[1440]

When you think about that, Mr. Speaker, what that means is that all of the successive governments in British Columbia since Confederation -- a period of about 130-odd years from when British Columbia joined Confederation until 1991 -- managed to accumulate about $10 billion in debt. Take your mind back to 1991 and think about the infrastructure that was in place in British Columbia: the road system, the railway systems, the bridges, the highways, the schools, the universities -- all of those public facilities and public infrastructure. The total bill left over -- the mortgage, if you like -- on all of the infrastructure that was in place was $10 billion. That's a lot of money, and a lot of people worried about that $10 billion and how we were going to pay it down.

Today, nine years later, the mortgage is $28 billion. You have to look around and try to say to yourself: "What have we got today that we didn't have in 1991?" To be charitable, we've got an Island Highway, and a very nice one. We have a university at Prince George -- UNBC. It's certainly the smallest of the four universities, but we have a university. And then I start to run out of examples. I start to find myself challenged to extend the list. So I have to ask myself: Did we really pay an additional $18 billion in order to get an Island Highway and a university in Prince George? I hope not. Heavens, I hope not.

But we also know that $18 billion is made up of ten years of deficit spending -- this year, $1.2 billion. That's $1.2 billion more that the government is spending on operations than it took in, capital expenditures aside. Last year it was $1.1 billion, and so it goes. It is with a real sense of despair that I see the government continuing along this path, which is entirely and diametrically different from every other jurisdiction on the continent.

Every other province and every other state is looking at balanced budgets, budget surpluses and paying down the accumulated debt. That's the thrust. They haven't always succeeded. Newfoundland didn't balance its budget this year. But it had balanced its budget for two or three years previously. Ontario didn't balance its budget this year, and I say shame on them. But beyond that, every other jurisdiction in this country balanced its budget: Manitoba, Saskatchewan -- we won't talk about Alberta -- Quebec and the maritime provinces, with the exception of Newfoundland, all balanced their budgets.

Sadly, and perhaps most disappointing, is that there doesn't appear to be any interest in balancing the budget. There doesn't appear to be any will. There isn't even a "Gee, I wish we could have, but we couldn't." It's just like: "We don't care; we don't think it's important."

[1445]

I'm starting to sound like I've been here too long, and perhaps I have. When I was elected in 1986 -- I came here for the first time in 1987 -- one of the most common heckles that was thrown across the floor from the Socreds, who were sitting on that side, to the New Democrats, who were sitting on this side of the House, was: "You guys couldn't run a peanut stand." I thought it was an exaggeration. I hadn't been here when the Bennett government was in office. I thought it was hyperbole. I thought it was kind of funny, but I didn't realize, as did a lot of those members who had been elected in the seventies and eighties and who had seen Mr. Barrett and his government in action. . . . They understood that that was a factual statement: that the NDP can't run a peanut stand. Today I suppose that the metaphor will have something to do with fast ferries. Clearly the fast ferries will become the new metaphor for the New Democratic government and its approach to fiscal matters.

There are lots and lots of other examples: the convention centre, FRBC. . . . I don't know if the folks are still in the stands who are trying to find the income tax money they were told they didn't have to pay. Really, these are the kinds of things that only happen in a badly administered government.

In my humble opinion, there are elements of that 2000-01 budget -- that $1.2 billion deficit -- that, in my opinion, are even more sinister than the spending that we saw with respect to fast ferries, the convention centre, FRBC, etc. These are the sweetheart deals that the government has signed, the so-called accords that have been developed in an attempt to mislead voters into believing that public sector wage settlements in this province have been zero-zero-and-2. For the first time this year, in this budget, we see a $600 million figure that is the cost of implementing those accords -- $600 million to implement a zero-zero-and-2 program in one of the zero years.

When I say it's sinister, I think it's sinister for two reasons. First of all, it was a very deliberate attempt to mislead people

[ Page 14670 ]

Mr. Speaker, the accords are not only in health care and education but also in the social services sector. The latest deal with CUPE is, quite honestly, enough to make you sick. It really is. Let's have a look at this deal. You have a Minister of Education in a leadership race. You have an accord signed with one of the public sector trade unions for a half-million-dollar bonus not to go on strike, and two days later -- two days after that accord is signed -- the union supports the Minister of Education in his bid for the leadership.

[1450]

J. Weisgerber: Well, I've always been very, very cynical about coincidences, particularly political coincidences. If there is anything that gives me a sense of good feeling about this thing it is that neither of them appear to have gotten what they wanted. The minister had to withdraw from the leadership race; CUPE has gone on strike and apparently may not get their half a million dollars. So at the end of the day, there may be some justice after all.

The health care accords particularly seem to me to simply add cost. They don't add any value. The government -- this government -- has bragged, year in and year out, about increases in public health spending. Indeed, they've made increases. But the money has all gone to their friends in the public sector unions. There are no more nurses, no more doctors and no more hospitals -- just longer waiting lists. My friends across the way love to criticize Ralph Klein and the Alberta government. If there's anything you can depend on it's that that's a topic that will get them going. A couple of them have actually perked up just at the mention of the names.

I live in the Peace country. Dawson Creek is ten miles from the Alberta border. I'm confused, Mr. Speaker, because we keep sending more and more sick people from the Peace country to Alberta to be treated. We send more people to the Grande Prairie hospital; we send more people to Edmonton hospitals. We send more people to specialists in both of those centres. I'd like to issue a challenge now to the Minister of Health -- something he can think about between now and estimates time. I would very much like to see a list of the number of people in the last year or five years -- whatever time frame works for him -- to find out how many people have travelled from British Columbia to Alberta for treatment and how many people have travelled from Alberta to British Columbia. I'd like to know how many went from B.C. to Alberta and how many came back to this province, with its best health care in Canada. How many came back here to get treatment?

I'd also like to see, in the broader sense, how many British Columbians our health care system paid for, for treatment outside of this province and how many times we received payment from other provinces or other countries for the treatment of people who have come here for treatment. I believe that the results would not be very flattering. I'm confident that the results won't be very flattering. I'm not pleased with that; nothing could be further from the truth. But it's something that I raise now and something that I'll pursue in the future.

Before I go on to talk about some local issues, I would like to hit on a couple of things that I think are at least rays of hope in the budget. One is the so-called green budget, particularly as it applies to a problem I raised the other day with the Minister of Environment. That is the continued use of MTBE as a gasoline additive. I believe that it poses a real danger to drinking water in British Columbia. I believe we need to move to an alternative gasoline additive, an octane enhancer. It seems to me to make absolute sense that ethanol be the additive of choice.

Countries like Brazil use ethanol almost exclusively for automotive fuel, and the U.S. is moving in that direction very rapidly. I'd like to encourage the Minister of Environment and the Premier to take up an offer that was rejected earlier to join the U.S. Governors' Ethanol Coalition, which is a group of governors around the United States who meet regularly to pursue the opportunities in that area. To date the only province in Canada that's a member of that coalition is Quebec, and I would genuinely urge the minister to pursue that. Currently there are grain-to-ethanol conversion plants in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. Those of us who stop at Mohawk stations will know that for the last decade or so, Mohawk has used ethanol in place of MMT or MTBE. There is a real opportunity.

[1455]

I do have a few minutes left, I believe, and I want to touch on a couple of issues that are of importance locally. One is this issue that has been quite well publicized, and that's the separation of the Peace country and the desire to move to Alberta. I want you to know, Mr. Speaker, that that's a very genuine sentiment -- not one that I happen to support, but a very genuine sentiment. It has deep historical roots. The Peace country wasn't part of British Columbia when the province joined Confederation. It wasn't until 1898 or 1899 that the Peace country was added to British Columbia. There wasn't a road or a railroad that connected the Peace country with the rest of British Columbia until after 1950. There is a saying in the Peace country that it's 2,000 miles from Dawson Creek to Ottawa, but it's a lot further from Dawson Creek to Victoria. So that sentiment is there.

An Hon. Member: Hear, hear!

J. Weisgerber: It was very evident it was there and very evident with. . . . The Electoral Boundaries Commission made note of that.

Today the alienation is primarily around taxation and what is perceived as pretty heavy-handed stuff by the

[ Page 14671 ]

Mr. Speaker, I'd wanted to spend a considerable amount of the time I had available talking about Tumbler Ridge, and I think I've nearly talked myself out of my time allocation. What I would like to do is just very briefly talk about Tumbler Ridge and perhaps come back at another time to the topic.

I had the opportunity once again to go up to Tumbler Ridge with the Minister of Energy and Mines and Minister Responsible for Northern Development. It was an opportunity, I think, for both of us to remind ourselves what an attractive community it is -- the assets that are there in terms of housing, recreation and setting.

I believe that the move to set up a task force to examine the opportunities there was entirely the appropriate thing. We want to look at tourism; we want to look at the forest industry, gas and oil, at-home business, retirement -- all of those things. It is key that Central Mortgage and Housing get real with respect to the houses that they have in Tumbler Ridge and put them on the market -- to do it quickly and to do it effectively.

[1500]

R. Neufeld: Fort Nelson.

J. Weisgerber: My friend from North Peace says, "Fort Nelson" -- classic example. Both communities had chopstick plants. They had to ship them to China to have them finished because of a preferential tax arrangement -- duty arrangement -- between China and Japan.

An Hon. Member: That's not free trade.

J. Weisgerber: I'm a free trader. I absolutely believe in free trade. But I can tell you that if your partners aren't trading fairly and aren't trading freely, then I don't think you have an obligation to either. I wish that the federal government had the courage to stand up to Quebec -- well, I wish they'd stand up to Quebec, too, but that's another story. I wish they would stand up to Japan and say: "Look, we're not going to continue to allow you to dump automobiles and electronic goods duty-free into Canada if you are going to punish our goods and if you are going to put the kind of pressure and deal the way you've dealt on northeast coal." The hope of that happening, I understand, is slim, but I still I believe that it's an important issue.

In closing, I want to talk just a minute about an issue that was in the news today. Finance minister Paul Martin is on record as saying that he would like to consider reductions in gasoline tax because of the obvious increase in gasoline prices, and he's waiting to see what the provinces will do. You know, I'm getting so sick and tired of listening to Ottawa say: "Well, we're going to do something if the provinces do something." First of all, they know that there are ten provinces, so the likelihood of all of them doing something is much reduced. Secondly, the only people who are enjoying a windfall in taxation as a result of these gasoline prices are Ottawa's, because the GST is based on the retail price of gasoline. The provincial excise tax and the federal excise tax are per-litre taxes -- 10 and 11 cents, respectively. Sure, I would agree: we should look at that.

But, darn it, we also know that at least the province spends more on roads and highways than it collects in excise tax. Ottawa spends about 10 percent of the gasoline excise tax collected in British Columbia back into our road system.

Interjection.

J. Weisgerber: The minister says, "Not that much," and I think he's right. I was being generous.

[1505]

Nevertheless, this is a serious issue for British Columbians; it's a serious issue for Canadians. Instead of Paul Martin wondering about what the provinces are going to do with gasoline taxes, I think it's time he dealt with the issue from his own perspective. If one looks at that from any sense of fairness, I would say: "Drop the GST and significantly reduce your excise tax. Then we'll see what we can do here in British Columbia with our excise tax."

