Hansard — Wednesday, April 30, 2008 p.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


Introductions by Members		11771

Introduction and First Reading of Bills		11772
	Patient Care Quality Review Board Act (Bill 41)
	Hon. G. Abbott
	Insurance Amendment Act, 2008 (Bill 40)
	Hon. C. Taylor
	Election Amendment Act, 2008 (Bill 42)
	Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act (No. 2), 2008 (Bill 43)
	Hon. W. Oppal
	The Grassy Plains Community Hall Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008 (Bill Pr403)
	D. MacKay
	Bridge River Valley Flying Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008 (Bill Pr401)
	H. Lali
	Manufactured Home Park Tenancy Amendment Act, 2008 (Bill M206)
	H. Bains

Tabling Documents		11774
	Office of the Auditor General, report 2, 2008-2009, Strengthening Accountability in British Columbia

Statements (Standing Order 25B)		11774
	Bountiful and polygamy issue
	C. Evans
	Errol Wintemute
	V. Roddick
	Mary Pichette and Servants Anonymous Society
	S. Hammell
	Langley downtown ambassadors
	M. Polak
	Riverside Secondary School cancer awareness events
	M. Farnworth
	Support for speech and hearing disorders
	J. Rustad

Oral Questions		11776
	B.C. Place roof replacement
	N. Macdonald
	Hon. S. Hagen
	M. Farnworth
	Government action on forest industry
	C. Trevena
	Hon. R. Coleman
	D. Routley
	L. Krog
	B. Simpson
	Call for review of sewage regulations
	C. Wyse
	Hon. G. Abbott
	Respite services for disabled children
	N. Simons
	Hon. T. Christensen
	Feed supply for hog farms
	C. Evans
	Hon. P. Bell

Second Reading of Bills		11781
	Medicare Protection Amendment Act, 2008 (Bill 21) (continued)
	M. Karagianis
	G. Gentner
	D. Thorne
	C. Puchmayr
	H. Bains
	J. Brar
	D. Cubberley
	S. Simpson

Proceedings in the Douglas Fir Room

Committee of Supply		11810
	Estimates: Ministry of Community Services and Minister Responsible for Seniors' and Women's Issues (continued)
	M. Sather
	Hon. I. Chong
	C. Wyse
	M. Karagianis
	R. Fleming
	B. Simpson
	J. Horgan
	D. Thorne
	N. Macdonald
	M. Farnworth
	D. Routley
	S. Fraser

Hon. G. Campbell: It gives me great pleasure to introduce a very special group of visitors to the House today. In the members' gallery this afternoon is the Order of British Columbia Advisory Council. They have gathered in Victoria to review this year's nominations for the order and to select the recipients for this June's investiture. I understand that this year there were 162 nominations, submitted by many members of both sides of the House, from every single corner of this province.

The advisory council is chaired by the hon. Lance Finch, Chief Justice of the Court of Appeal of B.C. It includes our Speaker — a man of fine judgment, I might add; the president of the Union of B.C. Municipalities, Susan Gimse; the president of Royal Roads University, Dr. Allan Cahoon; Robert Lapper, Associate Deputy Minister for Intergovernmental Relations; and two members of the order, Sudarshan Bakshi of Vancouver and Josephine Mills of Mill Bay.

I would like the House to make them welcome and give them thanks for the work that they're doing.

R. Chouhan: It gives me great pleasure to introduce some of my friends from the B.C. Nurses Union. Please join me to welcome them: the president Debra McPherson, Melanie Leckovic, Linda Pipe, Kathryn Dempsey, Joyce Procure, Sharon Costello, Wendy Strong and Kathy Turner.

Hon. R. Coleman: I'd like to introduce to the House today a great person in my community — a volunteer, a leader, a mother, a friend. But most importantly, she's my wife of 33 years, Michele. My wife, Michele Coleman, is in the gallery today.

Hon. G. Campbell: Today we have in the House a number of young British Columbians. I know every political party is energized by the dedication of young British Columbians as they look to their future, as they suggest to us the ways that we can move forward. I'm pleased to welcome today, and I hope the House will join me in welcoming, members of the B.C. Young Liberals to the precinct this afternoon.

M. Sather: I'm pleased to introduce today in the gallery 35 of the best young British Columbians. They're students from Thomas Haney Secondary School in Maple Ridge. It's a self-directed program and really has a great reputation.

They're here with their teacher Chris Connolly and are going to be spending three days in Victoria. Would the House please join me in welcoming them.

Hon. J. van Dongen: Joining us in the members' gallery this afternoon are representatives from Hong Kong, one of British Columbia's most valued international partners with long-established cultural ties to our province. Ms. Maureen Siu is the director of the Hong Kong economic trade office in Canada. Mr. Y.C. Chan is deputy director, and they are accompanied by Ms. Catherine Yuen, principal consultant for western Canada. I ask the House to please make them all very welcome.

B. Simpson: I would like to introduce my constituency assistant who is in the gallery today, Tobias Lawrence. Tobias just joined my office and is still full of enthusiasm and energy, and I'm sure that over the next few months, that will get metered a little bit. I ask the House to please make her feel very welcome here today.

Hon. R. Thorpe: Justin Shaw was born and raised in Victoria, playing community football since the age of six. Justin is currently on a scholarship playing for the University of Manitoba. Today Justin was drafted by the B.C. Lions. Justin's mother, Judy, works in my deputy minister's office. I would ask all members of this House to join me in extending our best wishes to Justin on his return to British Columbia and an exciting career with the B.C. Lions.

R. Fleming: I would like to introduce to the House a group of students and their teacher Miss Caitlin Schwarz — a class of 29 grade 5 students, boys and girls, from Northridge Elementary School in Saanich. Will the House please make them feel welcome.

J. Nuraney: In the gallery today I have two friends. One is Aziz Kara of LifeLabs, which used to be MDS, and another budding young hotelier called Karim Punja. Please help me make them both welcome in this House.

N. Macdonald: I'd like to make an introduction. My constituency assistant Joy Orr is here. As with many people, if they tried to describe what the constituency assistant does, very often people are left wondering what we do.

It's certainly the case with Joy. She does a tremendous amount of work and tries to make me look good. I appreciate that very much, and I wonder if everyone else would join me in welcoming her to the House.

Hon. G. Hogg: We are joined by 29 grade 5 students and their teacher Miss Thorvaldson from the wonderful elementary school that I attended. Please welcome these students from White Rock Elementary School.

B. Ralston: I'd ask the House to welcome today Melissa Sanderson, who works as my constituency assistant. She deals with the varied demands of the job with great skill and aplomb, and I'm very lucky to have her working for me. Would the House please make her welcome.

Hon. K. Falcon: Mr. Speaker, as you know, there was an election a short time ago in Saskatchewan. They've now got a new Premier, a very dynamic Premier, Brad Wall. I'm also pleased to say that we've got the new Saskatchewan Minister of Highways and Infrastructure and Minister Responsible for the Public Service Commission here with us today. I would ask the House to give a warm welcome to the new minister of transportation and highways, Wayne Elhard, who is joining us today in the gallery.

I. Black: I stand today with some mixed emotions because my legislative assistant Sabrina Loiacono is leaving our fine place at the end of this week. I wanted to acknowledge the tremendous service that she has been to me and to others in the east annex. To mark the occasion, she's also got her mom and dad here today.

I would be remiss if I didn't ask your assistance in giving a very, very warm welcome to Rosa and Giuseppe Loiacono, who are here to wish their daughter well as she goes on to the next phase in her career. Would you join me, please.

Hon. G. Abbott presented a message from His Honour the Administrator: a bill intituled Patient Care Quality Review Board Act.

Hon. G. Abbott: I move that Bill 41, entitled the Patient Care Quality Review Board Act, be introduced and read for the first time now.

Hon. G. Abbott: We're moving forward in meeting our 2008 throne speech commitment to establish new patient care quality review boards for each health authority. The review boards will give British Columbians a clear, consistent and transparent quality assurance process in which to register concerns they may have on the quality of health service delivery they or a loved one received.

Patients will have easy access to a complaint review process through the establishment of patient care quality offices in each health authority. If they're not satisfied with the results of the review by the care quality office in their health authority, they can ask the independent patient care quality review board to examine their complaint.

The boards will have the ability to make recommendations to the health authority and the minister on how to improve the future of our health care system from lessons learned. The board will also report annually to the minister on their activities and on trends they see, again with the goal of improving health care for the future.

Improving public confidence in the quality of the health care system should be a goal of government each and every day. Through this new legislation we'll be able to examine concerns, address them at the local level where they occurred, and also take those lessons and apply them across the province where necessary.

In the Conversation on Health the public told us that transparency and accountability are the two key principles of a world-class health care system. We enshrined those principles in the Medicare Protection Act earlier this session, and we are putting those principles into action today with the Patient Care Quality Review Board Act — greater transparency and greater accountability for British Columbia.

I move that Bill 41 be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 41, Patient Care Quality Review Board Act, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. C. Taylor presented a message from His Honour the Administrator: a bill intituled Insurance Amendment Act, 2008.

Hon. C. Taylor: I move that the bill be introduced and read a first time now.

Hon. C. Taylor: I am pleased to introduce amendments to the Insurance Act that will clarify the act's provisions and enhance consumer protection. The proposed amendments will protect consumers through improved coverage, better access to documents and enhanced dispute resolution mechanisms. The amendments strengthen the language on fire coverage and will provide consumers with more consistency across insurers. These changes are the result of a comprehensive review that included submissions from industry, consumers, the public and the legal community.

In addition, in reviewing and finalizing these amendments, we worked very closely with Alberta to develop harmonized legislation. This standardized approach will allow businesses to compete more effectively in both of our jurisdictions. To highlight this harmonized approach, this cooperation between our two provinces, my counterpart in Alberta is today introducing their Insurance Act amendments in the Alberta Legislature.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the bill be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 40, Insurance Amendment Act, 2008, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on

orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. W. Oppal presented a message from His Honour the Administrator: a bill intituled Election Amendment Act, 2008.

Hon. W. Oppal: I am pleased to introduce Bill 42, the Election Amendment Act, 2008. This bill makes amendments to the act that governs provincial elections in British Columbia.

The bill strengthens voter identification requirements to ensure that everyone who exercises their right to vote does so in accordance with the law. It encompasses a number of recommendations that have been made by the Chief Electoral Officer. In March 2006 the Chief Electoral Officer made a number of recommendations to modernize the act.

The bill regulates spending by parties and candidates during the period beginning 120 days before a scheduled general election. As the Chief Electoral Officer noted in his report, currently that period is not regulated, and parties and candidates may spend whatever they like. To ensure fairness and balance, the bill also reintroduces spending limits for third parties, which would also apply to the 120-day precampaign period through to the general voting day.

The bill also increases fines for all offences under the act. These fines have not changed since the last time the act was significantly amended in 1995.

Finally, the bill takes numerous technical amendments on the recommendations of the Chief Electoral Officer to modernize and streamline the administration of the act.

Hon. Speaker, I move that the bill be placed on the orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 42, Election Amendment Act, 2008, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. W. Oppal presented a message from His Honour the Administrator: a bill intituled Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act (No. 2), 2008.

Hon. W. Oppal: I move that the bill be introduced and read a first time now.

Hon. W. Oppal: I am pleased to introduce Bill 43, Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act (No. 2), 2008.

This bill amends the following statutes: Employment Standards Act; Final Agreement Consequential Amendments Act, 2007; Home Owner Grant Act; Insurance (Vehicle) Act; Judicial Compensation Act; Law and Equity Act; Local Government Act; Motor Vehicle Act; the Municipalities Enabling and Validating Act; Petroleum and Natural Gas Act; Private Career Training Institutions Act; Provincial Court Act; Representative for Children and Youth Act; Supreme Court Act; Transportation Investment Act; Treaty First Nation Taxation Act; Vancouver Charter. In addition, the bill makes minor and technical amendments to a number of other acts.

I move that the bill be placed on the orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 43, Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act (No. 2), 2008, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

D. MacKay presented a bill intituled The Grassy Plains Community Hall Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008.

D. MacKay: I move that a bill intituled The Grassy Plains Community Hall Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008, of which notice has been given on the order paper, be introduced and read a first time now.

D. MacKay: I move that the bill be referred to the Select Standing Committee on Parliamentary Reform, Ethical Conduct, Standing Orders and Private Bills.

Bill Pr403, The Grassy Plains Community Hall Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008, introduced, read a first time and referred to the Select Standing Committee on Parliamentary Reform, Ethical Conduct, Standing Orders and Private Bills.

H. Lali presented a bill intituled Bridge River Valley Flying Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008.

H. Lali: I move that a bill intituled Bridge River Valley Flying Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008, of which notice has been given on the order paper, be introduced and now read a first time.

H. Lali: Some of the communities affected by this are Bridge River Valley, Gold Bridge, Bralorne, Tyax, Gunn Lake and also the Spruce Lake wilderness area. The benefits are to tourism, recreation and economic development and, especially now, trying to get the air ambulance in and out. It's about a two-and-a-half-hour drive to Lillooet Hospital there. It will also increase tourism, economic and other opportunities.

I want to point out that the society was struck off in November of 1991, and it is not possible to carry on the business of the Bridge River Valley Flying Association. Obviously, it has to be a special act of the Legislature to revive this.

I want to thank Donna James of the BRVFA, the Clerks of the House and also the Minister of Finance for helping to make this happen.

I move that the bill be referred to the Select Standing Committee on Parliamentary Reform, Ethical Conduct, Standing Orders and Private Bills.

Bill Pr401, Bridge River Valley Flying Association (Corporate Restoration) Act, 2008, introduced, read a first time and referred to the Select Standing Committee on Parliamentary Reform, Ethical Conduct, Standing Orders and Private Bills.

H. Bains presented a bill intituled Manufactured Home Park Tenancy Amendment Act, 2008.

H. Bains: I move introduction of the Manufactured Home Park Tenancy Amendment Act, 2008, for first reading.

H. Bains: The Manufactured Home Park Tenancy Amendment Act, 2008, amends sections 42 and 44 of the Manufactured Home Park Tenancy Act by (1) requiring that a park owner provide 12 months' notice of eviction when the park is redeveloped for uses other than a manufactured home park; (2) requiring that a park owner, at the time of eviction, pay a tenant 12 months' rent or $10,000, whichever is greater, for relocation expenses; and (3) requiring that a park owner pay those tenants who are unable to relocate their home because their home failed to meet the transportation safety standards or local building standards an amount equal to the fair market value of the manufactured home as compensation.

The current act has failed the manufactured home owners all across this province and has left many homeless. This bill is designed to provide protection to manufactured home owners — many of whom happen to be elderly and disabled — who worked hard, paid their taxes all their lives and helped build their communities and this province.

By protecting their homes from land developers trying to cash in on high real estate values, this bill will provide respect and dignity and peace of mind in their retirement years. Further, this bill protects the affordable housing stock that this province badly needs. We as a society have an obligation to not only say that we look after our seniors but back it up through legislative safeguards so that they can live and enjoy the last few years of their lives without the fear of becoming homeless. This bill does that, and it brings back fairness and balance in dealing with a situation where the park owner decides to develop the land for other use.

I move that this bill be placed on the orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting after today.

Bill M206, Manufactured Home Park Tenancy Amendment Act, 2008, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. M. de Jong: Mr. Speaker, just to advise the House that in accordance with the agreement reached between the government and the opposition to have government legislation tabled in its entirety prior to the end of April, the presentation of Bill 43 today does represent the completion of the government's legislative agenda for this spring session.

In the days ahead, in the next few days, the Opposition House Leader and I will endeavour to arrive at a schedule that would see the work completed in a mutually agreeable fashion, and I'll report back to the House in due course.

Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members, I have the honour to present a report of the Auditor General, report 2, 2008-2009, Strengthening Accountability in British Columbia.

C. Evans: I'd like to use my two minutes of non-partisan time today to talk about Bountiful in my constituency in Creston.

The issue of polygamy at Bountiful is a huge issue for the people involved, for citizens generally, for the government of British Columbia and also for Canada. Canada has historically had a great deal of difficulty figuring out how to deal with polygamy within the law. Meanwhile, we have failed collectively for a quarter century, as far as I know, to find a single person living at Bountiful or elsewhere willing to make an accusation of abuse and then defend that accusation at court.

Attorneys General of all parties would, I think, have liked to resolve the issue on their own, and thus far

they cannot. Thus the polygamy question must be seen as a societal conundrum that is in need of broad-based solutions that belong, essentially, to all of us. I ask that the federal, provincial and state governments from Canada and the United States meet to discuss the legal and societal issues related to polygamous communities in comprehensive and open dialogue. I ask that this happen now, while it is in the public's mind on both sides of the border by virtue of the seizure of the children in Texas.

Similarly, I ask that every ministry in British Columbia and all elected officials that are in any way connected with Bountiful at any level also meet here in British Columbia in open dialogue to discuss how we might end cross-border immigration that facilitates polygamous marriage, how we might actively assist citizens at Bountiful who are in need of services to assist them to leave the community, how we might assist those who are already expelled from Bountiful and, lastly, how we might use all the services and educational activities at our disposal to assist children at Bountiful to understand the greater society that lives outside their walls and to lose their fear of the outside world.

Hon. Speaker, I ask that we end partisan behaviour and blame on this subject now and that we deal with it together now.

V. Roddick: The person of a man may leave or be taken away, but the best part of a good man stays. It stays forever. Delta South lost a pillar of the community recently, Errol Wintemute, at the age of 91. He was a quiet, respectable, nice man who was always there to help the community, particularly young people, and he got the job done.

Errol was passionate about his work in the coastal lumber industry, specializing in yellow cedar. His knowledge, vision, integrity and work ethic earned him the respect and admiration of colleagues throughout the Pacific Northwest. His last day on the job at Delta Cedar Products, which was founded in 1965, was Thursday, April 10 — the day before he died.

Errol Wintemute was a man of immense energy and enthusiasm. He chaired and was a major contributor to the capital campaign to build the Boys and Girls Club clubhouse in Ladner that bears his name. Delta Hospital benefited through an endowment fund from Delta Cedar. In addition to promoting parks and playgrounds in Delta, he was also a founder of the Mount Seymour Ski Club.

He did so much for us all. We will remember and, hopefully, learn from him the joy he took in life's simple pleasures. These pleasures he unfailingly welcomed with two words: "Oh boy." Errol Wintemute had a great run.

S. Hammell: I spoke this weekend with a woman whose name is Mary Pichette. Mary is a sexual assault survivor, a survivor of a drug addiction and a survivor of years on the streets during her youth. Mary is now the executive director of Servants Anonymous Society, an organization dedicated to rescuing girls and young women from the sex trade.

Mary told me that research suggests that one man out of ten buys sex from women, and approximately 100,000 purchases of women are made daily in B.C. from various outlets, including the Internet. Each woman on average is bought ten times a day.

Hon. Speaker, 30 percent of the young women SAS serves are second generation homeless, and the remaining 70 percent come from every other walk of life imaginable. They are recruited from schools, campuses, churches and malls. They are often vulnerable, with issues of self-esteem.

Mary told me that none of the young women she has worked with have chosen to be prostituted. Mary and SAS — with the help of donors, business, government and the Surrey Firefighters Charitable foundation — provide a wraparound service of outreach, safe homes, education and ongoing support for the young women who want to escape life on the streets. They provide in-depth life training and mentors for the young women, mentors who themselves have exited the sex trade and gone on to successful careers.

Education is central to Mary. She understands that SAS is engaged in long-term change and that commitment sometimes takes years. Mary believes deeply that if you educate a woman, you change a generation.

Mary has been nominated for the Making a Difference award of Soroptimists International and will be competing with women nominated in North and South America. Will the House please join me in wishing her success in that competition.

M. Polak: At the heart of downtown Langley city is a one-way section of the Fraser Highway that has become a favourite spot for all manner of shopping or just a quiet cup of coffee. It is also the area of town that is home to my constituency office. Owing to our location, my office receives a high number of drop-in visits from constituents every day.

I suppose I shouldn't have favourites, but I can't help it. I love it when the downtown Langley ambassadors drop by. With their distinctive blue shirts and smiling faces, these volunteers contribute their time to making downtown Langley a welcoming place for visitors and residents alike.

Today the downtown Langley ambassadors will launch their fourth season as some of the best examples of that well-known Langley hospitality. Last year they logged 1,366 hours between May and September. This year their 20-member-strong group will once again be touring the city streets, providing information and assistance to tourists as well as local people.

Langley was among the first communities to have an ambassadors program, joining others such as Nanaimo, Kelowna, Prince George and Maple Ridge. The program began as an initiative of the Downtown

Langley Merchants Association. It was an innovative way to add extra eyes and ears for the business community in order to curb vandalism and prevent vehicle break-ins through a partnership with ICBC.

As the ambassadors program evolved, it became apparent that due to their friendly nature, these volunteers were providing far more than crime prevention. These are people who love their city, and their enthusiasm has led them to focus more and more on creating a downtown that lives up to Langley city's motto "The place to be."

I'm proud to say that our downtown Langley ambassadors have been recognized for their exceptional work in our community. In 2007 they were awarded the Business Improvement Areas of B.C.'s Best in the West Award for social and safety initiatives. They've also expanded their program to include heritage walking tours of Langley's historic downtown.

M. Farnworth: Cancer is a disease that touches nearly everyone — in this chamber, in the province as a whole, even young people. That's why it's really terrific to see a high school in my community taking on this terrible disease and trying to raise public awareness.

Riverside Secondary in Port Coquitlam, in the first two weeks of May, will be holding a cancer awareness two-week time. They'll be using that time to raise awareness among students and the public about cancer and the fight against cancer. They'll be doing it by the use of the school newspaper, by bulletin boards and in the classroom. They'll be sharing stories about the fights against cancer and the victories against cancer. Truly remarkable.

On the 8th of May they'll be holding a wear yellow day, in which the school will be encouraging all the students, teachers, parents and the public to wear yellow to show support for the fight against cancer and to raise awareness about it.

It truly is reflective of the initiative of our students in British Columbia and the students of Port Coquitlam, and I'm extremely proud of them. I'd like to recognize three students in particular and their teacher, who have done an awful lot to get this initiative going and to organize it. They are Kate Olszewski, Carly Moy, Smruti Shah and their teacher Raquel Chin.

I know the first two weeks in May are going to be a truly remarkable, successful event, and I know that May 8 will be a very special day when Riverside School and the community will be wearing yellow to raise awareness about the fight against cancer. I ask all of us in this House to congratulate the students of Riverside Secondary.

J. Rustad: I'd like to draw attention today to a topic that affects one in ten Canadians. These are people who have speech, language and hearing disorders. In this province alone there are 200,000 British Columbians with a hearing loss. As politicians, we rely on communications. Imagine what it must be like to not be able to participate in this basic function. For some of us in this House, perhaps having a hearing challenge could be considered beneficial. But seriously, for many others, this can be a huge barrier in life.

To raise awareness of this situation, our government has proclaimed May as Speech and Hearing Awareness Month in B.C. This is one of two announcements the Minister of Employment and Income Assistance and the member for West Vancouver–Capilano made this afternoon. They also announced a one-time grant of $500,000 to the Western Institute for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing.

With this grant, the Western Institute will provide assistive equipment to over 400 low-income British Columbians who have a hearing loss. These low-tech devices range from vibrating alarm clocks to visual signals devices for their phones.

I had the opportunity to participate in a ceremony at lunch today with some of the Western Institute's clients, and I saw firsthand how they're making a huge difference for the lives of British Columbians. Please join me in congratulating the Western Institute for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing for the great work they're doing in our province.

N. Macdonald: For two years the B.C. Liberals have stonewalled questions about the roof of B.C. Place to cover up their gross mismanagement of this file, and taxpayers are going to be left holding the bag.

My question to the minister responsible for this mess: will he finally release the report he's had for two years on the state of the B.C. Place roof — a complete, undoctored report — today, or is he going to continue to hide facts from British Columbians?

Hon. S. Hagen: I would just like to inform the member that the report he's referring to is not a report referencing the roof at all. The report has been released. If he has a complaint about the way it's been released, he should contact the commissioner and take it up with the commissioner.

N. Macdonald: That's openness, B.C. Liberal style. I'll tell the public what that report looks like. It is 15 pages long, and 14 pages are stroked out with black pen. That is absolutely typical of every single document we get from this minister.

In May 2006, 25 years after the original roof was built, the NDP asked if the roof was in need of

replacement. The B.C. Liberals said: "Don't worry; everything is fine." The minister said: "It will last up to the Olympics and well beyond."

In January 2007 the world saw the roof collapsing. There are now 650 days until the Olympic opening ceremonies. It will be viewed by billions of people worldwide, and the Liberals are scrambling to replace it.

British Columbians have a right to a very basic question. Let's put this in context.

N. Macdonald: The life span of the roof of B.C. Place was up — what? — two years ago. That should have been a clue. The NDP asked about the roof two years ago: was it sound? That should have been a clue. A secret report on the state of B.C. Place was received by the minister over 20 months ago. The roof collapsed 15 months ago. That should have been a clue. The whole world saw that, but apparently none of those have triggered action from this government.

The question is: why has it taken so long for this government to make any decision on the roof of B.C. Place? Explain that to the people of British Columbia.

Hon. S. Hagen: Well, it is good to hear the member express concern about a building that the NDP were opposed to building back in 1983.

Hon. S. Hagen: I can assure all members of this House and the public out there that safety is always a top priority, whether it's with PavCo or any other government agency. Last January I committed to releasing all roof inspection reports that have been done. I have done that. They're on the website.

N. Macdonald: Even in a building where the question and answer are linked very, very loosely, that must set a new standard. This minister's incompetence has left us with 650 days to plan and build a new roof on B.C. Place. We saw what happened with the convention centre expansion project when you set that deadline.

Here's what the Auditor General said, and the Auditor General's report should be read so that you get some sense of where we're headed with this project. He says that having to complete the project within a short time frame led to a procurement strategy that left the taxpayers with all the significant risks. To remind British Columbians, that is $400 million worth of risk and counting.

Again, to the minister: what will the taxpayers of this province be forced to pay because of this minister and this government's sheer incompetence?

Hon. S. Hagen: I'm not sure I heard a question there, but I will make a few comments on what PavCo is doing. PavCo is working hard. They're working diligently to prepare a report for the government, and we want to do it right. The other thing is that we will end up with a project that the people of British Columbia can be very, very proud of.

M. Farnworth: Well, PavCo may be working diligently, but clearly this minister and this government haven't been working diligently on this issue.

In 2006 the minister responsible for B.C. Place said that it was not anticipated that a significant capital infusion was needed. Yet today at cabinet, the government is talking about how to replace the B.C. Place roof.

So my question to the minister is clear: when will he come clean with the public, and when will he tell them what the options are and what the costs are going to be to replace the roof at B.C. Place?

Hon. S. Hagen: I can assure the member opposite and all the people in British Columbia that PavCo is doing their due diligence. They're bringing a report and a recommendation forward to the government. The government will look at those recommendations, will make a decision and will produce a product that the people of British Columbia will be proud of.

M. Farnworth: This government has known there's been a problem since 2006. Each day that goes by without a decision sees an increase in costs. Each day of delay sees more questions about uncertainty. With the Olympics closing in fast, the public and the world want to know what this government is going to be doing about B.C. Place.

Will the minister commit to release the options to the public so that we know? Is it going to be a brand-new expensive roof because of the inflated costs that have been going on, or is it going to be the old roof flapping in the wind like a bad toupée? Come clean with the options.

Hon. S. Hagen: I would like to offer the opportunity for the Opposition House Leader to rephrase the

But having said that, I can assure the Opposition House Leader that we are doing our due diligence with the help of the PavCo staff. They will bring forward the recommendations. The government will make a decision. As I've said, the people of British Columbia are going to be very, very happy when they see what we're going to deliver. I hope that the opposition, unlike what they did in 1983, will support that.

C. Trevena: Yesterday we learned that the No. 1 paper machine at Elk Falls in Campbell River is closing permanently, so 145 jobs are lost in Campbell River, in my community — 145 well-paid jobs — because of this government's failure to take any action to respond to the largest crisis the forest industry has ever faced. That's on top of the 257 jobs being lost in ten days when the TimberWest mill next door closes down.

This is a direct result of the minister's choice to sit on the sidelines rather than ensure that coastal mills have a secure supply of logs and chips. It isn't market conditions. It isn't just that. It is government policy.

I'd like to ask what the Minister of Forests and Range is going to do today to ensure that coastal mills have the raw materials they need to keep people employed.

Hon. R. Coleman: I just want to read the member something: "While we knew 2008 was going to be one of the most difficult years in recent history for the forest industry, the continued reduction of the United States housing starts due to the sub-prime mortgage fiasco, extremely depressed commodity lumber prices, continued strong dollar, the challenging Japanese market and high cost of harvesting on the coast are all contributing to a profoundly negative impact on our business." That was Western Forest Products today.

For a member opposite to get up and say that market conditions are not the problem here shows a complete lack of understanding. Housing sales in the United States are at a 16½-year low. Housing starts are down by 66 percent in the United States. The sub-prime mortgage market has tolled a disaster on the U.S. marketplace, and the Canadian dollar is up to par.

I actually am concerned about the forest industry and its future. I believe that the industry is trying to make the adjustments so that it will be there to employ your people and your communities in the future. They have to do that in order to survive.

D. Routley: Mr. Speaker, I'll ask you to remember along with me when the Forests Minister told this House yesterday that there were 17 Western Forest Products logging sites in operation. Today we learned that 1,000 people lost their jobs overnight — 1,000 people; 1,000 families, 800 of them from those very logging operations the minister was referring to.

Surely the minister must speak to people in the industry. Surely the minister must have known. It's bad enough that he admits he's just a spectator, but he's not even watching the game.

My question is: was this minister playing games with this House yesterday when he said that those sites were in operation, or is he completely out of touch with his file? One thousand families want an answer.

Hon. R. Coleman: I'll just ignore the personal insults from the member for Cowichan-Ladysmith. Quite frankly, the company yesterday afternoon — probably because the markets close after or about the time question period starts — had not informed anybody, because they are a public company.

The reality is that six of their operations, which were on the list of 17 that I had yesterday, have now been curtailed for a couple of weeks — some for maybe 30 or 35 days. They made it very clear that their mills are continuing to operate and that they have lots of log supply. They have told people that they will go back logging when they need the inventory, as long as markets stay steady.

L. Krog: This Forests Minister has told us that selling off B.C. forest lands is a strategy to protect jobs. Well, yesterday I think we learned that's a pretty dismal failure. A thousand jobs lost — 1,000 people on this island who are not going to have their mortgage payments met or their rent payments made. They're going to be facing EI. The only thing that this government has delivered is a do-nothing round table.

My question to the minister: were 1,000 jobs lost yesterday enough of a wake-up call?

Finally, is it bad enough for this government to take some action today to protect those jobs?

Hon. R. Coleman: Well, you know, on Vancouver Island there are seven sawmills and three reman plants run by Western Forest Products. They curtailed some of their logging yesterday. Some of it is going to go back as early as May 20, some on June 2 and some of it as late as June 24. They have actually told the people what days they can expect to come back to go back logging.

This is what happens in the marketplace, hon. Member. You actually log to fill up your inventory for markets you can sell product to, and that's what they're doing. They're managing their business, which I think is appropriate in a very tough and difficult marketplace.

L. Krog: You know, that's the feeblest excuse that we've heard from this minister.

The people who work in the industry understand that it's not just about market conditions. They understand that it's government policy that encourages wood to be left on the forest floor instead of being taken to

the mills in the best pulp market we've ever seen. It's government policy to ship out raw logs in this province. It's government policy that's transforming forest companies into real estate companies. So I say to this minister: what's he going to do today to save those jobs?

