[ Page 785 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Oral Questions

Vancouver Island hydro rates. Mr. G. Hanson –– 785

Extension of B.C. Hydro grid. Mr. Guno –– 785

Pharmacy dispensing fees. Mr. Stupich –– 785

Ms. A. Hagen

Removal of Lac La Hache land from ALR. Mr. Rose –– 786

Regulations regarding access to legislature lawn. Mr. Sihota –– 786

Facility for brain-damage victims. Mr. Stupich –– 786

Federal-provincial council on economic development. Mr. Harcourt –– 787

Price of beer. Mr. Blencoe –– 787

Ministerial Statement

Organ donor awareness week. Hon. Mr. Dueck –– 787

Mrs. Boone

Tabling Documents –– 787

Teaching Profession Act (Bill 20). Second reading

Mr. Jones –– 787

Mr. Peterson –– 796

Mr. Rose –– 797

On the amendment

Hon. Mr. Strachan –– 801

Mr. Dirks –– 801

Ms. A. Hagen –– 803

Mrs. Gran –– 806

Appendix –– 808

The House met at 2:08 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: It's certainly my honour to introduce an old friend and entrepreneur of this province. I got to know him in the North Peace. He was one of those people who helped build the north. He built up Kaps Transport in the oil and gas industry. I'm doing this on behalf of the members for Okanagan South (Messrs. Serwa and Chalmers), because he is now resident there, carrying with him that spirit of taking risks and working hard in order to make things happen — with the impatience that will make him do it. So it is an honour to introduce Boomer Kapchinsky.

MR. ROSE: I just wonder, Mr. Speaker, whether it's in order and good taste to give commercials while you're doing introductions. I have a few of my own, and I'm selling time downtown on these things.

I'd like to welcome a class of grade 10 students from my riding of Coquitlam-Moody. They're here with their teacher, Mr. Meronuk, and have spent the day touring the Legislature. They're here to learn everything about parliamentary democracy, but they were afraid to ask.

HON. B.R. SMITH: I'd like the House to make welcome two constituents of mine, Mr. and Mrs. Harry Braun.

HON. MR. PARKER: In the precincts today are a couple of old friends of mine, and I'd like the House to bid them welcome: John Williams of Terrace and Don Longstaff of North Vancouver. They are with Wedeene River Contracting Co. Ltd., which is presently building a brand-new sawmill in Prince Rupert.

MR. LOENEN: I'd like the House to welcome a constituent, Mr. Gus Froese, who is a businessman and has great dreams about constructing a permanent link between the Island and the mainland. Please welcome Gus Froese.

Oral Questions

VANCOUVER ISLAND HYDRO RATES

MR. G. HANSON: I have a question for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources. In answer to my question on April 2, the minister said that an announcement on lower rates for electrical space heating on Vancouver Island would be forthcoming from B. C. Hydro. Now we hear the Premier is resurrecting the concept of a gas pipeline to the Island through the United States, even though the minister expressed reservations about this idea in this assembly last May 12 due to our public investment in the Cheekye-Dunsmuir line. My question is: has the minister decided when he will be announcing specific details about the lower electrical rates for Vancouver Island, or is he now assisting the Premier with the pipeline project?

HON. MR. DAVIS: B.C. Hydro will be announcing an electric space heating rate around the middle of June. Hopefully the Utilities Commission will approve that rate and it will be applicable across the province. That rate, or that energy, that low-cost electrical energy, won't be available in areas which are supplied with natural gas or which prospectively might be supplied with natural gas.

MR. G. HANSON: A supplementary. We certainly appreciate the minister's comments. I'd just like to ask him if he envisions or has he decided that the electrical rates for Vancouver Island would be at the gas rate, similar to the distribution system on the mainland?

HON. MR. DAVIS: The rate would be uniform across the province. It would be available to all consumers on Vancouver Island at the same price as elsewhere in the province.

MR. G. HANSON: Another supplementary, Mr. Speaker. I was wondering if he'd advise the House how he sees the construction of a gas pipeline along with the electrical power from Cheekye-Dunsmuir. How does he see both of those being financed?

HON. MR. DAVIS: As I understand the Premier said in Ladysmith, we'll look at any project which could bring natural gas to Vancouver Island, and we're busy looking at the latest proposal.

EXTENSION OF B.C. HYDRO GRID

MR. GUNO: My question is to the Minister of Energy. After I questioned the minister last Wednesday about the extension of the B.C. Hydro grid to Stewart, he indicated publicly that it would likely follow approval of the Mount Klappan project. Can the minister confirm that it is the policy of the government that the extension of the grid to Stewart is the preferred option?

[2:15]

HON. MR. DAVIS: The extension of B.C. Hydro's grid to the northwestern comer of the province is under study. There is no assurance at the moment that the Mount Klappan project would proceed, and it may be that the extension would occur without the Mount Klappan project being an integral part of that development.

PHARMACY DISPENSING FEES

MR. STUPICH: A question to the Minister of Finance. Several times since budget day, I and members of my staff have been trying to find out the details of the increase in GAIN, with reference particularly to the $5 prescription fee being charged, and all we get are people who say that they've heard something about it but have had no instructions yet in the Ministry of Social Services and Housing and the Ministry of Health. What I really want to know is, which ministry would have the answer or answers?

HON. MR. COUVELIER: We will be clarifying that matter in the very near future.

MR. STUPICH: Mr. Speaker, the policy was announced in the budget of March 19, and it would seem as though the message has not yet gotten to the people responsible for administering GAIN, so I'd like the minister to be able to tell

[ Page 786 ]

us in the House as soon as he can when somebody tells somebody, whoever it is, what's happening.

HON. MR. COUVELIER: That sounds like an eminently reasonable query, and we will respond to it as soon as possible.

MS. A. HAGEN: A question to the Minister of Social Services and Housing, in the same vein as the question asked of the Minister of Finance. There have been a number of questions about processes to ensure that those people who are not able to pay the $5 fee for the dispensing portion of their drugs and who are not going to be covered by the additional GAIN procedures have some assistance. Could the minister please indicate what action he is taking to ensure that no person will be deprived of drugs because of inability to pay?

HON. MR. RICHMOND: Mr. Speaker, the member is quite correct that those people on income assistance will not have to pay that fee, and the staff is working on the details at the moment. As the Minister of Finance said, as soon as they're available, we will be making that announcement.

REMOVAL OF LAC LA HACHE LAND FROM ALR

MR. ROSE: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Agriculture. On Friday we were talking about.... Acreage on the north shore of Lac la Hache, technically known as DL148, was removed from the land reserve in 1986 by the land use committee. I would like to ask the minister if he's had representations from the Cattlemen's Association and the Federation of Agriculture, or concerns of the regional district. Has he considered making some move, because of pollution of the lake and the loss of agricultural and grazing land, to put this parcel back into the reserve?

HON. MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Speaker, I have had a couple of presentations made to me, but not by the Federation of Agriculture. In both cases they are local people who have asked why the decision was made the way it was, and I'm having my staff check into it. But I believe that under ELUC a decision cannot be reversed.

MR. ROSE: Supplementary to the same minister. The cabinet can reverse all decisions, as can the regional district and the owner. They can make representations to cabinet. So in view of the local concerns and the minister's own words last Friday, what's going to happen to humans if we don't have enough agricultural land to produce food? Could I ask the minister if he will consider, upon these recommendations from the various groups he's mentioned, pressing cabinet to reconsider and to put that particular controversial parcel right back into the land reserve where it belongs?

HON. MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Speaker, the staff of the Agricultural Land Commission is reviewing the subject case, and I will expect a report in my office very shortly. I agree with the hon. member that it can come to cabinet, but ELUC itself cannot reverse that decision.

REGULATIONS REGARDING ACCESS
TO LEGISLATURE LAWN

MR. SIHOTA: Mr. Speaker, a question to the Provincial Secretary. On Friday the Provincial Secretary brought down by order-in-council what I would consider to be very heavy-handed regulations governing people out on the steps of the Legislature, which proves all along that prior to this there had been no authority granted to the government to move these people. My question is this: the regulations talk about permits; what system has the Provincial Secretary developed to date to allow people to secure permits before they go on to the steps of the Legislature?

HON. MR. VEITCH: Again, the Hon. member is a lawyer and I am not; I don't have that advantage — or disadvantage, as the case may be — with great respect to my colleague over there. However, the Hon. member knows that we're acting under the common law on the previous occasions, and that case has been dealt with in the courts and conveniently put to one side. Beyond that, nobody requires any permits to walk on the lawns or to stand on the steps of the Legislature, so I suggest you go back and read the regulations again. Once you understand them, you could ask some more questions.

MR. SIHOTA: I won't react to that in the manner that the minister would expect me to. Let me just rephrase the question and ask it again. It talks in the regulations about a system for permits to obtain the minister's approval to use the lawns and the precincts for certain functions. Is there a system in place right now to issue permits or a way in which to obtain the minister's approval?

HON. MR. VEITCH: I can assure the hon. member that there will be no permits issued for tenting on the front lawn of the Legislature. So if you have any relatives or anybody who wants to do that, they can't have the permit. So I'm just putting that message out right now. But if anyone wants to use the front lawns of the Legislature for any legitimate purpose, of course they can apply to the Provincial Secretary's office and they'll be granted that authority.

MR. SIHOTA: Supplementary, again. What is the procedure for that application? Is there a fee? What are your guidelines to obtain approval?

HON. MR. VEITCH: I suggest you read the order-in-council again, and read it more carefully. You'll see that it's not onerous in any way and that the guidelines are fairly carefully spelled out in that order-in-council.

FACILITY FOR BRAIN-DAMAGE VICTIMS

MR. STUPICH: I have a question to the Minister of Health. Included in the budget speech was a reference to a new facility for treating victims of brain damage. I wondered whether the minister has decided where that is going to be located now.

HON. MR. DUECK: Mr. Speaker, that is referring to the item in the budget speech. It is under review now. A decision has not yet been made, but we should come forth with a definite decision on that very soon.

[Page 787 ]

FEDERAL-PROVINCIAL COUNCIL
ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

MR. HARCOURT: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Economic Development about federal-provincial cooperation on economic development. It seems, after some initial friction with the federal government, that that council of ministers has settled down and is addressing the serious questions about economic development. I would like to ask the minister, given the good non-partisan precedents such as the establishment of the Board of Internal Economy and the Premier's inclusion of the Leader of the Opposition at constitutional conferences, if the minister has given consideration to including representation from this caucus at that council.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition for that question. The memorandum of understanding which we have entered into with the federal administration will see very many representatives from the community, including the representatives of councils, boards of trade and so on. If he is making the suggestion, we will give that some consideration. It is not established as yet, Mr. Speaker, but will be in the next few days or weeks.

MR. HARCOURT: Mr. Speaker, we appreciate that kind of representation, but I was speaking about being able to participate as an observer or in some other capacity with the council, so that we could have a bipartisan presence on this very important council of ministers. Is that something that the minister would also be prepared to consider?

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: Mr. Speaker, what we are embarking on in the Pacific Centre for Trade, Commerce and Travel is probably one of the most exciting economic initiatives for this province. Everyone has an interest. That surely will be given consideration.

PRICE OF BEER

MR. BLENCOE: A question to the minister responsible for consumer affairs. Last week, two more breweries announced increases in the price of beer. As you know, this government and the Premier during the election announced that there would be reduction in the price of beer. I am wondering if the minister has taken any action to actually live up to the promise of a reduction in beer, so that working people can see real action on Socred election promises and have a reduction in beer prices.

HON. L. HANSON: Well, Mr. Speaker, first of all, I believe the hon. member has the wrong ministry. I am in charge of liquor licensing and certainly have no responsibilities in price control. Certainly the price of beer is deregulated. The private enterprise sets the price for beer, and my ministry is not intending to take any action.

Ministerial Statement

ORGAN DONOR AWARENESS WEEK

HON. MR. DUECK: Mr. Speaker, today I wish to announce the occasion of Organ Donor Awareness Week, which will be observed nationwide from April 26 to May 2. British Columbia welcomes this opportunity to join with the entire country in stressing the importance of organ and tissue donations and meeting the growing need of patients who require organs for transplantation.

In British Columbia the Pacific Organ Retrieval for Transplantation program is funded by the Ministry of Health and coordinates organ retrieval efforts with the B.C. Heart Transplant Society. The program will be observing the week with publicity campaigns in various shopping malls and by promoting the need for organ donation through the news media. The British Columbia Medical Association is also helping to promote organ donation awareness and has recently approved the distribution to its members of wallet sized cards containing information for physicians on organ donation procedures. The Law Society of British Columbia as well has expressed support and is working with the PORT program to increase organ donor awareness among the members of the Law Society and their clients.

I am pleased to note the increasing awareness of the need for organ donations. I am also confident that our recent rapid progress in developing an integrated provincial transplantation service will continue and increase.

MRS. BOONE: Mr. Speaker, the opposition welcomes this and supports the government in any way that they can increase organ donorships throughout the province, anything by way of, as my colleague from Nanaimo stated, marking it on your driver's licence, computerization for this service. Anything along this line would certainly help the province of B.C. and we support the government in their stand.

Hon. Mrs. McCarthy tabled the eighth annual report of the Science Council of British Columbia, 1985-86; the Ministry of Universities, Science and Communications annual report, 1984-85; and the British Columbia Research annual report, 1985.

[2:30]

Hon. L. Hanson tabled a response to written question No. 11 in Orders of the Day for April 21; and the annual report of the Ministry of Consumer and Corporate Affairs.

Orders of the Day

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 20 — I believe the member for Burnaby North adjourned debate.

TEACHING PROFESSION ACT
(continued)

MR. SPEAKER: The member for Burnaby North has I hour and 25 minutes remaining.

MR. JONES: I'd like to take a minute to try to clarify the concern I had on Friday about the timing of the introduction of this legislation. My understanding of the sequence of events leading up to the introduction of Bill 20 last Thursday afternoon is that there was a tripartite meeting of government, BCSTA and B.C. Teachers to try to — for the first time, I think — have meaningful consultation on this legislation. Before that, the teachers in this province had taken a vote, in which they would take some action if there was no meaningful consultation. That was their threat. The Premier made a similar kind of threat. The Premier threatened — and it was

[ Page 788 ]

reported in the Times-Colonist last Tuesday — that if the teachers were to go on strike, the Premier would only encourage his government to push through the legislation more quickly than originally planned. So we had threats on both sides. For the first time we had the possibility of meaningful consultation.

