1993 Legislative Session: 2nd Session, 35th Parliament HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only. The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 1993

Morning Sitting

Volume 11, Number 4

[ Page 7211 ]

The House met at 10:04 a.m.

Prayers.

Orders of the Day

Hon. M. Sihota: Hon. Speaker, I should advise members that Committee A is meeting this morning in the Douglas Fir Room to deal with the estimates of the Ministry of Transportation and Highways.

I would like to call committee stage on Bill 24.

AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD STATUTES AMENDMENT ACT, 1993

The House in committee on Bill 24; D. Streifel in the chair.

Sections 1 and 2 approved.

On section 3.

W. Hurd: Just a couple of questions under section 3 of the bill, particularly clauses (3)(b) and (c). The opposition was wondering whether the fees were refundable or non-refundable under item (b). Perhaps I'll just ask that question first, before my next question on item (c).

Hon. B. Barlee: This is a non-refundable fee. It is not the original concept.

W. Hurd: Can the minister advise us whether that is a change in the current legislation? Has that fee always been a non-refundable fee?

Hon. B. Barlee: Yes, that is a change. The fee will be somewhere between $100 and $150, maximum.

W. Hurd: Under item (c), can the minister advise the committee how the penalties are currently established and what range of penalties is anticipated? It says: "...a tariff of the costs that the Provincial board may direct a party to an appeal under section 11 to pay to another party to the appeal or to the Minister of Finance." Perhaps the minister could just explain that particular provision.

Hon. B. Barlee: The tariff will be developed in consultation with the industry.

W. Hurd: That's not a particularly helpful answer to the committee. Can the minister give us a time frame or advise us when this tariff will be arrived at? Obviously we're passing legislation today that establishes this tariff. Can the minister just outline what type of consultation he is anticipating with the affected parties?

Hon. B. Barlee: It will probably take the B.C. Marketing Board or the superboard about four or five months to arrive at a reasonable process. That's the usual.

Section 3 approved.

On section 4.

W. Hurd: Just a quick question under section 4, 11(1). I wonder if the minister could just explain to the committee this particular language: "A person aggrieved or dissatisfied by an order, decision or determination of a marketing board or commission may appeal it by serving the Provincial board with written notice of the appeal...." Can the minister advise us whether that represents a change from the previous act? Is it just merely clarifying the language as it pertains to an orderly appeal?

Hon. B. Barlee: Section 4, 11(1)(a) has not changed. Section 4, 11(1)(b) has changed: "...if the Provincial board considers special circumstances warrant it, a further period specified by the Provincial board on request of the person who brings the appeal." That will be allocated, and that's fair.

W. Hurd: Before moving on, perhaps the minister could offer the rationale for the change to this section dealing with special circumstances. What kinds of special circumstances is the ministry anticipating in connection with this appeal process?

Hon. B. Barlee: In some instances a letter may be sent to the wrong address. That would be extenuating circumstances, and that appeal would be granted. So it would essentially be technical circumstances.

H. De Jong: I have some concern with this section. From time to time rulings are made by various marketing boards regarding the pricing and pay-out to the producer. I suppose that 30 days may seem a long time, but quite often the rubber hits the road when the farmer receives his next cheque -- all of a sudden he finds that the pay-out for his product is static or has even gone down. While most marketing boards don't necessarily have a payment in line with the cost of production, the cost of production has really been the base of payment, particularly for dairy producers; they have used that system for many years. The cost of production includes a whole lot of things. It doesn't only include the fertilizer, feed and cost of labour; it also includes taxes and the cost of certain regulations that are imposed on the industry.

With taxes going as high as they are -- municipal taxes have risen dramatically these days -- about a month ago the Milk Board gave an order that there would be no review of the price paid to the producer. They didn't give a specific time limit for that; they simply said that the price was going to remain static. That news really didn't hit the farmer until they got their next milk cheque, even though they were notified by letter. Farmers are busy people; they don't always read that kind of stuff. But they will soon find out that for perhaps five, six or eight months the price for that 

[ Page 7212 ]

product is going to remain static, because there has been no time limitation expressed by the Milk Board.

In situations like that, in my opinion 30 days is not long enough for the agriculture community or the commodity group to respond to such an order. I realize that the Milk Board, like many boards, has a lot of power. While producers have always been paid on the basis of the cost of production, all of a sudden the Milk Board has changed the entire concept of payment to them. Farmers have not had an opportunity to respond to that within the given time limit. I have difficulty with this. If the minister hasn't got an answer to it today, would he at least look into whether this in fact is a fair practice by the Milk Board of British Columbia?

J. Beattie: Hon. Chair, I'd like to know if I could have the opportunity to introduce a group of students in the audience.

[10:15]

The Chair: Are you requesting leave, hon. member?

J. Beattie: I'm requesting leave.

Leave granted.

J. Beattie: I'd like to introduce to the chamber 26 grade 7 students from Enderby. They are from the Ashton Creek Elementary School and are accompanied by their teacher, Mr. Harrison, and a number of adults. The students will be interested to know that at this time the hon. Minister of Agriculture is defending his budget. You're looking down at the minister. Of course Enderby is a large agricultural area, and this type of discussion will be very interesting to these 26 inquisitive and alert grade 7 students. I'd ask the House to please make them welcome.

Hon. G. Clark: While we're on the subject, I'd ask leave to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

Hon. G. Clark: I am privileged today to introduce to the chamber 15 grade 7 students from St. Joseph's School, their teacher Ms. Perrault, and Miss Dekraker. St. Joseph's is in my constituency, and as a graduate of St. Jude's, which is just down the hill, I know that historically there has been -- at least when I was there -- a great rivalry between the schools. I would ask members of the House to welcome the St. Joseph's students, their teacher and the adults accompanying them.

Hon. B. Barlee: Essentially, 30 days is standard in the business, and I realize that. In some cases it may not be enough for the farmer, and if he can show due cause, that period can then be extended. There is provision to allow an individual farmer facing some difficult circumstances to show due cause to the board and have it extended.

H. De Jong: I suppose this goes back a little bit to the previous section. In making an appeal, would the commodity group be charged the appeal fee as a group, or would each individual farmer have to pay the appeal fee?

Hon. B. Barlee: It may be an individual or it may be a commodity association. Originally the period of appeal was seven days, and we have extended it to 30. Seven was simply too restrictive. So 4, 11(1) more or less explains your last question.

W. Hurd: Just a brief question on 4, 11(2)(b), which says: "...be accompanied by the prescribed fee for bringing the appeal." Can the minister confirm whether this fee is the same one that we're dealing with in section 3(3)(c)?

Hon. B. Barlee: Yes, it is exactly the same as under section 3.

W. Hurd: I am addressing this bill for the first time, but the opposition has some additional brief questions under the last part of section 5 -- item (9): "In making its order or referral under subsection (8), the Provincial board may, if it considers this appropriate in the circumstances, direct that a party to the...."

The opposition had some difficulty with this section, particularly the level of protection for individual farmers who may wish to appeal a proceeding. This section implies to the opposition that costs can be apportioned to individual farmers who may bring a referral to the provincial board. Can the minister offer the committee some comfort that the interests of individual farmers will be taken into consideration should they be interested in appealing to the provincial board?

Hon. B. Barlee: There are two ways. Firstly, all stakeholders are encouraged to use alternative dispute resolution systems, so they really do not have to come to that final analysis. Secondly, the board will consult with stakeholders prior to the regulation being established, so there is a provision for them to seek another compromise position before coming to the board. I think most of them will do this, so it isn't particularly onerous.

W. Hurd: Can the minister advise us further if the farmers will have an idea of how costs are going to be apportioned before bringing an appeal to the board, or are they more or less at the whim of the circumstances and how the provincial board apportions costs? I'm just a little bit vague here as to whether some individual farmers may be discouraged from participating in this process because of a concern about bearing the costs of an appeal.

Hon. B. Barlee: The consultation process with that farmer will indicate exactly what the parameters would be on costs, and they are generally quite reasonable.

[ Page 7213 ]

W. Hurd: When the minister talks about reasonable costs, is the amount based on the complexity of the application or is it a standard fee? When he talks about modest, is there a dollar figure we can attach to that, or is it strictly up to the determination of the provincial board?

Hon. B. Barlee: The individual concerned usually pays a fraction of the actual costs. The maximums have not been established. They are consistent with other regulations, so there is not much difference in this area.

W. Hurd: Is our reading of the section correct when we assume that the board has incentive to automatically apportion costs to the applicant? Are we always dealing with a situation where those costs may be apportioned on a partial-payment basis, or is there any possibility of the board determining that the complete costs of the process will be borne by the applicant?

Hon. B. Barlee: The BCMB, or the superboard, does have the power to apportion costs; that's correct. But they have a history of being very fair-minded and are seldom appealed.

Section 4 approved.

On section 5.

H. De Jong: Section 5 deals with fines for those who do not comply with board orders, as I understand it. The fines used to be from $100 to $500.... I am on the wrong section; sorry, Mr. Chairman.

Section 5 approved.

On section 6.

H. De Jong: Okay, I'm on the right section now. The fines used to be $100 to $500, and this substitutes a fine of not more than $20,000. Perhaps the minister, for the enlightenment of all of us here in the House, could explain the complexity of the issues and why a $20,000 fine could be considered meaningful.

Hon. B. Barlee: That's a fair question, but the rationale behind this is rather obvious: if the fine was from $100 to $500, which it originally was, an individual could in essence take a $30,000 or $40,000 net gain and quite gladly pay his $500 maximum fine. If he made $30,000 by not obeying the rules, that would leave him with a profit of $29,500. In this case, it makes an individual think twice. The $20,000 would be used only in those rare circumstances where an individual has made significant economic gains and is quite willing to pay the original fine of a maximum of $500, which is simply not adequate for any individual to carry through on this particular project.

H. De Jong: A further question: are the fines, as proposed, levied by the board or the superboard? Are we speaking of fines that could be levied after the process has gone through the courts?

Hon. B. Barlee: No, this would be a fine after the individual is prosecuted and found guilty under the act. It would be awarded by the court.

H. De Jong: The minister is talking about an operation that is non-conforming with the board's regulations. I suppose there have been some in the past, and we are all very much aware of that. However, when there is a law in place at the municipal level, a fine for an infraction or a contravention of that bylaw -- maybe a zoning bylaw -- can be levied on an everyday basis. Is it the intent for the $20,000 fine to be imposed as a onetime fine, or could it be considered the same as a bylaw infraction, where the person still carries on after he's gone through the courts and had the fine levied, and be a $20,000 maximum fine per day?

