[ Page 4593 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Oral Questions

Long-term-care user fees. Ms. A. Hagen –– 4593

Provincial rights under free trade. Mr. Harcourt –– 4594

Increased costs from privatization. Mr. Lovick –– 4595

B.C. Savings Bonds. Mr. Peterson –– 4595

Committee of supply: Ministry of Environment and Parks estimates.

(Hon. Mr. Strachan)

On vote 34: minister's office –– 4595

Hon. Mr. Strachan

Ms. Smallwood

Mr. R. Fraser

Mr. Lovick

The House met at 2:06 p.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. VEITCH: We have some very distinguished visitors in the gallery today: His Excellency Zhang Wenpu, Ambassador of the People's Republic of China, and Mr. Duan Jin, consul-general of the People's Republic of China in Vancouver, who are accompanied by Mr. Lan Lijun, the consul at Vancouver. I would ask the House to bid them welcome.

MR. PELTON: Hon. members, our Speaker has a very special guest in the members' gallery today, Mr. Daniel Izzard, and his wife Denese. As many of you know, Daniel is a very famous Canadian artist who has pictures in the Queen's collection. He also has another claim to fame, which is that he received a new heart on January 12, 1986. I'd like everyone here to really welcome Daniel and Denese.

MR. HARCOURT: I too would like to pass on greetings to the consul-general and our distinguished visitors from the People's Republic of China. As we know, there is a tremendous and growing relationship with the people of Canada, and as British Columbia is the front door to the People's Republic, I think there are nothing but very exciting opportunities to extend our friendship. Indeed, welcome.

HON. MR. REID: I'd like to introduce three special people here today. They're tourists in their own right, over here trying to help the economy of Victoria and the members in the Victoria area. I hope they take full advantage of it. In the gallery today are my daughter Laurie Reid, who works at Woodward's in Surrey, my wife Marion and my executive assistant Hans Schinz. Would the House make them especially welcome.

MR. SIHOTA: In the gallery today is someone I can probably.... I'm sure not too many of us get an opportunity to introduce their best friend, but certainly my best friend is in the gallery today. He's a chap I've travelled all around the world with and had probably a lifetime of laughs with. I'm sure he knows all sorts of things that are inside my closet, but he swore not to tell anything about them.

Interjections.

MR. SIHOTA: That was tempting for the members opposite.

Now that he's been successful in his business ventures, his sole ambition in life is to get elected to this Legislature so that he can ask me questions in question period. Will the members please join me in welcoming Herb Dhaliwal to the Legislature today.

HON. S. HAGEN: I rise today to inform the House of something that happened on Saturday up in my riding in Parksville, where we had a great fishing derby. One of the boats that took part had six people in it, three female and three male. There was a bit of a contest to see who could catch fish and who couldn't. The female persons were Margot Sinclair, Daphne Bramham and Donna Sitter, and the male persons were Gary Mason, Keith Baldrey and Greg Lyle from Manitoba. As the minister responsible for women's programs in the province, I'm pleased to inform the House that the three female members of this crew all caught fish, while the three males did not.

MR. BARNES: I'd like the House to join me in welcoming a very distinguished guest, a man of letters who had the recent, somewhat dubious distinction of having been interviewed on the CTV documentary "No Fixed Address." Mr. Richard Greene, a citizen of Vancouver, is here with me today to see if we can find ways of making this a better place to live.

MR. JACOBSEN: We have 100 grade 10 students from Westview Junior Secondary School in Maple Ridge visiting the Legislature today, and on behalf of the first member for Dewdney (Mr. Pelton) and myself I'd like the House to give them a good, rousing welcome.

HON. MR. PARKER: In the House today, visiting from Kitwanga, we have 20 grade 7 students and their vice-principal, Mr. Baker. Would the House please make them welcome.

Oral Questions

LONG-TERM-CARE USER FEES

MS. A. HAGEN: Two months ago the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Couvelier) delivered a budget in this House that hurt seniors, and two weeks ago that same minister stated that the Minister of Health was reviewing user fee increases targeted to those seniors needing long-term care. Will the Minister of Health advise this House and seniors and their families when he will roll back these unfair user fees, namely the $900 annual increase to every senior living in a long-term-care facility, the up to $5,000 annual increase that seniors will pay in long-term-care facilities under a sliding fee scale, and the additional charges to seniors who require home support to remain independent in their own homes and communities?

HON. MR. DUECK: I wasn't in the House when that question was posed, so I'm not sure what the question was or what the answer was. I will have to take that as notice, look it up in the Blues and give you an answer when I find out.

MS. A. HAGEN: The Minister of Health doesn't do his homework and should be aware of what his Minister of Finance is advising.

Another question to the Minister of Health. The Minister of Finance has advised me in writing that this government is going to take 30 million additional dollars out of the pockets of seniors as a result of these senior fees. I've been asking questions about long-term-care facilities. Will the minister now advise this House and confirm that the sliding scale of fees that he has proposed to introduce for home support services will have many seniors paying all of the costs of those home support services, and that those seniors will be paying an additional $10 million over the next year and a few months from the present fees charged for those care services in their homes?

[2:15]

[ Page 4594 ]

HON. MR. DUECK: Again, I'm not going to comment on a letter that the Finance minister wrote. I don't look at his mail and he doesn't look at mine. However, when we are speaking about additional fees for home support, there always has been a fee charged for homemakers for certain clientele. I made it very clear in the House, and it was also brought down in the budget speech, that as of August 1 we would probably have a plan for income testing for the homemaker service and also perhaps income testing for the residents. That is being reviewed. I have mentioned it in the House before and I am saying it again. There is no secret about that. We're reviewing that and have been, and when we have reviewed it and come up with a conclusion as to how, whether and when we're going to do it, we will make that public to you.

MS. A. HAGEN: Would the minister please advise this House now if he is going to continue with this unholy attack on seniors in this province? Will he advise this House when he is going to inform seniors and their families what in heaven's name this government has in store for them? When, Mr. Minister?

HON. MR. DUECK: Again I'd like to make it very clear that we have sent a letter to all senior citizens telling them that the fee now is $19.20 a day. There is no secret; there is no holding back; there is no wondering what we're going to do. It is there on record. They have received letters and that's being charged at the present time.

It appears from the opposition that everyone is very upset. This is not so. I have received letters in my office from establishments, from resident managers. I have received letters and calls and personal commitment from people who are now paying that charge, saying that it is quite in order, that they're quite happy to pay that. We are not attacking the health care system of the seniors at all; the health care system remains as it is. But we're saying that as far as shelter and food are concerned, perhaps some people should pay a little more for that. That is in place and is now being paid as of May 1.

The other, as I have told you, we are looking at, reviewing, and when that information is public you will know.

PROVINCIAL RIGHTS UNDER FREE TRADE

MR. HARCOURT: I rose earlier to question the Premier about provincial rights while we still had some — they are disappearing so quickly. I thought that the Premier would be able to give us some answers about the Mulroney-Reagan trade deal and its threats to provincial rights. The province has constitutionally guaranteed energy powers which are threatened by this trade deal. Is the Premier prepared to surrender these rights to the federal government?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, most provinces, with the exception of Ontario and, prior to that, Manitoba — and of course that's all been changed now — are satisfied that there's no infringement on provincial rights in the free trade arrangement between the United States and Canada.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's not the question.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: That's the question.

MR. HARCOURT: In other words, our energy for jobs in the U.S. is the Premier's response. We lose the two-price system.

Let's look at another area, Mr. Speaker. We've always had the provincial power to implement buy-B.C. policies. Is the Premier prepared to abandon this right, to allow Ottawa to proceed with the deal?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, we are not giving up rights. There is no requirement within the free trade agreement for us to relinquish rights.

I would suggest that, from all I've heard from the opposition, it's not rights that we're talking about. It appears that when we hear from the NDP, it's a sort of Stadium-Expo- SkyTrain syndrome: we can't compete, we're somehow not as good as the others, and therefore it's all bound to be a failure. We heard that with SkyTrain; we heard it with the stadium; we heard it with Expo. They no doubt had the same opinion about the Olympics, if they'd been requested to comment on Calgary.

We're not afraid to stand up alongside and compete with the Americans. We are satisfied that not only can we do this, but the whole of the country will benefit tremendously, especially a resource province like British Columbia, where we want to diversify. We'll get the diversification, and the economy in this province will continue to improve, as we've seen it in the last couple of years.

MR. HARCOURT: I have a supplementary. I heard those same remarks from the Premier in October and November 1984; the people of Vancouver didn't think much of them then and they still don't. From the opinion polls of the last two weeks, I don't think the people of B.C. do either.

The Premier and his government were asleep at the switch on our fish-processing, unlike the Maritimes Premiers, and of course GATT too. Now they're asleep at the switch in the giveaway of our provincial powers and rights.

British Columbians want to know why you, Mr. Premier, are prepared to surrender B.C.'s provincial rights to the Mulroney federal government.

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Mr. Speaker, we are not. There is only one case in history that I'm aware of where a provincial leader went out of his way to turn over authorities to a federal government. That was former premier Dave Barrett, when he wanted to give it away to Trudeau and the Liberals.

MR. HARCOURT: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Clearly, the Premier is prepared to surrender B.C.'s rights to make our own independent economic decisions. He's putting his own laissez-faire ideology ahead of the rights of the people of British Columbia. Will the Premier put aside his personal agenda and show some moxie? Will he stand up for British Columbia and B.C.'s constitutional rights, instead of going blindly for this trade deal?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: Well, I'm not exactly sure of the question, so I will accept it in generalities and attempt to address that which I think the Leader of the Opposition is attempting to convey.

First of all, Mr. Speaker, this government, more than any other government, has stood up for provincial rights. We've seen it time and time again. Fortunately, we've been successful

[ Page 4595 ]

in seeing a federal-provincial council of ministers established, which is addressing the inequities and shortcomings in Confederation that we've already brought to the attention of the federal government. We're making great gains in that respect.

Mr. Speaker, the opposition is afraid of free trade because — as I said, and I'll repeat it again — they were afraid we couldn't compete, and therefore Expo couldn't be a success. They were afraid that we couldn't build SkyTrain, and they were against SkyTrain. They were against the stadium; they've been against all of these positive projects that we've seen throughout the province. We are not giving up rights; we are not doing as former NDP premier Dave Barrett did when he proposed to give away all rights over energy to the federal government. The Social Credit government stands for this province. We're not committed to some leader in Ottawa such as Broadbent. We stand on our own here.

INCREASED COSTS FROM PRIVATIZATION

MR. LOVICK: Mr. Speaker, to the Premier. Mr. Premier, we on this side of the House have been arguing for some time that privatization is actually going to cost the taxpayers of this province money rather than save them money. We now have some evidence. For example, a stop sign that used to be made in the Langford sign shop cost $19. Today the same sign will cost $22.78. That's an increase of about 20 percent. The obvious question for the Premier is: will he kindly explain to us why that increased cost should be the case?

HON. MR. VANDER ZALM: The suggestion from the second member for Victoria (Mr. Blencoe) is that I take it as notice. I will provide more information to the member with respect to that, because I haven't heard those figures before. Obviously, one of the advantages of privatization is that you do arrive at true cost because it is a competitive system. That definitely is always an advantage in the free enterprise system. I appreciate that for socialists this is difficult to comprehend, but the hon. second member for Nanaimo is not afraid, I should think, of competing and seeing the people in the private sector competing, or are we again hearing an Expo syndrome, a B.C. Place Stadium syndrome? Is it the same thing all over again? "We're afraid to compete, because as socialists we can't."

B.C. SAVINGS BONDS

MR. PETERSON: I've got a question for the Minister of Finance, and it concerns the current issue of provincial bonds that are up for sale. Could you tell us who is responsible for setting the interest rate at 8 3/4 percent?

HON. MR. COUVELIER: The 8 3/4 percent interest rate was set after much consultation with the trade. We had extensive conversations with the banking community, the trust companies, the investment brokers and those that are interested. The House may be interested to know that out of 12 firms, individuals and corporations we canvassed, seven recommended a rate of 8 1/4 percent, four recommended 9 and only one recommended something at 9 3/8 percent. So the 8 3/4 percent rate was obviously the one that was most popular.

Secondly, the hon. member might be interested in knowing that as a consequence of sales over the close of last week and the beginning of this week, it looks like we've had a tremendous reception of the offering. I'm advised that at the moment sales are somewhere in the order of $150 million.

HON. B.R. SMITH: I ask leave to make an introduction, Mr. Speaker.

Leave granted.

HON. B.R. SMITH: In the gallery today from England is a distinguished retired judge, Judge Alan King-Hamilton of the Old Bailey, who is also a well-known commentator on British TV on justice matters. He's here with his wife Rosalind and their daughter, Mary King-Hamilton. They are here as the guests of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Ward-Harris. Mr. Ward-Harris is a well-known local author and book reviewer. I would ask the House to make this party welcome.

Orders of the Day

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

[2:30]

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF

ENVIRONMENT AND PARKS

On vote 34: minister's office, $260,049.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I would like to begin this second series of estimates for me in this portfolio by reminding all members of the committee and you, Mr. Chairman, that staff are at hand and that although the ministry is large and varied –– 1,800 employees encompassing management strategies dealing with everything from ecological reserves to toxic waste — we do have technical expertise available to the committee to answer all questions the committee may put to us.

I'm pleased to present to the House the estimates of the Ministry of Environment and Parks for the fiscal year '88-89. During the coming year these estimates will equip the ministry to take significant steps in environmental protection and enhancement. These initiatives encompass virtually the entire range of ministry programs. Our activities are also taking place within a much wider framework, which extends beyond what has traditionally been seen as the context for environmental programs. This agenda has national and international implications, which I would like to touch on before drawing your attention to some of the highlights.

Last year the World Commission on Environment and Development, also known as the Brundtland commission, issued its report. It has been widely circulated and endorsed by world leaders. This report will have a major impact on global thinking, and its future influence cannot be overestimated. The commission issued a challenge to all nations to adopt better strategies for resolving environmental and industrial-development problems.

Most importantly, this report lays to rest the persistent and destructive myth that economic development invariably has to involve a tug-of-war between environmental and industrial priorities. The commission proposed that we will not have sustainable communities without a sustainable economy and that we cannot have a sustainable economy without a sustainable environment. Management of our resources and environment, investment strategies, social and

[ Page 4596 ]

community planning, and technological development must all work in harmony if we are to increase the potential to meet our needs, both today and in the future.

Canada was the first nation to take up the Brundtland commission's challenge, when the Canadian Council of Resource and Environment Ministers formed their national task force for the express purpose of looking for ways to implement the Brundtland recommendations in Canada. The task force was made up of federal and provincial Environment ministers, senior executive officers from industry, and people from environmental organizations and academic institutions. Its report, issued last September, was approved by all Canadian first ministers at their conference in November, and subsequently every government in Canada became committed to its implementation.

The task force called on each province and territory to develop and carry out a conservation strategy, a blueprint for a new era of development based on the principles of sustainability. A key element will be the setting up of round tables on environment and the economy in each province and territory. Each of these groups will be multisectoral, with senior decision-makers candidly discussing environment economy issues and making recommendations directly to cabinet. The Premier and I will shortly be setting up such a round table in British Columbia, and I will be calling on prominent citizens to participate.