Hon. R. Coleman: The member opposite may want to go to the quotes from the Leader of the Opposition on CHNL this morning, where the Leader of the Opposition said this: "It's not going back to the old system where it's linked to mills, to cut licences. You know, the days of bailing out old mills are gone. I've been very clear about that. I've said that publicly."

Hon. R. Coleman: I know what you're advocating, hon. Members opposite. You're advocating that we should say to some company: "Log when you can't sell the log, mill when you can't sell the product, and mill when you can't sell the product for a profit, because we in the NDP would like to see every forest company in British Columbia go out of business because we don't believe you should be allowed to manage your business."

B. Simpson: The sad reality is that overnight a thousand families found out that they're now part of the collateral damage of this minister doing nothing to address the deepening crisis in the forest sector. The minister answered a question about the pulp sector with an answer about the sawmill sector. He answered a question about the pulp sector with an answer about appurtenancy. The minister shows that every time he stands up, he doesn't understand the file he has in front of him. We need action now. This minister says that he can't take action.

Here is my request to the minister. For the sake of these families — particularly on the coast — who are struggling right now, will he take these two concrete actions? We're in the hottest pulp market we've ever seen. Will he keep pulp mills running on the coast by ensuring they can get the raw materials they need to keep people employed, and will he stop the export of logs from the coast so that other entrepreneurs can create jobs in the value-added and remanufacturing sector?

Hon. R. Coleman: Maybe the member opposite could do his research with regards to the one line on the one pulp mill, which was actually shut down last September. He might want to talk to the company and find out that the cost of actually chipping logs is too expensive for them to continue to operate. They've made that very clear on their fibre supply.

The member might also want to look at the fact that someone like Western Forest Products, who seems to be the target of this particular opposition, actually exported 2/10 of 1 percent of the logs, which were logs that they couldn't put through a mill off the Queen Charlotte Islands, in the first quarter of this year.

B. Simpson: What troubles me here is that, again, the minister stands up in defence of a company that we're not attacking. We're asking the minister….

Public policy determines who gets access to public forests. Public policy determines at what price. Public policy determines if our pulp mill sector on the coast gets access to the logs that they need to employ people. Public policy determines if other people, other than Western Forest Products, can get logs on the coast.

All this minister has offered is a round table. At that round table are two people from TimberWest, a company that prides itself on being a land developer, a real estate company and a log exporter. Is that what's really going on here, Mr. Speaker? Is that what's really going on — that this minister's vision for the coast is land development, real estate and no jobs? Is that the real agenda?

Hon. R. Coleman: That may be the vision for the NDP, but the vision is actually to have sustainable companies making products for a multitude of markets so that they have a sustainable future for the employees they employ. They employ thousands of them on the coast of British Columbia.

Hon. R. Coleman: You know, you get the catcalling from the other side. They don't want to actually recognize the marketplace. They could go and look at CIBC World Markets summary of the future of forestry. They could go do a little research.

The fact of the matter is that we are going to work with our industry to survive this downturn, because when it comes out, they will be in the most competitive place that they could possibly be for the future markets in British Columbia.

C. Wyse: John Wood of Hixon is out $25,000 as a result of his septic field failing after it had been installed for only one year. The new regulations authorize installers to determine what is legal or compliant. The regulations do not allow a public health inspector to approve or condemn a system design.

A coalition of professional organizations and individuals has identified seven critical deficiencies with the 2005 sewage system regulations. These deficiencies include loss of public health protection, loss of oversight and greater cost to the public.

My question: will the minister commit to a complete review and rewrite of the sewage regulations to correct problems and deficiencies that have been noted since their approval in 2005?

Hon. G. Abbott: I thank the member for his questions. I think the sewage regulations have worked generally very well. What we have is professional certification for systems. In virtually every case the system has worked well.

I think the case that the member is referencing is one that I'm familiar with, and I understand there are efforts underway to remediate the issues which the member has identified in a general way.

N. Simons: Well, there's another sad day for families on the Island, and that's the closure of Corner House today — a respite house for kids with special needs. Unfortunately, this service is so important for families on the lower Island here. Families don't know what they're going to do.

One grandmother, who has proudly and happily raised her 16-year-old granddaughter, is now wondering what she's going to do in order to be able to continue to do that. A family with four children, two with special needs, wonders how they're going to get one weekend a month to be able to sleep through the night.

Families with children with special needs need more options, not fewer options. So my question is to the minister. How can he justify to these families by taking away their choice and giving them an option of a little bit of money or this important resource? It's a choice of take it or leave it. How can he explain that to the families affected?

Hon. T. Christensen: The member is correct that respite services are an important part of a range of services that families with children with special needs require to give them a bit of a break. CLBC is mandated to deliver those services. They are looking at the ways that they can serve the individual needs of children and families on the lower Island. They're looking at how respite services are delivered across the province, and they have made some changes that will enable them to serve up to four times as many families in the Victoria area to ensure that they are getting the respite services they require.

They are working with each of the families that were receiving service from Corner House, and 16 of the 18 families that were receiving service have new arrangements in place. My understanding is that one other family is considering a particular option, and the final family has been presented with two different options but has declined those. In any event, CLBC will continue to work with them to ensure that they receive the respite services they require for their children.

N. Simons: I met with three families earlier this week. If there were 18 families…. He says that they've all received options. They haven't. The three families I met with were not provided with options by this government. I think this is a case where families across this province have to recognize that services to their vulnerable children are being cut by this government.

I'd like to know how he can justify saying that four families are going to be served where one was served before, when those services aren't even available in our communities. He is reducing the choice for families in this province. How can he explain that to families?

Hon. T. Christensen: The fact is that today CLBC is serving 1,800 more children across the province than were served two years ago. CLBC is serving an additional 1,200 adults across the province than they were two years ago.

We will continue to work closely with CLBC to ensure that they're able to improve services, that they're able to serve more families across the province, and that the resources that are available are being used in a manner that best meets the needs of children and families.

C. Evans: When the present outfit took office about seven years ago, there were 50 hog farms in British Columbia, and they've managed to reduce that to 32. The 32 are losing an average of $300,000 a year — $60 to $65 a carcass. Why are they losing money? Because, of course, feed grain is now going into the production of ethanol to run cars.

My question is: how can a government that is subsidizing the production of ethanol out of feed grain to the tune of $5 million a year let the 32 remaining hog farmers in the province go down the tubes because they can't use that grain to feed hogs?

Hon. P. Bell: In fact, it is a very difficult market, particularly in the hog and beef markets right now across North America, but we're working very closely with the hog producers. I met as recently as last week with them. We're developing a strategic plan in con-

junction with the hog producers across British Columbia to make sure that they have a long-term, viable industry.

C. Evans: The government has expressed some interest in the hundred-mile diet. The 32 produce only about 40 percent of our consumption in British Columbia. If they go out of business, hogs will come from Idaho or from Alberta into British Columbia to make up for what we used to do when they took office.

My question to the minister is: when they print the kilometres travelled on the package of bacon in British Columbia two years from now, how many thousands of kilometres will it take to make up for what you used to have when you took office?

Hon. P. Bell: I find it a little bit ironic. All the member has to do is look at his neighbour the member for Esquimalt-Metchosin, who's an active advocate for biofuels and likes to run her vehicle on biofuels all the time. So perhaps they should chat a bit back and….

Hon. P. Bell: Perhaps the member should just chat with his neighbour and get their position straight once and for all.

Hon. M. de Jong: I call continued second reading debate on Bill 21 in this chamber and in Committee A continued debate on the estimates, Committee of Supply — for the information of members, the estimates of the Ministry of Community Services.

M. Karagianis: I'd like to resume my debate from last night on Bill 21. It was with great interest that I read the minister's introductory remarks on this bill. The minister referred to the bill and to the change in language very distinctly by saying that the addition of these expanded definitions will not change how the Medical Services Plan is administered nor how the Medical Services Commission functions. So one has to ask: why is the government introducing legislation that in fact doesn't change anything to do with this act?

It is in fact an amendment act that the government has introduced. So going back to my remarks last night, there is obviously much more at work here than meets the eye. The government wouldn't be introducing a bill unless it was going to significantly change the laws within this province around medicare protection. This is an amendment to that act, and it's a very significant amendment.

I'd have to say that for the last seven years, I have watched the progress of the health care system here in British Columbia with great interest. It comes as no surprise that we are seeing some legislative changes that are the culmination of work that's been going on for seven years. In fact, for seven years I have watched this government dismantle the public health care system here in British Columbia piece by piece in a very stealthy way.

It started out with actions like Bill 29. In my community, that had a very serious effect and still continues to have a deep effect on not only jobs but the condition of the hospital. So when we look at Bill 29, which was one of the most immediate actions of this government in the slow and steady process of undermanaging, underfunding and dismantling the public health care system…. We ended up seeing government move in with a fairly aggressive privatization campaign and agenda on health services, including housekeeping and food preparation here in the province of British Columbia.

When we look at seven years, six years or five years down the road of seeing the results of Bill 29, what do we have now? Well, we have a continuing and growing concern about dirty hospitals. We certainly have notoriously bad food in hospitals. Certainly many of the privatized services have tried in many ways to rectify some of that, because I think the issue around dirty hospitals and bad food became so pervasive and such a huge public concern that the government had to take some kind of steps around rethermalized food.

Certainly there's an ongoing concern, a need now for steady audits, for oversight at all times by health districts around the state of dirty hospitals. We've seen a proliferation of things like superbugs. All of that has taken place hand in hand with this Bill 29 privatization and with the resulting dirty hospitals.

Finally, it took a Supreme Court decision to force the government to acknowledge some of the errors of their ways in Bill 29. But that wasn't the only part of the health care system that they have undermanaged, underfunded and handled very poorly.

There is the infamous and ongoing debate around long-term care beds. I was fascinated today to see a story in the newspaper that said they're announcing, finally, that 4,000 long-term care beds have been built

— this from a government that promised many, many years ago that it would build 5,000 long-term care beds. Here we are seven years later, and the government has still not delivered on that promise.

In fact, it's a specious argument when we see them declare that 4,000 beds have been built. We look at the number of hospital beds that were closed down, and we look at all of the supporting systems around seniors health care that have also been underfunded, shut down or undermanaged in many ways. We have seen the growing concern and the growing pressure on hospitals around emergency room closures, emergency rooms being packed and jammed and code purples and code oranges — all of that as a result of undermanaged health care provisions in the province of British Columbia.

Frankly, I know there was the great purge that this government undertook in its first couple of years in office, where anything that had been built under the New Democrats in the '90s was fair game to shut down, to dismantle, to undermanage, to do away with. It was a purge that went on. We continue to hear it from the other side today. Anytime you question them on the reality of the outcomes of the actions that this government has taken, they immediately go back to this purge mentality.

I would say that the steady and incremental undermanaging and mismanaging of the health care system has in fact been part of a larger plan that we are beginning to see the culmination of here in the amendments to the Medicare Protection Act before us today.

The chronic underfunding that has gone on under this government has also borne out its own results and has steadily led us, step by step, towards this argument that the government has put before us today — that somehow we have to incorporate a sustainability clause in the act, that we have to amend the Medicare Protection Act to include this concept of sustainability.

It's very interesting what that actually means. What does that actually mean in terms of how the government has managed the health care system to date, how the government has performed as far as its promises and its actual outcomes, what it has said and what it has actually meant in terms of on-the-ground action? I would say that the chronic mismanaging and undermanaging of the system is very purposeful.

We've seen the government turn a complete blind eye to the growing concern around private clinics. When the first issues in the province of British Columbia came about — private clinics wanting to begin to charge patients fees to go to these clinics and get the kind of treatments they needed — we saw the government stall on any kind of action for a very long time. The government purposely stalled. They were not proactive in going in and saying, "No, we're not going to support this idea of fee-for-service private clinics. We're going to actually ignore that" — until the outcry from the public and from the opposition grew too great. Then the government reluctantly moved in and said: "No, wait. You can't do that in these private clinics."

In fact, the government was prepared to ignore that for a very long time. Had there not been that outcry from opposition and from the public, I imagine we would have seen the kind of fee-for-service and "access to health care if you've got money" kind of privatization. We would have seen that escalated, I'm sure, at a greater rate than we've seen.

Now we come to this need for the government to somehow rewrite the Medicare Protection Act and amend it with this new terminology around sustainability. I know this is a real catchphrase nowadays that's used for almost anything. It does have real meaning, and it does have real purpose, but its application here is highly questionable.

I am not clear, from anything that the minister said in introducing this bill or from any indications that the government has given us, how they are defining this sustainability. But given their actions over the past seven years, given this sort of predetermination by government to mismanage and undermanage and underfund the system so severely….

We have seen the kind of backups in the system. We have seen the public outcry about hallway medicine. We have seen the proliferation of dirty hospitals and bad food. We have seen the number of seniors who have no access to long-term care beds and who become bed-blockers.

We see this system beginning to reach some kind of maximum density, where now the government can come in and say, "Look at how unmanageable the health care system is. Look at how much it's going to cost us. Look at how unmanageable it is. We desperately need to include this concept of sustainability," to justify more invasion by privatization into the system. I actually have seen the progress of this, seven years leading towards this.

This concept of sustainability is a culmination of a plan that has been taking place for some time. I know there has been a great deal of fearmongering by this government on the cost of health care. We saw the Finance Minister tell us that in a few years, health care will gobble up all the money in the coffers. What complete nonsense is that?

We also have a government that has been playing with huge surpluses. Now, those of course are dwindling away, but certainly a government that has huge surpluses cannot be saying at the same time, "Health care is gobbling up everything," because the reality is that as a percentage of GDP, there's been very little change for 20 years in this province.

What we have seen, though, very clearly is that a government that is spending less on non-health-care-related services in the province can certainly then say, "Health care is taking up a larger percentage," but those are misleading numbers. If you want to play with numbers like that, that's fine, but come clean on what the agenda is for that.

This fearmongering that has gone on around the cost of health care, I think, is completely inappropriate but, again, is driving us ever closer towards this ration-

ale for why the system has to be privatized. That is what this bill is about. It is about an excuse for more privatization.

Frankly, across a number of bills over the last couple of years we have seen this same steadfast forward movement to more privatization on every single front, whether it's in the Education Ministry, in post-secondary education, in transportation or now in health care.

I would say that this is, very frankly, a political and ideological battleground. This has nothing to do with sustainability. In fact, if you look at the real numbers, if you look at the percentage of our health care spending to GDP, there is no rationale whatsoever for us to be claiming that we are going to break the bank by our continued investment in health care.

Much of the pressure of all of this undermanaging and underfunding and this steady move to create chaos within the health care system in order to legitimize the idea of privatizing — where is this being borne? This is being borne on the backs of ordinary working families.

The fear is that health care spending will outstrip our ability to pay. The fear of privatized clinics — very expensive, exclusive privatized clinics where you can go and pay extra money to get the kind of health care that you deserve — is creating a great deal of anxiety and fear in most working families.

The reality is that working people in this province are just getting by. The cost of real estate, the ever-increasing cost of fees that this government has dumped on the backs of working families every single day, coupled with this concern around the growing pressures for privatized pay-for-service health care, is going directly onto the working people of this province. I would say that it is a completely unacceptable endeavour by this government to continue to create an atmosphere where it legitimizes a health care system where the wealthy will get better health care than the rest of the people in this province.

Frankly, Madam Speaker, I include myself in that. I do not consider myself to be wealthy, yet like many members of this House, I make more than most British Columbians who are working right now trying to raise a family, trying to pay the mortgage and trying to feed their kids, keep shoes on their feet, get them to school and keep their lives going.

We know that in this city it takes a minimum of two incomes earning at least $15 an hour each in order to meet the needs of a lifestyle here in my constituency. So the concept that in the future, public health care will not be there for future generations or that you will have to be rich in order to afford it is just appalling.

I am so suspicious about this sustainability concept that's now being forced as an amendment to this act. I'm suspicious as to what the motivation is for that. I am suspicious as to what the outcomes will be for that, and I am darn sure, standing here today, that it will be on the backs of working families in my community that any kind of sustainability will occur.

We've actually had a very interesting recent experience with privatization. The provincial government has demanded that any projects over $20 million are required to go through Partnerships B.C. We have recently had a hospital project here in this city, at the Royal Jubilee Hospital, where there's been an ongoing need, we know, for at least 650 new beds in this region here in the south Island, in greater Victoria.

Rather than allow the hospital board, made up of elected officials, made up of individuals here within the city of Victoria who have been responsible for hospital expansion in the past…. Instead, the government imposed on us the requirement to go to a privatized tower at the Royal Jubilee Hospital. As is very typical with privatized projects, it has morphed into something entirely different than what the region needs.

We need 650 new beds. But under this privatized model, as it morphed its way through the process of being forced down the throats of our elected officials and our hospital board here in British Columbia, what are we going to end up with? We're going to end up with a hospital tower that doesn't even deliver 500 beds.

That is very typically what happens with privatization. Because there is not a big profit to be made, the project gets downsized, gets scaled back. In order for profit to be made by a private contractor and a private partner, our need in greater Victoria has now suddenly been sacrificed to the business case and profitability of a tower for the private partner. So where we need 650 beds right now, by the time the tower is built and produces fewer than 500 beds, our need will be all the greater. This is very typical of the kind of thing that happens in privatization.

We also know the pay-as-you-go kind of mentality of privatization that we've seen at private clinics, where if you've got money, you can enrol for $3,800 a year and get preferential health care. I can tell you right now that most of the constituents in my community of Esquimalt-Metchosin sure as heck cannot scrape up $3,800 so that they can get the kind of health care services they deserve.

In fact, this dismantling of the public health care system, I think, is the biggest tragedy of our time. This ideological drive to privatize — that somehow by imposing a for-profit private partner into the health care delivery system between patients and their health care is a good move, is a sound business move and is in any way serving the public — is complete nonsense.

I would say that we are fighting right now the battle of our lives against privatization. I know that the government, because of all their enamoured behaviour with privatization through every single one of the other ministries that we deal with here, whether we see it in transportation, whether we see it in education, and now we're seeing it in health care…. I know there will continue to be this drive.

It is unacceptable. The people don't want it. The people of British Columbia understand that privatization will cost them more. They will get less service. We will see exactly what we saw when privatized services came in for cleaning and for food services — dirty hospitals and bad food. In the case of the Royal Jubilee tower, we need 650 beds. But it's not profitable for the

private partner, so they're going to build only 475 beds. There is a vivid example of what you get.

So when the minister stands up and says that this is not going to change anything and that this bill is simply a little bit of administrative language of sustainability, be highly suspicious. We should all be very highly suspicious, and we should vote this down with every ounce of passion we have left in us. I urge everyone in this House to vote no to this bill.

G. Gentner: I rise to urge all members of the House to defeat this draconian bill, Bill 21, the Medicare Protection Amendment Act. It is going to have profound, fundamental changes, as we know, to our medicare system, which has been built primarily by the hard work of many British Columbians and, of course, most Canadians who have worked very hard. Their families, grandparents have fought hard and long to establish high-quality health care in Canada and this province.

The fundamental changes that are being posed here today will of course affect my community south of the Fraser, an area that is under massive cutbacks and is well beyond the averages proposed by Canadian health authorities. We probably have the largest health authority in all of Canada, yet per capita we have the least amount of funding being spent in that area.

This bill, Bill 21 — it's called the Medicare Protection Amendment Act — is really one to protect the interests of profit-making. It's a bill that's going to see massive expansion of the private health care sector at the expense of the public health care sector. We have to stand steadfast in our resolve to defeat what this government is proposing with all the power we can muster as an opposition.

It's interesting that these fundamental changes being proposed in this bill are not supported by the federal government and are not supported by any province. They are constantly opposed, and they don't understand, frankly, where this province is going. Sustainability, which the Liberal government defined, defies the notions of medicare — universality, accessibility, comprehensiveness and portability.

Again, when you look at these fundamental changes, they really fly in the face of the results of the Premier's own Conversation on Health. This bill was to respond, we thought, to at least 1,200 British Columbians who participated. They spent good time and measure. Papers were introduced. There were many submissions made by organizations and associations who were very, very concerned.

Those who did participate in that discussion never, in their wildest dreams, thought we'd be here today with the complete upheaval of public health care as we know it in the province of British Columbia.

The Premier of the province had a very different vision. He had his mind made up before he even began his Conversation on Health. The Conversation on Health in many ways was a snow job. It was a big show — lots of airs about nothing but to pre-empt concerns about the real intent of what we saw in the throne speech.

This is not about sustainability, however defined. It's a very vague discussion or understanding. It is about a restraint program on public health. It's going to tighten the noose; it's going to tighten the budget on health expenditures. It's going to be a program of restraint. It's going to curtail and suppress health care as we know it in the province of British Columbia.

Sustainability is about curtailing spending. On public health care, it's forcing British Columbians to spend more on privatized medicine. You know, this bill is using sustainability to change the meaning and the value of medicare itself. Bill 21 represents a continued erosion of medicare in the province of British Columbia.

I'm proud to sit on this side of the House, because it was the NDP that championed the notion of medicare. Yes, we'll share all the assets and all the credibility. Everybody wants to stand up and pound their chest and say: "It was us." We'll certainly say, "Lester B. Pearson, kudos to you; you went ahead and did it," even though we introduced it in Saskatchewan. We don't care; that's great.

When W.A.C. Bennett came forward way back in the '60s, he called it dealing with what he called the little people. Well, I don't think the members opposite care about the little people anymore. They care about the profits that we're seeing for those who are investing in private medicine and private health.

You know, we're seeing a shifting of the health care costs now — user pay — to British Columbians. That's where we're going. Gone will be the progressive tax shelter that we've enjoyed in this province relative to health care. The Liberal government's record has driven B.C. from second to seventh in health care spending among all Canadian provinces. It's deplorable, absolutely deplorable.

The acute care bed ratio in British Columbia is 1.8 acute care beds per thousand. In Canada the goal is pretty close to 3.0. When you look to forecasts and what the expectations are, the expectation when it comes to primary acute care beds is 2.8 per thousand.

It's quite dismal south of the Fraser. When you look at Surrey Memorial Hospital, for example, it's the worst — close to 1.4 acute care beds per thousand. Talk about a squeeze we're going to see now in the province of British Columbia from this government.

The current rate of bed capacity at Surrey Hospital is 610, including 216 extended care beds, 45 psychiatric beds and ten psychiatric assessment beds. According to the Fraser Health final report a few years ago, Building for the Future, it suggests a shortfall of 50 beds to meet existing demand.

Even then, a few years ago, Surrey Hospital should have been operating with acute care bed capacity of 462 beds. So what do we have today? A growing number of alternative levels of care — ALC — patients, primarily in need of residential care beds, occupying scarce acute care beds. This further reduces acute care bed capacity at Surrey Memorial Hospital.

We can go through my community and throughout the community of Surrey and Delta. We look at what's

happening in long-term care beds. We can talk about the new emergency care facility where patients are now going to have to be moved into another private care facility, basically those of the friends of the government.

That's the government's rationale of restraint. It's called sustainable health care, privatized health care. Home support and residential care resources in Surrey have not kept pace with the population growth. Could this inability to keep up with the pace of population growth have anything to do with the fact that Fraser Health and the B.C. Liberal government actually closed almost 600 long-term care nursing home beds in 2001?

Yes, that's called sustainability in the eyes of the government. Chaos is what we have seen in the health care delivery system at Surrey Memorial Hospital, a lack of available medical beds creating backlogs in the emergency department. This is crucial, because the crisis in health care is the need for acute care medical beds that are full. Therefore, we have a backlog at the emergency wards. Thus we have something known in today's lingo as code orange in our hospitals. That is the government's view of sustainability.

We can talk about, in the report that was delivered a few years ago, an additional 112 acute care beds that would be available to Surrey Hospital, but the government hasn't delivered on that. It keeps delaying and evading, and the rationale once again is based on the need to suppress, quell and program a restraint.

The question remains: how long will it take the Fraser Health Authority and the B.C. Liberal government to plan and build the acute care beds required to meet the needs of the rapidly growing population in the North Delta–Surrey area? It is the fastest growing and has the lowest per-capita ratio of acute care beds anywhere in Canada.

What do we find in Bill 21? A fundamental shift of more privatization, not giving the people south of the Fraser their due. Now Surrey patients are faced with the unprecedented health care delays and wait-lists. I refer again to code orange alerts that cancelled surgeries while the government continues to delay action on expanding the hospital.

Despite being told by the health authority in 2001 that the emergency ER needed future expansion and again being told in 2004 that the hospital's ER was in a crisis situation, the government still hasn't dealt with the severe bed shortage at Surrey Memorial Hospital and in the Fraser region.

The Fraser region has major acute care bed shortfalls estimated to be more than 550 beds, growing to at least 700 beds by 2010. That's a very important year in the history of British Columbia, because we're going to be embracing the world. But in 2010, where I live, we'll be 700 beds short as a result of the growing population and the government's severe cutbacks in its first term. That's the vision of sustainability.

Despite promising to fix the problems at Surrey Memorial Hospital before the election in 2005, the problems worsened, and critical expansions have been delayed until at least — now we're told — 2011. Just before the 2005 election the Premier promised action by as early as 2008 at the latest. It's now looking like, again, it will be 2011 at the earliest.

In the meantime the Health Minister is telling people to get used to the problems. The only solution we have is privatized health. I'm going to quote the minister. He said in the Globe and Mail: "But a lot of this demand is driven by a society that gets older. Year over year it is going to continue to do so, so anyone who thinks that the problem is going to go away is dreaming." That's the view.

Innovation, according to the government, is not a matter of dealing with the issue, but one of privatization. The government's broken promises at Surrey Memorial Hospital include a new out-patient facility, day surgery and diagnostics at the Green Timbers site.

What we're going to see possibly is a P3 at a cost of $151 million, which could be increased by 20 percent or $30 million. This project will not be completed until 2011 at the earliest, despite it being initially planned for 2009.

An expanded emergency centre at Surrey Memorial Hospital at an estimated cost of $88 million has once again been pushed back to 2011. The 62 new acute care beds and five critical care beds that were to be in place for the end of 2007 have not been delivered on yet.

In November 2004 a report was submitted to the Minister of Health stating that Surrey Memorial Hospital's emergency ward was truly in a crisis situation. The government did nothing, absolutely nothing. Its solution is that now we're in such a crisis, created by this government, that we have to introduce more privatization.

This study built on another done in 2001, which recommended the expansion of the emergency department at Surrey Memorial Hospital. No action was taken by the minister on that report.

Just before the 2005 election as concerns reached a boiling point, the Premier promised to fast-track the review on Surrey Memorial Hospital. This move ignored the many reviews which had been completed previously pointing to the massive and growing bed shortage.

At the same time the Premier promised the construction of a new facility that was imminent, stating: "The money will be in our budget, and the shovels will be in the ground as quickly as possible. I should tell you that in terms of 'as quickly as possible,' that probably means 2007 or 2008 — early 2008."

That was the promise — didn't deliver. No, didn't deliver. We have a different plan for the people of British Columbia. It's called privatized health.

You know, in 2007 the opposition obtained a leak the planning department authored by the FHA and the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority confirming that the lower region is currently short 550 acute care beds. The health authority estimated that the shortfall will be more than 700 beds by 2010. By 2020 the shortfall will grow to 2,600 beds, the equivalent of six to eight acute care hospitals.

Now we have a bill stating that it's not sustainable. Well, it's been driven that way by the Liberal govern-

ment. The B.C. Liberals reduced the number of acute care beds between 2001 and 2004 by 457 beds in Fraser Health and 158 in Vancouver Coastal for a total of 615 beds in the Lower Mainland, and 45 of these beds were in Surrey. So 300 to 500 patients leave the Surrey Memorial emergency ward each month after waiting but not being seen by a doctor. There's the rationale for privatized health clinics. It's a deliberate attempt. There's no attempt here by the government to put in the proper money and the proper funding.

On the evening of March 12, 2008, Surrey Memorial Hospital again declared the infamous code orange, which lasted until the following day and left 41 patients without a bed on the morning of the 13th. All the booked surgeries for the day were cancelled.

Surrey Memorial Hospital is the second-largest hospital in British Columbia, with the second-busiest emergency. I hate to say this, but maybe we're being punished for voting for the NDP. The emergency department was built to serve a maximum of 44,000 people. It now sees more than 70,000 patients a year and more than 200 patients on an average day.

Surrey-Delta is Canada's fastest-growing area, with a hospital opened way back in 1959. It served 75,000 people. Today over half a million people depend on one hospital, primarily Surrey Memorial Hospital. The last major expansion of Surrey Memorial Hospital was the creation of a $62 million new wing completed in the spring of 2001 by — guess who — the NDP government.

Let's talk about the dynamic '90s. Let's talk about Liberal restraint on health care. We can talk all about it, but let's talk about the NDP systems of universality, accessibility and comprehensiveness. The NDP walked the walk. What did we see in the '90s south of the Fraser? The new south building at Surrey Memorial Hospital was built and opened, which included….

It included a state-of-the-art operating theatre including expanded surgical services, such as thoracic surgery; a new children's health centre; new state-of-the-art single-room maternity units; a new adolescent psychiatric unit; a new special care nursery; a new central processing department; 300 spaces of underground parking; government funding, including both capital costs and additional operating dollars, to support the new and expanded programs; increased services for seniors; additional funding for long-term care beds; increasing funding for community mental health services; the first MRI for Surrey Memorial Hospital; and expanded renal dialysis services, just to name a few.

Those were the dynamic '90s, and there was no need for any privatization. There certainly was no need for this vision of what the Liberal government calls sustainability. Sustainability is really the public health care in repression. This is a health care repression. We're going into a restraint program never seen before per capita by the government of British Columbia.

The Liberals reduced beds from 1,279 between 2001 and 2004. The government, frankly, was looking at core studies, core reviews. That's all they did for the first four years. They said: "Well, public health care is expendable." They peeled away the onion so far that in the end they've taken away all the essential assets of this province. It's a hollow province now. There's not much left. What's left now is to rip apart our public health care system.

What did we find, when they became government, south of the Fraser? What's the first thing they did? They increased administration — this elephant they created, huge elephant, south of Fraser, and 12 vice-presidents never seen before. Throwing money out left, right and centre, not to the delivery of health care. You know why? Because how they manage health care is called crisis management.

You move the chairs around on the Titanic. You create a new org model, a new organization. You move people around. You say: "Look at us; we've done something new, innovative." But they've done nothing, absolutely nothing.

You know, hon. Speaker, this bill about future cuts doesn't have to happen. We can be innovative. There's nothing wrong with surgical clinics, but why not surgical public clinics? They work. They work in Winnipeg. Doctors are very successful at surgical public clinics. They've worked everywhere else in this country. But they certainly are going to work now only for the rich. That is what this bill is all about.

When I go to my clinic on Scott Road in North Delta, you know, there's a cutoff a day of 100 patients. Once those hundred patients are there, it's cut off. Then you get to go back in line at Surrey Memorial, the worst place you want to go. I tell my people in North Delta: "Don't go to Surrey Memorial Hospital; go to Delta Hospital in Ladner." I can tell you, hon. Speaker, that when my daughter had a broken arm, I took her to Delta Hospital, because the backlog at Surrey Memorial Hospital is absolutely terrible.

Let's talk about the sustainability. This is really the slop test for food that we're going to continue to see in our hospitals. The minister was asked some time ago, last session, by the member from Maple Ridge to go do the taste test. "Let's go on a taste test. Let's go check it out." I don't think the minister really took him up on that offer. What happens when you talk about privatized health, when it comes to delivery of food at some of the facilities, is that they basically water down the soup, they water down the orange, all in the need of profit-making.