At that point the teachers decided to postpone for a week their intended action. It seems to me that if the government was interested in this meaningful consultation process and if, as the minister indicated, they really wanted input into the process, that would have been a point where the government could have proceeded with those talks, without any other sort of action. Instead, the government chose what might be called the preemptive strike — bringing in second reading of Bill 20, which we're discussing today.

As a result, I think the government has to bear the responsibility for any sort of action that follows. I think it's clear from their action that their agenda is really one of confrontation and not one of consultation. I hope that's not true. I hope the talks will be fruitful. But I'm afraid, from the actions that we've seen in this House, that it is confrontation that the government is interested in.

On Friday I tried to frame my concerns about this bill in terms of three contexts: the context of the schoolchildren of this province and what Bill 20 holds for them; the Canadian context, and how Bill 20 fits into other situations across this country; and the historical context — the timing of the introduction of this bill, looking at it in terms of the last five or ten years, and its impact on our education system by its introduction at this time. I think it was very easy to conclude that in terms of what this bill does for the schoolchildren of the province, it is a negative bill. It will have a negative impact on relationships between teachers and schoolchildren; it will have a negative impact on the students of our province. It's not only the bill that will have that impact, but also, as I mentioned, the method by which this process has gone on, which brought it to introduction last Thursday. There's nothing in Bill 20 for children. It's not in the best interests of the schoolchildren of this province or of the province at large.

I also tried to raise the Canadian context and what Bill 20 does for us as a province, in terms of what goes on in the rest of Canada. I think it singles us out as a province, because there is no other province in Canada that divides its teachers' organizations; and those organizations in other provinces have had bargaining rights for years. There's no other province with a college of teachers. I think it's probably clear to most in this House that such legislation was attempted in Ontario and Alberta, and was wisely withdrawn. There is only one other province in Canada that separates principals and vice-principals from their teachers' organizations. I think we were left with the question, as a result of trying to frame Bill 20 in the Canadian context: why doesn't B.C. fit? Why is B.C. different? I would like to examine that a little further.

I also tried to frame Bill 20 in a historical context and tried to have a took at the backdrop, the stage onto which Bill 20 is being dropped. I think everybody in this province would agree that we have gone through the worst possible period in the education history of this province in the last few years. We've seen our province, as far as education is concerned, as being conflict-ridden, with a school system that could be characterized as fighting for its life under continual attacks in terms of funding and attacks on morale by the Socred government. We see the loss of some 3,000 teachers. Not only have we seen financial and morale damage, but we've seen education become more than ever, and more in this province than in any other, a political football.

We were hoping that this would be an end, with an election, with promises of an end to confrontation, with promises of more moderation and of consensus-seeking; with the promise of a new minister who has an excellent background and understands the education system; with the maiden speeches that we heard in this House, where so many of the MLAs praised the teachers in their constituencies. We saw virtually identical briefs presented by the BCSTA and the BCTF to the Minister of Labour on collective bargaining rights for teachers. So there was hope there, and hope that we would see the much-needed stability and peace in our school system.

Until last Thursday, I think there was a good chance that that kind of hope could have borne fruit. But the introduction of Bill 20 makes no sense. It's very clear that by its introduction we're taken back in time; we're taken back to that period of confrontation that all of us want to leave behind us. We see that Bill 20 does not benefit the half-million schoolchildren in this province. It is out of line in the Canadian context. It doesn't fit; it's not appropriate; it's not the kind of thing that exists in other provinces. Also, it was injected at the worst possible time in history for the benefit of the school system in this province. There could not have been a worse time — a worse day, a worse month, a worse year, a worse session — to bring in this kind of legislation.

Considering that, Mr. Speaker, we must ask ourselves: what does this government want? Why is it bringing in this legislation at this time? It certainly begs common sense, and it does not produce the peace and harmony that we're interested in for our schoolchildren. The only thing we're left to conclude is that there must be some political reasons for bringing in this legislation, and at this time.

I would like to examine that further, but there are some features, some principles in and around Bill 20, that I would like to spend a few minutes discussing. One of those features is consultation. I'd also like to reflect on the role of principals and vice-principals in the school system. I would like to comment on the concept of freedom of association, on the concept of double jeopardy and on the idea of defence of our education system — on due process. I'd also like to try to give some analysis to what I think Bill 20 is all about.

On the first one, consultation, in the last while the minister has said a great deal about consultation in his public remarks and in letters to the editor. Yet at 5:30 last Thursday, when we were anticipating that we'd be dealing with the Attorney-General's estimates, and at a time when the press gallery had gone home, we saw — with threats on the government's side and on the teachers' side — that we had a chance for good-faith talks, a real chance for consultation and hope for a respite in confrontation, this bill was introduced. The only reason I can conclude was that it was to disrupt the consultation process; that the government is afraid of meaningful consultation and does not want it. The government wanted the teachers out of the schools. It wanted to provoke a reaction. It wanted to take the focus off this bill and put it on the problems, as we will see in the news probably tomorrow night, with teachers with their backs to the wall taking a stand.

When the introduction of this bill didn't scuttle talks.... Apparently the talks went very well; there was a good agenda established, and a timetable in which to pursue

[ Page 789 ]

those talks. When the introduction of the bill didn't scuttle the talks, the minister preemptively, again, issued a press release indicating that all this would go ahead, when it had not yet been agreed to by all parties. I think anyone can make mistakes. But the minister is a very experienced minister, and I think mistakes at this time are very serious. These are very sensitive discussions that are going on in this province with teachers, school trustees and the government. I think it's very sad and very unfortunate that these two things, which I hope have not placed those talks in jeopardy, have happened.

Those are some concerns I have in terms of consultation leading up to discussion of Bill 20 today. The concept of consultation is an interesting one. If I hire a consultant, or the government hires a consultant, I don't think I or the government would expect to agree with everything that consultant suggests. But I don't think you hire a consultant unless you're prepared to work with that consultant, to accept something of their ideas and to try to incorporate those ideas into the framework of the plans that the government might have. It's expected that the government would take into consideration the interests and the feelings of the parties involved in the consultation.

I'm not exactly sure what the Premier's idea of consultation is. I know he's reported as having said a couple of years ago that his type of democracy would require "less involvement by people. The more people get involved, the more gets lost" — Vancouver, April 1983. I know the Premier and the Minister of Education have received the teachers' Bargaining and Professional Rights Task Force report, which was some three years in preparation, with a very involved discussion, debate and democratic process producing that report. I think what we see in Bill 20 is some evidence not only of just having received that report, but perhaps not even having read it, because it was very clear on page 54 of that report that the idea of a teaching profession act with a college was a goal that had been eliminated by the B.C. Teachers' Federation.

The Minister of Labour (Hon. L. Hanson) has also received reports from the BCSTA and the BCTF, and has listened to presentations recently by those two bodies. I think the extent of the dialogue there was that the minister thanked those bodies for their presentation. Although there was virtual unanimity in the presentations of those two bodies, the minister, in his opening remarks, talked about divided opinion on these issues. I'm left with the question: is the government listening when they're receiving briefs? Is that what consultation is? Is a thank-you enough?

I believe that may be the beginning of consultation, but certainly consultation involves a lot more. It involves discussion, dialogue, debate and an understanding of the feelings and interests of those parties that you are in consultation with.

[2:45]

This process that we're engaged in right now is, I suppose, a consultation process. The minister, in introducing this bill.... The very first thing he said was that the government welcomed the input of various groups from the education community and from the community at large. Well, I don't know how, by the introduction of Bill 20, the minister is going to get input from the community at large. Certainly the media are focusing on what the government wants them to focus on now, and that is the problems in the school system. The focus is away from the debate on Bill 20, which is where the focus should be. It should be on the government and the government's bills, and what the government and the opposition have to say about it.

The minister went on to say that the bill is proceeding to second reading at this time to ensure opportunity for full, public debate. I don't see that full, public debate happening by the introduction of second reading. Certainly if we wanted full, public debate, there are numerous other vehicles for achieving that. Certainly us debating it here precludes public discussion. To set up the kind of consultation that is going on right now between the BCTF, BCSTA and government is good consultation, but if it were referred to a royal commission, that would provide an opportunity for public discussion.

I would like to comment further on the briefs to the Minister of Labour and try to decide whether or not the government was listening during that consultation process. In the briefs to the Minister of Labour, both the teachers and the trustees in this province made recommendations. The teachers' position — and I think it is an important one because I don't think it has been clear — in terms of salary bargaining was one of choice. Teachers in this province wanted the opportunity in the case of an impasse to choose between the strike option and arbitration. The reason for that is that the arbitration process has worked well for many years.

It had been particularly effective in terms of salary determination, and it's a process that avoided disruption of the schools. I think at this time the teachers were after the kind of process that existed under the Essential Service Disputes Act, which applies to nurses and firefighters in order to maintain those essential services and avoid a strike, if there is an opportunity for the choice of either the strike option or arbitration.

[Mrs. Gran in the chair.]

The trustees proposed a similar idea — not choice, but they wanted strike-lockout. So there was similarity between the teachers' and trustees' presentations to the Minister of Labour. In reality, the government has offered.... Certainly the government can say that some of what was asked for has been offered, because the strike-lockout provision is there for those locals that will be certified. The government might also say that the arbitration process is there. But the strike-lockout provision is one that is tremendously limited by Bill 19, a bill that really makes free collective bargaining in this province a myth.

What the teachers and trustees are asking for is not there anymore. They were looking for the Labour Code; the Labour Code is gone, so while the minister may say that we gave them what they wanted, we really didn't. The appearance is there but not the reality.

The arbitration aspect is unlikely to be functional, Madam Speaker, because boards traditionally are unwilling to submit to arbitration those items that they consider within their management prerogative. The arbitration process right now is still governed by the ability to pay, so it is very unlikely that the teachers or the trustees are going to be submitting very many of their disputes to arbitration.

We are stuck with strike-lockout, and I think we are stuck with somebody asking for something and having the tables turned on them. We are into predictable disruption as a result of this sort of fraud. On the concept of the expanded scope of bargaining that was asked for by both the teachers and the trustees, again it appears as though the government has

[ Page 790 ]

provided some opportunity for an expanded scope of bargaining. However, the question of that scope is still up in the air. The jury is out on that one; lawyers are still debating whether that scope is really there. I think the minister was sincere in improving the scope of bargaining; however, when there will be no bargaining on issues that will prevent or limit the exercise of power, authority or discretion of the school board, it is really questionable as to what the actual scope will be in bargaining.

In terms of the briefs on strike-lockout and expanded scope of bargaining, the government has given the appearance of satisfying those needs. Teachers and trustees also asked for the end to the CSP, and it is true that the CSP will end for the education sector in July 1988. But any arbitrations that occur after that will still be governed by the ability to pay as the paramount issue in that consideration, and, because the government holds the cards in funding, certainly the effectiveness of those arbitrations are going to be minimized. So in terms of ending CSP and expanded scope in bargaining and in strike-lockout, the appearance is there but not the reality. The government argues that they did deliver on those issues. It appears they delivered on the issues, but in reality they didn't.

It's not so much what was asked for and what was delivered in terms of appearance; it's what was not asked for. Neither teachers or trustees asked for a college to govern certification, discipline and professional development. Neither teachers nor trustees asked for a separation of the professional functions and the employee functions of the B.C. Teachers' Federation. Neither teachers nor trustees asked for the removal of automatic membership or the removal of principals from the bargaining unit. Neither teachers nor trustees wanted the administrators' bargaining rights removed in the process. Particularly, neither the BCTF nor the BCSTA asked for loss of control of the methodology of teaching in this province.

I think this is a very serious one, and I think the Premier's opinion on these kinds of things is significant. The minister spoke to the BCSTA the other day, and the Premier spoke to the BCSTA in 1982. He said at that time:

"When I went to school I was given 90 percent facts and 10 percent opinion, and in the process I acquired the tools which later allowed me to form my own independent opinions.... It seems to me that somewhere someone somehow took a shortcut, in effect, by saying: 'Why give them the tools to form an individual opinion, when the consensus should be one basic opinion'? I call that socialism, and of course, from whence I come and where I stand, you can appreciate, I think this is dangerous stuff."

That's what the minister said in 1982 about teaching methodology. In 1986 at the Whistler convention he said essentially the same thing — that teachers should teach facts, not opinions. I think it's a very dangerous thing for the government to be trying to determine the methodology of the teaching profession. There has grown up over the years not only in this province or this country but, I think, in all the western world a respect for teachers to be trained to do their kind of job and to do it without government interference.

So I think we see, as a result of submissions to the Labour Minister, that there were some issues that were granted in terms of appearance, but the vast majority of the implementation of Bill 20 were items that were not asked-for either by the employers or by the employees. So we can only conclude that this government is not listening and that it has its own agenda for Bill 20. I would like to discuss further what that agenda is a little bit later.

1 would like to spend a few moments commenting on what has happened to principals and vice-principals under Bill 20. Every province in Canada except one has their principals and vice-principals and their teaching staffs in the same bargaining units. This is an issue that has been discussed at length in this province, and the current Premier as Minister of Education provoked a lot of this discussion. As a result of that provocation of discussion, this item was dealt with in 1982 by the B.C. School Trustees Association at their annual general meeting, and the question was: should principals and vice-principals belong to the same bargaining unit and be part of the B.C. Teachers' Federation? A resolution was brought forward in 1982 that suggested that no, they are management and they should be separated and should not be part of the BCTF. That resolution was defeated. It also came forward in 1983 and was defeated again. The same resolution came forward in 1984 and this time it wasn't defeated; it was referred to a task force, and that task force reported back in 1985 with the same resolution and it was defeated again. By that time the momentum for this kind of separation had run its course, and in 1986 this resolution did not appear.

The only other public opinion survey that I would quote on the issue of separation of principals and vice-principals was from the "Let's Talk About Schools" report. In that report, the majority of the general public did not support the idea of separation.

