of cities and municipalities that have made considerable progress in developing waste management plans, and I speak of solid waste.

It is difficult, and I suppose premature, to speculate on where future environmental problems lie. However, in air pollution we are clearly focusing on the lower mainland and in particular addressing the high ozone levels and acid precipitation problems. In waste management, the disposal of the final products of society to land and water is a continuing problem made more difficult by the introduction of complex chemicals. In wildlife, we must very carefully review our controls and hunting regulations to ensure a viable balance for the future. In fisheries, we wish to increase the freshwater sport-fishing opportunities; I made special mention of this earlier in my address. We will also be working with our federal counterparts in bringing back the salmon to historic levels and encouraging the development of our mariculture potential. In water, we must protect this most valuable resource to ensure future supplies, maintaining high quality for human consumption, fishery and recreational needs. Above all, we must protect the habitat to maintain a diversity of wildlife for present and future generations.

The challenges will be many, and I look forward to overseeing the programs and directions taken by the ministry. I'm convinced that carefully researched and sound management practices not only will offer an extensive support base for our province's outstanding natural resources but will ensure their ongoing availability.

Mr. Chairman, I'd be pleased to receive questions from those members opposite, or any of my colleagues.

MRS. WALLACE: Mr. Chairman, certainly I commend the new minister for making all the right sounds. He has managed to touch briefly on all the various facets of his ministry. Having been there only two months, I don't know whether that indicates that he has been able to grasp the whole concept of his ministry in those two short months, or just that he is able to read a report very well and sound very persuasive in his manner of reading it.

I'm not going to draw the attention of the Chair to the number of people in this Legislature, but when we are discussing an item as important and critical as the environment, it indicates to me the need to utilize our new rules and to delegate certain estimates to committees, where the people who are interested in that subject can deal with it, can call witnesses, can do a job on that particular estimate, and even have some input which might change the figures. That is a possibility. In this House it is not a possibility. People sit here and read their books, and come in here because we need a certain number of bodies; but there isn't that input and cooperative spirit that we've been talking about in this Legislature. I think this is an outstanding example of a time when we should be in a standing committee rather than in Committee of the Whole.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Hon. member, your comments may be sincere, but would you please address yourself to the minister's estimates?

MRS. WALLACE: That was just an opening remark, Mr. Chairman. In the spirit of what this House is all about and the obvious accord from both sides of the House — which are here in equal numbers, incidentally — I think that is a pertinent remark.

Dealing with the minister's statement, I remember that when he was first appointed to the role he made the statement: "Environment is for everyone." I agree; environment is for everyone. But everyone is part of the environment as well. Each one of us is part of that environment. If we are going to have pure water, clean air, productive land — the three basic essentials of a good environment; I think the minister would agree with that — we as the people who are part of that environment have to ensure that that happens. We may all agree that it should be that way. The minister certainly touched on all those facets in his remarks, and many other things; but unless we are prepared to take the necessary action, to bite the bullet, it's not going to happen.

He talked about long-term goals. I couldn't agree more. But in my recollection, everything that has happened in environment in this province for the last ten years since I have been here has been a case of putting out fires. It's a case of cure rather than prevention. We really haven't made the concerted effort to take that whole global problem.... It is a major thing. It encompasses every ministry in this House. Every single minister who sits in the cabinet contributes in some way to the environment. All of us who sit on the back bench and in the opposition are part of that environment. Without that kind of all-encompassing perspective and a commitment to reach that goal to protect our clean water, our pure air and our productive land, that whole environmental concern falls into ashes. I don't see that commitment. I know that the minister is sincere, he is committed, but I don't see that kind of overall concept from this government.

I think time is running out. I would like to quote very briefly from a federal report that was brought in in January of this year, dealing with fisheries and forestry:

"A lot of the effects of environmental pollution are geometric. Very quickly you can reach a kind of a threshold where all of a sudden you have a dangerous situation, where a very short time ago you did not. If we could all just imagine for a minute a lily pond of such a size that it would take 28 days to cover it with lily pads, starting out with two lily pads, then 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, et cetera. On the 27th day you would have half the lily pond left."

You might be in the position of having an argument with somebody about how urgent the situation is. Someone would be saying: "We have half the pond left; why make such a big deal of it?" But of course, the minister is aware that the next day it's covered.

That's my concern about environmental issues. I think we are reaching the point of no return with some of our concerns and problems, some of the issues. If we do not take that global overall perspective now I think we're going to reach that point of no return, where neither the minister nor 1, nor any of us who are deeply concerned about this, are going to be able to recover. If we are, it's going to be extremely costly.

When anyone says to me, Mr. Chairman, that we cannot afford to do this or that relative to the environment, I say to

[ Page 6023 ]

them we cannot afford not to. In the long haul, the economically and ecologically based solution is the cheapest solution. It's the most economical route to go.

On that note, I want to turn to some specifics. I'm sure the minister is quite aware of what the first one is going to be. That poor little minister, you know, he's up to his armpits in garbage, and he's just about to go under for the third time. What are we doing? He said in his speech that we were looking at water and landfill for our sewage and our solid wastes. That's all we ever seem to think about. Sometimes we get as far as thinking about burning it. We've even come to the point where we're talking about putting that incinerator in Vancouver or Burnaby, or wherever it is, alongside an industrial plant where we can use some of the heat.

Well, maybe it's a start, but there's a long way to go, and we have missed the boat. We should have learned from the experience in Love Canal. We should have learned from the experiences in the disposal of waste in the United States that there is a better way and a cheaper way to go. The cost of cleaning up — just the economic cost, never mind the personal cost in sickness, in lives, in suffering, as a result of wrongful disposal of garbage and wrongful disposition of sewage — is horrendous. In fact what we're looking at is a source of income.

[3:00]

We can talk about general garbage disposal as opposed to and different from hazardous wastes, but the minister indicated that he has become aware, as I have, that in our everyday garbage there is a tremendous amount of hazardous waste. We get all panic stricken when a truck with three transformers is leaking PCBs in Ontario. Why in the world we're transporting PCBs from Ontario to Alberta just to store them doesn't make any sense. There are means of destruction, but we aren't prepared to put up the bucks.

In the long term, we may find that just in that one instance, with those PCB spills in Ontario, we are faced with a lot higher costs over the long term — and the minister is talking about long-term goals — than we would be to get our own system of disposal.

[Mr. Kempf in the chair.]

Mr. Chairman. the proposed dumps relative to the greater Vancouver area have certainly caused this minister some problems. I was disappointed at his reaction. It seems that if you can get enough names on a petition, you change your decision, and that's what happened in the case of the Langley dumps. But what's he going to do, Mr. Chairman, when the people who live in Delta can come up with three times as many names on a petition to get out of Burns Bog? Maybe he can't get as many names on a petition if the committee decides to put it at Pitt Meadows, right in his own back yard. What that minister has to decide is whether he is just going to willy-nilly try to accommodate everybody, and I know he's a very nice man and likes to accommodate everybody. But if he's going to do that, he's got to get tough with treasury board and with local governments and say: "Look, we're prepared to assist you in putting in the kind of a plant. We'll put up the upfront money to put in the kind of operation that will enable you to reap some benefit from this garbage, rather than to have the expense of getting rid of it."

I want to deal with some of the things that have happened in other jurisdictions relative to garbage disposal. I am moving a little bit into hazardous wastes, but the two go hand in hand really. You know, if we have PCBs spilled all over the highway we get concerned. but if you take the dry batteries, the dry cells, out of your flashlight and throw them into the garbage, you don't think about the fact that there's mercury in those. If you take an empty hair-spray can and put it in the garbage, you don't think about the fact that you're putting a hazardous waste into that garbage. If you take a paint thinner can or a cleaning fluid container and put it in the garbage, you don't realize you're putting hydrocarbons into your everyday garbage; but that's what you're doing. Sure, each one is very insignificant, but are there any safe limits? When you put a million families together, you could be getting a tremendous amount of heavy metals, hydrocarbons and other chemicals that are without a doubt in a hazardous class. So the two have to go hand in hand.

What has happened is that there are areas, particularly where the hazardous waste disposal has come to a head.... There have been terrific pollution and health problems in the United States, where local governments have taken over and have found that by putting in the proper facilities to take out the heavy metals, to take out the hazardous item, to recycle the paper.... There's one, I think it's in New York, where they call it their fifth forest. They get hundreds of tonnes of newsprint from their garbage, because paper makes up about 50 percent of the garbage thrown out by the average family.

Sludge. One of the biggest problems that we have is in taking sludge out of rivers and so on. It has been utilized to make oil, to provide energy. There are all kinds of examples of how this has been done. Hampstead, New York, is one of the most outstanding areas, where they're making, I think,100,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity. They can produce from the garbage of a city of a given size enough to produce something like 15 percent of that area's electrical requirements. Sure, it's costly to get into, but that upfront money is important.

Your colleague the Minister of Energy (Hon. Mr. Rogers), jointly with Victoria, did a study a few years ago on waste disposal here in Victoria. The report that came out from the Minister of Energy was.... I can't recall all the figures. The gist of it was that in fact the installation of that cogeneration plant.... The capital cost of that, coupled with the cost of disposal of the garbage as it is at the present time, or offset by that.... It could recoup its capital cost in ten years. In ten years we could have recouped the cost of putting in such an operation here in the Capital Regional District. What did they decide to do? To go back for more studies, and it just died. That was an effective way of killing it. It's never happened.

There's always an excuse: "Well, it won't work; it's too costly" — all those kinds of things. In fact, the situation is that in other jurisdictions it is working.

There is a wet system, so-called, and there is a dry system, which have been reasonably perfected in Europe and in the United States — basically in Europe. You can segregate the hazardous products. You can take out those heavy metals. You can sell them; you can recoup a great deal of economic return. Holland is an example where they have reduced the net cost of their garbage disposal because of the economic return they get from that garbage, even though it does cost them more to treat it and to sort it, and so on. It is being done in other jurisdictions: it's being done in Japan, China, Europe and the United States. It's being done in Ontario, to a fair degree, and even in Nova Scotia. The only

[ Page 6024 ]

example here is one that my colleague the member for Okanagan North (Mr. MacWilliam) has raised on many occasions, where it's being done in Vernon. A start has been made to utilize the sewage in that instance.

It's all part and parcel of the same thing. If we don't take that step now, we're going to have to face up to this problem: the NIMBY attitude, Not in My Back Yard. Why shouldn't we take that position? Why should Langley have a dump for Vancouver's waste? Why should we put it up in the interior somewhere, or try to put it down a tunnel on Texada Island? It's the problem of the generator.

I think the province and that minister are responsible for ensuring that the technologies are perused and studied — and they are there — and adapted to our own situation here. Goodness knows we need jobs and construction in this province. We have that great pool of skilled labour — engineers and technicians — available. What better time than now to start doing some of these things, to start getting those plants built, getting the facilities in place, and start utilizing that waste product, instead of always winding up with this problem of what are we going to do with it. Whose backyard are we going to dump it in? It's not fair to the people whose backyard you're dumping it in, and it's not fair to our economy. It certainly isn't fair to the environment.

With that, perhaps the minister would like to comment.

HON. MR. PELTON: I thank the hon. member for her remarks. She's very well versed in these matters that involve the environment. Certainly her opening remarks.... I listened very carefully to what she had to say. By and large there were many things she said that I would agree wholeheartedly with.

There didn't seem to be any specific questions that were brought forward by the hon. member, but perhaps I might be allowed to respond in a similar vein and just talk about the various things that were mentioned. The ongoing planning — the planning process — is in effect within the ministry. It might not appear that way to the hon. member, but it certainly is, particularly in the matter of water quality. We have criteria and objectives which are being prepared which will take us a long way into the future.