That is exactly what we're going to now see more and more with the delivery of health services, according to Bill 21 — food services now compromised under Liberal budget targets. Newspapers refer to it as disgusting, deplorable. Deloitte did a study in the Fraser Health Authority, and they certainly did report on the food services. They talked openly of the Liberals' failure and the poorly planned and implemented…. It was a disaster. It was a disaster then; it's a disaster now.

That is the record of this government, and it's going to get worse. It's going to get worse after Bill 21. And now we're going to see more.

Sustainability means the cuts to health care delivery. Fees are going to go up. It's a means of apology for what was happening and readdressing what had happened with Bill 29. We're going to see that infections are up like they never have been before in this province. It's really frightful when you go to the hospital. Don't go to the hospital. If you have a virus, don't go to the hospital, because there's another superbug waiting for you. Norwalk is breaking out. We're seeing it over and over again. This government's solution is to suppress, to restrict funding, to withhold and to crush the medical system as we know it today.

Now, sustainability in the Liberals' eyes is more downloading of health care onto individuals, the individuals who have the money to pay. You know, the question about the bill is reasonable access to medically necessary service. Really, there's the rub, isn't it? I mean, what is arbitrary? How is it going to be defined? The government talks about value for money for taxpayers, but where is the money for preventative health services? It's not there. No, it's not there.

Will we see more eye care for seniors? No. More naturopathic alternatives? No. Easier access to drugs or pharmacy for the needy? No. Then, of course, this is another ability for the government to slip in something they call medical savings accounts, the ability we saw happen in the good old U.S.A. with George Bush — first, of course, initiated in part by our friend Bill Clinton.

Unfortunately, it's a system that is creating a two-tier system of Medicare delivery in the States, and now the government's doing something similar with what they call ILSA, this RRSP approach for long-term care for the rich. Consequently, unfortunately, on the health care act, there are two rules. There's a rule here for the delivery of health care, but there's a different one here for the seniors' rights to delivery of health, particularly when we are seeing an economy today at $800,000 to buy a home — where I live in North Delta, $600,000. There's the inability to save money for an RRSP, and now you're told that you'd better sock more money away for delivery of your medical savings accounts.

Do you know what we're seeing? We're seeing that the Health Act does not recognize the seniors' rights to care. We're going to see dental care eroded, and we're now going to see, under this act, the beginning of Visa card medicine.

This is what the government feels. They can promote it. Hospitals can compete with one another. You can get your travel miles now by using your credit card. That's what this government is employing. The marketing strategy of the government is to provide more Air Miles to provide sustainability that specifically works for the rich.

I talk to a lot of members at long-term care facilities. You know, in many ways it's cheaper to go on a cruise. The meals are better for the same price. The recreation is better. When it comes time to come back home to B.C., you'd better jump off the boat. You'd better jump off the boat because — you know what? — we're coming back home to privatized medicine. Jump off the boat.

What is most important here is that sustaining life is now arbitrary under the Liberals. Life is all you have, and if you believe in the higher entity — spiritual, your own assessment of what it means, is based on…and others. But how you treat people is how you treat yourself. We are based on a society that's built on the principles of medicare and delivery of which…. And now we're going to see this individuality that's been created through Bill 21.

I also talked to a lady, Verna Demille. I'll give you an example. She had a stroke. She didn't ask for it, but she was put on the DNR list. She had a real problem with that. You know, those situations do happen, and it's really very troublesome.

When you read George Bernard Shaw — I know that the minister has spent some time reading good old George — read The Doctor's Dilemma. The doctor's dilemma is that when you have limited resources, you have to make decisions. It's a great play. Go read it. He had to make a decision on how he should save somebody's life. Who should he save, and who shouldn't he? He had to also think about the role of the private practitioner as a trusted authority that is somewhat compromised by the financial incentives of keeping patients ill for longer. It's an interesting play, and that is a view to which I think we're heading.

You know, we look at the burden on seniors, the costs upon them. They do a lot of good things with their lives, but really, what do they spend their money on? Do they tax the system on education or legal services or even going to jail? No. But for some reason, the government opposite is suggesting that they are a burden, and they're going to cost us more money, and there's the problem.

Well, you know what? We put more money per day into the convicted, the felon. They get more money in jail than those in senior home care, and they get better food in jail. They get better recreation. They get better education. They get better health. They also probably get better drugs.

This is where this government is going. We're going to have more social problems, more people thrown in jail, greater costs. When it comes down to the delivery of the health care system, we are going to contain, suppress, and we'll confine health care in order to smother their right for public, open, accessible health care.

As time is waning, I do have to quote one interesting comment from the minister opposite regarding improvements for seniors health care. The minister said to Gary Mason of the Globe and Mail: "Once guys like you and I are dead and gone, things will be fine."

Now, that's sustainable health. I don't respect any ill towards the minister. I certainly don't suggest he take his life, but I certainly would suggest that I believe we should put to death the bill, and in May 2009 I say death to the Liberal government.

D. Thorne: It's with dismay, actually, that I rise today to make a few comments on Bill 21, which is an act, the Medicare Protection Amendment Act, which presumes to amend the preamble to add the principle of sustainability to the five principles in the Canada Health Act.

It seems to me that this bill is based on the myth that health care financing is currently — and I assume the opinion is that it will remain — unsustainable. So we are adding the principle of sustainability. I believe, as do many others, that this is a myth and that health care financing is already sustainable. In fact, since the year 2000 numerous royal commissions around the world and in Canada have found that medicare is financially sustainable.

What's happening is that the aging society and changing needs in health care are changing the whole need for the kind of health care we have — the needs and our ability to meet those needs in the way that our health care system is organized today. I believe that we need to change primary care to meet those new needs and to ensure that health professionals are utilized to their full potential and feel valued. Primary care available 24-7, as one example, would ensure that emergency departments are available for real emergencies.

I believe that it requires strong leadership to make changes that are best for society. I think that defining sustainability from a narrow financial perspective is not the way to go.

I am quoting some of the things I'm saying from a letter written by a former member of the B.C. Royal Commission on Health Care and Costs. In that letter the former CEO of the Toronto-Dominion Bank himself stated that moving away from a single-payer, publicly funded system might in fact cost a government less, but it will cost our country, the country of Canada, more. I think that should worry all of us.

I don't believe that the Minister of Health or his government have sufficiently explained to the people of British Columbia what this Medicare Protection Amendment Act will actually do. I really don't believe that anybody who is listening to the nightly news or reading the newspapers or perchance listening to our debates here in the Legislature is aware of what this bill will do to medicare in Canada. I believe that if they knew, they would be rising up right now as we speak in great numbers to protest. If that happened, I believe that would have to make this government sit back and take a sober second look at Bill 21.

Let's talk a little bit about sustainability. The mistake that governments often make is to think that sustainability can be achieved by continuing to operate as we do today and passing increasing costs on to the patient. This thinking will not sustain medicare. I do not believe it will, and neither does my caucus. I do not believe the general public does either.

I think that instead, this kind of a bill and what this will do to the medicare system will effectively kill medicare. Certainly, it will kill medicare as we know it today. I think this government that is proposing this bill is failing to see what many business executives already know — that Canada's health care system is an economic asset. This medicare system is providing health insurance for all of us in Canada. That is taking a huge burden off the business community. It's just taking a huge burden.

We always talk about the United States when we're defending medicare. The reason we do that is because it is the best example we know of a system that doesn't have medicare, where in fact an estimated third of the population has no health insurance, not even basic health insurance. People are turned away from hospitals and all kinds of things that we in Canada can hardly believe when we hear the stories and the examples.

I find it impossible. I've sat here now for two and a half years, and we've debated many, many bills. I'm sure the members across will probably have a comment when I or other people say that we've been opposed to many of the bills brought forward by this government. I can honestly say that in my opinion, this one is the worst that I have seen since I have been here.

I find it very, very hard to believe that this government is willing to basically abandon medicare at this point in time. "We just can't do it anymore. We're going to bring in this Medicare Protection Amendment Act." The title of it itself is very ironic because it does the exact opposite of protect. It should be called the "medicare destruction act", because I believe that that is in fact what is going to happen.

I just can't believe that the government understands what it is that it is suggesting happen to medicare down the road. They live in this province and have children and grandchildren, exactly like we do on this side of the House. It's very hard to imagine that they don't believe that we're very, very lucky to live in Canada and that one of the main reasons for that is our health care system.

People all over the world envy us. That's the reason. They don't envy us because of the mountains, although they may like the mountains. They envy us because of medicare.

That we would willingly bring in an act that uses words like "sustainability," which are such new sorts of words…. Everybody is on the sustainability bandwagon. Nobody wants to be caught out saying: "Oh, I'm opposed to sustainability." It's like being opposed to green. I mean, you just don't want to be known for being that kind of person.

But this amendment bill is a medicare destruction bill. That's what I believe. I find it almost difficult, in one sense, to make my comments, because it's so hard to believe that I'm having to do it. I feel like I'm on

another planet or something that I'm doing this. But here I am in the Legislature, and we're debating sustainability when, as I just said, we have numerous commissions and people who know much, much better than I do and possibly even better than the Minister of Health. They know better. They say that it is financially sustainable.

That being said, I will acknowledge — I think we would all acknowledge — that we need to make the health care system more efficient. Nobody is saying that things are working in an optimal way. Nobody is saying that the system is perfect. We do have an aging population. Every one of us here in this Legislature, some more than others, are aging to the point where we're probably all thinking we can see the light of retirement down the road.

We are the people causing the problem, a good percentage of us here in this Legislature. As I even look around now, there are exceptions — some very young, blushing faces that I see in front of me. I'm just speaking about probably a small majority of us looking down the road to retirement. I don't want to go down that road. It's a scary road for me to even think about — almost as scary as this bill.

Let's talk a little bit about sustainability, how much we're actually spending and how much this spending has increased in the last 20 years. I have some statistics here that I will go through. I like to read these statistics, because then it goes into the record. It isn't just my opinion or my thought; these are facts. We people in Coquitlam prefer to operate in facts — right? They're facts.

In 2006 the Finance Minister projected that health spending would reach 71 percent of provincial revenues by 2017 — if the current rates of growth continued. This method overturned — overturned, Madam Speaker — nationally and internationally accepted measures of growth based on the percentage of GDP dedicated to a particular area of spending.

In addition, the percentage of government expenditures that goes into health care depends on three factors, first among them the amount that governments decide to spend on health. Two other important factors determine the percentage of government spending that goes to health care.

The first is how much governments spend on non-health-related items — important items, no doubt — such as education, police services and social assistance — all things that we would all support and agree need to be covered for the citizens of British Columbia.

The second factor is how much governments collect in taxes. If a government reduces its spending on non-health-related items or cuts taxes, the percentage of expenditures devoted to health care will increase automatically, and that describes what has been happening in B.C.

This is a very interesting line of thought, very interesting. In 2008 the budget indicated that total government spending had declined as a percentage of the GDP in 2006-07 after having remained constant from 2004-05 to 2005-06. This reflects the fact that the economy is growing faster than spending in the province's health, education and social services sectors.

I found this extremely interesting. If I had, you know, sat down and given it a lot of thought, I would have seen that that was the case, but after reading this I looked up my budgets, and in fact, this is true. You know, it's very, very true that the economy is growing faster than spending in the province's health, education and social services sectors.

Now, the Auditor General accounted for this in his public accounts in 2007, so we all have those reports. We can all check out these figures at any time that we want. I'm assuming that, before this medicare destruction act was brought forward, these facts were taken into consideration when the rationalization for this bill was presented in the House.

So between 2004 and 2007, the growth in the provincial GDP was a modest 3.6 percent, while government spending as a percentage of that GDP decreased during the last year, along with revenues. Those revenues would be taxation, revenues from natural resources, etc. It is this situation — not health care — which is unsustainable. Now, I'm just going to say that again. The growth in the provincial GDP — a modest 3.6 percent — and government spending as a percentage of the GDP decreased during that year with revenues also. That is the situation which is unsustainable, not health care.

This fits in with what I was referring to earlier — the commissions and the committees that have found, in fact, that medicare is financially sustainable. They found that medicare consumes 8 percent to 10 percent, approximately, of the GDP. In 2005, 20 of 30 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries — that's the OECD countries considered to be similar to Canada — spent between 7.5 percent and 11.6 percent. Canada, at 9.8 percent, ranked sixth of 20.

So all of these different commissions, these statistics and these facts, etc., all file nicely on top of one another. In different ways, because they're different kinds of commissions and they speak a little differently, each one, they're all basically saying the same thing — that yes, we do have a problem of unsustainability, but it is not, in fact, in the medicare system. That makes one wonder where this bill is coming from.

One of the other things that I heard here in the House was that it's coming as a result of the numerous meetings on health care that were held across the province in the last couple of years — that, in some way, this is what people have said they want.

Well, I take issue with that. I attended a couple of the forums, and I spoke to lots of people who went to the forums, and I read reports. I just don't believe that the people of British Columbia across the province asked for a bill to be introduced in the Legislature that would lead us down the road to a situation where we would be forced to have more and more and more patient-pay private health care. I don't believe it.

I await the day, the revelation, when the government actually produces some letters from some people

who will say, "This is what I want. Keep the system as it is, running along, perhaps, not in the most efficient way but ticking along and doing the same thing," just as if we didn't have such an aging population.

I absolutely believe that we need to make the system more efficient. I myself have no health care background at all — I have a social service background but no health care, other than members of my family being ill and being in hospital and that kind of thing — and I can see several areas that are causing the biggest problems to health care in my community.

Now, I am fortunate enough to live in the Fraser Health Authority. I can say that because I love the area that I live in, and I love Coquitlam, the area that I represent. But people who live in the Fraser Health Authority are really, really nervous about the state of health care in our communities.

We are, I suspect, according to the growth in population…. I do have the numbers here. The Fraser Health Authority has a 3.8 increase in population as compared to the Vancouver Coastal, for instance, which has only 2 percent. So it's almost twice as much in the Fraser Health Authority.

Many, many of the government members who sit on the other side of the House live in the Fraser Health Authority, and I have to believe that they are as concerned about the Fraser Health Authority and the problems in the hospitals, etc., that we have had.

In New Westminster at the Royal Columbian, which would be my hospital…. For some of the other members on the government side, their main hospital would be Surrey Memorial or Burnaby General, but I can speak more personally about the Royal Columbian. My mother-in-law was just in the Royal Columbian for seven weeks. She fell. She broke her hip. She's 94 years old, and she was in for seven weeks.

Now, this is a woman who is very, very with it and lived on her own until December 8 — I think it was — when she fell and broke her hip and ended up in the Royal Columbian and was there for seven, almost eight weeks. There was no reason for her to be in the hospital for seven or eight weeks.

The reason she was there blocking a bed, if you excuse my saying it like that…. That is in fact what she was doing, like many, many people. She could not go back to her apartment — a tragedy for our whole family, but especially a tragedy for her. She had 94 productive years, still cooking her own meals and looking after herself, and she couldn't do that anymore. So she had to go into care.

Well, I guess there was a shortage of care beds in the Fraser region, in the New Westminster–Coquitlam area, and I don't doubt that there is a shortage of complex care beds….

Eventually a bed was found for my mother-in-law, and her bed at the Royal Columbian was freed up.

What we have seen in British Columbia, and no less so in the Fraser Health Authority — New Westminster and the Coquitlam area — is a preponderance of new assisted-living beds. My mother-in-law probably felt she would go to an assisted-living bed before she fell and broke her hip. She hasn't walked since, so that was no longer an option. She needed what I used to call an extended care bed. Now the nurses where she is call it complex care. I guess it's the same thing.

There have been so few new beds added to that system. Yet many people out in the general public probably think there are many new beds that have been added, because now we add the assisted-living beds and the complex care beds together. When the Liberal government originally promised 5,000 long-term care beds…. That was before I was elected in 2005. When they originally promised that, they were talking about long-term care beds. At least that was what they called it, so we all assume that's what it was.

It's long-term care beds or complex care beds plus assisted living beds. I could, I suppose, but I haven't done a thorough count of how many actual long-term care beds there are left in the province of B.C. I know that just in Coquitlam and New Westminster alone, there are quite a number of new assisted-living beds.

In fact, the government can say, "Why? We have fulfilled our promise. There are 5,000 new beds," or "We're almost there," or "We'll be there in two years," or whatever the press release would say. Whereas, if in fact one didn't know that they were counting those two kinds of care that are so different, the general public would have no idea.

My mother-in-law is now in care, and I suppose she will be there for the rest of her life, however long that life will be. She's getting very good care. The nurses are wonderful. The staff is fantastic there, and she's getting really, really good care.

I can only think back to the Royal Columbian, and I assume that even now, as I speak, there are probably a dozen or perhaps two dozen elderly patients like her at the Royal Columbian who should not be there blocking beds and backing up into the emergency department where, as we know, occasionally they have ambulances lined up outside the door. They can't even take their patients from the ambulance into emergency. The emergency room is so overcrowded.

I was there with my mother-in-law the day she fell. I'm the one who found her. I called an ambulance. She didn't live that far from the Royal Columbian anyway, but they were there so quickly, and the attendants were so wonderful. They got my mother-in-law to the hospital so fast. I was astounded and impressed and grateful, really. When we got to the hospital it was basically full, but they were able to kind of get her just inside the door, which is what they did. So that was a good day, I gather.

They got her inside the door, and the ambulance was able to leave again and go and pick up somebody

else. Thank goodness, because as we know, they're always in demand. I understand that the next day or the day after, when I was probably upstairs visiting her, the ambulance drivers couldn't drop people off.

I'm just trying to illustrate my very strong opinion that I believe there are ways — not necessarily horribly inexpensive ways, because there's nothing cheap about providing complex care beds….

Assisted living, especially if it's done by a private operator, is virtually cost free to the government. It's mostly user pay, and the people are very with it. It's a very necessary and wonderful part of the continuum of health care. I think it's wonderful. Who knows? I may be there sooner than I think, and so may many of the people sitting on both sides of this House.

Some are younger, of course, and may not be there quite as quickly, but others of us may be there. I'm very glad that option is there. I would not want to give the impression that I'm opposed in any way to assisted living, because I am not.

I just don't believe it should be counted in with long-term care or complex care beds. I think it confuses the situation, and it perhaps makes it easier for the government to sort of forget that they're not providing enough complex care or long-term care beds, not enough to meet what's needed — the demand.

I believe we need to do that. That's the first thing we need to do. I think that move alone would free up so many beds in hospitals across the province that the emergency room problems would be cut in half. I'm going to say cut in half, because I know there are nursing shortages as well, and I think we need to very seriously look at why we have nursing shortages.

I understand there is a delegation from the nurses association in the precinct today. I think they met with the government this morning, and they're meeting with the official opposition this afternoon. One of the things they're very concerned about is the nursing situation because they are, of course, the representatives of the nurses.

Providing new training spaces is fantastic. Nobody will ever argue with new training spaces. Tomorrow I'm going to the opening of the health sciences centre at Douglas College, which I brought up yesterday in question period. That's very needed, and I'm very glad to see it finally opening in Coquitlam.

I just wish that the other side of that coin wasn't the closure of all the other programs so that we could open a new one. I wish we could sort of have both — the programs for the brain-injured students and the disabled students, etc., as well as the new health science centre.

I did digress a little there, but back to the nurse shortage. I think there are many problems with finding nurses that are not related to having enough trained nurses. That's one of the problems, but I think there's safety on the job, security on the job, the workload…. There are a number of issues that need to be worked on.

Certainly, I would be remiss to not mention that the biggest blow to the community of Coquitlam–New Westminster, our area, was the closure of St. Mary's. Our community has never recovered from the closure of that hospital. So when you talk about sustainability, you have to think about those kinds of issues as well.

I'm not sure how my time is going, but I did want to finish up, because I have digressed from my conversation about the GDP. I love talking about the GDP, so I just wanted to emphasize again that public health spending as a percentage of the GDP did not rise significantly in British Columbia between 1984 and 2006.

In 1984 public health care as a percentage of the provincial GDP totalled 6.1 percent, and that reached a high of 7.5 and fell to 6.9 in 2004-05, where it has since remained.

I fail to see how this bill is necessary when we are not in an unsustainable position. I don't believe we are in an unsustainable position, and I believe the bill is wrong. I am speaking against the bill, and I know that my colleagues are doing the same thing.

C. Puchmayr: Bill 21, called the Medicare Protection Amendment Act, certainly causes some incredible concerns to us in the opposition, to the people of British Columbia, and it should also cause great concerns to the members sitting across.

I'm puzzled that this legislation is coming forward. This legislation, in essence, changes the Canada Health Act and changes those provisions, and it does so in a very legal and creative way that should be troubling to all.

You know, we have a health care system in Canada that is really the envy of most of the world. We have a system that by most accounts is a not-for-profit system. Unfortunately, we're starting to see that turn into a for-profit system.

We're certainly seeing that the pressures on the government across in going that direction are the same kinds of pressures we're seeing in the United States. One of the analyses of demographics, of course, is that the baby boomers, which we are so favourably called, and the growth in the baby boomer population…. People that are investing or looking to invest in profitable ventures need to just target those types of growth patterns, and they can see a very sustainable growth in people that are aging in this country and on this globe.

I'm going to go through a bit of the bill and just look at what the implications are in a paralegal context. I don't practise law, but I have been engaged in some contractual work and some paralaw with respect to tribunals and that throughout the time.

When you look at the legislation and at adding to the principles of the Canada Health Act — adding the word "sustainability" to the Canada Health Act — one has to wonder: what exactly does that mean? How does that interpret? How does that provide us with a health care system that isn't one that is provided only

I look at the recent platform in the 2005 election. I know that the Liberal platform was fairly clear on what they were promoting for health care. They said, "Health care service when you need it, where you need it" — an affordable health care system, a public health care system. They were saying all the things that we would say as New Democrats while they were trying to get re-elected and sound like they really cared about a public health care system.

What have we got now? Now you take the health act and you go, "…building a public health care system that is founded on the values of individual choice, personal responsibility, innovation, transparency and accountability," and you add "sustainability" to that.

What does sustainability mean in the legal context? I know that the Health Minister, when he introduced the bill…. I was sort of expecting a little bit more with respect to his comments, maybe to explain to the people of British Columbia what precisely he means by Bill 21, and by changing something that is that important and that crucial to the people of British Columbia and doing so with one creative word. By changing one word, by adding or deleting a word in many legal texts, you can change the whole scope of the meaning of a text.

Just one quick example is when the government changed the engineered standards of a road — for instance, of logging roads. It meant that no longer was that road enforceable. No longer is somebody able to go in and say, "What you're doing here is wrong; it's dangerous; it's illegal," because it's no longer illegal. You've eliminated engineered standards out of a road.

By adding sustainability here, one has to wonder what exactly that means. Let's say, for instance, the economy right now is starting to change. It's starting to slip. If you look at the history of British Columbia, if you look at the history of the free world or of the world, period, you see highs and lows in the economy. It is just a natural fluctuation of highs and lows; some would call it booms and busts. The North American economy was riding a pretty high wave over the last little while, and that is starting to show some serious declines and decreases.

You have to ask yourself…. When you add a word like "sustainability" to the Canada Health Act, and all of a sudden the Finance Minister says in her next budget, or whoever the next Finance Minister is says, "I'm going to give another $500 million to oil companies and banks…." Then the Health Minister has to come around and say: "Hey, I can't provide this public health care system for you anymore, because it's not sustainable. I don't have the money to do it."

You have to really be concerned, Madam Speaker. When you look at adding one word to the provisions of the Canada Health Act, you're actually eliminating the securities and the protection of the Canada Health Act, and that is extremely troubling. It is extremely troubling.

The legislation goes on to say: "…health of all citizens and providing high quality patient care that is medically appropriate and that ensures reasonable access to medically necessary services consistent with the Canada Health Act." Medically appropriate. Could somebody now go in and use sustainability as an argument for whether something is medically appropriate or not? That is very troubling. When sustainability now becomes a test for whether a treatment is medically appropriate, someone has to be concerned.

I really would have liked to have the minister go through this clause by clause and explain this to the people of British Columbia, because everyone in British Columbia should be concerned about that.

Providing a high quality of patient care that is medically appropriate. It's an interesting legal concept, isn't it, when you add sustainability. It makes quite an interesting legal argument. "I'm sorry, Mr. Smith, but your wife isn't going to get the treatment that she gets. We don't think it's medically appropriate right now because our economy is not doing that well, and the Finance Minister just gave a huge tax cut to oil companies and banks." Interesting concept, isn't it?

What is the benchmark for sustainability now? Where is the benchmark for sustainability? Is it deficit? Is it non-deficit? Is it having people go into debt to be able to buy private? Does that now make the appropriateness of a certain procedure different because someone can afford it or may be able to sell their house? It opens too many arguments.

I know our member for Surrey-Whalley, who did his debate on this yesterday, is a lawyer — quite a good one, I hear. He asked some of those questions with respect to: how does this apply after? If somebody is challenging the government on the fact that maybe there is an unnecessary death due to the lack of an appropriate medical intervention, how would they argue whether or not there was actually a violation of the Canada Health Act when the sustainability issue is in here and when we really didn't hear anything from the minister with respect to an explanation of that?

I know the minister likes to get up and blame the '90s for everything. You know, the '90s were this terrible time in health care. Yet in the '90s, certainly with little children growing up, I thought we had a pretty good health care system. In view of the challenges that we experienced, we still had a pretty good health care system. We were delivering it at cheaper dollars to gross domestic product than we are today.

The waits that I see in the hospital — certainly in all hospitals and specifically in the hospital in my community, Royal Columbian — are absolutely unheard of. I have never experienced that kind of health care system where people are waiting in line. As one of the doctors told me, some people are actually triaged waiting to be taken in to be diagnosed, to be analyzed, to see what tests they need to perform on them, to see what X-rays…. It's actually people who are dropping on the floor and going into cardiac arrest that are now bumped to the top of the line. They're moved in quicker.

To look at a health care system like that, where you can have sometimes a dozen ambulances waiting out-

side with patients and ambulance attendants that are waiting with patients because they haven't formally been able to turn them over to the hospital staff…. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that some people are unnecessarily dying while waiting for health care. Doctors are saying it; nurses are saying it. We're seeing it in our communities. Now we take that and add this sustainability equation to it? That is extremely troubling.

The Royal Columbian Hospital isn't just a New Westminster hospital; it's a regional hospital. It takes some very serious cases from all over the province, actually. There's a helicopter landing pad, and there's an incredibly gifted staff of doctors and nurses that assist in emergencies. They work extremely hard, and the hours they work are sometimes extremely long. Doctors will work without sleep for hours and hours and more than a day, and that is just an incredible pressure on them.

I'm also hearing now some concerns about burnout, especially with nurses. We talk about the need to get more people into the nursing profession. What examples are we showing them? What inviting component of health care are we showing the students in the high schools that we're trying to encourage to get into a field of nursing? If they come down to a hospital as a volunteer and see the chaos just like a MASH unit, only sometimes it's days and days in a row, how does that encourage somebody to get into the health care field? Again, that is certainly a factor in trying to get professional health care workers into our hospital system.

We need to have a system that is universal. We need to have a system that isn't privatized, because it shows that the private system costs more. You know, the private system, certain private components of the system, may not show up on paper as costing more, but they are costing more.

When somebody is receiving in-home treatment to try to keep people from going into the hospitals — if somebody is trying to live at home for longer and be as independent as they can — you cut the home service to that person and tell them, "Well, you're only going to get four hours a week; two visits a week, two hours each," and that's housecleaning for somebody that is usually fairly old, assisting them with meals and with bathing.

So that family makes a decision that that is absolutely not adequate — that is, the system that has been provided for them. Then they go out and hire a private contractor to come in and provide more of that service.

You may look at that and say: "Well, you know, at least it's not costing the system that much." But it is costing the system, because the private contractor is now out there looking for professionals in that field to come and work for them, and they will certainly be engaged in raiding those workers so that those workers will be employed by them. We see the little pink Smart cars. I think they say "Nurse Next Door" or something like that.

I shudder to think that's the direction we're going with respect to health care, that we're going to have private providers going around and, for profit, charging for health care. It will be a greater cost to individuals that are desperately trying to not cost the health care system.

Right now with bed-blocking…. Certainly, that has a huge domino effect in hospitals. When people are going into hospitals, and they're tied up…. They're in beds because they're not getting the proper service at home and ending up in the hospital because of that. It's a very simple mathematical calculation that will show that money well spent is providing better home care for those people so that they don't end up in the hospital blocking the beds.

We look at it with Bill 29, which again was a huge cost to the taxpayers of British Columbia. The Supreme Court of Canada, of course, was right on point. This government broke the law. They breached the constitution of the country, and they were given a year to rectify the problem. They came back, and there was certainly some negotiation. You look at the dollars that were supposedly going to be saved by this new direction, by ripping up the contracts and giving this away to multinational private contractors to come and do the service. The end result has been a huge cost to the people of British Columbia — a colossal failure and a huge cost.

The failure wasn't only the fact that it was illegal. The failure was also what it created in the communities. We had many families that had both members of the family working in the health care system, husband and wife sharing a mortgage payment. We heard some of the horror stories of what happened when they received their pink slips and were out the door. There has been huge trauma. We've heard stories of suicide. We've heard stories of marriage breakups.

It created an incredible hardship on those workers who had a contract — a collective agreement that was still valid, that was still there and that was legal and binding in the law in Canada. This government decided they were going to go to this private initiative and tear up the contract, and the impacts on my community were very severe. The end result was a huge cost — some net loss, I believe, of over $170 million to the people of British Columbia.

Then we get back to the amendments of this act. You know, if we're talking in this sort of…. I don't know if I can use the word "airy-fairy," Madam Speaker, but I'll allow you to make that decision. When we talk about this, we have to wonder about the direction that the government is really going here when the minister refuses to really explain to the people of British Columbia what the reasons behind this are, because if they really want to create a valued health care system and to create one that is full of innovation, transparency and accountability, they don't need this bill to do it. They don't need Bill 21 to do it. They could do that now.

That is why there is such incredible concern about adding that word into the bill. We could build a better health care system. But I think if you're trying to tell the public and you're doing the fearmongering…. I did

hear, I think, that it was 70 percent of the gross domestic product that is going to go to health care by the year 2019. You know, the Conference Board of Canada wasn't anywhere near that figure. I know the government has now changed it. I guess they realized that that was just a little bit outlandish, and they reduced it to, I think, 50. You know, the Conference Board of Canada doesn't even agree with that, and I think their figure is around 32 percent.

You look at: what does that buy you in British Columbia? What does that buy you in Canada to have such a low GDP-to-health-care cost? It buys you a lot. It buys you the potential of an extremely strong economy in manufacturing, for instance.

You could create a very strong economy, and we were starting to see some of that. We were starting to see some of that flow even in the mid-'90s, where companies were coming up from the United States in the manufacturing sector, and they were relocating here. With a little bit of push — I think we had a rim plant from one of the car manufacturers — and with a little bit of initiative and creativity, we could have actually even built more of that type of manufacturing. We're talking about good, decent-paying jobs here in manufacturing, which we could use the foundation of our public health care system to encourage. So I'm puzzled where this came from.

I think our Health critic made some very brilliant points when he responded in his two-hour speech to this.

I'm wondering: where did this decision come from to go this direction? Who made that call? They try to make it sound like it was part of the Premier's Conversation on Health, which actually, after it started going sideways, just became the Conversation on Health. The Premier was no longer part of it.

It tries to parallel that the sustainability component was part of that. Well, you know, if you went to any of those conversations on health and said to anybody, "Do you agree that we should have a sustainable health care system?" you're not going to have anybody saying: "Well, no, we don't want a sustainable health care system." Everybody strives for a sustainable health care system.