Beyond that, our government has committed itself to encouraging a fundamental shift in direction, a new cooperative spirit not just between government and industry but among governments, industry, environmentalists and community planners. Many of the initiatives in which the Ministry of Environment and Parks is currently involved represent the spirit already in action. It would be misleading, of course, to suggest that this new direction has been taken only at the urging or instigation of government. No, it is very encouraging to see some very practical demonstrations by citizens and organizations in British Columbia who are already — to use a well-worn but very apt description — thinking globally but acting locally. Environment and parks staff can cite countless examples of this kind of activity.

Some weeks ago at Government House I had the pleasure of presenting the annual environment awards. These awards gave recognition to projects carried out across the province by people from many walks of life, and I'll give you just a few examples now. Two high school students and their teacher were there representing a school in Heffley Creek, just outside of Kamloops, where young people took part in an innovative wildlife habitat project, practising the kind of integrated management that wasn't even dreamt of by professional biologists and foresters until very recently. Two fish and game clubs and an Indian band on Vancouver Island have been very effective in helping to discourage poaching of the region's Roosevelt elk herds. We also honoured a major food retailer for the contribution it has made by introducing photodegradable grocery bags, made of plastic which breaks down after exposure to sunlight instead of persisting for years in the environment.

These achievements illustrate a principle which cannot be overemphasized and which forms the basis of our environmental policy for B.C.: that environmental quality in a viable economy cannot be based on unilateral government action alone. This basic truth is illustrated in practically every area of this ministry's activities. More and more, environmentally sound policies are the result of building resource management considerations into economic proposals at the earliest stage. The Nechako agreement, struck last year by Alcan and the provincial and federal governments, is an excellent example of this process in action. Recent applications of the mine development and review process and the coastal fisheries-forestry guidelines also demonstrate how multiple resource use can be best managed for our net benefit.

I will not attempt, in the short time available to me now, to present a summary of every program initiative the ministry is going to take during '88-89, but I will give you some prominent examples of how we will be discharging the environmental mandate in this broader context. Each is the result of months — in some cases years — of diligent technical preparation by ministry staff, but each is also the product of careful consultation with other government agencies, industries and citizens' groups and will require the same level of cooperation in order to be carried out effectively.

One of the most important projects coming to fruition this year is the provincial strategy for managing special wastes. Some years ago British Columbia committed itself to developing a user-pay system. Through the efforts of the Special Waste Advisory Committee, we now have such a system nearly in place, one which will be capable of handling all types and quantities of special wastes, including those produced by small-volume generators and municipalities. The entire regulatory system for special wastes has been put into effect, and during the coming year the ministry will be conducting a provincewide training program in cooperation with industry to make these regulations familiar to anyone who may be affected by them, from workers in large-scale operations to those in small businesses. This provincial strategy also has a national dimension, because B.C. is actively working with other provinces and the federal government to implement a national hazardous wastes action plan released early last year.

It should be clear from this description, then, that our approach to special waste corresponds at every point to the pattern for environmental action and economic development which we have endorsed. It is participatory in the fullest sense; it is being developed and implemented through consultation and cooperation with all sectors of society; it will use technology constructively and in a way that is environmentally sound. But most important, it will protect the health and safety of British Columbians while giving industry an acceptable means of treating and destroying their hazardous wastes. It is a classic example of good environmental management making good business sense. There are parallels to this approach — and similar benefits to the province — in the new direction we are planning to take in pesticide control, which will give special encouragement to agricultural users of restricted pesticides to take responsibility for prevention of misuse. It is in the best interest of food producers as well as of the environment and the public to make sure accidents don't happen.

Our wildlife program provides another example of how we can promote sustainable development through responsible environmental stewardship. We have introduced a policy for game farming which permits commercial raising of fallow deer, bison and reindeer to meet consumer demands from both within and outside the province. To make sure such operations are economically, environmentally and technically sound we have established an advisory council with representation from government, agriculture, wildlife and animal welfare organizations. We are convinced this industry

[ Page 4597 ]

is ideally suited to the British Columbia landscape, and consultation and cooperation will be the keys to its success.

We are also setting new directions for the management of our provincial parks. In the last two years we have made some major additions which make our B.C. system more than ever a world-class system, and we have increased its size by over a sixth. The emphasis will continue to be on quality as well as on quantity and must be accomplished while avoiding the tug-of-war approach to environmental and economic concerns which I mentioned earlier. The Strathcona Park Advisory Committee is currently carrying out the public review which will help to resolve the question of resource commitments in the park as well as set the future direction for its management. There will be further public consultation as the ministry drafts and implements master plans for other parks in the system.

Very recently I also announced the expansion of our policy of contracting some park services to the private sector. As I said at the time, this approach has proven so far to be extraordinarily successful, and it represents the kind of constructive partnership which is going to be essential to all of our programs in the coming years.

Complementing this will be an intensive province-wide marketing program during the coming year to make British Columbians better aware of what their parks system has to offer. Ecological considerations are fundamental to our conservation program, and public enjoyment of natural areas provides an equally powerful rationale for preserving and maintaining them. We are going to encourage our citizens to find this out for themselves.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, the mandate of this ministry is a broad one. It encompasses recreational opportunities, environmental quality and safety and many aspects of resource management. Their common denominator is simple but challenging. None of these priorities exists in isolation from the social and economic fabric of our province and its communities. We have the opportunity in British Columbia to usher in a new age of cooperative and sustainable development both in the private and public sectors. We are well equipped to rise to that challenge, and the Ministry of Environment and Parks is ready to do its part.

Interjection.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: You don't want to hear that again, do you? With that said, I will take my place and let the games begin.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I have to admit that the minister's last comment with regard to games was more like the minister than the speech he just gave. I'd like to compliment the writer of the minister's speech, because it certainly hit on all of the issues that we have raised in the last year.

I'd like to start off by complimenting the writer of the speech in reference to the Brundtland report. The first that this House heard of the Brundtland report was when we rose during the estimates of last year and brought to the minister's attention the good work that this international commission had embarked upon.

I'd like to start by taking a look at some of the things that the ministry has done. The minister certainly has been out and about the province giving speeches about their compliance with the Brundtland report, although I think that there are some very serious problems with the ministry's commitment. I would hope that by raising them now, we would see the minister dealing with those problems and hopefully coming back to next years' estimates reporting that they have been completed.

The summary of the environmental protection report that was done federally — and I think that the minister commented on that — lays some of the groundwork and recommendations for the ministry. It talks about some of the things that ministries can do to bring themselves into compliance. One of the things is a conservation strategy for every province and territory to be implemented within five years. I hope the minister can comment on whether that work has been undertaken and what direction we can look forward to seeing the ministry taking.

It talks also about all ministers with any responsibility for economic development being required to demonstrate that their departments' projects are more environmentally sound, and being held directly accountable. I'd be particularly interested in how this government intends to bring that recommendation into practice.

What we're seeing across Canada and, indeed, in British Columbia is a very strong commitment and understanding by the majority of people on environmental issues. Some of the recent public opinion polls, for instance, show that nine out of ten Canadians believe that their health has deteriorated because of environmental pollution, and 93 percent fear that they are being poisoned by toxins that have not yet been identified. Another poll, the Decima poll, shows that most Canadians believe that the responsibility for protecting the environment falls primarily on government. I am hoping that in this time during the estimates we can take a look at what your ministry is doing and what the record has been in protecting the environment and fulfilling your mandate, as well as looking a little bit into the future, and hopefully using the Brundtland report as a model for changing not only your ability to fulfil your mandate, but also changing the outlook and the structure of the ministry to deal with future needs in the province.

I will lay out some of the ground that I intend to cover during the estimates, so the minister can do some planning in having his staff available. I'm hoping this afternoon to deal basically with administrative and budget items, followed by the issue of privatization and the lab. Tomorrow afternoon I will be dealing with waste management issues. That may take us to Thursday morning. Under waste management, I'm hoping to touch on issues such as chemical pollution and some of the hazardous waste and solid waste management issues in the province. I will also be dealing with enforcement and some previous legislation this House has passed that I am particularly concerned with. I'm hoping the minister can enlighten us on the ministry's progress, specifically Bill 66.

[2:45]

Following that, I will deal with parks, wilderness and wildlife issues, and I will finish up the estimates dealing with aquaculture and water management — including free trade. That, hopefully, will bring us to the same time allotment as last year's estimates — approximately 10 hours.

We can start by getting some more information from the minister about the specific budget allotments. I have the dollars indicated in your budget, Mr. Minister. There are some increases and some decreases. I wonder if you might enlighten the House as to the reasons for those.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: At the outset, I would like the committee to acknowledge the presence of Tom Johnson, the

[ Page 4598 ]

deputy minister of Environment and Parks. I also thank the member for her acknowledgement of my speech writer. His name is Ron Kawalilak, and he'll be delighted to know that you enjoy the stuff he writes. I enjoy his writing as well. I think Ron will be remembered forever as the designer of the B.C. bird contest. He put that whole package together, the advertising strategy and the way we were to ballot, and he did a superb job. For that, I'm sure all British Columbians will be forever grateful — most specifically, the recipient, the Steller's jay. Ron is a great writer and a great idea man, and having his service to our ministry is of good benefit to us.

Briefly on the Brundtland report, it really has — as we both know, Madam Member — become the thing that everybody talks about this year, at least in fiscal year 1987-88. As it unfolds more and more, among ministers, environmentalists and industrialists, it's become the buzzword and the direction we're seeking to go. It's so simple and so obvious in its logic that I think a lot of people missed it. Nevertheless, it has become the direction of the 1980s and, I'm sure, the 1990s, in terms of industrial economic development, and how we can maintain a sustainable development and yet maintain a sustainable environment.

One of the things I wanted to talk about — because the member mentioned it — is what role Environment ministers play in governance. I found out to my surprise last September upon attending my first CCREM meeting — that's the acronym for the Canadian Council of Resource and Environment Ministers — that many of my counterparts throughout Canada do not play a role on any economic development committees, nor do any Economic Development ministers play a role on the environment committees. Maybe not typically, but occasionally the poor old Environment minister will wake up one morning and read in the paper that there's going to be a steel mill in the province, and he has had no input on the environmental implications of that project.

That is not the case in British Columbia. I don't know when this began. It probably began with the first Ministry of Environment, which had some life breathed into it as one unit in 1977 with the Bill Bennett administration. Since 1979, it's been my knowledge that the Minister of Environment always sits on the Cabinet Committee on Economic Development, and vice versa — the Minister of Economic Development sits on the environment committees. So it's always been the case in British Columbia that Environment officials and ministers know exactly what is happening in economic and industrial organization and development in the province. I think it's a good thing. It ensures that there are no surprises and that the environment constituency is represented at the cabinet table when development issues are being discussed. As I said, that's always been the record of management in any of the Social Credit administrations that I'm aware of.

I do thank the member as well for laying out the agenda of what she wants to talk about in the next couple of days. As I said at the outset, Mr. Chairman, it's a large ministry dealing with things from toxic wastes to ecological reserves and has a lot of staff who have their own expertise. Having an agenda laid out for me greatly assists all of us in ensuring that we can provide you and the committee with the most appropriate answers as quickly as possible.

I said this last year and I'll say it again, because the member for Surrey-Guildford-Whalley brought it up: the environmental awareness that we all face, and the way we have had a major attitude change in the last ten years. It is significant. The polls, as you indicate, Madam Member, indicate that people are concerned about their environment. They're concerned about health hazards because of what our lifestyle is putting into the environment, whether it's cars, industry or something else polluting the air, water or ground that we live in and on. Some polls will tell us — quite correctly, I'm sure — that environment in the minds of the average Canadian is just as serious an issue as unemployment is, which puts it right up there as a very serious concern indeed. I'm not at all surprised by that. I would say that the attitude change in the minds of the citizen, the developer and the captain of industry is probably just as significant as the attitude change we've all undergone in the last ten years with respect to drinking and driving. It's something we all did ten or 15 years ago and didn't think much about it. Then there was a Counterattack program in this province and other programs in other provinces; now it's something that's socially unacceptable. I would say the same attitude change has really taken place with respect to how we feel about the environment. Conditions that we would have put up with ten or 15 years ago in our community, such as sawmills that pollute and spew out fly ash, or industries that pollute our watercourses, or people that spill on the soil — that's just not allowed nowadays, not only by the regulations that we've introduced as a government but by the way we the citizens feel about how we want to see our environment.

You'll recall, Mr. Chairman, a concern you had in your area. It's now a very common political decision to make, that you have industry that is producing jobs and revenue to your community, but they're not doing it in the best possible fashion, so we are obliged to make sure that these people take remedial measures. We do that now with a heavy hand and very quickly, and the economy — wages — is set aside because we place a greater value on the air we breathe and the community we live in. There is that attitude change, and it is significant.

I've rambled a bit here, and the member wanted me to talk about specific budget items. I'll begin with the most significant, pesticide. You'll notice that there's an increase of over $1 million, from $964,000 to $1,995,000. That's an increase that's going to be used for food-testing and for pesticide residues, training of agricultural users and inspection on farm users.

Waste management has gone from $16 million to $20 million, and that will be used for the program of special wastes as we put it into place. That will be registration, audit and inspection of the handling of special wastes as they go to our hopefully soon to be announced treatment facility.

We've got an extra $2 million into surveys and resource mapping — that's the TRIM project, a very good private sector project mapping the whole province for the benefit of the private sector as well as the government agencies that use our maps.

For parks, we've had a $2 million increase in our budget. That's for facilities upgrading: everything from flush toilets to showers to just better conditions for our visitors. Let me end that point, as I went through that part of the budget, by pointing out that the B.C. park system is the second-largest accommodator in Canada. The federal park system is first. We had 19 million visitors last year, and the feds had 20 million. I think our record is quite remarkable because we're looking at a system that goes from Pacific Rim to, I presume, Newfoundland in terms of a federal park system. It includes the huge Rocky Mountain parks, Banff and Jasper. Yet our one provincial system was only one million visitors off what they did right across Canada.

[ Page 4599 ]

I'm very proud of that system. It has proven to be immensely popular. It's growing; it's well received. It's a world-class attraction in bringing people to our province. I think I can justify to Treasury Board or any other person who's going to look at my budget the reason for increasing that specific line on the parks budget from $30 million to $32 million.

I'll take my place now, Mr. Chairman, and welcome more questions from the member opposite.

MS. SMALLWOOD: There are two other questions outstanding, before I go back to the budget items that the minister raised: (1) the conservation strategy, and (2) the responsibility and accountability for the environmental impact by all ministries. Is it an intent of your government to bring those recommendations of the Brundtland report into place?

I would suggest to the minister that if he is truly committed to the Brundtland report and to the work that the environmental ministers are doing across Canada, one of the things he could do to show his commitment would be to bring in environmental legislation that would guarantee public involvement in decision-making, full public disclosure and freedom of information. Very clearly, that is the heart of the Brundtland report.

It suggests that the very best way, both cost-effectively and for the province to deal with the changing consciousness of people on this planet, would be to involve people in that decision-making. Would the minister please comment on: (1) the conservation strategy, and (2) the accountability for the environmental consequences of economic development from his government, and perhaps comment on whether he would consider bringing in legislation that guaranteed public involvement in decision-making.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Conservation strategy as mentioned in the Brundtland report, of course, is wide-ranging. Throughout the various branches of the Ministry of Environment and Parks we do practise conservation, whether it be wildlife, fish or wilderness. It is part of a plan. It's part of the policy in all branches that where conservation can be practised it be practised, and strategies are continuing in place to ensure that.

In terms of the public access, I think I'll have to admit that probably my mind changed a bit on that over the last year since I last stood here. Without trying to blow my horn too much, I think my record so far has been pretty good in getting the public involved in helping me address the problems faced by the Ministry of Environment and Parks. I guess the most significant and public issue right now is the Dr. Peter Larkin hearings on Strathcona Park and other contentious park issues in British Columbia, centring mainly on Strathcona.

As I said earlier, I didn't feel that strongly about public involvement at this time last year; however, the public got itself involved, didn't they? Therefore I had to reconsider what sort of input we were going to hear. On the basis of that, it became apparent that it would probably be best that we have a former member of the Wilderness Advisory Committee, Dr. Peter Larkin — who had done such good work on that first committee — carry out some of the recommendations that it had further recommended. Of course, in the Strathcona recommendations, they said we should have a further public review; so on the basis of that evidence, we put that policy in place.

[3:00]

Public input — there's quite a public appetite for that now, and I can't say I blame people. They want to know why governments make decisions and how they can be part of that decision-making process. Of course, all of us in government are Members of the Legislative Assembly; we all represent a riding, a geographic area. When you are a minister, you represent a constituency as well which is provincewide but has various people giving you input. I would say that the B.C. Wildlife Federation, for example, is a very significant group. Outdoors Unlittered.... Just about anybody with some good advice I'll listen to. So there is that avenue which, I would submit, all ministers have. They all have their constituencies and various associations that they listen to.

We have, of course, by legislation the environmental appeal process, whereby people who are concerned about a permit or a decision made by the Ministry of Environment do have the opportunity, through a proper appeal process, to have their concerns raised and adjudicated.

Another good example would be the issuance of variance orders. I know the member has some concern about those, but the member is also aware that in the case of an industrial operation we involve the union and we like their input. If there is going to be a variance order, we involve the local municipal council and other people we see fit and we think should be involved. We do try to encourage someone applying for a variance order — as a matter of fact we insist — to broaden the scope of whom they're going to talk to, whom they're going to listen to and whom they're going to present their case to. If they want a variance order for the pulp mill, then the union or unions are involved and the municipal council and other people we see fit and think should be aware of what that industrial operation is going to be doing. I think the record of previous administrations and my administration in this regard is pretty good. We do want to involve the public as much as we can and we do want to ensure that they are a part of our management process.

In terms of bringing in legislation and having the public commit to that.... I can't discuss this, because it's a bill we haven't seen yet but one that is coming. For your benefit, Madam Member. I'll just speak to it briefly, before the Chairman rules me out of order. That's river rafting; I guess that would be the best example. Because of the tragedies of last summer, we quickly put together a committee of people from the industry and some people who had been in the industry but weren't anymore. In other words, we tried to get a good public involvement of experts and former experts, and we did. The report they issued was extremely good and was well accepted by that industry, and I'm sure it will be accepted by the consumer, and we are right at the eleventh hour of presenting a bill. But you and I can't discuss that, so I’ll just leave that alone, only to say that I was quite pleased in that case to have good public involvement, and that did help me draft the legislation that is appropriate to what we had to do.

MS. SMALLWOOD: This is the third time I'll ask this question. I hope I'm going to get an answer this time, because we are knocking off some of the answers. I'd like the minister to comment on whether or not — through the committees he talks about sitting on, the economic development committees and so on — there has been any discussion that would suggest that the recommendation from the Brundtland report with regards to holding each ministry accountable for the environ-

[ Page 4600 ]

mental impact or environmental consequences of their own plans has been discussed.

The minister talked about several different things. He talked about the public process he is now committed to. It took, what, 69 people being arrested in Strathcona to get your attention and to get a commission that I would suggest does not deal with the issues of concern to those very committed and active community people, those people who care so much about their park, those people who are standing and being arrested for everyone in B.C., because if it can happen to Strathcona it can happen to any park or any place that is near and dear to any community.

I'm glad that the minister is finally saying that he is committed to a public process, but I would like to compare what this government is doing to a more junior level of government. The municipal area, whose power predominantly revolves around land use, is by legislation required to hold public hearings before land use is changed. It would seem to me, when we're looking at the planning process and community involvement, that that is the very least this province could expect from a provincial government that is making decisions that impact not only one community but the whole province and impact it significantly. We're not talking about the minister talking to his friends; we're talking about the minister hearing what the people of this province have got to say. My request is that the minister not only bring in legislation to make it compulsory for public involvement in decision-making but also to provide legislation that gives people the information that allows them to participate in a meaningful, informed way.

Much earlier on — approximately ten years ago — I went to my local council about a land-use issue and found myself sitting in an audience with a large group of community people trying to figure out what it was my government was talking about, because it seemed to be all in code. The agenda that was before us was laid out giving numbers of municipal bylaws. There was so little information there that you needed a decoding book. Our community group fought for information. We now have information packages in Surrey to all community associations and interested citizens. If you want to go to council, you not only get an agenda that you can understand and read but you also get information that the council members are looking at which allows them to make their decisions. In that way, you know if your concerns have been dealt with or whether they ever ended up on that table for discussion, giving you an opportunity to raise them and having your elected people be more informed and better able to make a decision that is more reflective of the community.

It seems pretty basic. It's not very threatening. I have to admit that when we first raised it with our local council there were several council members — some of them having sat on the council for 20-odd years — that were pretty darn intimidated by these activists wanting to have information. But you know, it's worked out pretty well for the council. They get a lot more support for the decisions that they make. It has also worked out very well for the community too. We feel more involved in the decisions that are being made.

I'm hoping that the minister, while he's very clearly heading down that road.... I would say from my own community, it was perhaps as painful as the year that the minister has just undergone. Mind you, we didn't have 69 people ending up in jail in Surrey. Hopefully, with the minister's new eye on public involvement, he may also look at some of the other important steps that he can take this year as far as access to information.

I won't go on too much further because, again, I want to remind the minister about my third question: has there been discussion about accountability among the economic ministries?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I regret I didn't quite follow the question. I hope I've got it now because there are some processes in legislation, in regulation or just from practice — I don't know how they came to be, but they are in place now — that are significant. I am advised by industry that they are some of the most significant regulatory processes in Canada.

An example is the mine development review process. Our good former colleague Tom Waterland, now president of the Mining Association of B.C., tells me that the mine development review process in British Columbia is the most comprehensive in Canada. I have a tendency to believe him. It's a very good process. All the concerned agencies, including the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, get together, and the mining proponent has to present programs and plans to all the concerned agencies — Environment is just one of them. We look at them to ensure that if the mine is going to go ahead, it's going to go ahead in a fashion that's appropriate to everyone.

I'll give you a good example. We worked on this one all last winter. It was Golden Bear mine. It had a variety of concerns. The Tahltan Indians were concerned. I was concerned as the minister responsible for wildlife because there were some major game trails that were being dealt with. The DFO was concerned about, I think, eight or nine creek crossings that the mine developer had to do in terms of his access road, and we had a little concern about acid. The major concern was not so much the mine but the road into the mine, but it was a major one. As I said, it involved a whole bunch of issues: native Indians, wildlife, the environment, soils, streams, fish. You name it; it was all there.

We had to put a hold on it. The application came last fall. We looked at it, and the recommendation which came back from the mine development review committee was that we just didn't have enough information. There were too many mysteries out there. We had to find out a lot more. Well, they worked on it all winter. They came back — and, coincidentally, I was talking to one of the officials in my ministry the other day who told me this — with a recommendation that has made the native Indian group very happy because it avoids some of their hunting area and is also going to supply them with a little bit of work in terms of building the road. It satisfies Environment because it's avoiding a confrontation with game. It satisfies the Department of Fisheries and Oceans because it avoids, I think, five or six of the stream crossings. Lo and behold, it's come out cheaper than the original road proposal was. By having all agencies have a look at this proposal, we have satisfied ourselves on every count, and we've also saved the company some money.

We do have master-planning process in Parks. We're all aware of what happened at Strathcona, and it wasn't that pleasant. Some people were very upset and, I guess one could argue, justifiably so. In many cases it works very well.

The other example is in my part of the world, and that's Tweedsmuir. We had good, extensive hearings with respect to the Tweedsmuir master park plan all last fall and in the winter. We listened to groups from Bella Coola to Burns Lake and made the various changes here and there as they were presented to ministry officials. I think we are finalized now — if not, we're very close to it — with a very satisfied public

[ Page 4601 ]

in that area. They're satisfied on all accounts that the master planning process for the development of Tweedsmuir Park was done on a first-class basis and everybody had their input. So you win some, you lose some.

Strathcona is heeded. Strathcona has been kicked around for 77 years; we all know that. It's been logged, mined, used for this, that and the other thing. Former governments have traded off wood for this and that. They've traded off wood for other pieces of park outside of Strathcona that they wanted. It has really been ripped — I'll admit it. So will anyone who looks at the history. Your government and my government, your administration and our administration: Strathcona has been hit, and hit hard, for a long time and for a variety of good — and maybe not so good — reasons. That's why we had the Wilderness Advisory Committee have a look at it, and that's why we are following up with the Peter Larkin committee. I don't blame some of the people for protesting, because they have seen that park of theirs hit for a variety of reasons over 77 years.

In any event, I think I have outlined all the interagency discussion we go through. We have a forestry-fishery policy now in the Ministry of Forests in terms of how close they are going to cut to a bank — that type of thing — to prevent soil erosion; we have guidelines there. We have the mine development review process. The ELUC deputies all sit together and discuss any proposal and how it is going to fit environmentally or with the other agencies.

I think we are really light years ahead of a lot of other jurisdictions. I guess the bottom line of what I want to say is this: when we put together our Premier's round table in British Columbia and they look at Brundtland's recommendations and at our own administrative process in B.C., I think they'll have to conclude that we are in fact meeting a lot of Brundtland's administrative recommendations now. I really can't think of too many holes that are out there. There may be a few, but by and large I'm satisfied, as I sit around the cabinet table or as I look at the reviews that are going on for whatever activity might be taking place, that we have a good administrative process in place.

[3:15]

MS. SMALLWOOD: I hope I'm misunderstanding the minister — you're not saying everything is fine and you don't have to do any more work?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: No, no. There's always more to do.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I would hope the minister would acknowledge that there is more work to be done.

I'd like to ask him about some of the budget items. On the issue of surveys and mapping, the minister said the increase was a mapping project, and then he referred to parks and the private sector. Can the minister elaborate on that? Is that geological mapping?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: It is resource mapping, Madam Member. The significant item is operating costs, up $2 million. Asset acquisitions are up about $350,000.

MS. SMALLWOOD: When the minister says resource mapping and he connects that with the private sector and parks, is the ministry at this time increasing the budget for the Ministry of Environment...spending taxpayers' dollars to identify resources in our parks?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Maybe my speaking notes confused the committee. No, the resource mapping that we're talking about is not in parks. It's the resource mapping that is taking place throughout the province, where a private sector consortium is identifying.... The Ministry of Environment is the agency coordinating that mapping activity for Mines, Forests, Hydro and anybody else who wants to have a look at what the province looks like. It's on digital maps — very state of the art. In a couple of years it will all be finished and we'll have 7,000 floppy disks. If a developer, Hydro, a mining company, the Ministry of Mines, the department of fishery and oceans or whatever wants to look at a specific area, you come to us and we put in the appropriate floppy disk, and the map comes out. Its contour, hopefully its minerals.... It shows forests, forest licence, roads — just about everything we can put in. It's a one-stop library of the maps in British Columbia on a digital basis.

That's what we mean. If I made any reference to privatization of parks, I didn't mean to. I wasn't attempting to, nor is there any connection there.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'm afraid the minister's explanation doesn't make me feel too much better, because in the last year we have seen the minister and this government bring in legislation that creates recreational areas and multiple-use wilderness areas, which downgrades parks. Now we're talking about spending taxpayers' dollars, albeit not in designated parks areas, if I understand the minister correctly, but to identify resources in this province. That information subsequently gets used by the private sector to exploit those resources. All we have to do is look at the history of other surveying or mapping projects in the province, and clearly some of the public quotes by the person responsible for the projects that justify the expenditure of taxpayers' dollars in the return to the province of mineral exploration. My question is: is the Ministry of Environment and Parks in the business of mineral exploration?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: That was one question. No, we are not in the business of mineral exploration. We are, though, the resource ministry for doing mapping in the province of British Columbia. In this day of computers and technology, we have gone from hand-drawn maps to digital mapping using satellites and a variety of very technical methods that we have TRIM, the acronym for this private sector consortium, doing for us — just providing us with maps. If you're alarmed that maps are going to cause more exploration or more resource development in the province, then you have a right to be alarmed, because I guess that's what maps will do.

In terms of park policy, that's totally separate, and I do not advocate exploration. That's not the mandate of the Ministry of Environment and Parks. We manage parks that are parks. Where we have claims, we label them recreation areas and we do our best to buy them out and quitclaim them so we can turn them into parks. Where the land is Crown land — in other words, not encumbered by either park status or recreation area status — we as the Ministry of Environment ensure that the environment is looked after, which is everything from game trails if there is development to whatever development is going to take place there — mine, pulp mill, whatever. But just because we do mapping is not going to make resource extraction go away.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Can the minister tell us if the $15 million that is allocated for surveys and mapping will include surveying and mapping in the parks system?

[ Page 4602 ]

HON. MR. STRACHAN: It's $12 million. It went from $10.6 million to $12.59 million. Yes, it's the whole province, but you have to map everything. It's digital mapping. It shows contours, but it's not specifically designed.... No, it is not designed to encourage exploration in parks. The program is in place to map the province. It's that simple.

MS. SMALLWOOD: The minister has said that it is resource mapping; it identifies resources — whether they're mineral or forest resources. The minister is telling us that the mapping will also include the parks. What we have seen over the past year, with the minister working alongside the Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources, is a downgrading, quite contrary to what the minister said in the last year's estimates. The minister said last year that we would never see the downgrading of parks, that we would only see the upgrading of status; but not more than a month after those words left the minister's mouth, we saw legislation in the House that caused downgrading of parks.

Some of that downgrading, moving from class A park to recreational area, was not due to existing claims as the minister had indicated, but was due to the information that was provided by such a program, information that showed that mineral values in Kokanee, for instance, were substantial, and this government downgraded that area to create a recreational area alongside of the parks and invited the private sector to stake claims in that area. So we used taxpayers' dollars to erode the park system. My concern is that with an increase in the budget item for that particular program, we will see a more rapid downgrading of the parks next year, a speeding up of the momentum that has already been set by this ministry.

I'd like to ask the minister about the expenditure for parks and outdoor recreation. We've seen an increase there of.... Obviously our numbers are out; the information I have doesn't seem to be the same as yours. At any rate, I have an increase of $2 million. You've said it is an upgrading of facilities. Can the minister explain: is that in the campgrounds? The minister says that the upgrading of the facilities is for campgrounds. How does that jibe with the minister's privatization of campgrounds? Are we spending taxpayers' dollars to upgrade facilities and then have the private sector make the profit off them?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The $2 million increase is, as I identified in my opening comments, for such things as flush toilets and other amenities that make camping a bit more comfortable and enjoyable, and more what the expectations of the twentieth-century park visitor are. I think it's a very good program that will do nothing but increase visitors to our parks and our province. Increased attendance will enable me to go to Treasury Board and get a bigger budget again next year.

The parks are not being privatized. Operations within the parks have been privatized since 1983, and we will be increasing that. That's such services as cleaning out those privies, if they have to be cleaned out, cutting firewood, bringing the plumber in, collecting garbage and doing all the manpower services needed to carry out an efficient operation and make sure that the parks are attractive to our visitors. I know that is not philosophically acceptable to the members opposite, and I accept that opinion of theirs. That's what politics is all about — those of us who have different opinions about things. I'm of the opinion that a lot of those services can be carried out by someone not employed by the government, because I believe that you don't have to be employed by the government to work properly and carry out a good job. So far the results have been just that: the private sector does a good job of catering and servicing our campgrounds. We are doing nothing except encouraging that. In areas where it's more cost-effective to use our own government forces we will, but clearly for the majority of services that we want to provide in campgrounds, it's better to have a private sector contractor performing those services for us. That's what we mean by privatization in the parks.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I would suggest to the minister that it's not just the government's opposition that has some concern about your privatization initiatives. You haven't asked the people of this province whether they want their tax dollars going to making profit for somebody else. The people in this province are paying taxes to have services rendered, to have their province managed to address and serve their needs, not to put money into somebody else's pocket.

I'd like to move on and ask the minister to provide some information about the revenue your ministry made in the last year. We talked a little bit about some of the funds available to the ministry in previous legislation — the Crown land fund, the heritage conservation and so on. Could the minister provide the House with the dollar value of fees and permits?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: On the revenue side, we're estimating for natural resources — this is water licences, which we characterize as a natural resource — $249,000,000; the Wildlife Act, $10 million; sales and services, $715,000; licences and permits, another $10 million; miscellaneous revenue — I'll have to get more detail on that if you wish, hon. member — of $100,000; and contributions from the federal government of $2,500,000; for a total of $273,394,000.

[3:30]

MS. SMALLWOOD: The Ministry of Environment is a significant money-maker. Can the minister assure the House that that money is going back into the Environment ministry and into addressing the environmental concerns and the preservation needed in this province, or is it also being funnelled off into general revenue like the other funds we heard of earlier?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: For the most part, hon. member, we are in fact a net spender. This all goes to general revenue, with the exception of the habitat conservation fund. But we still have a net expenditure on the general revenue of the province of British Columbia, with one exception. That's the big one: $249 million. That's water licences. The Ministry of Environment is the taxing authority there, so we take in more as a ministry than we spend. If you take out that water licensing job that we do, then we are a net spender out of the provincial coffers.

MS. SMALLWOOD: So the minister is saying the Ministry of Environment takes in more money than it spends. Is that correct?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Yes.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Okay. I think it's very important for that to get on the record, because I'm hoping that people

[ Page 4603 ]

begin to understand the significance of the ministry we're dealing with here. When we have one of the government's back-benchers making remarks about the ministry's money going into general revenue and spending it on seniors and health care and belittling the whole issue, he is completely oblivious to the very assumptions of the report that we've been talking about and the understanding that people are coming to — not only in B.C. but in Canada and internationally — that the Environment ministry is the number one ministry. If this one isn't taken care of, it really doesn't matter what we do about health care, jobs or our seniors. If we don't get our act together here, there very well may not be a future.

I want to touch on a couple of items before I go on to the issue of the Environmental Lab. I hope that some of the government back-benchers would be encouraged by the Minister of Environment's commitment to the Brundtland report and would take that report and do a bit of homework. Read it and see what they've got to say about the Environment ministry. It would only help the minister in persuading the government as to the wisdom of the work that was done.

I had a very interesting clipping come across my desk a few months ago about the New Zealand parliamentary commissioner for the environment. I'll just give this to the minister for his information. Hopefully it will be one of the things that he will take a look at. New Zealand has put in place a parliamentary commissioner who is almost at the level of an ombudsman and is responsible for environment. It takes the concerns of the environment and puts it somewhat at arm's length from the political process, and in that way makes it a little more responsive to some of the environmental needs. I hope that the minister will take a look at that.

I would also like to ask the minister about the standing committee of the House and why that standing committee has not met. We have now had two full sessions of the Legislature, and we've yet to see the standing committee on environment sit.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: A good comment. With respect to the member's comments about how we're spending, I think that might have been better directed to the budget debate. As you know, we develop a budget every year at Treasury Board. Mine is up from $135 million to $142 million, so I feel that I've been reasonably successful — as well as anyone can be — at Treasury Board this year, and that I am able to extract from my colleague a couple of seats down the appropriate amount of funding to look after the constituency that I serve — which is what we, as ministers, do when we go. We don't do this alone; our officials are there to make the good arguments for us and help us make our case, in which they do a very good job. It's all part of the budget process, and that can be criticized at budget time.

In terms of the New Zealand commission, Madam Member, I don't know exactly the details of what you're talking about. I'd be interested in hearing more of it. Would it not, from your description, compare to the Environmental Appeal Board, which is a body that hears complaints about actions of the Ministry of Environment? If it doesn't, then perhaps you could explain that to me further. I'd be interested in those comments.

Lastly, with respect to the Select Standing Committee on Environment, you're right that we haven't referred anything to that committee. I really hadn't given that much thought. Perhaps you could suggest items you wish to have referred to that committee. I'm always open to suggestions. We've seen other committees work pretty well so far: the Select Standing Committee on Forests and Lands, to do with the contracting clause; the Finance committee was put in place; we had a Gulf Islands committee last year. As you know, it's not characteristic of this government not to have select standing committees. I think our record is very good on that. If you have any specific suggestions you'd like to see a committee do, I'd be more than happy to hear them.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Before we proceed — and I know the minister was very kind in answering that question — I would just remind the committee that we cannot while in committee ask why another committee doesn't sit. If we want to do that, we have to ask the House. Please proceed.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I won't repeat the question, since we're dealing with the substance of it anyway.

The list is long. I think there are many things we could sit down and talk about, like my next topic, the privatization of the lab and the enforcement of waste management permits in this province, and on and on. There are times in this House when we don't seem to get down to some of the issues that are so important and so fundamental to, I would think, everyone in this House. Sometimes I think it takes some kind of extraordinary action, and maybe that extraordinary action is the government and opposition members sitting down to explore some solutions.

I have some things that have crossed my desk in the last while, and they've really jogged my attention and really made me ask the question of why in our busy days we don't get to talk about some of these important things.

I've got a letter here from Friends of the Ozone Layer asking for some attention. It's a pretty important issue to this planet.

I have another letter here from the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility. It includes an information package from the Okanagan with their concerns about Hanford, their nuclear backyard. It's a Penticton peace group. It's a pretty important issue, the impact of having the Hanford nuclear reservation so close to our border. Has this government considered putting together some kind of forum for this province to begin to get a grip on some of the major issues that impact this province because of the Hanford nuclear reserve?

[Mr. Rabbitt in the chair.]

I have another package that was prepared by the United Church of Canada. This is with regard to American bomber training over B.C. They lay out some of their concerns about the flights over northern B.C. I have in the past year helped them and sent letters to your ministry asking for information, because information is quite hard to come by.

Those are some pretty major issues that we never seem to get on the public agenda, that we never seem to manage to get into the House for debate. Part of that could very well be that because they are so big, we need to sit down and put some resources to looking at B.C.'s position on those important issues, and how we can be part of the answer.

I would like to ask the minister to comment on that before we move on to the lab.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: We're really dealing in the federal realm here, but I appreciate the member's concern.

[ Page 4604 ]

It's a concern we all have in British Columbia. Number one, I think all Canadian ministers and all Canadians were proud of the work that Tom McMillan did in terms of ozone layer protection and the initiative he took on behalf of all of us in Canada. As federal minister, he had the responsibility to do that. As a matter of fact, he won an environmental award for it. I think we can be proud of that. I'm sure to a man and to a woman — I don't think we have any ladies in our club right now.... All the Canadian ministers at CCREM supported Tom McMillan's initiative. As a matter of fact, he presented his paper to us in September last year in Quebec at the ministers' meeting. So we do support that. Anything we can do provincially will be done to encourage the initiative, in terms of protecting the ozone layer.

In terms of Hanford, I've dealt with this a bit in my previous Ministry of Intergovernmental Relations, and Garde Gardom had a file on it as well. Essentially, it boiled down to a series of letters between Garde Gardom — and latterly me — and Joe Clark as Minister of State for External Affairs, expressing our concern about the presence of that nuclear plant just south of our border. We were assured by Mr. Clark in response that they were monitoring that as closely as they could in terms of their ability to discuss that operation within appropriate protocol with the American government and the Atomic Energy Commission, or whoever they deal with there.

In terms of the bomber training on those flights, I can't really offer too much assistance, Madam Member. I guess the one concern we would have from a realistic point of view would be extensive and noisy flights over game trail areas. Outside of that I don't know what influence we could have on that type of flight. It's governed by Canada air regulations, and how the province of British Columbia could make comment in an official capacity is beyond me. I think as citizens, though, we have to make our concerns known to our federal leaders so that they are aware of how we feel about that type of involvement.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I would suggest to the minister that one of the best ways to make your voice heard is to actually get involved and get some more done. What we've seen all around B.C. is municipalities, right down to individual schools and school kids, creating nuclear-free zones all around this province. I think it's a challenge to the ministry and to this government to actually do some work and get involved in this issue.

I'd like to talk to the minister a bit about the privatization initiative, the Environmental Lab and the audit the minister has just announced. I'd like the minister to continue with some of the comments he made during question period, where he said he would be pleased to elaborate on the audit and some of the safeguards the ministry has put in place to ensure that issues of public health and safety, standard regulations and conflict of interest have been taken care of.

[3:45]

HON. MR. STRACHAN: We have officially communicated with B.C. Research to undertake all audit programs. These would be in air and water monitoring, and we would have the permit holders pay the bill. We want to ensure that we have an active audit industry. B.C. Research are the best people to ensure that audits are correct, that there is nothing dangerous happening in terms of emissions. I don't know what else I can say. I've got lots to say if the member wishes to ask me more specific questions.

The audit process is simple, as I understand it from the scientific community. You take a sample at random from the agency you're permitting and the one you want to test, and you say: "This one has to be split. The private lab is going to do one; B.C. Research is going to do the other half. We're going to compare the results and make sure everybody's singing off the same song sheet, getting the same results and using the appropriate methodology in testing." That's the simplistic way of doing it, and that's what will be done. We know that will be technically and environmentally correct.

I'd like to hear more questions you might have.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Did the minister say that B.C. Research will be responsible for making sure that everything is okay in the province?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: No. The Ministry of Environment and Parks is the regulatory agency, the permit issuer, the permit inspector, and regulates all the activities you're concerned about. We have other methods of ensuring that our regulations are carried out, one of them being B.C. Research.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I am sure the minister was pleased that I gave him that question so he could clarify that, because there would be a lot of people in the province who would be very concerned about his previous statement.

Can the minister tell the House the value of the audit program that has been given to B.C. Research?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: We're just going to find that out. I don't know if we have generated numbers yet. Let me read our general statement into the record with respect to B.C. Research and the role they are going to play acting on behalf of this ministry:

"B.C. Research would report all audit results to the ministry monthly in a form compatible with its existing data storage facilities. In addition, B.C. Research would produce an annual summary report assessing overall accuracy of permit holders and analytical laboratory results and reviewing method development activities. Progress reports on the latter would be provided during the year as appropriate. Liaison would be maintained with the ministry interface group to ensure that we are responsive to ongoing needs and priorities. Our current expenditures on audits and standards development total about $670,000. It is anticipated that permit holders will pay about $250,000 to $350,000 for their share of the B.C. research program, this representing 5 percent to 10 percent of the existing monitoring budget."

MS. SMALLWOOD: Two points. The minister has said that B.C. Research will be acting on behalf of the ministry. That's very different than having a lab do a job for government — contracting out a particular task. Is the minister suggesting that B.C. Research will act on behalf of the ministry? What powers will the B.C. Research Corporation have and what responsibilities beyond collecting and analyzing data?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Wherever you have an audit, whether it be in the financial world or the environmental or scientific world, the auditor acts on behalf of the person who employs him to do that. In that case, it is the government, and

[ Page 4605 ]

that auditor — B.C. Research — is told to test someone's evidence and test it just the way your colleague the hon. first member for Nanaimo (Mr. Stupich) would test someone's books. There are a series of tests that are standard and are applied by people with expertise, and that's that type of audit. When that audit and those tests are satisfied, the first member for Nanaimo says: "I have accomplished these tests, and I am satisfied they are correct." A scientific audit is a different process but arrives at the same results. "Here are the tests that I have done on this evidence given to me. I find that this" — whatever the results are — "happens to be the case." And they sign their name. But they work for the Ministry of Environment and Parks.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I would suggest to the minister that this is a very different relationship than an auditor. The minister seems to be wanting to compare it to the auditor-general or something of that stature. We are talking about an environmental audit that is being done by the province at arm's length and responsible to the Ministry of Environment. Can the minister tell the House — because this is a cost-shared arrangement between industry and taxpayers, via the Ministry of Environment — whether or not B.C. Research will be getting other contracts from the government?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The new dioxin lab or dedication of the mass spec that is going to be there — yes, they'll be doing that. But surely you are not suggesting that B.C. Research is somewhat suspect, are you? They are clean, pure research and are clearly at arm's length, and if we can't trust B.C. Research to do a good job for us, then we have a major problem.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I think that what the minister is doing is confusing people's concern and quest for information with casting aspersions on B.C. Research. Part of what we have to do is take a look at the history — who B.C. Research is — and seek information from the minister that will indicate whether or not the people's interests in this province are being taken care of.

What the ministry is doing is relinquishing some of its responsibility. The ministry is now saying that the responsibility for auditing and analyzing the data, the checks permits, will be done by a private corporation — a corporation that, incidentally, up until the end of March this year was the B.C. Research Council, which had government representation on it.

What I am trying to understand here is how, with this arm's-length audit, the people of the province can be assured that their interests will be protected. I have actually spoken to some of the people at B.C. Research and asked them for information about what they are doing with their new structure and their new corporation, how they will be able to protect their mandate, their 40-year history of being an innovative centre in this province that worked very closely with industry and shared technologies. It was a technology transfer between industry and the Research Council. I asked them: what will change now that you are the B.C. Research Corp. and are no longer a non-profit society, and are a profit-making company? What will make certain that you can maintain your mandate — the mandate that the non-profit society had? They haven't quite figured that part out yet. They are still working on the board of directors and all the rest of that. But you have put these people in such a situation, to say nothing of the fact that we now have a situation that is tantamount to a crisis, where the people of the province can't be sure that their job is being done for them by the Ministry of Environment....

Perhaps the minister can tell the House whether or not this audit program actually went out to tender.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: There are a couple of things I'd like to answer. Number one: the ministry is giving up no responsibility. Our responsibility is clearly stipulated in the statutes. Until you see a legislative change, there is no way you can anticipate that we are amending our responsibility. Our responsibility is statuted; it is there for everyone to see. It is some of the best — if not the best — in Canada and North America in terms of what we have a responsibility to do.

In terms of setting out a bid to B.C. Research to do an audit for us, I think that would fly in the face of what you are concerned about. We wanted to reduce the costs of government to the taxpayer. That's the reason we have a privatization program.

If I can speak about that generally, in some cases it has worked; in other cases it has not. As you follow privatization, you will be aware that there are some initiatives that we have said no to, because in fact we couldn't see any substantial saving to the taxpayer; nor could we see an improvement in services. So we have had initiatives put to us that we have turned down. This one might still go the same way. I have the time-line here, and.... Today is May 24. On June 24, 30 days from today, the bids close. In the meantime, according to this calendar, we have had an expression of interest from staff, and we are going to go through the whole thing, which you probably have before you. That process is in place.

You make the assumption that it is going to be sold. Maybe it will and maybe it won't. Right now we are simply receiving expressions of interest. They may not be satisfactory to the government. In that case, the process will remain the same. However, they may be quite satisfactory. The private sector or the employees may come up with a very good offer which provides a service to the public and to the government of British Columbia. We will be happy to privatize that industry so they can operate it on behalf of our government.

In terms of your other question — would we accept a bid for auditing? — that would cause us some problems, and I think that isn't what you wanted to ask. We specifically stated that B.C. Research, because they are pure, academic and at arm's length — everything you want a good audit function to be — would be designated as the audit authority in this type of auditing. We have faith that they will act in our best interests. As I said earlier, if we can't see that group, with their expertise, independence and autonomy, doing appropriate and responsible testing for us, then we have a major problem. I am convinced that they will be first-class, and I have no fear about the process that they will undertake.

[4:00]

MS. SMALLWOOD: The minister says that this group with their independence.... Independence from whom, Mr. Minister?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Independence from industry — the industry they are auditing or, I should say, the permit-holders they are auditing.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'm glad the minister clarified that about permit-holders, because while B.C. Research has

[ Page 4606 ]

stated that they will not do testing for the industry that they are auditing, by virtue of their makeup they work very closely with industry. The reason for the Research Council in the first place was a technologies transfer to industry.

I suggest that they are not independent from industry. I also suggest that you don't have the answers. You are asking us to take it on faith that this is a good group. Quite frankly, their history is irrefutable; they have a great record. But there are no safeguards. There is nothing more than a couple of well-meaning, dedicated people at the helm saying: "I'm the one who will stop it from happening." That's not good enough. This ministry is turning this province upside-down as far as the policing and regulating of waste management in regard to all kinds of tests. The ministry just tells us we should trust and is doing nothing to assure the people of this province that they have given any thought to the concerns of conflict of interest. For many months the minister was served notice as to people's concerns about conflict, and he has done nothing to alleviate those concerns.

I understand that the ministry has engaged the B.C. Research Corp. in a program for dioxin testing. This is a separate program. Has the minister offered that to other labs, or was this again a contract going to the B.C. Research Corp. without any public process?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Again, no. We went to B.C. Research on this because they are the best and because they have the facilities and the equipment. It's the GC-MS, a mass spectrometer, and we want to test for dioxins. If we want to look at current state-of-the-art testing, we're looking at 120 parts in the family of dioxins, some very toxic, others benign. When you're testing for dioxins, you have to test in parts per trillion, so this machinery — the mass spec — has to be dedicated to dioxin testing only. Parts per trillion is fine testing, so the machine has to first of all be dedicated and do no other testing, and secondly be set up in a totally clean environment, which requires a separate building or separate rooms, walls or whatever, to the tune of $200,000 — an extensive facility to house the machine so that you have this purity of very fine parts-per-trillion testing.

So that's where we are. We expect it to be in place by September 30. We had to go to it. In B.C., particularly since we have a large kraft bleaching industry that causes some suspicion with respect to dioxins in the water and the receiving environment, we know we had to do it. We couldn't get dioxin testing done in B.C. We had to send to Ontario or the United States. The waiting-list was extremely long, so we went to dedicating our own piece of equipment and our own testing, and B.C. Research has it. We're quite satisfied that we'll have state-of-the-art testing in B.C. We'll be able to look at our own industries, our own water, our own soils, our own herons, our own heron eggs, crabs, all the aquatic animals where we have a concern, and we'll be able to do it right here to better protect the people of our province.

I guess we're first in Canada outside of Ontario, and I'm quite proud of it. And I'm quite proud we could have that included in our budget and that we had a facility like B.C. Research to do the testing for us.

MS. SMALLWOOD: The minister talks about the mass spectrometer. Can the minister tell us where that machine came from?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: It's ours; we've always had it. The money is being spent on the room. The machine has been here for some years now, but it hasn't been dedicated for dioxin testing. If you use it for other testing it gets contaminated for that fine testing. We've had it for some time. It's just that now we're dedicating it.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Is this not the B.C. Research Corp.'s machine?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: To get you totally correct on that, it's been here for some time. We've been half-owner. The new arrangement, by the way, is a bit different. When we dedicate it, it's going to be owned 51 percent by B.C. Research — so we clearly indicate who the manager is — and 49 percent by the Ministry of Environment.

MS. SMALLWOOD: My understanding, Mr. Minister, was that this machine was purchased by the ministry approximately a year ago; that the arrangement was that B.C. Research Council at that time would own the machine; that the lab, which up until now has rented space in the B.C. Research building, would use the machine when they needed it; and that the arrangement in the purchasing of that machine was that should one of the partners in the purchase fail to exist, the other partner would assume ownership. At the time of purchase, I don't know if anyone ever imagined that the lab — the very tool and the organization responsible for environmental testing to the ministry — would be the agency that would no longer exist.

So again, we have taxpayers' dollars purchasing this very expensive machine; I understand it's approximately $300,000. We have a loan — is it an interest-free loan? — for renovations to B.C. Research to provide a space for the machine. I think you alluded to that loan of $200,000?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: We're going to provide $200,000 to B.C. Research to establish test facilities. That will be repaid with interest over the next three years beginning on September 1, 1988. The interest will be paid in terms of testing, because there's a value to testing.

MS. SMALLWOOD: So the interest to that loan will be paid in terms of testing — services rendered to the province.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: And the loan as well.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I thought we were talking about the loan. Okay, because the machine is already owned.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The principal and the interest.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Right.

What we have here is a dioxin-testing lab that has been set up pretty much with taxpayers' dollars. It's a private corporation now. B.C. Research is no longer the B.C. Research Council; this is B.C. Research Corp. — a private corporation. The dioxin-testing lab is the only lab in western Canada; the only other lab for dioxin testing is in eastern Canada. It is an extremely lucrative test. It costs a lot of money to do a dioxin test — approximately $1,000 per test. If the ministry is talking about a dioxin-testing program for the province, we have set up in a private lab a dioxin-testing facility which in essence is a permit to print money. This is an extremely lucrative situation that has been set up for B.C. Research Corp.

[ Page 4607 ]

I need my mind refreshed here. The minister said that this did not go out to any public tendering process and that no other labs had an opportunity to bid on the dioxin test.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I'm glad the member admits that this is like a licence to print money, because don't forget: we still own 49 percent of it. So we're in the game too — the government and the people of the province. We're still a 49 percent owner.

The $200,000 that we are going to get paid back — principal and interest, in tests done for the government and the people of British Columbia — is to build the facility, the super-clean walls, the filtration and all that type of thing that goes with the mass specs. So that's our investment in cash. April 7 is the date we signed the agreement — yes, the day after my wife's birthday. We've got that in place. We're going to get the loan returned to us with interest, and we are going to be in the business of doing our own testing in British Columbia, and we are still the 49 percent owner of the machine. There is no other facility that could do that type of testing — nor any other company that we would want to do that type of testing — in the province. So I don't see why you're concerned. We've got half the action, we're gaining our money back, and we have our own dioxin-testing lab. So we're a winner on all counts.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Further clarification. Is the minister saying that because the ministry at this time owns 49 percent of that machine, you will be getting 49 percent of the revenue? Is there a contract indicating that you have that kind of agreement? How long will that agreement be in place?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: As we are paid back, we will be paid back for our investment into the infrastructure, but we will not get the revenue from the other testing.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'm glad the minister sought clarification. So the ministry is no longer in the business of doing dioxin testing. The ministry has set up a private lab and given them the contract to do this very lucrative testing for the province, and the only thing the ministry will be getting back is the money put into the renovations, not for the machine, not for the ongoing profit made from the dioxin testing that has been done. Indeed, if there is a dioxin program in this province, which there should be, paid for by taxpayers' money, the ministry will not get a portion of that profit. Is that correct?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Yes, but we're still happy with the arrangement. We do have the facility in place, which means we will have on-the-spot, accurate dioxin testing done in British Columbia, and that is the prime concern. We're satisfied that this is probably the best arrangement we could have made in terms of having the machine dedicated for that purpose and having our industry and the people of British Columbia served in a good fashion.

[4:15]

MS. SMALLWOOD: The minister has indicated that he's pleased that we'll now have accurate dioxin testing. Can he tell the House whether this is a state-of-the-art machine and how he knows whether it is?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I'm advised, Madam Member, that it's state-of-the-art for industrial testing, not for research. It's industrial testing that we want to do.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'd suggest to the minister that while this is a very good and very expensive machine, it is not accurate to the extent that will be needed for some dioxin testing. While it may test for a certain level of some types of dioxin, it will not test for many of the lethal dioxins that would be of concern not only to industry but to the province as a whole.

I might also ask the minister, going back to his comments about fulfilling the mandate of the ministry and the ministry's responsibility for environmental protection, how the ministry will know, once it gets the information from the testing lab — the analysis of the dioxin testing, for instance — whether the information is significant.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: From time to time we'll have some split sampling done by the federal government in Ontario, so we'll have our own external audit as well.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Mr. Minister, I'd suggest that one of the things you're going to need is expertise on staff. You are going to need people on staff — and you would have had it in the Environmental Lab — who know what state-of-the art machinery is, know how the technology is changing daily and know what the data they have in front of them means.

I have argued for some time that what you are doing is putting the communities of this province at risk. One of the things I don't believe you have considered is that you are also putting the industries at risk, because you are gutting your ministry. Because you are cutting back on all the human resources in your ministry, you no longer have.... If you do have, you are putting those people at risk. You are in a situation that when you have the information coming back to you, you are not able to make the public policy decisions necessary to protect the industry and the community.

On the federal level we have seen.... I would bring to your attention the testing of shellfish contamination last year. The federal ministry put itself in a situation where it no longer had labs to analyze the problem and had to rely on private labs. Once they got the information, because they no longer had the mechanism to deal with it, they panicked; they shut down the industry; they cost the industry an enormous sum of money. You, Mr. Minister, will be in that situation very shortly. You will receive information from private labs and have to make a decision as to whether you have to take some action. Are you going to err on the side of the industry and then wait until you see the statistics coming out of the communities, the health effects of pollution, or are you going to act and possibly shut down those industries?

I would suggest to you that not only are you putting this province in an untenable situation, but you are putting yourself, your government and the industry in an untenable situation. You don't know if this machine is going to be able to deliver. The range of dioxins that are of concern is substantial. There are dioxins not of significant concern, and there are those that are so toxic that a very small amount can kill a person. If you don't have the resources in your ministry to analyze the information you are getting, to advise you on whether that machine and the machines doing the testing are state-of-the-art, then you don't have the information to make public policy in this province.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The member is upset because we are privatizing one part of a lab-testing process, and she is trying to connect that to a new program we are putting in

[ Page 4608 ]

place, dioxin testing, which has never been done. Let's start from there.

Dioxin testing has never been done in British Columbia, because we haven't had the dedicated machinery to do it. We have now leapt into the twenty-first century. We are using very sophisticated industrial-quality testing machinery, state of-the-art for industry testing. We are establishing that program at B.C. Research to better look after the concerns you've expressed. Prior to that, we were doing nothing. If you are advocating that we shouldn't have done this, I find that you are arguing at cross purposes. But we have done this. The agreement was signed on April 7, and we hope the facility will be in place by September of this year. We are doing something new and innovative and something we have to do in British Columbia for dioxin testing.

I don't know how you can say that we won't have control or knowledge or expertise to run this. I believe that in fact the people who will be there are hired and have the training, expertise and equipment to give us expert opinion. But just to show you that we want to ensure that everything is up to snuff, we have an agreement whereby we will have auditing done by the federal government, so that we can ensure that our results are the same as theirs and theirs are the same as ours and that we are getting accurate results.

Getting away from the dioxin lab and the more general privatization position, regarding privatization of the lab, I should point out to the committee — because the member already knows this — that we will be retaining six employees to form a data standards group within the ministry to monitor all the evidence that we are getting. As well as having an audit function performed by B.C. Research to have elements and whatever we want to test tested and audited appropriately, we will have our own interface group to ensure that all processes are in place.

We do suspect that the private sector — as nasty as they may appear to some people in the province — can accurately carry out the job they are being paid to do. I am quite convinced that we can satisfy the concerns of the public, and in terms of our being able to have the policy to react quickly, we have done it in the past. We will do it in the future, and I am quite proud of the policy and strategies we have in place for reacting to any environmental concern.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I was just asking my colleague here whether "silly" is unparliamentary. I won't bother to ask the Chairman that, because quite frankly, the comments belittling the concern around dioxin testing don't do it justice.

The point I have been making all along is that the government and the ministry have a responsibility to public policy, to fulfilling the mandate of the ministry, which is to protect the air, water and environmental quality of this province. To do that, Mr. Minister, you need information; you need certain resources. You are cutting your ability to make good policy decisions quickly.

The minister makes comments about the private sector. Quite frankly, I think that his comments belittle the concern. People in the government's opposition have confidence in the private sector, in business people doing a good job. But that doesn't in any way address the responsibility of this ministry, and that's what we've been talking about.

Let me tell you a little bit about the toxicity of the chemicals we're talking about here. To kill a 154-pound person, it would take 120 drops of PCBs, 20 drops of DDT, one-fifth of a cup of PCPs, two drops of cyanide or a two-hundredth of a drop of dioxin. So when we're talking about dioxin contamination in this province, we fully realize the significance of that contamination and the concern.

The minister forgets that it was the opposition that called on the ministry in the first place to do a dioxin-testing program in this province. We compliment you, and we are pleased that you are doing it, but there are concerns that need to be dealt with. The minister suggesting that he has confidence in the private sector does nothing to acknowledge or address the concerns we have stated.

Since the minister has indicated that he sees no problem, even with the concerns identified, as I have done, around the need for expertise on staff.... We've heard in the privatization debates that have gone on before in the House the concern about the public service, about the real brain drain going on through this government's initiatives to encourage people to take early retirement; to privatize; to put at risk the very confidence that people have, or need, to be able to plan for the future.

I think I will allow one of our other members to ask the minister some questions before we wrap up.

MR. R. FRASER: It's a pleasure for me to take my place in the debate and to put on record some of the great things this government has done with respect to the environment, and some of the things we can probably anticipate as a result of this thoughtful minister's efforts — supported, naturally, by his cabinet colleagues and the Premier.

I would like to hear a little bit of good news, just to remind the opposition that everything isn't gloomy, as they always say it is. I must say it's the one consistent thing that socialists have in common. They're so depressing and so depressed, so completely negative about everything. You know those beautiful words: "Mr. Minister, I'm afraid"; or, "Mr. Minister, I am concerned." Did you ever hear of a group that was afraid of tomorrow like the socialists over there? I don't know how they live, waking up and looking at the sun and saying: "It's probably going to rain."

But what did this government do? How about Moresby? Hundreds of thousands of acres of land into a park. Not bad for a little government that does great things for the community and this province. Oh no, we were not concerned about putting hundreds of thousands of acres into parkland; not a bit. Naturally those things take time. But it got done, didn't it? Not bad for that minister, who came in fresh like that. But do we ever hear anything like that from the opposition? The answer is never. Now that they've got the park, they never think of saying to the government: "What a good idea that you got it done, and got it done right."