Hon. B. Barlee: This is not a continuous fine, as it would be in other provinces in some instances. This is a maximum fine. We are really replying to requests from industry on this. Industry at large felt that the maximum of $500 was not adequate to dissuade individuals who are taking advantage of non-conforming farming methods.

[E. Barnes in the chair.]

J. Dalton: I request leave for an introduction, hon. Chair.

Leave granted.

J. Dalton: On behalf of the member for Richmond East, I would like to welcome 22 grade 10 students from the Richmond district incentive school to the precinct today. I would ask all hon. members to make them feel welcome.

Sections 6 and 7 approved.

Title approved.

Hon. B. Barlee: I move that the committee rise and report the bill complete without amendment.

[10:30]

Motion approved.

The House resumed; the Speaker in the chair.

Bill 24, Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Statutes Amendment Act, 1993, reported complete without amendment, read a third time and passed.

Hon. D. Miller: I call second reading of Bill 34.

[E. Barnes in the chair.]

FORESTERS AMENDMENT ACT, 1993

Hon. D. Miller: It's with a great deal of pleasure that I participate in second reading of Bill 34, amendments to the Foresters Act. I should say at the outset that this is the first major revision of the Foresters Act since 1970, some 23 years ago. This bill is another in a series of measures introduced by this 

[ Page 7214 ]

government to ensure the sound stewardship of our forest land.

Bill 34 amends the Foresters Act in several ways to increase professional accountability for forest management decisions. Firstly, Bill 34 broadens the practice of professional forestry to cover all activities foresters routinely perform in the forest. This includes areas such as assessing the impact of planned forest management activities and forest management audits.

Some members will be aware that last year the government discovered, through an audit performed on a random sample of cutblocks on Vancouver Island, that the fish-forestry guidelines, which have been jointly developed in this province to guide harvesting activities where they interact with streams and fish-bearing streams, had not been followed in many cases. Despite the fact that we had a set of guidelines -- and the audit revealed that when applied, they in fact worked extremely well and did what they were intended to do -- we discovered that in some instances in the field they were not being followed.

When I discovered that, I immediately assembled the major forest companies in Vancouver and issued several directives. Primary among them was that each of those companies had to go back to those cutblocks, assess the damage and submit a report to my ministry, signed off by a registered professional forester, on how they intended to remedy the damage that had been done. Subsequent to that, we required them to actually carry out the work and again report back to the government, to my ministry, with a report signed off by a professional forester certifying that the work had been carried out.

I suspect that many in this province have always thought that professional foresters had the specific responsibility for activities that take place on the land base -- whether that be harvesting activities, monitoring the post-harvest auditing or the construction of roads on the forest land base -- and that there had always been a specific responsibility assigned to professional foresters. In fact, they do not have that specific responsibility, and that never has been the case. This bill changes that. It makes foresters responsible for those kinds of activities. I think that is a significant change and one that is long overdue in this province.

When I refer to planned forest management activities, obviously other activities are involved as well. The intent of the amendments is to improve the accountability of forest practices. In the range of activities that fall under that category, we have issues such as the ones I mentioned, including auditing. We now spend a great deal of money to have my staff go out into the field -- and we never have enough of that kind of staff -- to look at those cutblocks that have been harvested and assess them in terms of whether or not they've complied with the fish-forestry guidelines and the other guidelines that we have in this ministry for those activities.

This change will allow professional foresters to do those audits, or to have them done, and to sign them off. If I can make an analogy, it's much the same as with professional engineers, who, in designing or putting together the drawings for a building, have to certify those plans by signing their name to them. If it subsequently turns out that the wrong-sized steel was used or that the design was inadequate and did not meet standards, then that professional engineer is responsible and accountable. Specific penalties may follow under the act that governs professional engineers. We are doing the same kind of thing with foresters. We're saying that they have the responsibility to sign off the plans that they prepared, whether it's a silvicultural plan, a harvesting plan or a road plan -- not necessarily in view of the fact that they are experts in road design, but they have to be prepared to sign them off. With responsibility, of course, comes accountability.

As I suggested to the professional foresters when I spoke to their annual convention earlier this year, this is a very positive change. I think the public will view it as a positive change. The professional foresters clearly view it as a positive change, and they've worked very hard on the drafting of the amendments to this bill. But with responsibility comes accountability. Professional foresters in our province work for a variety of forest companies, have private consulting companies and, of course, a significant number work for my ministry. This will present a real challenge, particularly to those foresters who are working for private companies, because the push and the balance that private companies have is always the imperative to reduce and minimize their costs. The professional foresters are going to be in the middle, saying: "The practices come first." All the practices that we have -- fish-forestry guidelines, soil conservation guidelines, all of those kinds of things -- are going to have to come first. That's a very positive change in what's been happening on our land base in this province.

Second, the bill protects the rights of visiting foresters and qualified non-foresters to perform work which may fall within the practice of professional forestry. There has always been an ability to issue a permit to foresters who, coming from another jurisdiction, have not received accreditation under the B.C. system. This continues that, with some modifications. It also changes or formalizes the relationship between professional foresters and those individuals who may not be professionals but are nonetheless qualified and trained to do some aspects of forestry work. A lot of the very good work that's done in this province is done by technologists who are turned out of schools like BCIT, people who are not foresters but, nonetheless, are eminently qualified. This will allow a formalization of the relationship between professional foresters and those other groups of people who are certified but are not professionals.

I should say that this legislation has been endorsed by all of the significant groups within the province. Not only the forestry groups but some of the environmental groups have approved them as well: the COFI coast forest sector; the Truck Loggers' Association; the Sierra Club of Western Canada; the B.C. Environmental Information Institute; the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of B.C.; and the Applied Science Technologists and Technicians of B.C. So there 

[ Page 7215 ]

is extensive approval from a wide cross-section of people involved in forestry.

As I said, the bill will allow for the permitting of visiting foresters and for the relationship between non-professional and professional foresters to continue. It will clarify the qualifications needed by visiting foresters to practise forestry in British Columbia and provide special exemptions for non-foresters with the necessary skills and qualifications to enable them to engage in an occupation that falls within the practice of professional forestry.

Third, Bill 34 provides the association with improved disciplinary provisions to help maintain professional conduct. These provisions will detail the procedures used at disciplinary hearings more fully. All self-regulating professions that are governed by their own act have a process that deals with the association's ability to discipline members for violations of the standards. This bill will require persons to provide information to aid in the investigation of professional misconduct and will expand the association's remedies for disciplining a person found guilty of misconduct. In addition, the bill contains provisions to protect the confidentiality of information gathered in an investigation and to apply disciplinary provisions to former members as well as members.

Fourth, the bill clarifies the manner in which the public can lodge a complaint against a member of the association and requires the association to respond to the complaint. Again, that is a welcome provision.

Fifth, the bill contains new provisions to allow the association to regulate ongoing membership. These enable the association to require members to take examinations for continuing membership, to conduct practice reviews and to impose conditions on continuing membership where a member has been disciplined.

Sixth, the bill provides the association with greater powers to pass bylaws to carry out its responsibilities under the act. The new bylaw powers will enable the association to meet changing demands in the practice of professional forestry. To ensure that these bylaws are in the public interest, the bill requires that the association file all of its bylaws with my office, and the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council then has 30 days to disallow a bylaw.

Lastly, Bill 34 enables greater public scrutiny and input into association business by enabling the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council to appoint two lay members to the council of the association. Again, that is a first; lay members representing the broad public interest have never sat as members of the board of professional foresters.

Bill 34 provides the association with the means to respond to public demands for better forest management and greater accountability. I look forward to some debate in committee stage on particular sections of the bill. I think that it is a significant change. It's one that will have a measure of impact in the public debate on forestry. It will, in my view, provide foresters not only with greater responsibility but with greater accountability. I would hope that this measure and others -- whether they be the protected-areas strategy, the 12 percent of the land base that we intend to set aside or the intent of this government to bring forest practices under a piece of legislation -- all taken together will provide the public with a greater level of comfort. The intention of this government is to manage our forest land base in the best possible manner, so that all British Columbians can have a sense of pride -- rather than the skepticism that we've had too long in this province -- that this great, wonderful resource is being managed in the best possible manner.

[10:45]

I look forward to that debate, and I'll close with those comments.

W. Hurd: The opposition is pleased to rise and support the intent and the principles of Bill 34, which, as the minister has indicated, contains substantial revisions to the act governing professional foresters in the province. The debate about ethics in professional forestry goes back to the very source itself, the faculty of forestry at the University of British Columbia, where it has long been recognized that foresters receive their training in what is really a profession and then proceed to secure employment with the major licensees in the province. There has always been that difficult relationship, as far as the association is concerned, between the responsibility for responsible forest stewardship and the fact that foresters are employed by a company that may have different ideas than the professional association about the nature of its activities in the province's forests.

This is a welcome piece of legislation. I understand that it reflects a consultation process that has gone on for some years in the province, intensively so during the last year. It's interesting to note that the new code of ethics governing the performance of professional foresters will also affect foresters within the Ministry of Forests. Those professionals in government will be accountable under this legislation to the same set of standards and rules that apply to professional foresters involved in private industry. I think that's an important development as well.

The minister raised the issue of the Tripp report, which found a violation of fish stream guidelines in selected cutblocks on southern Vancouver Island. Two of those identified in the report were actually small business forest enterprise program cutblocks. The Ministry of Forests bears the responsibility for handling those forest activities, such as preharvest silvicultural prescriptions and that type of professional work. There was also an incident last year in the Arrow Lakes, where the Association of B.C. Professional Foresters was looking at preharvest silvicultural prescriptions where claims were made of incorrect signatures. I think this bill, whether it intends to or not, will certainly enforce standards of professional conduct on the part of ministry staff as well as professional foresters working in the private sector. We all have to welcome that initiative from this government. The issue of stewardship in the forests needs to be treated as a separate ethical and professional consideration. Obviously the next step in the process is the introduction of a forest practices code for B.C., which will 

[ Page 7216 ]

tighten even further the types of activities that occur and are monitored in provincial forests.

This is a piece of legislation that the opposition can support in principle. We'll welcome the opportunity to address some of the specific issues in committee. I understand that professional foresters have certainly welcomed the introduction of this legislation. They have pressed hard with both the opposition and the government to see these amendments come forward.

I'm particularly pleased that there is a provision in the legislation for forest technicians who are graduates of schools like the B.C. Institute of Technology. It's encouraging that graduates of recognized schools will also find some professional standing under this legislation.