But a sustainable health care system at the cost of medical procedures is shocking. A sustainable health care system that has to make sacrifices that could lead to mortality is shocking. That is not what was meant by sustainable. Sustainable people wanted to look at new ideas. They wanted to look at new concepts.

I'd like to see right across the street from Royal Columbian Hospital in that huge Labatt Breweries site…. You know, when the brewery left town — oh, it was in the year 2000. That's right. All those jobs went to Alberta. That was while this government was in power. All those jobs went to Alberta, but they respected the fact that they had been there since the early 1900s. What they did, with a little bit of coaxing from some of the union officials and friends of mine, was decide to leave a chunk of land — I believe it was about an acre — to the Royal Columbian Hospital Foundation for a health care component on that site.

To me, that's creative. Okay, so now here's some free land. One of the biggest costs right now is land, when you're building or expanding health care facilities. Here's some free land. Like, that's creative. That's the community working together. That's the union, the city council — people working together to be creative and to provide an initiative that would create something new, something different.

All the government had to do was build on that land, maybe decant some of the emergency services that are happening at Royal Columbian or maybe decant some of the operating theatres at the Royal Columbian and create a bit of a model of kind of what used to exist at St. Mary's Hospital, where they put through, I believe, some 11,000 surgeries a year — highly efficient, very low infection rates, very high quality, incredibly gifted teams, incredible morale of staff that just really enjoyed working together and providing that service.

You know the mistake they made in closing St. Mary's? They could have said: "Whoops, let's try to create something here on this site right next to the hospital, like right across the street from the hospital." You could have had a pedestrian way over the road if you didn't want to cross the road or if you didn't want to go outside — creative. Doctors' offices were all there. It had all the doctors' offices. The specialists were there; the pharmacists were there. You know, it could be like a little college of health care. That's creative. That's ingenious. That's an initiative.

That's the community working together with a labour union, working together with a council, working together. They offered it up on a platter to the minister. What did he do with it? Nothing. And then he brings in legislation like this and says: "Well, we could tear down more hospitals, but we need sustainability. Let's tear down some more hospitals, but you can only get your treatments if it's sustainable."

They could take the system apart piece by piece by piece and then say it's not sustainable. They dismantle it and then they add this word to the Canada Health Act, and you no longer have a Canada Health Act. You can't provide sustainable health care when you dismantle the system.

So where are people going to go? They're going to go wherever. When your loved one is terminally ill or seriously ill or there's a hope for a transplant, where are people going to go? They're going to sell their homes, they're going to sell their assets, they're going to get a mortgage, and they're going to buy that service to keep a loved one alive.

I have friends in the United States, and I remember back in the Reagan era. There was a little bit of rumbling about socialized health care then in the United States. I remember one guy. He was so adamant that he didn't want to see socialized health care in the United States. He was absolutely adamant. He did not want to see socialized health care.

I said that if there was one good thing about health care…. I had met Americans who had lost their homes, putting second mortgages on just to pay the 10 percent

premium deductible on a surgical intervention. I said: "If there's one thing that you could gain and you would be ensured that you wouldn't lose your home or have to go in debt when a loved one was sick or dying, would you accept that?" He goes: "Well, that part I like."

But that part is leaving with this legislation. That part is going to be gone with this legislation because they can control what sustainability is. When it's no longer sustainable because they've dismantled the system, because they've made it so that health care professionals are leaving the country, they can just pick up this bill and say: "It's out of our hands."

Or if somebody challenges the government in a court of law — maybe this goes to the Supreme Court of Canada — the government will say: "No, no, this is legal; we've got it right here. It says: 'Yeah, we believe in all the provisions of the Canada Health Act, but it has to be sustainable.'"

This bill is wrong. This bill is serious. This bill is going to affect the health care system in British Columbia, in Canada, like never before. We will be the only province in Canada that will have this draconian legislation, and we need to do everything we can to ensure that this bill fails.

I guess when we are sitting in this House and debating some important policy issues and legislation that are before us, people out there are watching. Some of them are watching. Others are doing their daily duties — working, trying to earn a living to put bread on the table for their families and doing all kinds of their daily family duties that working people, small business people do every day. But they are all watching and hoping that some of the key policy decisions that are made here will make it a little easier for them to earn that living and look after their families, and that they are living in safer communities.

When we are talking about health care and health care bills and the legislation that is before us, I think there isn't anyone anywhere in the province of British Columbia that isn't worried — worried that if, through some bad luck, one of their beloved ones is struck with some illness or some accident, that their beloved one will receive health care services and treatment in a timely manner. I think that's what is in every British Columbian's mind because of the crisis in the health care system that we have today.

The crisis didn't happen all by itself. It's because of the inaction of this Liberal government for the last seven years. They allowed the system to deteriorate to a point where we see now that the patients going to hospitals in their emergency wards have to wait six, seven, eight hours, and many of them actually return from those emergency wards without seeing a doctor because they know that they will probably have to wait another six or seven hours. That's not the kind of health care system our forefathers envisioned.

As the Premier said during his campaign, health care should be for British Columbians where they need it, when they need it. We all remember that promise, but the day he got elected, like many other promises, he forgot that one as well.

Now people out there are waiting and watching these legislators sitting in this room debating this bill, hoping that there will be some answers to the health care crisis that we and they face every day in our lives. Every person who has gone to their doctor, every person who is waiting to get a scan test done, and every person who has to go to visit an emergency ward is worried what the outcome of this bill is going to be.

Is this bill going to resolve that problem along with many other bills that are before us in this Legislature relating to their health care? The government will stand up and try to tell them that this will do the job.

H. Bains: I don't believe it. No one on this side of the House believes that. You know what? No one out there believes this government.

We have a duty as opposition, at the same time the government is trying to peddle their agenda…. Well, what they normally do is they wrap it up in very catchy and very nice slogans and titles, and when you try to unwrap that wrap, you find that it's not what the title says. It's quite the opposite. They've got surprises after surprises after surprises.

So we need to examine this bill so that the people out there have the confidence in this House that we're doing the right thing, that we are providing them with the information so that they can actually judge for themselves what they are facing and what kind of bills are being passed and what that bill actually will do to their daily lives. That's what we will try to do here.

I looked through this, and I listened to the arguments made by the government side, by the minister, and I listened to the argument made by our Health critic and many of my colleagues on this side. I came to this conclusion: this bill does nothing to solve the crisis after crisis we see in our health care system — nothing.

It does nothing to solve the long lineups that our patients experience in our ER rooms — nothing. It does nothing to deal with the acute care bed shortage that we have in this province. When I look through this, it has nothing to improve the public health care delivery to patients where they need it, when they need it.

H. Bains: That was the promise, and this bill does not even go near that promise. In fact, it goes in the opposite direction, where our health care system will continue to deteriorate, the patient will continue to suffer pains, and patients in British Columbia will continue to pay more out of their pockets. That's what this bill is intended to do.

I think that we on this side of the House will fight with every ounce of energy that we have to defeat this bill so that the public will get the justice and the health care system that they deserve.

This bill has everything to do with promoting this Premier's and B.C. Liberal government's agenda of putting their multinational friends' profits before patient care. That's what this is all about.

You know what? It's no secret that this government is not a friend of public health care. Many of their cousins across this country feel the same way. That's why they have tried everything they could to privatize health care services in this province ever since they took office. They have tried everything to walk away from the public health care system, and they've done everything to help their friends to walk into our public health care system to make profits at the expense of patient care.

That is a shameful act, and I don't think that many members of the government, if they really examined this, would support this bill. I'm really hoping that they will take the minister into their offices, or they may want to walk into the minister's office and try to convince him that maybe….

I think the minister also doesn't believe. I don't think the minister believes in private health care in this province. I don't believe so. But, you know, he is guided by a Premier who actually runs his strings. The Premier actually tells this minister how to do it and what to do in the health care system. The Premier runs that side of the House. There's a one-man show.

I know the minister. I've watched him in this House. I think the minister doesn't believe…. He doesn't want to go in this direction where patients have to pay out of their own pocket, but the Premier is running the show. I don't blame the minister here at all, but the minister should stand up to the Premier and tell the Premier what he believes — that this is the wrong direction.

You know what? It's a well-known fact, and the evidence is all over. This Premier and this government are not friends of health care unions either. They just hate unions in the health care system. They don't like those workers out there. Bill 29 was clear evidence that's before us.

The Supreme Court of Canada clearly came to the side of the workers, and they told this government, this minister and the Premier that they were wrong. They were wrong to privatize and rip up their contracts after their promise.

There was another promise the Premier made. The Premier made a promise that he would not rip up a signed collective agreement. You read that. I read that. I know all the members on this side also read that, and the Premier knows that.

Soon he got elected. Guess what the first thing he did was? He ripped up that collective agreement, and guess what. Close to 10,000 workers were thrown on the street.

Why? So that their multinational friends could come in and make a profit. It did not improve health care an iota in this province. Actually, the health care system and delivery have gotten worse since 2001 until today.

Now this minister is scrambling, trying to fix their own mistakes. Again, he missed the opportunity, and he has again bowed to the pressure from the Premier. He went along with the Premier. I'm saying he's going in the wrong direction again. I think he will regret it, and that side of the House will regret it. They shouldn't have made this decision.

When you look at how they are trying to walk away from the public health care system, here's another example — this bill, when they try to put in these weasel words like "sustainability."

There are five basic guiding principles by which the Canada Health Act guided us, very good basic principles. It has served us well since 1965 — unless you're incompetent, unless you mismanage the file or you're run by a person who's got ideology, who doesn't believe in those principles, doesn't believe in the public health care system, or all of the above. I think in this case, all of the above.

I will also try to put it on record that the people on this side and the NDP all across this country have stood guard to our public health care system. They have stood guard, and we will continue to stand guard on the public health care system. We will do everything to make this system better and accessible to patients who need it rather than who can afford it. Patients who need it will get the service rather than patients who can afford it. That's the system that we will bring here, and that's the system we're trying to convince that side of the House to adopt.

H. Bains: I hope that the minister will listen to the many good suggestions to improve our public health care system that are coming from this side of the House.

There are five basic guiding principles in the Canada Health Act. That's all you need to do. Just follow them, Minister. Just follow them.

You know what? Let's talk about sustainability. The member from the Liberal side has said that there's a sixth principle that they want to insert in here: sustainability. I think that we should examine what sustainability means. Let's talk about it. Let's talk about what it means.

To me and to those people who pack their lunch pail in the morning, go to work, earn a living, come home, put food on the table, take their children to a hockey game or to a soccer game — to all of us — it means one thing. It means that if you can afford your health care service, you will get it. If you can't afford it, you're on your own. I think that's because it's not sustainable if it costs too much.

Another thing could be because all the statistics show that most of the money spent on a person is in the last six months of their life. So if you really want to

extend…. I know there are a couple of lawyers sitting in this House, and I'm sure they will agree with me that if the minister wanted to decide that sustainability continues to be one of the principles, we cannot afford to spend 75 percent of health care for that person's life on the last six months. Too bad.

That could happen, because it's not sustainable. It's not sustainable. That's what really worries us. I think everyone listening and watching who is worried right now should be worried even more, because this bill goes in the opposite direction from fixing the long lineup at the ER and putting more acute care beds in their neighbourhoods so that their elders can be looked after.

I don't think we should go in that direction. The public deserves better. Taxpayers deserve better. They need a better public health care system, not a public-private health care system, because that's where this government's going.

Let's talk about some of the sustainability costs that the government will try to scare the public with. They will try to throw out some statistics that it costs about 44 percent of the budget to provide the health care system in this province, and then they say that it will go to 50 percent by 2013 and 71 percent by 2017.

But here's the real fact. The fact is, under the guidance of this government, we have gone from second to seventh in per-capita spending on health care since they took office. That is a fact. Also, the fact is that health care spending compared to GDP was 7.4 percent in 2001-2002. In 2006-2007, it was 6.9 percent.

So all the numbers that they are throwing out there for the public, I think, are scaremongering. It's scaremongering, and the public deserve better. They don't need any more pain and agony from this government throwing out those numbers and scaring them. They pay their taxes, obey the law, and they work hard. They deserve our support on a daily basis. But this government isn't doing that, because this government's agenda isn't to help them and stand with them. This government's agenda is to be on the side of the multinationals who can make a profit at the expense of patient care. That is a shame.

When we are talking about public spending on health care decreasing in this province, the private spending is where the public is spending more and more out of their pockets. As you know, the first thing they did after ripping up the collective agreement of thousands of low-paid health care workers was that they increased the MSP premiums by 50 percent. The median expenditure per household for private health insurance increased from $360 per year in 1997 to $600 in 2006. The cost for private supplement insurance, including delisting services such as vision care and physiotherapy, increased from $256 in 1997 to $480 today.

This government will try to tell you that what they're doing here is as a result of over 12,000 who participated in the Conversation on Health. You know what? None of them asked for this. I think this was another of the Premier's dreams on one of his vacation trips. He came and hauled the Minister of Health to his office and said: "Look, this is what I was dreaming when I was on vacation, and you've got to do that." The minister said: "Yes, sir."

The minister should have actually stood up to the Premier and said: "No, I want to stand on the side of the working people and the taxpayers of this province who put me in this chair, rather than kowtow to the Premier as just a one-man show." He failed the opportunity.

I've got quite a bit of stuff here that I want to talk about. How does this actually relate to Surrey's context? This is the area that I represent — Surrey-Newton. I call it the heart of Surrey. It is one of the best places to live, and I think those folks will be watching to see what comes out of this debate.

Here's what's happening in Surrey right now. In the last seven years we saw this government's inaction around Surrey Memorial Hospital. Obviously, they are not in touch with the health care services and needs of Surrey residents. Local Liberal MLAs are used to spending most of their time delivering this Premier's messages to Surrey residents, and they hardly spend any time bringing Surrey's concerns to Victoria.

Here's a reality check. While this minister spends all of his time spin-doctoring his catchy slogans without any substance, Surrey patients continue to be faced with unprecedented health care delays and wait-lists, code orange alerts and cancelled surgeries while the government continues to delay action on expanding the hospital.

Despite being told by the health authority in 2001 that the ER needed future expansion and again being told in 2004 that the hospital's ER was in a crisis situation, the government still hasn't dealt with the severe bed shortage in the Surrey Memorial Hospital and the Fraser region.

What does this bill do to deal with the acute care bed shortfall? Nothing in Surrey, in the Fraser region. The Fraser region has a major acute care bed shortfall estimated to be at more than 500 beds, growing to at least 700 beds by 2010 as a result of growing population and the government's severe cutback in its first term.

Despite promising to fix the problem at Surrey Memorial Hospital before the election in 2005, the problems have worsened and the critical expansions have been delayed until at least 2011 now. That will be after two full election terms by this government — inaction. Just a little history here. Just before the 2005 election the Premier promised action by early 2008 at the latest. It now looks like it will be 2011 at the earliest. That's how that promise was broken again.

In the meantime, the Health Minister is telling people to get used to the problem. This is what he quoted: "A lot of this demand is driven by a society that gets older, year over year, and is going to continue to do so. Anyone who thinks that the problem is going to go away is dreaming." This is what the Minister of Health told the Globe and Mail. I mean, that is a broken prom-

ise. Not only is it a broken promise, but the minister is telling taxpayers and the residents of Surrey: "You're on your own."

The promise included a new out-patient facility, which would be for day surgery and diagnostics, at the Green Timbers site at 140th Street and Fraser Highway at a cost, now they say, of about $151 million. The original cost, I believe, was $126 million, and it could go further by another $30 million as a result of P3, because it's going to be a P3 project.

This project will not be completed until 2011, now we're told, at the earliest, despite it being initially planned for 2009. It's not only a few months, as the minister told me in the House here. "What are you talking about? It's just a few months' delay."

It's more than a year now, Minister. It hasn't been established, and you should actually admit…. At least admit to the folks in Surrey: "Yes, we couldn't deliver on time. We're breaking our promise. Now you will get that facility built by 2010 or 2011." That's all you have to do. Go out there. Be open with the public. Tell them.

H. Bains: Oh, I'm going to talk about that too, Minister. I'm going to talk about what we did in ten years, about Surrey. I will. The minister encourages me to talk about those ten years. I will do that.

The expanded Surrey emergency centre at Surrey Memorial Hospital also was to be expanded, but it was to be built by 2010. We just had a meeting with Fraser Health. The CEO said that it will probably be 2011 — so another year's delay. The patients in Surrey and that region will be forced to wait six, seven, eight hours at the ER, as they have been doing for the last seven years, and nothing is coming from this government. No relief is coming from this government.

H. Bains: I know the truth hurts, but that is the truth. The truth remains the truth. You can't hide from truth. The truth is that those two facilities that were promised will be delayed by a year. That is the truth. It will be more than a year. I predict that here — that it'll be more than a year. This bill will do nothing to deal with that promise that has been broken again.

Just before the 2005 election, as concerns reached the boiling point, the Premier promised to fast-track the review on Surrey Memorial Hospital. This move ignored the many reviews, which had been completed previously, pointing to the massive and growing bed shortage. At the same time, he also promised that construction of a new facility was imminent, stating: "The money will be in our budget, and the shovels will be in the ground as quickly as possible. And I should tell you that in terms of 'quickly as possible,' that probably means 2007 or 2008, early 2008." This is what the Premier said.

Now 2011. That is a broken promise to those folks who go to Surrey Memorial Hospital. They are forced to wait for long hours. Not only do they have to wait long hours….

H. Bains: As a result of this, not only are the patients waiting six, seven, eight hours in the emergency ward, but 300 to 500 patients leave Surrey Memorial Hospital ER each month after waiting but not being seen by a doctor. So 300 to 500 patients have to leave.

When I go door-knocking, there's hardly a family who would not mention Surrey Memorial Hospital and their bad experience. They would tell me that if any one of them has to use health care services, they will not go to Surrey Memorial Hospital. This is what they're telling me. This is how bad it is.

It got so bad on the evening of March 12, 2008, that the hospital declared code orange, which lasted until the following day and left 41 patients without a bed on the morning of the 13th. All of the booked surgeries for the day were cancelled.

This is the second-largest hospital in British Columbia we're talking about. An emergency department that was built to handle 40,000 patients is handling more than 70,000 patients today. It is the fastest-growing city in Canada. When the hospital opened in 1959, it served 75,000 people. Today over 500,000 people depend on Surrey Memorial Hospital.

The members opposite asked me: what did the NDP do? This is what they did. The last major expansion of Surrey Memorial Hospital was the creation of a $62 million new wing. That was completed in 2001 by the NDP government. It was started by the NDP. It was completed in 2001.

H. Bains: Who was the minister? I think the member for Nelson-Creston was the Minister of Health. I think it's about time we put the same member back as the Minister of Health so that we can get something done in Surrey Memorial Hospital.

H. Bains: We have example after example. What will this bill do to help patients like Tim Morley? He is denied health care at the Fraser Health services because he decided to sue them, take them to court. That's their democratic right, but this government will not give them health care service.

J. Brar: I am pleased to respond to Bill 21, Medicare Protection Amendment Act, 2008. We have heard quite an interesting debate, and I will continue on that. The member for Surrey-Newton has just finished.

This act basically adds a new definition to the Canada Health Act, and the definition is "sustainability." In my view, and in other words, that's a promise to the people of British Columbia that somehow this government is going to make health care sustainable. What is the definition of that word? What will be sustainable? For whom? We don't know the answers.

I've seen all dictionaries possible, except the Liberal dictionary. That's the only dictionary we need to know as to what it means by sustainability. But before I go to that — I have a lot to say about that — I would like to go back to the history of this government, about the promises they have made to the people of British Columbia and what happened with those promises.

This is a little after 1990. This is the new century. This government has been in power for the last seven years, over 84 months.

When this government came to power in 2001, they had a document called New Era. In that they had one promise for the people of British Columbia. They made the promise that they will provide the best health care "when you need, where you need." That was the promise, but in fact, they did exactly the opposite to that. That's what they did.

Let me tell you, Madam Speaker, what they did. The definition of that, after they took over, became "When you need" means, now, "you never know when." That's what it means. "Where you need" means not everywhere. That's how they defined the health care after winning the election in 2001.

C. Evans: That must have been part of that dictionary, that Liberal dictionary.

J. Brar: I don't know about that dictionary. We need to see that in the coming days.

That's what they promised. In fact, they cut 15 percent of the acute care beds in B.C. between 2001 and 2004. They closed five hospitals under that definition in the province of British Columbia, including the emergency department in my next city, in Delta. They promised to build 5,000 long-term care beds for the seniors who spent their entire life building this beautiful province, but in fact, they didn't build any. Madam Speaker, 5,000 new long-term care beds, and they didn't deliver that promise as well.

We were talking to the Fraser Health Authority. In the Fraser Health Authority at this point in time there's a shortage of acute care beds — 550 beds. They need those beds right now, and this minister, this government failed to provide those acute care beds.

Before the election the Premier went to meet with the health employee unions. The Premier met with them, and he made a promise with them. The promise was: "I will honour the agreement that you have with the government of British Columbia." That was the promise made by this Premier before the election, and after the election this Premier was totally different. What did they do? We all know that.

The first thing that they did was privatize food services and housekeeping. What it means to the health care union workers is that they basically made 8,000 people jobless by that. For the remaining people they asked them to take a 15 percent rollback in the province, when every member of this government and the Premier himself took a more than 54 percent pay raise. That's the standard for himself. When it comes to workers, they have to take a rollback. That's why the Premier before the election and the Premier after the election was much different.

Now, as the member for Surrey-Newton said, the Supreme Court of Canada said that was illegal to do. That was an insult to the workers. That was an insult to the ethical conduct of this government or any government of any province. And that's what they did after the election.

So if you look at that history of promises this government made and what they did after the election, that does not go very well with this government.

C. Evans: Maybe they've all changed, and they're wonderful people now, and they've turned over.…

Then we came to 2005. In 2005 the Premier promised to the people of British Columbia that they want to make health care sustainable. He said that they will do that after talking to the people of British Columbia, but they had made up their minds even before going to the people of British Columbia.

H. Bains: They didn't tell the minister. The Premier didn't even tell the minister.

J. Brar: My fellow member, from Surrey-Newton, says that even the minister probably was not aware of that. That may be true. That could be true. Sometimes — you know the style of the Premier and that it's a one-man show — it goes that way and it happens that way.

The Premier just mentioned a few minutes ago to the member for Surrey-Newton, when he said, "Have you read a book of political science?" or something like that…. So he understands the politics, and he respects that, which is good. The Premier takes the shot, and the Premier defines what health care is and what health care will be. On health care the minister is a good team player. That's good. But in 2005 the word….

J. Brar: In 2005 the word "sustainability" came up. I would like to know — and this government and this minister have failed until today to define it — what it means by sustainability. What is the definition of sustainability? Sustainable for whom? Either for big corporate friends or for average Canadians? We don't know about that part. The only thing I can say is that I haven't seen the Liberal dictionary yet. If we had the dictionary, sustainable would mean privatization. That's what it means; that's what they're going to do.

So they can't define it. They can't define it, which is the first responsibility of the government: to define what they want to do. Now they try to build the reasoning for it, and one of the reasons they give is that the cost is going up. The cost of health care is going up, and that's what we have heard from the Minister of Health. That's what we have heard from the Minister of Finance. That's what we have heard from the Premier: "The cost has gone significantly up."

That is a misleading statement to the people of British Columbia. That's not true. In fact, the spending in British Columbia has gone from No. 2 to No. 7, and the minister is well aware of that situation. The minister will not talk about that, because that is not what the minister would like to talk about.

The other thing is about the spending. The health spending as a percentage of GDP was 7.4 percent in 2001-2002 and has decreased to 6.9 percent in '06-07. That's the fact. How, then, can the government say that the health care cost has gone up? The cost has not gone up. It depends how you define it.

So those factors, those reasons which the government tried to give, do not work for the people of British Columbia. The people of British Columbia are very wise. They will not listen to those kinds of false reasons given by the government to move on to privatize the health care system.

Now, the Premier says that in the public consultation they have actually spoken to the people of British Columbia, over 12,000 British Columbians. The people never asked for it. People are very clear. The only person who is confused about it, the only person who wants to destroy public health care, is that member on the other side. People are very clear. People want to have public health care. That's what people want, what the people of British Columbia want.

The Premier also went to England to look at different kinds of health care, and the only person who went with him was the Premier's own relative. That person, the relative of this Premier, is well known. It's very clear to the people of British Columbia, to the health experts, that that person is a big supporter of privatization of health care. It's known. It's a very established fact that he is well known for that.

So there are three things that we see. One is that the government wants to add the word "sustainability." The second thing is that the government said that they are going to consult the people of British Columbia.

I want to read from this. This is a report called Building on Values: the Future of Health Care in Canada. This is a report prepared by Mr. Romanow. This was the federal commission. This was the report done by a much more complex, comprehensive, complete work, and after that work, Mr. Romanow presented this report. I would like to read a few things from that report for the record.

Part of the report is a message to Canadians. That's how Mr. Romanow defined it. In it, Mr. Romanow writes to the people of Canada, and I would like to read it.

"My team and I have worked hard to assemble the best available evidence. We began by analyzing existing reports on medicare and by inviting submissions from interested Canadians and organizations. To clarify our understanding of key issues, we organized expert round-table sessions and conducted site visits, both in Canada and abroad. Where we identified knowledge gaps or needed a fresh perspective, we commissioned independent experts to conduct original research. Finally, I met directly with Canada's foremost health policy experts to hear their views, challenge them and have them challenge me.

He continues to talk on page 16 under a headline called "Canadians Remain Attached to the Values at the Heart of the System." In that paragraph he says:

So here is the point. This is Mr. Romanow talking to Canadians in every corner in the country saying that the system is sustainable already, saying that it has to be delivered collectively by all provinces working together.

Here we have the government in British Columbia, which says: "We don't respect the findings of this gentleman. We want to go all alone. We want to change the Canada Health Act. We will not work with other provinces."

It's a double standard. On one side we hear every day of this government working under TILMA with the government of Alberta and many other initiatives that this government talks about. They want to bring consistency. They want to expand the standards to other provinces and work with them because this government is a business-friendly government.

On the other side, when it comes to the most important public policy in this country, the policy for which this country is proud — every Canadian is proud…. On that one this government wants to go all alone.

I want to read one more paragraph from Mr. Romanow's report. The headline of that particular paragraph is "The System is as Sustainable as We Want It to Be." Mr. Romanow says:

He goes on to say many things about that. We have this report done by a very experienced individual commissioned by the federal government of Canada. That report was presented in 2002. This government continues spending millions of dollars of the people of British Columbia and wants to talk to people of British Columbia. They never asked for it. It doesn't make any sense when you already have a report done by talking to not only the people of British Columbia but people from every province in this country.

I would like to conclude this piece by reading the last couple of lines from this report on what it means when we talk about sustainability to the people of Canada. It says: "But individual Canadians view sustainability from a very different vantage point. The key sustainability question for the average Canadian is: will medicare be there for me when I need it."

Will medicare be there for me when I need it? That's the question. That's the definition of sustainability that the people of Canada want.

What we don't know is what the definition of this government is. That's what the problem with this bill is. This bill is a secret tool, a very secret tool to privatize health care. That's what we will not allow this government to do.

Before me the member for Surrey-Newton has spoken about Surrey. I think that when you talk about a bill like this, of course, it's very important to look at your local system as to how it will be redefined, how it will improve or how it will benefit if there's a new act like this. The situation and the story of Surrey Memorial is very well known. The minister knows very well, the Premier knows very well, the members on this side know very well, and the members on the other side know very well as well.

This hospital was built in 1959 when Surrey's population was only 50,000 people. Today, because Surrey is the fastest-growing community in the country, Surrey's population is over 400,000 people, and we still have the same hospital. It has expanded, but it is the same one hospital.

The capacity of the hospital, as the minister is very well aware, is to serve anywhere between 45,000 to 50,000 people through the ER in one year. The actual number of people walking into the hospital is over 70,000. What it means is that the staff are serving almost 40 percent more patients than they should be, than they have the capacity to serve. That's the situation, and that's why we saw that a few weeks ago they called a code orange, which means the hospital was not able to take any more patients. In fact, the patients that the hospital already had were much more than the capacity of the staff of the hospital. In fact, when I have spoken to some staff members, code orange is a norm in that hospital. It happens almost every year.

As the members for Surrey-Whalley and Surrey-Newton said before me, I have been knocking on doors as well. Every house has a story about a bad experience in the ER at Surrey Memorial. I took my own mother a few months ago. We were in emergency for over five hours, and she is over 90. She was so tired, and she told me: "Let's go back, because I will get more sick sitting

here." That's exactly what we did. We came back, and the next day we went to our family physician. That's not the story of my mother alone. That is the story of many, many mothers and sisters and brothers of almost every family I have spoken to when I door-knocked in my riding.

This government has been here for seven years, seven long years — 84 months. They did not give Surrey one 2-by-4 during the last seven years. When the province had the biggest surplus in the history of the province — and this government boasts about it — we did not get anything out of that good economy. The people of Surrey did not benefit at all from that good economy.

Particularly, the number one issue in Surrey is health care. We did not get any help in that area other than announcements by this minister and an announcement by the Premier time and again. It's very surprising that the minister will go to Surrey every two months to make an announcement and re-announcement about the same thing.

In the middle of the 2005 election, under the pressure from the people of Surrey, the Premier stood in the middle of Surrey and made the promise to the people of Surrey that the Premier is going to fast-track a study and that the Premier will build a new hospital if that's the outcome of this study.

That study was completed in November 2005. The three key recommendations of that study were that Surrey needs a new out-patient hospital, for which the construction will start in '07 and finish in '09, and that the emergency room is much smaller as compared to the need of the city. Therefore, the emergency room needs to be expanded. The construction is to start in 2008 and finish in 2010.

The third recommendation was more immediate. It was that they need to add 62 acute care beds before the end of November 2007. It's very surprising that this minister went to Surrey to announce that they accepted all the recommendations, and then the Premier went to Surrey to say that they accepted all the recommendations, but after a year what we saw…. They delayed the construction of the hospital till 2010. They delayed the construction of the ER till 2011.

The minister kept saying, as the member for Surrey-Newton said…. They said a delay of only two or three months. We met with the CEO of the Fraser Health Authority, and they clearly said that it was one year. In fact, I say it's more than one year, because they don't promise to complete anything before the next election.

What it means is that during the first two terms, during the first eight years, this government will not give Surrey even one 2-by-4. That's the inaction of this government. I don't know how the word "sustainable" is going to help the people of Surrey. If the government continues to make promises and break promises as they've done in the past, Surrey will not benefit anything out of that. That's what the people are concerned about.

Will this bill, if they add the word "sustainable," change anything for Surrey? Will they build the hospital before 2010? The answer is no. Will they do it?

Hon. G. Abbott: Tell us about your out-patient hospital. What did it look like?

I want to tell the minister this. The NDP, during their nine years, spent at that time on one project — I'm talking about only one project — $65 million, which is worth over $300 million today.

This minister sitting here made a promise to the people of Surrey for just $126 million, when the province had a $4 billion surplus. They failed to deliver anything during their full eight years, during their first two terms, and that's the action of this minister. I'm surprised he still has questions for us.

D. Cubberley: I was so wrapped up in the member's comments that I couldn't believe it was coming to a conclusion.

D. Cubberley: No, I love it all. The give-and-take in the House is of interest to all members, and I hope to contribute to it in some small way myself in the amount of time that I have.

I'm happy to have the chance to enter into the discussion about the proposed changes to the Medicare Protection Act, because it is a very important piece of legislation that links the way in which we deliver provincial health care to the guiding principles behind the Canada Health Act. Those principles, the guiding principles of the act, create an orienting framework for the design and delivery of our single most important social program — public health care.