At this point in time we have six reports which have been completed in this regard. They cover water quality criteria for what we refer to as "particulate matter" and water quality objectives for five water bodies, including the Pouce Coupe River, the Pine River, Charlie Lake in the Peace River area, the Columbia and Windermere Lakes in the East Kootenays, and four recreational lakes in the Smithers area. We have eight other documents on water quality criteria, and 20 on water quality objectives are currently in preparation. So I think one would have to agree that although we haven't yet reached that point where we have all the bases covered, we are well are on the way, particularly in the matter of water quality.

The matter of wastes.... Perhaps I could deal with them briefly one at a time. Sewage effluent, which has been a problem for many years and continues to be one.... I guess it's been exacerbated because of the trace elements and other minerals, and items difficult to dispose of by primary, secondary and tertiary treatment that get into this effluent and cause a great deal of problems.

The hon. member did make particular mention of Vernon. The system which they employ up there, to my knowledge, works quite well and has worked quite well for a long time. But there have been other factors which have come into play that have caused them their major problem in that area. I don't think it's the method that's being employed. For example, one of the problems they've had with the particular method that they use is that the land area that they had to dispose the treated effluent onto has not been large enough to accommodate the amount of effluent that they have to get rid of, and they find the acquisition of larger parcels of land for the same purpose very difficult to achieve.

Also, there have been other problems relating to this. One has been that in years when you have particularly heavy rains, the soils can't soak up the effluent which is sprayed on them after being treated. The other problem they had was that the central storage area proved to be too small as the community grew and there was more effluent.

[3:15]

There are certainly still many more different expressions from people who have studied this particular problem. Some people, for example, say that in an area like Victoria, where the effluent is taken, I think, about six miles out into the ocean, the effect of the tides.... And there's a very heavy tide that runs through this area — something like six knots. So-called experts maintain that this provides for satisfactory treatment, dispersal and eventual complete disposal of the effluent itself. There are others who don't agree with that. So we still go on hoping that someday somebody will come up with a completely effective treatment.

There's another one that has been talked of quite recently which involves the filtration of effluent through coal. This is something that has been proven in a number of places. The Ministry of Environment, along with the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, is looking to adopting this on a trial basis in some area of the province.

Also, the whole Okanagan Valley, as you will agree, hon. member, has the same problem. It has been addressed on an individual basis by the cities of Kelowna, Penticton and Vernon, and they are still working on this. My ministry is trying to bring all these people together to see if we can't resolve the problem once and for all.

In the matter of dry garbage disposal.... I don't want to get into any acrimonious statements here, but I just would like to suggest for the record that in the case of the Langley site, the decision that the Langley site was not suitable was not just taken on the basis of a petition, although I don't think the hon. member would suggest for a moment that we didn't listen to those people who sent us to this place to conduct their business; I'm sure she appreciates how important it is that we do listen to the citizens of our province. But that decision was taken for a number of reasons. The regional districts involved didn't agree where the thing should go. The city of Langley and the district of Langley didn't agree, and then of course there were the problems and concerns that were expressed by our friends across the border in the state of Washington. Also, and I think of primary importance, the whole process that was being conducted in the lower mainland where everyone was getting together to try to collectively resolve the problems of the disposal of solid waste.... That committee had progressed to the point where they have their last meeting on the basis of consensus. It was always agreed that if they couldn't reach a consensus, then they would just have to kind of go back to the drawing board and see if they couldn't come up with something that was more suitable.

[ Page 6025 ]

Although the mayor of North Vancouver and an alderman from Port Coquitlam were very vocal about the Langley sites, they admitted quite freely that they themselves would not want to impose a landfill on someone who didn't want it. This has been, I suppose, for many years and continues to be the problem of the disposal of dry garbage. It's that everybody wants to get rid of it but no one wants to have it dumped in their back yard. I think we can all understand that.

The GVRD is still very active in the program that they have, which, as the hon. member mentioned, Mr. Chairman, involves the construction of an incinerator in Burnaby. I understand that the tenders are about to be let on that and also that there are tenders going out from the GVRD which see emphasis being placed on recycling and that kind of disposal means.

As the hon. member said, certainly if you recycle and take the paper products out, you do end up with a very, very small amount of garbage of which you can't dispose. But in the end, even when you resort to incineration and even the highest technology today of incineration, you still end up with a waste product. I think, if I recall correctly, you get rid of about 75 percent and you end up with about 25 percent, and that's what you've got to get rid of.

We're addressing that in, I think, a responsible manner. The disposal of solid waste has always historically been the responsibility of the individual municipalities and cities and towns, and all that our ministry has been trying to do is act as a kind of a catalyst to bring all these people together and see if those things which they didn't seem to be able to resolve individually could be resolved if they were worked out in a group. But I think this is going forward.

The matter of hazardous waste has certainly, from the events that have happened over the past few weeks in Ontario and even the spills we've had in our own province, brought very forcibly to our attention the requirement for some very definitive action in this direction. I hear what the hon. member said very well. In my personal opinion, yes, one can't help but agree that we should have stringent laws regarding the transportation of these hazardous wastes. And we do. Just recently the federal government had a commission that went out and discussed this matter, and I believe the federal government is bringing down legislation effective July 1 which will impose even stricter requirements on the transportation of hazardous wastes. My colleague, the Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. A. Fraser), whose responsibility it is within our province, will be bringing a similar document down about the same time.

But it seems to me that even if you transport hazardous wastes, like the hon. member said, and they end up residing in a warehouse in the province of Alberta, you haven't really got rid of the problem; you've only kind of stuck it underneath the table for the time being, because someday, somehow, somewhere, you're probably going to have to pick that waste up and move it again. I think that the only real answer to this is to develop ways and means of maybe not just disposing of the hazardous waste but of breaking it down into less dangerous chemicals — kind of a recycling process, or reusing things so that industry doesn't generate as much hazardous waste. And I think the technology is almost upon us whereby we will be able to do that — certainly in the PCBs, and I would suggest that they're probably one of the worst ones that we have to contend with. But there is technology now, and it's getting better every day, which is a very high degree of heat and incineration where the result.... I heard of one the other day where the people involved think that they have got to the point where they can reduce this stuff 99.9 to the 5th, which is almost completely. That holds out a great deal of promise.

The federal minister, Mme. Blais-Grenier, became particularly interested in this after the spill near Kenora. She has been in contact with me and, as a matter of fact, a week ago last Wednesday we had a very long conversation. Included in it was a conference call, and all the environment ministers across the country, with the exception of two, were on the line. We discussed this matter, and I am going to Ottawa at the end of this month, when we're going to see if we can't come up with some solution.

The most promising one, as I mentioned a moment ago, involves a very high degree of heat and incineration. But an added advantage to that one is that I understand it's portable. It can be put on the back of a vehicle and moved around from place to place. If I've missed anything, hon. member, I'm sure you will remind me.

MRS. WALLACE: Well, the minister's latter remarks, anyway, are certainly correct, except that it's not a particularly new technology. Of course, all technologies are perfected, but we've known for a long time that burning PCBs at an extremely high temperature is the way to get rid of them, and the portable thing seems to be the solution. Yet we're not prepared to put the money up front.

You say the federal government is revising the regulations, and certainly that's true. But I think that as a province we really should have a rule of law governing all environmental matters. That law must clearly define what our position is as a province, which can quite well go beyond the requirements of the federal rules. Certainly that has been exemplified in.... We haven't had the rule of law, but have approved or not approved certain chemicals once they have been okayed or not by the federal government. There are certain chemicals that are not used in B.C. that are used in other provinces. What we need is a rule of provincial law with teeth in it regarding these very hazardous items.

The Langley thing. Well, first let me deal with Vernon just very briefly. The problems that occurred at Vernon were two, both at the feet of this government. One was the funding, which, rather than being 75 percent, was cut to 25 percent. The other was that Crown land was not made available, and there was lots of forest land that could have been made available, I understand. So that was the problem there. When we have this sort of situation occurring, it doesn't help our environmental interests very much.

On the Langley thing, I certainly don't want to see a dump in Langley, nor do the people in Blaine or the people in Langley. Nobody wants to see a dump in their back yard. What I'm asking the minister — which he did not answer — is: what is he going to do in October 1986, when they can no longer put that garbage in Burns Bog? Is he prepared to get some upfront money to get a facility in place that can utilize that to make energy, make oil, make paper, and recover some economic return? Or is he going to run around looking for mines and holes in the ground? Maybe the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. McClelland) can oblige him with a hole, the one that's in the wrong place. Is that what we're going to do with this? Or are we going to get serious about this business of garbage disposal and take an economic approach towards it, rather than always trying to

[ Page 6026 ]

put it in somebody else's back yard and always having that cost? I didn't hear the minister answer that question.

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

MR. COCKE: On a point of order, I challenge the quorum.

MR. CHAIRMAN: The quorum has been challenged.

I do believe there is a quorum present on vote 26.

HON. MR. PELTON: The question, if I heard the hon. member correctly, is: why doesn't the government put up some more money to try to resolve the problem of the disposition of solid wastes? I think I mentioned before that it traditionally has not been a provincial problem. And it involves absolutely astronomical amounts of money. Let me give you an example. In the program that's been developed in the lower mainland, which involves the GVRD and other municipalities in the Fraser Valley, they're looking, over a ten-year period, to an expenditure of something in the neighbourhood of $600 million, which is a sizeable amount of money no matter how quickly you say it. I believe it's a service that should be provided on a local level. The distribution of costs, when it's done that way, is much more equitable.

[3:30]

I'm really not in a position to comment with respect to the cost-sharing arrangements of 75 and 25. It doesn't fall within the purview of my responsibility. It certainly has had some bearing on what various municipalities have been able to do, not only in respect to the disposition of sewage but in other areas as well. I would like to point out that the Ministry of Environment has over the years been involved in a modicum of support, I suppose you'd have to say. We have been involved in encouraging municipalities to get into the recycling business. We do support financially the various SPEC organizations throughout the province. As a matter of fact, recently I believe an award was made to the Saanich area; I think they have the second-best household recycling system in Canada. This ministry was involved in getting that system started. I think they also have a fairly good one out in Esquimalt, or in the Victoria area.

I think there's really not a great deal more that I can say in response to that question, hon. member. I think the ministry will just have to continue.... Unless we run into some kind of a windfall and accumulate millions of dollars, we'll just have to continue in our role of helping the various municipalities in every possible way to resolve their problems.

[Mr. Veitch in the chair.]

MRS. WALLACE: The minister keeps saying it's a municipal responsibility; that the council in the lower mainland was working and trying to go by consensus. Well, one thing the consensus is going to have to exclude now is Langley. The minister has gone in there flanked by his colleague, the MLA for Langley, and has said no way in Langley, whether or not they want to put it there. You know, he is involved, and the question.... If it had happened that they were going to put it in Cowichan-Malahat and I had happened to have a petition signed by a bunch of Cowichan-Malahaters, I wonder if he'd have been as quick to move in there and say: "Oh, no, not in Cowichan-Malahat." But he and the member for Langley did move into Langley and said: "Oh, no, not in Langley. None of the dumpsites in Langley."

He talks about our friends to the south. Sure, that was one site. I agree that none of those sites was ideal. None of them was good. I just do not agree with landfills. There are other ways. If you really believe in long-term goals, Mr. Minister, in the long term that will be the economic way to go. So it's $600 million, or whatever it is.

AN HON. MEMBER: Four billion, or whatever.

MRS. WALLACE: Whatever it is, if you put that money upfront now, the cost will be less than the long-term cost in dealing with this.

You did not answer the question that I asked you: what are you going to do in October 1986 when the people of Delta say: "No more refuse in Burns Bog?"

