[ Page 17089 ]

The House met at 2:08 p.m.

Prayers.

Hon. G. Clark: This week we have a very special delegation from South Africa with us, headed by the Premier of the province of the Eastern Cape. Behind me in the chamber is Premier Raymond Mhlaba, and in the members' gallery are his wife, Dideka Mhlaba, and Thobile Mhlahlo, Minister of Public Works, as well as seven senior officials of the government of Eastern Cape.

I'm very pleased to announce that earlier today Premier Mhlaba and I signed a joint declaration and agreement concerning cooperation on governance. The Premier and his delegation now have a very full program, being briefed on governance matters, both in Victoria and in Vancouver, where they will also meet with the First Nations Summit. I am confident and happy that the governments of Eastern Cape and British Columbia will enjoy a long and fruitful relationship. Please join me in extending a very warm welcome to our honoured guests from South Africa.

I understand also that the Speaker has agreed to invite Premier Mhlaba to say a few words to the House today.

The Speaker: Yes, that is the case; however, it's with the consent of the Members of the Legislative Assembly that we do so. I'd like to now invite our guest.

Hon. R. Mhlaba: Hon. Speaker, hon. Members of the Legislative Assembly, ladies and gentlemen, it is a great pleasure and honour for me to address this august House at this time, when my country is engaged in a delicate process of nation-building. Two days ago, on April 27, we celebrated the second anniversary of our freedom. On May 8, the new constitution of our country will be completed. To heal the wounds of the past, we have established the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Our country is in the process of taking its rightful place among the nations of the world.

Mr. Speaker, we view the unfolding process of democratizing South Africa as a product of joint efforts by our people and other peace-loving peoples of the world, among which the Canadian people feature prominently. We therefore consider the agreement we are about to enter into between our respective provinces -- we have already actually entered into it -- as a continuation and deepening of our friendship. I have no doubt that such an agreement of cooperation will go a long way toward benefiting both our people. As a mature democracy, you have traversed the road we are about to begin. Your country and your province, in particular, have been identified as that needed mentor by the province of the Eastern Cape.

Mr. Speaker, at the risk of being misconstrued as engaging in self-aggrandizement, I daresay that our province, poor economically as it is, prides itself in producing leaders of the calibre of Oliver Tambo, Chris Hani, Nelson Mandela, Govan Mbeki, Walter Sisulu and many others who have contributed significantly to the miracle of peaceful transformation in South Africa.

[2:15]

We have specific challenges confronting our government now. Our province must address the needs of economic growth and development, health care facilities, human resource development and training, infrastructure development and many others. Without good governance, little of these can be realized. We call upon you, as historic friends, to share your experiences and resources, to transform the potential of the Eastern Cape to the benefit of both our people. It is in this regard that we invite potential investors to come to our province.

Mr. Speaker, allow me to express my unpretending gratitude for the manner in which I and my delegation have been received. I am convinced that we will, together, in close cooperation, face the future with confidence, and I thank you very much.

The Speaker: On behalf of the Legislative Assembly, I'm sure all members would like me to thank you, sir, for your words and your friendship. It's a great honour.

Further introductions?

G. Campbell: I have the honour to introduce students from Point Grey mini-school, who are here in the precincts today to watch the Legislature, and I hope the Legislature will make them feel welcome.

F. Gingell: In the gallery today are three longtime residents of British Columbia whose families were all early settlers and who had the misfortune to be owning the wrong piece of land some 25 years ago when it was expropriated under the Roberts Bank backup lands. I would like to take this opportunity to introduce to this House Mr. Roy Cuthbert, Mr. Jack Bates and Mr. Peter Guichon, who are all members of the Delta Farm Expropriation Victims' Organization.

G. Wilson: In the precincts with us today is Miss Cheree Dealey. Miss Dealey was formerly the Liberal president for the riding of Saanich South and has left that party to stand for election for the Progressive Democratic Alliance. Accompanying Miss Dealey are Richard Fahl, our candidate for Victoria-Beacon Hill, Jude Angione and Lynda Sturdy. Would the House please make them all welcome.

Interjections.

Hon. A. Petter: I'm tempted to share in that introduction, but in fact I'm rising to ask the House to join me in welcoming some other out-of-province visitors -- in this case, not from as far as South Africa but from chilly Ontario to sunny B.C. That may not just be a comment on the weather, hon. Speaker. I'd ask the House to join me in welcoming Eleanore and Mackinley Rankin from St. Catharines, Ontario, who are with us today.

Hon. C. Evans: Hon. Speaker, I ask the House to recognize my friend Barb Barrett from Parksville and her granddaughter. I point out that Barb brought me this rose because I got to sit in this seat for the first time, having been absent the last few days. Thanks a lot.

A. Edwards: Hon. Speaker, this bill has a very simple purpose: to recognize the practice of remembering and telling 

[ Page 17090 ]

black history in British Columbia every February. Perhaps no British Columbia minority has contributed so much and at the same time been so little recognized as the blacks. From 1858, when a group arrived, at the invitation of Gov. James Douglas, to settle Victoria and Vancouver Island, blacks have contributed side by side with other British Columbians to the cultural, economic and social wealth that we all enjoy.

Much of what they did had to be accomplished in the face of foul, ingrained discrimination, and it required a degree of determination and sacrifice that was not demanded of other pioneers. Passage of the bill will acknowledge blacks through their history and will encourage all British Columbians to better know their story.

Hon. Speaker, I wasn't aware that earlier today we would have a representative of a country where black history is also extremely important.

Bill M202 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. E. Cull: Hon. Speaker, the Tax and Consumer Rate Freeze Act freezes taxes until the year 2000. The bill extends the current tax freeze until the year 2000 for B.C. families and small businesses. It also implements the government's commitment to protect British Columbia families from increases in three key areas by freezing tuition fees for one year, auto insurance premiums for two years and hydro rates for three years.

This legislation underscores our commitment to help middle-income and working families. We've listened to families in B.C.; we've listened to those people who have said that they're finding it difficult to make ends meet. Freezing taxes until the next century, together with the freeze on key costs such as hydro, ICBC premiums and tuition premiums, will allow families to face the future with confidence and with more money in their pockets.

The government has also made it clear that our first priority is jobs. Therefore the bill also freezes corporate income tax rates for small businesses, which often struggle to get by but which do provide the lion's share of jobs in our economy.

This tax and consumer rate freeze will provide B.C. families and small business with certainty and protection from increased charges into the next century, and it will be done without jeopardizing health care and education -- two essential services which our government has taken a stand to protect. Hon. Speaker, I move first reading of Bill 5.

Bill 5 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. G. Clark: After eight months of work, they've laboured and brought forth a mouse.

I have a question for the member opposite, the Leader of the Opposition. Last night I was watching television. . .

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please, hon. members.

Hon. G. Clark: . . .with my family, and I saw for the first time in Canadian history a negative, American-style ad against me personally, with a distortion of my face.

I would like to ask the leader of the Opposition to stand up in this House and apologize to me and my family, and to ask his Liberal Party to pull this American-style advertisement from the airwaves here in British Columbia.

G. Campbell: The only distortion that this Premier has is his claim about the record of this government. I can tell you right now that this government is known for the deceptions and the distortions they've been trying to put across to the people of British Columbia. This government has taken taxpayers' dollars to do this: ". . .inoculate against the notion that B.C. 21 expenditures are extravagant and are loading large new debts on taxpayers." This government's job strategy is debt, debt, debt and more debt, and taxes, taxes, taxes and more taxes. Will the Premier stand up today and admit that the inoculation didn't work, the vaccination hasn't taken hold, and he has a terminal case of tax, borrow and spend on the backs of B.C. families?

Hon. G. Clark: The Leader of the Opposition said he would not engage in negative American-style advertising. He said: "We certainly don't want to go negative" -- Vancouver Sun, April 6, 1996. I ask the Leader of the Opposition to not engage in this low level of American-style politics, of using personal distortions, facial distortions, in British Columbia or in Canada. We have never seen these kinds of ads before in Canadian history; we have never seen them in British Columbia. You should be ashamed of yourself.

I ask you to call your Liberal Party to account. I know the Leader of the Opposition is losing control of his caucus and they're drifting out of the party, but take control of your party and tell them to take that ad off the air. It does you no service, and the people of Canada and British Columbia. . .

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. G. Clark: . . .can see through that kind of American-style campaign.

The Speaker: Order, please.

[ Page 17091 ]

G. Farrell-Collins: I thought the Premier had a better sense of humour. If anybody should be sensitive about nose jokes, it should probably be myself, hon. Speaker.

The Premier's own document, which was written while he was the minister responsible, says this about B.C. 21 and the Transportation Financing Authority. They "still suffer from a hangover that includes communications without program substance (no meat in the sandwich), overlapping jurisdiction, uncoordinated and confused responsibilities, disjointed programs, and general public cynicism and skepticism." Your own documents are proving that what you have been saying for the last two months is not true. You have no job strategy. When are you going to start to tell the truth to the people of this province?

[2:30]

Hon. G. Clark: Desperate parties resort to desperate measures, and that's what we're seeing from the Liberal Party.

Hon. Speaker, one out of every three jobs in Canada was created in the last four years. A new business was created every six minutes of every working day last year in British Columbia. This province is doing well, the people of British Columbia know it, and that Leader of the Opposition should for once say something positive, instead of being negative about every single solitary thing in this province -- because the people of B.C. are not negative. If that member and those members of the Liberal Party -- or the so-called Liberal Party -- are so concerned about the debt, why are they promising a $1.1 billion tax break to big business and the banks?

G. Farrell-Collins: The reasons are that five people have been going on welfare in this province for every seven that have got jobs from the private sector, taxes are up, jobs are down, and the people of this province are tired of being lied to by this government.

The truth is in the internal documents. You finally get the truth out of the NDP when somebody leaks their documents. This documents gives, under appendix 1, the strategy for deceiving the people of the province. We are to attempt to "elicit a feeling of satisfaction that tax dollars are being spent wisely and locally." It says that we should "inoculate against the notion that B.C. 21 expenditures are extravagant and are loading large new debts on taxpayers."

That's the truth. That's what the documents are saying. It's time you ran some ads that told the truth instead of the lies we've been seeing for the last two months.

Hon. G. Clark: They've opposed the West Coast Express commuter rail. They've opposed rapid transit out to Coquitlam. They've opposed highway construction -- the Vancouver Island Highway. They've opposed the Westview interchange. They've opposed the Mary Hill bypass. They oppose school construction and hospital construction.

I ask those Liberals and the Reform Party: which schools would you close and sell off? Which hospitals would you not have built? Which rapid transit, which highway system, would you sell off if you had the privilege of being the government -- which they never will have? The Liberal Party and the Reform Party have opposed every single investment in building the future of this province.

Look back at history. Look back at British Columbia. Government has to provide leadership. Government must build, must invest in the future of this province. We are doing it; they are not. And that's why they are going to be relegated forever to that side of the House.

To get back to the tradition, I'll ask a question in the faint hope that we might get an answer from the government.

My question is for the minister responsible for ICBC. Can the minister confirm that ICBC authorized the spending of $20 million to implement photo radar and other government-sponsored traffic safety initiatives? And if so, can the minister tell us why that information hasn't been made public to date?

Hon. D. Miller: I thought jeopardy was being a member of the Liberal caucus. [Applause.]

The Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. D. Miller: We are taking significant steps in ICBC and the government to try to reduce a very serious subject, because British Columbia has. . . . I don't know why this is -- and I think all of us who drive must search our souls in this respect -- but British Columbia has an absolutely appalling record of driver safety, and that is the primary cause. The deaths and tragedies that occur around this province on a daily basis, and the costs that are borne by all British Columbians, are the responsibility of all British Columbians. ICBC and this government are taking steps, and indeed we will take whatever steps we can to try to reduce the scale of human tragedy and the cost to British Columbians.

With respect to specific details, I will endeavour to get some answers back to my hon. friend.

The Speaker: Supplemental, hon. member.

J. Weisgerber: I can save the minister the trouble, if he likes. I can just table the board minutes that I have here.

Last June the board of ICBC received the report by Mr. Weatherston, vice-president of claims, on the long-range outlook for claims. On December 11, the board considered an independent review of the 1996 Autoplan rate recommendations prepared by Peat Marwick. Will the minister commit today to table those two reports? We know the government is fond of tabling Peat Marwick reports. Would they be so good as to share with motorists and British Columbians the Peat Marwick report on projected claim costs and rate costs for 1996? Would the minister tell us whether those two reports were factored into the Premier's announcement of a rate freeze?

Hon. D. Miller: Once again, the rates have a direct relationship with the driving patterns of British Columbians. I would note that the Liberal administration of New Brunswick has just done what we've done here in British Columbia, which essentially is to freeze rates -- not for a government-owned autoplan company, but rather, they've just frozen rates for the private sector. They are looking at a number of measures, and I think anybody in the business is looking at a number of measures.

The issue is not the projections. If we simply sat here and accepted those projections as the price of doing business, we would be failing in our duty. The issue is what we as government can do -- indeed, what all British Columbians can do -- to bring those accident rates down. Real people are dying, real 

[ Page 17092 ]

people are being hurt, and all of us are paying this terrible cost.

Hon. U. Dosanjh: Hon. Speaker, that party opposite has no love lost for multiculturalism. I'm surprised. They have said very clearly that if they form the next government, there will be no Ministry Responsible for Multiculturalism. Let me say that Mr. Phillip Yeung -- pursuant to any of what my friend opposite is talking about -- has not done any work pursuant to any contract with the Ministry Responsible for Multiculturalism.

The Speaker: Hon. members, the bell terminates question period.

Presenting Petitions

F. Gingell: I rise to present to the Legislature a petition, if I may.

"To the Honourable Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, in Legislature assembled. . . ."

"The petition of the undersigned members of Delta Farm Expropriation Victims, of Delta, British Columbia, states that the undersigned and/or their immediate families had their farmland expropriated in 1968-69 by the government of British Columbia `for harbour purposes.' The expropriated farmlands were never used for harbour purposes (except for approximately 10 percent. . .required for transportation corridors)."

"In 1981 the ombudsman of British Columbia recommended, in special report No. 3, that for reasons of fundamental justice expropriated properties should be returned to prior owners where the land was not or is no longer required for the original expropriation purpose."

"The undersigned and/or their immediate families repeatedly petitioned the government of British Columbia, individually and collectively, for the return of the expropriated lands. These petitions did not receive appropriate or fair consideration."

"Your petitioners respectfully request that the hon. House support the petitioners' request for a fair and just return of the expropriated farmlands to the expropriated farm families or that a public inquiry be established to examine the justice of the petitioners' request for the return of the expropriated lands or that hon. House take such other action as may be deemed appropriate.

J. Weisgerber: I request leave to table a document.

Leave granted.

J. Weisgerber: In the interest of saving time for the minister responsible, I table minutes from the ICBC board meetings.

I move that the report be taken as read and received.

Motion approved.

F. Gingell: I ask leave of the House to suspend the rules to permit the moving of a motion to adopt the report.

Leave granted.

F. Gingell: I move that the report be adopted.

Motion approved.

[2:45]

Mr. Speaker, as you know, I was mayor of Vancouver for seven years, and during that time you always served as an MLA -- for a number of differently named constituencies, but for the same constituents. I would like to thank you for the time and effort you put into serving the people of Vancouver as their representative for Vancouver-Burrard.

Today, as well as saying thanks to those of you who have served, it's important for us to reflect back on the history of this New Democrat government. Last week we saw the continuation of what can only be called the deathbed conversion of the New Democrats. First, on Tuesday we saw the kindergarten speech by the interim Premier. Then on Wednesday we heard about the amateurish activities of this government in dealing with one of British Columbia's most important Crown corporations and most important public assets. Finally, we heard a throne speech which has become known as "kindergarten 2," because the fact of the matter is that it carries on the myth that the Premier tried to propagate in his Tuesday evening address.

It is important for us to remember what we all learned in kindergarten. Unfortunately, the Premier forgot a number of very important messages. Back in 1991, there was an election held in British Columbia. As I look across the House and see many faces I have worked with in the past and who I know ran for office hoping to make a contribution to the province, I 

[ Page 17093 ]

recognize that they must sit there and feel a sense of emptiness, a sense of concern.

I remember the day in November when we gathered together at the University of Victoria and heard about the hope and the promise that this government was supposedly going to deliver to British Columbians. We heard, in fact, that this government was going to change things, that this government was going to make things different. What have we found in the last four and a half years? What have we found, except a betrayal of that trust that the public gave them in November 1991? I'm sure all of the members opposite remember. They remember the television ad. They remember the leader of their party standing and looking into the television. . . .

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please. Hon. members, it's very difficult for the Chair to hear the member's remarks. I would appreciate it if members would accord the respect that is due any member at his place in the Legislature.