Recognizing that this bill represents a broad consultation with the affected stakeholders and that it's long overdue in many respects, and certainly recognizing that all professional foresters in the province will now have a stronger code of ethics to govern their behaviour, the opposition supports the principle of the legislation and welcomes the opportunity in committee to clarify certain points that we have identified.

R. Neufeld: The Social Credit caucus also rises in support of the Foresters Amendment Act, 1993.

Interjection.

R. Neufeld: Some of the members opposite are getting a little worried when both opposition parties support the bill.

Legislation such as Bill 34 presents to the House and to the people of British Columbia is done through consultation with the affected parties. That has transpired here, because we can see from the people in the associations we have talked to that there has been a lot of consultation. They basically support the major part of the bill that changes some procedures, adds some laypeople to the council, removes some of the long-standing exemptions from professional responsibility and places some responsibility on those that sign off on some of the silviculture and harvesting programs in our forests.

I think I can say for our party that we are all concerned about the forests. We all recognize how important the forest is to our province -- to the benefit of all people in British Columbia -- how many jobs it gives and how that affects the economy.

We're pleased in our party with all sections of the bill. We look forward to committee stage, where maybe we can go into some of them a bit more.

I also want to say that a bill like this does not become fact overnight. Discussions have probably been going on for quite a number of years -- long before the NDP took over -- about how some of the problems can be resolved. We in the Social Credit Party support the bill.

A. Cowie: I want to add my individual support for this bill. A long time ago I graduated as a forester. I think it's important that foresters, as a profession, have the respect to practise their profession in a way that the public clearly understand the rules they are working under.

Foresters work in a very broad field. Many foresters and many of my classmates have gone on to become urban foresters. They are not just working for companies in the forest business; they have gone on to become arboriculturists or to work in many business fields. Some of my classmates are working in Nigeria trying to replant trees to keep the desert back. I have a couple of friends who are working in China at the present time -- Canadians working abroad to help the Chinese with the many problems they have with their desert conditions and the loss of vegetation due to overcutting.

It is important that foresters are not just considered as people who look after cutting of the forests and getting the trees to the mill. They should -- and now legitimately through this act will -- be recognized as managers of the forests. I can remember as a young man visiting a forestry friend in Switzerland. In Switzerland there are 400 foresters. They are actually land managers, and they look after everything that has to do with the land -- even the marketing and the cutting of wood down to four inches in diameter. Because of the value of wood in that country, not only for soil conservation purposes but for proper water quality, they are well recognized as a profession.

When I walked over from engineering and said that I wanted to be a forester, I can remember the dean telling me: "Don't ever expect to make a lot of money. Foresters don't make a lot of money. You have to really want to be in the outdoors. You have to really love the various aspects of the field." Although I never went on to practise forestry in the woods, I used my degree to go on to do landscape architecture, which many foresters do as an allied profession. I certainly respect those people who have stayed in the business over the years. They have to have proper rules for the conduct of their business so that everybody recognizes what's expected of them. I wanted to make that individual statement of support.

Deputy Speaker: The hon. minister closes debate.

Hon. D. Miller: Just to touch on some of the comments in no particular order, first of all, I think the practice of forestry is not well understood. Despite the difficulties that we face in this province today in attempting to grapple with changing public views and changing demands that society wishes to introduce with respect to forest land management, and despite our history and any of the criticisms, there really has been an attempt since the turn of the century to manage our forest lands on some kind of broadly stated scientific forestry basis. The methods that we employed in North America generally were those that came over to North America prior to and at the turn of the century from European foresters, who had a long history of trying to manage the land base in what I term the best, sound, most scientific way. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, foresters probably evolved centuries ago through the management of land for wildlife and less through management specifically for tree harvesting. We find ourselves now, many centuries later, getting back to the essential roots of forestry.

[ Page 7217 ]

As the minister for the last year and a half-plus, as I've gone around the province I've been very pleased to look at some of the outstanding work that's being done in British Columbia. I suppose it's a feature of our society that we must concentrate on the negative: we must try to find those areas where we're not performing and expose them to the light of day. But we have not perfected an ability to look at the very best work we do and somehow inform the public about that. I can tell you that not only in the Ministry of Forests -- and I have a great deal of pride in the men and women who work for the Ministry of Forests -- but also in private companies there is some outstanding work taking place in this province. There is a group of professionals, foresters and technicians who have a great deal of concern about this land of ours and how it's managed, and I'm comforted by that. Although the difficulties that we face on a daily basis appear to be occasionally insurmountable, over the long term I'm convinced that we've got some outstanding people who have the dedication to work these problems through.

I agree with the member for Vancouver-Quilchena. In terms of personal satisfaction, it's pretty hard to beat the profession of forestry and all the related professions -- knowing that you're really trying to manage that land base in the best possible way. In my view, there's almost a higher calling to that. When I speak around the province, I certainly encourage people, particularly young people, to look at it as a career that has all the rewards one can ever hope to get in terms of a profession and the feeling that goes with it.

[11:00]

Members may have noted an article in the Sun on Saturday that the government partially funded a tour of German journalists to B.C. My ministry and several private companies put together a tour around the province. There was no attempt to hide anything or to show them the best work or anything else; we wanted to give them a balanced view of the province and the issues that are important not only to British Columbians but internationally. We took them around to a lot of places and showed them what I term the good, the bad and the ugly. I'm very pleased with at least some of the initial comments that I've seen. Once again people have come from outside our borders and, after looking in detail at some of the work we're doing, have said that B.C. is not the Brazil of the north. More and more people seem to be confirming that that's a complete misconstruing of what is happening inside our borders. The more of that kind of work we can do.... That kind of work is important not only for international marketplaces; it's also important for our own citizens to know that we are seriously addressing the issues on our forest land base.

I also want to say that there should really not be any misunderstanding.... I used an analogy in my opening remarks about engineering. I talked about an engineer who could be liable for discipline if they put together a plan for a building and used the improper steel size. Forestry is not that kind of profession. The difficulty we have in explaining professional forestry management is that perception generally outweighs reality. All too often I think we make a fatal mistake in evaluating by perception whether or not we're doing a good job. There are areas in this province that 60 years ago looked as bad as any of the worst photographs that you occasionally see. Today those areas contain absolutely astounding and beautiful second-growth forest with all of the things that people somehow associate only with old-growth forest. We really have to guard against perception.

We should also understand that forestry is not like engineering. It requires subjectivity. It requires the forester to apply knowledge and skill in arriving at the best decision. As any geographer knows, we have a movable landscape. With all of the best forestry and all of the right skills, we can still have things like slope failure and plantation failure. They go with the practice. There needs to be a public understanding that we're not dealing in absolute precision with these issues; subjectivity is involved. I hope this bill will provide confidence in those professional managers to manage in the public interest.

I'll close as I opened, by referring to the Tripp audit. The audits were done on land that had some private company cutblocks and some cutblocks under the small business forest enterprise program of my ministry. When I issued my ultimatum that I wanted a plan, signed off by a RPF, on how remediation was going to be done, that ultimatum was issued to the Ministry of Forests as well as to the private companies. There was no exception. I expect the highest standard of people who work for the Ministry of Forests, and I expect the highest standard of people who work for private companies. This bill will go a long way toward assuring the public that that highest standard will be employed and that as a result, we will have the best possible management of our forest lands.

I move second reading.

Motion approved.

Bill 34, Foresters Amendment Act, 1993, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. J. Cashore: Committee on Bill 26, hon. Speaker.

WASTE MANAGEMENT AMENDMENT ACT, 1993

The House in committee on Bill 26; E. Barnes in the chair.

On section 1.

J. Tyabji: For the information of the minister, I'd like to start by saying that we have a number of amendments that we would like to propose to section 1, particularly with regard to the definition of "remediate." We're just waiting for a final polishing. First of all, with regard to the definition of remediation that we have here, I note that there is a lot of talk about removal of soil and soil relocation from a site, and very little talk about what will happen on a site that it is removed to. Further to that, although under section 1(f) 

[ Page 7218 ]

of this bill it says "other action that the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council may prescribe," we don't have any reference, for example, to potential processing. Is it the purpose of this section that when we're talking about "from the site," it's going to a landfill? Is it possible to go to another site?

Hon. J. Cashore: With regard to soil movement, when we get into some of the detail in section 2 we have a section on soil relocation agreements, so the question would best be dealt with at that point.

H. De Jong: I'd like to seek leave to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

H. De Jong: With us in the House this morning are some 51 grade 7 students from Yarrow Elementary School. They are accompanied by several adults, as well as their teacher, Miss L. Esau. I ask the House to give them a cordial welcome.

J. Tyabji: Although I understand that under section 2 we do have some talk about the potential processing, when we're looking at the remediation plan, it seems to be very important to the definition of the remediation that we talk immediately about the idea of processing. The remediation plan deals quite specifically with removal and transportation being part of the plan, but there is no plan in place with regard to a site profile of the receiving site. It seems to me that if you're going to have specific talk about the plan for removal from a site, you should also have some reference to the receiving site.

With that, I would like to move that section 1(d) of this bill be amended to read: "implementation of a remediation plan, which includes the site profile and processing plan for the receiving site, made necessary by the removal of soil or soil relocation from the site as identified in section 1(c)."

With that amendment moved, I'd like to encourage the minister to look at it.

On the amendment.

J. Tyabji: Although I know that under section 1(f) we have a general open-endedness with regard to the definition of the remediation plan, the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council may prescribe that. When we're talking about people who are filing a remediation plan, we must have a plan under this act for the removal or relocation from the site. There should be some mention of the receiving site or at least a site profile of it. For example, is it going to be removed from this site to a landfill or another site? Will there be ocean dumping? Is that the plan for the contaminated soil? We know that in the past there has been an allowance made for contaminated soil to be dumped into the ocean, which is permitted, in part, by the ministry. We in the opposition would like to know whether there is a provision for the receiving site in the very first section, in the remediation plan.

Hon. J. Cashore: The words "remediation plan" are very clear: they mean a plan that deals with all aspects of soil removal -- on-site and off-site. It's a generic term. This is very clearly dealt with throughout the bill. If the hon. member has read the bill, she will be aware that is dealt with. This is a frivolous amendment.

J. Tyabji: Contrary to the minister's assertion that this is a frivolous amendment, we happen to believe that it is very important to identify at the beginning what is intended to happen to the soil being removed under section 1. I can inform the minister that not only have I read the bill but I also have a very good idea of how it relates to other legislation. It seems to me that if the intent of this minister is to get to the core problem, which is the contamination of soil and sites and/or groundwater, and if there's going to be removal of soil or soil relocation under section 1, he would definitely want some identification of where it's going and what the receiving site is like. That is why the amendment has been moved. It is not frivolous. I don't think we can make the point any more strongly than it has been made. We believe that it's in the best interest of the public to have some reference under the remediation plan to the receiving site and to what that site will be like.