T. Nebbeling: Like my colleagues, I must also say that I'm very disappointed with the budget that was presented to this House last Monday. But more important is the fact that the people in my constituency that I've spoken to and who either had knowledge of what the budget contained or just asked about it and were given some facts about the budget. . . . The disappointment and often the anger that I got from these constituents, because many expected this to be the last chance for this government to come in with a budget that

[ Page 14672 ]

If indeed we do get a budget next year -- if indeed this government is going to go right until the end of its term -- no doubt that next budget will be a budget that nobody will believe, because it will be a budget like 1996's that was full of promises and misinformation. After the election that was won on that budget, many or all of these promises quickly disappeared.

So people really said: "No, this is the one." I think it's not just in my constituency; in general that is the feeling that the people in this province had. Here is a chance to deal with these problems that we all have recognized. I'm not telling anybody news that the communities at large feel that and know that the taxation system that we have today is out of control. It is not just taxation per se; it is also the very many service fees -- fees for users -- that have been introduced over the last couple of years. The sum of all these tax increases, hidden taxes and user fees combined has led to serious financial pressure on family life.

Of course, what made it worse over the last three years is the fact that the government -- I think they were fully aware of the pressure they were causing with their excessive tax pressure on the communities in British Columbia -- was looking for a way to somehow off-load the tax pressure and see if they could make another form of government responsible for collecting taxes.

What we saw happening in the last three or four years is that more and more money has been taken away from municipalities through reductions in conditional and unconditional grants, forcing municipalities and cities and villages, for all intents and purposes, into adding new taxation to their tax base, which is the property base in a community.

[1510]

Now today, they are forced to collect over and above -- hundreds of millions of dollars, actually, because it has been well over $800 million that has been off-loaded in the last number of years onto these communities. . . . That's money that communities had to find within their own citizens' groups.

So the tax burden in this province has been enormous. If you listen to the economists, in general they calculate that of every dollar you earn these days, you're lucky if you can get 46 cents to keep for yourself. Now, with that 46 cents, of course, you still go to the store and pay your provincial sales tax, and you pay your GST. At the end of the day, there is very, very little left over. That has caused a lot of people to leave this province.

I think one of the hopes that many had in the community of British Columbia was that there would have been some considerable tax reductions that would have restarted the economy, which has truly suffered because people no longer have disposable income. When there is no disposable income, the consequence is that you can't go to the stores. So the stores lay off staff, or they close down altogether, and a number of people are unemployed. When the stores close down or don't sell consumer goods as a consequence of that, we see the manufacturing sector having less output, which means less need for employment. As a consequence of that, over the last years we have lost a tremendous number of jobs in the small business sector.

The statistics show clearly that 67 percent of every job that is created in British Columbia is created in that small business sector. So the taxation strategy of this government over the last year has driven not only an enormous number of people onto the welfare roll, but it has also driven a lot of people out of this province. And I think -- I know -- there are people who would love to come back if things turn around in this province with the economy.

This budget should have addressed it. This budget had the opportunity to address it, and this government chose not to do that.

As a consequence of that, it is no surprise that the business sector, who I believe made a very compelling case for some of the changes that should have happened in this province. . . . When this budget was presented, the business sector clearly identified that their advice had been ignored. But on top of that, they also declared this a sunset budget. This is a budget that could truly drive British Columbia into deeper debt -- not into deeper debt, because that's already happening, but into deeper despair.

So the lack of dealing with the taxation issue has really angered a lot of people, because as I said before, this was the last chance that this government could have done something. And it will be up to the next government in this province to take that bull by the horns, and we have committed to do that.

The second area where I think nobody should be surprised is of much concern is the area of the pieces of labour legislation that have been introduced in this House in the last couple of years. The one thing all these pieces of legislation have done is that they have empowered the labour movement far beyond what most people in this province believe is fair. It has empowered them far beyond what is reasonable.

[1515]

[ Page 14673 ]

Right now there are 450,000 school kids who cannot go to school; they are abused. Thousands and thousands of parents either cannot go to work or have to pay for sitters to take care of the kids; they feel abused. In my riding in school district 48 right now, in the communities of Squamish and Pemberton, there are many people who truly cannot afford to stay home. There is a high unemployment level because of the demise of the forest industry. Mothers have to take on jobs to make sure there is still some bread on the table. Suddenly the kids are on the street. What are these people going to do? They haven't got the spare cash to deal with this disruption. They are being abused. I think it is outrageous that a government that has allowed unions to feel so powerful as to do this to our children and to our families who have children in the school system is something that, as it is not being addressed, will always be a very black mark on this government.

I can go on about that subject. I can explain some of the incredible demands that the unions are making on school districts, but I'll leave that up to my colleagues. But once the community of British Columbia hears what indeed is being negotiated in Vancouver and what the unions are not willing to give up, I think anger in this province will just rise to a level. . . . It may be that anger that will get rid of this government. But something will happen. People will not accept the unreasonable demands -- antisocial demands, I would almost call them -- that the union is perpetrating on our school system today.

Another problem that raises its head day after day, of course, is the amount of bureaucracy that we face in this province, especially in the business sector -- the policies that have been brought forward by this government that have killed industries. Let's take the forest industry. I have two towns in my riding where the forest industry used to be the economic base -- Squamish and Pemberton. There are some smaller communities like Birken, D'Arcy, Anderson Lake. The forest industry was the economic base for these communities. It is really sad to see how these communities have lost that economic base.

Why have they lost it? Primarily because of the policies and the red tape that this government has created over the last number of years. Of course, the Forest Practices Code is the best example we could ever use of how policies kill industries, opportunities for people and the ability of people to stay in the community. All these things have happened because of the set of policies that is called the Forest Practices Code.

Mr. Speaker, people are looking for changes in these areas. People expected changes in these areas, because the only way we're going to create jobs again in this province is by making changes that deal with the overburdening policies that we have in this province. The only way we're going to make changes to create jobs again is to give the small and medium-sized business sector a chance again and to listen to and hear their voice. The only way we're going to get prosperity again in this province is by having labour be partners in how we build our communities -- not a bunch of dictators as they have become today.

[1520]

Do we know what we can do with $3 billion? I don't have the time to name a list of school projects, hospital projects, anything that this province needs -- more nurses, more teachers, more classrooms. I could go on. The sum of all these elements that are so desperately needed in this province to bring the quality of life back again could be paid for with that $3 billion that we spend every year servicing the debt -- not paying off the debt, just servicing the debt.

To put this province deeper into debt again is a big failure of this particular budget. The people of British Columbia are truly saying no. The people of British Columbia are saying that we should have a system as we used to have in the seventies and eighties -- a system where people who came to this province could invest and, by making an investment and putting in some sweat equity, could make a living.

I came to this province in 1977. I was very fortunate to be living in Whistler. I lived in Whistler because when I came here in 1976 on a holiday, I saw this place and heard about the plans for creating this international ski resort. I thought, I want to be part of that. I lived in Austria at that time. I skied every week. I knew that it was a phenomenal area to be created. So I arrived here and started a bakery. I thought I was going to have a lot of time to ski and then do some baking.

Well, things turned around in British Columbia, and we went through a bit of a recession. But it was okay, because even with a recession the government didn't create all kinds of hurdles to overcome. They didn't overtax you. They didn't create all kinds of fees to provide. They didn't demand all kinds of paperwork that would only lead one to be more focused on taking care of the demands of the government rather than the demands of the business. For years I was a baker. The recession disappeared, and things turned around.

I started some other businesses. That's what you could do in British Columbia. You did not need a lot of money to start doing something for your own future, and there was no government that stopped you from doing that. As a matter of fact, we had a government that was proud of its citizens taking the bull by the horns, creating their own future. That's the kind of business ambience we need in this province.

This government fights tooth and nail. Every time we talk about the unfairness of a piece of legislation and other controlling mechanisms of legislation just to make life miserable for the small and the medium-sized business sector -- every time we speak against it -- en bloc the government stands up and says: "Oh, no; we are right. We know what we're doing. We will bring prosperity into this province." Well, as the business sector has said, all that this government has done and all that they refuse to change have led to one thing: a sunset economy

[ Page 14674 ]

[1525]

One of my friends had an amusing story. He had gone with a group of teachers to a fire hall with kindergarten children, and they showed them around the fire hall. They decided to try and teach them one basic message that day -- what to do if they ever found themselves in the horrible situation of having their clothes on fire. They boiled it down to this little slogan: stop, drop and roll. Stop what you're doing, lie down on the ground and roll until the fire goes out. Stop, drop and roll -- they repeated that to them all day, throughout their little tour. They even taught them a little dance and a little song to do this stop, drop and roll.

There was one little girl that just didn't seem to be happy -- wasn't taking the message in real well. They never really did really seem to please her with their presentations that day. As she was getting on the bus, my friend decided that he'd try one last time and amuse her. He said, "So what will you do if your clothes are on fire one day?" -- expecting, of course, that she'd say: "Stop, drop and roll." She said: "I wouldn't put on those clothes." We all thought that was a really cute story, and it is -- a five-year-old saying something like that.

It strikes me that there's a similarity between that little story and what's gone on in this budget and in the other eight budgets that this government has tabled, because like the little girl in the story, this government has never been able to get the message. The message is that these approaches are failed approaches. Continually running a huge deficit, continually increasing debt and continually interfering in labour-management relations have driven our economy onto the rocks, so that we are indeed the worst economy north of Cuba, with the questionable company of Chiapas, Mexico -- the only two economies in North America that are struggling. It's very sobering -- the damage that it is doing to British Columbians, the way that it is hurting British Columbians.

A recent example is one that I touched on in my throne speech response, as I began to guide the new Premier through my constituency on a virtual tour. That was the example of the WCB smoking ban. Everybody agrees with the goal of protecting workers from secondhand smoke or from anything else that hurts them or makes them sick in the workplace. But the way the ban was implemented, the lack of due consultation, the failure by the government to even follow the consultation process that this government had the responsibility to lay out with the WCB in its regulations -- it's all an example of the kind of endemic administrative incompetence of this NDP government that, together with the ongoing collateral damage inflicted on this economy by that same government, is bringing tremendous pain to British Columbians.

Of course, since that throne speech of two weeks ago, the courts indeed have told the WCB to go back to the drawing board. You can't behave this way; you can't be arbitrary. You can't fail to follow your own rules for establishing new regulations. That is another sad reflection on the WCB and on an NDP government that, time after time, has abused its power. It has gone to court with British Columbians and lost, over and over again, at huge financial cost to the other sides in that court action. Many times ordinary British Columbians find themselves financially ruined in a struggle with their own government: charities, for example, that have had to sue this government over their entitlements to gaming proceeds; private individuals of all kinds; Carrier Lumber. . . . The list goes on and on. As a result, this government has a terrible credibility problem which it can't shake. It's an unshakeable credibility problem, because this government doesn't deserve to be able to shake it.