G. Campbell: I'm sure members opposite remember the television ad. They remember the leader of their party sitting and looking into the camera. He had a piggy bank in his hand, and he said to British Columbians: "We won't spend any money that we don't have." He took a penny to the television screen and he dropped it into the piggy bank. Do you remember that, hon. Speaker? That was the last penny that was saved by the NDP government in British Columbia.

In spite of the promise that they wouldn't spend any money they didn't have, this government has, in four and a half years, borrowed more money for tax-supported debt than was borrowed by every single previous provincial government in the history of the province combined. And they try to dress that up with their pathetic economics. It's pathetic. We have a Minister of Finance who treats British Columbians like they don't know any better, and says to them: There's good debt and there's bad debt." How many people in this House have ever gone into the bank and been able to line up at the good-debt line or the bad-debt line? There is no such thing as good debt and bad debt; there is just debt. When you think of that debt, when you think of that promise, when you think of that broken promise from this government. . . . It has cost British Columbia taxpayers $450 million for that broken promise. The NDP government has increased debt by over $10 billion in tax-supported debt since 1991, since they made that promise. The debt-servicing costs alone of that additional debt have increased our costs, the taxpayers' costs, by $450 million. Those are big numbers.

What could we do with those numbers? Well, one thing we could do with $450 million is pay for every single additional teacher, nurse and police officer that we're going to require in British Columbia over the next four years. We can't do it now because of this government's borrowing. There's going to be $450 million spent, year in and year out, to service that debt. That's equivalent to a 10 percent income tax cut for every single British Columbian, if this government had done what it said it would do. If we just had two weeks of that $450 million, we could eliminate all waiting lists for cardiac surgery and joint replacement surgery in the province of British Columbia.

"We won't spend any money that we don't have." That was the promise of this government. That was the promise that has been broken by this government. It's been broken every single month since they were elected, so that today in British Columbia we have to spend $5.8 million a day on interest alone. People in this province will not forget that broken promise.

But let's think of a little more that this government has done. Remember before the last election?

Interjection.

G. Campbell: Does your memory go back to before the last election? That's a good question. British Columbians' does, I can tell you.

Listen to this quote: "The vast majority of British Columbians would see no tax increases under an NDP government. They will see tax cuts or tax freezes." That was the promise. Sound familiar? That was the member for Vancouver-Kingsway. That's right; that was the interim Premier's own quote. What about this one: "Would an NDP government raise taxes? No, absolutely not. In fact, I think the contrary." Same person -- the member for Vancouver-Kingsway.

What did we get? Did we get the delivery on that promise? Did the NDP keep its word to the people of British Columbia? Did the NDP keep its word to the hard-working families of British Columbia? No, they did not. What we saw was 29 separate tax increases by this interim Premier, by the member for Vancouver-Kingsway. Remember this? "We will, in our first budget, reduce the tax burden on all middle-income and lower-income British Columbians." What did we get? Twenty-nine separate tax increases. Is there any doubt -- can there be any question -- as to why the people of British Columbia question this Premier's word when he gives it? Of course there's not.

Remember, before the last election, New Democrats all rose up and voted for the taxpayer protection plan. What was the first thing they did when they were elected? They rescinded the taxpayer protection plan. This government doesn't care to protect taxpayers. This government cares to raise taxes; this government wants to raise taxes; this government has raised taxes. So for the first time in a generation, after one short term in office, the average take-home pay for B.C. families has gone down -- 29 separate tax increases.

As if that wasn't bad enough, the confusion of this government with regard to what takes place in the average family's life in British Columbia. . . . Imagine standing up before the last election and saying there are going to be no tax increases and then giving us 29 separate tax increases that hit every single British Columbian: income tax increases, sales tax increases, property tax increases and Medical Services Plan increases. If they could find a tax, they created a tax increase to go along with it. What about the hydro increases and ICBC increases of 29 percent?

Property tax increases. We all remember, of course, that the interim Premier's favourite tax is the property tax. I can remember when he stood up as Minister of Finance in 1993 and said: "We're going to get those homeowners. We're going to get those people in British Columbia who have saved up. We're going to get those people in British Columbia who actually have some security for their future. We're going to get the people in British Columbia who want to leave their children something when they pass away. We're going to go after those taxpayers."

I can recall the interim Premier standing and saying: "Well, if they can't afford it, they should sell their house. Tough luck for them." Everybody knows that anybody who 

[ Page 17094 ]

lives in my constituency, anyone who lives in Vancouver-Point Grey or Vancouver-Quilchena. . . . They're all rich. I can remember their brother, Brother Ken Georgetti, standing up and saying: "They all own Cadillacs. They all own yachts." He didn't care for one minute about the hard-working families that had saved for their lifetime to own a home in Vancouver-Point Grey.

I remember one woman calling. She lives just a few doors -- four blocks, actually -- away from me on West 10th in Vancouver. She'd had the nerve to go out and save enough money with her husband so that they could afford to buy a home in Point Grey. They'd bought it 25 years earlier.

Interjection.

G. Campbell: That's absolutely right, hon. Speaker. And do you know who lived next door to her? A bus driver lived next door to her, and a hotel doorman lived on the other side of her. So that widow and that bus driver and that hotel doorman were fingered by the interim Premier, and he said: "You're rich; you're paying. Tough luck if you can't afford it. Tough luck. Get out of your house." That's what he told them, and that's what we've learned to expect from this Premier: "If you don't do it my way, tough luck for you." That's not good enough for British Columbia.

The really pathetic thing is that all these members opposite sat there smugly and said "Too bad" to that same woman and to individuals across the province of British Columbia who had worked so they could own their own homes.

Every single one of those taxes: the increase in hydro surcharges, the increase in ICBC -- 29 percent. . . . The trouble with this government is they don't understand that that actually takes money out of people's pockets. It's a new discovery. . . .

The parliamentary secretary over there who sits on B.C. Hydro -- dozing off, evidently. . . . I'll tell you this, hon. Speaker: the only reason that member passed a lie detector test is that he was asleep during that test as well.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for North Vancouver-Lonsdale rises on a matter.

D. Schreck: Hon. Speaker, if the member, by those remarks, intended to question my integrity or my truthfulness, I ask for those remarks to be withdrawn.

The Speaker: Is the hon. member imputing an improper motive, which is unparliamentary, toward the member?

G. Campbell: Hon. Speaker, I was not suggesting any improper motive. I was suggesting that the member sleeps more often than he should when he's got public responsibilities.

The Speaker: Proceed.

G. Campbell: During the Premier's kindergarten speech, he said that he spent the last eight weeks -- after four and a half years, he spent the last eight weeks -- trying to talk to and learn from British Columbians. What was he doing for the other four and a half years? Was he dozing off while he was supposedly carrying out his responsibilities at that time as well?

One of the critical things in the Premier's speech was that he actually looked into the television camera and he tried to place blame. He didn't accept. . . . It wasn't the poor minister responsible. No, not him; it was the bad old bureaucrats. Those bureaucrats will sure mess things up, won't they? Well, it was not the bureaucrats that let down British Columbians; it was New Democrats who let down British Columbians.

[3:00]

The interim Premier said: "You know, it's easy for governments to lose touch with people; it's really easy." You know why it's easy? Because this government has never told the public the truth. The interim Premier has the nerve to say to people: "You know, bureaucracies make an awful lot of good ideas, and take good policies, and they disappear in those bad old bureaucracies, don't they?"

Well, we've seen the 1,500 pages of material, the memo after memo from members of the public sector bureaucracy, from people who have remembered that they are supposed to support the public. They are in public service and saying to this government: "You should not sign this contract." It's wrong to give this contract just because someone's your friend or someone's an insider closely associated with the NDP. It's the public service that says we should remember the values those hard-working families in British Columbia have, and it's the NDP -- it's the New Democrats, not the bureaucrats -- that constantly ignore the public interest so they can take of their friends.

There are many heroes in the public service, who have continually over the last four and a half years tried to alert the public to what this government was doing. When the Treasury Board document was leaked last year, it wasn't because the Minister of Finance was going to stand up and tell people the truth. It wasn't because the interim Premier was going to tell people the truth. The entire cabinet was going to try and conceal the truth from the people of British Columbia. It was the entire cabinet that was trying to hold back what the public service had said, which was that the growth in public debt under the NDP is not sustainable.

What have we seen? We've seen the growth in public debt grow so quickly that the important services that we have to protect -- health care and public education -- are starting to erode. That's not good enough for British Columbians, and that's one of the reasons why this will be the last throne speech of the New Democrats in this century.

Remember this promise: no more special deals for friends and insiders. There have been hundreds and hundreds of patronage appointments -- so many that there has never been a government that has made as many patronage appointments. No more special deals for friends and insiders. The B.C. Hydro Cayman Islands tax scam is a perfect example of this government making sure that their friends are taken care of.

Let's just think back over four and a half years of stewardship. The first chairman of B.C. Hydro -- someone who actually knew what he was talking about, someone who never would have let the Cayman Islands scam take place -- was Bob Wyman. No, he's not an NDPer; he's not an insider. "Sorry, Mr. Wyman, you have to go." Who do we replace him with? That genius of the financial markets, that wizard of hydro and power supply: Marc Eliesen. What an incredible appointment! It just happened that he had no experience whatsoever -- except for driving companies to despair. Even 

[ Page 17095 ]

this government recognized that he was in fact hurting B.C. Hydro. He was taking away from one of British Columbia's most important public assets, so they pushed him aside -- slightly. I mean, just about everybody here would like to be pushed aside; every working family in British Columbia would like to be pushed aside like Mr. Eliesen was, because they have to pay him $1.1 million in pensions for his incompetence.

Then we got the genius to appoint his friend, Mr. Laxton. He was so concerned about B.C. Hydro that the interim Premier said: "I'll leave it all to you, Mr. Laxton. You take it away. Parliamentary secretary, if you go to the board meetings, take your per diem. But you can doze; it doesn't matter. Principal secretary to the Premier, if you want to go to the board meetings, that's fine. It doesn't matter; just ignore it."

So what we have for the first time is an RCMP investigation going on into what took place at B.C. Hydro and in the boardrooms of B.C. Hydro. We have a report that comes out that says it was handled like amateurs. It was an amateurish performance by all of the members of the board of B.C. Hydro and, in fact, by the government. The minister was irresponsible. He was inept and incompetent.

We want to have no more special deals for friends and insiders -- no more special deals. So what happens when you retire if you just happen to be a friend of the government? What happens is that Wilson Parasiuk's pension is jumped up by an order-in-council that would be incredible for any of the people who are working in this province.

An Hon. Member: Retroactive.

G. Campbell: Whether it's in a small business, whether it's in getting a paycheque in any kind of activity in the resource sector, they wouldn't see that happen -- retroactively, to take care of this government's friend. And Mr. Eliesen, with his $1.1 million.

What about Connie Munro? The Workers' Compensation Board is an organization which has gone out of control. Costs have skyrocketed. Services to workers have gone down. And what did they give to that NDP friend? A $300,000 agreement, hon. Speaker.

An Hon. Member: How much?

G. Campbell: It's $300,000.

It's the kind of rich, rich package that this Premier and this government believes in. This Premier tries to pretend he's on the side of the middle class. How many 38-year-olds do you know, hon. Speaker, with a $1.2 million pension for ten years of work? How many hard-working small business people, who are employing thousands and thousands of British Columbians across this province, do you know who after ten years in business can walk away with a $1.2 million pension? Not very many.

That's why this B.C. Liberal Party says we will eliminate those gold-plated pensions. We will make sure that MLAs are paid and taxed and can provide for their futures the same way as every other British Columbian who pays their bills.

It's time for this government, for this NDP, to tell the truth to the people of British Columbia. The fact of the matter is that a government that said there would be no new taxes increased taxes 29 separate times. A government that said we won't spend any money that we don't have has borrowed over $10 billion. A government that said there'd be no special deals for friends and insiders has done more special deals for friends and insiders than any government in the history of the province.

Remember this one? Remember this promise? The former leader of the New Democratic Party sits in the television studio and looks across to the people of British Columbia and says: "British Columbians deserve a government that's as honest and hard-working as the people who pay for it" -- as honest and hard-working as the people who pay for it.

You ask British Columbians. Would they think it's better to spend millions of dollars on taxpayer-funded political advertising before an election? Or do they think those dollars would be better spent on patients who are waiting to be cared for in British Columbia? Do they think it would be better if we could spend those dollars on students and teachers in the classroom, where they can get the kind of education they deserve? Or do they think it would be better to spend those dollars on police officers across the province? The fact of the matter is that for one ministry's communication plan alone -- most of which is propaganda -- you could pay for every single police officer that was announced in this throne speech.

A government that promised, a government that said British Columbia deserves a government that's as honest and hard-working as the people who pay for it, is subject, for the first time in the history of the province, to two RCMP investigations -- two of them. A government that said they were going to be open and honest spent three years trying to cover up the fact that they were directly connected to the Nanaimo Commonwealth Holding Society and the money that was stolen from charities for political purposes. This cabinet, this government tried to cover that up from British Columbians.

We should have known. We should have known when the former leader of the NDP looked at us and said that British Columbia deserves a government as honest and hard-working as the people who pay for it. We found out very quickly that that slogan was stolen by an American campaign consultant.

It is not just a stolen slogan that we have to worry about. This NDP government has stolen the hopes of British Columbians. They have squandered the trust of British Columbians.

I can tell you that this province and the people of British Columbia do deserve a government as honest and hard-working as the people who pay for it. They will have a government that's honest and hard-working after the next election. It will be a B.C. Liberal government.

Let's look at the numbers that weren't examined in the throne speech. After four and a half years of New Democrat government, what have we got? Life is harder for British Columbia's families. . . .

An Hon. Member: This is the best province in the best country in the world. Quit your complaining.

G. Campbell: We are the best province in the best country in the world. And we have a government that's got the worst record for the best province in the best country in the world: the NDP.

Let's look at the numbers that the throne speech left out. Let's look at the numbers that the interim Premier left out in his kindergarten speech. The number of British Columbians without jobs is the highest in British Columbia's history. The number of British Columbians on welfare is the highest in history. The number of tax dollars taxed from individual British Columbians: the highest in history. The number of dollars 

[ Page 17096 ]

borrowed by the government: the highest in history. The number of dollars of government debt: the highest in history. The number of government employees: the highest in history. The number of patronage appointments: the highest in history. The number of personal bankruptcies. . . .

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order! I would like to call to order the hon. member for Delta North and other members as well who have been interjecting from their places rather than standing and taking their turn in debate. It's very difficult for the Chair; all members know this. I would appreciate it if you would respect the person who has his place. Thank you, member. Please proceed.

G. Campbell: Just to conclude, the number of personal bankruptcies is the highest in history. The number of British Columbians worried about their future is the highest in history under this New Democrat government. British Columbians deserve better, and they will get it after the next election.

All of the indicators are down. If you deal with people in their living rooms at home in communities across this province. . . . I should tell you that I haven't decided to visit with British Columbians in the last eight weeks; I've been doing it for the last three and a half years. I can tell you that the standard for the average B.C. family is down. The take-home pay for B.C.'s families is down. Job security for B.C.'s families is down, and under this government's program, the job creation rate has been cut in half. For every job that's been created, five additional people are on welfare. That's not good enough for a province like British Columbia. For the first time in the history of this province, one out of ten British Columbians is on welfare. Over the last four years we have watched as private sector capital investment has dropped -- it has gone down.

[3:15]

There is a difference between this government's approach and our approach. We believe in private sector investment, we believe in private sector initiatives, and we believe in long-term, lasting jobs for the people of British Columbia, which will only be generated by the private sector in British Columbia.

Let me say this. I do agree with what the leader of the NDP has said recently. There is going to be a choice in this upcoming election. There is going to be a true choice. We can decide to carry on with more of the same from the NDP: more debt, more borrowing, more taxes, more spending, more patronage. Or we can take a new route. We can go to smaller and smarter government that protects public health care, that protects public education, that gets rid of the waste that this government has generated over the last four and a half years, and that makes sure that B.C.'s families have paycheques that are growing -- as opposed to shrinking under the NDP government.

We can create a thriving private sector economy that creates lasting jobs for people across this province. We can create a new kind of government that actually has respect for the kind of work it takes to generate a dollar. I look across this House, and I see people in the cabinet who don't understand how much effort it does take to generate some money. They don't understand what it's like for someone to go to work for 90 or 100 hours a week only to be told by the government: "We're going to take more. We're going to add more in terms of costs. We're going to add more regulation. We're going to take more out of your pockets in terms of tax." Imagine a Minister of Finance standing up today and taking pride in the fact that she is freezing the highest small business tax rate in Canada. Small businesses create jobs, not the government.

We can create that thriving private sector economy. We can reduce the costs of government and reduce public debt while we protect health care and public education, and that's what the B.C. Liberal plan will do.

Our plan is quite straightforward. Our plan, the Courage to Change, has already outlined 75 specific actions that we intend to take. They are actions that reflect the values of the people of British Columbia.