So this is a government agenda. It's not the agenda of the BCTF, the BCSTA or the general public. This is a Socred government agenda that sees principals and vice-principals separated from teachers.

It's true, Madam Speaker, that within the ranks of the B.C. Teachers' Federation there were family disputes between principals and the BCTF as an organization. But those disputes were patched up. I don't think the government was aware of that, and evidence of that is very clear. On the day the Labour minister introduced Bill 19 he said: "However, because school principals and vice-principals are assigned significant management responsibilities, and in accordance with resolutions passed at the BCT17's annual general meeting, we have recognized their special labour relations status." Hence they are separated.

[3:00]

In the debate on Bill 19, Madam Speaker, I read into the record every resolution affecting principals and vice-principals that was dealt with at the 1987 BCTF annual general meeting, and there was not one that could be construed as desiring any sort of separation. There was a patching-up of the differences there. Principals do not want separation. There is no record of any official representative body of principals that is desirous of being separated from their teacher colleagues.

1 don't know how a government could base the decision and read into the record of this House, in introducing a bill, that there was a move on the part of principals within the B. C. Teachers' Federation and that this was decided at their annual general meeting. It seems to me that this is a drastic step, and I can't see such a dramatic step being taken and rationalized with false information that has been made clear by the record.

What we see, Madam Speaker, is the assumption of a problem. The problem suggests that if teachers and principals are in the same organization, it's not possible for

[ Page 791 ]

principals to supervise those teachers properly. I again quote the Premier on the Bannerman show in 1982, when he suggested:

"I don't believe our principals are managing sufficiently. They're a part of that team; they're a part of the union. They tend to be much involved in group management. I think we do need some fairly good management in the schools, as you would in any other business...."

And from BCTV, also in 1982:

"I think a principal could be someone from business. If he's a good manager, that's really all that ought to be required, especially in a larger school. They don't necessarily need to be teachers."

On the first point, that they aren't supervising appropriately, the Minister of Education, with his vast experience in that field, knows better. He knows that there is good supervision by principals of our schools now. He knows that there is good supervision in the schools in every other province in this country as well, and they are in the same organization as their teachers. The minister also knows that being in the same organization does not prevent a principal from performing his supervisory functions. Separation, Madam Speaker, is not the answer to improve supervision. The minister knows that the separation proposed in Bill 20 will only cause disruption in the school system.

The minister, because of his vast experience, also knows of the leadership role the principals have played in the B.C. Teachers' Federation and their local associations. Often that role was a moderating role and a valuable role in order to ensure that the actions of teachers benefited from those principals' perspective and experience.

What we see now as a result of this separation is a "wethey" syndrome. For the first time in this province, we're going to see staff meetings in schools where principals are not present. That's a tremendous precedent to consider. Those kinds of meetings have not been held with any regularity in the past. The educational leader in the school was always there to give his or her view on the matters discussed in staff meetings.

I think this separation is going to result in school principals being less supportive of their staffs. There's going to be a less trusting climate in our schools. So many of the tasks that principals do are completely in support of the education system, of the children in the school and of the teachers, doing such things as filling in for teachers when they want to observe other classes, being advocates for their school, maximizing staffing and equipment, and speaking out in the interests of the children in the school and the potential for developing the best system within that school. I think those are the things that are likely to be stifled, and I think those are the parts of the principal's role that give the principal the greatest job satisfaction — being advocates for their schools within their district. As a result of Bill 20, I think we're now going to see principals lose collective strength. They are going to be put in this situation of having the potential of being fired without cause and being stripped of rights. I think they are going to be agents of the board rather than educators; they will be muzzled and will not speak out in defence of education in the future. That's why I think Bill 20 is opening up a very dangerous situation. The Premier said on the Bannerman show: "I don't think a principal even needs to be a teacher. In a large school he could simply be a good manager.... I think the majority of principals would agree. Certainly all of the good principals would agree, because they want to manage and they can see the need for good management. I would think that perhaps if the BCTF were totally honest about it, they would have to agree as well...."

Is this where we're heading, Madam Speaker? Does the public not have a right to input into this dramatic change of course for our province, unlike virtually every other province in Canada? They need an opportunity to decide whether they want the principals of their schools to be bosses rather than colleagues, whether they want those bosses to create conflict in the schools that doesn't exist there now. They need a chance to input into the decision whether our schools are going to be factories or places of learning. What makes sense for factories does not make sense for our school system. The human process of teaching and learning that goes on in schools is a very special one. It's one that needs evolution, not radical change. I don't think it can be legislated, and it certainly cannot be legislated to fit a factory mould or a military model. I think it's a dangerous piece of legislation. It's going to be very disruptive, and I think it's one that the government should reconsider.

I would also like to talk about some features and some of the principles involved in the College of Teachers. One of the aspects of the legislation that is quite unique compared to previous education legislation.... Not being a lawyer, I don't fully appreciate the language, but it's the kind of language.... Whereas before, when the legislation was silent on an issue it was presumed that powers were not granted under the legislation, under this legislation much wider powers are being granted, and the opposite assumption is occurring: if a body is not specifically prohibited from doing something, then that body can do it. I think the minister understands the section 1'm referring to, which gives wide powers to the college and differs from education legislation that exists for school boards now.

Central to the whole idea of a college, I guess, is the concept of freedom of association. It seems to me logical that it should be possible for organizations to structure their own structure, that they decide what the organizational framework should be. That kind of situation should be agreed to by government and organizations, and not imposed. I don't believe any other occupation is treated in this way, and forced to accept a certain organizational structure that is not their historical way. I think it's beyond comprehension for the government to suggest to the IWA that they are going to set up another parallel organization that is going to perform functions the IWA performs now. Or similarly with the BCSTA. Those organizations determine the kind of structure and operations they desire. They're not forced to do things; they do not have things imposed upon them. They operate with freedom of association and determine their own structure. They have the freedom to determine what kind of organization they think best. If it's respected for other groups in this province. I don't understand why it's not respected for teachers.

Another principle of Bill 20 that I would like to comment on is the concept of duplication of service. The college really provides for three main areas of operation: certification, discipline and professional development for teachers in this province. If we have a look at the certification aspect, this is an aspect that's now handled by the Ministry of Education. It is primarily a bureaucratic function and is handled very efficiently by the Ministry of Education. The province, of course, bears the cost of that operation.

With a college of teachers, where every certificated teacher that has held a valid certificate in British Columbia

[ Page 792 ]

automatically becomes a member of the college, we are in for a tremendously cumbersome process. My colleague from Coquitlam-Moody has a daughter who will be a member of the college. The college will have to track her down and try to figure out whether she wants to pay fees to that college or not. There are going to be teachers in the United States and all parts of the western world; there are going to be retired teachers; there are going to be a vast number of teachers in independent or private schools. The minister himself is eligible to be a member of the college.

All of those certificates are going to have to be reviewed, and all of those people are going to have to have an opportunity to say whether they want to be members of the college or not. The college is going to have to hire a registrar and a deputy registrar and a vast bureaucracy. It's going to have to keep records, and those records are going to have to be up to date.

The college is going to have to collect fees. Right now the certification branch has 11 staff; they used to have 23 and now, post-restraint, they have 11. That half-million dollar bureaucracy, because of the tremendous needs.... If you have a look at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, or other colleges that operate similarly, it's going to take millions and millions of dollars in bureaucratic costs to operate those colleges. This is unnecessary bureaucracy. The tremendous amount of red tape and rules and regulations that is going to be imposed by this college, by a government that I thought wanted to eliminate red tape, is going to be horrendous, and the costs are going to be shifted from the Ministry of Education to the College of Teachers.

[3:15]

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

I'm reminded of a story of a couple in love who wanted to live together, but they didn't really want to get married. They thought as an alternative that they would establish a contract. They went through all the details of figuring out who pays, and the division of labour, and who does what on what days, right down to who is going to pay for the telephone and the insurance costs. By the time their lawyers had met and they had gone through all this process, they decided that they didn't want to live together any more.

I think we can strangle things with rules and regulations and red tape and lawyers and interpretations of clauses, and that's what I see in Bill 20 and in the college — that it's going to be a job-creation program for lawyers and a great deal of extra cost borne by the teaching profession. So in terms of certification, what we see is a tremendous bureaucracy at a tremendous cost, and the cost shifting from the ministry to the teaching force.

In terms of professional development, another major function of the college, the ministry, boards, faculties of education and the B.C. Teachers' Federation all contribute greatly to the professional development of teachers in this province. The B.C. Teachers' Federation alone contributes something like $5 million to that operation, and I think it's agreed that there are already first-rate programs for teachers by these bodies. I think in his introductory remarks the minister indicated he supported certain aspects of the B.C. Teachers' Federation. I'm sure the professional development aspects were among those he supported, because it was, has been, and will continue in the future to be a job well done by those bodies and by the B.C. Teachers' Federation.

So what we see, not only in terms of certification but also in terms of professional development, is redundant processes being set up. Nobody asked for these kinds of redundant structures.

AN HON. MEMBER: The taxpayers.

MR. JONES: No, I don't think the taxpayers of this province ever asked for certification to be borne by teachers.

Teachers want to get on with the job of teaching. They don't need any more bureaucracy; they don't need to pay for any of the costs of any unnecessary duplication of services, either in terms of professional development or in terms of certification.

MR. SPEAKER: The Minister of Education wants leave to make an introduction. Is leave granted?

Leave granted.

HON. MR. BRUMMET: On behalf of Mr. Speaker, I would like the House to make welcome 40 grade 10 students from Hillside Secondary School in West Vancouver. They are visiting us this afternoon, and I would like the House to make them very welcome.

MR. JONES: What I was suggesting was that of the three functions of the new college, those of discipline, professional development and certification, the certification is a bureaucratic function and it's going to be shifted at great cost to the teachers of the province. The professional development is being done right now; it's a job well done. Those are not the two main issues in the college. There must be another agenda. The other agenda I suggest is the one of discipline.

Under the heading of discipline and the College of Teachers, I would like to comment on the principle of double jeopardy. Suppose, Mr. Speaker, that you are a teacher in a school. I know you would be a good teacher in that school. However, it is just quite possible that the Minister of Education might be your principal and you might not get along with that principal. You may have some problems. You may have an old car, or you may be a single parent. You may arrive late for class the odd time. For this, but primarily for your dispute with your principal, you may be terminated with 30 days' notice. Under this bill there are certainly expanded and open-ended powers for boards to terminate. Boards can terminate now for any cause that they feel renders the teacher unsuitable for the position he held, or for unprofessional conduct. So your dispute with your principal could lead to your termination. You would go before your school board.

[Mrs. Gran in the chair.]

However, let's assume, for argument's sake, that that was an enlightened school board; they saw the merit of your teaching ability and they understood the problems that you had and you were vindicated by that enlightened board. One would think that that would be the end of it, but that is not necessarily the case, because at that point that principal, whom you do not get along with, and four of his or her friends who would be members of the college — and they needn't be in the same school district or from among classroom teachers, or even from public school teachers — could ensure that you were called before the College of Teachers. Any three

[ Page 793 ]

council members — and five of those council members are appointed by government — could investigate your case and would have the potential to lift your certificate for conduct unbecoming a member of the college. And, Madam Speaker, you would have no appeal of that process on any of the professional decisions made by the college, no appeal on the judgment of that college.

So you've been put in double jeopardy: you've been vindicated by one body, brought before another, and found wanting. Your employer vindicated you as a good teacher but, because of the conflicts you've had — personal conflicts — with your principal, and because of the wording of this legislation, you've been placed in double jeopardy.

I think this kind of situation, with the expansion of powers of school boards and the double jeopardy of the college, places teachers in a very vulnerable position in this province. I think now I understand a little more the comments in the maiden speech of my colleague from Burnaby-Edmonds (Mr. Mercier), who suggested something to the effect that this legislation would be welcomed by 90 percent of teachers, in effect suggesting that 10 percent are dragging down the 90 percent, and this legislation has the power, I suppose, to shape up or ship out what that member thought was the deadwood of the teaching force.

I have also heard that there are other members on the government side who have names of people and so-called documentation of people they think can now be eliminated with this legislation. So what I see with this legislation is a prescription for a witch-hunt. It's a very sad statement, Madam Speaker, in a province that has gone through the kind of turmoil in the education system that we've seen in the last five years, that this kind of legislation is being brought in. It is very frightening to the teaching force in this province. Certainly doctors, lawyers and dentists, who are self-employed, need a professional body for discipline, because they don't have an employer to do that function for them. The employers are really the only body with the ability to supervise, to monitor and to counsel the performance of teachers in our school system. The employer can do the job properly. Anything a college is going to rely upon is going to be evidence presented by the employers, by those supervisors. Again, it's a duplication of services. Not only do we have double jeopardy with the college but we have unnecessary duplication and we have a prescription for a witch-hunt.

Another principle, Madam Speaker, that I am concerned about that relates to Bill 20 is the concept of defence of education. I know members opposite are tired of hearing the official opposition on this side defending the rights of minorities, disadvantaged and the poor. They are also tired of hearing teachers defend another group of people that needs advocates: that is, the children and the parents of children in our school system.

Madam Speaker, who was it who stood up to the government cutbacks in the numbers of people teaching our children? Who stood up to government in the cutbacks to the school programs and the narrowing of opportunities and horizons of our young people? Who stood up to government in the cutbacks in the resources, in such things as field trips and other important resources in our education system? The teachers of this province through their organization, the B. C. Teachers' Federation, stood up.

Who has been fighting for decentralization so that we can have better offerings at our local level that better meet the needs of our local communities and our individual students in each community? Who has been fighting for the rights of minority students in this province, and for the rights of handicapped students? The teachers of this province. The public record is clear: they have been the defenders of public education within this province, a role that in any other jurisdiction would be one adopted by government and wouldn't have to be left to the employees of the system.

The government has not done the job of being an advocate for the school system. The teachers of this province have been vocal in bringing to public attention the problems that face the schools of this province.