[1530]

Since then, this same government has given away the farm to CUPE in a number of these under-the-table, behind-the-veil agreements: a huge settlement with CUPE workers in the universities; another settlement in the colleges. . . . There are all kinds of these accords -- every one of them inflating expectations. And now this huge, ugly chicken has come home to roost, and it's costing our children their opportunity to go to school. It's costing our families their peace of mind, and it's costing them out of pocket substantially. Then we have these horrific revelations of a government that apparently is in cahoots with CUPE behind the scenes and going to pay them half a million dollars of taxpayers' money while gleefully accepting campaign contributions from that same union. What an incestuous little deal that is. That is so wrong, so reprehensible. It is enough to make taxpayers cynical about government, and cynical they are -- with good reason.

The present situation is not genuine collective bargaining. It's a pillow fight between bedfellows: the big bosses of CUPE and the NDP government -- just a pillow fight. But workers and children are being hurt by it, and our economy is being hurt by it. Once again our own government is attacking the people and the economy of B.C.

There's a school in my constituency called Marion Schilling school. Right now there's a picket line in front of it. Six little kids with picket signs. They want to go back to school. They can't understand why the educational system -- the government -- is letting them down the way it is. Employees, teachers, students, families and the economy of British Columbia -- all British Columbians -- are victims of this situation and this mismanagement by an NDP government.

The abuse of volunteers is becoming a year-after-year litany by this government. Once again, CUPE attacking the

[ Page 14675 ]

When we call out to this Premier -- who says he's something new, even though he looks exactly the same to me as he did all those years that he was sitting there beside the previous Premiers -- and ask him to do something for these students, to get our schools open again in British Columbia, all he can do is express his concern, say that he's monitoring the situation and finally start talking about how he wants them back in school by Monday. Assuming he has the gumption to actually deliver on that commitment, why won't he do it today? If his concern is genuine, if his intent is genuine, the Leader of the Opposition has provided him with a vehicle. Let's designate education an essential service in British Columbia and never see this happen again.

That being said, I'd like to carry on with the virtual tour that I was taking the Premier on in my response to the throne speech. This province of ours and that constituency of mine, having experienced a lost decade over the last ten years with the NDP at the helm in B.C., are now being confronted with a budget wherein there is absolutely no hope of change -- a budget that is entirely locked in the NDP past and cannot possibly take British Columbia into the future where the rest of the world is marching well on ahead.

[1535]

Indeed, they've never had any redress of their problems. Their problems are that this government insists on taxing them and jacking up their leases year after year to the point where they really can't make a living in their resorts. There's no recognition of the huge contribution they make to the economy, of all the taxes they collect from their clients for the government, of all the enjoyment they provide to British Columbians through the use of their facilities. The fact is that we are able to take our children out fishing on lakes throughout B.C. because of people like those who have poured in their own sweat equity as well as their financial equity to establish these little resorts -- some of them over 50 years old. Many of them are on the brink of going out of business. I know that Sandra Milla and her association and Dick McMaster, a very learned man who has studied this situation and made presentations to this government, would really like the Premier's attention on those matters. The taxes and the lease payments are putting them out of business, and it is not a positive thing in any way for British Columbia.

We wouldn't get very much further, and I would show the Premier the site of Tranquille. It's a former mental health facility, before that a TB sanitorium -- a beautiful piece of property. It's been for sale for some time, the B.C. government wanting to liquidate the asset. There were a number of people interested. There have been negotiations. There was actually a purchaser who didn't make his payments, and the government had to repossess.

For the last several years there's been this process underway where they're looking for a purchaser. I knew of business people who were trying to come up with the millions of dollars to purchase Tranquille. Suddenly this government sold Tranquille for $492,000 -- less than its value as a farm -- and forgot to include the city of Kamloops, which was owed $1.1 million in back taxes. There's all sorts of litigation flowing around that, because there were other people who would have liked to bid and, in the end, did bid; and the $492,000 purchaser lost the place and then regained it. It's just another debacle, another legal tangle -- financial wrangling that will probably end up costing the government far more than it realized in the sale. My friend from Kamloops, the current Minister of Municipal Affairs, was embroiled in it because she was Minister of Environment at the time. It's a mess. It's incompetent management by an incompetent NDP government once again.

We wouldn't get very far past Tranquille and we would visit the Overlander Extended Care Hospital. There we have seniors whose quality of life has taken a dramatic turn for the worse in the past few years since this government appointed its regional health board, having done away with the elected boards. That health board fired the competent administrators of our acute care hospital and our extended care facilities, and it hired people -- for whatever reason -- who in some instances are doing a terrible job. I've had so much negative input from union members working in those facilities about the terrible consequences to them of this government's incompetence, it would make every member on that side of the House blush.

It should make them blush. They should be embarrassed, because the quality of life of those residents has gone downhill. The staff do not feel valued. The place is in a mess, and it's being badly run. We have 363 people on the wait-list to get into extended care facilities in Kamloops, and we have a budget that doesn't begin to address the problem of providing that many beds in the whole province. There are 363 on the wait-list. It's ridiculous. These wait-lists and the trauma that families go through while their loved ones are waiting to get into a facility signify a tremendous amount of heartache and pain for the families that are involved. It's no way to treat seniors, and it's no way to treat families. It's no way to treat British Columbians.

[1540]

[ Page 14676 ]

Yes, finally this government has come up with $85 million in this budget for post-secondary education. That's just 11 days of the interest that this government is now committed to paying because of the huge debt it has run up with its foolish decisions around things like the fast ferry scandal, the coming SkyTrain extension scandal, the Skeena Cellulose scandal and the long list of scandals that pretty well any British Columbian could enunciate.

Our universities are all hurting because of the so-called tuition freeze and the failure of the government to replace the revenue that's so desperately needed. They don't have the research facilities that they need to attract the kind of staff they're going to have to attract over the next half-decade as people retire. They've had their ability to manage severely compromised by yet another -- their very own -- public sector accord between unions and this NDP government -- big unions, the big union bosses that own and operate, control and run the New Democratic Party in British Columbia.

Education province indeed. We haven't been funding them for research. We haven't been giving them enough money even to provide the courses they have. It's taking students five years to get a four-year degree. People are frustrated. People don't look at British Columbia as the education province at all.

There's a nursing program at UCC with excellent people running it. For years they've been asking for the creation of some more spaces. They can handle at least 24 more spaces each year than they are. It's as if this government with its head in the sand never, ever dreamt that we would have a nursing shortage. It never looked ahead to when the big bulge in the population, the so-called baby boomers, would begin to need more of the health care services that they've paid for all of their lives. So there hasn't been an increase in the number of spaces provided at UCC, and that's another huge lost opportunity.

This government seems incapable of looking at practical approaches like having a co-op program in our nursing schools. I'm not saying that they should go back to only having a diploma program. I've heard the arguments -- and they resonate with me -- about why nurses today should graduate with a bachelor of science in nursing. It makes sense to me. But along the way, why not allow them to work in the hospitals? That would take some of the pressure off the nurses who are being burnt out by this system, by the foolish casualization of the existing nursing workforce that has gone on. Instead, these people who are working their way through a four-year program to get a bachelor of science in nursing are having to work at minimum wage in the hospitality industry. They're burning themselves out doing that, trying to make a little paycheque, when they're worth far more than minimum wage working alongside nurses in the existing facilities and taking pressure off them.

Why is our government so foolish? It's very hard for me to answer that question. I would like to benefit from the opportunity of hearing the Premier answer that question when it would be posed to him by my constituents -- or anytime now would be fine.

In the little communities of Barrière and Clearwater in my constituency, there are regularly about 600 people looking for work and filed with the employment services offices in those communities. Sometimes there are six part-time jobs on the board, and 600 people per community with very little hope because of the shoddy kind of government that the NDP has provided in British Columbia over this last decade.

I wonder sometimes if the government pays any attention at all to the things that experts are telling it. For example, the B.C. Business Council, when it recently elected its new president, Jeff Mooney, elected a man who is terribly disappointed in this budget. This is a quote from him: "First, I got angry. Then I just got sad. It was just such a missed opportunity to send a message of change. The budget was a chance to send a signal that we've awakened from this devastation. And what happens? The same old course."

[1545]

What a pathetic thing -- because it's true. This government tries to brag that it's putting $14 million into a new day care program. As Les Leyne said in his column the other day, the poor little tykes will be grown and having to pay for their own day care themselves before we ever get around to addressing that portion of the debt. And it's because this government can't focus on the real priorities. It's always running hither and yon on a political agenda, doing the wrong things for the wrong reason, but always spending the same taxpayers' money.

We see British Columbia continually having to import its professionals from outside the province. We have only 6 percent of the doctor-training spaces in Canada in our one medical school in British Columbia. We have 14 percent of Canada's doctors. Why is that? We're denying all of those young British Columbians who would like to have that extra 8 percent of spaces the opportunity to become British Columbia's doctors in the future. Once again, we are facing a tremendous crunch in that aspect of the health care system as well. The doctor force that we have is leaving, because they're so disgusted with the way this province is managed and the way this NDP government has behaved.

Why won't this government get with the program, Mr. Speaker? I know you won't be doing any talking to us over the next while on matters like that, but I wonder what your answer would be. I wonder what the Premier's answer would be. Why can't the NDP get its act together? And if it won't, why doesn't it call an election and give a new government a chance to deal with all of these problems? Why don't we have a school of rural medicine in British Columbia? We just have an urban school that tends to have a lot of urban candidates. We have a problem throughout British Columbia which is growing, where we don't have doctors out in the rural communities. And we need them.

I was recently in Alberta. I spoke with people in government in Alberta. They're sad about what's going on in British Columbia, even though they've been tremendous economic beneficiaries as wealth has moved out of British Columbia to Alberta, as head offices have left the lower mainland and gone to Calgary. They're sad about it, because they recognize full

[ Page 14677 ]

The federal government doesn't trust this government. Why would it? They're reluctant to partner with such a government, such an irresponsible group of people. The Vancouver Convention Centre was a classic illustration of that. They dragged their heels on everything, because they do not trust the New Democratic Party, judging by its record in British Columbia.

We have two facilities in Kamloops that I'd also like to show the Premier, called the New Life Mission and the House of Ruth. Both of them were established through the wonderful sacrificial giving of residents of Kamloops. New Life Mission is for men who have found themselves on the street, many of them addicted to alcohol, drugs and gambling. Through this facility, people help them get on the road to recovery and into a new life -- break those chains that have them in bondage. The House of Ruth is for women. They were both really only built and established in the last year -- wonderful facilities. But they can't get any operational funding from this government, even though there's a wait-list for both of them -- people who desperately need assistance with their addictions. But the government had half a billion dollars to throw away on fast ferries. People just can't understand it.

In my throne speech response, I touched briefly on the fact that the Ministry of Highways, for whatever perverse reason, has created a furore in my constituency between the communities of Valleyview and Juniper Ridge, asking people to choose between two $80 million options for a change in the east Trans-Canada Highway through Kamloops, which this government has absolutely no money to deliver anyway. I made a trip this week up the Trans-Canada Highway and confirmed for myself what I've known all along. There are much worse problems on the east Trans-Canada Highway in British Columbia than Valleyview -- Three Valley Gap, the Kicking Horse canyon, all kinds of places. This government just has not kept up with the responsibility that it has to maintain British Columbia's infrastructure.

