Hansard — Monday, March 3, 2008 a.m.

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

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY


CONTENTS

	Routine Proceedings
		Page


Point of Privilege (Reservation of Right)		10115
	B. Ralston

Private Members' Statements		10115
	The changing world of mental health and addictions services
	M. Polak
	D. Chudnovsky
	Standing up for Vancouver
	S. Simpson
	L. Mayencourt
	Crisis communications
	H. Bloy
	L. Krog
	Service equity to rural B.C.
	D. Routley
	B. Lekstrom

Motions on Notice		10124
	Provincial support for federal crime bill (Motion 8)
	I. Black
	M. Farnworth
	L. Mayencourt
	L. Krog
	D. Hayer
	B. Ralston
	D. MacKay
	R. Hawes

B. Ralston: Mr. Speaker, this being my earliest opportunity to do so, I rise to reserve my right to raise a question of privilege.

M. Polak: I rise today in this House to talk about a very complex issue and one that has challenged successive governments for decades. It will probably continue to challenge us for decades. I'm speaking today of the treatment of those who are mentally ill and addicted.

Certainly, in years gone by it was the practice that we would maintain folks who needed these services in institutions that really weren't meant for rehabilitation. They were meant for housing, and they were meant for maintaining these folks in what was thought to be a positive and supportive environment.

There really wasn't a view to taking a look at them as individuals and seeing to it that we could provide to them the kinds of supports that they needed in order to, hopefully, be rehabilitated and live a higher quality of life, reconnected with our communities.

When our government came into office, it was a commitment on the part of the Premier to form a task force on homelessness, mental illness and addiction services. As those services were reviewed and contemplated, it became apparent that we needed to start taking some new approaches. We needed to start taking a new view with respect to mental health and addiction services in British Columbia.

Certainly, while our goal of providing the best system of support in Canada for those most vulnerable in our province is a laudable one, it's also a very challenging one, especially when one recognizes the need to correct some of our past errors. We certainly know that there are errors in the way that we've done things in the past, and at a UBCM address the Premier acknowledged that.

I'll quote from his speech. He said: "We're going to listen to what we've heard from you, and you know what you've told me. Deinstitutionalization is a failed experiment. So we're going to work with you to make sure that we provide for the care and the support for people with mental illnesses as we look ahead, and it will be a major item on our agenda."

It certainly has become a major item on our agenda. Since our government took office, we've spent about a billion dollars a year just on mental health services alone. Then when one considers the amount committed to capital…. We now have $138 million in capital funding allotted to renovate or construct new mental health facilities across B.C. Adult community mental health beds have increased by 57 percent since 2001. That means that as of 2006 we've created 2,800 new beds, and that's going to be a total of 7,741 across the province.

We're providing new facilities. We're using new approaches. But where this really means something is in our willingness to explore different types of service for people with different types of needs, and I think that's an area where we've made significant progress. In Langley itself we've seen the opening and the groundbreaking for two facilities that are not only cutting edge in terms of their philosophy but are also opportunities for us to review and revise the kind of services we're providing for those unique needs that people with mental illness have.

It's common in British Columbia — it's common everywhere — for us to think that if someone has a mental illness, they all need the same kind of service. I'm really pleased to see that, largely as a result of what has come out of the task force, we've been able to address the different needs of those who are mentally ill by providing different types of facilities. I want to talk about a couple of them.

The first is a place called the N.G. Nair Place. It's named after a leading psychologist in Langley who has been at the forefront of developing new approaches to serve the mentally ill. N.G. Nair Place is really different. As a 25-bed facility, it's intended to allow these folks with mental illnesses that will preclude them from living independently to reside in a home environment. They feel like they have their own home, and yet they're in a community that's supportive.

What's most important is that the services will adapt with them so that they can age in place. Many of these people will be there over the course of the later part of their life and will probably reside there until they need the services no longer. Those are new approaches that haven't been seen in British Columbia before.

It's really exciting when you can go to an event, open a facility like that and have the residents themselves come to you and say: "I love this place. I love being here." You can see it on their faces. One of the residents came to proudly tell me how happy she was to have access to a piano in the common room so that she could play. It's all those individual stories that lead up to how we must understand the treatment of the mentally ill and not just lump them all together as needing one individual type of service.

N.G. Nair Place is one of two community mental health facilities in the Fraser health region. It's designed to meet the residents as they age, but it also incorporates green building technology. It's LEED-certified, and the

building itself is one of the cutting-edge facilities in terms of environmental sensitivity.

This past weekend I was at the groundbreaking for another facility in Langley, Memorial Cottage. Memorial Cottage is also a 25-bed facility. It's long-term, temporary residential that will assist those who have very severe mental illnesses and psychosocial difficulties and need to be reintegrated into society. They need help getting a job. They need help learning life skills. These folks will return to society, and we know from other facilities of their type around the province that we've had success with that.

Certainly, one of the biggest changes we need to make was announced in the throne speech — and that is, dealing with those who need to be taken into care and need to be made well and sometimes not when they want to be.

I want to read from the throne speech. What we've committed is this: "Patients with severe mental illness who require intensive, sustained and complex medical treatment will be provided care in new and existing facilities at Willingdon in Burnaby. People in the downtown east side and elsewhere who can't cope will be cared for in safe and secure facilities until they are well."

I'm proud that we are taking the time to review what we do in mental health and addictions services, to ensure that what we're providing for the mentally ill is not just the best level of service and support that we can provide but is designed to meet their individual needs and recognizes that, in spite of the fact that they have mental illness, they are people. They are people with individual needs. They are people who deserve to have the attention paid to what it means for their quality of life, not just what government thinks their quality of life should be.

I'm very proud of the progress that we've made. There certainly will be continuing challenges as we continue to learn more about how to treat and serve and support the mentally ill.

D. Chudnovsky: I'm pleased to respond to the presentation that has been made by my friend opposite with respect to the very serious and challenging issue of services for people in our province who suffer from mental health problems.

I want to begin by saying that there are elements of the presentation that were made by the member for Langley that I think we can all agree with. I think that, as she said, the health issues that face our neighbours who have mental health problems are complicated. They're complex. They're ones that often don't present us with easy answers.

She said that new approaches should be tried, and I think that's something with which we can all agree. I would add to, or perhaps echo, the comments made by the member that suggested that we need a range of programs. We need a range of tools and approaches that deal with specific and individual problems that people face. So I think there are areas where we can agree with the member opposite.

I think we would want to place emphasis, as she seemed to be suggesting in her comments, on community-based approaches to problems with mental health. I think the days of warehousing people who have these kinds of health problems are over and that, while our frustrations and the frustrations of people in communities are great and our motivation to deal with the problems quickly and with some immediacy are great, we need to watch ourselves and be careful that we don't accidentally move in a direction that we moved away from a couple of decades ago — the direction of warehousing.

I think we can agree to some extent with the comments that were made by the member. But I think it's very, very important that we take note of the concerns that have been expressed to us by people in our communities, who are reminding us that we face today, in 2008, in British Columbia a crisis in mental health services unlike any that we have faced before and that, on the watch of the government opposite, the situation has become a crisis.

That's not something that needs to be said by the opposition, although I guarantee you that the opposition will say it. It's something that we were reminded of by, for instance, the Vancouver police department, which tells us, in a study that was released only a few weeks ago, that the crisis of mental health services in the province is unlike what it has ever been before, and it is something that causes disruption to the services that the police force would like to be able to provide.

I think it's also worthwhile to say that at a time when the mental health services are at a crisis because of policies of the government opposite, mental health services are being closed — Laurel House here in Victoria. People were here on the lawn of the Legislature last week. Mental health services that have provided important support for people in this community are going to be gone.

The Willow program in Kelowna is a model program which closed at the end of last week, at the end of February. So at the same time as those opposite acknowledge, at least in part, that we're dealing with a terrible crisis of mental health services, one that we've never seen before in the province, services are nonetheless being closed across the province.

I want to say that even the courts are telling us that the problems are there and need to be resolved. I quote from an article in the Times Colonist:

"The B.C. Court of Appeal is urging the provincial government to address critical shortages of resources for mentally ill offenders, especially those with addictions." Referring to a particular case, the court said, "Without treatment to back up the admonitions, such orders will often do the opposite to what is intended…. This court can do no more than to acknowledge the lack of resources and urge our legislators to respond to the need."

The police, the courts, the people in the communities across the province acknowledge the crisis situation. We would urge this government and the member opposite to do what they can to resolve the crisis.

M. Polak: I think for any of us, the point is well taken — that successive governments have done a poor job of addressing the needs of the mentally ill in our province. But I think we can easily contrast a mental

health plan from the '90s, which was wholly unfunded, to the continuing investment of almost a billion dollars a year by our government since we've been in office and an almost $140 million commitment to build new and upgraded facilities across this province.

I mentioned two facilities in Langley. Of course, being that they're in my riding, I'm very pleased to see them there. I'm very supportive of them, and I'm proud that we're doing it, but there's more than that. In Kamloops in 2007 we opened a 44-bed Hillside Centre, a $17 million facility. In Vancouver in 2007 we opened a $19 million mental health building at B.C. Children's and B.C. Women's hospitals.

In Coquitlam in 2007 we opened the 24-bed Cottonwood Lodge, a $55 million facility. In Surrey in 2007 we opened Creekside Withdrawal Management Centre, a centre specialized for addiction services. In Burnaby in February the Premier announced that we will open a new Burnaby centre for mental health and addictions, a 100-bed facility at a cost of $3.5 million.

It cannot be said that this government has not invested with its whole heart into the service and improvement of service for those who are mentally ill, but there's certainly a challenge before us. The member well knows, being where his riding is located, that that challenge is outlined by the VPD and by many others who've looked at the downtown east side.

I will read again from the throne speech, because we've committed to expanding outreach programs that will help lift people off the street and offer them personalized support. I wonder if that will get the support of this whole House. We've also committed to ensuring that the people in the downtown east side and elsewhere who can't cope will be cared for in safe and secure facilities. I wonder: when that comes to this House, will it get the support of the whole chamber?

Certainly, it's by moving forward with these new ideas and actually putting those services on the ground that we are going to succeed in helping those who are most in need. It will be interesting to see if the talk is followed by action. We need to see the support of this whole House if we're going to truly take hold of the challenges that those people face. Instead of casting them aside and saying, "We're just going to maintain you the way we are," we find a way to aggressively approach their needs so that we're providing the service that is actually going to lift them out of their challenges and not just maintain them at that same level.

I would challenge everyone in this House to consider how important it is that we move forward with these important commitments to ensure that those who can't possibly make the right decision for themselves in those circumstances are allowed to have the same opportunities that we take for granted by having the support of this House to ensure that they get it.

S. Simpson: I'm pleased to have the opportunity to stand and speak today about an issue that is generating a growing concern across Vancouver among parents and others in the community. It relates to what, as we start to see school closures beginning to occur in Vancouver and the discussions starting to heat up around those questions of closure….

As we know, in Vancouver, as in a number of communities, there is pressure around closures. Some of it is around reductions in school populations. I believe that is cyclical and not structural in nature. I'm sure that we will come to a time when we will see those populations rise again, but it is a real issue. However, it's not the only issue we're seeing that is motivating school closures in Vancouver.

These issues are largely being addressed by the Vancouver school board through their facilities review, a review that has been criticized by a number of people in the community, a number of parents, because it's been quite a secretive process. Now that the work is starting to roll out from the review that the board has done…. It's being done in a piecemeal way, starting first in the Dunbar–Point Grey area with Queen Elizabeth School. I'll speak to that in a second.

I know that in my own constituency there are a number of schools — all annexes, essentially — that are potentially on the chopping block. We have Garibaldi in this case, which is an annex that was taken out of the facilities review and is on the table to be closed, separate and distinct from the review.

These are all of great concern to parents, and I'm hearing from parents across the city. I want to give you just three quick examples of the situations that we're facing here. In the case of Garibaldi, you have a very small school but a school that is facing closure without having gone through a process, without being looked at in the context of a policy that relates to all schools in the city.

That's a challenge largely being foisted upon the board, I believe, because of the government's policies around capacity — rules around 95 percent capacity that are strident and arcane in many ways, that don't recognize or acknowledge the role schools can play in the community and allow for other legitimate uses in schools, whether it be music rooms, parent rooms or community uses. Those aren't considered when the capacity is being calculated.

We are asking and have asked for a rethink on how, in fact, those questions of capacity get dealt with. At this point there is no flexibility on the part of the government on this. You have a school board that's in a situation where they're looking at the closure of schools that play an integral role in communities, particularly our inner-city schools, and that have a greater role than simply an academic one in the lives of these kids. They're not being allowed the opportunity to be more creative and innovative.

You have situations like General Gordon School. It was up for a seismic upgrade. Lo and behold, now the talk is about demolishing the school and building a new school that might be slightly less expensive than the upgraded and retrofitted school.

Of course, on the face of it, it seems to make sense, but now parents are coming and raising great concerns

that a number of the amenities that are attached to General Gordon will disappear, and you'll end up with classrooms that are significantly smaller than what we see today at General Gordon, which is an older school on the heritage B-list for heritage buildings in Vancouver. The concerns quite legitimately are being raised about why those buildings aren't being retrofitted to deal with not just seismic but also with efficiency questions.

Then you have situations like Queen Elizabeth School. Queen Elizabeth School on the west side in the Dunbar–Point Grey area is a school that is at capacity. It's a bilingual school. It's an annex with 135 kids in it, and it's a school that's going to be closed. The proposals are to close this school in order to fund the building of other schools in that area.

Parents there are, to say the least, outraged at the notion that successful schools that are efficient, that are running at capacity would be considered to be closed in order to fund other schools in that area, rather than finding other resources through the province to pay for those schools.

What we have here is a situation where the Vancouver school board is being obliged to look at the situation of closing that school. When I talk to parents at Queen Elizabeth — and I've been speaking to them — they raise their frustrations that they're not being talked to. They raise frustrations about the government not talking to them.

One of the parents referenced me that she had sent at least 15 e-mails to her MLA and made three calls to the office. Her MLA is the Premier. The extent of the response from the Premier was a note that said the Premier had been apprised of the situation and was aware of the situation, but no assistance in trying to find strategies to support a successful school to continue and stay open.

We have a situation where the minister talked about schools as neighbourhood hubs — the Minister of Education previously. It's time for the government to either step up and say that they mean it when they talk about that and provide the resources that allow our existing schools in Vancouver, particularly ones that are at capacity, to be able to continue to operate and provide services to kids and meet the needs of parents.

Unfortunately, we're not seeing that here, and it raises great concern for those of us in other parts of the city. One of the parents said to me, I think quite rightly: "If they can close a school that's full and at capacity and has waiting lists, what will it take for them to close other schools in this city that may be somewhat below that capacity?"

I'm concerned about that, particularly when we talk to the board about this and the chair of the board. The board is very clear and the school district administrators are very clear that because of the narrow parameters and the narrow policy of this government, they are finding themselves in a place where they have little room to move to actually meet the needs and the interests of parents around these questions of community schools and neighbourhood schools. So they're feeling that frustration.

I would acknowledge that they should probably be stronger advocates than they've been, but I believe their frustrations are legitimate and real. This government needs to step up and say that it will commit the extra resources and capital resources and will create the flexibility to allow us, in fact, to have the schools we want in Vancouver.

L. Mayencourt: Madam Speaker, just before I begin my response, I want to say to you that last Thursday, in the heat of debate, I was inconsiderate to the Chair, and I do apologize for that.

The member for Vancouver-Hastings raises some very excellent points, and these are things that really concern me as well.

One of the things that I've found is very, very useful as an MLA, in terms of ensuring that we have a good communication protocol between parents and schools and all of that sort of stuff, is to attend parent advisory committee meetings and to become part of a more real sort of engagement, if you will, with parents and kids in the school district. Those forums also include teachers and administrators and so on.

I completely sympathize with parents that feel they have not had the opportunity to engage with the school district. I think that's something they need to do and be very proactive about. But I do know that every time I have asked for meetings with my schools or to talk with school officials, they've been open to that.

The other thing that is really important in this discussion is the question of where you are putting your funding. In the case of a school where there has been a significant decline in enrolment, there is some justification for saying: "Wait a minute. Is that resource needed for us at this point?"

Why is that? Well, my riding is a good case in point. I have 94,000 households in my riding, and I have three schools: two elementary, one annex and one high school. Right now all of those schools are full, and I actually have kids that have to travel to Henry Hudson Elementary over in Kitsilano or over to Strathcona to attend school there. I really believe that it's time for us to be focusing on providing schools where those kids actually live.

In this case it is in Coal Harbour and in the Chinatown or International Village areas. There has been an explosive growth of families in both of those neighbourhoods as a result of people finding out that it's great to live downtown. More and more moms and dads are saying: "You know what? I want my child to grow up in a city environment." It means that they're going to have access to a lot of services and what have you. One of those services that they're desperately in need of is a school.

We also have a choice to fund either based on students or based on buildings, and I will always come down on the side of basing our funding model on students. That's where we're supposed to be focused. Those are the things that we're supposed to focus on. It isn't so much about bricks and mortar. There is a very real need for education in every neighbourhood where there are

kids. If there are not kids there going to school, then it is time for the school district to have a good hard look at it to try and find some way of accommodating whatever is going on in that area.

Very often we have great challenges when we look at this sort of thing, and I completely sympathize with the school district and the members of the school board. I've had an opportunity to talk to them. I've had talks with school districts across the province, you know, as part of my job. There is nobody in the world that wants to close down a community school. We really don't. We want to make sure we use them.

One of the ways that Vancouver can be very creative about this is to start looking at our throne speech, in which we talk about creating all-day kindergartens. Using those buildings all the time means that we're getting good value from them. So it is time to start talking about all-day kindergarten for five-year-olds. We're also looking down the road at reducing that to four-year-olds and perhaps even three-year-olds.

One of the things we've got to learn to do is to make use of the resources that we have where they are. If they are useful for community events, for libraries or for early childhood education, then we should be using them for that. But if there is no practical use for the building, we must always focus our attention on what we are going to fund. We're going to fund based on the student population that exists there.

I've had the opportunity to work with the member for Vancouver-Hastings over the years, before he was in this chamber. I salute his community activism and his courage to stand up for Vancouver.

I agree with the member that talking to PACs, parent advisory councils, and talking to parents generally and to community interests about what goes on in schools is essential. The challenge here is that they aren't being talked to. They're not being talked to in a meaningful way by the school board, but they're also not being talked to by the ministry around what options or flexibility there is.

The member talks about those other uses, whether it be moving to all-day kindergarten, which is a good thing, or looking at other community uses. That's exactly what we're saying. Those options and choices should be there to use those facilities if they're being used for legitimate purposes that enhance the academic or social interests of children and families in communities.

Unfortunately, the current kind of narrow interpretation of capacity issues that the government has on the table doesn't allow that to happen. Outside of the StrongStart program, where there is some flexibility, we don't see that in an array of other potential uses in our schools, and the government needs to broaden its flexibility on that.

Also, when you have situations like Queen Elizabeth, where you have a school that is full and at capacity…. It's meeting the needs of the parents and the kids. It's a French immersion school. It achieves all the things that you look for in an annex, which is smaller classes for K-to-3, a better environment for young children. It's meeting those needs in that community.

It probably needs to grow, if anything, but it's potentially going to be sacrificed in order to get the dollars to build the NRC site and a new high school in the UBC area. It makes no sense to sacrifice successful schools in the area in order to fund other schools.

It's time for the government to say, as the member says — and I think he's right — that there are areas where we need new schools — in his community and in other places where there's a demand for extra seats. They should be met, but it is my view that you don't meet them at the expense of children in other parts of the community, at the expense of communities and at the expense of what these schools can do as integral parts of the community as community schools, as neighbourhood schools, as fundamental resources within the community.

That's where we should be heading, to a new role for schools, an enhanced role within the community. The current policies of the government around capacity will take us in exactly the wrong direction.

It's my view that it leaves too many questions unanswered about the integrity of the academic experience for these kids, particularly when you have a board here that's trying to do this in a somewhat piecemeal way and getting no direction from the government to be more comprehensive, to be more inclusive and to really look for options and alternatives that are creative and meet the needs of both the school and the board.

H. Bloy: I rise in the House today to speak about a serious issue that is fundamental to the security of over 100,000 people in this province at any one time. It is something that will require an enormous amount of careful planning, coordination and sharing of good practices. It is too often that our post-secondary institutions have become scenes of gun violence and tragedy.

In 1989 a 25-year-old gunman walked into a classroom at l'École Polytechnique in Montreal and targeted women, killing 13 students and one professor. We remember this tragic event every year with a December 6 national Day of Remembrance and Action to Stop Violence Against Women.

In 1992 a professor at Concordia University in Montreal killed four of his colleagues. More recently, in 2006 a young man killed an 18-year-old woman and injured 19 others when he opened fire at Dawson College in Montreal.

In the past few months the possibility of a school shooting has seemed even more real, with specific credible threats forcing the closure of the University of British Columbia biosciences building on January 31 and February 8. Just last Friday the Coquitlam campus of Douglas College was closed. Sadly, Americans have experienced many more of these deeply upsetting incidents, most recently on this past Valentine's Day as

an armed individual killed six students on the campus of Northern Illinois University.

Work is being done to prevent these tragic events, and I'm here today to speak about the role of post-secondary institutions in ensuring that our campuses remain safe for all people. Issues of student safety and procedures to notify students of any potential dangers are decided by each post-secondary institution's board of governors, who are best able to determine the most effective form of crisis response.

Post-secondary institutions are aware of these issues. Many schools around the province have already introduced broadcast e-mail systems that allow administrators to issue a message to the entire staff and student body through e-mails. Schools that already have this in place are the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, University of Victoria and British Columbia Institute of Technology.

Many people only check their e-mails a couple of times a day. In the event of a crisis there is a concern that the message may not be received by students in the necessary time frame to be effective.

As a result of this and of the increased popularity of communication technology, post-secondary administrators are beginning to look at other options. One of the most effective ways of contacting students appears to be the use of SMS, short message service, to cell phones. In North America, this is referred to as text messaging or just plain texting.

Modern communications are widely used. The most recent statistics show that two-thirds of Canadian households have at least one cell phone, while one in ten homes has over three cell phones. These numbers are increasing every year. In British Columbia 68 percent of households spend money on cell phones, pagers and hand-held text messaging like the BlackBerrys that you see around the House here every day.

Text messaging can be a very effective means of communicating, as it can be conveyed quickly, even in shorthand, and most people, particularly youth, are very proficient in its use. I've seen some messages that I've had a hard time interpreting, but I've got a couple of examples here for the members in the House. Some of you may find them amusing.

"IMHO" is text messaging shorthand for "in my humble opinion." "MIHAP" means: "May I have your attention, please."

Across Canada this technology is already being put to use in crisis communications. In my own riding Simon Fraser University has taken the initiative to introduce text messaging to their communications tools for use in emergencies. This new program will be launched this Thursday and will enable administrators to send messages to the recipient's cell phone, voice mail phone, land line, e-mail address and instant messaging.

The University of Calgary and Concordia University in Montreal have already introduced SMS-based emergency system response. Simon Fraser University, the university in northern Alberta and the University of New Brunswick are in the process of doing extensive study on the use of text messaging in crisis communications.

This system will be beneficial to students and administrators, not only in the event of a violent incident on campus but also in the event of a major fire or a chemical spill, weather conditions related to classroom closures or any of these issues that would require people to avoid a building or an area on campus.

In the recent incidents at UBC and Douglas College, there was confusion among the student population as to what was going on. With the development and implementation of an effective form of crisis communication, this confusion can be minimized in future situations.

Regardless of the methods that post-secondary institutions choose to employ, it is essential that we begin this discussion today so that we can have quick and decisive methods of crisis communications before more lives could be lost.

L. Krog: I think everyone who watches the legislative channel is always fascinated by the topics that come to the fore, particularly on Monday mornings. I think that as legislators, we're always looking forward to something that's a little more visceral and exciting that might inspire some real passion, but it's hard to argue with the concept of communicating with people in crisis situations.

There is no question that there have been some dreadful and horrific incidents, particularly in North America. Maybe it's part of our society's problem. It doesn't appear to be an issue around the world. There are issues of violence, of course — terror in Afghanistan, Somalia, Darfur — all over the world. But here in North America it seems we have a particular problem with mass violence committed by very disturbed individuals and access to automatic weapons that create a sense of fear in our society, which — with no disrespect to the topic that's been raised by the member for Burquitlam this morning — I think is perhaps unwarranted.

What we really should be talking about…. I agree that it is most important that all institutions have available to them the means of communicating with those in attendance at a university campus or indeed anywhere in society. That's important. I think most of the members in this chamber, not all — the member for Powell River–Sunshine Coast probably wouldn't; he's young enough — recall the early warning systems back in the early '60s, in the early days of TV, when we were all waiting for the nuclear war to start and when the Cuban Missile Crisis was on.

I don't know that I lost any sleep. I'm not sure my mother did; I'm not sure my older siblings did. But if we are going to live in a society where these kinds of incidents happen, the question for me is: why are they happening? What is wrong with a world where a teenager feels compelled to go into a school and start shooting at his teacher or fellow students?

What does that tell us about the way we treat people? What does that tell us about the values that we are passing on? What does that tell us about the kinds of ways we entertain ourselves — what we watch on TV, what we see in movies — and what we say about violence? What does that tell us?

I think it tells us that, notwithstanding that the new buzzword in politics is community, we're not spending enough time really living in our communities and thinking about them. Schools are one obvious place. When there is someone in your classroom who's isolated, who may be somewhat disturbed or who may be suffering the first signs of some mental illness that will increase in severity, what do we do as a society to ensure that we reach out to that individual?

That, for me, is as big and as important a question as ensuring that when these kinds of incidents happen, we respond quickly. It's just as equally important to me that we devote energy and resources in our society to ensure that no student goes through our school system being so unnoticed, so forgotten or so bullied that they become one of those potential perpetrators.

If we fail to do something about that, we're not really going to save nearly as many lives through a system of warning people when there's an incident on a campus. We're going to save more lives and prevent more tragedy and more death if we address the problem of those people in our society who are isolated by our inaction, our failure to recognize their needs and our failure to provide a safe, secure society for them.

As long as we continue to do that, and as long as we continue to sensationalize violence in our society — as long as we continue to make it look like you can be killed on TV and show up in your next movie next week — there will be those poor troubled individuals in our communities who will continue to take lives.

That's the tragedy. The tragedy is that we haven't reached out, and we haven't done anything to prevent that.

Early warning systems — great. Text messaging. Perhaps one of the problems is that we communicate with each other too much. Perhaps we've got too much information being flashed at us every day in every way. Perhaps we are feeling overwhelmed.

Our job is to recognize those in our society who do feel overwhelmed, who feel pressured, who feel, somehow, that the only way they can be heard or noticed is to become the new news story, to get their 15 minutes of fame on television, to kill other human beings in order to achieve that.

H. Bloy: I thank my colleague for his comments. As a government, I think it's important that we have effective communications. I think it's important that we have a number of the programs that this government and governments across North America have initiated, trying to help individuals so that they're not left alone.

It is a true and sad comment on society that we do have these incidents that take place. I also think that it's very important that these incidents do happen no matter what we do, and I think we have to be prepared.

I found that strange from the member that he wasn't prepared to accept that we do have to look at how we warn other people in situations and how we protect the students there who weren't tied up in it, who were going about their daily lives, who were going about their business of learning and becoming educated so they could step out and become future leaders in this country. That's why I find it disturbing from the member that he decided not to take that approach.

It's not perfect, what we're doing. There are lots of things that we want to do. There are problems with this proposed system of text messaging. Not all students have cell phones. If there's a hostile individual registered on campus, that means they'll get the information as well. Sign-up is voluntary, so not necessarily everyone will have it. Cell numbers change quite frequently, so they may not have their number on an up-to-date list.

Many post-secondary institutions are considering messaging-based crisis communication systems in conjunction with other warning and response systems that they have in place at the school. Some of these include announcements over websites, digital billboards, public-announcing PA systems including emergency blue light campus phones. Other approaches should always be considered. It's not just one message that will get to everybody.

In addition, our government announced in the throne speech a 211 service to provide new telephone access to information about social services located in their communities.

The truth is that school shootings are a fairly modern phenomenon, and we as a society are only beginning to come to terms with their unpredictable nature and devastating effect. There are no simple answers as to why these seemingly random acts of violence occur. As a result, there are no simple solutions.

I do want to thank Simon Fraser University for taking a lead in crisis management initiatives and research. While this is clearly an uncomfortable topic, I encourage post-secondary institutions to begin a dialogue on this most important topic. I hope my comments here today have served to educate members of this House and the public and to bring more awareness to this very serious issue.

D. Routley: I rise today to speak to the House about the issue of service equity in rural B.C., particularly when it comes to public education. The Education Minister's constant pronouncements of improvements sound to my constituents like the spinning of straw into gold. In fact, a brief history is in order here.

In the recent past, since 2002, Cowichan school district in a three-year period lost over 62 teaching positions, while they lost less than 7 percent of our student base at the same time. So we lost well over 10 percent of our teachers and less than 8 percent of our students over the same period of time.

We also closed a number of schools. We started out that period with 34 schools, and we're down to 26, with

four more targeted for closure this year. We have systematically cut at every function of our school district's operations. We have cut maintenance, supplies, special needs teachers, teacher aides, teacher-librarians and teachers. We have closed schools. We have enforced walk limits, which parents have resisted.

All through this time our Minister of Education has stood in this House and talked about the increases that she has allowed for our schools. I asked the minister if she would manage my daughter's allowance. If she did, perhaps she could increase my daughter's allowance. Then my daughter could start paying the heating bill, pay the increase in the teacher's salary and the ongoing costs downloaded by myself to her.

When she came to me at the end of the week and said she had no money, I could repeat the mantra of our Education Minister and say: "No, indeed, you have more money than you've ever had." The point would be the same. The B.C. Liberal funding policies have downloaded onto our schools extraordinary costs which….

R. Hawes: Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. If I could just read from the standing orders. "In reviewing the practice of this House, highly partisan remarks that negatively reflect on individual members or groups of members in the House have not been regarded as falling within the spirit and intent of Standing Order 25a."

I would suggest, Madam Speaker, that the member's comments are highly partisan and are negatively reflecting on an individual member of the House. As such, I would ask that you direct this member to at least adhere to Standing Order 25a.

Deputy Speaker: Proceed, Member, but I caution you to comply with Standing Order 25. Continue.

D. Routley: Well, the government's choices, when it comes to funding public education, have caused huge inequities in service delivery in B.C. I think the intent in this province has always been to deliver equitable services, no matter where a person lived. That has been the stated intent by the government, but they have failed to honour that intent when it comes to the funding of public education.

A per-student funding formula imposed on rural communities which quite clearly, through a simple demographic, study could be shown to be losing enrolment penalized those communities. It guaranteed that those communities would have no choice but to cut programs and close schools, and that is the result we have seen all throughout this province.

In fact, the member for Vancouver-Burrard said that he would prefer the funding was based simply on students and not on buildings. Well, that has hurt our district, and we can see it in the mouldy buildings in my district, which have been reported in the media over the past two weeks.

We had to cut regular maintenance. We had to cut every function of the school district's operations to meet the cutbacks in downloaded costs that were imposed on our school district by the government's education funding choices. So we entertained a facilities report which, under current practices, pointed to a dozen schools and recommended them for closure.

There was one statement within that report that really rings in my ears, and that statement was: "Take advantage of low-enrolment periods to rid yourselves of unwanted inventory." Small schools in small communities should hardly be viewed as unwanted inventory, but the policies we've received from this provincial government have indeed imposed that upon us.

Now, in this new age of carbon emission awareness, we realize that neighbourhood schools in small communities serve a great function. They reduce the amount of student transportation at a time when transportation is being cut as well, and they provide the basis for adequate parent involvement in education — another goal that the minister repeatedly touts. Yet her policies are driving school districts throughout this province to close their small neighbourhood schools and thereby move the children further from parent involvement. We can't speak out of both sides our mouths at the same time.

We must live up to the pronouncements we make in this House, but the government has failed to do that when it comes to public education. The most telling example of that is the recent targeting of Koksilah Elementary, which is truly the first, first nations school of choice. For the past three years it has been teaching cultural programs that range from language to cultural heritage. Those programs were developed over a 30-year period.

Now, because of the cutbacks and inadequate funding provided by the provincial government, our district is being forced to consider closing that school with a population of over 140 students and with ten students on a waiting list being told there's no room for them. That is an increase of 40 students over just last year.

If the government really means what it says when it comes to reconciliation, when it comes to funding public education and putting students first, then it ought to start to do that. Our empress has no clothes when it comes to her pronouncements on public school funding. In rural communities, we know differently. We know that we've lost teachers, that we've lost schools and that we've lost services. That is an abandonment of the principle of equitable service in British Columbia and a serious, serious failing of the government.

I call on the government to recognize that decreased enrolment requires increased funding and requires increased commitment to rural communities. I challenge the district to change the funding formula and to recognize the additional costs of operating schools in small communities, rather than abandoning the notion of service equity in rural B.C.

B. Lekstrom: I do want to thank the member for Cowichan-Ladysmith for his comments this morning.

I'm going to respond probably on a little broader aspect than just education. It's going to be based on the service equity to rural British Columbia, which I believe was the topic.

I do want to point out that today we have 50,000 fewer students in our system, and that's nobody's fault. That's a reality of the society we live in. At the same time we have continuously increased our education budget. Is it enough? I think the question isn't: has there been a cut?

Clearly, there hasn't been a cut to our education budget. It's probably close to a billion dollars higher today than it was in 2001. The question may very well be to the government or to the trustees: is it being allocated properly? That might be a better discussion point. I think it is.

I think that when we look at what we've got in our education system…. We have growing areas, like Surrey, that have to develop and look towards expansions of their education system. We have areas of the province that have declining enrolment. It's about balance. But the service equity issue is one that I want to touch on.

I've lived in northern British Columbia, in Dawson Creek, all of my life. I've had the opportunity to travel our province extensively. When you look at equity, there is always the question of rural versus urban. There are two rural versus urbans in our great province. There is the rural versus urban of the lower mainland and Victoria. Everybody outside of that feels that they're rural and looks toward the equitable balance of funds being allocated to each region.

Also in an area like mine…. I live in a community of 12,500 people — Dawson Creek, a beautiful city. We have a rural-urban distinction. The people who live just outside the community of Dawson Creek or in the rural areas look towards the city: are they getting more investment? Is there a fair and equitable distribution of the funds?

I think we as a province have developed a good working relationship with our federal counterparts in the east, in Ottawa. I believe we're building the bridge where we see the west being recognized. I believe our government is building the bridge with rural British Columbia. I think there's always going to be work that needs to be done there, but we have to work together.

Rural British Columbia does not survive on its own. We need Vancouver. We need the ports. We need the commerce that takes place in the cities, just like the city and the cities in our great province need rural British Columbia. Sometimes, and myself included, it has taken a bit of getting used to, to recognize that. But I do recognize it, and I'm proud to be a British Columbian and proud that we can work together.

We as a government have invested significantly. I want to focus on the equity. We talk about that in our great province. There was an agricultural plan that was put forward, which I think is an amazing document. It finally begins to recognize the importance of agriculture. This transcends any political party or any government that I've seen in the history or what I've studied in British Columbia.

We haven't lived in a society that has valued agriculture the way it should. Agriculture puts the food on our tables. We can turn our lights off, we can turn our furnaces off, and we'll find a way to survive as a society. But you can't take the food off our tables, or we'll cease to exist.

We've done a number of things, whether it be in our small community grants, whether it be in transportation, health care, the Port of Prince Rupert investment or the transportation investment that takes place. All of it is good. The question has always been and will probably always be: is it enough?

I have yet to, in my lifetime, hear people say: "You know what? We're investing too much in rural B.C.," or "We're investing too much in our infrastructure in the cities. So please, government, don't invest any more."

The question is…. We invest a great deal. And we try and work together, rural versus urban — whether it be on the educational front or in transportation, as I said, whether it be in our review of the farm assessment situation, which is going to be a huge benefit to rural British Columbia. I'm proud to be part of a province and a government that recognizes that we have to find balance.

Do the people in my area, in rural British Columbia, question a $14 billion investment in transit? Certainly they do. But what they also do is say: "Look. We recognize the need. We know where the greatest population is." But we actually have seen…. I want to point this out, because we always hear about cuts, not only in education…. And I pointed that out — that we're a billion dollars higher today than we were in 2001, while at the same time, there are 50,000 fewer students in our classrooms. That to me is anything but a cut.

Transportation. Between 1991 and 2001 the northeast part of our province realized about $24 million in investment in our road infrastructure up there. That sounds like a high number, although I do want to point out that between 2001 and 2007 we've seen $70 million. So the equity issue is there.

D. Routley: My thanks to the member who responded, and my sympathy for having to respond and justify what has happened in rural B.C. after the last five years of ignoring the problems of rural B.C. and refusing to acknowledge the failings of policy.

In fact, in 2001 the per-student grant in public education was $6,297, essentially the same grant that we have today. In that time we've seen huge downloaded costs, be it the teachers' salary increase that was legislated by this government and downloaded onto districts that districts had to make up hundreds of millions of dollars to compensate for.

Now we see 19,000 British Columbian school children displaced from their neighbourhood and rural schools — 19,000 students who are now being bused or driven far from their neighbourhoods, far from that parental involvement and with increased emissions into our

atmosphere and increased costs to rural British Columbians. We are told that now we must have a 110 percent capacity average in our district to get a new school. We are also told we must pay 50 percent of the cost of the new school.

Those policies leave districts no choice but to close schools, sell properties and consolidate students into ever-greater numbers to offer the economy of scale that Mr. Larry Blain demanded when he met with the Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships and told them that B.C. wants to pursue a British model of regionalized service delivery with options for private service contractors.

That is the real agenda, I believe, behind the concentration of our rural school population. Bill 33, which recognized the terrible classroom conditions that our teachers are labouring under, has never been honoured or funded to the point where districts could actually address some of those concerns.

This government says it's all about outcomes. Well, the outcomes aren't so good. The outcomes are 19,000 displaced children. The outcomes are over 130 closed schools, with four more targeted in my constituency this year. The outcomes are special needs unfunded. Attention deficit disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and fetal alcohol spectrum disorder — all of those issues are unfunded. All of those issues are making it impossible for our teachers to maintain the competitive advantage that our public education system has offered British Columbia over many generations.

All our children in B.C. deserve to start at the starting line together, but in rural British Columbia our children are being left out. It is a matter of priority. We see the surplus, and we see the cuts. It's a matter of priority, and this government has the wrong priority when it comes to funding public education. The priority should truly put children first, not just as an excuse to cut from buildings and cut from transportation but to put their learning needs first in rural B.C.

Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members, unanimous consent of the House is required to proceed with Motion 8 without disturbing the priorities of motions preceding it on the order paper.

You know, there are two elements and two themes to the motion before the House this morning. The first has to do with the spirit of cooperation between the provincial government and the federal government, and the benefits that can flow to all British Columbians as a result of such a levelheaded approach. The second element of this pertains to this very crucial piece of legislation.

This legislation is very much about law and order. The legislation in front of the federal government, which very much affects British Columbia, has to do with protecting children and the vulnerable from sexual exploitation, violence, abuse and neglect. It has to do with raising the age of consent from 14 to 16, increasing mandatory sentences for gun crimes and implementing restricted bail for those accused of gun crimes. It also implements the presumption of violent offender status for three-time offenders in violent or sexual crimes.

The theme of this legislation is very consistent with our government's priority in the area of public safety, policing and being tough on crime. B.C. has indicated support in the past for the federal agenda with respect to the reduced use of conditional sentencing for the most violent offenders, for stronger penalties for handgun possession or use and for an increase in maximum sentences for the most violent crimes. For example, aggravated assault currently now carries a 14-year term.

British Columbia's position is that the answer to violent crime is not found in simply changing the penalties in the Criminal Code. The province has also asked the federal Justice Minister to work more closely with B.C. in developing collaborative and strategic approaches to violent crime.

Now, where this collaboration meets policing is where British Columbia's involvement steps in. The spirit of cooperation is shown very clearly within the province in that British Columbia has more integrated units and joint operations per capita in the area of policing than anywhere else in the country. The ten integrated teams, which have almost 600 officers, receive more than $56 million every year from the province.

The major integrated units investigate crimes such as homicide and illegal gambling. They target criminal operations and gangs. They investigate computer-related crimes such as Internet luring and identity theft. They monitor sexual predators. They provide a rapid, integrated response with the emergency response team, and they have reduced auto theft through the integrated municipal-provincial auto crime team, known as IMPACT, and improved road safety communication throughout the province through the integrated road safety units.

It's also an issue of legislation and policy, and there also our government has stepped up. The province has brought in civil forfeiture legislation that ensures that the profit is taken out of crime and, simply, that crime does not pay. We've also supported technological advances to support evidence-based policing, such as real-time sharing of information, the PRIME system; the bait car program, so successful that it was expanded to include boats and bikes; and auto licence plate

Also in the area of funding, this government has delivered to show its priority in the area of public safety. We have returned 100 percent of the traffic fine revenue to municipalities to help them battle crime in their communities. In my area of the Tri-Cities this means over $6 million of incremental additional money to the city of Coquitlam and the city of Port Moody since 2004 alone. Provincewide it's over $50 million.

We also support Air One, a dedicated traffic helicopter which intervened in more than 300 dangerous situations in the lower mainland during its first year of operations alone. In addition, more than 450 officers have been hired by municipalities since this government began returning those traffic fines — more than $50 million in 2006.

What have these results been? I can speak for my community. In the last ten years the Tri-Cities, which I so proudly represent, has had a population increase of over 13 percent. In that time we have seen a 29 percent increase in the police strength in our community. What this has meant is that with a much larger population, we've got a 4 percent decrease in violent crime in the last ten years with a much bigger population, a 12 percent decrease in the area of property crime and the lowest crime rate in ten years.

The B.C. Liberal government is very much in favour of these concepts. We've proved this with respect to our funding. We've proved this with respect to the funding we've put forward for policing, the innovative new programs that we've funded and the legislation that we have put in place to back this.

We proposed these measures. The NDP opposed these measures and voted against every budget that funded these programs. I might add that Bill C-2, when it passed in Ottawa, had one holdout vote. Who was it? It was Burnaby NDP MP Bill Siksay. It was also the NDP who opposed the motion to fast-track this crucial motion.

The second part of this motion this morning has to do with recognizing the positive relationship between the provincial government and the federal government. We have made this an objective over two different federal governments in Ottawa. We believe in collaboration. We build on believing in the strengths to the benefit of all British Columbians and, in fact, of all Canadians, regardless of the party in power.

What has this meant for British Columbia? In the area of law enforcement, this has meant over $53 million to help the provinces recruit new police officers. It has meant that we've had an extension of the federal commitment to the Pacific gateway from $591 million over five years to $1 billion over eight years, of which $800 million will go directly towards projects in British Columbia.

We are seeing $74 million from a federal contribution in support of B.C.'s wait-time guarantee for cancer radiation therapies. We're seeing over $30 million come from the federal government to B.C.'s program to support labour market participation by people with disabilities.

In one of the more creative programs, we've seen support from the federal government to support the provinces and territories with enhanced drivers' licences, with specific reference to British Columbia's successful collaboration with Washington State. There's the word again — collaboration with an American government, not just the Canadian federal government. We believe that cooperation and collaboration work to the benefit of British Columbians.

Perhaps most exciting in our area, in the Tri-Cities, we have seen in the most recent federal budget a firm commitment to support the Evergreen rapid transit line, a reality that will come true under this government.

The collaborative approach and the cooperative approach and the spirit of this government are working. In Toronto, in Ottawa and in Montreal, people are looking west. The good ideas are coming from the west. This is being noted across the country.

The Globe and Mail had two varied quotes on this one that are worth sharing with the House. The first one says: "The dividends for B.C." — of the Premier's federal-provincial diplomacy — "have been quite astonishing. The list of federal projects for the province is long and impressive. He even gives the federal government due credit, whatever party governs, rather than trying to hog it all for his own government." Then more recently: "At federal-provincial tables, until the Premier of British Columbia arrived, B.C. was considered a lightweight or irrelevant."

This balanced approach is benefiting all British Columbians in many, many areas of shared jurisdiction, certainly including but not limited to areas of justice and law enforcement. I'm very proud to be part of a government that believes in such a spirit.

M. Farnworth: It's my pleasure to take my place in the debate on this motion, which some might describe as a political paid advertisement for the current federal government. I'm sure that the motion was crafted with the support of the well-known federal Liberals on the government benches, including such esteemed federal Liberals as the Solicitor General, whom we all know ran for the federal Liberals.

M. Farnworth: Yes, he ran for the federal Liberals. Others — our Attorney General, well known for his federal Liberal views…. I'm sure that this motion and this speech were crafted with all their input in mind.

But what I really want to comment about is why this motion is on here. The federal government thinks it's doing a great job. I'm glad the member does.

I believe we should have a positive relationship with the federal government. I know that in my own community I have a very good relationship with our local MP, James Moore. His office and my office work

hard together on dealing with constituents' issues and getting things done, but at the same time, I also know that I'm going to be critical.

The Minister of Transportation says he wanted to see…. He was expecting $410 million in matching funding for transit in British Columbia, in particular to deal with the Evergreen line. Well, we've got a little bit of money, and small steps are better than no steps, but we've got a long way to go before we get the money that's needed to ensure that the Evergreen line — transit to the Tri-Cities — becomes a reality. So we want to see that in place. That would really contribute to a positive relationship between the governments of Canada and British Columbia. We want to see that money on the table.

We want to see that issues regarding crime and public safety are dealt with in the way that they should be. The member wants to talk about Bill C-2, which we support, as did Gary Doer's government in Manitoba. We felt it was the right thing to do, and that's why I'm happy to stand up and support that part of the motion. Bill C-2 does what many Canadians want it to do, which is that we need to deal with issues around violent crime and repeat offenders and making sure that our children are safe from pedophiles and those who would prey on them.

It's important that Bill C-2 was passed. It's important that it wasn't delayed in a Liberal-dominated Senate. By the way, the….

M. Farnworth: Oh, I heard the chipmunkian melodies from the member for Port Moody–Westwood. I'd like to remind him that on Bill C-2 the NDP caucus, with the exception of one, voted in favour of it. Unfortunately, that's something the Solicitor General the other day could not get quite straight in his comments. I don't know whether he was misleading or whether he was just ill-informed through poor research, but the fact is on Bill C-2, on the vote, the federal NDP, with the exception of one, supported the bill.

What is really unfortunate is the attempts by this government…. They are so concerned about the public's perception — rightly, I would add — of their flat-footedness on criminal issues in this province that the Solicitor General — who ran for the federal Liberals, I might add — refused to condemn the Senate in their delaying tactics. I find that really unfortunate because on this side of the House here, along with Gary Doer in Manitoba, we wanted that bill passed through the Senate. So we fully supported that.

I'd like to bring to the House's attention some of the areas that make it easier to have someone declared a dangerous offender, particularly repeat offenders. What was really puzzling is that this probably could have been dealt with a lot faster if we had had a common message from British Columbia. Unfortunately, you get the Solicitor General saying, "The law does need to be changed," but the Attorney General says: "Well, no, the laws are fine as they are." Again, we tell Ottawa mixed messages from the government.

That's not the only area for dangerous offenders. On resources to fight criminal gangs in British Columbia, the member for Port Moody–Westwood has trumpeted about how much money is going for law enforcement in British Columbia. Unfortunately, when you get this government on the record, as we did in the House, the Solicitor General says: "No, we don't need any more resources to fight gang violence. There are plenty of resources." Yet you get the Attorney General outside, and he says: "No, we do need more resources to fight gang violence, and we need those resources from Ottawa." Again, we have a government that sends mixed messages.

We would do much better as a province if they would send one message instead of, I guess, one message for the federal Liberal members of their caucus and another message for the federal Conservative members of their caucus. That is the inherent contradiction in this government. Too often they speak with two faces out of both sides of their mouth.

Anyway, as I've said, on this side of the House we want a constructive relationship with the federal government that's based on respect and ensuring that the needs of British Columbia are met. For the Tri-Cities that means a larger funding increase for the Evergreen line, and on Bill C-2…. As I said a moment ago, this side of the House supports the motion on that, as did our federal colleagues, as did the government of Gary Doer in Manitoba.

With that, I would just like to say that I know we have other colleagues of mine who will be speaking to this particular piece of legislation, but I just would wish in future that the Solicitor General and the Attorney General could both speak from the same page. It would make things better for all of us here in British Columbia.

L. Mayencourt: I rise in support of the motion put forward by the member for Port Moody–Westwood. I want to assure all members of the House that there is really only one message that's coming from our caucus. That one message is that we need to ensure that criminals that do serious crime do serious time.

It's time to ensure that when an individual has served a portion of their sentence, they are eligible for parole. But the way that we have it right now, where they automatically get parole after serving two-thirds of their sentence, is wrong. We believe that parole should be earned. It shouldn't be a right.

If someone is in prison and participating in a variety of courses to deal with anger, to deal with conflict, to deal with whatever issues they have, then I think they are in the process of earning the option of parole. But we also have to make sure that they are not going to be a danger to society. We also believe that serious gun crimes require serious measures to ensure that those kinds of crimes don't occur.

I don't know that you joined us on the particular day, but some weeks back, I think it was on February 3, the member for Surrey-Whalley invited all members to attend a rally to speak out about crime and the inequities in the criminal justice system with respect to the murder of Chris Mohan and Ed Schellenberg. I thank the member for doing that.

There were a lot of MLAs that came to that event, and the message that we got from that group of people — and there were hundreds — was that we need to do something about the fact that criminals are not deterred enough by the laws and the way that we enforce the criminal justice system in British Columbia as well as in Canada.

There was a speaker at that meeting who was very, very passionate. He talked about the fact that he was not a good friend of Chris Mohan's. He knew Chris, but he was not a good friend of Chris Mohan's. There was nothing special that went on between them. But he recognized that it was time for someone of his age to stand up and talk about the dangers of crime and to highlight for legislators and for the general public that there is an awful lot about the criminal lifestyle that is very appealing to young people.

I mean, they actually are looking at: can I make some money? They are actually weighing the choices between a life of crime — which often has, you know, a brand-new Hummer attached to it or a good skidoo or a variety of expensive toys that they can afford because they can go out and make a lot of money selling drugs — or choosing to do a life that is more substantial and law-abiding. There are some difficulties that young people are having in making those choices.

There should be no difficulty for those kids to make the choice. They should know that if they are engaging in a life of crime, if they are engaging in robbing banks or beating people up or sexually assaulting people or any of that stuff, they're going to do serious time. That's what Bill C-2 really puts in place.

There's an awful lot of work that needs to be done in making sure that we rehabilitate people in the criminal justice system that might be involved in serious crime, and I support that. As a matter of fact, our government supports it.

For members opposite and for members around the province, you need to know that we have a therapeutic community which has been developed, called Guthrie House. It is there for people in the criminal justice system. It is about a new way of reintegrating individuals into society. That is important work and stuff that members of this Legislature should go and avail themselves of the information.

Right now we have a situation where we've got to stand up against crime. We've got to make sure that people that do serious crime do serious time. We've got to make sure that parole is earned. We've got to make sure that violent offenders are taken off of our streets and rehabilitated. It is only when we do that that we will actually have a great, just society here in Canada.

It is time. I know that the Senate has made a commitment to pass the C-2. It's time now for us to implement C-2.

L. Krog: Crime is one of those lovely hot-button topics. Politicians love to talk about crime. We want to sound good and tough on the issue.

Interestingly, the truth is that in most legislatures, in the Parliament of Canada, there isn't a vast difference between the positions on crime. Nobody wants to see criminals roaming the streets. Nobody wants to see pedophiles attacking our youth with impunity. Nobody wants to see any of that.

Let's start with some basics. What we know about the rate of crime in most societies is that there is a direct, almost irrefutable correlation between the percentage of young males in society and the crime rate. There is nothing about that that any of the members in this chamber or in the federal Parliament of Canada can do anything about — nothing, nada. As that percentage of society diminishes, the rate of crime diminishes. We know that.

Let's talk about what's really behind the issue of crime and our response to it as a society. The law, firstly, should reflect our common values. We don't think that it's okay to drive drunk on our streets. We don't think that it's okay to rob banks. We don't think that it's okay to use firearms to shoot one another in our society. We don't think that's okay.

The bigger issue for all of us is: what is it that we can do as a society to not only protect one another from those individuals who don't choose to follow the common values, if you will, and what is it that we can do once they've come into contact with the criminal justice system to ensure that victims are fairly compensated and that the criminals who are capable of being rehabilitated are in fact rehabilitated? That's the bigger, tougher issue.

You know what? That costs a heck of a lot more money than it does just to pass legislation that trumpets that we're going to solve the crime problem by making things tougher and tougher.

The fact is that in cases where it's appropriate, you're darn right we should lock up people for a long time. You're darn right they should be declared dangerous offenders, because there's nothing you can do about it. But where we also need to focus is on dealing with people who are capable of rehabilitation and not putting people who are capable of rehabilitation in institutions where they're going to learn a better quality of crime. That's one thing that nobody wants to talk about.

But talking about crime was only part of the member's motion this morning. The other part, interestingly, was about cooperation with the federal government. It talks about: "…recognize the positive relationship between B.C. and the federal government."

Now, my friend the member for Port Coquitlam–Burke Mountain pointed out the wonderful relationship between the federal Conservatives and the federal Liberals. When I look across this chamber, I'm always reminded of the fact that if the NDP didn't exist, they'd have to invent us so that these guys could actually get together once in a while and be civil to one another for a few years — certainly around election time — so they've got someone to oppose. That's really what they like to do, generally,

British Columbia is still waiting for a few hundred million for child care. What happened to that cooperation? I didn't hear the member for Port Moody–Westwood talk about child care. Oh, no. That's a forbidden topic, because….

L. Krog: The Kelowna accord. Let's talk about the Kelowna accord. But I want to talk about child care, because it's an issue that's dear to my heart.

I've got a poor community, where people who want to work can't afford the child care, if they had the education to find the job or the ability to find it anyway. Those that do, can't get the quality child care. So if we really want to talk about dealing with crime in our country, I'd like to hear the member for Port Moody–Westwood and the government talk about providing decent child care so that children get raised appropriately and don't end up on the streets. They don't end up in the justice system. They don't end up robbing little old ladies. That's what I'd like to hear from the members opposite, but I haven't heard that.

I think that since the time before Dickens we've all understood that there might be a relationship between crime and poverty. What's poverty? I've got news for you: it's an absence of money. You know what the solution to poverty is? It's money.

L. Krog: A job, my friends say. They're absolutely right. But you know what you do with the money when you've got a job? You get yourself some housing so that you have a decent, safe, secure place in which to raise your own children, to give them the values and the security they need to grow up to be productive members of society.

I didn't hear anything this morning about cooperation from the federal government around the issue of housing. I didn't hear any blathering on about the money the federal government has provided for public housing or for assisted living. I didn't hear any talk about that kind of cooperation this morning.

Now, that kind of cooperation is cooperation that the members on this side of the House would really love to hear about.

L. Krog: My friend the member for Vancouver-Kensington says this morning that they're using quiet diplomacy. I've heard of quiet diplomacy, but I think I sense a rather dull silence from Ottawa on this issue and an even duller silence out of the province of British Columbia when it comes to talking about those kinds of issues.

It's easier this morning to get up and talk about Bill C-2, which as the members know — as much as they can pretend it's not the truth — was supported by the federal New Democratic Party. The values reflected in it — around protecting our children, around dealing with people who use guns in the commission of offences — are all commonly held values.

That's the easy one to talk about, but the tough topics this morning — housing, providing secure environments for our children…. Members don't want to talk about that, because you know something? That would cost money. That would require them to put some actual compassion into what we say in this chamber. That would require them to make a commitment, which I sense this government doesn't have the interest, the motivation, the incentive or the common sense to do.

If they did those things, if they provided the housing that's necessary and decent child care, I can assure you of one thing. Notwithstanding what I said about the percentage of young men in our society being related to the amount of crime in our society, we'd see a further reduction in the crime rate in this country if we did the right thing for our children finally, instead of trying to deal with all of the people who we failed along the way in other ways.

I know other members want to talk this morning. I am particularly looking forward to the remarks of my friend the member for Surrey-Whalley, who, as an experienced criminal lawyer, I think will have a lot of intelligent remarks to make this morning. I hope the members opposite give him the attention that he deserves.

D. Hayer: I support this motion, and I support all that this motion calls for — commending the federal government for enacting Bill C-2. This bill addresses many of the concerns that I expressed for many years before being elected as an MLA and since being elected in 2001, and many of the concerns expressed by my constituents on an almost daily basis about this issue.

This bill also meets some of the criteria set out in this government's throne speech on February 12 of this year. It's also determined why B.C. court sentences tend to be shorter than those imposed in other provinces, in relation to murder, property crime, theft, fraud, drug possession and impaired driving. Bill C-2 addresses some of those concerns. I'm very encouraged by the fact the federal government has listened to us and is looking seriously at the concerns of British Columbians from the west here.

The federal government is imposing a minimum sentence on a number of crimes, which we have called for. They have listened, and it speaks volumes of a very good relationship that we have between our Premier and our government and that we had developed with the federal government — something that, when the opposition were in power, they could not develop.

In fact, the NDP seemed to go out of their way to sour relations with the federal government when they were in power. They did almost everything they could to destroy the relationship with the federal government. Even today, when they're in opposition, they argue against everything this government is doing to improve our

relationship, and they complain about every positive action we achieve with the federal government.

But I don't want to dwell on the negatives. I want to talk about the positive, and that is what this Bill C-2 is all about for British Columbians. I was also impressed by this bill. It now increases the mandatory sentence for gun crimes, and offenders accused of illegally using firearms will have restricted bail conditions. So there will be no revolving door. This helps close the revolving door that we have seen too frequently for repeat offenders, particularly those using firearms to commit crimes.

I was with the Solicitor General for an announcement dealing with Surrey issues on Friday, when they talked about some people being convicted and charged more than 20 times and still going on and doing more and more of those crimes. We're trying to bring different levels of government, from housing to health to corrections and from the Solicitor General to the Attorney General, to make sure we look after those people. Some of the people are better off in jail. Other ones can be rehabilitated to make sure they can adjust back in society.

When I read the newspapers recently, it suggested to me that impaired driving cases are increasing dramatically as people flout our current laws. This cannot continue, as the drunk driver behind a wheel is just as deadly as a person with a gun. I had some members from MADD visiting me at my "Coffee with Dave" on Saturday, and they were also saying that, finally, the federal government and the provincial government are doing the right thing.

Therefore, I was also very pleased to see that the prison terms for impaired drivers will be increased and that fines for those convicted will be higher. We need to take the guns out of the hands of the criminals, and we need to get the drunk drivers out from behind the wheel. I know our Solicitor General is very concerned about this issue. I applaud him and his determination to make our streets are safer.

Another significant part of Bill C-2 is that those who have been convicted of sexual or violent crimes three or more times will now have to prove why they should not be deemed violent offenders. That's very good news and just one more step to close that revolving door. It puts the onus on the criminals rather than on the victims, who I have always thought of as having vastly more rights than the rights of the criminals.

Also, that is something our courts must recognize. In part, this bill addresses that the rights of the victims are paramount and that strong and long-term prison time acts not only as a deterrent but, in some small measure, helps to bring closure and comfort to the victims, whose lives have been forever affected, or the families of victims, whose lives have been changed forever due to the violent psychopaths.

This bill further protects our children, who are often crippled for life by sexual predators. Minimum mandatory sentences will now be levied against those people who prey on our children and deceive them into illegal sexual activity. Those hurt and twisted souls who are involved in child pornography will now see minimum mandatory sentences increased. That's very good news.

I also want to say that I was very encouraged by Bill C-2's raising of the age of sexual consent from 14 years to 16 years. That's something our government has been calling for, for a long time.

I fully support this bill. I also want to send a clear message to the Members of Parliament from Surrey and British Columbia and other parts of Canada. I support the bill, and they should support the bill. I also want to make sure that all of the contents and the conditions of the bill are supported by everyone, by the federal government, to make sure that it's actually implemented the way it's supposed to be.

In closing, I want to say that I support the bill. This is very important for all victims. It is important for the rights of the victims' families. It's also important for our law-abiding society.

B. Ralston: I rise to speak in favour and support of this motion. Recently in the local newspaper the Surrey Leader, one of the Black Press chain…. That publication, in association with the CBC, did a fairly extensive survey about public attitudes towards crime. Some 1,300 people participated — I think voluntarily participated. So 80 percent felt that crime had increased, 3 percent felt that crime had decreased, and 17 percent felt that crime had stayed the same.

Mr. Rob Gordon, who is the director of Simon Fraser's School of Criminology, said that crime rates are actually going down in the region — according to him. I think that's really illustrative of the problem that ordinary people feel in their communities. They don't feel safe.

Regardless of assurances by so-called experts in the justice system or in the courts or senior police officers, all of whom are doing their jobs as best they can and have these issues at the forefront of their preoccupations and their duties, ordinary people nonetheless feel less safe in their own communities, not more safe. That's a real challenge for all of us, both here and in Ottawa, but particularly in Ottawa, where the criminal law is made.

Now, this Bill C-2…. Granted there are some mixed messages coming from the government side. Certainly, criminologists say that it's not only the penalty that one receives for crimes, but it's also the certainty of detection and the certainty of punishment — as opposed to the kind of punishment you get — that are part of real deterrence from committing further criminal acts. That's a well-established principle.

On the enforcement side, then, that becomes very important — not simply police officers on the street, but the kinds of sophisticated investigations that require background intelligence, wiretaps and other complicated investigative procedures. Those kinds of investigations are the kinds that get results for some of the offences that are set out in Bill C-2, where stronger and more lengthy prison terms are prescribed by the bill.

The Solicitor General, up until very recently and under tremendous public pressure, has resisted some of the suggestions that have come from senior police officers about how the investigative side in the lower mainland might be strengthened in order to more seriously attack the growing public problem of gang violence — shootings in our streets — which really make all of us feel unsafe and insecure in our own communities.

This legislation also prescribes longer sentences for a series of gun crimes and prescribes some mandatory minimum sentences. It strikes me as somewhat ironic that, while the provincial government has relatively little legislation in the criminal or quasi-criminal spheres under its control, there was a mandatory minimum under the Motor Vehicle Act for a person who was convicted for the first time of driving their motor vehicle while prohibited from driving.

That's usually the result of a court order or an order from the superintendent of motor vehicles. That was a seven-day minimum time in jail. The provincial government apparently thought so little of that mandatory minimum that they abolished it for first-time offenders. So again, that's something within the legislative control of the provincial government.

While we hear a lot of rhetoric from members opposite about mandatory minimums and their deterrent effect in an area in which they had control, an area that police recognize is a problem — unlicensed drivers who are, as a result of being unlicensed, uninsured, and usually people with very serious driving problems in the past and a danger to the public…. When the opportunity came up to maintain a mandatory minimum sentence of seven days, the government did away with it. One columnist speculated that it was for budgetary reasons that they did away with it, because there is a cost, of course, to housing people in a correctional facility, even very briefly. I suppose one is struck by that irony.

In addition, there are other sections of this bill as it relates to impaired driving — without going into much detail in the very brief time allotted to me — which reduce some of what are properly described as more technical defences to some of the impaired driving offences and, in particular, offer some legislative tools for law enforcement to more effectively prosecute those who drive while impaired by drugs.

There have been some cases in the not too recent past where there's a firm belief on the part of the investigating police officers, and indeed sometimes admissions from people who are driving, that they have been intoxicated by drugs. Yet to provide reliable proof of that in a court hasn't been possible, given the state of the criminal code.

These amendments will take some step toward beginning to provide the tools that are necessary to make those investigations stronger and have them result in the kinds of results in court — convictions where they're deserved — that in the past have not been possible just due to the deficiencies in the legislation.

The other provisions of the act that I wish to highlight, as well, are strengthening the bail provisions. There are some tools for electronic monitoring of people released on bail. Again, there would be a financial cost to the provincial treasury. When people are released, if they are to be released on offences, there's a provision that the court can order electronic monitoring. That's a step that we support.

This is a bill that we on this side of the House support. Gary Doer, the Premier of Manitoba, has supported that. The NDP caucus, save one…. I'm sure the member for Peace River South, for example, wouldn't object to someone voting against legislation that was contrary to his conscience. He has taken that position in this Legislature on several occasions.

The federal NDP supports this legislation, and we can only hope that those appointed Liberals in the Senate stand down their stonewalling against this bill and that this bill comes forward and is passed into law. With that, I conclude my remarks.

D. MacKay: I am pleased to stand today in support of Bill C-2 and the motion that was put forward by one of my colleagues.

I just heard the member talk about the fact that the provincial NDP support the legislation and the motion itself. It's interesting because during the federal bill, which we are now talking about very briefly, the federal NDP did, in fact, vote for the bill. However, they voted against a motion that was put forward by the Prime Minister of Canada to move it quickly through the Senate. So the NDP, again, are talking two different languages here. They may have supported the bill originally, but they were against the motion to move it through quickly so we could enact it and get on with it.

When we talk about Bill C-2, we're talking about law and order. I have to stand up here today and speak in support of Bill C-2 and the motion.

Having come from a law enforcement background, I think I probably speak for a large brotherhood of police officers who every day get up, go to work and put their lives in jeopardy in some cases. Sometimes they don't come home.

I want to talk about the frustration of police officers around our province spending time and effort investigating crimes, getting the crimes into the court, only to have the person who they have spent all the time and effort on, and who has been convicted by our courts, beating them home. They're getting home before the police officers do.

So I'm certainly pleased to talk about the minimum sentencing provisions that are contained within Bill C-2. There are a number in there that certainly caught my attention as I went through it.

There's one there on the use of firearms in the commission of an offence that caught my attention, and I'm going to just talk about it here very briefly. It says that in the case of a second or subsequent offence, and that's in the use of a firearm, the term of imprisonment

goes for a term not exceeding 14 years to a minimum punishment imprisonment for a minimum term of three years. That's up from one year. That's good news, because you're going to get these people off the street. I would suspect police officers around this province would support and are in favour of this legislation that imposes minimum sentences.

In our throne speech we talked about the fact that B.C. has always historically been on the low end of sentencing. We are going to look at that to find out what's creating that problem.

These new provisions contained in the amendments to the Criminal Code are actually going to get rid of some of that problem. We're going to eliminate the fact that B.C. has historically been low on the sentencing side of criminal activity because now the courts are going to have an obligation to impose minimum sentences for certain provisions.

I heard members talk about the impaired driving provisions of the Criminal Code, and that's another one that caught my attention. With this new Bill C-2 that we have here today, a first-time impaired driver is going to be looking at a minimum fine of $1,000. I think, historically, if you look around the province of British Columbia, it's probably around $300 to $400. So the courts are going to now have a minimum requirement for sentencing provisions for first-time impaired drivers. For second-time, we're going to be seeing sentences of 30-days imprisonment.

There are a number of great provisions in Bill C-2. When we talk about working in collaboration with the federal government, the NDP seems to think they support the federal government. One that comes to mind is Nanoose Bay.

That goes back to the previous government and the previous members, when they were in power under the former Premier Glen Clark. He got into an argument with the federal government and demanded $70 million from the federal government for fisheries renewal B.C. That got into a war, and the end result was the federal government acts expropriated Nanoose Bay, and we lost $125 million in lease payments back from the federal government.

Noting the hour, I do have other members that would like to speak to this motion, so I will yield the floor to them.

R. Hawes: As the others before me, I rise to speak in favour of this motion. Clearly, this is what the people want.

In a second I'll speak to one aspect of the bill, but I did want to note that the member for Nanaimo got up and spoke. He kind of segued into a thing about poverty and homelessness and all kinds of other things — what he calls the root causes of crime.

I just want to read something into the record. This is from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, which is, of course, the NDP's left-wing think tank. "The 1990s were a difficult decade for British Columbians, particularly for the poorest in this province…. There was an increase in poverty in B.C. by any measure…. The depth of poverty was also higher and more visible on the street in the rise of homelessness, panhandling and food banks. Life for the poor is more difficult and precarious than it has been in several decades."

That was from Falling Through the Cracks, written by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives in the year 2000. I think these members need to be a little careful. If you live in a glass house, you shouldn't throw stones.

I did want to touch on the one aspect in Bill C-2 that actually is the one that affects my constituents a lot. I've had a number in my office, and my heart goes out to them. People have come into my office who have daughters that are 14 years old and, for one reason or another, have become involved with drug-peddling pimps — I guess you'd have to call them — who are maybe 30 years old. They've gone to the authorities, and they've gone to every single source they could possibly look to for help to get their daughters freed from the clutches of these types, and with absolutely no success, because of course at 14, the age of consent, nobody could do anything.

My heart really goes out to these people. Think of it, if it were your own daughter. I have a daughter, and every time I speak to these people, I can't help thinking about what I would have thought were it my daughter who had somehow fallen in with somebody who is double her age, who was getting her involved in a life of crime and prostitution, and there's nothing I could do about it.

At least the age of consent is being increased now to 16. I'm hoping that some of these young girls, by the time they hit the age of 16, at least have had a little bit more time and a little more maturity to think about what they're doing and that they won't get involved.

I would have loved it if they would have said that the age of consent was actually being raised to 18, where it used to be years ago. Frankly, I think that anything we can do to safeguard our kids we ought to be doing.

I do speak in favour of this bill. It has so many positive aspects that are going to reflect positively on our society.

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