[ Page 2941 ]
Routine Proceedings
Tabling Documents –– 2941
Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Compensation Act (Bill 6 1). Second reading. (Hon. Mr. Couvelier)
Mr. Williams –– 2941
Hon. Mr. Parker –– 2942
Open Learning Agency Act (Bill 58). Second reading
Hon. S. Hagen –– 2943
Mr. Jones –– 2944
Member's statement
Resignation of first member for Boundary-Similkameen. Mr. Hewitt –– 2946
Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm
Mr. Harcourt
Open Learning Agency Act (Bill 58). Second reading
Ms. Edwards –– 2947
Mrs. Boone –– 2948
Ms. A. Hagen –– 2949
Mr. Ree –– 2950
Mr. Harcourt –– 2950
The House met at 10:09 a.m.
Prayers.
MR. LOVICK: Mr. Speaker, my colleague for Esquimalt-Port Renfrew (Mr. Sihota) is unable to be here today and he has asked me to make a brief introduction in his stead. Seated directly behind me in the gallery are a group of students from Glen Lake School with their teacher, Jean Markowsky. I would ask the House to please join me in welcoming these people.
HON. MR. ROGERS: Mr. Speaker, for a diminishing number of members — and I mean a diminishing number of members; I believe there are only six, maybe fewer — this concludes 12 years as members of this assembly for some of us: the second member for Delta (Mr. Davidson) and myself and the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf). For some of us this was a day which we will remember. There was a time in this chamber when this particular day was a day that everybody recognized, but it's getting that fewer and fewer of us from the class of '75 recognize it. To my fellow colleagues from the class of '75, congratulations for sticking it out.
Hon. S. Hagen tabled the ninth annual report of the Science Council of British Columbia and of the Secretariat on Science, Research and Development for the year ending March 31, 1987.
Orders of the Day
HON. MR. STRACHAN: I call adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 61. The hon. member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Miller) adjourned debate. I see he's not here, but I'm sure debate will proceed.
SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS
EXPORT CHARGE COMPENSATION ACT
(continued)
MR. WILLIAMS: Less adequate, I'm sure, than the member for Prince Rupert.
Interjections.
MR. WILLIAMS: Carry on, carry on!
This bill is kind of fascinating, Mr. Speaker. It's before the House, and I don't think we have an agreement with Canada on all the details. Maybe the minister can help us out in that regard. I don't know if we've got an agreement with the Americans on all the details, but maybe the minister can help us out in that regard.
We've established a date of January 15, 1988, for coming to grips with this, and I guess the minister is crossing his fingers hoping that all the mess and details will be sorted out by nextyear sometime. Or am I just too confused? But it does seem to me that's the kind of problem there is in the Ministry of Forests these days. There are probably various camps arguing on various sides over there.
How can you prepare a budget? Goodness! You came in with all your new rules and regulations in October; it's still not clear where all those pieces are going or what they're going to mean in the end. Gosh, you've got to prepare a full budget for the next fiscal year, and there are obligations there that you say will be the companies' obligations, which are currently the Crown's obligations. If you don't have legislation, you're going to end up with those obligations still on your back. You told us you were going to clean up that mess in terms of those companies having a free ride.
MR. CLARK: A leap of faith.
MR. WILLIAMS: This is one more leap of faith in terms of this government's operation.
It's not at all clear. The one thing the forest industry dislikes the most in this province is uncertainty. We have a real author of uncertainty here in the present Minister of Forests.
MR. CLARK: No contest.
MR. WILLIAMS: No contest.
Have you got the act cleaned up with Canada, Mr. Minister? Have you got the act cleaned up with the United States, Mr. Minister? I think not.
The other strange thing about this is that it's not clear in terms of the refund arrangements for the export- tax that British Columbia is currently receiving and that the industry is paying. Under this legislation, the date could be flexible. Maybe the minister could explain why it would appear that the date could be flexible in terms of the refund period.
[10:15]
The new rules with respect to stumpage came into effect at a certain time, when one could argue there was a duplication in taxes. But the legislation doesn't tie the minister to that date, in terms of refunds. So it allows the potential for overpayment to the industry, for example, which would be very unsatisfactory and could be inequitable between parties, or it could be overly generous to all the parties. Maybe that's the minister's inclination, given his history. But it doesn't seem reasonable that the firm date would not apply — period — in terms of refunding funds that are very significant dollars indeed.
The other point I'd like to make, Mr. Speaker, is that the integrated industry in the last couple of years has never in the modern history of the province done so well. The pulp industry is doing incredibly well. Just think about it. There was a Canfor announcement earlier this week, made by — interestingly — the Minister of Economic Development rather than the Minister of Forests, but I guess that's just a matter of pecking order and seniority. The announcement was significant. There will be $300 million plus spent on the Port Mellon plant and subsequent expenditures on a paper mill.
This company was on the ropes two and a half years ago. This company was on the block, available for sale — lock, stock and barrel — for peanuts. The free enterprisers weren't smart enough to pick it up. This company was on the ropes. They had debts of something like $600 million in terms of current bank obligations, and the bulk of those debts has been paid back out of cash flow in the last couple of years. Just think about that. A company that was totally on the ropes, going down the drain, as wobbly as they come, is now secure and sound. The reason is the money they made in pulp. That's the reason. Hundreds of millions in profit. And still a system in place that has meant that this jurisdiction provides through the generosity of the Crown the lowest-priced feedstock for
[ Page 2942 ]
pulp mills in the world. Half the price anywhere else in the world is the price they pay for the raw material for our pulp mills in British Columbia. That's incredibly cheap raw material. And the price of pulp has gone up dramatically — hundreds of dollars a tonne in recent years — and each time the industry has pushed their new prices, they've stuck. So it's an unparalleled success in terms of getting new prices to stick because of high demand around the world. We should reflect on that,
This ministry has pursued a new policy announced in October in terms of getting improved funding and improved prices from the industry, in terms of the Crown's return on its assets. That's a bit of progress. Some of us — I and the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf), former Ministers of Forests both — argued in the spring of this year that there was at least a billion dollars in terms of underpriced assets, in terms of the Crown selling timber and pulp material in this province. We don't have to back down from those statements at all, Mr. Minister.
There is now an academic study out, published by the Institute for Research on Public Policy out of Carleton University, that looks at uncollected economic rent in western Canada. The editors are Thomas Gunton and John Richards, professors of economics and resource management at Simon Fraser University, along with associate Richard Schwindt at Simon Fraser and other academics in western Canada. They list the uncollected economic rent from Crown resources in western Canada. They suggest that the uncollected rent in British Columbia, depending on market, could be as high as $2 billion annually. The member for Omineca and I were too conservative. Highly respected academics, in their list of uncollected economic rent in the west, where the Crown owns the resources, suggest that it could be as high as $2 billion annually.