[1550]

The public should be protected by its government. That kind of priority has to be the government's priority, not some political agenda so that the Minister of Highways, the member for Yale-Lillooet, can get himself re-elected in his own riding.

I talked about the desperate need for a hospital in Clearwater, a multilevel-care facility that was promised to Clearwater eight months before the last election -- not just one of those vote-buying promises that the NDP leader of the day ran around making to the people of the province in my constituency, but a business decision -- because it's needed. And one is needed in Chase. In neither circumstance is there even a spade in the ground.

So if you have a loved one and you live in Clearwater, and that person has to go to a continuing-care facility, they can end up four hours away in Lillooet in the Fraser Canyon. Their family can't get out to see them. They die very quickly, because they wilt without the support of their friends and loved ones. I cannot be cynical enough to believe that it's what this government wants -- that it actually would want individuals to just give up and die because this government has failed to provide the kind of health care facilities they need, in their hour of tremendous need.

I thought it's interesting to read some of the quotes from the new Premier and some of his cabinet ministers over past months. When this Premier was asked about this budget and its sorry failure to depart from the miserable track that the NDP have been on the last nine years in British Columbia, he had this to say: "The budget represents balance. If we had not tried to be fiscally prudent, it could have been much worse." Well, some quote -- if he had not tried to be prudent, it could have been worse? That's like a drunk driver after his collision, telling the police: "If I'd had my eyes closed, I probably would have had a worse accident."

[T. Stevenson in the chair.]

We expect this government -- British Columbians expect all governments -- to be fiscally prudent. Frankly, we don't expect the NDP to be particularly fiscally prudent, because they have absolutely no track record of it. If you want to turn over a new leaf, then a human being changes their approaches. But this government hasn't changed anything.

It throws the word "new" in -- I think it's 18 times in the budget speech, a couple of dozen more times in the throne speech -- referring to itself as a new government when there's just been a little shuffling of the chairs over there, the same blank faces staring back, same silly heckles coming across the room. There's nothing new. In fact, it's a bit of a theft to even refer to yourselves as new or refer to the word "balance." Those are misappropriated words, because they don't apply to anything that this government is doing. There is nothing new here and nothing fair about this situation. It's a government that is incapable of change.

The Premier feels that he has said "Sorry," and he can move on. But there's far too much to apologize for. He couldn't begin to make all the necessary apologies in this government's time left in office.

So the time for an election is now. As Winston Churchill put it, these are sheep in sheep's clothing. This is all that this government is capable of delivering to British Columbia; this is the best this government can do. The new Premier has repeatedly said he's looking forward to the next budget. Well, of course, that's really going to be on the eve of an election, if this government manages to drag its sorry self to the end of a five-year mandate.

These people are sheep in sheep's clothing. As Jesus put it, "By their fruits ye shall know them," and the fruit of this government is deficit -- an admitted $1.3 billion deficit in the coming year. And the fruit of this government is debt -- $36.5 billion at the end of the coming budget year and almost $3

[ Page 14678 ]

The fruit of this government is misery, impoverishment, unemployment, broken families; people having to move away; failure to look after the needs of British Columbians; failure to address the terrible concerns of people being dealt with by the family maintenance enforcement program, whose contract has been renewed, year in and year out, by this government, when it is utterly failing to provide for the needs of children of broken families.

I see you're about to tell me to wind up, hon. Chair. I'll do that, although I hate to.

What we need is an election. We desperately need an election. I call on this Premier, on this government, to do the right thing. . .

[1555]

K. Krueger: . . .and do the honourable thing, quit slogging on through the mud and let the people have their say.

Hon. D. Miller: Hon. Speaker, I hope you know what I mean when I say I couldn't help but listen to the last speaker. A cheery sort of fellow -- upbeat, optimistic. As he travels around his constituency, I don't know if people run away when he's starting to approach. He's got to have just a little tiny corner there that might say there's something positive in this world -- in British Columbia. Maybe he's talked himself into this sorry state.

But as I was saying to Ralph Klein not too long ago. . . . I was very pleased that Mr. Klein had made an investment in British Columbia -- in my constituency, as a matter of fact. To the extent that it shows some faith in making an investment in British Columbia, I was also pleased to note -- notwithstanding the member's very dour outlook on life in general -- that tourism has achieved unparalleled growth in British Columbia. I know that is true in the Kamloops region as well. I don't know why the member is so downhearted about life, but maybe there are some other factors at play here that are eluding everybody.

I was pleased, by the way, as the Minister of Energy and Mines, to participate with other ministries and with Cominco and the Steelworkers in putting together a major economic initiative that saved 1,000 jobs -- some of which are in that member's riding -- and which now allows Highland Valley to operate in a very tough competitive world when copper prices are as low as 60 cents. Perhaps the member, whose advice to the House is, "Don't fix the road to the mine so that the mineworkers might have safer driving conditions; don't take those dangerous curves out of the road to the mine. After all, the mine's only going to last another nine years. . . ." What a doomsayer! I've been talking to the same company, and there's great hope that the mine will last longer than nine years. But if the member who represents the region doesn't care, and doesn't care about the safety of the workers driving to that enterprise, then how do we achieve some progress -- with that kind of black and negative view of life?

Interjection.

Hon. D. Miller: Now, now. I never heckled once, not once. In the new spirit of cooperation, Mr. Speaker, I bit my tongue. I listened patiently, and am I given the same kind of. . . ?

Interjections.

Hon. D. Miller: No, I'm not. Well, it's a tough world, but we shall try our best to prevail. I actually think we could educate more doctors, but I understand that the doctors are actually in control of admissions. Perhaps the member there might want to take it up with others.

I want to talk about a couple of specifics in the budget relative to my portfolio, because it's an area that I have some pride in. But it's also an area that holds great promise for the province. It's also an area where the changes that are contained within the budget, I think, show some promise with respect to what I would call an environmental initiative.

[1600]

Interjection.

Hon. D. Miller: Mr. Speaker, with all due respect, I did listen, not because I accepted what the member was saying, not because I agreed with even a single word that the member for Kamloops-North Thompson was saying. But I sat here respectfully and listened, and it does appear to me that the member's inability to do that speaks volumes about his viewpoint.

I do think that the priorities were right. I'm delighted to live in a province and to be a member of government where all of the university presidents put out a press release the other day saying: "Right on; bang on. This is just what we need in British Columbia." I know Martha Piper, and I know Jack Blaney, and I know them to be pretty hardheaded, realistic people. They're the top-quality people in this country with respect to universities. When I hear them say that, I must confess I'm more inclined to accept the opinion of Mr. Blaney or Martha Piper than I am the opinion of the member for Kamloops-North Thompson. No disrespect when I say that. . . .

The fact is that tuition fees in British Columbia are 30 percent -- probably a little more now -- lower than the Canadian average, and we've committed money for 5,000 new spaces at our post-secondary institutions. The member was even critical of the University College of the Cariboo -- the university college in his region -- where we have in the past allowed and conferred degree-granting status on that university college, so that students in that region now no

[ Page 14679 ]

With respect to health care, I want to briefly say -- and it's offering a personal view -- that notwithstanding that I think that British Columbia has, again, been outstanding in its record of contribution to health care, it is my view that the broad issue of maintaining the medicare system in this country, which I think Canadians value very, very much, is not necessarily going to be resolved through money. I accept to some degree some of the statements made by the federal minister, the Hon. Allan Rock, with respect to looking at this system of ours and looking at instituting reforms that will ensure that we do have medicare for the next 100 years.

I think medicare is a competitive advantage that we have in this country; I think it's a significant advantage. By and large, by the way, I think the system works quite well. That's not to say that there aren't areas that need to have attention paid to them, but I don't think it's simply a question of more and more money. I think it's a question of looking very, very hard at the system -- how it's organized.

I listened not long ago to an American health economist from Yale on the "As It Happens" program on CBC. I thought the individual had a lot to contribute to the debate. In fact, I got a transcript of the remarks. In a nutshell, he -- I apologize; I've forgotten his name -- indicated that his view as a person who has been in this field for many, many years, a noted expert in terms of health care systems, is in effect that Canadians don't know how lucky they are in terms of the system they've got. "Don't abandon the system you've got," was his message.

Now, are there problems? Yes. He indicated that there were some areas where, through restructuring and through the way we organize ourselves in the system, we could cover off and protect and make sure that we do have medicare for the next 100 years, unlike. . . . He quoted some systems in the U.S., where the HMOs have failed the health delivery mechanisms they have. In this case, it was a cooperative. The restrictions that those HMOs put on doctors and the restrictions those HMOs put on individuals, in terms of which doctors they can and cannot see. . . . If that system were ever implemented in Canada, there would be a revolution. People would be aghast.

[1605]

I want to talk just on a couple of specifics relative to the oil and gas sector. By the way, I should also point out, Mr. Speaker, that while there has been. . . . I do understand that the opposition's job is to oppose and to criticize, and I don't fault them for that. I spent five years on the opposition benches myself, and I tried to be an effective critic. Occasionally I must say that my experience tells me -- and quite often our experience is in hindsight -- that often I was too critical and too negative. Given my years of seniority in this place, if I can offer that up to members of the opposition as a helpful suggestion, I'm happy to do so.

I note that my colleague the hon. member for Peace River South obviously understands that as well, having been a member of the opposition and a member of government. I noted and listened with interest to his very informative budget speech, during which he levelled, I think, some good criticisms at the government. He levelled some good criticisms at the federal government.

I want to say I agree completely with what he had to say with respect to Paul Martin and fuel taxes. When the federal government restores $4.2 billion in health care, social service and education funding, and when they start to return to British Columbia even a tiny portion of the federal fuel tax that they collect in this province, then perhaps we might have something to talk about. But they're in a huge surplus position. They're in a surplus position because they cut funding to the provinces. And if Mr. Martin wants to cut fuel taxes, he should get on with it and do it. But don't talk to us about it.

Generally, with respect to the state of the B.C. economy, I wish people would look at some of the encouraging signs. You only have to look at the revenue side for the fiscal year we're still in to note that the indicators there tell you that the B.C. economy, I think, had some pretty good growth in this fiscal year.

Toronto-Dominion Bank's senior economist, David Burleton, said a number of things yesterday on a radio station, and I think they're worth quoting. He said: "We've seen very compelling evidence that B.C.'s economy has been recovering since the early part of last year. Recently, over the past four to five months, we have seen B.C. consumers jump on the bandwagon. . . Retail sales have been rising, and job markets have been improving."

I think it's worthy of note that the unemployment rate in British Columbia is the lowest unemployment rate in the last 18 years. The member for Kamloops-North Thompson went on, in very bleak terms, about touring around his riding with a rain cloud. . . . What's that -- that "Li'l Abner". . . ?

An Hon. Member: Btfsplk.

