1995 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 35th Parliament
HANSARD
The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.
The printed version remains the official version.
(Hansard)
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 1995
Afternoon Sitting (Part 2)
Volume 21, Number 17
[ Page 16361 ]
The House resumed at 6:35 p.m.
[The Speaker in the chair.]
Hon. G. Clark: In the House tonight, I call committee stage of Bill 51, continued debate. In Committee A, I call Committee of Supply for the purposes of concluding the estimates of the Ministry of Employment and Investment.
ADOPTION ACT
(continued)
The House in committee on Bill 51: D. Streifel in the chair.
On section 3 (continued).
V. Anderson: I think we need to take a few minutes on section 3 to flesh out the meaning of it, because it's such a crucial section to the rest of the bill. The validity of the rest of the bill comes from a number of things in this section. The child's safety and physical and emotional needs and level of development are fairly standard, and most people understand that. But you might say about the importance of continuity in the child's care.... One of the concerns we have is that for many children in foster care, for instance, there has been anything but continuity in their care. So many children are held in abeyance before adoption and are going through a lot of other concerns that it would be important to share the relationship between foster care, which is the guardianship of the government over children.... These are primarily the children who get held up, and there should be some discussion about how children in foster care might more quickly get into permanent care through this act than they would otherwise. I have another question as well.
Hon. J. MacPhail: The hon. member's point is very well taken. In the implementation of the new act we will also be putting in place a case management model that ensures the progress of a child -- a permanent ward; I hate that term but that's the term -- into the adoption process much more quickly, to avoid exactly what the hon. member aptly describes.
V. Anderson: I appreciate that. That's very crucial, and people need to see the breadth of the relationships here.
The other thing that I raised the other day in second reading and also talked privately to the minister about.... When we talk about the child's physical and emotional needs, one of the realities that I'm not sure the community at large is aware of.... So often we hear about a shortage of adoptive parents because there are very few adoptive children. In the sense of healthy, small infants, that's true, but I wonder if the minister would tell us.... It's my understanding that there is a large number of children with handicaps, disabilities and special needs out there. We need to understand the number of children for whom, at the present time, there are no adoption homes. I don't think that the community at large is aware that there are these children desperately in need of homes and no parents coming forward to provide them. I think we need to clarify what that particular need is in relationship to this act.
Hon. J. MacPhail: There are, sad to say, approximately 2,000 children who are in the permanent care of the ministry, the government. Of those, about 500 are under the age of 12. I don't want to suggest that each and every one of those.... Some of those children are in permanent foster homes or in the care of a relative, but many, many, many of those children are able to be adopted. They have a variety of special needs. There are many hundreds of children out there who are able to be adopted right now and are not.
V. Anderson: There are 2,000 children in permanent care at this point, and 500 of those are under the age of 12, so 1,500 are over the age of 12. Could you describe some of the special needs some of these children have? One of the reasons I raise this is that when we were going through an adoptive process ourselves, we discovered that there were some persons who felt very qualified to look after a person who had a mental handicap. On the other hand, there were persons who felt extremely qualified to look after a person who had a physical handicap, and others who felt well qualified to look after an older person. There were persons who would be willing, even, to take a family of two or three into their household if they knew that that need was there, and there are those who would take youngsters of, as they used to be called, mixed-race background for whom there were no homes available in their own culture -- or they may be a culture of one group, but their homes were not readily available, so it was more difficult to find them placements.
I think this is a good opportunity for us to understand that adoption is about a whole range of children -- up to 2,000 of them -- who do not have adoption placements at this point. It is those 2,000 that we are talking about as much as the 100 or 200 that may be adopted, which is what we usually think of. I think it is important that we highlight that group.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Let me say first that the hon. member has listed many of the categories. Unfortunately, those categories that you have outlined of children who are available to be adopted still exist: siblings, minorities as you say, children with physical health problems, children with behaviourial problems, children born addicted to drugs, FAS and FAE children. They are all wonderful human beings, capable of being loved and of loving, but they are still available for adoption. I hope -- and I believe -- that this new act will reinvigorate the entire adoption process so that there will be great hope for these children. We're bringing to light adoption as a viable way of looking after our children and really opening up the adoption process. I have great hope that the children now on the waiting list will be adopted.
[6:45]
V. Anderson: If it doesn't come back and revive the adoption process, I'll be after the hon. minister for her false promises. It's extremely important, as an adoptive parent, to know the joys and excitement of that opportunity.
Though it comes up later in the act, it's relevant to say here, when we're talking about the physical and emotional needs, to have the minister confirm -- as I understand we'll be discussing later -- that if parents adopt some of these children with special needs, and if they have medical needs which are going to cause extra financial hardship, the act is there to help provide some of the financial support for those parents if they come forward to respond in a caring way.
[ Page 16362 ]
Hon. J. MacPhail: That exact provision is under section 80.
J. Tyabji: Subsection 3(1)(e) talks about the effect of maintaining that relationship. Is it the implied effect on the child of maintaining that relationship, or is it the effect in general?
Hon. J. MacPhail: It reads, as it does on the face, "the effect on the child if there is delay...." But the entire clause has to be read in the context of the best interests of the child.
J. Tyabji: Someone might judge the best interests of the child as being the effect in general rather than just on the child, so that's reassuring.
What are the factors in security? Section 3(1)(d) talks about a secure place. What kinds of things are taken into account regarding security? Or will those be determined while drafting the regulations?
Hon. J. MacPhail: It's always.... The security is in the context of the specific needs of the child who is being adopted, but it's basically a safe, stable and consistent home.
J. Tyabji: Under section 3(2), we see again the differentiation of aboriginal versus non-aboriginal. Since subsection (1) of section 3, which is titled "Best interests of child," says "all relevant factors must be considered," and subsection (1)(f) says "the child's cultural, racial, linguistic and religious heritage," that seems to be covered. Yet subsection (2) of section 3 says: "If the child is an aboriginal child, the importance of preserving the child's cultural identity must be considered...." Why is it separate? Wouldn't that be covered under subsection (1) automatically?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Again, this is a replication of what exists in the Child, Family and Community Service Act, so I say with the greatest of respect that the debate that occurred last year applies here. This is in recognition of the reality that 30 percent of our children who are adopted -- or 30 percent of our children who are in care -- are of aboriginal descent or aboriginal heritage, and that there is a wealth of communities ready and willing to participate in planning for the future of their aboriginal children.
J. Tyabji: Just a quick follow-up. I do recognize that we had a lot of this debate last year when we were talking about protection of children, but now we're talking about placement and adoption. The last question I have on this is that subsection (2) talks about the importance of preserving the child's cultural identity. Last year we covered this to some extent, and I haven't reviewed Hansard to see if we asked this specific question. But we know that in subsection (1), when they're non-aboriginal children, we're talking about the child's heritage. In subsection (2) we're talking about the child's identity. In the definitions section we talk about aboriginal children as children who have one parent who may be of aboriginal ancestry and who considers himself or herself to be aboriginal; that's a very loose definition.
The cultural identity of the child could be something that the child has never encountered. That's one thing I'd like to ask: could the cultural identity be something that runs with the child's ancestry rather than the child's upbringing to that point, if the child is not a baby?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes.
J. Tyabji: In that case, how do we reconcile the continuity of care in subsection (1) and the continuity of care which could be in a non-aboriginal home with absolutely no aboriginal surroundings -- if it's a foster parent, for example, and the child is going to be adopted? Could there be a situation or is subsection (2) supposed to permit, for example, an aboriginal child in foster care with a non-aboriginal family being taken into a new context, which would be an aboriginal context because of that child's biological heritage?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The courts will use this whole section to determine the best interests of the child. Where cultural identity is a factor to be considered, the courts will put that as a factor to be considered. The continuity of care has to be read in the context of whatever is in the child's best interest for continuity of care. The court can also consider, where it is being asked to consider -- if one of the birth parents suggests it is important -- that the cultural identity be a factor as well.
R. Neufeld: I know there's been lots of discussion about "aboriginal child." I recall the studies that were done and the aboriginal community asking, in the main, that their children be returned to the communities for adoption or for foster homes. I fully agree with that, so I don't have a lot of questions about the aboriginal child.
But I do want to go to the cultural, racial and linguistic part in subsection 3(1)(f) regarding other races. We place an awful lot of importance on that, I understand, because the aboriginal community asked for that. What importance do we place on children of Chinese or Japanese descent or of other races? Are there homes available in the spectrum of homes that we have for those other races? Or are they maybe not being adopted out because there's not a home that they can go into?
Hon. J. MacPhail: One of the things I've learned about adoption is that there are cultural issues around children being put up for adoption. There's actually an entry issue around culture. The extended family in some cultures look after the child, and therefore they're not available for adoption.
However, where children of a specific cultural or racial background are available for adoption, part of the process is to consider a match wherever possible. If that's not possible, then I know that as part of the arrangements, courts often say that there should be a consideration for the adoptive parents to expose the child to his or her cultural background in some other way. I think it's safe to say that there are certain cultural backgrounds where children just aren't available for adoption; they just aren't there.
R. Neufeld: Will this section of the act hinder the ability to adopt children out when there may not be a home that their culture would fit into? I would hope that someone would have some authority to bypass this part -- the child's cultural and racial and linguistic heritage -- so that if there is an opportunity for a child.... I'm sure there are homes that specify -- in fact, I know there are -- that they would like to take in a child of a different race. I just hope that this would not be held so hard that it would disallow the opportunity for a child to be placed.
[ Page 16363 ]
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, you're quite right; it's not mandatory and it's not overruling. There would not be a hindrance to a child being adopted into a home that's not of his or her cultural background. All this is saying is that it's a consideration -- that's it.
V. Anderson: I would like to comment just briefly, first of all, on subsection (h), which is the effect on the child if there is a delay in making a decision. I know that in his study about children, Judge Gove indicated that a great deal of lasting harm had been done to children because so many processes were so slow in taking place -- reminding us that a day or a week in the life of a child is maybe a year in an adult's life. So I really appreciate that timeliness being there.
The other comment I'd like to make is regarding subsection (2), about an aboriginal child. I feel more strongly -- and the more I look at it, the more I'm concerned -- that the aboriginal people.... That's not a racial question, and I disagree with those who say it is. To me it's a history question. This is a group of people of many nationalities and ethnic backgrounds -- of many nations. We understand that the Scottish, the Irish and the English are of different ethnic backgrounds, but somehow we don't understand that the Iroquois, the Mohawk, the Cree and the Musqueam are of different ethnic backgrounds. They're not one group of people, and to group them as one is, to me, wrong.
It's one of the difficulties of using the term "aboriginal." It's a shorthand which is useful, but it is historical shorthand; it's not a racial or an ethnic shorthand.
I think we're acknowledging that there has been an inappropriate relationship created with the people of this early heritage. That is what is returning to people: that which is rightly theirs -- their heritage and their inheritance. I'd like to stress that I appreciate that this is not a racial discussion; it's a historical reality which the courts have said we must deal with, not racially but historically. I'd like to stress that and support it on that basis -- not on a racial or an ethnic background....
Aboriginal people don't consider themselves part of the multicultural community. That is terminology which is not appropriate as far as they are concerned. They stand in their own historical primary reality, and I think it's important that we consider it in that context and in that context only.
J. Tyabji: I don't want to get back into second reading debate, but given that there are people monitoring this debate, I'd like to put on the record that I obviously have strong disagreements with both the minister and the previous speaker on this issue. When we write legislation directed at someone's race and we differentiate in this way, it's racist. We have been racist toward the aboriginal people since we started to pass laws in this country, and they won't be equal until we start to treat them equally in all respects, in the eyes of the law.
Section 3 approved.
On section 4.
J. Tyabji: I note that usually, in drafting legislation, things are placed in a certain sequence, usually for emphasis. If that's not the case, maybe the minister could tell me. But here, where it says, "The following may place a child for adoption:..." the superintendent is listed first, then an adoption agency and then a birth parent or other guardian of the child. Is that because everything is now going to fall under the umbrella of the superintendent? Are we to read in there that it could be in any order of particular importance?
Hon. J. MacPhail: No, there is no ranking in this section.
Section 4 approved.
On section 5.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Hon. Chair, I would ask that we stand down section 5 until later in the debate.
The Chair: Would that be to stand down the vote, or the debate on it? The member for Vancouver-Langara.
[7:00]
V. Anderson: When we discussed this earlier, we had a suggested agreement that we deal with section 5, both the debate and the vote, at the same time that we deal with section 29, because it's the same issue. Let's not repeat it. We understand that division will be called, and therefore it can be done all at the same time.
I would support standing down both the debate and the vote on section 5, and dealing with that when we come to section 29, which is essentially the same.
The Chair: Section 5 is stood down.
On section 6.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I move the amendment to section 6, which is in the possession of the Clerk:
[SECTION 6, in the proposed section 6(1)
(a) by deleting paragraphs (b) and (c) and substituting the following:
(b) if the birth parent or other guardian requesting placement wishes to select the child's prospective adoptive parents, provide the birth parent or other guardian with information about prospective adoptive parents who have been approved on the basis of a homestudy completed in accordance with the regulations, , and
(b) by deleting paragraph (e) and substituting the following:
(e) give the prospective adoptive parents information about the medical and social history of the child's biological family, .]
On the amendment.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I just want to give a very quick explanation of it.
The amendment to section 6(1) first of all clarifies that the birth parent or other guardian requesting placement can choose the adoptive parents for their child if they desire to do so, and it clarifies that information regarding the home study and the child's biological family must be shared between the parties. It's not permissive; it's required.
In no way are we doing anything to limit anybody's rights here; we are just saying that in order for the process to be as fully informed, open and inclusive as possible, this information must be shared.
[ Page 16364 ]
V. Anderson: Just as a clarification, I am presuming that it balances out that the full information about the child being placed is provided to the adoptive parents in the same fashion that full information about the adoptive parents is provided to the child. I just want to make sure that that's working equally in both directions.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I think you meant to the birth parent. Yes, the information flows both ways.
J. Tyabji: Certainly the change to section 6(1)(e) is much better, obviously, because it makes it mandatory to give prospective adoptive parents information about medical and social history. But I am confused about the change to subsections (1)(b) and (1)(c). We are deleting subsection (1)(b), which says that the superintendent or an adoption agency must "complete, in accordance with the regulations, a homestudy of the prospective adoptive parents," and are putting in its place: "... if the birth parent or other guardian requesting placement wishes to select the...adoptive parents," provide them with information.... Would these parents who have been approved on the basis of a home study?
What I am concerned about is when we take out subsection (1)(b). If the intent of the amendment is to amalgamate (1)(b) and (1)(c), where does insistence on the completion of a home study come into play? Have we taken that out? It almost seems like we have now taken out the legal requirement for a home study. If not, could the minister point to where it is still in the bill?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Well, to clarify, the new subsection (1)(b) says: "...on the basis of a home study completed in accordance with...." So it's in there. But it's also in section 6(2): "The superintendent or an adoption agency may only place a child...who have been approved on the basis of a homestudy."
Interjection.
J. MacPhail: That is section 6(2).
J. Tyabji: I understand subsection (2) being there. It's just that prior to the deletion of section 6(b), which said very simply the superintendent must "complete, in accordance with the regulations, a homestudy of the prospective adoptive parents...."
Interjection.
J. Tyabji: No, I understand that. We have taken that out.
The amendment says "if the birth parent or other guardian requesting placement wishes to select the child's prospective...parents." If they wish to select, then the superintendent must provide them with information on these parents who have been approved on the basis of a home study. So there's an "if." If they don't want to select the parents, I'm assuming that there still has to be a home study completed in accordance with the regulations, because we make reference to it not only in this amendment but also in subsection (2). But we've just taken out the legislative requirements for a home study to be completed in accordance with the regulations. Now, if it's enough for it to be implied, then that's fine. But if it does have to be somewhere by legal requirement, then maybe we'd want to leave subsection (b) and just take out (c) and put that amendment into (c).
V. Anderson: I would like to support that discussion. It seems to me that if you simply replace (c) with the new one and leave (b) in, then you have clarified the issue and made it much clearer that the home study is a requirement -- (b) replacing (c) simply does that. If the minister is willing to move that amendment, I'm certain she would get support on doing that. Leave (b) in and replace only (c) with this amendment.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Let me try to give some assurance that what you're asking for is already there under two parts. One is that the language included in (b) is on the basis of a home study being completed. Don't forget we're talking about parents who have already been approved. Then subsection (2) of section 6 covers the fact that home studies have to be done generally and always.
J. Tyabji: Could the minister, then, tell me where we will find a home study completed in accordance with the regulations if the birth parent or other guardian giving the child up for adoption doesn't wish to select the prospective adoptive parents?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Section 6(2) requires that a home study be done for the placement of any child, and section 91(2)(f) talks about the regulations for home studies.
Amendment approved.
On section 6 as amended.
J. Tyabji: Just on sub-subsection (2)(f), where the superintendent has to "make sure that the child, (i) if sufficiently mature, has been counselled about the effects of adoption, and (ii) if 12 years of age or over, has been informed about the right to consent to the adoption," how is this going to be determined? Is this determined at the superintendent's discretion? Or are there going to be regulations which provide guidance to the superintendent?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The section around 12 years of age or older is under the old act as well, so there's no change there. But it will depend -- I know the hon. member is the mother of three children, and I speak as a mother here -- on the individual situation of the child, the determined maturity.
J. Tyabji: Is there going to be any expectation of psychological assessments? Will an actual clinical psychologist or family court counsellor determine whether the child is mature?
Hon. J. MacPhail: No.
J. Tyabji: Then I repeat one of my first questions: is it solely at the discretion of the superintendent?
Hon. J. MacPhail: No, it's not the sole interest. It could be the agency; it could be the adults around the child. The fact of the matter is that the court will be using that as a determination of the child's best interest, so it will have to be sought.
[ Page 16365 ]
V. Anderson: On section 6(2), we had a little bit of this discussion during the definitions. Here we are stressing that a home study is required for adoption. I think this is the key factor in this area. Could the minister expand on the nature of the home study here? There is very little understanding of the comprehensiveness of a home study. That was one of the concerns that was raised by certain private agencies -- that the kind of home study was not involved or was not there for international or interprovincial adoptions. I think we need some assurance that the whole new validity and strengthening of the home study is here.
In that regard, since we have been through the unfortunate circumstances of the Gove inquiry and discovered that we did not have qualified personnel in the field to deal with children, what are the upgrading qualifications? What is going to be done to qualify social workers in the field to do the new kind of home study which is required by this act? A different kind of home study, in effect, has been generally available in many adoptions.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, it's the reverse of the situation, and I'm pleased to report this. Ministry social workers now do the home studies and carry the expertise in that area. It's outside of the ministries that there will need to be an expansion of home study expertise. Again, as I suggested earlier, the purpose of the home study is to assist prospective adoptive parents in evaluating their abilities to meet the needs of a child by adoption and, then, also to gather information which will enable the birth parent, the ministry or the licensed agency to make placement decisions.
The regulation of home studies, of course, is to be determined in a broad public consultation process and also -- there is no question -- within the licensed agencies themselves. The agencies in the adoption community understand that they will have to become expert in the area of doing home studies. Many of them are already, but if they are not now, they will have to become expert.
V. Anderson: The other part of it that I think is not well understood, if you haven't been through the process yourself.... Many of the people who are interested in this act are people who have not been through the adoption process. I'm discovering that people who have not experienced the process have a different understanding of what is going on from that of people who have been through the process. It seems to me that we need to clarify that the home study is not only to indicate that these parents are qualified and able to adopt a child but that there is a match. In putting a child together with a particular parent, it's the needs of the child rather than the needs of the parent that are uppermost.
Let me give a simple illustration. In our own particular case, it was the understanding of those doing the casework for our daughter that her parents were musical in nature. So one of the things that they were looking for were parents who had a musical interest, because they felt that would give her the best opportunity to develop that musical nature. What I'm saying is that there are a variety of characteristics in the home study that, I think, are broader and on which we need to focus. There may be a dozen parents who are all approved for home study. They don't necessarily get the first child who comes along, because that child has to be matched with a home that meets the needs of the child. It's that need that is primary. It's not the needs of the parents; it's the need of the child to fit in. I think we need to stress that so that people really highlight the needs of the child in that regard.
Hon. J. MacPhail: There's nothing like personal experience to clarify legislation, and the hon. member is exactly right.
J. Tyabji: Under subsection (2), would a home study be where this act is captured by the Criminal Records Review Act that has just been passed? In that debate and in discussions with the minister, there was a reference that there would be criminal record checks on prospective parents.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes.
R. Neufeld: Further to that question, which I was going to ask further on in the act, I have a question on criminal records. Maybe I should know this, but how far do we define criminal activity before someone is not able to adopt? I believe that drunk driving, for instance, is a criminal offence. Would that record prohibit someone from being able to adopt a child?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The criminal-record check is an indicator for assessing the best interests of the child, and it's.... How can I say this?
R. Neufeld: You commit one crime and you're out.
[7:15]
Hon. J. MacPhail: No, I don't want to indicate that. I'm not addressing your specific example yet; I'm talking about the general parameters of the criminal-record check. It's to determine your ability to parent. I don't want to speculate on hypotheticals, but consistent abuse of alcohol that leads to a criminal offence may be a factor or it may not -- but it's a consideration. It's all in the context of the ability to parent.
Section 6 as amended approved.
On section 7.
J. Tyabji: When we look at section 7(1)(b), this is obviously where there is a philosophical difference, because we're dealing with aboriginal communities here. I note that it says that if the child "is not registered or not entitled to be registered as a member of an Indian band," then the superintendent has to make reasonable efforts to discuss the child's placement "with a designated representative of an aboriginal community that has been identified by (i) the child, if 12 years of age or over, or (ii) a birth parent of the child, if the child is under 12 years of age."
When we were dealing with the Child, Family and Community Service Amendment Act, 1995, we found that it could be a member of an aboriginal community who could have input with the minister. In this, it's fairly narrow. We're talking about either the child, if the child is over 12, or a birth parent, and I'm assuming that the birth parent may be the non-aboriginal birth parent of the child. I'm not clear on that,
[ Page 16366 ]
because we could have a birth parent of the child who is non-aboriginal, and I would assume that under this section, the parent would have to identify a designated representative to assist the minister in deciding which aboriginal community or which band would be relevant to this child's placement, when we go back to section 3, the child's best interests.
Could the minister clarify that? In the event of the child being under 12 and a birth parent not being a member of an aboriginal community, would it still be the birth parent assisting that representative? If the birth parent is not available for some reason, what would the process be in this section?
Hon. J. MacPhail: There are so many hypotheticals here. If there is no birth parent who is aboriginal to identify with an aboriginal community, it doesn't happen. I'm really unclear as to which hypothetical we're talking about here.
J. Tyabji: Maybe if I'm more specific.... The birth mother is non-aboriginal, the father is a full-blooded aboriginal, and the child is being placed for adoption. The father is not in the picture, and the mother is the one who is placing the child for adoption. What happens in that case?
Under sub-subsection (2)(b), I note that a birth parent can object to a discussion taking place with respect to designation, but I don't know what form that objection takes. I don't know if they would have to be aware of that section of this act first, or if they would just have to say: "I'm not interested." If they say they are not interested, does that cancel out the provisions under subsection (3)?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The parent has to say "I'm not interested" and this section doesn't come into play.
V. Anderson: One of the realities we have at the moment in relationship to aboriginal parents is the understanding of a moratorium, which is not referred to in this act. My assumption is that when this act is passed, that moratorium ceases, and this act in its proper form -- as it is written here -- will apply. I hope so, because I think that what is written here covers the bases. The moratorium, in effect, has deprived some children of the opportunity to be adopted in a timely manner. It has kept them on hold when there was no hope of adoption at that particular time. I want to clarify that once this bill is passed, the moratorium -- which is not in here -- does not have an override and is now done with. I hope that is true.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, and I'm sure the hon. member opposite knows that the moratorium was only in place as policy and for children who were wards of the state, in the care of the ministry. It didn't apply to private adoptions. What the new act does is say that no matter what agency or method the aboriginal child is being placed by, considerations around background, etc., have to be taken into account.