If you look at the huge profits made by companies.... Canfor is not different from the others. All of them in the pulp sector have reaped enormous profits in the last couple of years. They've reaped those profits because we undercharge for the raw materials and because there's an oligopsonistic system wherein the unintegrated sawmills don't get the price they should for the chips that they produce out of producing lumber.
MR. CLARK: Explain that word.
MR. WILLIAMS: Quasimonopoly, for the benefit of those not familiar with the word.
We have only 20-odd pulp mills in the province. There's a question of transportation of chips to those mills, and each of them has regional advantages in terms of being the only mill in the region, in some cases, and being able to discriminate or not pay the price that the raw materials are really worth because they're the single buyer. Several sellers, single buyer. It's a severe economic problem in terms of having the small, unintegrated mills survive.
That's where the advantage is taken. The advantage is taken of those small mills that have to deal with the big pulp mills as the single buyer, and the advantage is taken with the Crown, which has been asleep at the switch in terms of collecting what the resources are worth. Progress has been made, and the new ministerial statements and policies are outlined but still not backed up by legislation. We anticipate that. If the warring factions in the cabinet and in the ministry can get together, we look forward to having the next bill before the House.
Interjection.
MR. WILLIAMS: You need all the help you can get, Mr. Minister.
This bill raises more questions than it answers, really, because the date is wobbly. It's an elastic date. It's not clear in terms of the compensation question how you're going to move that around and whether it will be as equitable as it should be or whether it will be too generous. So it provides those opportunities that are of concern.
You don't appear to have worked out arrangements with the nation or the United States in this regard, so those are huge question marks. We have this date down the road, and we have the question of additional legislation, which is needed in order to make it all work. I don't envy the folks in Treasury Board trying to pull next year's budget together, because you folks haven't pulled your act together.
Maybe you know what you want; maybe you're having trouble with your other colleagues and with other people in Treasury Board. But clearly the act is not pulled together, and this one is a faltering step in terms of pursuing the whole question of a proper return on our resources in British Columbia.
MR. SPEAKER: I advise the House that the Minister of Forests will close debate.
HON. MR. PARKER: In answer to some of the questions from yesterday from the hon. member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Miller), he was concerned why we would have to talk to the Americans at all about whatever we're doing in British Columbia. I would have thought that as the forestry critic for this House, he would have determined that since the Americans constitute a substantial share of our market for our forest products, we would probably talk to our customers. We are indeed talking to them. We are in negotiations with them on the matter of the memorandum of understanding that has resulted in the federal legislation on the softwood lumber products export charge. In those discussions we talk about a number of things: first and foremost, the replacement of the softwood lumber tax on British Columbia softwood lumber shipped into the United States, and the changes in forest policy in British Columbia that serve to replace that charge.
So naturally we talk with the Americans. We also have to deal with the memorandum of understanding, which is a two-party agreement, and therefore you must talk with the other party. You don't stand around talking to yourself, although across the floor it seems to be a preferred method of doing business. I can't understand why you just stand around and talk to yourself. But I guess if they had the mandate to do this, they'd probably stand around talking to themselves and wondering why they weren't getting anywhere. We talk to the other party, and we're making substantial progress, and we hope to be able to report just what the details of that progress are within the next few days.
Bill 61 provides for refund of the export tax paid. The member was concerned whether it has to do with how lumber is priced, etc. It's a charge on wood sold into the United States, and this bill provides for a refund of export tax paid, so that our industry isn't double-charged.
[ Page 2943 ]
Another concern he had was that what we're undertaking here provides no guarantee that there won't be further countervail action. The member seems to think that life is full of guarantees. He should know by now, at this stage in his life, that there's nothing guaranteed, that life is a dynamic process, that change is very much a part of business, personal life, public life. There are no guarantees.
He alluded to the industry being greedy, jumping too aggressively into U.S. market opportunities and seizing too great a share of the U.S. softwood lumber market, thereby causing the American lumber interests to lobby their government for a countervail move against Canadian lumber and specifically British Columbia lumber. When an opportunity exists, if you're in private and free enterprise you seize those opportunities. But those things that you don't have control over, such as exchange rates — and the exchange rate that was at the very root of the concern between the two nations.... You cannot control that particular facet of commerce. Our dollar was down considerably, some four or five cents below what it is today, and it made a real advantage to the consumer in the States to buy Canadian lumber on that basis.
The question has been raised this morning about why this particular piece of legislation provides for some leeway in the dates of enactment. We are still in negotiations with the U.S. Department of Commerce, through the Canadian Ministry of International Trade, and until our negotiations are complete and the date set for rebate, we have to provide for flexibility. This bill deals with that quite effectively.
[10:30]
The bill also provides for dealing with such concerns as overcompensation on a rebate or undercompensation on a rebate. With a little bit of homework, the member opposite would have been able to determine that for himself.
Slipping off the topic of the morning, namely Bill 61, and commenting on the recent announcement by Canfor and the fact that they were on the ropes, as was a lot of the forest industry in the province several years ago — and now are reaping great benefits, great profits — isn't it great that they were able to announce the total value of $1 billion worth of expansion improvements and new opportunities in the forest industry? And aren't we thankful that they were able to accumulate some profits to make that happen; to bring in a partner from Japan — Oji Paper — and make a substantial contribution to the further stability of the forest industry in British Columbia, to the employment opportunities, to the foreign trade opportunities, and to the revenue opportunities for British Columbia? The private sector is much more capable of putting together such beneficial packages than government.
The member likes to refer to the state of our industry. We're fortunate indeed that our industry survived those years when he was in the driver's seat, driving it into the ground, picking up a lot of bad assets that have impacted on this province for years.
MR. JONES: He knew where he was going.
HON. MR. PARKER: Yes; he disappeared, didn't he. Anyhow, we're talking about uncollected economic rent. You like to talk about academics who seem to know everything that's going on in the world. I guess academics are not unlike a lot of the editorial boards. If they're so great, why aren't they serving in public office? They obviously have all the answers. We talk about $2 billion in uncollected economic rent in the west: I wonder how much of that is in Manitoba and other parts of the west, and what resources we're talking about, and what amount is actually attributable to the forest industry, and in what way. It's nice to make innuendoes and to fish because you don't know what you're talking about and you're trying to find out what might be going on, so you fly a whole bunch of incredibly inane questions and expect other people to do your homework for you.
Anyway, this bill serves to assist our industry in dealing with the softwood lumber products export charge, and I commend it to the Legislature. I move that we now read it a second time.