Hon. J. Cashore: The more I look at section 1(c), the more frivolous this amendment becomes. It says: "...including a plan for any consequential or associated removal of soil or soil relocation from the site." That very clearly indicates that within the aegis of the remediation plan, all aspects of that are thoroughly covered. There's absolutely no need for this amendment.

J. Tyabji: What the minister is missing in his assertion that this frivolous, is that, yes, section 1 says "from," but the word that's missing is "to." That's what we're trying to get across. I'm prepared to stand up and say that I think the remediation plan is good, except that there has been an oversight. Even if the intent of section 1 is to make some obscure reference to where it's going, it doesn't. There's nothing in section 1 that allows for the person preparing the remediation plan to say where it's going. The word "to" is missing. It's a simple point. It's not a frivolous point; it's a very important point. If this minister feels that he can trust people who are preparing a remediation plan to automatically include that, I think he's being naive.

[11:15]

Hon. J. Cashore: That's exactly what soil relocation means. It cannot be relocated if it's not going to somewhere. That's implicit. The wording is entirely appropriate.

G. Wilson: I am absolutely amazed that the minister would say that this is a frivolous amendment when we are saying that we want the implementation of a remediation plan that says that there has to be some assessment of the impact on the receiving site for this kind of material. I go back -- and let this minister think back, if he can think back that far -- to the mid-1970s in Ontario, when we had to deal with nuclear waste 

[ Page 7219 ]

contaminants. The government there brought forward a bill that dealt with the relocation and disposal of contaminant waste from the Ontario nuclear power industry. At that time, the small but budding Liberal opposition in Ontario said they had to have some documentation of what the impact on the receiving site was going to be: "We need to know where you're going to take this contaminated material, not just the remedial plan for the site that it is going to be taken from." In that case it was essentially a stored facility. "We want to know what you're going to do when you start to bury this stuff" -- or dump it, which was even worse. And do you know what? We had a Conservative minister back then who said that was a frivolous thing to be bringing up: "Who cares about that side of it? We've got it intrinsically documented in the language of the bill." From 1976 through to the mid-to-late 1980s, we have been plagued with the problem in Ontario because that piece of legislation was fallacious.

We're saying to this minister that there is nothing wrong with what he is attempting to do here; in fact, what he is attempting to do here is reasonably good. But for heaven's sake, let's have enough foresight to recognize that if you're going to be moving and relocating soil, you should have an implementation and remediation plan that addresses the consequence to the site that is receiving the material. That's what we're saying. That is not in the language of this bill, nor is it clear in terms of the intention of these definitions.

I find it quite incredible -- and as the people of British Columbia watch and listen to the debate in committee stage on this Waste Management Amendment Act, they are going to find it astounding -- that the Minister of Environment....

Interjection.

G. Wilson: I hear the member opposite say that they're hanging on every word. Believe me, they will read every word from Hansard; trust me on that point. They find it absolutely astounding that you have a minister who says that it is inconsequential, in fact trivial, to have a plan that documents where this contaminated material is going to be placed and the local impact of that placement. That is the reason why throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s we continue to take contaminated materials and deposit them in sites, particularly in Howe Sound and Georgia Strait, which I have been hammering this minister on ever since he came into power and which they have done absolutely nothing to correct.

Hon. J. Cashore: The amendment says "includes the site profile." If the members of the opposition had read the act, they would know that in the forthcoming section 20.11, a site profile is done prior to the remediation plan being put in place. The issue of a site profile is already established in the bill at the appropriate time. It's not something that we should leave until we get to the remediation stage; it's something that is done much earlier in the process. Obviously this is a point that comes up later in the bill, as there are many sections dealing with the remediation plan.

Every member of the House should know that trying to put all of the detail of the bill into section 1 really indicates an intent to approach this in a way that is not well coordinated. Trying to incorporate everything in the first section that shows up in the bill is not good legislative drafting. Again, it is clear that the Liberal opposition has an intent here that is not really related to the Waste Management Amendment Act.

J. Tyabji: If we follow the minister's reasoning, there is no need for section 1, because the remediation plan itself is described in detail later on in the bill. Section 1 is the definition of "remediate"; that's why it's there. The reference to the receiving site is missing from the definition. With respect to the site profile that the minister is referring to, if the minister has read his own bill, he will recognize that the site profile is in reference to the contaminated site, and later on there are some obscure references to what is going to be done with it. However, in the definition section we have the outline for the remediation plan. Later on in the bill we deal with some of the specifics and we get into more detail.

As this minister must be aware, all legislation relies on the definitions to outline the structure and parameters of the following parts of the bill. If this minister would like to rely on the rest of the bill for the remediation plan, let's get rid of the definition, because the receiving site is missing in the definition. From our perspective, the receiving site is fundamental to the definition of the remediation plan. I don't understand how the minister can miss that point. It's a little bit disappointing that this government, which continues to talk about cradle-to-grave, can think that it's enough to have a remediation plan in the definition section for one site and that it doesn't matter about the receiving site.

Amendment negatived on the following division:

[ Page 7220 ]

On section 1.

Interjections.

The Chair: Order, please. Hon. members, we are in committee, and it would be helpful if the members who are not remaining would leave to continue their conversations. The hon. member for Okanagan West has the floor.

[11:30]

C. Serwa: The minister's expanded definition of remediation is the exact definition of remediate used in the old act, but they have added parts (a) to (f). It seems to me that the old definition of remediate, which forms the basis of remediation, was quite expansive and accounted for all of the concerns expanded on in subsections (a) to (f). Perhaps the minister could explain why it was necessary to identify specific expansions and then qualify them as not being limited to the expanded definitions.

Hon. J. Cashore: The extensiveness of the legislation that we are embarking on requires that we have the substance of the definition that was there. We needed to expand on it, however, with regard to issues concerning preliminary site investigations, detailed site investigations, the evaluation of remediation alternatives, remediation plans, the implementation of remediation plans, and monitoring and verification. So this is a somewhat more expansive definition, which is appropriate given the scope of the bill.

C. Serwa: I don't know if this is appropriate, but it's in reference to section 1: what triggers the remediation process defined in section 1?

Hon. J. Cashore: Section 2 explains the entire process. With the understanding of the hon. member, I hope we will be able to get into a more fullsome discussion of those steps as we get into section 2.

Section 1 approved.

G. Janssen: I ask leave to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

G. Janssen: Visiting us today from Eighth Avenue Elementary School in Port Alberni are 52 students and their teacher, Mr. R. Erickson. I ask the House to make them welcome.

On section 2.

Hon. J. Cashore: I move the amendment, modifying the proposed section 20.1, standing in my name on the order paper.

[SECTION 2, in the proposed section 20.1,

(a) by renumbering the section as section 20.1 (1),

(b) by deleting the definitions of "operator" and "owner" and substituting the following:

"operator" means, subject to subsection (2), a person who is or was in control of or responsible for any operation located at a contaminated site, but does not include a secured creditor unless the secured creditor is described in section 20.31 (3);

"owner" means a person who is in possession of, has the right of control of, occupies or controls the use of real property, including without limitation a person who has any estate or interest, legal or equitable, in the real property, but does not include a secured creditor unless the secured creditor is described in section 20.31 (3);, and

(c) by adding the following subsection:

(2) A government body is not an operator only as a result of

(a) exercising regulatory authority with respect to a contaminated site,

(b) carrying out remediation at a contaminated site, or

(c) providing advice or information with respect to a contaminated site or any activity which took place on the contaminated site.]

Amendment approved.

On section 2 as amended.

J. Tyabji: One concern that I have with regard to a "contaminated site" under section 2 is that I note that although "special waste" is defined in the Waste Management Act, there is no reference to it in this bill. We see that throughout this bill there are references to the Waste Management Act -- to definitions and to parts of the Waste Management Act -- but there is no bridging reference to "special waste" as it's defined in section 1 of that act. That's "contaminated site" as defined under 20.1(a). Under 20.1(b) a contaminated site means "an area of land in which the soil or any groundwater lying beneath it, or the water or the underlying sediment, contains...another prescribed substance in quantities or concentrations exceeding prescribed criteria, standards or conditions." The question that comes up is: prescribed by whom, and in what kinds of quantities or concentrations? Where are the standards being set for this? When it says "prescribed criteria, standards or conditions," what is the objective by which those are being set? For example, is it concentrations that exceed prescribed criteria, standards or conditions for human health, or is it the conditions for environmental integrity as defined by the clean water regulations that will be coming down? What does 20.1(b) refer to, and why isn't special waste referred to from the original act?

Hon. J. Cashore: Special waste is part of the act. These are critical standards that are subject to public review in the development of the regulations, and the criteria are based on health and environmental protection standards.

The Chair: I'll just point out to members that there are a number of amendments to section 2, and it would 

[ Page 7221 ]

be convenient if the committee addressed them one by one as they are listed on the order paper.

J. Tyabji: Am I to understand that we're going to go back to amendments on section 2? I'm not sure how this is to be done. Are we going through each amendment by itself? What was it that we had a voice vote on, then?

The Chair: Does the hon. minister wish to call each amendment while we're under the section?

Hon. J. Cashore: That is my intent, hon. Chair. Section 2 amends section 20 of the Waste Management Act. Therefore, to facilitate the debate, section 20 is broken down into several sections, and for many of those there are House amendments. To help facilitate the work of the House, we could go through them, subject to identifying the various sections of section 20 that we are dealing with during section 2. As I understand it, the House has approved the amendment to section 20.1, and we are now debating section 20.1 as presented in the bill.

C. Serwa: On a point of order, this is a very complex technical bill that was presented with very little time for an adequate review, and four or five pages of amendments are presented by the minister. If there is going to be a fair and balanced debate on the amendments presented here, surely we should be given the opportunity to assess the actual changes in the amendments prior to debating them. There is altogether too much to read in the technical changes to define and determine precisely what the amendments are. Some of them are relatively straightforward and innocuous. But it seems to me that it is unreasonable for me to engage in debate on the amendments without an ample opportunity to study them. In view of the volume, I would earnestly request that the minister consider standing down the amended sections until we have a chance to pursue them. Otherwise, the debate will go on until we can review these changes. The specific changes are not identified.

The Chair: The hon. the minister on the same point of order.

Hon. J. Cashore: These House amendments are clerical in nature. They are important to the description of the actual amendments in the act. They are presented in a logical way. This morning we provided a briefing for the staff of the two opposition parties. If we can go through this as it is laid out in section 20, one part at a time, it will be very clear. At present we are still on section 20.1.

