2000 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 36th Parliament
HANSARD
The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.
The printed version remains the official version.
(Hansard)
THURSDAY, MAY 18, 2000
Afternoon Sitting
Volume 19, Number 21
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The House met at 2:07 p.m.
Hon. J. Kwan: There are a number of visitors and guests today in the gallery. First I'd like to introduce a group called the Circle of Hope. They are folks who are here trying to raise awareness and who I met with earlier today to talk about the substance misuse issue. With the Circle of Hope is also a group called From Grief to Action. They are part of the coalition, but of course, they're also a separate entity on their own as well.
These individuals are Jim Leyden, the co-chair of the Circle of Hope; Rob Ruttan from From Grief to Action; Keith Guertin of the Quality Recovery Society; Bill Blair, a Circle of Hope supporter; Garvey Soosay, a Circle of Hope supporter; and Pauline Johnson, who's also a supporter of the Circle of Hope, along with Conor Mervyn, Cathy Golding and Rhonda Roben. There are others as well; some of them came in at a later time and I did not get a chance to catch their names. If I've missed any of them, my greatest apologies. Would the House please make this delegation of people welcome.
I. Chong: Today at the noonhour, all members of the Legislature were hosted at a luncheon by the Certified General Accountants Association. They've done this for a number of years, and we're very grateful for them doing that. They provided us with an interesting presentation.
From the association, we have some representatives that are here. I would like the House to welcome the following people: Mr. Ted Friesen, FCGA, president of CGA-BC; Bill Caulfield, executive director of CGA-BC; and Edward Downing, director of communications and public relations, CGA-BC. I would ask the whole House to make them very welcome.
Hon. P. Ramsey: Joining members of the press gallery in the Legislature today is Mr. David Twiston Davies. He's with The Daily Telegraph, London. He's in our province for a few days, giving him a chance to compare how parliamentarians act in this House compared to Westminster and, I suspect, how the media report on their activities. Would the House please make him welcome.
C. Clark: I'm delighted to be able to introduce today representatives from the district 43 school board in the Tri-Cities area. They have finally got a long-sought-after meeting with the Minister of Education, so congratulations to them on that.
I'd also like to introduce Mr. and Mrs. Ulrich, who are the owners of Cherry Point Vineyards in Cobble Hill on the Island. I hope the House will make them welcome as well.
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Hon. I. Waddell: We have in the gallery today my uncle and aunt, Robert Gardiner Dickie and Evelyn Dickie from Toronto. Robert is very active with the machinist retirees in Ontario and the Ontario Federation of Union Retirees. Both Bob and Evelyn are great dancers, which unfortunately their nephew has not quite mastered. I ask the House to make them very welcome here today.
G. Farrell-Collins: There are two people visiting us in the House today. One has also come all the way from the United Kingdom. His name is Alex Folkes, and we met this morning. He's an activist with the Liberal Democrat Party in the United Kingdom, and he's here talking about electoral reform. With him is Julian West, who is a member of the Green Party. I'd ask the House to make them welcome.
J. Cashore: In addition to the member for Port Moody-Burnaby Mountain, the member for Port Coquitlam -- the Minister of Health -- and I would like to introduce the members of the delegation from district 43 who met with the Minister of Education today. They are Barb Hobson, chairperson; Keith Watkins, vice-chair; additional trustees John Keryluk and Judy Shirra; as well, representatives of partner groups, Teresa Grandinetti, John Simpson, Brenda Dane, Diana Dilworth and Colleen Dane. Would the House please make them feel very welcome.
L. Stephens: Also in the House today, visiting from the Campbell Valley Women's Centre in Langley, are Dr. Carl Stroh, Terri-Lee Seeley and a graduate from that program, Erin. Would the House please make them very welcome.
Hon. G. Mann Brewin: I have a couple of introductions and welcomes. I would first like to add my words of welcome to guests from the Circle of Hope Coalition and the From Grief to Action group, as well as the group from Campbell Valley. I was very pleased to meet with the Campbell Valley group this morning. It was a good meeting, and I think we heard each other very well -- more anon on that one.
In the gallery today, as well, is a chap named John LeRoy, father of Sean LeRoy, who is one of our legislative interns. Sean has been working in my constituency office as well as doing great work for the caucus in the Legislature. Would the House please make Sean's father John LeRoy welcome.
F. Randall: In the visitors gallery this afternoon is Margaret Koster. She's a constituent of Burnaby-Edmonds and is on the Seniors Advisory Council of the Simon Fraser health region. Margaret is also on the accreditation team for continuing care, and she is certainly very active in the constituency of Burnaby-Edmonds. With Margaret today are daughters Judy Ostling and Margaret Hangartner. She also has her brother Eric Pettman with her, who she has not seen for about 40 years. Eric is from Lindisfarne, Tasmania, and he is a civil engineer and an expert on tunnels. Would the House please make them all very welcome.
Oral Questions
CONDITION OF PROPERTY
OWNED BY PREMIER
M. de Jong: Just when I thought things couldn't get any more bizarre, I wake up, I read the morning paper, and I read Surrey councillor Dianne Watts's comments describing how the Premier of B.C. is a slumlord.
The Speaker: Will the member take his seat, please.
The member may wish to rephrase his question.
M. de Jong: If I rephrase the question, if that's appropriate, Mr. Speaker
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described as a rundown disaster -- numerous complaints to the city. There was a marijuana grow operation bust. Last year the bylaw inspectors had to move in, apparently to stop the illegal sale of rats. If that's not the description of a slumlord situation, maybe I could ask the Premier what his description of that is.
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Interjections.
The Speaker: Members, order, please.
The question is out of order. It does not relate to the ministerial responsibilities of the Premier.
The member for Matsqui has a new question?
M. de Jong: I do have a new question. Imagine the howls of outrage that we would be hearing from those pious, sanctimonious, self-righteous members of the NDP if a member of this opposition were conducting themselves in this way. Imagine that. Imagine the Premier
Interjections.
The Speaker: Will the member take his seat, please.
I recognize the Government House Leader on a point of order.
Point of Order
Hon. D. Lovick: The previous question was ruled out of order. Demonstrably, the member is coming at precisely the same issue to ask the same question, which will also be out of order. I suggest he be stopped from that rather disgusting and very questionable behaviour.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order, members. The members will pay attention to the rules in regard to parliamentary language in this chamber.
M. de Jong: Here are the facts. The Premier is sitting on land worth, apparently, $750,000, and while he waits to develop it, he is behaving no better than the slum landlords his colleagues and he take great delight in criticizing day in, day out, Mr. Speaker. His excuse is: "Oh, it's my property manager's fault. Talk to my property manager." My question for the Premier is: when is he going to begin to accept responsibility for his own actions instead of assigning blame to everyone else?
The Speaker: Members, the question does not relate to the minister's responsibilities. If the member for Matsqui has a new question on a different topic, I will recognize him.
M. de Jong: Absolutely, Mr. Speaker -- a new question.
Will the Premier confirm this? Amar Bains, the individual identified by him as his property manager, is in fact not some individual he hired at arm's length; it's his business partner.
The Speaker: Excuse me, member. Would the member take his seat, please.
M. de Jong: Mr. Bains is his business
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order! Order!
Members, the Chair would suggest that if this is going to be a productive question period, we will have a question on a different topic from another member.
G. Plant: I have a question with respect to the administration of the Residential Tenancy Act. I have heard from ministers responsible for the administration of that act -- including the current minister responsible and the former minister, now the Premier -- that there are concerns that the government takes into account from time to time with respect to the conduct of landlords in the province of British Columbia. That is the basis, apparently, upon which they occasionally consider whether or not government policy in that area is adequate.
I have a question for the Premier. If he can't conduct himself like a proper landlord, how can he expect to be in a position to make public policy for the rest of the landlords in British Columbia?
The Speaker: If members continue to show disrespect for rulings from the Chair, we will not continue this question period.
Interjections.
The Speaker: I caution the member. I have made a decision in this matter. I would ask for a question on a different topic.
G. Plant: I am interested in the government's position with respect to the adequacy of the protection available in the Residential Tenancy Act of British Columbia for the conduct of landlords in this province. I know the issue is under review by the government. The government has been presented very recently with evidence that suggests to me that there are reasons they should look in-house with respect to the conduct of landlords in British Columbia. What is the government's position on this issue?
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Hon. A. Petter: I don't think the member is fooling anyone. We had an extensive debate in estimates on residential tenancies and other matters, as the member well knows. To try to use this as a cute way of trying to raise inappropriate questions and trying to breach the rules of this House is something that I think the public can well see through, hon. Speaker.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order, members.
DIESEL FUEL SPILL IN BURNABY
J. Weisgerber: My question is for the Minister of Environment. Several weeks ago I advised the minister of actions taken by the state of California and by U.S. President
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Bill Clinton with respect to a ban on the gasoline additive MTBE, a known human carcinogen. There are reports today of a massive MTBE diesel fuel spill at the Chevron refinery in the minister's back yard, in Burnaby. What steps has the ministry taken to protect groundwater and surface water from serious and lasting contamination as a result of this particular MTBE spill?
Hon. J. Sawicki: I certainly, as I've said previously, share the member's concern about MTBE. My ministerial staff were out at the site immediately, along with the Burnaby fire department, to contain that spill.
I would add, as I have said before in this House, that there is only about 10 percent of the gasoline in British Columbia that contains MTBE. It is being phased out, and it will be gone. I certainly agree with the member that the sooner it is out of our gasoline, the healthier our groundwater will be. I would just add that I am pleased to hear the member reiterate that he is concerned about groundwater protection.
The Speaker: The member for Peace River South has a supplemental question.
J. Weisgerber: For the first time that I'm aware, MTBE is being added to diesel fuel. I don't know if the minister has been aware of that. We do know that a cupful of MTBE will pollute 13 million gallons of water. A major spill could do irreversible damage both to groundwater and to fish habitat.
Can the minister advise how many cups -- or how many litres -- of MTBE were involved in the spill in Burnaby? And will the minister commit today to some definitive action to protect B.C. water, both groundwater and surface water, against further contamination by MTBE?
Hon. J. Sawicki: Hon. Speaker, it was this member and his party who campaigned against groundwater protection.
Interjection.
Hon. J. Sawicki: It certainly was the hon. member's former party. The hon. member, in the past, did not understand the need to have groundwater protection when we this in House had been working very hard to do that.
I can only repeat what I have answered for the hon. member on this issue before: I agree with him. MTBE is not something we want in our gasoline. Our ministry is working hard on this issue. This government is taking initiatives to promote ethanol production as an alternative to MTBE in our gasoline. All across North America, it is already on its way out, and I would welcome the day, along with the member, when it is gone.
ADDICTION PREVENTION
AND TREATMENT SERVICES FOR CHILDREN
L. Stephens: Today in the gallery are Rob and Susie Ruttan, members of the organization From Grief to Action. Their son was put on a five-month waiting list for drug addiction services. When he finally got to the top of the list, he was told that his problem was too severe to be handled in British Columbia and that he would have to go to Ontario for treatment. Why is there no help for youth in British Columbia, and why must they go to another province for long-term residential drug treatment? And minister, don't tell me about the $9 million being spent on therapeutic foster care homes, because that is a different issue.
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Hon. G. Mann Brewin: I thank the member for the question, and I appreciated this morning's meeting. We in British Columbia provide a range of services, including at-home detox, residential care, out-patient services, day programs and supported recovery options for more than 40,000 British Columbians. And I will say: this government has invested $9.25 million just for youth and child addiction services, including the opening of 75 more beds from Victoria to Fort St. John. That $9.25 million investment includes 17 youth detox beds, for $4 million; 16 youth residential services beds; 42 youth residential detox-treatment services beds; intensive day-treatment programming; and family and youth counsellors. There is, further, $2.18 million for youth justice addiction services and $3 million in capital funding. That will provide for youth in British Columbia 117 beds -- a 79 percent increase from one year ago.
The Speaker: The hon. member for Langley has a supplemental question.
L. Stephens: Many parents in this province know that those services aren't there. Regardless of what the minister is saying, the services are simply not there.
After seven months of treatment in Ontario, the Ruttans' son is back in British Columbia, and he needs more treatment; he's had a relapse. But the ministry is still not funding long-term intensive residential treatment programs. There are programs like Campbell Valley Women's Centre
Hon. G. Mann Brewin: I will pass out to anyone who wants a copy the information that I just provided. The commitment is there for the drug and alcohol addictions services that are there in this community. I want to know, Mr. Speaker, just how the opposition would have dealt with this, when they said to the business community: "We are going to cut 5 percent out of these budgets."
USER FEE INCREASE
FOR KAYAK BUSINESSES
G. Robertson: I have a growing number of sea kayaking tour operators within my constituency. They are concerned that BCAL staff are talking about raising the annual rental fees on camping sites from $500 to $2,000 a year, and possibly even making that retroactive. Does the minister for BCAL want this industry to grow? And what is he going to do about my constituents' concerns?
Hon. C. Evans: Congratulations to the member for asking a real question in defence of his constituents. Now, it is true that BCAL was going to raise the fees of the sea kayaking industry. But the Premier said to me: "I want you to use BCAL for community economic development. Rather than getting in
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the people's way, make it work." And the hon. member said to me: "These people are making jobs in my constituency, so see if you can fix it."
So I met with the hon. member's constituents last week. I said that there will be no increase in fees or regulations this year. And more than that, because the Premier said, "Make community economic development work," and the member wants to make it work in his constituency, I told the sea kayak industry that I'd meet them this fall in Alert Bay, and the member and I will solve the problems.
[1430]
The Speaker: The bell ends question period.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order, members.
GOVERNMENT HANDLING OF
WHISTLE-BLOWER ISSUES
Hon. A. Petter: I rise to respond to a question I took on notice a few days ago from the member for Matsqui.
The member alleged that staff at the Fraser Regional Correctional Centre have been disciplined for revealing wrongdoing. This is categorically not the case. The issue to which the member refers had nothing to do with whistle-blowing; it had to do with allegations of inappropriate behaviour on the part of those disciplined.
I'm constrained from commenting in further detail because the matter is still subject to an ongoing grievance and arbitration process, but let me say this. There were two independent investigations in 1997 at the FRCC prior to the airing of the "Fifth Estate" report regarding illegal drug activity by staff, abuse of inmates and harassment -- one by retired Vancouver police chief Bob Stewart; another by the investigation, inspection and standards office.
These investigation reports were publicly released on December 15, 1997, and neither report substantiated any allegations of wrongdoing. In fact, they concluded that the majority of staff were managing a difficult and complex inmate population in a professional and appropriate manner.
I may say also that the ministry strongly encourages staff with knowledge of any illegal activities to come forward. If the member would like a further briefing so he can avoid using these kinds of issues to grandstand in the House, I'd be happy to provide those to him.
Petitions
Hon. J. Kwan: I have the honour to table two petitions. The first petition is from the Circle of Hope Coalition Society. It has over 900 signatures calling attention to the need for additional detox centres and supportive recovery service programs that are essential to people who are seeking treatment for addiction.
The Circle of Hope petitioners call upon all levels of government to work cooperatively to provide treatment on demand and further call upon the government to facilitate decentralized delivery of ethical services within British Columbia communities.
I know that the members across the way will be happy to work on this issue in a non-partisan way, as the people from the Circle of Hope and the From Grief to Action folks have said to me as well. We on this side of the House would like to do that.
The second petition that I'm tabling has been signed by almost 200 people who are also Circle of Hope members, but they are residents of the Fraser Valley specifically. They're calling for detox services in that region more specifically.
Tabling Documents
Hon. G. Wilson: I have the pleasure to table the annual reports of the Ministry of Employment and Investment for the years 1998-99.
Orders of the Day
Hon. D. Lovick: I call Committee of Supply. In Committee A we shall continue to debate the estimates of the Ministry of Advanced Education, Training and Technology and Ministry Responsible for Youth. In Committee B, in this chamber, we shall continue to debate the estimates of the Ministry of Health.
[1435]
The House in Committee of Supply B; T. Stevenson in the chair.
ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF HEALTH AND
MINISTRY RESPONSIBLE FOR SENIORS
(continued)
On vote 36: ministry operations $8,125,203,000 (continued).
C. Hansen: Before we adjourned for lunch break, we were discussing issues surrounding nursing education and nursing supply. I want to move on to some of the more general areas of labour force issues other than nurses, which I think have the potential in many cases to be at least as serious and critical for health care in British Columbia as the nursing situation has become. In September of last year the former Minister of Health announced that there was a federal-provincial initiative for a chair that was to be an advisory committee on health human resources that British Columbia was going to chair. In fact, I believe it's being chaired by the B.C. deputy minister. I am wondering if the minister could advise us what progress has been made in the work of this committee to date.
Hon. M. Farnworth: The committee is indeed up and running. It is working on two strategies. One is a national nursing strategy; the other is a primary care reform strategy. The work is proceeding. In fact, it's proceeding quite rapidly.
C. Hansen: In terms of the professions, what differing professions are being considered by that committee? What's the scope of its work?
[1440]
Hon. M. Farnworth: Well, clearly the nursing strategy is dealing with nurses in terms of the primary care reform
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strategy. It's dealing with a full spectrum of occupations involved in there -- physicians, nurses, psychiatrists, psychologists and the whole range of people involved in the delivery of primary care.
C. Hansen: We have started to hear increasing alarm bells going off with regard to doctors in British Columbia, particularly in some specialty areas. I'm wondering if the minister could tell us, in view of the action that has been taken with regard to increasing training spaces for nurses in British Columbia, whether or not this government is going to deal with the physician supply issue and the physician training issue in a timely fashion, rather than waiting until the crisis gets even worse than it is today.
Hon. M. Farnworth: That is a very good point, and it's one that we have mentioned a number of times over the past few days. In fact, I've been talking about it publicly since assuming this post. I am concerned about the issues around physician supply. We have to start working on those now. We have to start interministerially, with this ministry and Advanced Education, in terms of addressing those issues. That's one of the priorities I'm attaching
We also need to do that in concert with other provinces. This is one of those areas, in terms of human resources, that we want to address in our discussions with the federal government -- how we train more people here in Canada. That, to me, is the ultimate solution to the challenges that we face in the coming decades. We have to train more people here. As far as I'm concerned, that's one of the key areas that I intend to be working on.
C. Hansen: Certainly I'm glad to hear the minister say those words, but what we're interested in is what to expect in terms of when we will see some action taken on that front. Currently UBC medical school has 120 spaces. In British Columbia we don't even train 50 percent of the doctors that we need in this province. We rely on our ability to import doctors who have been trained in other jurisdictions.
There are two things wrong with that. One is that doctors trained in other jurisdictions are going to be increasingly difficult for us to attract to British Columbia. The second issue, which is equally as important, is that these health care professions are good jobs, good-paying jobs. I think we owe it to our own youth in British Columbia that those opportunities for training are there, so that they can meet the health care needs of British Columbia in the future.
I would like to know from the minister if we can expect an increase in the number of training spaces at the UBC med school within the next year.
[J. Cashore in the chair.]
Hon. M. Farnworth: Certainly in terms of, "Is work being done within the government," yes, it is. We're starting to do the work that's required. Will it be in time to make some decisions by September of this year? I don't think so. I mean, September is just a few months away.
But certainly I want to have the work done, start to have some consensus and involve the people who are required to be involved, which is this ministry, the universities and Advanced Education, so that we can
[1445]
I attach a great deal of importance to this particular problem; I think it needs to be applied to a range of specialties as well. This fits in with one of the areas I've been talking about, in terms of the longer-term vision of what we need to do to address physician supply in this province, which comes back to
We are doing the work required. My goal is to have us in a position, sometime next year, where we can actually make some decisions that can be implemented fairly quickly.
C. Hansen: There's one very important player that I think the minister left out in describing the various bodies that would have to be consulted in the development of this program, and that's the teaching hospitals.
There is certainly a concern that the number of residency positions at the teaching hospitals has been scaled back considerably in the last couple of years and that the teaching hospitals simply aren't given the resources, or don't have the resources when they're under other cost pressures, to set up those residency programs to complete the training cycle for a physician. I'm wondering if the minister can give us any assurance that the funding will in fact be there to provide for the residency positions as this program expands.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Just in terms of the explanation, I certainly don't mean to omit the teaching hospitals. But I will also raise this for the member. I have met with the dean of medicine at the medical school at UBC, and we discussed these very issues. I've raised this with him, and I'm very encouraged by the response I got from him.
Second, in terms around funding, that's the type of work that needs to be done -- identify what costs would be, how we would go about doing it, what type of services or what type of requirements, for example, the teaching hospitals need, what is the work that has to be done within the ministries. That has to be done first so that then we can make decisions around what costs are, for example. But certainly it's my intention that we start to move so that we can do something like that and ideally make some decisions at some point next year.
C. Hansen: One last point on this subject before we move back to regional operations -- it's actually regarding nursing; this document had slipped out in my sequence of issues to deal with -- and that's the training for foreign-trained nurses who need skills upgrading in order to be registered to practise in British Columbia.
Just to read a sentence from a letter that was sent to me
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other provincial sites -- perhaps as an evening or weekend course to accommodate those who must also make a living, as well as day programs. I'm wondering if the minister has given consideration to the expansion of courses to allow trained nurses from other jurisdictions to come up to the standards that we expect for registration in British Columbia.
Hon. M. Farnworth: There are, in this year's allocation, about 28 refresher seats for ESL nurses. So that will go some way to meeting the demand for nurses who were trained outside the country. I also recognize that there needs to be work done in terms of identifying the pool of nurses here from outside of the country that may not have qualifications and finding ways of getting them qualified and into the system.
[1450]
C. Hansen: I think the point the individual was making in his letter to me is that there's a need for a variety of training. I think this applies not just to foreign-trained nurses who want to upgrade their skills but also to those nurses who are in service today in British Columbia, who are having difficulty accessing training programs to upgrade their skills. This is particularly a problem when you get outside of the lower mainland and greater Victoria area, as courses are less flexible to accommodate particularly shift work and other schedules.
If we're going to be able to meet the need that's there, there's going to be a need for far more innovation in the way that nursing training is offered for upgrade skills and in-service training. I'm wondering if the minister can give us any sense of new programs that might be coming on stream to provide that kind of opportunity for training.
Hon. M. Farnworth: This is one of those areas where we're working with Advanced Education to find ways of bringing more flexibility into the system. We're also working with HLAA to try and deal with issues around tuition, for example. There are some ways in which they can help in that regard. In terms of nurses coming into the system who have credentials in specific areas and where they may need upgrading, for example, what we try and do is see if there's a particular area where they need specific upgrading in order to try and work with a hospital to provide that particular training. But in terms of flexibility, I think that's one of the key areas. That applies not just to nursing but to a host of training that is required by workers in all kinds of fields, not just health care. There needs to be flexibility to recognize the different shifts and the different work styles that people in fact actually have.
C. Hansen: There are many, many more issues in the whole area of human resource training. We could go through virtually a roster list of health professions and identify that each one of them is facing some challenges when it comes to having an adequate number of trained professionals available in the future. I'm certainly aware of the fact that the average age of anaesthesiologists in British Columbia is, I believe, 57 years. That's a rather scary thought, when you think of the importance of anaesthesiologists in making sure that our acute care system can function. We start looking at the shortage of physiotherapists -- the growing shortage, when you start looking at the numbers that we're training -- and then you start realizing how important physiotherapists are to ensuring that regional hospitals can provide a very meaningful service for individuals who live close to home, instead of having to not only go through surgery, say, in the lower mainland but then also have to go through the rehab work in the lower mainland because of the shortage of physiotherapists in some of these smaller regional hospitals.
While it is an area that we could spend a lot of time on, I just urge the minister to keep that issue very high on his priority list. It's an issue that potentially has some very serious consequences for us down the road a couple of years, if we don't start taking the actions to ensure that we don't face a similar crisis to what we are facing today in terms of a nursing shortage.
With that, I want to move back to the area of regional operations. As I indicated to the minister before, I want to work through their performance plan as a convenient way of sequencing some of these issues that come up. On page 6 of the document are regional operations. We have already dealt with the issue of accountability to my satisfaction.
If we can then move on to the issue of cancer care, the key program objective, as outlined, is to address the availability and timeliness of cancer care. The performance measure is wait-time standards established and actual wait times reported for surgical oncology cancer treatment. This is an issue that I think there's been a growing concern with in the last few weeks. The minister made a comment in response to one of my colleagues, when asked a question about wait-lists for cancer treatment. He indicated in his reply that wait-lists are down to what they were two months ago. I would say in response that that's not good enough. Two months ago those wait-lists were unacceptably long, especially for certain types of cancer treatment.
I understand that there is a shortage of oncology technicians in British Columbia. I also understand that we have been able to recruit a couple of new oncology technicians from Alberta, much to the dismay of the Alberta Ministry of Health, which the minister may hear about at his next Health ministers' meeting. But there has been some action taken to try to deal with the problem.
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My concern is not the mean wait time for cancer treatment. My concern is for those individuals who wind up on the long end of the wait time. I get letters from people virtually every day, who are facing wait times of four and eight months for cancer treatment. I think the minister would agree that is much too long and is not acceptable, even if that is the level that we were at two months ago as opposed to a month ago. I'm wondering if the minister can tell us what action is being taken to deal with those wait-lists and what options have been considered by the ministry to get those wait times down.
Hon. M. Farnworth: At the current time, while the new facilities are coming on stream, there is a system of triage which physicians administer in terms of assessing what type of treatment the patient requires. Of course the answer to deal with the issue of wait times is also dependent on the facilities that are available. Currently there are two facilities which are under construction. One is the bunker in Surrey; that's the radiation machine in Surrey. The other is the facility here in Victoria. One opens up at the end of this year; the other will open up early in the following year. That will have a dramatic impact on wait times.
B. Penner: Just two days ago, on Tuesday, I raised a matter with the Minister of Health regarding a constituent of
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mine, Mr. Joe den Bok, who had been told by his physicians that he'd have to wait up to four months before he could begin radiation therapy at the Surrey cancer clinic. Some cynical people would say
While I'm pleased for Mr. den Bok that he at least has some light at the end of the tunnel, I am concerned about the process followed by the Ministry of Health. I know that my colleague the opposition Health critic, the member for Vancouver-Quilchena, will follow up on this. I wonder if the minister could explain how that happens. Or is it just a coincidence that he got action once the matter was finally brought here to the Legislature?
Hon. M. Farnworth: It is a coincidence. In fact, when staff were looking into the background of the letter, they found out that he had already been scheduled for June 7. There is no way that we would interfere in terms of a clinical decision.
B. Penner: One question which was left unanswered from our discussion on Tuesday was: what policy or procedures does the ministry follow when people are seeking out-of-province care due to unacceptably long wait-lists in British Columbia? I know that in years gone by, quite a number of people from the Fraser Valley have received treatment in Bellingham, Washington, at the expense of the B.C. Ministry of Health. In fact, I know personally of some people in the Harrison area who had to make use of that service, because the waiting list was simply too long here in British Columbia.
Does the ministry still follow that procedure? And what are the criteria that are applied in deciding whether or not to pay private authorities in Washington State to treat patients from British Columbia for cancer?
[1500]
Hon. M. Farnworth: There was the contract a number of years ago. However, with the construction of the new facilities in British Columbia, that was discontinued. Since then, the policy is to treat people here within B.C., because we have the capacity to do that. We work with the B.C. Cancer Agency, and they have indicated to us that if it comes to the point, in their opinion -- and they are the experts on cancer -- that we don't have the capacity to treat in a timely fashion, they would notify us. The fact, as I'd mentioned earlier on, is that we have two new facilities coming on stream this fall and early next spring, which will have a dramatic impact on wait times. So I don't see any change in that policy taking place. We don't send people out of province at this time.
B. Penner: So just to confirm, then, in the past fiscal year the province of B.C. did not pay for anyone to go to Washington State to receive cancer treatment.
Hon. M. Farnworth: That is correct. We have not. We don't send anybody out.
C. Hansen: I want to just pursue that issue of out-of-province care, because the minister said that in 1995 the decision was made to fund treatments in Washington State. I think the words that the minister just used were: "We didn't have the capacity at that time." Yet if you look at the last five months in British Columbia
I am told that in January of this year, there were more than 700 people waiting for radiation treatment, and that that was up by more than 100 over the previous month alone. Although I haven't been able to confirm this, I'm also told that is a number considerably higher than what the wait-list was in 1995, when we did go out of province in order to allow these individuals to get the treatment that they urgently needed. I'm wondering if the minister can explain why it is that in 1995 it was felt important that these people get timely treatment out of province. Yet here we are in the year 2000, and suddenly there seems to be a much higher threshold of tolerance before the government considers it to be important to look at out-of-province treatment.
Hon. M. Farnworth: There are a number of things that we need to realize. First off, the B.C. Cancer Agency has told us that it can cope with the current situation, that they would advise us if they can't and that we need to rethink our current policy. There's a number of changes that have taken place, which have allowed us to increase our capacity until those new facilities come on stream. We've increased the number of hours at the facility here in Victoria, for example, to 13 hours from ten hours a day. We have been able to recruit a number of technicians, which has also allowed for an increase in the number of procedures that can be performed. Those things have been put in place.
Couple that with the fact that our new facilities are coming on this fall and next spring. B.C. Cancer feels that the situation is sufficient, that the resources are sufficient and that we can cope. If they advise us otherwise, at that point we would then reconsider something else.
C. Hansen: I know the subject of prostate cancer has been raised by a couple of my colleagues. I just want to pursue a couple of issues in that regard. Tonight at 7:30 I'm going to be in Courtenay at the offices of the Comox Valley health council, at the invitation of the Comox Valley prostate cancer support group. They are organizing a public health forum. I would like to be able to take some positive messages from the minister to them, in terms of treatment for prostate cancer in British Columbia. I would also like to take them some positive messages in terms of increased funding for PSA testing in British Columbia. I'm wondering if the minister can give me some indication that there is, in fact, some positive initiatives that will be taken by the ministry in the very near future.
[1505]
Hon. M. Farnworth: There's a number of points that I'd like to make. First, the B.C. Cancer Agency is currently reviewing its policies around PSA testing and prostate cancer, and they will be in contact with the ministry shortly, once that review has been taken. Second, as I said, there are the new cancer treatment machines coming on line this fall and next spring, which will significantly reduce wait times. Perhaps the most important issue is that British Columbia has the best
[ Page 15832 ]
prostate cancer outcomes of any province in the country. I think that speaks considerably to the work that's done in terms of cancer treatment in the province. Thirdly, around PSA testing, if a physician recommends that you need a PSA test, it's covered, and it will be done and paid for by MSP.
C. Hansen: In discussions I've had with people who are living with prostate cancer or perhaps a family member or those that are involved in some of the support groups around the province, the one subject that often comes up is the parallels between prostate cancer and breast cancer. In British Columbia there has been a lot of attention paid -- and appropriately -- to the issues around breast cancer screening mammography. There has been considerable government effort put into those programs, which are to be supported. I note that individuals who raise concerns about prostate cancer in no way want to diminish the effort put by government into issues around breast cancer, but the parallels are drawn. In the same way that the PSA testing has all kinds of uncertainty around it -- that it does produce false positives and does produce negative results -- we have the same kind of results coming out of screening mammography programs. I'm wondering whether or not, in developing the public policy around prostate cancer issues, whether or not the ministry consciously looks at the parallel between breast cancer and prostate cancer in terms of the consistency of government policy in these areas.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Absolutely. Of course there are parallels in a number of ways, but I think there are some key issues that need to be recognized. First, the specificity of the test as it relates to mammography and breast screening is different than the PSA test for prostate cancer. The rate of false positives is much higher in the PSA test. Also, the treatment that derives from the results of those tests is significantly different. So it's very difficult to compare the two on a straight medical basis.
Having said that, I also understand the parallels between the two forms of cancer and how they
Historically we haven't seen that around prostate cancer in this province or this country. It's only in the last few years that you've really seen attention and focus and awareness around public debate on prostate cancer. I expect that the focus and research -- and we're already starting to see that -- are also now coming in terms of prostate cancer. We've seen the $20 million donation from Jimmy Pattison, which received a great deal of public
[1510]
C. Hansen: I guess the concern is what appears to be an inconsistency in approach. If you look at screening mammography and if you look at cervical cancer screening, those also produce false positives. Yet that does not seem to be an impediment for those programs to move forward. There seems to be an inconsistency when it comes to the approach to prostate cancer. There are false positives that come out of PSA testing, and that comes up as a reason why we don't move forward in this particular area. I'm just wondering if the minister can square the seeming inconsistency in that?
Hon. M. Farnworth: I understand the concern, and I understand the frustration that people may have. I certainly understand the perception, but there is a considerable clinical difference in terms of the outcomes between the two tests -- between mammography screening or screening for cervical cancer. The procedures that are used are much more accurate at this point in time than they are for PSA testing for prostrate cancer.
We really have to take that into account. Across the country and indeed around the world there is considerable debate and focus going on -- and in fact a lot of effort -- to find a reliable test for prostate cancer. The sooner we can find a test that is accurate 99 percent of the time, that will be a big breakthrough. That's the difference between the two screening tests. One is much more accurate than the other. The consequences of a false positive test have serious implications for the person who has had that test, in terms of treatment and what may happen.
C. Hansen: I think in terms of the medical practice, a false-positive will result in additional testing as opposed to surgical intervention or radical treatment at that point. In the area of cervical cancer screening, there was a court case last year that attracted a fair amount of media attention. A woman in Vancouver had received a false negative three times -- three consecutive tests over a period of time. Only after it was too late for her not to suffer some long-term effects, it was finally positively diagnosed. The woman is Stephanie Nicolls.
I've had the opportunity to talk to Stephanie Nicolls on a couple of occasions. She won that court case, in essence. I don't think it was the judgment that was important to her. What was important to her was that this issue be addressed and there be some things learned from the experience that she went through, so that other women in British Columbia aren't faced with the same results she faced.
My understanding is that there was a review of that done within the ministry and in the B.C. Cancer Agency. I was told that that particular paper was going to be completed on or near January 17, 2000. I'm wondering if the minister has that paper and whether or not there have been any changes that have resulted from the review that was done.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Yes, we have in fact got the review. We are looking at the proposals in it. We are looking at the requests that flow out of it. They are currently under consideration.
C. Hansen: I had previously written to the minister asking if a copy of that report could be made available to me. More importantly, I would like to ask the minister if he will undertake to share a copy of that report with Stephanie Nicolls. I think that she very passionately wants to ensure that every action is taken that can be taken to make sure that other women don't go through the same experience.
[ Page 15833 ]
[1515]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I would be quite happy to do that.
C. Hansen: I want to move on to screening mammography. In the budget of a year ago, there was a commitment made that 38,000 more women would receive screening mammograms in British Columbia. I'm wondering if the minister can tell us how close they came to achieving that goal.
Hon. M. Farnworth: We managed 225,000 screens on a target of 240,000.
C. Hansen: So in terms of the increase, basically that's falling short by almost 50 percent of what had been targeted in the increased number. I wonder if the minister can explain to us why the promise was made in the budget last year for 38,000 additional women to receive screening mammograms, and yet by the numbers that he's just given me, in fact we've seen that it falls short of that considerably.
Hon. M. Farnworth: There was some delay in getting the program up and running, particularly in the new centres. However, those targets are still ongoing in terms of us trying to achieve the screenings in those new areas. We are still going ahead to make sure that they happen.
C. Hansen: My information was there were some problems that developed in terms of affiliation agreements between the ministry and some of the host hospitals that would be offering this program. I wonder if the minister can explain how affiliation agreements of this nature would be delayed. My question is relating, first of all, to ensuring that we're going to have these services available when they're promised. Second, there's a concern in terms of the relationship between the ministry and the host hospitals that result in these kinds of problems arising and whether or not it could even spill over into other programs.
Hon. M. Farnworth: I have some differing information, so you have my undertaking that I will check out the concerns that you have raised, and I will get back to you on them. The issue, from what I gather, is not between the ministry and the hospital, but it may in fact be between the program and the hospital -- if indeed that is what happened. But I'm not sure that that is entirely accurate. I will find out for you and get back to you.
C. Hansen: In terms of the expansion of the screening mammography program, are all regions of the province now on line in terms of the centres which are expected to deliver some of these increased services? And are we now at a level of screening programs that will be stable for the foreseeable future?
Hon. M. Farnworth: There are currently three areas which have to get up and running, and it's our expectation that they will be, and then all the ones that were anticipated will be functioning. At the current time, though, all areas of the province do have access in one form or another to the screening program.
[1520]
C. Hansen: Can the minister tell us what three areas are yet to come on stream?
Hon. M. Farnworth: I know that Penticton is one of them; the two others, we'll get for you, hon. member.
C. Hansen: Thank you. I want to move on to a slightly different subject, still under the realm of the B.C. Cancer Agency. One of the things that has bothered me considerably in terms of letters that I've received from individuals around British Columbia
The one that I particularly want to ask the minister about is drugs that are required in cancer treatment. Individuals who are treated in hospitals have those medications covered. Of course, as soon as they go home, they're not -- which is an issue that we covered off the other night, to a certain extent, under Pharmacare. But I was also concerned that there was a program being run by the Canadian Cancer Society for drug coverage as part of what they call their emergency aid program. It had provided financial assistance for needy families, which they defined as having an average income under $17,000 a year. Apparently we were the only province in Canada relying on a not-for-profit agency to meet this need in the community.
Just to read this note here: "It became increasingly evident to us that this was properly a responsibility of the Ministry of Health, as is the accepted practice in most other provinces. A couple of months after, we withdrew the service entirely, and soon after media exposure, the government indicated a willingness to take responsibility for these drugs through the B.C. Cancer Agency."
My question to the minister is: has that in fact taken place? Is that now fully operational? If the minister could give us some indication as to how that commitment is coming to fruition.
Hon. M. Farnworth: All direct cancer drugs are covered under our system. In terms of issues for low-income people on the side-effect drugs that were not covered, the program that was in place was taken over by the B.C. Cancer Agency, and they now provide that service. So those drugs are covered as well.
C. Hansen: I want to move on to northern issues. I've deliberately skipped over the capital planning process in the performance plan, for the reason that it comes up again when we follow continuing care in the list that has been provided for me by the deputy minister. So I will defer capital. There's also a report which I'm hoping to have the opportunity to read before we get into that section. So I look forward to receiving that.
On the issue of northern health care issues, I was interested in a comment that was made in the environmental scan that the ministry sent to me. I'll just read this quote under rural health. It says: "Analysis of utilization patterns show that per-capita expenditure on medical services, including physician services, is less in remote and rural communities. Consumption of acute rehabilitation hospital days in rural communities is actually higher than the provincial average.
[ Page 15834 ]
Rural residents receive a higher portion of their care in specialty and teaching hospitals."
[1525]
I read that to say that what is happening is that those who live in rural and remote communities are travelling in order to access medical care, much more so than the average British Columbian, in that the specialty and teaching hospitals are typically in the lower mainland. In order to access care, far more British Columbians from smaller communities and rural communities have to travel. I'm just wondering if in fact that's an accurate interpretation of the comments in this document and whether or not the provincial government is looking at programs that would assist people in travel to access necessary medical treatment.
Hon. M. Farnworth: If I've got the second part of the member's question wrong, I'd ask him to correct me, but the way I understand the member's question, I would say that he is right. That is an accurate assessment, on the first part of his question. Northern and rural British Columbians, in fact, do travel farther than their lower mainland counterparts. That's a reflection of a number of factors. One is the geography; another is the sparsity of population. The fact is that for a lot of services, you require a critical mass of population to deliver or to supply those services. Those are fewer and farther between, especially in northern British Columbia, than they are in the lower mainland.
If I understand the member correctly around his second question, there is the travel assistance program that is a part of MSP. In that sense I would say, yes, there is a program to assist people with their travel costs -- if I understood the member correctly.
C. Hansen: The travel assistance program -- if we're referring to the same thing -- is a program that basically provides for reduced airfares. It is a program that was put together by what used to be the two major airlines. I can tell by the minister's reaction that we may be talking about two different things here. I want to make the point about the air travel assistance, and then perhaps he can elaborate for me on the travel assistance program.
The reduction in airfares for individuals from rural parts of British Columbia who have to travel by air to access necessary medical treatment, and for their accompanying family members, is a program that
I have two concerns. One is the issue the minister raised about the travel assistance program and also the other program which is provided by the airlines. And there's whether or not the reduction in service by Canadian Airlines and Air Canada in this province is going to have a detrimental effect on British Columbians' ability to access, and to afford to access, necessary medical treatment.
Hon. M. Farnworth: The issue around the merger is a good one. That is one of the areas which we are monitoring. In fact, we're working quite closely in terms of trying to determine the effect that the merger is having on communities throughout British Columbia, in terms of levels of service and the potential impact that that may have.
[1530]
However, the travel assistance program is based on a number of criteria. One, it's available for medically approved travel. In terms of the airlines, whether it's Air B.C., Canadian or Central Mountain Air, the discount is about 30 percent. In terms of rail travel, which is also covered -- B.C. Rail, Via Rail -- it's 50 percent. In terms of B.C. Ferries, it is in fact free. In terms of approvals or the numbers: 46,417 people were assisted in terms of ferry travel, 62 by rail and 4,492 individuals by air.
C. Hansen: The minister made reference to a travel assistance plan under MSP. Is this what he's talking about?
Hon. M. Farnworth: This is in fact what we are talking about, yes.
C. Hansen: I thought it was me that was getting confused earlier, when the minister seemed to indicate there were two different programs.
The travel assistance program obviously helps some families in British Columbia, but I guess you could argue that there is a component of B.C. Rail in there that is provincial government dollars and a component of B.C. Ferries dollars that is in there that is obviously provincial government dollars. Aside from that, it's outside of government that this is being run. I would like to ask the minister
Certainly as Air Canada and Canadian Airlines are obviously giving a slap in the face to British Columbia, in terms of the reduction of service to this province, there is an opportunity for other airlines, such as WestJet, Pacific Coastal Airlines and others, to start filling that void that is being created by Air Canada and Canadian Airlines. I'm wondering if the minister has had any discussions with those other regional carriers to urge them to become part of the travel assistance program.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Central Mountain Air is one of the participants in the program, as is Harbour Air. Those are regional airlines, and we are more than happy to talk to, and will talk to other airlines as well. Around the issue of the merger, as I said, we're monitoring that, and that's one of the areas where I think there is a wide government look in terms of what's happening. I think there's a lot of government concern around there.
It also, I think, highlights one of the issues that we having been raising and that I have raised in discussion with the federal government. That is the issue around transportation for northern and rural residents. One of the things that I think we need to do is look at if there's a better way of addressing the issue than we have right now by perhaps recognizing that it's not just B.C., but it's all the provinces, especially the western ones -- all the provinces that have those large rural areas, along with the Territories.
Maybe there's a critical mass if we are cooperating together to provide a better range of services than we cur-
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rently have. That's something that I've been pushing for us to be looking at. So I recognize the issues around there, and I think there are ways of dealing with it. But certainly in the practical short term right now, there is the existing plan. We are happy to talk to other regional airlines. Of course, we are watching and trying to assess the impact of the merger on communities in British Columbia.
C. Hansen: I want to deal with the travel assistance program first, because it is a program that is in place that provides some small benefit to families living in northern and remote parts of British Columbia. But, to put it in perspective, even the 30 percent reduction in airfare is 30 percent off of their full fare rates. It's not 30 percent off of even charter-class fares that we see around the province, and charter class is usually considerably cheaper.
[1535]
Where this program does help families is when they have to travel on very short notice and don't qualify for charter-class rates that are there. So they can see a 30 percent reduction. But if you're talking about a $1,000 plane fare out of a community in northern British Columbia, obviously 30 percent helps, but you're still facing $700-plus per seat per family member that has to travel. I would like to ask the minister to give the House his definition of what universally accessible health care means to him in this context.
Hon. M. Farnworth: That's a good question and an interesting one, because there are a number of ways to answer it, and I think that needs to take into account some of the realities upon which we operate. My definition of universality would be that the services are available to everyone in the province who needs them when they need them, in a timely fashion. However, if you look at what services are available and you look at what universality was set up to be, it was services covered under the Canada Health Act. Since that time there has been considerable growth in the services that are available under our medicare plan that are outside of that. In that sense, universality is not there; but, in fact, it should be. Ambulance services, for example, are one of those services outside of that.
This is where I think it's important that we have that debate around what the core services of medicare are in this country. What should the Canada Health Act be covering? That means that we need to recognize that we have changed. The country has changed, the health care system has changed and technology has changed since it was first brought in. And it is going to change dramatically more over the coming decades. We need to anticipate what those changes are, how they are going to impact on Canadians and British Columbians and what the pressure points are. How do we cover them to ensure that there is universality of access and service for the people of this province?
C. Hansen: Yesterday I read excerpts from a letter that I received from Mr. Earl Houlden of Terrace. I'm sure the minister would agree that when it comes to our universal health care system -- the core of medicare -- there's probably nothing that would rank higher in most people's minds than the premature birth of a child. This family -- just to quickly remind the minister of the circumstances that we went over yesterday -- was medevacked from Terrace to Vancouver. The baby was born, I believe, at 26 weeks. They were in Vancouver for a few days and then were told
They had to rent accommodation in Vancouver so that they could be near the baby. From there, they were transferred to Prince George, because somebody thought that Prince George would be closer to home for them, in Terrace -- which, in fact, is not closer to home when you look at travel time and accessibility. Yet they had the additional costs of transportation. The baby was transported at public expense, but the family members had to find their own travel arrangements in order to be with their child. In Prince George they had to find accommodation. There was the additional cost of going back and forth to their community until such time as the baby was stable enough to move back to Terrace.
In the system that we have today, that family incurred thousands of dollars of cost in order to enable a premature baby to survive and grow and have the prospect of a healthy life. I would like to ask the minister: if that's not two-tiered medicine, what is it?
Hon. M. Farnworth: I think that example illustrates the point I made. Twenty-five years ago those children didn't survive. Now they do. We have centres and can provide specialists and specialties that can deliver the medicine and can deliver the ability to save lives, in a way that was never imagined when our system was developed -- was never even dreamt of. That, to me, illustrates why we have to re-examine the act, and look at what it is we can now do and what it is we should be covering -- recognizing that with the advances of technology, and the ability of new medicines and new surgical procedures to do so many more things than we've been able to do in the past, there also come other issues.
[1540]
For example, issues around transportation of family members to be with their loved ones when they're receiving the care and transportation
[T. Stevenson in the chair.]
C. Hansen: I want to raise an issue which flows from that, although this takes us right back to the discussion we had on acute care and takes us out of the northern issues.
It's actually a case that was brought to my attention by the member for Langley. She outlined for me a discussion that she'd had with a constituent who had to take their child from Langley to Children's Hospital for daily treatments. In the course of the treatments that had to be undertaken, they have now accumulated parking costs of $1,600 at Children's Hospital in Vancouver. I appreciate the fact that I'm taking us on a bit of a tangent from our discussion on northern health care. But I wonder
[ Page 15836 ]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I don't think it would be too difficult to look at ways of relieving some of those costs that people would face. I don't think it would be inappropriate, because most people don't go to a hospital month after month. That clearly speaks to unusual and not typical circumstances in terms of accumulating that level of parking. It speaks to the intensity of the care that an individual requires. I think you could structure something with the hospital or with the foundation that would recognize the impact on a family in terms of the costs of parking alone and find some way for there to be either a nominal pass or a pass in recognition of the visits that are required. I think that is something which is not beyond the bounds of what would be reasonable to expect.
C. Hansen: Would the minister undertake to give consideration or at least to initiate a process of reviewing these types of issues within the next month?
Hon. M. Farnworth: I would certainly be willing to raise that with the health authorities. I don't want to be accused of micromanaging, but certainly that's an issue that I'd be happy to raise. My sense of fairness
C. Hansen: I want to move on to the area of provincial wait-lists. I would like to address some issues around the wait-list web site. If the minister would prefer that I save those questions for our discussion on information technology, I'd be prepared to do that. But if now is the appropriate time, under wait-lists, I would certainly do it now.
Now? Okay.
[1545]
In the wait-list web site, what it shows today on the home page is that there are 61,000 waiting for surgery. Yet if you take all of the various areas and the categories of surgery that are listed, the numbers don't add up. This is a wait-list web site that was launched a year ago last week. It was brought into being in a rushed fashion. It was obviously done for political reasons to allow the minister to say that something was being done in the area of wait-lists. In the rush to get it on line, there were a considerable number of errors that became evident as soon as it was unveiled. Now we see what appears to me to still be some pretty blatant errors in terms of the numbers of individuals in British Columbia who are waiting for surgery. I wonder if the minister could comment.
Hon. M. Farnworth: The reason that the two numbers don't reconcile is in part because there are a number of surgeons who have fewer -- let's say two or three -- patients on there, who are not included in that number. That's part of the reason why the number doesn't reconcile with all the different types of surgeries on there. Second, not every single surgery for which people may in fact be waiting is included on the list.
Before I yield the floor, I just want to ask leave to make an introduction.
Leave granted.
Hon. M. Farnworth: In the gallery today we have one of British Columbia's longest-serving mayors, someone I know very well and have had the opportunity to work with when I was a city councillor in Port Coquitlam and later as Minister of Municipal Affairs. That is George Ferguson of Abbotsford. Would the House please make him welcome.
C. Hansen: I don't think the minister's explanation was satisfactory. The home page says 61,000. Then he indicated that there are several areas that would not be included. The problem is not that the number, when you total up the list, is less than 61,000; the number is considerably greater than 61,000. In fact, the number on the home page says 61,000 people waiting. If you add up the list, you come up with 77,354. Clearly there is a discrepancy here of 16,000 patients. I'm wondering if the minister could explain where those 16,000 patients are.
Hon. M. Farnworth: I've been informed by the architect of the system that that couldn't possibly be. So we are going to check it out for the hon. member and get back to him.
C. Hansen: I would like to visit some of these numbers in terms of what we saw a year ago compared to where we are at today. The problem that we see when we actually look down this whole list of surgical procedures reported in that web site is a significant increase in virtually every single area except for cardiac surgery.
[1550]
Cardiac surgery, to the credit of all of those involved in British Columbia, is down. The wait-list is down by 26.5 percent. I know that the ministry put some targeted dollars into trying to deal with the cardiac surgery wait-list. I am also aware that cardiac care is one of the areas -- I believe it is the only area in British Columbia -- where there is in fact a managed wait-list system in place. I think we start to see the benefits of that attention that has been paid.
Radial therapy is up 37 percent. I'm not going to be able to pronounce all these surgical terms, so I'm not going to try. But basically the only areas that are down are cardiac surgery
In all the other categories we see increases, and in most cases significant increases. Vascular surgery: the wait-list is up 29 percent. Plastic surgery: the wait-list is up 11 percent. Orthopedic surgery: it's up 15.4 percent. Knee replacement wait-list, up 15.2 percent; hip replacement, up 7.8 percent; gynecological surgery, up 18.4 percent. Some of these are in the 5 and 6 percent range, so I will skip those. Opthalmological surgery is up 41 percent; cardiac surgery is up 40 percent.
I wonder if the minister can explain to us why they are claiming to be having success on the wait-list front, when in fact we see significant increases in wait-lists in all of these areas except for cardiac surgery.
Hon. M. Farnworth: I think a number of points need to be made. First off, it's not the waiting lists themselves, but rather it's the median waiting times that are in place that are important. Second, since those figures are based on an annual basis, there are a number of things that have happened -- there have been a significant number of new facilities and institutions that have come on line -- in the past year.
There are also a number of areas where some additional program or additional funding has been targeted that will now start to show up. Orthopedics, for example -- there were
[ Page 15837 ]
a thousand new procedures built into last year's base. In turn, they will be allocated throughout parts of the province this year. We will direct them to those areas which show greater than median wait times. So there is the ability to target those.
Second, in areas around cancer treatment, for example, there are new facilities which are coming on stream later this year and early next year which will also have a significant impact on the wait times in terms of procedures and treatments that people are going to need to receive. That will have a significant impact as well.
C. Hansen: I want to come back to this issue of the management of wait-lists in British Columbia. I made the comment earlier that my understanding is that the only managed wait-list that we have in British Columbia is in the area of coronary care. Can the minister explain to us what initiatives are underway in terms of managing wait-lists and when we might see that approach expanded beyond coronary care?
[1555]
Hon. M. Farnworth: There is a provincial advisory committee that is looking at access in a number of different areas. There is work being done in several other areas as well. Perhaps one of the most important, on a strictly provincial basis, done here in British Columbia is to mirror what has been done in terms of cardiac surgery with regards to orthopedics. There's work being done to try and manage the wait-lists for orthopedics in much the same way as has been done around cardiac care.
Second, there's a program underway involving the four western provinces, which is looking at how we can do similar things in terms of managing the demand for services in five key areas. They include MRI, hip and knee replacements, cataract surgery, general surgery and mental health. We do recognize that there have been some significant advantages in terms of how we deal with cardiac surgery. We're looking to expand that to orthopedics and other areas as well.
C. Hansen: If the minister could anticipate all of my next questions, we would actually be able to move through this even faster. This project that he just referred to
Hon. M. Farnworth: That is actually a literature article and not the name of this particular project at all. That's something completely different.
C. Hansen: Then maybe the minister can advise us in terms of the other work that is being done by the western provinces. When will we see some tangible outputs from that?
Hon. M. Farnworth: It should be by September that we should be able to have some tangible information for the hon. member.
C. Hansen: One last point on the issue of wait-lists, and that's a quote in the environmental scan on page 30. It says: "Simply increasing funding often paradoxically results in increased demand and longer wait-lists." I'm wondering if the minister can elaborate a bit on that thought.
Hon. M. Farnworth: It's a worldwide phenomenon. Perhaps I can put it this way: before I had a dental plan, I'd go to my dentist and all I ever needed was a filling; since I got a dental plan, all I ever need is a crown. Sometimes it seems to be that because we can do it, you need it, and that is a problem. Because we're able to provide a service, and sometimes it's deemed to be the best and most encompassing procedure
C. Hansen: I challenge the minister to make that thought and that sentiment a part of his opening speech to the health innovation forum, which I think would probably stimulate some very interesting debate from some of the various stakeholder groups that the minister has invited to that forum.
I have one last issue to deal with before I turn this over to my colleagues. It's actually the last issue under the area of regional programs -- when we take this up again, we'll be able to move into public and preventative health -- and that's the issue of the trauma strategy.
[1600]
The performance plan talks about enhancing tertiary services and indicates that the performance measure is: "Provincial trauma strategy is developed and implemented, and a cardiac costing model is developed and implemented." Particularly in the area of the trauma strategy, I'm wondering if this is part of a process that in fact started in 1990 with the trauma report, which I think largely got stalled. There didn't seem to be much progress being made on the implementation of some of the recommendations in that trauma report.
Is this process that the minister is talking about in this document picking up on that 1990 report and fleshing out the parameters of a provincial strategy? My question is: when are we going to see that, and how expansive is that strategy going to be?
Hon. M. Farnworth: All the recommendations are in fact being acted upon. For example, the one at Vancouver Hospital was designated and opened on May 3.
C. Hansen: At this time I'm going to turn this discussion over to the member for Peace River South, who I believe has some issues that he wants to raise.
J. Weisgerber: I have a couple of issues that I'd like to raise with the minister. The first probably will come as no great surprise to him. Last week in question period I raised the issue of Eric Read and the ambulance charges incurred when he had a heart attack up in Whitehorse and wound up being flown to Vancouver. At that point he was facing a $12,640 bill as a result of that trip.
I was aware at the time that I raised the issue that Alkan Air, a private air ambulance firm, had taken a patient from Vancouver back to Whitehorse. We were arguing with Whitehorse -- with Yukon Health -- about taking a share of that responsibility. My understanding is that they have now offered $4,800, which they say would have been the cost of an alternate arrangement had they not used the return flight. I wonder whether or not the minister has been able to examine this issue with the point of looking at that bill.
[ Page 15838 ]
In examining the issue in a broader context, it seemed to me that the one thing that most British Columbians don't consider is that travel within the country, within Canada, might expose them to a significant health care cost. I think that most people -- most people that I've spoken with -- believe that there is a broadly universal health care system in this country, regardless of where you are in Canada. It seems to me that this issue simply highlights the risk that many British Columbians are at when they travel outside of the province. From my perspective, I would like to see three things. First of all, I would like to see a commitment to Mr. Read to look after that uncovered portion of the air ambulance -- some $8,000. Secondly, I'd like to see B.C. move forward -- kind of go out on a limb, if you will -- and commit to British Columbians to cover ambulance charges, when ordered by a physician and not covered by some other jurisdiction, regardless of where you are in Canada.
If I understand the situation correctly, if you happen to be in Alberta and require an ambulance -- either ground or air ambulance -- to another location in Alberta, chances are that that will be covered by some reciprocal arrangement. It is only in the transport of patients between provinces where this lack of coverage comes into play. I'd like to see us take the lead in British Columbia by assuring British Columbians that regardless of where they are in the province or this country, they wouldn't look at an air ambulance bill or an unreasonable ambulance charge.
Thirdly, I would urge the minister to work with other health care ministers across this country to include ambulances under the Canada Health Act. I wonder if the minister could comment on that.
[1605]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I can tell the hon. member that we have had some discussions, and I have looked at the situation regarding the Reads. I'm able to tell the member that we in fact can resolve it to their satisfaction. They have no need to worry about any unnecessary burdens, and that will be taken care of.
On the other points the member raises, I think they're excellent points, and they're ones that I would like to address for a moment, because I think they're important. Certainly in terms of the policy as it relates to British Columbia, I am more than happy to look at the policy as it relates to transfers and to out-of-province transfers. I think British Columbians do expect that when they leave the province, that is in fact covered. Unfortunately, the Canada Health Act doesn't cover that. So I'm happy to look at that, to look at what the policy is, to see what the costs are, what's involved and to do a thorough analysis. I think that's an important first step.
Finally, I'd also like to comment for a moment on the issue around other provinces and the Canada Health Act. This comes back to my comments a little while ago in terms of how our system has changed in this country over the last 25 years. We are now able to do so much more than was initially anticipated with our health care system. You know, 25 years ago there were injuries or situations, and basically there was the inability to transport people to major trauma centres, for example, in time -- or to communities where necessary services were provided -- and those people died. Now with changes in technology, better ways of delivering service, better ways of ensuring that important decisions are made in the first stages of an accident or trauma or illness, patients can be transported to centres where technology can literally work modern miracles. We can do far more than we could 25 years ago. We look at that in the coming decade, and the advances will be even more remarkable.
I think it's prudent and important at this time that we recognize that these changes have taken place and that we engage in that discussion with the federal government around the Canada Health Act and what it covers, recognizing that the ability now to move people to different places has a tremendous impact on their ability to receive treatment and to survive, in many cases, illnesses that they would have died from 25 years ago. I think it's appropriate that the member raises that, and I think it's appropriate that it is part of the discussion. It is something that I have been raising and will continue to raise.
The final point that I think we need to add in the meantime, while we're working on that, is to recognize that in terms of rural and northern communities in this province, we face the same issues around transportation and being able to move people around as we do in northern Alberta, northern Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, the Territories and the Yukon. Maybe what's also required is for the provinces to recognize that we can achieve more if there is more interprovincial cooperation -- whether it's through reciprocal agreements or what have you -- recognizing that if we're working together, we can probably supply or develop a service that services the residents and communities of the northern and rural regions of this country far more effectively than if we're operating independently. So I'm quite happy to work on this issue, and I'm more than happy to work on it with the member, who I know has considerable interest in this regard.
[1610]
J. Weisgerber: Well, first, let me say on behalf of the Reads, thank you for dealing with this issue. I know that it has been something that's been burdensome to Mr. Read, and to his wife as well. I know they're going to be very, very relieved to understand that that's an issue they don't have to worry about any longer.
I also welcome the commitment of the minister to look at the issue in a broader policy sense, because it is an important issue. I don't think there are many cases where a British Columbian is outside of the province, gets ill and then is flown from one jurisdiction back to British Columbia or to a third jurisdiction. But when it does
The same applies to people working or visiting in the Yukon Territory. I expect that in most other jurisdictions, emergency-type air evacs would take place within the jurisdiction. If my understanding is correct, that doesn't normally put the patient or their family at risk with respect to the costs involved with ambulances. I may be wrong there; it may be that I've just never run across one before. But I think that to examine that in the broader policy sense is extremely worthwhile. Good luck, in terms of what you can do with the federal government and the other Health ministers. Perhaps I could let the minister respond at this point.
[ Page 15839 ]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I thank the member for his comments. It's worth noting as well, while we are undertaking these investigations and analyses around the problem
J. Weisgerber: I appreciate the caution that the minister is extending, although I will just say that I don't think British Columbians should have to worry about insurance as long as they're staying within Canada.
I would like to move on, if I could. I'm certain that my colleague from Peace River North has touched on a somewhat related issue, and that is the whole issue of travel for health care services by other than ambulance. It has seemed to me for as long as I've represented this constituency that one of the great imbalances or injustices in our health care system is that if you live in the lower mainland or greater Victoria and you require treatment for something like cancer and are obliged to go perhaps once a month, those costs, if you have to bear them, are minimal. But I have constituents who have been travelling for years to Victoria or Vancouver once a month for treatment. They wind up paying thousands, if not tens of thousands, of dollars in airline fares.
[1615]
What is particularly heart-rending is families where one of the children is ill, and the patient being treated is too young to fly by themselves. Every time that they go to Vancouver from Dawson Creek, even on a special fare, they're looking at about $1,000, or $500 each, per ticket. I'm thinking of one family in particular who built into the family budget $1,000 a month for travel to Vancouver for treatment. I have believed for a long time that we need to address that.
I've thought that we could address it by way of frequent-flyer points, and I've raised that issue over a number of years, so far without success. Certainly that wouldn't necessarily be the only way to deal with that issue. If we're going to have truly single-tiered health care in the province -- and I know the minister believes in that concept -- then the cost of travel for northern residents should be factored into that health care delivery system. The people shouldn't be obliged to pay $1,000 a month for one or two or three years as part of their obligation to get treatment for serious illnesses. I wonder if the minister has any thoughts beyond those raised by my colleague a couple of days ago.
Hon. M. Farnworth: The member's right; it is a problem. I think it's a problem right across this country, and probably acutely so in British Columbia because of our terrain and topography. There are no easy answers to it. I think there are a number of ways we can try to look at addressing it, but I don't have any quick answers, and I don't think anyone has any quick solutions. Certainly there is the issue around airline points, and that has been looked into and is being looked into again. There are some issues around the airlines in terms of making something like that successful.
Even then, that's not, I think, how a good program would provide the entire answer. I think part of it needs to be addressed in terms of the discussions that are currently underway, in terms of health care around health care reform and change in this country, in terms of the discussions with the federal government, in terms of let's say
I don't know how you deal with that specifically. All I know is that it does place a burden on families. We need to recognize that given the advances that have taken place in technology and our ability to do far more than was ever anticipated
I'm more than happy to try and look at solutions that may solve the problem, but it is a complex one, and there isn't an easy answer to it.
[1620]
J. Weisgerber: I appreciate that there isn't. But I think of the families in my own constituency who are faced with the problem that I've described -- perhaps $1,000 a month; that's probably the most expensive. It's probably the case that is the best example, if you like, because it's the most dramatic example. That family is probably also looking at pharmaceutical costs. The entire family budget in that case is all focused around the cost of getting proper care for this child, which must be a tremendous burden on the child itself. The child must realize that this whole family is focused around his treatment.
I don't think we should pay for everybody to drive across town or to take a taxi across town. But I wonder if the minister has examined or thought about putting health care travel on a footing very much like Pharmacare, where a family would look at the first $800 or $1,000 being the deductible. Dealing, then, with travel that was authorized by a physician, there would be some kind of either coverage or coinsurance for the next X number of dollars. Then beyond something in the neighbourhood of $2,000 a year, the health care system, rather than the family, would accept those obligations.
That would seem to me to be something that would serve as somewhat of a deterrent, so that there wasn't unnecessary travel, so that people weren't immediately wanting to jump on and accompany their spouse or whoever it is if that wasn't absolutely necessary, so that there's enough of a financial obligation on the family to treat this cautiously and prudently. On the other hand, surely our whole health care system and what makes our health care system unique is that families aren't at financial risk as a result of illness. I look at what happens with some of my constituents, and I say that the health care system, because of those costs, appears to be failing them in a very fundamental way.
I would appreciate -- not a commitment, because it would be unreasonable
[ Page 15840 ]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I want to thank the member for that very constructive suggestion. Those are the types of ideas that we need to examine. We may find that it's not workable or we may find that it is a very workable idea and certainly worth a look. Those are the types of ideas that I'm certainly interested in, and I'm more than happy to try and work on them to see what would be involved and to see how something may work -- see if we can bring a resolution to this particular issue. It is a challenge, and it is an issue that I recognize is a concern. The member is quite right: you're quite often dealing with a small number of cases where the travel bills are of this magnitude. Certainly I think it's something worth exploring and trying to do further work on.
J. Weisgerber: It is, perhaps, an example that is at the extreme. But I believe also that the minister might be surprised at how many people travel out of Dawson Creek, Fort St. John, Terrace or Fort Nelson on a regular basis for health care treatment, where those bills really have an enormous impact on the family budget. It's certainly not isolated.
Because of where I represent, I spend a lot of time on airplanes and in airports. I meet a lot of people that are travelling for health care treatment. It can have a huge impact on someone who's on a fixed income or on people who are living on $700 or $800 a month to all of sudden have to pay -- even at a reduced rate -- for a trip to Vancouver. If a spouse has to travel with them, it can be a matter of going to the extended family to raise the money, and not on a one-time basis.
I want to move also, while I have the opportunity, to an entirely different area -- one that involves B.C. Housing as well as the Ministry of Health. I may in fact be asking some questions that might better be addressed under Housing.
This has to do with a facility being created or built in Dawson Creek to replace an existing extended multicare facility. Approval has been given through the South Peace health council for a 44-bed multicare unit that is to be located on 17 acres of land in Dawson Creek that was donated by the city. What has been proposed by the council, the Ministry of Health, the city of Dawson Creek and the Rotary Club is to construct, in conjunction with that, a 36-unit complex -- one- and two-bedroom units where people can move in and have a shared recreation-dining area. People could choose to take their meals with that group in the multicare facility or in fact look after their own food services.
[1625]
Just incidentally, my mother is in a very similar facility in Alberta. It's a small community; it's kind of unique. My mother is 88 or 89 years old; she has an older sister who is in the facility, as well as a younger sister and her husband who have a two-bedroom unit. It really has been a marvellous transition from her home in quite a close-knit community into a facility that really has been an extension of that community.
I'm wondering if the minister is familiar with the proposal for Dawson Creek. To what extent can his ministry support this 36-bed add-on to the multiplex unit?
[E. Gillespie in the chair.]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I can tell the hon. member that the ministry does indeed support this project. It is the type of project that we want to see go ahead. I'm particularly pleased about the fact that it is a partnership between Health and Housing.
One of the things I want to see is projects of this nature going forward. It allows for the flexibility for people to be in a residence and then, at the appropriate time, to be able to move into the care facility either on a full-time or on a gradual basis -- to be able to take meals
The ministry is supporting this project. There are some steps yet that still have to be gone through, but it is one that we want to see go ahead.
J. Weisgerber: I want to close by thanking the minister for the positive response on all of these issues. Again, on behalf of Mr. and Mrs. Read, I want to thank him for what I'm sure will be very nice news for them today.
Hon. M. Farnworth: As the member knows, I am generally receptive to sensible solutions.
L. Stephens: I have some questions for the minister around women's health issues. I see a staffer here, so we can proceed -- or would the minister like a little bit of a recess for a few moments?
Interjection.
The Chair: We'll have a five-minute recess while staff change.
The committee recessed from 4:30 p.m. to 4:35 p.m.
[E. Gillespie in the chair.]
L. Stephens: I have some questions that I'd like to ask the minister around women's health issues, to recognize that the issues in health care for women are very significant. Over the years those needs have increased, and they've certainly changed somewhat. I think the minister's aware that the determinants of health for women are poverty and housing and safe environments -- and, frankly, sometimes whether or not she's a mother.
There is "Women-Centred Care: Working Collaboratively to Develop Gender Inclusive Health Policy," a final report of August '98 that I'm sure the ministry has. It talks about women-centred care. It gives the definition:
"Women-centred care recognizes that women's health involves emotional, social, intellectual, spiritual and physical well-being, and that women's health is determined by the social, environmental, political and economic context of women's lives, as well as by physiology. This includes a recognition of the validity of women's life experiences and women's beliefs about and experiences of health."
It also goes on to say:
"Furthermore, women-centred care recognizes the importance of gender differences in health experiences; seeks to reduce inequalities; values women's experience in defining their problems and health goals; recognizes women's diversity -- in race, ethnicity, culture, sexual preference, education and access to health care; supports empowerment of women in their own recovery and as valued members of the community; supports women's values of caring and providing social support; and works to change the context of women's health problems."
[ Page 15841 ]
I would like to ask the minister whether or not the ministry has been making plans to include, within the policies and practices of the ministry, women-centred health when it comes to the delivery services of health care for women.
Hon. M. Farnworth: The ministry takes this quite seriously and has initiated a gender mainstreaming health planning project with health authorities, for example, and has also attempted to incorporate what you've outlined, with a gender lens, into the different components of the ministry, such as aboriginal health. HIV/AIDS care is another example. We are trying to bring this approach to all aspects of the Ministry of Health and with health authorities around the province.
L. Stephens: One of the issues that always comes up when you're talking with women who are involved in the delivery of health care services and are recipients of health care services is that what we have in British Columbia is a biomedical model of health care. Most women would like to see a more holistic way to deliver that health care, which would include socioeconomic considerations.
Have discussions been going on within the ministry -- on how we can move away from a patriarchal, hierarchical, biomedical model and move to one that is more holistic and takes into consideration all of those aspects that I talked about earlier?
[1640]
Hon. M. Farnworth: There have been a number of activities take place -- initiatives around regional workshops, for example -- to promote the inclusion of women's health issues. A women's provincial health statistical profile has been done. Gender-inclusive planning tools for health authorities
L. Stephens: In the regionalization process
Hon. M. Farnworth: There are about four or five health authorities that have specifically included women's health issues in terms of their health planning, and they are incorporating them, in the way that is taking place in your particular area around the province. There are others who have, to somewhat lesser degrees, incorporated them into their plans and into their practices. We expect, though, that all authorities need to do that -- incorporate them into their practices, plans and health procedures.
L. Stephens: Could the minister make available which regions those are, if there's a time line in which all regions must bring forward their system changes and what those system changes may involve? If the minister could be a little bit more specific about some of those regions and what specifically the Health ministry is looking for in outcomes for the planning process for the regional boards
Hon. M. Farnworth: In terms of the specific health authorities, I can tell the member that they are Vancouver-Richmond, Coast-Garibaldi, Fraser Valley, South Fraser, capital health region and the North Shore. Clearly as plans are being developed and communicated to the ministry, this is one of those areas in which we can, in turn, say: "Look, we need to have these issues addressed. You need to be looking at addressing gender, women's and children's issues in your health plans. There are health authorities that are currently doing that -- some in a very broad range; some on a more specific issue." We can assist, if they're having difficulty in doing that, in terms of saying: "Look, here's what's happening here, and here's how you go about doing it."
[1645]
L. Stephens: In terms of some of those issues that the local health authorities -- and the ministry as well -- are going to be grappling with, one of them is biotechnology. The federal government introduced a bill a year or two ago now to do with the new biotechnologies in health care and reproductive technologies. Can the minister comment on what is happening with that particular initiative? Are there still ongoing talks between the federal government and the provinces to address the issues of these new technologies? They're having some significant impact on, for instance, the ethical questions of reproductive technologies in particular.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Yes, in fact we are working with the federal government, and the member is absolutely right. This is an issue of enormous importance in the coming years. One only has to see the research and the data that are coming out of such things as the Human Genome Project to recognize the implications that that has, not only in terms of being able to cure disease and illness but especially in areas such as reproductive technology. I think it's critical that we address the ethical and moral questions. This information, as much as it is beneficial, is also a double-edged sword, and we have to start recognizing that. We are more than happy to work with the federal government in terms of addressing those issues.
L. Stephens: Cloning and all of those kinds of issues have been in agriculture for quite some time, as I know the minister knows. Also, transgenic food is now the top of mind of a lot of people as well. So it is getting closer. The issue is becoming much more urgent.
I will ask the minister whether or not there is a committee of the Health ministry in British Columbia. Is there a formal group of some kind that is meeting regularly, talking with scientists, all of those people in the medical profession and others, to put together a response to that particular piece of legislation? What might the time line be? What time line is the minister working towards?
Hon. M. Farnworth: In terms of regulatory decisions and the framework, they are in the federal government's purview. As far as the provinces are concerned, though, there is an advisory committee on health services, which is comprised of representatives of the provinces and the federal government and is working on the particular issue. The federal govern-
[ Page 15842 ]
ment is expected to deal with this legislation in the fall, if I'm not mistaken.
L. Stephens: Is there any appetite for the ministry to include some women's organizations, perhaps some forums, to gather broader public input into what might guide the ministry's position? Has any of that happened?
[1650]
Hon. M. Farnworth: We would certainly be interested in consulting and working with women's groups around these particular issues. We have to recognize that the federal government does have the responsibility in this area, but certainly in terms of
L. Stephens: The minister talked a little bit earlier about medicalization of women. It's a fact, and it's been going on for quite some time. It's largely a case of overprescription of benzodiazepines -- tranquilizers and sleeping pills. This isn't the first time that we've raised this issue with the Health minister. Previous Health ministers have acknowledged that it is a significant concern and that there have been some processes undertaken to try to deal with it.
The facts are that it is a chronic use with women; it is primarily women. The average number of prescriptions is five for women and four for men. I think that if you talk to the medical people, they'll tell you that these medications should be used on a short-term basis and certainly not for a long term. There is a significant number of women around the province who have been on benzodiazepines for up to ten or 15 years. A lot of people think that they are not addictive; they are. They're highly addictive. They have many side effects, and they're very difficult to withdraw from. I'd just like to know whether or not the minister has addressed this issue of overprescription -- for people generally, but women in particular.
Hon. M. Farnworth: There have been a number of initiatives to deal with this particular problem. There has been a health transition fund project to address the problem around sleeping pills in particular. There is the 30-day supply rule so that when you go to your pharmacist, they will give you a 30-day supply; that is it. After that, you have to get another prescription from your physician. Thirdly, there has been a change in the dispensing policy with the pharmacists so that we pay double in terms of the dispensing fee, as opposed to the number of times that your prescription is actually filled.
L. Stephens: Yes, those are some initiatives, but the problem is that the doctor keeps prescribing them. It doesn't matter what the pharmacist says, in effect. The doctor will keep prescribing, and that's the problem. Somehow we have to get to the doctors that are prescribing benzodiazepines day after day, week after week, month after month and year after year.
[1655]
This is a very large issue. About 20 percent of the senior men on the North Shore and 30 percent of the senior women on the North Shore were prescribed a benzodiazepine. These individuals continue to be medicated in this way. There are all kinds of other health problems that flow from that, particularly for senior people, who can fall and have trouble driving. There are all kinds of safety issues around it as well.
I wonder if the minister could perhaps look at this particular issue and give it a little bit more care and concern. It is serious; it is systemic, it appears. There does have to be a concerted effort made to address it and to change the way the doctors are prescribing these particular drugs.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Absolutely. I don't disagree with the member one bit in terms of trying to address the issue. I outlined some of the initiatives that are currently taking place. There are some others. The therapeutics initiative, for example, in terms of people who approve new drugs and the conditions that they can be used for, has recently tried to educate physicians on alternatives to treating some of the conditions you outlined -- anxiety, those sorts of things -- without using these particular drugs and has sent a newsletter out on that. Certainly if we need to do more, I'm prepared to look at ways of how we might accomplish that.
L. Stephens: In the whole area of addictions and dependencies, many of the groups and organizations that are women-serving organizations believe that there needs to be more of a fused approach to treatment as opposed to the sort of stovepipes that are now employed -- more of a unified approach for women. This is particularly true in the area of substance abuse, where women must be either/or. They must be either completely detoxed and stay that way or completely free of drugs and stay that way before they can get services for the issues that developed in the first place. It just seems that what they're doing is dropping out of treatment, because they can't stay clean. So there needs to be more flexibility. There needs to be more of a continuum for women to come into programs and remain there, to get the kind of counselling and support and medications that they need in order to build better lives.
I'd like to know whether or not there is a pilot project that is happening along that line -- whether or not the ministry is trying to deal with a more flexible arrangement for treatment, particularly for women who have perhaps dual addictions, perhaps mental health issues, drug and alcohol issues and children.
There's a lot of issues around women who have these kinds of concerns and have children. And what do they do with the children? They can't get treatment with their children. There is only one facility in the lower mainland where they can take their children, and that's up in the valley at Peardonville House. So we need to have some more resources around those issues, and we need to have some more attention paid to how we're going to deliver those services in Vancouver.
Hon. M. Farnworth: It's a complex issue that the member raises, and a significant part of the answers can come from the Ministry for Children and Families. But what I can tell the member in terms of our approach at Health is that we do support a harm reduction strategy in terms of dealing with treating addictions. We have a methadone advisory committee that advises Pharmacare on the services that are required. That committee consists of physicians and people who are using it, and it includes women on it as well, so that their input is part of the advice that's given.
[ Page 15843 ]
[1700]
In terms of mental health
L. Stephens: I wonder if the minister could talk about the mental health plan and what components of the mental health plan are geared specifically to women. I think the minister knows that many women who access the mental health services do have dual addictions. They self-medicate, or they don't take their medications. But there are other issues around
Hon. M. Farnworth: I'd like to make a couple of points. First, B.C.'s mental health plan is the first mental health plan of any province in Canada to recognize the need to move away from gender-neutral services and recognize that there are differences between men and women in mental health service utilization and also in key aspects of life experience. That can have a significant impact on mental illness.
There have been a number of projects that have been undertaken within the mental health umbrella to deal with some of the issues that women face in particular. We have done provincewide research projects on women-centred mental health care, development of treatment guidelines for women with mental illness during pregnancy and postpartum, and symposiums on the needs of parents with mental illness and children whose parents have mental illness, for example.
So there are a number of initiatives that have taken place and will continue to take place. As I said, the mental health plan is the first in the country to recognize the differences in terms of needs for women and men.
L. Stephens: The drug and alcohol services for adults are still with the Ministry of Health. I'd like to ask the minister: what amount of money has been set aside in this year's budget for drug and alcohol treatment services for women in the province?
Hon. M. Farnworth: It's all with Ministry for Children and Families -- both adult services and youth services.
L. Stephens: Perhaps the minister could comment on the sobering centre that the city of Vancouver has been looking for, for quite some time. Is the minister aware of that? What is the state of negotiations? Has it been complete? When will that sobering centre be up and running?
Hon. M. Farnworth: I am aware of the particular facility and part of the harm reduction strategy. As for the specifics around it, I will get the information and get back to the hon. member.
[1705]
L. Stephens: I just have a few more questions. One of them is around nurse practitioners. I know the critic for Health has talked at length about the needs of the people in the rural parts of British Columbia -- that certainly extends to women -- and the difficulty of keeping doctors and other medical personnel in some of the more rural and remote areas of the province. Could the minister tell me what the policy of the ministry is on nurse practitioners?
[T. Stevenson in the chair.]
Hon. M. Farnworth: The Health Professions Council is currently dealing with the issue and looking at all the different aspects around nurses and scope of practice. I myself have made some public statements which say that I think we need to see expanded scope of practice as opposed to restricted scope of practice. People should have the ability to work to the fullest opportunity that they are trained for. I think that speaks volumes about where I'm coming from on it.
L. Stephens: I will have to agree with the minister. I think that nurse practitioners have a major role to play in the rural and remote areas of the province. They've been used to great effect in other parts of the country; I'm sure that they would be here as well. Expanding their role is critical. There are many women in some of these areas who would prefer a nurse practitioner to travelling great distances, for instance, to get to see a doctor. Depending on what the nature of the illness was, a nurse practitioner, in my view, would be able to serve the patients quite well. That's an area that I would like to encourage the minister to work on with some vigour.
Part of the reason for that is the FAS problem that we have, particularly in the northern and the central parts of the province, and again, trying to find services for these kinds of issues, trying to provide counselling programs, educational programs on what happens if you drink during pregnancy
Hon. M. Farnworth: That particular program is under the Ministry for Children and Families, but we have a keen interest in it. We assist them at every possible opportunity in terms of this very important program.
L. Stephens: The federal people announced an $11 million initiative. Can the minister tell me that none of that money came to his ministry, that it all went to Children and Families? Does the Ministry of Health not have any input at all into FAS treatment and services in the province?
Hon. M. Farnworth: If there's money coming into a program from the federal government and there's $11 million in B.C., then we'd get it shared accordingly. If the program is in Children and Families, that's where it would go. It wouldn't come into this ministry.
That having been said, we recognize the importance of the program. We try to work with them as much as possible; this is clearly in the area of interest to us. We would assist them in any way that we can.
[1710]
L. Stephens: Well, let me just make this pitch to the minister. From what I've seen in the Ministry for Children and Families in their efforts around health issues, it's been less
[ Page 15844 ]
than adequate. That includes not just FAS but drug and alcohol treatment services and any other health-related issue that they undertake. I would encourage the minister to ask for those services back into his portfolio, because I think these are health issues, and they do belong in the health care ministry. They've certainly been looked after much better in the past in the Health ministry than they are in Ministry for Children and Families at the moment.
Home care is an issue that I know the minister is very familiar with; I'm sure everyone in the House has talked about this one today. I want to talk about it in terms of what it means to women, for in home care, women are the caregivers; many of them are the receivers of care. It's been said that the regionalization of health care is being done on the backs of women, because moving the services closer to home means that it's the woman usually in the home that does the looking after. This is impacting on a lot of women's lives.
I've had a number of callers in the constituency who have brought their spouses home from the hospital. They are frail; their spouse is frail. They don't know what they need to do, and they're fearful of a recurrence of the initial health problem. They are very apprehensive about looking after this particular individual and how they will ever get some help if anything goes wrong.
I'd like to ask the minister what he's doing around home care and, specifically, the impact that it has on women that are providing that care.
Hon. M. Farnworth: In response to the continuing-care review, the ministry has identified caregiver support as one of the key elements and one of a number of areas that require strengthening. That is one of the areas that will be focused on during the development of a comprehensive five-year strategy to renew continuing-care services.
I've said over the last few days that this is one of the key areas that we need to address, in terms of expanding and recognizing the funding requirements for home care and also the ability of home care to relieve some of the significant pressures that the current system faces. The ability of people to remain in their homes and receive appropriate treatment at home is far more desirable than to occupy acute care beds or long term care beds unnecessarily. Home care combines a number of facets, certainly in my mind. There's the home care and support in terms of nurses and physicians -- those sorts of things. But also in home support itself there's the ability to ensure that some basic levels of service that people require are able to be delivered.
This is very much one of the areas of interest between the provinces and certainly between British Columbia and the federal government. It is a key area of my talks with the federal minister in terms of developing a plan to see the restoration of federal government funds into health care. Incumbent upon that is a recognition that women play a significant role in both home care and home support. That needs to be recognized in those discussions and in any final agreement that results from the work that's being done by B.C., other provinces and the federal government.
[1715]
L. Stephens: Well, it needs to be more than just recognized. What I would like to see the minister do is to have some kind of an organization or a committee that studies this. I don't know if that's what he's contemplating or what kind of mechanism he's going to employ to reach some kind of plan to deal with this issue.
I know he knows that it's a significant one; it's probably the most important issue in health care today, aside from the continuing-care or long term care facilities and spaces that are required. But this one, for women
I just want to reiterate that the regionalization of health care and the so-called Closer to Home
The ones that the minister referenced as the paid caregivers, whose wages tend to be low, do give a valuable service. Those are issues that have to be addressed as well. The other area is the paid caregivers, and those are the female employees in the health care system. I think it's about 80 or 85 percent of the employees in the health care system who are women. I know that members of the House here have talked about that at length, as well, during this estimates process. With the nursing shortage and the levels of part-time work and the casualization of nursing services in this province, they are undergoing tremendous and huge pressures, as again I know the minister knows. These are women who need to have their issues addressed as well. So I'd like the minister's response on what he's going to do for the women in the system -- the paid caregivers.
Hon. M. Farnworth: I think there's a number of things we can point to that show how we have made some changes. One has been to recognize issues around pay equity within the health care system and to recognize that many of the positions that women were filling in the health care system were traditionally low-paying. There has been considerable effort and work in those areas around the issues that you raised, in terms of how we involve and ensure that women are part of the debate, the discussion, because I agree: it's not just a question of recognition. When I use that term, I mean that there has to be
I think there's a variety of ways in which we can ensure that women are participating, whether it's at the
[1720]
L. Stephens: The minister forgot himself. I'm sure he is keenly interested in women's issues in the health system as
[ Page 15845 ]
well. I know that the staff have been very forthcoming. Anytime I've asked questions, they've been very helpful. I'm sure that with all of us watching very closely to see how the issue around paid caregivers and unpaid caregivers unfolds, we will be making sure that the minister is well aware of the words that he's just said. With that, I thank you for your answers.
T. Nebbeling: Just a couple of words of introduction -- I will be speaking and asking questions related to issues in my riding. However, I would also like to make the point that the problems that I will identify and that have been ongoing problems for the minister are problems experienced in many communities. The impact of the problems that I will be talking about is negative not only on staff in hospitals, be they doctors, nurses or administrators, but on the patients as well. Ultimately, that is what drives us to ask questions: to see if we can make improvements that will benefit patients.
I'm talking about communities that have health facilities and, because of community growth or population growth, have fallen back in providing the service for the community due to lack of funding. This is not the first time I bring this issue to the floor. Every year I have been assured that the minister is aware of some of the problems created by the shortfall. At the same time, action that I'd hoped to see happen, because of some statement by the minister or an understanding by the minister of the problem, has often been lacking.
When I talk about the Squamish situation with the hospital, when I talk about the situation in Whistler with the Whistler diagnostic centre, when I talk about the health centre at Pemberton, I'm sure staff is fully aware of where I'm going to go with my questions today. The situation is such that because of the qualification of the facilities like in Whistler and Pemberton, funding is truly not reflective of the number of patients going through the system. The health council in the Sea to Sky corridor has brought this issue to the attention of the minister many times; I've brought it to the attention of the minister. Unfortunately, after years of finding some recognition for the very unique situation that Whistler and Pemberton are in, we haven't seen any action there.
So I'm going to ask some new questions that hopefully can lead to more recognition of what the problem is and how serious the problem is. Indeed something must happen. I was really pleased last year when the Premier made a statement about extra funding or more funding because of the additional money that was made available by the federal government for health care, for communities that are experiencing extraordinary growth. At that time I felt that most probably we should see some positive action that would deal with these diagnostic centres. Unfortunately I haven't seen any differences. I've heard more talk, but improvement in what's been happening in these two communities has not been noticed.
My first question to the minister is: can the minister tell me if indeed the thought process that the Premier had as far as channelling more money towards areas with excessive growth in the population
[1725]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I think one of the things it's fair to say is that, this has been part of the discussion for the last few days -- issues around funding formulas and moves to recognize high-growth areas and changing the funding formula accordingly. I have made a number of comments around that, about how we are moving in that direction and how there are
That having been said, I also think it's important that in the case of the Sea to Sky CHC where Whistler is located, there has been $900,000 in one-time funding that was provided in March to assist with cash flow difficulties. We recognize that the board is trying to address some issues. We are working closely with them and their CEO. It is receiving attention from the ministry.
T. Nebbeling: Before I go on to my next question, I would like to respond on two points that the minister makes.
First of all, the comment about population-based funding -- that is indeed what the diagnostic centres are. That's the principle of the formula that is used for the diagnostic centres. A community with 2,000 people gets X amount of money. You look at the annual visits to the clinic, and it covers it pretty well.
When we talk about these two communities that I've introduced, Whistler and Pemberton, and considering not only that Whistler, of course, services a community that has grown by 60 percent over last year and Pemberton by 70 percent but that on top of it we have millions of visitors, and a good portion of these visitors need treatment in the emergency service, none of that element is really considered for proper funding.
Having said that, I also want to make a point about the $900,000 that the minister just said was made available to the Sea to Sky community health council. The minister should be aware that not one penny of that money was really new money to initiate new programs; it was money to catch up with the debt -- the debt of Squamish General Hospital in particular. So the full $600,000 and the $300,000 that was made available went to the Squamish Hospital. I'm not saying that was totally wrong, because the Squamish hospital was in deficit. They were running behind, and staff can most likely inform the minister on the reasons why that hospital actually was running short of funds. It had to with former laws that didn't recognize activities that are taking place in the Squamish hospital -- for instance, surgery was not calculated as being part of the activity in the hospital at the time that last year's funding was established.
Having said that, I would like to go back to the consideration for Whistler and Pemberton and their excessive growth. It was the numbers of Statistics Canada that in 1996 -- it's now the year 2000 -- recognized that the communities of Whistler and Pemberton had growth of 60 and 70 percent. So far nothing has been done. I know there has been a lot of talk with staff, but I have not seen one statement that leads me to believe that at this point staff is considering steps to deal with the problem that I've identified -- the underfunding for these two diagnostic centres. So I'm asking the minister: can he tell me, failing any funding having come to these two diagnostic centres to deal with the problem, what is being done today to assist these centres?
[ Page 15846 ]
[1730]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I think it's worth repeating that there was $900,000 in one-time funding put into the region this year. That is significant. It does represent services provided; it does represent a recognition that there were significant services provided. Yes, the area is growing, and we acknowledge that -- so are a lot of other areas of the province. In terms of moving towards population-based funding, we have to look at what the impacts of that are going to be. The work is being done, and I've talked about that the last few days.
I also think it's important to recognize that we are working with the health authority itself to look exactly at what the run rates are, what the service levels are and what the actual hard numbers going through the door are. That will take into account a lot of the activity around the transitory population that exists in the Whistler-Pemberton area. There is considerable work being done. We're working very closely with the board and with the CEO to address these issues, and we will continue to do so.
T. Nebbeling: This is a five-year-old problem that for five years has been looked upon by staff, for five years has been discussed, for five years has been giving an impression
The $900,000 -- I'll say it one more time -- went to the health region, but it went exclusively to the Squamish hospital. That's where there were financial deficits; that's where they needed to put that money immediately to pay their debts. There was no relief for communities like Whistler; there was no relief for communities like Pemberton.
The minister keeps bringing back that they will be looking at population-based funding. The minister knows that the diagnostic centres are funded based purely on population, and that's the problem. If you have a population of 2,000 people, it's one thing. When you have to service up to 100 patients a day, it's another thing.
There is still denial by the minister on this particular issue, and he's trying to hide behind discussions with the administrator or the council there. It has led to nothing. The only thing it has led to is a deterioration of services, because if the money is not available, something somewhere will crack. That is the problem in the Sea to Sky corridor.
Another problem, of course, related to this whole issue -- and I hope the minister pays attention to this as well -- is the fact that of the patients going into the emergency ward at Whistler, one-third are from British Columbia. They are not from Whistler; they are from British Columbia. That represents thousands and thousands and thousands of patients every year. Can the minister maybe tell me what the compensation formula is for the Whistler diagnostic clinic providing health care to patients that come from outside the Sea to Sky corridor?
[1735]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I think it's worth recognizing that we have a global health care budget in the province, and we don't discriminate on the basis of where people are from. Yes, a lot of British Columbians travel to Whistler. A lot of British Columbians travel to Vancouver, to the Okanagan, to the Kootenays and to all over the province. They break arms and legs, and they are treated. That's part of the global budget. Those issues are the same from one end of the province to the other.
It's important to recognize that we are working with the health authority to address those issues. Yes, I understand the member wants a population-based funding formula; so does everybody else. But everybody else wants a population-based funding formula that meets the needs in their area. You may have a population-based funding formula in mind that addresses everything in your area to your satisfaction. It may be great, but it will have an impact in Richmond or in Comox or in Port Coquitlam or in other areas of the province. If we are going to make
Interjection.
Hon. M. Farnworth: Oh, it would. There's nothing wrong with that.
Interjection.
Hon. M. Farnworth: There's nothing wrong with that. But if we're going to move to a particular formula, you've got to know what the impacts are in every other health authority, every other community health council and every other CHS the province. It requires a great deal of work to do that. Plus, you want to bring them along in some sort of consensus. It's not a question of imposing something that people don't buy into, because then all you do is repeat the problem that the member says he's got in his particular area.
What you've got to do is identify what the impacts are of a particular funding formula, what the ramifications are in the different health authorities, what the negative impacts are, if any, and then figure out a way to deal with them. In a lot of areas we are moving to that already. In terms of marginal funding and increases that have taken place, that is already taking into account significant recognition of the differences in population, based on a population formula.
We are sitting down with the health authority to recognize what's actually taking place in that particular region -- looking at, for example, the run rates, the service levels and the input that's happening. We recognized that in Whistler there are some challenges. So $900,000 was put in at the beginning of March. That $900,000 in one-time funding went to address services that were provided last year. Let's look at what that represents. On a base budget of $7.7 million, that is more than 10 percent put into that particular area. That is a significant amount of money.
We are moving in the direction the member wants to go, but it's not going to happen overnight. You can't impose something. You have to, when you do it, be prepared to transition, and it will take a few years to do that. You have to be prepared to address the impacts that occur in other parts of the system. It's like the classic case of the waterbed. If you push down here, there is a reaction over there or over there. If you don't recognize that and don't deal with it, you're going to have problems.
T. Nebbeling: Well, quite frankly, the minister is just showing me that he's a great student. He hasn't been a minis-
[ Page 15847 ]
ter for long, but, man, he's taking it with hook, line and sinker. That's exactly what I heard a year ago, it's exactly what I heard two years ago, and it is exactly what I heard three years ago. There is nothing new in your answer, Mr. Minister.
I would like to ask the minister if he's aware of the programs that have been introduced in the Squamish hospital, which two years ago were not there. I would like to hear from the minister if the minister is aware of what percentage of patients are actually getting surgery done in Squamish and what percentage are still having to go to Vancouver because it is not available in Squamish for the Whistler patient. Can the minister please answer these questions?
Hon. M. Farnworth: You know, hon. member, sometimes the answers may be the same because the information is accurate. It may be because the issue that needs to be resolved is one that isn't resolved overnight and requires a great deal of work in order to make it happen. What has been outlined is a series of steps that have been underway to move in the direction that you want us to go in. That work is taking place. But as we keep saying, it doesn't happen overnight.
With regards to the type of services that are provided, whether they're in Squamish or Pemberton or Whistler, as much as I may know a lot of things, I can't tell you the specific number of patients were in this hospital as compared to that hospital. I'm more than happy to get you that particular information.
But I can tell you that one of the crucial factors in determining the services that are provided in any particular facility relates to the area which the health authority serves and the critical mass that's required to support a particular level of service. You have a core level of services that are probably available provincewide and can be found in any community. However, from that you build on a base of specialized services, which require a larger population base to support the health care practitioners that can treat those particular types of injuries. Then on top of that you have specialties on top of specialties, which require an even larger population base to deliver a particular type of service. You come to the point where you have services that are so specialized and so unique that you need either an entire province or an entire country to support the one or two individuals that are capable of supplying that particular service. That is a function of health care not only in British Columbia but in Alberta, in Manitoba and right across this country -- and indeed right across North America.
So all those things come into play in the ability to provide service and different levels of service. There is a lot of work that's being done -- perhaps not as fast as the member wants it to be done, but it is taking place.
[1740]
T. Nebbeling: Well, I've noticed a trend in the way this minister is answering the questions. Every time he doesn't know the answer, he makes a longer speech. I asked two questions. I didn't get any answers. If the minister doesn't know the answer, then just say no, and I can go on.
The minister is obviously not familiar with the facts of what's happening over there. I can tell the minister that only 5 percent of Whistler patients can actually find treatment in Squamish, and 95 percent have to go for surgery to Vancouver. So don't tell me that it is a healthy situation that way. That's one of the problems.
The $900,000 that stayed in Squamish is based on the fact that last year they introduced in Squamish surgeries that were previously not available, like caesareans or hernias. For that they had additional cost. They had to bring in an additional surgeon; they had to bring in an anaesthetist. That's why Squamish ran out of money -- because, in part, it was the government that asked Squamish to do these types of things. I'm not saying that it is wrong that Squamish got the additional funding. They had spent the money already, before they received it. This was an emergency bailout; this was not an additional grant. This was to bail out for costs that were related to new initiatives in Squamish that came, in part, by request of the government.
I don't think I'm going to get much further with the minister on this particular issue. He will come back telling me about the $900,000. He will come back telling me that things don't move fast. Well, this whole issue is going slower than cooked spaghetti being pushed up a hill.
I will now ask a question that the minister indicated he has got an answer to. He has indicated there has been a series of steps taken to deal with the problem. Would the minister share that series of steps that he has taken to deal with the problem?
[1745]
Hon. M. Farnworth: I must admit I do find it surprising that the hon. member would get up and criticize what he said was a long answer, when I was trying to explain to him the complexities of the situation, and then launch into a long sort of tirade himself. I guess brevity is not his strong suit either. Anyway, there is a lot of work that is being done, and I look forward to sharing with the member the concrete examples that are being done.
Noting the hour, I move the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.
Motion approved.
The House resumed; the Speaker in the chair.
Committee of Supply B, having reported progress, was granted leave to sit again.
Committee of Supply A, having reported progress and resolutions, was granted leave to sit again.
Hon. D. Lovick: I would wish all members a safe journey to their constituencies, a pleasant respite from our duties here and a healthy and happy time away.
With that, I move that the House at its rising stand adjourned until 2 o'clock on Monday, May 29, 2000.
Hon. D. Lovick moved adjournment of the House.
Motion approved.
The House adjourned at 5:49 p.m.
PROCEEDINGS IN THE
DOUGLAS FIR ROOM
The House in Committee of Supply A; D. Streifel in the chair.
[ Page 15848 ]
The committee met at 2:43 p.m.
ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF ADVANCED
EDUCATION, TRAINING AND TECHNOLOGY
AND MINISTRY RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUTH
(continued)
On vote 11: ministry operations, $1,682,444,000 (continued).
D. Symons: We did have a few questions hanging over the lunch-hour break there, relating to the scheduling of the project. I was asking how far behind the original schedule Bombardier was in relation to the construction of the tunnel portion, their work on the guideway and any station work that Bombardier is involved in. So there should be three separate, distinct things on where they are now in relation to what schedule was set a year ago.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: So the member's question is only regarding Bombardier. Bombardier isn't involved in any contracts for tunnel guideway or stations.
D. Symons: Maybe I should have asked the question a little differently, but we'll leave that for a moment. I did ask also whether there was a problem with the interfacing of the design manuals between Bombardier and the Rapid Transit Project office. Will those dovetail together, or was there a problem where there are going to have to be some adjustments made?
[1445]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The Bombardier design manual and the RTP design manual are documents that serve different purposes. The Bombardier design manual is a design-construction interface manual. It outlines the requirements for interface with the civil works. The RTP design manual is a document that outlines civil construction standards. In many cases the RTP design manual requires tighter tolerances than are required in the Bombardier design manual, thus providing an additional safety factor.
D. Symons: About a year ago the minister responsible for transit at that time had said that the first section of the line would be in operation by the end of this particular calendar year. Four months later that date was changed to the fall of 2001; it was changed to about eight months beyond what the original statement was. Can you tell me what the projected date to begin service now is, and what the projected date for the full Broadway-Lougheed-New Westminster line will be?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: First we should distinguish between the point at which construction may be complete and the point at which it's operational or in service. For the in-service dates, the new line through New Westminster should be running by late 2001. That section would be from New Westminster to Braid. New Westminster to Braid is what we're looking at, and then from there into Broadway and Commercial by the summer of 2002, and finally to VCC in late 2002.
D. Symons: Thank you. I think we can leave that.
I'm wondering if the minister can give me any indication that they have a signed agreement -- not the negotiators' agreement but indeed a signed final agreement -- between the Rapid Transit Project office and TransLink.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I think what the member is referring to is the cost-sharing agreement between the province and TransLink. There was a negotiators' agreement, and then what we had to do was have the final legal agreement. We are very, very close to that and expect an announcement any time now.
D. Symons: I gather that on March 28, GVTA had signed the agreement but the province had not signed on at that time. Is that correct?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: That was TransLink business, but as I understand it, what they were dealing with was board approval of the negotiators' agreement, not the final legal agreement.
D. Symons: I thought the negotiators' agreement was well before that time, but I might be wrong on that, and you can correct me. I'll move on to the next, because I have a thing back in summer of last year that talked about that.
I wonder if we can go on to some of the agreements that we have here, one of them being the HCL agreement on administration. In one of the program management plans of September '99 there is a reference to the fact that there are basically some difficulties here. In a number of the documents it refers to allowances for wage increases. I'm wondering if you might explain what that refers to.
[1450]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I'll do my best to answer that question in terms of what I think the member's looking for. Direct responsibility for HCL falls under the Minister of Transportation and Highways, because it falls under the B.C. Transportation Financing Authority. Having said that, HCL did sign a contract, I'm informed, with their subtrades that they would include a wage increase. Our budget for RTP took this into account.
D. Symons: I'm raising the issue again from a Rapid Transit Project 2000 office paper on the program management plan. That issue came up there, so I think it's fair game here. Can you give me an idea of what the total cost of that wage increase was from RTP's viewpoint, and what budget line these increases come from? Where do they show up in the financing?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The labour costs of this project will show up in a number of areas. They'll show up contract by contract. It's the full labour amount. What happens is that the contractor and HCL work together to put a bid to RTP on a given contract. We don't see the amount of any wage increases or what have you; we just see labour as a component of their contract bid.
D. Symons: I gather that the wages are not paid through the contractor, though, but paid through HCL. So I'm surprised that you wouldn't be able to know that particular answer.
Just two remaining questions, one for the Highways ministry
[ Page 15849 ]
I wonder if you would have a similar one now that's between HCL and the Rapid Transit Project office. There should be a contract, I would think.
I see the CEO nodding in a "no" direction there. I find it difficult, if you've turned over the labour component of this to HCL management, that there's not a contract that you are a part of.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: We're not party to a collective agreement, because we're not the employer. The employer would be the contractor, so the contractors will be in a collective agreement with HCL. Our contractual relationship is only with the contractors for the provision of services. That includes a labour component, but we don't have employees on those contracts; those are employees of the contractors. I should make it clear as well
[1455]
D. Symons: Well, I suppose, to the good offices of the Rapid Transit Project office, they could get me a copy of the contract. I'm assuming that would be quite possible to do.
I find that HCL -- and you may have answered the question here in your answer -- charges administration fees. I would assume, then, that will again go back to the contractors rather than the Rapid Transit Project office. So we will skip over that very quickly, then.
I have some other questions here which maybe you can pass on to HCL as well. I have a document here that is HCL's; it is relating to the SkyTrain project. If I might just ask your indulgence in finding
In the middle of page 2 there's a safety officer's report that gives the contractor first aid, medical aid and lost time due to accidents occurring on the site. Unfortunately, none of the figures are there, just the blocked-in thing. If we might be able to get the safety record, no doubt those figures are filled in now. It indicates here that the information was not available at report time. I suspect by now that would be available. So it's page 2 of the weekly HCL report ending April 29, 2000.
There's one other item further along in here, which is basically all the appendages that go with that. This is the labour report for May 4, 2000, from HCL -- the weekly labour relations report. They have, toward the end of this agreement, a number of appendages. They have listed the HCL grievances. I note grievances No. 17 and No. 18 both relate to SAR. In the eagerness to sever information, they don't even mention that it's SAR there, but you can quickly figure that out from other things in the diagram. As you can see, everything about which union it was, what the complaint was about and so forth and the final result of how it was resolved is totally blank. Again, if I could have some more information on some of the missing information in that
The Chair: Excuse me, member. Order for a moment, member.
I question whether or not labour relations under this is in the direct responsibility of the minister's office. I would suggest that it's out of order for examination in estimates if the minister does not administer that collective agreement.
D. Symons: Again, not to differ with the Chair, but this is information. They're the project managers; they own the project. This is happening on the project they own. So I think it would be fair game to ask. If they care not to give the information because of the Chair's direction, that's fine. But again, you won't have that stuff there, I suspect, and I would expect it at some future time.
The Chair: Member, I'll try a question myself of the minister and his staff -- whether or not they administer the collective agreement. If they do, then it's open for examination; if they do not, then it's not open for examination in these estimates. Minister?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I think the Chair is correct, so what I would suggest is this. HCL does not come within my purview. Certainly I'll ask my staff, in the vein of being helpful -- not under any legislative duty, but just being helpful -- to review the points you've raised in the Hansard and to see if they can't, through some contact with HCL, get information for you. But it really isn't something that I'm in a position to respond to as minister responsible.
[1500]
D. Symons: We will get back into project progress reports, August 19, 1999. That is SkyTrain, so it's in the purview of the minister. If we go on to
I'm wondering, particularly
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The reason that those appear as cancelled is because, while they were originally anticipated to be separate contracts and RTP did initial design work, rather than being put out as separate contracts, they were incorporated into the SAR guideway contract.
D. Symons: If we can skip on to the progress report on October of '99, I'm looking further into it. Figure 2.5 has the status of contract reserves and cash allowances for the reporting period September 30, 1999. You can see that I'm rather short of information there; there is absolutely none, including the headings, let alone the figures that are below them. So again, if I could have either a reason why you felt that this information should not be shared or a commitment that you can get that information
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The reason that information is severed is because the contract reserves, of course, are not part of the contract; they aren't known to the contractor. It wouldn't be appropriate for the contractor to know; that would be a poor business practice. Otherwise what will happen is that contractors may very well look for ways to try and squeeze more money out of the reserve, rather than working within the original contract. We need to keep that number confidential in order that we can maintain a good bargaining
[ Page 15850 ]
position with those contractors and protect the interests of the taxpayer.
D. Symons: In other words, the minister is saying that there is a cushion there in case something comes up. You're not going to let them know what that cushion is, because they might want to dip into it. I'm just curious. Indeed, if the question isn't as big as concerned, how are you going to manage to deal with it, then?
I rather suspect that in many of these cases you're going to find that, because of changes, because of delays and so forth, you're going to have a lot of charges or challenges, I guess from the contractor that: "Indeed you owe us more money, beyond what the contract was for, because of these particular change orders or delay from the contract. We weren't able to do what we'd contracted to do, because you weren't ready. Or the previous section of this line wasn't ready at the time for us to do it." Does it make much difference whether you keep that information secret or not? They're going to put the claim in regardless of whether they know there's a reserve there or not.
[1505]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: It doesn't make sense in terms of any negotiating that you may be involved in to let the party with whom you may be negotiating know what your bottom line is and know what you have available to put on the table. I know. Of course, I'm privy to this information. I have been briefed on the state of contract reserves. I know that the contract reserves are dipped into. In the case of some contracts there's nothing gone; in others there's a fair amount gone; in others there's very little. It varies from contract to contract. It depends on the nature of the work being done and the contractor that we're dealing with. But it does not make sense to reveal to the contractor exactly what's in the reserve, or they will invariably put in a
I don't know enough about how contractors operate. Maybe it is the case that they invariably put in claims anyway. But at least, if we do it this way, they're going to put their claims in, in the dark, so to speak, rather than knowing how much is in the reserve that they can try and leverage out of the project.
D. Symons: I won't wave the page in front of you again, but I would suggest that it would be like waving a red flag in front of myself or people who have an interest in this, when you even have the headings at the top of it blanked out as well. When you leave the whole thing blank, of course that makes people begin to think: Well, what are they hiding? Besides hiding the numbers that the minister's referred to, you've hidden absolutely everything. That, of course, raises people's interest. You might be a little careful in how you hide things so that you don't create the questions that I'm asking.
If we can move on a little bit, I'm looking at the progress report of November '99 also: "
You have an agreement with Burlington Northern in the New Westminster area. I'm wondering if you can just give me a very quick thumbnail sketch of what the agreement was with Burlington Northern regarding the lands in the New Westminster area.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: There are two elements to the agreement with Burlington Northern in New Westminster. The first is design and construction, which comes down to what was being constructed and where it was going. There had to be agreement from Burlington Northern on that. Secondly, there was the issue of land: getting access to Burlington Northern land and having to pay to purchase a right-of-way. I've asked staff about the cost of that, and they don't have it here. But if the member wants to know, I don't think there's a problem with revealing that.
D. Symons: That was my next question: what are the financial impacts or ramifications of that, or other agreements of a similar nature, for the Rapid Transit Project office? And involved with that and possibly any other areas on the route that you're taking, could you tell me if there are any other provincial organizations besides the Rapid Transit Project office that are involved in making agreements over land and other issues relating to the Rapid Transit Project office? Is it just the Rapid Transit Project office that is dealing with people like Burlington Northern or other landowners along there? Or are there also provincial lands involved in this as well?
[1510]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: Perhaps the member could just nod for me as to which is the correct understanding of his question. Does the member mean to ask if there are any provincial agencies which own land along the line that we have to deal with? The answer to that is no.
D. Symons: Going back to Burlington Northern, there are some other lands involved in Burnaby itself, as we get over toward Boundary, and I guess all the way along the cut, as well, where Burlington Northern has property that is going to be used by the Rapid Transit Project office. Can you tell me the status of negotiations with Burlington Northern on those lands?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: Those negotiations are complete.
D. Symons: I would gather that within a month or so your line, as it's moving along the Lougheed Highway, is going to come very close to some of those lands as you get toward Boundary, for putting the pillars up. You're telling me that at this stage we're that close to needing access to land, and you have no agreement with them. I'm amazed that you would leave things to this state of time, because it certainly seems to put the other party in control.
We had the same thing happen when the West Coast Express was built, as far as dealing with the CPR, you know. Once they know you are dependent upon them, it gives them a stronger negotiating point; they know they've got you up against the wall. That seems to be the case here.
I remember a Premier we had a few years back -- in fact, only a year ago -- that had a reputation for attacking people and then expecting some cooperation. I read in yesterday's Province that "SkyTrain Chief Slams U.S. Rail Giant." It seems that we're going to be doing the same thing here. If you're going to hammer away at them, I don't know if you're going to get a very agreeable person sitting across the table from you to negotiate this difference that you have or this concern you have over the lands that they have every right to.
The Chair: Before I recognize the minister, I'm going to remind the committee members to direct their questions and their debate through the Chair, please.
[ Page 15851 ]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I also was concerned when I read that in the paper. I have received assurances from Ms. Stewart that what happened was that there was a private meeting, and there was no understanding or any media in attendance.
The fact is that Burlington Northern is a massive, massive corporation. The primary problem in terms of any briefings I've had about this has been getting their attention. They're a large corporation headquartered in Texas.
What we have to do now
[1515]
D. Symons: I thank the minister for that answer. Again the minister can see from my demeanour and asking questions and so forth I think cooperation is much more conducive to getting responses and getting somewhere than it is to simply bash away at them, although occasionally I might deviate from that.
Another issue I have relates to the November 1999 progress report. On page 5 of that, section 2.5.2 talks about potential changes. I know the answer the minister will give. "The status, potential changes of the three major contracts is as follows
So I'm wondering if I might have a filling-in of those particular blanks, as they have occurred and are no longer subject to future happenings -- indeed, the future has occurred. The same is true of the cash allowances that occur right below that particular chart on page 5 -- just a question of whether you can supply that information as the need for secrecy disappears.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: If there's information that's being severed and it's no longer necessary for it to be severed to protect any sort of business interest of RTP, then I don't see any problem at all with releasing information. I'd just suggest that maybe the member make a specific request of RTP. If there are problems, he can certainly contact my office here directly. The only reason that information is severed is to make sure that we're not compromised in our contractual relationships. If that risk has passed, then of course the information should be made available.
D. Symons: I have found in the past, however, that some things are severed where the reasons for severing have long passed. Although we got the information recently, they seem to be working on old information as far as the fact that the requirement through section 17 is long past.
The information I passed over to you a moment ago is also from the November '99 project report. I'm looking at the graph on the left-hand side, which is the budget for the project, and I'm finding that the first column there, which is direct costs, is at $917.3 million. I find, however, that if we go back to September and look at the budget costs there, it's a number that's $75 million less than this one in November. Between August and November that direct cost budget thing has got considerably higher, so I'm wondering if you can tell me why that has occurred.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: Perhaps the member could clarify whether he's looking at a chart that relates to all projects or just the Millennium Line.
D. Symons: You'll have to tell me what these are. It's your report.
[1520]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: That figure goes beyond just the Millennium Line. So when we cite a figure of $1.167 billion, that's the Millennium Line only. This includes the costs of two other studies: the one is from VCC west, and the other one is Lougheed Mall to Coquitlam. Those two studies are at a cost of $8 million. It also includes $1.7 million for negotiations. It includes $94 million for systems upgrades. It's worth noting that the $94 million for systems upgrades is recoverable from TransLink as each piece of the line opens.
D. Symons: Again on that chart, since you have it in front of you: if we look at the left-hand side, the budget, we have it broken down into "direct," "indirect" and "other costs." I suspect in the original one they were colours, so they showed up a little better. Would it be correct to say that we can add those three numbers together -- the direct, the indirect and the other costs -- to get the total project costs? I think I see some affirmative on that.
If we can just skip next to it and look at the "cost to date," if you can tell me a little bit on the "cost to date" compared to "commitments to date," do the commitments to date include the costs? Or are the costs what's spent, and the commitments are what you have not yet paid for? So if you can answer all of that, please
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The member referred, first of all, to the left-hand side of that chart. Yes, that does represent total project cost, but it's important to recognize that that goes beyond the Millennium Line -- right? As far as commitments to date, the commitments to date do include costs to date.
D. Symons: Basically, then, if we took the two right-hand columns -- the centre one and the right-hand -- and projected that $399.9 million or $400 million over to the other one, we could say: "Well, there's $400 million of these direct costs that have been spent, and the other $334 million are ones that are under the commitment but not yet
Just carrying on, then, with these reports, if we can move into December of 1999 -- and we are getting closer to current times, you can see here I'm noting that on December 1999, page 7, you have a quality management section. Partway down it says: "
[ Page 15852 ]
[1525]
Can you give me an idea of non-conformance, whether there are penalties involved with non-conformance and whether it depends
Hon. G. Bowbrick: There have not been any penalties assessed to date. Really, these are more a tool of management, I should say, not a punishment. The way the process works is that it may involve site inspections, for example. If there's a defect found in some of the work being done, there will be a report. Corrective action will be recommended; a due date will be set for it. The task to oversee that completion will be assigned to someone. The reports and inspections are conducted by independent professionals.
D. Symons: Just an aside here: I notice that on that same page, at the bottom of page 7, it talks about Burlington Northern. It says: "Access to lands was on the critical path of guideway construction by SAR Transit." Considering that this is the December progress report, certainly if it was critical in December and we're now in May, it's even more so. I know that the minister mentioned earlier that he'd even go down to Dallas if he has to; that might become a necessity.
Can we move into January? There are contract reserves. The minister has answered that one, so I'll skip over that. We do have some figures in here, actually. I note that the Bombardier E and M contract was for $890,000 there. I'm wondering, since you have that down here under status of contract reserves, whether indeed that contract is under some sort of negotiation for changes.
[1530]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I'm not sure what the member's referring to. Certainly we can take a look at it and try and get him an answer.
Just to back up a moment, a moment ago the member made a reference to the need for access and to concluding an agreement with Burlington Northern being on the critical path in the November report. That was with regard to New Westminster lands. It's not the same problem we're facing with Burlington Northern now; that's already been resolved.
D. Symons: I'm glad to hear that, because if it was critical then, it certainly would, as I said earlier, have a problem.
It's on page 19 that I was asking about, in your January 2000. I'll leave that for the moment and expect that possibly you can explain it at some later date. In January, I see that the critical path issue came up again. So we'll leave that.
Progress report for February 2000. There's a line in a financial document, "Rapid Transit Project 2000 Limited Statement of Cash Flows, Unaudited, January 31, 2000." I'm looking down under financing. There's a line referred to as "Increase in lien holdbacks." I'm wondering � if the minister might give me a little bit of explanation as to what it means by increase in lien holdbacks.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: Perhaps the member could pass the document over. We could take a look at it and be better able to answer the question.
D. Symons: There's also a line in here: "Deferred startup costs." You'll see they're both highlighted.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: It's standard to have a lien holdback in every contract; that's pretty much standard business practice. The reason that figure was increasing is because there were more contracts; therefore there were more lien holdbacks.
D. Symons: In contracts with suppliers, which is a little different than labour element suppliers of equipment, apparently there have been delays, and in some cases considerable delays, without explanation for them from SAR primarily in paying their bills. I'm wondering that as project managers, as RTPO is, you would allow your prime contractor to hold up payments to suppliers of equipment. . . .
I can think of one instance here where there was $750,000, which isn't a large number in the scheme of the project you're doing, but for a company that has four or five employees, that's a huge amount of money to be owed for over 150 days. I gather now that the bill has been paid. Nevertheless, the fact that it went on for 150 days, from the time the bill was submitted to the time they received payment
What is the project office doing in this relationship to see that SAR does not continue this process of holding up payments to its suppliers?
[1535]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: RTP staff have met with SAR on a monthly basis for several months now to address this issue. Each month they receive a statutory declaration from SAR that they've paid their suppliers up to the month previous and within the terms and conditions of the contracts they have with their suppliers and subcontractors. RTP has now received an undertaking from SAR that by the end of this month they will be completely up-to-date with any outstanding accounts.
D. Symons: Good. I should say, through the Chair, that I thank you. I think it's the suppliers, really, that would thank you for that answer. So on their behalf, I will thank you for taking care of that situation. It has been a real concern to a couple of firms.
I asked quite a long time ago about the business plan for the Rapid Transit Project. I gather that in one of your documents I got an answer back, the business plan directing Rapid Transit Project 2000, made up of three documents: project requirements definition, program management plan, and program management procedures and guidelines document.
You know, you put those three together, and you still don't have what's referred to as a business plan. I'm wondering if you do indeed have a business plan or a business case analysis or something of that sort. Those three do not make up what any business person would refer to as a business plan. If that's available, I would be very pleased to have a copy.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I could read aloud into the record right now, but I think I'm just going to stick to answering the member's question as briefly as possible. On May 8 of this year the business plan was issued. The member referred to the need for a business case analysis; I believe that was his concern. The project description includes a multiple-account analysis. It's our view that that's essentially the same as doing a business case analysis on a government capital project. So that's included.
[ Page 15853 ]
Certainly if the member wants to pursue it, I'd be happy to read into the record everything off a couple of pages that we believe amounts to the business plan.
[1540]
D. Symons: I think we'll probably differ a little bit on the definition of business plan, but for the moment, anyway, I don't think it's of interest to go into that here.
I'm wondering if we can look at the operation management agreement with Bombardier. I believe that has not yet been a signed document, other than a memorandum of understanding. What is the status of negotiations with respect to that agreement with Bombardier? Secondly, what are the qualifications of the financial risks if the agreement is not signed?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: Those negotiations, because the contract won't be between the province or RTP and Bombardier, if they're concluded -- it's between TransLink
The member asked what the risk was to the province. This is the risk: Bombardier has built their Centre for Advanced Transit Systems where they're building the new SkyTrain cars in south Burnaby; it's just about to be opened. If there isn't an O and M agreement concluded between TransLink and Bombardier, then Bombardier does have the right to sell the centre to the province; that's the risk.
D. Symons: I suppose we could word it slightly differently: the province has the obligation to buy it from Bombardier. Maybe it ends up being the same, one way or the other. The province would be on the hook for that. I believe we passed the date, theoretically, where Bombardier could then exercise that option. Have there been any discussions relating to that?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: No. The condition upon which this risk would be eliminated -- the condition that would have to be met -- is the conclusion of the operations and maintenance agreement or contract between Bombardier and TransLink.
I should point out as well that the language is not that the province is obligated to buy the centre. It's that Bombardier has the right to sell it to the province; there's a slight distinction. I don't want to dance on the head of a pin here, but the point is that Bombardier believes that they can in fact have success marketing their product in Asia. They're not just building this centre in order to build cars for British Columbia. They're hoping that it becomes a longer-term concern for them.
D. Symons: I'm just moving on quickly to ask for more information, so this won't need a response. I'm after some figures that I find in the Rapid Transit Project 2000 Ltd. performance plan. There's mention of quarterly financial audits by KPMG and also the annual financial statement -- I think KPMG prepares that as well -- and quarterly project reviews. I'm wondering if I just might be on the mailing list, so to speak, for those particular items as they come up. That will just be a request, and I'll leave that at that. I don't think that is relevant right now.
[1545]
Next, I'm looking at the provincial budget books, and there's a table H9 that's referred to as the "Provincial Net Debt Summary." I think I asked this earlier in the day, relating to transit. But you can you just confirm
Could you just confirm that the SkyTrain extension is different than the Rapid Transit Project office? Why the two separations in there? One comes under "Provincial government direct: Capital financing purposes." The other one is under "Economic development Crown corporations and agencies," for the Rapid Transit one.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The reason that those two items are treated separately is that under the heading "SkyTrain extension," which is the figure that appears in direct government debt, that's $491 million in prepaid capital advances, which are for the Millennium Line. That will end up being, and is, direct government debt.
The figure of $101 million under the RTP 2000 heading is money that is advanced to purchase cars, as well as to pay for the systems upgrades which I referred to earlier. They're called fiscal agency loans, and they're all repayable by TransLink. So that won't ultimately be direct government debt, because TransLink will be repaying that money.
I should just add
D. Symons: I thank the minister for that. I found, looking in the web site, sometimes things are a month or two behind the dates that they're issued. If you get your web site up to snuff, I will use the web site. Otherwise, I'd appreciate getting a copy when they come out, and we'll see which I get first. Thank you very much.
Just going back to contingency funds, I have in front of me the September '99 figure for the Vancouver Community College to New Westminster corridor studies, "Cash flow requirements." Down in the list of these, the contingency for this particular report, the total in millions is $106.2 million. Yet I find that there tends to be some contradiction, because in other documents you find the contingency budget is $80 million. That's in the appendix 2.1 of the same report. This is appendix 1.7 that has the $106 million. I'm wondering what the discrepancy
[1550]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: What I believe the member is referring to is
[ Page 15854 ]
document -- would've brought the figure down to $80 million. It would be a little lower now, because there have been further allocations. But
D. Symons: Ballpark figures are fine there. Again, I seem to be doing a lot, because we only have certain documents to work from. In September '99 you had originally, under your original and current budget projects there
Hon. G. Bowbrick: What happened was that the project office, in an abundance of caution and being conservative, forecast
D. Symons: I am a little disappointed in that answer, because I was hoping you'd be able to give me some way that I might save as much on my PST payments. But unfortunately, I guess I have to overestimate, and that really wouldn't help my bottom line very much.
I also notice in that same document I keep referring to that there are payments to B.C. Hydro in '99-2000 of $8.5 million and in 2000-2001 of $6.5 million. What line in the budget will these payments to Hydro come from? What are the reasons for the payments to Hydro, and how much money was paid to Hydro in the past fiscal year?
[1555]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: Where that should appear is in the guideway budget. The outlay is for utility relocation, and when it comes to utility relocation, you pay the utility to do it. As for the actual costs in the past fiscal year, we'll try to get that for you; we don't have it right now.
D. Symons: That's fine. I had forgotten about the reason the minister gave and can see that's quite logical, then. There is one other thing here that I'd like to know about in the Rapid Transit Project 2000. In September again, there's mention of a revised agency agreement with B.C. Transit. I'm wondering what a revised agency agreement is.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The agency agreement
We had some legal advice prior to the changes in the agreement that the agency agreement wasn't as tight as it could be, so it was tightened up. That's the reason for the revision in that agreement.
If one wants a little bit of the history of why we had to have such an agreement, it was because, with the transfer of responsibilities to TransLink, B.C. Transit no longer had an operating mandate within the lower mainland. So what we've done is continued to use their mandate around capital with an agency agreement for RTP to be able to build a major capital project.
D. Symons: Since there may not have been authority for expropriation given to RTP, it sounds like maybe there was a little bit of an oversight in part of putting RTP together -- for that not to happen. You seem to be basically doing it through the back door, using another agency to do the expropriation. At least that's how I read the answer you gave. Unless I'm totally wrong on that, we'll leave it at that.
I did get a letter back from the Rapid Transit Project office on April 28, and I apologize to Mr. Eastman for indicating I hadn't got it. I found it in all my papers that he had responded. I did get another letter -- thank you -- when I said I hadn't got it. I got it along with some other information I asked for more recently. If you will tell Mr. Eastman that I did have his letter, found it
[P. Calendino in the chair.]
It's very nice. His letter tells me: "After negotiating with a low bidder, Dominion Construction, the Rapid Transit Project office awarded a project to them in value of $7.9 million." I had asked the CEO of the Rapid Transit Project to maybe give me information the way Highways does, where they show all the bids down. And it was very nice, because I got something on that Sapperton one, and it lists the tendered price for the three unsuccessful bidders.
[1600]
It did not list, however, the tendered price for the successful bidder. All it says is what the contract was awarded to, and there can be quite a distinction between the contract award and the tendered price. It seems from Mr. Eastman's letter here that basically you did some negotiation. He was the low bidder, all right. We're not telling you the number he bid, mind you, but we worked with them, redesigned the contract or something or other to get it down to the figure we were willing to pay, which seemed to be $7.9 million. I'll re-ask my question: can you tell me Dominion Construction's tendered price?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I'll tell you what my instincts are on this. My instincts are to say: "Yes, you can have that." I'm receiving advice right now that we should check into this, because what happens is that we take the low bid in many of these contracts, and frankly, we drive them down further, which I think is good news. But there may be some sensitivity on the part of some contractors, for whatever reason. I don't understand that.
At this point I'm not going to make a commitment to give you that. I'm telling you that my instincts are that I would like to, but I'll await further advice as to what excellent reason there must be why I can't do that. If there is no good reason, then I think it should be made available.
D. Symons: I guess it will depend upon who decides what a good reason is.
I'll give you my reading of the situation. We find that the three unsuccessful bidders are all in the range of $9.5 million, and I'm suspecting that Dominion Construction will not be
[ Page 15855 ]
that far off that particular figure -- certainly not $1.5 million less than that. That percentage difference is going to be quite unusual, I would suspect, in a bid of this type.
I'm suspecting that Dominion Construction may indeed be the low bidder, but not that low -- besides the fact that you talked them down to a lower price. I doubt whether a contractor could survive by taking that much of a hit in order to keep the contract. What must have been involved in that talking is some redesigning, some changing of the scope of the contract that the low bidder had bid on. Maybe the minister can tell me I'm totally wrong on that -- that they indeed all bid on the same project, that the tendered award was for the same price as the actual tendered price and that the contract award was for exactly the same project -- that there had been no changes to the project.
[1605]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: On this station there was no scope reduction; there wasn't any. Certainly we would reserve the right to change scope, if that's how we keep this project on budget overall. On this station that isn't what occurred.
What happened here was that every bidder came in over what our engineer's estimate was, so we took the low bidder and worked with the low bidder. We did a post-closing value engineering analysis. We were able to work with the low bidder to find ways to do the work more efficiently. That station is very complex. It's being built in an area that's very busy in terms of the roads. It's got railways going underneath it; it's got the riverbank right near by. So it's a very complex site.
We were able to work with the low bidder in that case to bring down the price through working out more efficiencies in the way they did their work without reducing the scope of that particular contract.
D. Symons: It's interesting that you managed to get a 12 percent reduction, roughly, on the value of the contract. That's pretty good. If I'm building something, I'm going to bring you along.
The Rapid Transit Project office, of course, claims that it's on budget. I think the time line has changed somewhat, so on time -- not quite so, according to the original ones. That's entirely their fault. Anyway, I think you will frequently find that there were extra costs that contractors are incurring because of contract changes, because of ground conditions that were unknown at the time, because of change orders, because indeed we have had delays and some concerns that those delays have cost factors attached to them.
So to date, how many change orders or additions have been made that are going to add to the cost or have the potential of adding to the cost of the project? Can you give me an idea of what the potential is? Maybe you'll be able to negotiate with them. So far, what's the potential for cost increases because of the fact that we've had either change orders or delays -- and changes, for that reason, to costs -- or even additions to the project?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: For the member's information, there are 428 contracts. So in order to generate a list of change orders, it would be volumes, probably. It would be a very, very long list, so we don't have the number of change orders here.
[1610]
It is worth noting that every month, RTP goes through the contracts to identify any potential for increased costs to the contracts, so they do that on a monthly basis. I think it's worth focusing on the three main contracts -- the guideway contract, the E and M contract and the tunnel contract. Those are the major contracts where, if there is going to be an overrun, it's going to be significant. There are hundreds of other contracts that are far less significant.
As far as the delay goes, and any increased costs associated with that, there were a number of claims made, and they're very close to all being resolved now. We have healthy contingency reserves on the various contracts.
D. Symons: Just another request -- because I have requested these before and have yet to receive them -- and then I want to get into another question. So I can do this quickly, all at once, before I let another member in here.
I have requested the reports by Henry Wakabayashi and Wendell Cox on studies they had done. I have seen portions of the Cox one; I've not seen Mr. Wakabayashi's or Pacific Liacon's report. I notice Mr. Wakabayashi is receiving an Order of British Columbia later this month. I will be most interested in reading something he has done, since he's become that noted.
Just back to something that has been resolved, but I think it relates to my earlier question, where I was asking -- and you've dealt with it, I'm glad to hear -- about the fact that certain suppliers are not receiving payment. Certainly it seems to tie in to a contract or general conditions for conventional construction contracts that were being used -- or were attempted to be used -- on the station construction by the Rapid Transit Project office.
In the contract, it stated:
This has generally been referred to as a "we'll pay you when we pay you" type of agreement. I know that is no longer in effect, because basically the contractors banded together and said: "We simply are not going to bid under the conditions you have." And that was just one of a number of items within this particular one."Notwithstanding any other provision of the contract, the obligation of the owner to pay money to the contractor under the contract is subject to receipt by owner" -- the Rapid Transit Project office -- "from the province of British Columbia sufficient funds to make the required payment to contractor. If the owner fails to receive sufficient funds from the province of British Columbia to make payment when due to the contractor under the contract, owner's obligation to make payment will be suspended until owner receives sufficient funds to make such payment."
But I think it shows a mindset to basically hold people in a rather precarious position in dealing with the Rapid Transit Project office. I suspect by starting off with something like that, you've done yourself more damage than good, in people having faith in the good faith of the company. Certainly this last thing, in dealing with people not being paid and supplies, would help to reinforce that.
I wonder what the Rapid Transit Project office is doing to sort of clean up its image with people that are doing business on the SkyTrain project. Both that and the lack of payment on time, I think, are things that go around the community very quickly and don't do you any good in the long run.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I'm going back and dealing with each point the member raised. The Wakabayashi report is a
[ Page 15856 ]
Treasury Board report. I've asked if we can get it, but I'm told that the request has to go straight to Treasury Board. My staff will be following these proceedings in my office, and I'll see if that's something we can get released from Treasury Board.
[1615]
The member refers to SAR, and we shouldn't be mixing up these issues. The problem with SAR had nothing to do with RTP. RTP paid SAR; SAR wasn't paying its subcontractors. So that isn't a matter of whether the government is withholding money from RTP.
D. Symons: But you wear it, in a sense.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: It's fair enough for the member to say that we'll wear it, but I think it's important that we have accuracy here.
On the final point, the provision the member refers to is something that comes directly out of the Financial Administration Act. The RTP worked with small operators who felt most vulnerable as a result of this and removed the provision, by working with the Attorney General to get agreement that this kind of provision could be removed. It's a standard provision in these types of contracts. But, listening to and being responsive to the smaller businesses, in particular, who felt most vulnerable, RTP worked with the Attorney General to remove that provision.
I guess the point is that it may not have looked great -- and I can understand their concern -- but at the end of the day, we listened and responded.
C. Clark: I have a few quick questions. As the minister knows, the project is a very important project in my riding. It affects a lot of people. The minister was talking about the impact on small business. I'd like specifically to refer to the businesses along Spring Street, which will be affected by a potential station location in Port Moody. I'd be interested to know what the Rapid Transit Project office has done to consult with those small businesses to ensure that their businesses will be minimally impacted by any station location.
Hon. G. Bowbrick: What RTP has done is sent letters to every small business along the line. They've followed up with phone calls to those businesses and asked if any of those businesses wanted follow-up meetings. They met with anyone who wanted a meeting as a result of those phone calls. They've also met several times with the local chamber of commerce.
The concerns of the businesses in question relate to one particular option for a station. At this point it's not clear that that will be the chosen option. RTP is looking for the input of the city of Port Moody to see if they have a recommendation as to which option should be chosen. If that option should be chosen, then RTP has made a commitment to work with those businesses to deal with questions of mitigation of impact as much as possible.
C. Clark: Yeah, the minister pointed out that this is a particular problem for
The last time that this happened they notified the government, and the government responded by modifying its plans. What they're seeking through me today is an assurance that the government is going to be prepared to modify its plans. Should the government decide on the one station location that's going to most impact them, is the government going to be willing to make the same kinds of changes to mitigate the problems that they did with the West Coast Express development?
[1620]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I have a project manager sitting to my left who modestly pointed out that it's the same excellent project manager who was there from West Coast Express, who helped resolve the situation then. It sounds like she's very committed to try and make sure we resolve the situation now. I think the most important thing is that they have seen from experience in dealing with us that we'll work in good faith on this; we've done it in the past. We'll continue to work in good faith.
Can I make a commitment today? I don't even know what modifications they want. I can't make that commitment here today. The fundamental bottom line is to keep this thing on budget, but within those confines I would certainly encourage RTP to do everything they can to be accommodating.
C. Clark: The other bottom line for all these small business owners is that they'd all be bankrupted by government decisions -- right? I mean, these people have invested their life's dreams and all their money in these places. For the government to come along with a stroke of the pen and say, "We decide that we don't feel like accommodating you," is a real potential fear that they have. So I think they're quite legitimate in raising it.
The reason that they have raised it is because, while I know they were accommodated last time after much comment from them
So in addition to the comments that the minister has made, would he also clarify for the owners of this company that it is going to be the RTPO that will be ultimately responsible for making these modifications and that if his business is impacted, it's the RTPO and the minister responsible that he will go to, to seek some kind of mitigation?
[1625]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: At the end of the day, RTPO is building the station and therefore will take lead responsibility, clearly, for doing any mitigation work. I think the point of the correspondence is this: what we'd like to see is local decision-making. So the city of Port Moody can make a choice about the options before it in terms of a station location. I think the point would have been that if they have concerns about this
[ Page 15857 ]
particular option, since the city of Port Moody is going to be a key player in making that decision, they should talk to the city of Port Moody as well about their concerns. But if that's the chosen option, then RTP will absolutely work with them to do whatever mitigation we can.
C. Clark: On another issue that I have
But one of the issues that was raised by the citizens was the issue of a buffer zone policy and providing some kind of compensation for properties that aren't directly impacted but are adjacent to the SkyTrain portals and whatever. I understand that that is not explicit in the Expropriation Act, but citizens have been advised on an individual basis -- they tell me -- by representatives of the RTPO that that is going to be part of the expropriation policy that's pursued, ultimately, when we get to that stage of the process. Could the minister confirm that for me or maybe elaborate on that for me?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: You know, it's always easier to give answers that people would like to hear, but I can't do that here, I don't think. Now, I haven't seen the correspondence, but I'm advised that what's being requested in the correspondence from some of the residents goes beyond the Expropriation Act and goes beyond the mandate of this project. There would be implications.
I'm also advised -- and I may be wrong -- that this is more of a lifestyle issue. It's not a direct physical impact situation necessarily, in terms of a line running across someone's property or anything like that. It's about being a few houses away or a number of houses away and feeling that having the SkyTrain running nearby reduces the quality of life and that there should be compensation for that. That isn't the way our Expropriation Act works. That's not the way it's ever worked. To change that principle now would have enormous ramifications for every public project in the province from here forward, clearly.
Certainly I understand where the member's coming from. I had to deal with this in New Westminster myself, with Fraserview residents. The argument that was being put to me at Fraserview was that if their property value declined, were we going to pay for the difference? And the answer is no. That's not the way any major capital project in the history of this province, by a government of any stripe, has operated.
[1630]
I regret that, and my commitment is that we do everything we can to mitigate. In New Westminster, with Fraserview, we did take mitigation measures. There's a new waterfront park going in there, and I hope that will be sufficient. But in this case I can't commit to that. I can only commit to an ongoing commitment to trying to mitigate as much as possible, but I can't say for sure that we would go beyond the terms of the act.
C. Clark: Well, the minister wouldn't have to -- I don't think -- necessarily use the act in applying a policy of compensating property owners. There's a line that you can draw -- right? There's the issue that perhaps your view might be obstructed, and then there's the issue that, well, you're next door to a big hole coming out of the side of a mountain, which is a little bit different -- right? It's a little more immediate issue and a little bit bigger impact on your enjoyment of your own personal property. And what I'd suggest to the minister is that in order to avoid setting a precedent by expanding the scope of the Expropriation Act, which I can appreciate, the RTPO or the minister could certainly apply a broader policy without using the act at all. Is that something that the minister would consider?
Hon. G. Bowbrick: I take it that when the member refers to a hole coming out the side of the mountain, she's referring to Seaview in her constituency. I want the member to know that within just a few weeks of being appointed to this portfolio, I had heard the concerns being raised at Seaview. I went down quietly one day with two of my staff, and I actually walked around the neighbourhood. I had them tell me about the various options, where the portal would be. I do know that all of the options on the table are doable, and there are options that are far less intrusive than others.
It may be, in the final analysis, that an option is chosen which has nothing to do with a hole in the side of a mountain beside someone's house. I hope that will be the case. I hope that an option will be chosen that's most beneficial and has least impact on those residents.
As for whether I could go beyond the act, well, I understand I can go beyond the act. I don't have to seek amendments to the Expropriation Act to do something. It would set a political precedent. Beyond that, there would be expectations created for the future, so I would be extremely careful about that.
Let me just say this. I don't want to close the door on this. All along the line so far, we've sought creative ways to deal with residents' concerns. There is no policy around creating waterfront parks in New Westminster. We went ahead and did that. We did it in cooperation with the city, in that case, and with TransLink and the region, and we did it out of the municipal improvement fund. There may be other opportunities for mitigation in a neighbourhood like that out of the municipal improvement fund. I think it's a little premature at this point to be talking about Expropriation Act-style compensation when we haven't even chosen the options yet. We're still awaiting community feedback on what the options that are to be chosen should be.
C. Clark: All right. The other area I'd like to just quickly canvass is the issue of devolving the political responsibility, if you will, for the portion of the SkyTrain line between Lougheed Mall and Coquitlam Centre to TransLink. The frustration that citizens have is that they go to the RTPO or to the provincial government or to TransLink with a complaint. Depending on who they go to, they get a different answer about who's responsible. So there's lots of pointing going on, saying: "Well, you go talk to the other guy. I'm not responsible."
It seems to me that a good way to resolve that, because this portion of the line is, in reality, going to be mostly financed by the GVTA
[ Page 15858 ]
RTPO -- not by any stretch of the imagination. I don't think there is even the expertise out there in British Columbia to have another RTPO office, and God knows, we don't want the added cost.
What I am suggesting is that at the political level, when citizens have a concern, they want to know where the buck stops. For this portion of the line the buck should stop with the GVTA, given that they're the political body that's providing the vast majority of the funding.
[1635]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The member can tell her constituents that when it comes to construction of SkyTrain, the buck stops with me -- okay? So if there are concerns around construction or the process that's being undertaken right now, ultimately we are the lead. There's a number of reasons for that, which I think are fairly good reasons. The province advances all of the funds for this until the year 2005 or until the date of revenue service on that line, whichever is later. We are advancing all of that money right now.
In addition to that, the projected cost of this line is $730 million. It's true that TransLink is paying the bulk of that; they're paying $650 million. To understand how that's structured, by the way, it was a question of cost-sharing the entire T-line, or in this case what they decided was to let the province pay for the L-line, as we call it -- the Millennium Line itself -- and then they would pay the majority of the Coquitlam line. Under the cost-sharing agreement, the province takes all risk for anything over $650 million. We have $80 million committed, but if that project starts going way over budget, the province eats it. If we're taking the financial risk, we have to be the lead on it.
I understand the frustration of residents who get pushed back and forth. If they have questions around SkyTrain operations and what that will look like, then that's clearly TransLink -- right? If they have questions about the construction, the process for consultation during construction and planning and design and all of that, there are obviously other players involved. The city of Port Moody would be one, the city of Coquitlam; Burnaby is on that line. They're all people that should be accessed, and they should try to exert influence there. But at the end of the day, I'm responsible.
C. Clark: With that, I thank the minister and his staff for being so helpful. I will table the letter and the photographs from Vega Manufacturing, a refrigerated- and dry-showcases company on Spring Street in Port Moody.
D. Symons: I have a very short question. First, I would like to thank the staff. Many of the questions I have down here that I will not get to involve the stations -- Sapperton, Lougheed Mall, the one in Port Moody we've just been asked about, Coquitlam, and so forth. We did get some answers at the briefing, and I would thank them for the opportunity to ask them there, if not here.
The one last question which I'm pushed to ask -- and then give the other critic an opportunity to get up today -- relates to the problems that now seem to be occurring around the Burlington Northern cut and the change of the alignment in the Broadway-VCC vicinity, moving it down onto the False Creek Flats, and the concerns people have raised. There has been a change in the alignment at this time.
I'm curious whether that changed alignment will open up the problems of environmental assessment again. Now that you've got a different line than where it was proposed -- got the ending in a different place, anyway -- will that necessitate some more environmental assessments of that particular portion of the line? Has that environmental assessment already been done, or will you now be undertaking it?
[1640]
Hon. G. Bowbrick: The federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans is the lead agency with whom we deal when it comes to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency. We have been in contact with them since this new alignment occurred. They've agreed there are no new triggers, as they call them, which would trigger further review. We've agreed to supply them with additional information.
In fact, I'm informed it's their view that this change results in a positive benefit. There is less construction impact with this option as opposed to a tunnel, which would have affected a creek as well as a park. Then beyond that there are all kinds of measures that we'll take in terms of dealing with environmental issues in the cut. Some work has already been done east of Commercial to look at vegetation and animal life. What they've found, just for the information of the member, is that there's a lot of blackberry bushes. They found the most predominant mammals are squirrels, moles and rats.
We'll continue that work west of Commercial around environmental impact mitigation. But when it comes to CEAA, they've indicated through DFO that they're not concerned right now.
D. Symons: Having a great love of blackberries, I certainly hope you're not going to hurt those blackberry bushes, and I will stick up for them. It's my placard out there with the others. That brings us into an agricultural point, where I have my Agriculture critic who's been nipping at my heels to end up this particular questioning.
I would thank the minister. I have a lot of other things I'd love to ask, but I thank the minister and his staff for spending this time with me.
The Chair: If we can have some order, I'll call the motion on vote 11.
[1645]
Vote 11 approved.
Vote 12: Information, Science and Technology Agency, $39,733,000 -- approved.
Vote 13: Public Transit, $180,516,000 -- approved.
The Chair: Okay. We'll call a short recess to change the guards here. We'll resume in about ten minutes.
The committee recessed from 4:46 p.m. to 4:53 p.m.
[P. Calendino in the chair.]
ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE,
FOOD AND FISHERIES AND MINISTRY
RESPONSIBLE FOR RURAL DEVELOPMENT
Hon. C. Evans: I note that I'm offered a period of time up to 30 minutes to make an opening statement. I'm going try to come in considerably under that limit.
[ Page 15859 ]
The Minister of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries and Minister Responsible for Rural Development is a new title which I'm very pleased to represent. We have added the Fisheries ministry to our portfolio since last year, bringing the ministries of Agriculture and Fisheries together. We have added the B.C. Assets and Lands Corporation and the Open Learning Agency.
All those tools fit together, because what we're really trying to do is to fundamentally change the way government works in a meaningful way and to bring the resources to bear to allow communities to choose their own futures and achieve self-determination and diversification. We are building a system of long-term and community-driven economic development that looks at the resource side and the people, not just one at the expense of the other. We're trying to help people to stay in the communities they live in, to make a decent living where they live and to continue to learn and determine their own future.
[1655]
The budget was increased by $10 million this year. That will be invested in building industry and self-sufficiency and developing sustainable growth. In addition, the increase to the ministry's budget will allow us to access something over $8 million of additional federal money flowing from the new federal-provincial safety net agreement, which I know that the hon. critic understands since he was involved in its negotiation.
The key objectives of the ministry are industry development, developing value-added initiatives in competitiveness and investment in job creation -- essentially developing viability and resource management which supports land stewardship programs, to make sure that the productivity of the land within the ALR remains stable or increases every year and is not depleted.
Our partners and clients in the industry and in rural communities have responded to the initiatives of recent years in ways which I think most of us -- most of the people listening to us and most of the people that we represent -- can barely comprehend. We're used to hearing the story of agriculture being in a jam. Commodities that experience price collapse or weather disaster make news; good news doesn't. It is poorly understood by the citizens of the province that we produced the highest net cash income ever in British Columbia agriculture last year. Our net cash income was up 24 percent -- or $87 million -- over the year before and was 53 percent above the 1994-1998 five-year average.
One of our main goals in the next year in terms of industry development is to put in place a more equitable share of federal safety net dollars -- that was the result of our recent negotiations -- and to use that money to move toward self-reliance and diversified economic growth for all people.
Our goals for this year are to make certain that we make efficient use of the ministry itself and of all the resources at our disposal, that we continue to cut red tape -- I'm really quite proud of the initiatives, which we can get into later, that we've accomplished in recent years to decrease the amount of paperwork -- and that we continue to improve and adapt the risk management programs to make effective use of risk management money.
Every year that I've had this portfolio, we have essentially re-engineered the safety net system -- crop insurance, NISA and what we first called our disaster program and now call the federal-provincial disaster program -- to make it work for increasing numbers of producers and to increase the percentage of producers that participate. We're moving very rapidly, I'd say, toward a day where just about everybody in the business is in some form engaged in self-directed risk management. We've also re-engineered the programs toward crops or varieties that make money. You're well aware of the replant program and the changes we've made there over the years. This year, I think, we'll actually have the vegetable industry covered by crop insurance. I think we're making it work.
[D. Streifel in the chair.]
We're trying to move toward a stable funding relationship. I talked about it in the House the other day. It was a big subject of conversation in the standing committee's deliberations, and in my travels in Canada, it seems to me that agriculture grows where farm organizations are assured of some annual funding to represent farmers.
We're also moving quickly toward developing niche markets -- small-lot agriculture, agroforestry, organics, greenhouse vegetable production and all kinds of production that ten years ago people might not have thought of as farming. It's happening, and it's assisting us to drive the industry.
I'm sure we can get into the specifics of all that the ministry does, in the hon. members' questions. But I just want to touch on the addition to the ministry of B.C. Assets and Land Corporation, because I'm sure that the hon. critic is interested in how it comes to be that we've added Crown land and Crown tenuring capacity to the Ministry of Agriculture. I am quite thrilled with this change. It means moving the idea of the management of Crown land and Crown tenure away from the Ministry of Finance, where it perhaps had an equity relationship to government, to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, where it has a job creation, community development, economic relationship to government.
We are moving as fast as we can with shellfish agriculture, with finfish agriculture and with back-country recreation to use the people's access and ownership of the land to benefit the communities who actually live there, as opposed to necessarily the Crown.
[1700]
Not everybody is engaged in that same way of thinking. I would use the example of Oyster River and UBC's decision to close their historical research presence on Vancouver Island as an example. If land is not used by the institutions that control it on behalf of the community, it tends to become either a tool for the driving-down of local people's aspirations or, at bare minimum, a vacuum. We are trying, with BCAL, to turn some of those things around.
I could list the achievements of the last year, including: the safety-net agreement; tremendous achievements of the Partnership Committee on Agriculture and the Environment; the $16 million that we paid out in the disaster program, primarily for tree fruits, hog and grain last year; the $27 million that we announced for stage 2 of replant, aiming the fruit industry towards viability; a five-year agreement with 4-H; really enhancing Buy B.C. by getting it on television, increasing its budget and aiming it toward food as health; the
[ Page 15860 ]
first farm bylaw under the Farm Practices Protection Act, really a model for other provinces. We are trying to use the power of governance to say that not only is the land protected but the people's farming on the land.
We changed labour standards in the last year, at the request of farmers, to make less paperwork and to make things easier and to make labour standards match the way we actually work.
We addressed forest ingrowth in the East Kootenay Trench, which for those of you who don't live there might not seem like an agriculture issue. But essentially, we're growing trees on the grassland -- the grassland being the most threatened ecosystem in British Columbia. It isn't really giant trees; it's actually the grass that was here before we came and that ranching depends upon. This ministry is now working with the ministries of Forests and Environment to address that question.
We have agriculture advisory committees now up and running in Surrey and Delta. You can read in the newspaper that they don't work every day, but we are moving toward developing a relationship with the municipalities, which we hope will become more supportive toward farming in the future. It certainly didn't work in the days when the province and municipalities and farmers were not in the same room.
In the Fisheries part of the portfolio, I guess the story is that we're moving away from the fight -- as the hon. Chair will know, since last year he stood up and answered these questions. This ministry used to be in struggle, essentially, over salmon policy, licensing policy and area licensing and the like with the federal government. In recent years, under the stewardship of the previous minister, it's been aimed toward diversification into different species and into different ways of doing business.
It's very odd. Just like agriculture, you now have a situation where the people outside this building -- the people reading the newspapers -- assume that the fishing industry is in decline, when in fact the number of jobs and the gross income continue to rise. It's in transition rather than decline, and we're trying to use BCAL, tenuring, shellfish aquaculture and all the things that we can do -- let the record say the minister was motioning up in this -- to try to drive the industry toward profitability.
[1705]
In terms of federal-provincial relations, I've met twice now with the federal Minister of Fisheries and several times with the federal Minister of Agriculture. I find our working relationship with those gentlemen to be excellent much improved since the old days of the Mifflin fight. I think that assisted us in getting the federal government to agree to appoint people to Fisheries Renewal for the very first time in the last few months and the province agreeing to appoint people to the federal government's various boards -- economic or conservation boards -- so that the two governments can get along better in future.
I've already explained about B.C. Assets and Land Corporation in general and the new emphasis on attempting to make this the Ministry for Rural Development. But I'll say that British Columbia is not the first province to come to the realization that the Ministry of Agriculture is the correct ministry to act as advocate for rural people elsewhere in Canada. That has been a trend in three or four other provinces throughout the nineties. I think the reason is that the Ministry of Agriculture traditionally, in all provinces, has less of a regulatory or enforcing or policing relationship with the people than it does as an advocate -- working to try to help people achieve their dreams and in recognition of the two economies in British Columbia and the fact that you can't really run urban and rural economies from one point of view.
This ministry is now going to try to be an advocate in government for rural people in general. It doesn't mean that we've created another bureaucracy; there are five people working on rural development. But what we're trying to do is to use those five people and the good offices of the ministries to access programs and ideas and tools that exist in other ministries to deliver empowerment to rural areas whether it means land or water tenure to high-tech development in communities where it might not have existed before.
The same with the OLA. It might seem odd to people that the Open Learning Agency and the Knowledge Network, traditionally housed in the Ministry of Advanced Education, would move to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Rural Development. To me it's a recognition on the Premier's part that wisdom -- knowledge, training, change -- is the human component of the new economy in the rural area. There has been, I think unfortunately, the mistaken idea that the new economy is an urban economy, and if you want to participate, you should move to Richmond. We are hoping to work with the Open Learning Agency to make sure that that wisdom is delivered through their 13 learning centres around the province and, by virtue of their electronic capacity and their agreements with colleges and universities, to people wherever they live to do work that they might aspire to.
Hon. Chair, that completes what might have been a much longer speech about the activities of this ministry in the past year and in the future. I'm thrilled to have the job. I'm thrilled by the achievements we've accomplished in the last year and even in recent months. But even more so, I'm really excited about where we're going and the way that partnership works.
I want to make one final comment through the Chair, as we start, to the critic opposite. The hon. member knows that the other day his leader stood up across the street, just three days ago, and said to farm leadership that my relationship with the federal government was so broken that I had to take the hon. member with me to Ottawa in order to achieve a dialogue with the federal government. I am offended -- as you might imagine, hon. member -- by such a statement. I would remind the hon. member that I have always believed that the government is only as good as the opposition and that British Columbia should be represented by all of its points of view when we meet the federal government, because they tend to ignore us.
My desire to work with the critic for Agriculture on the federal level predates even the present Leader of the Opposition. I would like to find out -- before we start, before I know what kinds of answers to give -- whether the hon. member agrees with his leader's representation that without his presence there, we couldn't have a dialogue with the federal government. It's always been my belief that we work best -- in Agriculture at least -- in partnership. If that opinion on my part is going to be used for partisan advantage, then I'm going to change my opinion as of now, and the relationship will follow. That concludes my comments.
[ Page 15861 ]
[1710]
B. Barisoff: First of all, I would like to make some comments about Agriculture Day and what takes place in the province of British Columbia, and then I'll go back to that statement later on in my comments.
I'd first like to comment that in British Columbia, we have a diverse agriculture community, whether it's the grain producing in the Peace River or the fruit producing or the grape and wine industry in the Okanagan or the fruit industry -- actually, in the minister's part of the riding -- or the dairy farmers and the berry farmers and the hothouse industry in the Fraser Valley and the complete diversification of all facets of agriculture on Vancouver Island.
I think that over time we've been able to work together in accomplishing a lot of goals in the province to make things happen. I commend the minister on the fact that we have been able to work together and to make things happen. From my standpoint, and I know from a lot of my caucus members' standpoints -- in fact, all our caucus members' standpoints -- the rural part of the province is the part that seems to be left out in the greatest fashion.
With that, we have to look at the broader picture of what happens and how things work and where we go with things that are happening. I know the B.C. Agriculture Day that the B.C. Ag Council brought forward and put together was a great accomplishment, for all of British Columbia and, in particular, the members of this Legislature to see the different parts of agriculture and what took place. I think they have lobbied and done well to bring a lot of concerns to all parts of agriculture.
As far as the comments that were made by my Leader of the Opposition, I think that comments like that
In all fairness, over the years we've tried to keep agriculture as non-partisan as possible, and we've certainly done that with the Select Standing Committee on Agriculture. It's one of the areas that I think we have grown. We've accomplished a lot, and I think we're going to accomplish a lot. We're going to make a lot of things happen because of the non-partisan nature that has taken place. We will certainly be working in that direction for all facets of agriculture in British Columbia -- it doesn't matter which riding or which part of the province it happens to be in. I know that when it comes to provincial-federal relationships, there'll be some specific questions we will be asking in those particular areas as we progress through the estimates.
With that, I'd like to basically congratulate the farmers of British Columbia on the effort that they've been putting forward to make things happen, to make British Columbia a better place to live. It's a struggle for all of them, what they're going through. As I mentioned in my speech in the House on Agriculture Day, you see it in the struggle with the grain farmers in the Peace River and the struggle with the fruit growers in the Okanagan, in the chicken industry on Vancouver Island that has created some problems and in the positive areas too -- the wine industry, the greenhouse industry.
[1715]
What I'd like to do in specifics is go through the different areas. I would hope that in a lot of the areas that we'll touch on, some of them will be repetitive. We hope that a lot of them won't be -- that we won't have to take as much time as we've had to do in the past -- simply because of the fact that the select standing committee will be dealing with a lot of the areas that we'll be touching on.
I thank the minister for his comments. Again, I ask him if he would take that up with the opposition leader, and we can go from there. With that, I'd like to get started.
I'm going to work from the Agriculture and Food performance plan book. The first section is: "Market and product development initiatives
The first key strategy is one of the areas here: "Provide market information, advice on farm management, production, direct farm marketing, pest management, small-lot agriculture and herd health to producers
Hon. C. Evans: We have responsibilities to see to it that animals kept for production in British Columbia don't get sick, and one of the things we do is try and keep them healthy in the first place. We have responsibility to keep records on outbreaks of disease and to assist producers to come up with management techniques that keep animals healthy. That's what herd health is.
On the larger question of the hon. member's suggestion that I take up my concerns with the Leader of the Opposition, I'm happy to do that. I would ask that somebody go get him, and we'll deal with it now.
G. Farrell-Collins: In response to the minister's comments, he's in government; we're in opposition. We ask the questions, and the minister can choose to answer
The Chair: Do you have a question, hon. member, on vote 14?
G. Farrell-Collins: Mr. Chairman, I'm responding to comments made by the minister on vote 14. If they weren't out of order on vote 14 when he said them, then they can't possibly be when I am.
The Chair: Member, you've been in the House long enough to know
G. Farrell-Collins: So have you.
The Chair: It's not appropriate to argue with the Chair. Withdraw that comment, hon. member.
G. Farrell-Collins: I'm not going to withdraw it.
The Chair: Withdraw the comment, hon. member.
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G. Farrell-Collins: Which comment do you want me to withdraw?
The Chair: Member, order. Take your seat, hon. member.
It becomes increasingly difficult to manage debate in committee if the members are going to argue with the Chair. I asked the member to withdraw the comment.
G. Farrell-Collins: You're impossible.
The Chair: Then
G. Farrell-Collins: Can you tell me why you didn't rule his stuff out of order and you rule mine out of order? Get a sense of fairness and balance. I knew you'd be a disaster in here, and you are.
A Voice: There's an argument between the member and the Chair.
G. Farrell-Collins: Because your ruling was unbelievably unfair, that's why.
Interjection.
G. Farrell-Collins: Will you tell him what the question was? The question came from the minister, not the opposition.
[1720]
Interjection.
G. Farrell-Collins: Neither did the comment by the minister. Figure out how to do the job or give it up.
Hon. C. Evans: If it makes it easier for the member, we could both withdraw. I got to say what I thought.
G. Farrell-Collins: You go ahead.
Hon. C. Evans: Hon. Chair
Interjections.
The Chair: The hon. member should
G. Farrell-Collins: The Chair leaves me with absolutely no choice. The fact of the matter is that in his second comment, the minister raised the issue again, in response to a question after opening statements. He raised the issue again. I rose to respond to that issue and was immediately called to order by the Chair. Now, if I was out of order in responding to a question from the minister, then certainly the question raised by the minister was out of order. If he wants to withdraw his comment, I'll withdraw my comment.
Hon. C. Evans: I withdraw. Pass on my message -- okay?
G. Farrell-Collins: Then I'll withdraw my comment, and we can get to what the purpose really is for these estimates.
The Chair: That ends the matter, members. Thank you very much.
The member for Okanagan-Boundary on vote 14.
B. Barisoff: Moving on to industrial development, one of the next key strategies was including first nations with agricultural lands. Can the minister indicate to me what he means by that?
Hon. C. Evans: A real failing of this ministry for a really long time has been to assist first nations to use the agricultural land that they control. For example, we have no first nations people on staff, at least not that I have met. We are attempting to move quite rapidly, as you know. Everywhere from the Fraser Valley to the wine country there is reserve land. It's now growing poplar; it's growing grapes. It's on lease. There are cattle operations happening.
But I think the ministry really needs to make up for lost time. We've not really made any efforts in the past, and we have an interest in trying to accelerate agricultural production on first nation land -- with participation of first nation people.
J. Wilson: Going back one point here and dealing with the herd health issue, if we may, is the minister stating that the ministry is simply going to be in a position of providing information to producers on herd health? Or is the ministry actually getting into the business of herd health-related fields, where they would come in and practise herd health, which is in the veterinary profession? I don't believe it lies anywhere else. If that's the case, is there then going to be an additional cost associated here?
[1725]
Hon. C. Evans: It's primarily the former, of course, but we have one of the most respected veterinary labs in Canada, as the hon. member will know. Its function is primarily to provide assistance but also to do research when people need additional assistance with information. We have no intention of taking over the veterinary industry or even the good-practices role of producers themselves.
B. Barisoff: Just further along that same page, the minister's got the target sectors to include dairy, genetics, beef in northern B.C., poultry products, canola and fine seed, nursery, agroforestry, horse breeding, bison, game, greenhouse vegetables. It goes on and on and on. I'm just wondering why the ministry picked those particular ones. Is there a reason behind that? Is it for industrial development, or is it just a broad brush to sweep across everything?
Hon. C. Evans: Well, some of them are chosen in the target sectors as what the staff around the province see as growth opportunities. Some of them are strategies aimed at maintaining the market strength that we already have. It is in no way intended to be a list of what we think is important.
B. Barisoff: I was just wondering; I would think that there was a broader list than that. Moving down to the next section -- and in fear of mentioning anything about federal -- just the access to federal research funding, can the minister indicate to me where that access is going to come from?
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Hon. C. Evans: The federal government puts lots of money -- millions and millions of dollars -- into research around Canada every year. It might not be a surprise to the hon. member that we think British Columbia perhaps doesn't quite get its share. So one of the things we want to do is develop a relationship with the federal government that allows more of that research money to come to British Columbia.
B. Barisoff: I noticed that one of the performance measures indicates increased federal funding secured through liaison through the appropriate federal agencies. Have you got a list of those federal agencies that would be the ones that you would get funding from?
Hon. C. Evans: We can provide the hon. member with a list. I don't have it with me.
B. Barisoff: Further on, to the bottom of the page here: "Minimize regulation and promote investment in B.C. agriculture." I know that's one of the comments that is made throughout the performance manual here. I'm just wondering how the minister would be looking at what regulations he might be minimizing and what kind of investment we are promoting.
Hon. C. Evans: The minimized regulation part of the question really runs across the broad spectrum of government. Just within issues that I think we've discussed here in previous years, there's a need for the Ministry of Health to make it easier for people to sell their goods, to process their goods and to get inspection. There's a need to bring municipal, provincial and federal inspection, all of which impact sometimes on the processing sector, together so that there's not duplication. There's a need for the taxing capacity of government to see to it that farm tools are all legitimately part of the list. Every single year we try and add more.
[1730]
I think the hon. member knows that there are broad discussions going on with a standing committee and also internally in the ministry about how you assess farmland. We're trying to make it more business-friendly. There's tremendous work going on at the Agricultural Land Commission to try to make agritourism and on-farm marketing and some segments of processing easier on farmland. Those are just three or four subjects off the top of my head.
We have made real growth, for example, in labour standards. We've managed to give agriculture different hours per week -- or every two weeks -- than every other sector, in order to match labour standards to the way people actually work. We've streamlined our regulations related to farm labour contractors.
So you get the drift; you could go on through 20 ministries listing the ways that we interact with them. The J licences, I guess, are the most sort of sexy issue that's come up in the last year, as we managed to make some headway on that subject. The list is as long as your arm.
B. Barisoff: Probably what I'd like to see, if it was possible
It would be appreciated and probably appropriate, when I'm commenting to people, if I had a list of whatever else is there, to say, "Listen, this was done," or "that was done," or "this has been done in this sector, and this has been done in that sector," and whatever else it might be, so that people could understand exactly what was taking place. Is that possible?
Hon. C. Evans: Yes, and I completely agree. Efficient streams are a really good example. It took us two years to get DFO to the table so that we could actually deal with the ditching regulations that the hon. Chair raised many times. I think we fixed it a year ago, in terms of coming up with a regulatory regime that allowed farmers to clean their ditches. But do you think I can get people to understand what the rules are? I still hear that we should deal with ditches, every day, because of the inability to communicate the fact that we've accomplished it. So getting the hon. member a list so he can go out and tell the good news of the government would be a great thing.
B. Barisoff: There's no doubt that the minister mentioned ditches. One of the areas that we will be touching on in these estimates is the fact of ditch-cleaning. I'm sure that if my colleague from Abbotsford were here, he would be poking me in the side, saying: "Listen, you've got to get some regulation on ditch-cleaning." So if we can get those, it would be much appreciated.
If we move on to the next page, objective 2 is: "Maintain the current size of certain mature sectors that face challenges but are important contributors to the employment and farm cash sales." The one at the very bottom of the page that jumps right out at me is the support of the B.C. Chicken Marketing Board and the efforts to resolve the marketing issues on Vancouver Island. I know the minister has been working on this, and maybe he could elaborate a little bit and tell us exactly what's happening.
Hon. C. Evans: This is an impossible issue to discuss in a few words. However, I will attempt to say what is happening. The government observed that there was a rancorous, ongoing and difficult relationship between the Chicken Marketing Board and processors and producers, and it was unable to resolve the question. I fired the Chicken Board, and we replaced it with an appointed three-person board headed by a judge.
By virtue of some court cases and various orders of the board itself, the BCMB lifted the freeze on Vancouver Island and told producers that we would provide them with a $300,000 transition fund to assist them to do whatever they felt was necessary to deal with the lifting of the freeze. They could use it to assist them in grain transportation costs; they could use it to assist producers to get into another form of chicken production; they could use it to build a processing plant or use it to aim the farmers themselves at another commodity.
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We are working this through with
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producers on Vancouver Island, who have a cost disadvantage for several reasons I won't go into but the hon. member probably knows. I actually have some faith that the producers on the Island, in the main, will not opt to sell their quota off-Island but which will look for solutions to process it here. Or a portion of the quota will be sold, and some will remain here.
Actually, the real long-term solution is not government; it's marketing and brand loyalty. The 600,000 or 700,000 people who live here haven't been eating Vancouver Island chicken ever in my term of office. Even when there was a Lilydale plant here, it turned out that all of its production went across the water, because they couldn't get it into Vancouver Island stores. Even when they had promotional campaigns, they couldn't get it into Vancouver Island stores.
Until we can build the connection between the product that is for sale, the consumers that buy it and the retail sector that acts in the middle, we won't really solve the problem. But I think all the structural changes that we've made in recent months are aimed at trying to produce a product here that the people here want to buy. That will lead to the long-term solution.
B. Barisoff: I guess the question that I have
Hon. C. Evans: The fact that we're going to have a permit system on Vancouver Island is true -- or I believe we are. I announced it in Duncan last week. I actually think it might work better at 100 percent rather than at 50 percent. But the hon. member should know that the permits won't be saleable. We're not talking about allowing people to sell a commodity with an equity value and reap reward and then get, for free, another commodity with an equity value. In my announcement I suggested that people who sold all their quota wouldn't get permits.
It is my hope to devolve to the Chicken Board a permit system, so that people who sold part of their quota would be able to replace it with permits -- there's a cost to that, and it's not saleable -- in order to keep or get back enough production on this Island to allow somebody to build a processing facility. The great risk is that should quota transfer, it will be difficult to get enough economies of scale back to Vancouver Island to ever build a processing plant in the future.
I should say that I haven't taken an order to cabinet; and once it goes to cabinet, then it has to go to the Chicken Board for implementation. So I assume that all that we are discussing here today, while it is my intention, it's public and it's in the public domain, will take a considerable amount of time -- months or a year -- to be put in place. And that's fine.
What the chicken producers were asking for was recognition of the trauma and some way to bridge the gap, some transition assistance. That is what the $300,000 and the permit system are intended to accomplish. But please understand that you can't sell permits, and permits have a cost.
[1740]
B. Barisoff: I guess my concern is that if we're working in a supply management environment, and we have marketing boards, and we have a Chicken Marketing Board
Hon. C. Evans: I want to reiterate that I haven't quite decided yet whether it would be 50 percent or 100 percent. That's the second time I made that correction -- because the hon. member said there would be 50 percent permits. There may be 100 percent permits for birds that are transferred, which of course exacerbates his point.
The answer to his question is yes, you are increasing the net or aggregate amount of chicken production in British Columbia. However, I don't think a whole bunch of quota is going to leave; ergo, not a whole lot of permits are going to come back. Even if it does, Vancouver Island production is a small percentage of British Columbia production. And there's 7 to 8 percent growth every single year in the aggregate amount.
So I think we can accommodate a permit system within British Columbia's natural growth. And the hon. member's quite right; supply management is intended to match production to demand. But if the permit system fits within the natural growth of the industry, we cannot threaten supply management and still manage the permit system.
B. Barisoff: I guess that's my concern. Ultimately, my thinking would be that if we are in favour of working under the guise of supply management and marketing boards, by doing this we are actually increasing whatever the quota is on Vancouver Island.
I guess my second concern to the minister is that if we're going to allow this on Vancouver Island, are we going to allow the same thing to happen in the Okanagan or the Peace or the Cariboo or the Fraser Valley, or wherever it might be? Not only with chicken, but whether it might be for -- my colleague from Abbotsford isn't here -- dairy for milk, for turkeys, whatever it might be
The Chair: Minister, noting the time.
Hon. C. Evans: I'll answer the question and then note the time. It's a really good question. The hon. member is suggesting that if you have to create a regional system for a region, why not a regional system for every region?
I would put on the record that I think society should ask that question, and the hon. member should think about the answer to that question. I am not ready to go there. I don't think it's in the interest of supply management to destabilize the system to create regional boards. But in an era of centralization, it's an idea that society should think about, because Canada has to think about how supply management is going to work in a changing economy.
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We are doing it for Vancouver Island; we're creating this permit opportunity at this time, because Vancouver Island is an anomaly. It has a shipping cost from the mainland to Vancouver Island that the north doesn't have, the Kootenays don't have, the Okanagan doesn't have. We all have different operating regimes, but nobody has the abstract market nature that Vancouver Island has at present.
Having said that and noting the time, I move that the committee rise, report resolutions and ask leave to sit again.
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Some Voices: No -- progress.
The Chair: Hon. minister, the motion is correct, and I'll explain to the committee.
Hon. C. Evans: I promise you, this was written by a
R. Neufeld: I don't know what you're doing.
Hon. C. Evans: I move that the committee rise, report resolutions and ask leave to sit again.
The Chair: Do you want an explanation first, member? Okay, fine. That's fair, I think.
The estimates of Advanced Education, Training and Technology were completed earlier in the day, and we have to vote those resolutions and report those resolutions in order to continue this committee. That extends the ongoing debate of the Ministry of Agriculture estimates.
A Voice: Fair enough.
Motion approved.
The Chair: Thank you very much, and folks, have a good weekend.
The committee rose at 5:46 p.m.
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