Unfortunately, Madam Speaker, Bill 20 will stifle teachers as defenders of public education by putting their tenure in jeopardy. Those rights that provide the security they need to be advocates for our public education system are jeopardized. Boards, as I mentioned, will be able to give any teacher 30 days' notice for any action that they deem unsuitable. Certainly after this legislation goes through, teachers will think twice before they speak out in defence of education. They've been placed in an extremely vulnerable situation — principals and vice-principals in the school system in this province even more so. As a result of this, our school system is going to lose. The children in our school system are going to lose. In fact, even our democratic way of life is going to lose those advocates who in the past have felt free to speak out on behalf of education.

The minister is right, in his thinly veiled criticism, that students learn by the example of their teachers. Teachers were right to stand up for public education yesterday, they'll be right to stand up for it today, and they'll be right to stand up for it tomorrow. I would be very proud to have my child taught by teachers who are willing to stand up for public education in this province.

Another principle that I would like to comment briefly on that is impacted by Bill 20 is that of due process. As I mentioned, dismissal under the former legislation was a fairly straightforward process. If there was any gross misconduct or any behavior that really warranted dismissal and suspension, boards had an opportunity to do that. If it was a case of teaching competence, there was a process — and I realize it was not a particularly popular process with many school boards — that involved evaluation; it required that there be three unsatisfactory reports written within a period of 12 months. All that it required was three unsatisfactory reports. If the school system was unsatisfied with the performance of a teacher, then three reports over a period of 12 months would have seen the termination of that teacher contract. Now we see termination within 30 days for any cause deemed unsuitable by the board. I think it is sad that there is no evaluation process built into this. Certainly evaluation was a critical part of the previous process. To turn so radically away from any evaluation process being part of terminations is, I think, a dangerous precedent.

Boards of reference upon appeal are now going to be very restricted in their latitude in terms of being able to treat these situations so that the punishment fits the crime. Previous boards of reference were able to uphold, reverse or apply any other sanction that they felt appropriate. Now the only options for those boards of reference are to reinstate or to confirm the decision of the school board. Boards of reference being restricted in their latitude does not bode well for the school system, because the punishment cannot fit the crime if we can only reinstate or confirm.

[3:30]

[ Page 794 ]

Due process is also affected under teacher transfers. Formerly there was an appeal process for teachers who were going to transfer. Now there is no appeal process. Now it is wide open to transfer teachers, and there is a dangerous opportunity for abuse opened here. The language in the bill suggests that teachers can be fired for the cause that that teacher is deemed unsuitable for the position held. But now, because there is no appeal to the transfer process, if you wanted to make a teacher unsuitable for a position, all you would have to do is transfer them. Suppose you had a secondary auto mechanics teacher that you transferred to a French kindergarten class; the teacher would obviously be unsuitable, would have no appeal for that transfer, and would obviously be open to termination. There is no due process here, and Bill 20 leaves teachers wide open to abuse by employers under this section of the bill.

This legislation is a tremendous puzzle to me. We know it is not good for kids; we know that historically it is producing the opposite effect from what we would like to see in our school system in 1987, after the years of strife and turmoil. We know it does not fit in the Canadian context, and I am sure what we are doing in this Legislature here now is a puzzle to all other provinces in Canada, not only to me.

It is obvious that this bill is being poorly received by the teachers of this province. More than 20 school boards have written indicating their concerns and asking for a delay of this legislation. At this moment — probably only a few hundred yards from us — there are talks going on. Those talks are still pushing ahead. The minister says he wants input; he says amendments are forthcoming; yet we are debating this bill. It seems to me logical that the bill would be amended and then brought forth in the amended form, and we would debate that amended bill.

Many features in that bill were never asked for by anybody in this province or by any representative body. The principals and vice-principals: nobody asked for their separation. We see that the college violates the right to determine a workers' group's own structure, that it involves duplication of service. It involves double jeopardy in that teachers as advocates are being stifled and that there is a loss of due process in this bill. It is brought in now to shift focus away from the bill, because the government knew that that was going to cause disruption in the school system, and that would be the focus. I believe that the government wants confrontation, that they are out to get teachers. They want to push through this legislation that divides and conquers, that separates teachers from teachers on a union, non-union basis. It is going to produce division and conflict in our school system. It separates teachers from principals and produces a factory model that we know will hurt those relationships that are so delicate in our school system; it reduces the security of tenure of teachers; it sets up a college that is going to drain the resources of individual teachers in this province; and it's going to set up a college that is in direct competition with the B.C. Teachers' Federation.

We know, Madam Speaker, the long history between Social Credit governments and the B.C. Teachers' Federation, and the confusion becomes a little clearer when we look at some of the quotes from the Premier of the past. The present Premier as Minister of Education said in a speech to the Agrodome rally in 1982: "Was the decision [to cut education funding] political? Not political in the sense of your president calling me some very uncomplimentary names the day after my appointment."

And to the Victoria Chamber of Commerce in 1983: "We're having to fight, as so often happens, the big machine, the people in their ivory towers on Burrard Street in Vancouver.... That large organization is more interested in power for the sake of power, and political power, than...are really interested in ensuring that people maintain their jobs and the system remains intact."

On the Bannerman show in 1983: "1 really don't wish a fight with teachers.... I think the problem is with the B.C. Teachers' Federation. If there's a power struggle there, and if there's a desire for power for the sake of power, or political power, and if there's a thought that this might be a means of expanding that BCTF organization into something more than what it presently is, it's with some of those members on the executive."

From the Sun in 1982: "I'm not trying to pick a fight with the B.C. Teachers' Federation, but I believe its leaders have turned to union work to get their kicks because they may not be as effective in the classroom as they should be."

So what we see, Madam Speaker, from these quotes, is a Minister of Education, now the Premier of this province, who I think in those remarks displayed pettiness and vindictiveness and I suppose is of the philosophy that "I don't get angry; I get even." So what we see in this legislation is vindictive legislation.

Certainly I can understand the Premier's feelings about past disputes with the B.C. Teachers' Federation and their executive. However, it seems to be small reason to bring in radical legislation that is going to upset the education system in this province, that is going to drastically affect the relationships between all those concerned in education. When we were promised a fresh start, I think this kind of vindictive legislation is totally out of place with that dream that I think everybody wanted to see.

Certainly government has a difficult job. It's difficult to represent the views of all British Columbians, but this government was elected to do just that. I think everybody in this province respects their right to bring in legislation, that they were democratically elected, and that the decisions that this government makes have to be accepted. However, the comments I heard a few minutes ago don't speak to the same sort of principles when it comes to other organizations. It seems to me that the same rationale has to apply to organizations that the government deals with. When organizations such as teachers' organizations operate perfectly democratically and they elect a leadership, government has to accept that leadership and has to work with that leadership. Attacks on that leadership are attacks on that membership. So I don't think we can say that we like teachers but we don't like the B.C. Teachers' Federation, because the B.C. Teachers' Federation is teachers. In 1971 when automatic membership was last removed, out of 22,000 teachers only 69 chose not to be members. I think the membership supports the leadership, because they believe in the democratic process just like we believe in the democratic process in this province that put members opposite in government. So we respect the decisions that government makes, but we also have to respect the leaders that represent organizations and work with those organizations.

The organization that seems to be distasteful to so many members opposite was incorporated in 1919. The original objectives of that organization were to foster and promote the cause of education in British Columbia; to raise the status of the teaching profession in British Columbia; to promote the

[ Page 795 ]

welfare of teachers of British Columbia. The economic welfare of teachers and the professional cause have been the underpinning of that organization. Those objectives under which that body was incorporated in 1919 are still the objectives.

Nineteen-nineteen is a very long time ago. If we think about the two political parties present in this House today, we see that it's twice as old as the Social Credit Party, at least in terms of government in this province, and probably three times as old as the New Democratic Party. It has contributed in many important ways to the life of British Columbia.

Yes, on many occasions that organization has had the opportunity or the responsibility to be critical of government. They've been critical on such things as the funding or underfunding of education, and class sizes that were too large. They've been critical of the government in terms of the bargaining conditions of teachers. They asked for nothing more than was present in other parts of Canada. But surprisingly, that's a very small part of that organization's activities.

It might surprise members present to know that the vast majority of the budget of that organization goes to professional development. They have tremendous support for conferences and symposiums on instruction and curriculum. Each teaching area in this province has its own organization that is funded by the BCTF. They are out there, meeting the needs of teachers as they identify them, assisting them with lessons in the lesson-aid branch. The organization publishes something like 20 professional journals. They work with teachers in the Third World. Since the inception of their international program, they have donated more than $1 million to that cause, and those funds are matched by the federal government through CIDA.

Not only in terms of professional development programs, but also in community outreach programs.... When the government stopped funding for parent-teacher organizations in this province, the BCTF jumped in and sponsored annually, bringing in parents from all over the province to a parent-teacher conference. This organization, which this government so loves to attack, has stood up for the rights of children and has a rights-of-children committee. It has tremendous programs on multiculturalism, on peace education and on status-of-women issues.

Since 1919 this body has been articulate and effective in working for the rights of teachers and students and in promoting public education in this province. Although they have run into government at times and there has been conflict, I don't think there's any evidence that they have influenced the voting patterns of their membership. So there is no need, Mr. Speaker, for a vindictive political attack on this organization. There is no need to attack the teaching profession through this body. In other societies the teaching profession is looked upon as the highest in society. I don't know why, in British Columbia, it is such a victim of government attack.

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

There is no need to carry on with Bill 20 when talks are going on across the way. There's no need to carry on with this legislation when the Royal Commission on Education is just beginning its work. I know the minister is thinking that I was one of those who suggested this was an item that needed to be dealt with in a relatively speedy fashion, and should not be part of the commission on education. But when I said that, I was envisioning a real royal commission, which would probably be a two- to three-year project. I was envisioning the small kinds of changes that would put the bargaining and professional rights of teachers in this province in line with those of other provinces, not a radical change to upset the school system and a wholesale alteration of long-standing traditions in this province, having a drastic impact, as I predict this bill will, in terms of the delicate teacher-student relationship which I think we all hold as so important in our school system.

[3:45]

What we have left for the commission on education is very little. Nothing could be bigger in terms of education in this province in this year than what this bill is dealing with. Mr. Sullivan is probably feeling very insulted at this moment, that probably the major issue in education is not going to be part of that royal commission.

I would think that it should be clear by now that the bill is not good for children, does not fit in the Canadian context and has not transpired within the process of consultation. The government was not listening at the time of submissions to the Labour minister. It's going to have a drastic impact on our schools, particularly on the principals and vice-principals of this province. It interferes with freedom of association, and it's going to be cumbersome and involve a tremendous duplication of service with the college. A real part of the agenda is probably in the discipline section of the college, which puts teachers in double jeopardy. As a result, we're going to see a tremendous loss of advocates in this province, who will no longer feel free to defend education as they have in the past. We also see that due process is being considerably reduced as a result of this legislation.

It is essentially vindictive legislation. It is out to get a group of teachers in this province through their organization, which has certainly been in conflict with government. But government has the opportunity to be big about this and work with that body, which is democratically elected.

It's also clear that in its existing form this legislation will not work, that the college without the support of the teaching body is a bizarre idea. Certainly Ontario's Premier Bill Davis, when this situation occurred in that province, saw it as naive to try to introduce the bill against the wishes of teachers and to impose a college on teachers. It is unworkable. It's not good for kids. It's going to hurt the education climate in this province. That's why trustees are doubtful about this legislation, why teachers are opposed to it and why we in the opposition are opposed.

If there's one thing we must have learned in the last five or ten years, it's that we don't need any more confrontation. Confrontation in the education sector is particularly harmful, and it doesn't work. If we care about our school system and about the children in that school system, we'll find that there's no need for imposition of this kind of radical legislation, that it doesn't have to be rammed through this Legislature, and that there are alternatives. There is an alternative for government and the interest sectors in education: to work together for the good of children and to try some positive vehicles for cooperation and consultation — such vehicles as the commission on education and the talks that are going on now. Everyone respects the right of government to govern, but they would respect government more if it governed by consensus. That was the kind of thing that was promised in the election — that there would be more cooperation, less confrontation and more consensus.

[ Page 796 ]

Mr. Speaker, we are opposed to Bill 20, and in the interest of British Columbians we ask this government not to proceed with this legislation at this time.

MR. PETERSON: Mr. Speaker, I'd like to open by saying that I hope that everybody considers the most important factor in this education debate to be the students. I know that our Premier feels that way, I know our Minister of Education feels that way, and I know that this whole government feels that way. Yet I hear some rhetoric that makes me wonder about some other individuals in this House, and sometimes some of the comments I've heard outside this House.

I must comment on a few things that the member for Burnaby North (Mr. Jones) spoke of. He came up with some words and some terminology that really disturbed me — words like "teacher-bashing, " "mistrust of teachers" and "government wants teachers out of the schools." I can't believe that. What kind of rhetoric is that? What are your interests? Are your interests political or are they those of the students in the school program? I won't accept terms like that without saying something about it. I'm usually a very calm individual, but when I start hearing rhetoric like that I start getting a little bit upset. Please, let's use a little rationale.

Anyway, some of the other things he said, talking about the college: "There's no room for appeal." Well, I'm not sure he's all that familiar with this legislation. There's some kind of distortion here, because does he realize that the three member discipline committee only constitutes a working committee, and if the respondent does not agree with the suspension or any other type of discipline, it then goes to the entire committee? I'm not sure he's aware of that. Let's look at the entire committee. Fifteen members of that committee are elected by the teachers themselves. That's 75 percent of the committee.

MRS. BOONE: This year?

MR. PETERSON: Well, there's got to be some time to form it. Even you may realize that.

Anyway, some other comments by the member for Burnaby North: he's talking about "a prescription for a witch-hunt." Again, I can't believe my ears. What is the rationale over there? Is it a good education for our students? Is it concern for our good teachers in the system? I believe that the majority of our teachers are excellent. They're committed, they're dedicated, they're well qualified, and their interest is to teach our students, not this political garbage I'm hearing from the other side. So let's put things in perspective.

I really, really must take issue with some of these statements. "A prescription for a witch-hunt" — you're going to tell me that the 20 members of that college, of which 15 are teachers, are going to go out on a witch-hunt in their own profession? What kind of thinking is that? "Out to get teachers, " and comments like that: we're not out to get teachers. What we want to do, and what Bill 20 does, is to allow teachers to get into the education system, to let them teach, to let them educate those students without political interference. They have a choice whichever way they go. What more could they ask for?