First, we have already said that we are going to reduce the size of government. We are going to reduce the waste; we are going to reduce the duplication; we are going to make sure we get our financial house in order. Why do we do that? For one reason: the only way to protect health care and education in the province of British Columbia is to make sure our financial house is in order.

Under our plan there will not be more patronage, as there has been under the NDP; there will be less patronage. We will introduce bills that will eliminate the kinds of special deals for friends and insiders that are running through this government and eating away at the heart and the integrity of the public service.

We intend to improve education -- not with phony bills, like we saw from this government last weekend, but by establishing education as an essential service in British Columbia. We will lay out for British Columbians a concrete plan as we go through the next few weeks. And unlike the New Democrats who broke their promises, we're going to keep our promises. They are going to see our promises, and we are going to keep every single one of them. Ours is a concrete plan. It is a plan that is realistic, it is a plan that is doable, and I can tell you that we recognize it's a plan that is going to require us to make some tough choices. But we will not shrink from those responsibilities; we simply won't shrink from them.

Should this legislative session last a little longer than we anticipated, we will bring forward a number of pieces of legislation to re-establish trust in the public sector in British Columbia. We will introduce merit employment legislation. It will restore the integrity of the public service. It will ensure that the kind of patronage appointments going deeper and deeper into the heart of the public service are eliminated for good. It will ensure that public servants in British Columbia know that their responsibility is to the people of this province, not to their political masters. Their responsibility is to give us non-partisan professional advice. People in the public service are hungering for the re-establishment of integrity in their professions, and we will give that to them through merit employment legislation. We will also introduce a public appointment act which will eliminate literally hundreds of patronage appointments across the province of British Columbia.

We will introduce a conflict-of-interest amendment act to make sure that we never again see the disgrace that we've seen in B.C. Hydro.

We will introduce an MLA pension elimination act to make sure that people in this House are paid the same way, taxed the same way, and can provide for their futures the same way as every other British Columbian who is paying the bills.

We will introduce a constitution amendment act to establish fixed election dates in the province. We will introduce 

[ Page 17097 ]

legislation that will make it illegal. . .will prohibit the government from spending millions and millions of taxpayer dollars on pre-election propaganda.

We will introduce Labour Code amendments that give workers back their rights to a secret ballot in the province of British Columbia. We will bring in legislation that establishes education as an essential service. We will bring in balanced-budget and debt-reduction legislation so we can get our financial house in order, so that it will be illegal to manage the books the way this government has for the last four and a half years.

Four and a half years ago there was an election in British Columbia, and the member for Vancouver-Kingsway stood up and, talking about a former government, said: "You know, given the longstanding failure of this government to tell the truth, to distinguish right from wrong, does anybody believe that this promise will last more than two or three weeks of an election campaign?" Unfortunately, the NDP promises from the pre-election campaign in 1991 were broken. One at a time, every one of them was broken.

On Tuesday last the interim Premier stood in a kindergarten class. There are a lot of things you can learn in kindergarten, and it would have been nice had the Premier decided that he was going to keep up with those lessons from kindergarten. One of the first things you learn in kindergarten is: put things back where you found them. One of the things we are going to do is put things in the province back to where this government found them. That means reduce debt, reduce taxes and reduce spending in British Columbia.

Another thing you learn in kindergarten: don't take things that aren't yours. Don't go to those nuns, don't go to those charities and steal money and use them for your political purposes. A more adult way of looking at that is: just because you have a blank cheque doesn't mean there's money in the bank. This NDP government has one bank and one bank alone, and that's the wallets of every single, hard-working British Columbian. Frankly, they're tired of a government that reaches into their wallet, month in and month out, and makes sure that they have less take-home pay than they did when this government was elected four and a half years ago.

Finally, another thing you learn in kindergarten is: say you're sorry when you hurt somebody. This government has hurt the hard-working families of British Columbia. This government has hurt the people of Prince George, where they can't get proper health care. This government has hurt teachers because of the chaos they've created in classrooms. This government has hurt students, who have gone with two million days of lost learning because they were more concerned about their friends than about making sure children got taught in British Columbia.

As they say, wouldn't it be nice if all governments had as a basic policy that they'd always put things back where they found them, and they'd always clean up their own mess? The New Democrats will not clean up their own mess, but I can guarantee you that B.C. Liberals will clean up the mess that has been made by the New Democrat government, and we're looking forward to putting them back in opposition where they belong.

This government is bankrupt of ideas. It is driving the people of British Columbia further and further down the ladder. It is time for a true choice. It is time for people in this province to decide. Do they want a government of the past? Do they want a government that keeps spending? Do they want a government that keeps borrowing? Do they want a government that so clearly said before the last election that they would not spend any money they didn't have; that they would not raise taxes, and that it was time for a government that's as honest and hard-working as the people who pay for it? I believe that in British Columbia people expect some fundamental and basic values from all of us who serve in public life. They expect the truth. They expect us to deliver on our promises and not betray the trust that is left with us when we're elected.

This Premier and this government have decided to try and divide British Columbians again. They've decided they're going to label British Columbians into one class or another. They've decided to try to drive the wedge of division across the province. That is wrong. We are going to succeed by bringing every British Columbian together, by recognizing that we do live in the best province in the best country in the world, and being able to look at our kids in a few years, and say: "You know, back in 1996 we had a choice, and we made the right decision in British Columbia, because we have reduced the cost of government, we have protected public health care, we have protected public education, we have lowered people's taxes. So this province is a province of great and glowing opportunity once again, for every single British Columbian who lives here."

J. Weisgerber: It's my pleasure today to take my place in debate and speak against the throne speech. If I speak against it, I'll vote against it. It's a tradition that new members of this House don't seem to understand. They believe that you talk against the bill and then vote for it and cover all your bases that way.

As I said last week, with all the new fat that the government has added, I had hoped that there would be at least a little bit of sizzle in the throne speech. Alas, it was all refried hash and beans -- reannouncements of the $1.5 billion in pre-election promises that this government has absolutely no intention of keeping.

I must say I felt sorry for His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor. Indeed, it was rather tacky of the government to put partisan words into his mouth, although he had -- and did read them with -- grace and aplomb.

[3:30]

What was most interesting about the throne speech was what it didn't contain. What it didn't contain was the government's record. It failed to mention the government's true legacy: 125,000 more people on welfare; one British Columbian in ten on welfare. That's the legacy of this government. It's $900 million a year in extra welfare costs -- over $300 a year per taxpayer. Whose side is the NDP on? Certainly not the side of the working poor. They work until July each year just to pay the NDP tax bill.

The budget failed to mention $10 billion in new debt, or $6.1 million a day in new debt since the NDP came into office. Mr. Speaker, that's $6.1 million in new debt a day, each and every day, since this government was elected. That's the true legacy of this government. It's a direct debt that's double what it was in 1991 -- double the debt accrued by all governments in the history of British Columbia over the last 120 years. It took successive Liberal, Conservative, NDP and Socred governments 120 years to rack up the first $9 billion in tax-supported debt. After four and a half years of this government, we've more than doubled that amount.

It's a massive debt that's been deferred as a tax burden of over $7,500 for every man, woman and child in British Colum-

[ Page 17098 ]

bia today -- a new tax burden of over $2,000 per family per year that's been swallowed up in that black hole of government over there. That's $1.6 billion in new taxes courtesy of our current Premier, who wants us to believe now that he'll freeze taxes. Two of the largest tax increases and largest budget deficits ever tabled in British Columbia were brought in by our current Premier in his role as Minister of Finance, and he now stands up and proclaims himself a fiscal conservative. Heaven help the real conservatives!

The taxpayer-supported debt has mushroomed under the NDP. It's going to take three dollars to pay back every one borrowed when one factors in the interest. The numbers don't lie. The growth in debt tells the story of this government's legacy. That's the legacy -- the true legacy -- of four and a half years of the NDP. Red ink. It's a record of higher taxes, increased debt and runaway spending.

The only ones getting rich off the NDP are its friends in organized labour and, ironically, its avowed enemies in the banks. I calculated the other day that this government is paying banks and lenders forty times more in new interest charges than it collects from the banks by way of corporation capital taxes.

[D. Lovick in the chair.]

Whose side is the NDP on? It sure isn't on the side of taxpayers. The NDP's extra interest costs and welfare costs alone combine to an amount that is more than the entire Medical Services Plan budget. The entire MSP budget could be paid by increases in interest costs and increases in welfare costs if we could simply roll back those two items to 1991. This government has the nerve to say it's protecting health care and education. Nothing could be further from the truth.

We've seen whose side this government is really on, and it's so deep in Ken Georgetti's pocket that it's unseemly. There is also the Island Highway sweetheart deal with the highway construction unions that's costing us $72 million a year. Can we forget the sweetheart deal with the BCGEU, where the government's own negotiator was sent in and told to cave in to every demand and ask for nothing in return, no concessions? That's the kind of government we've had.

The health care labour accord has increased health care costs in this province by at least $125 million a year. We're paying as much for that gift to the unions as we are spending on policing in total. That's an incredible statistic: more money is being spent on health care as a result of the health care accord than is spent entirely on policing by the province. No wonder the union brass are lined up behind their new benefactor: the guy who gave them that rich, no-cut contract -- our shiny new Premier.

Who can forget the fixed-wage or fair-wage policy, which has increased construction costs by at least $100 million a year for B.C. taxpayers? Worse yet, the government is sticking future taxpayers with that sop to the NDP paymasters. Non-union construction workers are being put out of work because their companies aren't even allowed to bid on government contracts. Whose side is this government on? Working people know, and it sure as heck isn't them.

What was the first thing the NDP did after winning the last election? They lifted the wage freeze on senior bureaucrats, and then blamed school districts for giving a whopping wage increase to school administrators who were already making $100,000 a year. They repealed the Compensation Fairness Act, which was aimed at reducing public sector wage costs. It was this government who paid the BCTF for its election support with a 7 percent retroactive wage increase for teachers. It was this government who told school boards it's okay to run deficits to pay for those increases, which largely explains why we have 11 school districts that are in the red today. Whose side is this government on? Certainly not property tax-payers, who are footing the bill for those extra wage costs in the school system.

This government doesn't care about taxpayers, parents or, least of all, students. Its Labour Code said it all. Education is not an essential service as far as the NDP is concerned. What is essential is that their kissing cousins in the union board rooms are happy. What is essential for the NDP is not that kids are in classes or patients are well cared for, but that their union bosses are there with the cheques and the volunteers at election time. No one's going to be fooled by that tough guy act last week, nor will a Reform government be bound by it. For that wasn't about standing up for kids and parents, and it sure was not about standing up to organized labour. It was about standing up for the unions against the elected school boards. It was about disguising a gift to the public sector unions as a protective measure for taxpayers.

Ask yourself, why aren't the unions screaming from the rooftops? If any other government pulled that stunt, it would have been drawn and quartered. Where are the howls of outrage by this government's political bedfellows in big labour? All we've heard are the perfunctory whines of wimps who are so scared of seeing the NDP embarrassed, they're prepared to sell out their principles and compromise their own members. Why aren't the union brass pounding on the Premier's door and demanding that he withdraw this draconian bill? It's because they know that he will inevitably come pounding on their door for money and campaign workers.

Bill 21 is about crass politics with a capital P. It's about projecting a false image of the Premier as someone who doesn't bow to the unions, when everybody knows he's utterly beholden to them. In the final analysis, Bill 21 is a carrot held out as a stick that's aimed at leading us all down the garden path.

I want to serve fair notice right now that any settlement imposed under B.C. 21 or Bill 21 -- it's hard to tell them apart -- that's beyond the taxpayers' ability to pay will be undone. A Reform government will not be hogtied by this government's union pork-barrelling.

Nor will we sit still for the patronage and payoffs that this government has used to reward its card-carrying supporters. Those NDP hacks can kiss their patronage plums goodbye. A Reform government will replace those people with ones who are hired because of their abilities and the merit they have as individuals, not because of the party they belong to. We will bring in a patronage prevention process to ensure that all senior bureaucrats and Crown corporation officials are hired strictly on merit, subject to an all-party confirmation process. If we'd had that in place before Joyce Rigaux was appointed, she would never have been appointed as superintendent of family and child service. Whose side is the NDP on? Certainly not on the side of children, or it never would have hired Ms. Rigaux.

We will put legal caps on severance for all public sector workers to prevent the kinds of abuse we've seen. No more Connie Munros -- she was paid $88,000 for moving expenses she never incurred and then paid $300,000 for quitting her job. That's wrong, Mr. Speaker. We will put all senior officials on multi-year renewable contracts that are fair and affordable.

And we'll treat workers fairly. No more Frank Dixons -- he was hired by the Premier, then minister responsible for B.C. 

[ Page 17099 ]

Transit, and then fired, threatened and smeared just for doing his job. That disgraceful episode cost B.C. taxpayers another $300,000 in damages to Mr. Dixon for wrongful dismissal, all under the watch of the man who is now our Premier. Whose side is the NDP on? The courts have proven that it sure isn't on the side of fairness and decency. Time and time again we've seen goon squad government, whether the victim is Frank Dixon or Ted Hughes.

The Premier can't just wave his hand and wish away his track record. He's going to have to explain why he let Hydrogate happen right under his nose. The voters will want to know why he didn't know what was going on on his watch, why he didn't know about NCHS, even though he used Marwood Services to pay his constituency expenses for six years. The last MLA to leave Marwood Services was the man who is today our Premier. Why he didn't know that his party was stealing money from charities is beyond many of us.

Most recently, why didn't he know about his party's latest fundraising scam, that official election survey that was mailed to voters? It's one thing to make an honest mistake and admit it. It's quite another to feign ignorance, blame the mistakes on people who work for you and then apologize on their behalf.

The NDP promised open, honest government, but they have deliberately deceived us, mislead us and tried to cover up every crooked deal they've ever hatched. They were perfectly prepared to go into an election last fall, knowing what the Parks report contained and still pleading innocent with respect to the Nanaimo bingo ripoff. They tried to keep us in the dark about treaty negotiations, until we pressed the issue and forced them to open up the process.

We caught this government red-handed trying to siphon money off the books through NOW Communications to Karl Struble in Washington, D.C. Both the auditor general and the conflict-of-interest commissioner concluded that it was a deliberate attempt to mask the NDP's relationship with those U.S. spin doctors. We caught the government trying to hide the true extent of welfare fraud and abuse. For two years they denied the truth, until the RCMP and the Vancouver city police called them on it.

Open, honest government? Not according to Judge Gove, who exposed this government's deepest, darkest secret -- that child deaths have gone uninvestigated, swept under the carpet by the ministry responsible for child protection. Open, honest government? It's not found at B.C. Ferries, where a multimillion-dollar contract for fast ferries was awarded in secret without public scrutiny or a fair bidding process.

[3:45]

We were promised no new taxes or tax hikes and then struck with a corporate capital tax and at least 29 separate tax increases. Most of those were introduced by our current Premier, acting as Minister of Finance.

Thinking of this government's track record over the last 1,636 days, I'm reminded what the then leader of the NDP said in 1989, in a speech to the Union of B.C. Municipalities. Some of you might remember. He accused the former government of "lyin', spyin', cheatin' and denyin.' " He promised that the NDP was different, and he was right -- they did all that stuff and a whole lot more. They refused to accept responsibility; they refused to be accountable.

We saw the Minister of Environment found guilty of professional misconduct by the Law Society and barred from practising law for 18 months. Yet here he sits, back in cabinet after a blink of an eye in the penalty box, rewarded for his crocodile tears.

We saw the Minister of Finance share the Parks report on Bingogate with various NDP hacks and a committee of cabinet. She was warned not to share the information with anyone, because it could be the subject of a criminal investigation, but she found just enough time to give her party the heads-up on what the report contained. The current Premier sat in on that briefing and then sat by that minister when she tried to cover up the contents of the Parks report. Here she sits, still in cabinet, without ever having the decency to even tender her resignation.

In fact, the only one who has ever paid a real price for his transgressions was the last Premier. Even that member didn't admit the error of his ways. He simply suggested he'd been saddled with a lot of baggage he couldn't unload.

The legacy of this government is a sad and sorry one. Over the past four months the new Premier has been spending millions of dollars in taxpayers' money on advertising to try to make us forget their own legacy. He has promised $1.5 billion of election goodies in a desperate attempt to buy votes with people's own money. As he said some time ago: "We're shovelling money off the back of a truck." I kept waiting for that visual in his TV address last week, but I guess he had his hands full with the pie chart.

It is a fact that you can't take $3 billion from the budget without cutting into health care and education, and it's dishonest of the Liberals to say you can. The Premier made that point in spades. He's absolutely right; the Liberal numbers don't add up. But I'm just dying to learn how the Premier is going to square his own promises with the debt management plan in tomorrow's budget. It's also a fact that you can't make $1.5 billion worth of promises, cut taxes, and still live within last year's debt management plan. Something's got to give -- or more accurately, someone. I suspect it's going to be future taxpayers. The debt will continue to escalate, and the higher it gets, the higher interest costs will be. And the higher debt-servicing costs are, the less money there will be for health care and education. It's this government and its debt that represent the greatest threat to health care and education, and taxpayers know it.