Hon. D. Miller: Joe Btfsplk. He reminds me of Joe Btfsplk; he's got a rain cloud over his head. Wherever he goes, it follows him around. Does he not recall the economic trauma in the Kamloops region in the early eighties, when the Social Credit government was in power -- the government that he supported? Does he not recall that? The unemployment rate in Kamloops is far better now -- far better -- than it was then. The unemployment rate in British Columbia is lower today than it has been for 18 years. Now, that's got to tell you something. Things can't be that bad. They're not perfect, but they can't be that bad. I'm not an economist, but I'm quoting an economist from the Toronto-Dominion Bank. Surely the members would accept these comments, as opposed to any opinion I might have. He's saying the B.C. economy is doing quite well and getting stronger. He said: "Looking ahead to this year as a whole, we're looking at 3 percent, which would be the best growth performance in B.C. since '94." Well, things aren't perfect, but boy, they're not bad. They're getting better.

[1610]

[ Page 14680 ]

If government revenue is an indicator of the relative health of a sector, what does it mean when in 1998-99 the revenue from the oil and gas sector was $362 million, and we look at 1999-2000, and the revenue from the oil and gas sector is $660 million? It means that there is significantly more activity taking place in the oil and gas sector as a result of the initiatives we put in place.

The latest one, and one of the reasons I wanted to talk about this in the budget speech, is section 51, which members will note, if you look at the brief description in the budget documents themselves, provides for a significant expenditure on roads over the next five years -- specifically $103 million. This is over and above the base expenditures by the Ministry of Transportation and Highways. This expenditure, this $20-odd million a year to improve road access, will lead to even greater investment in the oil and gas sector. It's being paid for because revenues are higher. We're taking some of that revenue stream to service a debt of $103 million over the next five years. The potential growth in that region is significant.

In discussions with, for example, the government of the Northwest Territories and the government of the Yukon, it's clear to me that the opportunity to have British Columbia be the destination for new gas finds in the territories -- to have new pipelines, to have new gas stripping plants -- is significant. I want all members to know, as the budget documents indicate, that this is a commitment we have made -- as a result, by the way, of presentations made by the councils of Fort Nelson and Fort St. John and the regional district in the Peace River -- a solid commitment to spend $20-odd million a year over the next five years to improve that road access. I can tell you that it's been very greatly appreciated by the elected councils and the regional district people that I've talked to in the Peace River.

Section 35 of the budget document is, I think, rather unique. We're phasing out the compressor fuel tax. Where gas companies used the natural gas to drive compressors to pump gas through the pipelines, that's an extra cost. It's passed on to the consumers in British Columbia. We're phasing that out. The budget documents will indicate a number of years' phase-out of that. Very interesting from the environmental side, we are eliminating the compressor fuel tax on compressors that are used to re-inject sour gas or acid gas back into the ground. That is a significant environmental initiative on the part of my ministry. I want to thank the Minister of Environment for her involvement and her support in achieving this. We are looking, as well -- through the $5 million environmental fund that is in place in the Peace River -- to do even more to deal with the environmental questions that arise as a result of oil and gas activity.

We are poised, I think, in British Columbia to make a significant contribution, a positive contribution, to the broader issues of global warming and climate change. It's clear that our exports of clean energy, natural gas and indeed hydroelectricity to the United States is a positive contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. What remains and what's a real challenge are the rules with respect to whether we will get credit for that. It has not been determined. The Minister of Environment and I are determined to work very hard to ensure that when we export natural gas out of British Columbia into the United States, and that's used to displace coal-fired power generation, the credit should come back to British Columbia. These are serious questions with respect to our economy. We want to do our part, and we're going to continue to drive to ensure that British Columbia's interests are protected as we move forward.

[1615]

I also want to note that we've made, I think, a modest beginning with respect to trying to reduce the tax burden and bring British Columbia more in line with other provinces. British Columbia is the last province to have a stand-alone machinery and equipment tax, which is a sales tax on machinery and equipment. No other province has that; or if they do, they have investment tax credits. For the first time British Columbia has made a move now -- 3 percent. It's only 3 percent. But for the first time, that will be converted to an investment tax credit for eligible investments. I would hope, as we move forward over the years, we'll continue to look at phasing that specific tax out -- the M and E -- or converting it fully to investment tax credits. It should have wider application, in my view. But there's a cost to all of this, and affordability clearly is one of the questions.

We'll continue to try to produce more revenue for the province in the oil and gas sector, to try to ensure that perhaps in future the rest of the province can look as good as the Peace River, with respect to the very low unemployment rate, and build the economy in a way that's balanced, never forgetting that the priorities of the public -- what they expect governments to do -- is to continue to put adequate resources in our health care system, to continue to put adequate resources in our education system and, at the same time, try to address in a broad and balanced way the interests of the economy so we can continue to expand. I think this budget achieves that balance.

E. Gillespie: I ask leave to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

E. Gillespie: It's my great pleasure to introduce to the House today some 40-plus students from Huband Park Elementary, along with over 20 parents, two teachers and their principal, Mr. Berry. I hope you'll all join me in welcoming them to this Legislature and to the city of Victoria.

Hon. G. Mann Brewin: It's a pleasure to rise this afternoon to address the budget. But before I do that, I would like to offer my congratulations to our new Speaker on achieving this new position. I know that the new Speaker will find it interesting, challenging and very rewarding and will very much enjoy the situation as we will no doubt enjoy having him preside over all of us. It was for me -- the second point I want to make in this -- a real privilege to serve in that position for two years. It was a pleasure to serve the position.

[ Page 14681 ]

But before I move on, I'd just like to say a few words of thanks to the service systems, to the support systems, that provide all of us in this chamber with so much of the background that lets us do our jobs here. I think especially of some of the areas like Hansard, the Sergeant-at-Arms, the security people, the dining room, the personnel staff, the library and even our legislative comptroller. I think we all know that they have our best interests at heart, and they're here to help us do our job.

[1620]

Thirdly, I'd like to say thank-you to my colleague the member for Kootenay for her comments last evening during private members' statements. She talked a good deal about the Ministry for Children and Families and some of the changes that have happened and are happening. I appreciate very much the support and the interest that she has shown.

As Minister for Children and Families, I am very pleased about this budget. I believe it to be -- and feel it very strongly to be -- a socially responsible budget, a budget with a new and modern direction. The budget is open and transparent. It signals the start of a new kind of government. It is the kind of government British Columbians have said they want, and we have listened. British Columbia has said that it wants a budget that presents a complete financial picture, and that is what we have delivered. That financial picture shows that we are investing in today's families to ensure that families of today and tomorrow have the supports and services they need in an increasingly complex world. That financial picture portrays a budget that balances the priorities of British Columbians, a budget that balances the need to control the deficit with the needs of health and education.

Families in British Columbia understand this balance. We listened to those families and delivered a socially responsible budget, a budget responsive to the needs of children, of women and of families throughout this province. We are acting on their top priorities: health care, child care, tax cuts, economic growth and education. They've told us that they want a better health care system, and we continue our commitment to provide and respond to that goal. Our health care system is indeed the bedrock of family life in Canada and in B.C. While other governments in Canada are cutting back health care spending, we continue to increase support to our health care system. This is what families in B.C. expect, and this is what we have delivered.

For the eighth straight year we have increased health care spending. Those regular increases have amounted to $2.9 billion in increased health care services. With this budget we are continuing our commitment to the health of children and families in this province. We have committed $24.8 million to reduce the shortage of nurses, with a plan to deal with the burnout pressures these health professionals experience. Most of our nurses are women -- women whose families need their time and need their energy. We're committed to easing the pressures that these dedicated women face on a day-to-day basis.

As well, we have allotted an additional $5 million for new licensed practical nurses. Another $300 million will go to building better health care facilities for British Columbians. Families can look forward in this budget to increased funding for continuing care services for their aging parents. An example of that, a long term care facility -- Mount St. Mary's here in Victoria -- will be providing innovative multilevel care to elderly patients in its new location, thus ensuring some more consistent and continuing care in the later years of their lives.

We're also providing funding to address the shortage of doctors in rural areas -- because families live in rural areas -- as we know only too well in this province, as has been pointed out often to us here in this Legislature. . . . This budget reaffirms our commitment to universal health care in British Columbia and lets families know that they will get the services they need when they need them. This modern budget supports parents, and in particular those parents and families with children with special needs. I am really pleased that we were able to provide and commit $8 million to reduce wait-lists for services to children, including those with special needs. In my discussions with many parents from my constituency, Victoria-Beacon Hill, and from around the province, I have been told time and again of this need. I am therefore especially proud of this commitment.

[1625]

We are providing new supports for working families. This is a step in the right direction for parents who are juggling jobs, children, housework and their personal time. We've committed $14 million to before- and after-school child care, beginning in January 2001. This will reassure parents, especially single parents -- again, most of whom are women -- that their children are safe in facilities like the ones in my community -- James Bay Community School and Margaret Jenkins Elementary School -- while the adults and the parents continue to participate, then, more fully in the economic opportunities that B.C. offers.

This budget also allows those people who receive income assistance to keep more of their earnings, to help them move from assistance into the workforce, to be better able to meet their families' responsibilities.

This budget eases the tax burden on middle-class and lower-income families. Personal income taxes for these families will total $225 million this year and $354 million next year. These tax cuts, though perhaps modest, will help families balance their economic lives, while giving them the opportunity to be active participants in the economy of this province. These tax cuts will mean that 100,000 low-income British Columbians will no longer pay income tax, and this

[ Page 14682 ]

As we build on the economic strengths of our communities, we have increasingly come to understand the value and huge potential of the high-tech industry. To this end, we are continuing to work with this sector, and it is paying off. In my region alone, the number of high-tech businesses has grown since 1994 to 709 companies. That is a 40 percent increase -- and the good news doesn't end there. In Victoria the high-tech sector has grown to be the third-largest employer, growing about 15 percent per year. Statistics like this show us the big picture. This is something that is happening which we can all take a huge amount of pride in.

In addition, the budget talks about the film industry in this province. As we move toward a knowledge- and service-based economy, the film industry will play an increasingly important role. We know that success in the film industry in B.C. over the last ten years has been remarkable. For example, I am aware that according to the Greater Victoria Film Commission, over 71 film and video projects generated over $15 million in production revenue for the Victoria area in 1999. This resulted in over 38,000 hire-days with an economic impact of over $42 million to the area. We have recognized in the budget the growth potential of this industry for the province, and for the first time we are providing financial support for regional film offices across this province. I believe this to be a very sound investment.

British Columbians also gave us some other information. They told us about their concerns about education for their children, and we listened. Because we know a healthy and constructive learning environment is essential to the education of our children, this modern budget increases support for education -- funding 300 new teachers, reducing class sizes in early grades and eliminating 387 portables. This budget provides $445 million for construction of over 100 new schools -- replacements and expansions. And for the fifth straight year we are freezing post-secondary tuition. Funding to the universities and colleges of $87 million will restore core funding, help with the tuition freeze and create 5,025 more student spaces. I am very aware of the student and institutional needs in my own area. In Victoria, the University of Victoria, Royal Roads University and Camosun College -- at those institutions students are benefiting from the steps that have been taken for the fifth year in a row.