Why is it our most important program? In a nutshell, because the advent of illness that can be cured or death that might be preventable and can be avoided through timely intervention is a source of trauma and victimization in the lives of families and individuals. Illness is a source of individual and group suffering that can be, as it turns out, effectively addressed through collective solidarity and action.

That is what public health care actually represents — collective solidarity and action; effective action that's available to individuals to address the problems of illness and disease as they occur in individual lives, available without regard for the ability to pay at the time the disease strikes. You get the care you need

when and where you need it. That resonates a little bit. Sounds like a slogan from the 2001 election campaign that I think a particular political party had on offer.

To be sure, there are obviously limits to what can be delivered. Individuals do have to travel to places where the care is available. It isn't available equally in every location in a vast province like this or in a vast country like Canada. They may have to travel across town or even go to another city or, heaven forbid, come to Vancouver in some cases. But if the care is medically necessary, medicare strives to make it available to them.

It's very easy for people in current times to think that this was always with us, but there was a major struggle within society to get the system that we enjoy today put in place. That is why I think it's important that it not be changed frivolously or carelessly or by stealth without a clear statement of the intent of those who would set out to change the system. It's certainly why it's important that government not be allowed to alter the system in ways that could interfere with its design, because that design has shown itself to work, to be workable and to be in accord with the values that the public has around public health care.

Certainly, government should not be allowed to change the orienting principles in ways that contradict exactly what it heard from the public when it engaged in a conversation with them. Government did ask the public for its opinion, and the public did tell them. They want health care kept. They want health care improved. They want better service, not less service.

Yes, they want innovation and delivery, not a delisting of services. They want the system to be extended into prevention, the long-awaited move into prevention, whether it's by creating more physically active communities or by extending home care supports so that people can actually age in place. The message is more and better care, not less care.

The message certainly was: "Hey, we can't afford this. We can't afford this care." That's Brian Day's message on care, and I think it's the Great Decider's message on health care, but it's not the public message on health care. That wasn't what came out of the conversation, but rather that we can afford it, and we're prepared to pay the taxes to maintain and sustain and enhance the public trust.

Make no mistake. Universal, publicly funded and administered health care represents the key public trust that any government is given to manage and that they have the responsibility to steward.

D. Cubberley: How important is public health care? Well, I think the members opposite know. In any sampling of opinion, the number one issue is health care. In any election, federal or provincial, publicly funded health care is top of mind. In any family, access to health care services when needed is foremost.

If government says it's going to talk to the public about health care and the stresses and costs of delivering it, it hears from the public. What it hears, if it cares to listen — and apparently it doesn't — is that the public wants, needs and expects that government will treat it as the linchpin of our public policy.

There are five principles behind the Canada Health Act, five principles that have been interpreted in such a way that keeps them broad and universal; five principles that have been adapted to changing times, technologies, practices and forms of delivery; five principles worthy of respect because they've delivered a system that's the envy of most, a system where there's a clear commitment to provide all individuals with reasonable access to medically necessary care without subjecting that access to a test of resources. No user fees for a necessary service, no facility fees in order to see a doc at a clinic, no credit card medicine.

All of this, as the member opposite says or implicitly suggests, is financed through the collection of taxes, the majority of which are progressive in nature — one hopes they stay that way — and based on a relative ability to pay in order to fund a service that's supplied, as it's required, without regard for ability to pay — i.e., access governed by need, not by ability to pay.

This represents, as a social program, a highly refined form of social solidarity. It's a commitment that Canadians make to one another and that they expect their governments to respect, to embody and to exercise stewardship of. It's based on pooling risk and pooling resources. It's an insurance scheme with compulsory enrolment — everyone has to belong — and universal benefits, and it works. It works exceptionally well. It doesn't mean there aren't problems with it. It's a massive system.

Providing health care for all comers is an immense undertaking. There will always be a need for change and reform, but the system works so well, in fact, that even governments like the one opposite, with leaders who don't actually like the idea of pooling risk and resources to meet the risk; who don't really like the idea of government intervening in the public realm in ways that advantage all citizens…. It's a government which, if they dared, would come right out and say that their view is that inequality of access based on available resources in a competitive universe — i.e., choice for those who have the dough — would be better.

Those are the free enterprise instincts. They're so strong that deep down they're as upset as Dr. Brian Day is that docs aren't free to charge whatever the traffic will bear. But of course, they can't come out and say that, Madam Speaker, and you'll never hear it, because they know the public doesn't support that. They know that the public does support, overwhelmingly, public

health care. They know it from their own orchestrated conversation on health care, because that's what the public told them. They also know it from the Romanow commission and the federal consensus that came from that to begin reinvesting in the federal transfer to provinces for health care.

You know, Madam Speaker, if you went down to Tim Hortons and randomly talked to some folks enjoying a coffee and a doughnut down there, they'd tell you the same thing. They want health care, they want it publicly funded, and they want it available when they need it.

D. Cubberley: What? Are you slagging the people that go to Tim Hortons? I don't think I would. I like to go to Tim's for a coffee myself. I like to chat with the people down at Tim Hortons because those are everyday people, and I don't have contempt for them.

Even the folks down there want it kept. They want it improved; they want it made more user-friendly. You know what? They know it can be done, and they're prepared to see it paid for by investments drawn from taxes — their taxes.

D. Cubberley: News flash: "B.C. Liberal government sees tax revolt over health care. We're paying too much for that publicly funded health care. It's got to stop. We want tax reductions." Have you heard that somewhere recently? In your caucus, perhaps.

They're not going to disclose that, because they know that if they disclosed themselves and what they really think, they'd become the issue…

D. Cubberley: Sadly, rather than learn from what people told them in the conversation on health care and understand that the public wills medicare to be the comprehensive health care plan it is and wills that it be upgraded, extended and enabled to do all that it can through the accumulated wisdom and experience of doctors, nurses and that whole array of practitioners who deliver the care and also through the magic — which is, sadly, infrequently deployed by governments of this ilk — of preventive interventions that would actually reduce the amount of disease in society, they instead persist in trying to unravel things by using a device, putting a new undefined but potentially very destructive principle into the pantheon and giving us no clear indication of why it's there and what it means.

The public wants government's attention full-time on ensuring the future of the public trust, but rather than learn from that, they choose to be devious and pursue their own agenda by stealth. That is what the introduction of the so-called principle of sustainability actually represents.

It's the use of stealth to embed a modifier in the cluster of principles anchoring the public trust we call medicare — a trust created, I might say, in the face of opposition from exactly the forces this government represents: those who see a market in illness with a potential to make vast wealth for entrepreneurs if they could just find a way to break up the public monopoly, if they were just not constrained to be available to everyone irrespective of ability to pay but could offer immediate services to those willing to prime the pump with a special premium.

If they could get that, they know they'd be in the business of manufacturing money. That's where their instincts lead them. Right now through public health care they're constrained to work in the way that all those practitioners who are in medicine for the cure, who actually care for the people they're working for…. That's the overwhelming majority of them.

D. Cubberley: You don't feel it is? The Health Minister apparently doesn't feel a majority of health care providers are in it for the cure. A few may not be. They may be donors to a particular political party. They look to a government of this ilk to find a way to unravel the pooling of risk and resources, and they look silently south for inspiration. That's their real beacon, the mother ship of their convictions — a place where each is left to fend for herself and her own. If you don't

happen to have the cash and can't remortgage your home, well, it's tough noogies for you — no health care.

You know, I listened to the member for Vancouver-Kingsway, our Health critic, recall the Premier launching his version of the conversation with the opening remarks by Dr. Brian Day. I vividly recall that opening slide with its comparison of the sacred trust of public health care to George Orwell's 1984. The very first thing he did in launching a conversation about our public health care system is compare it to the Soviet Union and 1984. Big Brother controlling our every move. We've got to get our freedom back from Big Brother.

D. Cubberley: I'm glad to provide the members opposite with some humour, but you know, it was revealing. This was done at a forum overseen by our Premier, the Great Decider. He took no offence at the image. That set the context for the spurious conversation on health care which ensued.

Perhaps he thinks practitioners, too, should not be constrained to work within the public trust but should be allowed to charge what the traffic will bear. Get out from under Big Brother.

I find it odd, if you think about it, that a social program that has delivered so much to so many individuals in our society, touched every family in positive ways, should be compared to an alien force demonically controlling the direction of society by the keynote speaker at the opening of the conversation on care. Well, hopefully the Premier…. Apparently not.

I was going to say that he must have learned one thing, but he's buried it, if he did, because British Columbians do have boundless appetite for their medical insurance plan and knowing that it's there to backstop them when they need it. It gives them a confidence that enables them to pursue their lives and their goals wholeheartedly, knowing that if trouble occurs, should it strike, help is available when it's needed.

I was also struck by the Health critic's comments about the failure of government to justify in any way, shape or form its introduction of a new principle, a principle that I think does require justification. If you're going to change something, you should indicate why you're doing it. It will certainly have an impact, because the principles are constantly interpreted and reinterpreted on the basis of precedent. I think what we see behind all of this is evidence of an undeclared agenda.

So it's interesting. What you can't do out in the open because your true convictions, if you actually stated them — or the Great Decider's true convictions — would cause you to lose credibility, you attempt to find a way to do by stealth. I don't know.

If you want to fight over this stuff, why don't we fight out in the open? Why don't we have an open declaration of what the actual intent is? You know, let's get at it. Let's have government state its intentions clearly. Stop trying to manipulate the public, come out of hiding, drop the sheep's clothing, state your purpose, and then let's get on with it. But don't monkey with our mantra. Don't try to embed a ticking time bomb inside the Medicare Protection Act.

D. Cubberley: I have to say that after the minister's robo-rant about the '90s instead of describing what the actual intentions were behind the changes to the Medicare Protection Act, I think the comments missed the mark.

Medicare is an organized response to the reality of human suffering, and it reflects a sense of compassion for the suffering of individuals. It costs us money, for sure, a large amount of money, but look at what it delivers. It relieves human life of a lot of the arbitrariness of that suffering that comes with illness.

I have a lot of respect for the folks who helped to build this system. One of them, Mr. Justice Emmett M. Hall reminded us back in 1980, and I'll quote here: "We as a society are aware that the trauma of illness, the pain of surgery, the slow decline to death are burdens enough for the human being to bear without the added burden of medical or hospital bills penalizing the patient at the moment of vulnerability."

That is the underlying sentiment behind our medicare plan in Canada and of that in all the provinces that comprise Canada, who deliver the care to people on the ground — that individuals should not be forced to pay for the service at the moment of vulnerability, that access to assistance, pain relief, remedy and restoration of life should not depend upon being able to pay as one goes, that all people deserve reasonable access to medically necessary services. That is what drives our public health care system, and it's what's reflected in the existing principles in their interpretation.

They do not need modification by a new and spurious principle of sustainability, a principle put forward not by those who treasure the vision and achievement of universally accessible health care but by those with a secret agenda: to undermine.

We can only surmise here, because they will not declare themselves, that (a) they can't stand government programs that work, or (b) they want desperately to cut back on government expenditures, which is sort of the other side of the same thing. A government desperately wanting to cap or pare back revenues and inflate expenditure projections so it can try to spook the public into accepting some kind of doomsday scenario about health care eating the entire meal? It's bosh. It's worse than bosh.

I thought the member for Vancouver-Kingsway, again, did a masterful job of pointing out the concocted numbers that were being spread about by the Great Decider, our own George Bush, about the looming 71 percent of public spending that was going to go down the drain on this program that simply couldn't be afforded. What was the thinking there? Was it: "Let's

see if we can stampede the sacred cows and see if we can't cause bedlam"? Concocted numbers? A specious argument? "We just can't afford it. We've got to cap it somehow."

You know, when we do look at health care spending as a percentage of GDP, we find that its growth is pretty modest, and in fact, we can afford it. When we consider how much of the growth in spending today is actually a result of federal transfers that are finally being restored slowly…. Let's face it, additional spending by the federal government is a major source of the funds for the growth of expenditure in the province of British Columbia, not coming directly from the B.C. taxpayer but coming through a federal investment.

I remind the members opposite too. I know they don't like to acknowledge that they get any money from the federal government. It's all coming out of our pocket here, but the recommendations for that increased spending did come out of the Romanow commission.

Hon. G. Abbott: We wouldn't be spending that money if we weren't getting it from the federal government. Is that what you're saying?

D. Cubberley: No. In fact, back in the '90s, which you love to decry, when the federal government cut its deficit by off-loading onto the provinces, we had to take the money from here to find the way to fill the gap.

D. Cubberley: I believe you should ask for permission to ask the question through….

D. Cubberley: He was just becoming didactic, and you know he likes to do that. He can't help himself, and I like to indulge him sometimes.

Those transfers are somewhat offsetting some of the growth of expenditure, and they're obviously intended to finance new initiatives that will improve service and the quality of care across Canada and in British Columbia.

I know that it's hard for the members opposite to accept that last little piece, when the minister was becoming didactic, because you know, in the '90s there was a struggle to sustain the budget provincially because of the federal cuts.

I remember the members of the government side, who were then the members of the opposition, calling on the provincial government to cut the health care budget further. "Cut it to the bone. We're spending too much money on health care." Well, there's a kind of consistency in that, isn't there? They didn't feel we could afford it then, and they don't feel that we can afford it now. The only problem with that position is that the public doesn't agree with you. They want it, and they're willing to pay for it.

Hon. G. Abbott: They seemed to agree with us in the 2001 and 2005 elections, and they seem to be agreeing with us now, in the opinion polls.

It was a difficult thing in the '90s to try and sustain health care in the face of cuts to federal transfers, and it was done. Is it not ironic — the stealth initiative of the principle of sustainability, the Trojan Horse of the principle of sustainability, dressed up as some sort of innocuous offering? "It's really nothing. We want to put it in because sustainability is good."

In fact, it houses the seeds of the undoing of the other guiding principles of medicare, and I think that's ironic — bitterly ironic. How right we are to be aggressively suspicious of the Trojan Horse, because the government is incapable of telling us why it is it's doing it and what its purpose actually is.

In fact, the minister made little or no attempt to explain why government was considering changing the law.

D. Cubberley: It needs a few more times for it to sink in and for the minister to reflect on the fact that that's perhaps not a good basis for changing the law. No explanation is not a good rationale to go for changes to the law.

D. Cubberley: I think that when you're responsible for a sacred trust, you shouldn't just monkey around with it. You should have a rationale. Should you not have a rationale?

But that's just what's on offer: a change disguised as nothing. They don't really want to talk about it. Now, I haven't listened to all the observations from the members opposite, and I'm sure that means my life is incomplete and my picture of what's going on is incomplete. But from what I've heard, I haven't heard anything convincing except that they're concerned about rising costs. I don't think I can accept even that as being terribly sincere or accurate.

They're worried about who's paying the costs and how they're being paid and especially about the regulatory framework that constrains them to be paid in that way. They just don't like the fact that it's public resources that are funding public health care. What they really want is to have private resources come into the funding of health care, your savings and mine — if we have them.

They really don't care about costs either. It's who's paying the costs. In this case, government with a revenue collected through taxation — all of us acting in

concert. I think they're especially interested in the potential of private pay to generate vast wealth, ultimately, for large corporations and individual providers.

They see how that works already in the second tier that's evolving in British Columbia where lax oversight by the government enables people to offer quicker access to still-insured services. They feel secretly that they just have to find a way to enable more of that to happen, and that maybe if you could create a situation where you could one day say, "We have to cap funding," that would be a good way to enable more of that to happen.

I want to know why they don't look south more often, because down there, there's a living experiment that shows that what they really want — which is opportunity for their friends to maximize the profits from care — does the job way more poorly than our humble public health care system.

How could I possibly say that? If you look at the results, of course, 45 million Americans have no coverage at all. That's more than the population of Canada and 17 percent or more of the population of the United States, and it's rising. Down there where market forces set prices, those with money get the world's best service. Many of the rest struggle, and many of those go broke.

D. Cubberley: Well, just out of interest, the single biggest cause of personal bankruptcy in the United States….

D. Cubberley: You know, the members are demonstrating their ignorance once again, which seems to be the business they're in. The Shouldice clinic is part of the public health care system in Canada.

D. Cubberley: Yes, it is. It is part of the public health care system in Canada.

Madam Speaker, allow the Speaker's office to determine whether that's true or not. I rest my case. It is part of the public health care system. You pay with your CareCard. Yes, you can go….

D. Cubberley: Madam Speaker, I thank you for your indulgence. I sense the members opposite would love to hear the rest of my speech, but alas, I don't have the time.

S. Simpson: I know the minister would have loved to have got up to close debate, but the reality is that the minister, apparently, has been spending more time chattering over there than he has been listening to the good advice he's getting from this side of the House. So I look forward to giving him a little bit more good advice. I look forward to that.

I'm pleased to have the opportunity to get up and speak to Bill 21, the Medicare Protection Amendment Act, 2008. This act is essentially an amendment to the Medicare Protection Act, and what its purpose is, hon. Speaker, is to add the term "sustainability" to the five values and principles that we have from the Canada Health Act.

We all know that sustainability has become quite a buzzword for a whole lot of things these days. Sometimes that happens, and when it happens there are always organizations and groups and folks like the government over here who are happy to capture that word and twist it in ways that they think will work for them.

S. Simpson: The Canada Health Act, as we all know, has the five principles that it puts in place. They've been developed in a very thoughtful way, I believe, and they really have created a foundation under that Canada act that has allowed our health care system to move forward successfully and to arguably be the best health care system in the world.

With the Canada Health Act, we see that the five principles are its public administration, that the system stay public and remain public; its comprehensiveness, to ensure that it in fact covers all aspects of health care that Canadians and British Columbians require; its universality, to ensure its availability to all British Columbians and Canadians; its portability, to ensure that people have access to that health care wherever they may be in our country; and its accessibility, to ensure access.

I think everybody agrees with the five principles of the Canada Health Act, but now this government and this minister have decided that they want to add sustainability to that. In doing that, they've identified sustainability in this piece of legislation, and it's a very small piece of legislation. It's three or four pages long. Not much to it, but its potential impact is significant. What it says is…. It talks about health expenditures within taxpayers' ability to pay.

Now, everybody's interested in the taxpayers' ability to pay, but British Columbians, I believe, are interested in ensuring the quality of our health care system — ensuring that the five principles of the Canada Health Act are a priority and remain paramount — and that they continue to have access to that health care.

The problem with this is that it raises great questions as to what it truly means. We know that the

minister…. Well, he didn't have a lot to say in substantive terms about the act when he opened this debate, and he has tried to assure us that it's to some degree just words, but we know that it's more than words, and we know that the government wouldn't have done this if it was just words.

What the minister said to support that…. In an article in the Globe and Mail, he's quoted as saying: "It's a framed statement of values. The definitions can take on critical importance in issues that may be argued in courts of law. They can be very important in terms of framing legal principles to guide governments." The concern comes, and the concern from British Columbians comes, that this is going down the same road as much of what this government has done in a whole variety of public policy areas.

What we know about this government is that they tend to be focused in two core areas with all of their policy, all of their legislation, and those core areas seem to be trying at every turn to accelerate privatization of public services, to accelerate the privatization of our services whether it be in transportation, whether it be here in health care, whether it be around the environment, whether it be in any variety of areas.

The other thing that this government is very good at is downloading responsibility, whether it's downloading that onto local communities or onto individuals. It's interesting that what the government says, of course, is that this is about "individual responsibility." They talk about individual responsibility here.

Well, I think what we're talking about here, when the government talks about individual responsibility, is looking at ways to pass those costs on. That's what I believe we're dealing with here in the government with Bill 21.

What is the situation we face here in terms of this government and its track record on health care? The minister will tell you about its track record, but the reality is that we know that this government has seen our health care system slide from second in the country to seventh in health care spending among Canadian provinces on a per-capita basis.

We've seen the bed-to-patient ratio in B.C. drop to 1.8 acute care and rehab beds per thousand population when compared to a Canadian average of three. It's even lower in the Fraser Health Authority, which is probably the health authority facing the greatest amount of pressure in the province.

We've seen that 15 percent of acute care beds in British Columbia were cut between 2001 and 2004. Of course, we saw the drastic and dramatic cuts in the first years of the government. Now the government throws a little money back in and tries to say: "See how we've increased spending." But they never go back to talk about where we started in 2001.

We saw the closure of five hospitals and emergency departments. We know that Fraser Health is currently experiencing a shortage of some 550 acute care beds, and the projections are that that shortage gets bigger, not smaller, by 2010.

Then, of course, we have the broken promise that arguably has created much of the concern in our acute care hospitals. That was the broken promise around long-term care. In 2001, hon. Speaker — I'd remind you, because I know you're aware of this — the government promised to work with non-profit societies to build and operate additional new intermediate and long-term care beds by 2006. Of course, what happened is that they didn't appear. There weren't 5,000 care beds.

What did the government do after having to acknowledge that it had broken its promise, had failed seniors in British Columbia? What it said was: "Well, we'll make another promise. The last one wasn't very good, so let's make another promise." That promise was 5,000 new residential care and assisted-living beds by 2008.

We'll see whether those 5,000 beds — that package of quite changed policy, a quite different promise — in fact get realized. But it's important for people to understand that there really is a difference between residential care and assisted-living beds.

I worry, of course, that the government makes these promises, and they spin this out. The public affairs bureau works overtime, and they spin this out. People begin to say: "Oh, I guess we're getting what the government told us we would get." But what we know is that they're very different kinds of care. Assisted living is really independent housing for seniors who are capable of dealing with their own issues, and it's great. It's an important thing to provide. It's great when seniors, in fact, can avail themselves of assisted living. If they can do that, that's a fabulous thing.

However, what was called for were 5,000 residential care beds, and residential care beds provide a level of care and assistance in the tasks around daily living for seniors that is much different than that of assisted living, and at a much higher standard. Those beds aren't being provided.

I am sure that when we get to the election next year, the promise of 5,000 residential care beds will continue not to have been met. Eight years after the promise was made, it will be broken and continue to be broken because this government has no intention of fulfilling that promise. They have no intention of fulfilling that promise on residential care.

The importance of this isn't lost on people who are pretty knowledgable about our health care system. I would quote a piece that was in the Times Colonist on April 17, a piece that was written by Ken Fyke. Some of you will know that he was a member of the B.C. Royal Commission on Health Care and Costs here in British Columbia, a commissioner for the Commission on Medicare in Saskatchewan, a former deputy minister in both Saskatchewan and British Columbia, and the CEO of the greater Victoria hospital.

Mr. Fyke said — and I think he's a pretty knowledgable guy when it comes to health care:

He goes on to say that there are challenges, though, and when he talks about the challenges, he talks about primary care, he talks about aging, and he talks about those kinds of services that, if the government had kept the promise it made for 5,000 residential care beds, we would have been moving in the right direction to address. But because the government never got there — it never fulfilled the promise it made — we, as a consequence, have exacerbated a problem that we have.

The government, of course, will tell us that this particular bill is necessary because of the pressures on spending. What we know, of course, is that the government, in terms of pressures on spending, has gone from second to seventh in per-capita spending on health care, as I said, based on the Canadian Institute for Health Information's national report, 2007. Health spending as a percentage of gross domestic product — which is how people who are being forthright would measure health care spending — was about 7.4 percent in '01-02 and has decreased to 6.9 percent in 2006-07. That number comes from the B.C. Economic and Financial Review, not from us.

So what we know is that the challenge that the government is putting in front of us is somewhat of a false challenge, but they're doing their best to try to sell this to British Columbians.

How did the government decide to deal with this? First of all, of course, with a grand statement and with all kinds of pomp and circumstance, the government announced the Premier's conversation on health care. We knew that this was going terribly wrong in terms of where the government wanted this to go at the point where they pulled the Premier's name off the beginning, and it became the conversation on health care. At that point, it became clear that they weren't getting what they wanted.

But what we do know is that some 12,000 British Columbians participated in that process. They talked, they met, and they did the best they could do to contribute to that discussion around health care. What we know is that those people — the vast, vast majority of those folks — talked about innovation. They talked about ideas they had both locally and provincially to deal with health initiatives.

But they said one thing over and over again. They said: "Keep our system public. Don't expand privatization of health care. Keep the system in the hands of British Columbians. It is a treasured jewel for British Columbians and Canadians." That is the position of British Columbians. It's a position that this side of the House agrees with and respects. It's a position that for that side of the House we're not so sure about.

So what does the government do? They introduce a series of bills, primarily this bill, that look like the decision is to ignore what the conversation on health care was saying and begin to put the framework in place to take health care in a different direction, and that's something this side of the House isn't prepared to support.

They've taken the view that this is business as usual and that health care is seen like business and will be treated like business. British Columbians don't see health care as business. They see health care as an essential public service, a service that they want to be there should their kids get sick, a service that they want to be there when their elderly parents are ill and are needing help in their later years, a service that they know they can rely on and depend on.

If government has any commitment it needs to fulfil, it needs to fulfil that commitment and that expectation of British Columbians. That's the challenge for this government. The problem is that Bill 21 doesn't necessarily take us in that direction. It doesn't take us in that direction at all. So you have a situation where British Columbians are paying more for health care. They continue to pay more, whether it is increased MSP payments; services that have been delisted, like physiotherapy and vision care; increased costs for individuals and increased costs around private insurance plans.

We know, based on what Statistics Canada tells us, that the personal costs, health care costs for individuals, are going up, and this government has given no indication that it's prepared to do anything to support that.

I think I see the look here from the hon. Speaker. So I reserve my right to finish my comments and move adjournment of debate.

Committee of Supply (Section A), having reported resolutions, was granted leave to sit again.

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF
COMMUNITY SERVICES AND
MINISTER RESPONSIBLE FOR
SENIORS' AND WOMEN'S ISSUES
(continued)

M. Sather: I wanted to ask the minister about the order of Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council, No. 768, who approved an order on November 22 of last year, signed by the minister and the Deputy Premier, that amends…. On the recommendation of the Lieutenant-Governor, as attached, the Greater Vancouver regional district growth strategy exemption regulation is made.

This regulation, essentially, deletes the authority of sections 853 to 862 and section 866, parts 4 to 7, of the Local Government Act. What it does is enable those municipalities that are trying to take land out of the green zone to do that. By the order of this regulation, if adopted by two-thirds of the votes at the GVRD, municipalities can take land out of the green zone.

This is a big issue in my constituency. All our ALR land is in the green zone, and this is, essentially, a process whereby the municipality and others that are in the same position are enabled to take land out of the ALR for development.

My question to the minister is: why are the minister and the provincial government enabling municipalities to take land out of the green zone and out of the ALR?

Hon. I. Chong: I do want to say first and foremost that this order allows the GVRD to make those changes to the green zone boundaries so long as they are still consistent with the livable region strategic plan. But in order to make the change….

Let's be very clear about it. This says that the proposed amendment bylaws must be initiated by the municipality having jurisdiction for the land. So if a municipality is not interested in making any changes and if the municipality does not initiate any changes, then nothing occurs.

However, if the mayor and council, who are locally elected persons, feel they would like to make a change, they can do so. They must also have a public hearing held before the amendment bylaw is passed and, of course, allow for a two-thirds majority vote of this GVRD board to pass the bylaw.

But it does begin, first and foremost, with the municipality. If the member is concerned with the municipalities that he represents, then I think he would need to, first and foremost, speak with that mayor and council.

M. Sather: Clearly, it's understood that unless a municipality initiates the action, they're not going to be taking land out of the ALR and the green zone. Unfortunately, the majority on the council of Maple Ridge are doing just that. They're trying to take land out of the green zone, and they're trying to take land out of the ALR.

They can't do this without the actions of the minister and this government. So my question, then, is: does this government support taking land out of the ALR and the green zone, as would be very much indicated by this regulation?

Hon. I. Chong: Local governments are in the best position to make decisions impacting their communities, and regional districts are the ideal bodies or entities that can ensure there is consistency among municipalities that make up the larger area that they represent. What we have allowed is that municipalities that wish to initiate changes, that want to bring forward changes within their lands that they have jurisdiction over, are able to do so. They will, as I say, have a requirement for a public hearing as well as a requirement to have a two-thirds vote of the GVRD.

Certainly, I can appreciate that the member may disagree with the mayors and councils that he represents. He's an elected person, but so, too, are the mayors and councils.

M. Sather: Well, that's really unfortunate that the minister and a government that's saying that they're green, saying they want to protect the agricultural land reserve…. When push comes to shove, they're not doing it. They're enabling municipalities to take land out of the ALR, as simply as that. So I guess the answer is yes, the minister and this government supports taking land out of the green zone and land out of the ALR.

What's also disturbing is that this is a significant change to the Local Government Act. Here, again, we don't see it brought to this Legislature for debate. We see it come in by regulation. We're seeing this being the government by regulation now. Everything in terms of climate change is by regulation. So we don't get to discuss in the Legislature these important matters.

Can the minister answer why she didn't bring this to the Legislature for debate and, instead, brought it in through the back door by regulation?

Hon. I. Chong: For the record, I would like to correct statements made by the member opposite when he

implies that we are supporting this action or that action, and in particular in regards to the agricultural lands that he is referring to.

One matter is clear; that is, we have enabled municipalities to do a variety of tasks that they wish to do. We introduce legislation. We make changes to legislation that provide tools for municipalities to take certain actions that they believe best serve their constituents, their citizens. In many cases municipalities don't take advantage of some of those enabling opportunities, but for those municipalities who do wish to take advantage, they are enabled to do so.

This is not directing a municipality to be taking specific action in regards to the green zone. The member knows that. While I respect that he has his opinion, so, too, do the elected people in his area — the mayors and councils in his area — and if he is so compelled to disagree with them, then he would need to take that up with them and see whether or not he can convince them to not act in what they believe is the best interest of their citizens.

M. Sather: So the minister is saying that they bring in a number of pieces of legislation that enable municipalities to do this or that, but it's up to the municipalities to choose whether or not they use that legislation or regulation in this case.

That's not what happened here, and the minister knows that. It's the municipal governments that have come to the minister asking her to enable them, and she has complied. She said: "Go ahead. You have my blessings to take the land out of the ALR and the green zone." It's very clear what the government has done in this case.

I wanted to ask the minister also about 5(b) of this regulation which says, under "Additional terms and conditions": "The minister may establish any other terms and conditions the minister considers appropriate regarding the consideration or adoption of an amending bylaw under this regulation."

That really is vague to me. What does it mean? It sounds like it's saying that, notwithstanding anything in this regulation, or these regulations which override a lot of pieces of the Local Government Act, the minister can do anything else that she wants to do. Could the minister please clarify what that means?

Hon. I. Chong: Well, I think perhaps the member is misinterpreting the section that he is quoting. This is an opportunity or mechanism that ensures for more, I guess, safety mechanisms to be in place so that if, in fact, an amendment were to be made and there was — I don't want to say an abuse — a situation such that the way the amendment was being brought forward was not held in a proper way, it would allow myself as minister to set terms and conditions to ensure appropriate actions to be followed.

So if a public hearing was not conducted in an appropriate way, then I would be able to, by this particular section, have the authority to ensure that that does take place. If that bylaw amendment is to take place, we want to ensure that it is followed through in the appropriate fashion, and this would allow us to ensure that that does take place.

C. Wyse: Minister, I have a series of questions that I'll be posing through the Chair to you, and basically, they come out of the objectives contained in the report. To refer actually to one of them, it says:

To my colleague opposite, that raises questions around one of the local levels of government regional districts and their lack of involvement being covered under the Community Charter. Are there funds committed to develop a Community Charter for regional districts?