The Premier has done a masterful job of manipulating the media -- with only a few notable exceptions -- by avoiding the Victoria press gallery like the plague. He's done a first-rate job of wrapping the Vancouver media around his fingers. I'll give him his due: he has played the television networks like a Stradivarius violin, and he has produced the intended short-term results.

But sooner or later, British Columbians are going to catch on to his act. They are going to draw back the curtain and see the wizard for what he really is: a clever con man who thrives on the fear his power creates. He's got most of the business community so terrorized they're scared to death of facing him down in public.

Fortunately, the voters aren't so skittish. They're not afraid to look the devil in the eye and tell him what they think. Moreover, they recognize that the ultimate power lies with them, for it is within their hands to consign this government to oblivion. Mr. Speaker, I don't believe most voters are really buying the flimflam that this government is peddling. I know they aren't in Peace River South.

Taxpayers understand that the promises don't add up. They see through the smoke and mirrors, which is why they will increasingly turn to Reform. We are not prepared to say 

[ Page 17100 ]

anything or do anything just to get elected. The fact will be made very clear during the campaign, when we lay out our priorities for the next four years: smaller, less intrusive government that lives within taxpayers' ability to pay; government that listens and gives people real power to influence the decisions that affect their lives; honest government that will treat all British Columbians equally under the law, with special status for none.

That's what we want for British Columbia: less debt, less interest on debt, and lower public sector wage costs; good jobs and wealth creation, not resource confiscation. Those are our priorities: to protect health care and education over the long term and make lasting tax cuts possible.

We will have much more to say on each of these points over the next 29 or 30 days, but I do want to conclude by making a few observations about the political landscape in British Columbia. Over the last two years we've seen the Liberals plummet 20 points in the polls and our support stabilize, albeit less than we would like. Conversely, we've seen the NDP come back to their traditional support levels, under their new leaders, as the Liberals continue to alienate their natural constituency.

Both the NDP and the Liberals are trying to repolarize the electorate because they think that works for them politically. Yet the most significant fact is that almost half of all voters regard themselves as either undecided or willing to switch their support to another party. The truth is, most voters aren't stuck on any party's side, and in all likelihood the party that wins the most votes won't win an overall majority of votes. We haven't seen that in British Columbia for over 50 years.

In my response to the throne speech in 1992, I talked about that fact and how the Socreds got what they deserved. But I also argued then, as I do today, that British Columbians deserved much better than the NDP government they elected. They didn't deserve to be saddled with any government that only answers to the interest groups and union bosses who tell them when and how high to jump.

British Columbians deserve a government that listens to the people, to all the people, regardless of which party they happen to have voted for. They deserve a government that answers to them and responds to their priorities, not to the dictates of pressure groups or party donors. In short, British Columbians deserve a better system of government, and the only party really committed to that goal is Reform. Regardless of whether we have a majority government or a minority government -- Reform, NDP or Liberal -- the people must be put in the driver's seat. That's our bottom line.

Real reform starts with giving taxpayers real power to hold their elected representatives accountable at all times. Real reform starts with a government that is willing to put its trust in the common sense of people through direct democracy. Real reform means giving all British Columbians an equal vote on the Nisga'a blueprint, an equal vote on constitutional reform, and an equal vote on major issues that fundamentally affect their lives and their rights as Canadians. It's giving taxpayers, not the Legislature, the last word on the budget. It means outlawing deficits, new taxes or tax hikes without the approval of taxpayers by way of referendum or the unanimous approval of the House. It's giving taxpayers the right to overrule the Legislature at any time, and to amend, repeal or introduce laws by citizen-initiated referendum. It means allowing MLAs to vote freely on all matters in this chamber, with confidence votes restricted to the budget and to bills aimed at fulfilling election promises. Real empowerment means giving voters the right to fire or recall any elected representative who doesn't cut the mustard. It means preset election dates, preset legislative sittings and budget dates, and electronically recorded votes on every vote taken in this assembly.

That's what we'll be fighting for: a government that is only on the side of democracy, taxpayers' rights and individual equality, not the special interest groups or the power brokers who have dictated the shots in B.C. for far too long, and not the barons of Howe Street who shelled out $250 a plate for a plaid performance nor the kingpins of organized labour who are doing backflips to get their new Premier pliant re-elected.

Time after time in the last five years voters have demonstrated that they will not be pressured by anybody at the polls -- not by the politicians, the pundits or the establishment elites. Voters will do what they darned well want, based on what they know in their hearts is the right thing to do. They voted for a new multi-party landscape in 1991 and elected the NDP as a vote of protest against the Socreds. They voted against the Charlottetown accord in 1992, as I did, notwithstanding the threats of economic calamity predicted by our new Premier. They voted for reform in the 1993 federal election and made a mockery of the pre-election polls that suggested another Tory government was in the wind. They voted for Mike Harris in Ontario, to overcome a 30-point Liberal lead that most critics said was insurmountable.

Within the next 29 or 30 days, the voters of British Columbia are going to take a close look at all of the parties and all of the leaders. They are going to vote out of confidence, not out of fear. They are going to vote for the party and the leader who best represents their principles and values; not simply against the NDP, but against the status quo; for positive change and integrity in government, not for any party that defines itself simply as the ideological opposite of its avowed enemies.

Unless I miss my guess, most British Columbians are going to vote for a vision of hope, prosperity and empowerment. The party and the leader who most clearly and credibly articulates that vision will win. It's that simple. I look forward to going toe to toe with all of you in the next few weeks, and I wish you all luck -- just not too much luck. I especially look forward to the first day back in this chamber after the next election, joined by at least 38 other Reformers who will give British Columbians the government they deserve.

G. Wilson: I want to start in my response to the Speech from the Throne by saying what an incredible privilege it is to be able to stand in this chamber and speak on behalf of the constituents of Powell River-Sunshine Coast, and, I suppose, in my capacity as leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance, speak on behalf of the people of British Columbia -- certainly for those of them who believe in our view and the kind of direction we'd like to take. What a tremendous honour it has been to have been asked to serve, and I look forward to whatever new role they may ask of me in the future in this chamber.

[4:00]

Having said that, I want to direct my attention to some of the issues from the Speech from the Throne. I've heard the response from the Leader of the Opposition and the Leader of the Third Party today. I think the point that we need to make to the people of British Columbia, from all sides of this House, is that the government that is elected in this next election will not just take us into the next four years. This is not the government that will simply take us into the next century. 

[ Page 17101 ]

This is the government that will take us into the next millennium.

We are at a historic time in the history of western civilization and the history of British Columbia as a functional part of this nation Canada. I think that we as a people have come together and have made and built an unparalleled nation. It is unparalleled anywhere in the world because we have a nation that is made up of such diverse peoples from various backgrounds, from different ethnic origins, and we speak different languages. It's true that sometimes those differences have caused us a great deal of trauma and a lot of angst as we try, as Canadians, to build a strong, united nation and to honour and respect the differences that we have.

This Speech from the Throne has some good things. It has issues that we would very much like to support in some of the proposed legislation, particularly around the fishery. It talks about another historic deal, and that's the Nisga'a agreement, something that we would very much like to have an opportunity to debate in this chamber, to go through in some detail, to be able to talk about in terms of its long-term impact -- not just on the Nisga'a people, the Nisga'a first nation, not just on the people who are directly affected in the areas around the Nisga'a lands in the north and central part of British Columbia, but on all the people of the province who are affected by the precedent that this agreement has made.

This Speech from the Throne also goes on to talk about some of the directions the government may have with respect to the economy. I'm not going to spend my limited time in this Legislature and my opportunity to respond to the Speech from the Throne to bash away at this government. We've heard that from both other opposition leaders, and I'll leave it up to the electorate to make a decision as to whether or not this has been a good or bad government. They know as well as any, if they are interested and if they've been following exactly what this government has and has not done.

I think what the people of British Columbia are more interested in as we talk about the vision provided for in this Speech from the Throne is the vision that we can offer through the Progressive Democratic Alliance, a party that is committed to go to the people and put that vision before them so that they may in a true and democratic fashion make a decision to vote for and elect those individuals whom they believe will best represent them -- as individuals, their families, their communities, this province and, indeed, as a functional part of this nation Canada itself.

Let me say to you, as we stand here today and suggest what is lacking in the Speech from the Throne, that what we would have liked to have seen included is a platform that would put forward a very clear and articulated vision with respect to tax relief and tax reform. I know that tomorrow we have a budget to be tabled in this chamber. Much of that budget has already been released from constituency to constituency as the Premier has gone around providing for those people who clearly were in line for money. Much of the money for the school boards, the hospital boards. . . . We now know much of what is in that budget, because it's already been announced in one way or another. We heard again today, with the tabling of a piece of legislation about a so-called freeze on taxes, something that I think could have been done four years ago that wasn't done four years ago, but nevertheless is now introduced in advance of this budget.

So we have to ask the question: what is there in the vision of this government that might fundamentally change its direction? We have a new Premier, it's true. That Premier, I think, has done a quite remarkable job, frankly, of putting aside the last four years that were difficult for this government, that had certainly been unacceptable in terms of the vision of the people of the province. Clearly, this new Premier has come along and done a remarkable and credible job of trying to convince the people of British Columbia that they're going to take a different path.

But we have to be very cautious, particularly at the time of an election, that what we hear in the rhetoric and what we see in the written verbiage that comes out in various campaign slogans and pamphlets and in the various kinds of ads that you will see on television. . . . We have to be very careful and cautious as to whether or not that indeed is going to be the platform and program that will be advanced after the election -- if they, in fact, are successful enough to be re-elected.

I want to say that we are prepared and have put in writing precisely what our contract will be with the people of British Columbia. We have put it forward in a "Blueprint in Brief." It will be coming forward in the next few days and weeks -- a very detailed explanation of a program of tax relief.

The great tragedy in this province is the number of people who were formerly functional parts of the middle class earning good wages, buying homes, consuming and living, as most British Columbians do, in British Columbia. How many of them are suffering financially now? I hear the Premier talk about all of the jobs that they have created. I challenge the Premier: if there are so many jobs, quit yours and go out and find one. Go out and find one in the province that will pay you the kind of income that you're earning today, that you would expect to earn given the kind of salary that you've had over the last four years. Go out and find a job; find one of those good, simple, easy jobs that this government has created.

In fact, hon. Speaker, I would challenge any member of this Legislative Assembly who believes that the record of job creation has been so great to quit theirs. In fact, some of us may be forced to go out looking for jobs in the next month. In which case, I would say that when we go out to seek that employment, we will learn -- and learn the very hard way -- that there are many British Columbians out there for whom jobs are not available, who are now finding themselves less able to make ends meet, who are struggling, who find that they cannot pay their mortgage, who are struggling, who find that they cannot educate their children, because of expenses.

It's difficult now to meet the rising cost of living in this province, and yet this is a province that has unprecedented wealth. We have the most incredible resource base. We have an enormous potential in the people of this province, who have tremendous knowledge, a tremendous entrepreneurial spirit and a will to do well.

What we must do as legislators and what we must do as politicians as we head into this next election is provide an opportunity for those who wish to succeed, who struggle to succeed, to in fact accomplish their goal.

So we have put forward a program of tax reforms which we believe are perhaps the most progressive of any that have come forward, certainly since British Columbia has had a functional and working Legislative Assembly. We recognize that the time has come, given the record of the federal government with respect to transfer payments, for British Columbia to move forward and to demand that we will collect all taxes provincially, and to move to a single, graduated tax 

[ Page 17102 ]

on income. That graduated single tax on income would be collected in the province of British Columbia, and we would remit our share to the federal government.

We as British Columbians cannot allow Ottawa to continue to withhold funds that are due to British Columbia. That threatens our health care system. The loss of those funds threatens our educational system and our social service system. We must collect them provincially. We must service the people of this province provincially. Then, because we are not miserly people, because we are committed to the Canadian constitution, the Canadian federation, we will send to the federal government our provincial share.

Our control over that revenue -- the control within the province of British Columbia -- will afford us the opportunity to put in place the tax reforms that we require. We will move forward, and we will allow as a deduction against income the interest that is paid on a primary mortgage on a principal residence. The reason we want to have interest deductibility on a first mortgage is that people are finding it impossible to meet those rising mortgage costs because of the tremendous amount of profits made by the banks in this country, which are holding them, with respect to interest rates, almost to ransom.

I don't seek to make an attack on the chartered banks; I seek a way to help the people of British Columbia. Interest deductibility on a first mortgage is something that should be done. I make no bones about saying that we will have an exemption on credit unions; credit unions, with respect to the proposed surtax on banks, will not be admitted. What we say is that credit unions, first, are chartered differently and, second, are member-owned.

The loss of revenue to government that would occur as a result of the fact that the mortgage deductibility would be in place will be picked up through a surtax on bank profits. It was asked how we would accomplish that, and the answer is that we will accomplish that by requiring those chartered banks doing business in British Columbia to file an audit so that we know where those profits are made and so that we can, in an equitable and fair way, bring back the revenue to government and allow that revenue to go back into the pockets of British Columbians.

We also recognize that there must be deductibility for those who cannot afford to own a home or who choose to rent a home. So we propose a deductibility of rent to a maximum of $10,000 annually, to allow those people to have an opportunity to save enough money off their taxable income to make sure they can afford to house their children, their families, and to prosper.

Unlike other members of the opposition, unlike this government that promises to freeze taxes and reduce taxes, we have given a specific program to the people of British Columbia, and I defy anyone to stand and challenge its validity. It has been tested with people in the marketplace. To be sure -- and I make no bones about it -- the chartered banks don't like it. They know that what we are about to do is take back some of those profits and put back into the pockets of the people of British Columbia dollars that would provide, for an average family with dual incomes, a savings of somewhere between $5,000 to $8,000 a year -- a substantial savings.

We also recognize that in tax reform, if the government is committed to it, what we have to do is stop penalizing those people who are industrious enough to improve their homes, to improve their commercial properties. By simply going and looking at them when the assessor comes around to see to those capital improvement. . . . Not only have we required them to pay tax on every board, stick and nail they put into it, but they are taxed because their wealth has gone up because the value of their property has gone up. So we go around and punish those people because they're industrious enough to improve their homes -- to the degree that we find people today, especially those who are retired on fixed incomes, who are saying: "Let's leave the siding off. Let's not finish the roof. I'm not going to do any more. Please don't put in a sidewalk. I don't want streetlights, because I can't afford the property tax."

We hear a lot of rhetoric about those members opposite and their commitment to senior citizens. Those people, who a generation ago looked after us, now need us to care for them. We're saying that if you're on a fixed income, living in a home that you've already paid for, you should not be penalized through capital tax on the improvements that you've made on your home over the years. It's wrong, and we are moving to amend that in our tax reform proposals: specific programs that will help the people of British Columbia, not political rhetoric at election time -- programs that have been costed thoroughly and have been investigated in terms of their ability by what we would call our three-R measure. Are our programs, first of all, realistic? Everybody we have tested them with said yes, they are. Are they, in fact, responsible? Everybody we have taken them to and consulted with said absolutely. Are they the right thing to do? The answer to that is yes, they are the right thing to do, because they invest in the people of British Columbia and provide tax relief for the people of British Columbia so that they may succeed.

There will be those opposite who will stand up and ask: "What do you do with the loss of revenue? What is government going to do about the lost revenue that comes in through this tax reform program?" We are courageous enough to stand up and say: "We will deal with those lost revenues through an amendment to the tenure system in the forest industry, to allow for an opportunity to get greater value and revenue back from the forest sector than we do today."We have courage enough to stand up and say that with tenure reform, we will put more timber into a free, open log market, to allow that timber to get into value-added production. Instead of getting $950 a cubic metre for timber and selling it off in a squared cant, we can get $2,000 a cubic metre by selling it off as finished lumber -- finished lumber that means hiring many people in the local mills and local areas of British Columbia.

That's a reality that is in front of us today. People in the forest industry who are in sawmilling -- the value-added producers -- lament that they've got a long list of orders. Our timber is wanted all over the world, and they cannot get the timber because it's locked up in tree farm licences to the major corporations, which are shipping it off as unfinished timber.

Let me say that I am not attempting to attack the major forest companies, because I believe that under the system we propose, they will have an equal opportunity to compete. Open competition in the log market is something that's necessary. We are sending our timber out at $950 or $980 a cubic metre when we could be getting $2,000 a cubic metre for it. Hon. Speaker, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to know that we're losing multimillions of dollars a year. If we want to give tax reforms and relief to the people of British Columbia, there is one area in which revenue can be generated and jobs can be created -- long-term, high-paying jobs -- in the local communities of the province.