HON. MR. PELTON: On the last question, I don't think I have any responsibility there. That responsibility rests with the people. Delta is a member of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, and the way the.... The outcome of the last meeting would see three separate areas now. One would be the Greater Vancouver Regional District, which would include North Vancouver, West Vancouver and the immediate lower mainland. The other two would be on the east side of the Pitt River, one on the north side and one on the south side. The only suggestion that has been made — and this was made by a management committee made up of engineers and various administrators from municipalities and cities and towns — was that there was a requirement for a landfill in the east area, because, hon. member, I repeat.... I know you're aware of this, because I saw you agree with me when I mentioned it before. Even if you have 100 percent incineration, you still have a residue that has got to go into a landfill or something similar. So you're never going to get away without having landfills, period, at least not with the present technology available to us.

I think we minimize the requirement. For example, you speak about Burns Bog. If everybody is dumping into Burns Bog, I can certainly appreciate the way the people of Delta would feel about that; no problem there at all. If everybody from the lower mainland was coming in and putting their garbage in my back yard, I wouldn't like that very much either. If the GVRD can get all of the people that are involved in their waste disposal program that they have, the residual garbage they have after incineration will be less than the amount that's going into the landfill site right now from the municipality of Delta and from the city of Vancouver.

MR. KEMPF: Just briefly this afternoon I would like to discuss in this minister's estimates some items of concern, particularly to the northern and north-central residents of this province, where they relate to the fish and wildlife branch.

Interjection.

MR. KEMPF: I think we've had enough garbage. I'm just going to give us a break from the garbage, and listen to the real people for a change.

We're very concerned, particularly in the area that I represent, about the catch quotas recently announced by the fish and wildlife branch. We are concerned not only about

[ Page 6027 ]

those quotas now in effect, but in many cases the reasons for those quotas being instituted.

We have a very serious situation in regard to many of our river and lake systems in the northern and north-central part of this province, in that fish stocks are becoming very low. There is very good reason for that. I think we have to act, and act swiftly, in order to curb some of the problems that exist and cause these quotas to be put in place. One of the very real problems is poaching, the illegal taking of fish. I want to talk about wildlife in general, as well as fish; however, there's a very real problem, particularly in the spring of the year, with literally thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of spawning rainbow trout in particular being taken by people who would arrive at a spawning stream with a gunnysack and fill that gunnysack with spawning trout before they left that place.

Mr. Chairman, that relates back to a problem which I've been talking to the minister about relating to the lack of sufficient conservation officers in the field to look after that problem. Unless we do something about it immediately, we are going to simply deplete most of our rivers and lakes of that most important resource. I think, Mr. Chairman, the minister is going to have to seek the assistance of the Attorney-General in attempting to ensure that such infractions are properly dealt with in our courts, because it's no longer acceptable that someone caught with a gunnysack full of spawning rainbow trout be, after several weeks, taken into court and simply fined $25. That's not acceptable to me; it's not acceptable to the people of this province that live in the area where that resource exists.

We have to ensure that there are sufficient conservation officers in the field to look after the problem as well. Certainly the conservation officers out there now, having literally hundreds of thousands of square miles to look after, can't possibly do their job properly. In particular, I have a community north of which stretches clearly one half of this province, and that community is Fort St. James. The conservation officers that are designated to look after that very vast wilderness in which is contained a very real resource....

MR. LOCKSTEAD: They've all been laid off there.

MR. KEMPF: No, that's not true, Mr. Member, but.... No, that's not true, and there are 43 employees working out of the ministry's office in Smithers in the Omineca district, and only three of those people are conservation officers. I don't think that's good enough.

However, I was talking about Fort St. James, and the need in that community for at least two resident conservation officers. Right now, Mr. Chairman, there are none. There are two conservation officers working out of Vanderhoof, 35 miles to the south, who can't possibly even cover the area in the vicinity of Vanderhoof itself let alone the very vast area north of Fort St. James, 300 miles of which has access via the Omineca mining road.

It's a very serious problem. It's a very serious problem when we consider the kinds of catch quotas that we have to initiate because of depleted fish stocks. It's a very real problem in relation to moose and deer and other ungulate populations which exist in that area. It's a very real problem when we have as many limited-entry draws for the hunting of those species and animals that we do. We've got to address it. I think we're taking too lightly the value of that resource to the province of British Columbia.

Interjection.

MR. KEMPF: Precisely, Madame Member. It's a very lucrative industry and a very important industry to many of the people that I represent here in this chamber. We've got to adopt rational rules to ensure that a proper program is put in place to stop the poaching and to increase, not allow to decrease, the stocks of wildlife and game fish that we find in the northern part of this province.

We have also got to come to grips with the coarse fish problem in the areas that I talk about. That too is a very real problem, and unless we as government realize that unless something is done, we won't have in the very near future that resource that brings in those many dollars to our coffers; we're going to be in real trouble.

[3:45]

Mr. Chairman, a couple of other points. One point I want to talk about is the practice of issuing sustenance permits. I — through you to the minister — would ask that the minister use all of the influence he can, where he can, in order that we stop the issuance of sustenance permits in the province of British Columbia. It's unnecessary and it's very costly when you consider the value of a moose, for instance, to this province. If you consider that value, it makes no sense at all to issue one sustenance permit in this province, because you can go out and buy beef from any rancher or farmer at a lesser cost. So, Mr. Chairman, I would ask of this new minister that he seek ways and means by which to stop that practice. It doesn't make sense, it's useless slaughter of a very valuable resource out there, and I ask him to use every bit of influence that he has so that we never again, in ensuing winters, issue sustenance permits in the province of British Columbia.

One other point, and I guess in very great part this has to do with policy that's brought down in other jurisdictions and in places other than this. That is the netting of many of the game fish in our interior lakes. Very recently I saw a net pulled from a river in my constituency which had in it probably more char and rainbow trout than the fishermen in that community of 5,000 would catch in an entire season. If we allow that kind of practice to continue in this province, we can never hope to sustain the fish stocks we have or even keep them from seriously depleting. Something has got to be done, and the old story that these fish are used for sustenance is absolute.... We talked earlier of garbage. This is absolute garbage, Mr. Chairman, because I've also seen with my own eyes hundreds of pounds of those fish left lying on the shores to rot and go to waste. It's totally unnecessary, and we've got to wake up to the fact and do something about it very quickly.

You know, the first signal of danger is the kind of catch quotas that have been initiated in this fishing season, particularly in the area that I serve. It's very serious when you have to bring in catch quotas that say that a fisherman can catch only one fish a day. It's absolutely ridiculous when 75 percent of the land mass in northern British Columbia is covered with water. It's unacceptable, and it can't go on. Something very drastic and something very immediate has got to be done in regard to these problems.

HON. MR. PELTON: My hon. friend, the member for Omineca, who always expresses himself in a most forthright

[ Page 6028 ]

way, has probably presented me with more questions in a very short period of time than I've had from the time we started this afternoon, some time after 2 p.m.

I have discussed the matter of the catch quotas with the hon. member, who has brought two specific problems to my attention. These will be dealt with in the ministry as expeditiously as possible. I guess, before we introduce the remedy, we've got to examine the background. But let me just give you a couple of interesting details, and I know that the member for Omineca will appreciate this, because he's an outdoorsman and he realizes where we're coming from here.

Of course, the problem is, I guess, that we do have countless lakes and streams in this province, but there are only so many fish there. What we have to do to overcome the problem of having to establish fish quotas is somehow or other get more fish into these lakes and streams. We are doing that to the best of our financial ability, which has been enhanced for this particular fiscal year. This year we hope to put upwards of 10 million fish in our lakes and streams.

But I do have a couple of interesting things here, and they are quite outstanding statistics. In 1960 we issued 175,200 fishing licences, and the people with these licences fished for 2.5 million days. They caught 7.6 million fish, which averaged out at three a day. Ten years later, 299,000 people had licences. They caught 8.6 million fish, an average of 2.3 a day, and they fished — being more people for a longer period of time — for 3.2 million days. In 1980, which is the last year for which I have statistics, 450,300 people got licences. They fished for 5.2 million days and caught 8.1 million fish. This might not be of any immediate import to some people, but I think the important thing here is that we have done a reasonable job of restocking, because the 450,300 people have still caught the same amount of fish. So we have kept the lakes and streams reasonably well stocked.

On this basis, perhaps I could just jump right over to the last item that the hon. member made mention of, and that was netting. Certainly that is a problem, but it relates directly, I'm sure he would agree, to the conservation officers. The only way we're going to stop that is to catch the people who are doing it and punish them accordingly.

In the matter of environmental Crown counsels to take care of the legal problems involved with the environment, I would just bring to the attention of this House, and to the particular attention of the member, that effective the beginning of May we have had an environmental Crown counsel, appointed by the Ministry of Attorney-General, who will be operating out of Kamloops. I would suggest to my friend the hon. member that we are certainly moving in the right direction on that.

Conservation officers. I certainly recognize that the shortage of conservation officers is a real problem. On the few trips that I've made out into the field since my appointment, it's one that I have been reminded of in a very forceful way by every place I visited. I have tried to address the problem, where I could within the resources that we have. I'm not saying this as an excuse; I'm just stating this as a matter of fact: within the Ministry of Environment we suffered the same staff reductions as other ministries; but we made a particular point, when we undertook to reduce the FTEs to which we were entitled, of giving special consideration to conservation officers, and they were reduced by only 10 percent. Two years ago the conservation officer staffing level was 121 full-time equivalents, made up of five Victoria and eight regional administrative staff, and 108 field-operational conservation officers. I know that the hon. member wasn't in the House during the full course of my introductory remarks, but by amalgamating offices we have accomplished a considerable reduction in the administrative workload. And we have actually accomplished more in the way of picking up people who are poaching and breaking other laws.

The House might also be interested to know that we do get criticized from time to time that these people aren't being fully or property utilized because they sometimes work in pairs. I'm sure that everyone will agree that in this day and age if you respond to a report that somebody is poaching, particularly after dark, you really wouldn't want to send an individual out on his own; he should be accompanied by someone. The other thing that has happened within the ministry is that we have tried to compensate for this lack of conservation officers — and I agree that it's a lack of conservation officers. What we have done is try to initiate a reporting system whereby wildlife groups or rod and gun clubs, or suchlike groups of people, report infractions to us and we take care of them as quickly as possible.

I think I've covered most of your questions, hon. member, but if I have not, I'm sure you will remind me.

MR. KEMPF: Just a few final remarks, Mr. Chairman. On that question of consulting with rod and gun clubs and others very interested in our outdoors and our resource in that regard, I would also ask the minister.... I know this happens in some areas of the province, but it certainly isn't happening and hasn't happened in the Omineca district: that is, you ask your resident biologist to confer with those same people before bringing in catch limits.

[4:00]

We have daily catch limits — for fear of contradicting myself here — which I have suggested earlier are nearing a very crucial number. We also have regulations that were brought down recently, in particular — and I've mentioned this to the minister — relating to the Tweedsmuir area in my constituency. The catch limits in that particular circle of lakes are absolutely preposterous. They're not necessary. It's an area, for those who would know, protected by Ootsa Lake. Ootsa Lake, Tahtsa Lake, Tetachuck Lake and Knewstubb Lake were raised when the Kitimat project was constructed, making it a very dangerous area to get into, so that not just any fisherman can utilize that lake system. You have to have very large boats. You have to want to really endanger your own life to get in and fish these areas. Other than that, they're serviced by fishing guides who charge as much as $1,100 for a four-day trip. Now to initiate those kinds of catch quotas in an area that isolated, that hard to get into, is absolutely ridiculous. The reason it was done, Mr. Chairman, was that there was no consultation between the resident biologist in Smithers and the Tweedsmuir Park Rod and Gun Club, a very energetic, active, large and, I might add, knowledgeable club situated in Burns Lake, just a few short miles north of the Tweedsmuir Park. Had that consultation gone on, I wouldn't be badgering the minister now for an order-in-council that would change, for this summer season, the catch limit in that lake system.