Motion approved.
Bill 61, Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Compensation Act, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.
HON. MR. STRACHAN: I call second reading of Bill 58.
OPEN LEARNING AGENCY ACT
HON. S. HAGEN: I have the honour to move second reading of Bill 58, the Open Learning Agency Act. This legislation will create the Open Learning Agency, which will merge the operations of the Open Learning Institute and the Knowledge Network.
The purpose of this bill is to provide a framework that enables government to develop an integrated and responsive system to open learning, using distance education techniques and technology along with conventional delivery methods. The Open Learning Agency will play a coordinating role in the development of open-learning programs in the province.
[Mr. Petton in the chair.]
The agency will work in close collaboration with the universities, colleges, institutes. boards of school trustees and other agencies concerned with education to develop and use open-leaming methods in providing educational programs and services to the citizens of our province.
The bill will establish planning councils for each of the three components of the agency. These councils will be composed of representatives from the post-secondary education system who will provide input and recommendations to the agency respecting educational programs and courses.
An important function of the agency will be to coordinate and facilitate an educational credit bank for students. This is a process whereby a person may obtain credit for both formal and informal study, which can lead to a certificate, diploma or degree. Any certificates. diplomas or degrees granted by the Open Learning Agency require the endorsement and support of the relevant planning council. Currently over 200 courses are offered, from non-credit personal enrichment offerings to high school completion, and from occupational and vocational certificates and diplomas to university degrees.
[ Page 2944 ]
The Open Learning Agency will operate the Knowledge Network, the educational broadcasting arm of the organization. The Knowledge Network currently broadcasts educational programs to over 255 communities and has an average weekly viewership of close to 500,000 people.
Because of the vast size of our province, open-learning education methods are essential in ensuring that our government's objective of equality of access to education is achieved. With the establishment of the Open Learning Agency, we can offer educational and training opportunities to British Columbians in all regions of the province.
I commend this bill to the House and move second reading.
MR. JONES: I'd like to welcome the minister to the House today for one of his infrequent visits. It's always a pleasure to see him. I know he's working very hard on his portfolio. It's always a pleasure to hear his remarks in the House.
Ironically, the second member for Vancouver-Point Grey (Ms. Marzari) is not able to be here this morning; she's speaking to some 500 students in Vancouver. So I've been asked to comment on second reading of this bill.
It's always very difficult when it comes to responding to government initiatives, particularly in education, from this side of the House, because there's always tremendous potential for very worthy projects to take place in the education field. However, government also has the opportunity to impose ideological projects, and we've seen so much of that in recent times in this Legislature. It's easy to be skeptical about the kinds of initiatives that government is taking.
I must frankly admit that I'm not really clear on the need for this legislation. The minister read some fine-sounding words about coordination, integration, framework, development and a number of things, but did not convince me of why this particular initiative is being taken. We have, I suppose, with this legislation tremendous potential for either using advanced education in this province or abusing it.
British Columbia, as a result of initiatives taken by Dr. McGeer some years ago, has shown leadership in this area — I suppose following the lead of Britain. For some ten years now we've engaged in distance education, serving the citizens of British Columbia and providing, as the minister indicates, particularly adults in this province with a wide range of opportunities for learning experiences that have, I'm sure, advanced their lives in many ways. It has provided access that was formerly unavailable to sparsely developed communities, to isolated areas of this province, and without this opportunity there would be no other avenue for this enhancement of their lives.
There are some well-deserved pats on the back for the Open Learning Institute, the Knowledge Network. To use modern technology to create these universities without walls, to use television and satellites and facsimile transmission and the mail services to provide educational opportunities that the people of British Columbia want and need, is certainly commendable.
We have, I think, even greater potential here for improving access to education in this province and expanding beyond this province, for taking these kinds of opportunities, developing our technology and being a leader in that area, and moving beyond British Columbia to Pacific Rim countries and to the Commonwealth. I know there was talk earlier this year of Vancouver becoming a centre for the Commonwealth Open University Network. I had hoped that this legislation had something to do with that, because there was tremendous potential there. I don't know where that's at right now, and I'm sorry the minister didn't bring good news as far as that was concerned.
We've seen this kind of potential blossom in other parts of North America. Some years back Massachusetts was considered an economic basket case, but through the establishment of innovative and vigorous educational institutions they're now in a situation of zero unemployment. So the potential for establishing this administrative centre in Vancouver was a great opportunity. I hope we can still achieve that, to provide much needed employment opportunities for British Columbians, to provide jobs and diversify the economy of this province. This technology has the potential to be a moneymaker for British Columbia. If it's properly used — and I stress "properly used" — in a sort of balanced way, to provide post-secondary opportunities, it can become a major asset to the economy and the well-being of the citizens of this province. That's if it's properly used.
However, as I mentioned earlier, there's always a double-edged sword, particularly when we're dealing with a Social Credit government. The government of British Columbia.... The minister smiles. Does the minister deny that this Social Credit government has over the years consistently underestimated the tremendous potential in educational opportunities for developing the economy of this province? I think any public opinion poll — and I'm sure the minister has seen these kinds of things — would confirm that that underestimation has taken place.
HON. S. HAGEN: How about last year?
MR. JONES: I don't know if any polls have been done or if the minister has any polls on public attitudes from last year.
[10:45]
I will grant the minister that in my visits to post-secondary institutions in this province I have seen at least a temporary change in attitude. I hope it will be a continuing one. We do want to see this kind of development take place in this province, and if this is what the minister intends, then he has the wholehearted support of this member.
I think the minister agrees that the Social Credit philosophy of education in this province over the years has been one of finding ways to save costs. In public education right now — and, I suppose, in post-secondary education — we have action teams going around with that very purpose in mind. That is their sole focus. At the same time, on another track, we have citizens of this province suggesting to Barry Sullivan, the royal commissioner of education, the very thoughtful, positive and constructive kinds of things that should be done in education in this province. The Social Credit philosophy has been that'education is an albatross around the neck of government, that it's a sinkhole, that it's strictly a consumer of public funds and not a place to invest in the future of our people, particularly our young people, that it's a waste of tax dollars.
The real danger, and the other side of the sword in this legislation, is that we're going to view this technology as a vehicle for replacing traditional education methods in this province. I can just see some Social Credit philosophers rubbing their hands with the opportunity for television to replace buildings and teachers, to do away with an expensive
[ Page 2945 ]
process that we have, investing in young people in this province. We do not want to see this kind of abuse in this province, to see a replacement of education by television, a replacement of real education, which is as much an environment as anything else.