[4:15]

I think it's also important to recognize -- and I do ask for recognition on this from those people listening -- that our 

[ Page 17103 ]

program is indeed somewhat radical. It does call for a significant change to the way we do government. Unlike the Liberal opposition, who stand up and say that they're going to bring in a law that says you cannot run a deficit -- balanced-budget legislation. . . . That, quite frankly, is not possible in British Columbia, and anybody who has studied this Legislative Assembly and the process of budgeting in this Legislative Assembly knows it.

We are saying that what we need to do is move toward four-year-based budgets -- a four-year system where we can provide, on the first budget day after the election, a four-year-based budget to our school boards or hospital boards so they know they have long-term potential, long-term supply. It's something whose time has come.

Hon. Speaker, I've been asked if I might be interrupted for a moment so that an introduction can be made before a guest leaves the premises, and I'd be happy to do so.

S. O'Neill: I request permission to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

S. O'Neill: I would like to thank the speaker for this minute; it was very gracious of him.

We have today 55 students from grades 10 to 12 from Enumclaw, Washington. They are a choir visiting Victoria, and they are here in the Legislature today -- and, I believe, probably about to leave. Would the House please make them welcome.

G. Wilson: I certainly pass on my best wishes to those students and hope that my words are informative to them today.

A four-year-based budget is important, because what it provides for is long-term security in the financing of the public sector, in terms of both education and health care as well as social services and non-profit organizations. It provides us an opportunity to allow planning to take place. No longer will we have school boards and school trustees finding out, as they are this year, that they have a budget of X, Y or Z on a per capita basis, months into their years of expenditure. They will have that security and that planning available to them.

We also know that a four-year-based budgeting system with a single spending authority will keep a regulated check on our ability to spend. Where we should be putting our energy is not into balanced-budget legislation -- which, frankly, is a crock -- and not into a $3 billion cut, which cannot possibly be made without massive cuts to health care, education and social services. My guess is that when the member for Richmond-Steveston -- a former member of the Liberal caucus -- says that he doesn't believe it to be true, clearly he doesn't believe it to be true, because it's impossible to put in place those kinds of $3 billion cuts without a massive cut to our health and education services. My guess is that he has had a glimpse at what really is being planned and simply couldn't stand to be there for it.

We're saying that what we need to do is put in place a single spending authority that will keep an ongoing, regulated check on government spending. Where statutes should be put in place is for a limited borrowing authority, to limit the borrowing authority of government to a percentage of the overall budget, so that we can limit the amount that any government may borrow in any given year. In order for us to accomplish four-year-based budgets, we need to have a fixed, four-year term of office. No more finger to the wind: "Well, today's a good day for an election, or maybe tomorrow is a good day for an election" -- and who knows, maybe tomorrow really is a good day for an election. But no more of that. A fixed, four-year term of office with a fixed election day, so we can put in place sound fiscal planning.

If you need any reminder of it, I would remind you that this government is going to be asking for interim supply. It is spending right now on warrant. For those people who don't know what I'm talking about, it basically means that the government goes to the Lieutenant-Governor to get authority to spend and can spend your tax money without one syllable of debate in this Legislative Assembly as to how or what they're spending that money on, something that this opposition. . .excuse me, this government, when they were in opposition -- I'm already ahead of myself, thinking they're back in opposition, hon. Speaker; you'll forgive me for that -- stood up and resoundingly chastised the former government for doing. Special warrant spending is antidemocratic; it is a fundamental breach of the principle of our democratic system. Our four-year budget with a four-year fixed term of office and a fixed election day will prohibit any form of warrant spending.

We have put in place, and we take to the people, a sound program for reform -- for change, for small-r reform -- of this Legislative Assembly, so that we have an opportunity to truly represent the constituents. We are the only party that I'm aware of -- certainly the only party represented in this chamber -- that is talking about sensible electoral reform, where we will limit the number of MLAs who are elected through the first-past-the-post system, and we would have a block of seats assigned through a proportional representation of the vote. The time has come for that, because otherwise we are able to have a government with a big majority that only took 38 or 40 percent of the vote. Sixty percent of the people can say no, yet that government can walk in with a majority of seats and do virtually what it wants. That's not good democracy; that's not good for British Columbia.

I, for one, don't fear minority government, because I -- and I believe my track record in this assembly has proven that -- am prepared to be constructive in debate. I am prepared to acknowledge when government has done well. I am prepared to work with government when government brings in good legislation. And I am prepared to hold the government accountable when I believe, on a philosophical level, that they have broken their path, that they have gone astray, that they are doing things that are not in the best interests of British Columbians.

If we elect people who are prepared to hang up their partisan coats when they walk in this door and say, "In this chamber we are not partisan politicians but people who stand to work for those people who own this seat" -- and the people who own this seat are the people of Powell River-Sunshine Coast -- "and every single seat representing the people of British Columbia" -- then we will elect politicians who will be prepared to go forward and do what is in the best interests of their constituents and the people of this province, not what is in the politically expedient interest of their own political party. The time has come for us to do that. The time is long past for us to have done that, and I would argue that that's what the people of this province are going to have an opportunity to do in this election.

In my closing few minutes I want to turn my attention to two issues. One is the upcoming election campaign. I'm going 

[ Page 17104 ]

to fully acknowledge here, as leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance, that we don't have a big, fancy bus, with all kinds of money. We don't have $5.5 million to spend, which other parties are going to spend -- something, frankly, that I think is obscene. It is truly obscene to be spending that kind of money to buy your way into an election. So we don't have a big, fancy bus. We're not going to be able to command the kind of television time for the commercials that are out there.

I want to comment on an issue that the Premier raised during question period, and that was the television advertising that he was alluding to. I have my differences with the Premier of this province, and I am ready to challenge him on any policy issue or issue of principle. We are quite different politically, and we are foes, and in this upcoming election I will fight him as hard as I know how. But I truly hope that we in the province of British Columbia have not degenerated to the point that we slip into the muckraking style of American electioneering, which will reduce this political process to nothing more than the kind of Americanism that we all look at as Canadians and despise.

It's understandable when the Leader of the Opposition suggests that one of the things the Premier should have learned when he went to kindergarten is that you have to put things back the way you found them. Well, I understand why the Leader of the Official Opposition would say he wants to put things back the way he found them, because he's financed and run by the very individuals who put them where he wants to put them back: the former 1991 Social Credit members who sat at that time with Rita Johnston. It's no wonder he wants to put them back, because those are the people who put them there in the first place.

Well, we're saying it's time to change -- it's truly time to change. I would say, when we talk about change, that we're not talking about standing in the Legislative Assembly and advancing one position, saying that we are now ready to protect medicare and health care, as I heard in the response to the Speech from the Throne by the Leader of the Official Opposition. That isn't what his people are saying on the hustings, because the people out there on the hustings. . . . I can tell you that the candidate running on behalf of the Liberals in Powell River-Sunshine Coast has told people that they are talking about a two-tiered health care system. The reason he is talking about a two-tiered health care system is that that's what it says in their policy briefing packages for their candidates.

But I suppose the fact that you could go out on the hustings and say one thing, and turn around and say something else in this Legislative Assembly. . . . That's the courage to change. I suppose the fact that you can stand up and speak opposed to a labour bill, as we did on the weekend -- solidly opposed to it -- and then speak in favour of a hoist motion introduced by the leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance -- my motion. . . . Then when it comes to the vote, having spoken staunchly against this bill, you stand up and vote for it. That, I guess, is the courage to change.

When you run an ad and find that the garment you are wearing is not suitable, and therefore you need to change -- to put on a new image, a new view, something else that might sell better -- I suppose that's the courage to change.

We don't need any more gimmickry. We do not need any more slick electioneering. We do not need multimillions of dollars being spent on all kinds of glossy brochures and big-time, fancy election commercials. We do not need the big, slick expensive campaigns anymore. What we need is an honest assessment of where we are financially, socially and politically, as a province and as a nation, and then a set of views put before the voters, in as direct and clear a way as possible, that represents the interests of each of the political parties, so they may choose.

All I ask, as we go into this election campaign, is that we have a fair opportunity to do so. I know that often what I say -- my press releases and the kind of message we put out -- is not covered in the print media. It's a frustration. It's a frustration when I hear the Leader of the Third Party referring in his speech to the three parties: the New Democratic Party, the Liberal Party and the Reform Party. He entirely excluded the Progressive Democratic Alliance, despite the fact that we've had two years of history here as PDA -- and I was elected as the Leader of the Official Opposition -- and despite the fact that I believe that right now, if I am to count properly, we are fielding more candidates in the province than the Reform Party is, by some margin. That's frustrating.

Most of all, I want to say in my closing words that we will take to the people the vision, the view, that I put forward in this response to the Speech from the Throne. I will say that this government has done many things right; it has. The Labour Code, I think, was a step in the right direction. Forest Renewal is something that is workable. The Forest Practices Code is something we needed in the province, and it's been said. I think the fact that we have created a number of parks will be a legacy, like the agricultural land reserve, that this government will be held forward for. I also think that the economy of this province, generally speaking, is not in too bad shape. Despite the rhetoric about the debt, and there is a big debt, it's not in too bad shape comparably across Canada. We're prepared to acknowledge it when the government has done some things right.

We believe that where they have gone wrong is they have forgotten that they have to invest in the people, which is why we put out the tax reform programs that we have. We would also say that they have forgotten that British Columbians need stronger and more vigorous representation on the national stage.

[4:30]

There will be another referendum coming up in the province of Quebec. I say to the people of British Columbia: when you choose your next leader, your next Premier, the person that you will send to Ottawa to negotiate on behalf of British Columbia, think back in history. Find out who those leaders were, and where they were, and what they voted for on the Meech Lake accord and the Charlottetown accord, and what their voice has been with respect to the provisions for British Columbians and to how British Columbians are going to stand. There is a first ministers' conference coming up almost immediately following this election. Hon. Speaker, what a glorious time to go forward and put British Columbia's position as vigorously and as forcefully as possible.

I thank you for this time and this privilege to stand in this chamber today.

Hon. A. Petter: Hon. Speaker, it's indeed a pleasure for me and an honour to take part in this very important debate at this very important moment in our province's history, as we stand really very much at a crossroads as to where we're going to go. I want to start by saying that I appreciated the comments of the previous speaker, the leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance, who, while I disagree with much of what he said, at least put forward a positive program, at least put out a positive challenge to British Columbians. While I would encourage British Columbians not to endorse 

[ Page 17105 ]

that positive program, at least it was framed in a positive way, in stark contrast to the two preceding speakers -- the duo of despair and destruction, represented by the leader of the Liberal Party and the leader of the Reform Party.

I've been struggling for many years to distinguish the difference between those two leaders and those two parties, and it occurred to me. . . . I think I figured out what the difference is between the leader of the Reform Party and the leader of the Liberal Party. In one we have a leader who shed his party affiliation to pretend that he isn't who he is -- to pretend that he isn't still a Socred -- and in the other we have a leader who bought his party affiliation to pretend that he is who he isn't -- to pretend that he is a Liberal. That's really the only difference between the two.

Really, what we have here are two parties representing the same set of interests -- the interests of the privileged few. The only courage to change -- as the leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance indicated -- that is possessed by the leader of the Liberal Party is his courage to change his spots. The program is the same; it will always be the same. It is the program that was discredited in the last election, and it is the program which British Columbians will reject in the forthcoming election.

But there was one other important difference. I want to credit the Reform Party and its leader here, because at least the leader of the Reform Party had the courage to admit that the program of cutting $3 billion from our public services would indeed cause serious damage to health care and education. The Liberal Party, it turns out, is even too far to the right for the Reform Party. That's the sorry state things have gotten to in this province.

I want to come back and talk a little bit, as Minister of Health and as a member of this House and as someone who is concerned about the future of health care, about what the Liberal agenda is for health care. I'll leave that to the end of my speech, because I think there are some very real concerns that need to be addressed and that British Columbians need to attend to, and some statements that have been made by the leader of the Liberal Party and the critic which I think disclose what the real agenda is.

I'd like to start by outlining what this government stands for and who we stand for. Because as we approach the election, as British Columbians have to make their choice, they have to decide who is on their side, who has stood on their side over these past four years and who will stand on their side in the future. I want to say, hon. Speaker, that I think the record of this government, when you pierce through all the rhetoric and the despair and negativity that comes from the two main opposition parties, they have no answer to the fundamental truth that this party and government have produced a record which is squarely on the side of ordinary British Columbians, a record of hope for the future, a record of hope for ordinary British Columbians, not just for the select few.

You know, no matter how much they rant and rave and become hysterical and try to up the rhetoric, they can't hide the fact that we have the strongest economy in Canada right here in British Columbia. They can't hide the fact that we have converted what was a $2.4 billion deficit inherited from the previous Social Credit government -- it's now changed its name to the Reform Party -- into a balanced budget last year. I fully expect that tomorrow we'll find it's a balanced budget again for the next year.

To hear the leader of the Reform Party, whose government, when he was a member of that government, increased expenditures by 12 percent a year -- a completely unsustainable rate -- talk about how we can't afford to live within the program of this government, which has reduced the increase in government expenditures annually to less than 3 percent, is duplicitous at best.

We have the lowest debt in Canada. In fact, let me quote from the Standard and Poor's report of July 1995: "B.C.'s debt burden remains modest compared with other provinces." And why do we have a debt burden at all? Standard and Poor's says this: "The growth of infrastructure debt relates to two factors: the demand for services from a rapidly growing population, and the need to catch up on building new infrastructure following sharp capital spending cutbacks in the mid-1980s" -- in other words, the need to invest in schools and hospitals, the need to meet the needs of a growing population.

Less than 8 cents of every taxpayer's dollar is spent in servicing the debt in this province, to invest in new schools, new hospitals, new transportation infrastructure. I defy the members opposite to show me a company or corporation in a growing economy that is meeting the needs of a growing marketplace -- a successful corporation -- that invests as little as 8 cents on the dollar to meet the needs of that growing population, that growing clientele. We have a modest investment strategy, which is framed within a debt management plan. It is ensuring that the services of health care, education, transportation and infrastructure are there for our future, and that our economy will remain strong.

We have the highest credit rating in Canada. That has been confirmed time and time again by independent rating agencies, and I'll come to them in a second.

We have the leanest public sector in Canada, something that's often forgotten by the members opposite. Let me read from the Globe and Mail from May 29, 1995: "Despite all the slashing and all the headlines, Albertans still have the fattest public sector in the country. The leanest by a wide margin is British Columbia." We have the leanest, most efficient public sector. Of course, the Premier of the province is ensuring it's leaner still by making reductions in the number of public servants and reducing the number of ministries, so we will continue to provide the best services but in the leanest and most efficient way possible.

In terms of taxes, for the last two years in this province we have had a tax freeze, and as a result of legislation introduced today, we will have a tax freeze. If the people of British Columbia don't make a tremendous mistake in the next few days, we will have a tax freeze for three more years, through to the year 2000. That is a government that understands the impact of taxes and is prepared to protect ordinary British Columbians.

The record of this government on the economy can be vouched for by any number of people. But let me just give you the verdict from some of the harshest critics, the bond-rating agencies who have to advise their customers about this government and this economy. Nesbitt Burns, in December 1994, said: "B.C. is in the best financial shape of all the provinces." Goldman Sachs, in March 1995, said: "B.C.'s economy remains Canada's healthiest." Standard and Poor's, in July 1995, said: "British Columbia's economy has been the strongest performer in Canada."

Most recently, in February 1996, the Investment Dealers' Association of Canada -- hardly a New Democratic fan, hardly an association which has been a strong supporter of New Democratic Party historically. . . . Here's what they said 

[ Page 17106 ]

in their fair and evenhanded assessment: "British Columbia is the least indebted province in the country. British Columbia has maintained the highest credit ratings in the country over the past five years, reflecting its strong balance sheet and economy." That's the Investment Dealers' Association of Canada passing judgment on this government and this economy.

The thing that is the real test for ordinary British Columbians is jobs. What about jobs? Will there be a future for jobs and for people here in British Columbia? It is in the record of jobs that this government has really demonstrated whose side it's on. The job creation record of this government has been second to none of any government in Canada.

The Liberal opposition doesn't have to leak documents to know what this government's job creation plan is. We released that plan. It's called: "Investing in Our Future: A Plan for B.C." It was all about creating jobs and a strong economy. It talked about investing in skills and training, which we have done through the Skills Now program; it talked about investing in infrastructure, which we have done through B.C. 21; and it talked about investing in natural resources, which we have done through the forest renewal program. The result of that has been the best job creation record in the country.

Let me just talk about one area that until recently was near and dear to my ministerial heart, and that's the area of forestry. In the area of forestry -- notwithstanding huge changes in forest management -- 15,000 new jobs were created over the past four years in this province. That was no accident. Those jobs were created because this government showed leadership in demanding that there be more work done in our forests to restore damaged streams and to ensure that our environment is protected -- notwithstanding the opposition of the Liberal Party, as well as that of the Reform Party, to the enforcement provisions of the Forest Practices Code. Those jobs are a direct result of Forest Renewal B.C. making investments back into our forest land base -- notwithstanding the opposition and the Liberal Party voting against forest renewal. Voting against forest renewal, if you can believe it! Those increases are a direct result of this government introducing initiatives like the credit system and value-added programs, to encourage more value-added production, and showing that we can both protect our environment and create jobs.