In my discussions outside of this House with teachers, with members of my constituency, I find that there is a lot of erroneous information out there, and I would really like to publicly say to the teachers: "Get a copy of the act and read it." If I may, I'd like to quote from our Minister of Education and talk about the three fundamental principles of the act that he wrote about in his own press release. They are: " (1) That teachers are given the same rights as all other employees in the province to have full scope of collective bargaining and the right to strike if they choose." Great stuff! I mean, who would argue with that?

"(2) That there be adequate separation of the organizations that collectively bargain and represent the economic interests of teachers from the organization that governs their professional conduct and qualification."

Well, I would say that's common sense. Would somebody please tell me how, if somebody is representing somebody under the terms of a collective agreement, they can at the same time discipline? It just doesn't make sense to me. What's the big deal? What's all the noise about? The noise is political; that's what it is.

Let me get to the third point: "(3) That principals, vice principals and administrative officers be recognized as managers equivalent to excluded management personnel in other employee groups." Commonsense stuff; it's not all that complicated. I don't know; I just don't know.

Anyway, as I said, there seems to be a lot of erroneous information out there, and I really would urge all teachers to get a copy of the proposed legislation. Look at it yourself. Don't take somebody else's word for it, because I'm afraid you're being handed some information that is, in fact, faulty. I think it's quite important. Consider your actions, too — remember those students. Don't be stampeded into doing something that you don't want to do. That's relatively important.

In my maiden speech I made reference to teachers in Langley, and in a maiden speech in this House, that was a pretty important time for me. I was pretty nervous doing it. But I really admire our education system in Langley. It's great. The teachers are great; the principals are great; the school board is great. They do a wonderful job. I have two children in that system, and they were doing a great job with them. I was talking to my children this weekend. They're a little young yet — 8 and 10 years old — but pretty astute. They're saying: "Dad, how come there won't be any school on Tuesday? Can you explain it to us?" To be quite honest with you, I had some difficulty. Was I going to say: "Well, the teachers wanted the right to full collective bargaining. We've given them the right to choose the right to strike if they so desire, but now they're going on strike because they've been given what they asked for"? That really doesn't make sense, does it? So I really couldn't rationalize it for them. They said: "Well, Dad, you know, something's wrong. We want to go to school. We enjoy our school. We think our teachers want to be there too." I said that they were probably right.

I really had a difficult time explaining it to them. Maybe it just won't happen tomorrow. Maybe a lot of teachers will show up at school. Maybe they'll have a close look at this legislation and look at the facts. I hope so. I have a lot of faith in those teachers. I think they'll do that.

[4:00]

The member for Burnaby North (Mr. Jones) also talked about no consultation. My understanding is that our Minister of Education was meeting all morning with members of the BCTF.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's not very long.

[ Page 797 ]

MR. PETERSON: That process is in play right now. So I'm really having difficulty with some of the speeches from over there.

I don't want to stand up here and speak for too long, because others have a lot to say on this, too. But I would just like to point out that if you look at the structure of the new legislation, teachers are given a choice. They can certify if they wish. They have also the right of association without certification if they wish.

The new college. Let's not forget that 75 percent of that body will be made up right out of their own profession. Everybody says the final decision of the college is it, but that's not true. There is the right to appeal to court. That's everybody's God-given right. I think the legislation is excellent. It will work. It'll give our teachers the rights to do what they want to do: an excellent job of educating our youth. I totally support it and I ask that everybody else in this House support it.

MR. ROSE: The member opposite for Langley asked some very interesting questions.

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: Is it the second member for Langley? The first member for Langley (Mrs. Gran) wants the second member for Langley to know his place. We've got that over here.

He asked some very interesting questions, I felt. And he objected to some of the terms used. Sometimes terms used in the House tend to be somewhat inflammatory. That is done for effect and emphasis. But that doesn't mean that they're any less sincere, in my view. We've had five years of cutbacks and a lot of unkind things said about the public system over the last five years. If some of that comes out sounding like teacher-bashing, some of us get fooled, because we can't look into the heads of some of those members over there and we don't really know what they're after. I suspect what goes on in their heads sometimes, but I can't say for sure.

But if you were in a profession dealing with the young people of this province, and you found the funding devoted to those young people year after year for the last five years proportionately cut back........

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: It has been cut back $400 million in the last four years, if you count inflation. If you, year after year found that there were fewer and fewer supplies in your school, if year after year you found that the school classes became larger and larger, if year after year you found your negotiations and your salaries and all the bargaining that affects your job and young people were frustrated, some people who were extremely sensitive might think that was teacher-bashing. Now I wouldn't think that, because I'm not particularly sensitive. But there are some sensitive souls out there who do get that feeling. They may be paranoid. But just remember that even us paranoids have enemies sometimes. That's question number one.

The second member for Langley made his speech almost but not quite saying that if we could only get rid of some teachers, the children would be protected.

AN HON. MEMBER: He didn't say that.

MR. ROSE: No, I didn't say he said that; I said he almost said that. He said that we were out to protect children, and therefore this act is going to protect children from the nefarious activities of some teachers who see it as their job to teach, for instance, democratic responsibilities, professional responsibilities, curriculum development, and all those other neat things that teachers do.

The other thing that I object to from the member's speech, which I.... And I admire the member and I admired his speech. I liked it best of all because it was so short. That was what I liked about it most. But if we wanted to go into what he said, he implied that if we as an opposition oppose anything the government wants to do in terms of education, somehow we're anti-pupil. This is good stuff for the kids, therefore that opposition should roll over and play dead. That round-heel opposition over there should keep quiet. Now it is the government's job to govern; take none of that away from them. Everybody knows it's the government's job to govern, and they are accountable at each election time, and it's the opposition's job to criticize and oppose and to make the legislation better. That's exactly what happened in Bill 19. We criticized, we opposed, we moved a reasoned amendment, and all of a sudden we heard: "There are going to be amendments." The minister — I heard him on the radio the other day — said the door was open for amendments to come along in this legislation. Maybe some of the principles won't change much, maybe.... I can hardly resist the pun that some of the vice principals won't change much, but I think they'll all change a lot, because their roles will be altered.

We're critical of the legislation because we think that it would be better for education and for children if it were different. Not necessarily legislation to maintain the status quo — teachers didn't want that, the trustees don't want that, and the government doesn't want it. We know the government doesn't want the status quo to prevail, because of the six Education ministers we've had in the last six years — and I'll name them: the present Premier; a Mr. Pat McGeer, wherever he may be; the current Attorney-General (Hon. B.R. Smith) ; Mr. Heinrich, wherever that good individual has found himself a place; the current member for Boundary-Similkameen, or one of the members; and the current minister. We've had six. Almost half a dozen, and every one bad eggs, except of course the current minister. Only kidding. If that is considered an insult or unparliamentary, I retract it. They're not bad eggs. That's not the point. They haven't been very good for education. So what has happened to them? The ministers are given the yo-yo treatment. They're put in to do a hatchet job on education, and then when things get tough they're yanked up and then we get a new one. It's a constantly moving target. Moving targets are harder to hit. Now even that large moving target over there is going to be hard to hit. As elusive as he is — I know that he is fast on his feet; I know he's a hunter and a sportsman and a good old boy — even he is going to get splashed with this. But even he has suggested, Mr. Speaker, that this is not perfect, that government draftspersons are not perfect. They goofed up on Bill 19. It may be that they might have goofed up on Bill 20; there's another possibility.

So what happened to the second member for Langley (Mr. Peterson)? There he is, sitting over there in all his pristine splendour. What I would like to know is what all the trouble is now, causing his youngster to be worried about — since he loves his teacher so much — the stopping in work for a day for a study session. I don't know if the people in Langley are going to do what's been suggested he done here

[ Page 798 ]

in terms of study sessions, but I know one thing: this party did not organize any of those things. We are legislators; we are not organizers. That is left up to the teachers themselves. Same with the trade unions; same with any other body. And what they do is what they do. If they're upset, I think that has implications for education, because as a very good colleague and friend of mine wisely observed just recently, this does not motivate teachers. Turmoil and chaos in the education system does not motivate teachers to go the extra mile. I quote my colleague from Surrey-Guildford-Whalley and points east: "The teacher's working environment is the kids' learning environment." [Applause.] I assume that the applause is from the member for Surrey-Guildford-Whalley (Ms. Smallwood). If you distort the students' learning environment by disturbing the teaching conditions and the teachers' working environment, that cannot possibly be good for education.

Anyway, that is the thing that bothers me so much about this. Yes, talks are going on — rightly so, and I am pleased that they are. Talks are going on as well in terms of Bill 19 and its implications and possible problems. Nobody can knock those. But what I'm afraid of, Mr. Speaker, is that the lines will harden. Some harsh things will be said — not by me, of course, but by someone, perhaps blurted out; and from that stance there will be no retreat or opportunity to expand the discussions to make consultations really meaningful.

The minister will claim that he has consulted far and wide. I admit that he's gone around the province and talked to a few people. I don't deny that he's done that. I think he probably has. But that is not the same as getting down and working out a compromise on the legislation that is now before us, which as far as the schools are concerned is so unacceptable — I won't say reprehensible — in its present form

About a year ago, Mr. Speaker, I was down in a little town in California called Victorville. That's in the high desert — that's why I have to have a drink of water; it's very dry there — about 100 kilometres east of Los Angeles. I was down there to visit some teachers. I talked to about seven or eight of the 15 teachers in Victorville, and they came from British Columbia. They were among, the 3,000 teachers made redundant by the cutbacks in education of 400 million bucks over the last five years.

1 know he's shaking his head; he's saying: "He's a wild man; he's throwing these figures out of the air." I can document every one of those figures. If you count inflation and 2 percent per year, I know what you're cutting. It doesn't take any mathematical genius to figure that one out. Anyway, these people have no jobs because of cutbacks and various other things, and since they want to practise their profession and since they want to make a contribution, they're making it not to Canadian but to American youngsters. So they are down there working in the high desert. They'd like to come home; at least they did want to come home — about half of them. They're down there in a foreign culture, far from home. Some of them like it and some of them don't like it very much, but most of them would rather be home. I don't know if they still would rather be home, after they see what this is all about.

We don't know the implications of this. People say: "You're fear mongering." Unless you try to anticipate what might happen, I don't see how you can make any informed decision at all. We're always guessing what the future's going to bring, in some way or other.

Mr. Speaker, these people are down there. They're not making any more money than they are here; some of them are making about the same, when you consider American dollars versus Canadian dollars at 75 cents. I asked them what they liked about it, and do you know what they said? "We get the feeling that our work is valued; that they want us here; that what we do is important. The contribution we make to the youngsters of Victorville is valued, and we don't feel that our work is valued in British Columbia."

If you've had five years of the kind of chaos and turmoil that we've had in British Columbia, that's going to lead to people feeling that the government is anti-teacher, whether the government or the minister is anti-teacher or not. All I know is that whenever there's been trouble and cutbacks, one minister is yo-yoed out and the other minister is yo-yoed in.

[4:15]

AN HON. MEMBER: Your day will come, if you're lucky.

MR. ROSE: Maybe the minister's day will come, but he's the first one who actually had any experience. He's the only one, Mr. Speaker, who's had any sort of what we call "on hand" experience in the classroom. I don't know how long ago that was, but nevertheless he has experienced the classroom; he knows how to keep a record of attendance, and all that stuff.

There were 15 of them there last January. Do you know how many are there this year? Forty-five. Do you know why they're there? Because the Americans aren't producing enough teachers. Proposition 13, a few years ago, displaced a lot of teachers. First of all, it cut back the municipal financing of the schools to the point where they had to cut way down on the numbers of teachers. It also made teaching so unrespectable — almost one of the oldest professions and almost as unrespectable as the oldest profession. The minister is sitting there; he's reading or something like that. He's like the piano player in the bordello; he doesn't really think; he's playing the piano. "That's all I'm doing, playing the piano, " and he pretends he doesn't know what's going on upstairs. Well, what's going on upstairs is that teachers are very unhappy about the way in which they've been regarded, and that's bound to affect the children.

Not many people like politicians; they love the buildings, but boy, they don't like politicians. I wonder if it's the same around the schools, that you've got surveys to show that.... You know, a lot of people like children but maybe they don't like teachers very much, and therefore if you can whack them between the eyes, a big chunk of public expenditure will be eliminated — about $400 million in the last four years.

Anyway, there they are teaching down there. Many of them would like to come home. Many of them will never come home and we've lost their contribution. But what is worse is that the reason they're there is a combination of two things. Young people wouldn't go into teaching. They went into something else. "Why should I do this? Why should I take all this nonsense? My profession, what I'm doing for a living, is not regarded, it's not valued, so I'm not going to go into teaching."

I talked to a radio reporter in the hall. This radio reporter is well known to all of us, and he said to me the other day: "You know, Mark, " — is it permissible for me to use my own first name? "You know, hon. member for Coquitlam-

[ Page 799 ]

Moody, I wanted to be a teacher, " he said. Here he is running around armed with his microphone. He said: "When I got out of high school, I wanted to be a teacher, but I wouldn't want to be a teacher today. You couldn't get me into the classroom with a ten-foot pole. I wouldn't do it because it's not respected, it's not valued, and I would have no intention of doing that."

Now if we oppose this particular bill, it's because we do not think that it has been rationally discussed — there's the word rational that was used down there — with the profession. Democracy means that the government rest on the consent of those governed. Now if something is coming along and is being imposed on a group of people to which they object, and those people are reasonable people, then I think it's foolish to proceed with it. I think it's politically foolish to proceed with it. There are all kinds of suggestions here about how great this is going to be. "We're going to bring some of you under the Labour Code, that is if you're in a union." What happens if 40 percent of the people decide they're going to have a union and 60 percent an association? Then what happens in the district? What happens if the people who want to join the union say: "The heck with you, we're not paying into your association"? Do they have to pay? Is that voluntary? If they don't pay, who finances the association?

AN. HON. MEMBER: The association.