If the minister doesn't think that the academic community in this province is concerned about that, then I think he should perhaps spend more time out of the House and check these things. There is tremendous concern about television replacing traditional education in this province. I know the minister is a conscientious minister and is going to respond to these comments. With the kind of attitude towards this Legislature that we've seen displayed recently, I wouldn't be surprised if we would use television to replace the Legislature. I don't think we want to see that kind of thing, and we don't want to see television replacing traditional education in this province either.
I'd like to raise a few questions that perhaps the minister can respond to, and I would put him on notice that certainly if there are no responses to these questions, we'll try again in committee stage of this bill.
The first question relates to the section of the bill that talks about collaboration with boards of school trustees. It seems to me that the traditional role of the Knowledge Network and the Open Learning Institute is not specifically to deal with boards of school trustees in terms of setting up off-campus courses for high school students. That was at the post-secondary level. In the Ministry of Education's brief to the Sullivan royal commission, they very clearly mentioned the enhanced possibilities of home schooling for public school children in this province. To me, that is a travesty, and if the Minister of Advanced Education thinks that the people of this province are going to buy into a scheme whereby public-school-age children are going to be educated via television as opposed to experiencing the rich environment of the schools of this province, he has another think coming. If this is what is intended by this section, he's going to act a fight on this one.
Another question that I'll ask the minister and to which I hope there will be some response is a sincere question about the relationship of the Company Act and the College and Institute Act, and why there is the section in the bill that bypasses these areas. Is there a specific intention of the minister that is something positive and constructive in terms of this part of the bill, or is he doing an end run around the academic community of this province?
I would also like to ask the minister what is again the overall question, rather than use general terminology about coordination and framework and development: what is really behind this bill? Why are we bringing forward this bill at this time? Where is the pressing urgency? What is the need for this bill? Why are we, on one hand, in a section of the bill dissolving the Knowledge Network and the Open Learning Institute, and then re-establishing them in another part of the bill as separate components? I think the minister probably appreciates my skepticism, given the kind of attitude towards education that this government has had over the years.
Fundamental to the abuse of this kind of thing is the overall question of this agency expanding the number of boards of directors to set up a much larger bureaucracy that is going to end up competing with the established institutions of learning in this province.
Again, while I'm on boards, I would hope the minister, who I think is highly respected in this province, would see that these government appointments to these boards would go a little beyond what we've seen in this province, whereby the only qualification for appointment to these boards is some connection with one political party in this province. I know the minister would like to see holding those board positions people who have real qualifications in terms of the academic community. The minister is responding positively and I'm very pleased to see that.
A major concern I have is with respect to the scope of degrees that are going to be offered under this new agency. A section of the bill indicates that, as opposed to what currently exists where the Open Learning Institute grants baccalaureate degrees in arts and science, we're changing the wording to the prudential granting of all degrees. Perhaps that means post-baccalaureate degrees. Perhaps we're going to give master's degrees and doctorate degrees. Or does it just mean that we're going to go beyond arts and science?
Perhaps the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Veitch) is the one who has suggested this section. That member is perhaps wishing to advance his collection of degrees by a sort of mail-order method. I think he has some degrees from Columbia — or was it Columbia Pacific or some such institution? — and perhaps this was the suggestion to the Minister of Advanced Education to create a situation whereby rather than the kind of environment and research opportunities and exposure to a wide variety of faculty, credible in this province.... I think it's of great concern to the minister that we maintain the high standards of postsecondary institutions in this province so that we attract people for teaching positions, we attract students and we make this a major learning centre of the world. We have the potential to do these things.
[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]
But if we get into television replacing these institutions, we're going to lose any credibility that we have in the world academic community. The minister has to be concerned about the scope by which these institutions are going to be granting degrees. We can't get into a situation where television is used as a vehicle for replacing the academic environment, replacing those buildings. Certainly it would be a cost saving, but that environment is irreplaceable.
I know the minister, under this legislation, is setting up bodies with chancellors, and I hope there is some democratic structure to this so that those boards and structures have representatives from the teaching staff. I have written to the minister with the complaint of at least one participant in the Knowledge Network or Open Learning Institute who felt a tremendous loss of his rights of authorship of courses in this regard. Without that representation, there can be further abuse of those rights.
As I say, we have tremendous potential for development, for providing access to areas of this province that have been unserved, for reaching out beyond British Columbia to the Pacific Rim and to the Commonwealth countries, for making British Columbia a leader in this area even more than it already is, and for making money for this province in terms of education. Or we have the opportunity for abuse.
So I reserve judgment on this bill. It's really up to the minister to respond and convince me that this is a worthwhile bill for the citizens of British Columbia, and I await his response.
[ Page 2946 ]
MR. SPEAKER: I have been advised by a member that he would like to make a personal statement, and I think most members of the chamber would like to be here. If it's agreeable to members, I would ring the bells and get back to Bill 58 after the member's statement.
[11:00]
Member's Statement
RESIGNATION OF FIRST MEMBER
FOR BOUNDARY-SlMILKAMEEN
MR. HEWITT: I rise to make a personal statement pursuant to section 55(l) of the Constitution Act, and at the end of my remarks I will be giving formal notice of my intention to resign as MLA for the constituency of BoundarySimilkameen.
Interestingly enough, today completes my 12th year as a member of this House. Members will recall that the Social Credit Party under Bill Bennett was first elected as government on December 11, 1975. I have enjoyed the past 12 years. I have been honoured to have the opportunity to serve the people of Boundary-Similkameen and the people of the province.
I have also been honoured to serve as a cabinet minister for ten years and was able to participate in a number of exciting and progressive decisions which have benefited British Columbia. The decision to proceed with Expo 86 was one of them. My term as Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs gave me an insight into the complexities of the marketplace.
As Minister of Agriculture I gained an understanding of the value the agricultural community has to the well-being of the province and the country. My involvement as minister responsible for the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia and as minister responsible for the B.C. Systems Corporation was also very rewarding. Working with the directors and employees of those corporations, we were able to change them from losers to winners. Both corporations are now held out to be the leaders in their respective fields by the private sector and by other provincial governments.
The experience I have gained as MLA and minister over the past 12 years, coupled with my background in accounting and finance and administration, will greatly assist me as I embark on a new career.
As for the future, I am pleased to announce that in conjunction with the announcement of the federal Minister of Agriculture, the Hon. John Wise, in Ottawa, I have accepted the position of chairman and chief executive officer of the Farm Credit Corporation of Canada.
Mr. Speaker, in making this announcement I would like to state that the Premier has been aware of my discussions with Ottawa, and I would like to thank him for his support and encouragement. I mention this because I want to quash any speculation — media, have you got your pencils ready? — that I've resigned over any disagreement over decentralization, privatization or any other action of the Premier or the government. The Premier and his cabinet have my full support.
Mr. Speaker, we in this House must be aware that nothing is as constant as change. We have seen examples of that recently: countervailing duties, free trade, the Canadian constitution, the Meech Lake accord and, most recently, two world powers, the United States and Russia, signing a disarmament agreement. I compliment the Premier for questioning and challenging the status quo. Far too often, politicians tend to shy away from change in case it may upset some of the electorate. The only caution I have for the government is that you give consideration to the impact of your decisions on employees and their families. Every effort should be made to lessen that impact.
Mr. Speaker, I would also like to thank the members of this parliament, and of previous parliaments going back to 1975, for making the past 12 years so rewarding. I certainly will miss it. I will miss the debate that my colleague from Vancouver South and I had over grapes and wine, and I'll miss the discussions that I've had with my colleagues the member for Delta and the member for Omineca from time to time.
If I can leave any advice to my colleagues, it is to maintain your sense of humour, and to remember that we are like actors on a stage: we enter, we enjoy the spotlight, we perform and then we exit, to be remembered or forgotten by the quality of our performance.
Finally, Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the people of Boundary-Similkameen for their support over the past 12 years. I hope I have served them well.
With those remarks, Mr. Speaker, I hereby give formal notice of my intention to resign as MLA for the constituency of Boundary-Similkameen, my resignation to take place effective midnight, December 10, 1987.
HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, it's easy for us to see today that though at times we have our differences and our arguments in the House, we certainly develop a great attachment to it. The first member for Boundary-Similkameen has no doubt developed a very great attachment to the House and to working for the people of his constituency and this province. We've had an opportunity to discuss this, and I realize that it's been a difficult decision for the member. But the opportunity offered him in his new post is enormous. He has all the qualifications, and I know that there's a tremendous future for him in his new position.
Perhaps we can best describe the first member for Boundary-Similkameen as Mr. Dependable. He's always been there; he has served extremely well in all capacities. He has served on the back bench; he has served on numerous committees; he has served as minister in a number of portfolios; and he's always been there and always come through. He's always landed on his feet, so to say. He gave his constituency and his province the very best.
We're sorry to see him go, but we wish the member all the very best. We're grateful that he's assuming a position of such importance with agriculture in Ottawa, in an area where he will continue, I'm sure, to serve the people of the province in a way that all of us will recognize: not only the contribution he's given in the past, but the contribution he'll continue to give.
It's an area he has loved, agriculture. He served agriculture extremely well, and I know that the farm community in British Columbia as well as the people of British Columbia will continue to benefit for many years to come.
Mr. Speaker, we wish the first member for Boundary-Similkameen all the very best and a happy, long future.
MR. HARCOURr: On behalf of the New Democrat MLAs in the House today, I also would like to extend our
[ Page 2947 ]
congratulations to the first member for Boundary-Similkameen. I want to say that, on a personal level, I have always found the member to be a very pleasant and enjoyable human being to deal with, even when we agreed to disagree on minor things like the financing of Expo and other issues like that. It was done in a good-spirited way, and I'm sure that he will carry that same approach to the public's business into his new responsibilities. We're going to miss that part of you, hon. Member, in this Legislature.
We also share a few other values. First of all, the hon. member comes from a similar value system in the credit union movement, which is self-help, mutual aid and cooperation. Gee, that reminds me of an election speech I heard last fall. And I was just reading through the parliamentary guide and noticed that the hon. member is a member of the United Church, the church that I also belong to. And we're also united by our haircuts. Those of us who have the privilege of being so distinguished in appearance are going to miss you here in this Legislature, and I'm sure the hon. member, from his background that we share in the United Church, agrees that God made perfect people and then put hair on the rest of them.
So although we agreed to disagree on issues like Bills 19 and 20, on the trade deal that we're looking at, and on privatization and decentralization, we can agree that this is a great institution that we all participate in and that with the leaving of one of our members we all feel the leaving, but we remain, aside from our political differences. colleagues in our great democratic institution. I would like to close by saying we wish you well in your new career and, being an eternal optimist, we know we'll make a New Democrat out of you yet.
OPEN LEARNING AGENCY ACT
(continued)
MS. EDWARDS: I rise to make a few points from my experience — post-secondary and distance education. Contemplating some of the directions that we could go in this province on distance education, which of course is what this agency is designed to achieve: the sum education for people at a distance, as they say....
I'd like to point out to the minister, and I'm not sure how aware he is of this if he grew up in British Columbia, that British Columbia is a bit of an adolescent when it comes to distance education. I grew up in Saskatchewan, where the ways of distance education had been bred into the whole fabric of the society. I took my post-secondary education in Saskatchewan, worked in Saskatchewan, and then moved to British Columbia. If you lived in Vancouver, you had a difficult time as a person not in the education system as a student, teacher or instructor accessing any of those facilities, but I discovered when I went to the rural parts of British Columbia that it was even more difficult.
The problem was an attitude. It was an attitude that I see changing. My colleague suggested that it was ten years ago that it changed; I think it was a little more than that. Nevertheless, it's not a very old movement, and British Columbia is only now trying to get a large percentage of the people involved in post-secondary education — as well as elementary, but I'm only talking about post-secondary — and to get them involved in the attitudes that make the distance part of post-secondary education effective.
I myself have been an observer of a number of the movements that have happened in British Columbia. Of course, one of the first ways the government in this province decided they would try to reach the people was to establish a number of colleges. Colleges were established with a mandate to develop the distance-education techniques and in fact to reach out from within the college regions and get to the corners of their own reagions. They barely got started at that when that was all taken away by a centralized sort of agency, and that agency has moved from one sort of phase to another sort of direction. It went through a process of saying,"We're going to have open learning like Britain," and when people started suggesting that what we had wasn't anything like Britain — it was all brought in by members of the government administration arm. perhaps, and some of the politicians as well — it was: "Oh well, we've gone to Texas, and now we know how it's going to be done and we're adding a bit from Texas to the British system."
I've been asked, Mr. Speaker, to allow an introduction.
MR. SPEAKER: The Attorney-General would like leave to make an introduction.
Leave granted.
HON. B.R. SMITH: I would like to welcome to the House a Grade 12 class from Mount Douglas high school, here with their teacher. Hilary Spicer. This is a French class, and they are here for the first time to view the deliberations of the House. Thev certainly picked a very historic and moving moment, watching the resignation of the first member for Boundary-Similkameen (Mr. Heixitt). That seldom happens. I've been in this House eight and a half years, and I've never seen that done in that way. I've seen some resignations, but I've never seen them done with that class. You have seen an interesting and historic moment, and you can get some idea of the kind of depth of feeling and tradition that people do develop here, which has nothing to do with party. It has something to do with the importance of the chamber. I welcome you and the House welcomes you.
MS. EDWARDS: As I say. there have been, in the progress that we have made so far, a number of different initiatives. We go this way and go that way, and some of it was zigging and zagging. In fact, I'm not too sure how well we've done. I would ask the minister to address this question, too, because we have a difficult time in trying to.... I haven't tested this recently, but there was a time when I regularly used to try to find out some answers as to how well the Open Learning Institute had done. Of course, it used to announce the number of people enrolled and so on and so forth, but in fact we had a difficult time. First of all, there were no figures, for example, for people who had completed degrees, diplomas or certificates offered within the institute or through the classes in other institutions. We also found it difficult to measure.
I don't want to say that the activities that go on through the Open Learning Institute — which would now go to the Open Learning Agency — and the kinds of things that the institute puts out through the Knowledge Network.... I mean, they're very useful. It is simply not something that we measure by completion rates and so on. But we also do not have clear figures, and it seems that there is a considerable
[ Page 2948 ]
question in a number of people's minds as to whether in fact we are addressing the right audience with what we are doing.
I hesitate to say "traditional" in case it's misinterpreted, but the traditional and the forward-looking educators in this province are still saying the same thing that has been said for years: education occurs most importantly and nearly always needs the interaction between people to occur very well. That has been a major problem when considering the business of delivering education by television.
What has happened is that we know that correspondence approaches have not been successful. You can measure them almost anywhere and they have a very low completion rate. So the process in British Columbia, and I won't apply any particular name to it, has gone from correspondence courses to sort of a combination with videotapes. That kind of thing has been put in through the colleges and so on.
Now one of the things that happens — this comes with a lot of discussion about socially remote people and so on — is that there's considerable doubt that in fact you get to the socially remote people by putting it on cable television. It certainly is true that you don't get the geographically remote people. The minister will recognize, even from the Winter Games in Fernie last year, the problems in the remote areas of getting to what we, when we sit in the urban areas, think of as mainline television. We think we just switch on the machine and it comes; it does not do that. Even if you can get to the people who have cable access, there are very few of them; there are many people who don't have that opportunity.
I am interested to know how establishing the Open Learning Agency will address these problems better than they were being addressed, and I hope they will be addressed better. Distance education has received a whole lot of attention in this province. There has been some very exciting thinking done on it; there's been some very good planning. All sorts of things have been done. But, unfortunately, too often when something happens that has been very good, there have been cutbacks, and that affects not only the programs that were planned but, by echo effect, the people who were working on distance education. It's happened too often that the people who were in the system, if they developed a distance education product that would be very good, would impact on their own jobs, and would lose their jobs. That's been made very clear to them, so what do people do? They sit on their hands.
This whole pattern has happened many times. There are a lot of recriminations that could be made about who should do what, but the problem of funding and the ways that these things have been administered and brought in have prevented this province from following up on many of the exciting initiatives that have been suggested, and the theories and planning that have been done by some of the people who have magnificent expertise in the area of learning.
There is also a question — I'm not sure, and I would like to hear the minister's response on this too — of who is going to benefit the most from this kind of education. In other words, I'm not sure that the direction of what's going through this agency will match the figures that we have and the knowledge that, if we don't have it, we should get about who is missing out in our education system.
In fact, one of the largest groups is the one that needs adult basic education; that is education for adults who have not yet received a high school diploma, and certainly not a degree or so on. Those people are perhaps in the greatest need. I've seen a number of places where this is the largest group of people we should be reaching. Is this kind of education going to reach those people who are not skilled learners? They have not been taught the craft of learning.
I think that kind of consideration should be taken into account when this agency is set up, because those are the people who are not in the system; those are the people who are at a distance. I'm not here to suggest how we deal with that. I'm suggesting that it should be addressed, and it must be put into the package of what's happening here.
Education is certainly one of the strongest underpinnings of successful economic performance in our communities. For that reason I applaud the minister for what I think is his aim, which is to continue to improve and expand learning from the centre of our population. It's certainly not the centre of the province, and I don't think it's the centre of the world; it's the lower mainland, where our urban concentration is. We have a great hunger for more education in other parts of the province — in the interior and so on. We have been asking — and this is a bipartisan issue — for a university, for more postsecondary facilities in other parts of the province. We want better and broader college facilities; we want universities; we want better adult basic education facilities too.
I hope that this does not come as something "instead of." If it's a substitute, we would rather save the money and have the other facilities, because we need those facilities very much.
Having said that, I'm just going to ask the minister to address those remarks, because they are matters of considerable significance to those of us in the interior. I know that cuts across party lines.
MRS. BOONE: This is an area that is of great concern to many of us. It is very important to those of us who live outside the lower mainland, because in many instances we depend on open learning and the Open Learning Institute to obtain our education.
[11:30]
The point I want to make — I hope the minister really listens to this — is that I do not believe in any way that by increasing the scope of the Open Learning Institute or by promoting it in such a way, it is going to take the place of a university in the various parts of the province. There was a time when a Minister of Post-Secondary Education came to Prince George and said that there was absolutely no way that they would receive a university in that area, that any university education could be obtained through the Open Learning Institute. At that time the college principal, Charles McCaffray, very aptly stated: "Well, if that's the case, if university education can be obtained for us via the Open Learning Institute, then why are we bothering building universities at all? If it's good enough for us, then it ought to be good enough for you people in the lower mainland as well."
I want to make the point that a university structure outside the lower mainland in various parts of B.C., including Prince George and the Kootenays and the Okanagan area, is an absolute requirement, as I see it, for a community to grow. It needs to be there for economic development. It needs to be considered as part of the entire growth of that community. So often we do not consider the educational aspects and how they relate to economic development. I think these things go hand in hand, that you cannot develop economically unless you also grow educationally. Companies look to communities to find out what their educational requirements are, what they've got to offer employees, what they can gain from that
[ Page 2949 ]
community for their employees, and what they will have to give to their people when they think in terms of moving there. I appreciate any improvements that will bring about better quality education and greater access to education for those outside the lower mainland area. But I must emphasize that this does not in any way replace a full-grown university-type program that could exist within communities.
As an aside, and similar to what my colleague from the Kootenays said, it's really important that the ministry understand the various areas. For that reason, I hope that board members will be appointed on a regional basis, and that they will be representative of their areas. When I go to places, I've often found that they say: "Well, it's not possible for me to obtain the Open Learning Institute here, because the channel that the Knowledge Network comes on is scrambled in this area." That's not an uncommon thing to happen. So we need to have people from the regions who know what the particular problems are, who can explain to the board what's happening there, so that they know distances, if there are problems in communication, what facts are involved and how realistic various approaches are in those areas. I hope the minister will consider appointments on a regional basis, and that we don't see a board such as this dominated by people from the lower mainland, who often have no knowledge of what goes on beyond Hope. I think that's probably fair to say — from all sides of the House.
I see the minister nodding his head over there, so I take it he's in agreement with this. But you haven't heard the last from me in regard to a university in the north.
MS. A. HAGEN: I would like to make some comments in second reading of this bill. The first thing I would like to do is just go back a little in history. Unfortunately, because of the timing of the presentation of this bill, I have to rely on my memory. I haven't had as much opportunity as I would have liked to do research and to bring more detailed information into the comments I'm going to make.
As I see it, this bill, in its simplest form, amalgamates two existing educational organizations within the province: the Knowledge Network and the Opening Learning Institute. First of all, I'd like to note that, particularly with the Open Learning Institute.... When it was first introduced in the province, my recollection is that it sprung fairly well full-blown off the head of the then minister. I'm not sure if he was Minister of Education or Minister of Post-Secondary Education at that time, but it came into being out of an idea that he had in a eureka kind of way. He had some consultation with Britain, which is an island of very dense population where people may, in fact, not have access to post-secondary education for some of the same reasons that we do not have access for all of our people — lack of facilities. But the very nature of the geography, population and demography of that country was very different.
It seems to me that in some ways this amalgamation is springing up in somewhat the same full-blown way. It was introduced yesterday without even the presence of the minister, and we are going to move fairly quickly to discuss it in the House.
I am disappointed with that kind of process when we're looking at a major educational reform. I say that not because I don't think we should be having major educational reform, but because I would be much more comfortable with a process that lets us know that consultations had occurred among the various parties who were going to be concerned about this agency; that there had been some opportunity, perhaps, for discussion to take place, as it did with the establishment of the colleges before they were instituted in the province, and that a lot of those processes are in place.
I think the reason for that is that although the minister gets the very best of advice — and I know he is a very hardworking person in gathering that advice — it seems to me that at times we move too quickly in getting that advice. There isn't an awareness of process. We've talked a lot around a number of major initiatives that have been occurring in the province, about the importance of process to people in understanding what the goals and objectives are, and the framing of the legislation or the reaulations or the decisions that would implement good and productive changes.
I would just note in the context of this bill coming down that yesterday the minister made public a report on the future of BCIT; a report, as I understand it, that was commissioned not by the minister but by the Premier, with the report going to the Premier and not specifically originally to the Advanced Education and Job Training ministry. There are significant changes suggested in that report.
Out of that process, which again seems to come out of the Premier's office rather than out of the minister's office and which he has now accepted and is beginning to work on, I would hope that the process of responding to any recommendations in that report would involve some open dialogue among the education community.
The second thing that I want to note is that the purposes of this agency are very far reaching, certainly to concur with the intent that I think is inherent in the bill, that there should be greater access. I don't need to repeat to the minister the record of this province in terms of access to education in regions outside the lower mainland. He knows it well, and I know it is a concern of his.
Something in the order of 5 percent of students who go on to take a university degree.... We know too that in the college level there are people who go so far in their academic and career training, but because there isn't access in their communities, they aren't able, for financial reasons, to go further.
We had an opportunity to discuss some of that informally yesterday around some of our mutual concerns, and I think we both agreed that education available to students where they live has one very beneficial result for our province: people very often then stay within the geographic area in which they've grown up to work there. I agree that this is something that meets the aspirations of young people, and people going on with lifelong learning — to remain in communities where they have an affinity and a commitment to those communities.
However, this is a very broad-ranging bill in the kinds of changes that it may make possible, and it is very minimally flushed out in the purposes that are defined for that agency. I want to just associate myself with my colleague for Kootenay around some of the concerns that we have about education in the remoter regions of the province that do not provide people with an opportunity for hands-on instruction and contact with instructors. Certainly that's very characteristic of open universities upon which our own were originally modelled in Britain.
I think I also want to associate myself with the comments of my colleague for Prince George. In no way should this particular bill be seen to preempt the need for institutions that are degree granting and that require full or virtually full
[ Page 2950 ]
attendance in order for people to achieve that particular status.
There are a number of details that I want to go into in much greater length, but I would like to have more opportunity than I've had at the present time, since this bill was tabled for the first time yesterday without any prior notice, to my knowledge, to look at those clauses. I look forward to the thrust of clause-by-clause debate with the minister to follow up on the specific aspects of this quite far-reaching bill.
MR. REE: I find this bill very positive and very ongoing. For some time I have felt that our educational institutions, particularly in the classics and at the secondary level, are archaic in their methods of teaching. I guess 1,000 or 2,000 years ago, teachers stood up in front of a class and lectured to them and taught them. We are still doing this 2,000 years later. There is no change in the actual method or form of teaching.
This bill is far reaching because it is starting to implement and use the new technology — technology which we have had for some time. Although, as I said, it is now fairly new, it is broad enough to incorporate additional technology as it is developed over the coming years.
I see no reason why we need the archaic classroom in a great number of teaching situations.
MS. A. HAGEN: Shame!
MR. REE: I expected such comments of "shame!" coming from the opposition, who are the great supporters of the B.C. Teachers' Federation.
There will be a great change in the future in the methods of teaching and in the qualifications of teachers with respect to teaching. I recognize the need, in most instances, of hands-on teaching with respect to a student, but that hands-on teaching need not be the standing in front of a classroom to lecture and teach from that position. The hands-on teaching will, I believe, in the future develop as a motivator. What a student will require more is a motivator.
[11:45]
We have the technology today where thousands of people could be taught the same subject matter at the same time. We are also developing.... The technology is there but cannot be implemented yet because of a question of costs. A thousand students over a thousand individual minutes could punch in and get that course, each one on a different minute cycle. They could play it back. So you could have a thousand students taking the same subject, not at the same time, but certainly in the same time-frame. That technology is going to be there. It could accommodate the slower learners and the more efficient learners. What we are going to need in our educational field, as far as teachers are concerned, are motivators and communicators through this technology, rather than standing in front of a classroom and reading the same notes year after year.
Mr. Speaker, we could cut down on the number of teachers teaching the same course. As I suggest, we could have one teacher almost provincewide teaching that course. I recognize that there are many courses where you are going to require the classroom scene. Certainly in some science courses and the science courses at university, the classroom scene would be needed. But the new technology can teach courses such as law. I see no reason why we have to have the same classroom situation in law school that we have had for many years.
One of the members of the opposition was sort of averse to correspondence courses. They didn't think they suited; people couldn't learn from them. I certainly disagiee with that, Mr. Speaker. Maybe I leave myself open on this, but I took grade 11 by correspondence course.
AN HON. MEMBER: It shows.
MR. REE: I had no problems with it. I had no problems either with grade 12, and I did graduate with a law degree from university. So maybe it does show. Maybe the value of the correspondence course does show — maybe favourably, Madam Member.
MR. JONES: It was said that it was a low completion rate. That's all that was said.
MR. REE: Maybe the low completion rate, yes, lacks the motivator, not the teacher. Because the education is there. The information is there; it is available. The motivator is required, not the teacher. Correspondence courses can, if the student has the initiative, the motivation, be of great value as an adjunct to the open learning method, through our other means of communication. They could complement each other.
I strongly support this bill; I think it is going to be a great adjunct to the educational knowledge of the members of our community. I know British Columbia, with its Knowledge Network and other educational facilities, is in the forefront in the world, and I anticipate we will become an example in the world and will benefit from that. It's a pleasure to speak on behalf of this bill, which I believe is very positive.
MR. HARCOURT: I'd like to close the debate from our caucus on this bill on the Open Learning Institute, not by going over the well-expressed remarks of other members of our caucus from Burnaby North, from the Kootenay and from New Westminster; what I'm going to do is say that we as New Democrats think the concept of opening up educational learning opportunities for British Columbians is a good one. The idea of using modern technology in McLuhan's world of the global network is a good one, particularly in a province which is 95 percent mountainous, so that it's very difficult for people to travel and very difficult for radio signals to be received and to use the latest in modern technology — including the battle about getting receivers for those signals throughout British Columbia in remote and rural communities. The idea of using satellites and satellite receivers and of an institute that can make learning and education and extended knowledge available to British Columbians wherever they live in this great province of ours is a good concept.
Also, the idea of extending adult education is very important. I think most people are aware that it's anticipated that people will have three to five career or job changes during their life. In a modern world you need skills to be able to do the work that's available in our economy. So that's a good concept.
But you've heard some of the concerns of our caucus about abuse, about access in a real sense, hands-on teaching — even given the controversial success of the member from the north shore in his correspondence courses and his feeling that it's an either-or. You either have hands-on or you have this new technology. We think it's a mix. So those have been expressed. I also know Dr. Walter Hardwick, who had a very
[ Page 2951 ]
great role and was a pioneer in putting this together. He's an old friend of mine and played a very active role. So I'm aware, Mr. Speaker, and I'm sure the minister knows, that I have been kept fully up to date on the operations of the Knowledge Network and these other initiatives.
We have two concerns that I want to emphasize in my remarks before we adjourn. The first one is in regard to the existing institutions. We have a number of statements, letters, petitions and meetings that the minister has received and had with people like Dr. Strangway of UBC, Dr. Saywell of Simon Fraser, Dr. Petch of the University of Victoria and with college administrators outlining a number of serious problems they're having with ageing plants, with the replacement of professors over the next ten years. The professors are ageing very quickly, and there's a need for a large number of master's and PhD students in this province, and it's a very competitive situation right across North America.
We have the problem of ageing plants, the need to do just basic maintenance. They have been neglected for a number of years now for economic reasons, or because of conscious policy decisions over the last few years. We feel that those existing institutions should not suffer with any new initiatives that are taken.
We also, Mr. Speaker, are quite aware of the fact that up to 8,000 students have been turned away from the doors of the colleges because of a variety of reasons that I won't go into here. They've been dealt with before.
So that is our first major concern that I would like to express to the minister, Mr. Speaker. We cannot neglect the existing fine institutions that we have in this province which are into a catch-up and keep-up challenge of very massive proportions in terms of training and finding the necessary professors and instructors that we need, of bringing their plants up to a proper standard of maintenance and of replacing ageing facilities, and we don't need to neglect the existing institutions.
Secondly, Mr. Speaker, and I would like the minister to hear this, it is very important for British Columbia's development that we do not foreclose the very real need in this province to build this province by having hands-on teaching institutions in the north and the interior, which are more than the fine two-year degree-granting colleges that we have now.
We have built railroads, highways and hydroelectric systems, and we have built all of these economic development tools. Well, we've got another one, and that's education: an absolutely essential investment in the young people of this province. I picked that up everywhere I've been in this province this year. I visited 110 different communities, and I've met hundreds and hundreds of young people who feel that they have no option but to leave their home towns. I think that's a real tragedy, that our fine communities like Nelson, where I spoke to a high school class.... Ninety percent of them felt they had to leave Nelson because there weren't educational and job opportunities. In Vanderhoof, Dawson Creek, aAlberni — throughout this province there are communities that are losing their lifeblood, the young, because there aren't educational opportunities in the north and the interior.
That's why we feel very strongly — and we'd like to work with the minister — that there should be a four-year degree-granting institution in Prince George to serve the north. In the largest tree-farm licence area and the largest forestry area we have, it could specialize in forestry. Then we could have some of the functions of BCIT and UBC, as satellite programs there, to specialize in forestry, and we could have our young people becoming foresters and forest technicians and entrepreneurs who do more than just make 2-by-4s and produce pulp bales; who replant the forest and are tree-farmers. On the other side, as we have pointed out continually, we could add more value to the trees, the logs we cut down, by way of furniture. computer paper and all the other products that add so much value and so many jobs to the great treefarm that we are here in British Columbia.
We feel, Mr. Speaker, that there needs to be another institution in the interior, a four-year degree-granting institution, not just academic but also technoloaical and vocational. There is a tremendous need there. It could possibly also specialize in mining and agriculture, which are two significant activities in the Cariboo and throughout the Okanagan and into the Kootenays.
Mr. Speaker, those are the two major concerns that we want to pass on to the minister and that we would like to follow up with him, to develop these two major challenges we face, of maintaining and improving our existing institutions and continuing province-building with the greatest investment we can make: the young people, the displaced workers who need new skills, particularly in the north and the interior — and that there be new institutions for them.
MR. SPEAKER: I would advise the House that the minister closes debate.
HON. S. HAGEN: Will I have an opportunity, Mr. Speaker, to answer the questions this afternoon?
MR. SPEAKER: If you act into committee.
HON. S. HAGEN: Well. I want to respond to the questions that were asked, but I'm looking at the time.
MR. SPEAKER: I think that if you adjourn as House Leader, we can come back and you can close debate this afternoon.
Hon. S. Hagen moved adjournment of the debate.
Motion approved.
Hon. S. Hagen moved adjournment of the House.
Motion approved.
The House adjourned at 12:58 p.m