Let me give you one example of that. This government said that beehive burners, which were burning wood waste in this province, had to be phased out. Members of the industry and some members opposite complained and said that it would cost jobs. What's now happening in the north and elsewhere in this province? Companies that were previously burning their wood waste are now turning that wood waste into medium-density fibreboard and creating jobs: jobs for the environment, not jobs or the environment. That's the record of this government, and that's why we have 15,000 new jobs here in British Columbia in our forest sector.

As the Premier has indicated, if we are re-elected, a jobs and forest accord -- a jobs and fibre accord -- will be our number one forest policy, to ensure that we continue to build on that record and get more jobs here in British Columbia for forest workers. As the legislation that we introduced two days ago indicated, we'll ensure that those who are displaced in the forest sector are first in line to get those new jobs.

That's the kind of record that shows very clearly whose side this government has been on and whose side we will continue to be on: the side of ordinary workers, not the side of large companies. We're not on the side of large companies but on the side of ordinary workers who are looking for long-term jobs and a future in our forests here in British Columbia.

The throne speech also talked about crime. I want to say that we sometimes hear a lot of rhetoric from the two major opposition parties on crime. There's a lot of rhetoric but very little in the way of performance. This government has performed and will continue to perform in terms of crime prevention. I won't go through the extensive list, because time doesn't permit me to, but we have instituted major initiatives that get tough on crime in B.C., that protect victims' rights, and that protect the interests of women and children. Whether it is working to encourage -- indeed, demand -- Ottawa to get tougher under the Young Offenders Act, whether it's to provide a Victims of Crime Act, whether it is to ensure that a policy is introduced requiring offenders to be charged in cases of violence against women or that a Criminal Records Review Act is introduced to ensure that criminal record checks are conducted on people working with children, we have a record that's second to none in terms of dealing with crime. Because we understand that dealing with crime isn't just about talking tough. It's about providing support for people in communities, providing support to deal not only with crime but also with the causes of crime.

The report card came out recently from another group that has no particular interest in this party or this government -- from CAVEAT, a victims' rights group across the country. They looked at different jurisdictions. Do you know what they concluded? The jurisdictions on whose policies the Reform Party and the Liberal Party model their program -- the Mike Harris program that Gordon Campbell wants to implement here in British Columbia. . . . The groups that follow that lead are the ones that end up short in this report card. Ontario got a D-plus in terms of crime; Alberta got a D-minus in terms of crime; and British Columbia, because of these programs, scored a B -- the highest grade of any government in Canada, including the federal government, in terms of tackling crime.

People should understand that not only can you not protect health care and education when you cut $3 billion but you also can't protect the instruments we need to give to our police, our courts and our community workers to battle crime. That's what's happening in Ontario right now. Crime prevention is being compromised on the back of a right-wing ideological agenda of the kind that the Liberal Party and the Reform Party want to implement here in B.C. So much for crime prevention on their part.

[4:45]

Let me turn to medicare and education. This government, particularly under the leadership of Premier Clark, has made it very clear that we regard medicare and education as our number one priority in the province. In terms of education, we have pursued an extensive program -- the Skills Now program -- to give high school students the opportunity to gain the skills necessary for the workplace. We have added spaces in colleges and universities -- almost 20,000 new spaces -- so people who previously couldn't get access, who were standing in line under the Social Credit government, who were unable to get in the door of post-secondary education, now have a guarantee of a place. If they're qualified, then that place is there for them. To ensure that that access is meaningful, there is a tuition freeze -- to ensure that when they get to the door they will not be burdened by an inordinate barrier in the form of what they have to pay.

Let me talk a little bit about medicare, because this is an issue that I think is near and dear to the hearts of all Canadians. Let me say that protecting medicare isn't just about protecting a social program. It goes much deeper than that with British Columbians and Canadians. Medicare is very 

[ Page 17107 ]

much, I think, a national symbol. It is part of what holds this country together. It is one of the sinews that holds this country together: a national medicare system.

I think British Columbians look to medicare as the program that ensures that regardless of their status, their income or their wealth, they will have the same right to health and the same right to medical attention and care as any other British Columbian. That is what makes us different as a country and as a province from some other countries and some other jurisdictions: all British Columbians are equal when it comes to accessing health care in this province. They don't have to reach into their wallet and measure the size of their billfold in order to get access to medicare. They can rely upon a universal, publicly funded system, and we must ensure that that system is not compromised.

What have we done as a government to make sure that it isn't compromised? Well, one thing we've done is ensure that the funding is there. You can talk about medicare all you like. If you don't have the resources at a time when our population is aging and growing, and at a time when costs are increasing, you can't maintain a universal medicare system. Over the past four years, we have increased funding for medicare by about $1.5 billion annually over the situation that we inherited -- over a 25 percent increase -- and that has been absolutely necessary to ensure that our medicare system is protected. If we had frozen that funding, we would not have a publicly funded medicare system as we recognize it today. That increase was essential to keep up with population, with age and with the changing and increased demands of our health care system.

We also have made savings. We spend smarter to make sure that those medicare dollars are directed where they're needed. That meant making some tough decisions in facing up to the large drug companies, as my predecessor did in introducing reference-based pricing, to make sure that those precious taxpayer dollars don't go to padding the profits of multinational drug companies but to providing the best therapeutic prescription for patients, and that we redirect those dollars into good health care. I don't begrudge drug companies wanting to make their profit, but I do begrudge a party or a government that would allow them to make that profit when there is no therapeutic reason to do so. So we introduced reference-based pricing, which said we would fund drugs based upon their therapeutic effect, not based upon how much profit they provide to multinational drug companies.

Our whole New Directions initiative and regionalization is about reducing bureaucracy and giving local communities more say in stewarding and directing those precious health care dollars. We've also reduced surgery wait-lists substantially over the last four years. In fact, cardiac surgery wait-lists have been halved over the last four years. Cancer wait-lists are down substantially, and new cancer facilities are adding to that record.

We have at the same time ensured, through our medicare protection act, that there can be no compromising of the basic tenets of our medicare system. Indeed, in the face of huge federal reductions and a lack of commitment from the federal government to protect medicare, we have introduced. . . .

Interjection.

Hon. A. Petter: Yes, a Liberal government -- the federal level -- that has cut commitments to medicare. In the face of that, we have introduced, at the provincial level, legislation that embodies those same principles. So we in the province can at least be sure that if the Liberal government in Ottawa continues to back away from medicare -- if we see an erosion in other provinces -- at least here in B.C. we won't see an erosion in our medicare system.

Now that's a record to be proud of. That's a record that represents the interests of ordinary British Columbians.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. A. Petter: But what do the opposition parties offer? Let me focus here very much on the official opposition -- what's left of it. I find it rather sad to hear the Leader of the Official Opposition trying to convince British Columbians of what he can't even convince his own caucus members. He can't even convince his own caucus members, and he expects British Columbians to believe him when he says he can cut $3 billion without affecting medicare and education.

He cannot convince the member for Powell River-Sunshine Coast, who used to sit in that caucus; the member for Okanagan East, who used to sit in that caucus; the former member for West Vancouver-Garibaldi, who used to sit in that caucus; the member for Chilliwack, who used to sit in that caucus; and the member for Richmond-Steveston, who, as of yesterday, used to sit in that caucus. He can't convince them that he has any kind of credible commitment to medicare or education. He can't convince those who were elected as Liberals in the last election; how the heck does he expect to convince anyone else in British Columbia? Well, let me tell you that he can't convince them. I haven't had a chance to speak to the former Liberal president in Saanich South, but I'm sure he didn't convince her either, which is why she has now crossed over to a different political party -- one step on the road to salvation; one more step and she'll be there.

Let's look at what the Leader of the Official Opposition has set out as his program for the future, and let's test its implications for health care and education. His number one priority is to cut $3 billion from public services -- 15 percent. His number two priority is to give a third of that -- $1 billion -- in the form of tax breaks to large corporations and the banks. Those are the two priorities. At times he tries to pretend, depending on which audience his members are in front of, that this can be accomplished without doing any damage to our health care and education systems. But at other times he's more candid. He was more candid just a month ago when he was in Nanaimo. You know what he said? Here's the newspaper report from the Nanaimo Daily Free Press dated March 29, 1996: "Gordon Campbell says a $6 billion annual budget is plenty of funding to run a public health care system." That is what he said to the reporter in Nanaimo. "Six Billion Dollars is Plenty," is the headline.

That represents about a 13 percent cut in terms of health care. Last year's budget was about $6.7 billion for health care; this years will be close to $7 billion. Mr. Campbell, the Leader of the Opposition, is arguing that he can cut it back 13 percent, to $6 billion.

An Hon. Member: Are you leaking the budget?

Hon. A. Petter: I'm leaking nothing.

You can add up the announcements that have been made, and I think you'll agree with me: it's going to come close to $7 billion. We'll have to see how close in the very near future.

[ Page 17108 ]

What does this amount to? This amounts to an admission that the Liberal Party's agenda is to cut fully $1 billion from our health care system -- $1 billion from our health care system. Do you know what it would take, hon. Speaker, to cut a billion dollars from our health care system? Let me tell you, it would be draconian. If you want to do any number of calculations, it would be draconian.

Here's just one calculation. To cut $1 billion from health care funding, you'd have to close 5,000 hospital beds and eliminate 17,000 health care workers -- 5,000 health care beds and 17,000 health care workers. That's the equivalent of closing about eight major hospitals: Vancouver General, Surrey Memorial, B.C. Children's, Victoria Royal Jubilee and a few others. That's what we can expect from the official opposition in terms of their program when we get more candid indications of what they're really about.

Let me tell you this: I fully expect that the Leader of the Opposition is now going to shift his position. That's been his tendency. As people start to catch on, he shifts his position. Already. . . .

Interjection.

Hon. A. Petter: He has the courage to change, as the member opposite indicates -- the courage to change a position when it starts to get unpopular. He has lots of that courage. I know what the new position is going to be, because I already hear it coming out desperately from Liberal candidates who say: "Oh my God, we can't live with these kinds of cuts." The new position is to pretend that they can maintain health care services without cutting health care funding.

Let me tell you, hon. Speaker, if you were to maintain health care funding but not increase it -- to simply freeze health care funding -- it would amount to 10,000 patient days lost in British Columbia because of increased health care costs. Leave aside the increase in population; leave aside the increase due to the age of our population. No matter how you add it up, the Liberal Party is about cutting education, cutting health care, and making it their number one priority to meet the needs of their corporate friends through billion-dollar tax breaks rather than protecting our education and medicare systems. That's what they're about.

Now let me correct one other misapprehension before I close. Very often the Liberal Party is equivocal in its position on issues concerning health care. At times they say they're in favour of a private system; at times they say they're against a private system; at times they say they're in favour of user fees; at times they say they're against user fees; at times they use cute little words like "gateway deterrents." I wonder if one of the members over there remembers that term. "Gateway deterrents" was the former Liberal Health critic's euphemism for user fees. When she didn't want to say "user fees," she said: "We should have 'gateway deterrents.' " Gateway deterrents sound like user fees to me, and they're going to sound like user fees to British Columbians, and I bet they sounded like user fees. . . .

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Richmond East rises on a point of order.

L. Reid: Yes, I do, hon. Speaker. The minister has uttered a mistruth. He is attributing a remark to me that was in fact made by the member for Esquimalt-Metchosin, and I would ask this member to withdraw those remarks and check the Hansard. You are in fact in error.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, please, hon. members.

It is customary for members to correct mistakes when they're speaking. If he has in any way improperly impugned motives, could he withdraw? It is not a point of order to ask him to correct errors in his speech. Please proceed, hon. member.

Hon. A. Petter: I'll be happy to check the record, hon. Speaker. But whatever euphemisms are used, the reality is the same: this Liberal Party and this Liberal opposition has not been able to convince anyone that they are opposed to user fees. Look what their Health minister. . . .

Interjections.

Hon. A. Petter: Well, if the former Health critic doesn't want me to use this terminology, let me refer to the next Health critic. Should he ever get elected -- and I hope he wouldn't. . . . Dr. Gur Singh is running for the Liberal Party in Kamloops and is well known for his views on medicare. He says the problem in Canada is that we don't have a second system. He says to get ready with Visa and MasterCard. This is the position of the leading Liberal Party candidate in terms of health care. And if you don't believe him, then believe the current Health critic.

Here's what the current Liberal Health critic said just last week in a debate on health care in Vancouver: "I cannot tell you how often I have heard this from people who contact me who are in the private care business who are told by bureaucrats in the Ministry of Health to consider that it is deplorable that anyone would even consider making money being involved in health care for profit." It's a little tortured, as the member tends to be.

Then he goes on to say: "Well, ladies and gentlemen, we don't have the luxury in government anymore to take that ideological, puritanical view and impose it across this province, and that is unfortunately what has happened over the last four years, and a B.C. Liberal government would change that attitude." That's what he says: a B.C. Liberal government would change the attitude that says there's no place for private for-profit medicine here in B.C.

[5:00]

So they can scream and squirm and contradict whatever they want, but they're not convincing their own former caucus members, they're not convincing British Columbians, and I know that in the next election British Columbians will reach their own conclusions on who best to repose their trust in in health care and education in this province.

The real choice we face in this province is between a government that looks forward with hope to the future, that has a positive vision for the future, with a Premier who speaks very unabashedly on behalf of ordinary British Columbians and is prepared to take on some of the powerful and vested interests, and who, like Al Smith in the U.S., is a happy warrior on behalf of ordinary British Columbians. . . . Then we have the tired retread Socreds across the way, some of whom have changed their name and others of whom have changed their leader, but both of whom believe in the politics of doom and despair, who believe that they can scare British 

[ Page 17109 ]

Columbians through negativity and bludgeon British Columbians into yielding the political agenda to a few rich and powerful people in this province who would like to deny ordinary British Columbians their future. I'm sure that choice will be made in the very near future.

The Speaker: Hon. member, your time has expired.

L. Krog: "What we desire for ourselves we wish for all." J.S.C. Wordsworth said it and probably is best known for having said it, but I suspect there were many social democrats who said it prior to his appearance on the political scene, and many have said it after in various other ways.

Frankly, this government, through the throne speech the other day, said basically the same thing in a broad, visionary statement that speaks to the needs and the hopes and the aspirations of the vast majority of British Columbia's people.

This may be the last time, according to rumours I hear, that I have the option to address this particular session of this parliament. . .

Interjection.

L. Krog: This session only.

. . .so I think it's incumbent upon me, as the member for Parksville-Qualicum, to perhaps reflect a little on some of the achievements of this government and on some of the things that were said earlier today by the Leader of the Official Opposition, the Leader of the Third Party and the leader of the -- well, we'll call it the fourth party -- Progressive Democratic Alliance.

In his address in response, the Leader of the Opposition talked about the increases for the average family in terms of taxation that has been brought in by this government. I kept trying to remember: what were those increases? I don't remember a personal income tax increase brought in by this government, either by the Premier when he was the Minister of Finance, or by his successor in that office.

I do recall a surtax on high-income earners. I recall a necessary increase in the provincial sales tax in order to deal with the mess left by the former Social Credit government, now styled as the Reform Party. I also recall a budget that brought in a rebate program for the sales tax so that working and poor British Columbians would get some of their money back.

I recall eliminating roughly half a million British Columbians from the rolls of those who have to pay for medicare premiums. But I just don't recall the kinds of increases that the member for Vancouver-Point Grey talked about -- pardon me, Vancouver-Quilchena; I shouldn't make that mistake.

It was a wonderful bit of hyperbole talking about the disastrous government that we're supposed to have been for the last four and a half years. He talked about the Premier telling people to get out of their houses if they couldn't afford the property taxes. I don't recall that kind of rhetoric from the Premier. But it makes great television. Anyone who's had the opportunity to read the reviews of Kim Campbell's book about her time in politics recalls those wonderful words about "form over substance." Down there on the opposition benches, it truly is "form over substance."

An Hon. Member: Not even style.

L. Krog: And it's not even style.

If we want to talk about rhetoric and blazing your guns away trying to make a great show, there was certainly an attempt to make a great show today. One might almost have been swept away by it. But I took off my shoes, I took off my socks, and I don't recall my toes getting even a tiny bit wet with that great, sweeping speech that rolled down from the Leader of the Opposition. I waited for some substance. I waited for something more than empty rhetoric. But I didn't hear it. I didn't hear it from the Leader of the Opposition. You will never hear it from the Leader of the Opposition, and you'll never hear it from the Liberal Party.