Mr. Chairman, it may sound strange to say it in this chamber; it may sound strange to some of the lower mainland members; but unless we do that we're going to place in real financial jeopardy a number of fish guides this coming summer. Would you pay $1,100 for the possibility of catching

[ Page 6029 ]

four fish? I very much doubt it, and I very much doubt that that's going to happen. I think my argument of having placed those fish guides in jeopardy is real. The whole question of consultation, I think, is a good one and should be a necessity, rather than left up to some biologists who wish to do that and some who do not.

A final comment on the poaching issue. I think we have to get much tougher, Mr. Chairman, with our native Indians. We can no longer accept the fact that they can go out there and do what they wish in regard to hunting game in this province. They do it under the guise of sustenance permits, which shouldn't be issued in the first place. I want to tell you, they have the greatest number of people who would go out there and break the law of any citizens in this province. I've got to say that, because I know that firsthand. I know what's going on in my constituency, and I see it time after time. We've all got to be considered as Canadians under the law. For any judge in this province to bring down a judgment on the illegal shooting of a moose, out of season, charging that individual $25 for having done so, is absolutely unacceptable. It happens time after time. That particular animal is worth $1,000 to this province. I don't care who shoots it, whether it be white or Indian, it still costs this province $1,000. It's got to be stopped. I've seen situations with my own eyes where a sustenance permit has been issued for one moose and half a dozen have been shot merely because they were there. They're very vulnerable in the middle of January in the country that I come from. It's got to be stopped. We can no longer allow a judge to bring those kinds of judgments against a person merely because he's a native Indian, because it's a British Columbia resource, and it belongs to all of us, Indian and white alike. So we have to be treated the same under the law. If we don't, we won't have the resource in a very short time.

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

HON. MR. PELTON: Mr. Chairman, just a couple of remarks. In the matter of the Tweedsmuir Lake area, I don't doubt the facts that the hon. member brings forward. As I said before, we are looking at this. If there was an error made, it will be rectified.

I would just like to make one short comment about sustenance permits and sustenance policy, because I think it's appropriate that it be made at this time. Since 1966 the Wildlife Act and permit regulations have stated that the director may issue permits to take wildlife outside the regular season to residents of B.C. "in actual need for sustenance." No mention is made of racial origin. The only qualifications are residency and actual need; thus the matter of sustenance use of wildlife is one of allocation, not of aboriginal rights. However, where treaties apply, such as on portions of the Island or in northeastern British Columbia, those treaties take precedence over the Wildlife Act.

I just felt that it was necessary. I know that that's not completely where the hon. member was coming from, but I just felt that that statement had to be made.

MR. LEA: I'd like to return to the topic of garbage, although I don't take away from the importance of what the member for Omineca was talking about. I know, also being a northern member, that 99.9 percent of what he said was absolutely accurate. I think what he did is point out the need for some local autonomy, as opposed to a centralized bureaucracy. It not only applies to Environment; it applies to every ministry. As long as we try to run things from a small table in a centralized way in this province, we're trying to deal with problems that cannot be dealt with because of the centralized decision-making process. It runs throughout government.

I'd like to touch on the topic of garbage, as I said. Some people would use a much nicer term; I think they would call it solid waste. But it's garbage we're talking about; everybody understands that. For the minister to say that it's a municipal responsibility is ducking the issue, because it is of such magnitude, this problem of garbage in this province, that we have to deal with it as a province. There is no way around it.

If we are going to leave this, as a provincial body, strictly to the municipal governments, we are going to see happen again and again what happened in Langley. It's called the brushfire policy: not having an overall policy, but a brushfire effect, where something raises its head to such magnitude that the government has to go in there and do something. That's going to be what will go on from now on unless we as a provincial government and a provincial body come to grips with it as a provincial problem.

Now I know a number of us have said that you can't cure the education system by strictly throwing money at it; you can't cure the health problems by throwing money at them. But this is a problem that can go a long way to being cured by throwing money at it, spent wisely. What we have to do, I think, is first of all accept the premise that we are dealing with a provincial problem. It doesn't matter whether it's the lower mainland, in the riding of Mackenzie or in my riding in Prince Rupert: we all have a garbage disposal problem in our tidings. Either there is no authority to look after garbage, which happens in rural areas, or there are 50 authorities to deal with garbage, which happens in the more populated areas of the province; but no coordinated approach by the provincial government to deal with garbage.

Let's take the lower mainland problem. You have enormous amounts of waste that have to be disposed of, some of it containing very hazardous ingredients. But even under incineration we've got the problem of air pollution. So incineration, although a better answer than landfill, is not without its problems. As the minister said — and correctly — even after incineration you still have some waste that you must find a way to get rid of. But I'm still not sure whether the old method of landfill is the way to go. There are new technologies where you can deal with it in a more sensible way. Those technologies are available, in some cases in such simple forms as compressing it and putting tar around it, keeping it watertight, and then going to landfill or an old mine shaft. The technology is available, so the question comes: are we going to pay for it? Are we going to accept the responsibility, as citizens of this province, for dealing with the problem of garbage?

Dealing with the lower mainland, if my figures are correct — I think some of them are — we're talking about an incineration program, as proposed, of a capital outlay of $200 million to $250 million when we get through, if we follow the recommendations.

HON. MR. PELTON: Double that.

[ Page 6030 ]

MR. LEA: Okay, I'll take the minister's word. We're talking maybe $400 million, $450 million. Other jurisdictions are looking at some pretty creative approaches to the capital needed to deal with this problem. In Wisconsin they are issuing what they call environmental bonds. People can take the money that they now have in savings and invest it in environmental bonds. The central state — that is, the state in the United States, the state of Wisconsin — is then guaranteeing the people who purchase those bonds a guaranteed return on their money. It's a way of raising the capital without having to go out of the jurisdiction to borrow it. It's a way of raising the capital without the province having to put it up, a way of using money that's in savings and put it to work for us as British Columbians in a needed cause.

Environmental bonds are working quite effectively in Wisconsin. One of the other good things about raising the money in that way is that you can stabilize the cost over a long period of time; the only ingredient in there then that becomes flexible is the ongoing wages needed to run the capital goods once you get them into place — your incinerators and such. It's a creative way of looking at it, and it may not be the way for us. Another way we could do it is to make a deal with the federal government. If we could approach the federal government and ask them to remove the capital gains from the earnings from environmental bonds, it might go a long way to creating the investment that we'd need.

What it really boils down to, Mr. Chairman, is that it is a provincial concern. It should be a concern of this Legislature. It should be a concern of this government. We can't just let the problem grow, and hide behind the fact that it's the jurisdiction of the municipal or regional district, because it just won't go away. Number one, they're not going to come to an agreement of where we're going to dump the garbage; number two, they don't have the wherewithal to raise the kind of money we're talking about to deal with the problem — and it's going to take a great deal of money.

[4:15]

After having talked about environmental bonds, somebody has to pay the money back — the original principal — and that has to come out of the users. We're going to have to postage-stamp the user fee for garbage in this province, or at least in regions, if we use the bond issue approach, so that everybody pays for the amount of garbage disposal they have. If we do that, I think we are going a long way toward solving the problem. There may be other ways. I think what people are looking for is some sort of creative approach out of this provincial government to deal with the problem of garbage. A creative approach is not saying: "It's nothing to do with us." It is something to do with us. It affects every citizen in this province.

Mr. Chairman, it is not just an unsightly thing we're talking about. We're talking about health problems that could come along because of an improper garbage disposal system. We're talking about immeasurable damage to the environment, especially to the waterways of this province, if we don't deal with it properly. We're talking about immense air pollution problems unless we deal with it properly. There's no point in telling someone that it's a municipal problem. Air goes everywhere. Water goes everywhere. We can't isolate it as somebody's specific problem in a specific area. It's a problem for all of us.

MRS. WALLACE: It won't stay in my back yard.

MR. LEA: That's absolutely correct. It is a universal problem in terms of this province. It's a problem that we have to address ourselves to. It's a problem that we're going to have to be creative about. There is technology that will take us a long way down the road to solve this problem. It is going to cost a great deal of money, but we're going to have to pay it. We're going to have to find the most economic, the most creative, the most environmental way of dealing with the garbage problem. But we're not going to deal with it by saying it's somebody else's problem.

We, as the provincial body, should be a resource for local areas. We shouldn't be dictators; we should be a resource. We should recognize that they have a very real problem that they don't have the resources to deal with on their own. We should be going to them and saying, "How can we help resolve this problem in a reasoned way?" as opposed to saying: "It's your problem. It's your jurisdiction. We'll only step in when there's a brush fire that has political overtones that may hurt the chances of someone being elected."

That's what Langley was all about. There were 400 or 500 people out at meetings over garbage in Langley. That's a big political meeting. You can't get that many out for a peace march in Langley. That's a lot of people; that's a lot of concern. There were a lot of people who signed petitions. Local politicians are falling on the issue or gaining office by the issue in Langley. The problem was that the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. McClelland) had a political problem in his riding. And that problem was solved politically. But you didn't deal with the problem. All you've said is that Langley will not be the landfill. But who is going to be? Or are we going to put a proper, creative program together and be a resource for all the regional districts and municipalities throughout this province?

The environmental bond issue may not be the way to go, but I'm saying that other jurisdictions have tried it. We could look at their experience and see whether it is indeed working for them and whether it isn't something that we could look at, even if it meant involving the federal government in capital gains, in an allowance.

Mr. Speaker, I am not satisfied with the answer from the minister that it's not our problem, that it's their problem. It is our problem. Every citizen in this province is going to be affected if we don't come up with a reasonable, creative, economic way to deal with solid waste in this province. We have not taken it on as a provincial jurisdiction; we've just let it lapse. We can't do it any longer, because it's a problem that's going to affect us as a whole — all of us — and we have to deal with it. I realize it's not easy, but first of all we have to come to grips with it and say: "It's our problem as citizens, and the provincial government should be involved." I'd like to hear where the minister feels we should be going in future with this problem.

HON. MR. PELTON: Mr. Chairman, my thanks to the hon. member for Prince Rupert. He always — in his usual manner, in reasoned and relatively gentle criticisms — has a suggestion to throw in as well, which I think is a very laudable thing, and I appreciate that.

First of all, if I may take just a moment and not launch right into the garbage business, I would point out that the Ministry of Environment is not so centralized as one might think. As a matter of fact, it's quite a decentralized ministry, and I think it has been for some years, particularly in the fish

[ Page 6031 ]

and wildlife branch. As you probably know, hon. member, we have a number of regions around the province where they enjoy a fair amount of authority, and we'd like to keep it that way. I for one certainly don't subscribe to centralization; I don't think it's a good way to do business at all.

The matter of getting down to the garbage dumps, solid waste disposal sites or whatever. Maybe I should reiterate what I was saying. If I didn't say it in very good English, what I was trying to say was that traditionally and historically this particular problem has rested with local jurisdictions. Maybe the time is here, or certainly rapidly approaching, when this should change. But I do believe — and I don't take credit for this, because it was my predecessor who got it going — that there was a certain amount of creativity displayed by the ministry in that for many years — and I was part and parcel of this when I was involved in municipal politics — we were all spinning our wheels at a great rate and getting no place, and just rationalizing to ourselves how we could dump another year's refuse onto our garbage dump. Whereas at one time it was a hole in the ground, it was now becoming a mountain. I think there was some creativity shown inasmuch as the previous minister and senior members of the ministry did get involved in trying to bring all of the parties together to see if they couldn't come up with some reasonable solution.

I think that there is still a solution there, and I think that the work that's been done up to this point in time.... I spoke to Mr. Doug MacKay, who is the gentleman in charge of the GVRD on the non-political side, not too many days ago. He was at that meeting where the decision was made with regard to the Langley sites, and he didn't see it as being too difficult a thing. He seems very positive about where he thinks they're going to go, and thinks that they, through the program that they have in place and maybe through some minor modification to the program, will be able to resolve the problem.