I want to clarify that we're not in a rush to change our policy around the moratorium for children who are wards, mainly because it's working okay; it's working in the best interests of the children. But we'll assess it as the new act unfolds. Certainly more and more aboriginal communities are saying: "Give us more ability to look after our children and be responsible for adopting our children." I note that that specific point was the issue of discussion between your leader and the First Nations Summit delegates.
The act doesn't actually.... There is no moratorium that is invoked by the act -- you're quite right -- and certainly the policy of the past is limited to children who are in the permanent care of the ministry. We are going to monitor that and keep a very close eye on it, to make sure that we're doing the right thing from the point of view of implementing the new act and ensuring the best interests of children of aboriginal background.
V. Anderson: I'm surprised at the answer. Because what it says is that regardless of what the act says, for children in the care of the ministry, they can override the act and create any policy they want. It's not a question of regulations; she's talking about policy. That wasn't in the old act, and I think they were acting improperly in doing it. It denies the timely fashion that we just discussed in a previous section: the effect on the child if there is delay in making a decision.
I've been made aware very recently of children who are being placed in long-term foster care and moved from place to place, because this policy of the moratorium was in place, which prevented them from receiving timely, continuous care and from having -- as this act provides -- the developing relationship in a family that would develop their heritage.
To have as a policy a moratorium as a policy that overrides the act is unconstitutional and improper, I think, and should be challenged in court. If you're going to say, "This is the act, but we have a policy that says we'll do something else," that is inappropriate. I think it's a shame to do that. I know all the reasons for putting it in place. But once the act is in place, it must stand on its own feet. You cannot have policies that contradict and override the act. The act is there: the children will be placed in a timely fashion, they will have continuity of care, their cultural background will be assured, and the contact will be there. There is no reason whatsoever for a moratorium. There hasn't been, except that it pushed the ministry to get on with what it should have been doing anyway. I agree that they should have been doing that, but to carry the moratorium, to deny the validity of a legal act that's being put forward and to say.... If that policy holds true with the rest of the act, you're saying: "Well, it doesn't really matter what we pass here; we'll have a policy to override it." I just don't think we can do that, so I object strongly.
Hon. J. MacPhail: The hon. member misunderstood what I was saying. In terms of this act and in combination with the Child, Family and Community Service Act, it is exactly what the hon. member espouses. That the ministry must now do under law what it should have been doing all along is exactly the case. In fact, it's working very well. Fewer children are coming into the system, because aboriginal communities are being informed, are participating in the process and are looking after their children. The aboriginal communities themselves say: "Keep on doing this with us, and eventually the problem will not even exist." You and I are not disagreeing. We are saying is that we should carry on doing exactly what we always should have done, which is, in the best interests of the child, to maintain their aboriginal heritage, etc. And that's exactly what we're doing. We will continue to do that until this is absolutely a non-issue, which I hope is very soon.
Section 7 approved.
On section 8.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I move the amendment to section 8 which is in possession of the Clerk.
[ Page 16367 ]
[SECTION 8, in the proposed section 8 (2) by deleting paragraphs (a), (c) and (e) and substituting the following:
(a) provide information about adoption and the alternatives to adoption to the birth parent or other guardian proposing to place the child,
(c) give the prospective adoptive parents information about the medical and social history of the child's biological family,
(e) give a copy of the pre-placement assessment to the prospective adoptive parents and to the birth parent or other guardian of the child, and .]
On the amendment.
J. Tyabji: Just a quick question. I note that the amendment has the effect of taking out the provision to give "to the birth parent or other guardian a written statement of alternatives in the prescribed form." Why was that taken out? Is that somewhere else, or is that just implied by the first part of that section?
Hon. J. MacPhail: This amendment is just to make this consistent with subsection 6(1), which we've already discussed. But it will still be in writing, and it could take many different forms.
Amendment approved.
On section 8 as amended.
R. Neufeld: A quick question to the minister about pre-placement assessment. The minister gave us a brief outline of a home study. Do you have something that you could give us that would outline what a pre-placement assessment is?
Hon. J. MacPhail: To reiterate, we're talking about a direct placement, where the birth parent places directly. It will be made of the prospective adoptive parents. It's a little less formal, but it will include a criminal and personal reference check. Because it's a direct placement it won't be quite as comprehensive as the home study, due to the nature of the direct placement and the time constraints.
R. Neufeld: I appreciate that. I realize what a direct placement is. So a pre-placement assessment is going to deal very narrowly with a criminal record search and that's about it. Is that what I understand?
Hon. J. MacPhail: It's like an initial glance at suitability, to make sure that that's in the best interests of the child. A fuller assessment is completed in preparation for the post-placement report that occurs before you go to court to finalize.
R. Neufeld: What authority does the superintendent have if, on a quick look, he or she does not feel comfortable with what he or she sees?
Hon. J. MacPhail: We would make that assessment available to the birth parent to assist her in deciding whether she wishes to proceed. Also, that kind of information will be included in the post-placement report, prior to.... It will be put into the court for the court's final determinations.
[7:30]
J. Tyabji: I have just a quick one on subsection (1). Perhaps this is my lack of familiarity with the process. This says: "As soon as possible before a direct placement, the prospective adoptive parents must notify the superintendent or an adoption agency...of their intent to receive a child in their home for adoption." Why wouldn't the superintendent already have known of this from the birth parent? Isn't that already covered by the act?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, that's just the point. If this act were not implemented, we wouldn't know about it. But it would be.... This is the first notification.
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: By the adoptive parents, yes.
J. Tyabji: Then, if one is a birth parent who is thinking about giving a child up for adoption, I assume that under this "Before a direct placement" section, if they didn't have prospective adoptive parents to deal with, they could come straight to the superintendent or adoptive agency. In which case, if they went to an adoption agency, at what point does the adoption agency notify the superintendent -- only when prospective parents have been found?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Okay, let me just try to clarify. This is where it's a direct placement. No agency is involved. I think the hon. member understands that. Therefore it's up to the adoptive parent to inform us. That's the first notification.
If a birth parent were going to the adoption agency, it's an inclusive.... We're not involved. The adoption agency takes care of everything. Then the adoption is completed in the courts.
Section 8 as amended approved.
Section 9 approved.
On section 10.
J. Tyabji: Section 10 -- yes, that's what I'd like to talk about.
Interjections.
The Chair: They're popping up so quickly here, the Chair is having a tough time.
J. Tyabji: To what extent will a birth fathers' registry be a continuation of something already in existence? Will there be more regulations if there's nothing in existence?
Interjection.
J. Tyabji: There's nothing in existence? I had never heard of it before. Is this the only section that actually creates a birth fathers' registry? Is there somewhere else in the bill that we can get to later on that will be much more specific? I couldn't find anything more specific than this section.
Hon. J. MacPhail: It does say it's "in accordance with the regulations," so it will be established under regulations. But if you've got questions, let's hear.
[ Page 16368 ]
J. Tyabji: It appears to me that this birth fathers' registry says: "A birth father may...register...to receive notice...." I'm assuming, then, that we've got a birth mother who has already communicated to the birth father that she is considering giving the child up for adoption. The birth father then can register on a birth fathers' registry to receive notice. The birth father would be contacted, in the case of a direct placement, at some point after the superintendent had been contacted by the prospective adoptive parents. Is that correct?
Hon. J. MacPhail: This registry, which is the first of its kind -- and it's great news for kids and actually great news for men, too -- is for all adoptions, regardless of how the child is going to be placed. If a man believes that he is the father of a child, he will be able to register his name with the ministry in order to receive notice of a proposed adoption of the child. That will give the birth father the opportunity to become involved in the planning very early in the process and therefore really reduce the risk of a custody application later in the placement process -- or perhaps after the placement, as well.
J. Tyabji: Going back to the last question that I had, in the previous section that we discussed, we talked about the adoptive parents in a direct placement. The prospective adoptive parents will notify the superintendent prior to a direct placement. So if you are a father who is on that registry, and if the birth mother or the prospective adoptive parents haven't communicated with you directly, I would assume that it would follow that your first notification of the prospective adoptive parents being all ready to receive your child would be after the superintendent finds out.
Hon. J. MacPhail: That may be. One of the requirements will be that the lawyer has to search the registry before placement.
J. Tyabji: Is this registry held in the office of the superintendent?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes.
J. Tyabji: The minister said yes. Okay. Why was there no provision for automatic registration? I just wonder why it wouldn't have come out in language that would say that with any prospective adoptee, a birth father would be registered wherever possible. The reason I ask that is that in the event of an adoption taking place and no birth father registering, are those records automatically covered in another section if the child comes back later for that information? If the mother might not be sure who the father is, at what point do we make reasonable efforts to ensure that when the child comes back for those records, there's something there about the birth father?
Hon. J. MacPhail: This has nothing to do with the birth registration; that's separate and apart. That's information that would be sought later. Really, I would be the last person to say that a father has to register or that a birth mother has to register the father. This is a voluntary process.
J. Tyabji: A last question on this, then. So the onus is placed on the birth father. This is not the birth registry; this is just about the father's legal rights and having a provision for notice of the father. Will there be any provision in the regulations for the birth mother having to provide some notice to the birth father ahead of time, or is that going to rest with the superintendent if the father happens to register on the birth registry? That's one. I guess the second part of that question would be: what happens if the birth father doesn't know that he has the right to register, so he doesn't register, and then later on he finds out that his child has been sent for adoption without his notice? Don't we end up with the same problems that we had before?
Hon. J. MacPhail: There are two ways for the father to access his rights. One is through this registry. It really is the obligation of the father to do this. I think it was the hon. member for Peace River North who said that he hopes that a lot participate in this. Or if the birth mother names the father, then that....
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: No, she names the father, and then that becomes the information of the superintendent, and the superintendent puts it on the birth registry, etc.
R. Neufeld: I do agree with the birth fathers' registry. I think it is a move in the right direction.
I don't like to deal with hypothetical questions, but some enter in here. It's not unknown that there are birth fathers who do not know that they are fathers; they find out later on in life and start a custody hearing. We hear of those things happening in the U.S. on a regular basis. It seems as though this has been widespread, and they've actually taken children back from adoptive parents because the birth father did not agree to the adoption. I'm just wondering.... Although it's a good idea, if we open up the door, it may cause us a few more problems in the end. Or will it be such a small problem that we can probably get by?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Let me start by saying that birth registry is there to prevent exactly those kinds of problems. It's very innovative, and it's good news to prevent exactly those kinds problems. Let me just say that once the adoption order is.... There are all sorts of avenues here, but once the adoption....
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: No, I know. But how can the state interfere in that? The state can't interfere in too many things, and certainly the state would be.... I wouldn't want the state to interfere to the extent that the birth father's name has to be registered, by any means. That would be the only way to prevent that, and we are not going to do that. Once the final adoption order is made, that's it.
R. Neufeld: Just following on a little bit with subsection (2), it says: "Notice to a person registered on the birth fathers' registry is properly given if it is sent, in accordance with the regulations, to the address recorded in the registry." Later on in the act -- section 17, for instance, if you just want to turn to sub-subsection (1)(b) -- we talk about reasonable efforts being made. I just wonder if an address recorded in the registry.... Maybe the birth father moves, doesn't leave a forwarding address, and it just comes back. Would the minister be amena-
[ Page 16369 ]
ble to putting in something about "reasonable," as we do in other parts of the act where we are talking about reasonably trying to do things? I'm not saying that we have to send out a private detective, but there should be some reasonable try.
Hon. J. MacPhail: The test is the test of reason within the context of the legal meaning of it. Really, I think this is probably hypothetical, because any father who is going to register on this registry.... It's the opportunity for us to advise him how to keep it current and how to participate fully. I actually think that, with the fathers who participate in this registry, we won't be facing that hypothetical situation.
R. Neufeld: I guess I'll get away from the hypothetical and go to the voters list. I used the most up-to-date voters list the province has to mail out questionnaires to people in my constituency. Out of 16,000 questionnaires that went out, 3,000 came back. This is what we are talking about in up-to-date.... That's what I'm trying to say: how easily it can happen. All I'm asking for is that "reasonable" be put in. We use "reasonable" in other areas of the bill, but here we are intent not to use it.
V. Anderson: A question that I think will come up from others here, and just to clarify the process.... The birth mother has decided to give the child up for adoption; the birth father has registered, so the notice of adoption is there. The birth father says: "Whoa, if she's going to give the child up for adoption, I want to be part of this." What's the process for the birth father who wants to contest the adoption against the birth mother at that point?
Hon. J. MacPhail: That's section 93 of the bill, and it outlines how the regulations will be established for providing notice and participation.
J. Tyabji: I think everyone agrees that section 10 is an excellent provision. I can't find.... I have some research somewhere, but I don't have it here. There was a case in Ireland -- the minister may be aware of it -- where a father was not notified before his child was put up for adoption, and he took the Irish government to court through the Hague and won. Not only was it a wrongful adoption, but he won compensation because the government had not notified him.
The member for Peace River North is talking about the fact that in section 10, the onus is on the father. The state could actually be assisting in the adoption or agreeing to an adoption of a child where one of the parents doesn't even know the child exists, and that may end up with a wrongful adoption. I guess we go back to the question: why wouldn't there be a little bit stronger provision -- maybe it will come in by regulation -- that at some point the superintendent has to be sure that the father knows the child exists. Otherwise, how will the father know to register?
Hon. J. MacPhail: I apologize if I sound short on this. This is groundbreaking. This section is to prevent those kinds of....
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: This is why these situations won't occur: because of this birth registry, for the very first time.... The obligation is on the birth parents to keep the registry current, just as when you move it is your obligation to get your licence changed. The obligation is on you to update the records, etc. This process will work in keeping the birth father informed. But if he doesn't know.... This is exactly what this is all about. It is for the father to take on his rights, as a parent, to participate through registering.
[7:45]
Section 10 approved.
On section 11.
J. Tyabji: Once again, we get back to the same question as before. If the minister sounds short, I can understand that she's frustrated, because she's making a provision -- finally -- for a birth fathers' registry, and she should be congratulated for that. We are saying that if the father doesn't know the child exists, he wouldn't know that he has that right.
Interjection.
The Chair: Through the Chair, hon. member -- all debate through the Chair.
J. Tyabji: If someone has rights that are enshrined in law, they should at least know if those rights are applicable. If I were a man and there might be a child out there that I may have fathered, I'd want to have some provision to know before the child is given up for adoption; I'd like to at least be notified. Then I would register and take whatever action is necessary. If I don't know the child is there, how will I know I have any rights? That's the only point we're raising.
Although this registry will prevent many of the cases the minister has referred to, in the case that I referred to in Ireland where a precedent was set in the Hague for a father to sue because he didn't know the child existed.... There are those precedents in international law that the government will be held liable for in not making those provisions the law.
Section 11 says: "...the court may dispense with notice of proposed adoption to a birth father if it is satisfied (a) that it is in the child's best interests to do so, or (b) that the circumstances justify dispensing with the notice." There's no reference here to a father who is registered on the birth registry. In this section are we to assume that unless it's in the best interests of the child not to do so, or the circumstances justify dispensing with the notice -- and I don't know what that means -- that the birth father named by the birth mother would be notified of a proposed adoption, even if he's not on the registry and that may be the first time he's aware that there is a child?
Hon. J. MacPhail: This subsection provides the ministry or an adoption agency representing the birth mother to apply to the court for an order dispensing with notice to the birth father. The action would be taken in circumstances such as sexual assault or where there is a history of abuse or violence, when providing notice of the proposed adoption to the birth father may be inappropriate or puts the birth mother at risk. It also provides for the ability to plan in a timely fashion for a child if a birth father cannot be located. It provides a balance of rights of birth fathers to be given notice of a proposed
[ Page 16370 ]
adoption so that they have the opportunity to assert their interests in planning for a child if they so desire, and the rights and interests of the birth mother to ensure that the best interests of her child are met and that her own safety and well-being is protected.
Section 11 approved.
On section 12.
V. Anderson: I just want to clarify.... One of the concerns we have is to make sure that the interests of the child are protected. When an adoption goes through the adoption system, we are assuming that all the legal things have been taken into account. If a child is adopted by a relative, are we assuming that it's the responsibility of the court to make sure that the interests of the child are protected by the court order rather than the system of the ministry?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes.
Section 12 approved.
On section 13.
J. Tyabji: Section 13(1)(c) says: "the father." Is that supposed to be the birth father? That's the first time I've seen it appear as "the father" instead of "the birth father." It says "the birth mother" just above that. If so, perhaps we would want to amend that just so it's consistent with the rest of the bill.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Section 13(2) in that same clause defines "father" further, so you can just....
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: The hon. member asks why I didn't put it into subsection (1). Well, it's broadening what a father could be. It's only specific to section 13. I think it goes quite a way towards taking care of the concerns expressed throughout this debate around the interests of the father. You see, it actually requires the consent of the father, rather than having paternity imposed upon him. It lists exactly what the definition of a father is. I mean, proving motherhood is straightforward; it's less so for fatherhood.
V. Anderson: I'm curious to know.... Perhaps it's covered some other place that I haven't been able to find, but if the birth mother and the birth father disagree -- one says yes and the other says no -- how is that resolved between the two of them? Which of the two would stand, or does it mean that the child cannot be adopted because they...? According to this, they both have to agree. Is there a clause someplace that overrides that?
Hon. J. MacPhail: There could possibly be two avenues: one is the course determining whether to dispense with consent of one or the other, or it's a custody battle.
R. Neufeld: Point of order. I noticed the minister wanted to tighten up the procedure and get moving with this. I would suggest that we need a quorum in the House, so I ask for a quorum to be called.
The bells were ordered to be rung.
The Chair: We can call the committee back to order; we have a quorum.
J. Tyabji: With respect to the definition of "father" in section 13, am I correct in thinking that there could be more than one person notified under this?
Hon. J. MacPhail: It could be possible.
J. Tyabji: Is it mandatory that someone will at least be named as a father under this section, or would it be possible to adopt a child without someone actually being listed as a father?
Hon. J. MacPhail: It is possible if the mom doesn't name someone or if there's no registry, yes.
Sections 13 and 14 approved.
On section 15.
J. Tyabji: I'm a little concerned about section 15, "Birth parents under 19 years of age," where it says: "A person under 19 years of age may give a legally valid consent to the adoption of a child." I'm not sure if that's new; I'm not sure how that correlates with other acts. I do know that in the Child, Family and Community Service Act, if I'm not mistaken, a person between the ages of 12 to 19 is still deemed to be someone who is in the care of the state, if they are in need of protection from their home environment. So given that there are other statutes that recognize that the ages of 12 to 19 are potentially still under the age of majority, why is section 15 in here? That's the first part of the question. The second is: why is there no provision for counselling or some method of expanding the circle, so that even though the person under 19 may make that decision, there may be somebody else who would be talking to her?
Hon. J. MacPhail: I will deal with the second question first. Counselling is a requirement of all adoptions, so that is taken care of.
This provision is more definitive than the provision in the current Adoption Act. It's consistent with the legislation in other Canadian jurisdictions and with section 16 of the Infants Act, which permits a mature minor to consent to health care. It reflects the current social reality as well.
J. Tyabji: Then that is unfortunate.
The question I was leading to is: if it turns out that the person who is under 19 is in the care of the state because they fall under the Child, Family and Community Service Act, to what extent would that person be able to keep the child, be counselled to give the child up for adoption, or have his or her legal guardians and parents -- who do not currently have care of the child, because the child is in the care of the state -- give some input into this decision?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Nothing changes, actually, if they are in the care of the state. They get the full range of counselling and the guidance of their guardians and support system. But just to make it clear: when a person is in the care of the state, the guardian is the...
[ Page 16371 ]
An Hon. Member: ...state.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yeah.
J. Tyabji: I just want to register on the record that I have a bit of a concern. If it turns out that a teenager has been troubled, runs away from home and ends up in the guardianship of the state, but she has parents who would really like to be involved with her upbringing -- maybe she ran away because she was pregnant.... She is in the care of the state; she's in that 12- to 19-year-old age group where she can be taken into care; there could be an investigation going on with her parents, or whatever -- which by statute is required by the Ministry of Social Services.... There should be some provision in here for the parents to have some formal role in addition to the counselling. She may not have direct contact with her parents, because she's in the care of the state, and she's still.... She could be 15 years old, and she could be making a decision that will affect her family -- including her parents, who would be the grandparents of the child -- for the rest of their collective lives.
Sections 15 to 18 inclusive approved.
On section 19.
L. Stephens: I have some questions around section 19(1). During the briefing with the minister's staff, we discussed the issue around this. I would like to know whether or not the minister anticipates making some changes to this section, specifically that the 30 days of a birth mother's revocation begin after she has signed the consent, as opposed to at the child's birth. It seems to me that this is a very difficult time, and 30 days from the time of birth to the consent ending really isn't long enough. Would the minister comment on whether or not she feels that that is something she might like to revisit at some time?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The hon. member made an excellent presentation during the earlier briefing that my staff provided. Let me assure her that we will monitor this very carefully in the context of her points. Certainly we'll look further into it. There may be an opportunity, as the act is implemented, for further modifications, but at this stage, no. Certainly it's something that we're going to monitor very carefully as we implement the act -- yes.
V. Anderson: I'm still debating whether to put an amendment in on this. We did discuss it but still haven't got a satisfactory answer to it. The mother cannot put her child up for adoption until the child is ten days old. Then there's 20 days beyond that to revoke that. But if a mother decides not to put her child up for adoption until the child is six weeks old, then there's nothing in the act that enables her to revoke that within 20 or 30 days.
So I would like to put in an amendment to that effect, which says: "(1) A birth mother may revoke her consent to adoption within 20 days from the time of consent...."
So if the mother decides after the child is two months old to put it up for adoption, then she has 20 days to revoke that consent. The present act says that after 30 days she cannot revoke the consent. It doesn't deal with the issue that we are trying.... So I'd like to move this amendment.
[8:00]
On the amendment.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Certainly I understand the point that you're trying to make here. There is provision under section 18 to revoke consent; that is already there. But also, just moving on to some other points that need to be considered.... Certainly we're not insensitive to the direction that the Liberal members are taking, but there are other issues to consider here as the act unfolds.
One is that moving a child over one month of age can have a serious negative impact on the child. The older the child is, the greater the impact on the child. Of course, I know everybody knows that. Both actions are contrary to the best interests of the child, as identified in terms of continuity and a secure place.
What happens to the child if the birth father or another person had custody prior to consent? Does the child return to the birth mother, who may or may not have a relationship with or experience in caring for the child?
Your point is well taken. We will factor it in and consider it, as we also have to answer all the other questions that may flow from that amendment.
Amendment negatived.
Sections 19 to 22 inclusive approved.
On section 23.
V. Anderson: On transferring care to the adoption agency, I would just like a little clarification. I understand that care is given when a child becomes in effect the guardian of the child. But are we suggesting here that in putting the child with an adoption agency, the child in effect comes under the care of the adoption agency as of guardian? How is that feasible, for an adoption agency to take that care in the same way that we think of the care that comes under the government? In some cases that would also involve trusteeship. I'm just curious about how all that works out.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, this provision is designed to facilitate the placement of a newborn directly with adoptive parents, although the birth mother is not able to give a valid consent, which would transfer guardianship, until the child is ten days old. It allows the care and custody of the newborn child to be transferred to the superintendent or the licensed adoption agency in that period following the birth of the child and before the mother can legally consent to adoption -- the ten-day period.