They have accomplished something that is remarkable in Canadian history. They have taken that concept of honouring the unknown soldier on Remembrance Day -- something purposeful and meaningful to most Canadians -- and they've combined it with the great work that the Red Cross generally does with blood donors. They've mixed them up. What we have now with the leader of the Liberal Party is the unknown donors' list for his leadership campaign. The Premier of the province wasn't afraid to release his. Questions have been asked for years now about the list of donors who support the Liberal Party. But where are they? The only time they've had to disclose is because this government had the courage to bring in an Election Act that requires disclosure -- for the first in the history of British Columbia. So in a little while we're going to find out who the real friends of the Liberal Party are, those people who are prepared to help them.

Talking about blood and donors, the Liberal Party is not only bleeding but it's actually losing body parts, a member at a time. It requires not a simple transfusion to sustain it; it requires some incredible surgery that I don't think anyone in the electorate of British Columbia is capable of performing -- nor indeed wishes to perform.

An Hon. Member: You can't do a brain transplant.

L. Krog: One hon. member across the way talks about a brain transplant. They've tried brain transplants in numerous by-elections, and the body has still been shrinking from what it was in 1991, and it's not looking any healthier.

The simple truth is that if truth really is the currency of politics, then I, having looked at them, must tell you that the Liberal Party in this province is eligible for welfare. We have listened over and over to a lot of rhetoric and unnecessary attacks on a government's record. It has to be that way, because the fact is that the so-called courage to change, the Liberal platform, really doesn't exist. It's as phony as a plaid shirt.

The throne speech speaks to a vision. I understand fully that the role of the opposition is to criticize. But we are coming into and finishing the last session of this Legislature before an election, so there is more than an onus on the opposition to simply criticize. There is an onus on the opposition parties to put forward a platform -- a program to offer up to the voters of British Columbia their vision, what they hope. . . .

Interjection.

L. Krog: "A recipe," my friend in the Reform Party says. If it's a recipe we're looking for from the Liberal Party, I've got to tell you that nobody's going to eat what they serve up when they put the recipe to action in the kitchen. Nobody is going to eat it.

The vast majority of British Columbians know whose side this government is on. They know which government 

[ Page 17110 ]

and which party represents their interests. They know which party is going to maintain the mainstream values that have been the historical interests of the people of British Columbia. They know that a government's job is more than to simply sit around and make sure that the rules are obeyed. Government's role in British Columbia historically is to set a path for the future and to ensure that every segment of society gets on board and builds for that future.

This government's record at protecting and creating jobs is absolutely first class -- head of the game; number one in Canada. My friend the hon. Minister of Health spoke about it earlier in his address to the House: 177,000 new jobs in British Columbia. But a number of other statistics are important. It's not that the government is just taking money and creating jobs. The government, through its policies, is ensuring that new industries are created and that old industries are revived. There is no better example than the forest industry: 91,000 direct jobs in 1991, despite a vigorous program of environmental protection, stiff environmental regulation for pulp mills and stiff competition from abroad. Four years later, the forest industry directly employs 105,000 British Columbians in decent jobs.

But let's look at a completely unrelated sector of the economy. This is an absolutely fascinating set of statistics from 1985 to 1995. Let's talk about total film and television revenue in British Columbia. It started to work up a little bit, and peaked in 1989 at $200 million. Then, with that pathetic former government, it started to drop, and it dropped steadily until 1991, to a little over $150 million. But we all know what happened on October 17, 1991: the people of British Columbia, with a pretty strong voice, elected a good government. The statistics reveal, without fail, increase after increase, each and every year: 1992, up to $210 million; 1993, $275 million; 1994, a little over $350 million; 1995, a little over $450 million. Jobs! Jobs -- that's what that's about.

The segment of the Vancouver Island Highway project in my riding nears completion, and the workers on that job have been ensured decent wages and decent working conditions -- the kind of wages that families can be supported with. And what have we constantly heard from the opposition parties in this Legislature? They opposed it. They didn't want to see working people earn decent wages. When you think about how many car dealers there are in the Reform Party, you would have thought they'd support decent wages so that people could buy the cars. But they don't; they don't support decent wages for working people. They should have taken something out of the book of W.A.C. Bennett. W.A.C. Bennett knew what was important. He knew that jobs were crucial for British Columbia; that people who worked paid taxes; and that when they paid taxes, they could provide social programs and they could support health and education -- the priorities of the people of British Columbia.

This government's record in terms of making communities safer is outstanding. The minister talked about the first-class mark we got -- the best mark in the country. People in British Columbia need to feel safe and secure in their communities, women in particular. Look at the record of this government in terms of funding for women's centres, for safe houses, in support of day care, and in programs designed to affect and touch people -- not some broad policy of government that doesn't impact on their daily lives, but real policy, real changes, real money, making communities safer, making people feel they have a future, and making them feel that their children's lives will be better than theirs.

The politics of this party, the politics of this government, are the politics of hope. Down at the other end of this chamber it is the politics of fear; it is the politics of dinosaurs. As we approach the twenty-first century, they will not change, and they believe that they can convince others with the rhetoric of the past. It won't work. It didn't work in 1991, and it's not going to work in 1996.

[5:15]

Protecting medicare and protecting education. This government, under a dynamic new leader, has outlined programs in the throne speech and in policy announcements in the last few weeks that speak to those priorities for British Columbians. You heard what the Minister of Health had to say about the opposition leader's remarks in my own community of Nanaimo, British Columbia. "We can fund health care adequately with $6 billion." It would be nice if the Liberals would actually look at the estimates once in awhile and see that we were already spending more than that in the fiscal year that just passed.

I want to talk about Nanaimo Regional General Hospital. I want to talk about the new ambulatory care building being put up that's going to reduce the surgical waiting list. I want to talk about the new CT scanner that was desperately needed and that this government has provided. I want to talk about a community health council that's getting underway. I want to talk about a new long term care facility in Qualicum Beach called Eagle Park. I want to talk about a new ambulance station in Qualicum Beach. I want to talk about those things that this government has done that reach into my community, into my riding, and touch people's lives. I don't want to listen to a Liberal opposition or a Reform opposition that believes you can cut your way to better health or cut your way to prosperity.

We need something in this province that is equal to the will and the vision of the people. I have listened for that vision carefully. I have listened for that vision from the Reform Party; I have listened for it from the PDA; I've listened for it from the Liberal Party. The people of British Columbia have been listening, too; they've listened carefully for many months. What will the polls tell us? They've heard it. Do you know what? They don't like it. We've watched the Liberal Party plummet from over 50 percent to something drifting down around 30 percent or in the high twenties. The Reform Party. Where is the Reform Party? Well, it's kind of stuck there, you know. Somebody is trying to rev up that motor, somebody else in the party has got their foot on the gas, somebody has it on the brake, and somebody else has the emergency brake on. It's making a lot of noise but it's not going anywhere.

Speaking of going somewhere, let's talk about crime in a very specific way. You know, there's the Reform Party talking about the need for tougher penalties and all those kinds of good things: "We want to make people safer." But what's one of their platforms? It's borrowed right out of the province of Ontario -- right out of Mike Harris's dark vision of the future. "We're opposed to photo radar. It's a cash cow. It's a nasty interference with British Columbians' right to kill themselves on the highways." Let me give you an interesting statistic. For every British Columbian who dies as a result of a homicide in some form of criminal act, five of us are going to die in motor vehicle accidents. They oppose photo radar despite the studies and the numbers that show the significant reduction in the number of deaths. In the state of Victoria in Australia, there was a 50 percent reduction in the number of deaths in motor vehicle accidents and a significant reduction in personal injuries and property loss. Yet the Reform Party wants to speak to some narrow, miserable vision that says that trying to ensure that the laws that are enacted for the benefit of all of us 

[ Page 17111 ]

shouldn't be enforced, that for the government to enforce them is good for us and that more of us should die out there. They'll be tough on old crime, boy, when we're talking about those nasty criminals, but they're not prepared to go to our fellow citizens who speed every day and threaten our lives and the lives of our children and say: "By golly, you're going to pay a fine if we catch you." They're not prepared to do that; that might actually cost them some votes. But it's okay to attack the criminals and pretend that that's the real source of danger when, in terms of dying in the province, I'm five times more likely to get killed in a car accident.

In my riding, people are concerned about their future. They are concerned about the environment. They have seen the impact of unmanaged growth -- growth encouraged by people who had no vision and no plan for the future. What has been this government's response? This government's response has been a growth strategies amendment act, which is going to ensure that Vancouver Island doesn't become what is affectionately known among my Green friends as Campbell's Sooke; a forest land reserve that ensures the viability of the main industry of this province; a string of parks that will ensure that all our children and grandchildren, generation after generation, will have an opportunity to sample what makes this province so wonderful and so unique -- one, if not the last, of the true, great wildernesses left on the face of the whole planet.

It's not just about ensuring that our children have a place to go. It's about ensuring, by preserving that beauty and that wilderness, that one of our main industries will continue to grow. As the world has diminished its forests and its wilderness, more and more people come to British Columbia. The Minister of Tourism knows the numbers better than I and can quote them with great glee. But the fact is that by doing that, we are not simply ensuring that the lungs of this planet have a chance to survive; we are ensuring that one of our main industries will continue to grow year after year.

The fact is that the average number of tourists, international visitors, in the rest of all the provinces in Canada is 5.7 percent. In British Columbia, it's 11.3 percent, nearly twice the average of the other provinces. They're coming here because they know there is a progressive, forward-looking government in British Columbia that has a plan for a protected-areas strategy, which is making us a model for the world.

In my riding, education is crucial. My school district took a strong stand against amalgamation, and this government listened. It's not just that this government listened on the issue of amalgamation; this government also listened to the needs of the constituents in Parksville-Qualicum. A brand-new school in north Nanaimo, Randerson Ridge, just opened last fall. Another brand-new school underway in Parksville will open this fall, Springwood. There's Oceanside at French Creek; Nanoose Elementary at Nanoose; a new high school in planning; and the planning money for two other new schools in Parksville-Qualicum, School District 69. I want to pay tribute and say thanks to both the present Minister of Education and his predecessor, the member for Kamloops, who took such a personal interest in ensuring that Parksville-Qualicum got the schools it needed and that the children get out of the portables.

This government is about putting your money where your mouth is; it is about walking the talk. That's the difference between us and the other parties. It's about walking the talk.

It's very easy to be in opposition and criticize, but it's a lot tougher to implement your vision, to implement it over objection, and to sustain it and to see it through. This government has seen that vision through. This government is ensuring that the interests of British Columbians are protected. We're not going to give a $1.1 billion tax break to the banks and the developers and the wealthy in this province. We're not going to trim government service by 15 percent. We're not going to take $3 billion out of the British Columbia economy. We're not going to do to this province what Bill Bennett did in the early eighties. We're not going to drive this province's economy so deep into the ground that it was the last province to climb out of the recession of the early eighties. We're not going to allow it to happen, because the people of British Columbia aren't buying it, and they will never buy it. The people of British Columbia know that this government is on their side, that it shares their values and their priorities. It is a government, as I said, that speaks to the politics of hope.

Try and envision this election as a car ride for a moment. I'm going to start with the smallest party in the Legislature. It's a subcompact. Now, it's got people in it who'd really like to pick you up when you're standing by the side of the road and take you a ways down -- give you that ride, that help. But it's so small, it just doesn't have room. It's got its own luggage compartment and it's already full. There's no other room, so it's not going to take us forward in British Columbia. It's just not going to move us along. And perhaps it speaks, to some extent, to the lack of funding that you get when you're a small party.

And then we've got the Reform Party. Now there's a classic. It is a wonderful, shiny, big, old Ford Edsel. It has a huge baggage compartment, and it's got lots of seating room as well. But it's not for everybody. When you're standing by the side of the road, if you don't share those moral values, brothers and sisters, you'll be left at the side of the road in that big Ford Edsel. It's only a small, select group.

An Hon. Member: It'll be obsolete in a couple of years.

L. Krog: Exactly, my friend. It will be obsolete in a couple of years. We know that it pollutes when it goes, it uses a lot of gas, and no matter how hard you put your pedal to the metal, nobody wants to be caught dead in it in a public place.

Then we've got the Liberal Party's hot Italian sports car. If you have to ask the price of it, you can't buy it; you don't belong in the car dealership. It only has a couple of seats, and it's not that they don't pretend they don't want to have room for you, it's just that, well, it's the way it's built. It's only for a small elite. Only the elite can afford it, and only the elite can sit in it.

Interjection.

L. Krog: My friend says: "It only goes to Howe Street."

And frankly, what you have in the New Democratic Party is a nice made-in-Canada minivan. It doesn't pollute very much, it doesn't use a lot of gas, it's got a very small baggage section, but what it has is room for a family. Not only does it have room for a family, it has room to pick people up on the side of the road.

It doesn't have the excuse of the Reform Party that you're either not morally fit or not of the appropriate views to get in the car. It's not like the PDA, where there simply isn't room, because it's too small. It's not like the Liberal car that not only doesn't have room for you and only pretends to have room for you, but says it does. It actually has room for you, for the vast majority of British Columbians.

[ Page 17112 ]

They want to get in it, and they want to ride on it because they know it's got a driver in the driver's seat who knows where he is going, who represents a government and a caucus and a party that knows where it's going. It's a party and a vehicle that's never going to pass you by. It's going to listen. It's going to stop; it's going to pick you up.

I think British Columbians are ready for a ride in that new vehicle any day. They're not about to jump into that Edsel or try and climb in that Ferrari or try and squeeze into a subcompact. They want a big vehicle to take us home. Frankly, this government laid out a road map in the throne speech, and British Columbians are ready to get on board.

[5:30]

R. Chisholm: We in the independent party, if you will -- or the movement: the fastest growing party in British Columbia -- are just on our shoes. We don't have any automobiles; we don't have a budget. We just got. . .so that we can give tax receipts, so we're paupers.

It gives me great pleasure to stand here and follow the member for Parksville-Qualicum. He made some great observations, and he put them into very good pictures for the people in British Columbia.

The first thing I'd like to do is congratulate the member for Vancouver-Kingsway on his new position as Premier. Since this is the last throne speech before the election, it is obvious that many of the objectives may not be implemented until after an election.

I am therefore going to outline the concerns of my constituents in Chilliwack. As everyone knows, I've not always agreed with the government's policies. I have spoken out strongly against the government on some issues to ensure that the government knew the concerns of my constituents. It was my duty to my constituents and the reason I was elected. I am pleased to say that although the government did not always change their position after our discussions, at least they listened.

At this time I would like to make a comment on the upcoming election. I certainly hope that the American style of politics displayed by the B.C. Liberals will end after today. Politics in Canada and British Columbia has always had some dignity, but this latest display puts us into the gutter with the politics down south. I don't think we need it in our jurisdiction.

The opposition leader wants to reduce the number of MLAs so that power is consolidated in the hands of the leader instead of in the voice of the people. Our forefathers fought against dictators. They fought for democracy and representation by population. British Columbia has less representation by population that most other jurisdictions in North America. Our population is exploding in the lower mainland. By reducing the number of MLAs, as suggested by the new Liberals, we are expanding the bureaucracy while eroding democracy and the voice of the people. I urge this government not to reduce the number of MLAs. Keep representation by population alive to prevent dictatorship by the few.

This government has listened to my constituents and reacted to some hard work on the part of my constituents and myself to ensure that some of Chilliwack's concerns were met. I am proud that while I was MLA, the University College of the Fraser Valley became degree-granting, that the Chilliwack University College of the Fraser Valley campus received several new buildings and that 12 major capital projects for schools have been completed, including many new schools.

There is an argument brewing in my constituency about who gets the privilege of announcing all these great projects, because so many individuals in home communities deserve credit for moving these projects along, and most of them are the constituents themselves. Quite frankly, since provincial tax dollars belong to the people, I think it would be quite refreshing if we could find some random taxpayer to announce the good news. In fact, I have promised that if the government would just give us approval on our provincial courthouse project, that's exactly who I would try to find to make the announcement -- a taxpayer.

I'm looking forward to returning to this chamber, to work with whatever government is formed following the next election. This government, though, deserves great credit for listening to not only myself but also to the former member for West Vancouver-Garibaldi over the course of our time as independents. I think there is room in our system for a few more independents, and I look forward to that day.

We have work to do to improve our educational system while reducing costs. If the opposition became government, I fear their present leader would not allow this to happen. His proposed deep cuts would cripple our education system.

Interjection.

R. Chisholm: Yes, I wrote the speech.

As this government knows, I have also been very vocal on health care issues over the past four years. I strongly support universal health care with more patient care services, less bureaucracy and fewer overpaid administrators. I question why hospital administrators are paid more than the Minister of Health and why some small hospitals need so many senior administrators, all making more than the Minister of Health.

The fact that the Chilliwack General Hospital received a $6 million budget increase when many hospitals in British Columbia had their budgets cut shows that my presentation of facts and your willingness to listen benefited my constituents.

There is more work to be done to improve health care and gain more beds. I'm committed to preserving health care. I strongly oppose those who would privatize it and sell it to their Howe Street buddies. The poor will suffer.