C. Wyse: The question that pops into mind, based upon positions that have been taken by the UBCM on this particular aspect…. When there was discussion with the Community Charter and with the UBCM and its membership, there was agreement that it made sense to go with the incorporated areas with the Community Charter, but based on the presence that regional districts would follow with their involvement within Community Charter, and that position has been supported consistently by various resolutions at the UBCM.

Hon. I. Chong: Firstly, I do want to say that the working relationship that this government has had with UBCM over the past number of years, I think, has been particularly productive. I can say quite comfortably that since I've been minister, since 2005, I have met with the executive on a regular basis. In fact, I have always attended their executive meetings when invited and have been able to share with them areas of concern. They, too, have shared those areas of concern with me.

I will state that I have heard that there has been interest in having a new charter prepared for regional districts, but I have indicated to them — and the member, I'm sure, has been made aware — that we are committed to ensuring that we do have vibrant communities around the province and that we want to ensure that local governments are supported in an effective and an appropriate way.

However, there were changes to legislation, I believe, back in 2000, in relation to regional districts when there were extensive changes made in the Municipal

Act, which became the Local Government Act in the year 2000. So there had been some rather, as I understand it, extensive changes made at that time.

The Community Charter, however, was developed and took effect in 2004, and so that is relatively new — the Community Charter for municipalities. It's still to this day not being used to the fullest extent. In fact, some municipalities are still ensuring that they understand the full extent of authority and powers which they have been given.

I have said to those who have asked about our regional districts' charter that I do believe that we have to allow the Community Charter legislation to be fully, I guess, canvassed and used to the extent possible and that where there are needs that the regional districts feel they would like addressed, we look at that in a non-legislative way, both for specific regional districts and those generally.

I continue to ask them to share with me some areas that they feel that there can be improvements on, that we can deal with in a non-legislative way, and I'm waiting to hear back from them. I understand that there is a subcommittee working group through the UBCM executive who are doing exactly that.

I am waiting for their report to me, for their recommendations, and when I receive that, then I will act appropriately.

C. Wyse: The comments that were made around this item and the explanation for the postponement of the application of the Community Charter to another level of local government is lost somewhat on me. I apologize if it has gone by me. Likewise, from talking with people within local government, they feel that if the legislation had all the merits and all the hype that is mentioned by the government as being such great improvements, then there's the lack of understanding on why those same items and improvements are not extended to this other level of government.

After all, regional districts have contained within their membership the incorporated areas. There seems to be somewhat of a double standard that is being applied to the two levels of local governments. Particularly when we get into the less urban, more rural area, where the importance of the unincorporated areas improves in significance for providing local government, that question becomes even more important.

It would be my interpretation that there does not seem to be a commitment by the minister to move on regional districts having the Community Charter extended to them within the time frame of this particular document.

My question to the minister is: does she have a projected period of time for regional districts to have this improved document extended to also cover them?

Hon. I. Chong: At the time of the introduction of the Community Charter, which was in 2004, it was agreed that a municipal focus was appropriate. It was also understood that regional district legislative provisions were extensively reviewed with the adoption of the Local Government Act in 2000 and with various amendments throughout, up to the year 2003.

That was the agreement. The ministry and UBCM at that time also made further comments that perhaps it would be appropriate to work to strengthen regional districts' effectiveness and without necessarily the introduction of more legislation.

I do acknowledge that as recently as last fall this matter arose again regarding legislative changes as opposed to non-legislative changes. I have, of course, since asked the UBCM executive and, specifically, a number of members on the executive who have now undertaken the task to look at specific areas they feel are of particular concern to regional districts. Maybe they can be dealt with very quickly and in a non-legislative way, as opposed to having a complete rewrite of the Local Government Act, which can take much longer and therefore not provide some of the more specific remedies that regional districts are looking for.

So at this time during the process, I am awaiting the report or recommendations of the subcommittee through the UBCM executive. Once I have that and see that, then I will know what next steps are necessary.

I just want to let the member know…. He's looking for specific time lines. Right now I can't give him those specific time lines or what actions will be taken, because I am waiting to hear back from the UBCM executive's subcommittee on regional districts.

C. Wyse: To resolve issues by having agreements, I can understand that. However, I also do understand the concern that regional districts themselves, as an entity, would have with not having agreements incorporated in legislation. There's quite a long list of legislation that had been passed here in this House over the last several years that, in actual fact, has removed authorities that had originally been granted to local levels of government, and they have concentrated upon regional districts primarily. So I do understand where their angst is, and I do understand where it's coming from.

However, I do wish to move on to another item. The questions have come up from Bill 11 — the supportive housing issue around zoning. When discussions took place on that particular item in the legislation, it ended up being left with some ambiguities, according to the answers that were received through questions upon which level of government would actually be responsible for the zoning of land that was designated for supportive housing. The answers that were received during the discussion…. After many attempts to clarify in the legislation, the ambiguity remained. Upon which level of government here in Victoria would the zoning take place? Or would the zoning still remain the responsibility of the local level of government?

My question to the minister: which level of government, in actual fact, will be designating the zoning

classification for the supportive housing designation underneath the land classification?

C. Wyse: I do appreciate that clarification from the minister. I will ensure that, where the inquiries on the ambiguity have come from, that that is the response that we have upon this item. I very much respect the response from the minister.

So leaving that particular item and moving on to another topic. This topic involves treaty discussions and the interaction in the discussions of the effect that treaties — particularly upon the urban areas, urban treaties — have upon local governments.

When we were discussing the treaties here in the House, which on behalf of both sides of the House we were pleased to support and see move forward…. In the debate around those items, it did raise the question on the involvement of local governments with commitments that do end up being made at the table for these two groups that are now created, living side by each. The effect of the local level of government upon such items as assessments; lands to move into for development; possible joint uses of facilities, water and sewer and so on…. Items of that nature did not appear necessarily to have been provided with all of the oversight that could have been done.

C. Wyse: Yeah, thank you. I'm trying to keep all my thoughts right and still keep the actual designations. That's my weakness, and thanks for bearing with me, Minister.

Hon. I. Chong: Firstly, I should make it clear, in case he is not aware, that local governments specifically are not at the treaty tables. But local governments are consulted, can be consulted through the treaty advisory committees. I think he's aware — they call them TACs — that a number of them are established so that the views of local governments can be considered. Sometimes they're even called RTACs, regional treaty advisory committees.

Our ministry, though, does work very closely and actively with the treaty negotiation team to ensure that any issues that are also raised with us directly from a local government we can advance through to the treaty negotiation team, because those local governments don't have a voice at the treaty tables.

We do have staff in our ministry who do this — I wouldn't say on a regular basis — when matters of concern are raised with us at the local government level. We have that way, that opportunity, to provide that input.

So we did play a key role in the Tsawwassen and the Maa-nulth treaties. There were a number of areas, I think, of concerns that arose or considerations and views that wanted to be heard, so our ministry staff would have provided that through to the treaty negotiation team.

C. Wyse: My questions were meant specifically here to see what Community Services does around the item and what role and function it plays. We are well aware that these issues that do come up with local government have to be directed through other channels, and it seemed to me that this was the appropriate area to be asking the minister about.

If I heard the minister correctly, her response suggested that local government had to advise Community Services that they had these concerns for them to be brought forward. So I'm asking for clarification on that part of her response.

Hon. I. Chong: I thank him for seeking that clarification. If I left him with that impression, I do want to correct that. It's not that local governments could only have their views or considerations aired by coming to local government. That is one way that local government may wish to have some of their views heard. They can, as well, deal through the treaty advisory committees if they wish to or raise them in other ways.

The local government–first nations relations program that exists is one that has been, I think, quite useful. It supports the B.C. treaty process, and this program allows for what we call community-to-community forums to take place around the province. This ministry has provided about $70,000 through UBCM, which then administers that program. It has been, I believe, very useful and very successful, and a number of local governments have attended these forums.

It is about bringing local government and first nations elected officials together to discuss issues which then can lead to a greater understanding when it comes time to discuss treaty-related issues. There is the opportunity at these community-to-community forums to begin to put out some areas of interest, concerns, which then can become that much more advanced by seeking input through the treaty advisory committees or, as well, through our ministry.

I do believe that there are a number of avenues that local governments can take. We are not the sole source, but as the Ministry of Community Services, when we are also made aware — not necessarily from local government — of items that may require input from our ministry as the ministry responsible for local governments, we certainly can discuss that and bring that forward with the treaty negotiation team.

Again, our local governments can initiate some discussion, and we can also — staff has developed quite a knowledge in this area — remind the treaty negotiation teams of areas of concern in general that local governments may have. Of course, to support the community-to-community forum is also a good way to

C. Wyse: Not to denigrate the significance and the function of the community-to-community aspect, the question that I'm focusing on is the actual resolution of issues at the treaty table.

At that point, the minister has indicated that her ministry does play a function here and, if I'm allowed a humble opinion, a very important critical function, whether staff, in increasing the possibility for the better movement ahead of these communities here in the future…. How well known is it throughout local government that Community Services and the staff here fulfil this particular role during treaty negotiations? And if it is not well known, what intention does the minister have to ensure that this possibility is more widely known amongst local governments?

Hon. I. Chong: Perhaps the best way to provide clarification for the member is, with respect, to say that I do believe that local governments do know about the opportunities to avail themselves of assistance through our ministry or through the treaty advisory committees to ensure that their views or concerns are heard.

We are living in a time where our relationship with first nations is stronger than ever before. Local governments have been involved and brought together in particular because of recent treaties. Legislation has been brought forward, so I do believe that local governments know there is a process that they can access and a variety of avenues that they are able to seek when they want their views or concerns heard.

If the member is aware of any particular local government that feels it was not made aware of that, certainly, we would like to know about it. If he believes that there is a way we can improve upon raising awareness, we're always interested in that.

I certainly can say that at UBCM there's that opportunity. The Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation attends UBCM and has had, I believe, a number of workshops over the last number of years, because of our new relationship, to inform local governments how they can be involved, how they can participate and be a part of some rather significant history-making legislation.

I am aware that staff currently are working directly with the Powell River Sliammon First Nation and the Fraser Valley regional district and on the In-SHUCK-ch and the Yale negotiations that are going on.

So I do believe that there is widespread knowledge, but if the member feels that that's not the case, I'd be willing to hear what we can do to improve upon that, because there are always ways we can improve how we raise awareness when it comes to dealing with our relationships with the first nations.

C. Wyse: When the treaties were debated and I was asking questions in the House on legislation around these particular questions dealing with consultation on the use of services and the effect and review upon the local governments that were involved, there didn't seem to be an awful lot of information that was readily coming forward during the discussion and the debate around those items.

The questions that I was asking in order to try and provide some improvement in the overall process came from local governments in concerns and copies of correspondence that I had received with regards to issues with local government and the Tsawwassen treaty.

I believe I've raised the point with the minister. It is she who has the staff and has the ability to make the determination whether we might add some more improvement overall to this system by making sure that there is a better understanding, a more informed understanding, amongst all the local levels of government that are involved at the treaty table that this is another door that is open to them. It would be my opinion that this possibly creates another opportunity for us to have our province move forward more harmoniously and in step with what is going on.

Having brought that forward, I would like to move on. Again, when you talk with many people that have been involved in local government, they find consistently that there are more demands that are made upon that level of government than they're able to afford, and because they are so close to the electorate at large, they are easily accessible on quite a variety of different items. As the minister referred to earlier in her answers to my colleague from up the Fraser Valley area, the province often passes enabling legislation, and they leave it up to the local government to determine whether they want to go down that route.

That part having been discussed, the source of revenue that is available to local government for dealing with the items that they are mandated to deal with is relatively narrow. That doesn't mean they don't suffer the additional pressures that are brought to their table as a result of what the senior levels of government may not have addressed under their watch, whether it be housing issues, addiction issues, mental health issues, and items of that nature. But because they are so close to the people and because the results of those inactions are felt directly in those communities, those pressures are brought directly to bear on them.

Primarily, their source of revenue to deal with things is taxation on property and, to some extent, fees. So that source of revenue is relatively narrow. With recent other provincial legislation, such as transit, which also is looking at the use of property tax for a provincial item — and that is only one of several — the pressure upon local government to be able to fund the services they are dealing with is increasing tremendously because of results that have been made here at this level of government over the last few years.

My initial question is: what plans does Community Services have to secure long-term financial capability of local government to provide services mandated by the provincial legislation for that level of government?

Hon. I. Chong: Before I answer this question, I didn't want to leave his comments as we concluded the discussion regarding the first nations and local governments and treaty negotiations without ensuring that he is aware…. For those who are following Hansard, the issues he raised were as to the local governments being involved in the specifics of two pieces of legislation that were brought in last fall in regards to the Tsawwassen and Maa-nulth final agreements treaty legislation.

Local governments were, in fact, involved in that process. Their views and concerns were brought forward, and they were heard. The issue that they had was that they didn't receive the consideration in full of what they wanted. That may be their concern, but I did not want to leave it that they were excluded in entirety from that treaty process.

Their concerns were in fact heard, and their concerns were brought forward, specifically with those two treaties which ended up becoming legislation. As I indicated, the other two that we are actively and currently working with…. If those were to become final agreements, we could again state that local governments have been involved.

With regards to revenues to local governments, I will state at the very outset that I know local governments certainly have a bottomless wish list for more and more dollars to do more and more things. I believe that since 2001 we as a government have provided more and more resources for local governments to continue to provide necessary services and programs to their communities. Since 2001 this ministry alone — and that doesn't include other ministries, which I know there have been — has committed more than $860 million in additional direct grants to local governments.

I know that these grants have been used to improve air quality and water quality. They have also been used, in some cases, to reduce energy consumption, which is good, because then there are long-term savings and advantage to those local governments. There have been grants to improve safety for citizens and accessibility for older residents and to encourage British Columbians to become more active.

We have also worked with the federal government in particular, resulting in, I think, a unique and significant arrangement with UBCM, where well over $2 billion is being returned and is available for communities to enhance their public transit and infrastructure. Those dollars are able to go directly to UBCM for them to administer without provincial government intervention at all in those dollars.

I can say quite proudly that we are the only province that has such a unique arrangement, and other municipal organizations and other provinces are asking their provincial governments to mirror their arrangements like ours. So I know that there has been work done, specifically since I've been minister. Prior to that, my colleagues engaged local governments to ensure that we can take a look at how we can provide more dollars for more services being provided.

I know the member is aware of the traffic fine revenue-sharing agreement. That one in particular is, I think, one of the most successful, where we're returning 100 percent of traffic fine revenue to our local governments, which at one time was stable at $10 million a year and which is now close to $60 million a year as a result of increased revenues there.

The fact that the small community and regional district grants…. We committed to a doubling of that in 2005, so by 2009 that will be doubled. Again, there are certainly more opportunities for that.

More recently the member will be aware of a number of new grants, new programs, that were provided to local governments, and that's through our green cities, our green communities programs. Our LocalMotion program is a $40 million program over four years.

Our Towns for Tomorrow, a $21 million program over three years — that one is specifically for towns of populations of 5,000 and under. That one, as well, in particular, has a cost-sharing of 20-80, whereby the provincial government provides the 80 percent share, and these are for projects up to $500,000.

Our Spirit Squares program, a two-year program valued at $20 million, and of course, our Green City Awards — which is a direct cash amount that can go to various communities, depending on their category of population — will see $2.5 million over five years.

These are all new programs. These are ones that we're very proud of. I know that as a result of the wonderful and productive relationship we have with UBCM, we'll continue to seek ways and programs that are looking at specific areas that we can address and address together to make our communities vibrant and healthy places to live.

C. Wyse: The minister has rolled out a number of programs with dollars that are attached to them. Many of those programs are a discretionary type of program that a local government can make application to. At the same time that she's rolling out that list, she also didn't roll out the other legislation that passed on additional expenses to local government at the same time.

The cost of policing, for example, has now been rolled out at the same time that the traffic fines came along. The smaller municipalities, with the unincorporated areas, got additional expenses at the same time that the additional revenues came along. So that's really part of the point of raising the broader question.

See, there are a number of issues that are like municipal pocketbook issues that have the same effect upon you and me, the effect upon our ability to be able to afford things. So when we have increases…. For example, provincial sales tax — local government has to deal with that increased cost. Fuel tax increases are also paid by the local government. MSP premium increases are paid for the municipal staff. Property taxes have been capped on major ports in some industries — again, decisions that are made here.

ICBC and B.C. Hydro rate hikes have to be paid by municipal governments. Courthouse costs have resulted in a direct loss of revenue, as well as increasing

Those are a few examples of how decisions that are made at other levels of government affect the ability for local government to be able to afford providing the basic needs that are contained within the community.

The second point that comes to mind — and it comes back to the treaty discussions…. One of the aspects in the discussion and debate was that there didn't seem to be any consideration extended to the local governments for any financial expenses that they may be subject to, to accommodate the new levels of government. It's an area that possibly needs to be looked at, so that with the new levels of government, local government and the new neighbour with the new empowerment are not having to bang heads in trying to come up with the funding capabilities to work out mutual agreements between them.

That flows out of another example here — the need for the review of the base funding to be put on a steady basis for local government. The question remains: what plans contained here within this document are there for the establishment of assured, basic funding on an ongoing basis for providing the basic needs for local government?

Before I actually turn the question over to the minister, the minister later would be advising me that her programs in water and sewer are always oversubscribed. Basic funding in those areas has the limitation in the amount of funds that are available. That, to me, increases the importance of what is contained in this document over the period of time that exists for establishing solid, secure, ongoing funding for local government to provide for their basic municipal needs, other than the property tax and fees.

Hon. I. Chong: I guess if we want to spend an hour or an hour and a half discussing our differences of opinion on how funding, additional dollars, are going to local government, we can do that. But I think it's important to note that there are a variety of dollars that flow directly through to local governments for which there are no grant requirements.

The small community program and regional district program — a doubling of that since we announced in 2005 for that to be achieved by 2009. There is no grant application that occurs for that.

The traffic fine revenue-sharing — no grant application for that. That just occurs as a result of the traffic fine revenues that are tabulated, received, and then the calculation is made based on the policing costs around the province.

What I perceive the member's concerns about that particular revenue-sharing program, which I believe is a good one, pertain to is some of those rural communities and the populations of under 5,000. The member has been in municipal government for a number of years, as I have, and we are both aware of that. That was an area that had been discussed at several UBCMs. It was always known that at some point, at some time, those policing costs would be a cost to both smaller populations.

It has been discussed at a number of UBCMs and a number of area association meetings. People knew that was coming. What I can say, though, is that by returning the traffic fine revenue-sharing, we've been able to enable those communities to transition towards those costs. But in general, a number of the larger municipalities that pay for their own policing have certainly benefited.

The member is suggesting that the traffic fine revenue-sharing program is not sufficient or is not well liked. That's interesting, because I can certainly take that back to UBCM and ask whether we should roll back the clock and go back to the $10 million per year that was allocated, because I don't think that's what is particularly acceptable.

If the member doesn't agree that the small community and regional district grant, the doubling of that, is what the municipalities want, I'd certainly like to hear that, because that's not what I have heard. In particular, the small community and regional district grants are unconditional. We are not dictating where or how those dollars are spent. Those are certainly available.

I do believe that local governments in British Columbia are in good shape. They have low taxes; their citizens have low taxes. That's a corporate policy we made as a province — to reduce income taxes so that their citizens have more dollars to spend. We are at low debt levels, and as a result, lower interest rates are required.

We can certainly take the time here to debate what our philosophical beliefs are, but I don't know if that's going to be particularly productive. I do want to say that I know local governments have received, from this ministry alone, more than $860 million since 2001, and that is a record amount. We will continue to work with local governments to take a look at opportunities where we can help them build vibrant, green, healthy communities. That is certainly an objective we have, and I would hope they would share that.

One last initiative that I think is worthy of note is the resort municipality initiative, whereby hotel room tax now is available for up to 13 of our municipalities that are considered resort-based. Again, it's not a grant process but an initiative that allows those dollars to flow through as a result of a formula.

These are successful programs. I would like them to continue, and I hope the member supports them.

C. Wyse: My recollection of the discussion was not support for the existing programs, but the question was around whether there was going to be an expansion for something that gave security. To me, that isn't debating philosophy. That was simply trying to determine whether there was any plan contained in the document here to be investigating and putting that into place.

Having said that and moving on, in looking at this issue of the restructuring of local government, I have a series of questions around the restructuring of local government. To start off with a broader one, if I may, how is it determined when it is time to restructure a local government?

C. Wyse: What happens in the case where they haven't asked and they are told that they're restructuring, such as what happened with the Comox-Strathcona regional district?

Hon. I. Chong: In the case of the Comox-Strathcona regional district, I can tell you that they in fact have been asked to restructure. However, there has not been agreement, and therein lies the problem. There have certainly been requests over a number of years.

In fact, I had been advised that there have been struggles and disagreements over some 20 years as to how to move forward. It was becoming a problem in allowing the regional district to take a look at things like the regional growth strategy, in terms of moving forward in dealing with the issues of high growth that were occurring in the area.

With several requests, but not having agreements from one group or another as to what to proceed on, it was a determination I made that it would be best to have the regional district separated into two so that they can focus on those areas that are most pertinent to their geographic area.

I am pleased to say that the regional districts that are currently in place now, while there are still certainly some growing pains, are actually working quite well and quite productively. I am pleased that they are making progress. We have a facilitator who they can still utilize, if they need to.

The fact that there are two regional districts that also have received a substantial amount of money to ensure that they are able to move forward — more money than they would have had if they remained as one district — is also noteworthy.

I just want to assure the member that when we look at restructuring, it is as a result of concerns that are raised at the local government level.

C. Wyse: Minister, I believe that yesterday you had indicated that you were also agreeable to receiving a number of questions in writing, if time restrained itself. There are some other questions that I would appreciate asking you, and I will get them to you in writing. But at this moment in time I'm joined by a couple of my colleagues who have questions also that they would like to pursue with you.

I'm taking your nod as agreement that I will forward those on to you. You and your staff have all been very, very cooperative in providing me with the answers, and I thank you for that. With that I would like to turn it over to my colleague.

M. Karagianis: I wrote a letter on April 9 with regard to issues occurring in my community of Colwood around septic systems. I'm assuming from the nod there that the minister is aware of this.

There is a growing concern in my community around the new regulations that the provincial government is requiring the CRD to implement around septic systems. I know that there are a couple of issues around this. One is the financial burden to some of the homeowners there, and the second is the non-discriminatory nature of the levy.

Some of the residents have maintained their septic systems. They are very diligent about pumping them out and maintaining them. Others may not be as diligent about doing that. Certainly, in some cases those residents are being denied access to the municipal sewer treatment system, so they find themselves between a bit of a rock and a hard place. They don't have any choices.

I just wonder if the minister can address this in some way and if she has had a chance to read my letter and, perhaps, has a response ready for that.

Hon. I. Chong: I want to let the member know that I'm not able to give her the final conclusion or answer to this particular problem, because it has been some time and it's ongoing. What I can say is that our ministry is concerned, in terms of the provincial interest and from a public health concern, about making sure that the septic systems are safe and reliable and do not create a public health hazard.

What we are currently doing is working with the city of Colwood and providing them with some assistance, and working with the CRD as well. I guess that the best way to describe it without…. I'm not saying we're facilitating the actual work, but we're providing mediation in a sense, as I say, with Colwood and the CRD with regards to a number of these property owners and, of course, developers.

That's going to take some time because these are not easy negotiations, for lack of a better description. But our staff have been involved and will continue to work with that. If we are able to speed that up in any way, we certainly will.

If the member has suggestions on how that might be done, I would welcome that, because I know that it is an important issue. I am concerned, too, along with her and those residents. If there's a way that we can make this process be resolved that much sooner, I would welcome any suggestions she has.

M. Karagianis: I appreciate the remarks of the minister. Perhaps we can find a time outside of this estimates process to meet and discuss this, because it is an ongoing concern.

I know it doesn't affect most of the other communities here, but it certainly does for those of us that have the transition of communities that are not all on sewer systems at this point. I'd be happy to sit down with the minister and meet and talk about this.

I guess my only other question would be: is there some opportunity for residents who have questions or concerns to directly approach the minister? Is there a

way for them to at least make their particular concerns known as well, especially if they don't feel that they're getting adequate response through the CRD, or something? I'd like to be able to say to them that here is an opportunity for them to connect with the minister or staff, or something of that nature.

Hon. I. Chong: Yes, absolutely. I think that if the member, in meeting with the residents in the area, advises them that they're always welcome to write to us…. Or if they care to write to the member and then she wants to provide me with those letters, we can certainly deal with them, especially if they are letters of a similar nature. We know how those can stack up after a while, and then present them to us.

We do receive letters directly from citizens from time to time. When we receive ones that have a common thread in them, we definitely realize there's a problem. Staff are quite diligent about looking into it right away when we have a concern that pops up over a period of a number of weeks.

Absolutely, over the next while, after estimates are concluded, we will see how we can arrange a time and take a look at this issue. I do, with respect, know that it is an ongoing problem, certainly even before she was elected. It would be nice to provide some assurance that the matter is not forgotten and that there are people who are concerned and looking at this.

M. Karagianis: There are a couple of other issues here, but I'll work in collaboration with my colleague here from Victoria-Hillside.

R. Fleming: I wanted to ask the minister a couple of questions this afternoon about the capital region sewage treatment plant and some of the role that her ministry is playing in working with the municipalities and the regional government to move towards sewage treatment in the region.

I wanted to ask her, maybe to start, some questions that were contextualized in a letter by her colleague the Minister of Environment from December 14, 2007, about five or six months ago. I want to quote from a section of the letter that says, and this is the minister's voice:

Clearly, the expectations of what Partnerships B.C.'s role in this sewage treatment plant will be are outlined in the minister's letter. With that, I wanted to ask the minister if she could maybe begin by telling me exactly what kind of advice Partnerships B.C. is providing to this project.

Hon. I. Chong: Based on the UBCM announcement, the ministry engaged Partnerships B.C. in February of 2007 to assist in the review of the CRD wastewater treatment plan and project. The Partnerships B.C. activities that we anticipate through to March 31, 2009, some of which have started and are ongoing, will include the following: business case analysis, modelling for P3 decision, governance structure analysis, financing structuring analysis, risk analysis, procurement brokerage functions and the integrated resource management preliminary study advisory services.

These are the activities that Partnerships B.C., as I say, has been involved in, is involved in or will be involved in through to March 31, 2009.

R. Fleming: I wanted to ask the minister how much Partnerships B.C. is being paid for its advice and who is paying Partnerships B.C. for this advice.

Hon. I. Chong: As at March 31 this ministry has incurred the following expenses for services: for the fiscal year '06-07, a total of $21,387; and for the current fiscal year just ended, 2007-2008, a total of $141,425; so a two-year aggregate of $162,812.

R. Fleming: There was a second part of the question, which was about who is paying Partnerships B.C.

Hon. I. Chong: I thought I had said at the beginning that our ministry has paid for those services.

R. Fleming: Was the work that Partnerships B.C. has been compensated for competitively tendered?

Hon. I. Chong: The member may recall that the announcement that was made at UBCM regarding projects of $20 million or over that the provincial government would be contributing towards would require Partnerships B.C. to be the agency or the organization which would take a look at a P3 model.

R. Fleming: I think that answers it — that it's an automatic entitlement rather than a competitive tendering process.

One of the deliverables the minister mentioned a moment ago was the preparation of a business case by Partnerships B.C. I wanted to ask her if Partnerships B.C. has actually involved itself in preparing the business case. If so, who is compensating Partnerships B.C. for preparing this business case? Also, if she could add into her answer whether there is a role here that the Premier's office is playing in reviewing the business case once it's produced.

Hon. I. Chong: The CRD is responsible for preparing the business case. What Partnerships B.C. will do is analyze that business case. The Premier's office has no involvement in that.

R. Fleming: I wonder if the minister could tell me, on one of the other deliverables for Partnerships B.C. around the public sector comparator…. Again, is Partnerships B.C. involved in producing the public sector

comparator? If so, who is compensating Partnerships B.C. for providing that? And if she could describe in any way the involvement of Partnerships B.C. in the direct production of the public sector comparator.

Hon. I. Chong: Firstly, the CRD business case needs to be concluded. That has not yet been done. Once that is done, Partnerships B.C. then will be doing that work, as the member indicated. The Ministry of Community Services will be paying for that work.

R. Fleming: Okay, so the CRD is paying for the business case and the ministry is paying for the public sector comparator. Have I got that right? Seeing the minister nod, more or less….

I wanted to ask: as part of the analysis or oversight, what have you, that Partnerships B.C. is providing, who is generating an analysis of comparative life-cycle costs and financial obligations that would be attached to the wastewater treatment plant? If she could describe who might be participating in that modelling and whether, again, it's Partnerships B.C. that's participating.

Hon. I. Chong: I know the member is aware that this is a CRD project, so therefore, the CRD is planning the project and will be building the project. Partnerships B.C.'s involvement and activities in relation to this are to take a look at the procurement options, which is one of the reasons why the Premier had indicated that, for projects for which the province will contribute $20 million or over, we want to have Partnerships B.C. involved to take a look at that procurement.

The life-cycle cost, of course, would be part of the planning and building of this project, and that would be what CRD would be responsible for looking at. So I hope that's clear. At this point, as I say, my understanding is that CRD has not gotten that far along. I think they're still taking a look at a number of options.

R. Fleming: I think that the minister is probably aware by now, because she's made some comments recently on the public record, that one of the difficulties the CRD is having in meeting a deadline of June 30 that the Minister of Environment set for submitting the business case is that they don't have information that is in the hands of the minister but has not been released to the CRD.

Before I get to some questions about that, I wanted to ask her again to try and understand this relationship where Partnerships B.C. is inserted into directing and overseeing the shaping of this project, and the CRD is left paying for it and having roles that don't exactly complement or at least don't have the destiny of the project in their own hands. I want to ask her if there's a role that she can describe that the Ministry of Finance has in the project.

Where local government capital projects are involved, the partnering provincial ministry is considered the client of Partnerships B.C. and is responsible for paying the advisory services and costs — our ministry, in this particular project. The partnering ministry is also responsible for administering related Treasury Board submissions with review and feedback provided by Partnerships B.C. The local government proponent may utilize their own resources to create their project business case, with input provided as warranted by the partnering ministry and with Partnerships B.C. That is what is now occurring with the project here in the CRD.

R. Fleming: The minister earlier, I think, suggested that the Premier's office isn't playing a role in this project at all, but I want to ask her again, in light of a number of freedom-of-information requests that a variety of parties have submitted to attain information related to this project. The refusal to receive that information has been…. Some of the answers that those parties have been getting back are that it is privileged cabinet information. To me, that may signify that the Premier's office, in fact, has a role in reviewing the wastewater project.

So I want to ask her again, on the record, if the Premier's office has any role in this project in Victoria for our wastewater treatment plant.

Hon. I. Chong: I'm not trying to be presumptuous on the member's line of questioning or where his next questions may be going, but I would suspect that what he is alluding to is what has been in the media of late, and that is in regards to the integrated resource management study.

I will say it now and say for the record that the integrated resource management study is not a CRD study. The integrated resource management study is a study that we commissioned, our government commissioned, which is for use provincewide, which many municipalities will look at as we go forward in dealing with integrated resource management.

What was included in that study — and it felt appropriate — was to be able to use the CRD as a test case or as an illustration, because they were looking at their new sewage treatment plan. So it made sense, when we commissioned this study, that the CRD participate in that — which they willingly did. It was either that or they'd have to commission their own study to take a look at the area of resource recovery.

First and foremost the study was completed as a provincial study, but it does, as I say, illustrate how the CRD might consider integrated resource management. If that's what the member is alluding to, perhaps that provides the clarification he needs.