As I reach the conclusion, let me tell you that I feel very confident about this budget. It is a budget based on the expressed needs and hopes of families throughout this province. It affirms our commitment to the children and families of today and tomorrow. The budget provides fair wages for the professional and support staffs -- mostly women -- who teach our children, care for our aging parents, tend to the sick and provide social services to the most vulnerable in our communities. Low-wage redress for community social service workers earning close to the minimum wage was long overdue. The working poor who were given responsibility for the most difficult social problems in our community deserved a fair wage, and they got it. The government has done the right thing.

Fred Muzin, who is the president of Hospital Employees Union, agrees. He said recently: "This government has produced a budget that's in line with the desire of British Columbians for quality health care, education and other public services. New funds to hire licensed practical nurses. . .is a very positive move that acknowledges the important role that these nurses can play in addressing the nursing shortage facing health care." He went on to say that the B.C. government's 7.1 percent increase goes a long way towards maintaining the current level of health services while funding some initiatives to modernize health care. Again we did the right thing.

This budget is a solid commitment to families and students in education, giving our young people the opportunity to get ahead through their own hard work at school. We've continued the tuition freeze, provided more spaces and more courses in our universities and colleges, and increased K-to-12 education funding for the sixth year in a row. Again this government has done the right thing.

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Mark Veerkamp, president of the Canadian Federation of Students, agreed. He said that universities and colleges have been provided the resources that they've been asking for and that are needed to provide post-secondary education in British Columbia and that the tuition fee freeze, growth in core funding and capacity, and the maintenance of the B.C. student assistance program are the foundation for an excellent access policy. So I say again: the government has done the right thing.

This is a budget that meets the needs of children, women and families, a budget that responds to the wishes of the people of British Columbia. This is a socially responsible budget, a budget that balances the priorities of families in this province.

D. Zirnhelt: Hon. Speaker, let me take this occasion to congratulate you on becoming Deputy Speaker in this House. We look forward to judicious rulings and kind, caring and firm chairmanship under you.

I'm going to take a positive approach to this budget, because I feel there is a budget here that we have submitted which supports the initiatives coming from the people in the Cariboo. I want to cover economic development; I want to cover the diversification of the economy, the traditional economy, some of the social issues in my riding and in the region. I have to say from the outset that I am proud of the fact that many of the locally initiated programs and projects are being funded by government, but that the program design and initiative have come from the people in the area themselves.

I want to start and thank people. This is the first time I've spoken that I haven't been a cabinet minister. I enjoy the extra time I have for my community and my family, and I would like to thank all those people who have worked so hard over the years for me, to support me in serving this House and this province as Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, as Minister of Economic Development, Small Business and Trade

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I'd like to thank those people who serve on school boards and who serve on parent advisory committees. Many of them have been getting active in the area trying to save their schools recently, and I'll say more later.

There are people in communities everywhere, from one end to the other and across the riding, who, when their services like schools or bus routes are threatened, are really there to support their communities, and they rally to do so.

I'd like to thank many of those volunteers that I'm going to speak about today. Virtually every initiative I'm going to speak to is supported and carried out by the involvement of people who give of their time freely to create a better community and a stronger economy, and who provide the glue of society. They are the ones who are producing a new economy.

Finally but equally importantly, I would like to recognize the aboriginal leaders -- leaders in communities who themselves suffered at the hands of the residential schools, but who've come through and continue to strengthen themselves and provide moderate but aggressive leadership in their own communities, dealing with high unemployment, very difficult social circumstances and difficult cultural contrasts and tensions. They do so willingly. They do so with considerable bravery. I think we as a society owe all these community leaders a significant vote of thanks.

I also say to my family and my immediate staff that they have continued to support me and make it possible for those of us who spend months down here in Victoria to continue to serve people in our home communities. We can't ever lose sight of that.

With respect to the economy and what's happening in the economy, I really feel that too much negative has been said and that it really has dampened the recovery in British Columbia. We are recovering, and there are many people out there who are working on that recovery.

Let me just quote a couple of people. Toronto-Dominion Bank senior economist Derek Burleton, said on CKNW recently that we've seen very compelling evidence that B.C.'s economy has been recovering since the early part of last year and that recently, over the past four to five months, we've seen B.C. consumers jump on the bandwagon. Retail sales have been rising, and job markets have been improving. Looking ahead to this year as a whole, we're looking at 3 percent growth, which would be the best growth performance in B.C. since '94. That is above the 2.2 percent growth that we have forecast as government. But we do so on the advice of experts, and we've set ours a little lower. He's upbeat, and he goes on to say that we do see B.C. consumers feeling a little bit better about things. Housing markets have been picking up. In the broader picture, things are definitely brightening in the economy. That, I think, sets the tone for where we should be thinking in British Columbia. We can create the reality of a faster and deeper recovery by ourselves, thinking that way and acting to make it so.

Unemployment has been reduced. The forest industry has seen significant recovery. Now what happens in some of these rural communities? We don't see a tremendous bounce-back immediately. We don't see all the retail stores that have been having trouble open up again. Why is that? Because every time you come through a recession, there's a few more jobs that have been shed to get the economic efficiencies so that the plants can operate. Little by little we ratchet down, and over the last ten years -- or eight years in the Cariboo -- we've seen something like 500 permanent, good-paying, union plant jobs lost. They've been replaced by value-added jobs. Almost every job, job-for-job, has been replaced -- at a somewhat lower wage rate, no doubt. But the fact is that that's the shape of the forest industry as it is today. It is changing, and it was never as vigorous as it has been in the past two decades. We've had three very good decades. Things are booming with respect to the industry right now. We're perhaps over the allowable annual cut, as is permissible up and down our cut control. But we see these towns needing to diversify within the forest sector and needing to continue to diversify in other sectors.

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There's another thing happening. For every resource community in the province, when they hit the wall because there's been a major problem in that industry, it takes them a while to bounce back. But when they bounce back, they're stronger. I can point to Nelson. I can point to the Kootenay region, where they diversified when they hit the wall decades ago and shut down a lot of the major mills. They were simply running out of timber.

A lot of communities in B.C. have not hit that wall yet. As a result, they haven't been forced to undertake the diversification that's necessary. Despite the planning that we try to encourage and despite the efforts that we make to diversify the economy, it doesn't really happen anywhere fully until you hit the wall and try to bounce back. I've been an observer of this in the Pacific Northwest. I've been watching it closely and asking "Why?" and "What can we do about it?"

What did we do in the Cariboo? We decided when we settled the land use issues by creating a regional land use plan that we'd build an economic component into the land use plan. We set up the Cariboo Economic Action Forum, a grass-roots group that was led by people in the communities -- cross-sector, cross-communities. They got to work, and year after year they planned to develop small, doable, inexpensive but nevertheless effective means of diversifying the economy.

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Guess what: after three or four years, we have things like the Gold Rush Trail. They've drawn other regions into the Cariboo -- used the Gold Rush Trail from the lower mainland up through as far as Prince George -- to benefit from this thematic development in order to market the area. Why? It's because tourism has been up in, say, the Kootenays and Kamloops, but there are regions like the Cariboo, where it's down. The lack of effective marketing and the lack of a strategic approach to marketing and product development require more effort. This budget is supporting that through the community enterprise program, through the Small Business, Tourism and Culture ministry. There are a number of projects there that will help this part of the economy. It's known that effective product planning and marketing will allow that part of the industry to thrive.

The traditional economy has not bounced back, except in forestry. Mining is sitting there. When copper prices go up, we will see the Gibraltar mine open again. We have one operating copper mine and another one being planned. Government assistance, in the form of job protection, will help get the Gibraltar mine up again. I'd like to see and hope we'll see it up in the spring.

Diversification in the forest industry has happened. We've had permanent plants in the West Chilcotin develop -- West Chilcotin Forest Products. We've seen the OSB plant. We've seen the Cariboo Made Value Added Society, with a whole lot of microbusinesses, develop in the 100 Mile area. Across the Cariboo, we've seen phenomenal development. And we're working. As a result of FRBC-funded economic development studies in the little town of Clinton, which struggled for an economic base, we've seen them now come forward with a plan that they developed. One of the things they want to do is have a targeted sale -- a value-added sale -- which would encourage an investor. They have an investor, and they're working actively on trying to ensure that they diversify their base within the forest industry there.

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In this budget we have continued to invest in education, in training, in a few things that will happen in the Cariboo. There will be more money for K-to-3, as we reduce class sizes. The University College of the Cariboo, it is hoped, will see some of the capital dollars in advanced ed go into rebuilding the campus that was damaged by a slide in Williams Lake.

There are more university spots around the province and in the regions, so that our students can attend and develop skills and take apprenticeship training. That alone -- that investment in the human resource -- will mean that when we need trained people, they will be there to fuel the economic growth and development.

Of course, health care is critical to people coming and staying in the Cariboo. People move up there to retire. They want to stay there. They want a level of service. And I'm pleased to say that this budget includes additional dollars that will run the long term care facility in the 100 Mile area -- one of the first in the province where we've integrated the public health, mental health, drug and alcohol and all the services along with the hospital and the extended care in one facility, to get efficiencies through office and reception, through finance, through laundry and through the kitchen. I have to say that it's the people in 100 Mile House that made that happen. They conducted a campaign, they did the work and they brought in an effective building.

I'd like to say at this point that Al Richmond, the chair of the Cariboo regional health board, has provided tremendous leadership in bringing the communities together to develop one regional plan for all capital facilities. Before, there'd been nothing but competition, and it's taken careful support but locally initiated leadership to make this happen. I want to commend those efforts.

Alan Boyd, the chair of the South Cariboo community health council, who recently presided at the opening of that health centre, did tremendous work -- all volunteer work; many years working to have terrific facilities there, working with me to get adequate funding for the hospital and other facilities. Charlie Wyse, in Williams Lake, the chair of the Central Cariboo-Chilcotin health council, worked long hours after his teaching job making sure that the right priorities have been set there. In the Clinton area, the representative of the Thompson health board, Fran White, travels on the road constantly, making life better so that the people can access services in their communities.

There are many others who work to make health priority decisions, to grow our communities around the need to have adequate health services. I want to commend the many, many presidents of the parent advisory committees, at 70 Mile, Buffalo Creek, Riske Creek, Crescent Heights, Marie Sharpe, 150 Mile -- all of these, some of them outside my riding, including McLeese Lake and others. They're honestly working, trying to help the school board do its job of being accountable and, in the end, to hold the provincial government accountable for the efforts that we make to address inequities in education funding, where they exist. I'll continue my work with them. My efforts are very much strengthened by the role of volunteers who come out to countless meetings.

In this budget are contained millennium grants, community spirit grants. . . . I want to mention a couple, because it relates to the need to build stronger communities. I know that the other side wouldn't support grants, and they're yet to support any of them. But these are important where communities have come together and said: "We need that new roof on that old barn, because it's part of a historic site." It might be insignificant to the opposition, who haven't supported these grants. But they are important to the people who put in countless hours to keep our history alive, so that when people travel through they can stop and visit, and they have an enjoyable experience looking at the preserved history. There are many applications for cultural grants so that they can restore buildings and have the infrastructure, whether it's a community hall, a library, archives or just renovating the community hall. It all has to do with community pride, and it's absolutely essential to us to diversify our economy.