MR. ROSE: I don't know about that. If those people don't pay, what are they going to do? How are they going to force them to pay? Are you going to force them to join the association? It's voluntary whether you want to become a union or you want to become an association, but it's mandatory that you belong to the College of Teachers. Why don't you let that be voluntary as well?

AN HON. MEMBER: We are with the BCTF.

MR. ROSE: You're not. You're saying everybody has to belong to that association. No, it's the same thing with the principals and vice-principals. But anyway, think about that seriously. It might trigger a little amendment for you. It just might, because if I were in that 40 percent and I wanted a union, I might not want to support that association. I might consider it just sort of an in-house kind of a little group and I wouldn't want my money to go there. Are you going to make me put it there? I hope not, because that would be highhanded of you. That wouldn't be liberty that we hear about all the time, and freedom and all that other stuff. We never hear this.

Anyway, principals and vice-principals — there's another gem. Now why would you want to do that? Why would you want to bring everybody into a kind of a turmoil right now? Is it a hammer? "You guys are going to take a day off on Tuesday; therefore we're going to bring in the second reading on Thursday." Well, why then? Why are you bringing it in while we're talking? Why don't you go away and talk? As a matter of fact, I'm going to give you a perfect opportunity in about 15 minutes so you can go away and talk to the teachers, and I hope you'll support me.

Anyway, I'm sorry that the member for Langley has disappeared into the sunset, because I have a letter here from a retired principal in Langley. He has been everything from a principal to a director of instruction, is a life member of the BCTF and has his master's degree. His name is Roger Winter, a well-known, highly respected, highly venerated man, a principal originally from Fort Langley in the Langley School District. They talk about the wonderful teachers in Langley. I quote Mr. Winter in his letter to me of April 13:

"I should like to comment first on the intended separation of principals from the teaching body. As the term implies, the principal is the principal teacher. As a vice-principal and as a principal, I always taught one or two subjects. This keeps a principal down to earth" — if the principals cannot belong to the BCTF or to their own local, how will that affect their ability to teach? — "and familiar with both subject matter and methodology."

I guess some teachers, as they get older — like most of us — get a little bit rusty at various things, at numbers of things. Maybe teachers, as they get older, get a little bit rusty too; they're not quite up to date on methodology. I presume, though, that the college will look after all that stuff. It won't be up to the teachers anymore.

"As a director of instruction, I encouraged principals to spend time in the classroom, thus retaining the knowledge of effective procedures and keeping up to date with new needs in organization and equipment."

So Mr. Winter is right on. He says that if you remove those guys and go for a factory model — those gentlemen, those women, those persons — and make them managers and assistant managers, what you've gone for is.... You've abandoned the idea of the principal being the principal teacher, the organizer and stimulator of instruction, and the head professional in that school, and gone to that of a factory model turning out numerous dozens of widgets at a predictable rate.

Anyway, if we're concerned about this bill, it's not because we just want the status quo; it's not that at all. We're not interested in protecting the incompetents; we're not interested in protecting the child abusers. We're just as concerned, and so is the profession, about people like that in our schools. So let there be no mistake about that one. We want to see the profession have the highest standards and the highest ideals. But you know how you get that, Mr. Speaker? You don't get that by intimidating or browbeating them; you get that by encouraging them. You get that by making their jobs worthwhile.

I don't know how teachers are going to react to this, but that really isn't the point. The point is: does it affect the learning of our youngsters? That is the real test, and the test is answered by the statement I made a little while ago: if you have bad working conditions, you probably have bad learning conditions. If you have poor morale among your staff, the result will probably be poor morale among those youngsters under their direction.

I was a teacher for 13 years, and I also was a teacher at the College of Education, so I think I know a little bit about education. I don't know that I know a great deal, but I know this much: I don't think I had a lunch for seven, eight or nine years while I was in Kelowna because I was too busy conducting noon-hour rehearsals. I probably raised from $3,000 to $5,000 a year to provide high-school band and orchestral instruments.

You know, all the years I was there, I never once felt that I was exploited. I think there are hundreds of teachers — thousands — who have done similar things. They didn't ask

[ Page 800 ]

for overtime. They didn't ask for extra money for trips. They didn't ask for all these things that.... Normally, in an industrial situation, there would be some kind of recompense; they didn't ask for that. Those were the happiest times of my life, because I felt that the community appreciated what I was doing. I felt that the board appreciated what I was doing, but I was wrong, because as soon as the teachers' organization decided that living in Kelowna wasn't worth $300 extra a year in sunshine, in a salary argument they published our names and our salaries in the paper, and made us, in many cases, the topic of the month.

That's when I quit, and that's when I became politicized, because for the first time I realized I wasn't.... The minister knows what kind of attitudes there are in Kelowna on this subject, because he went to Rutland school and graduated therefrom. I know what a tough time he had during that period because I knew his principal, a nice principal who just recently died in Oliver. He talked very highly of the minister, and I wouldn't want the minister to disappoint his former principal.

But I realized, Mr. Speaker, what I was. I wasn't an independent professional like an assessor, a doctor, a lawyer or a dentist; I was a worker. And any time my superiors, my board, wanted to play hardball with me, I was vulnerable, and that's when I became politicized.

What I think will happen is that after five years.... We've seen teachers becoming more and more politicized. Twenty years ago you couldn't have got teachers to walk half a block to protest for their own rights, because they were being granted to them — not everything they wanted, but they were gradually developing a certain jurisprudence of rights. These are being jeopardized, and I think this is going to do more to politicize teachers than anything that has happened until now. Whether or not it is benign is not the point. They don't want to have this imposed on them.

Surely a professional group who have been frozen in their jobs for about five years, who have had catch-22 played on them with Ed Peck and ability to pay, is not threatening to the minister or the government. If they are, I haven't seen any evidence of it. Why you need to hammer them again right now under this kind of arrangement, I don't know.

They get the feeling they are not very highly regarded. Teachers are greedy. Therefore you freeze their salaries. Teachers are incompetent. So what do you do? External exams. Teachers are lazy. What do you do? Larger classes. There may not be a causal connection on the part of the government to those things, but that may be how it appears to the victims.

Anyway, Mr. Speaker, on behalf of New Democrats 11 want to defend the rights of B.C. children. I think that it is arguable that the government's failure to provide enough funds for public education discriminates against many of our youngsters and disadvantages the future of a great number of them. The government says it is ability to pay, or we can't afford it. Well, I don't know, but B.C. spends less of its a wealth on education than most other provinces. I'll give you a few figures. Figures are not very good in arguments, but they're the best I can do right now. Quebec spends 8.7 percent of its budget on education; Manitoba, 8 percent; Canadian average, 7.3 percent; B.C., 5.1 percent. That's from Stats Canada. The rest of Canada spends proportionately half as much again on education as B.C. does.

Let me give you a little bit of the history of spending. Only in British Columbia has spending per student in K to 12 gone down in real dollars. All other provinces have kept up with inflation. Not us. We're down. In 1983 under Bill 6, the then Minister of Education, Jack Heinrich, predicted a cut of 2 percent per year for three years. You add that to inflation, and you get that $400 million I was talking about a little while ago. Oh, sure, you dipped in and stole some money from textbooks, and you put a few bucks back into this, that or the other thing when we caught you with your arm in the till up to the elbow. You took it from textbooks and gave it to the excellence fund. Some of you have heard me make this speech before, and I know it is one of your favourites.

Only in British Columbia have operating grants to universities been cut 9.7 percent in the last five years. I'll give you the figures on how other provinces have increased theirs.

[4:30]

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: I have 40 minutes because I am mover of the amendment. Is that right? Somebody wants to switch my light off? I don't mean that literally; I just mean that.... A great number of people would probably like to do that.

Anyway, here are the figures. Newfoundland increased theirs 9.1 percent, and Ontario 20 percent.

I could go on and tell you what these things mean. What they mean is that there are going to be larger classes, fewer specialties, less help for individual needs, greater stress for staff and all the people working in the schools, leaky school roofs, fewer sports services and all this other stuff we've talked about before. There's likely to be more of the same.

I realize the hon. House Leader from the government side has gone out....

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: He said he'll be right back. He doesn't want to hear that, for instance, we raised the education budget 2 percent this year, which doesn't even keep up to inflation, while we raised the independent schools, the private schools — the Crofton Houses and the St. Georges, with fees of $4,000 a year — over 40 percent.

What's happened to the local boards? They got their freedom last year to raise more taxes on the backs of their own citizens. The argument was: "Well, you people are hollering all the time for autonomy. We'll freeze your budgets at an austerity level, and if you want any more, go to your own people and take the political consequences." That's a neat move. "We won't give you any more money. We'll take millions of dollars out, and we'll give it you — reward and furnish — through the excellence fund." Another brilliant move — wonderful, just wonderful. Taxes have been hiked in the provincial budget, in provincial government policies, on the property owner 29 percent every year since 1983. Property taxes of $125 in 1983 are $350 in 1987, and there's more to come, I understand, while you even up from the underassessed boards.

I talked about the pork-barrel of education funds. While we were rewarding with education funds, and didn't have enough for all the applications, guess what Norman Spector.... There was $54 million in education applications ending, and Norman Spector gets a big job at UBC. He didn’t take it because there was so much hue and cry raised about that kind of use of excellence funds. His excellent services were acquired by Prime Minister Mulroney, and I hope Mulroney is pleased to have Norman Spector, because

[ Page 801 ]

he certainly needs some help. I don't know if Mr. Spector can provide that help, but I rather think that his presence will be a spectre he would rather not be associated with.

I talked a little while ago about the efforts of collective bargaining — how that was wrecked. I didn't talk about the centralization of control, though, in Victoria. Curriculum: fewer options, more academics, less opportunity to take fine arts, education and the various music, art and drama programs that I think make a distinction. I know the hon. House Leader of the government would have been one of the first to enter those programs in music. I understand that he might even like to do that yet so he could learn to read music. He told me he has an excellent ear — I thought that meant he didn't need to learn to read. But if he were to come into the schools today, for instance in Centennial Senior Secondary School, with about 2,000 people, he would have a chance at half a music teacher because of the limiting of the options. And he would be very disappointed, this House Leader, because he couldn't get the kinds of courses that he could get 20 years ago when he should have been taking them in the first place.

Interjection.

MR. ROSE: He did take them, and it's because he took them, he tells us, that he's such a success today in the music field. But I make light of this, and I mustn't. I make light of this only to make the point that the curriculum has been centralized, there are fewer options, and therefore, with the range of ability, there are fewer opportunities for students to meet the kind of needs that they should be able to meet in our public school system.

In the meantime our public school system is demeaned as not being a very good product, and if we'd only send our kids to the independent schools, something better would come out. I don't believe that, personally. I think it serves another purpose entirely. It serves a political purpose. It serves a purpose of providing those people who are normally supporters of the government with an opportunity to project their own values through their children — which I think is a laudable objective; I don't object to that at all. But they're not independent and they're not private, because they use public funds. I do object to the fact that certain schools that provide networks for those people who are the business elite of this province should get public funding when their fees are up over $4,000 a year. That's just an absolute waste of money. It's nonsense, and it's payola. It's pork, and it's in the public trough. But I mustn't speak extravagantly on this subject, because you know I'm always a subtle and very careful person when I'm dealing with matters such as this.

Mr. Speaker, there are all kinds of things that we could talk about, but I don't intend to, because I think that if there is any point to be made — and maybe there isn't — perhaps I've made it by now. So I don't think we should proceed with this bill right now. I think it will cause a lot of turmoil. I think it's premature. We're going to have amendments to Bill 19, so why do we want to pursue this turkey at this time? Why don't we just wait and do the whole ball together? We don't have to go through and cause a lot of trouble and chaos and concern right now. It's unnecessary. What's the rush? Let's take time to consult. Let's take time to discuss this matter with the people concerned — the children and the parents. What is this going to mean for education? What kind of future relationships with the students, the parents, the teachers and the government does this bill imply?

This radical thing isn't something that we should rush into right now. Why impose it on various principals, teachers, parents and pupils when attitudes will...? The second member for Langley (Mr. Peterson) admitted that it's already filtering down into the classroom about teachers taking time off and schools being closed down. Delta has already said they're going to close their schools. It opts to do that. It's not necessary. Government admitted that Bill 19 needs improvement. I think we need a breathing space. We've had five years of hammering. I think we just need a breather.

We've got a royal commission. What's Mr. Sullivan going to do? He's going to go and make some recommendations that they've already made decisions on. What is he? He's not some kind of a yo-yo to be put out there whose work needs to be considered irrelevant. I think it's an insult to the Crown prosecutor to have him out studying education when all the decisions have been made. What's he going to report about? What's left for him to report?

So the whole thing is premature. Let's leave the door open. Let's stop the lines hardening. And to give us a chance to do that, Mr. Speaker — I know that you've been waiting for this — I move that the motion for second reading of Bill 20, intituled Teaching Profession Act, be amended by deleting the word "now" and adding the words "on this day six months hence."

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The motion is in order.

On the amendment.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I'll briefly enter into debate and simply say that the government rejects the motion.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: On the hoist motion, the Chair recognizes the member for Nelson-Creston.

MR. DIRKS: There seems to be a little confusion here, Mr. Speaker. I have listened very carefully to the speakers opposite talking about listening to the teachers and listening to the BCTF. I wonder if I could quote out of the BCTF brief that was submitted to the Minister of Labour (Hon. L. Hanson) on his tour — and this is why I speak against the motion to hoist. The quote is: "We hope you will act quickly to implement them, because the problems we have described are aggravated by the passage of time. The provision of a basic system of collective bargaining between teachers and boards has been on the agenda for too many years, has been sought in too many briefs, has eluded the action of too many ministers."

There seems to be a little confusion, Mr. Speaker, as I said. I listened to the member for Burnaby North (Mr. Jones). He seemed to be a little less than enthusiastic about it all, and I wondered if he was trying to find out how he could actually talk against the ability of teachers to form unions and still be able to justify that to his union bosses. Then I listened to the last speaker. He speaks very eloquently, but I thought I was listening to a speech on the budget rather than Bill 20.

There seems to be confusion as to whether consultation did take place. Let me tell you, Mr. Speaker, that consultation did take place, not only by the Minister of Education but also by the Minister of Labour and Consumer Services on his tour.