Infants are often ready for discharge from hospital soon after birth. In fact, in our Closer to Home policy, it's almost immediately after giving birth. Birth mothers who have firm plans to place their child for adoption and have chosen a family, may want to have the infant placed directly with the adoptive family so that bonding can take place as soon as possible. This section actually allows the placement to occur but still allows for the period of consent not to be limited in any way for the birth mom. If it's through the agency and not the superintendent, the agency must be able to provide care in order to be licensed.
[ Page 16372 ]
V. Anderson: Does that mean that the agency has the kind of insurance and coverage for liabilities and all the other items that we assume the government would have? What kind of standards...? Are agencies aware that they will need insurance and coverage for liabilities during this time of care?
Hon. J. MacPhail: All of this will be in regulations, and there's going to be a good consultation process that.... For instance, the Board of Registration for Social Workers has clear guidelines on this; there are other jurisdictions to which we can turn. But all of that will be part of the regulations and part of the licensing requirement as well.
Sections 23 to 26 inclusive approved.
On section 27.
V. Anderson: Under section 27(2) it says: "A person having care and custody of a child under this Act may consent to the child's participation in school, social or recreational activities." Under "social" are we including religious activities? Because it's important for that opportunity to be carried on for children who have a religious background. Or do we have to make an amendment in order to put that in? Freedom of religion is.... I just want to make sure that religious activities are included in that possibility.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Let me just take that from another point. Yes, that's included in the concept. What we're trying to deal with here is.... On a school trip, you need consent -- formal, legal consent -- in order to participate; the person has the right to give that consent. But certainly religious activity is not excluded.
V. Anderson: Thank you. I appreciate that, because I know of circumstances where that has been a problem. I think it's important to have it on the record.
Section 27 approved.
On section 28.
V. Anderson: In section 28, "Joint guardianship in direct placement adoptions...." Could you explain what this means so that we understand it clearly?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, the same principle applies here as the one we had previously in section 23. It's for the interim period, to ensure the continuing guardianship of the child until the adoption order is granted. It's the same principle of a period up until the order.
Section 28 approved.
V. Anderson: Maybe we can go back to section 5 and take it off the table, please.
The Chair: Would the pleasure of the committee be to debate sections 5 and 29 together and call separate votes, or are we doing the...?
Interjections.
The Chair: We'll vote separately on the sections; they can be debated together.
On sections 5 and 29.
R. Neufeld: I'd like the minister to explain 5(1) for me: "A child may be placed for adoption with one adult" -- I can quite well understand that -- "or 2 adults jointly." Would the minster please explain to me what that would encompass?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The new Adoption Act allows a single adult or any two adults jointly to apply to adopt a child. This will allow common-law and same-sex couples to apply to adopt a child. The provisions in the new act regarding eligibility to adopt are consistent with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which provides that everyone is equal before or under the law and has rights to equal protection and benefits of the law without discrimination. A recent Supreme Court of Canada decision found that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is prohibited under section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
It must be emphasized that this provision only affects an individual's eligibility to apply to adopt -- to put their name on a list. There are a number of checks and balances to ensure that a child is only adopted where the adoption will meet the best interests of the child as ultimately determined by the court. In second reading the premise was put forward that somehow the Charter of Rights and Freedoms exceeded the best interests of the child. This is simply not accurate. It is the courts that will determine the best interests of the child, which is paramount throughout the legislation.
All prospective adoptive adults with whom a child is placed by the superintendent or a licensed adoption agency are subject to an assessment through a detailed home study process before a child may be placed with them for adoption. The assessment includes an evaluation of the adoptive applicant's parental capabilities and a criminal record and personal reference check. In the case of a direct placement, a basic assessment of the prospective adoptive parents will be undertaken by the superintendent or a licensed adoption agency, including a criminal record and personal reference check. This information will be shared with the birth parents, with the consent of the prospective adoptive parents. Actually, we've amended that: the information will be shared with the birth parents -- period. In most cases, the birth parent will personally choose the prospective adoptive parents.
The provision will also allow the unmarried partner in a relationship to adopt the biological child of his or her partner, as in step-parent adoptions. It is likely that most adoptions by unmarried partners will be of this type. The court will only grant an adoption order if it is in the best interests of the child.
The new act spells out for the court exactly what best interests mean, including: the child's safety, the child's physical and emotional needs and level of development, the importance of continuity in the child's care, the importance to the child's development of having a positive relationship with a parent and a secure place as a member of the family, the quality of the relationship the child has with the birth parent or other individuals and the effect of maintaining that relationship, the child's cultural, racial, linguistic and religious heritage, the child's views, and the effect on the child if there is a delay in making a decision.
R. Neufeld: I have one more question for the minister. On same-sex adoptions, were there any professional polls of
[ Page 16373 ]
British Columbians taken by the government, other than the member for Comox Valley going around the province, who I will say performed very well and did a good job? Were there any professional polls taken around the province as to acceptance of same-sex adoptions?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The provincial government has done no polling regarding same-sex adoptions. Angus Reid-Southam News conducted a national poll from May 24, 1995, to May 30, 1995, which indicated that 42 percent of the 1,500 people surveyed said that same-sex couples should be allowed to adopt -- that was nationally. In B.C., opinion was equally split between approval and disapproval. The same Angus Reid-Southam News poll reported that B.C. residents approved of the Ontario court decision supporting gay adoption rights. The national adoption study prepared by Daly and Sobol recommended that the opportunity to adopt should be extended to single and unmarried individuals regardless of sexual orientation. The position of the Child Welfare League of America is that applicants for adoption should be selected to be parents on the basis of their capacity to understand, accept and meet the needs of a particular child in need of parents. Sexual preference should not be the criterion on which the suitability of an adoptive applicant is based. I understand that the hon. member has been provided with detailed study as recently as a month ago on this very issue.
Research up to this point is very consistent, and has generally found that children are not compromised in any way by having gay and lesbian parents instead of heterosexual parents. There is no evidence to suggest that gay men or lesbians are more likely to molest children than heterosexual men or women. In fact, the significant majority of sex crimes perpetrated by adults on children are by heterosexual men.
[8:15]
V. Anderson: I would assume that.... I'm thinking particularly of the 2,000 children we talked about earlier, who are looking for adoptive parents and for whom adoptive parents are not available at the moment within our own province, much less other places in Canada and around the world. The number is unlimited.
It's my understanding, and I want to clarify, that two heterosexual ladies would be able to apply to adopt and that two heterosexual men would be able to apply to adopt.
Interjection.
V. Anderson: Someone asks: "Why would they do that?" Because they have a concern that there are 2,000 children who do not have adoptive parents. They are willing to care for and devote themselves to children who have a physical, mental or medical need, and they have the time and the resources to do that.
I also understand there is no age limit regarding suitability, and there are some persons who may be in their middle years who would be prepared to adopt a youngster who is 15 years of age. This would enable them -- two heterosexual males or females -- to adopt. What I'm trying to get at is that this wording allows an availability of persons who are allowed to adopt that is far greater than what we have had in the past, and there's a significant need for these options.
So from that point of view, these older or handicapped children have the opportunity to go into family relationships. I'm convinced in my own mind that if this opportunity is available, these kinds of persons will come forward. I know that in the past, single heterosexual men and women have adopted children in exactly these kinds of circumstances.
One of the difficulties of doing it as a single person was the responsibility of being single and also of caring for them. At the present time, we have single mothers who are living together in order to share the care of their children. That can go on for five, ten, 15 or 20 years. I'm sure a number of those single parents who have children and are living together would, with the opportunity, adopt both sets of children and create a double-parent relationship with greater financial stability than they would have otherwise. So it seems to me the opportunities that are brought by this far outweigh any difficulties that we might see in some circumstances. I'm perfectly aware that adoption only takes place, in any case, after a home study has been made, a placement study has been made and the court has heard all of the relevant documents showing that this is in the best interests of the child.
I stand for this because of the expanded opportunities. I'm really concerned that those 2,000 children out there have opportunities for adoptive parents, adults who will support and care for them and give them legal viability and a loving home that is much more permanent than a foster home will ever give them. I am convinced that many foster parents who are now fostering children on a long-term basis would move very rapidly to apply for adoption. In fact, I know many that have already tried to do that, and there have been impediments in their way. So I think that this has a whole host of possibilities and should be affirmed in that regard.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, the hon. member's interpretation of this is exactly accurate; it is a section to celebrate. All sorts of opportunities will open up here for people to adopt. There would be every reason why two aunts would adopt an orphaned or abandoned niece -- absolutely. There would be all sorts of opportunities for grandparents, finally, to be able to adopt.
[L. Krog in the chair.]
I just want to clarify that there is an age limitation. You have to be an adult in order to adopt, but beyond that -- the age of majority is 19 -- the barriers to adoption have been removed. This is a celebratory time for the 2,000 children who are in our care, but it's also.... Any time a society can open up the available number of homes that are loving, caring, safe, secure and long-term is.... Who could object? Who could possibly object, with all of the safeguards in place in this act, and certainly with our strengthening of the act with the amendments we just made, where the birth parents will have all of the information available? It's mandatory to share the information, and the decisions will always be made in the best interests of the child by those who have the best interests of the child at heart.
K. Jones: Could the minister tell us...? I've heard her referring to these 2,000 children who are awaiting adoption. Most of them have great difficulties and for some reason are not acceptable under the normal adoption process that exists today. How many of these children would be adopted with
[ Page 16374 ]
these changes that this Adoption Act now presents? Just roughly how many does the minister feel would be taken up through this act, opening up the opportunity for these children to have homes? Really, how many of these new people, who are being added in to have the ability to adopt, would actually adopt one of these 2,000 young people?
Hon. J. MacPhail: That's a very prospective question. I can't possibly analyze it because, of course, they don't even have the ability to put their name on a list right now. But we can certainly keep track of that and monitor it very carefully as the new act is implemented.
K. Jones: My colleague says he figures that maybe a minimum of 10 percent, maybe 20 percent. What makes this a greater opportunity? Why would these new people be so different from the population that you're currently drawing from for adoption? Why would these people be looking for adoptive children who have disabilities any more than the rest of the current adoptive community?
Hon. J. MacPhail: As I say, you're asking me to predict. I'm sorry; I can't do that. But any time one widens the circle of people eligible to adopt, it's only in the best interests of the children.
K. Jones: Could the minister tell us: by widening the circle, how many new potential adoptive persons or parents are ultimately going to result from this?
Hon. J. MacPhail: I can't predict. We've removed all barriers to eligibility to adopt, but I can't predict what that would possibly mean. I do know that I have received overwhelming interest in the changes to this legislation, and many, many thanks as well.
K. Jones: Perhaps the minister would find it easier to just tell us how many persons currently -- before this legislation is brought in -- are available to become adoptive parents. How many people are potentially able to be qualified under this present legislation?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Well, right now you have to be a married couple or a single person. I could try to get the vital stats or the StatsCan stats on that for you. Then it would be everybody else that would be added to the list.
R. Neufeld: I have resisted to this point to put on the record what was in the previous act, and that was that an adult single person has always been able to adopt. "Power to adopt child," section 3(1), says: "An adult person, or an adult husband and his adult wife together, may apply to adopt a child under the provisions of this Act." Further, it's in policy that was taken forward by the ministry before this government came into place. When the minister says "only married couples," I'm sorry. Unless the information she sent me is incorrect.... She said only married couples could. I want to read it out: "Applicants for a child with special needs may be married, single or living together in a stable common-law" -- common-law -- "relationship as husband and wife...." That is for infants over two.
So this has been in place for a long time. When we talk about all of a sudden having.... It's unfortunate that we have 2,000 children in this province who are not adopted out, I agree. There are reasons for it. But for us to stand here and say that all of a sudden we are opening up the ability to have a good part or all of these children adopted out is wrong.
An Hon. Member: Misleading.
R. Neufeld: It's misleading. It's not correct.
We also must remember that 2,000 of those children, if we use the 30 percent figure that the minister gave us, are children in care who are aboriginal and whom there is a moratorium on.
So there's no doubt about it. I'm not going to dispute the fact that some may be adopted out. But to go on the premise that all of a sudden this is going to solve all the ills of the adoption world is pushing it just one step too far.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I just want to make a point here. The hon. member is interpreting policy incorrectly. It is true that in a common-law relationship one person could adopt in that common-law relationship. The child would be left adopted to one partner in the common-law relationship, as a single. So he is incorrect to say that the couple could adopt.
R. Neufeld: I guess that, all of a sudden, we're debating legislation policy that is in place. I did read into the record, and I'll read again.... This is for a child with special needs. A child with special needs is defined in policy. I read verbatim: "Applicants for a child with special needs may be married, single, or living together in a stable common-law relationship as husband and wife, and must...." That tells me that a common-law relationship, which all of us accept, is a male and a female -- a man and wife. That's in the record; that's in the policy now. I understand it quite well.
Hon. J. MacPhail: My goodness, you're stubborn in refusing to understand what actually goes on! Before the court order can be made, the couple must get married. Married couples are currently the only ones who can adopt -- jointly.
L. Fox: I just want to put on record.... The minister read out some statistics a few moments ago from a national poll to show that there is indeed a split, almost an even split, in terms of acceptability of same-sex couples adopting. For the record, and for the benefit of this Legislature, I want to share with the Legislature the statistics from my riding. While I personally have very strong feelings opposing same-sex-couple adoptions, I would feel obligated to represent my constituents if their wishes were different. But to a recent question of whether or not same-sex couples should have the opportunity to adopt children, over 800 people in my riding answered; 26 said yes, 689 said no, and 60 had no opinion. It is very clear that my riding opposes this particular section of the legislation, and I just want to put that on the record so there is some understanding as to why, when a vote is called, I will be voting against it.
[8:30]
Section 5 of Bill 51 approved on the following division:
[ Page 16375 ]
|
YEAS -- 37 | ||
|
Dosanjh |
Marzari |
Pement |
|
Edwards |
Zirnhelt |
Charbonneau |
|
O'Neill |
Perry |
B. Jones |
|
Giesbrecht |
Miller |
Gabelmann |
|
Clark |
MacPhail |
Barlee |
|
Sihota |
Evans |
Randall |
|
Conroy |
Doyle |
Janssen |
|
Lord |
Streifel |
Jackson |
|
Tyabji |
Stephens |
Farrell-Collins |
|
Reid |
Jarvis |
Anderson |
|
Symons |
Boone |
Hartley |
|
Lali |
Schreck |
Copping |
| Brewin | ||
|
NAYS -- 8 | ||
|
Mitchell |
Serwa |
Hanson |
|
Hurd |
K. Jones |
Fox |
|
Neufeld |
Chisholm | |
Section 29 of Bill 51 approved on the following division:
|
YEAS -- 37 | ||
|
Dosanjh |
Marzari |
Pement |
|
Edwards |
Zirnhelt |
Charbonneau |
|
O'Neill |
Perry |
B. Jones |
|
Giesbrecht |
Miller |
Gabelmann |
|
Clark |
MacPhail |
Barlee |
|
Sihota |
Evans |
Randall |
|
Conroy |
Doyle |
Janssen |
|
Lord |
Streifel |
Jackson |
|
Tyabji |
Stephens |
Farrell-Collins |
|
Reid |
Jarvis |
Anderson |
|
Symons |
Boone |
Hartley |
|
Lali |
Schreck |
Copping |
| Brewin | ||
|
NAYS -- 9 | ||
|
Dalton |
Hurd |
Hanson |
|
Serwa |
Mitchell |
Chisholm |
|
Neufeld |
Fox |
K. Jones |
On section 30.
J. Tyabji: Before we held those votes I had leave from the minister to raise a few things on section 29. I just want to speak very briefly to that. There are many people who are monitoring the debate, and I want to put on the record that although many comments have been made on section 5 and section 29, both represent dramatic improvements to the act. Here again we have, I think, an improvement that is better than the Family Relations Act -- we have the Attorney General here -- and I said that under section 3.
On this, I'd just like to put on the record that my comments on second reading stand with respect to section 29 and section 5. Provided the best interests of the child are paramount, these sections are excellent sections. I look forward to seeing how they are going to be implemented with respect to adoption.
Section 30 approved.
On section 31.
J. Tyabji: I'm sorry, hon. Chair. I thought we were finishing off discussion of section 29 before going to section 30. And I just have a quick question under section 30.
Interjection.
J. Tyabji: Yes, I seem to be running a section behind.
If the minister doesn't mind, I'll ask a quick question under section 30. Again, when we talked earlier tonight we were talking about....
The Chair: Hon. member, would you please take your seat. The Chair recognizes the member for Vancouver-Langara on a point of order.
V. Anderson: I haven't heard the discussion. I'm wondering if we could.... We go from the fact that we have no government members here to the fact that we have a noisy bunch, and it would be helpful if we could hear the discussion.
The Chair: Well, thank you, hon. member. I'm sure that all members will take heed of your words.
[8:45]
J. Tyabji: I guess that's the irony of calling a quorum earlier. They're all hanging around now making noise, especially the member for Mission-Kent.
Earlier we talked about the child's views and the discretion of the superintendent. Here again, will it be the discretion of the superintendent that will decide how the child's views will be represented if the child is between seven and 12?
Hon. J. MacPhail: A person will be assigned and authorized to seek the younger child's view in a fashion that is then recorded.
J. Tyabji: What qualifications will the person assigned to the child have? What kind of dialogue will they be developing? Will the person interviewing the child be a counsellor and be making recommendations?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, in fact that will probably be what will happen in the regulations. It will be after consultation, but it will be along those lines.
J. Tyabji: Obviously the next year of discussions on the regulations is going to have a lot of impact on this section. In addition to that, it says that a written report must be made. Would this written report then be given to the superintendent for determination of the best interests of the child, or is it sent to court?
Interjection.
J. Tyabji: The minister is saying "to court."
On section 31.
V. Anderson: In these areas when we're talking about the children, I'm sure somebody is going to ask the question: if
[ Page 16376 ]
there is a feeling the children's interests aren't being listened to, is this a place where the child advocate can come in, if invited, to speak on behalf of a child?
Hon. J. MacPhail: So far, the child advocate does not have responsibility for the Adoption Act, but I fully expect that to occur. I don't want to predict the will of the Legislature; but if that does occur that would be exactly the case.
Sections 31 to 35 inclusive approved.
On section 36.
J. Tyabji: When we're talking about changing the name of the child, wouldn't it automatically be one of the provisions under the adoption order that there would be a change of name? Or is this being given for children who are older, and that's why it's in here? If so, the child's consent has to be achieved before the courts. Is the child testifying, or is someone providing evidence on behalf of the child?
Hon. J. MacPhail: I want to clarify that. Sometimes we face situations where an older child has attempted to change their first name as well. It's to protect against something being imposed on the child against their will in that kind of situation. But it will be consent, and the court will determine.... There are various methods of giving consent -- the child can appear, write a statement or whatever. But consent has to be proven in the courts.
Section 36 approved.
On section 37.
V. Anderson: Under subsection 37(6), perhaps the minister might elaborate so that it's clear: "An adoption order does not affect an interest in property or a right of the adopted child that vested in the child before the date of that adoption order." Most of this indicates that what happened previously is no longer relevant, because you're in a new family and a new situation. But there is an exception here which makes it different, and I think that should be clarified so we understand what it is.
Hon. J. MacPhail: This is just to protect.... If a child has a trust or something vested in him or her in terms of real property or whatever, that interest continues; that remains unchanged by the adoption.
J. Tyabji: Could the minister clarify subsection (4), which talks about the laws relating to incest and the prohibited degrees of marriage? I'm not familiar with that language.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I'm actually just repeating what I was just told: there are degrees of consanguinity in which you're not allowed to marry, like family relationships. You're not allowed to marry your brother, for instance. It's against the law.
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: That's right. That relationship, that effect, continues after adoption as well.
J. Tyabji: I'm still not clear on this. When they talk about the laws relating to incest and the prohibited degrees of marriage, are they saying that once the adoption is completed, all of those laws will now apply to this family unit as if it's a family unit? So you couldn't have an adopted child marrying a sibling who has become a sibling through adoption. Is that what we're talking about? Or are we talking about people who should never pass a home study anyway? I'm just assuming.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Sorry, you had a right to not understand. There are laws relating to incest and prohibited degrees of marriage which are on blood relations and, therefore, prohibition of mixing blood relations in marriage. What this says is that those laws don't apply if there's an adoptive relationship, but they would apply if there's a biological relationship but they're not listed as your brother or whatever.
Section 37 approved.
On section 38.
J. Tyabji: What comes to mind under section 38, I guess, is that we have a case with Ms. Amandah Sinclaire. In that case we have a child in the care of Social Services who actually has an access agreement that the grandmother carries. The foster parents may make an application to adopt that child. I don't see any provision in here that would say that an access agreement with an existing relative would have to stand or be taken into consideration. In this, it seems like it's pure discretion. In fact, if anything, it says that those access agreements would terminate if adoption takes place. The reason I'm standing up on this is that in the Child, Family and Community Service Act there was an attempt to ensure that....
Hon. J. MacPhail: It's just a point of order, hon. member. A person has been named, and therefore I will not comment under the laws of confidentiality.
J. Tyabji: I understand, actually, because that person may not be within the responsibilities of the ministry, but other people are. Okay, fair enough. Maybe I'll just ask a general question, then. In the child, family and community services debates we had last year, the minister went out of her way to ensure that any relative of a child in question.... Whether that child was in the care of the state or -- in this case, I would assume -- up for adoption, that relative's continued relationship with the child was one of the things that was under consideration. What I don't see in here is any recognition that an existing access order could be with someone other than the parents who are signing the child away. Okay, so it could be someone else. A good example would be if the state is the one that has guardianship of a child; then the state has a legal right to put that child up for adoption. But there are also relatives. In any of those cases, whether it's the state or someone else, whether through regulation or through this act, would the government's first inclination be to recognize the rights of the blood relatives of that child who do not have rights in giving the child up for adoption?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, in general what you outlined is possible. Let me just give you an example. In a situation where a biological grandparent wants to continue to have relationship access, this is what that exact provision is for.
J. Tyabji: Perhaps the minister could give me some policy direction, then. Would the policy of Social Services for the
[ Page 16377 ]
purposes of adoption be consistent in this act with that of the Child, Family and Community Service Act, which is to encourage blood relatives?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, clearly.
Sections 38 to 40 inclusive approved.
On section 41.
J. Tyabji: I was just wondering why there's a provision for privacy under section 41. If this goes before the courts, then usually court applications are in the public domain. Here there's a provision for privacy for a hearing with respect to adoption. Is this a court hearing, or is this a hearing before the superintendent?
Hon. J. MacPhail: It's a court hearing. It's just an option that could be made available to the court.
Sections 41 and 42 approved.
On section 43.
J. Tyabji: Just quickly on section 43, how does this correlate to what we will get to -- which will probably be a little more lengthy -- and that's the disclosure provisions of sections 61 on? I see that there's a provision.... "Confidentiality of court files." Are these files going to be any of the files referred to later on?
Hon. J. MacPhail: May I offer this? There's a distinction between court files and vital statistics files, which are dealt with later on.
Sections 43 to 46 inclusive approved.
On section 47.
V. Anderson: This has to deal with adoptions outside British Columbia. It would be very useful if the minister would explain the process involved here. What is the effect of this on adoptions that take place outside British Columbia? Why would those adoptions, which take place and are confirmed outside the province, be listed in this particular act?
Hon. J. MacPhail: This is not dissimilar to the existing act. This says that all the tests that have to be met in British Columbia have to apply to adoptions done outside British Columbia as well.
V. Anderson: I'm not quite sure I understood what the minister said. If a couple were able to adopt in Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario or whatever, and if the adoption were finalized, then what is the reason for this being in here? My assumption would be that if it were finalized and legal in one of the other provinces of Canada, it would simply be accepted when you come into B.C. There wouldn't be any looking over the shoulder and saying that it's not acceptable.
[J. Doyle in the chair.]
Hon. J. MacPhail: You're right; this is a reciprocal agreement on laws if the laws are substantially the same. The flip side is that if the laws aren't the same, if they are shadier or much less based in the best interests of the child, then they don't apply. That's basically it. The exchange only applies where the laws meet the same test.
[9:00]
V. Anderson: That leaves it very uncertain. I could see where this might be true for jurisdictions outside Canada, where there's a wide variation. I'm not sure why this is true within Canada when we have been saying that we're all equal Canadians and we apply under Canadian laws. It seems to me that you're setting up a jurisdiction in British Columbia which overrides other provinces' jurisdictions. What I hear here is that if someone is living in Saskatchewan, and they adopt....
Interjection.
V. Anderson: That's what I want to clarify. If they adopt and move into British Columbia, from what you said earlier, someone could say: "Sorry, the Saskatchewan regulations aren't good enough; that adoption won't be recognized here." We have some cases already where this is happening with international adoptions, so I just want a little clarity on that.
Hon. J. MacPhail: As the hon. member knows, adoption law is provincial law. This provision is actually a carryover from the act under which we operate right now. All it's saying is.... And you're quite right: in other jurisdictions of Canada this is not an issue at all. It's just saying that the effect of a provincial law from another province has an equal effect in British Columbia. That's all this is saying.
V. Anderson: I can't help but comment that when we say that it is already in the existing law, that's not a very good argument, because it's the existing laws that we're rewriting and that we should change. There are a lot of other things in the existing laws that we're changing, so I think it still can be questioned.
Section 47 approved.
On section 48.
V. Anderson: We're talking here about the scope of the Hague convention, and we shouldn't pass this without highlighting the implications of that. The minister might explain the implications that are new in the act. Prior to this, the Hague convention wasn't in effect, and the province wasn't involved in adoptions outside the country. So there's a whole new process, and I presume that new services will be established for this. I'm asking the minister what services and processes are established to deal with the Canadian office of international adoptions, and what connections are being established with overseas areas where it is possible to have adoptions from these other places.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, this does not deal with the Hague convention. Sections 51 through 57 deal with the Hague convention, so maybe we could wait until then.
Section 48 approved.
On section 49.
[ Page 16378 ]
V. Anderson: On sections 48 and 49, before a child who is not resident of the province can be brought into the province for adoption, the parents must obtain the approval of the superintendent of an adoption agency. So, in effect, the question that I raised earlier does apply. You cannot go outside the Hague convention without getting approval.
As I understand it, the minister is saying that residents of British Columbia who want to adopt from outside the province have first to get permission from the superintendent or an adoption agent in B.C. So 48(1) -- I think this is very crucial -- if I understand it correctly, says that a resident of British Columbia cannot adopt.... If you want to adopt, the only thing you can do, if you don't agree with the superintendent, is move outside the province. I want to clarify how rigid this is and the implications of it -- in 48(1). I think it's very crucial that we understand it.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Well, maybe I can deal with the whole range of sections 48 through 57, which deal first with non-Hague convention countries, then the Hague-convention countries. What this requires is that... Sections 48 and 49 deal with provinces or countries that haven't signed onto the Hague convention, but they do mirror the requirements of the Hague convention. So my words will apply to your question and about sections 50 through 57 -- the Hague-convention countries -- as well.
The intent is that in all cases the best interests of the child are served and that all parties to the adoption are provided with the basic protection, even if the child's state of origin has not ratified the convention. It requires that a person bringing a child into the province for adoption is subject to essentially the same basic examination as if the adoption were arranged entirely within the province, in order to ensure that common standards are applied to all adoptions in the province. So the requirements for the best interests of the child and the placement process have to be followed for Hague-convention-country adoptions, non-Hague-convention-country adoptions and adoptions of children brought to the province from other parts of Canada.
Sections 48 to 50 inclusive approved.
On section 51.
J. Tyabji: On section 51, what definition will we be using for an "adult adoptee"? Generally speaking, when we're talking about adoption law, when we talk about the child we're including the child when the child has grown up, if the child was adopted while under the age of majority. Now, in this bill, I note that in the definition section we've said specifically that a child is someone under the age of 19. But some of the jurisprudence in other jurisdictions shows that a child has rights that would in this bill accrue to a child but in other sections accrue to adult adoptees -- who, of course, were adopted when they were children. So, first of all, is there a definition that this minister will be using -- especially when we start to deal with the international conventions -- for those adult adoptees? What are we calling them in this section?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The definition is as it is on the face of it. An adult is an adult, and an adult adoptee is an adult adoptee who is no longer a child, and that's when they turn 19.
J. Tyabji: Did the minister, then, canvass that under this section? In international conventions, when they talk about the child's best interest, they are often speaking of people who are adults but they are talking about their interests as adopted children. The reason I'm asking this under this section is that when we get into the disclosure section, I'm going to have to know what the minister has read into the international convention on that definition.
Hon. J. MacPhail: It's too hard to talk in generalities of conventions, so you'll have to name a convention specifically, please.
J. Tyabji: I'd like to read into the record something that I'm sure all of us have on the national adoption study, which has been provided to us by Parent Finders of Canada. It says:
"United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child article 7 and 8 state that, 'Every child has a right to his or her birth name and knowledge of who his or her parents are. If a child is deprived of his name, identity and family relations, signatory states have the responsibility to re-establish the same'."
Now, when we're talking about them.... The jurisprudence in the international arena is using that to say that a child.... We're talking about the person at the time the person was adopted, who was under the age of majority. Those rights will apply even if the person makes the application when the person is over the age of majority.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I think this discussion is appropriate under the disclosure sections.
V. Anderson: Section 51(1) says: "The provisions of the Convention have the force of law in British Columbia as soon as the Convention comes into force in British Columbia." Can the minister indicate when the convention is to come into force in British Columbia? If we're being guided by that, why isn't it being brought into force now rather than a year from now, which would be the next opportunity to do it?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Canada signed the convention, but it can't come into effect in British Columbia until Canada takes the further step of ratifying the convention. The federal government has to do that.
V. Anderson: Is the minister saying that British Columbia has taken the step to ratify it for British Columbia? Is it only waiting for the final ratification because the provinces have ratified it? Has British Columbia taken its ratification and must it do so?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The process is that the province has to bring their legislation in line with the convention -- and that's what we're doing here -- which then enables the federal government to add to its ability to ratify it.
V. Anderson: I think I'd also highlight section 51(3): "If the law of British Columbia conflicts with the Convention, the Convention prevails." I think that's very significant. Does that mean that you will make copies of the convention available to all persons who are interested in international adoption? Will copies of the convention be made as readily available as the
[ Page 16379 ]
Adoption Act is, because many people -- about half of our people -- are involved in international adoptions and others would like to be. I think it is important that the ministry make these available.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, a copy of the convention will be attached to the act.
H. Lali: I request leave to make an introduction.
Leave granted.
H. Lali: I'd like to introduce three people in the House. First of all, I'd like to introduce a friend of mine, Tawney Sather. She is the fiancee of Mike Geoghegan, who is the ministerial assistant to the Minister of Small Business, Tourism and Culture. Joining Tawney are her parents, Ron and Janet Sather. Would the House please make them welcome.
Section 51 approved.
On section 52.
V. Anderson: Could the minister explain the implication of: "The superintendent is the Central Authority for British Columbia for the purpose of the Convention"? Does that mean that private non-profit societies would also be working through the superintendent for international adoptions and that this would be the one channel for international adoptions?
[9:15]
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, you're correct.
Section 52 approved.
On section 53.
V. Anderson: What is the meaning of a "body accredited in a contracting state" that "may act in British Columbia"? Under this section, what kind of body may act in British Columbia?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The equivalent of the authority of the superintendent that exists in British Columbia would be allowed to come in from another country or another jurisdiction.
Sections 53 and 54 approved.
On section 55.
V. Anderson: Could you explain what is meant by the conversion of an adoption? I think that this conversion you are talking about is important.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Some jurisdictions allow birth parents to consent to a simple adoption. These adoptions differ from B.C. adoptions in that the child's birth parents do not relinquish all of their parental rights. The conversion of a simple adoption requires that at the time the birth parents signed the consents to the adoption they were aware that all their parental rights could be legally terminated in the country where the child and the adoptive family would be living.
Sections 55 to 62 inclusive approved.
On section 63.
J. Tyabji: Is it the intent of section 63 to ensure that an adopted person who is 19 or over will be able to have access to information relating to that person's adoption?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes.
J. Tyabji: What will be the limitations around an adult adoptee obtaining that information, if any?
Hon. J. MacPhail: The limitations will be that if one of the birth parents.... If the adoption has taken place under the act in existence now or under a previous act and a disclosure veto is registered by one of the birth parents, there is a limitation on the identifying information that could be disclosed.
J. Tyabji: I had trouble hearing the minister. She referred to a previous act. One question I'm asking under this section is: is this only for people who originally came under this act, or is anyone in this province over the age of 19 who was adopted going to have access to information? Clearly, the disclosure vetoes didn't exist before.
Hon. J. MacPhail: This section applies to this act and all previous acts as well.
D. Mitchell: Just a further question on section 63 so I understand it. I've had some concern expressed to me about this section and about whether or not it may create -- and I'm not sure if this is the case -- two classes of adoptees: those who.... Under section 63(2) we create a section where disclosure to adopted persons 19 or over is allowed, but under section 63(2)(a), a disclosure veto has to be filed pursuant to section 65. I think that with these next few sections which deal with disclosure and the openness of the bill -- which I think is commendable and which I support -- there is a concern expressed as to whether or not we're creating two classes of citizens under this legislation: those 19 and over where disclosure must be permitted, and those under 19 -- a child under 19. Maybe the minister could just explain this for my benefit.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I understand the point you are making, but it has nothing to do with the age of the.... It's not over 19 or under 19; it's the act under.... I think you're getting at the point that children who are adopted when this act is passed may have different rights or different access to information than adult adoptees who were adopted under the current act or under previous acts. I think that's what you're getting at. Is that what you're getting at?
Interjection.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Well, there certainly is under.... Children who will be adopted when this act is implemented have
[ Page 16380 ]
access to their birth information. Adoptees who were adopted under the current legislation or previous legislation have access to that information unless a birth parent issues a disclosure veto. It's that fine balancing act. I know that the hon. member was arguing the case of the privacy commissioner in second reading, and it's that very fine balance of protecting the interests of everybody in the adoption circle. While I may have my personal views on the right of the child to know her birth information -- and I wholeheartedly support that -- the fact is that we also heard from birth moms who had very particular concerns around their issues and about the circumstances of their lives at the time when they gave birth and gave their children up, and around their wishes to have certain information not come to light.
So, it's that balancing. Believe you me, it's one of the issues that we struggled long and hard with in terms of how to balance those rights. I know that some may feel that yes, there are two classes; I would only say that if there's that feeling of two classes, it was society imposing a particular point of view -- very harshly, I think -- on birth moms 20, 30, 40 or 50 years ago that we just can't repeat in this new legislation. So I'm hopeful that the experience of the adoption reunion registry that has now been in existence for three years and has been proven to be a very positive experience will give guidance to all parties to the adoption, and guide them in the way that they should deal with the disclosure information.
But at the end of the day, we felt it incumbent upon us to ensure that if the birth mom wished to have the contract she made at the time of adoption continue, then she should have the right to do so.
D. Mitchell: I appreciate the minister's answer on this, because I think that what we're doing with this section, and with this whole portion of the bill, is moving from a closed system to an open system, and we're taking the secrecy and the shame out of adoption. That's positive, and that's one of the really very positive features of this bill.
The minister referred to some concerns that were raised by the privacy commissioner which I tried to reflect in second reading debate. I should say that when I referred to the fact that almost 50,000 women in this province have decided in the past to put up children for adoption, and that some information indicated that perhaps only a small percentage of those have sought reunion, I was mistaken. In fact, it has been pointed out to me since I made that speech, by a very diligent organization called Parent Finders of Canada, that the Canadian adoption reunion registry, which the minister just referred to, contains the names of 13,800 birth relatives, 8,675 male adoptees and 18,610 female adoptees, for a total of 41,085 people who are registered and seeking reunion. Obviously there is a demand, and there is an interest in a more open system.
The one issue that the privacy commissioner did raise -- and I would appreciate the minister's response to this -- is the privacy rights of birth mothers. I've had birth mothers who have contacted my office and who have indicated that they're fully supportive of the legislation, and I don't doubt that. On the other hand, there is a balance that the minister has tried to achieve, and I think it's important to raise it during our discussion of these sections dealing with disclosure. Is the minister comfortable that we have a balance, and that we adequately take into account the privacy needs of birth mothers? I know that it's dealt with in section 66, the no-contact declaration. Is that sufficient, in her opinion?
Hon. J. MacPhail: I have sought guidance on this from the wide consultations we've done, because I don't have personal, direct experience with this issue. I have a wide circle of friends that have experience with this, and I'm guided by those who are affected, basically. No, not basically -- fully. We did an extensive consultation in this area, as you know.
I actually do believe that we have achieved that balance. I also know that individual needs won't be met; there will be cases of individual needs not being met under these circumstances. I would say that the fact that we've allowed for a disclosure veto.... But then birth moms have also said to us: "Please give them the information, but I can't have contact. In the context of my other family, I can't have contact." So that's why we've done the two levels: to allow for the greatest possible sharing of information while still protecting the birth moms' rights to privacy through no contact. I think it's a creative solution to some pretty emotional concerns.
In England and Wales adult adopted persons have been able to access identifying information, and in Scotland records have been open to adoptees since 1930. They will be implementing the same process as ours in Saskatchewan by September of this year. In Alberta adoptees can get their birth surname. Several states, including Kansas and Alaska, release the original birth information to the adult adoptee. Almost without exception this has been implemented without problems.
J. Tyabji: Just quickly, then, so that I'm clear on this, because there was no provision for a disclosure veto prior to this act.... The minister said that people who are covered under the current or previous acts will have access to this information unless a disclosure veto is filed. How will that be done? Clearly there won't be disclosure vetoes in place, and I would hope that there will be as much openness as possible.
If I can just add an editorial comment, when I hear the kind of intelligent debate that goes back and forth in this House on what a radical change we're making here with this bill, I really lament the focus of the coverage that's existed so far, because it hasn't done justice to the work of the minister. I also refer to the work of the member for Comox Valley. They have made a huge difference in many people's lives, and it's unfortunate that we haven't heard anything about that in the media.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Hear, hear! I absolutely agree with you. Those who are affected by it are hearing us and very much appreciate this. They too laud the work of the member for Comox Valley and her team on the adoption review.
Yes, it is essential that we take time to have a national campaign to inform the public about the changes. We're going to do that through the media and allow people the opportunity to be informed of their rights under this bill, including the right to issue a disclosure veto and the right to have access to the information. We'll do that through the media, nationally and internationally, because many of our children were adopted into the northern border states in the United States, as well. We will use adoption agencies and information brochures, and we'll do it via the Internet, which has proven successful already. I must tell you that my staff informs me that the process has already started through the public discussion around this bill.
[ Page 16381 ]
J. Tyabji: If I were an adult adoptee in British Columbia -- and I would be celebrating the new openness in the records -- when could I reasonably anticipate being able to exercise my new rights under this bill?
Hon. J. MacPhail: We actually anticipate that it will take us a year to complete the national campaign of information, and so the new act will be implemented at the end of that. My staff just informed me that in three days of calls to our office after the act was introduced, 53 out of the 74 calls were about disclosure, so it's already starting.
[9:30]
J. Tyabji: I'm sure that of those 53 calls, many people were asking the kind of question I just asked: when do I get to exercise my rights? So if it will be a year, it will be a year until this act is brought into effect and at that time all of these provisions will be made. Is it possible for someone to already register themselves as someone who would like to seek that under this? I guess the consequential amendments that go with this bill also won't be proclaimed for a year. Is that correct?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, there is already an adoption reunion registry where this is able to take place, and that will continue. We will continue both the active and passive adoption reunion registries throughout.
D. Symons: I'm probably going to express a differing opinion than what was expressed by many people about this section in second reading and, indeed, than what has been expressed this evening up to this point. I do have some concerns about disclosure. I have concerns regarding the negative-option feature that is contained in here, where one can put in a veto. It would seem that if we already have an adoption reunion registry, and a good number of people have not, obviously, come forward.... It's more the birth mothers who have not come forward to put their name in there. The member for West Vancouver-Garibaldi mentioned a good number of children seeking parents. He did not give the corresponding number of parents seeking children. I think there is a significant omission there, because we have to consider them as well.
Earlier in the day the minister commented about the fact that we are looking after the best interests of the children, but she did admit that when a child reaches the age of 19, they are no longer a child, and therefore that particular interest of this act does not apply at that point. What we have at that point are equal rights -- rights of the birth parents, rights of the birth child. I think that in this case, you are overweighting it to one side, because if we look at section 63, the information given is sufficient for a person -- after a little bit of detective work -- to discover who the birth parent is. They have to get a copy of the adoption order and the original birth certificate. That will be given to them. That will give the name of the person who brought them into this world. From that point they would be able to do some tracing; possibly the person is still in the neighbourhood. If we look at the next section, we find those same rights are denied to the birth parent. So it's not equal here, because there's a section at the end that says: "Before giving the applicant a copy" -- I have to read section 64 because the two are tied together -- "of the requested record, the Director of Vital Statistics must" -- and I emphasize must -- "delete the adoptive parents' identifying information." Therefore it will be more difficult for the birth mother to discover who the child is, so there's an inequality on that point.
The concern I come at it from is probably different from that of most members here. I am an adopted child -- no longer a child. I have only recently tried to find my birth mother. I left it a very long time, although I've known my birth name since I can remember. Since my own parents have died, maybe it's whetted a little bit of interest on my part to discover who my birth mother is. This act would seem to meet the needs you say are there. But I don't know by fact of my birth that I have the right, simply because of that, to intrude upon the life of my birth mother, her family or others, without her permission.
You might say there's a veto option in here. First, it's a negative option, and in spite of all your advertising, a lot of people aren't going to see it or know about it. If that was the case and this person was interested in being discovered, they would have identified themselves through a birth reunion registry. So I don't know that by birth I have the right to intrude upon that person's life again. I would like some forum where somebody in some quiet way could get her aside, talk to her and say: "We've had a request. Would you be interested in doing something?" But for me to barge in on her life is asking quite a bit, and that's basically what this bill will allow me to do.
I think also that in the process of doing this, when you.... If I was to be able to get the information that is now available here...as an adult I get this information.... I now know who my birth mother is, and if she has signed a veto order or a non-contact order or something of this sort, I think I would be even more upset than not knowing who she is. Now that I know who she is, not being allowed to contact her would bother me a great deal more than not knowing. I don't think you've thought of that aspect of it. This is something that would be really upsetting to me: if I knew who it was, and I knew she didn't want any contact. It's something that I think must be considered: that there are more involved....
Indeed, I would think that, for the number of people involved in birth and the parent-finders' group and the various TRIADs and other groups that work on behalf of people -- and I've been in contact with the TRIAD group in the province in which I was born.... I think you'll find that most of these people are dealing with children who want to find the parent; there are not nearly as many parents trying to find the child. Until you have an equality in that, this bill is unbalanced and is not meeting the needs of both sides of that equation.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I very much appreciate the member's personal experience. It's valuable in informing us, as were all of the personal experiences that people came forward with in our wide-ranging consultation. I absolutely accept your point of view as your personal point of view.
What we've tried to do in the legislation is balance people's needs -- balance them in a fair way that gives as many opportunities as possible for greater access to the information but at the same time protects people's privacy. Actually, I think that the disclosure and no-contact declaration offers more protection than is presently available. Persons are searching now with their own information, just as you say,
[ Page 16382 ]
and there's no prohibition whatsoever. Indeed, our act codifies that prohibition under the circumstances.... The hon. member shakes his head, but I'm sorry, there is no prohibition right now.
I also want to say that I understand your personal point of view. The experience from the adoption reunion registry, though.... We've done a wide-ranging survey of it. Many, many, many birth parents do participate; they're a substantial portion of the registrants searching out their children. It has been an overwhelmingly positive experience. I think up to 90 percent repeated that they would recommend it. There have been concerns expressed, all of which we have tried to take into account in this legislation.
I also want to say that we very carefully reviewed other jurisdictions where this kind of process is in place, and it really has been a positive and very empowering experience. Nevertheless, I don't want in any way to not take into account the member's personal point of view.
D. Symons: I have just one more comment. This has been rather difficult for me, I must admit. The driving force now for me to find my birth mother is nothing but curiosity -- really, when it comes down it. Whether I be 19 or 62, which I currently am, the driving force is curiosity. Who was she? Why...etc. I don't know.
You're saying I have the right, because of my curiosity, to intrude on somebody else's life, who may or may not want me to do that. If she would like me to, I would love it. But if she doesn't want me to, I don't think I have that right. You're basically giving that right here.
Now, when I shook my head earlier.... You're wrong when you say that this will codify what I could do now, because what I know now I didn't get through any government registry or government office. Therefore any search I might do now isn't covered by this act. So I'm not bound by any veto or any non-contact at all, because I have not signed any form -- nor possibly has my mother, on that point. So these laws will not affect people using information they currently have at all. In that sense, you're wrong on what you said.
Again, I go back to the point. I don't think I should have the right simply to intrude on them to satisfy my curiosity. As much as I would like it to be that way, I don't have that right.
R. Neufeld: Obviously, we're more or less doing sections 63 to 66 all at the same time, the sections that I support because of the difficulty I experienced searching out my birth parent. Whether this legislation was in place or not, I had the opportunity to do that. You can glean the information through all kinds of records that are there already, if you're determined to get that information. Only people who are determined to get the information are going to go after it. It's usually people who are not 19 years of age. It's usually people who are maybe in their late thirties or forties or, in my own case, late forties. All that information is there. It's a matter of putting it together.
Opening up the records and doing it in a proper way and the right way, so that the right contact is made with the birth mother, is the way to go about it. There is a process to be used to contact the birth mother, and that's not arriving on the doorstep. I am sure the ministry and the adoption agencies will have firsthand knowledge about how to go through that process to make it a human process that works well for both parties.
The only question I have is on disclosure in section 65. I know the minister said, and her staff explained to me, that there will be a wide advertising blitz across the country. I know that that's not going to catch everyone. You go by addresses that were on record at the time. If it's an address in 1944 or 1952, it's very unlikely that person is still going to be there.
I am just wondering: did I understand the minister to say that one year from the day this bill is passed we are going to start giving out the information if there has been no disclosure veto? Or are we waiting until this bill comes into force, then we take about a year to advertise and then the disclosure portion comes into place? I just didn't quite understand the minister on the chronological events.
Hon. J. MacPhail: This act will not be proclaimed until probably a year from now, but we will start the advertising campaign now. We will monitor that campaign and the response to it to guide us in the proclamation of the act. The experience of other jurisdictions is that you can do a very, very deep saturation in that period of time. Also, I just want to clarify that there will be no limitation on issuing disclosures. That can continue even after the act is proclaimed.
Sections 63 and 64 approved.
On section 65.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Hon. Chair, I actually want to move an amendment, and I'll give the hon. members opposite a chance to see it.
[SECTION 65, in the proposed section 65 by deleting section (7) and substituting the following:
(7) While a disclosure veto is in effect, the Director of Vital Statistics must not disclose any information that is in a record applied for under section 63 or 64 and that relates to the person who filed the veto.]
This is an amendment under section 65(7) recognizing that there are two birth parents, and that if one birth parent issues a disclosure veto, the veto will stand for that birth parent, but information on the other birth parent, who may choose to have the information released, can be released. In case this is a point in the disclosure, it recognizes that there are birth fathers and birth mothers.
[9:45]
On the amendment.
G. Wilson: I haven't had a chance to look at it yet, but does the amendment essentially provide for one birth parent to have effective proxy for the other? I'm thinking of a case in my own riding. There were new immigrants into Canada, and the birth father had command of the English language but the birth mother did not. They came from diverse cultural backgrounds, and when the adoption was sought, the birth mother had all her rights transferred to the birth father, according to the birth father. Is that provided for in this? In the event that those two split, which is what happened.... The birth mother
[ Page 16383 ]
in this particular case is now sincerely regretting that she allowed the birth father to have her child adopted on her behalf and is seeking to have some remedy. I wonder if this has been considered in the amendment.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I take your point. There are other parts of the act that take care of the concern of your particular constituents, but this one is treating the birth mother and the birth father as individuals, with both having separate rights to disclose or not disclose.
L. Reid: I want to commend the minister, and I want to put out a point for consideration. We received a fax today from the TRIAD Society for Truth in Adoption, and from Audrey Scammell, who is the president of TRIAD Victoria. She talks about the harshness of a disclosure veto, and that if this is about the best needs of the child, that the rights of the child be paramount. Should any legislation deny them that information? She does not suggest that we should do away with the no-contact veto. Whether you have made contact may be something we can advise on, but whether you have access to your parentage and your heritage is the extension of this act that.... Perhaps we should not be heading down that road.
Certainly it warmed my heart during second reading debate that we as members of this Legislature approved in principle the necessity for children to become aware of their heritage. The majority of speakers in this House talked very eloquently of just that fact. So if no amendment is coming forward to reduce the harshness of this disclosure veto, I suggest that this legislation has not done some of the very fine things that it could this evening.
I would very much like to see disclosure be something that.... If this is about openness and honesty between birth parents and their children, but more so, that the children have the rights to that information, then I strongly stand in support of them having every opportunity to secure that information. I trust that the minister will comment and perhaps weaken this particular section of the bill, so that information is available for all who must seek it.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, I have my personal views on this. I spoke when the hon. member was not present, and it's understandable that we reiterate the discussion.
What we're talking about is that, under this new act, all adoptions from now on will have complete disclosure. So that's great. It's the historical promises or commitments that were made, under the current or previous acts, on which your colleague from Richmond Centre iterated the opposite point of view. It's that debate around previous arrangements that we've tried to incorporate from a very balanced point of view.
I am very pleased that we're able to meet the needs of people who wish full disclosure, from the proclamation forward.
Amendment approved.
V. Anderson: I would like to move an amendment by adding section 65(8): "The government must undertake a thorough process of advising birth parents and adopted persons of the need and opportunity to register a disclosure veto if they wish to keep their names private." I know the minister has said that this is what they will be doing, but we felt it was important that it be in the act so that everybody would be aware of it.
On the amendment.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I appreciate the intent, but we would be trying to incorporate practice and procedure into legislation. Let me assure the House that the intent of the amendment will be followed completely, but it would be inappropriate to incorporate policy and procedure into legislation. Who would be the judge of the achievement of it? But I appreciate the sentiment.
Amendment negatived.
Section 65 as amended approved.
Sections 66 to 79 inclusive approved.
On section 80.
V. Anderson: I want to highlight that this is an area in which financial assistance may be given to adoptive parents for those who have need of it in caring for children with special needs. I think it is very important, and should be noted.
Sections 80 and 81 approved.
On section 82.
J. Tyabji: Just briefly to the minister. I received submissions from a number of people who talked about offences that occurred in other jurisdictions where there had been false birth records prepared by adoption agencies. I was just wondering if the falsifying of documents would be captured, either by the regulations or anywhere in this section, as an offence under this act?
Hon. J. MacPhail: If the document is falsified in a foreign jurisdiction, we don't have control over it, but if that fraudulent document is knowingly used here, it's an offence.
Sections 82 to 87 inclusive approved.
On section 88.
R. Neufeld: Just a quick question. "A person who contravenes section 42...commits an offence and is liable to a fine of up to $5,000." Does this apply to adoption agencies or people who work within the ministry? Who does this actually apply to? Really, confidential information would apply specifically to ministry staff. I've never yet seen a piece of legislation where ministry staff were under a threat of a fine -- not since I arrived here.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, it does apply.... The current act has this provision, and other legislation does. It applies to anyone who releases unauthorized confidential information.
Sections 88 to 91 inclusive approved.
[ Page 16384 ]
On section 92.
D. Mitchell: Just a question to the minister on section 92, dealing with the adoption agency regulations. The minister referred to this way back when we were in the definitions section of the bill, section 1. It deals with the kinds of regulations that are being contemplated for adoption agencies. The minister will recall that over the last few years, there has been speculation in our province as to whether or not we were going to ban private adoption agencies. That's not the case with this bill; we're going to be regulating them. We don't know exactly what kinds of regulations are being contemplated here. Will the regulations promulgated pursuant to this section have an impact on adoption agencies in the province? Will it force them to become societies, where some are not currently societies? Will it require them to do their business in a substantially different manner than they're currently doing? That's what I'd like to understand about this section.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Yes, that's the point.
D. Mitchell: Could the minister just elaborate on that a bit for my benefit and for the benefit of the other members of the committee? How are adoption agencies going to be required to do their business in a substantially different manner than what they are currently doing?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, there are no regulations now. But let me just reassure the members of the House that this is a provision that consensus was reached on; it's regulations around private adoption agencies, including those who now carry out adoptions outside the ministry. What it means is that the prerequisites for adoption done through a private agency will now be the same as those done through government adoptions: i.e., criminal record checks, the person has to be licensed to carry out the adoption, there has to be a home study done, fees will be regulated, qualifications will be regulated, etc. But we'll be doing all of this in consultation with those who now are in the private adoption business.
D. Mitchell: I appreciate the minister's commitment on that. Does the minister have the ability in committee this evening to tell us how many adoption agencies there are in British Columbia and whether or not any consultation has taken place with them to date? Or will all the consultation take place after the act is passed into law?
Hon. J. MacPhail: There are currently two unlicensed agencies, and they have been integrally involved in the consultation.
J. Tyabji: One concern that was raised with me by a person who is an adoption agent, and who isn't making a huge profit at it right now.... She likes to have the individual contact that she has with the birth parents, and of course works through the ministry right now. The concern that she raised was that if she has to incorporate as a society, she's worried about the increased costs that would be associated with that, because de facto, the Society Act has a lot of provisions. There would have to be staff, a board of directors, membership and bylaws that have to be registered.
For the purposes of this act, unless an individual can incorporate under the Society Act so that they would take on the responsibilities that accrue under the Society Act without necessarily having to fulfil all the details.... If we could have a streamlined societies' registration process for an individual who is an adoption agent, then I think that person's concerns would be recognized. The thing she pointed out was that if she has to expand the size of her operation, the cost to the prospective adoptive parents goes up substantially. They will be the people who will be paying for the staff and for all of the people that she'd have to bring on board. Perhaps the minister could address her concerns.
Hon. J. MacPhail: The purpose of regulating private adoption agencies is so that a full range of services is provided and so that there is no conflict within an unregulated.... Where it could exist right now, where, for instance, a single-person agency is representing the interests of both the birth mom and the adoptive parents. That's the kind of situation that we're regulating around. I do say that there's an opportunity for a person to offer that kind of experience, but within the context of an agency. Perhaps he or she would work in the context of a larger agency.
[10:00]
J. Tyabji: On the face of it, that response actually will heighten this person's concerns. The minister says that she knows the person. I'm not sure that she does, because this actually comes out of my constituency. There's a person who is dealing with this individual. Although this individual is in Vancouver, maybe the minister has been dealing with her. If the minister is saying that it will be the objective of this act to prevent individuals from acting as adoptive agents and that they will have to work as partners, then perhaps she could say why that would be something that she would want to have as the objective of this bill. I'm having a hard time understanding. An individual can be as accountable as a society if regulated adequately.
Hon. J. MacPhail: Unfortunately, that's simply not the case. There are two parties to an adoption: one is the birth parent and the other is the adoptive parents. A single person cannot provide for both without conflict.
The Chair: Before I recognize the member for Okanagan East, I would ask the members in that vicinity of the House to keep their discussions down to a dull roar so we can hear the member who has the floor.
Interjection.
J. Tyabji: The comment that came out of that group over there was that they were speaking in Punjabi so it shouldn't have been relevant, but it still makes as much noise.
The minister is saying that it's the opinion of the government that it is a conflict of interest for a person to act on behalf of both the birth parent and the prospective adoptive parent. If that's the case, isn't the superintendent always acting on behalf of both parties?
Hon. J. MacPhail: Actually, the superintendent is only vested with the best interests of the child.
J. Tyabji: Wouldn't the adoptive agents be regulated so that they would always have to be acting in the best interests
[ Page 16385 ]
of the child? Wouldn't all their activities have to undergo that scrutiny before they would even be licensed to operate, even if they weren't a society but an individual?
Hon. J. MacPhail: I understand that the hon. member is advocating on behalf of an individual, and we'd be more than willing to discuss this outside the context of this legislation. But suffice it to say that it would be very difficult for an individual to act on behalf of two parties, and that's what this is all about. However, there will be regulations for licensed agencies, and the agencies that meet the tests of those regulations will be able to be agencies.
J. Tyabji: I will take the minister up on that offer to speak of this outside the House and certainly will be following the development of the regulations quite closely.
Sections 92 to 112 inclusive approved.
On section 113.
Hon. J. MacPhail: This is a very important section, and I think we should engage in a lengthy debate around it. No, I'm just kidding.
I have an amendment which is in the possession of the Clerk.
[SECTION 113, in the proposed section 113 (a) by deleting ' "direct placement", '.]
Section 113 amends the new Adoption Act to make it consistent with the Child, Family and Community Service Act when the act is proclaimed. The definition of "direct placement" does not refer to the superintendent, therefore it's not necessary to delete those words from that definition. The amendment corrects a minor drafting error.
Amendment approved.
Section 113 as amended approved.
Sections 114 to 121 inclusive approved.
Title approved.
Hon. J. MacPhail: I move the committee rise and report the bill complete with amendments.
Motion approved.
The House resumed; the Speaker in the chair.
Bill 51, Adoption Act, reported complete with amendments to be considered at the next sitting of the House after today.
Committee of Supply A, having reported resolutions, was granted leave to sit again.
Hon. G. Clark: I call the summary of the estimates of the Ministry of Employment and Investment.
REPORT ON COMMITTEE A ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF EMPLOYMENT AND INVESTMENT
D. Mitchell: I think that the Minister of Employment and Investment, who has just returned from an exercise in foreign diplomacy, tried to acquit himself honourably during the review of his estimates. A number of issues were raised. I had the opportunity to participate in a small portion of the review of his estimates.
We talked about a number of issues, including some issues relating to Crown corporations, the possible privatization of Crown corporations, and the possible privatization of one particular Crown corporation: B.C. Rail. It was quite interesting to hear this minister, who was a lot more forthcoming on that issue than some of his colleagues when I questioned them during the review of estimates. As it appears, the minister did confirm that the government, through the Crown corporations secretariat, which he is responsible for, is giving some consideration to the possible privatization of Crown corporations, including B.C. Rail. It will be interesting to know what kind of outcome results from that.
We also talked during the review of the estimates of the Minister of Employment and Investment about the issues surrounding the Columbia River downstream benefits, and why he is involved in this issue given the fact that we have a Minister of Energy who has been dealing with this as well. The minister's comment was that he's involved for a whole variety of reasons, including the fact that he is the minister responsible for the Crown corporations secretariat. There has been some ongoing involvement with the issue relating to the Columbia River downstream benefits and the deal with the Bonneville Power Administration.
The minister has just returned from a trip to Washington, D.C. He has yet to deliver a ministerial statement in the House on this matter. I don't know if he wants to take the opportunity during the windup of his estimates to actually report very briefly to the House on the results of his exercise in international diplomacy. We can only wish this minister and the government well in their continuing dialogue and exercise in diplomacy with the Americans.
This is not to bring the Bonneville power authority to their knees, necessarily, but to ensure that British Columbia's taxpayers, under the terms of the Columbia River Treaty, get their fair share of those downstream benefits. I think that's vital. It's vital that this government get a good deal. Maybe it's not the deal they negotiated in the memorandum of agreement last fall; maybe it's a deal that's even better than that. Who knows? Maybe we need to bring the Americans here. Maybe we need an addendum to the agreement. Maybe we need an addendum that's named after this minister. We could call it.... I can't use his name, obviously, but we could name the addendum after this minister. I would be willing to support that as long as it's a better deal for British Columbians.
Tonight we welcome this minister back to British Columbia. We look forward to his report on his efforts to secure a deal under the Columbia River Treaty that's of benefit to all British Columbians. Not British Columbians in one region of the province, not simply the B.C. Hydro and Power Authority -- a Crown corporation that doesn't own those downstream benefits -- but all British Columbians own that entitlement. That entitlement is something that's owned by each and every
[ Page 16386 ]
taxpayer in the province. We wish this minister all the best as he continues to try not to bring the Americans to their knees, not to simply rattle the sabre and try to whip up a frenzy of anti-Americanism, but to get the best deal possible for our province.
G. Farrell-Collins: I want to advise the House that that issue was discussed to a certain extent this evening in response to the minister's arrival from his trip. I understand he had a good trip and engaged in some media relations while he was down there. Let's hope the journey was successful, and we'll see what the end results are.
I want to thank the colleagues in my caucus who participated heavily in this debate, as they do every year. The items of discussion were virtually everything. B.C. Transit and some of the challenges that are faced there were taken by the member for Richmond Centre, along with the Transportation Financing Authority in some detail. Also, B.C. Ferries' ten-year plan and the fast-ferry fleet were discussed by that member and the member for Delta South. B.C. Hydro and the Bonneville issue and the whole debate around the downstream benefits was engaged in by the member for North Vancouver-Seymour, and the member for Surrey-White Rock canvassed that in some detail.
I know that the member for Surrey-Cloverdale went into some depth with B.C. Buildings Corporation and engaged in a good debate with the minister regarding potential privatization of that Crown, as we did with a number of the Crowns. Science and technology was taken by the member for Richmond East, looking at some of the biotech opportunities that the province faces and some of the strategies in order to achieve that. The member for Delta South participated as far as the community bank goes and where we are as far as implementing the legislation that was passed last session.
So I want to thank those members of my caucus who helped in scrutinizing a ministry that's extremely wide-ranging and comprehensive, and I look forward to monitoring it for not another full year, but a portion of a year -- at least a few months, until we have a chance to go to the polls.
The Speaker: The minister winds up.
Hon. G. Clark: I want to thank my staff in the various Crown corporations and in my ministry for the work they've done over the years. It has been generally exemplary and very hard work, and I have been a hard minister to work for, I'm sure. I also want to thank my colleagues across the way for a very civilized and constructive estimates discussion. I look forward to working with my colleagues across the way in opposition for many years, and I also look forward to working with the staff in my ministry for many years to come.
The Speaker: That concludes the report on the minister's ministry.
Hon. G. Clark moved adjournment of the House.
Motion approved.
The House adjourned at 10:14 p.m.
The House in Committee of Supply A; G. Brewin in the chair.
The committee met at 6:39 p.m.
ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF EMPLOYMENT AND INVESTMENT
(continued)
On vote 24: minister's office, $375,615 (continued).
L. Reid: I'm delighted to enter into debate with this minister on science and technology. I believe that on a number of key points we agree. In terms of the future of science and technology in the province of British Columbia, I have a couple of broad questions, and then perhaps we can refine it as we go ahead.
Some of the correspondence I receive talks a lot about impediments to the economic climate experienced by new biotech companies and information technology companies in British Columbia. Can we get any sense from this minister today if this province will move at all to some kind of improved framework around taxation for new high-tech companies?
Hon. G. Clark: It's an interesting challenge. These are interrelated issues. There's no question that one of the challenges with high-tech companies is the fact that it's a footloose industry, by and large, so people can move. Two of the factors that people consider in terms of location are the tax regime and the net income they are going to receive. But I would say to the committee that there are a lot of other things that people look at in terms of how they proceed.
When I talk to investors in British Columbia, and particularly when I deal with the science and tech community, I think it's fair to say that the most important factor attracting growth in this industry is quality of life. Increasingly, investors from around the world, in this industry and others, are not moving to British Columbia because we have low taxes, because we don't, relative to other jurisdictions such as Vietnam, China or even parts of the United States.
Interjection.
Hon. G. Clark: Or Alberta, sure. They have lower taxes than us on the high end, and we're about the same for 60 percent of the population.
Interjection.
Hon. G. Clark: And the second-lowest in Canada.
But what they look at, increasingly, are things like environmental quality. Whistler is a big attraction that keeps coming up every time I talk to investors about why they want to move here. There is the quality of the educational institu-
[ Page 16387 ]
tions, the quality of health care and the fact that their kids don't get shot going to the 7-Eleven at night. These are quotes from potential investors in British Columbia.
So while the tax structure for certain individuals is a challenge, other factors are critical to our competitive advantage: quality of life, a high-quality labour force, quality education, etc. We don't really have anything to apologize for. We're doing very well, and it's a very fast-growing industry here. Obviously we're working on impediments to see if we can help them.
Another impediment in the high-tech sector is the ability of capital -- expansion capital, mezzanine financing, venture capital -- and we're looking at that as well.
L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's comments. If I can bring that to bear on the discussions we had at the Biotech Alliance, the exposition that happened.... I was pleased to be there. I think the folks who came together brought some wonderful ideas to the table. Their biggest concerns were around the competitiveness of Washington and Oregon. I don't believe you've addressed that in your remarks in terms of what you may have in mind to ensure that within that proximity we are the greater attraction, if you will.
For a number of your examples -- certainly quality-of-life issues -- Seattle and Vancouver are probably not dramatically different. Could the minister comment in terms of whether or not there are any specifics around increasing attractiveness?
Hon. G. Clark: For the American experience, the quality of life in the United States, the Pacific Northwest, might be good, but it's not nearly as good as British Columbia. Health care is a huge driver, so we have a competitive advantage on the health care side, vis-a-vis Washington State. We have a competitive advantage in terms of environmental quality, notwithstanding that it's an attractive place. I don't know if the member has been to Seattle lately, but I was there recently, and the number of homeless people in Seattle is very large. It's not as large as many American cities, but it's getting larger all the time. That's a huge competitive advantage we have.
It would be folly to radically change our tax regime. It would be a false attempt to attract this kind of business, if it meant that we undermined at the same time the very qualities that currently give us a competitive advantage. I think the member is aware that in the venture capital field we've made some moves with respect to a life sciences fund and merchant banking for expansion capital. We have the B.C. Focus funds, one of which at least is related mostly to the high-tech industry. We are addressing the research question at universities, etc., which is also critical to expansion of this industry.
In general, our record speaks well. While I accept that there are tax disadvantages vis-a-vis certain parts of the world, we outweigh them on all these other advantages. I think the evidence is that we have, as you know, the fastest-growing economy in North America.
F. Gingell: First, I want to thank the minister for the letter I got the other day on B.C. Ferries. I got it on Wednesday night; I wrote to the minister in January. There was no discussion, but it took a long, long time to get a response. Then the response arrived a bit late to be useful in estimates, but fortunately estimates were delayed. They were a bit late to be used in estimates, and that's why we've been keeping them going.
[6:45]
If I may, I'd like to pass the minister a new schedule of emissions. I know we're not going to agree on issues of safety. I know we both agree that the first problem with this issue is the lack of parking area at Horseshoe Bay. That's really what started this. I know you can't go horizontally, but I'd like to suggest that perhaps there's a solution in Horseshoe Bay to go vertically.
This latest schedule that I've given you.... I'm just going to focus for a few moments on the issue of emissions.
Hon. G. Clark: Where does it come from?
F. Gingell: It comes from a university, where a friend of mine doesn't want to be embarrassed by it.
D. Schreck: A member of your constituency association?
F. Gingell: No.
I want to just focus on the question of emissions. You're going to have to deal with the safety problems; you're going to have to deal with the flotsam and jetsam -- the forest debris that's in the water; you're going to have to deal with all the pleasure boats; you're going to have to deal with what I think is a whole bunch of money for not much improvement. But the area in which I really am not satisfied is the question of emissions.
In this schedule in the centre column, "New C-class, reciprocating diesel," we have adjusted all the emissions to take into effect all the improvements in new engine technology, catalytic converters, low-sulphur diesel fuels, etc., that you mention in your letter. We have built an imaginary new C-class ferry and reduced the emissions to those levels.
D. Schreck: Kind of the Liberal plan on engineering.
F. Gingell: If the member doesn't watch it, I will take my navy and sink him.
You can ignore the catamaran turbine diesel in the fifth column. The Coast Guard isn't going to allow you to use natural gas.
I have had this person make a series of comparisons, and in the end, the important criterion or measurement in my mind is the amount of emission per passenger per kilometre. If you reduce emissions to one-quarter and carry the passengers in double the number of trips, you have a real winner. So the exercise is to measure the emissions per passenger-kilometre. That's the key.
We also took into account the fact that, as mentioned in your letter, the ferry would not be running at full speed for more than 45 minutes. So the columns on either side are the volumes of emission per passenger per kilometre compared to the latest, brand-new C-class reciprocating diesel. You can see that on the catamaran, which has reciprocating diesel, the carbon dioxide would be double, the nitrogen dioxide would be double and the hydrocarbons would be double. If it were a
[ Page 16388 ]
turbine diesel, they'd be up 225 percent for CO2, fractionally down for nitrous oxide and fractionally more than double for hydrocarbons.
I was fascinated at the responses I received from other ministers to whom I had sent copies of my letter. I kept getting all this stuff back about clean air and that this government supports clean air, zero-emission vehicles and all this kind of thing. Here's the Minister of Employment and Investment off on his own little tangent that will put more greenhouse gases, but maybe not acid rain-causing gases.... That's not because of the ferry; that's because of the fuel. It seems to be going in the opposite direction. The airshed from the lower Fraser Valley, which is all hemmed in, extends over the straits. I don't know if it's too late to convince you to think this through. The minister knows that I haven't been a proponent of it from the start, but I would be most interested in his comments.
Hon. G. Clark: I would say a couple of things. First of all, it's difficult to respond to this, and I take very seriously the member's questions and also the work that has gone into this. But I'm not sure -- CO2 per passenger-kilometre? I guess that factors in the fact that they're operating at less time. Does it?
F. Gingell: Yes.
Hon. G. Clark: I wonder if the member would agree, though, that to be complete, one should include the fact that we're saving significant emissions, because the cars won't be in lineups on the street for six hours with cars idling. The member appreciates that one of the advantages of fast ferries is smaller loads that are more frequent, with a reservation system as opposed to the current system. Even with a reservation system, you have to have a huge holding tank for cars while they wait for the ferry.
This will be a much more efficient system. I think to be all-inclusive, if you want to deal with the environmental question, you have to look at the savings with respect to car traffic this will generate in terms of the emissions that they generate while they're waiting for C-class ferries now. This will significantly reduce the amount of time people spend in their cars.
I have to say that we have looked at this question in general terms. I think the member got a fairly detailed answer to the question. He has now had a chance to try to review and refute it. I appreciate that it's extremely difficult for me to rebut that at this time. I will have to take a look at it and get back to the member, and I certainly undertake to do that.
At the end of the day, these are issues which have to be weighed against each other. I'm sure the member would agree that the overriding consideration.... I think I had better put it a different way. There are many factors which one has to consider when making a decision: savings on the capital costs, more efficient movement of transportation, goods-movement corridors, truck transportation, speed, price, operating costs, fuel costs and comfort of passengers. I think the member would appreciate that a lot of factors go into decision-making. Clearly one of those factors should be, and is, environmental considerations.
All I say is that even if there is an argument on the environmental side, on all those other ranges of questions, this is a significant, super form of transportation; one has to balance those. At the end of the day, there are some judgments that have to be made. Let me put a hypothetical.... Obviously we could go to natural gas turbines, and that would be better.
F. Gingell: You can't; the Coast Guard won't let you.
Hon. G. Clark: That's not correct. We can go to natural gas turbines tomorrow. They happen to be significantly more expensive. They happen to be very problematic in terms of maintenance costs, etc. We've done all that work. On the environmental question, natural gas is superior.
On balance, in terms of dealing with the taxpayers and the other factors I've considered, it's not acceptable. We could outfit the current ferry system to natural gas, and, indeed, we are exploring that opportunity with B.C. Gas. The economics don't seem to be very good. Again, while environmental considerations are important factors, and more important to this government than most, I think it's only one factor you have to consider when you're deciding on a major capital plan for the Ferry Corporation.
F. Gingell: Just to deal with the question of CNG or LNG, prior to my writing the first letter to you in late December or early January, I talked to the Canadian Coast Guard and was advised that compressed or liquefied natural gas ferries would not be allowed. I don't know whether that has changed since that point, but that was a definitive answer.
I was most interested to learn that you're planning on moving trucks through the catamarans. I thought it was only cars and people.
Hon. G. Clark: I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say that. Trucks will be transferred through Tsawwassen on route 30 up to the new terminal at Duke Point and linked up to the Island Highway.
F. Gingell: So there isn't any plan on changing that, but you used that as one of the arguments as to why you've got catamarans.
Hon. G. Clark: The reason I made that argument is that right now, if you've been to Horseshoe Bay -- and you'll see it this long weekend -- or if you've been to Departure Bay, you'll have seen that trucks are lined up for hours and hours and hours with their rigs running. As we speak, there are rigs lined up and running. In many cases they are for refrigerated cars, etc. There has not been a reservation system up until us moving on one. When we move those out of Departure Bay, it gives them a reservation system and moves them down to Tsawwassen. There will be significant environmental savings linked to moving the trucks out of a very congested area at Departure Bay and Horseshoe Bay and moving to the high-speed catamarans.
The member should know that the logic is that if we were to go to C-class ferries on the existing routes, aside from the capital costs and infrastructure, we would still have trucks lined up at significant lengths, unless we were to spend literally hundreds of millions of dollars trying to accommodate them, and that would be detrimental to the environment.
[ Page 16389 ]
F. Gingell: I don't understand why you just don't require the trucks to go on the Tsawwassen-Nanaimo route, as you're planning on doing. The routes are already in existence and would take the trucks out of Horseshoe Bay. That dramatically changes the need for the amount of storage space you've got and solves a whole bunch of other problems. Then you could use C-class ferries, and you wouldn't be into all these arguments.
One of the first things that struck me when I read the initial press releases was that you were talking about great jobs and being able to build more of these for the rest of the world, etc. Well, everybody wants to do that. That's what we were going to do with the S-class ferries, which I think are really fine ferries; I travel on them all the time. I just feel that we're going off on an experimental journey here that isn't proven, whereas we have real expertise in the standard ferries. There are opportunities for those markets.
The turnaround time is reduced so little; in fact, as you have said in your own response, there is only a chunk in the middle where you can get up to these speeds. I presume these catamarans will have wave-piercer bows -- I haven't seen the latest one -- which would be sending logs and stuff all over the place. But if you think about what the issues are, you get the trucks out of there, you perhaps look at two-level parking at Horseshoe Bay and maybe the whole problem could be well solved -- particularly because, with a little alteration, the ferries can be loaded at two levels.
Hon. G. Clark: First of all, I don't think a 30 percent time saving is insignificant, and I think people who commute and have to take ferries would agree with that. Secondly, remember that we have to put another level on the Horseshoe Bay terminal just for the Sunshine Coast -- that's how fast that traffic is growing with C-class. So we're talking two more levels and taking trucks out. The growth is that great. So it would be a pretty spectacular parkade that would have to be constructed, which is one of the factors under consideration.
I also want to remind the member that when there are six-hour lineups at Horseshoe Bay, as there probably will be this weekend, the ships do not leave full. They actually leave partially empty, because they are lined all the way up the highway, and we can't get them through the ticket gate fast enough to load. So we have a crisis to deal with.
On the question of fast ferries, I won't make a big speech, but I'll just remind the member that there are about 20 of these in commercial operation. They have been in operation for some time. Seventy-five percent of all the incremental ferry construction in the world is now high-speed catamarans. Right now they are only built in a couple of yards in Europe -- Finnyard being the largest -- and a couple of yards in Australia. There's a licence for Washington State, because they're building some passenger-only catamarans there; and we are, of course, going to be in the market shortly. That means we will be one of the few places in the world competing against a couple of other areas for the fastest-growing segment of the marketplace.
[7:00]
I can't say now -- I'd love to say specifically.... I'll just say tantalizingly that we've already had some interest from places around the world in terms of the ferries that we are building here in British Columbia. Whether anything comes of that, one never knows, but there is significant interest.
Stena has commissioned the fourth largest fast ferry before the first one is complete. As I say to the member, this is a significant opportunity. Whether we can grasp that opportunity and be competitive is obviously an open question. I believe we can; the member may believe we can't. I say it's worth the opportunity, given the fact that it makes sense for us, in any event.
D. Schreck: I just want to take this moment to say that I know that the federal Liberal member for the Victoria area, the Hon. David Anderson, has abandoned the shipbuilding industry in British Columbia. The majority of the shipbuilding industry in British Columbia is in my constituency, and I want to make it clear that I expect these market opportunities to be seized. I expect Allied Shipbuilders, Vancouver Shipyards and the other shipyards on the North Shore to be given an opportunity, notwithstanding the naysayers in the federal and Liberal opposition.
I want to hear from this minister that there is a commitment not to follow the Liberal course of abandoning the B.C. shipbuilding industry but instead to take this opportunity to see that there is some sort of future. We're investing in the infrastructure of the shipbuilding industry in British Columbia.
Hon. G. Clark: I obviously have no hesitation confirming the member's views, because he's been instrumental in developing this program as a member from the area where remaining shipyards are. He's been instrumental in convincing the government to pursue this strategy. I should also say that the shipyard industry is very excited, both by the conventional shipbuilding program we've begun and by fast ferries, which we're about to begin.
In fact, the big challenge we have is that we want to make sure that these jobs, which will be several hundred in this new industry we're creating, go to existing shipyard workers in British Columbia. That's going to require some retraining, because we have the fastest-growing economy in North America. The danger we have, of course, with this exciting program is that people will start moving here in an attempt to fill those jobs. We want to make sure that they go to British Columbia unemployed shipyard workers first and unemployed British Columbians second. Frankly, I'd be happy if nobody else benefited from that program. I think it will be of significant benefit to the businesses in that member's constituency and, more importantly, of significant benefit to some of that member's constituents who have been looking for leadership in this field for some time.
F. Gingell: I'm glad that the chairman is the government member on the board of B.C. Ferries. I guess there's no point in pursuing this any more. We've got all the Ferry people here. Maybe I've convinced the member of the board to reconsider the issue.
I don't think that your statements about the federal government -- and I'm not here to defend the federal government; God forbid! -- are truly fair. There has been a substantial amount of work, not in the construction but in the maintenance of vessels out here. Maintenance work has a much, much higher labour content than does capital construction.
[ Page 16390 ]
So, passing on, in the legislative dining room this evening I noticed the president of the community bank, and the community bank reports to the minister. I wonder if you actually brought the president of the community bank here for the purpose of the discussion. Before you say anything, I appreciate that the community bank is just starting. This is, perhaps, an opportunity for a question. I'd like to find out where you are, where you're going and how you're loaning out taxpayers' money.
Hon. G. Clark: It's obviously quite appropriate to ask this question in my estimates, and I do have some staff here from the community bank, but if the member just wants a general update, I'd be happy to provide it.
First, we're probably a bit behind. We're looking at opening in September. We're obviously still at that target, but my guess is that it will be more like October. The project is working very well. We've hired, on a part-time basis, Les Welton, who was a vice-president of VanCity Credit Union. Prior to that he was vice-president of Gulf and Fraser Fishermen's Credit Union, I believe. He has just come back from a trip to South Africa where he consulted with the new government and other community groups about setting up credit unions in South Africa. Mr. Welton is retired. He's not looking for work, unfortunately. He's been instrumental in helping us in terms of the nuts and bolts of setting up.
The board is working extremely well; it's a good board. The member may know some of the people on it: Lucille Johnstone is on the board of directors; Bob Fairweather from Richardson Greenshields; Gordon Westrand from the Longshoremen's Union; Elain Duvall, who's with a subsidiary of Michael Audain's Polygon Properties; Barbara Charlie, who's an aboriginal housing woman on the board. Not to belabour the point, it is a very good board. It's been working very hard. They've been meeting more than once a month, and now they have some expertise, retained for some time, working on refining the business plan and getting the nuts and bolts of the thing ready.
About 25 people are being trained right now to take positions as tellers and other duties in the bank organization. We probably won't need 25, but the member may know we have a pretty ambitious training program underway, working with the Vancouver Canucks to provide new people for the stadium. I'll say publicly, again, that Mr. Griffiths deserves enormous credit for his commitment to the people of the downtown east side. He's agreed to hire up to some 200 or 300 people in the new stadium from the community if the government can provide qualified people. So we need to do some significant upgrading, and we are working on that program as we speak.
The first piece of the program, though, is to develop a little synergy between the bank and some of these other initiatives. So we have about 25 who are being trained; they just started last week. The bank building will, I believe, start to be renovated in the next little while. The renovation is not a huge project. The old vault in the bank is still acceptable. I think we have to spend about $3,000 upgrading it to today's standards. Obviously, the inside needs to be redone somewhat.
So it's looking very good. The review of the business plan has proved to be not bad. The spreads between mortgage-pooled funds and what we pay out is not as great as it has been. It's narrowed a little bit, and that hurts us, because we really rely on that spread to cross-subsidize, if you will, what banks would consider to be uneconomic deposits. So that's going to be a challenge. It simply means, at the end of the day, that we probably need more than we'd hoped on deposit in order to start breaking even. But those spreads change all the time, of course. Part of the business plan is also probably contracting out a bit more of the work -- maybe some of the accounting work, at least in the short run as we get it up to speed.
We're working with the Ministry of Social Services on electronic transfer. That's a little slower than we'd like, to be candid, in terms of working with Social Services on such a project. So we may end up opening the bank without electronic transfer and then continue to work on that. It has all kinds of policy implications, too, so we're not trying to rush it.
So in general, it's very good news. The community is still holding public meetings all the time and are very excited by the opportunity. We're starting to train people; we've hired someone with expertise in the area, who has just been, by all accounts, superb. We have an ad going out very shortly, if it's not out already, advertising for a general manager. I think the board's considering not hiring a CEO but someone a little bit senior to a branch manager, because there's only one branch, of course. We're looking for applications. As I said, we're looking for a banker with a social conscience, so it will be an international RFP to look for such an individual.
F. Gingell: I presume two things. First of all, we're still talking about the northeast corner of Main and Hastings. Second, you won't be taking in any deposits or funds until October of this year.
L. Reid: Just say yes.
Hon. G. Clark: Okay, yes.
Interjections.
F. Gingell: I was just confirming that we're still talking about the northeast corner of Main and Hastings and that when you talk about the bank opening in October '95, we're talking about the bank not taking in any deposits until that point.
Hon. G. Clark: That's correct. Obviously, a physical infrastructure has to be complete, and the personnel questions have to be solved. We'll be soliciting deposits in the interim, prior to opening, so we're ready to go when it moves. As the member knows, in the banking business it's critical that the money goes to work for you instantly. You can't just leave it around. All that has to be set up in advance so that when we take deposits, they can immediately go back out and start earning more interest. We have to start paying interest the second they go in.
L. Reid: In his answer to the last question I posed, the minister cited the life sciences fund and the B.C. Focus fund. I would like to ask him for some direction around those programs -- i.e., where they sit today and where he would like to see them go in the next six months to a year.
Hon. G. Clark: I ask leave for Deborah George to answer that question, because she has been dealing with it specifically.
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Leave granted.
D. George: The life sciences fund is perhaps the most appropriate one for the biotech area, and it has a very heavy deal flow. There are 130 proposals in front of it right now. It has made three or four investments. So far there are some very interesting new projects. The other B.C. Focus funds, such as Ventures West, etc., are experiencing the same kind of deal flow but of course aren't focused on the biotech area.
L. Reid: For clarification, the life sciences fund, I understand, is all biotech; as for B.C. Focus funds, a portion of it looks at biotech and some of it looks at information technologies, etc. Is that correct?
Hon. G. Clark: I'll ask Deborah to explain a bit further, but just recall that what we did with the B.C. Focus funds -- I was Minister of Finance at the time -- was to put some government money in. That money was matched and managed by the private sector on a pari passu basis, so the risk was shared. The life sciences fund really springs out of the old Discovery portfolio and is an attempt to do the same thing. We took some of the assets and values of the Discovery Foundation, but rather than having a government-run fund, we sought partners in the private sector to match it and manage it, with someone on the board from British Columbia to pursue that. In the course of that RFP, we were looking for matching partners like the B.C. Focus fund opportunity, which we think has been a successful model. The successful models want to focus on biotech, it's fair to say. The successful bidder for us in the RFP -- because it accomplishes both our objectives and goals but also with their expertise -- really sees that as a big opportunity for British Columbia.
[7:15]
I apologize for the long answer, but I'll ask Deborah to complete it if there's anything missing. That fund is dedicated to focusing on biotechnology, because that's a big growth industry. Obviously the fund is largely in Toronto. They moved out here with some of their capital.
Of the other four B.C. Focus funds, Wardley specializes in forest and mining issues, some of which may be high-tech. Ventures West is a venture capital firm. Michael Brown is the CEO and president, I believe. It has a high-tech focus, but not a biotech focus, although they're not excluded from doing biotechnology. They may well have done some biotechnology investments, but they're basically a high-tech venture capital fund looking for opportunities across the field. The life sciences one is primarily, if not exclusively, focused on the biotech field.
L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's clarification. I believe that he and I were at one of the launches of one of these funding initiatives. I applaud the fact that tremendous success has been arrived at, if you will. The companies that have spoken have spoken well of the program and believe that it has allowed them to launch into a number of new initiatives. I support that. I trust that it will continue and, hopefully, have some more funds and energy behind it as we proceed. I believe the minister and I agree about the necessity for ongoing research and development in this commitment and on the importance of hiring new science and technology graduates. I don't think we have any issues around that.
What I would like to touch on is technology transfer -- the number of new ideas that flow from technology institutes, particularly from our universities, are commercialized as products and sent into the marketplace. From my perspective, the district liaison offices make perfect sense. I'm wondering if there is anything else that this ministry is looking at in terms of ensuring that the transition is smooth -- i.e., so that the person at the university level with a product actually has some support and guidance as an attempt is made to take that product to market and hopefully return a reasonable investment.
Hon. G. Clark: Once again, I think I'll ask Deborah George to answer, and then I'll try to fill in.
D. George: The liaison offices were our first technology transfer mechanism. As well, of course, the research and development funds under the Advanced Systems Institute and the Science Council had built-in technology transfer requirements. There has to be an industry and an academic partner to receive those funds.
More importantly and more recently, we held a technology transfer forum last month, sponsored by ourselves and the federal government, bringing together all levels of government -- the academic community and industry -- for a day in Vancouver to talk about new models of technology transfer, because we feel we could always do better. We're particularly interested in the associate institute model and perhaps looking at the machinery instituted at UBC to do just that with.
L. Reid: One of the other opportunities that seems to have been fairly successful in British Columbia is the discovery park option: to bring together a collection of individuals to work out of a discovery park, to energize each other and create some decent opportunities to do good things in terms of recent graduates in science and technology. I'm hoping, because I would like to see some consideration being given to the creation of a discovery park in the Fraser Valley.
When the previous ministers talked about the creation of a technical university with a very low number of students -- 3,300 FTEs -- it seems to me that this should have some sense of fiscal responsibility around it in that discussions of operating dollars were never really laid on the table. This is a glorious opportunity to bring together a discovery park option, perhaps partnered with the technical university discussion that's currently underway with the ministry, and to place some of those new businesses into the Fraser Valley. It could be win-win for all the parties involved. I would simply ask the minister to comment on whether it could form part of an ongoing discussion around the future of technical skill development in the province.
Hon. G. Clark: I think that's definitely worthy of consideration. I'll just say a couple of things, though, that we have to be careful of. The discovery parks that the member talks about are still being developed; they are not fully developed. You need a sort of critical mass for developing the kind of synergies the member talked about. I'm not sure we're quite there yet with the ones we have. While it's quite legitimate and I tend to agree -- and I will pursue with the board of Discovery Enterprises the notion of looking into the Fraser Valley -- I do think we have to be careful. We don't want to spread them out; we're really trying to cluster these around.... I think the member has made a good point in associating, maybe at the outset of the new university, a discovery park portion
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of that new university. That's something that I'll certainly take seriously.
Lastly, I just want to make a point. There is some private sector interest in high-tech parks. There has been a lot of interest from Taiwan and elsewhere that looked like it was going to come to fruition but at the end of the day did not. These things happen, of course. That is also something we've been trying to encourage in terms of facilitating investment in B.C. to see if we can't develop some private sector industrial parks that specialize in technology -- again, developing that kind of critical mass.
I think the member knows this; it isn't anything she isn't aware of. There are certain areas where we're very close to developing that critical mass, like the biotechnology field. Of course, we talked about this before, with Michael Smith's award. Biotechnology and the pharmaceutical sector are sort of nascent industries. If we can get some private sector investment in an industrial park on the biotech or pharmaceutical side, that would be almost better than if the government started setting up little nodes around the province to try to artificially stimulate the industry.
L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's comments, because this should not be exclusive -- no matter the one or two partners. I would certainly welcome more people coming to the table, hopefully enlarging the enterprise. If in this discussion your comments are about private sector involvements, I would welcome that. The Liberal caucus would stand for anything that's going to create new opportunities for graduates, hopefully generate a profit and allow this province to continue to be on the leading edge in some of the new science and tech areas. You would have no argument from us on that.
In terms of the minister's remarks about pharmaceuticals, I would again ask the minister if he could kindly consider the science and tech branch of his ministry taking on a pharmaco-economics institute for the province of British Columbia. It's been discussed but not taken seriously, and the member certainly qualifies as someone who doesn't take the issue seriously in terms of the necessity for outcome-based research around the provision of pharmacology in the province of British Columbia.
I believe we're playing at it around the therapeutics initiative, but it's not a replacement for really legitimate decision-making around prescription drugs. The bottom line is that we need to take those decisions based on whether or not it's a good decision for the patient. What I would hope, and what I would ask this minister to consider very carefully, is where we are today, which I think is the first step. We could do some wondrous things, and certainly the model I will reference for the minister is the pharmaco-economics institute for the province of Alberta. They have a very useful model. They're making some good decisions, and I would only hope that if the minister was serious when he talked about critical mass that there could be a critical mass around legitimate decision-making for pharmoeconomics. What we haven't done particularly well is understand the efficiency of a product, the duration of a prescription and all those things. That to me falls well and truly in the bailiwick of a good science and technology program.
If this is about measurement, this is one area where British Columbia could excel, because we're basically on the first step. We haven't done a great job to this point. I think it's a new opportunity; it would invite investment. It certainly could be cost-shared with the private sector. The opportunity is there for this minister, who typically loves new opportunities and could approach this with tremendous zeal and, hopefully, at least report out on whether or not it's viable. It's certainly a viable decision-making structure in the other provinces in which it has been tried.
I would hopefully ask this minister to respond.
D. Schreck: I listen with considerable interest to the member from the opposition, and I'm interested in hearing the minister's comment on this as the minister responsible for the economic development area.
As the Liberal critic attempts to heckle me down, since she was absent on Friday, when in this Legislature we debated the issue of the vicious scaremongering tactics of the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers' Association of Canada, maybe she can put on the record whether she supports those scare tactics, which are based on gouging tens of millions of dollars out of the taxpayers of this province, or whether she supports the therapeutics initiative initiated by the Minister of Health for this government, which is based on good science and good economics.
I hear the opposition Health critic calling for a pharmaco-economic approach. That's precisely what this government established under our Minister of Health and is being furthered through the therapeutics initiative. That is precisely what is under attack, with the campaign costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, in order to try to stop this government implementing good science and good economics and further the profits of an organization headed by a former Liberal cabinet minister, Judy Erola, heading the PMAC, taking this government on in a toe-to-toe fight in order to stop good science, in order to stop good economics and in order to terrify the senior citizens of this province for the purpose of lining the pockets of multinational eastern-based corporations.
I would like the minister to comment on precisely how his ministry is backing up the efforts of the Ministry of Health in stopping that vicious attack by those multinational eastern-based corporations headed by a former Liberal cabinet minister.
Hon. G. Clark: I will just comment on a variety of points that the member and the Liberal spokesperson made on this question.
First, there is, as the last member who spoke indicated, a drug therapeutic institute initiative funded by the Ministry of Health as well as the Ministry of Skills, Training and Labour. It does deal with some of the questions the member raised -- outcome-based analysis and review. We are, of course, very supportive of that, and I think that is an appropriate course of action.
We have been looking at the pharmaceutical industry generally to promote investment in B.C. I just want to remind the member and all members that the entire pharmaceutical industry in Canada invests only 3 percent of their investments in British Columbia. It's very, very modest indeed. They have not been investing in British Columbia nearly as much as they have been in other provinces, and in other provinces they haven't been investing much relative to other parts of the world.
Of course, the Mulroney government's patent protection has been a disaster in terms of stimulating the kind of invest-
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ment that they promised. Our share of that disaster has been very, very small indeed. It is more than a bit frustrating to see, when a government moves to deal with taxpayers' funding on reference-based pricing, the kind of attempted blackmail we get from the industry. They have a bit of a challenge because they're not making any investments in British Columbia to speak of, yet they're threatening to make even less, which is kind of interesting. They haven't lived up to their bargain in the past. I think the industry does have a responsibility to be more responsible in terms of their rhetoric around that, the protection of health care in the country, and in terms of their investment patterns. We really haven't benefited as much as we should, even in terms of science.
We have been attempting to lever some investment from pharmaceutical companies. I can tell you that we'll continue to do that, but we're not going to be blackmailed by them in terms of undermining the health care system and the costs associated with that. Blackmail is a strong word. I believe it generally, but I can also tell you specifically that they attempt to put pressure on the government before they make any investments in British Columbia.
We're prepared to play our part and try to lever further investment where it makes sense, but we're not prepared to undermine our health care system by attempting to get some phantom investment from the pharmaceutical industry when they haven't proven to be good corporate citizens -- certainly for British Columbia to date.
L. Reid: I thank both speakers for their commercial. The question was really about legitimate decision-making around prescription drugs. I would agree, to a certain extent, with this minister when he talks about the therapeutics initiative. I think they're doing a fair job. I think the opportunity is there for this ministry to do an absolutely excellent job. If you were the rungs on the ladder, in terms of where the therapeutics initiatives sit, it's absolutely on the first rung of the ladder. It is not a comprehensive decision-making structure, nor is it designed to be that.
Let me give you the classic example that comes back again and again and again. When they talk about heart medication, there's not a cardiologist at the table. That kind of lack of foresight does not suggest that that is an excellent decision-making entity -- it simply does not.
The necessity for a broad-ranging pharmaco-economics institute goes far beyond whether this individual will talk about drug companies. This is a much bigger issue. It makes good fiscal sense for the number of dollars that this government, any government, pays into health care to fully understand the impact of decision-making. This is not about the level of investment in the province of British Columbia. It's part of it, but that wasn't my question. If we can attract investment at some point, fabulous.
As the Minister of Employment and Investment, I don't suppose you've ever turned anyone away. But the bottom line is that this is about whether or not this branch of this ministry -- the science and technology branch -- is prepared to involve themselves in taking responsibility for a new decision-making structure around pharmacology. That is the only question that I have on the table today. I think it's a legitimate question and deserves a serious response. I do believe it will impact dramatically on the patient in the province, but also on the taxpayer.
[7:30]
Many times members of this government have risen to their feet and suggested that those costs are out of control. This is how you understand costs. This is how you come to grips with drug utilization. This is how you review it on a regular basis. Having folks come together under a therapeutics initiative and read research reports is not the answer. It's an interesting start, but it truly is not the answer. I would certainly call upon yourself or Deborah George to make comment. I think there is a necessity for this in this province, something that this ministry and yourself could do extremely well.
Hon. G. Clark: The reason I'm talking more about investment is that.... I'm sure the member agrees that we can't be debating Health estimates in this committee. It's really not appropriate. It's really not appropriate for me to be commenting on some of these issues.
L. Reid: Science. It's a science question.
Hon. G. Clark: On the science question, we believe the drug therapeutic initiative is a beginning and may well grow into something more substantial, as the member talked about. We, of course, support moving in that direction. I would just say this, though: the drug therapeutic initiative is very much a practical attempt to deal with measurement of outcomes and to look at these questions. I think the member is talking about much more theoretical studies around the outcome question. That's what I hear from some of the remarks.
I'm not diminishing the need for more research on any of these questions, and to the extent that I'm responsible for trying to promote research in this area, I certainly agree that this is a fruitful area for study. This is a significant initiative which has just begun in the direction the member has talked about. I think that as it develops and grows.... We're monitoring it and working with industry on it. As I said, SPARC has a committee on pharmaceuticals and others looking at these questions. We'll continue to monitor and support it. I think it is an excellent initiative and tries to deal fairly pragmatically with some of the issues the member talked about.
L. Reid: I thank the minister for his comments. If I can leave him with one other thought around a pharmaco-economics institute, I referenced the institute that's currently unfolding in Alberta. I would simply ask that this government consider whether it would ever be appropriate to have a western pharmaco-economics institute and see British Columbia, Alberta and Saskatchewan aligned together. I think, to broaden the base....
Hon. G. Clark: If it was in Vancouver, I'd agree.
L. Reid: The minister says if it was in Vancouver, he would agree. Well, that's not beyond the realm of possibility. But in terms of decision-making on the broader spectrum, these are not decisions that only impact on British Columbia; these are decisions that impact on the patient, and our patients
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in British Columbia are not dramatically different than those in Alberta and Saskatchewan. So if there are ways for us to share in the costs of operating such an institute and have all the provinces benefit from the output, I would ask the minister to consider them in his deliberations.
I don't believe, ever, that we have to have everything housed in any one province if there's information that can benefit all parties and hopefully have a positive impact on everyone's health care budget. The pharmacy budgets in British Columbia, Alberta and Saskatchewan are growing. Drug use is something that all provinces will be looking at very, very carefully. So if there are ways for us to come together and share that information, I would hope that we do that. I would simply ask the minister to perhaps comment on whether or not he sees any viability around aligning with the institute that's currently underway in Alberta.
Hon. G. Clark: I think the member should know that there is very good pan-western cooperation on science and technology issues, so it's not as if we don't benefit from research being done there. And it's not as if we're not aware of what they're doing; we don't duplicate what they're doing.
I have to say that in my experience, which is not extensive, it is very challenging; nor am I inclined, initially at least, to support B.C. tax money going to an institute of research elsewhere. I'm not arguing that it can't be done or shouldn't be done from time to time, but given the challenge in terms of scarce resources in this province, generally speaking we try to support initiatives here in British Columbia and make sure that there's good cooperation between the provinces. That might mean that at some point in the future -- and I don't mind exploring that -- there will be some more formal linkages, provided we use our researchers here in British Columbia to pursue that.
L. Reid: I thank the minister for his comments. I certainly am intrigued by the notion of British Columbia dollars leaving the province, because I think that happens on a fairly regular basis in terms of joining together to create useful entities. I think the future will hold more of that, and if this minister has been serious in terms of past remarks about partnering enterprises to arrive at the best possible product, this may indeed have a future, and I would certainly welcome that.
In terms of a more specific question around the networks of excellence, there are three that I understand are operational in British Columbia: bacterial diseases, genetic diseases and protein engineering. If I could ask for a status report on those three programs, perhaps we can go from there.
Hon. G. Clark: I'll ask Deborah George to give an update.
D. George: The three biotech centres of excellence -- we are active in several others as well -- have been funded for a second round and are very successful. There is, in fact, a new centres-of-excellence competition being held by the federal government. We hope to have a decision on that in August. It doesn't look like there will be any specific new biotech centres of excellence, but there will be a health care one, so that could bring even more of our health care and biotech researchers in through a different door than in the past. But all three of the other ones were re-funded in the second phase of the competition, and we funded them as well.
L. Reid: If I might continue with Ms. George, in terms of the opportunity that may exist for a health care network of excellence to come to Canada -- I guess that's the understanding to date -- will British Columbia have a reasonable opportunity to attract and site that program here in this province?
D. George: I'm sorry, could you repeat the beginning of the question?
L. Reid: When I asked about bacterial diseases, genetic diseases and protein engineering programs, you talked about a new one coming on line on health care. Has the province selected where that program will be sited?
D. George: No, it hasn't. Essentially, they're in the shortlist process now. We know there's a shortlist of several applications under health care, but we don't know which one will be successful in August. That's when that sort of decision will be made. We're very hopeful that we will play a very strong role, because UBC is recognized as one of the best. We've probably closed down more biotech research money than any other university.
L. Reid: In terms of criteria for selection, what types of criteria would be evaluated for British Columbia to be successful?
Hon. G. Clark: I'll ask Dr. George to answer.
D. George: It's a federal government competition, so it's their criteria. My understanding is that the types of criteria they're looking at this time -- there are, in fact, B.C. people on the federal committee making the decisions, Hugh Wynn-Edwards from B.C. Research being one -- have a much more economic emphasis. In their policy, the federal government is moving away from basic research to much more applied research. Our understanding is that all three, perhaps four, new network areas would be much more applied. For instance, there's an economic policy network and a telelearning network. The health care one, as opposed to being what we would call science per se, is going to be application of health care as well. It's a bit different than in the past.
L. Reid: Mention was made of the fact that British Columbia has those existing three -- hopefully a fourth, if we're successful in the competition to achieve a home for the health care one. You also mentioned that British Columbia has involvement or dealings with the others. Could you kindly comment in terms of what those others are and the level of involvement?
Hon. G. Clark: I'll ask Dr. George to answer.
D. George: We're involved in approximately 13 networks overall; we don't lead them. We lead a certain number of them. They range from advanced systems, health care.... I think altogether -- actually, I'd have to confirm these figures -- we have participation in almost every one of the funded networks or centres-of-excellence with the federal government, leading in much more than our population share would suggest. The very successful ones do tend to be biotech, protein engineering and advanced systems.
L. Reid: Might I perhaps request a detailed examination of each of those networks? I'm certainly happy to receive it in writing; that's no problem at all, if you'd be so kind.
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In terms of the level of funding to science and technology in the province, I haven't received as many letters this year as I have in the past over decreases in funding. As the minister well knows, many of these areas are looking for some kind of stability. They are hoping to create some kind of stability of funding. Certainly the notice they receive seems to be in question as to when their dollars become available and whether or not they will be funded for the coming year.
An Hon. Member: Centres of excellence?
L. Reid: No, other research and development projects underway in the province. I asked for their centres of excellence material in writing, so I'm moving on.
In terms of the B.C. Research Council and other councils that have sought funding from this government over the past, it seems that the notice around funding is sometimes lacking. Is there any way for this ministry to look to a three-year or five-year funding cycle for some of these projects that are currently funded and underway so that they can make some plans around how best to proceed, and whether they should be taking on monumental projects -- if indeed they'll have a funding base to continue them?
Hon. G. Clark: This, of course, is the big debate across government. I appreciate that everybody in government would like to have budget cycles longer than one year, but having been Minister of Finance, I also appreciate how difficult it is because of removing the discretionary ability to make cuts. I won't make a political speech about the member's party and the kinds of cuts they have been talking about, but you just can't lock in long-term commitments all across the board and then deal with the kinds of cuts that might be the imperative of the day.
What we have tried to do is give some stable funding. We received a letter from the Science Council this year, and my experience has been that with our strategic planning initiative, with the Premier's Advisory Council on Science and Technology and with stable funding for a couple of years now, they have realized that in spite of cuts everywhere else in the country, generally speaking it has been very well received.
Having said that, the kinds of investments you could make in this area are not infinite, but pretty close to infinite. There is a lot of demand, and we don't fulfil that demand, so priorities have to be made. We are not in a position to give the kind of five-year funding forecast that many people would like, and I don't make any apologies for that. At the end of the day, government has to retain that discretion.
What we have tried to do is have the community itself know that we are serious about science and tech, and that in spite of what's happening around the country and the earlier cuts in the administration -- we tried to deal with the deficit question, and now we've solved that problem -- we have managed to maintain funding. That has gone well in the community, and I think there's a really good, solid, stable understanding.
We can't fetter the discretion of the Minister of Finance, and I can't give ironclad commitments for the future. We are obviously doing extremely well financially in British Columbia, fiscally and economically, but if that were not the case, then we would have to compete for heart surgery, hospital funding or ambulance funding versus science and tech funding. I know that it sounds awful, and it's certainly awful to people in the science and tech field, but at the end of the day, that's what we were elected to do.
I don't know if the member would agree. She might, but I think we can say objectively that we have really tried to protect this science funding, albeit not as greatly as people would like. We have a commitment, and we think it is a growth area for the government. The best we can do as politicians in this day and age is give that level of comfort, but we can't give certainty and the kind of comfort they would like for taking on longer projects.
L. Reid: I appreciate the minister's comments. If the commitment is there, we can hopefully put some pins in place either to find them the dollars elsewhere or to ensure that they have some greater incentives to continue to want to do business in British Columbia.
In terms of scarce dollars that are often unavailable, I wonder if the minister has given any thought to what we currently appear to have, which is the Biotechnology Alliance, the Information Technology Association, the biotech industry association and a number of other groups. Is there any opportunity to bring them together under one umbrella, in that a majority of their activities are in common? The majority of them put out a newsletter and do some things around sharing information. In all those activities, they have specific responsibilities for their particular area, but a lot of their activity level is common.
[7:45]
Is there any way that we can find some dollars to reduce the cost of each of those entities doing the work individually? Perhaps we could bring them together and ensure that the same communication tools are in place and the same level of expertise is there, but that we're not having five, six or ten different associations around R and D operating independently and performing exactly the same function. Could the minister kindly comment?
Hon. G. Clark: We've done some of that. I'm not sure if the member is aware of it, but there is the B.C. Technology Industries Association, or TIA. That was really in part an initiative of the ministry and the government -- in part, I say, because it's really an industry association, but we were helpful with that, I think, and they have acknowledged it. We provided a bit of seed money. There was no core funding, because we don't want to get into core-funding the industry associations, but we provided some funding for their conferences and the like. I spoke at their awards dinner a couple of years ago, and it was very well attended. I think there were 400 or 500 people there. I unfortunately couldn't make it this year; I think I was out of town or something. We do -- or at least, we did -- give some funding assistance for their magazine.
So that's really an alliance and an attempt to build the kind of thing you were talking about and to at least get them talking and thinking together, developing some synergies and maybe even some mergers down the road.
On the other hand, there are specific industry associations, institutes and the like which are sufficiently distinct that there isn't as much cross-fertilization as you might like. There have been some examples of co-location in the same facility to save money, but not actual lending of the associations.
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The ministry has several staff people who work with industry associations as part of their mandate, and I think they do a good job liaising their concerns to government, and vice versa, and working with them. We're constantly trying to see if we can't build these into more viable units to continue on without any government support, of course, and to provide a strong voice for that sector to government and to the public.
I think the Technology Industries Association is really a very positive example of the technology industries coming together. That's very recent; it's only in the last two or three years they've come together. When you're getting hundreds and hundreds of people out to awards dinners, you can really see that things are starting to develop. It is kind of nascent in that regard, and I think more work can be done. We try to do that all the time.
L. Reid: I thank the minister for his comments. My understanding of B.C. Technology Industries Association is that it has approximately 150 member companies, and they virtually all reside in the lower mainland. The direction I'm heading is to see if we can create some better alliances and some better communications across the province. They look at hardware, software, telecommunications and do some things in the service industry, as well.
I appreciate the minister's comments about biotechnology perhaps being somewhat distinct. But I do believe the minister, and I agree that the goal is to build something incredibly fine around how best to communicate around new technologies. If all these groups are hopefully working on the same goal, we'll be even further ahead.
In terms of the Science Council, has there been any discussion or any change around how best to proceed? Is their mandate fairly set so that we won't be anticipating any major changes in service delivery around the Science Council?
Hon. G. Clark: I'm actually a bit surprised by this question, because the member is quite knowledgable in this area. I don't mean this to be nasty, but we've just initiated the regional science councils, which is a huge regional initiative for the Science Council. There are now five of them set up, and I think we're going to have eight. We're going to have a few more, anyway. They've been a huge success way beyond anybody's expectations, particularly in some parts of British Columbia -- the Okanagan, the Island and elsewhere -- where there is a very large science community, so they were very warmly received.
I'd like to ask Dr. Deborah George to give a bit of an update for the committee on that regional focus, which has just happened in the last year, by the Science Council and the ministry. They are really to be commended for it.
D. George: The Science Council is one part of the regional initiative overall, and the technology assistance program is the other. Both are beyond our wildest dreams. We always had great difficulty in moving science out of the lower mainland and southern Vancouver Island. The TAP program has grown in leaps and bounds, and 30 percent of TAP grants are now in the regions. The regional science councils likewise have grown, I think because in each region we didn't say: "Here's the template; this is how you need to do it." Instead, we got the champions in the community and let them develop their own councils. We're overwhelmed by the success of the councils and by what is happening.
Each regional science council is quite different, but what they're doing in their community is working with the colleges in terms of technology transfer. We're also funding some pilot technology transfer offices at the colleges in the regions. In the last few years it really has moved ahead.
L. Reid: I thank both individuals for their clarification on the Science Council. As the minister knows, I am a strong supporter, and I wish to acknowledge the mentorship, if you will, that I've had from Ron Woodward. I think he's done an absolutely outstanding job in terms of bringing me up to speed. My role has been to work in concert on a number of these issues. I think that's always to the good, because I do believe that science and technology is not a partisan issue. It's an issue of whether we're going to put this province on a good footing to launch some new companies and some new ideas. I think that's a very, very important undertaking.
I have one or two questions in this area. One of the concerns a number of businesses have brought to me has been around the new labour legislation in the province, which they see as being very unworkable for new biotech companies and information technology kinds of companies. They don't see the legislation being responsive or flexible and even that it is fundamentally unworkable in a knowledge-based economy.
The structure of the new economy requires much more flexibility and team work, etc. They don't perceive the new labour legislation of this government to be at all complementary to the direction they perceive for science- and technology-based companies. What I'm looking for from this minister is some sense of the impact he believes this legislation will have on new biotech companies and new information technology companies in the province.
Hon. G. Clark: You mentioned Ron Woodward. I just want to say a couple of things about Ron Woodward, because he's leaving. He's going to the Saskatchewan Research Council, which is unfortunate for us and very positive for Saskatchewan. For the record, I would say that Mr. Woodward did a very good job for the previous administration and for our administration in this field. It's a big loss to us in terms of his institutional knowledge and the role he's played. I was disappointed that he chose to take the other job. I guess it's a higher-paying opportunity for him, and I hope -- and actually expect -- that once he gets to Saskatchewan he'll want to come back. Maybe we'll get him back yet. Just for the record, he's been a really outstanding public servant for British Columbia, and he's done a really good job in his field. I think he deserves a lot of credit for the work that's being done.
Having said that, now on to the question of the Labour Code. I obviously don't agree with the member, but I do understand that there's some apprehension in the community around the Labour Code. That's unfortunate, and I think it's largely ignorance, and I don't say that in a pejorative way. Because that sector is so largely non-union and doesn't have the experience in labour relations dealing in a unionized environment, they have a lot of preconceived notions about trade unions. I think they are incorrect. Some high-tech firms have unionized environments that work very well, including some in the United States and here.
I think there's a knee-jerk reaction and concern. Obviously many employers would have a concern about their workforce unionizing, because it does potentially limit flexibility and gives workers a say in their wages and benefits and
[ Page 16397 ]
their working conditions. So one can expect that employers might have some concern about that generally. That concern is heightened when you don't have the experience in that environment. I would say too that unions don't have the experience they should in the high-tech field. Obviously I have very strong views on this, but my own very strong view is that the unions, at the end of the day, want their companies to be successful. In the high-tech environment or in a low-tech environment, it doesn't make any sense for a union to cripple the competitive advantage that company may have. In fact, the incentive is the opposite.
I don't accept the notion that they are fundamentally bad for business. I think it's a fundamental question of democracy that people have the right to join a union. If you believe people have a right to join a union, then you don't fetter that right. It's their democratic right to do that if they choose to do so, and you want to make it as easy as possible for them to make that choice. If they choose not to, that's fine, but you want to give them that opportunity.
If unions are successful in organizing some high-tech firms, increasingly they will understand the flexibility that is required to make these continue to be successful. They have demonstrated that adaptability, and I think it's in their interest to accept that adaptability. I understand the concerns of the business community in this field, and I accept that management rights are fettered by the fact that they have to consult workers. It is a more democratic environment; they have a say in their wages and working conditions.
To me it's part of our democratic system that people have and can exercise those rights. I think it is important for the government to work with unions and with high-tech companies to allay the unfounded fears they have about the inflexibility of unions and the way in which the Labour Code can impact them. If at the end of the day they have some legitimate concerns about the Labour Code not reflecting the unique environment -- as it does not, I think many would contend, in the construction industry -- then I certainly have no.... I'm not wedded to any particular model. I think we want to give workers the right to exercise their rights as freely and easily as they can. I would never agree, personally, to anything that did not allow the opportunity for people to unionize in a high-tech environment or elsewhere. But if there are ways we can ensure that in a radically different industrial environment the Labour Code will keep pace with that, I'd be quite happy to work on that question.
A lot of it stems from traditional business concerns. Some of them are legitimate in terms of unions or workers wanting to get more of the profit, etc. Also, it comes from ignorance around the role of unions in a post-industrial setting, where unions can play a productive role. I think government has an obligation to work with the parties -- and I think our ministry does -- to ensure that those parties are brought together, to work on it. Despite the fact that they're high tech and leading edge and very enlightened in a lot of areas, in this field it's difficult to get the parties together because you have a traditional adversarial relationship. So I'm not sure they're keen on working with the union sector to make sure everything is coming along. I think at this point they'd still rather not deal with the problem. That's not acceptable to me, but we will continue to work on it.
L. Reid: The theme that I think will be experienced by all folks in the province over the next five, ten or 15 years will be that it is a choice. There will be individuals who will choose to unionize and those who will choose not to.
The minister's comment that perhaps the union sector today simply does not have experience in dealing with high-tech companies is a valid one, I think. There isn't a sufficient number of high-tech companies yet, therefore individuals haven't been afforded enough opportunities to become involved. But from our perspective, we would always look to choice as being the number one driver, and we must certainly respect the individual nature of these companies. If it is not in the best interests of the workers or the company to unionize, we would trust that this government would respect that. The minister very clearly made the point that workers have the right to choose to become union members, and I would hope that the other side of that equation is also realized: companies may also choose to unionize or not, around a number of service delivery models.
[8:00]
In terms of my questions on science and technology, I appreciate the comments I've received. I certainly appreciated receiving the science and technology strategic plan for British Columbia, which arrived soon after I requested it. I thank you and your staff for your comments.
Hon. G. Clark: I want to thank the member, because her questions were knowledgable, as usual.
I will make one last point on the unionized sector, because I can't resist. Microtel is arguably one of the most successful high-tech companies in British Columbia, and it has been unionized for many years and continues to be. There is some experience with unionized firms, and they've been extremely successful, adaptable and flexible; it's not completely virgin territory.
Again, I say thanks to the opposition. Any assistance or information that we can provide is, of course, always available to you.
D. Symons: I have a very few questions on the air transport assistance program and possibly a few on ports.
I looked through the line ministries. I don't find ATAP listed as such, so I'm wondering if you might tell me where I can find that in the estimates books.
Hon. G. Clark: It's under the Transportation Financing Authority; it's funded by the TFA.
D. Symons: Therefore it doesn't appear with the line ministries as it used to. Can you tell me how much is budgeted this year for ATAP?
Hon. G. Clark: It's still under review, but I think it will be about $2 million.
D. Symons: I wonder, then, while we're projecting and not certain on things, if you might give me an idea of a few of the major projects that might be considered for this coming year.
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Hon. G. Clark: I'm not actually prepared to do that today. There's a big list of individual municipalities and others that have applied for funding, and I really don't want to make that announcement today, because I haven't informed some of those who either will be or won't be getting it. I'll just make one comment generally for the member, and that is that we do have to review this program, not this year but in the next year, because of the radical devolution of airports from the federal Liberal government and the dramatic consequences that that could have in regions. So it seems a bit incongruous that we might be continuing to fund small capital projects for non-provincial airports, if you will, and have the provincial airports in deep crisis because of federal cuts. So we do have to rationalize this whole area as the feds try to off-load onto the provinces some of their fiscal problems.
D. Symons: If you aren't able to tell me this year's, maybe you can tell me the amount of money that was spent on ATAP programs last year, outline a few of the larger spending items and give me a cost for the largest items.
Hon. G. Clark: I'm sorry, I'll have to get that information for the member; I just don't have last year's here. It's not before the committee, but I'm happy to get it for the member.
D. Symons: There are a few projects around the province, I think, to take special note of, one of them being the airport at Castlegar. I believe for quite a number of years they have been asking about a new landing system. Because of the terrain at Castlegar, this is quite important. As the planes come in, they have to weave around the mountains, and they can actually lose the signal for a while. I think it's been number one on their list for quite a while. Is that anywhere in consideration for the ATAP program, or is it going to wait again until what happens with the federal devolution of airports?
Hon. G. Clark: I apologize -- maybe I shouldn't. I don't have the appropriate staff here for this question because we've completed the TFA; I'm not trying to dodge the question. My recollection is that Castlegar is not eligible for ATAP funding. I have to be careful, because I could get letters and phone calls and everything else by saying that, but....
An Hon. Member: Too late.
Hon. G. Clark: Yes.
I think Castlegar is a federal airport, at the moment, under federal ownership and control administration. Traditionally ATAP has funded very small regional airports: a landing strip at Port Alberni, which we funded a couple of years ago -- it was a grass landing strip until literally a couple of years ago -- and those kinds of things, which have no access to federal capital.
Castlegar is a big airport; it's not a small regional airport. I'm pretty sure that it's completely the domain of the federal government, not ours. As the federal government devolves and off-loads that airport onto either community control or provincial control, then we have some big challenges, because we don't want to pick up the subsidy costs from the federal government, but neither do we want to jeopardize the important transportation corridor.
Here we go. Castlegar is a federal airport and not eligible for ATAP, so I was correct. Last year ATAP's funding was about the same, about $2 million. And as soon as we make the announcement this year, I'll make sure the member is aware of this year's funding allocation.
D. Symons: I am impressed by the quickness with which answers come to the minister. I'm wondering, then, if you might be able to tell me about the Masset airport. We had a disaster last year with an air crash there and the loss of lives during an air evacuation. I'm wondering if you can tell me whether the Masset airport comes under federal authority and possibly if there has been any consideration to checking in and improving the landing system at Masset, because that seemed to be something that led to that accident.
Hon. G. Clark: Yes, Masset actually has made application. As I say, we haven't made the decisions on individual questions, but we're very aware of it. I don't believe the infrastructure was blamed as the problem with respect to that crash. That's not to say that we don't want to deal with it. I think Masset airport is the kind of airport which ATAP traditionally has looked at. Similarly, we have some problems the member be aware of at Dease Lake, particularly with Cassiar closing, in trying to make sure there is.... When I was up in Dease Lake six years ago with the former member, Larry Guno, and the Premier when he was Leader of the Opposition, I remember the public meeting there when I asked na�vely, coming from Vancouver, how they dealt with evacuation. They announced that the whole town came out, turned their headlights on and lined the runway with their headlights so that people could get in and out.
Their request was for some Medivac assistance. I'm pleased to be in a position now where I can have some impact there. In fact, we've made some significant investments in that area to try to deal with those questions. That's a good case for some provincial government capital subsidy to make sure that health and safety are taken care of.
D. Symons: A couple of airports around the province are trying to prepare for the devolution and are somewhat concerned about their viability. I think a few of them are concerned about the land on which the airport sits, and the tenure of the land will really depend on whether they can make a case for a viable operation. I believe one of these is Terrace. I suspect Terrace has passed its concerns on to the minister that Terrace really needs to take over all the land that the airport sits on in order to ensure that they will be able to have an operation that won't have to be heavily subsidized. Is there any decision made on that, and what are the plans in that regard?
Hon. G. Clark: No decision has been made as of yet. I'm obviously intimately aware of that. I think some of your people running for nomination are involved in that.
The challenge the government has in this regard is this. First of all, these are subsidized airports from the federal government. We want to minimize the subsidy. We've engaged a firm to do business-case analysis at each airport at their request, working with municipalities. We don't, frankly, believe the numbers from the federal government, and they're
[ Page 16399 ]
grossly inflated. So we want to work with the communities to minimize the subsidy. In some cases there's always going to be some subsidy if we want to maintain the airport. In some cases the tougher decisions around closure may happen.
Secondly, we want to have a fair policy across the board. The problem I have -- I speak personally -- with this is that there are a couple of airports, maybe three or four, that might do very well with Crown lands adjacent to the airport. They might be able to log Crown timber and make money off that to subsidize the airport. The problem with that is that it deals with a solution only at that airport. What do I say to another small town with an airport that doesn't have any valuable timber on their land when they say: "You gave Quesnel the land with all the timber, so we want you to give us some money to do that"? These are Crown assets. These are owned by all the people in British Columbia, not by Quesnel or anywhere else, and the timber is owned by all the people of British Columbia.
While it's very seductive -- and I wouldn't dismiss it, because it's under active consideration -- we can't simply do a one-off deal with a couple of airports that happen, by circumstance, to have a whole bunch of valuable Crown land in the vicinity, without setting a precedent for the other airports around the province. That's what we're grappling with. It's a very challenging problem. Other airports, particularly in the Okanagan, would like to develop industrial sites, etc., on what was Crown land.
We have to come up with some kind of policy which helps the communities, and we want to work on that. We've been giving them lots of assistance. We don't want to take the off-load from the federal government and just pick up the subsidy. We're not going to do that. I think there are some real benefits happening with the local involvement in community control, but neither do we want to give a specific subsidy -- because that's what it is -- from the provincial taxpayer to one or two airports, unless we're prepared to give similar assistance to all the airports in British Columbia.
D. Symons: In speaking to a few mayors around the province where airports are in the circumstances of devolution, it's interesting, because some of them obviously look at this as an opportunity. I think the mayor of Cranbrook looks at this as quite an opportunity for Cranbrook. Other mayors look at it with real concern as to whether they're going to be able to make it or not.
I think the minister anticipated my next question, which is going to move to Quesnel. You talked about timber rights and so forth, and Quesnel was asking that question.
I have a letter from Mr. Nelson, responding to their concerns about it, and addressed to the city administrator of Quesnel earlier this year. It says: "I would suggest that Quesnel and every other community affected should proceed with development business plans without making that assumption" -- the assumption being that Crown lands would be available.
I agree that they shouldn't make the assumption. What I am asking is: can they at least make the recommendation? There's a difference between making assumptions that you're going to get this and saying that you'll look at various options and that one of the options may involve the use of Crown land. How flexible is the minister being as far as these various proposals that are going to come forward from a good number of airports around the province? I hope there is some flexibility in doing what you're doing and that you don't set a precedent in one that will cause a problem in another.
I know the minister also has some concerns about Vancouver International being the moneymaker. Most of these airports are feeder lines into Vancouver International. Therefore Vancouver's success depends partially on the fact that these airports are feeder lines for it and maybe the profits from Vancouver should go there. I have a concern there. That's all very well. It may be right and it might be moral, but Ottawa may not play ball that way. So we're going to have to make plans other than depending on the fact that Ottawa may not do what we think might be the right thing for them to do. What contingency plans do we have?
Hon. G. Clark: First of all, we are, with the municipalities, doing business plans for each airport. We need to make sure we get the efficiencies first, and people can't look to Crown timber or gravel or hotel development on government property as the saviour to their problems. We have to go through the exercise of seeking the efficiencies and doing the business plan without any provincial subsidy by way of land or timber or other assets. That's the first thing we're trying to do. That's why Mr. Nelson, who is sitting next to me, wrote back and said that you have to assume you're not getting anything from the province.
Secondly, we're now doing an evaluation of the value of the assets at all of the B.C. airports. There may be an option, for example, to take all those assets and say: "Okay, we will dedicate them to airports, but not that particular airport. Maybe we should spread whatever revenue there is around, using some sharing formula." This is hypothetical; the government has made no decision. These are the kinds of options that I think have more equity to them and are the ones we need to consider.
[8:15]
Thirdly, the member made a good point, and I invite the opposition to support the government in this regard. The Vancouver International Airport is profitable. It profits to the tune of more than $35 million a year, and it pays $35 million a year to the federal government. The subsidy to British Columbia airports from the federal government historically.... Last year it was $35 million. Therefore I would argue very aggressively that the federal government can't take the profits from Vancouver International Airport and then leave the ones that are losing money to the province or municipal government. I would argue that if the federal government took the $35 million they generated from the Vancouver International Airport and rebated it back to the B.C. Aviation Council or the provincial airport authority and allocated the funds in a rationale way between the airports to improve their efficiency and competitiveness, then I think we're really talking devolution in a way that makes a lot of sense.
I think it's important that 30 percent of the traffic at Vancouver International Airport comes from the regional airport system in British Columbia. The Vancouver International Airport makes money because of the regional airports in British Columbia. So there is a logic to what I'm saying. This doesn't just give us money from the federal government; this is saying that if you want to get out of the airport business,
[ Page 16400 ]
which you're doing, you can't say that you're going to keep the one airport that makes lots of money and say to all the ones that lose money: "Tough luck" -- especially when it's an integrated system.
We will and have been requesting from the federal government that they don't give the money to the province but that it go into a fund. I would argue -- and far be it from me -- that the federal government should be involved in any kind of airport authority in British Columbia and that the funding should come via the profits less the payments that Vancouver International Airport pays. I would just remind the member that there are other devolution talks in eastern Canada, and no such payment is being requested. This is a payment being paid by Vancouver International rather than, say, the opportunity they were looking at Mirabel. Mirabel doesn't pay anything, and Vancouver Airport pays $35 million. So I think there's a logic to that. These are just giving you some of the dynamics here.
In addition to that, we have been talking to the B.C. Aviation Council. We have been meeting with them extensively and working with them on this question. There are significant regional pressures from people who can see the saviour being provincial gravel or provincial trees. I'm not immune to that. We want to be pragmatic about this, so it's still under consideration.
I do want to say further, as I alluded earlier, that we have about $2 million in annual funding to the ATAP. There's an incongruity here of providing provincial funding, although it's very modest, to small airports if we've got this other problem. It may be that there needs to be some pooling of capital so we can make sure we maintain these airports. At the end of the day they're really critical to the economic development of the province, and the province has a big role to play in ensuring their viability. We're trying to work with them to help solve these problems.
D. Symons: I appreciate the remarks of the minister, and I think it would show that particularly on this topic, if there happens to be a change in government, there certainly won't be much change in attitude toward how we're going to deal with the problem facing our airports in the outlying areas of British Columbia.
I wonder if we can move, just for a very few minutes, to the ports. In the past, this has been a name on a door or a letterhead or something in one of the ministries. It really hasn't been very much of a position. I think the last person was a Mr. Seymour, who left a number of years ago, and from time to time I find his name still on things, but he's no longer there. I don't believe anyone took over that position in the ministry, so in the Ministry of Transportation and Highways, we had a ports position with nobody in it. Is there a person designated to look after ports issues? Is there any money going into dealing with ports issues, funding that position or any programs that might be taking place in ports in the province -- outside of B.C. Ferries, of course?
Hon. G. Clark: This has never really been taken seriously by the province, and I don't say that to sort of attack previous administrations. But airport policy and ports policy have always been viewed as a federal responsibility. It's really odd, especially for a province where ports are so important to our economic development. We've tried to take it much more seriously, and one of the moves with the restructuring of the ministries is that we now have a transportation policy group, which is looking very much at ports policy. We've been working with the federal government in this regard, so we do have staff dedicated to it and no provincial funding.
You may have heard Minister Young talk about the devolution of ports, similar to airports. So we're preparing and doing some work now, though we are doing some consulting work. We've retained some consultants to look at some of these questions.
Just on that point, I meet with the CPR, and we've been working closely with the CPR on a variety of questions. CPR meets annually with virtually every province in Canada, except for British Columbia. They have these ongoing dialogues and working groups on railway policy questions. Ports are critical to that. I'm not known to be a particular friend of the CPR or CNR, but it did seem quite striking that the province has never really engaged them in any discussion about such a critical piece of infrastructure. Actually, we've been engaged maybe too much in the last little while. We have been engaged intensely on a variety of questions, including the question of ports policy, given the radical changes that are happening in the rail transportation industry as a result of federal cuts to the Crow rate and the like.
Those are areas where we're kind of playing catch-up a bit. That's why we have the Transportation Financing Authority doing integrated transportation planning, including these questions, and that's why we have a transportation policy now in this ministry, looking at all those questions.
Lastly, on ports, we have one added problem, which we are now doing a lot of work on, and that's subsidies of ports in the United States. The member may know that Portland.... I hesitate to open up a whole new range of areas for questions, but potash comes through British Columbia, and the potash corporation called Canpotex, the potash export arm of the companies in Saskatchewan, has now announced that they are going to be building a facility in Portland to export a fairly large part of potash. It won't have any particularly devastating impact on the short term, but it obviously means that they have the ability to play one port against the other.
What's so annoying about it, aside from a variety of things, is that they're being subsidized by the American authorities to pursue that development, including tax holidays and a whole range of tax advantages that ports have in the United States. We believe that's a trade question. I've raised that with the federal government. They're not particularly keen on pursuing a trade remedy or an attempted trade remedy on this question. That's just the tip of the iceberg on a range of questions in looking at competitiveness of our ports.
D. Symons: I thank the minister again. I gather that the last comment you were making about the port of Portland would have as much to do with railway rates, as well as the fact that there's some subsidization for putting potash in there. It certainly could affect Vancouver Wharves, which I believe is owned by an arm of this government or is a Crown corporation. That could make it of double interest, I suppose, to this government.
Moving on to ports, I wonder if we can take a look at the Victoria harbour. There was some motion toward setting up a port authority for Victoria. It was moving along fairly smoothly up to the point where the provincial government,
[ Page 16401 ]
which had been a player in that to begin with, basically opted out. I wonder if you can tell us some reason why the provincial government, when they had gone along at the beginning, seemed to opt out of it when it came down to making some actual decisions. It basically destroyed whatever progress had been made up to that point.
Hon. G. Clark: The Chair, actually, would be better to answer this question.
The previous Minister of Government Services was looking at this question on behalf of the government. It's my responsibility, but it has been obviously of great local interest. In general, the province is very supportive of the attempt to get more regional control and a harbour commission in Victoria. We have been supportive. There is unique federal legislation which allows it without any particular changes. Frankly, the feds have been moving extremely slowly on the file. I'm not sure where it's going; there's a big debate locally.
We're still pursuing it, still working on the question. Again, we're generally in favour of more regional control of these facilities. This issue is a challenging one because of all the politics involved. The federal government is clearly not too keen on moving too quickly.
D. Symons: This is my last topic. The information I had on that was that the provincial government wasn't too keen. I guess there's a difference there. Certainly the information I got seemed to imply that.
My last topic deals with railways other than B.C. Rail. We have the E&N line on Vancouver Island and CP up north looking at either privatization or cutting certain lines as a cost-saving measure. Yet these lines do serve some very useful purposes within the province's transportation needs. Is the government looking at some contingency plan, a plan B, to deal with these situations as each one develops in various portions of the province, and at how we're going to handle them?
When we look at the E&N, it seems that anything I ever see relating to the E&N problems on Vancouver Island, particularly the passenger service, says that the federal government must do something. I've never seen the other side of that -- what we're willing to do as well. I think somehow the province has to be some player in there, other than simply saying: "Somebody else has to pick up the ball and run with it. Our only job is to prod them into doing that."
Indeed, the federal court seems to have implied that the federal government, or at least CP Rail, does not have the legal responsibility to carry on a passenger service. They might have the moral obligation, and I would agree with the minister on that, but legally they don't have to. If they're going to cut that out, what plans is the provincial government making to: one, see that the roadbed is secure for the future, because I'm sure that we'll come back to using passenger and commuter rail down the line; and two, make sure that we maintain some of that service now?
Hon. G. Clark: I was sure the member said he was in favour of commuter rail down the road, but that's completely inconsistent with all of his remarks with respect to the one line we are opening.
I would say down the road -- no pun intended, hon. Chair.
D. Schreck: Actually, I thought they were on record as saying they'd cancel it.
Hon. G. Clark: That's right; they are on record. The member is correct. He's on record as saying they'd cancel the commuter rail.
I do want to make a distinction between the E&N and other railways. That's why the province is so aggressive with respect to the E&N. The E&N was part of the Terms of Union of Confederation. We believe, and I believe, that the federal government and the railways have an obligation to run passenger service on that line. We are not about to step in with tax money from the province to subsidize something which is part of the deal in which B.C. entered Confederation. I appreciate that the court case has been lost in this regard, but anybody looking at history knows that there is a historical commitment to British Columbia which we believe remains. That's why the member has noticed that we have been aggressive on the E&N with respect to federal responsibility.
The question of rail policy is actively under debate. We have been working and talking to railways on this question extensively. Rail abandonment is a huge problem on the Prairies. It tends to be a problem here, but not nearly as significant, because of the corridors we have. We have been working to see whether we can make sure that the restructuring meets British Columbia's needs, particularly on the goods side, but also on the passenger side.
There are opportunities for short-line railways in Western Canada. We've had several inquiries on that, so we have been attempting to facilitate some of that development, at least on the BCR, but potentially on the E&N and elsewhere. We have been working very diligently on this question. The field is changing very quickly, and the province is not going to rush in with tax money to support the railways, particularly when there is a federal responsibility.
D. Symons: That was to be my last question, but I have to correct either a misstatement by the minister or maybe some misinformation he was putting out. I don't think you will find anywhere on record that I've said I would cancel commuter rail. You will find that I said that I believe that your commuter rail was ill-advised and maybe should have been looked into to make sure it was more financially viable. Since there has been so much money sunk into it, I'm not going to see that money go down the drain.
I will put it on record that I do not intend, if we form government, to cancel commuter rail. It's there; it may not be the financial success the minister has suggested it will be. I hope I'm wrong, actually, because it will cost the taxpayers dearly if I am right. I'd rather be wrong and have a success, even if it's a success for this government. I would prefer that it would be a success rather than a failure.
W. Hurd: I have a brief series of questions for the minister with respect to the natural resources community fund budget of the ministry. I note that there's a source of revenue for the natural resource community fund; there's a set of disbursements, as well. The money, I guess, travels out of the special account, and the amount held is $25 million in perpetuity. I wonder if the minister could advise us, given the potential need for this fund in resource-dependent communities in the province, whether any thought has been given to
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allowing the fund to increase with the source of revenue, rather than disburse it to, I assume, general revenue. Of course, with inflation, $25 million definitely would produce fewer results for resource-dependent communities. I wonder if the minister could possibly take a few moments in these estimates to elaborate on the strategy for maintaining a $25 million fund in what appears to be perpetuity without allowing it to potentially build up and create a greater cushion for resource-dependent communities.
Hon. G. Clark: First of all, let me deal with the natural resource community fund this year in terms of why the spending out of the fund is down. There are two main reasons for that. The main one is that commodity prices have generally risen. There aren't the prices in resource communities that we've seen in the past; therefore there aren't the applications that we've had in the past.
[8:30]
Second, the forest renewal fund, where there is restructuring taking place, is doing such an outstanding job that there isn't a crisis with respect to accommodating it. That's a second reason for the decline.
I was the Minister of Finance when this was set up. If the member checks the record, he will note that the main reason for this fund came out of the Cassiar question, in that there was no contingency fund to deal with resource communities in crisis. We could have a debate about whether it should be $25 million or $50 million, etc. Obviously we're protecting this pool of capital from other demands that may happen on the government treasury. I support that; the government obviously does. It's protected because of the fact that it's a share of revenue from natural resources.
I guess the question is: how big should a contingency fund be? We're really dealing with the possibility of a failure of a resource community. If the member is asking me if it should be adjusted periodically, I would strongly agree with him. But at this stage, we're not contemplating a crisis of the magnitude that would require in excess of $25 million. If it does, obviously it simply comes out of general revenue.
The Chair: Hon. members, there is a division, and we are required in the other House. So we will take a recess.
The committee recessed from
The Chair: We reconvene Section A. The floor is being maintained by the member for Surrey-White Rock.
W. Hurd: When we left debate on this estimate we were talking about the natural resource community fund. The minister was giving us the reasons why the $25 million fund was maintained in perpetuity. I think we were talking about the sources of revenue for the fund, which come from petroleum and natural resource revenues, mineral revenues and, of course, forest revenues. I just wonder if the minister could advise the committee why someone wouldn't come to the conclusion that, in fact, this fund just represents a new tax or a new form of revenue-generation for the Crown, in light of the fact that it is simply flowing through the fund into general revenue.
I suppose one could justify that strategy in year one or two. But I just wonder whether there's a concern here that as the fund stretches on to four or five years, someone from the petroleum or forest industry, who was paying this money to allegedly sustain the account and finds that it just flows through wouldn't come to the conclusion that it represents nothing more than a hidden or additional tax on the industry. I wonder if the minister could comment on that.
Hon. G. Clark: First, it's important to remember that there was no additional tax imposed when we created the fund. This was a redirection from general revenue of a share of the revenue generated by the natural resources of the province into a fund, which can be used for contingencies in the event of a crisis in a community. That still stands. The forest industry and others are not paying any incremental revenue. This was taken out of existing revenue share.
Second, remember that land use planning in the forest sector has been a significant success in terms of mitigating some of the impact. We have a forest renewal plan which, of course, is taking up a lot of the slack with respect to some of the planning around communities in transition.
I think the essential argument for the fund is still valid -- that is, a contingency in the event of a crisis. When we see a commodity downturn, there will be pressure on the fund, and we should spend it.
I want to remind members that this is not a bookkeeping entry. There is actually $25 million in real cash in the bank, which can be drawn down without any votes in the Legislature after this passes. It's a real bank account with real money in it, and we can draw it down in the event of a problem. We have not had significant demands on the fund because of the success of our land use policies and because of the forest renewal fund investments in those communities to help with transition.
W. Hurd: I'm just wondering why there is deemed to be a need for a disbursement of $11 million at all. What is the rationale? Why wouldn't the government simply create the $25 million fund and allow the interest to build up? What is the rationale for identifying revenue sources and then just having them flow through? Regardless of whether the revenue is new taxes or not -- and the minister has assured us that it's merely a redirection of existing funds within general revenue -- I wonder what the rationale is for basically putting $11 million in and taking it out. Is that because you want to draw down the interest -- divert it? Is that the reason? What is the reason?
Hon. G. Clark: When we brought it in we indicated that we'd cap the amount of the fund at $25 million as a reasonable contingency. I agree with the member that that should be reviewed every year. We didn't feel any need to increase it this year, therefore any surplus in revenue goes directly into the fund. Remember, if, in the middle of this year there is a crisis -- a mine closure or a whole town closes or something -- then we can draw down $25 million, and that $11 million won't be redirected into general revenue. It will go back in to top up the fund to $25 million. It's a real bank account -- the surplus above that.
If the member thinks we should put more money in there, we could. That's legitimate; I understand that. I think you could argue that $25 million is probably reasonably large, because you'd have to have a pretty big crisis to deal with it all.
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If the member suggests we should not have this kind of arrangement but simply have $25 million in the bank account making interest, we could do that. We thought it important to establish the principle that half a percent of all the revenue coming from resources go in there and then cap it to $25 million. I think that principle for regions of the province is very powerful -- that a share of the wealth that they're generating is there to protect them in the event of any catastrophe that befalls their community.
W. Hurd: I have just one further point of clarification. The minister has suggested that if the failure of the community, the mine, the mill or whatever occurred in the middle of a fiscal year, there might be the potential for there to be more money available than the $25 million. Since we have a revenue stream flowing into the natural resource community fund, then one would assume that if the failure, say, occurred in September of the third quarter of the fiscal year, there might be potentially $32 million or $33 million available that could be drawn down, and the shortfall would be made up in the budget estimates by some other revenue source. But in fact, we could be dealing with a larger fund during the course of a single fiscal year. Then at the end of the fiscal year, the $11 million is drawn out, and it starts building up. Is that the kind of strategy that we're dealing with here?
Hon. G. Clark: Not quite. It is capped at $25 million, so we can't spend more than $25 million. Let's say that this year we're only planning to spend $100,000. Let's say that ended up being $5 million. Then, instead of $11 million going to general revenue, it would be $6 million, and we would still have $25 million in the account. That $11.7 million is an estimate of what's going to go into general revenue from the surplus. If that surplus isn't there because we have a crisis, then it diverts there. But we still can't spend more than $25 million at the end of the day, because the amount was capped at $25 million.
W. Hurd: I just have one further question, and it takes us in a somewhat different direction than the natural resource community fund, although I guess it is related to natural resources. It may already have been canvassed. If it has, the minister will, I'm sure, take the opportunity to advise me.
I understand that the Ministry of Employment and Investment has played some small role in the ongoing renegotiation of the Island natural gas pipeline arrangement -- the rate stabilization arrangements that I understand are ongoing with the pulp mills on Vancouver Island. I may be wrong, but I hear through the grapevine that the Minister of Employment and Investment has taken some interest in these negotiations and the potential revenue impacts on the Crown.
I wonder if he could advise whether in this set of estimates any resources have been devoted to supporting the work of the Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources in their negotiations with the pulp mills on Vancouver Island to, as one would expect, dramatically increase the cost that they will be paying for natural gas -- at least, that's my understanding. I wonder if the minister could just advise us what role, if any, his ministry might have.
Hon. G. Clark: No, the ministry has played no role in those negotiations.
Vote 24 approved.
Vote 25: ministry operations, $380,987,385 -- approved.
Hon. G. Clark: I move the committee rise, report resolutions and ask leave to sit again.
Motion approved.
The committee rose at 8:57 p.m.
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