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Now we're seeing watershed groups spring up as well -- two or three of them in Bridge Creek. They're in the Quesnel River watershed, in the Williams Lake-San Jose watershed; they happen out in the Chilcotin. Virtually every valley and watershed has its group that's there not to preserve but to protect the various uses and ensure that there's careful balance. Decisions that can't be made by bureaucrats alone have to be made in the spirit of partnership and community building.

I have to say that we have in the Cariboo one of the most successful experiments in the devolution of land use planning and the engagement of people from communities and sectors. I don't think there is any community that can say they've done a better job. In my view, it's because the concept of a deal -- a land use plan -- made in the Cariboo, not in Victoria, has pervaded every decision since.

At this point I'd like to credit the many efforts of the many officials involved, but more the regional resource board of volunteers chaired most recently by Wade Fisher, who's done, in my view, an admirable job of representing more than one sector -- in fact the whole region. It's creating that regional spirit that to me is critical to many of the successes. You don't hear about it, because it's not controversial.

But in the Cariboo-Chilcotin, starting way in the far west, you had the Anahim Round Table, the first land use plan ever to achieve consensus. They did that back in the early nineties. They did it with volunteer efforts, but by working at it.

The budget supports that -- some of the efforts now that are going on under people like Rob Gordon and Ken Vanderburg and others, where they are continuing to work in a spirit of partnership. You have the volunteers from the community working with the interagency management committee of officials in a partnership. It is truly a public and public official partnership that makes it work.

I was a bit cynical about the phrase, when I heard it: "Well, it's a partnership." That implies a business relationship of some kind or something that's structured. But they have done it; it is an accountability between the public and the public officials at the regional level. I support that. I think that's absolutely the key to making our society, our economy and our stewardship of the land work better.

I have to say a word about agriculture, in that the budget has supported $10 million more in the development and marketing of agriculture. They're going to involve the community across the province in what that will be, what those dollars will be spent on. But it does denote that we have seen the end of cuts in the Agriculture ministry and that we need to support marketing and the people. I'd like to credit the Cattle Belles from the Lone Butte area, who set themselves up as a women's farm organization.

An Hon. Member: You are going to run again, aren't you?

D. Zirnhelt: Of course I'm going to run again.

An Hon. Member: No question. . . .

D. Zirnhelt: There is no question about it; I'd like the other side to acknowledge that. Why would I. . . ? I'm having so much fun.

I noticed the members opposite were also wearing the gold ribbons. Many people in the House are wearing the gold ribbons -- the gold ribbon campaign from the Canadian Farm Networks. These are people dealing with the real stresses of being involved in agriculture across Canada and across the world. Farmers everywhere are having a difficult time. Their lives are full of stress. They are actively engaged in making life better for them and other community members. To Helen Horn and the others in the South Cariboo who sent us the ribbons, thank you for your continued efforts. We hope things will be better in agriculture.

Hon. Speaker, the Cariboo worked for five or six years on economic development. I reminded you earlier about it -- continued hard work. They set forth a program that led quickly into a Premier's economic summit. I'm happy to say that there was a repeat of the phenomenon of the Premier's summit six months later, where there was a reporting out of tremendous progress by the people in the region, following up on the plans that were laid and progress by the officials in Victoria in responding to the initiatives in the Cariboo. There's work to be done -- but very successful reports.

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The budget supports everyone of these initiatives and allows us to move on. The rural development office that's set up under the minister from Nelson-Creston will be there to ensure that the will of the region is driven through Victoria, so that there's a constant reminder that we need to have a connection between what happens in Victoria and what happens in the region -- that it has to be led by the people in the region.

Community by community we are seeing value-added; we are seeing support. For example, West Chilcotin Forest Products were here today meeting with the Minister of Energy, talking about the need to generate power out there at Anahim Lake. They can't buy enough power from B.C. Hydro, who generates it with diesel. They want to do a wood waste facility. They think that helps to contribute to a sustainable industry and sustainable resource use out there. And they're right; it does. Hopefully this year we'll see advancing of that project. There's more to be done, but the budget supports many of these activities. And I'm pleased that when

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The budget for the Ministry of Forests, which has gone up a little bit, has given us more people in the regions and can retain people that continue to work with the small archery products production facility in Lac la Hache, for example. Everywhere in the West Chilcotin I see economic development groups forming, where people are working, saying: "What can we do together to demand the services and telecommunications so that we can have modern businesses everywhere in the landscape and people can stay at home and work at home?"

All of these things contribute to stronger communities. The way that I'm approaching the budget and approaching my work as an MLA is to say: What is there in your community that I can do to help your community be stronger? That's the one basic question that we all have to ask as leaders, and that's my approach to organizing my work. When somebody says, "This is what will make this community stronger," then I get behind it, because it seems to me that if you have a strong community, what follows is a strong economy. You can have a strong economy by traditional terms and have a weak community.

We've suffered in the Cariboo for having very high rates of income, but we've had poor literacy rates, amongst the poorest health and the highest crime rate. Why? We don't have enough community holding together. It's not just income; it's not just economic activity. If you had to say what comes first, a stronger economy or the strong community, I'd say the strong community comes first, because people can create economies -- and they are. I submit that's what's happening in the Cariboo, and I think it's done in large part because we've taken a holistic approach -- a comprehensive approach to matching the resolution of land claims, the development of land use plans and economic and social development as well.

I could go on and will go on a bit more, because I want to say something about a line item in the budget. What's in the budget is dollars to deal with creating interim measures. We need to have interim measures in advance of treaties to prove to aboriginal and non-aboriginal people alike that there is resolution, that it is possible, that you don't have to wait for ten or 20 years -- that you can have progress now. I'm using the opportunity now that I'm no longer in cabinet to devote time to projects like that, because I know there are projects that are doable. And the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs will know that he will find me encouraging and prodding him and his officials to do some deals -- however small -- to ensure that we see some tremendous progress there.

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Finally, this budget is supporting the development of the volunteer centre in Williams Lake, where, in addressing the needs of poor children and countering family poverty, it was determined that the single biggest thing they could do is create a little business centre -- a little volunteer centre -- that can help distribute volunteers to much-needed programs. I know that this budget will find some money in it to support that, if not through the community enterprise program through one of the many ministries that work to support these activities in Williams Lake.

I want to remind people that this budget continues our commitment to the dental care part of the B.C. Benefits program -- little known and certainly not celebrated, but I can tell you that children with better teeth are in stronger families and those families are better able to go out and contribute to society. You know the child credits that are in B.C. Benefits also contribute. There's been a massive redistribution of tax dollars to help the poorest people, the poorest of the poorest.

I will end with that, hon. Speaker, and say that I'm positive about what's happening in my community. I invite the opposition to be as positive as I am.

I. Chong: I rise today as well, in response to the budget that was tabled earlier this week, on Monday, March 27. As I read through this budget speech and looked over some of the documents that we received with the budget, I had to look deeply into exactly what was presented. I find that what is missing is actually more interesting, and I will get into that in a moment. What I'd like to focus on is to be somewhat positive as to what is there and explain how that will affect the constituents that I represent, the constituency of Oak Bay-Gordon Head.

Firstly, hon. Speaker, the budget does acknowledge that this government should not involve taxpayers' money in megaprojects, and to that I agree. I just wish they had agreed to that much sooner. That's not to say that large-scale projects should never happen in this province; it's just that this NDP government shouldn't be involved in that process.

The most significant megaproject that we all know about is the most disastrous one, of course, and that's the fast ferries fiasco. I know members on the other side of the House probably don't want to hear it again, but they will hear it, and I'm sure many more times throughout this debate. So what does the fast ferries fiasco mean to the residents of Oak Bay-Gordon Head? Well, first of all, the constituents that I represent. . . . We live here on Vancouver Island, and we depend on the ferry system as our vital link to the mainland. The money spent on fast ferries means that the moneys are now not available to improve and enhance our existing ferry service for our Island residents. It means the money that is spent on fast ferries is money that will not go towards needed replacement vessels. It means the money spent on fast ferries will create an additional debt load to each and every constituent that I represent in Oak Bay-Gordon Head, regardless of age.

The B.C. Ferries debt of approximately $1.1 billion translates into $275 per person for each British Columbian. There are about four million people in British Columbia, so that's about $275 per person of additional debt. It doesn't matter how old they are, from the newborn to the senior.

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What would the forgone $5.4 million do for the residents of Oak Bay-Gordon Head? Last year, the greater Victoria school district was ready to close four schools. Two of those schools, Torquay Elementary and Cedar Hill Junior Secondary, were in Oak Bay-Gordon Head. The school board was attempting to deal with a budget shortfall of about $1.5 million. I don't think it's going to be too hard to see what the choice would have been for the people of Oak Bay-Gordon Head.

I know that the members opposite don't particularly like it when the official opposition reminds them of how the fast ferries boondoggle affects each and every one of us and each and every one of our constituents. But it is very, very necessary. It's necessary because they still don't understand it. They don't understand that it was really their fault. They don't understand -- or they don't acknowledge -- the gravity of their failed experiment. They don't understand that their feeble apology is not enough. If they did, they would have allowed for an independent inquiry into the fast ferries fiasco.

When I realized what the $463 million wasted on the fast ferries could have paid for, I was astounded. So here's a list. The $463 million wasted on the fast ferries alone could have paid for all of the following items: 200 teachers' salaries for one year, 400 nurses' salaries for one year, 200 RCMP officers' salaries for one year. . . . We could have eliminated the existing cardiac and hip-surgery wait-list. We could have built seven new rural hospitals. We could have paid for 600 kidney and 40 liver transplants. We even could have paid for 250 air ambulance trips from Prince George to Vancouver. We could have bought ten mobile mammography units. We could have constructed and operated 900 long term care beds for one year. We could have bought six MRI scanners and 12 CT scanners. We could have paid for the care of 200 children in foster homes. And we could have bought new textbooks for 10,000 high school students. Those are just some of the items that $463 million could have paid for, and there would still have been a little left over for other items.

When Mike Harcourt was Premier nine years ago, he said to the people of this province -- when the Premier was sitting on that side of the House -- that we would see a balanced budget over time. How prophetic. He didn't realize, though, that it wouldn't be over the NDP's time but over the B.C. Liberal government's time.

Earlier today, when I heard the Minister of Energy and Mines and Northern Development, the member for North Coast, respond to the budget, he spoke about the unemployment rate being at an all-time low. But he needs to look deeper. He needs to look deeper into how that statistic is derived.

Unemployment rates comprise two things: the number of people looking for work in relation to the number of people working. But here's the catch: if the number of people looking for work drops or is totally eliminated, does that mean we have zero unemployment? In the past two years we have had an exodus of people leaving our province looking for work in Alberta and the United States. The government shouldn't take any credit for a lower unemployment rate, particularly when it is skewed by other factors.