[ Page 802 ]

We received 16 briefs from local organizations. One of those briefs represented seven school districts, or seven school associations.

Let me just read a little bit from some of those briefs, if I may, Mr. Speaker. The Grand Forks Teachers' Association, on January 19: "The solution to improved collective bargaining for teachers is to amend the School Act to allow teachers to be included under the Labour Code."

The Prince George District Teachers' Association, January 15: "Teachers want the legislatively protected right to negotiate with their employers on more than just salary and bonus items."

The Peace River South Teachers' Association, January 29:

"Teachers in B.C. have neither the right to interest arbitration or the withdrawal of services. This is an unjustified distinction. Teachers in B.C. have no access to independent and neutral agencies to assist parties in getting negotiations on track, such as industrial relations officers, industrial inquiry commissions, special officers, trouble-shooters, under Code section 112 and the Labour Relations Board. The value of an outside party to the bargaining process between two groups cannot be overemphasized. Teachers should be provided access to such people and bodies."

The Peace River North Teachers' Association, on January 29: "We need an ability to bargain on all items and conditions of employment, access to a meaningful dispute resolution mechanism and grievance procedure. The compensation stabilization program must be eliminated."

Greater Victoria Teachers' Association, on February 2: "We are not 'employees,' as that term is defined in the Labour Code."

Saanich Teachers' Association, on February 2:

"In the interest of labour peace, we would hope that the government will take action that will bring the bargaining rights of over 30,000 B.C. teachers up to the twentieth century and give them the same rights and responsibilities in bargaining with their employers as all other teachers in Canada and all other public sector employees in British Columbia. We urge the government to remove the CSP, with its inequities due to costing of increments together with general increases."

[4:45]

Langley Teachers' Association, February 3: "Langley teachers are asking for the right to negotiate all salary and non-salary items. We're asking for what other workers in British Columbia and all other teachers in Canada already have."

North Vancouver Teachers' Association: "Legislation must be changed to provide an equivalence of authority, so that two equal partners can deal with each other and fair bargaining can proceed through the proper collective bargaining framework."

Nelson District Teachers' Association, on January 21: "Extend full and fair bargaining rights to teachers, either by significant amendments to the School Act through inclusion of teachers under the Labour Code or through a parallel body of legislation for teachers."

The Nechako District Teachers' Association said: "Amend the School Act and Labour Code to allow teachers full collective bargaining rights."

The Sooke Teachers' Association said on February 2: "The association agrees that the concerns raised in the B.C. Teachers' Federation brief are legitimate. The solutions suggested are reasonable and fair. Put teachers under the Labour Code and the full services of the Ministry of Labour."

On January 22, the Nanaimo District Teachers' Association said: "The association supports and endorses the brief submitted by the B.C. Teachers' Federation. We call for the establishment of a sensible system that would accord teachers the fundamental rights and the proven practices in regard to collective bargaining."

Most teacher associations refer to the B.C. Teachers' Federation brief. I don't want to bore the audience this afternoon, but let's look at some of the key things there. On page 2 of their brief it says: "The first improvement would be the establishment of a sensible system that for the first time accords teachers the fundamental rights and the proven practices in regard to collective bargaining. The second improvement would be the elimination of the unfair and bureaucratic albatross around the necks of all public sector bargaining, which is the compensation stabilization program."

On page 5: "That is why there is a positive duty to bargain in good faith on all those matters under the B.C. Labour Code and similar legislation in other jurisdictions."

On page 7: "The second principle is that there must be a fair and functional method of resolving employment disputes that are not settled in the first instance by negotiation mediation. The expression of that principle in British Columbia is the legally recognized and protected rights of employees to withdraw services in favour of negotiation objectives."

On page 9: "The third important aspect in normal collective bargaining regimes is the existence of independent and expert bodies and processes which provide both assistance and, where necessary, neutral supervision of the bargaining relationship."

On page 10: "The Labour Relations Board itself is established as an independent agency with the authority to settle virtually all disputes about the bargaining process. In its administrative style it has the ability to get to the underlying causes of disputes and to fashion remedies that address the real employment problem as well as the legal issue in a way that tries to foster good employer-employee relationships."

On page 11: "The value of an expert independent administrative tribunal to provide guidance to the bargaining parties is hard to overstate, although often taken for granted."

On page 12: "There is no independent body whatsoever to fulfill the role of the LRB. Problems with bargaining practices have no avenue for resolution. There is no proscription for any unfair employment practice. There is no body to which to turn if one is alleged. There is no independent monitoring of the bargaining relationship."

On page 13: "It is not appropriate that the legislative responsibility for fair employee relations in a public institution such as the public school be assigned solely to the ministry responsible for overall management of that institution. That approach is not followed in any other field, for good reason."

You can go on and on through this brief.

MR. JONES: Page 54.

MR. DIRKS: Page 54, the man wants. This is my speech. I'll let him talk about that one.

[ Page 803 ]

But back to what they're saying on page 33: "We hope you will act quickly to implement them." They were asking for full bargaining rights. They were asking to come under the Labour Code. "Provision of basic bargaining rights for educators and returning to the positive principle of freely negotiated agreements would immeasurably improve bargaining relationships in education. More, it would be the clearest sign of a new, forward-looking approach to the challenges ahead."

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that the teachers got precisely what the B.C. Fed was asking for. Why this reaction then? If indeed, as I think these briefs indicate, they wanted full collective bargaining rights under the Labour Code, why are they now seeming to object? I believe there are two reasons. One is that they didn't fully recognize what they were asking for. I think to a large degree it was like someone picking berries in a berry patch. You look off to the distance and you see the bushes are covered with berries. They looked to the Labour Code because they were restricted in what they could bargain for under the School Act. They looked to the Labour Code and all the great things that they could bargain for under the Labour Code. That was the berry bush that they couldn't attain. Now they can attain it. But they didn't realize that there are other obligations; there are other things they have to do. It isn't an automatic thing. The BCTF now has the opportunity to go out and sell itself to the membership if it wants to continue to be the representative in the union sense.

I would suggest that the other reason there is this reaction is because of the changes that have occurred: the separation between salary and working conditions, and the creation and development of a teachers' college. As a teacher, I find the development of a teachers' college to be a very interesting and energetic type of thing. I don't look at this as something that will hold teachers back, but I see that it helps us to get out of that impasse that we seem to be in today.

While the BCTF may well have done a lot of things in professional development — and I'm sure they have — if you think back with me, the times we saw media coverage of BCTF action was not in professional development. It wasn't when they were trying to develop new programs. The general public didn't see that. Maybe the teachers saw it from within their organization, but the general public didn't. The general public saw when the BCTF was acting as a union and when they talked like a union. That's when the media saw them, and I think this division of the two functions — the working conditions and the professional development — will allow both to develop side by side, and now the public will be aware. It will be able to be aware of how teachers' professional development can happen under a teachers' college.

MR. JONES: Don't lower yourself to the mentality of the media.

MR. DIRKS: I understand that's where a lot of your research comes from.

Today the BCTF has to decide what it wants to do and what role it wants to play. It can either become the union which I believe some of its executive might like to see, or it can actually, as far as I can understand from the legislation, still be the association to look after the associations of the teachers, if it so desires. It will have to go, in either case though, back to the membership and verify its existence with its membership. I think that's the important, key ingredient, both in Bill 19 and Bill 20. It goes back to the individual.

The teachers, when this legislation is passed, will not only have more rights to negotiate, they will have also more freedom to decide how and when to negotiate, and who will negotiate for them. It is the freedom of the individual that is being protected. I believe that if this message were out to the teachers, the reaction would be different. Therefore I would speak against this motion to hoist.

MS. A. HAGEN: In rising to support the motion to hoist Bill 20 at this time from the floor of this Legislature, I would like to begin by making a comment about the premise that I bring to any debate in this House, and that is that it is our responsibility, in fact, to ensure that the legislation we pass is in the best interests of the people that we have been elected to govern. As I have looked at the climate and the context of the introduction of Bills 19 and 20, and as I prepared over the weekend for some comments on this bill, it became increasingly obvious to me that there was a need for some time to be placed between the reading of this bill and its passage.

It seemed most appropriate that we should be looking to delaying the legislation for some period of time. I want to put some context for that thinking on this beautiful weekend that we just had, because I did spend a considerable amount of time giving very serious thought to this legislation and its implications. As many people in this House know, I come to a discussion of this legislation from a background of being an advocate for children and an advocate for the public education system in this province. I've been a teacher of children, I've been a teacher of adults, I've been a school trustee. I care very much that the education system we have in this province is one of which we can be proud and one that provides the climate and opportunity both for children to learn and for people — their parents and teachers who have that as their agenda — to be able to have that happen for those children.

My thinking went to Bill 19, first of all, a very complex piece of legislation, and one that has a very significant impact on Bill 20. It is clear that while Bill 19 is still before this House with all of its ramifications — including, we may anticipate and hope, some significant amendment — it is very difficult for us to look at Bill 20 as a discrete piece of legislation. It is in fact not a discrete piece of legislation, but one that is very closely tied to Bill 19 and all of the implications of that legislation.

I thought too, as I often have, of the events last fall when many of us were talking to our constituents, and very strongly over these last few days the perspective that I found among people in New Westminster about education has come back to me. It was the issue in my community; it was the issue that people wanted to talk about and that they felt strongly about. They felt strongly about it because they felt that at the time of an election there was some reason to have optimism — that the difficulties that had faced this particular sector in our province might perhaps be overcome and that we might be looking at better times.

I remember meeting with the teachers' organization, as I did with many groups during that period of time. They talked very optimistically and with enthusiasm about the prospect of being able to get on with taking a long-range look at what was going to be happening in their schools. We talked about some of the difficulties and some of the problems that teachers, principals and parents are facing. They were interested and ready to get on with talking about long-term goals and where our education system was going.

[5:00]

[ Page 804 ]

That optimism and that willingness to get on with that future-oriented development of our education system, in my view, has been very seriously damaged by the events of the last few days. It has been damaged, I think, not only among the teaching profession but among many others who know and are concerned about the education system. What I find people talking about and trying to puzzle through is to understand the agenda of government at this time. What are we about as we seem with some precipitateness to move ahead with Bill 20?

1 must confess that last Thursday afternoon, when the Minister of Education rose at 5:30 to begin his presentation on second reading of Bill 20, I greeted that matter on the floor with surprise and with consternation. I did so because I knew that at that very time in the minister's offices, discussions were going on among his officials and representatives from the teachers' and school trustees' organizations. I knew that the message that the minister had given — whether that was in fact the agenda prior to 5:30 on Thursday, or whether that was what he thought would be the course of events — was that there was going to be some work taking place in consultation around this bill, that there were some concerns that he was beginning to understand and recognize, and that some working arrangements would be developed that would allow the parties to take a look at this bill. I had a sense, before he stood up in this House, that there was beginning to be some understanding and some movement around what this bill really did say and how it was going to affect the climate in which children learn. All of a sudden that whole perspective altered, when the minister, late in the afternoon, proceeded with second reading of this very major bill.

1 began to think then of the variety of messages. I can understand that the government was trying to work that through, but it seems to me that it derailed the process of trying to work that through with that activity.

1 looked then at some of the other events that are a part of the education scene and climate at this time, and it seemed to me that the more I looked at it, the more difficulty I was going to have in debating the principles of this bill, getting on with second reading. Not only had the minister acknowledged that major changes needed to occur, the dimensions of which were being hammered out in his offices at the very time he began debate, but in fact one of the first initiatives this government took was to fulfill an election promise by establishing a commission on education: a commission that the education community had asked for a number of times. In my view, it was a decision of good faith out of that election perspective. We had some questions about the mandate of the commission, but I acknowledge that that mandate was established according to the government's desire to get on with that particular job.

As I looked at the mandate of that commission, it seemed to me that the agenda was something I was having difficulty clarifying in my own mind. We knew what it was we were doing and in what context, what other people were doing, and that we were embarked on endeavours that were going to bring to all the parties a due process that would enable us to take future direction, to deal with some of the problems within the education system and, I might say, to meet the aspirations not only of teachers but also of school boards on matters related to employer-employee relations. When I went to the terms of reference for commissioner Barry Sullivan, it seemed to me that the clarity of the agenda was clouded by the mandate we have given this important person at this time.

We have asked that person, under the heading of accountability, to be accountable to the community for its performance, by recommending appropriate mechanisms and standards of measurement for, among many other things, teacher performance and teacher qualifications. Yet suddenly we have in this bill a whole setup through the College of Teachers that is entirely different from anything that anyone has ever envisaged, let alone examined. It seems that with this bill we're putting the cart before the horse, setting up two processes that might be mutually incompatible, that might come to mutually contradictory conclusions or that might presume a course of action without enabling the commission to go forward in the spirit of free inquiry.

Further, under the section dealing with teaching methods and curricula, the commissioner is charged with establishing "the process required to ensure that teacher recruitment, training, qualification, remuneration, promotion and ongoing professional development policies are effective in ensuring a uniformly high and continuing standard of professional performance, initiative and motivation." I would suggest to this House that this presumes that there are some changes that may need to occur in that area, and it seems to me presumptuous in the extreme for us to set up, at the very time we have asked the commissioner to begin to look into these particular aspects of our education system, a process that would do a lot of the things noted in that particular clause of the mandate.

There's another point I would like to note in the terms of reference for the commissioner, under the heading "Structures, " where the commissioner is asked to establish "means of ensuring effective, constructive and broadly based teacher input in the educational planning process and in the determination of policies directly impacting their working conditions, remuneration, professional and career development." In addition to some clearly new processes that the minister and the government propose we should move into law at this time, we have also given the education commissioner the mandate to examine those very things. I find it difficult at this time to examine a bill that is going to make very, very significant change in the education system and its delivery as we know it — mechanisms, processes, forms, structures and development — at the same time a commission is examining those very things in a goal-setting way.

So the agenda is not something that has been clearly defined, and we are in fact moving in two directions at the same time. In that regard, I think it would behoove us to stop and allow that other process to have the kind of attention and pre-eminence it needs. As many of us have noted, an education system is not its parts or even the sum of its parts. It is a very holistic experience. The minister has many years in that field and knows that as well as anyone. Many people in this House have experience in that field and have some knowledge of the kinds of working relationships so critical to an education system. I've said it before in the debate on Bill 19, and I would say it even more so in this area because we are dealing with children: the climate in which an education system is developed and in which we as legislators work to alter it is extremely important to the enterprise.