What are we going to do now? Now we've got to worry about the lab. We're going to talk about the privatization of a lab. Oh, and the crime of that! All of a sudden the people who were government employees who will now be working in the lab in the private sector will change from being honourable members of the BCGEU and will become dishonourable, I suppose, from their point of view. They will change; their integrity level will change. Well, I say to you, Mr. Chairman, that if you have a good level of integrity working for the government, you'll have the same level working in the private sector. You'll do a good job. You have to do it right. I've been in that kind of business, and I've had to disappoint a few clients. But you do it because of what you are.

I want to hear a little more good stuff from that member over there who constantly downs this good minister — now

[ Page 4609 ]

that he's looking better from all the great support he should be getting from you, on the great parks system.

[4:30]

MR. LOVICK: It's always such fun to follow the learned first member for Vancouver South, who always reminds me of my mortality, in that we are all, after all, only human, as the saying goes.

I wanted to deal just briefly with a couple of the assertions made by the minister in defence, dare I say, of the privatization of the Environmental Laboratory, and I want to give him an opportunity to answer a couple of questions. The argument, as nearly as I can understand it from listening to the minister's comments both today and previously, was that this really was all about saving taxpayers' dollars. That's the essential argument: that we can perform the service as effectively and efficiently at less cost. I am wondering if the minister would be kind enough to outline for me precisely where the savings are going to come from in terms of this particular initiative. I haven't heard those yet, and I would like to.

Do you want me to give you a couple of questions?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Yes, if you wouldn't mind.

MR. LOVICK: Let me just, if I can, explain why I asked that question by posing another question. The latest glossy pamphlet extolling the virtues of privatization landed on my desk today. I delight to receive these. It's rather like getting the Sunday funnies; they brighten up one's life and so forth. This one talks about the new look to privatization of the Environmental Laboratory. What strikes one instantly is: well, wait a minute, this is a newly announced program. How, then, is it that already we have a new look? What the document points out to us is that there are apparently a couple of changes — and I can quote — that amount to "a restructuring of the Environmental Laboratory privatization." That's the kind of thing the minister has been talking about.

If we are going to break the job that was hitherto done by the Environmental Lab into those two other functions — one to be done by the research council, the other to be done by a six-person data group staying within the ministry — the obvious question then is: what are the costs going to be for each of those initiatives? That is just, as I say, a kind of subset question to my first question about total costs and savings.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I mentioned this earlier to the member for Surrey-Guildford-Whalley (Ms. Smallwood). We are anticipating that the permit-holders will pay about $250,000 to $350,000 for their share of the program.

You had another question. I'm sorry; I got looking at this and forgot the other part of your question.

MR. LOVICK: Let me rewind the tape just a little bit, Mr. Minister, and I will come at the first question again.

As I said, the basic argument we have had from the beginning about privatization is that we are providing comparable services at less cost. Explain to me, please, if you will, where the specific costs are to be achieved in the privatization of the environmental testing laboratory. That's the first question.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: If the bids come in appropriately, there will of course be a revenue to the Crown. We haven't seen that yet, so it is hypothetical at this point, and I will admit that to you. Secondly, we are convinced that the private sector will be able to perform that testing appropriately, and because they will be doing it they will be paid only by the permit-holders and there will be less of a cost to the taxpayers. That's where the saving comes in. I would suggest that efficiency would be a factor to consider as well as the revenue from the bidder.

MR. LOVICK: The answers to those questions, with all due deference, are vague rather than specific. In other words, we aren't talking about specific cost projections and so forth. I guess the obvious follow-up question is: are there no specific cost projections? Are we simply rather given, dare I say, an ideological response to the question?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I wouldn't call it ideological, but I would call it a bit premature, because we are looking at a date in June before we open the envelopes. If we look at how the bidding has come in other privatization initiatives, it comes in a variety of forms. The bidder may extract a contract from the government for so many years, saying that they have to get all of this, that or the other thing, or there may be other features. All of those features to the bid, whatever the bid might be, have to be analyzed.

I wish I could be more specific, but I can't. We're dealing in a mystery land. But you know full well that our government record to date is that if the bid is not acceptable and we can't show a saving to the taxpayer — liquor stores are a good example — and if we can't show a better operation, we're not going to consider it; we will stop at that point. I know you are concerned, and I'm concerned too. But I think the government's record to date on privatization initiatives has been that clearly we have to have a better deal to provide to the taxpayer. Otherwise the deal's off. That's really all I can say, Mr. Member.

MR. LOVICK: The temptation to speechify strikes me. The liquor stores.... We're confusing different things. It's very clear that the reasons for not going through with any liquor store privatization had nothing to do with finances. We weren't talking about getting a better deal or not getting a good enough deal. That wasn't the issue, and I'm sure the minister will agree with me.

Again, with proper deference afforded and accorded, I think that the arguments are indeed ideological. When we hear statements such as "increased efficiency," one of the arguments enunciated by the minister suggesting why we are going to do this, without proof.... If we don't have any evidence, if we can't demonstrate any efficiency automatically accruing to the privatized operation, then it seems clear to me that we are making an ideological argument. Indeed, I would suggest to the minister that most of the literature on the subject comes up with precisely the conclusion that unless and until one can come up with specific, tested-out arguments demonstrating cost savings, the only thing one does at that point is make some kind of ideological claim. Perhaps that's a debate for another time; I won't belabour the point here.

I do want to touch on a question. The minister makes the point that one of the savings to the taxpayers — we are led to believe — is from the revenue from the sale itself. In other words, we suddenly have in our hands a certain amount of cash because we sold the particular asset. Surely the point is

[ Page 4610 ]

that by any honest accounting procedure, all we've done is change from one kind of asset to another. All we've done is effectively taken a tangible or concrete asset and rendered that into cash. That doesn't mean we've suddenly become wealthy; rather it means only that we now have more liquidity. We've got the money in our hands rather than the assets. Surely you will agree with me, Mr. Minister, that the simple transfer of the asset is not where the cost saving is to be achieved. Would you not?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Not necessarily. I follow your drift; I'm not going to try and duck it and say that I don't know what you're getting at. But until we open the envelope — which will be public — I really can't say much more. Don't forget that there are two concerns when we open the envelope. How much are we going to get? What are the future works going to be? What sort of contract do they want to extract, and what will they pay for that? It's our anticipation that there will be a saving. Again, it's hard to say until we see what the bids say.

Maybe the liquor store example wasn't all that good, but the one that comes to mind.... This, of course, is not as sophisticated as environmental testing, but we found generally in the parks branch that we were saving about 15 percent on the contracted services as opposed to the services done by government employees. We thought it far better to have our parks people doing the supervision and management and a contractor cutting the firewood and taking the garbage out than to have those employees doing that type of thing. That general rule-of-thumb saving has been about 15 percent, achieving the same service.

MR. LOVICK: I'm pleased to hear that, and I would like to ask the minister if he would be good enough to table the study that demonstrates that 15 percent cost difference, because I recall from the auditor-general's report — I believe it was 1986 — that when they examined campground privatization and so forth, they weren't able to determine whether there were any savings accruing to the taxpayer. So if you have that data, Mr. Minister, I for one would be very grateful to receive it. I would love to see that, believe me.

I want to pose another question. I'm glad the minister does agree with the validity of the case I argued about liquor stores. The minister essentially presents three arguments in terms of where this saving to the taxpayer will occur. One, you said, is efficiency. That remains to be seen; we haven't yet determined that. Second is the sale of the assets themselves, and third is what the minister tells us is the fact that the private sector will now have to pay for this testing. Is it the case, then, that privatization is effectively shuffling off services hitherto performed by government and giving them to the private sector? In other words, those companies are now assuming costs they did not have before. Is that the case?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I guess you could say that. I guess one of the examples — as a matter of fact your leader brought this up in question period one day — is water-testing. Currently the public is charged about $25 for each water analysis. That's a real subsidy, a remarkable subsidy. We recommended that the cost is about $125. So if you look at invoicing and that sort of stuff, the real cost to the fellow who wants his water analyzed should maybe be $150 nowadays. You see, you and I are subsidizing that, if we are on city water or whatever, because it is not that many people. It's our position that in fact the taxpayer shouldn't carry on that subsidy to the fellow drilling the well or the public sector.

We were subsidizing government too. For example, we had an account with the Ministry of Finance at the private lab, and I questioned this. The only testing we could do for the Ministry of Finance was to find out if they have ice water in their veins and, of course, if they do, then they can stay employed. If they don't, then they are fired from the Ministry of Finance, because that's the way those guys are. Actually, it turned out to be testing for coloured gas — that type of thing.

We were doing lots of testing free for other departments and branches, and you and I — the taxpayer — were paying for it. Maybe the money would be better off going to health or social services — whatever. We've taken the position that we are going to privatize; we are going to anticipate and look into privatization for efficiency in ensuring that the user pay. We feel that in many cases we will be right.

MR. LOVICK: Would the minister inform me, then, what steps are going to be taken to ensure that people do indeed carry out the kind of testing that they now have to pay for? Surely there may be a disincentive to have those tests undertaken if one has to pay. Are we talking about setting up some kind of elaborate monitoring supervisory function?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Currently for a public water sample, it's municipal law that will do it. Quite often it's the mortgage people who will insist that if you are drilling.... If you have a well on your property and they are lending you the money, they want to know that the well you have drilled and the product you are getting from that well is satisfactory to them. My father, as a matter of fact, had a VLA lot, and VLA insisted that the water — because he had a well — be tested; it was part of the condition of borrowing. That lender now will have to pay more money for his tests. Maybe that's right and maybe that's wrong, but why should you and I subsidize it if we are not having the test done?

[4:45]

MR. LOVICK: What about the commercial sector then? Take, for example, a couple of industrial operations in my constituency, both of which you are familiar with, Harmac and Hooker Chemical, and both of which, of course, have properties directly adjacent to seashore and both of which, however careful they may be, are always at risk of having spillage into that. Will there be or are there currently in place restrictions that say there must be water testing undertaken on some kind of regular schedule? Is that the case?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: In the case of those two operations, under permit they had to do their own testing. They always have done their own testing, and that will continue to happen. We will now, though, have B.C. Research audit their testing to ensure that their results are accurate and that they are to proper standards. The testing that we used to do, as the Ministry of Environment — because occasionally we would come into those operations and do some testing ourselves — will now be done by the private sector. Occasionally we will have our samples split and one sent to B.C. Research for audit, so that random audit will continue. That is the distinction.

In terms of the permit that they have and testing for what it is that they are doing under that permit, nothing changes for them. It's all still tested.

[ Page 4611 ]

MR. LOVICK: I thank the minister for that answer. It clarifies.... Just if I might — and I'm sorry that I was a little obtuse perhaps in the earlier reference to the private landholders — what about ongoing testing? Obviously the water table and the conditions of a particular property can change rather significantly in a very short space of time by developments on property surrounding that given property and so forth. And the minister's answer thus far has been, in terms of a transfer or a purchase of property, that yes, as a condition of sale perhaps a lender or a mortgagor may indeed impose that. The question is: what about the ongoing operation of a given property, when something might happen to the quality of water, and so forth, which can in turn constitute some kind of public health hazard? Will there be an ongoing monitoring operation set up by the ministry under this new system?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: In terms of the example I gave of the private property — my father's — and the lending agency insisting that his water be tested, I don't know what will change there. That water will never be tested again, because the original mortgagor is satisfied that the water was fine at the time of the mortgage, which was the mid-60s and is soon to be paid out, I would think. So that water will never be tested, and it is my parents' own risk to ensure that whatever is coming up from the well is appropriate to drink.

In terms of groundwater generally, as the Ministry of Environment we do a number of tests throughout the province to look at the receiving environment and to ensure that there aren't buildups of toxic materials in the groundwater. That's carried out throughout the province; that will still go on. It's just that we won't do it; another lab will do it. But it will still go on. So there's a regular regime in that case.

MR. LOVICK: I'm pleased to hear that there is envisaged a regular regime — to use your words. The question is: under what authority? Is that by some kind of statutory requirement? How does it happen, if your ministry no longer has the responsibility for performing them, that those tests get done?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Simply, it's policy of the Ministry of Environment, Mr. Member, to monitor groundwater on a random basis throughout the province. I could dig out the policy manual for you. I presume we look at agricultural areas more, because there are more pesticides and that type of thing being put on there. I don't know why we would want to look at the groundwater 20 miles out of Prince George, because there are not too many people drinking it, and there's not too much pesticide or other injurious application. But random testing is done, and there is a policy in place.

MR. LOVICK: Then the testing will continue as currently; it's just that the analysis of the data will be done by some other body. Is that the case? All right; I detect the minister's nod as an affirmation. Fair enough.

Let me come at another very specific question. I'm intrigued by the six-person data standards group. I'm wondering if those people are currently within your ministry and separate and distinct from the environmental laboratory component.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: They were at the lab and employed by the Ministry of Environment. They are identified now as the interface group. We've identified the personnel. They've been told, as I understand it, that they're it. They have their duties, and they were picked because of the job they were doing with the lab.

MR. LOVICK: Those persons will now be working with the ministry and no longer with the Environmental Lab. Therefore in wearing a different hat from the Environmental Laboratory hat, they are a cost that is now going to be borne by the ministry. Right?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: They've always been with the ministry. They are ministry employees because it was a ministry lab. Right? Now there will be ministry employees with the interface group, probably doing the same procedures they were doing when they worked for the lab and ensuring appropriate liaison between industry testing and staff — jobs appropriate for them to do. Those six will be maintained; 42 of the 60 will be part of privatization, and six staff will be retained by the ministry. So they have not changed employers.

MR. LOVICK: Mr. Minister, I certainly don't want to sound terribly skeptical or anything like that. I just have this faint fear, because I have seen certain claims made — in this jurisdiction as well as in others — about the cost-savings of privatization. I'm hoping that when some kind of reckoning, financial accounting or statement comes from the ministry explaining to us what the cost-savings are, we will indeed acknowledge that yes, the laboratory may cost us less money, partly because six of the employees who used to work there now work somewhere else in the ministry, and we are also paying for those people. So all I'm asking the minister is: will he give us the assurance that we will have an open, full and complete accounting so we know precisely what those actual costs are?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I guess when and if this all comes.... I share your concern. As a matter of fact, you wouldn't be doing your job if you didn't raise that issue with me in this House and with the public. That's what your role is all about. We share those concerns too, because we want to....

Interjection.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: A good word, too.

Seriously, I'll have to face re-election some time, as we all will, and I will want to be able to say on the next campaign that I privatized the lab, and here's what I did, and why I did it, and how successful it is. Let's not lose sight of the fact that this is a serious political move by a government on all facets of privatization. We are going to make it work, and we know we have to demonstrate to the public that we have in fact achieved savings and efficiencies. I'm sure that in all cases we will. If we can't do that, then there's not much sense in doing it. That really has been our record to date. We have said, upon opening the envelopes: "No, this bid, this deal, is not acceptable. We can't live with that, so we're going to turn it down." Others we have entered into. That will be the case in this privatization as well.

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

MR. LOVICK: I am delighted to hear the minister acknowledge that he has an eye on the next election, as does

[ Page 4612 ]

his colleague the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Veitch). So do I and I was thinking of taking a chunk of Hansard, quoting the minister telling me about how effectively I am doing my job, and using that in the next mail-out or some such thing.

I have one other question and, again, one generated from that delightful glossy pamphlet, Info Line, May 20, issue number 18. We're getting up there. We're on the way to the 39 steps, but it's coming along nicely. The heading for this particular section of Info Line is "Confusion Clarified. " It's fascinating, given that the confusion was created by the government. Nevertheless the government is being kind enough to clarify, so we appreciate that.