On April 10, I wrote to the minister with regard to this integrated resource management report. Because there's so little known at this point about what is con-

In particular, I'd like to address that because it's vital, in my community of Esquimalt, around the debate that the community is having on the location of a treatment plant. It's become very public knowledge that the community does not approve of Macaulay being used for a larger treatment plant and has petitioned the CRD to include a significant and serious look at McLaughlin Point, where the current tank farms are, as an potential option for an alternative site.

In addition, I am sure the minister will have read in the newspaper today that other parts of my constituency — including Colwood, in partnership with Langford — are now speculating about taking on their own sewage treatment outside of the CRD process. As my colleague from Victoria-Hillside outlined here, you know…. I think the deadline of June 30 looming for a decision from the CRD is very closely tied to whatever parts of that report would be valuable in making the business case.

The minister has outlined that we can't look at a comparative analysis until we get a business case. CRD is in the process of going through the exercise of creating a business case. Controversy out in the community is growing around site location, around costs. I think that the issue of resource management and recovery here is a pretty key part of the decision-making process, of the business plan.

Again, I would ask the minister why the report can't be released in time for that consideration to be part of the business discussion that the CRD is having and perhaps give communities like Esquimalt some comfort around some alternatives for smaller plants, for resource recovery that would offset costs and perhaps mitigate this discussion going on that Colwood and Langford will go on their own and not even be part of the CRD process.

It's getting to be a pretty tangled web out there, and it would seem to me that the release of this report could help to at least reduce some of the chaos.

Can the minister explain why she is unable to release the report or the portions of the report that would help create this business case for the CRD?

Hon. I. Chong: As I indicated, the CRD have participated in this study all along and right from the very beginning have been involved. We certainly appreciate that. It made sense that, while they were looking at their project, they be included as an illustration of how integrated resource management may or may not occur.

But I want to be clear. This is not a CRD study. This is not a blueprint for the CRD sewage treatment plant. However, because the CRD participated in this study from the very beginning, the CRD have had all the information made available to them. The CRD staff have the entire report, and the CRD have been made aware of all of the comments that have been made on this.

The CRD staff have been using all the information that they require — which is contained within the report — to prepare whatever report they were going to provide to their committee all along. As I indicated, I was very surprised last week when I heard there was a sudden stop to the work that occurred, because in no way would this report — whether it's released to the public or not — be impeding the work they're currently doing. They were working on that right along, and as I say, the CRD staff were aware.

I will say this. When the report was completed, the CRD staff met, along with others who are on a steering committee that have been involved in this report. They all agreed on how this report, this study, should be released. This included the CRD staff, in particular the chief administrative officer. They agreed that the next steps would be that the provincial government as well…. There are comments from a technical advisory committee, there are comments from peer reviewers, and they agreed as well that the provincial government should provide their comments.

So when the report is released — because we intend to do that — it would be released with full and complete information, not partial information. They agreed and set a time line of the end of May, early June. Certainly, I would like it sooner as well, but this is the time line they set and that they agreed to.

So, you know, I don't know what is occurring. The kinds of comments that are out there in the media…. But for the record, I want to be clear. I did not set that time line. The steering committee, made up of representatives and CRD staff and others, decided that would be how this study should be handled.

In addition, the mayor of Esquimalt was just recently in Sweden. I understand that the objective there was to have a look at integrated resource management as well and to come back with information to perhaps provide to the staff to complement the work that they were already undertaking. So I have requested, in speaking with the chair of the CRD, that they continue to do their work and would like her to direct their staff to continue to do the work to provide it to the committee. I still am at a loss as to why they feel that this report, by not having it in the public domain at this time, in any way impedes their work.

Again, I feel that we need to commit to the time schedule that was laid out, and we will commit to that time schedule as was provided to us when this report was completed.

M. Karagianis: Well, it's a bit of a mystery here, then. Certainly, we have the chair of the CRD very publicly stating: "We don't have the report. We can't make a decision without the report." We've had the minister saying: "You have the report." I'd like to know: where is the disconnect? Because communities at this point are very concerned.

We have a $1.2 billion price tag hanging over our head, which may or may not be correct. It may not be, in fact, the cost here. There may be resource-recovery offset on this that I think could be a very compelling part of the decision-making process. Where does the

answer lie? Meanwhile, the debate is going on and on, and frankly, it's taking us backward in time.

We now have proponents out there saying: "We don't need sewage treatment." The longer we get mired down in this mystery here about who's responsible for releasing this information or where it's got to…. We are moving backwards in time rather than forward to something that's a bit more technologically advanced, that's a bit more cost-effective and that allows our communities to get on with the planning.

I would hope that the minister is trying to figure out where the mystery is. Where's the disconnect? Why do we have local elected officials saying one thing, the minister saying the other? Where's the problem? Where's the disconnect in this?

Hon. I. Chong: Well, if there was an absolute answer as to where the disconnect is, certainly I would provide it. But as I indicated, it was quite a shock to me what occurred last week. I can't presume what kind of activities are going on at the CRD. It is a board made up of 23 representatives — 13 municipalities — and how they each receive information and how they each process information that they receive is certainly up to them.

What I have said, and I will confirm, is that the CRD has this report. Perhaps I should say the CRD staff do. If they do not feel that they can share that with their board members — understandably, because the agreement that the steering committee, which includes the CRD representative, made was that it would not be publicly released until such time as the internal review, which our government was also making on this study, in addition to the other comments that have been received, would be released as a package…. That was what was agreed upon.

We were given a time line of end of May, early June. We were working towards our time line. At the same time, the CRD staff felt they had enough information, because they had the report, that they were able to develop their report or their case to provide to their committee.

So I am at a loss, but I have also made it known, and have said so to the chair of the CRD, that if they would like a briefing, staff is able to provide that. I was contacted the very next day — that they would like that. We thought we would have that briefing this week. Now I'm advised that it will not be until, I believe, next week that they can make time to receive the briefing.

Again, I've asked our staff to continue with the work based on the time line. As I say, end of May, early June was the timeline they set. I've always said that anytime we can have things done sooner and quicker, all the better. Again, information contained within that study is in the hands of the CRD staff. My understanding is that they have been using it to prepare their report. Why they suddenly felt stopped is a complete mystery. I would agree with the member.

R. Fleming: I think what's interesting in the minister's answer that she just gave now is that she basically admitted that the ball is in her court. She has the report. She can release it publicly. She's described the structure of the steering committee for the resource-recovery report. She's described an agreement that people have signed on, which is basically that CRD staff have signed a non-disclosure agreement so they can't release this information to elected officials. That's what she's told this committee this afternoon.

You know, she's changing her story all the time. She has said — two weeks ago, when she was questioned as to when this report might be released into public hands — that she wouldn't release the information in August. She said she would take the balance of the summer and maybe release it in August or the early fall. Then she said last week on CFAX that the study report contains sensitive information which is not ready for the eyes of local decision-makers.

The local decision-makers that represent the local taxpayers and that are responsible for managing the risk and procuring and ultimately paying for this system are not allowed to inform those taxpayers of all of the information that will go into building that wastewater plant. So this is the situation. Furthermore, the absurdity of it is that the other minister who is part of this package is the Minister of Environment, who has said: "By June 30 you must comply and submit a business plan."

So the information cannot even go to local decision-makers yet. She's offered a briefing, which I presume is a slideshow of sorts that will release limited amounts of information that won't talk about the financial implications of the report or whatever sensitive information. I don't understand why the report can't be released. I'll ask the minister again. This is a peer-reviewed report. What more reviewing needs to be done by her ministry? The people who are on the board of this resource-recovery report group have reviewed it. I mean, that's why it's a completed study.

So will she commit to releasing that report to locally elected decision-makers and not disingenuously hiding behind the fact that CRD staff have participated in the production of the report but are bound by a non-disclosure agreement and can't share it with their own elected officials?

Hon. I. Chong: Well, the member opposite can try as he might to twist my words around. I know that's what he likes to do, but I've been very clear on this matter. This is a provincial report. This is not a CRD report, nor is it a blueprint for the CRD sewage treatment plan.

The CRD have participated in this report from the very beginning because they felt that it would be useful to gain some information for them to prepare their report, which they would otherwise have to do anyway to get before the Minister of Environment. There is no need for the work to be halted on this — the work that the CRD needs to do to put in place a report for the Minister of Environment.

All along we have said that we would make this public. All along we have said that there is a time line

that was set, and I have made this clear. The staff from the CRD have been involved in the steering committee, have been involved since the very beginning and agreed that there was a requirement to ensure that due diligence was available and that full and complete information would be made available with the report when the report was released. If it is completed sooner, then certainly it will be, but the time line they set and agreed to was for the end of May, early June.

So I am, again, asking that the CRD staff continue to do their work. They were preparing their report right up until last Wednesday, and they can continue to prepare whatever information they need to put before their committee.

If the member would like to be helpful here, he should speak to his colleagues on the CRD and ask that they request the CRD staff continue to do their work, because they were doing, I think, an enormous amount of work. They were making progress. Now suddenly they have been asked to stop doing their work.

It is unfortunate, and I would hope that everyone can move on quickly on this, because we do want to see the business case, and we do want to see what the next steps are. The most important issue here is, as well, that a decision has been made for Victoria that there will be sewage treatment that will take place. There has been a commitment by this government that we will fund one-third of the best, lowest-cost solution. We want to have the most cost-effective, the most environmentally sustainable option possible. So again, it's important that this work continue and that the CRD meet their deadline of June 30.

R. Fleming: I think it's unfortunate that the minister hasn't taken the opportunity to stop messing about, quite frankly, and keeping this report from people who deserve to see it. If you're going to treat local government like a partner, you should let the elected officials see the report that they have participated in, that they have a vested interest in and that they can't produce a proper business case to submit to her colleague the Minister of Environment without the benefit of seeing.

I think she is trying to confuse people here today, because she has the proprietary power to release that report — today, if she wanted. Let the public see it. Let the elected officials see it and, through them, the taxpayers see it. She won't do it. I think what's really going on here with this end of May business is that she's trying to compress the time line so tight that those directors will not be able to do their due diligence before they have to submit a comprehensive business case to the Minister of Environment on June 30.

By dragging it out right to the end and not letting people consume and digest and see this report, that's exactly what she's doing. This would be a tragic missed opportunity if the CRD had to submit a business case that did not have the benefit of resource-recovery technology and analysis to build a state-of-the-art facility.

Now we have a greenhouse gas reduction act that has come into effect. Section 2 of Bill 31 mandates that greenhouse gases from waste management facilities be managed in accordance with the regulations of that act. We also have Bill 27, which has been debated, the Local Government (Green Communities) Statutes Amendment Act, that requires that OCPs now target greenhouse gas emissions.

I mean the whole point of this resource-recovery report is to take solid waste and turn it into green energy and to reduce the carbon footprints of these communities. The minister is creating a disconnect between the release of that information to those local decision-makers, to then produce the business case that is required of the Minister of Environment.

I will ask her again. Will she, instead of hiding…? She has the power to release the information in that report. Will she today commit to the CRD residents who pay the taxes, who are footing the bill for this project, that they can see that information?

Hon. I. Chong: What utter nonsense and diatribe from the member for Victoria-Hillside. He knows that this is not a CRD report. If he doesn't know it…. I've said it four times today. This is a provincial study that will affect municipalities right across the province. The fact that the CRD staff have had this report, have been working with information in this report and using this information in this report obviously means that they feel that there is value there and they've had the benefit of using information there.

The staff have the report to put together their analyses so they can present to their committee. For some reason, they've been stopped. So they can't even do the work. They never asked to be stopped. I can tell you that the staff did not ask to stop doing work on this. The staff were continuing their work.

Hon. I. Chong: The staff are preparing this for the benefit of their committee members, but the staff were suddenly stopped because someone made a decision that had to occur. But the staff never once came to us and said: "Well, we can't do our work." Never once did the staff say that.

Hon. I. Chong: Is the member making an unparliamentary comment now? Because if he is, hon. Chair, I would ask him to withdraw it.

Again, we hear from the member because he wants certain things happening, and it doesn't fit within his schedule. Well, that's just too bad. This is an agreement that the steering committee had indicated that they felt was important for the due diligence to occur on this report. It is a technical report.

If he doesn't value the work of professional staff, that's too bad, because I certainly do. My professional staff are working on this. There have been others who have worked on this. That's perhaps why the steering committee agreed that it needed to…

The Chair: Member for Victoria-Hillside, would you please allow the floor to the speaker.

Hon. I. Chong: …have the work available and agreed that that work is valuable work and that when the report is released publicly, which I said we fully intend to do, it is released with all the information, complete information.

Now, he might not think that's important, but I think others will think that is important, and they will see the value of that when it is reported.

I look forward to the successful completion of the work of our staff and for them to do their due diligence. They are professional, and they will continue to meet that time line. If it can be done sooner, that's always an objective of this ministry. Certainly, this was agreed upon, and I will support my staff on their work that needs to be done.

B. Simpson: I would like to canvass two areas. They are directly related to the ministry's service plan, goal 2, "British Columbians live in resilient, sustainable communities," and specifically, objective 2.1 on climate change and 2.5 on the socioeconomic issues in communities — just so that the minister knows where we're going for the next few minutes.

With respect to climate change, I'm wondering if the minister could inform us what communities get, what direct benefits or abilities they get to move forward on climate change when they sign the charter — which is the stated performance measure for this objective.

Hon. I. Chong: With regards to the climate action charter, I'm pleased to inform all that at the time of the charter being signed in 2007, we had 63 communities come forward, and we're now at 115. So I'm really pleased to see more and more communities coming forward.

The objective of the climate action charter was really to allow communities to take a step towards climate change. We have said as a government that we want to be carbon-neutral by 2010, and this was an opportunity for local governments to express whether they wished to also move their communities, their local governments to be carbon-neutral by 2012.

It's their choice. That's perhaps why we are at 115 communities, as opposed to 188. I don't know if everyone will be signing on. It would be great if they would be, but it certainly is a choice whether they choose or choose not to be carbon-neutral by 2012.

What we're able to do is look at tools to help them get there. Some of those tools are in our Bill 27, which will enable communities to look at barriers that they feel might have hindered their ability to become carbon-neutral.

We also are able to look at some financial ways to help communities look at becoming carbon-neutral, and those are through some of the grant programs that we have in place. Our LocalMotion grant regarding helping communities connect pathways or walkways that may allow people to commute on these walkways, pathways without the use of cars — that could certainly be one way.

Towns for Tomorrow, again, is a program, especially for the smaller communities, that would allow them to look at a program that would help them reduce their carbon footprint. The small community grants, as well, which are unconditional grants to some of our communities…. The increase in that will allow them to look at initiatives as well.

Most significantly, perhaps, is the gas tax agreement that we signed, and then we have an extension of it. In particular, local governments can use those dollars to deal with reducing their carbon footprint to help them become carbon-neutral by 2012.

B. Simpson: My question was quite explicit. What do they get for signing on? If I read between the lines with the minister, a whole bunch of initiatives that were underway…. It meant that most of them were underway before the government got involved in climate change and before we got climate change bills, etc. Those communities got access to those resources and funding, independent of whether they signed the charter or not.

Is it now going to become: "Sign the charter, or you get excluded from all of these other opportunities that are available to you"? Is there going to be a penalty to communities who do not sign on?

Hon. I. Chong: I know the member is aware that as with other grant programs, communities are always competing for these dollars, and that competition will continue. I think communities know that it is challenging, but they are willing to step up to ensure that the projects they have in mind will be better focused on a number of programs and initiatives that will help reduce their carbon footprint.

I think it's fair to say that what local governments will need to do when they put forward their applications now is be clear about how they can reduce their carbon footprint and reduce greenhouse gas emissions — in particular, in the LocalMotion program. I think the competition is out there for those dollars and for those projects that clearly show that this will help those local governments become carbon-neutral by 2012. I think we'll see the benefits of that.

B. Simpson: Is the minister, therefore, saying that part of the qualification criteria for these sources of funding — or the way that they're scrutinized — is going to be whether or not they've signed the charter?

Hon. I. Chong: The access to the programs is not contingent on the signing of the climate action charter. However, I think it's fair to say that when we introduce these programs…. We have always said we would take a look and evaluate them as we continue.

We have certainly said that it's important to focus on items such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It's also looking at things like physical activity and having age-friendly communities. We've made this clear. I've made this clear to a number of communities as I've spoken to them.

As I say, the fact that there is competition for dollars will certainly see applications come in, I think, that are now going to be much more focused on some of these areas that will make their communities more livable, greener and healthier as well as reducing their carbon footprint.

B. Simpson: One of the things I find odd, and the reason I'm asking the questions, is that as a performance measure, this is quite weak relative to what the intent is. If everybody just signs up…. The performance measure, for the edification of the minister, is the percentage of British Columbians living in communities that have signed the charter, yet the goal is to get local governments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and take other climate change actions.

I think a better measure is whether or not they've actually done something — because they can sign the charter and not do anything — or maybe the government's own ability to enable them to do something. So let me ask a couple of specific questions about whether or not they're going to be enabled to do anything.

Has the ministry done any cost calculations of the so-called carbon tax on local governments? How much is the carbon tax, year over year, going to add in incremental costs to local governments?

Hon. I. Chong: The fact that a local government has signed on to the climate action charter, I believe, is a commitment they're making that they will do their part to find ways to reduce their carbon footprint and, in so doing, reduce the amount of carbon tax they may have to pay because they are changing their ways or looking at ways to change how much carbon they use. The fact that they are committed towards doing that, I think, is certainly commendable.

As a government, we have said we are going to be carbon-neutral by 2012. We're challenging our public sector. We're challenging those agencies of ours that we have an ability to impact, to say that we're all in it together. We all want to move towards being carbon-neutral, so there is an opportunity to find ways to change how we do things to reduce our carbon footprint.

Municipalities are, in the same way, able to find ways to do that. They're also able to look at programs that may exist in our ministry or in other ministries that will allow them to do that. Again, the fact that there are some municipalities already moving towards that…. They are changing and retrofitting even some of their buildings to provide less use of energy and GHG emissions and will be used as examples that other local governments can consider.

The fact that so many local governments have joined with us in our commitment to climate change is commendable. The fact that more will be signing on, I think, is an important measure for our government.

Let me ask the question again but give it a bit more context. Local governments will have to absorb fuel tax costs escalating over the next three years. It's not revenue-neutral for them by any measure whatsoever. Supposedly, according to the government's math, individual British Columbians get income tax relief, small businesses get tax relief and corporations get corporate tax relief. There's no tax relief, unless it's hidden somewhere, specifically for local governments, so they absorb that cost.

They're going to absorb the cost of carbon-neutral by 2012. They're going to absorb the cost of adaptation strategies that they have to undertake, and the ministry recognizes that. My question to the minister is: has any work been done by the ministry to get a sense of what this whole move towards carbon-neutral and carbon-pricing is actually going to cost local governments — a few samples?

If you look at the budget, there are all kinds of calculations of what the costs are going to be for individuals and for couples and all sorts of things. Has the ministry done any work on the downloading costs to local government against what some of these bits and pieces of programs are going to do, including the gas tax rebate from the federal government?

That's my specific question. Has the work been done to understand this from a local government level — what the costs are and whether or not the programs under this objective are sufficient to offset those costs?

Hon. I. Chong: I cannot provide the member with specific examples because every municipality is different and is so unique. Some municipalities are actually looking to become carbon-neutral prior to 2012.

Again, it would depend on municipalities that have…. Some have hybrid vehicles, and some don't. Some will use them to drive greater distances than others, and some will be in traffic that causes them to idle that much more. The fact is that we are going to ask municipalities to provide us with their greenhouse gas reduction targets, to be able to tell us where they're at. Then we will be able to have a base to see exactly how they're going to move towards reducing their greenhouse gases and to reduce the amount of carbon tax that they will pay.

It is about reducing their carbon footprint. It is about becoming carbon-neutral. They've signed on to the agreement, which indicates to me that they're willing to do this. It means that they're looking at changing attitudes and looking at ways of how to do this. Certainly, as a government and as a ministry, we will work with them. If we find, in one area of the province, some initiatives that will particularly work well or that the life cycle of a particular asset or a building saves dollars, we certainly will want to share that with other municipalities.

At present I don't have a case to present to the member. I know he would like examples, but it's because our municipalities are so different and so unique. I don't think it would be fair to present that to them, thinking that this was the baseline upon which they can all be compared to, because some municipalities have moved further than others on becoming carbon-neutral.

B. Simpson: As far as I know, every family and household in British Columbia is unique and different as well. Yet the Finance Ministry managed to go through and figure out what the implications were and give some examples. That's all we're asking for. Has the work been done? The answer is no. The work hasn't been done. The implications of this on local government are not understood. Fair enough. That's where it's at.

Let's get to the resources side, because that's really what the issue is. Local governments are wondering where the resources are that are going to come with this. So you've got…. In this objective, there is all kinds of language around adequate targeted funding, legislation, regulatory framework, etc.

There's one bullet that says: "Provide local governments implementing climate change initiatives with tools, best practices material and advice." I'm aware of a number of local governments that have struck climate change action teams. Some of them are combining it with peak oil or sustainability action teams. One of the biggest struggles they have is getting source funding to actually do that work and to get resources that they need to undertake a sustainability plan or a climate change plan for their community that looks at all of the things that the minister is saying in her service plan need to be done.

Is there a source of funding that communities can apply to, to get resources to do that planning work? It's a very specific question because it's a specific need that communities have that are moving in this direction. Is there some place that these communities can go to, to get assistance at the planning and strategizing level to do the work necessary?

Hon. I. Chong: Certainly, we have within our ministry infrastructure planning grants that are made available. They may be able to use that to do some of their planning on how to bring about some initiatives that will reduce their greenhouse gases as they do their planning.

There are what we call smart planning grants that are available through the gas tax program. For example, I think Kamloops did receive $605,500 for an integrated community sustainability plan. Fort St. John received sustainable neighbourhood initiative dollars, and they received $135,000. So there are opportunities there.

I think what is important is to ensure that our local governments are aware that there are some steps they want to move towards, to do smart planning, to take a look at even their infrastructure, and that they can look at these grants that will allow them to do this. But if they're using the grants in the same way and same fashion they do, they may not find it as beneficial as they can in terms of reducing their carbon footprint.

B. Simpson: Just a quick question to the minister on that. Does that require money contributed by the local government as well? Is it a shared arrangement, or is it fully underwritten through this smart planning fund?

Hon. I. Chong: No, there's not a matching requirement through the gas tax planning grant. As well as our infrastructure planning grant, it is a direct grant that needs to be applied for.

B. Simpson: Just because of time, I do have to move on. But it does strike me that that's the piece that's missing in my work as I've gone around, not only in my own riding but in other locations on the forestry file. That is the piece that's missing — the resources for communities to struggle with this, to figure out how to achieve not just the government's carbon-neutral goal, but how to really deal with the adaptation and mitigation strategies they need to undertake and then roll that into the overall sustainability agenda.

I'll take a look at that. I appreciate the minister's reference to that, but I think that the ministry also needs to look at how we fast-track that process so we can all do that work together.

A couple of quick questions just on objective 2.5, which is the socioeconomic issues. As the minister will recall, we canvassed this at great length last year with respect to the number of communities that are being impacted on forestry. I'm wondering if the minister could tell me what is happening, because there's a new term in here — socioeconomic resilience. Are there actual teams on the ground just now in specific communities working on this socioeconomic resilience, the new buzzword that's in the service plan?

Hon. I. Chong: For the benefit of the member, I want to be clear about the fact that…. If he's looking to find out if we actually have a team of people, a staff of five or seven that run into a community when there is an issue, I will say emphatically right now that we do not. That would be difficult to do, because every community is different. What we have done and continue to do is provide assistance through our transition pro-

In the past 12 months there have been seven communities who have asked for assistance. For the record, I will name those: Mackenzie, Fort St. James, Fort Nelson, Lytton, Okanagan Falls, Port Alberni and Grand Forks. We do have one staff person who is familiar with this, so when we get the call from that municipality, we right away do respond and advise or find out what it is that they need and provide the dollars that they are requesting to look at how they're going to revitalize their community or help sustain their community.

These communities in particular, though, are ones that have been affected by the forest industry. I was just checking to find out if we had any other requests from any other municipality that is not in a forest-affected community, but these seven, obviously, the member will know.

So we have been working with communities affected by the downturn in the forest industry. The member will know that the Minister of Forests and Range is the lead on this and has the round table on forestry and is responding to a number of the issues that have been raised. I would expect that at the end of his meetings he will have some suggestions and solutions on how we might be able to move forward.

Our ministry becomes involved with the community following a request that we receive, usually from an administrator or elected official. Then we assess that and see how we are able to provide assistance in that way. We will work with staff persons in other ministries and across government to ensure that we are all aware of concerns.

So while we may be providing some financial dollars to help build a plan on how to move forward, if they have concerns such as their local community hall or their local public health office, we will work with another ministry staff person in another ministry to make sure that they're aware that these need to be maintained in the town to keep the town viable and sustainable so that they can be resilient once they recover from some of the downturns.

B. Simpson: I'm getting the shepherd's hook here. So I'll just ask one quick question.

It's very frustrating, as someone who lives in a resource-dependent community and as someone who's got the responsibility of being the Forests critic, to go around to all of these communities and see what's happening. I know there's great frustration out in those communities, because it seems like everybody's pointing to everybody else to take the lead or do the work on what needs to be done.

I would make the same pitch to the minister that I made to the Minister of Economic Development. Right now where I live we have the beetle action coalitions. They're doing their work. We have the Northern Trust. It's doing its thing. We have western diversification. It's doing its thing. We have this new labour money that's coming in. It's doing its thing. The minister has bits and pieces of community transition that are going on. The local governments have some work being done at the local government level.

It is a nightmare out there, and everybody's tripping over everybody, but nobody can seem to get resources on the ground to where they count. We have a dilemma just now between western diversification and Northern Trust where neither one will commit, but they both need each other's money in order for the money to actually flow to the projects that need to be done, and none of those projects are related to what the beetle action coalitions are doing on the ground for what needs to be done.

We need some agency or ministry to step in. What I asked the Minister of Economic Development to do…. He indicated he might look at it, but I would make the pitch to the minister as well. Bring these groups together in the same room and see if we can figure out how to rationalize all of these processes so that we are not wasting a whole whack of taxpayers' money chasing smoke-and-mirror exercises and not getting the resources on the ground that we need to get on the ground.

Somebody needs to take the lead role to bring the parties together to figure it out so that we can actually help these communities out. I guess it's my plea to the minister that, as she sits at the cabinet table and talks to her colleagues, somebody needs to take charge of actually making that happen. It could be done within the next month if there's a will to do it.

J. Horgan: Well done. It's a pleasure once again to be engaging with the Minister of Community Services on issues of importance in my community.

I'd like to start with a simple one, and that would be an update on the status of the Metchosin–East Sooke phase 2 restructuring study. The minister will be in receipt of correspondence from the chief administrative officer of Metchosin seeking an extension. Could the minister confirm that that extension has been granted?

Hon. I. Chong: To the member: it sounds like he has a bit of a cold. I hope it's not hay fever or anything too serious, but I wish him a speedy recovery, having gone through that a couple of weeks ago myself.

I do appreciate the member's question, and I want to let him know that I did sign off on the letter yesterday. I indicated that the grant that they had requested is still available. However, we wanted to hold off until the new year so that, after the civic elections that take place this November, we'll ensure that the new council will reaffirm the commitment from Metchosin council and the electoral area director that this continues.

The dollars are still on the table. They have not been removed, but given that there is going to be an election, it's important that we know, going forward, that this is absolutely what everybody is committed to.

Hon. I. Chong: There were two amounts allotted. There was $30,000 provided for the Metchosin–East Sooke restructure study phase 2 and another $25,000 that has been committed, and that is for the Metchosin–East Sooke restructure study public consultation and vote processes. So $55,000, as I say, is still on the table.

J. Horgan: It's good to see that the money is still available, and I appreciate the logic the minister has just put forward that we'll have a new council and…. Well, we'll have a re-elected council and an electoral area rep, and we can deal with it again at that time.

I will say before we move on, though, that when we first engaged on this issue, my appeal on behalf of my community was for resources to do a governance study. Staff attended meetings in Otter Point to deal with the entire unincorporated areas within the confines of my constituency, which included Jordan River, Otter Point, Shirley, Port Renfrew and Malahat.

Somewhere along the line, a decision was made to focus those minimal resources on the amalgamation study in East Sooke and Metchosin, which certainly I'm not opposed to. But we started off on a different track, and we ended up where we're at. As a result, we had three years of, in essence, no progress. That's disappointing, certainly for those who voted overwhelmingly in 2005 in referenda to seek a new way of governance on the west coast of the Island. To have three years passed and no progress made is disappointing for them, and I pass that on to the minister for her consideration.

The next issue I'd like to talk about is the Mill Bay incorporation committee, which the minister will know is also within my constituency. This area is characterized as electoral area A within the Cowichan Valley regional district. The incorporation committee is a collection of volunteers, APC members and parks board members within the area of Mill Bay.

They came together and formed an incorporation committee. They've been corresponding with the minister in the hopes that this grass-roots movement would have some guidance and support from the ministry. In response to that, they received a copy of the 2003 municipal incorporation document and the guide for grass-roots organizations.

I think the concern now is that, although this started as a grass-roots movement for the incorporation of Mill Bay, it has now taken on a new life, including area A, area B and area C — which in real language is Cobble Hill and Shawnigan Lake — all within the confines of the Cowichan Valley regional district.

The minister will know that that particular regional district…. I think there are 15 electoral area reps, so you have this grass-roots body that started an incorporation process, which has now been sucked into the vortex known as the Cowichan Valley regional district, and it's looking at three areas — A, B and C — as part of a shared services process, which is not what this grass-roots organization was hoping to see. So I'm wondering….

There has been correspondence. They have requested a meeting with the minister or senior staff, and I'm wondering if the minister could update us on how we went from, again, a grass-roots group coming to government, looking for new ways to organize their affairs, and getting caught up in a bureaucratic process that will inevitably have no end.

Hon. I. Chong: I just wanted to, for clarification, respond to a comment that he made regarding the request that was made when he was first elected regarding the sort of larger amalgamation or study that was to look at rural governance study for the entire electoral areas that he spoke of earlier. Just so that he's aware, it was the electoral area director who turned down that request, which is why, when it came back a second or third time as to the new studies to look at, we agreed to do that. I had not turned down that request, and if it had gone on we would have continued. That's what happened, so I just wanted the member to be aware that's what occurred.

I appreciate the fact that…. It sounds like he is supporting the grass-roots organization and they should have been allowed to conduct this governance review and governance study at the outset because it was certainly their ideas and their thoughts. But it is a complex matter in that there are a number of electoral areas, and these communities can intertwine in terms of the fact that there are electoral area directors that represent overlapping areas.

Generally, though, when we do approve a restructure study, we approve it as it is requested by an elected body or an elected official. We don't generally receive requests from grass-roots organizations and then immediately act upon that. Although, if there's no opposition to that, we would certainly take a look at that. While it started as a grass-roots organization, once, in his words, it got taken into this vortex — what he calls the regional district — and once it moved to that state, and I received the formal request from the Cowichan Valley regional district chair, then I was obliged to respond and take a look at a governance study in that regard. So I realize that it may be disappointing, but that is the general approach that we take.

J. Horgan: I'll just clarify, then, on the Otter Point, Shirley, Jordan River and Port Renfrew issue, the minister said that it was the electoral area director who said that was not the direction that the community wanted to go in and instead wanted to channel what resources were available to the East Sooke–Metchosin amalgamation. So I'll leave that out there, and you can respond. I see your staff knows where I'm going with that.

I'll get back to Mill Bay because what the minister has just said about what happened in Otter Point and on the Juan de Fuca side of the Island is exactly what's happening in the Cowichan Valley. Citizens, dissatis-

fied with the governance that they're currently living under, are seeking input from the ministry directly — not through their elected representative, but coming to the provincial government for assistance, which is what they've done in this instance and also which is what happened with OPSRRA and the other groups in the Shirley–Otter Point area.

They're coming to the government because the electoral area director may well have had a different view of the world and in the instance that we outlined earlier, the electoral area rep, I would say — I'll put the words out there, you don't have to say them — hijacked that process and went in another direction. That's exactly what's happened to the good people of Mill Bay, who had a plan, wanted to discuss it with government and made overtures to government for meetings and some framework within which they could operate.

Instead of, at a minimum, having a discussion about where they live, they're now caught, not even in a process, but embraced in some broader Cowichan Valley process that includes Shawnigan and Cobble Hill. I don't believe that the people in Cobble Hill want to talk to anybody, based on the people that I've been hanging around with.

What came as a simple overture by Mill Bay, the largest community in south Cowichan, for a discussion about how they could better organize their affairs to deal with the onslaught of development that's coming, whether it be the Bamberton project or numerous other large-scale residential developments in and around electoral area A….

In trying to get that away from the provincial approving officer, which is where it rests now, into some other form of dialogue that would have a better reflection of what the community wanted, what they ended up with is an abyss. They've raised this issue with me. I said I would raise it with you.

They want to work directly with the provincial government. They have no animus towards the electoral area rep. That's not the issue, and I don't believe that's the issue on the west side of the Island either. But these are citizens, large numbers of them, that have a vision, have a plan and have broadly discussed these issues with their neighbours and their community, and they came to government asking for assistance. What they got was a quick slide into the CVRD maw, and they may never recover from that.

Again, would the minister avail her staff to these people as they have requested so that they can put forward a framework in their own community that could then carry on to the electoral area director and on to the CVRD? As it stands now, they have brought this forward, and now they're being removed from the process. That's how they feel, and I'm bringing that concern to you today.

Hon. I. Chong: I just wanted to get some context. My understanding is that there has been a meeting, I think in the last couple of months, with one of our staff members. If the member is saying, "Well, will you meet with these people again?" the short answer is then yes. If the member would like to help facilitate, arrange that meeting, perhaps it would be a good thing for him to be the lead on that. I will ask the member to contact our staff and see what the appropriate time is and how we might facilitate that.

J. Horgan: I thank the minister for that. I'll certainly take her up on that and get something together as quickly as I can.

I'd like to now move to an issue that I know will be a sensitive one for the minister and me. I regret that very much, but I'm compelled again to represent my constituents, and I'll be doing that in the next 15 or 20 minutes.

Is the minister familiar with the regional growth strategy in the capital regional district?

Hon. I. Chong: I am familiar with the regional growth strategy, although perhaps not in detail as to more recent changes, if there have been recent changes to it — not in terms of amendments but the strategy as a whole. I was involved with the regional growth strategy some years ago when I was in the CRD, so I'm familiar with the intent and the direction they were headed in a number of years ago.

J. Horgan: Is the minister aware that as of January 2007, the regional growth strategy contemplated the resource lands on the west coast of Vancouver Island as being just that — resource lands, and not available for residential or commercial development?

Hon. I. Chong: I wanted to check again with staff for clarification about the last time when the regional growth strategy had been amended. I know that the CRD adopted its regional growth strategy bylaw on August 13, 2003. I'm advised that there have not been amendments to that since the date in 2003. The resource lands that he spoke of, identified in the regional growth strategy…. If they were identified as resource lands, there were also, at that time, residential units and sites within some of those lands, as I understand it.

J. Horgan: Well, I'll stop beating around the bush because the bush doesn't have much more time left. I'll just get right to the point, and that is the Western Forest Products lands. I know that the minister would be seized of that question in my constituency.

I'm curious. When the proposal came forward to remove private lands from Western Forest Products TFL 25, bringing some 1,200 hectares of land into potential development, did the minister advise her colleague the Minister of Forests that zoning issues and the absence of any coherent governance structure…?

Again, the minister would be quite aware of that. We touched upon that briefly. And the fact is that OPSRRA — a vibrant ratepayers organization representing people in Shirley, Otter Point and Jordan River

— had been spending about 15 months trying to develop a strategic visioning process so that they could better deal with potential growth in the community.

Did she take the opportunity to advise the Minister of Forests that it was a really bad idea to allow those lands to come onto the real estate market?

Hon. I. Chong: The member will know, and if he's not aware, the decision that was made by the Ministry of Forests and Range did not come to cabinet. It was a decision that the Minister of Forests and Range was able to make.

Generally, what occurs is that the minister is aware that if there are to be rezoning issues taking place, they will be under the purview of local government. So there's no automatic change in use, other than what is available. There will be a requirement, as I say, to apply for any changes, but it did not come forward to cabinet and did not come forward to me directly.

J. Horgan: Was there any consultation with your ministry prior to the lands being deleted?

J. Horgan: The minister is the MLA for the capital regional district. She will have been aware of comments in the local press, certainly — commentary on the various talk shows, whether it be public radio, private radio.

The overwhelming position of the majority of those who have expressed a view on this matter has been opposition to it. The result has been, as the minister will know, zoning bylaws that came to her in February. I'm wondering: prior to those zoning bylaws arriving, did she or her staff ever have any meetings with Western Forest Products about those lands?

I will say that I had met with representatives of Western Forest Products who wanted to understand how the process for the adoption of land use bylaws occurred in general. At the time — I want to be clear — we had not received bylaws for approval or for review. I certainly know, through the media and through comments that were made, that the CRD was going to be preparing bylaws for me to look at and amend.

At the time, when I had received a request, I did entertain that request. It was a very brief meeting, very clear, and only spoke to process of land use bylaws. I just want to let the member know that — very mindful, I think, of where he wishes to ask his questions — but I want to give him the facts so that he's fully aware.

I think the meeting occurred some time in early February. The bylaws came to the ministry's office on February 29. That was the date that we date-stamped them in our office.

J. Horgan: The minister said publicly that after the bylaws arrived in her office, her staff conducted due diligence. Can she describe what that due diligence was? Did that due diligence include meeting again with Western Forest Products?

Hon. I. Chong: When bylaws such as these are received in our office for review, our staff review them from a provincial interest perspective. They ensure that there are no adverse effects on areas like environment and public health. They generally take four to six weeks for staff to do their due diligence and review, and this is the process they follow.

In terms of the question the member asked — whether part of that process was a meeting with Western Forest Products — I assure him that there was no meeting by myself or by staff once the bylaw was received.

J. Horgan: Did the minister or her staff ever meet with Ender Ilkay, either before or after the bylaws were received?

J. Horgan: During the course of conducting due diligence, does staff engage with CRD staff? Does it engage with members of the public? What exactly takes place that takes four to six weeks to approve bylaws that were approved by a public hearing?

Hon. I. Chong: I'm advised that staff do in fact engage with CRD to sometimes seek additional information if that is required. Staff also will receive phone calls, concerns they hear from the public, if the public felt that their concerns had not been heard. We will also receive e-mails from the public.

In this particular case, staff advised me that they received quite a significant number of letters, primarily from the small-parcel homeowners. So they were coming in very continuously for, I believe, a number of weeks. There were, as I say, a number of them received, which is perhaps one of the reasons why staff did contact the CRD for additional information.

J. Horgan: There were four bylaws. Two, I believe, had an effect on the Western Forest Products lands. I also have received correspondence and phone calls from my constituents, concerned that they were captured — the unintended consequences of an action by the CRD. I will be working with those constituents and, potentially, ministry staff to see if we can find some way to resolve some of the unintended consequences, as I say, of the downzoning.

But again, the challenge as I see it, as a member of the Legislature trying to represent my constituents…. The Minister of Forests told me…. I know that I'm taking us down a road that may not necessarily appear to sound relevant, but I know that the minister has the fact pattern fairly clear in her mind. I'm certain of that.

The Minister of Forests took an action without any consultation with the capital regional district — an

entity that is her responsibility — took action without any consultation or dialogue with people in the community. The end result has been individuals, community members, pitted against each other as a result of a provincial policy decision.

The end result of that…. The Minister of Forests said to me in the Legislature that zoning was a municipal responsibility, and he washed his hands of it. The result is that those lands are now in the hands of a provincial public servant, the approving officer within the Ministry of Transportation.

Now we have a phenomenon where we had a dysfunctional governance process on the west coast of Vancouver Island. I raised it with the minister in 2005, '06 and '07. We've had very good relations on this question, trying to move the ball down the path that all of us want to get to. Along the way, the Minister of Forests inadvertently opened Pandora's box in my constituency, and it has now led to people who are neighbours fighting amongst themselves as a result of a provincial policy, and many are looking to this minister for some form of resolution.

I put to the minister: how is it that we can have municipal entities responsible for land use in most situations in British Columbia but not in my community when it comes to these forest lands? Why is it that now, as a result of the delays — perceived delays — that have been qualified by the minister and her staff with respect to due diligence…?

These perceived delays have now led to the land use decisions being taken away from regional government and put back to the provincial government. How do I explain to my constituents that this is a fair and just process?

Hon. I. Chong: I want to confirm that land use zoning is still the responsibility of local government, and they have the ability to do that. While I can appreciate the member's frustration — I guess, to be polite — in regards to this matter, the fact is that the authority the Minister of Forests and Range had in terms of approving the removal of private land from these tree farm licences was certainly his authority. He had the ability to do that.

He was also correct, though, to say that just because of its removal, that did not automatically change the land use. In fact, that land use was still the purview of local government, which is rightfully what…. The CRD then stepped up to make some changes to land use.

It is difficult and, as I say, I appreciate his frustration because in rural and remote resource areas, in particular, there are a number of decision-makers. Each one respects each other's role. Can that be better coordinated? Perhaps, but that has been the way it's existed for a number of years — in particular, in these rural areas.

I do want to say this for the record and, also, for the benefit of the member, because he mentioned a delay or perceived delay. I want to be clear that the staff did their due diligence in the normal and routine practice that they normally take. Given the fact that the member had concerns, maybe he would have asked us to speed it up. But they did receive the bylaws and proceeded in the normal process by which they conduct their work in looking at these bylaws.

They did take about four to five weeks, and as I say, at the time there was a substantial number of letters that the staff was receiving. So there was contact made with the CRD which, again, I advised. Through this process of due diligence, we did contact the CRD.

They indicated that they would be sending a letter to us. We did not know what that letter would be. So, of course, staff waited for that letter to arrive.

I can tell you that when the letter did not arrive within that first week, we contacted them again and asked whether they were going to send the letter that they had said they were going to send — again, not knowing what the content of that letter would be. They did subsequently send a letter to me, which arrived on the 11th of April at 5:05 p.m., as noted on our fax machine. When I came in on Monday morning, I was given that letter that we received, and I immediately signed off on the bylaw.

I can assure the member that there was no delay on our part. He may wish to say that there was a perceived delay, but I want to be clear that I was following the advice of my staff. I was also trying to be complete in the work that I feel responsible in doing. I just want to give him that time frame. It may not ease his frustration, but I just want to let him know that that is the process that was followed and the chain of events that took place.

J. Horgan: Unfortunately, I have to wrap up. I will say that I hold the minister's staff in very high regard, and this comedy of errors that has been brought upon them was certainly not of their making nor of your making. I think that's very important for the record.

But the challenge for all of us when we hear pronouncements, glorious pronouncements, of a new world order where climate change will be our primary focus and then have a developer go to Jordan River and say, "I want to put 10,000 people in this community…." It's the worst kind of urban sprawl.

When the minister is bringing forward bills to try and capture some of these positive initiatives to reduce urban sprawl, to make whole communities where infrastructure exists…. We have a misguided policy by the Minister of Forests — who has put this minister, her staff, myself and numerous other people behind an eight ball without any regard, in my opinion, for how it makes us all look. It's not just the government of the day but myself, other members of this Legislature and the member for Saanich North as well.

We're trying to do good things here. That's why we all came here. And what do we get? We get a stupid idea from one minister that has unintended consequences throughout government. I can't go back and sell any of this to my community. The minister knows that. Her staff knows that. The member for Saanich North knows that. Nonetheless, that's the position I'm put in.

In that process, if I end up having to take shots at bad public policy, regrettably, I will do that. But the challenge we all have, I think…. Every time I get a chance to talk to the minister and her staff about the many, many communities in Malahat–Juan de Fuca…. I don't need to enumerate them; she knows them full well.

How do I go back and say to them that government has a plan, that somehow we're trying to make the regional growth strategy work, when out of the blue, a gift to a corporation…? It's an entity that's not even housed in British Columbia, that's worth hundreds of millions of dollars and will have a profound impact on our region for decades and potentially for generations.

I'm gobsmacked, dumbstruck. For someone who talks a lot, to find myself in a position where I'm virtually speechless is a tragedy — maybe not for the members on the other side but certainly for me and my constituents.

I very, very much regret that I have to have this disappointment with the Ministry of Community Services. It wasn't of their making. They have been brought into this vortex. Had there been consultation at the beginning, perhaps we could have avoided all of this. I am hopeful that if the minister has not taken the opportunity to remind her cabinet colleague of that, she'd do that now, on my behalf if not for herself.

Hon. I. Chong: I'll take the member's comments to be heartfelt. I know he's passionate about this issue. But I do want to say that the decision the Minister of Forests and Range made was one that he was authorized to make. While I can appreciate the frustration the member has, I also want to say that sometimes it is important that we learn from items such as this. If this is one of these areas that we can learn from and do better, then that is something that we can certainly work towards and have better cross-government cooperation.

I didn't want to leave it unspoken, with the member's comments, that the Minister of Forests and Range was not entitled to make this decision. He was. As I say, we can learn, we should learn, and we can always do better. With that, I will certainly work with my colleagues to ensure that we have a better understanding on how we can make this process one that is of benefit to all British Columbians.

D. Thorne: I would like to raise questions today around an issue that was and is still a big issue in Coquitlam. It's around municipal elections — candidates and slates, if you will.

We looked forward to Bill 7. I know that there were a few acknowledgments and changes in that bill that were certainly working toward more accountability and more transparency in municipal elections, and particularly around financial disclosure.

I myself was a city councillor for nine years, and I think that I understand the responsibilities of a councillor very well, particularly around financial disclosure. What I'm seeking today, because I am still getting questions and e-mails and phone calls from people in Coquitlam that don't feel Bill 7 has totally mitigated what happened with….

Hon. Chair, I'm not sure. Am I allowed to name the group, the slate, of which I'm speaking?

D. Thorne: Thank you, no. The slate was called Coquitlam First, and it was in the last municipal election, so it was in 2004. There was a mayoral candidate and a number of council, and I think also school board, candidates on the slate. The story goes that the slate was formed too late to be registered as an official organization, I guess you would call it.

They went along and ran as a slate, did all of their advertising together and got their donations and contributions together, both cash and in-kind. At the end of the day, when it was time to do the financial disclosures that I would have to do or any other city councillor anywhere in the province of British Columbia, they did not have to do that.

I understand that that was not an isolated incident, but I'm only speaking about my own community. I'm not going to talk about any other communities. I don't want to take any more time than is necessary, because I know that there are two or three colleagues that still need to speak this afternoon.

What I need from the minister is for her to tell me specifically — so that it's read into the record, so that everybody in Coquitlam can see — how Bill 7 solved that problem. How the nine, ten, 11 people, whatever the number was, on that slate in that organization would, in the election that's coming up in November…. How would the experience be different for them? Would they have to fill out a form just like I had to fill out running as an independent, to say every penny and where I got it from over whatever the dollar figure is, $50 or whatever it is?

Would they now have to do that exactly like I would have to do as an independent, and if so, what parts of Bill 7 specifically state that that's going to happen? I can't answer the questions in my own community, and I don't know how else to get this out into the general public.

Hon. I. Chong: I want to assure the member that the exchange that I had with the MLA for Port Coquitlam–Burke Mountain, the Opposition House Leader, last year in estimates and, also, in a number of times that he raised during question period that these were definitely areas of concern.

I have to say that I shared a number of those concerns, in addition to other issues that were raised with us as a result of our post-election survey. The purpose of Bill 7 was to deal with a number of issues that were raised in the post-election survey as well as the specific issue that this member is also raising once again.

We will be publishing new voter guides, candidate guides, things of that nature that normally come out

around June in time for the civic elections in November. But perhaps what will help the member is that I can direct the staff to specifically prepare a letter to her outlining the intent of the changes made in Bill 7, which will expressly provide for her some information if she needs to provide it to people who are coming to see her.

We do believe that our new candidate guide, our voters guide, will explain it. Again, Bill 7 was designed to capture exactly what she said, and if that has not been made clear, we will find a way to make it that much clearer.

The Chair: Member, I may just make a remark that these are questions concerning legislation that has already been fully debated. We're talking about the estimates of the ministry.

D. Thorne: I appreciate that information, and I am aware of that. But I'm also aware that I'm continuing…. Nothing has changed in my community. The people who have been…. They have copies of Bill 7, and they don't see that it says specifically that somebody who is in that exact situation, where it is not a registered organization, will have to individually fill out the same form as an independent person running for council.

I don't know. If it is specifically in Bill 7, I would like it read into the record today where it is in Bill 7. I would appreciate a letter. I mean, a letter to me is terrific, and I appreciate it. But I want it read into the record today for everybody in British Columbia to see where it is in Bill 7 — specifically, the sections or the words or the paragraph where it says that that specific person running for council with that organization would have to fill out the same form as I did as an independent candidate. That's all.

I don't need to know…. Nobody needs to read it to me. I just want to know where it is specifically so that it's read into the record, so that I can go back to Coquitlam this afternoon or tomorrow and tell people: "Yes, it's there. It's read into the record. Look it up. Do your homework."

Hon. I. Chong: With the greatest respect, I don't have Bill 7 here with me. We did debate this. What I will commit to doing is sending a letter to the member with that specific information that she has requested. She could have that, so if the questions come to her by her constituents, she can reference the letter we will provide, which will specifically say what is in Bill 7.

What is important, I think, is the fact that when we publish our guides in June and have them available in June or July…. I'm not sure. Again, I don't want to put a deadline on the publication dates. You never know what happens with the paper supply and all. But when those guides are prepared and people pick up their guides to become candidates, perhaps we will have to put a box on, "what is new" — just like the income tax guides; they always have a box at the beginning — so that they all know what is new for this year, what is new for the 2008 civic elections.

If that's something that needs to be done because the member feels in particular that people don't know or aren't paying attention, that's what should take place. When people do pick up their forms, their papers, at the municipal halls and when they decide to run, there is a requirement to have some of that information provided to them through the municipalities.

I think it's a good suggestion that we do have that highlighted and that people are made very much aware of the changes that Bill 7 has brought about.

The Chair: Member, I would once again caution you that the scope of this debate is relative to the estimates.

D. Thorne: This is my last question. I appreciate the new guides, and I hope that the minister is aware that there already are loose-knit organizations or slates that are getting together and forming as we speak.

I'm feeling better. I'm hoping that this letter will reassure all of the people in British Columbia — I mean, I only hear from the ones in my riding — who are worried about this ability to use what they consider a loophole in the act — that all you have to do is officially announce that you have this organization, this slate or whatever, at a point in time when it's too late to register and that you can avoid, then, saying where you got your money.

I look forward to the letter and to the guide. And yes, I think that it would be really helpful for people, because it would stop these groups in their tracks. There would be no point in forming them. They might as well just run as independents if there's no benefit — right?

N. Macdonald: Just one quick question with Jumbo Glacier resort. Any questions, if it's something that is sitting with this minister, if there's anything…. The people of Invermere, as you know, had a referendum on the issue in area F, I think it was, of the regional district of East Kootenay. They rejected it. I think 73 percent said they were not in favour of the resort.

I just want to check. Is it something that's sitting with this ministry? Is it something that you're active on? Or if I have any questions, would I direct them to Tourism, Sport and the Arts? I wonder if you could let me know.

Hon. I. Chong: He would have to direct that to the Minister of Tourism, Sport and the Arts. It's not with us.

M. Farnworth: I have just a couple of questions for the minister on an issue that I've raised in the past. I know my colleague from Coquitlam-Maillardville raised the issue about Coquitlam first.

Mine is around section 32, which I raised a number of times in the estimates. Has the minister, since last

year's estimates, been keeping track of complaints associated with section 32 of the Municipal Act and the powers of local government?

Hon. I. Chong: I will acknowledge that the member has raised those issues on successive years during estimates, and unfortunately, I have to advise him that we have not heard any further on section 32.

M. Farnworth: Specifically, I guess, there's been the ongoing case of the Spraggs family and the city of Coquitlam regarding the construction of the David-Pathan connector that went over their property, with their objections. They are feeling particularly aggrieved about that. I'm wondering: has the ministry ever done any investigation into their complaint, or has the minister ever followed up on their complaint?

Hon. I. Chong: I was checking with staff to see whether we actually received any direct correspondence from the Spraggs, the people indicated. My staff advise me that we have not.

However, we did receive a number of letters from neighbours or friends of the Spraggs, asking the same kinds of questions that the member is. We wrote back to them advising them on the concerns that they expressed and responding to them. Basically, we advised them that municipalities are the responsible bodies for a wide range of critical local services like roads, policing, and things such as that, and that the local governments and the municipalities need to have the reasonable legislative authority to meet certain of their responsibilities. That was the response that we provided to constituents who wrote to us, I think, on behalf of the Spraggs.

We also indicated that municipalities should and need to use care and discretion when using powers granted to them in legislation. I know that may not be comforting, sometimes, when people receive responses of that, but that was the response that we did provide to them. The member asked whether we have done any specific investigation. The answer is no.

M. Farnworth: Well, briefly then, I would suggest that I think it would be a positive thing for the minister to look into this particular case, because I do think it outlines some of the problems that individuals face with local government in terms of section 32.

One of the issues that I think would be worthwhile for the ministry to look at is the ability to have a quasi-judicial process where people can get redress and get a complaint that they've got in place against local government, particularly as it relates to section 32. There are a number of people who do feel that it clearly doesn't work for them. I would ask the minister to look into this particular case, because I do think that it outlines some of the problems that people face with local government under section 32.

Hon. I. Chong: I will commit to the member that I will have staff look into the matter and see, but I do have to caution this. We do receive from time to time, and sometimes more times than others, letters of complaint from citizens about their local governments. I think that the member can appreciate, seeing as he used to be a municipal affairs minister, that we can't go in and tell municipalities what they can or cannot do, because they are an autonomous local government body.

We are mindful when we do hear of complaints. If there is something that we can do or if we can provide some guidance or direction, we do. I know this is a matter of particular concern to this member. We will see whether there is any more we can do, but he well knows the difficulty there is when local governments have their Community Charter. They are legislative bodies and have legislative authority to do a number of things, some of which are in disagreement with their citizens.

D. Routley: I'd like to ask the member some questions regarding the Ladysmith Spirit Square. I wonder if the minister could provide me the funding details of that project.

Hon. I. Chong: I did not bring the details of all the Spirit Squares that have been approved, but I can advise, though, that the Ladysmith Market Square did receive approval for $500,000, which is the maximum amount permitted for a Spirit Square contribution by the provincial government.

D. Routley: It is my understanding that the Ladysmith share of the project funding or commitment is $600,000. Am I correct?

Hon. I. Chong: I don't have that detail with me. Our program is such that we will provide 50 percent of the cost of a Spirit Square, up to a maximum of $500,000, so if a town or municipality wishes to have a very expensive Spirit Square, they can do so. The maximum we can commit is $500,000; otherwise, we wouldn't have enough dollars to go around to as many of these projects that we have applications for.

D. Routley: For the purpose of this discussion, it was my understanding that the share is $600,000, and that was what was announced on the day of the announcement, at the announcement. The minister was there, but I know that it was $500,000 and $600,000.

Hon. I. Chong: I am afraid that I don't have the actual date here with me. I can provide that to the member if he needs the actual date that it was approved.

D. Routley: I would like to find out that information whenever it's available.

Hon. I. Chong: This application, I believe, came directly from the municipality of Ladysmith.

Hon. I. Chong: I'm not aware of the details of how the councillors vote regarding these. I understand, though, that all the applications would have required a motion and approval at their city council meetings to allow them to provide or to complete an application to request a Spirit Square grant.

So I don't know how the voting took place, but I would have to suspect that it would be a majority of council that would have passed a motion which then led to the application being sent in to our office.

D. Routley: Is the minister aware of any such formal motion or letter passed by council and sent on behalf of the whole council?

Hon. I. Chong: I'm not going to say all, but the majority of the applications that had been received did indicate that council approved the application put forward for their particular square. Because, as with many grant programs, it is a budget amount that needs to come out of their dollars, and as the municipality is committing toward those dollars, they would need to formally pass a motion and have it approved by a majority of council.

We can see if we can locate that within the application. If we have that available, we will certainly provide that along with the date that the approval was made for that.

D. Routley: I can let the minister know that I received notice of the announcement about an hour and a half or two hours before it occurred. I'm not impugning the minister or the ministry because I know those things happen. It's a regular occurrence. It probably happens with other governments too. So I wasn't surprised by that.

I went back to my office after the announcement, and about two hours after I got back to my office, one of the councillors of Ladysmith came into the office and asked me when I had found out. I told this person that I had found out only a few hours before the announcement. He shared with me that he had only found out about this a few hours before the announcement.

Hon. I. Chong: I'm cautious not to cast allegations to any specific incident that might have occurred and say that this is something that occurs regularly around. I can say that once we have made an approval, and we have a date to make that announcement…. Of course, because it is a program that administers through our ministry, certainly, I would like to come out and take a look and see where the site is.

So we do contact the municipality, generally the mayor's office. We aren't responsible for the invite list, shall we say, as to who is to be advised. In this particular case, the member will recall that we even had to move the location due to inclement weather that morning. Until I got there, I didn't know where the announcement was going be made — just that I was coming that morning to make the announcement.

I haven't an answer for him as to why that councillor was not made aware. We, as I say, advise the municipality when we are coming into town and just advise that we will be making an announcement. They generally know what the announcements are simply because they know what kind of applications they have applied for. I don't know if it's always such a well-kept secret, but they certainly know. I feel badly that that occurred in his particular case, but that's not generally the case.

D. Routley: I'm glad to hear that's not generally the case, but in this case he also shared with me that he had contacted the other councillors from the town, particularly those who are friendly to the government and are quite clearly friends of the government, and they were equally surprised by the announcement. They didn't know about the announcement either.

Hon. I. Chong: Again, it's difficult to say what occurs in each one of these announcements. I can say that sometimes they just…. From the perspective of when a minister is able to make it out to a particular town, city or village to make an announcement, sometimes it is problematic in scheduling.

We sometimes look at a number of dates that may not work. There have been occasions where we've chosen dates and mayors have not been available, so we'll say: "Well, then we're not sure when the next one is." It is a scheduling problem.

I don't know in this particular case how much notice was provided, but as I say, we work with the municipality — usually the mayor's office or an administrative person — on how we can accommodate the announcement to be made. I would like to believe that they're all handled consistently, but I appreciate as well that there are sometimes conflicting schedules.

D. Routley: As I said before, I was not upset about not being notified. I know those things do happen, and so do the councillors involved. The bigger problem is that none of them knew that an application had been made.

I believe, from what I heard, that this agreement was arrived at without the approval of the local council. Can the minister share with the House whether that has ever occurred before or whether that is regular practice?

Hon. I. Chong: It is a policy of our ministry that all grant applications, especially such as this…. When we

receive them, we receive them with an endorsement from council or a motion of approval from council that this has been decided upon, because it is a commitment from council. Even if the local council does not provide the dollars directly out of their budget and a community association does — and that can happen — the council still shows their support of the project if the dollars are coming, as I say, from a community association. There is a policy in place that we look for that documentation.

As I said to the member, I will commit to finding whatever information we have in our file and providing that to the member so he has some comfort knowing that this was approved in the normal process that we follow in granting these projects.

D. Routley: The commitment, in my understanding, was not from the council because the council members, in fact, didn't know about the commitment that was being made on their behalf. It was a commitment made on their behalf, apparently, without their knowledge.

I think it points to a real problem there in this particular arrangement. I don't know about the other arrangements with other Spirit Squares, what motives direct the government's choice of where those go, but if there is no application formally approved by council, then it seems a little bit unusual.

There's a further problem. The minister is aware that Ladysmith is a well-known former coalmining town. It's built right on the edge of the ocean, midway between Nanaimo and Duncan — very famous for its hills. It's like the streets of San Francisco — very steep. The particular piece of land is, in fact, a little corner off to the side of one of these shelves of land, a terrace in a way, with a baseball diamond. The baseball diamond, of course, has a curved outer perimeter. It's the corners of land outside that perimeter that are being committed for this project.

The additional wrinkle here is that that councillor, Mr. Donald Fyfe-Wilson, was in the process of publicly engaging the residents of that neighbourhood in planning what they would like to do with those particular pieces of land. They had had several community meetings, and they had put forward ideas and were in the process of voting on these ideas, so this councillor was very upset that this could happen.

When he went back to the residents, they said to him: "Well, how could this be happening? You've been working with us in planning the use of that land, and now this decision is dropped. You must have known." He's been placed in a very difficult position with his constituents, as have I, because none of us knew of this arrangement.

Can the minister commit to investigating this issue and reporting back to this member and to my community what occurred?

Hon. I. Chong: I just want to be clear that the ministry approves projects that municipalities apply for. Generally, we receive, as I say…. Because they are municipal applications, we believe everything is in order.

There are times when community organizations provide the money and the municipality is not financially providing their dollars, so what the council will generally do is provide council endorsement. We do look for those things, and that's how we assess them.

Also, we don't decide where those projects should necessarily be. The applicants — the municipalities — know what the criteria are, and we would have expected that they had followed that. In this particular case, I can tell the member that we can go back and look at it. He has raised some concerns, so we can certainly have a look back at it.

Ultimately, if the member believes that this is not a project that should occur there, and he wants to speak to his mayor and council and, essentially, the town and say, "We don't want this," it's possible that municipalities can write us a letter and ask to withdraw their application — if that's what the member is suggesting take place.

I don't know about the next step. We can look at this, but at the end of the day, if this is not what is wanted, municipalities can certainly turn it back.

S. Fraser: Just a couple of questions. I know we can't discuss the bill specifically. Around the carbon tax issue, a number of communities within my constituency — Port Alberni, Qualicum Beach, Tofino, Ucluelet, Bamfield…. There are some costs associated with the carbon tax, of course, and I was just wondering: was there any type of work done by your ministry as far as impact study of what those costs might be on those communities?

Hon. I. Chong: I'll advise the member that a previous member did canvass this issue. I indicated that we did not provide examples as to how the effects would be around municipalities, simply because they are so diverse. They have very different mechanisms and ways in which they use their assets.

It's simply to say that a number of those municipalities — as mentioned, I think — have signed on to the climate action charter, which to me indicates that they are rising to the challenge of reducing their carbon footprint and will work towards being carbon-neutral by 2012. I think they will look at those ways, therefore, to reduce their carbon costs.

Hon. I. Chong: Before I move the motion for the committee, I just want to thank all members who have participated in the estimates debate. I really appreciate the succinctness with which they posed their questions, and we will provide that information back. I also thank

all the staff in our ministry, who have done tremendous work to allow this debate to take place.

The Chair: First, I just want to state that Vote 22 and Vote 23 have been carried.

Hon. I. Chong: Now I move that the committee rise, report resolution and completion of the Ministry of Community Services and ask leave to sit again.

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