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If we were to use the comments of the Minister of Energy and Mines and Northern Development which say that unemployment is at an all-time low. . . . Perhaps he should look at Gold River and ask the people that were living there if this means they have an economic boom. I don't think so.

I'll caution the government members to be very careful about boasting of low unemployment rates. In a robust economy a low unemployment rate does mean something. But while B.C. is in a declining economy, with a mass exodus of people -- especially our young people, our nurses, our doctors, our teachers, our professionals -- then a low unemployment rate is something more to be concerned about rather than something to be boasting about.

I also note that the Premier has repeated several times, as have many of the members on the opposite side of the House: "This is a different government under a new leader and new style." But actions speak louder than words. If this truly were a new and different government with a new and different leader with a new and different style, then why is it that we have the same old budget and the same old budget speech? It is the ninth consecutive deficit budget. How does that make it different from the previous budgets? It is a budget where the debt is skyrocketing upwards and where debt servicing, if it were set aside as a ministry apart on its own, would represent the third-largest ministry in this government. How is that different from last year or even the year before?

We have a budget where spending is up in 16 of the 21 ministries. How has that changed, hon. Speaker? If it has changed, it's changed for the worse, because as I recall, last year the spending was up in only 11, 12 or 13 of the ministries. This year we have a record 16 ministries where we have seen an increase.

I've also heard some members on the other side of the House speak about choices. They speak about choices between tax cuts versus spending for health care and education. When I hear that, I realize that they have a fundamental problem in understanding what choices really are. It's probably because they don't understand basic economics. They don't understand that those are not the choices. It's not about tax cuts versus health care and education. Health care and education depend on the benefits that are derived from tax cuts.

If we want to talk about choices, we should be talking about choices as to whether you want to spend more on megaprojects without proper business plans or whether you want to spend more to build long term care beds. Those are the choices that you should be comparing, because tax cuts do work. Tax cuts allow for more revenues to be returned to government to allow them to redistribute that towards protection of health care, towards spending on public education.

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I know that it is a concept that members on that side of the House can't understand. I don't know why, because if you were to check the statistics that are out there, provided by many independent resources, you will find out that in all the jurisdictions that reduce their taxes in an effort to stimulate the economies they represent, the revenues actually go up. Therefore the choice is obvious, and spending for health care and education is possible.

This past winter I was asked to attend an event in my riding on the top of a mountain. It was Mount Tolmie in the area that I represent in Gordon Head. We were asked to attend, because there was a launch of a project called the capital urban poverty project. To the good credit of the work that was done by the Community Social Planning Council of Greater Victoria and a number of municipalities, as well as the capital region, a number of individuals got together to finally acknowledge that poverty is certainly a real issue and that urban poverty is a serious and growing condition that we have to deal with.

At that launch, they provided a booklet or a brochure with a lot of statistics. Also at that launch, they had a number of speakers. They had a young woman who spoke. I don't think she was more than 19 years old. She was a single mom. She was proud to be a single mom, but she would be one of those people who you would class as being in poverty. She said many things, and they touched me. She talked about how poverty makes it more difficult for her to hold her head up high and walk as an equal amongst those who are not in poverty. In the end, she said that when you are poor and when you have no money, you have no choice. If we were to take that comment from that individual, then surely we would have to say that it is about providing more money -- more disposable income -- for every British Columbian so that they would have the opportunity for those choices. Without money, there is no choice.

Also, I recall last year and even as late as last fall -- last year in particular, though -- that the member for Port Moody-Burnaby Mountain and the member for Surrey-White Rock on this side of the House, along with some members on the other side of the House -- I apologize; I don't recall who they were -- spent a night out on the streets in Vancouver, called A Hard Night Out. They too came back with some profound feelings as to how they were treated when they appeared to be people living on the streets. They spoke of the difficulty of people making eye contact with them. People who walked by them looked at them as poor people, people living on the street, people who were homeless.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

In the end, they too recognized that without money there are no choices. Last fall -- I believe it was in November -- I know that the hon. Minister for Children and Families, the member for Victoria-Beacon Hill, and a number of other members. . . . I remember her in particular being there as well. I applaud her for attending the Hard Night Out event here in Victoria. She said the same things and came away with those same comments. I spoke to a number of people afterwards. It all came down to that.

So when we speak about choices, we should speak about what we define as what the choices are. What are the choices we're looking at? When members on that side of the House continually speak of choices, of tax cuts versus health care and education, or they talk about what we would cut instead, those being the choices, I know they don't understand. I feel sorry for them. If they did understand, then perhaps they could acknowledge what every other jurisdiction has acknowledged when it comes to tax cuts.

[1720]

In fact, the amount -- I know that this government would like to boast -- is not that much at all. I believe that the true amount, when you factor in all the other adjustments -- the real tax break that has been given to an average taxpayer, based on this budget -- is about $22.63. It's not very much. Let's round it up to $23, which is why you're hearing that all that will do is pay for a movie and a bag of popcorn. Given that many people, average taxpayers who would have benefited from this $23, have already spent it this week alone, and then some in additional costs dealing with child care because of this school strike they have had to experience, if I were a member on that side of the House, I wouldn't go rushing out wildly to boast about a tax cut which really isn't there.

I also want to speak about the debt and the deficit. I know that the members on that side of the House have heard this from us many times. I do intend to repeat it, because I don't believe we can say it enough times. Our total provincial public debt has doubled in nine short years, from $17.2 billion in 1991, I understand, to $36.5 billion now in the year. In any other circumstance, you might expect that -- if you were a new province, perhaps, and you were just growing and experiencing a huge population boom. But that hasn't happened. We have had a mass exodus of people.

We have had low investment -- investor moneys coming in here -- from the private investment climate. We have not had any real benefits from this huge debt. I know that some members will say: "Well, there were some schools built, and there were some roads built." Yes, I will acknowledge that. But for a debt to double in nine short years, from $17.2 billion to $36.5 billion. . . . I don't know; I think that's an awful lot of money.

I know that the members on that side of the House do appreciate that getting a handle on your debt is important and that dealing with the deficit is important as well. The Premier -- who was not then the Premier but the member for Vancouver-Kensington -- said on March 29, 1994, some six years ago plus a day: "Perhaps for the first time in many years, we are conscious of the fact that debt has to be repaid, and a beginning has been made now." I guess he said that in the hope that the then Finance minister, who I believe was my

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A number of other comments that have been made over the years from '92 to 1998. . . . I'll just extract from one or two throne speeches and budget speeches, just to show you that the members who were there at the time understood the importance of the debt and deficit. In 1992 -- March 17, 1992 -- the Speech from the Throne said: "This government has inherited a fiscal problem of major dimensions, which must be dealt with through a balance of reduced growth in spending and higher revenues." Now, hon. Speaker, what that says is that there has to be a reduced growth in spending.

Yet we have 16 ministries this year that have an increase in spending. As for the higher revenues, I guess I didn't realize at the time in 1992 that that Speech from the Throne referred to higher revenues from taxes versus higher revenues from the economy -- from tax revenues from the economy rather than higher tax rates.

[1725]

In the budget address of March 30, 1993 -- again from the former Premier, the member for Vancouver-Kingsway -- the budget speech said: "As the Premier announced in his January prebudget address, this government is committed to a balanced approach to deficit reduction." This means again that this member, the former Premier, understood, because he repeated the words "deficit reduction." He didn't say "deficit increases." He didn't talk about not dealing with the deficit.

Also in that budget speech he stated: "This government will ensure that we remain among the lowest-taxed jurisdictions in Canada and that our tax dollars are spent wisely and efficiently." Well, I take exception to the last two words, "wisely" and "efficiently," because the B.C. fast ferries project will tell us, right then and there, that it was neither wise nor efficient.

In the Speech from the Throne, March 14, 1994, we have the following comment or statement. It says: "In addition, this government will balance the budget by 1996, and will soon put in place a plan to manage provincial debt" -- there again, hon. Speaker, reference being made to balancing the budget, reference being made to managing the provincial debt. These are not just my words. These are the words from the members on that side of the House, this NDP government, this administration. So I have to ask: when did the light go off?

We also have the budget address of March 22, 1994. The then Finance minister -- again, who was my predecessor -- stated: "We as a government have two key goals. One is to eliminate the deficit and ensure that British Columbia remains on a sound financial footing. The other is to build British Columbia's economic foundations for the twenty-first century" -- again reference to eliminating the deficit, talking of a sound financial footing and speaking about economic foundations for the twenty-first century. So I know that there is truly a concerted effort -- or there was a concerted effort -- to understand what British Columbia can or could be built on.

We are moving towards a different world, hon. Speaker, where we have e-commerce, e-business and soon, one day, e-government. The demands on us as elected officials will be different. The consumers will be demanding things of their retailers and manufacturers in a much, much different way. You will have people who will no longer be speaking to people when they're making transactions. Everything will be through the Internet. All these things will change in an effort to get costs down and in an effort to build our economy as well. This government has to at least understand that. That is why the need to get a handle on our debt and deficit is so very important right now.

[1730]

The three pillars that this government is heralding as an economic factor are high-tech, film and tourism. There must be more to this economy than those three areas. Unfortunately, this budget has no clear vision of what more that will be. For that reason, I find, with regret and difficulty, that I am not able to support this budget.

Standing Order 35 Motion
(Speaker's Ruling)

Hon. members, prior to entering upon orders of the day, the Leader of the Official Opposition rose pursuant to standing order 35, requesting leave to make a motion for adjournment of the House to discuss a definite matter of urgent public importance -- namely, the present school strike in British Columbia.

Firstly, I wish to thank the hon. member for providing my office with notice of his intention, in accordance with practice recommendation No. 8. The subject matter of the hon. leader's application is undeniably a matter of considerable importance and urgency. But successive Speakers of this House and throughout the Commonwealth have ruled that it is the urgency of the debate which must guide the Chair in render

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One of the questions a Speaker must address is whether or not there is an existing opportunity to debate the matter in question. It seems to the Chair that the clear answer is in the affirmative. The House is presently engaged in debating the motion that the Speaker do now leave the chair for the House to go into Committee of Supply -- traditionally a wide-ranging debate, permitting the discussion of virtually unlimited matters. Also, the matter in question has been canvassed on many occasions during question period, and the government has outlined the present course of action being taken in relation to the matter.

What could be the result of a debate proceeding under the hon. leader's application? A successful application under standing order 35 does not result in a motion being passed, the introduction of a bill or even a statement of opinion of the House. It simply brings on a debate. I refer members to Parliamentary Practice in British Columbia, third edition, page 59. It has ruled many times in this House that where an ordinary parliamentary opportunity exists to debate the subject matter of a standing order 35 application, the application for adjournment does not qualify. I refer hon. members to the Journals of the House, 1998-99, pages 82 and 86, and 1997 Journals, pages 63 and 64.

I must therefore rule that the hon. member's application for leave under standing order 35 does not pass the rigorous restrictions applicable to such applications.

I'll now recognize the hon. member for North Vancouver-Seymour to continue debate.

Budget Debate
(continued)