The Chair: Thank you, hon. minister. The Chair proposes to call these proposed sections numbered 20 that are under section 2. I won't be referring to section 2, however; we will treat them as though we were going one by one under section 20. For instance, section 20.1 is the first matter to be addressed, then section 20.11, etc., until we are complete. Then we will return to section 2 and ask for the question.

On section 20.1 as amended.

J. Tyabji: My understanding, then, is that we will go through just the first amendment, and then we will get to the second one and deal with that. Is that correct? Okay. I understand that we've passed it, and that's why we can debate it now. Is that correct? Otherwise, where we have a difficulty is that we have the amendment before us, and we also have the definitions in the bill in section 2....

The Chair: Hon. member, just a moment. I'll give further clarification. We did pass one amendment, and it appears your understanding is that the amendment we passed was section 20.1. But it was an amendment to 20.1, not 20.1 itself. We're now dealing with 20.1 as amended. Is that understood?

J. Tyabji: Yes.

The Chair: Please proceed.

J. Tyabji: I was just worried that our voice vote to accept the amendments might have precluded debate on that, and that would have been a problem. So under 20.11 we're dealing with the definitions of operator and owner.

Hon. J. Cashore: The hon. member said 20.11. It's my understanding that we are still on section 20.1 as amended.

The Chair: That's correct. The member for Powell River-Sunshine Coast on a point of order.

G. Wilson: Mr. Chairman, I'm trying to get clarification. Which paper are we working off? Basically, we are now dealing with an amendment to section 2, which provides us an opportunity to deal with this amended section on the order paper. Is that correct?

The Chair: The amendment we passed is on page 2 of Orders of the Day, and we amended section 20.1. That was passed, so now we're on section 20.1 as amended.

G. Wilson: Correct. Just to further clarify this point, the debate is not limited to the amendments now but can go back to the main section in the bill as amended by the notice of motion. Is that correct?

The Chair: Section 20.1 as amended is the scope of the debate. I'm not sure if there are wider parameters to it, as you may be suggesting. Perhaps I don't understand you.

G. Wilson: I want to be absolutely clear, so that when we get into this debate we know exactly what we can discuss. The bill has been amended this morning. Amendments that were proposed are now passed. Therefore we can once again debate the main bill, as amended under section 2, and we're dealing with section 20.1. Is that correct?

[ Page 7222 ]

The Chair: Yes, within the parameters of the rules of committee. It doesn't mean we're on second reading of the bill. That's the only concern that I have.

J. Tyabji: I believe that takes us right back to the definition of "contaminated site." When the minister was answering that question.... Unfortunately, we were a bit distracted by the debate about the amendment. I would also like to register for the record that it isn't very helpful to receive a stack of amendments 20 minutes before the House convenes. Having said that, a lot of the concerns with regard to the definition section apply to the section as amended.

[11:45]

Let's get back to "contaminated site," under section 20.1(b). When the minister was talking, I didn't quite get.... That was some minutes ago now. He was talking about the criteria, standards or conditions as set by regulation. Is that correct? He said something about public hearings. Could we canvass that again, please?

Hon. J. Cashore: That is correct. But it's not public hearings, it's public consultation.

J. Tyabji: I need to know, then, what the structure will be for the public consultation. Secondly, when and how would we expect to see the regulations that would add the definition to this definition? Who is the person prescribing...? Is it my understanding that the prescribed substance would be set out through public consultation? And if so, will technical experts be involved, or would it be any member of the public who would like to define a contaminated site?

Hon. J. Cashore: We will provide an overall package of proposed regulations for stakeholders and the public to review. Following their feedback on that and the consultation process, those regulations will be brought into effect through an OIC approximately six months after the enactment of this bill.

J. Tyabji: It's my understanding that this bill is going to be proclaimed in the fall. So six months after that the regulations will be brought in. Is that correct?

Hon. J. Cashore: It's not possible to say exactly when it will be proclaimed, but one may assume proclamation at the conclusion of the session. At any rate, we're aiming to complete the review and consultation process pursuant to the regulations by January 1994.

J. Tyabji: So the proposed regulations will be in a discussion paper, which will have public distribution, and then they will go back to the minister.

Hon. J. Cashore: It will be far better than a discussion paper. The stakeholders will be able to see the whites of the eyes of the draft regulations and give specific comments on them.

J. Tyabji: So in effect, under this bill, the interpretation of a contaminated site will not be prepared until the final draft of the regulations. Is that correct? Will there be a final opportunity for technical input into the drafting of the regulations for contaminated sites, or will it be driven more by the public process?

Hon. J. Cashore: Except insofar as there already is a definition of special waste in the special waste regulations. Given that, there would be a definition coming out of the consultation, and it would involve technical and public input.

J. Tyabji: What would be the parameters? Are the draft regulations almost ready to go to the public?

Hon. J. Cashore: That's a good question. They will be ready in slightly over two to three months.

J. Tyabji: Perhaps the minister can't answer this question. For the record, I have a real problem debating an enabling bill when the regulations aren't anywhere around, because we can't even discuss what the parameters will be for the discussion paper. I am assuming that the criteria or conditions that will be set out in the draft regulation will be geared toward safeguarding human health. Or will they be more broadly based and geared toward environmental integrity, for example? Does the minister have any plan to tailor the regulations for this with his clean air and clean water policies and regulations that should be coming out this year?

Hon. J. Cashore: It is health and environmental integrity in the context of the technical input.

J. Tyabji: Are the regulations being drafted? What is driving the drafting of the regulation process? The reason I'm asking is that when we talk about human health and environmental integrity being the objectives by which the regulations are being drawn up to begin with, are they looking more to precedents for contaminated sites and previous groundwater contamination, and therefore the public element of it, or is it that some of the previous studies done for the state-of-the-environment report and legislation in the past -- the technical side -- are drafting the regulations for public input?

Hon. J. Cashore: The hon. member asks what is driving it. We need some clarity with regard to definitions of contaminated sites. In order to do that, we need this legislation, and this definition relates to the detail that we get into further on in the bill. What is driving it is the need on the part of industry, commerce and environmental protection to have an appropriate definition that serves the purposes of the other sections of this act.

J. Tyabji: Maybe I should rephrase the question. In the drafting, is a team of technical experts working with the best available scientific knowledge to put the regulations together, or is a team of researchers looking to environmental precedents in this jurisdiction and others and saying that it wants to be pre-empted? Are 

[ Page 7223 ]

the regulations drafted more from a public aspect or a technical aspect?

Hon. J. Cashore: The answer is yes to all of those questions. There is a team of people working on this who have an excellent scientific background, and it is also one component of a national process that involves virtually every province and jurisdiction in Canada. It is in keeping with the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment, who have had a major role in drafting the generic overall guidelines within which this process is functioning. I recently attended a meeting of CCME ministers, and this is very much in keeping with the development of similar legislation across the country for purposes of equivalency.

J. Tyabji: The next subject that I want to get into under this section is going to be fairly involved. So that we don't have to get into the detail of the definition of government body, I would move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.

Motion approved.

The House resumed; the Speaker in the chair.

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

Committee of Supply A, having reported progress, was granted leave to sit again.

Hon. J. Cashore: I move the House do now adjourn.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 11:56 a.m.

PROCEEDINGS IN THE DOUGLAS FIR ROOM

The House in Committee of Supply A; D. Schreck in the chair.

The Committee met at 10:10 a.m.

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF TRANSPORTATION AND HIGHWAYS
(continued)

On vote 58: minister's office, $410,000 (continued).

D. Symons: I just have a few other financial questions, and then I'll go back into our provincewide tour, if we might. I suspect the reason I'd like to start off with these is that no doubt you would want some time to prepare answers for them. They probably involve a fair amount of calculating.

What would be the total amount paid to the maintenance contractors for this fiscal year? I'm not sure if that number up here is in the estimates supplementary book or not -- the amount the contractors themselves get rather than the total at the end for that particular line in the estimates book. Then I'd like to compare that to the total that is budgeted for these estimates, which is roughly $366.5 million. Do you have the figure readily available for what the maintenance contractors themselves would get?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The total of all the maintenance contracts is $285 million.

D. Symons: What is the total amount budgeted for the rehabilitation contracts for the year? I'm after the total of the proposed contracts, whatever you might be giving out for rehabilitation work done in the province. These are not to include the ministry expenses, just what the contracts would total.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: In the rehabilitation budget, the amount totals $172 million, made up of $137 million for roads and $35 million for bridges.

D. Symons: Could I also have those totals for the last five years? I'm sure you won't have those figures here, but I would appreciate a breakdown of the roads and bridges, so I can see what has been happening over the years with rehabilitation.

[10:15]

I'll go on to the other question: what is the total budgeted for actual payments to contractors for capital construction? Again, I wonder if we might break these down into: minor capital, major capital and then the total for capital construction. Could I have those figures for the past five years, from '88 to '93, as well? If you have those figures for this fiscal year, I'll take them now, but otherwise we can leave them until they all come out together.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The budget amount for major capital is $28 million, and for minor capital it's $68 million.

D. Symons: This is the last of this particular set of questions, then, for the last five years, I'm wondering how many persons might have been employed by the ministry -- both as direct employees and, possibly under the previous administration, as contract workers on personal service contracts. And what is the total wage bill for each of those years? Again, those may not be figures you have readily available.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I will have to take that entire question on notice.

D. Symons: I really didn't expect you to have all those figures at hand. I'm pleased that you have the other answers to those questions, and I'll wait for the ones you don't have handy.

[ Page 7224 ]

Now, if we can move back in our provincewide tour into the city of Vancouver, I was expecting the member from West Vancouver to arrive. Many highways lead into the city of Vancouver but don't extend into the city. So roads to handle this traffic are really funded through the property taxes, and revenue-sharing mitigates this somewhat. But the city received less than its fair share -- at least that's their opinion -- based on population. Also, bicycle and pedestrian facilities do not qualify for revenue-sharing assistance. What can be done to give the city of Vancouver a more equitable share of such costs?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: If I understood the question correctly, in seeking additional funds Vancouver would primarily have to work through the revenue-sharing, and thus the question would be better put to the Minister of Municipal Affairs. But I can say, on the bridge rehab for example, that the lion's share of the moneys that were available have gone to Vancouver projects.

D. Symons: I'm not sure if the minister was making a pun when he said "the lion's share," since the Lions Gate Bridge is certainly going to be due for its share very soon.

I was simply quoting from some concerns expressed to me by the city of Vancouver about the revenue-sharing. I thought the ministry also had some revenue-sharing, besides the Ministry of Municipal Affairs.

Moving into Richmond now: Highway 91 off Annacis Island into Richmond, where the road divides to carry the traffic to New Westminster or connects to the Richmond connector there, is very poorly designed. It goes up and down and turns and all the rest, and there's unnecessary congestion that an overpass would alleviate. I'm wondering if there may be some plans afoot to correct that design error made in the past.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: It isn't a case of a design flaw or anything like that. It was stage construction -- a stage project. The stage that has not been completed requires about a $60 million expenditure on the north end for an interchange to properly direct the traffic away and toward the north abutment of the bridge. I have identified the traffic problems there on numerous occasions as something that needs to be attended to, and the project now must be completed. There's an interchange there, and some other roadworks are needed on the north end of the Alex Fraser Bridge to truly complete the project.

So that there is not a misunderstanding, I just want to back up a couple of questions. You had a question on the major and minor capital items. What I did not include, but should have, is that through the Transportation Financing Authority, we have authorization to expend about $76 million in addition to the $96 million I outlined before. The particular projects have not yet been announced.

D. Symons: I was aware that that was a separate item in there, but thank you for that information anyway.

On the Alex Fraser Bridge project to be completed in Richmond, I gather that the alignment for the Alex Fraser Bridge was initially somewhat different than how it was really built. The intent was that it would carry through and connect into another bridge from Lulu Island into Vancouver, somewhere in the neighbourhood of Boundary Road. I'm wondering if those plans are still in the future, where this interchange you are referring to in Richmond will eventually connect into something that may carry on into Vancouver at that point as well.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The alignment that the bridge was built on had been planned for many years. What you might be referring to was that, at one point, consideration was given to continuing a road northward, putting a new bridge across the North Arm and then connecting into the system. That would be a new bridge, rather than the Queensborough. A decision has been made that at the present time the Queensborough Bridge can meet the needs, but we have concerns about its age and susceptibility to seismic forces. We have to look either at a rehabilitation of the Queensborough Bridge or a new bridge across the North Arm, perhaps near Boundary Road, but that decision has not yet been made. But it is not a case of the Alex Fraser Bridge not being built where it was originally designed to be; it was built on the intended alignment.

D. Symons: So it will possibly carry on depending on the fate of the Queensborough Bridge, much like the fate of the Lions Gate Bridge, which is more imminent, I suppose.

Once we get this traffic into the Vancouver area, there are problems with not many through streets since they've avoided the Seattle syndrome of having a freeway through the middle of town. What's the status of the Grandview connector and turning the Grandview railway cut into a freeway or an entryway into downtown Vancouver?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: Possible uses of the cut include, of course, the ongoing use by Burlington Northern and a commuter rail that might use the Burlington Northern alignment. There's also the possibility of a roadway through the cut that might be just for commercial vehicles -- a truck route -- or, conceivably, a high-occupancy-vehicle route only.

In the funds provided to Vancouver in the bridge rehabilitation program for several of the bridges over the cut, careful consideration is being given to pier locations, such that the pier locations do not interfere with future choices.

D. Symons: I am very pleased to hear that this long-term planning is going into effect so that money won't be wasted. Quite often you see projects built, then later on something comes along, and piers or other things inhibit the development of new traffic routes. One of these problems developed in New Westminster along Front Street because the roadway is basically part of the Highways ministry and also competes with the railway there, and there's an abutment for the overpass 

[ Page 7225 ]

that narrows the road really into a single lane. This is a main truck route through New Westminster. I'm just wondering if the ministry has any plans for upgrading that, making it a bit more accessible and reducing the traffic congestion that's particularly bad if there happens to be a train along the tracks there, as there's very little room for two trucks to pass each other.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I'm familiar with that road and the rather difficult alignment problems around some of the railway piers. It has secondary highway status. The costs entailed in doing any kind of a major upgrade on that road would be enormous, and there's no current intention to do that. I would point out, however, that because it is on the secondary system, the city of New Westminster could make application through Municipal Affairs for cost-sharing projects on that road.

[10:30]

D. Symons: Probably the city doesn't do that because it has limited resources -- just as the government has -- as far as undertaking what you indicated would be very expensive projects.

I wonder if we could move on to the district of Coquitlam. I know the member for Port Coquitlam canvassed some ideas and problems in that area a while ago quite thoroughly. But one area he didn't mention was the need to widen Broadway between North Road and Gaglardi Way in Burnaby -- I think this is referred to as the Broadway connector. There appears to be some differences between the Ministry of Transportation and Highways and the municipality regarding the grade of this particular roadway. I'm wondering if the minister might enlarge upon that and see whether there might be some solution in order that this particular connector could alleviate some of the traffic problems in that area.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: Before answering that, I want to correct my last answer. My misunderstanding was that New Westminster could apply for some revenue-sharing on Front Street. But because Front Street is secondary classification, it is strictly our program. They would not apply for any revenue-sharing on our roads, and we at the present time do not have any plans for any substantive upgrading of Front Street.

With respect to your second question on the Broadway connector, I have to preface my comments and cast my thoughts back to my response to the budget speech in which I made certain comparisons to "aviary citizens, birds that change their plumage." I commented then that I was certain that when estimates came along I was going to be asked many times about why we didn't spend more money on something, and today is one of those spending days. It's going to take a little while to add up the total of the projects mentioned so far. We must be up in the many hundreds of millions of dollars so far. I'll give you a running total, perhaps, when we can get one.

[D. Streifel in the chair.]

Interjection.

The Chair: Hon. members, if we want our comments on the record, you must rise in your place and be recognized and address yourselves through the Chair, please.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I appreciate that because there were some people in the room maybe getting out of order.

On the Broadway connector, yes, there is a difference of opinion between the municipality and the ministry. We would be willing to accept a grade and complete the four-laning of Broadway for $2.5 million to $3 million, whereas going to the flatter grade that the municipality would like to have would put the prices more in the $6 million or $7 million range. The difference of opinion continues, but even though it is only -- and I say "only" -- $3 million, it is $3 million that we do not have to expend. Looking at it another way, if we had an extra $3 million, there might well be a number of other projects we might want to undertake for that $3 million. We are continuing discussions with the municipality about it. Beyond the discussion, there is the fact that the Broadway connector is going to have to be built. It does cause severe congestion in that part of the city, and we would look to alleviating that congestion as soon as possible.

D. Symons: I think that would help prevent the congestion and accidents that occur quite regularly on Como Lake Avenue and North Road along the Clarke corridor.

The former government committed to contract for the Mariner overhead, connecting Mariner to Johnson, in conjunction with the Westwood development. Phase one was completed in 1991. This bridge is critical to handle the vehicle volume generated by that Westwood development. It is also needed for the development of an effective transit system in the area. That has not taken place -- only the first phase of it -- and the bridge is needed as part of that overhead. I'm wondering what the status of that would be for the Westwood development.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: We have an additional item, then, to add to the "spend" category. The cost would be approximately $13 million. The preliminary design has been completed; there has been no detailed design work done on it. It is part of the major road network and is another project that needs to be done. It is highly desirable from the municipality's point of view, and we will proceed on it when funding is available.

D. Symons: I thank the minister for his offer to cost out all of these for me because, as I mentioned earlier in debate, these are issues that have been brought to my attention. What the people who bring them to my attention often don't say is how much it is going to cost. Maybe having these figures by project will give me a greater appreciation of the difficulty the minister has in allocating limited funds to an exhaustive number of 

[ Page 7226 ]

projects. I would appreciate it. I know the minister was replying tongue in cheek when he was adding up everything I'm asking. Of course, I do realize that not all these projects can be carried forth in the near future, but nevertheless they are projects that are of concern to people out there. I would be interested in knowing the status of them, and I thank the minister for his willingness to give me the costs. That adds another dimension to the whole problem.

The Barnet-Hastings project is well underway. There was a commitment to construct a Hastings-Gaglardi connector as part of this project. My first question is: what is the status of this connector?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The Gaglardi connector is another very worthwhile project. I've met with the mayor and council on several occasions, and the MLA as well. The problem again, of course, is funds. Its status is that design for the Gaglardi connector is nearing completion; it would be completed this year. Property acquisition is well advanced; a few pieces are left to be acquired. The cost is in the $8 million to $10 million range. But again, it is an important project. It would take a lot of pressure off some neighbourhood roads, particularly the Curtis-Parker road in Burnaby.

D. Symons: Also, the HOV lanes -- the Barnet Highway -- do not extend east of Port Moody. Would it not serve the purpose better to extend those HOV lanes into the Coquitlam park-and-ride area?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The system is designed such that the HOV lanes start where the congestion really picks up. Further east from that point the economics of it dictate that we run on standard lanes, but through Port Moody, where some considerable congestion begins, the HOV lanes begin.

D. Symons: The member for Port Coquitlam commented earlier on the danger situation of the dead-man's curve on the Mary Hill bypass. I won't comment further on that except to say that he's right. In fact, the whole highway system and its related interchanges in that general area are basically a disaster. These are serious safety concerns regarding traffic merging at the Cape Horn interchange. An interim measure to reduce traffic congestion, pending a larger scale permanent solution, could be a connection of the Mary Hill bypass to the 401. Is the ministry considering this, or any other sort of interim measures, until that whole area can be redesigned?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The member has really hit the goldmine on this one. The congestion, the safety aspects and the delays coming out of the northeast suburbs onto the Trans-Canada are severe, and part of that is the connection from the Mary Hill bypass onto 401.

There is no band-aid solution possible. The 401 should be expanded to six lanes plus two HOV lanes, and we need to twin the Port Mann Bridge. The Cape Horn interchange needs to be reworked in order to facilitate that and the more direct connections onto the Mary Hill bypass. All of those come somewhat as a package, and they have to be done in a certain sequence to have the investment make any sense. As you have probably guessed by this time, we're up into the half-billion range to accomplish that.

We are doing design work on the Mary Hill bypass. I believe the design work for the present choke at the underpass is virtually complete, and property acquisition is also advanced. I have pointed out, however, that solving that particular bottleneck will to some degree just move the bottleneck further down the road. That will resolve it at the underpass, but it will still exist at the point where traffic is trying to get onto 401.

[10:45]

Again, the constraint is not on the engineering side, the ideas side or the innovation side; the constraint is on the financial side. When we are able, perhaps through the wisdom of this government in creating the Transportation Financing Authority, to undertake this particular set of projects and do all the things that I have mentioned, then we will have resolved the traffic congestion problems around that area, while allowing a safe and efficient transportation system.

D. Symons: I remember the minister, besides the dollar figure and the construction of it, talking about other costs in time and energy: people's nerves, accidents, ICBC costs, the time that people are caught in traffic jams and the cost to business because of that. So there are costs other than the cost of construction involved, which all of us are paying every day. I know the minister is fully aware of that.

You just jumped my next question to the one after. You have answered my last question here, so this will become the last one in this set of questions. The minister mentioned the $500 million price tag for that area. I'm curious as to whether that includes the Pitt River crossing. You suggested tolls as a method of financing and fast-tracking this project, and this new bridge would link up with the Mary Hill bypass and therefore make the improvements in that area more urgent. When could residents look forward to seeing a tangible start on this new crossing of the Pitt River?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: We're going to be talking about real serious money pretty soon, because the Pitt River Bridge was not included in my previous list. By the time you count the road connections, we're probably talking about $200 million for that single crossing. It wouldn't make a great deal of sense to start this process by building the additional capacity there without having built the capacity into the system that it feeds into; that is to say, the previous list of projects.

Furthermore, all of this has to be looked at in the context of the ongoing Transport 2021 study. We will be reporting in the next few months. Whatever we do, we should strive as much as possible to fit within the framework established by Transport 2021 in prioritizing these projects. One of the central decisions that has not yet been made is where a new crossing of the Fraser occurs and how it might tie in to all of these projects.

[ Page 7227 ]

J. Dalton: I have two or three things that I would like to raise about the Lions Gate Bridge. I know this came up earlier in your estimates, but there are a couple of things that I spotted in the Buckland and Taylor report of March 30 that I think we should canvass for a moment.

On June 2, when the subject of the Lions Gate Bridge came up, you commented on the safety of the bridge. In essence, you said that you feel it's safe into the indefinite future. As I look at some of the statements in Buckland's report, I invite your reaction. For example, on page 17 of the report, dealing with the remaining safe life of the bridge, the estimate is that with annual inspections and maintenance and conservative ratings, we can ensure safe service until 1988. That's that infamous five-year time frame that we're all targeting. In the executive summary of the same report, the last sentence reads: "It is recommended that reconstruction or replacement of the Lions Gate Bridge be completed within the next five years." That flies a bit in the face of the minister's statement of June 2 on the safety of that bridge.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: As I have said in previous statements, the bridge is safe. It's secure. The major structures of the bridge are fine. The footings, the towers, the cables, the trusses and the downhangers are all fine. We have some progressive deterioration on elements of the roadbed, and although they too are structurally sound now, there will come a time when the wear and tear on those elements becomes problematic.

About five years out, in the best estimate of the consultant, we will have a choice to make. By that time we will have either finished the rehabilitation or replacement of the structure, or be faced with rapidly increasing maintenance needs, perhaps including unplanned closures to facilitate replacements of a piece of the deck -- and all of the tremendous congestion and dislocation of traffic patterns that unscheduled closures entail. It would lead to even more frequent closures of the bridge as time went by and it would simply be intolerable, not only from a cost point of view -- these patches become increasingly expensive -- but also from a service point of view. So the consultant has looked at that and said that we are going to see this dramatic upswing in cost, ongoing maintenance and inconvenience factors in about five years. Hence, we recommend this bridge be rehabilitated and that we start the planning and the design now to either replace or rehabilitate the bridge -- primarily the roadway -- in that period. So there's nothing inconsistent about the two statements. It is safe and secure into the indefinite future, but what it means is that these ever-escalating maintenance costs will occur on the one hand, or the replacement rehab on the other. I'm obviously opting for the latter.

J. Dalton: In the Buckland report, he estimates $1 to $2 million a year just to maintain the surface. I drive on that bridge regularly, going way back to when I was a mere youth. I know full well that the bridge certainly has deteriorated over the years, and I hope we're not getting into a position where we're throwing good money after bad to maintain the structure. But obviously everyone recognizes that the structure, or some replacement, must be maintained.

I would like to move into another component of this: the timing as to when we might expect the meaningful public consultation process that the minister announced May 7 in his release when the Buckland report came out. I don't know. I'm not an engineer, and the minister certainly can assist me, I am sure, in this regard. As the minister said again on June 2, it will take more than a year for the consultation process to run its course, and construction will not be starting for two or three years. Further on the minister states: "That leaves two and a half years where the construction...." Are these feasible time frames, even if we can get our act together and agree? I have some reservations as to what the public may want in a third crossing.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The public process, to some degree, has started already. I've addressed this issue with the GVRD, made public statements and I am involved in an extensive dialogue at the present time. There will be a consultation process, the details of which we should be able to announce shortly, which will entail working with people at the political level in the summer and then moving into public meetings in the fall. I anticipate that process would wrap up early in the new year. Depending on what that process has led us to.... If it is to rehabilitation, then detailed design work could probably be done in the following year leading to construction work in the year beyond that -- presuming that funds are available -- and easy completion of the project within five years. On the other hand, if the public process ends up at a point where the public preference is a tunnel, that puts it on a dramatically different time path. If the public process is the complete replacement of the bridge, it is probably somewhere in between.

In any event, we have to recognize that if things continue as they have been, and as the consultant predicts they will, about five years out the bridge that is there now -- more specifically, the roadway of that bridge -- is going to be increasingly expensive to maintain. Those would be possibly throwing away dollars that I don't think any of us would like to get into.... If the public process goes one way, it could be a project delivered in maybe four years. If it's another -- there has to be some work on the bridge -- the process of constructing either its replacement or some other means could be five or six years out. But the five-year line is a reasonable estimate.

J. Dalton: I do recognize that this five-year time frame perhaps is going to be a bit misleading, because people are going to get all excited and think the bridge is going to fall down in five years, or the pavement will become undriveable or whatever. Back in '76, when he first started looking at this bridge in a serious way, Buckland also suggested in one part of his report that perhaps only 10 years might be realistic. Well, we're now 22 years later and happily the bridge is still standing, so we haven't got into that predicament.

[ Page 7228 ]

One other thing on this and then I'll move into another topic, also on the North Shore. Does the minister see any role for private companies in the construction or refurbishing or whatever of the Lions Gate or alternative third crossing? Are there opportunities for private companies perhaps to get involved in the construction or investment aspects of this?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I'm just going back for a second to your comment that back in the seventies it seemed the life expectancy of the bridge was such-and-such, and that has been exceeded already. One thing that happened, keep in mind, is that heavy trucks were taken off the bridge, partly as a result of the studies that had been done up to that point. That was a very good decision, because the truck-loading on these deck panels was a severe problem. By removing that problem, we've alleviated the wear and tear on the bridge, and the road sections have lasted longer than had been anticipated.

[11:00]

I don't take a lot of comfort in that. I've looked at the report carefully. I know the structural status of some of those roadbed members. Although they're absolutely secure from a public safety point of view, we're going to get some increasing wear and tear at some point, increasing roughness, and then the need for a decision to be made -- perhaps with little time warning that the bridge has to be closed in order to effect certain repairs. We don't want that to happen. But, at the risk of repeating myself, I've got to emphasize that the bridge is structurally sound. In fact, should we have a bit of an earthquake the Lions Gate would fare very well -- better than a lot of other bridges -- due to the inherent flexibility of that design.

With respect to the second part of your question, yes, I'm contemplating all possibilities. Two or three firms have put in unsolicited proposals, saying: "Here is a way we see that we could possibly be involved in this." Design, build, operate, finance, design finance: a variety of options have been put forward. I welcome them; I welcome any others and would consider them. The possibility of using private capital, a pool, a pension fund and some kind of joint venture -- are all possible. Of course Bill 3, under the Transportation Financing Authority, establishes my authority to enter into joint ventures.

I think that however it is done, whatever route is chosen, the chances are that it's going to have to be user-pay when the bridge reopens. This would be a golden opportunity for the member opposite to stand up and say that he supports the user-pay philosophy and the notion of reasonable tolls in order that these important and vital projects can be carried out in a timely fashion.

J. Dalton: I'm amused by the minister's comments about tolls, not because his remarks are funny, but it does remind me of my initial experience as a driver on the Lions Gate Bridge; going to UBC, we had to line up every Monday morning and buy our tickets. I've experienced tolls firsthand, hon. minister. I'm not convinced that I want to go back to them, but I recognize your point. Obviously, there has to be some realistic method of payment, and if we get into private enterprise to construct a third crossing, naturally private enterprise has to be paid. That may be the route to go.

I want to move off the bridge, if we're able to. However, I might point out to the minister that sometimes the backups northbound on the Lions Gate Bridge are so bad, especially on Friday afternoons, that you literally cannot get off the bridge to get into north or west Vancouver. I would add that west Vancouver in particular has a very serious problem with the expansion of Park Royal and the new developments at the entrance to west Vancouver. I'm sure the minister has heard from the mayor and other people in that municipality, so I'll just make that observation. It is becoming a very serious situation, both safetywise and economically, because it is choking business enterprises and others in the west Vancouver area.

I would be remiss, before I step down from my questions, in not asking the minister about the possibilities for the Westview overpass. As the minister knows full well from our line of questioning in last year's estimates, the light at the Westview interchange on the Upper Levels Highway is becoming more and more.... It's not just an annoyance, and as a regular user of it, I get very annoyed. The people who regularly use the Westview interchange -- or lack of one, I guess I could say -- are concerned that there is a very serious safety problem, which is very inconvenient. On Friday afternoon -- again in my travels around the North Shore -- when I get off the Lions Gate Bridge, sometimes I have occasion to go along the Upper Levels Highway. The traffic is backed up there when you're heading westbound past the Lonsdale interchange. It's a quarter of a mile, if not more. That's a very serious traffic problem, because it's a downhill slope to the Westview light. I'm sure the last thing that people using the Upper Levels Highway expect to find is a traffic light at a major intersection, but there it is, as the minister knows.

To make a long story short, are there any prospects in the immediate -- I might even say distant -- future, given that Westview goes back to 1960, if not earlier, for the overpass to move into the construction stage? We've had discussions of design, and all the planning has been done. The acquisition of property is basically concluded. Can we assure the regular users of the Upper Levels Highway that Westview will go forward?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I'm going to have to bring in a calculator or perhaps a computer with a very large memory, so I can keep toting up the totals here. Westview is desirable; there's no doubt about it. As you know, it's the last intersection between Horseshoe Bay and Kamloops where we have a traffic light. It would be very nice to replace it with a proper interchange; it would be much safer. Every time dollars are spent on upgrading roads into limited-access highways, interchanges would save lives and a lot of ICBC claims. The lives and the injuries are the most important, but we'd save a lot of property claims as well.