I just want to read the minister a very short statement and then ask a one-syllable question of him, and I hope he will respond. I'm quoting: "Control and analysis of environmental data standards will not be given to B.C. Research. This has been and will remain a ministry responsibility." Here's the operative part: "In fact, this function will be strengthened after privatization, with more staff and more funds." The question is: how?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The answer is: I didn't write that. Seriously, I can't absorb four or five thoughts all at once. I would appreciate your sending that over to me so I can review the whole paragraph, if you don't mind, because it rambles a tad. I will have a look at it. You're right; it sounds a bit curious at this time.

MR. LOVICK: I shall indeed provide the minister with a copy of the statement. Here we are talking about downsizing and reducing the size of government, and yet we're saying we're going to retain this one function of government and, by gar, to make sure it's done right we're going to increase the size and the staff and the funding. If that ain't a contradiction, I don't know what is, Mr. Minister. I just wonder if that kind of contradictory signal is perhaps what is most deeply embedded in this particular privatization initiative. I have fears that it may be the case; thus my questions today.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I'm a visceral person. I'll have to read it, and then I will be able to comment.

[5:00]

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'd like to ask the minister a couple of questions. One, about the water testing. Jeez, you know, I....

MR. R. FRASER: I beg your pardon?

MS. SMALLWOOD: I said jeez, as in golly gee. I have to admit that having the first member for Vancouver South (Mr. R. Fraser) in the House...

MR. R. FRASER: Brightens the place up, doesn't it?

MS. SMALLWOOD: ...brightens the place up. That's the word I was looking for. I always thought — and maybe this has to do with my mom and dad's upbringing and all that kind of stuff — that the reason we were here was to do the people's business, to fight for those who aren't being heard; that that was a really positive thing to do. Giving those people a voice — whether it's the minister's own father, who hasn't had his water tested for 20 years — is a really worthwhile venture. It's not just a matter of performing or lightening the mood, but doing the real business of the province. That's what I will continue to do.

The minister has admitted to, or agreed with, the interoffice memo — and I brought it to his attention a week or so ago during question period — from waste management. It said:

"As a result of this action" — they're talking about restructuring and privatization — "the capability of the Environmental Lab to perform analytical services is expected to be reduced to approximately 50 percent to 70 percent of current capacity. All ministry staff are thus being requested to reduce monitoring activities requiring analytical services to only essential requirements until approximately October 1.... "

The minister didn't have an opportunity to elaborate on that, and I'd like him to do so now.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: First of all, to get to the general issue of water quality monitoring, which I believe the member led off with, we have a program that began in 1987, and there's a levy on waste management permits to allocate funds to ambient water quality monitoring programs. We set water quality objectives, and we test about 20 different basins, and we establish data. We have a total budget for the program in '88-89 of $700,000.

With respect to the letter written by Mr. Ferguson and ministry testing, I think that was answered — at least I hope it was — in a subsequent question period. I said that there would be a slowdown in testing procedures; however, we would still do all emergency testing that we had to. The private sector would do them as they have in times past when we have a lot of testing to be done. Although there would be a slowdown, as indicated in the memo, between the time that the lab is sold, if it's sold, until October, all tests would be done sooner or later. The emergent ones would be done first. In dire straits or heavy pressure, we would go to the private sector, which was always done in the past anyway. That answers that question to the best of my ability.

You do anticipate in your question that the lab is going to be sold. You do anticipate that there's going to be a dire need to do an awful lot more testing. If those events do happen, then we will address the situation as best we can. That's all I can say at this point.

MS. SMALLWOOD: The minister indicates that there will be emergency testing only, if I understood him. The minister said that they will continue to do emergency testing. Perhaps I can be more specific. I could ask the minister about some of the work that the lab does, and the minister could indicate whether or not the lab will be continuing to do that. I'd like to start with Atlin. At present the Environmental Lab performs an analysis of air samples for asbestos as a quality assurance check and routine analysis carried out by the mine for the Smithers office of the waste management branch. The lab experts have also helped to review the types of monitoring programs which should be carried out at Cassiar and have participated in testing dryer-vent discharges at the mine. Will the lab continue to do that?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Yes.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'm not going to read all of the tests; I'm just going to highlight them. Smithers, Houston,

[ Page 4613 ]

Hazelton, Telkwa. Recently the lab experts were called to help measure the potential formaldehyde contamination of the air in the vicinity of the Northwest Panelboard plant in Smithers. Will the lab continue to do work such as that?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The answer to all of the questions I think the member is going to pose will definitely be yes. That type of testing must be done. It will be done as quickly as possible. The memo from Ferguson, I think, may have anticipated an inordinate number of employees leaving and alerted some of the regional managers to problems they could anticipate. I think that's just good management on Ferguson's part to get his staff in place to consider those things.

I do not, though, think that we have to make some very negative or disastrous connection between Ferguson's memo and what is going to happen or how the people or the environment of British Columbia are going to be treated. I can't make that connection, and I don't think it would serve our interests, Madam Member, for any of us to make that connection. All I read out of Ferguson's memo is a good manager alerting his men in the field to certain conditions that may come about so they can be best prepared to handle them.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Waste management inspectors are currently trained in sampling techniques through regular courses offered by the lab. Joint government committees have helped resolve difficult technical problems in Prince George monitoring. This is an ongoing responsibility of the lab. The lab doesn't just test; it is actually involved in providing training courses and technical support. Will the lab continue to do that?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I'm quite aware of the Prince George situation which has been going on for some three or four years now — maybe even longer. It hasn't been just lab people; it's been other officials with industry and a lot of people with the Ministry of Environment who aren't lab people. But to answer your basic question, that is one of the functions that the data services group — the six employees who will stay in place — will perform.

MS. SMALLWOOD: In Williams Lake this summer a new program was started to carry out state-of-the-art testing for toxic PAH compounds in the air, as well as to measure amounts and size range of smoke particles. This new program very much depends on the expertise of the sampling experts and chemists at the Environmental Lab. Will that program go ahead?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: That's Dr. Rick Wilson's program. He's doing very well with his staff, his expertise. I'm convinced that no matter what he wants to do or where he wants to test the elements that he's having tested, he'll get first-class results. I can't see, nor can I anticipate any problem there. I really think you're fishing on that one.

MS. SMALLWOOD: With answers like that, I think I need a translator. Are you saying that that test, that program, will not go ahead in the lab; that the gentleman you referred to will seek expertise elsewhere?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: What I'm saying is that Dr. Wilson is a superb investigator. He will maintain his air-quality program to his standards, which are very high, and he will use private testing to ensure that the job he is doing is continued in a first-class fashion.

MS. SMALLWOOD: In the southern interior, water and effluent samples taken in lakes and rivers in the area by agencies such as Fish and Wildlife, waste management, pesticide control branches, are all tested in the Environmental Lab. Will those tests go ahead?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Sure. I told you earlier that the statutes say all of the things we have to do, and we have policy of testing that we have to do. We have a very big ministry regulating environmental activities and environmental events throughout the province, and tests will continue.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I thank the minister for his patience, but we're trying to get to the bottom of what this reduction in services is really going to mean. So I will continue until I can figure it out, because the minister hasn't been forthcoming with that information.

In Kamloops, pulp mill gases, acid rain sampler and a sampler for smoke and fly ash levels are all tests conducted and analyzed by the lab. Will that also continue?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Yes.

MS. SMALLWOOD: And in Vernon, Summerland, Lumby, Peachland, Kelowna and Penticton. Specialized continuous samplers are operated in Kelowna and Penticton to measure ozone layers — we talked a little bit about the concern around the ozone depletion — with some of the data going to the national air pollution surveillance committee. Is that a frill or is the lab going to continue to do that work?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: You didn't tell me if the lab is doing it now.

Interjection.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: It's doing it now. The lab will continue to do it then.

MS. SMALLWOOD: This goes on to deal with the lower mainland. Even though the GVRD has responsibility, the lab is involved with it. In Sechelt, Gibsons, Powell River, the Environmental Lab water analysis service is being increasingly used, because of the fisheries section of the Ministry of Environment, to check the fish farm industry rapidly expanding on the coast. Will the lab continue to be involved in that work?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Yes.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Mr. Minister, the memo you have agreed to has gone out to all ministries, and it tells the ministries that the ability for the lab to respond will be significantly reduced over the next few months, and asks the ministries to cut back on their requests for analytical information. It asks the ministries to forward only essential tests. Can the minister tell us what work the lab is doing or has done in the past that is inessential?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: That's a very good question. I guess all the work done is considered essential to some

[ Page 4614 ]

degree, but I guess like everything else there's a degree of essentiality to it, dealing with immediate hazards to human or animal health. Emergent problems would be considered to be more essential than, say, the situation testing of a watercourse or tests that might not be trying to find something injurious to animal or human health. I guess it's on that basis that we would separate them out. I'm sure regional managers and those people in the various agencies who want to have elements tested have a strategy or regime that they follow in terms of what they consider should be done immediately or what can wait — what is simply data-gathering and what is essential to ensuring good human or environmental health.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I would like to ask the minister some questions about the dioxin issue. The minister has expressed concern and has talked about the pulp mill bleaching process. I wonder what involvement the ministry has had with the industry to explore alternatives.

[5:15]

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The alternative, as the member knows, is to go from chlorine bleaching to some other form of bleaching, hydrogen peroxide being used now in the CTMP mills. The kraft pulp mills, many of which were built at the turn of the century, are very much a part of our British Columbia industry. In some cases they can convert part of their bleaching process and avoid using as much chlorine as in times past. I think that's the case at Port Mellon, in the new building program there. We are encouraging everyone.

Of course, the industry themselves are not very happy about the threat of being shut down if they are producing dioxins. They know they are going to be at some risk if they're using the chlorine bleaching process, so they're trying to avoid at all costs any problem with creating dioxins.

This comes from another angle, but the anti-sapstain material that so many of the sawmills use can cause dioxin problems, and industry themselves have been told by their customers that they're going to have to find another anti-sapstain material or their product won't be allowed to be imported into other countries. We've told them they have to clean up as well, both the federal and the provincial Ministries of Environment. We're working pretty closely with these people.

It's difficult, though. I think we all expect when we set a standard that we're going to see immediate compliance. It would be nice if the world were that way, but when we're dealing with a major mill that may have been built in 1910 or even in the mid-sixties — the Prince George mills, which were state-of-the-art of the day — and we find out through testing, research and work done throughout the world that we've got a dangerous process that we didn't know about in the 1960s when the Prince George pulp mills were built, and certainly had no idea of in 1910 when some of the old coast mills were built.... We know that we have to do something. We tell these people that they're going to have to start cleaning up this area and that process or whatever. We all know what they are; they are many and varied. They identify their problems and they work at it, but nothing is achieved overnight, and no one is perfect.

It's our job to maintain high standards and to keep inching everybody up higher and higher. I think we do a pretty good job at it. Occasionally we get pretty upset with the people and we close them down. They know that they're at risk of being shut down if they don't go along with our conditions. To tell an industry that because we've discovered some new toxic element, which we want to do and which society is intent on doing, they have to close down tomorrow because they have that toxic element being produced is a pretty drastic step to take.

We work with them as closely as we can. We work with the testing, as we discussed earlier, to a great degree. We are dedicating our resources and our mass spec to dioxin testing so that we can better serve the people of B.C. and industry, in terms of having them clean up their act. I think we're doing an admirable job, but these things don't happen overnight. When you are dealing with new elements that have just come on and are found to be dangerous, you just can't expect a multimillion-dollar pulp mill or any industrial operation to turn around on the next shift. It just doesn't happen that way.

Just as a point of information, I met with one of the Prince George people a couple of years ago — I think it was Northwood — who told me that they have spent as much money redoing their pulp mill to comply with current standards as they did building it in the mid-sixties. Inflation skews that comparison, but that's really what they have gone through. What they spent to build the mill, they have re-spent again in coming up to new compliance standards. So industry is trying. They know there is a price to pay to do business in British Columbia. We think their heart is in the right place, and so is their pocketbook.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I hope the minister would elaborate a little bit on how he is working with industry, because I would tend to agree that while there is a very serious problem, the reaction or action that government takes has to be a supportive, compassionate one for everyone involved. I would like to explore with the minister a little further what involvement the government has had in encouraging alternatives, because while the minister talks about his dioxin-testing program, just finding out how badly the environment is being poisoned isn't going to solve the problem. We certainly need that information, but in all special waste or hazardous waste situations, it is far wiser to try to encourage alternatives than to try to deal with the poison after the fact.

There are a couple of different processes that the minister has identified. One is the pulp mill chlorine process, and there have been alternatives identified — the oxidizing process — and I think that we now have a couple of mills in the province that are using this process. There's one, at any rate, that I am aware of. In what way is the government encouraging mills that are doing renovations or upgrading their mills to bring in the oxidizing alternative? I am aware of a couple of mills that have spent large sums of money and have not changed that system.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: First of all, I think we have to get something on the record here in terms of beating our own chest a bit, and that is that the committee has to recognize — and the member is aware of this — that last September the hon. Tom McMillan and myself, along with other provincial ministers, told the industry that they had to change the sapstain recipe. We were quite insistent upon that, and they had a year to do it. They have now come a long way and are, as I see it, mostly in compliance.

What have we done in terms of other testing? In Prince George this year we went to one of Northwood's recovery boilers and burned off some PCB-treated mill ends at 1200 C. for two seconds — that's the burn we wanted to put to them —

[ Page 4615 ]

and we are sampling those results now to see if we have eliminated the dioxins with that type of testing. So industry and the government are working closely at all times to ensure that we are doing our best to eliminate dioxins.

In terms of how we tell the industry to put in a better process, the economics does that for us. The Port Mellon operation plant is going to be far less reliant on chlorine for the bleaching process, and they are going to be into the peroxides for a greater part of the process. They are doing this for a couple of reasons: (1) it won't smell as bad, because there is no smell to the H₂0₂ process; and (2) they just know it's going to save them an awful lot of money in terms of permits, compliance and anticipated problems down the road. So it's in their best interests to go to oxygen bleaching. I know it has become very popular in the Scandinavian countries now, and I think the economy and the market is going to dictate that it become the technology of the 1980s and 1990s as well. I'm convinced we do a good job of telling industry that they have to improve their standards, but the economy itself and the realities of dealing with toxic substances as opposed to finding an alternative process really dictates a lot of it as well.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Is the minister saying that...? All you've told me is what the industry is doing. You said that economics are the deciding factor and that it is more economical for an industry to bring on this new process, rather than stay with the old. I know we've got good corporate citizens in this province. We are seeing — perhaps not as often as I would like — shining examples of corporations taking the lead, far out in front of the government and the government's initiatives.

What is the government doing to encourage, support and work with industries to find out what the industries need to help them change over to a process that is indeed more economical for them and that has less environmental impact? We talked about the Brundtland report and ministries accepting the responsibility for compromising the environment. I'm asking this minister what he's doing to work with the industries to encourage them along these ways. Have you explored options in the way of grants, loans or cost-sharing between the province and the federal government? Some of these industries need that kind of support.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: We're not in that heavy-duty grant business, nor heavy-duty R and D. I make no apologies for the work we've done. Again, the anti-sapstain initiative in terms of treating lumber was a government initiative. We told the industry they had to have this element out of the yard within a year; that was our initiative.

In terms of the Prince George experience, that was a ministry industry test. We worked very well and very closely with them, and I think our record is extremely good. We work with industry all the time; they're our stock and trade. That's what that branch of the Ministry of the Environment does. It works with anybody who has a waste permit, and we ensure that in fact they don't violate their waste permit. We help them out in any way that we can so they can get their standards up and their record of non-compliance down. They don't want to be bad citizens either, so we work together. If that's what you want me to say, that's what you're hearing. The feds do an awful lot of research and development, and we assist them when we can. We're a regulatory agency by and large; research and development is a small part of what we can do. The Prince George experiment is the one that I'm most familiar with because it's my riding. But we do that type of thing, and it's to the benefit of the environment. We're not going to do things that aren't to the benefit of the environment.

MS. SMALLWOOD: It's kind of difficult to do too much R and D when you don't have a lab to do it in.

On the issue of the alternatives to the wood stain, I think you're referring to — and correct me if I'm wrong — the use of the substitute TCMTB. My member from Nanaimo is not here to give you the full name, so....

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I know the full name.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Good. I'll look forward to that in your response, then.

Interjection.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Except that it got lost in a note. Okay.

I have some concerns about the intergovernmental committee that put in place this alternative. I understand, first of all, that it was a federal committee; it involved industry and government. I also understand that the initiative wasn't altogether brought about because of environmental concerns; that it had a great deal to do with requirements of European countries, in that they were no longer going to allow this chemical in. Part of this is naming it for what it is.

[5:30]

Beyond the concern around the alternative, I'll talk about the wood preservatives first of all, and the dip-tanks that are used in the mills, and the kind of concern that people have around the contamination not only for the workers in the mill and the contamination entering the environment, but one of the things that I have here for the minister — and I would share it with him — is a picture of a dip-tank operating in a mill. It's a load of lumber being dropped into the dip-tank, and the chemicals sloshing out onto the pavement, and then presumably entering some kind of drain. There's a very serious concern. One of the things we saw in the federal studies around dioxins is the concern around the wood industry and what it was doing to the environment.

The use of the substitute TCMTB. I've spent a fair amount of time trying to track down information about this chemical, to learn exactly what it is and what we're getting ourselves into. Wood preservatives were in place prior to the use of TCMTB; I think it's fairly accurate to say that people weren't really aware of what they were dealing with for a long time. I'm hoping that we're not in the same sort of situation. But again, this is an example of the licensing process in Canada and B.C. We have — I don't have to remind the minister — asked you on several different occasions to take a look at the pesticide regulations in the province, pointing out that you do have the power to make stipulations or requirements on chemicals entering the province.

This TCMTB, there doesn't seem to be a great deal of information about it. The information, the tests, I gather, were provided to the licensing agency, but beyond that, no one really has too much information about what they are dealing with. Perhaps the minister could tell me if he has information about this chemical and exactly what its properties are.

[ Page 4616 ]

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I'd like to spend a bit of time on this, because it is something that I am quite familiar with, both as an MLA and as the minister who announced last September the initiative that we had to change the anti-sapstain chemicals.

The member is right in that there was consumer pressure to the importing countries, and I said that earlier. They just made noises. They hadn't totally stopped it, but I think it was Japan and West Germany who were the first. Of course, those are two major consumers. They said: "Listen, B.C. sawmills, we think we have a little problem here and we would just as soon you guys have a look at what you are doing and what you are sending over here, because we may have to stop receiving your goods and consider taking dimension lumber from other countries who don't use this chemical." So there was a bit of a scare there from the customer, and the results of a concern expressed by the provincial and federal governments.

To give you a bit of history, back in the early eighties, the unions and the sawmill people themselves set up a policy group to look at the anti-sapstain dip tanks process, but from a worker-health point of view, which is legitimate and admirable. I'm glad they did it. They didn't consider the environment though. What they did, in fact, was study the anti-sapstains and the process of handling dip tanks and ensure that the workers were protected: appropriate masks, gloves, aprons, rubber boots. Whatever they did in the mill, they ensured that the worker was protected, which, as I said, is an admirable thing.

Environment didn't really have too much to do with it, because we saw that the worker was being looked after. WCB and the unions were playing a good role, and we hadn't really acknowledged it. Then we started discovering, particularly in the lower Fraser Valley area, some buildups of the material in the sludges and waterways. The feds discovered that; that's why we had to take the action. It was a couple of things.

First of all, in a lot of the lower mainland they don't really dry their lumber the way they do in the interior. They don't wrap it to keep the moisture off, and of course in the Fraser Valley they have a lot of precipitation. So the rain's coming down, this unwrapped lumber is getting into the sawmill yard and flowing into the Fraser River, and therefore you have contamination of the environment. That's how we took our position. If I had my way as a central interior MLA, I would insist that everybody wrap their lumber. That's what we do in the Cariboo. First of all, all wood shipped out of the central interior is kiln-dried so that you don't have to apply as much anti-sapstain in the first place. Secondly, it's wrapped so that precipitation, either rain or snow, is not coming down on the lumber but on the wrap; therefore there's nothing leaching out into the ground. Thirdly, because they do a pretty good kiln-drying process, in many cases now they can avoid using anti-sapstain.

Anti-sapstain is put on lumber so that it won't stain as it goes through countries with high humidity, but if your lumber is kiln-dried to almost a bone-dry measure, then you won't have a problem. There won't be that humidity buildup to stain the lumber in the first place. They can test for that dryness just by running the boards out of the planer mill very quickly and testing for electrical conductivity. If they have high conductivity, then they know they've got an acceptable moisture content. The ones that are a little too wet and at risk of staining are simply rejected and dried again. Others are wrapped and sent. There are lots of ways you can avoid using any chemicals at all. But the lower mainland industry doesn't kiln-dry. They are in a higher precipitation area, and they just haven't gotten to that method of sophistication that we have in the central interior. I've noticed that in other areas of the lower mainland as well.

So there's the information on how we've arrived where we're at. The new chemical is one that was approved by the federal government — the one with the five initials, as opposed to four. It was approved because it's less toxic on fish.

Interjection.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Is it six? I can't say it unless I have it written out in front of me. Do you have it? Oh, my gosh.

Are you ready for this, Mr. Member? This is sophisticated stuff: 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole. It's probably got cyanide in it. That's probably what the "cya" means. Delightful stuff. In any event, it was tested by the federal government and allowed for use in Canada. The reason it was allowed for use in Canada is that it is not thought to be toxic to fish. Of course, fish were our main concern, because that was the receiving environment in the lower Fraser River.

I understand that it's caused some worker problems, but I also understand the WCB and the Ministry of Labour and other people are looking at that. The federal government tells us that this new sapstain material will be not as toxic on the fish or the rest of the receiving environment. That's all I can say about that.

MS. SMALLWOOD: On the issue of PCPs, the minister has indicated that they have undertaken a program to pull them out of the market and use alternatives. I wonder if the minister could indicate how successful that program has been to date and how many mills are now using an alternative process or chemical.

Some of the information that I have.... When the minister talks about the lower mainland, I was wishing that our member for Prince George North (Mrs. Boone) was here. She would have enjoyed the reverse discrimination. Your comments about the lower mainland and kiln-dried lumber.... It's hard to kiln-dry when you're under water more often than not.

The concern around the PCPs is really underscored by a spill that happened in 1984. At that time it killed the entire fish population of the Serpentine River — that's in my constituency — and was directly linked to the deaths of two grey whales. I would be very interested in the mills in the lower mainland in particular, I guess, because they do use the chemical more than, as you've indicated, drier climes. What number of mills is still using this chemical?

I would also ask the minister whether or not he would find it a little bit disconcerting, regardless of the information he has about its effects on fish, that if TCMTB is at present causing bleeding noses, sinus problems, sore throats, headaches and nausea among workers, would that not raise a concern about how it would affect other living things?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: First of all, my comment that we're more sophisticated in the central interior was not discrimination. It's simply a fact of life.

Interjection.

[ Page 4617 ]

HON. MR. STRACHAN: But I was being serious.

We think we're at about 50 percent compliance now, and the deadline, I think, is the middle of September. We brought out the dictate in September 1987, and by September 1988 there has to be 100 percent. We think we're at about 50 percent now.

In terms of this being safe and if it is safe why are people getting nosebleeds, I can't comment on that. We've been advised that the feds like it. They say it's less a problem to fish. Maybe it's water soluble and maybe it's inhalation in the air that causes the problem. Since fish don't inhale air, maybe once in the water or in the soil it's more soluble. I don't know; that's just a guess. It is regrettable that we have some health standards, and I am sure that, first of all, the mill using this material and, secondly, the chemical company producing it and, thirdly, the federal government and also the WCB and everybody else who has the job of ensuring worker safety are quite concerned about it. I know I'd be. What the results have been in the last couple of weeks since those problems were brought to our attention I don't know. As I said, that's another department. I don't want to duck it that way, but worker safety is not the concern of the Ministry of Environment.

MS. SMALLWOOD: The existing levels of discharge of TCMTB were set by the federal and provincial governments in September 1987. This would coincide, I would guess, with your study. The level is five parts per billion of TCMTB. There is a joint committee now functioning, and that committee is made up of industry and the provincial government. Is your ministry involved with that committee?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: We are involved from the receiving environment side of it — fish, water, air — but not worker safety.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I'm led to believe that the committee is considering suggesting that in September '88 the levels of the discharge would be increased to 300 parts per billion. I'd like the minister to make a comment on that and hopefully assure the House that it will not happen.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: I can't get that for you now, Madam Member, but my staff, as indicated earlier, is noting all this, and I'll have a more appropriate and fuller answer for you tomorrow. I give you the assurance that we'll be able to react to the numbers that you've told me about.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I look forward to that information, because I think that it's quite important that while the federal-provincial committee that worked on this alternative chemical.... I spoke to the regional health and safety officer for the IWA, who was directly involved with that committee, and she suggested that the good thing about this is that there was an acknowledgment that they didn't have all the information and that this committee, while working with this chemical and encouraging the use of an alternative, more or less committed itself to ongoing research and investigation to make certain that they didn't end up with a major problem down the road. I would imagine that that's one of the.... The minister has made reference to the WCB program underway now that is studying the effects of this chemical. It wasn't a matter of accepting it in total; it was a matter of saying: "Let's put a process in place so that we can make certain that if things aren't working out, we can change it."

I will look forward to the minister's comments about the committee he's participating in now, and hopefully some assurances that we are not looking at a reduction in standards rather than an increase in the concern.

[5:45]

One of the other issues that I wanted to bring forward relates to a comment that the minister made. This again has to do with PCPs and TCPs and contaminated wood chips. I brought this particular case to the minister's attention some time ago with an instance in Nanaimo, where organic gardeners found themselves in a situation where they had been using wood chips as a mulch in the garden, and found out that by using the chips they had effectively contaminated their farm. There were two sources for the wood chips, and the case was very well documented. It showed the chips being brought in for bedding for their farm from a mill and also from a dairy, mixed with a manure compound; both sources were contaminated. The concern is how widespread the contamination is, how significant that contamination may be, whether or not the minister has taken steps to locate the source — there was a suggestion of where that source may be — and what action has been taken.

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Madam Member, I recall seeing a briefing paper on that or having a briefing some time ago. Regrettably I don't have anything with me right now, but I know there is information available. Again, I will give you an undertaking that I will provide that information to you as quickly as possible in the estimates.

MS. SMALLWOOD: The minister has talked about — and all of the material that we have touched on deals with it — the issue of regulation and testing of dioxin. You talked about a dioxin program, and you now have in place a lab to do that testing. Can you give the House a little more information about the dioxin program and how extensive it will be?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: Well, I don't know how much more I can say. We have some information here that we've been discussing for the greater part of the day today: how the lab is going to be set up and what it will do. It does industrial level monitoring to parts per trillion. Here's a series of initiatives, not to do with the lab itself but to do with dioxins. We have brought into effect a prohibition of open-burning of railway ties; establishment of the research lab at B.C. Research; participation in a program to determine the conditions required to minimize dioxin emissions from a pulp mill power boiler burning chlorophenol-contaminated wood — that was the Prince George test; development of interim guidelines for dioxin emissions from spray booths using chlorophenols; announcement that we have stringent discharge levels for chlorophenols and storm-water runoff from wood treatment; storage areas — that's one I spoke of earlier; and participation in a national program to monitor and control dioxin discharges from pulp mills.

I might add that Earle Anthony, the Assistant Deputy Minister of Environment and Parks, was the leader of the official's committee of CCREM in preparing the dioxin report to CCREM last year, so we have within our staff in British Columbia probably one of the best dioxin managers in Canada to this point. Earle did lead that committee last year through the report, and they produced a very excellent brochure. I think you have the brochure on dioxin. It came out from the federal government last fall. Our ministry officials took a lead role in that work.

[ Page 4618 ]

We are maintaining up-to-date data on dioxin and environmental monitoring results obtained by the federal government, so we see it as a major concern. There's no sense in hiding it in a province like B.C., with the wood and the pulp and paper industry. We certainly have it as a concern to deal with. It's not going to go away. It's been around for a long time. It's a newly identified element. As you state, one element of the family of about 110 or so is extremely fatal. The rest aren't so dangerous. That doesn't mean that they are going to go away or anything, that we won't have to concern ourselves with them, but there are some elements of that chemical family that are extremely dangerous. As you say, one very small part is fatal. We are aware of that, and I think we are making great strides in terms of identifying what it is we want to do, what the problem is and what the remedies are.

MS. SMALLWOOD: Did I understand that the monitoring program only pertains to pulp mill emissions, the joint provincial-federal monitoring program that you talked about?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: The monitoring program is in place wherever it can be put in place and in any areas that we've been concerned about. It's mostly been led by the federal government; they have the best monitoring and research capability. They alerted us to the problems in the Fraser River.

The comment about the pulp mill was the one I mentioned earlier — the Prince George test burn, where they took contaminated mill ends, burned them at 1,200 degrees Celsius for two seconds and are now testing the results of those emissions to see if they have eliminated all the contaminants. By the way, that's taking some time because that material still has to be sent to Ottawa, and that's where the backlog is. If we had our own dioxin testing in place — which we will by September — we could have done that here. But we don't, and we didn't at that time, so it's in a lab in Ottawa, if I'm not mistaken.

MS. SMALLWOOD: I guess that's specifically the information that I'm looking for. If the ministry has invested money in setting up this lab in B.C., what sort of program does the ministry have in mind to use that lab? What kind of testing are you going to do? Will it only be sampling around pulp mills? Will it only be the existing sampling that is currently going back east? Or does the ministry anticipate a more extensive dioxin-testing program?

HON. MR. STRACHAN: That's a good question. I'll have to be advised as to what the capacity of the machine is, once we get it dedicated and into place. That will tell us to what depth we're going to test. If you look at what we've identified so far as being a problem, clearly the older pulp mills on the coast appear to be the biggest problem. I think logic will tell you that's where you're going to want to do your heaviest sampling — those dip tanks as well. I'm speaking of what may be in the crabs, oysters and shellfish in the sludges around those areas — and in the heron eggs. So I see that as priority number one, but I'm the layman. The experts in the ministry will make the decision as to where they want to go first. Those dip tanks that you pointed out, the dioxins that may be burned because of contaminated wood products, the burning railroad ties, any place where we identify that there could be a problem, will naturally be tested or at least will be on the agenda.

I'll get some information on what we see the strategy being in terms of identifying what we want to test and what our capacity is, and I'll tell you tomorrow.

In the meantime, Mr. Chairman, I'll move the committee rise, report remarkable progress and ask leave to sit again.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

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

Hon. Mr. Strachan moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved,

The House adjourned at 5:56 p.m.