Let us look at the situations that face us at this time: a commission on the education system, Bill 19, which we know is in lock-step with this bill, where many things have yet to be settled. We know, too, of the uncertainty and the kinds of questions that have been raised about many aspects of that bill. So much so — and I commend the government for

[ Page 805 ]

this action — that they have taken it off the floor to allow time for, we would hope, very reasoned and very carefully developed amendments. That is an extremely important initiative that suggests that the government is prepared to act in good faith. I think it sets up some expectations with the education community, too. Perhaps because there was some time between the introduction of Bill 19 and the introduction of Bill 20, the process of listening and consulting got underway. To the credit of the parties, there seemed to be some movement toward identifying a number of issues that needed to be understood, clarified and moved on in the way of amendment.

It's clear from the people I've talked to that there is an expectation on the part of the public that we will not as legislators do things that will bring instability and difficulty to the education system. I think the public would see it as an act of statesmanship on the part of this House to pause and allow time for Bill 20 to have many opportunities for further consultation.

The government has indicated that there has been consultation, and I want to acknowledge that there has been a good deal of information flowing back and forth. Let's remember that both these bills are in their actual prospectus going to very significantly alter working relationships and alter the way in which our education system is organized. It's extremely important that people have adequate opportunity to address the issue.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

One of the things I did on the weekend, in addition to giving some further thought and study to the bill, was to spend some time with some former colleagues of mine who were at an annual convention in Vancouver. It was a very useful opportunity for me to get a perspective from right across the province; in fact, I stayed much longer than I had originally planned to, because I was learning a good deal about what was happening in school districts across the province from the school boards, who very often have a good handle on how people are feeling. I would note that a significant number of boards have taken the initiative to make their viewpoints known to the minister on the progress of Bill 20. Almost two dozen boards — not all boards meet, I might note, early in the month — very strongly urge that the government delay the passage of the bill. I would just like to note a couple of the resolutions, because it seems to me they present a very reasoned perspective on why delay would be to the advantage of us all in our responsibility to ensure a good school system.

[5:15]

From Stikine they note a number of the things I have raised about the lack of consultation and some of the issues that are involved in Bill 20 and the complications with Bill 19 and Bill 20 going quickly through the system. They note that these bills will have a dramatic and serious effect on our schools in these ways — board, teacher and community relations; the quality of education in our schools; the future of education in the province of British Columbia. They therefore urge that the government withhold passage until all parties have had an opportunity for discussion and input. I would note that they are talking about both Bill 19 and Bill 20.

The Greater Victoria School Board has a good resolution. They urge withholding of passage until all parties have had an opportunity to consult and discuss. The reasons they note are:

"Some aspects of Bill 19 and Bill 20 have already been found by Ministry of Education and Labour officials to be unclear and confusing. The recently appointed Royal Commission on Education will not be able to carry out its mandate in the atmosphere of animosity that currently exists in the education community. Lack of consultation to date has led to a serious questioning of motives for the legislation. Good legislation will withstand discussion."

From my own board, the New Westminster board, a significant number of points are raised, suggesting a fairly complex series of consultations and suggesting some pauses that need to occur in the course of action while we get this bill on the road in a way that is going to ensure that it is passed, we would hope, with the unanimous support of this House, because it has had the consultation and discussion that it truly deserves.

I'd like to comment for a moment about what I consider to be consultation, because members on the government side have often commented about the consultation that has occurred. Again, I would note that there have been, with the initiative of both government and parties, a great number of occasions where information has come forward. I would acknowledge, too, that the government is clearly listening to some of the common ground that teachers and trustees have found around the issues of full collective bargaining. That said, the consultation, once the policy, if you like, which is really the bill that we're looking at.... Once that bill is presented to the House, the consultation needs to go ahead in a spirit of openness and cooperation.

When I was at the school trustees' convention, I heard announced the terms of the consultation that the ministry has stated would prevail. That was a very circumscribed consultation. I'm sure that the minister was hopeful that it would be adequate; but, with respect, I would suggest that it is not. The announcement that I beard was that there would be discussions today and tomorrow — April 27 and 28 — and that there would be further discussions on May 4 and 5. It's my understanding that it was the minister's expectation that those consultations would deal with the issues that he felt were in need of being addressed, and would deal with any changes that should be put in the form of amendments to the bill.

Clearly, Mr. Speaker, from what we are hearing from teachers and trustees, and from parents across the province, there needs to be more time for consultation. Because of the far-reaching implications of this bill, because of the many significant changes that it proposes — changes that no one has even thought about, let alone examined — and because of the relationships between the various structures that are being proposed in this bill, it's going to take much more than a couple of days this week and a couple of days next week for people to adequately look at how this legislation might work and what will be the effect in the classroom.

Any good policy development puts forward a proposal; it invites feedback. There's no question that we've had a good deal of that in the last short period of time. It goes back with further options, and alternatives are looked at, and eventually out of that discussion comes resolution. While I would not propose to the minister that this particular process will take months and years, I would certainly suggest to him that,

[ Page 806 ]

having moved as boldly as he has presumed to do in bringing forth legislation that suggests such radical change, it would behoove him and the government to take time to ensure that those particular structures are examined and that all the options are explored.

I would like to take a look at one of the aspects of the bill, one that I feel very strongly about and think needs a good deal of additional attention. The bill proposes to make principals and vice-principals managers. It proposes to take those people out of the system in which they have worked and been trained and to make them managers of the system, with very different responsibilities.

AN HON. MEMBER: They want that.

MS. A. HAGEN: The member on this side of the House but of the government party suggests that this is what the principals wanted. There is not, in fact, in any of the information that I have received and in my consultations with as many principals as I have been able to talk to, a willingness or request on their part that they be treated as management and treated as people who are responsible to the school board in terms of their working relationships with their staffs.

Let's go back and take a look at what a principal is and, first of all, at what that name involves. In my book, that name says that this person is the principal teacher, the primary educator in the school system. That's something that has been there since the beginning of any kind of administrative organization within the school system and something that is practised, in fact, by many principals who are practising teachers in the school system. In my own district, even within an urban and metropolitan district, a significant number of our principals are teaching at least part-time within the system. And that goes for vice-principals to an even larger degree. The majority of vice-principals are virtually full-time teachers with administrative responsibilities.

Secondly, look at why those people are chosen to be principals. They are chosen to be principals because of their skills as educators. They have additional skills and training as well, but their primary curricula vitae, if you like, in presenting themselves for this particular position is that they are effective, good teachers, with very strong commitment to education within their system.

Let's look at the nature of their work. The nature of their work is with teachers and with children. They are not managers, in the sense of being paper-pushers. They are people who are hands-on in dealing with the goals of the school; with how teachers will collectively and collegially achieve educational goals; with how to work with students, to evaluate those students, to ensure that they're getting the very best education possible. There is no question that the kinds of skills they bring to that involve cooperation, goal-sharing, working with the community.

They are not people to be answerable to the school board as the primary reason for their existence. There's no question that their working relationship with the board and with senior officials on the board is a very important part of their work, both from the point of view of their communicating the perspectives of the board to their schools, and in terms of their advocating for their schools. But in that role of principal of the school, they are primarily spokespersons for their school; they are primarily advocates for children within that system; they are primarily people who work with their teachers; and they work very closely with the community.

1 would wager that there's not one parent to be found anywhere in this province who does not expect that principal to be something other than a manager; who does not expect that principal to be the first teacher in that school — somebody committed to education, children and the quality of education in that school system. We are suggesting that these people are going to be administrators of a "plant" — how I hate that word when it comes to apply to a school. They are going to be concerned about the "product" — and I don't like that word when it comes to talking about a school. They are going to be the agents of the board, in terms of school board relations.

They are going to be in some pecking order in a hierarchical structure. That is just one example, Mr. Speaker, of the major changes occurring in this bill that require us to delay its passage. I will look forward at some future time to debating the substance of the bill.

MRS. GRAN: I rise today to speak against the hoist motion. I had hoped that the hoist motion wouldn't be there. Mr. Speaker, I have some very strong views on where we are today in education and why we're here in this Legislature debating this very bill.

In a meeting with some teachers over the weekend, I listened to what I consider a very sad story from a long-term teacher of 35 years. She talked about the BCTF with fondness and almost with tears in her eyes, because of what the B.C. Teachers' Federation used to be and how, when it was formed, it helped the teachers and did the job that the teachers wanted it to do; and in the last ten years that federation has turned from helping teachers as a whole, to a political organization — that's the only thing it can be called. The reason we're in this House debating this bill, for the most part, is because of the actions of a few people in the B.C. Teachers' Federation. The statement that I'd like to make also is that the public education system in this province belongs to the people of this province, not to the B.C. Teachers' Federation.

One of the previous speakers — I believe it was the member for Burnaby North (Mr. Jones) — talked about the wonderful committees structured within the BCTF. Well, I'd like to talk a little about one of those committees. It's called Teachers' Viewpoint. I don't know whether any of you recognize it or not. As a parent, I had two children go through the system and graduate, and I have had these minutes placed in my office for the last six years. This is the last set that I could find, and it was from 1981. Some of the members on this committee — if that's what it's called — are active in my own constituency, as a matter of fact. I just want to read some of the things in these minutes that have brought us to where we are today. There were 100 members in attendance, and the minutes of the meeting go on to say that Teachers' Viewpoint wants "full collective bargaining rights for teachers, including the right to strike...a BCTF which operates as a democratic union...a reduction in the management functions of principals...and (in] the pay differential between principals and teachers" — they want teachers and principals to be paid the same amount of money — "...and that the BCTF take positions on social and political issues of the day" — I guess that's abortion and things like that.

[5:30]

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

They want Teachers' Viewpoint "to build a new kind of progressive caucus within the BCTF" — which they did.

[ Page 807 ]

"We need a caucus in the BCTF because there are many 'progressive, ' 'militant, ' 'socialist, ' 'left, ' 'activist' teachers in our federation...at the annual general meeting we voted virtually unanimously to back the right to strike for teachers...among the members of Viewpoint are supporters and members of the NDP, people who distribute and defend the newspaper Leftwords, members and supporters of In Struggle!, people who are associated with Trotskyist groups, and others who are 'independents' or see themselves essentially and simply as trade unionists.

"One view holds that we should elect the NDP, another that we should build an 'anti-monopoly coalition,' another that we should work to unite the working class and build a communist party, still another that all of these options are irrelevant to teachers and we need to spend all of our time working on the BCTF.

"It is essential that there be an organized group of B.C. teachers openly and consciously working to build a union with the right to strike — in other words, beginning the task of uniting teachers with other workers.

"The articulation of our principles creates a pole of opinion in the BCTF committed to militant, democratic trade-unionism for teachers. In the past, this point of view existed but in a disorganized and unstructured way.... This situation must end. Teachers' Viewpoint is the place for us to have our discussions, make our plans, develop our strategies."

Mr. Speaker, I say to you that the strategies worked, the plan was developed; and in order to keep our education system intact, this government had no choice but to bring in a bill to bring order to the education system in this province. Mr. Speaker, I believe that the majority of the public support Bill 20. In fact, I have talked to very few people who haven't said: "Don't back down."

I believe also that teachers are fearful. They're fearful for good reason. They've had security, and as long as teachers were involved in teaching our children, the taxpayers and parents were willing to go along with the security. But when all of a sudden political ambitions and wages meant more than the children in the classrooms, the public became very upset about the situation that existed.

It's fair for all of us to recognize some of the problems in the classroom today. The lot of the teacher is not an easy one. Children come from broken homes; some of them are abused; some of them have learning disabilities and don't have enough help in their classrooms; their parents are working and don't have the time to spend with them. We have to acknowledge that teachers need help in those classrooms. They need help — not necessarily of other teachers. I think, frankly, we should have social services workers in the schools to identify problems such as child abuse. Most sexual abusers have been abused in their lifetime, and I believe that if we identified those children in the schools we could eliminate a lot of problems later on.

Mr. Speaker, I see a situation that has developed over at least ten years, where the public and the teachers have to come to grips with the situation. It doesn't matter to me, frankly, what happens to the B.C. Teachers' Federation. I think they've made their own bed and now they're going to have to sleep in it. It's my hope and my dream that the teachers of this province will become the professionals that the majority of them are — that they'll form associations, that they won't become trade unionists and that the children in the classrooms will become the number one thought in their minds.

I hope this government recognizes some of the problems that some of the opposition members have brought forward and that have been in the press. I happen to be an individual who believes that we should perhaps look at feeding children in schools. It is done in other countries. Children don't go hungry just because there is no money in the house. There are children in those schools undernourished because they eat the wrong kind of food, because they live on junk food. I believe that if we gave our children one good meal a day in school, it would be an investment in all of our futures. So I see give and take on both sides.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair, ]

This hoist motion bothers me. All it is is a stall. All you are doing on the other side of the House is prolonging the frustration and the upset in the schools. So I ask the opposition, through you, Mr. Speaker, not to continue debating the hoist motion and to get on with Bill 20 and put it into committee stage.

Mrs. Gran moved adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: It is a tad early this evening. However, I understand there is a significant sporting event happening this evening between the members opposite and our members of the press gallery, and far be it from the government to stand in the way of this most significant and remarkable event. We will look forward to having the same courtesy extended to us when it is our turn later on this session for the press gallery ball game. With that said, I move adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 5:37 p.m.

[ Page 808 ]

Appendix

WRITTEN ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS

11 Mr. Gabelmann asked the Hon. the Minister of Labour and Consumer Services the following questions:

1. For each of the years 1982, 1983, 1984, 1985 and 1986, what was the average real wage increase in British Columbia?

2. For the same years, what was the number of worker days lost through labour disputes?

3. For the same years, what was the percentage of workers in the Province who were members of unions?

4. How do these figures compare with parallel ones for the period 1967 through 1971?

The Hon. L. Hanson replied as follows:

* Average earnings adjusted for inflation — this figure indicates the change in purchasing power of paid workers.

N/A — Not available.