[ Page 7229 ]

A four-lane divided limited-access highway is ten times safer than a secondary road in terms of accidents per vehicle-kilometre. It's a matter of costs again, of course. The preliminary design has been done, and the property for the most part is there. It would take about a year to get through the detailed design and about $35 million to build it. I support it as a project; I support everything that has come up today as projects. They are all vitally necessary for the congestion we have in our lower mainland infrastructure.

Again, I would make reference to the fact that the federal government has not been a player of any significance in this. The federal government takes out of British Columbia about half a billion dollars a year in fuel excise taxes, and only a small amount of money flows back into the province in various forms of transportation infrastructure or operating costs.

Here we have the Trans-Canada Highway with a crying need for an interchange as part of the national highways system, and yet we have not been able to move the federal government to adopt a national highways policy. All of the provincial and territorial jurisdictions have been in agreement. All the territories and provinces are willing to start putting their money on the table on a matching basis, but the federal government is not. The Minister of Transport told me directly just a month ago that he does not see the federal Treasury Board giving him any funds for this. I don't think that is correct. I think that in the broadest sense of user-pay, the users of our roads and of Westview intersection do pay through the excise tax with every litre of gas they put in their car.

It is the responsibility of the federal government to come to the table with money and to be prepared to put that money on the table as cost-sharing funds to be matched by the province on the agreed-to national highways system, which would include the Westview interchange. They should do so in a serious way. They should be willing to put on the table, in my view, $1 billion. Even if all of the provinces matched that on a yearly basis across the country, we would still probably not be catching up on our transportation needs. But between you and the Westview interchange? About $35 million.

P. Dueck: Hearing my colleagues spending all this money, I feel like a poor cousin coming to the table and begging for a few crumbs. Of the money that is spent here today, I want only a very small percentage. As a matter of fact, it is so small that I am sure that there will be no problem with you agreeing to my requests.

I brought this forward during the last estimates, and I suppose it was a different minister in place at that time. No, I think it was the same minister. I'm referring to the overpass or the interchange on the Mount Lehman Road and the highway. To clarify this a bit for the minister again -- since he has so many things on his plate, he may not remember little Matsqui out there -- as you come off the freeway and then get to Mount Lehman, turning either left or right is quite a hazardous situation because we have this bridge that hasn't got very good visibility. You can't see through it, and it is difficult because we have had some major developments since last year. The auto mall is now in operation, and it is still growing -- some dealerships have not yet moved -- so it is becoming a very important part of our municipality.

The municipal government -- the mayor and council members -- keep asking when. I know that not only have there been preliminary studies done, but also some drawings may already be completed. My question is: what is the status of that interchange at this time?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I am familiar with the road. I have pulled off there myself a couple of times and appreciate the hazard there. We are expending just short of $1 million this year in that area to improve the ramps. The complete replacement of that old interchange with a current-standards interchange is, again, probably in the $30 million range. I simply have not had the budget to do it.

[11:15]

We have been working with the mayor and council. There was quite a flurry of activity almost a year ago when a particular piece of property that we needed eventually for the interchange was on the market. The mayor was faced with the potential of it being developed commercially, and we would have had to turn around and buy out whatever was there. I'm pleased to say that that land was acquired, in cooperation with the municipality, so we pretty well have the land that is required. The preliminary design has been done, but there has been no detailed design work done. Again, pending the availability of funds, I imagine that it will be in the order of a year for detailed design and roughly $30 million for construction. It is not on a schedule right now, but I recognize it as a priority along the Trans-Canada corridor.

P. Dueck: I understand that $1 million will be spent for improvement of this interchange or the bridge. What kind of improvement? Where will you spend $1 million? How will it affect that particular bridge?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I provided a packet to all MLAs, and I think this information should be in your office. There is the reconstruction of the westbound off-ramp. There is construction of a retaining wall and the installation of some lighting. There is an initial project to upgrade roads to current safety standards occurring right near or at the Mount Lehman interchange. As I say, a total of just under $1 million is being expended in the vicinity of the interchange to improve safety.

P. Dueck: I have another question, to clarify that. I know that there have been some improvements, but from the statement you made earlier, I thought that there was something being done about the safety of that particular bridge. Is there anything being done to give better vision? That seems to be the big problem.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: The particular problem you are referring to occurs where the concrete guardwall interferes with vision as you try to get onto the road, particularly making a left turn onto Mount 

[ Page 7230 ]

Lehman Road, right? Other than having some lighting improved, that is not being addressed. That would require the replacement of the overpass itself and would be part of the $30 million overall project for replacing that interchange.

P. Dueck: I know the interchange is the thing that we are waiting for and it is necessary. It has been on the drawing board for years and has been asked for even during the time of the other government. But the bridge itself -- the concrete posts that go along that overpass -- are really, at the moment, the most dangerous part of that whole system. I go there quite often, and you've got to nose into traffic quite a distance before you know that there is anyone coming. If there is a car coming and it is going a bit too fast, you can't back up and let them get by. So that is a really dangerous point, and it's been discussed many times how that can be improved without doing the total interchange. If that could be done, it would be a tremendous advantage. By saying that, I don't mean to say that you can find some way of improving that and we can wait for the interchange, because I wouldn't want that to happen either. The mayor also tells me that he understands you will somehow reimburse the municipality for any expenditures on lands that have been prepurchased for the use of an interchange at a later date. Is that correct?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: It is my understanding that the municipality has already been reimbursed, but we can check into that for you. Perhaps the hon. member can clarify the situation in a letter, and I could respond in writing.

With respect to your fundamental concern about the hazard due to the poor visibility, I'll have somebody from the regional office go out and take a look specifically at the vision problem with respect to that concrete guard rail, to see whether or not a portion of that guard rail might be replaced with something else that would allow the driver on the off-ramp to have better visibility. I would not consider that to be sufficient reason to postpone the interchange any longer. The interchange will come along when we have the funds to do it, but in the meantime, if we can make some significant safety improvements at a reasonable cost, then I would support that. I could advise you after these two estimates as to what has been discovered in the field and what we might be able to do.

P. Dueck: I do appreciate that. Perhaps it wouldn't cost that much if the whole westerly section of the bridge -- all those cement posts and maybe the metal where you can look through -- could be taken out. That seems to be the problem at this time, because the auto malls have attracted much traffic and they are not even in full operation. So I can just imagine what it will be like when all the auto malls have been developed with all the dealerships moved to that location and the traffic coming in and out, big trucks hauling stuff in and out of the wider commercial area on the other side, and other developments occurring. It is a bad situation -- and I appreciate that it will be looked at again, at least temporarily. It also has a negative impact on the development of that whole area. First of all, the municipality is very reluctant to give people permission to develop. Secondly, the individual who wants to spend money is reluctant, because he knows getting on and off the freeway is a problem due to the traffic. So if anything can be done with that vision part, that would be tremendous.

I have one more question and it relates to the Abbotsford area and the widening of the road from the Sumas border crossing to Abbotsford. Last year we got into a bit of a discussion that perhaps it was good that all this traffic couldn't go to Sumas to shop and vice versa -- I think it was tongue in cheek. Anyway, that traffic is very heavy on that particular stretch of road. We've had indications that the green light was given and that the municipality apparently didn't cooperate -- didn't put up their share or whatever. What is the status of widening that particular highway at this time?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I'm really pleased to find that the auto mall out there is doing such a rip-roaring business. If there happens to be a Chev-Olds operation there, I hope it's doing very well as well.

With respect to the road down to Sumas, we did make some modifications to the intersection down by the border station. But the last information that I had indicated that the federal government had not put the revisions in the border customs station itself into effect yet. Further up the road there's a shopping centre we've been in discussion with with regard to access into and out of the shopping centre; this is closer to 401. But the basic problem I think you're asking, of four-laning the highway between 401 and the interchange, is going to have to wait until we have available funds.

The Chair: Hon, members, there is a division in the main House. We will recess this committee to accommodate the division in the main House. We'll be under direction to come back here after the division is taken.

Hon. A. Charbonneau: In view of the time that division might take, I was wondering if we should recess until after lunch.

The Chair: We could accommodate the motion to rise and report progress if someone were to move it.

P. Dueck: I have one more dumb question which....

Hon. A. Charbonneau: Oh, let's recess and come back.

The Committee recessed at 11:26 a.m.

The Committee resumed at 11:34 a.m.

P. Dueck: My questions were all answered. I've asked all the questions I was going to ask.

But I couldn't and won't resist answering to the remark the minister made that he was so delighted the auto malls were so successful. I want this on the record: 

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they were very successful until the tax came in. Now people just drive there to look, and say: "Not until the tax is eliminated."

W. Hurd: I just had a question about the policy -- I don't know whether it's a policy or a decision of the ministry -- to transfer responsibility for one secondary highway in Surrey to the municipality, forcing the municipality, one assumes, to pick up the costs of maintenance. I think we're referring to 120th or Scott Road. Can the minister advise whether any other roads in the municipality are going to be affected by this policy? Exactly what is being transferred in terms of maintenance on these secondary highways, not just within the Surrey municipality but in others around the province?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: An agreement was reached between Delta, Surrey and the ministry that if the ministry picked up the expense of a complete upgrading of Scott Road, it would then be turned over to the municipalities. Under normal circumstances that level of investment might not have been made by the ministry, because Scott Road does not serve as a significant inter-regional transportation link. But it was a transfer in the context of upgrade and then transfer. After an upgrade at 100 percent provincial expense, then transfer was agreed to by both Delta and Surrey.

W. Hurd: The minister will be aware that the municipality initially expressed some concern about the manner in which the road was transferred to its jurisdiction. Can the minister assure the committee that the municipality is completely satisfied with the terms by which the transfer has occurred; that in fact the municipality will not be forced to assume additional cost burdens that it previously might not have been aware of; and that the road will be returned to the municipality in a virtually intact state in terms of any significant additional costs in the next few years?

Hon. A. Charbonneau: I am told that in the late eighties an agreement was reached between the two municipalities, the provincial government and the ministry. The ministry lived up to its part of that arrangement by completing the upgrading of Scott Road. It's my understanding that some in Surrey then expressed misgivings about some elements of it, but it appears clear to me that when the agreement was reached, it was supported by both municipalities. The upgrading was done, and the road was turned over. Now the ongoing maintenance and operation of the road falls to the municipality, and it might well be that some are now dissatisfied that they are bearing that cost, but what they should recognize is that the benefit they got out of the agreement was a complete upgrading to four lanes of Scott Road.

I would move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.

Motion approved.

The Committee rose at 11:40 a.m.

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