I should mention also that the $500 million to $600 million is over a ten-year period, and your idea about the bonds sounds like an excellent one. I think it's probably similar to one that is being used here that applies in agriculture, but that's one that we certainly should look into. I should also maybe mention that with respect to the jurisdiction of individual municipalities over garbage and the costs involved, certainly you are absolutely right, hon. member.

When you start talking incineration and even landfills, the difficult part for most municipalities, especially the smaller ones, is the upfront money for the capital costs of whatever they're going to do, and finding some way to amortize these costs over a period of time which won't impose too big a burden on the taxpayers. That really is a problem. It's one where the other levels of government could quite conceivably become involved, and maybe the issuance of bonds would be the way to go as well.

Also, you spoke of user fees. There are some places who still don't have user fees, although I guess everybody's kind of kidding themselves because the money is coming out of your tax dollars, which you're either paying in residential taxes or in some other way. Although in Maple Ridge, where I live, we pay directly to a private firm who comes around and removes the garbage once a week, and takes it and deposits it in the dump.

There also are some jurisdictions where the disposal site is operated in such a way that, once they could get rid of these capital costs that we speak about, they break even. Some of them even make a very small amount of profit, although not a great deal. I understand very clearly what you're saying, hon. member. We have notes of the remarks that have been made, and we can pick up more information from Hansard. We are not turning our back on the problem; we're not burying our heads in the sand. We are going to continue to work with the GVRD and with the municipalities in the Fraser Valley to assist them in reaching a solution to the long-standing problem of the disposal of solid waste.

MR. DAVIS: This is an interesting debate, and I think we all appreciate the minister's willingness to answer questions and to endeavour to develop policies as we go along. It's an area in which slogans abound, and yet no particular solution is the whole solution. I think one slogan, though, that should be upfront — it can't apply to all cases, but it's important; it can deal with many cases — is that the polluter pays. The polluter, if the polluter can be identified, should pay for the pollution, but better still should be caused to install whatever equipment, whatever processes, will prevent the pollution from occurring.

If one translates this to garbage, I think that pollution in the form of solid wastes.... I'm talking about the more conventional solid wastes: waste paper, glass, debris from construction sites and so on. The municipality has, in a large part, the jurisdiction. The municipality can develop systems and has the capability through bylaws and otherwise to organize collection, to organize transport in the initial stages. In a municipality with a large area and some waste land, landfills are perhaps the answer. But the collection and disposal of garbage is really a protection of property. Municipalities in the main have jurisdiction over property. I think that's another reason why the municipalities should endeavour to look after their own garbage.

When the problem reaches a scale which transcends the ability of an individual municipality to deal with it, clearly several municipalities will want to get together. The GVRD is, in my view, the ideal vehicle to substantially deal with the conventional garbage problem, and hopefully deal with it within the larger territory of GVRD. It may well be that shortly incineration will reduce the volume and reduce it considerably. But incinerators cost money. Collectively the municipalities should be funding incineration. If the province can borrow money at a lesser interest rate on their behalf, I think the province should be involved. I think the province must be involved when it comes to advice. The province often has technical people — biologists and otherwise — who have the capacity to advise in this area. The federal government has a number of people who are expert in some aspects of ecological protection. They should be included.

[4:30]

But I'm not for transferring the problem, especially the cost problem, away off onto someone at a great distance. The hon. member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea) refers to tax-free bonds. Well, tax-free bonds would be demanded immediately by every municipality in Canada. We could end up, since we're relatively well-to-do, paying for the massive garbage problem the city of Montreal has. Montreal has dealt with air pollution fairly effectively, but tended to ignore its other pollution problems. There is a bigger challenge there. I think on balance we'd be paying for them; they wouldn't be paying for us. So I'm not for income tax-free bonds insofar as it would tap the federal treasury. But I do think the province could guarantee bonds for the GVRD or for some authority

[ Page 6032 ]

which had a broad regional base in the lower mainland to help deal with the problem.

As a general principle, I think people individually and firms locally should endeavour to look after the pollution problem. The small local ecology is often much more vulnerable, and unless it's looked after on-site, so to speak, it may be devastated altogether. There are some pollutants that spread around the world, and there are some problems that cross provincial and international boundaries, and I think they logically should be dealt with nationally and internationally, but I think the responsibility, certainly in the first instance, should be local, then municipal, then provincial. If those several levels of government or power and influence capability can't deal with it, then involve the federal people, but not otherwise.

I think the problem, if it can be identified, and certainly garbage can — conventional garbage — is a regional problem. It's a lower mainland problem. The province can help in the selection of disposal sites. As I've said, it can certainly help in financing and it can certainly help in terms of technical advice. I understand the concern of some of the mayors and others who've through their own municipalities financed a comprehensive study of the problem in the lower mainland. I can understand their frustration when they find the province effectively vetoing certain sites which had been identified. It's interesting, of course, that the sites were outside the boundaries of the GVRD area, the municipalities and the GVRD having financed the study. One site was near the international boundary, so that was another excuse to drop it. But sites have to be found, and treatment processes have to be adopted. It is a problem, but I would certainly put the bulk of the costs on the shoulders of those who create the problem in the first place.

HON. MR. PELTON: Just a very short response to the member for North Vancouver–Seymour. The business of polluter pays: certainly that is done in a lot of instances. As a matter of fact, I guess I might suggest that those people who pay to have the solid waste removed from their homes are in a sense following that process. Certainly within the Waste Management Act of the provincial government, when it involves toxic wastes, the polluter certainly pays in that regard. Also, we do have some municipalities around the province that have littering bylaws. I guess all of these things help. I certainly understand where the member is coming from when he speaks of cooperation. I would just mention that the Waste Management Act was amended some time ago. Whereas it used to be that individual municipalities and towns and villages disposed of their solid wastes through permit, now they can get together and go a different route by putting in a waste management plan. This is precisely what has been done and is being done through the Greater Vancouver Regional District and the other areas in the Fraser Valley.

MR. ROSE: I have two or three different topics, Mr. Chairman. But before I start, I'd just like to chide the member for North Vancouver–Seymour (Mr. Davis), because he is advocating a policy of polluter must pay. When he was a Minister of Environment, we brought in the Canada Water Act. During that time when he was a minister, he was also monitoring the effluent of all the pulp mills on the Fraser. They were among our biggest and most prominent and favorite polluters at the time. As a matter of fact, we could relate their activities, I think, to some of the fall-offs of the salmon runs. They're not the only ones, but they certainly were a major source of contamination in the Fraser. If you can link that to a decline in salmon runs — or at least partially responsible for it — that's where it is.

The point I would like to make is that there were massive amounts of chemical and solid pollution coming out of those plants, all up and down the Fraser — I think around 17 in all from Prince George down south. I had a question on the order paper for months to get him to give me....

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. I think the member would appreciate that we're debating the Minister of Environment's estimates here, and not the estimates of a former Minister of Environment in another jurisdiction.

MR. ROSE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, but I had this question on the order paper for months, and it involves the polluter-must-pay principle. It's been alluded to not only by the member for Vancouver-Seymour but also by the minister. So I think I have a right to complete my statement.

I was unable to get any kind of information from a series of questions on the order paper. The minister refused to respond. I too believe that the polluter should pay. I know that there is a shared jurisdiction — federally and provincially — and that was one of the problems with the Canada Water Act. One of the problems was that the provinces wouldn't at that time go for as stringent standards as the feds were prepared to do. That's when environment was a popular item; environment is no longer a popular item, unless, of course, you spill a few PCBs on the highway. Then it reaches a certain kind of visibility, mainly because of the scare tactics associated with it. But it's no longer a big thing.

But nobody wants these things. "Not in my backyard" is the slogan for garbage, isn't it? Whether you're talking about a toxic waste dump.... We've got one in Canada. The Americans won't take any more of ours. I know what fun the previous Minister of Environment had when he tried to get a toxic waste dump in this province, because nobody wants it. Nobody wants a nuclear waste dump either. So for that reason, we put them on Indian reservations. That's where they are, mostly, in the United States.

Acid rain gets a little bit of publicity from time to time, because acid rain spoils the environment. It spoils the hunting and fishing for all those people, like the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf), who are interested in the tourist industry.

When that comes about, then it becomes a very highly visible, highly controversial subject. But most of the time we'd just rather forget it. Our whole history has been getting rid of it in the most immediate and cheapest way possible, and to hide it. We've continued our pattern there, because to do anything else is too expensive. When you talk about solid waste disposal or recycling or incineration or whatever, they throw up their hands and say: "Millions and millions of dollars." Therefore we don't support it because we can't justify it to the taxpayers. There are other higher priorities, until we get sick or until the salmon runs completely dry up or until we cut down all the trees or ruin them all with acid rain or have the noses of the gargoyles rotting off. Then we're prepared, perhaps, to do something about it. Until that time, we would like to just shove it aside. Maybe we'd like to ship our garbage up to Texada or someplace....

MR. LOCKSTEAD: We'll get to that.

[ Page 6033 ]

MR. ROSE: I think it's only fair to the House if I gave you some of my own views about environmental alterations in general, and here they are. I'm reading this from a letter I wrote, so I'm indulging in the supreme form of arrogance: I'm going to quote myself. First of all:

"Seldom are environment-altering works constructed without substantial environmental cost. Whether we consider sanitary landfill, dredging, water and hydro dams, logging or stream diversions, these impose future costs to be borne, which can offset the near-term benefits such works bestow."

That's my first principle. The second one is:

"Our society has traditionally opted for the initially most economic — cheapest — alternative, ignoring the true cost and content to pass these costs on to future generations."

Right? That's what we've done all along, and now we're stuck with some very severe problems. I don't know what we're going to do about the garbage. Shoot it at the sun, I guess.

AN HON. MEMBER: There's a spot under Tumbler Ridge that's available,

MR. ROSE: Oh, I see: the wrong hole at Tumbler Ridge; dump it in there. That's better than Texada, you think? I would agree with that.

I know the minister has a substantial problem. First of all, nobody wants the garbage, and secondly, nobody wants to pay for it. So that's a hydra-headed conundrum he's facing.

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Coquitlam volunteered? Coquitlam has been taking everybody's garbage for half a century. We started out there with a sanitary landfill called Terra Nova, which was once a molehill and has now become a mountain. That's what's happening, and we can't take it any more. We were willing to take everybody else's.... Well, it was then called Fraser Mills.

Okay, so that's sort of my views, and also trying to point out some of the difficulties the minister faces. I know the minister faces substantial political problems over this issue, but that is no solution. He's got to be staunch, vigorous, aggressive, inventive and fearless, and I know he is.

I want to ask a couple of things. This is a direct question. I don't want it answered immediately, just on a series of questions you might address. Has the ministry any policy on the filling in of wetlands through pumping material, sand or whatever, out of the Fraser and landing that material to provide either wharfage or land or factory sites or whatever? What is the government's policy on that? I know he's a new minister, and I mentioned this wetland preoccupation by me before. Mr. Chairman, the marshlands are the cradle of marine life. You fill in the wetlands, then you get rid of the waterfowl, you get rid of many of the organisms that are at the lower end of the food chain, upon which the higher forms of marine life feed, and you're destroying the environment; you're destroying the food; you're probably destroying the fisheries. That's why I'm concerned.

I recall vividly — this might be considered out of order, but I know it isn't, Mr. Chairman — attending as a guest of the former minister of fisheries and environment over there, one evening out at the.... I forget the name of the building in which he hosted the fisheries committee. We had a lesson in pollution. It showed what primary treatment would do to take out the toxic wastes that affect fish, and it showed what secondary treatment would do to remove toxicity from sewage. There was virtually no difference. It wasn't until you got to tertiary treatment that it amounted to anything really in terms of protection.

But we're still using the air as a sewer, and we're still using the water as a sewer. I would like to know the position of the ministry on primary and tertiary sewage disposal. Did you get that one? Wetlands and primary, secondary and tertiary sewage disposal; and what is the Crown, his department, prepared to do about that in terms of either regulation or assisting municipalities to develop these works, to protect the environment?

[4:45]

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Well, yes, I know. The member for Cowichan-Malahat (Mrs. Wallace) tends sometimes to be a little....

MRS. WALLACE: Cynical,

MR. ROSE: Well, yes, I didn't want to say cynical, but if you care to say so.

The other thing I would like to ask the minister is whether, since we both live by the Fraser, he would take some time and look at the film by the Fraser Coalition of two or three years ago, maybe four years ago now, on what's happening to the Fraser, because the film stressed that the multiple use of the Fraser was severely threatened by what's happening there.

The multiple use.... We know what it is: it's a place for logging, fishing and recreation, but it's also a sewer. I don't know if it's still true, but the last time I looked, New Westminster had about five outfalls of primary sewage right in the Fraser. Now if we're interested in a clean environment, I don't see how we can tolerate that kind of stuff. But to correct it costs a lot of money, megabucks. So I would like to ask him if he would look into that.

Turning to a couple of other matters, I guess the most emotional issue to some people in the Coquitlam basin is the Coquitlam River, It's had various forms of assault directed against it over the years. I suppose the most massive one was the original hydro dam that was put in there to trap water ultimately to feed the Lake Buntzen power plant.

AN HON. MEMBER: And the gravel pit.

MR. ROSE: Then the gravel pit operators on the edge of the river. Going back to 1966, I was an alderman in Coquitlam, and we had lots of fun with them then. We still have fun with them. It rains sometimes, and then their settling ponds seem to become unsettled. The fish population there has been obliterated by a combination of less-than-adequate runoff at the right times of the year plus the solid pollution of the sediment there that comes out.

The next assault on the Coquitlam basin has been the proposed GVWD diversion of Ore and Hixon Creeks from their natural movement into that river, into the dam, in effect raising the dam and providing more water for Lake Buntzen and also, incidentally, more spillage so that the water needs of a growing population in the lower mainland can be satisfied.

[ Page 6034 ]

Doing that and proposing this avoids some other difficult problems, such as the possible park on the North Shore, the Lower Seymour regional park. Actually, there could be more water in that source developed, but only at the expense of a park called Lower Seymour Park. Therefore, Coquitlam is again being asked to absorb an environmentally unsound proposition for the expense of the other members of the lower mainland municipalities.

I draw the minister's attention to it. I don't know that he has any direct authority, because the dam is controlled by Hydro. The dam is not controlled by the GVWD. Several alternatives have been put forward, and there's been a great big splashy flashy PR business justifying these diversions, and there are a lot of people on side. But the Port Coquitlam and District Hunting and Fishing Club is definitely opposed, including such luminaries as Bill Otway, who was once a candidate running against me and is well known to the member for Dewdney (Hon. Mr. Pelton).

MR. CHAIRMAN: Two minutes, Mr. Member.

MR. ROSE: Well, perhaps I could have an intervening speaker.

Let me say, just to conclude this little part of my diatribe, that I would like to direct the minister's attention to this matter and let him know that along with the Port Coquitlam gun club, I don't support the diversion of Ore and Hixon Creeks. There are other alternatives, such as buying off B.C. Hydro's licence. They've got a massive surplus there anyway. Lake Buntzen does not need the water, and diversions are environmentally unpredictable and unsafe. I commend that to him, if not for his own personal consideration then perhaps if the matter is ever discussed in cabinet.

HON. MR. PELTON: I'll start from the back and work forward for the hon. member. First of all, I have learned a few things in this short period of time I've been in the ministry. One thing I am aware of is that any kind of diversion requires the approval of our ministry. We're aware of the one you just mentioned. It has not been approved as yet, so that's one that we can keep....

Interjection.

HON. MR. PELTON: Well, let's drop the "as yet." It has not been approved to this point in time. No, it has not been approved.

Interjection.

HON. MR. PELTON: I know that.

MR. WILLIAMS: The Maple Ridge fish and game club feel the same way.

HON. MR. PELTON: Do they?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. All members will have their opportunity to participate in the estimates.

HON. MR. PELTON: This is turning into a long day.

Let's go back to the matter of the wetlands. The policy of the ministry is normally that we would not support filling of wetlands. As a matter of fact, in the fairly extensive diking system we have in the lower mainland, if there are any requests to change any of these dikes that are in a wetland location, they must not be changed and will not be changed unless that change is approved by the ministry, particularly the wildlife and fishing portions of the ministry. But then again there are occasions, as the hon. member is aware, where we do become involved; where areas within a flood plain are filled with sand that's pumped out of the river. But normally this is.... Certainly it wouldn't happen in a wetland per se area, where there are fish and wildlife involved.

AN HON. MEMBER: What about Burns Bog?

HON. MR. PELTON: I can't really speak to that one, hon. member. I could certainly find out for you, but they obviously have a permit in that particular area.

MR. ROSE: I was going to thank the minister for his fair reply, but I'm not particularly reassured. There's a lot of pressure on the ministry by the GVWD and others to divert those creeks. Before he does that, I would ask him if he would like to share my study of the matter, which was done by a hydrologist in that area. It was his suggestion that the best possible solution to this diversion, and also to supply the future needs of the growing population, was not to divert but just to buy the licence from Hydro — they would have a surplus anyway. Then that water could be not only controlled in terms of how much is allowed to be released at certain critical times of the year for fish, but also to have the full responsibility for it thereafter. Hydro certainly has massive surpluses in power at the moment and doesn't need them.

AN HON. MEMBER: They would prefer money.

MR. ROSE: Sure, they like money.

The Land Commission.... The minister says the ministry doesn't believe in filling in wetlands, but I can give him two or three examples, one right in his own riding. Low-lying land along Silver Creek has been filled with all kinds of junk — anything from garbage to stumps to whatever — and is now a driving range. That land along Silver Creek was under the Land Commission. Now there are proposals for it for some plant, and they have to have a rezoning and get it out of the Land Commission in order to do this.

AN HON. MEMBER: Fill the swamp.

MR. ROSE: That's exactly it! Right. And when you're up to your…in alligators, you sometimes forget that you entered the swamp for the purpose of filling it. But never mind that. Sure it's a swamp, but that's exactly what most people think: wetlands are waste lands.

Anyway, that's one example. Another example: if he goes along the main highway or the Lougheed Highway between Maillardville and Fraser Mills, north of the highway you'll see trailer parks and industrial plants and all the rest of it, all built on land that was once truck gardens and latterly a sort of cranberry swamp when the economics of truck gardening and imports and fast vehicles from Mexico made that industry no longer viable in that position. I can take him to dozens of places where this has happened. They did this in San Francisco until they nearly filled in the bay there; they had to

[ Page 6035 ]

outlaw it. Landfills to extend the land around the bay, until they nearly filled in the bay,

But I say to the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Chabot) that it's a misuse of.... I think it's ignorance to say.... I'm not saying he's ignorant but I think it's ignorant to say that wetland is waste land, that a swamp is wasteland. It's really the creative part of a great deal of marine life and waterfowl, and highly important. Unfortunately, the practice has been that someone will buy a swamp, a wetland — perhaps it's under the Land Commission — and put up a sign: "Free fill wanted." Pretty soon it's all filled up and they say: "Oh, you can't use that for agriculture anymore." That's the Silver Creek example.

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Well, it could be.

Anyway, I'll close with that. I see the former minister (Hon. Mr. Brummet) over there looking on with great interest. He had a kind of smug smirk on his face. I know he's an expert in certain aspects of environment, but I would....

AN HON. MEMBER: Wolves.

MR. ROSE: Wolfgang over there; yes.

I would welcome the minister's response.

HON. MR. PELTON: Mr. Chairman, I know the hon. member was involved in municipal politics for a long time, and unless it's a new rule in the last number of years — I refer specifically to the Silver Creek problem, where he mentions the wetlands being loaded with fill, and so on and so forth.... Certainly I would like to look into that one, because it seems to me, if I remember correctly, that you cannot fill agricultural land unless you get a permit from the Agricultural Land Commission. I'll certainly have a look into that one.

When I was on my feet before, I neglected to mention the Coquitlam River, which was raised by the member as being a problem area. We are well aware of this in the ministry. It's been a problem area for some time now. It relates to a number of issues, I guess, but the gravel pit operations certainly have seriously affected the fish resources in the river. As far back as 1980 there were some pretty heavy fines imposed on the people involved; there were also closure orders. But this didn't seem to bring about the improvement we were looking for. Subsequently a committee was formed to look into this. They were able to coordinate some interaction between government agencies and the gravel wash operators to try to improve the environmental impact in the area. As the member probably knows, they've put new settling ponds in there and they've got equipment for handling silt. I recently received some complaints that it appears the works that were put in are not working properly, are not doing the job they were intended to do. Of course, it might be exacerbated to an even greater extent if we get a few very heavy rains. But we're continuing to monitor the matter of the Coquitlam River.

[5:00]

MR. ROSE: The minister said that we're not supposed to fill in wetlands without a permit, without approval.

HON. MR. PELTON: Agricultural land.

MR. ROSE: Well, I don't think you should fill in wetlands either, but never mind that. Anyway, there was a preclusion from doing that.

There's another one he might be interested in visiting, right in my riding. The location is south of the Minnekhada farm — you know where that is; it's a GVRD regional park now — and east of the settled part, in what is left of the agricultural area of Port Coquitlam, between Pitt River and that area. It is very rich, the greenhouse area. There have been numerous examples of....

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: You're not supposed to transport soil either, but that soil is being removed there by the truckload; it's an industry in that area. Moving and selling soil off lands zoned as agricultural, if you couldn't police that....

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Don't heckle me. You had the responsibility for that right up until now. That's your problem. Don't make light of it. I'm trying to suggest to the minister that there are places where the law is being flaunted and violated. I think an inspector from the ALR has even been threatened in that area. So I just lay that one on you too — to keep you awake a few afternoons.

HON. MR. PELTON: Mr. Chairman, I would just like to remind the hon. member that the matter of the removal of soil.... . I'll look into it for him, but it doesn't fall within this ministry; it falls under the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

[Mr. Kempf in the chair.]

MR. LOCKSTEAD: First of all, this is the first opportunity I have had to congratulate the new Minister of Environment on his appointment. So please accept my congratulations.

I might tell you, Mr. Chairman, that over this last two hours or so.... We shall see at the end of the debate of these estimates, but up to this point — and you're two months or so in office — you seem to have gained a fairly good grasp of the situation in terms of your portfolio. That's very good.

Mr. Chairman, I have a whole lot of topics I wish to discuss.

HON. MR. CHABOT: Hurry up.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: We've got all summer. What's your hurry, Mr. Provincial Secretary? In fact, Mr. Chairman, I understand that the House will be recessing in August, and then we'll be coming back this fall to complete the session — that's just a rumour.

I'm going to be discussing a number of the items — and I'm giving the minister prior notice — particularly in the area of mariculture, flood control, and these kinds of issues. But right now we're on to one particular topic, waste disposal, and I'd like to stay on that topic. I'm not sure that the minister is aware of this matter. It has just recently been brought to my attention that a large international company, Genstar.... As you may recall, we had a confrontation in another part of my riding on Texada Island some years ago. The residents

[ Page 6036 ]

were very successful in lobbying the GVRD, and that proposal was finally — after a very long, hard and difficult fight — won by the residents of Texada Island and the regional board of the Powell River area.

The point I'm making here now is that in the last two weeks Genstar has entered into negotiations with a native Indian band in my riding — the Sliammon band, just some six miles north of Powell River — to dispose on part of their reserve, which happens to be an island called Harwood Island. Again, why pick on islands? But here we are again. They are now negotiating with that Indian band to possibly dump garbage on Harwood Island. Now Harwood Island is an island approximately.... It's less than a mile wide and probably a mile and a half long. It's a very small island and has no water on it.

This is possibly why the federal government, some hundred years or so ago, gave it to the native Indian people — because it was a big sandpile. Nonetheless it's a lovely island, a Gulf island that should be preserved, and certainly in my opinion not one that should have garbage dumped on it. I know, it's the old syndrome: not in my back yard, but that's fair enough. We're talking about another Gulf island that could possibly be ruined.

Now I don't know at what state the negotiations with Genstar are at this point, but I have a couple of specific questions for the minister. I wanted to ask first if the minister is aware that these negotiations are currently taking place between the native Indian band and Genstar. Secondly, even if the minister is not aware of such negotiations, I would like to know exactly what jurisdiction the provincial government has — and particularly the Minister of Environment — in dealing with an environmental matter involving a native Indian band which comes under federal jurisdiction.

In other words, will hearings be held? Will the normal review procedures through all the agencies be undertaken? Will the regional board be involved, or other interested groups in the area? I received a phone call just yesterday from a regional board member in Powell River who asked me these very questions, and asked me once again: "How do we proceed to stop this particular situation?" It becomes far more complicated when you're dealing with a native Indian band. They happen to be a very fine, understanding band, but nonetheless these negotiations are currently taking place.

So my reason for getting up at this point was to inform the minister of what is happening in that regard and to let the minister know we don't want the garbage up in that area; and secondly to ask the minister what he could do to prevent this situation from continuing.

HON. MR. PELTON: I have no great deal of knowledge about the negotiations that are going on, hon. member, but it was mentioned to me in a conversation that I had with Mr. Doug MacKay from GVRD. That's the only knowledge I have of it: that there have been or are still ongoing negotiations on this matter.

Normally we could give you some assurance by saying that before it could be converted for use as a landfill site it would require a permit. Inasmuch as I would imagine that it's Indian land and comes under federal jurisdiction, I would still think that we would have some authority about the issuance of a permit, but I'm just not sure. What I'd like to do, hon. member, if you would allow me, is to look into this particular one further and let you know.

MR. COCKE: Just a few words on this whole question of garbage. I heard years and years ago that by the turn of the century we'll be up to our elbows in garbage. And, you know, if we continue through that time it'll be over our heads. We have a terrible disrespect for this planet, an absolute disrespect, a disrespect that starts out in school. I'll take you to practically any school in this province, and go around it and you'll find McDonald's bags and all the rest of the things dumped on the street. We don't have the kind of respect that we should have.

If we are to survive as a civilization, we have to take care of this particular problem, and it's got to be one of the biggest. We have at our disposal a tremendous amount of usable garbage. Some jurisdictions take aspects of garbage and make fertilizer out of them. Some jurisdictions take aspects of garbage and make metals — you know, just bring the metal back to its original state and make metal for future use. Other areas use organic aspects of garbage to create power. It costs a few dollars. But I'll bet if we had the courage, instead of investing money — billions of dollars — in empty holes in the north.... Instead of doing that sort of thing, why aren't we spending some money which will give us — society — a return? I believe that we're going to have to come to terms with this very quickly.

We can carry this right on through to the most dangerous kinds and aspects of garbage of all, nuclear waste. We can send a spaceship into space about once a month these days, have it orbit the earth and then come back. It strikes me that what we should be doing with our nuclear waste is sending it right at the sun. Let the sun use it up. I believe, however, that this minister hasn't got much jurisdiction where that's concerned.

But I do believe that this government has jurisdiction with respect to how we handle our own garbage. I don't think we should be looking for more landfills, more Burns Bogs and all the rest of it. I think we should be trying to set aside the capital that's required to reuse or create power or make fertilizer and all the things that can be done with our own refuse. The sooner we get to that, the sooner we're going to get to a place in time where we can be assured that we're leaving a heritage, instead of a great heap of junk. If we have any respect for future generations, we should be respecting them now by putting all of our energy into this subject. This problem is not going to go away. We keep continually magnifying it, every day of the week. When I see those garbage trucks running around, it just gives me — knowing where they're going — a terrible sense of frustration. I believe that the sooner we get on with this job the sooner we're going to start leading other jurisdictions to do the same thing.

Mr. Chairman, we had better not only be critical of our kids in school; we'd better be critical of ourselves, because we're just like they are. We're dumping our garbage all over the world, and it's creating a less hospitable environment for us all. The sooner we get on with the job, the better off I think we're all going to be.

[5:15]

HON. MR. PELTON: As I have in the past on many occasions over the past 40-odd years, I agree with the things the hon. member for Westminster says. We certainly have no problem in recognizing that we do in fact have a problem, and it's one that has to be resolved.

I know I'm repeating myself, but basically the questions posed call for the same answer, and it might give some

[ Page 6037 ]

consolation. The plans that have been put together at this point in time by the GVRD are quite comprehensive in that they look at the very issues that have been the specific issues mentioned by the hon. member for New Westminster.

Within the incineration program, the first one that's being built — they're calling it the Belkin incinerator; it's being built in Burnaby — is in fact being built in conjunction with an industry, and there will be energy recovery and the utilization of either the steam or electricity which will be generated from the steam in the plant that's being built in that area.

Also the member might find it very interesting to note that in the program that has been devised through GVRD, they look for resource recovery and an extensive resource recovery and recycling program. That particular facet of the program is out for tender at this very moment.

MRS. WALLACE: I don't want to say too much more about this particular issue, but I do want to provide the minister with some concrete recommendations. He mentioned a little earlier to another member of this Legislature that he welcomed concrete recommendations.

In line with what my colleague from New Westminster has just said, those are the things that I hope this minister will consider. Let us be very cautious, to be sure of two things. First of all, we have in the GVRD the most modem and up-to-date methods of dealing with garbage. If what you tell me is so, that 25 percent of that waste is going to have to go into a landfill, then you don't have a good system. You should have 3 percent.

The second point is, when you talk about putting things out to private contract, I am concerned. The situation that happened in the United States with doing that was that actually the Mafia became involved, because they would take hazardous waste and slip it in with the other waste, and there was big money to be made in that from large producers of hazardous waste. When you put it into private hands, we do not have the assurance that our hazardous wastes are treated as they should be. So just those two cautions.

Now to the positive suggestions. First of all, sewage, and my colleague the member for Coquitlam-Moody (Mr. Rose) talked about the wetlands,

In Humboldt, Saskatchewan, they had to make a marsh. They didn't have any marshes. They have been purifying 30 percent of the waste from Humboldt, which is a town of 5,500 people, for the past several years on an experimental basis. A shallow lagoon is constructed about three feet deep, and cattails and reeds are planted. The cattails purify the water, and the water is discharged, not polluting the rivers that it goes into. In this experiment, nesting cover surrounds both the artificial treatment lagoons and patches of open water, and in that they have large numbers of wild waterfowl, which is something they are really attracting in Saskatchewan. Many were songbirds not found in other areas. The total cost, which is simply for maintenance and the harvesting of the cattails once a year, is $60,000. That is based on a system that is in existence in Krefeld, West Germany, which has successfully been using the same system for 15 years. The same system is now being taken to Meadow Lake in Saskatchewan, where they are going to take all the sewage and put it into that kind of man-made marsh to dispose of pollution. They are getting wood pellets from the reeds for energy, and they're doing that in Humboldt too. So in the long haul the $60,000 will be well recovered.

A Canadian company has developed a process that would convert as much as 50,000 tonnes of sewage sludge into a million barrels of oil and 250,000 tonnes of a coal-like material, while saving millions of dollars in sludge-disposal costs in any year. This technology transforms 95 percent of the carbon within the sludge into reusable energy sources. It's estimated that at the present time Canadian cities spend more than $100 million a year in disposal of such sludge. There we could use it. For every 50,000 tonnes, we could get a million barrels of oil and 250,000 tonnes of a coal-like substance.

Some areas are looking into producing fuel from refuse which can be burned with sewage sludge. Lime will be reclaimed from the sludge to treat incoming sewage. The steam will be used to generate electricity. So much for sewage, ways that we could utilize our sewage to make money if we had a little upfront capital.

Let's talk about garbage. A firm in Ontario has developed a process that turns garbage into energy. It eliminates the need for landfill sites and provides a good resource recovery system. The system could take all the garbage from the town in one year and convert it into 87 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, saving the town — and now hear this — $1 million a year that is now being wasted.

Conversion projects are being developed by the Ontario government and industry and municipalities working together, Mr. Minister, that will produce at least 3.2 percent of Ontario's energy by 1995, just from household garbage in Ontario. And that is the equivalent of 27 million barrels of oil annually, or enough to heat more than one million homes. These are not small projects. They're not half-hearted projects. You have to go the whole way.

In Hempstead, New York — and I mentioned this before, but I'll give you the specifics on it — a facility has been built that converts 2,000 tonnes of garbage a day into 250 million kilowatt-hours of electricity a year, enough to meet the electricity needs of 15 percent of the area homes. The facility not only produced electricity; it reduces the town's garbage to an inorganic ash, which is equal to only 3 percent in volume of the original mass of waste.

There are similar facilities, Mr. Chairman, in Ohio, Japan and Florida. Holland has recently built a plant that uses a combination of sorting, burning and composting to turn garbage into fertilizer as well as recycled materials. Even scrap plastic is extracted. As I mentioned before, there are two systems, the wet and the dry system, for taking out all those various substances.

In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, there is a trash-to-steam plant that can bum 740 tonnes of garbage daily. That would be the amount produced by a city of 423,000 people. The population of Harrisburg is only about half that. So they're taking in from surrounding areas. So once they get that in from surrounding areas they will be able to use it all for electricity. Presently they have some surplus steam, but that can be accommodated as soon as they get the extra in. The way that works is that a truck pulls up to the facility, dumps the household garbage into a 10-metre pit and a grapple lifts the garbage a ton at a time and puts it in a furnace that's heated to 980 degrees. That's the secret as far as disposition of any items that you might be concerned about. The steam is produced by burning the material and is sent through pipes to the city centre.

So there are lots of ways of moving, Mr. Chairman, that in the long haul.... Those long-term goals you're talking about, Mr. Minister, would be realized at less cost than the

[ Page 6038 ]

problems that will be occurring if we don't do it. I used the lily-pond analogy earlier, and I suggest that we're close to the twenty-seventh day. We may think we've got half a pond, but tomorrow the lily pads, or the garbage, may have spread to cover the whole. A political solution area by area is not good enough. We have to grasp the nettle and do it now. I see the minister is nodding his head, and I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman. I think with that I would like to leave the garbage question, at least, and move on to another issue.

The one that I would like to move onto now is chemicals. We've touched briefly on chemicals because they are involved in garbage, so I think it's a natural to follow. One of my concerns is the way the appeals operate when a citizen or a group want to appeal the use of chemicals. There are so many deterrents in their way. For every single application they have to put up $25, and it becomes an impossibility. This is supposed to be keeping the frivolous appeals out. What it is doing is keeping out the appeals of concerned people who don't have big bucks. That is almost an infringement on our bill of rights.

I would just like to draw to the minister's attention — we've been talking about PCBs — that Chicago very recently came up with a process for getting PCBs out of sediment in harbours. What I'm trying to point out — again, almost harping back to the garbage thing — is that those processes are available. We don't have to wait for those technologies. They're there. We just need to search them out.

A UBC professor in Vancouver has come up with the fact that sulphate emissions — and we're talking about acid rain now — do create health problems. He's done some very extensive studies in Vancouver relative to the health problems. You know, the feeling was that now, seeing that it was related to human health, just maybe something would happen. When you related it to maybe killing some trees or some fish, or destroying the water, it didn't seem to be as important as when you related it to human health. It's unfortunate that we have to wait for that very demonstrable and almost acute situation before we're prepared to do anything about it. I think the minister may well just recognize that. I would hope that he would use his authority and his influence to encourage his government to ensure that he has the kind of support in research and in funding to allow us to start moving before the thing gets so out of hand that we're into the loss of our forests, as happened in eastern Canada and in the States. They figure 50 percent of those forests in that area will be destroyed by acid rain. Let's not wait until that happens in B.C.; let's move now.

Spraying. We're always concerned about spraying. We are so concerned about what chemicals we're using. One of the most flagrant things that happens is the fact that a company like the CPR or the CNR that has federal authority behind it, that is federally franchised or recognized.... We apparently don't have any real control over them. What we find is that before we even have advice of it, as is usually the case when it's dealt with through the provincial ministry, that spraying is done.

It's happened time and again along the E&N right-of-way here on Vancouver Island. We have been trying for some time to find out what was sprayed on the first of May on the E&N near Chemainus, and we haven't been able to find out. I haven't been phoning you personally, but I've had my staff phoning your staff, and we can't seem to find out what it was. There is a real concern there. It's an individual, you know; her life is important, and also the life of the child she's carrying. She's a pregnant woman who was there and was practically sprayed with this stuff. We're trying to find out what it is, and we can't find out. That's a real concern.

[5:30]

[Mr. Ree in the chair.]

My counterpart in Ottawa, Mr. Manly, the MP for the area I represent, has a private member's bill on the order paper which would ensure that federal authorities abide by any provincial regulations relative to spraying. I would hope that that bill is called. I hope that it will be passed, because we certainly need all the control we can get over the chemicals that are used here.

We talked about the mobile plant for PCBs. You should check with your colleague the Minister of Energy (Hon. Mr. Rogers), because B.C. Hydro has something in hand right here.

No discussion on environment would be complete without mentioning 2, 4-D. This is a very questionable chemical, and it is used more freely than we think. You go out and buy — what is it? — Weed and Feed. If you look at the fine print, it's got a lot of 2, 4-D in it. If you spread it on your lawn and your kids roll around on that, it's very hazardous. I would like the minister to comment on that as well.

HON. MR. PELTON: Just a couple of comments in an endeavour to answer some of the points you've raised, hon. member. But first of all, I'd like to ask you if you would be.... I was very interested in something you said at the outset regarding the breakdown when you incinerate. You had read or you had knowledge of a system whereby there was only 3 percent left that had to be disposed of. I'd appreciate knowing more about that.

The other thing that I found very interesting was when you were talking about the effluent in Saskatchewan. You mentioned about it being put into the reeds and how it came out reasonably pure. The question I would be interested in there was what treatment that effluent had before it was put into that particular environment — whether it had primary treatment, primary and secondary, or whatever. I'd appreciate knowing that.

I know that you have been concerned about pesticides and their use for many years. I've read through some of the back issues of Hansard before coming in here today. One of the major problems we used to have was that the railways could spray along their right-of-way with a certain amount of immunity. But I think you'll be pleased to know that they have agreed — both the CPR and the CNR — to come under the provincial pesticide regulations. So we will have a handle on that from here on in down the road.

Interjection.

HON. MR. PELTON: I haven't got the answer to that right off the top of my head.

On the matter of 2, 4-D, it is a very noxious chemical. My particular knowledge of its use relates to the Eurasian milfoil, which as you know is a real problem in the interior, the Okanagan particularly, and also a problem in the lower mainland in places. We have some Eurasian milfoil problems out in Hatzic Lake. It does the job very well, but it's so toxic that people just don't want to use it; so they resort to other methods of taking care of Eurasian milfoil, like harvesting it and this kind of thing. We do know — I'm told, at least; I've

[ Page 6039 ]

never done this, but I'm told — that flying over Okanagan Lake you can look down and see the areas that are completely free of the milfoil. You know what has happened there, but you don't know how. It's a matter of policing in some way or other, I suppose. I would suspect, since 2, 4-D is the only thing that has ever proved effective on Eurasian milfoil, that it's happening there. I appreciate your concern on that matter. We're likewise concerned.

One other point that you mentioned related to the $25 fee before you can appeal. I'll tell you right here and now that I agree with you, and I'm going to do my utmost to do something about that. I think that's probably a very unfair way to operate the system, to put that tag.... I know what it was for; as you suggested, for frivolous appeals. I guess we'll continue to get those as well, but some people who have genuine concerns find it difficult to come up with even $25. So I think we should look into that.

You mentioned acid rain. As you probably know, British Columbia is very fortunate in having levels of acid rain that are well within the tolerance levels. We have a continuing program where we monitor the amount of sulphides, and we will continue to do that. We do this so regularly that I think if there was any appreciable increase we would know about it almost immediately. We believe that a lot of the acid rain that does come into this area comes from a plant across the border. We also understand that this particular plant is being shut down, and this should ameliorate our acid rain problems even further. But the hon. member may be assured that this is an ongoing thing with the ministry — the matter of acid rain, that is. We're monitoring it continually.

If I've missed any of your questions, hon. member, if you will remind me of which one I missed, I'll respond.

MRS. WALLACE: No, you haven't missed any, but I just want to talk a little more about 2, 4-D. You mentioned how potent it is on milfoil, but you use it because there are no alternatives. I think there are some alternatives, but because 2, 4-D works so well, we haven't really looked seriously at using some of those alternatives. I would just point out to you that it works so well on milfoil probably because of the type of thing it is. It's a — I'm not even going to try to pronounce it, but I'll spell it for Hansard — phenoxyalkanoic acid. It is the most dangerous of the herbicides in terms of damaging effects on health. It has a hormonal action like estrogen. For example, a tree sprayed with 2, 4-D will have a sudden spurt of uncontrolled growth and will twist and then die. That's what happens with the milfoil. But it also has the same effect on human beings. It causes birth defects, interfering with the functioning of hereditary molecules which direct the organ to the formation structure and function. It has the same effect, you see; it affects growth and proper development. The kinds of things we get are cleft palates, incomplete formation of the face, abnormally located intestines, abnormal enlargement of the cranium, stillbirths, miscarriages and others.

I have some examples, which I won't bore the House with but I'd be happy to send you, of specific cases where it has been shown that these things have happened as a result of the use of 2, 4-D. Now it used to be used in conjunction with 2, 4, 5-T. I remember in the days that I worked at Hydro, we got something called Brush Killer, which was a combination of 2, 4-D and 2, 4, 5-T. We have taken the step with 2, 4, 5-T: we've agreed that it shouldn't be here; we've banned it. Why not ban 2, 4-D? It is used so freely, and what really bothers me is when we put it on our lawns and in our water we swim in, and then we send our kids out in little bathing suits to play in the grass or to go swimming in that water. Who knows what we're doing to them? It's not worth the risk, and I would urge the minister to take action on 2, 4-D.

MR. MITCHELL: What I'd like to do is follow along on something that my colleague has just mentioned. It's commonly called Agent Orange, which is a fifty-fifty combination of 2, 4-D and 2, 4, 5-T that was used very extensively by B.C. Hydro and is being used by the logging industry. I guess it was the only thing available for the job that they wanted to do. When it came in and was used very extensively, there was very little research done by any government, There are a lot of victims of industrial accidents who are now starting to show up in the health system, in our hospitals and in the ranks of the unemployed.

These people were hired by Hydro and by other companies to spray it. The big problem was that they were hired and they were not given the proper instructions. We didn't have the standards that we have today. Consequently, in some cases that I've researched — and I've spoken to people who were involved in it — they would go to work wearing cut-off shorts and T-shirts and they would literally use the spray in spray fights among themselves.

We all look at that with twenty-twenty hindsight, realizing the damage it caused to them. But I feel that governments, society and the community have some responsibility for some of the types of damages that are now starting to appear. What studies have been made within your ministry on the problems that are taking place now and have taken place in the last ten years and are showing up more and more? They have the same symptoms as the Vietnam vets. When they came out of Vietnam, they had the same type of symptoms. They managed to take a class action in the United States against Dow Chemical, and I believe they settled out of court for something like $180 million.

I know there is not the public appeal or the publicity or the large veteran organizations behind the people who are suffering from the same problems here. The minister can correct my assumption or belief when he answers if I'm wrong, but I believe that though the government has a policy of not using 2, 4, 5-T, it has not been officially banned. There are no regulations or orders-in-council actually banning it, It may be that the ministry's policy not to issue permits at the present time is in vogue, but I want some assurance. Is that his policy? Or is it the policy today, but maybe six months or a year from now some other situation will come up where the combination of 2, 4-D and 2, 4, 5-T — a fifty-fifty mixture, commonly called Agent Orange — can still be used?

[5:45]

The main question I would like the minister to answer is: has there been in his ministry any support given for or studies made of the spinoff results of misuse of the various herbicides by people because of insufficient education or insufficient direction or regulations by the Ministry of Environment in the past? These victims are out there. They are starting to show. They don't have the financial resources that the veterans from Vietnam had, but someone within the Ministry of Environment or the Ministry of Health or the Ministry of Attorney-General.... There must be some support given to them. There must be some exposure of the results. There should be some studies made of what is happening and what is going to happen.

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I know that a lot of the trade unions, who are worried about it, and a lot of the health organizations and environmental groups, individually, are making studies, but what I'm finding is that they're really not coordinated to the extent that some solid support or legal advice.... These chemicals were allowed to be sold; they were allowed to be manufactured. I think we all know that some of the tests that were made are now considered not to have been made honestly. They were not made properly, but they were accepted by the federal government. What is the position right now? Is it a policy, or is it a hard and fast regulation, order-in-council, or whatever comes into play to completely ban it and ban its use?

HON. MR. PELTON: Hon. member, I think that some of the points you've made.... I must start by saying that I certainly admire your extensive knowledge of this particular subject. I think latterly in what you were saying that we were kind of crossing over some borders, and maybe it was getting into the authority of the Ministry of Health.

Insofar as 2, 4, 5-T is concerned, it has never been banned per se in this province. However, this province, along with two others, is the only province in Canada that has.... We have listed ours under one of the schedules of the Pesticide Control Act. Insofar as we're concerned, this particular pesticide hasn't been used for quite a number of years.

There is no ongoing testing program that I am aware of, although it was known that at one time a number of years ago 2, 4, 5-T had been used in keeping the area clear on the border between the state of Washington and British Columbia. Some fairly extensive tests were conducted there, and it was found that there was no residual around that would cause any trouble.

As I said before, 2, 4-D, as the hon. member knows, is licensed or approved for use by the federal government. But in this province we actually control its sale, the people who are authorized to sell it and the retail outlets through which it's sold. There has to be a permit involved. Although I appreciate the concern of the hon. member — both the hon. members — I would suggest that the various controls which are in place in this province are effective.

MR. MITCHELL: I would like to ask the minister to confirm that he's saying that there is no outright ban; that the myth that's out in the community.... Every so often you see in the press that 2, 4, 5-T is banned for use in B.C., but it's not. As a policy, it's not being used, but that policy can change. One thing I find to be a great concern is that it's sprayed on certain areas, and when they make tests later on they find no trace of it. What happens is that because it's water soluble it does get into the water table and is washed away. This is where the great danger is. I think the policy of B.C. Hydro for years, whenever they put in a substation, was to literally saturate that ground with Brush Killer, with the idea of stopping weeds that would cause any damage to the electrical fixtures. The big problem with that is that the majority of the bases for the Hydro substations were gravel, and the water and rain and everything leached it out. The Brush Killer and the 2, 4-D and the Agent Orange — whatever you want to call it — would then get into the rivers right around that area.

I think the majority of the damage is going to be coming; it's like a hidden bomb that's going to explode. I think we should be doing that follow-up now. We should be doing the studies. We should be checking back on some of the people who were exposed to it unnecessarily. I know that the Minister of Health will be faced with this problem somewhere along the line.

There are some other facts that I would like to go into later on, Mr. Chairman, but looking at the time, I would like to move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

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

Hon. Mr. Nielsen moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:53 p.m.