I look forward to tomorrow's budget that will see increased funding for hospitals, as promised in the throne speech, and I hope the government will be held to its promise. I believe this throne speech is correct in pointing out that nowhere is the difference between the two paths facing British Columbians clearer than when it comes to the services people rely on.

The government's initiatives on the environment are also to be commended. During the last election I campaigned for a commuter rail. Your government listened to me and others who supported this project. We did not get it to Chilliwack, but at least it is to Mission. Due to pollution and the environment, it is vital that this government now commit to a commuter rail on the south side of the river from Chilliwack to Vancouver.

This throne speech highlights the differences between two visions for the remainder of this decade. This government's vision sees an active role for government, as the throne speech says, "building our communities and building the economy to create new opportunities for jobs." My community of Chilliwack needs this kind of vision. We are a 

[ Page 17113 ]

growing community in many ways, but we are losing jobs like it's an epidemic.

We look for further proof of this vision in the coming days. In particular, the Minister of Transportation and Highways knows that I'm looking forward to an announcement on a new flyover at Evans Road and the Trans-Canada. I appreciate the support he has already given to this project and hope provincial officials and district of Chilliwack officials will soon be able to iron out the details that will allow this project to proceed.

As I remarked earlier, the Attorney General knows that our community is still hoping that we'll receive some word on the funding plans for a new provincial courthouse to replace the one that is close to being condemned and is becoming very dangerous to its users. I'll take any kind of announcement before voting day, ministers. Let's see true proof of this throne speech's vision in the constituency of Chilliwack. I know you can do it.

I also stress commuter lanes on the Trans-Canada, which are in the process of being built, but they must continue on to Chilliwack. If I recall correctly, one of the new Liberals in the House -- Vancouver-Quilchena -- opposed the commuter rail, showing his contempt for the environment. Some issues are bigger than dollars.

For the last four years I have had a private member's bill on ethanol before this Legislature. I hope to resubmit it this session and urge the government to pass it this session. It is not costly to the consumer or the government, but it is definitely one answer to our immediate vehicle-emissions problem.

This government has promised to look into the fishing situation. I spoke in the past about the problems with the fishery. We need -- and I stress that we need -- to stop fishing on the inland rivers, and that is commercial, aboriginal and nonaboriginal fisheries. Those fish are just coming up to spawn, and that is for the future stocks. It is time it stopped. We need to reduce the size of the fleet, and whatever government is in power, this House needs to back them to make the federal government move and try to force the Americans to come to the table. If it doesn't happen, we will lose this fishery. We need to change the way we do business. Otherwise we will lose a very important species to this province.

This government has not been perfect over the last four years. Past polls show the public did not like the numerous increased taxes and debts and the debit that we have now achieved. But obviously, in some areas this government has learned by its mistakes. People are becoming increasingly nervous about the new Liberals' dictatorial ways and big-business approach, as recent polls show.

I am appalled at the way the CFB Chilliwack issue was handled by this Legislature. Credit is due to former Premier Harcourt for appointing the MLA task force last fall. Future history books will show how wrong this Legislature was in not being more vocal on this issue. Once gone, this year-round training facility cannot be replaced. I urge this government to get involved today in the fate of this $1 billion national asset. British Columbia needs an emergency measures training facility. Our police force train there. This government must ensure CFB Chilliwack is given to the province and not to developers or let sit idle. I would like to see the province maintain the facility, in cooperation with the federal government, for RCMP, local police and reserve forces training, as well as for a central facility for emergency preparedness training.

Recently the mayor and MP for Chilliwack went to Ottawa to discuss its fate. Unfortunately, this government has not been vocal enough on this issue, and they weren't there. I spoke to most of the B.C. MPs and senators, the Prime Minister's Office and many federal cabinet ministers. However, the Premier and his government must show interest in the facility and lobby the federal government themselves for the facility's utilization. Otherwise, this asset that belongs to the taxpayers will go unused and empty, only to waste away. Now that the federal resources are moving further away, how is the Premier going to enhance emergency training in this province to take up the slack? In time of emergency, who is going to respond? I have heard no answers in almost a year.

Forestry is another area which my community relies on. We need more value-added -- as you stated in your throne speech, which is great. But we don't need hollow words; we actually need value-added. We need the bill that was tabled today to ensure that forestry workers who were laid off are now rehired under this new program. But the spotted owl issue needs resolution. Every time one of those flies over the cuckoo's nest, the whole industry shuts down. It's time we had resolution on this issue, and the industry will not be able to stabilize until this happens.

Although this government states that it is proud of its job creation in the province during their mandate, job loss today in British Columbia is a very serious problem. One out of every ten people in British Columbia is on welfare. This is deplorable. It needs far more effort, and it needs consistent effort. Over the four to five years that this government has been in the House, I don't think there has been enough effort put into this area.

Taxation remains high. That it remains high is also crippling our economy, and we must take a look at it. As I have said, Chilliwack has recently been hit hard with job losses due to the impending closure of CFB Chilliwack, closure of two Pillsbury plants, closure of a lumber company, closure of Dairyland, loss of forestry jobs of 15 percent, and now Douglas Manufactured Homes is leaving. These are only a few of many jobs lost in the last year in Chilliwack. This is due to both the federal and the provincial governments, and the federal and provincial governments are needed to come back in to ensure that this community recovers from all of these fluctuations.

Chilliwack needs friendly, clean, environmental industries to replace these large job losses. This is why I have urged this government to move the PNE to Chilliwack and utilize CFB as a training centre. Our youth are graduating with little hope for employment in their own community. This can't continue. Our youth are our future, and they are completely demoralized.

During the upcoming campaign, I invite this Premier to come to Chilliwack and tour this national asset at CFB Chilliwack. You can even bring your NDP candidate with you. But come and see for yourself what belongs to the taxpayers, and dream a little about what a good public-private partnership could do with this facility.

This weekend I had the pleasure of speaking with our Minister of Tourism and Small Business. He is responsible for the film industry promotion in this province. I suggested that he ask those responsible for promoting British Columbia film locations to hustle over to CFB Chilliwack, take lots of photos and tell Hollywood that in the short term we do have "a deal for you." Over the next couple of years CFB Chilliwack would make a great location for filming. I know that minister doesn't let a trick pass. I know that he is going to follow up quickly on this suggestion.

[5:45]

[ Page 17114 ]

On the taxation issue, we must revamp our taxation system to make it fairer. The big banks and corporations should pay tax on their profits. The many tax loopholes must be closed. I urge this government not to harmonize the PST with the GST. It will mean tax on more items, thus increasing the tax people are paying overall. Let's all join John Nunziata and tell the federal Liberals a deal is a deal, the GST must go. At least there's one honourable politician in that House.

I want to remind all parties in the coming campaign that we have a very important agriculture community in British Columbia and that it continues to need the attention of government. In Chilliwack especially, we have to work harder to preserve the family farm. Your new right-to-farm act needs a little improvement. It needs some teeth, and I hope that a new government will quickly make the necessary changes to improve on the good start.

We must do more to make our communities safer. The Premier has promised to do more, and I hope his government will. The judges need to get the message from this Legislative Assembly: our citizens are saying that enough is enough. We must return to a system that makes the punishment fit the crime and where the punishment for the crime is enforced. Half the problem we have is that we do not enforce the laws we presently have.

We must do more to allow victims to be heard in our communities. We must do more to ensure young offenders have an outreach program or some such facilities to go to so they don't become hardened criminals in our prisons. There is an awful lot of improvement that we must make in this area, in this jurisdiction.

In closing, I want to pay tribute to the citizens of my constituency of Chilliwack. I've been pleased to meet many of them and work on their problems during the term of the thirty-fifth parliament. I have indicated that I will be seeking re-election in the coming campaign, and I hope I will have the privilege of working with them again.

I also bid farewell to members of this assembly who are not seeking re-election. Mr. Speaker, you are one of those, and all sides of this House commend you on your outstanding 25 years of service to the people of British Columbia. Then there are those who have been members of this thirty-fifth parliament and who may not be coming back for other reasons. I have made some special friends here over the past five years. I've enjoyed working with many of you, and although I plan to return myself, I want to comment that it has been a great privilege to serve with you in this parliament. I wish everyone an enjoyable life, regardless of what lies ahead. To the member for Kamloops: after this speech I will draw him a map so he won't get lost on his way home.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I intend to vote in favour of the throne speech.

L. Reid: Hon. Speaker, I'm pleased to rise today and represent the riding of Richmond East. It's a riding that makes good sense for the province of British Columbia. It's a free enterprise riding. It's interested in free enterprise with a human face, and it's interested in advancing the issues that are most important to British Columbians.

I want to come back to the hon. member for Parksville-Qualicum, when he talked about New Democrats riding in minivans. I suggest that the member for Parksville-Qualicum should know that those minivans are in the process of being recalled, as will this New Democratic government in the province of British Columbia.

I want to take a special moment and thank the people who I know have chosen not to seek re-election: particularly the member for Vancouver-Point Grey and the member for New Westminster. Both of those individuals have meant a great deal to me in my short tenure in this House, have guided the discussion and have offered wisdom well beyond their years. I thank them most sincerely.

I would also offer the same thanks to the member for Vancouver-Burrard -- yourself, Mr. Speaker -- in that you have guided all of us through the last number of years in this Legislature. For that guidance and for that mentorship, we are indeed grateful.

In terms of the throne speech we have before us today, my comment to my local press was that this was a strike-a-committee throne speech. We saw a committee struck to look at Crown corporations, we saw a committee struck to evaluate the Workers' Compensation Board and we saw a conflict-of-interest committee struck. At the end of four years -- almost five years -- certainly this government needs to take definitive action on those issues. It's not appropriate to govern two or three days, or two or three weeks, before an election; it's appropriate to deliver on promises made four and a half years ago.

I will share my innermost feelings around the WCB, because every single member of this Legislature will know that there are rooms full of reports on how best to restructure the Workers' Compensation Board in British Columbia. I would say to this new minister, this Premier: pick a report. Do not put the taxpayers of this province through another exercise that will generate yet another report. There are suggestions, recommendations and concise, precise comments on what should be done to ensure that the Workers' Compensation Board becomes a vehicle that does serve injured workers. The mandate of any royal commission will be upwards of two years and likely closer to four. There are injured workers in the province today who simply cannot wait. Their lives have been on hold for upwards of ten years now. We're not solving their problems. I think that in the 1990s the public at large look to politicians to be solution providers. They don't look for them to strike yet another committee to evaluate yet another aspect of their lives that is currently not working. I'm saddened that there has not been action taken regarding the WCB.

It's not as if this minister or the previous minister were not aware of the problems surrounding that organization. They were dishonest to the extent that they never once stood up and agreed there was a problem, and that saddens me. They too must have had countless numbers of constituents come to their constituency offices and talk about the issues around the Workers' Compensation Board -- the frustration, the apathy. They must have had those people come, yet they chose not to acknowledge that level of honesty emanating from their constituents.

We, the B.C. Liberal caucus, chose to acknowledge it. Our task force looked at the problem and said: "Please, make these changes." That was two years ago. The previous minister continued, to the last number of days, to stand up and say that there wasn't a problem at the Workers' Compensation Board. It's not fair. It's not fair to employees in the province who need a reasonable service when they become injured. Again, I would suggest that what British Columbians are looking for today is action. They're not looking for yet another committee.

I will also take a moment to touch on the expenditure in British Columbia. Last year, 1995-96, it was $20 billion. Some $20 billion dollars was spent to run the corporation of the 

[ Page 17115 ]

province of British Columbia. Any survey document across this land will always place health care as the number one concern of Canadians. Education is number two. Often peoples' desire to live in safer communities is number three -- some kind of justice issue.

If you took the expenditure for education, health and justice in the province of British Columbia and also rolled in the expenditure around social services -- because liberalism is about having a human face. . . . If you ran all of those expenditures together, you would have $14 billion worth of expenditure out of a $20 billion budget. These individuals are the same government that first off were going to pass the reduction in transfer payments from the federal government on to students and patients in this province. A 180-degree turn saw them say: "No, we're not going to do that." The bottom line is they never had to put the fear into British Columbians with that original statement, and this government is classic for creating a problem and then coming back and attempting to solve it.

We saw a fine example today: with 29 new taxes in the province of British Columbia, this minister is announcing a tax freeze. Well, I can tell you, you can freeze things for so long, whether they are ICBC rates or tuition rates. If you haven't been prepared to govern in a reasonable way, when the big thaw comes -- and mark my words, it will come -- this government will be the least equipped to devise any kind of economic plan to move this province forward.

Again, I come back to the $20 billion expenditure for the province. As Liberals, what we are saying is that if we don't get that expenditure under control, there will be a 3 percent rate of growth. We will see a $23 billion expenditure in this province in four years' time. What we're saying is that B.C. Liberals are intent on securing today's levels of expenditure. Frankly, there isn't a person out there today. . . . I would defy any of my colleagues across the floor to put up their hands and say that they're prepared to pay more in taxation. What people are looking for is better government and better management of the resource.

I'll come back to my point: health care spending, education spending, social services spending and Attorney General spending account for $14 billion out of $20 billion. This government is doing something different with $6 billion. They're not the priority expenditures for British Columbians. It's not health; it's not education; it's not about living in safer communities. Something else is happening with that remaining $6 billion. The public is finally going to say: "Enough. We're not prepared to go down that road with a government that is, frankly, a bad money manager."

We've heard tremendous, senseless rhetoric from members opposite. A lot of the debate has been very transparent: this is a throne speech for the election; it's not a throne speech for British Columbians. It will not take us past the next four weeks. That saddens me.

I would draw the members' attention to the Vancouver Sun cartoon yesterday. There are two individuals. It says: "Mr. Premier, our polls show that if an election were held today you'd probably be out somewhere throwing money around and never hear of it." This is exactly the level of announcement that makes British Columbians more skeptical of all politicians. What this government is doing is damaging the role of politicians across the land. They're inviting the skepticism, the hesitations and the concern that people will not deliver what they say. Frankly, they would be right if they looked at this government. This is the same government that talked about no new taxes. The list of 29 new taxes is before me. There are tremendous amounts of inconsistency, of, frankly, deceit and dishonesty. The public has every right to expect that politicians will do what they say they will do. That is not evident when we look at the New Democratic government in the province.

We look at the ICBC rate freeze. There were 94,000 accidents in the province of British Columbia. Somehow we're expected to believe that this rate freeze will result in fewer accidents. There is no sense, no logic, emanating from the government benches when they do not acknowledge the reality before us today, which is about getting a handle on the level of inappropriate driving that's occurring in the province. Giving somebody a rate freeze does not respond to the educational needs.

Interjection.

L. Reid: The Education minister is in fact engaging in debate. If the Education minister were truly committed to educating people in this province, we would see some decent initiatives in place.

Five hundred people died last year in road accidents -- 47,000 injuries. The costs to our system are enormous. Again, this government has done very little other than suggest a rate freeze. It does not warm my heart. We need to come full circle and establish some significant penalties around drinking and driving. This is about putting in place some plans that allow law enforcement officers, politicians, members of communities and parents of victims to come together and work more closely on better law.

Interjection.

The Speaker: Minister of Education, please come to order.

Please proceed.

L. Reid: Thank you, hon. Speaker. This minister needs to understand the benefit and the value of education. I trust that he will do his homework before he engages in debate.

When I speak of drunk-driving penalties in British Columbia, it's because a number of constituents in my riding and around this province have come to me in my role as justice critic and have said: "This is a significant issue for us." I have met with many law enforcement officers around this province. I have a solution to offer for your consideration.

Interjection.

L. Reid: I would trust that you would listen very carefully, hon. member. A number of law enforcement officers around this province have said that oftentimes the roadside suspension is granted because they don't have the officers to spend two or three hours off the road processing that kind of paperwork -- putting someone through a breathalyser test, if you will.

What we are proposing, what I would like to see happen -- and in fact police chiefs around this province will hopefully look at it with some intensity -- is some kind of processing system in place. Nothing frustrates me and police officers and families more than when a drunk-driving charge goes to court and it's tossed out on some kind of paperwork technicality. So if we had a system in place that allowed officers on the road to deliver their person to a processing area, to have the paper-

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work done by people who do it every single day, to have the test done by people who do a lot of them in a given day, we would eliminate some of the technical difficulties we currently experience which result in fewer convictions.

[6:00]

This is about getting to a conviction the first time out. This is something that is a positive solution that we are prepared to bring forward. If there are folks out there who are prepared to get onside and advance an idea because it's worth advancing, this is one of those very ideas.

Hon. Speaker, if I might reserve my place in debate, I would be prepared to adjourn debate and resume tomorrow.

L. Reid moved adjournment of the debate.

Motion approved.

The Speaker: Before adjourning, hon. members, I would just like to table the auditor general of British Columbia's and deputy ministers' council report, April 1996: Enhancing Accountability for Performance: A Framework and an Implementation Plan, second joint report.

Hon. J. MacPhail moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 6:01 p.m.

Copyright © 1996: Queen's Printer, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada