2009 Legislative Session: Fifth Session, 38th Parliament
HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

official report of

Debates of the Legislative Assembly

(hansard)

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Afternoon Sitting

Volume 38, Number 10

[ Page 13939 ]

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2009

The House met at 1:34 p.m.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Introductions by Members

Hon. M. de Jong: I'm thrilled. Today in the gallery my brother Rick and his wife Tracy are visiting from West Kelowna. I hope the whole House will make them feel welcome.

G. Gentner: In the gallery today are friends of mine and long-term community activists from Richmond: Jean Sickman, who worked 42 years for the provincial government, and also Golden Handshake John — John Lieffering. John spent 42 years as the doorman at the prestigious Hotel Vancouver, and boy, he must have stories to tell. Can the House please make them welcome.

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Hon. J. McIntyre: Today in the members' gallery we have two special visitors from the United States, with whom I've had the pleasure of working. Mr. Phillip Chicola, who is the consul general at Vancouver, is making his very first official visit to Victoria. He's accompanied by Kathleen Hill, the deputy consul general. I was hoping that the House would give them a very warm welcome.

Hon. I. Chong: Today in the House, as well, are very special guests I'd like to introduce. We have the Hon. Ron Stevens, Deputy Premier and Minister of International and Intergovernmental Relations for the province of Alberta. He is joined by Daryl Hanak, executive director of trade policy, and Mr. Shawn Robbins, director of internal trade. I hope the House will make them all very welcome.

H. Bloy: It's a pleasure to introduce some local business people to the House today. We have Dave Woods, who is an inventor and founder of Woodscan Industries. We have Scott Johnson, the president of Woodscan Industries, and we have David Brooks, who provides technical support and is a longtime friend from grade 3. Would the House please make them welcome.

D. Hayer: It gives me great pleasure to introduce 56 grade 5 students from Pacific Academy, which is one of the best schools in Canada. They are here from my riding of Surrey-Tynehead. Joining them are three teachers — Mrs. Sharon Douglas, Mr. Grant Wirtz and Mrs. Sue U-Ming — as well as 28 volunteers and their parents, who have taken time away from their family and their work to accompany these students. Would the House please make them very welcome.

Statements
(Standing Order 25b)

TERRACE AND HOCKEYVILLE COMPETITION

Mr. Speaker: The member for Skeena and Hockeyville.

R. Austin: I would like to speak of my home community, Terrace, a very resilient community that is surrounded by mountains and is home of the white spirit bear. Despite all that this town has endured in the past decade, it has held its head up high and is making its voice heard during the 2009 Kraft Hockeyville competition.

Terrace is one of the final five towns competing for the coveted title. They started their run in late October 2008 and have since made their way through the story-collecting phase, which saw residents submit a total of 716 hockey stories — the third most in Canada. In the top five vote they saw it garner the second most votes.

This small town in northern British Columbia has shown heart like no other. It has tenaciously showed what it is made of through a sport that is loved by so many across this great province.

They are dedicated. For one event a minus-35-degree cold snap couldn't keep children and parents indoors, as many fled to Lakelse Lake to play pond hockey. It snowed so much that day that for every five minutes of playing time, there were five minutes of ice cleaning to be done. That didn't stop hockey lovers from having a day that they will always remember.

Terrace is the type of place that when it does something, it does it well and does it big. Volunteers built the largest hockey stick in the country to celebrate Hockeyville. This stick was showcased during the Hockeyville-themed Christmas Parade of Lights. Six hundred students came together to support education as children read the stories they submitted to the CBC. This was followed by a Q-and-A segment with CBC's very own Cassie Campbell.

The indomitable Carol Fielding has formed Terrace's Hockeyville committee and galvanized residents, businesses and organizations. Everyone has been giving this competition everything they have, and I commend the town of Terrace for all their efforts.

Northwest B.C. has come close before, but this time we will win and then receive $100,000 for rink upgrades, get to host an NHL preseason game and will be crowned Hockeyville 2009.

I ask for your support and the support of every citizen in getting behind the last remaining British Columbia town. Vote for us as many times as you can between February 28 and March 4, and help make Terrace Hockeyville 2009. Just text 222111.

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Mr. Speaker: Now, I'm sure the member will become more appropriately dressed as soon as we get into the business of the House.

WOODSCAN INDUSTRIES
AND LEGEND POWER

H. Bloy: I rise to inform the House of two great businesses that are working to save the planet and provide energy savings to my constituents and all British Columbians. Woodscan Industries is an industry leader in environmentally friendly signal devices for construction and mining sites.

In the past, disposable air horns used tetrafluoroethene, which has been a leading factor in climate change. Now Dave Woods, the inventor, Scott Johnson and David Brooks at Woodscan have developed a new electronic signal device using nano battery technology to replace the aerosol sounding devices. It will eliminate the use of over 250,000 aerosol canisters, and these products are already being used all over North America and Europe.

In Burnaby we have Legend Power and its president, CEO Gerry Gill, who have a product called an electrical harmonizer which will save electricity, money and the environment. The device adjusts the amount of electricity entering a building to the optimum operating level for each facility. The harmonizer component reduces the amount of electricity used by up to 20 percent. The savings can be used or sold on the electrical grid. It saves money not only on electrical bills but also on maintenance costs, as well as reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The great thing about the electrical harmonizer is that the cost of the device can be recovered within three to four years. Installations are in place across Canada at all Canada Post facilities, as well as schools and hospitals. In fact, Science World started using the harmonizer back in 2001.

In Burnaby ingenuity is home-grown, and there are companies created to make a better planet. I want to thank Woodscan Industries and Legend Power for their contributions to a better planet.

GOVERNMENT SUPPORT
FOR HOSPICE CARE

S. Fraser: Hospice is synonymous with quality end-of-life care. I am proud to have stood with the hospice advocates. We persevered until Ty Watson House in Port Alberni finally got its doors open just over a year ago. Ty Watson has been a huge success, but funds are tight, and fundraising takes much time and effort. I have donated personally, along with many others in the community, but I believe that government must take the lead.

Great news from New Brunswick. On Valentine's Day there was an announcement that the province of New Brunswick will work hand in hand with the hospice society there to deliver quality end-of-life care, and New Brunswick advocates were ecstatic.

One of the quotes from the event struck me as significant. "Government's commitment to this project signals that New Brunswick is a gracious and enlightened place, a place in which compassion has a role in good public policy, alongside cost-effectiveness."

Here at home the federation of Vancouver Island hospices is trying to work with VIHA to establish quality hospice, palliative end-of-life care. They need to be supported. We need leadership here, like we saw in New Brunswick.

This government's own end-of-life framework document affirms the need for hospice to be an integral part of end-of-life care. Yet there is virtually no core funding provided, even though the monetary values to the ministry and to VIHA are huge and the value in compassion and care to the community is priceless.

Let us in this Legislature ensure that we, too, show the leadership and compassion that we have witnessed in New Brunswick. We should be able to hold our heads high and celebrate that we, too, support hospice where the compassion of end-of-life care is made a reality.

Lynn Turner of Ty Watson House in Port Alberni sent congratulations back to her counterpart in Saint John, and Sandy Johnson replied and thanked our advocates in B.C. for "blazing the trail." All we need now on Vancouver Island is government support.

FIRE AT 108 MILE RANCH RESORT

J. Rustad: B.C. is blessed with a plethora of natural beauty that attracts tourists from around the world. Our resorts provide many great experiences and memories to residents and tourists alike.

There's a jewel in the centre of B.C. that many consider to be the most fantastic place to go to relax, to enjoy the outdoors and to enjoy the great service and cuisine. Many people in this House today and many more around the province can tell fond stories of visits to this great location.

Unfortunately, I'm saddened today by the news that a fire at the 108 Mile resort ranch has destroyed the north wing of the resort's motel.

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Emergency crews responded to calls about a fire at 8 a.m. yesterday morning. Fire departments from the 108 Ranch, 100 Mile House and Lac la Hache, along with the RCMP, ambulance and B.C. Hydro, responded to the call. Fortunately, the fire has been contained, and no one was injured.

The 108 Mile resort ranch has contributed immensely to tourism in the north. It's where people from all over British Columbia and the world vacation to enjoy various activities such as golfing and horseback riding and especially the beauty the Cariboo has to offer. That's what makes the resort such a unique destination.
[ Page 13941 ]

I visited the 108 Ranch a couple of times for golfing. I have many good memories, and I'm sure the resort will recover soon from this devastation.

Please join me in thanking the emergency response personnel for helping to save what they could, and also please join me in wishing the resort a speedy reconstruction so that it can continue to be one of the jewels of tourism in B.C.

WOMEN'S MEMORIAL MARCH

J. Kwan: We all know that February 14 is Valentine's Day, but it is an especially important day in the Downtown Eastside neighbourhood. On a clear Saturday morning a few weeks ago, there were four bald eagles flying overhead, and 2,000 people gathered at Main and Hastings for the 18th Annual Women's Memorial March. Women sang and drummed the women's warrior song. It was the largest event the organizers had held to date.

In January 1991 a woman was murdered on Vancouver's Powell Street. Her name is not spoken today out of respect for the wishes of her family. This woman's murder in particular was the catalyst that moved women to action years ago. Out of a sense of hopelessness, an annual march on Valentine's Day was organized to express compassion, community and caring for all women in the Downtown Eastside community. And 18 years later the march continues, with a growing list of names of murdered and missing women in the Downtown Eastside.

The annual march is an effort to ensure that their lives, struggles and stories will not be forgotten as they work towards justice and closure for the family members. The event is organized every year to honour the lives of the missing and murdered women from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside and the highway of tears. The February 14 Women's Memorial March remains an important day every year to come to terms with the trauma of lost lives and unanswered questions.

I join my community to renew the call for a public inquiry into the missing women of the Downtown Eastside and now the highway of tears. Each year we'll continue to march in order to mourn and remember our sisters by listening to their family members, by taking over the streets and through spiritual ceremonies.

Once again, congratulations to Marlene George, the Downtown Eastside Women's Centre, the family members of the missing women and all the others involved in the 18th Annual Women's Memorial March for organizing such an important, memorable and elegant event. On behalf of my colleagues in the B.C. Legislature, thank you.

CHILDREN'S ARTS FESTIVAL
IN rICHMOND

J. Yap: Last Friday I had the honour of attending the first annual Richmond Children's Arts Festival. This event was held at the beautiful Richmond Cultural Centre as part of the Richmond Winter Festival. The organizers scheduled the Children's Art Festival to occur on a pro-D day. As a result, it was very well attended by primary school students.

The Children's Arts Festival was not limited to one aspect of art. Various forms were represented, from drama and hand drumming to music and dancing. Children also had the opportunity to paint and to learn how to spin records with local deejays. Some of the highlights of the event included performances by the Tickle Trunk Players and Vancouver TheatreSports League.

The Richmond Children's Arts Festival could not have happened without the support of the Richmond Cultural Centre and the Richmond Winter Festival. The cultural centre fosters understanding and appreciation of the arts in the community, while the Winter Festival is celebrating its second year in Richmond. The British Columbia Children's Art and Literacy Centre and the city of Richmond presented this children's art festival.

This was a special event that provided an excellent opportunity for school kids to engage in hands-on workshops led by professional performers and artists.

One of the goals of the festival was to promote various art forms as crucial components of school curriculum, not just as secondary subjects. This important event could not have been possible without the dedicated volunteers and the support of the B.C. Children's Art and Literacy Centre.

[1350]

Debbie Tobin, director of the B.C. Children's Art and Literacy Centre, is a longtime Richmond resident and passionate teacher devoted to promoting the arts and literacy. I'd like to congratulate Debbie Tobin and all the volunteers who made the first Richmond Children's Arts Festival a great success.

Oral Questions

BUDGET PROVISIONS
FOR CHILDREN AT RISK

C. James: Last week the B.C. Liberals cut services and budgets for at-risk children. The Representative for Children and Youth called those cuts "reckless with respect to the lives of the most vulnerable children." The government brushed off those concerns. They said there was nothing to worry about.

The opposition has an internal ministry report showing the real cost of the B.C. Liberal neglect. Let me quote from that report: "Overall costs of children-in-care expenditures are increasing at rates beyond inflation and beyond the ministry's capacity to continue to fund within existing budgets."

My question is to the minister. Why does he continue to say everything is fine when his own budget and an
[ Page 13942 ]
internal report show that you are continuing to fail the most vulnerable children in our province?

Hon. T. Christensen: The Ministry of Children and Family Development's budget this year will increase a further $14 million. That builds on an over $400 million increase since the NDP was in government — a 40 percent increase in the ministry's funding to serve vulnerable children.

The task ahead of us is to ensure that each of those dollars is spent in a manner that best meets the needs of vulnerable children across our province.

Mr. Speaker: Leader of the Opposition has a supplemental.

C. James: After eight years of this government failing the most vulnerable children, it's a bit tough to take the minister's assurances today for those children.

The report speaks for itself: "Over the last year and a half, the number of foster parents has declined. Foster care for highly challenged and troubled kids pays the same as homestay programs for foreign students." And the result: "Approximately 16 percent of homes in Vancouver Coastal and 12 percent of homes on Vancouver Island are over capacity." This report has example after example after example of a system in crisis.

My question, once again, is to the minister. Why should British Columbians trust the B.C. Liberals when they have brought forward a budget that cuts support for children at risk?

Hon. T. Christensen: The Leader of the Opposition is wrong. This budget increases funding for the Ministry of Children and Family Development. This budget continues an increase of $30 million to support foster parents over a three-year period so that we can increase the rates and try and attract additional foster parents into the system.

This is a government that will continue to ensure that we're focusing our resources on front-line workers, on those who are interacting with children and families so that we can be confident that we are meeting their needs.

Today in the north, for example, we're close to 100 percent full on our staffing compared to less than 60 percent ten years ago.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition has a further supplemental.

C. James: I'd suggest that the minister go back and take a look at that budget, which actually reduces front-line staff, and explain to people out there how they're going to provide support with less staff — not more staff — in that budget.

In an end-of-year interview the Premier said: "Literally all of what I've tried to do in my public life is about children." Then he turned around and cut support for front-line workers.

[1355]

Children, the government's report says, are in greater need than ever. I quote from that internal report again: "Regional staff agreed that the acuity of need among children in care is both more severe and more concentrated — nine-year-olds needing 24-hour double staffing in residential facilities, 13-year-olds dealing with drug addictions and pregnancy."

My question is to the Premier. Why did he break his promise to the most vulnerable children of British Columbia? Why, once again, has he failed children in B.C.?

Hon. T. Christensen: The budget is going up. Today we're serving twice as many children and youth that are challenged with mental health issues as were served ten years ago. Today we're serving over 5,000 children and the families of children that are dealing with autism compared to less than 500 a decade ago.

This is a government that has consistently added resources, ensuring that we are serving thousands more children than were served across this province when the members opposite and their party were in government in the 1990s.

N. Simons: This isn't just about numbers. It's about boys and girls who for one reason or another can't live with their parents. The Premier promised that there would be no cuts to programs or services for these children — in fact, that they'd be a top priority. This budget shows that they weren't a priority at all. In fact, we're going to end up with fewer social workers, fewer foster parents and fewer programs for families. This leaked document shows that government already knows this.

Will the minister admit that there isn't enough in this budget for children, and will he go back to the Premier and ask him to reverse the cuts?

Hon. T. Christensen: Only the NDP could suggest that a budget that adds millions more dollars to serve children and families across the province is a cut. We are adding resources. We are focusing the spending of those resources on our most vulnerable children and families to ensure that vulnerable children across our province have the care that they require.

Mr. Speaker: The member has a supplemental.

N. Simons: In fact, the minister knows very well that any increases at all won't even cover the cost of labour increases. This report is their report, and they should know better. This report points to a system in crisis, a ministry in chaos, and this minister is fiddling while this is happening under his nose.
[ Page 13943 ]

There's been a 54 percent increase in the use of hotel rooms to look after children who are vulnerable. Foster homes have been decreasing by 8 percent a year for the last three years, and many of them are overcrowded. That's what this report says.

The number of children living outside their parental home is not going down. Their prevention services aren't working. Will the minister, on his way out the door to spend more time with his family, do one thing — one thing? Will he do one thing to help children in this province? They need his help, and they're not getting it now. Will he go to the Premier and say that enough is enough?

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Members.

Hon. T. Christensen: This is a budget that will allow this ministry to continue to increase resources to children and families. We have allocated $47 million — an additional $47 million — over the next three years for supporting families and children in care, including the foster parent rate increase.

It's a budget that allows for an additional $38 million over the next three years to support children with special needs, consistent with what we have been doing to increase the number of children with special needs who are receiving services.

I can assure this member that I will be doing everything I can to ensure that children and families in this province have a bright future by ensuring that those members never form government.

[1400]

M. Karagianis: The minister's own report shows that current funding levels are not keeping up with the need. I'm going to read the opening lines of this report, the very first statement: "Overall costs and costs per case of children-in-care expenditures are increasing at rates beyond inflation and beyond the ministry's capacity to continue to fund within existing budgets. Over the last three years, expenditures for children in care have gone up significantly," it says. The report forecasts an additional 11.2 percent increase in this year alone.

What does the minister do? He signs off on a budget that will cut existing supports, a budget that will make things worse for those children in care. My question to the minister is very simple: what happened to this government's commitment to protect children? Is this his version of how to protect them — cuts to existing programs and services?

Hon. T. Christensen: The member is wrong. This budget allows for $47 million in additional dollars to support families and children in care. In fact the ministry's budget plan expressly recognizes that there are cost pressures to support children in care, and that's why we're adding $47 million over the next three years.

Mr. Speaker: The member has a supplemental.

M. Karagianis: This sham budget that the government continues to try and shove down our throats here is a failure. This report confirms it, as do the cuts that are apparent in this budget. This government has failed over and over again to learn from the mistakes of the past, and it is continuing neglect of these children.

They are going exactly against what they said was their priority. In fact, what it has taken is a leaked document for us to see the real facts here, and this is information that the public deserves to know. Yet this government has continued to hide this information from us.

Will the government please stop playing fast and loose with the children in care in this province, and when will they start living up to their promises to protect the children in their care?

Hon. T. Christensen: Each and every day in the province of British Columbia thousands of front-line social workers do exactly that. They protect vulnerable children and families across the province. That's why this government has added 300 front-line positions over the last few years. That's why this government continues to recruit, to fill vacancies of our front-line social workers so that we can be confident that we have the people on the ground to ensure that we are serving British Columbia's most vulnerable children.

ACCESS TO MINISTRY REPORT BY
REPRESENTATIVE FOR
CHILDREN AND YOUTH

A. Dix: During the minister's little statement, which was so well applauded by his colleagues, he forgot to mention that this House voted unanimously a couple of years ago to reinstate an independent children's representative in British Columbia.

This report that we've been talking about today, Child in Care Cost Driver Analysis, which details chaos in the ministry, details inadequate services — which is the kind of information the minister gets but that the people of British Columbia have hidden from them. It's the kind of information, surely, the child representative should have.

I want to ask the minister whether this report, which details specifically the chaos in his ministry, was shared with the Representative for Children and Youth.

[1405]

Hon. T. Christensen: I don't know what the members opposite don't get about the budget. The budget is increasing resources to the Ministry of Children and
[ Page 13944 ]
Family Development. The ministry reviews a host of documentation and projections. We consult with our regions around the pressures….

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Member, just take your seat for a second.

Continue, Minister.

Hon. T. Christensen: We consult with regions about the pressures within the regions in serving children and families. That is why our budget will allow for an additional $47 million to be spent over the next three years to support families and children in care. That is responsive government to the challenges at hand.

Mr. Speaker: Member has a supplemental.

A. Dix: This House created an independent child representative after the Premier broke his word and got rid of the last independent children's commissioner.

For that office to work, they have to have access to information. The question is very simple. The minister has access to this document. It details the chaos in his ministry and the consequence of that chaos for children in British Columbia.

My question to the minister is very simple. Did he cover it up or not? Did he share it or not? Was the Representative for Children and Youth given access to this document, which details the chaos in his ministry?

Hon. T. Christensen: If the opposition has a document that they believe the representative should review, then they should provide it to the representative to review it.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Members.

Continue, Minister.

Hon. T. Christensen: There is a range of documents and projections that are prepared for the ministry and that the ministry reviews when we're preparing our budget submissions. This budget reflects an increase to the Ministry of Children and Family Development.

It allows for additional spending for children in care and for children and youth with special needs over the next three years. That will help to ensure that this government is meeting the needs of those vulnerable children across our province — 40 percent more spending today than there was when we became government, thousands more children being served than there were ten years….

I'm happy to put this government's record of increasing services up against the government when that member was in the back rooms ten years ago.

M. Farnworth: The minister's cavalier answer to the question of whether or not the children's representative had the report is indicative of the problem. I'd like to quote for the minister. Section 10….

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Members.

Continue.

M. Farnworth: I'd like to quote for the minister section 10 of the legislation, Bill 34. It says: "The representative has the right to any information that…is necessary to enable the representative to exercise his or her powers or perform his or her functions or duties under this Act."

My question. This important information on the protection of children: did the minister share it with the Representative for Children or not? And if not, why not?

Hon. T. Christensen: The ministry meets with the representative and officials from her office on a regular basis. We have shared literally thousands of pages of information with the representative since that office was established, and we will continue to do that.

We are working to develop a constructive information-sharing relationship so that the representative is able to do her job most effectively and the ministry is able to continue to do its job most effectively.

[1410]

Mr. Speaker: The member has a supplemental.

M. Farnworth: Well, it's pretty clear the answer to the question is no, and the minister just doesn't want to admit it. So my question to the minister is this: did he read the report? And if he did read the report, why did he clearly take the deliberate decision not to share it with the children's representative?

Hon. T. Christensen: I can assure this member and this House that I read hundreds of pages of reports and documents in preparation for this year's budget. That is why this year's budget increases funding to the Ministry of Children and Family Development.

It is why we have added $47 million over the term of this service plan to support families and children in care. It's why we're adding $38 million to support children with special needs. It's why we're adding millions of other dollars to ensure that vulnerable children across
[ Page 13945 ]
our province receive the services that they require. We will continue to ensure that we put in place the right front-line people to ensure that those services are delivered.

LIQUOR TAX INCREASE

B. Ralston: The budget tabled last week artificially pumps up revenue numbers, but those numbers are contradicted by what's going on in the real economy. It's also clear that the Minister of Finance has found another way to pump up revenues, and that's through stealth tax increases. Will the Minister of Finance confirm that increased taxes on liquor are just one of the ways he plans to gouge British Columbians in the year to come?

Hon. R. Coleman: You might want to stop with the reckless and irresponsible comments you just made with regards to how we handle liquor in the province of British Columbia. The fact of the matter is this, Member….

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Members.

Hon. R. Coleman: If the member doesn't want to hear the facts about the raising of the floor price on hard liquor in the province of British Columbia, which have been sent out to over 200 people in the province to notify them, and how that process has been done for the last generation, he might want to go back to the 1990s when he raised the floor price of liquor four times and used exactly the same process that we used on this announcement.

Mr. Speaker: Member has a supplemental.

B. Ralston: The new liquor tax comes on top of a tripling of the gas tax, hikes to hydro rates, increased MSP premiums and the highest transit fares in the country.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Continue, Member.

B. Ralston: Will the Minister of Finance confirm that he plans many more ways to gouge British Columbians in the year to come?

Hon. R. Coleman: It's not only an irresponsible comment coming from the member opposite, but completely uninformed. This is a raise to the floor price for hard liquor in liquor stores in the province of British Columbia.

Annual adjustments to minimum beverage alcohol prices was a core recommendation of Canada's national alcohol strategy that was endorsed by governments over the years with regards to the floor price of alcohol, particularly hard liquor, in jurisdictions across the country.

This is a standard practice. You did it in the 1990s. We've done it a few times in the 2000s.

The fact of the matter is, though, hon. Member, it has been done exactly the same way every time, exactly the same way to inform. It is actually the floor price. It doesn't change the price more than setting the floor price of alcohol, and there is not taxation in addition to any of that.

[1415]

BUDGET REVENUE PROJECTIONS

R. Fleming: The Finance Minister staked the credibility of his budget on a number of doubtful revenue projections. He projects sales taxes to go up, when economists report B.C. retail sales are "in full-blown retreat," and last week the minister brushed off questions that we had about how he forecast an increase in personal income tax revenue for the province when employment levels were dropping.

Today we learned that as of December, B.C. had the distinction of having the largest increase in unemployment claims in the country. My question to the minister is: will he commit to presenting credible revenue forecasts to British Columbians, or is he still asking us to think beyond the numbers and believe his budget?

Hon. C. Hansen: The member is, quite frankly, wrong. We don't build a budget with a rearview mirror. We don't build next year's budget for the year starting April 1 based on statistics and data from last December. We base it on the expert forecast for the economy and for growth in the economy for the year to come, starting on April 1.

Mr. Speaker: The member has a supplemental.

R. Fleming: You know, it was exactly while the minister was preparing his budget that B.C. saw a net increase of 50,000 unemployment claims — a 33 percent increase on the year before. This is a Statistics Canada report. It shows B.C. is the number one job loss province in Canada. More people in B.C. are applying for unemployment benefits here than in Ontario, the site of the auto and manufacturing meltdown.

So how can the minister, at a time when people are worrying about putting food on their table, forecast personal income tax growth in his budget, with this troubling employment backdrop?
[ Page 13946 ]

Hon. C. Hansen: This is a province that since 2001 has seen a net increase of almost 400,000 jobs in this economy. We know that the B.C. economy is going to….

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Minister, just take your seat. Sit down for a second.

We're going to listen to the question, and we're going to listen to the answer.

Continue.

Hon. C. Hansen: British Columbia continues to attract workers. Unlike the late 1990s, when 50,000 young British Columbians fled this province to go to other provinces to finds jobs, those British Columbians are coming back to B.C. because there is opportunity here once again.

I'll tell the member something that they clearly didn't recognize in the late 1990s. When people leave British Columbia to go to work in other provinces, they pay income tax in other provinces. When British Columbians, people from around the world and other Canadians come to find jobs in British Columbia, they pay income tax in British Columbia, and that's what helps pay for our health care, our education and our social safety net.

DISCLOSURE OF DOCUMENTS
IN B.C. RAIL COURT CASE

L. Krog: Tomorrow Madam Justice Bennett of the B.C. Supreme Court will hear an application by the official opposition to be given access to binders of material related to the B.C. Rail scandal. The Attorney General has repeatedly said he is committed to openness and accountability. Does he or does he not support the public's right to know the truth about the B.C. Rail corruption trial?

Hon. W. Oppal: I think that Madam Justice Bennett can make her decision without the assistance of anyone in this chamber.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Members.

The member has a supplemental.

L. Krog: What would be of assistance to Madam Justice Bennett would be if the government would cooperate by releasing all of the information that the public of British Columbia has a right to know.

[1420]

I would remind the Attorney General that his government goes before the public of British Columbia on May 12 for the ultimate vote of confidence, the ultimate truth-finding expedition, and I would encourage him strongly to encourage the government's lawyers to hand over the documents so that the people of British Columbia know what the truth is behind the B.C. Rail corruption trial.

It's been over five long years since this Legislature was raided. The people have a right to know. Again I'm asking the Attorney General: does he support the right of the people to know, or doesn't he?

Hon. W. Oppal: It's apparent to me that…. When that member went to law school, he apparently missed the lecture that dealt with the doctrine of separation of powers. That is that during the course of any trial it is totally improper for legislators to comment on what's going on in a courtroom.

[End of question period.]

S. Fraser: I rise today to raise a point of privilege.

Mr. Speaker: Proceed.

Point of Privilege

S. Fraser: I served notice yesterday of my intention to raise a question of privilege, and I rise now on that matter, of which written notice has been given to the Chair under Standing Order 26.

I believe that I can establish a prima facie case on the face of the record that the member for Nanaimo-Parksville breached the privileges of this House by misleading this assembly. I have attempted to keep my presentation brief and non-argumentative, in accordance with the rules.

The member for Nanaimo-Parksville has made statements in this House on the subject of logging in the Englishman River. On Thursday last week in question period the member told the House: "This was logged under a plan, a watershed management plan, that involved consultation with the Arrowsmith Watersheds Society and other groups."

I would like to submit as exhibit 1 an e-mail from Michael Jessen of the Arrowsmith Watersheds Coalition Society which takes issue with this statement by the member. Mr. Jessen's e-mail states: "We assure you that we have never collaborated with Island Timberlands or its predecessors in the preparation of any watershed plan, nor have we reviewed or approved any timber-harvesting plans for any private managed forest land company."

Yesterday when I gave the member the opportunity to correct the record and to apologize to the organization he named, the member for Nanaimo-Parksville instead stated: "I want to say to the Arrowsmith Watersheds
[ Page 13947 ]
Coalition Society that I used the wrong acronym, AWCS. I should have said the Arrowsmith Water Service, which is comprised of representatives from Parksville, from Qualicum Beach and from the regional district, who indeed took part in the watershed assessment portfolio plan to protect the watershed in this sensitive area."

This explanation by the member is in turn countered by a second document I submit as exhibit 2: a press release from the Western Canada Wilderness society quoting Barry Avis, who sits on the Arrowsmith Water Service, regarding logging in the Englishman River. In this document Mr. Avis of the Arrowsmith Water Service states:

"If there was ever a time to speak up, it is the present day. What is happening here exposes almost all that is wrong with forestry policies, watershed protection policies, riparian areas, proper stewardship, ownership conflicts, potential health risks, local financial waste and as well as many, many volunteer hours and financial donations from the stewardship groups and land trusts over the past 25 years — just wasted now."

I respectfully submit, based on these exhibits, that the community organizations cited by the member were not consulted and did not agree to the plans, as asserted in this House by the member for Nanaimo-Parksville.

The member also made claims that only 21 of 228 merchantable trees were removed from the site. "It was a selective harvest by helicopter," it was quoted. "Only two trees actually hit the ground," it was quoted. The Western Canada Wilderness Committee did a complete inventory of the logging site, and their inventory shows that 47 trees were cut down and 22 were taken away. Another 25 were left behind, including trees that were between 150 and 500 years old.

[1425]

I submit these documents of the site as exhibit 3 and will table these along with all the other documents I have cited and the relevant excerpts from Hansard.

From the documents I have tabled today, I believe that I have made a prima facie case of breach of privilege. I am prepared, Mr. Speaker, to move the necessary motion should you find a prima facie case exists.

Hon. M. de Jong: I'll reserve the right to provide a more fulsome response shortly.

Mr. Speaker: I'll take it under advisement.

Tabling Documents

Hon. C. Hansen: I rise to table a revised schedule I for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2009. The revised schedule I reflects the changes to the ministerial accountabilities under the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act, resulting from the government ministry reorganizations that took place in 2008-2009.

Motions Without Notice

MEMBERSHIP OF SELECT STANDING
AND SPECIAL COMMITTEES

Hon. M. de Jong: By leave, I move the following. Just by way of explanation for members of the Committee of Selection, these are the names that are being proposed for the committees. The Opposition House Leader and myself are advised that this abbreviated procedure can be safely utilized in this case.

By leave, I move:

[That the following Members comprise the membership of the Select Standing Committees of the Legislative Assembly for the 5th session of the 38th Parliament:

Select Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs

Katherine Whittred (Convener), Al Horning, Dennis MacKay, Claude Richmond, Val Roddick, John Les, David Chudnovsky, Gary Coons, Scott Fraser, Harry Lali

Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth

Claude Richmond (Convener), Dennis MacKay, Val Roddick, John Rustad, Richard T. Lee, John Les, Nicholas Simons, Jagrup Brar, Maurine Karagianis, Leonard Krog

Select Standing Committee on Crown Corporations

John Rustad (Convener), Olga Ilich, Dennis MacKay, John Yap, Val Roddick, Rick Thorpe, John Horgan, Corky Evans, Harry Lali, Shane Simpson

Select Standing Committee on Education

John Nuraney (Convener), Daniel Jarvis, Richard T. Lee, Rick Thorpe, John Rustad, John Yap, David Cubberley, Rob Fleming, Norm Macdonald, Doug Routley

Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services

Randy Hawes (Convener), Harry Bloy, Dave S. Hayer, Richard T. Lee, John Rustad, John Yap, Bruce Ralston, Robin Austin, John Horgan, Diane Thorne

Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts

Rob Fleming (Convener), Rick Thorpe, Randy Hawes, John Yap, Claude Richmond, Olga Ilich, John Rustad, Ralph Sultan, Harry Bains, Bob Simpson, Bruce Ralston, Claire Trevena]

Leave granted.

Motion approved.

D. Routley: I seek leave to present a petition.

Mr. Speaker: Proceed.

Petitions

D. Routley: This is a petition signed by 931 residents of the island of Gabriola. They're seeking to have the government freeze B.C. ferry fares.

Orders of the Day

Hon. M. de Jong: I call Committee of Supply — for the information of members, continued debate on the
[ Page 13948 ]
supplementary estimates, Housing. And then, I believe, we are dealing with the Health supplementary estimate.

Committee of Supply

SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES:
MINISTRY OF HOUSING
AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

(continued)

The House in Committee of Supply; K. Whittred in the chair.

The committee met at 2:30 p.m.

On Vote 36(S): housing and construction standards, $30,000,000 (continued).

D. Chudnovsky: Good afternoon to the minister and members of staff. I have, actually, three areas that I want to ask questions about. I wouldn't expect that they would take very long, but we'll see.

I apologize in advance if this has been canvassed. I don't think so. It's to do with the buildings that have been purchased over the last couple of years by government, especially SRO buildings in Vancouver — but open to hearing about others as well. The question has to do with renovations and the schedule for renovations.

I know that my colleague from Vancouver–Mount Pleasant talked earlier in the day with the minister about financing around these buildings. I wanted to specifically deal with the renovation schedule. Again, if it's been canvassed, I apologize.

Could the minister deal with the first buildings that were announced as purchased and give us a sense of the renovation schedule — where we are at with respect to those buildings being ready for people to live in them?

Hon. R. Coleman: I'll try. I'll go through each particular property, and maybe this can help the member. The total in renovations we are investing in these buildings, by the way, is $90 million. I don't have in front of me those numbers broken out by building on what the renovations are costing.

The Marble Arch is underway. Anticipated completion is February 2010. We're doing it in a phased way to give residents the ability to stay in the building and move around. The St. Helen's Hotel is underway. It will be completed in November 2009. The Walton Hotel is underway. That's June 2009. The Orange Hall is underway. That's March 2009. The Carl Rooms is April 2009.

The Molson's Bank Building is late 2009, possibly early 2010, due to some renovations and obviously moving people in and around as we do the renovations. The Park Hotel is May. The Orwell Hotel is December. The Savoy was January, so it has been completed. The Rice Block is March.

D. Chudnovsky: Those were the ones from the first set of purchases. Thanks to the minister for that.

Does the minister know whether any of the costs of those renovations might be captured by the recent announcements regarding renovations in the federal budget?

[1435]

Hon. R. Coleman: We did canvass this earlier, but I'll repeat it. The renovations they have allowed so far in the federal funding are only to do with projects that were provincial and federal buildings that we had some joint relationship in. So it probably goes back to pre-1990. Anything that was done by a province unilaterally at this point doesn't qualify.

We are in discussions with the federal government with regards to that. But in what they presented to us at the initial stage, only the buildings that would have been in the provincial-federal relationship in the past would be qualifying buildings. So at this stage, no. The dollars to do this are already in our budget.

D. Chudnovsky: Thanks to the minister for that.

The second area I wanted to talk about or ask about has to do with the criteria that the ministry uses in the potential purchase of buildings. I guess the best way to ask would be to say: is it ever contemplated by the ministry, in looking at possible purchases, that family accommodation buildings might be purchased?

Hon. R. Coleman: In one purchase we made as we came through it, we did purchase the Alpha and Beta projects in Burnaby, which were family. But it isn't our priority criterion, to be honest with you.

The priority criterion is units for people who are at risk of homelessness, homeless with mental health and addictions, with supports as a criterion. Most people who are families today can be accommodated in the rental market now. With the rental assistance program, we have 8,000 families that make under $35,000 a year receiving a cheque every month to offset their rent.

D. Chudnovsky: If I could just investigate this a little bit more. I was aware of one project that fit that category. I'm wondering if the minister might explain to the committee why that particular project was proceeded with, given his statement about what the priorities are.

Hon. R. Coleman: At the time they were purchased, which was in the first tranche of purchases, they were at risk of leaving the marketplace, and we had some capital available. That's about the simplest answer I can give.

I do have the letter from the member opposite dated December 11, where he asked if we would consider purchasing two buildings in Vancouver. As we came through our capital with regards to these purchases, the capital went only so far. We focused on our priorities
[ Page 13949 ]
when we came to the buildings with regards to this latest purchase.

[1440]

D. Chudnovsky: I will just press this question for a minute. I'm not going to take too much time of the committee except to say this. Without reference to any particular address or particular building, it seems to me that the challenge faced in finding affordable housing, and therefore reducing the risk of homelessness, is a great one for families in our community, where I live. It's a serious problem.

I would suggest to the minister that the situation that's faced by many, many families in our community and in many communities across the province, in what is relatively affordable market housing which is disappearing because of development pressures — maybe a reduced speed at which it disappears, but it certainly is disappearing because of development pressures — is completely and totally analogous to the problems faced by those who live in some of the buildings that the ministry has chosen to purchase.

So what we have is relatively affordable housing stock — and I use the term "relatively" advisedly — in buildings which are in not great shape and which, if there is no intercession by the government or somebody, come off the market, are renovated or are knocked down and replaced with housing that is unaffordable to the residents of those buildings.

Now, that is the case in many of the projects which the ministry proceeded with and purchased SROs. It is equally the case in many situations where people are in family housing. I would impress upon the minister and suggest to the minister that the criteria that are used by the ministry in making these decisions could be usefully expanded to include relatively affordable market housing, which is disappearing and which is available now to families and will not be when those places are purchased speculatively, knocked down and replaced with market housing that isn't affordable to those families.

I leave it with the minister. He, for now, is the guy who gets to make the decisions. I think these are families who I'm referring to who are working families, who are in a situation where they're desperately in need of housing. The criteria, it seems to me, could be usefully expanded to include them.

My third question. I wonder whether the minister could give us an update on the situation at Little Mountain social housing.

Hon. R. Coleman: First of all, on the first issue. The member added to my list for discussions, with the member opposite earlier, the people who might refer buildings that should be purchased in communities — to add MLAs to that list.

The member asked us to buy two properties in Vancouver. When the member was asking me what were our criteria…. We hear from all kinds of people.

There are some changing times out there with regards to rentals in B.C. right now. As the Minister Responsible for Housing for the last four years, I would say that in the first three years I never got a call from anybody in the development community or anybody else who said they'd like to build some purpose-built rental housing and what programs might exist for rent assistance for tenants.

In the last 90 days we've had a lot of calls. I guess people have realized that they're not going to be able to retail these things the same, and they're starting to look at purpose-built rental housing, which is actually good news for us.

But there still is one issue that I think needs to be settled with regards to rental housing in this country. This isn't unusual, and I think we all have advocated for it over the last 15 or 20 years in British Columbia.

[1445]

That is, we'd like to see some tax incentives to actually get people to build affordable rental housing again in our marketplaces — like the MURB program back in the late '70s and early '80s, which was the last time we built a lot of purpose-built rental housing.

I remember doing debates in opposition and having a discussion with the member for Port Coquitlam–Burke Mountain, which I guess is the riding now.

Interjection.

Hon. R. Coleman: Coquitlam–Burke Mountain.

Anyway, I had a conversation back then. I thought that unless we dealt with this as a country, we would end up with a rental crisis in the future, and I think he agreed at that time. I know that they were having discussions with the federal government back at that time, which would have been about 1996 or '97.

With regards to Little Mountain, we do have a contract and purchase of sale. We have an MOU with the city of Vancouver with regards to the proceeds being invested in housing — quite a substantial amount of the proceeds being invested in the city of Vancouver and other sites — as well as the replacement of the actual units on the site and a contract that dictates what that price will be for pricing going forward.

Our objective is to give the developer vacant possession. However, they think that they may be able to phase some of the site now, so there are some discussions going on with regards to that. I can't tell the member the exact number. I think it's about 15 residents still left on the site in that number, out of 224, but at this stage the one person who has that answer isn't with me today.

I'm actually happy to give, at any time, the member an update on the project.

D. Chudnovsky: I'm wondering whether the minister is aware that the company with whom the MOU has been entered into has just announced the cancellation, mid-project, of a huge project in downtown Vancouver
[ Page 13950 ]
and, if he is aware of that, whether that is of concern to him with respect to moving forward on the Little Mountain project.

Hon. R. Coleman: We are aware of that. We haven't been given any indication by the proponent that this affects this site. At the same time, we have a substantial non-refundable deposit, so we are not uncomfortable with the deal we're in. If it were to have difficulties in the future, this would actually be a very good time to continue on with the rezoning to get the site ready for when the market might shift. We would continue on with the process one way or the other.

D. Chudnovsky: I admire the minister's confidence. He may be the only one in North America who has that confidence, but it's admirable nonetheless.

With respect to the project as it is proceeding right now, the minister made a comment about the ability of somebody to move ahead with something, notwithstanding the fact that there are still residents on the site. I probably didn't pick up what I should have in his answer.

It's not clear to me who we are talking about, in terms of moving forward while there are still residents on site. Who is he talking about in terms of that moving forward — the developer, the city, B.C. Housing? Who would it be, or what entity would it be, that would be moving forward, notwithstanding that there are still people on site?

Hon. R. Coleman: That's done in cooperation between us and the parties I mentioned, but the ultimate decision-maker is B.C. Housing because it's our site.

Just for the members opposite, I was very close. Some 14 of the 224 units remain occupied, and everybody else has been occupied to another residence of some sort and has been paid their moving costs. They're told that they'll be paid their costs moving back in and that they get first priority to move back into the site when the site is done.

Maybe I could clarify for the member what I said about being optimistic. I didn't say I was optimistic about the marketing opportunity.

[1450]

However, having been around the business, I do know that if you have property during a downturn, the smart thing to do is continue to rezone and get your densities and your design and all that ready so that when the market does shift, you're actually somebody that can go into the market and take advantage of that market in the future, rather than sitting on a piece of property and then, as the market changes, missing the first 18 to 24 months of that market. Our planning time line on this works either way.

D. Chudnovsky: It's to the planning time line that I wanted to turn. I think we're both going in the same direction. The MOU between the city and the province on this project, which the minister and I have had an opportunity to talk about in the past, indicates that no construction on the site will begin until at least the spring of 2010.

That's pretty clear, given that we're in February of 2009 and that there is no indication at this point — despite the minister's optimism or realism or practicality or whatever adjective we want to put there….

What we have at Little Mountain is 200 empty places to live while there are thousands of people with nowhere to live. That's a strategy and a decision that the ministry and B.C. Housing took, and we've had other arguments about that. Forget about the arguments for now. The arguments — let's set them aside. We'll have them another time.

There are 200 empty places that are boarded up. There are thousands of people with nowhere to live. What's the time line expected by the minister at this point in terms of when people will be able to live on the site?

Hon. R. Coleman: I didn't realize we were going to get into a lengthy debate on this today. Otherwise I would have had different staff here.

Regardless, the vacant units today are not habitable. They have lead paint. The buildings have asbestos. There are some issues with environmental stuff. We've started to do something on some of the vacant units to start to get them ready for demolition. They're not habitable.

The plan all along was to do this over a timed process. The objective at the beginning — and it still is the objective — is that our 224 residents be taken care of, which they are being. The objective was to then take this property and use it as a long-term asset to enhance the ability to do more for homelessness, mental health and addictions and housing in the city and in other jurisdictions across B.C., as well as get back the same number of units net for the residents to move back into if they wish to when it's done.

The project's time line is that we would like to get the demolition permits soon and start to demolish the buildings that we can to start to remediate the site and get the site ready for future development.

D. Chudnovsky: Thanks to the minister. Again, I want to acknowledge to the minister that he may not have expected this line of questioning on this project, and I understand that there are not staff people here who might be able to talk about the details of this project. I acknowledge that, and I'm not looking to get into a whole series of debates that we might otherwise get into, because the minister and I see this quite differently. We could get into a debate about whether the places are habitable or not habitable at the moment.

My question is a simple one, and it isn't about "was it a smart plan?" I think it wasn't. He thinks it was. Are
[ Page 13951 ]
they habitable? I think that with very little investment, they could be very habitable within days. He thinks I'm wrong. That's a debate for another time and another place, and you can bet we'll have it.

The question is: what's his best guess as to when people will get to live on this site again, beyond the 14 or 15 families who are still there? When is the best guess? These places have been empty for months, some of them more than a year. There are empty places there. There's a big hunk of land in the middle of Vancouver where people could live. Lots of people are homeless. What's his best guess as to when people will actually get to live there?

Hon. R. Coleman: I'm not in a position to give you that answer at this moment, because I don't have the information in front of me. So I will be glad to get the information for the member — happily get the information for the member. The member knows what the MOU states and what goes on there. The member also knows that significant investment will go into housing in the city of Vancouver as a result of the site, in addition to the hundreds of millions we've already spent in the last three years.

[1455]

We think it's important to take sites that are underutilized, to maximize them, to take the money out of them, to replace old housing stock — this stuff is well over 50 years old and is basically obsolete — and be able to enhance and add additional stock elsewhere across the province by leveraging our assets. So we think that's an important piece of Little Mountain. The member and I have had debates on this when he was the critic in last year's estimates. Like I say, I'm happy to get you an update.

D. Chudnovsky: Not to ask another question, because I know my friend from Kingsway wants to get up and ask some questions. Just to say thank you to the minister for his offer. I would very much like to have an update on the Little Mountain situation as quickly as possible, and we'll be in touch right away with the minister's office to try and organize that.

J. Kwan: Yes indeed, we'll perhaps combine that with the other briefings. Just on that note, the minister did mention, though, a potential default. Should Holborn default on the Little Mountain project, the minister mentioned that there would be a substantial amount which they would be penalized against for the default. If that should happen, would that penalty which the province would receive be applied towards the building of social housing?

Hon. R. Coleman: Yeah, I would think so. Not to get into the commercial piece of this arrangement because it's obviously got some confidentiality around it. All I said was there was a substantial non-refundable deposit. There are deposits that go up at different levels of the process of the development, which is pretty standard on a development this size.

Obviously, if there was money that came back because of a default…. I don't want to get into a discussion precluding that decision, because I think that would be unfair to all the parties involved, or lead anybody to believe that I have anything in front of me today that says we do have that difficulty. But if there was a default, that money would be reinvested in housing.

J. Kwan: Then on that note, is it the anticipation that the minister is then waiting for the developer to act? Or is there a drop-dead time line to which the government says: "Enough already. We've waited and waited and waited, and there is no action. It's time to move on"? Is there a clause that will trigger either the automatic default of the developer or the progress of the project?

Hon. R. Coleman: There are some specific dates that have performance dates that are subject to the confidentiality clause of the entire commercial arrangement. But they are there. They are monitored by our staff. Our staff do meet with the proponent on a regular basis and will shortly be meeting with their new president and CEO who has just been appointed. We will probably have some other ideas with regards to where they fit within the dates that are required under the commercial arrangement at that time.

J. Kwan: I'm really going to look forward to the briefing with the minister, actually. At around Christmastime, I think, I had a telephone conversation with the minister, at which point the minister did offer a briefing on this with me directly. Then it fell apart. I think the minister went to New York or something.

Anyway, one thing led to another. Time marched on, and the briefing didn't take place. I would certainly be interested in following up with that and hopefully shed more light on some of the developments or lack thereof with regards to this site.

Again, I think the interest here is to see the project develop in such a way that meets the community's need and is in the best interests of British Columbians in providing affordable housing. So in that spirit, I'm looking forward to that conversation and discussion with both the minister and his staff.

[1500]

I know that my colleague the member for Powell River–Sunshine Coast has got some questions for the minister, so I'm going to yield the floor to him for a few minutes before I get back to other questions on this set of estimates.

N. Simons: I thank the minister for being here and available with his staff to answer questions. My questions
[ Page 13952 ]
are simple — about a couple of projects, in particular in Sechelt. These are the Green Court project and the Arrowhead project. I'm wondering if the minister might be able to let me know what the status of those projects is. I believe that they're waiting for some sort of notification to proceed or not. Any information would be most appreciated.

Hon. R. Coleman: There are some projects that have come across my desk, but I couldn't give you the status off the top of my head. My staff don't have that information available like I did for the other members of your caucus. I undertook to get you an update on the projects. Before we do that, though, could you restate the names of the project for me? The first one I didn't quite catch.

For the member's information, on the Sunshine Coast there are today 265 units of existing subsidized housing. There are 79 seniors that actually get SAFER, which is Shelter Aid for Elderly Renters. There are 56 people in the rental assistance program on the Sunshine Coast, which gives them a cheque every month to offset their rent if they make under $35,000 a year and they have a family. That's an annual subsidy on the Sunshine Coast of $1.2 million a year.

If you would restate those, we will write them down, and then we can….

N. Simons: One was the Lions Club project with respect to a building project called Green Court. They were going to be removing some affordable housing and replacing it with other…. Because it was old, and it needed replacement. The other one was the use of the old RCMP building partially for affordable housing. That was called Arrowhead.

If that doesn't satisfy the minister, I'll make sure that I get the names exactly right so that the projects can be identified. I can come and speak to the minister at another time.

Hon. R. Coleman: That should be enough. If it isn't, I'll give the member a call. There is another project that I do know that's in that area that isn't…to either one of those. It's an innovative project that's taking place. I think it's with disabilities. I think the member is aware of that project. That's why I needed a name. So now we'll have our guys get that information for you.

J. Kwan: In the supplemental estimates there's a phrase that says "long-term renovations are in the planning stages." Could the minister explain to me what that means? Is the $30 million in this set of estimates going to be applying to long-term renovations, and what are the planning stages that we are talking about here?

Hon. R. Coleman: Each one is different, of course. The most extensive renovations are expected to be at the Dominion Hotel. It could take a year to complete the extensive renovations. The others — some of them — might be able to be done in a couple of months because they're more health and safety.

One of the challenges about saying that and then fixing a firm date is that some of the challenges we found as we did some of the buildings in the past…. For instance, I was in the vice-president of development's office at B.C. Housing recently, and he showed me a very large beam, a piece of a very large beam.

[1505]

The beam was actually in this building for, oh, probably the last ten or 15 years. It was actually a structural beam, and the entire inside of the beam was hollow because it had rotted. It was something we visually couldn't have seen when we did the renovations.

So the one thing we do find is…. Sometimes we'll find things that will take more, but our initial assessment of these buildings would be anywhere from two months to one year that the total renovation is done. The most extensive one is the Dominion.

J. Kwan: Presumably, all of the renovation cost would be covered by this $30 million? The minister said there is $3 million out of that $30 million that's allocated for renovations. So is the anticipation that all of those renovation costs should be covered under this set of supplementary estimates?

Hon. R. Coleman: Yes, and there's a healthy contingency, as well, for what I just described as might be unusual circumstances.

J. Kwan: Would the tenants be entitled to apply for the rent supplement program that the minister has in place — for the rent?

Hon. R. Coleman: Not in these buildings — the reason being that these are subsidized buildings. We subsidize to income on these.

Most of the tenants in these would be people that would not have families, that would be single. They would be receiving the shelter allowance under social assistance, which would be their rent. We subsidize the difference to balance off the cost of the operation of the building, including the supports and all the costs, etc.

So not typically in this situation, because we wouldn't typically have a family. The rent assistance program is geared to people that are in the marketplace. This is a subsidized building.

We don't have rent assistance, for instance, in social housing projects either, because as the member remembers, that's 30 percent of income, rent geared to income. So they pay rent based on their income, so the subsidy is different because we subsidize the entire project versus the individual.
[ Page 13953 ]

J. Kwan: The rent supplement program is significantly undersubscribed. The government has put out ads in the newspapers and so on urging people to utilize the program. Having said that, it is still hugely undersubscribed.

Now, I've learned of some situations whereby people who are on income assistance could actually get access to this rent supplement program. Is that the case?

Hon. R. Coleman: The rent assistance program is people that are low income, working — you know, out there working. People on social assistance, depending on where they're living — whether they're in social housing or elsewhere — get a piece of their social assistance cheque that is a shelter allowance. So no, they don't qualify for rent assistance.

We do, however, have one exception to that. We do have $1,100 in rent assistance available for people if we need to take them from a shelter to the market because we don't have a place available in one of our buildings.

J. Kwan: Just so that I'm clear then, for people on income assistance — for example, you're staying at a shelter and you cannot access a social housing unit…. If you go into the market to get a rental space, then the rent supplement would apply to top-up that family's shelter portion, even though they're on income assistance. That's an exception that would apply? Did I hear the minister correctly on that?

[1510]

Hon. R. Coleman: Yeah. Don't confuse them with the rent assistance program. These are rent subs for people that are homeless to help them, if they can't occupy a social housing project. A year ago we announced the ability to do this in certain circumstances. I don't have the details of that program in front of me, but I'm glad to share them with the member.

So what we do is if we have somebody in a shelter that we think could be housed in the normal housing market and their biggest barrier is they can't quite make it, then we can help them with their rent to get them up on their feet for a period of time so that they can be stabilized in the housing market.

J. Kwan: I'd be very interested in further exploring this with the minister, because a couple of cases have been brought to my attention where people on income assistance are accessing the rent supplement program to top-up their rent in the marketplace. I had always thought that the criteria were such that people on income assistance were not eligible to access these rent supp dollars. Maybe I've confused two pots of money, but I don't think so. So I would be interested in clarifying that with the minister, on that front.

On a different question, I met with a group of people on several occasions now. They call themselves the homeless nation. They live, frankly, in a park in the streets of Vancouver. They're primarily aboriginal people — aboriginal men for the most part, although not exclusively — and they're older men. Some of them are on income assistance. Some of them are actually on a pension. The majority of them are individuals who are struggling with addiction challenges, although most not with drug addiction but rather with alcohol addiction problems.

In any event, they are sleeping on the streets. They want to find a way to access housing. They were very specific to say that they did not wish to move to the Downtown Eastside, for obvious reasons. Many of them have actually recovered from drug addiction issues, and they did not wish to be in the Downtown Eastside community for their own personal reasons.

Others did not want to go to a shelter, for example; many of whom are residential school survivors. In fact, one of them, in that very cold spell where there was snow and so on, was actually at a shelter. At around midnight he couldn't take it anymore. Why? Because the shelter reminded him of the residential schools, and he left. He'd rather stay outside. It was bitter, bitter cold, but he stayed outside anyway, and he didn't go back.

So they came to my office, and I also met with them at the park. They said that they would be interested in looking for alternatives in terms of securing housing. I actually phoned up the minister and talked to the minister's assistant at that time, because the minister was out of town, to see how we could assist this group of people.

The outreach worker came to my office to meet with them as well but to no avail, because there simply was no housing available to put them in. At one point I was told by the minister's staff that if the outreach worker could not find housing to meet the needs of these individuals…. I explained to them about the residential school situation, the Downtown Eastside geographic location challenges, and so on. I was advised that the outreach worker would be able to access funds to provide support to these individuals, whether it be getting a temporary option available.

That was not to be. No funding was available. The outreach worker, when she came to my office, I asked point-blank, and she just said: "Well, who told you that, and where can I get it?" So there were no funds available.

My question to the minister on that note is: this set of projects in Vancouver would not provide assistance to this group of people. What other options are there for this group of people? How can we provide assistance to them so that they can get out of the elements and off the streets? They don't have a mental health challenge, but they do have an addiction problem.

For very coherent, specific reasons, they have outlined for me why the existing options that are there are not options for them. What can we do for this group of people?

[1515]
[ Page 13954 ]

Hon. R. Coleman: Thanks to the member, and I apologize if there was a meeting cancelled in December. The New York trip was a complete surprise to the minister, actually. It was a birthday present that was arranged by his spouse, my wife, and I was basically told about 24 hours ahead of time that I was going on this trip to New York. It was fun, and we enjoyed it. If we missed a meeting as a result, I apologize. I do think that, for the most part, she had worked with my staff to make sure nothing was being scheduled, unbeknownst to me.

With regards to this, what the member describes fits clearly to me within what we thought about when we decided to put some supps into the homeless side for people who couldn't fit into other forms of housing.

I think it would be appropriate if one of our people from B.C. Housing, if the member would agree to make the arrangements, went to meet with these folks and go through their issues and identify them and then see if we can find the options that might work for them. That may be space in one of the new buildings we have, because we have the one at 55 East Hastings. Quite frankly, it's 90 units. It's coming on board. It should be on stream pretty soon, and a few others that are under construction. There may be something in an existing facility that might meet for this cohort.

At the same time, if it's residential school tragedy, as we know what it was, I think we should work with probably the native friendship centre and others to identify how we would do that to make sure there was something that was culturally sensitive to meet their needs, if that was the case, or if we're going to find some other place for them with other funds.

I'm compelled by the member's story. They haven't come to see me, but I'm compelled by her description. I would like to make arrangements for someone to sit down with them.

J. Kwan: I'd be happy to set that up — that is, if the group is willing. They have, frankly, been very good at keeping in touch with me and coming to my office on a periodic occasion. We've kept an ongoing dialogue with each other, even though they don't actually have a fixed address. But I will endeavour to chat with them and see if we can organize something to that effect.

They have their own coherent reasons why certain options don't work for them. To me it may not make any sense, to you it may not make any sense, but for them it makes a whole lot of sense. Of course, from the perspective of always trying to….

Government trying to develop programs to meet the needs of the clients rather than have the clients meet the needs of government programs ought to be the goal. If we can find some way to accommodate and to meet the needs of this group of folks who are the homeless nation people in the community, I think, again, that will only serve us well.

I'd like to ask the minister some questions. I see that in this set of estimates there are no dollars allocated for anything related to the Olympic village. The Olympic village social housing project, as the minister knows, is in complete disarray, it seems to me. They are in quite a financial situation. So I wonder whether or not the minister had turned his mind to this housing initiative that is meant to be a legacy of the Olympics?

[1520]

Hon. R. Coleman: We're not involved. There was $15 million given to VANOC by the province, I believe it was, and $15 million from the federal government to the affordable housing that was anticipated being on the Olympic village site. We've not been involved, nor have we been asked to get involved at any level. I've had what would be called casual conversations with people in the city but not about them asking us to get involved, just to sort of see how they were doing and that sort of thing with the project.

There are issues of costs, etc., that I don't have the expertise to comment on with regards to those particular units, their square footage of construction costs and that sort of thing. I know the city is trying to work through those issues, but at this point in time the B.C. Housing or the ministry are not involved in the Olympic village.

J. Kwan: Is it because the minister or the ministry has not been officially asked by the city of Vancouver? If they were to be asked by the city of Vancouver, what kind of involvement might the ministry consider?

Hon. R. Coleman: We have no commitment at this point. We have no involvement. I understand our staff from B.C. Housing may be meeting with senior staff in Vancouver this Friday with regards to that component.

It would be from our standpoint a hard look at what the costs are if we were to get involved and whether it made sense or not for the particular housing or whether the dollars were too excessive and would be better invested in social housing in the city that we're doing. There is not a pool of capital sitting around that government is prepared to go running into the Olympic village on.

I have various quotes and comments from members of the opposition who have made some fairly interesting comments with regards to it — that Vancouver shouldn't be subsidized by rural B.C., which also needs housing. Those sorts of things I have on record.

From our perspective, we have always been a collaborative partner to try and help give advice. If the city looks for advice, our guys are pretty good at assessing a project and giving them advice. I think that's the only level that we could commit to at this stage of the game. We just don't know enough of the details to make any other comment.
[ Page 13955 ]

J. Kwan: I think those quotes were in the context of the market portion of the project. The minister will recall that we were recalled back into this Legislature for a special sitting of the House, where legislation was brought in to bail out, quite frankly, the developer Millennium.

People were asked to provide, essentially, a blank cheque so that the city could deal with the bad deal that was established by the previous council under the leadership of Sam Sullivan. I think those comments were put into the context of that situation. I stand corrected, but that certainly is my recollection with respect to that.

Again, perhaps that's another discussion that we can have, too, with the Olympic village and the general Olympic legacy on the social housing legacy side of things — on where we are going to be at.

The minister will recall that when the bid book was established, when the province and the city of Vancouver went out to try to get the Olympics, one of the very specific commitments was around leaving a social housing legacy, a housing legacy. Here's the history of it.

The Olympic village site was held up to be the site to which the province and VANOC and the levels of government could deliver on a housing legacy. What has happened? First, the council had committed a one-third, one-third, one-third mix. That is one-third market housing, one-third middle income and one-third affordable housing.

Then there was a thing called an election. The municipal government changed, and then that commitment was watered down to a 20 percent, 80 percent split — 80 percent market housing, high-end condos, and then the other 20 percent on social housing.

Now another election rolls around, and we find ourselves in the situation where even that 20 percent of social housing is at risk. Pretty soon, the way I look at it, there isn't going to be any social housing legacy arising from the Olympic village site.

[1525]

Certainly, the city of Vancouver taxpayers are being asked to contribute towards this legacy only to find there's nothing to show for it except, you know, million-dollar condos. I am a city of Vancouver taxpayer, and I find it a little bit difficult to take that my tax dollars are going towards bailing out Millennium, the developer, so that they could build their million-dollar condos so that they can ensure that the return to them on the bottom line is there, and the general good of the community in terms of the social housing legacy and other amenities happens to have gone to the wayside.

Now, I fully recognize that it's a discussion that may not fit into this set of estimates, and I'm happy, again, to explore this issue with the minister or the minister's staff to see what plans there are, if any, from the government side to ensure that there is some sort of housing legacy arising from the Olympics as promised under the bid book. So I look forward to that discussion with the minister, if he is agreeable.

Hon. R. Coleman: We've not been involved in this project at all. There were funds provided through VANOC by the provincial and federal governments towards the housing component at the Olympic village. That's our only involvement. We've never been involved in the decision-making, the planning or any of the other aspects of this particular project.

It is not our intention to step in at any time and supersede the city of Vancouver. The city has asked for a meeting to discuss this particular project. It will be very carefully looked at if something does come forward to me with regards to this and what it really means and whether it affects the ability to perform on the agenda to do projects for mental health and addictions across British Columbia, because Vancouver is not the only community that has these issues with regards to it.

We are not making any commitment at all at this time, nor have we offered up any suggestion that we're prepared to make a commitment with regards to the Olympic village issue from the provincial government.

The Chair: As the member noted, that last question was really off the substance of the estimate, and perhaps we can move on to more relevant questioning.

J. Kwan: Yes, I do fully recognize that, but seeing as the minister was so open and forthcoming with his answers, I thought I'd give it a shot anyway to try and see if we can shed some light on the latest debacle of the Olympic village site. I thank the minister for his answers.

I'm about to wrap up my debate here with the minister, and I would have one last question in an area that I wonder if the minister can shed some light on for me. This is actually a project that I heard in New West. I think there was an announcement. I don't have the site location, though. I apologize to the minister. But there was an announcement that the government had made in New West for a housing project to be initiated. To my recollection, I believe that was actually made at UBCM by the Premier.

Could the minister tell me if there are any housing developments that might be considered or underway in New West, and if so, what is the status of that?

Hon. R. Coleman: If the member can get me…. There are so many projects on the go. I do know that we had some discussions at one point with regards to a brownfield site that existed in New Westminster. I don't know the status of that, because it would need a remediation.

We did buy the College Place Hotel in New Westminster, which is for mental health and addictions and issues with regards to homelessness. That one is going through its renovation and being turned into….

[1530]

I was actually at an event, an opening of a project, that was very good with regards to seniors and an integration of adult and infant and regular child day care in New
[ Page 13956 ]
Westminster a couple of weeks ago, and the mayor didn't bring up any other project to me that was specifically of interest. So I would have thought he would have if there was a problem or difficulty.

If you have the details, fine. Otherwise, I'll check with our staff on anything else in New Westminster. I do know that if you go community by community, we have things at various levels of discussion with non-profits and municipalities and other groups with regards to things that we think we can do for housing.

Of course, they don't all come to fruition, because if they did, we would have to come up with billions of dollars on everything. Everybody's idea was the right idea. But we certainly try and work with any group that we can make something work on.

J. Kwan: I will endeavour to try and find the name of the project. I don't have those papers in front of me, and I just don't recollect it at the moment. If the minister finds anything else out in the meantime, I would appreciate that as well.

I think that this brings the estimates to a close. I do want to say thank you to the minister for his cooperation and for the forthrightness of his answers and also to thank the staff for their assistance.

Vote 36(S): housing and construction standards, $30,000,000 — approved.

[S. Hammell in the chair.]

supplementary estimates:
ministry of health services

On Vote 37(S): ministry operations, $120,000,000.

A. Dix: Thank you to the minister and his staff. I look forward to the discussion of this estimate.

The amount in question is $120 million. It's to go to the health authorities. Perhaps what I can do to start with…. The minister might want to just tell the House what the $120 million is in a general sense and kind of lay out where it went and what it was being spent on.

Hon. G. Abbott: Let me introduce, on my immediate left, my deputy minister, Gord Macatee. On my right is Manjit Sidhu, who is assistant deputy minister.

The $120 million was funds that we were able to bring forward to the health authorities earlier in 2008. At that time, the economy was far more robust than it is today. As a consequence, we had an opportunity to provide the health authorities with an incremental $120 million.

The fiscal year, of course, is not over. That runs until the end of March, so the health authorities are still utilizing that $120 million.

[1535]

There is a range of things that have been undertaken by the health authorities with their shares of the $120 million. Examples would be improving wait times for diagnostics. In some cases, funds were utilized to get patients quicker access to MRIs, to CAT scans, to X-rays and the like. I know that for some health authorities there was utilization of the funds to shorten wait times for surgeries. Hip and knee replacements, I guess, would be good examples of that, but just two examples of that.

For some health authorities, Vancouver Coastal notably, their portion of funds was utilized to offset budgetary pressures. So the utilization of the funds would vary by health authority, and of course, they are still in the process of utilizing those funds through to the end of March 2009.

A. Dix: Just so I understand this. The minister made reference to the economy and that it was better then, but the fact is — and this is confirmed in several of the health service plans, I think in three of them — that this is one-time funding. So it was only intended, at the time when the government made the decision to do it in July, for this to be one-time funding for operating funds.

Is that what I'm to understand, that different health authorities had different demands, but what the minister was doing here was giving them $120 million to get through this period — the period ending March 31, 2009 — but that there was never an intention for this to be a $120 million lift to the base? So they wouldn't get it for next year — say, in the periods from April 1, 2009, through to March 31, 2010.

In spite of the reference to the economy, am I to understand that this was always intended — and as it is referred to in the health service plans — to be one-time funding?

Hon. G. Abbott: We always made it entirely clear that this was a one-time lift to funding.

A. Dix: I just want to explore that briefly with the minister, because the kinds of things that the minister is talking about using the money for were sort of core services of the health authorities. They were surgeries and diagnostics and seniors care — all the things that the health authority does. This is the most general of supplementary estimates, such that, in fact, we're fortunate here today to be able to have a wide-ranging debate on the health authorities as a result.

So the minister is saying that he thinks it's the right approach to give a $120 million lift to the base for a nine-month period in 2008-2009 for operating funds but then to have that lift for operating funds disappear after that period. Does the minister think that that is normal practice or good practice?

Hon. G. Abbott: The member is certainly conversant with the pressures demographically and the chronic
[ Page 13957 ]
disease pressures that drive health care costs in this province. The member has been a keen student of provincial politics for a long, long time. He knows that health care budgets in this province have gone from 25 percent overall of the budget 20 years ago to 35 percent a decade ago to now about 45 percent today.

A lot of that growth, and a lot of the demand that drives that growth, is linked very closely to the demographics of our society. A decade ago about 8 percent of the population was over the age of 65. Today it is about 14 percent, and about ten years from now it will be well over 20 percent and approaching 25 percent. So we know that each and every year there are challenges.

[1540]

We had the opportunity, with the economic resilience that was being enjoyed in the earlier months of 2008…. We had an economic resilience that allowed us to make some investments to try to push back some of those pressures on diagnostics, on surgeries, on a range of areas, and that is precisely the utilization that has been possible through that one-time $120 million lift.

I think the member asked: is it normal practice? No, it's not normal practice, although I think that at different points in time in history, no doubt, there have been supplemental payments or supplemental lifts to budgets for health authorities. But it was unusual in the sense that we had an opportunity, and we wanted to make good use of it, because we know that year over year, the demand is not going to go away. The demand is going to grow. Whenever we have an opportunity, as we did, to try to alleviate some of that demand, which will inevitably grow, I think it is wise and fortuitous to do it.

A. Dix: The minister has kind of made the point that I'm making. Year over year the demand for the $120 million — which was there, presumably, in July of 2008 — is still there and growing. There's nothing in the expenditure of this money that's effectively going to reduce future-year demand. If there was a need for $120 million…. That's what we're getting at with the question. If the minister disagrees….

The minister says: "Well, you know, the $120 million was available, and so we decided — even though, generally, supplementary estimates are used for kind of one-time, late-year funding things or one-time funding decisions — to actually briefly lift the base and then pull it away."

That's what he did. He lifted the base. That's the effect of it. He said that it's $120 million for this year, which they'll spend for things that they're going to have to need to spend on next year, except that that $120 million will be, of course, taken away next year.

The question, I guess, is: what is so special about this period leading into April and May of this year? What is so special about this one-time lifting of the base to solve problems this year, since all of those problems, the minister has acknowledged, have been there over time and will be there next year? I guess that's the question, because what's unusual about this funding decision by the government, this $120 million in pressure, is that it's for, essentially, basic services. So you lift up the health authorities and pull away the $120 million.

That's my question. What is so particular about the needs in this particular year? The minister — I think, to understand him correctly — has suggested that had the government realized that the economic problems were coming to British Columbia sooner, they might not have made the money available. I think that was implied by what he said.

Setting that aside, what's so particular about this period of time that forced the government to make this decision and then pull it away in future years, so that this period leading up to April 2009 gets this extra $120 million in funding, but in the government's view, that incremental funding, that $120 million, isn't needed in the year following April 2009?

Hon. G. Abbott: As you know, the last thing I would ever want to appear to be is quarrelsome. But the member said, and he can correct me if I misheard him…. I believe the member said that the services produced by the $120 million lift — and I think this is what he said — would not reduce out-year demand.

Well, that's wrong, and that, I think, goes to the fundamental premise of his question. In fact, the $120 million does reduce out-year demand. As I explained in a previous answer, the $120 million allows us to do MRIs, to do CAT scans, to do surgeries, to do a range of beneficial services and procedures which, in fact, will help us manage the demand in further years.

[1545]

Just to make the point and to bring it to a human level. If John needs a hip replacement, or believes he needs a hip replacement, there will be the necessity for at least one MRI, and advancing him on the MRI schedule has an impact. If we have the capacity for additional hip replacements, he can be moved up the line in terms of receiving the hip replacement.

People, of course, don't go out and get hip replacements because they think it would be interesting or fun. They get them because they're necessary, and once they're done, they're done. John would be the beneficiary of the $120 million invested.

Similarly, if Mary needs a knee replacement, again, she can get her MRI more quickly, she can get her surgery more quickly, and it will relieve the pressure that the Johns and Marys would bring on the health care system in a subsequent year.

So the member's premise that somehow the $120 million doesn't reduce out-year demands is flat-out wrong, I'm afraid. It is fundamentally flawed.

The member also said something to the effect of, "We pulled it away," meaning we didn't add $120 million
[ Page 13958 ]
again this year. Well, the fact of the matter is this — that in the budget for the '09-10 fiscal year beginning on April 1, there is an incremental $480 million going to the health authorities. In the subsequent '10-11 year there is $530 million incremental going to the health authorities, and in '11-12 another $560 million going to the health authorities. In total, that is a three-year lift to the base of $1.572 billion.

There are huge investments being made in the health authorities along with the Ministry of Health. In fact, I think, as the member may have heard…. Perhaps I should read it into the record now, given he may have missed it. I know how busy that opposition critic can be during times of budget. Ninety percent, nine-zero, of the incremental dollars, any additional dollars in the provincial budget over the next three years, go to health care.

So that's wonderful, and I'm sure the opposition critic will share in my fulsome satisfaction in seeing that level of commitment by the provincial government — 90 percent.

A. Dix: Well, I have to say, even though…. And forgive me, hon. Chair, because the minister was wandering into fiscal years future. Oh, I'm delighted with his decision to expand the terms of this debate, but I just say that that statistic, of course, is determined in part by cuts to the Ministry of Children and Families, cuts to court services, cuts to prosecution services. That statistic, if you cut everything else and were to give a lift to the Ministry of Health, would be 100 percent.

So there are two factors there, and I'm sure the minister doesn't feel quite as good about the serious impacts of cuts to the Ministry of Children and Family Development. But we digress. The minister inspires me to digress. So we'll get back to the topic.

The minister was agreeing with me. It seemed surprising. He sounded quarrelsome, but he wasn't quarrelsome. He was agreeing with me. I mean, John and Mary are going to need that $120 million this year, and it won't be there. That's the point I'm saying. It's one-time funding for operating. You lift the base; you take it away.

That's clear if you look at the three-year funding program. It's clear. You lift the base; you take it away. So if we needed that $120 million in '09-10, it wouldn't be there. That's the point I'm making to the minister, and he surprisingly agrees with me, although he has a remarkable capacity to make it sound like he's disagreeing with me.

I guess I want to take the minister through this because it seems to me, anyway, what's special about this period is that the minister and the Premier want to get through an election. So it was $120 million for this period that will disappear after the election.

[1550]

The minister talked about funding pressures. You can see it in the very budget he describes: on page 45 of the economic and fiscal plan where it says there is 3.5 percent of the grant to health authorities that are funding pressures — right? — in this coming year, which are unfunded in the budget. The minister says, "Well, they'll go out, and they'll find those moneys." Fair enough.

This year one of the things that helped them find that, presumably, was the $120 million. I mean, presumably, that was the case. The minister will recall — just to take him through the process of how we arrived at the $120 million figure magically — that last year we had a little debate about health estimates.

I suggested to the minister that the estimates for the health authorities were inadequate, given what the health authorities had said that their needs were, that the health authorities themselves had asked for more, and the minister said that it would be this.

Here's the minister agreeing with me again. It's an amazing thing.

Subsequent to that, the minister said, "Well, I think maybe the opposition was right" — but just on a one-time basis. He didn't lift the base. Just on a one-time basis — in his election year — he found an extra $120 million.

Maybe the minister can take us through the process that led to this $120 million decision. There was the decision in January 2007 to fire the chair of the board of the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, Mr. Trevor Johnstone. In the period that followed that…. He was fired — just to be clear — for running a deficit.

The minister was taking control. He was putting his hand on the thing, and there weren't going to be any more deficits. That's what happened.

Then we got into the 2008-2009 fiscal year. The health authorities asked for a certain amount of money, and the minister gave them less than that. The minister said that they would like it or lump it. Then in the middle of the fiscal year he found $120 million.

I just want to understand it from a process perspective. The health authorities very recently put their plans for the current fiscal year on their website. On a Thursday in February they decided to tell their staff and their clients and the people who live in the health authorities what their plans were for the fiscal year starting the previous April. That's what they decided to do.

Of course, that wasn't the beginning of the process. That's just when the public was let into the process. The beginning of the process, I think, was that the health service plans in question — which were in response to the allocation that was in the minister's budget, minus the $120 million — were presented to the minister in April.

I think they got an extension. In 2007-2008 it was March 31. The '08-09 thing was the middle of April. These aren't the health service plans we've seen — at least not exactly those that were put on the website — because all those health service plans refer to the lift in July. Presumably, they were rewritten at least to accommodate the list. Maybe the minister can tell us a bit more about that.
[ Page 13959 ]

What the health service plans presumably said to the minister was that if the levels continue at this funding level, there'll be cuts. Indeed, there'll be cuts — dare I say it? — in an election year. That's what Mr. Gordon Barefoot, for example, with whom the minister is familiar…. The chair of the Fraser Health Authority had a nice exchange with the chair of the board at a recent event the minister and I both attended in Surrey.

He said on May 19 that he had significant concerns that Fraser Health will be able to achieve its service plan targets to meet the needs of communities and balance its budget. That's what he said. That was May 19.

So maybe the minister can take me through the process of how we got to this $120 million. The health authority had asked for a certain amount of money. The minister said: "You're not going to get that." Everybody told the minister there would be cuts if we proceeded with that budget. The minister said no a hundred times in estimates. When I asked him that question, he said: "No, that's not possible."

The health authorities presumably appealed. They did their service plans. Then the minister decided at some point that he would find $120 million for this year.

Is that a fair description of the process? I ask the minister. What's the process after that in terms of the service plans? When were the new service plans produced after this $120 million announcement, and why was the decision made to table those service plans at the very end of fiscal year?

[1555]

Hon. G. Abbott: The member asked many, many questions in that dissertation. I'll try to address them as well as I can. But he may have to revisit some of them. There were, I suspect, dozens of questions contained in — as well as a number of assertions of questionable merit, or varying merit, let's say….

I should begin with this. My previous comments somehow were construed by the member as being in agreement with what he had asserted in his previous question to me. I'm sure it is in no way a reflection on the conceptual abilities of the member to understand what I said. I suspect, in fact, it is back again to that business of being such an amiable and affable kind of minister that even when I'm disagreeing, it appears that I'm agreeing — because of my affability and amiability. I'm sure that's what has occurred here.

Let me just revisit this point again. I referenced two citizens of British Columbia — John and Mary. John needed a hip replacement; Mary needed a knee replacement. The member says: "Well, they just need them again this year." Well, that's not the case. Again, the member can go to the wait-times registry — or the surgical patient registry, it's called more precisely. On there you can see who's waiting for procedures. Once John's had his MRI and once John's had his hip replacement, he won't be on the registry anymore.

We actually make progress with the dollars invested in more diagnostics and more surgeries. Similarly, Mary comes off the surgical patient registry because she's had her procedure, she's had her knee replacement, and so we free up room for others. Overall, we can reduce the surgical patient registry by hundreds, if not thousands, by making that investment. We had the fiscal capacity.

Now, this is to the member's question. Well, how did it develop? We had the fiscal capacity. We were seeing remarkable revenues from some sources like oil and gas, and we had the opportunity to make the investment. It seemed wise to make that incremental investment, to try to ensure to the extent we could, to advance patient procedures. I think, in fact, it was a very, very good idea.

Frankly, I'm shocked that the member appears to read some kind of nefarious scheme or conspiracy into all that, as if somehow the public policy decision around that would be skewed by base political motives. I suppose maybe it's the culture in which the member existed for so long. Perhaps that was the order of the day when he had a leadership position in….

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: The member for Malahat–Juan de Fuca says: "It was never like that." Well, I don't know whether it was or not. My grasp of the history of that period is tenuous at best.

I do want to say that it was with sincere and pure motives that this $120 million was advanced. It was a genuine opportunity to advance patient care. It seemed sensible, and no one…. I don't believe even the member spoke up against it. I don't recall anyone speaking up against it. It was a good opportunity, and it's produced better patient care, more timely care. I think it's a very, very positive thing.

A. Dix: Well, that's an interesting description of history and an interesting trip down memory lane. But the reality is, of course, that just speaking…. Unless John and Mary are the accountants for the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority or John and Mary are accountants for the Fraser Health Authority, given the numbers that appear in the budget, these were all to deal with deficits, in fact.

They were to avoid cuts to services, not to provide services. That, indeed, is what people in the Fraser Health Authority have said in their response to it. They said that they were anticipating cuts to services that they would have to make and that what the money from the ministry did was avoid that.

[1600]

Equally, when you look at the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, which…. We'll get into these issues of deficits in a moment, because I know they fascinate the minister, and it will allow us to go through one of our
[ Page 13960 ]
usual debates about the existence of deficits in health authorities.

The Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, presumably, without the $35 million — they're running a $28 million deficit — would either have cut services, existing services by definition, or they would have run a $63 million deficit — if you add the $28 million to the $35 million.

So John and Mary are the accountants for the health authorities. If the purpose, as the minister said in the case of Vancouver Coastal, was to reduce the deficit that the health authority was facing and has faced over a period of years — it adds up to, I think, $100 million so far, and it appears in this coming budget that those amounts will grow even higher — then I think it's clear that the intent of this, the problem here, was that the health authorities were saying that we could do one of two things. We could cut services in an election year on the one hand, or all the health authorities would run deficits.

I mean, I think it's the case, in the case of the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority. It's reasonable to say that had they not received this $35 million, their deficit would be higher. I think that's reasonable. As it stands, the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority is running a deficit.

I guess my question to the minister, as he goes through this process, is: what were the cuts that were being avoided, when Mr. Barefoot refers to cuts? What were the cuts that were going to be avoided by this infusion of money? The minister has talked about John and Mary, but what services was the Fraser Health Authority going to cut from John and Mary had this money not come forward? Is it not the case that the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority is still running a deficit in spite of the arrival of this $35 million?

Hon. G. Abbott: The answer is yes to the latter portion of the member's question.

To the former portion, which involves the Fraser Health Authority, I think I want to observe off the top that the Fraser Health Authority has a long tradition of balancing their budget. There is no occasion since the formation of the Fraser Health Authority where that health authority has had anything other than a balanced budget or a modest surplus.

Last year it was a modest surplus, I think, of just a few million dollars. But they do a very effective and thoughtful job of managing their budgets, and every year they've come in with a balanced budget or something akin to it — a modest surplus. I expect that they will do that in the current year as well.

In terms of where did the Fraser Health Authority spend their money, I'll just…. This comes from some analysis that was done on the question the member raises. Through the infusion, FHA is able to address a 3 percent increase in emergency room visits, address a 12 percent increase in ambulatory care visits, increase day care surgical cases by almost 1 percent, increase assisted-living personal care hours by 22 percent.

I should also note that in terms of the detail around the surgical procedures, since 2001-2002, which reflects the time at which the FHA was created, not long after a change of government — that, I guess, is more than coincidental, since we're the ones that created the new structure, but I'm sure the member will celebrate these figures along with me — the Fraser Health Authority has increased angioplasties by 112 percent. They've increased cataract procedures by 56 percent. They've increased day surgery cases by 25 percent. They've increased MRI exams by 285 percent, and they've increased CT scans by 82 percent.

Again, to the point I made earlier, different health authorities have utilized the funds in different ways. Across the range of areas I cited particularly is where it has been most valuable to Fraser Health Authority.

[1605]

A. Dix: Is it not the case…? I mean, the Fraser Health Authority…. I'm just looking at their statement of operations, their proposed ones for this year. They're not talking about running any kind of surplus this year. They're talking about being right on balance after receiving the $40 million. That's what they're saying.

The minister, I presume…. He shrugs, but he knows the answer, of course, to these questions because he gets regular reports. So what I'm saying to the minister is that either it did not receive the $40 million…. And this is what Mr. Barefoot said, as well, in public, I think — that either they would have run a deficit or they would have cut services. That's clearly what was going to happen, because as Mr. Barefoot said, and as people from Fraser Health said, the budget provided by the ministry was inadequate. I guess that's the point I'm making.

The minister talks about, for example, Fraser Health dealing with a higher-than-expected number of emergency room visits. They're not alone in that. I think Vancouver Coastal Health, at some of their institutions, is dealing with that as well, as are some other health authorities. We don't want to go on too long about John and Mary or even Joe the Plumber or anyone else. But I guess the point is that emergency room visits are things that — to pay for them — are ongoing costs of health authorities.

I think the point I'm making is that if in fact there's a 3 percent lift in emergency room visits and you're using your share of $120 million to deal with that this year, what are you going to use next year? When we're talking about a budget that's right on the edge of going into deficit, as this clearly was, according not just to me but the Fraser Health Authority, then that's what you have.

I guess I'll just ask the minister, then, since he suggests that Fraser Health is going to balance the budget this year, to answer about the other health authorities
[ Page 13961 ]
and whether the $120 million here has assisted the other health authorities in balancing their budgets.

For example, the Northern Health Authority suggested today publicly that they were a little bit behind and that they'd have to make some cuts to balance by March 31. Is it the minister's expectation, based on the reports from the health authorities which he has, that the Vancouver Island Health Authority, the Northern Health Authority and the Interior Health Authority will balance their budgets for the current fiscal year?

Hon. G. Abbott: We always hope and expect that health authorities will balance their budgets. Every year the health authorities work tirelessly towards that objective.

The member says: "Well, how are they possibly going to replace the $120 million?" We talked about that earlier, and I provided the member with the additions of $480 million, $530 million and $560 million — over $1.5 billion over the three years of the plan. That's an approximate 20 percent increase in the budget for the health authorities over those three years.

The member somehow ascribes particular magic to the $120 million, as if that is the only thing in the world that can solve problems or balance budgets. It's not true. It's helpful, and it is absolutely beneficial, but it is the over $1.5 billion addition to base that is critical to ensuring that health authorities operate on a sound basis into the future.

I'll talk a moment about some of the other things. Again, I think there's an assertion here that health care funding is some kind of zero-sum game where you're either losing or winning, and there's no place where there is a possible win-win. Again, that's not true.

One of the things we have been attempting to ensure in health authorities is that they be thinking on a constant basis about where, through shared services or other mechanisms, we can not only secure better patient care but also secure budgetary savings which can then be returned to front-line patient care.

[1610]

One of the very good examples of this is the approximately $150 million in savings that will come from having a common supply chain — i.e., common procurement — among all the health authorities.

I know the member is a strong supporter of those collaborative efforts between the health authorities, so I won't dwell on it. I know he's a very, very strong supporter of those kinds....

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: No, not a strong supporter of that.

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: Oh, you don't believe in shared services either. Okay, fair enough.

A. Dix: No, just the $150 million.

Hon. G. Abbott: Oh, you don't believe the $150 million. Well, it's interesting. The reason why places like Costco and others exist, where people do bulk buying, is that you get savings by buying in bulk. Why would we have six health authorities or subdivisions of six health authorities buying independently and not getting savings that they can get by having pooled procurement? I guess the member disbelieves that it is possible to save any money anywhere in the system.

I guess maybe that comes back to some fundamental difference in our outlook. There are always those for whom the glass will always be half-empty. For those of us for whom the glass is always half-full…. I see the member has just got a full glass, so maybe it has shaped his perspective for the balance of these mini-estimates. But I actually do believe that things like shared services, common procurement — a whole range of initiatives which we are promoting and which the health authorities are embracing — help us to meet some of the quite compelling budgetary demands.

One of the things I've never done in the now almost four years as Health Minister is try to diminish the very real pressures that are on the health authorities on a day-to-day basis. It is a challenging role, but I do believe that every day, if we think about it, we can find opportunities to produce both better patient care and savings, which again can be translated into more and better patient care.

I think it's germane to point this out, although you may be calling me to order any moment, Madam Chair, for taking far too expansive a view of these discussions. I will, if you chastise me, of course bring myself into full compliance with your direction.

You look at things like the health innovation fund, $100 million. A couple of years ago we did that, and through that we have remarkable projects like eye care in Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal Health that have developed out of that — better management of patient flow through hospitals, through the eye care program — terrific innovation and one that I'm sure every member of the House would celebrate.

We saw examples of managing emergency department pressures more effectively. The streaming project at Kelowna General Hospital is a terrific example of that. I know the hon. member particularly likes the pay-for-performance emergency department project that was undertaken at a number of hospitals in Vancouver Coastal and that now is extending into Fraser Health.

But these are innovations that we backstopped first with the health innovation fund. More recently, in the last fiscal year and the current fiscal year, we have the innovation and integration fund, which again are ways that we encourage and nurture more collaborative efforts between health authorities so that patients can benefit from that.
[ Page 13962 ]

We have also — this is $100 million that resides with the Ministry of Health, but it will be expended in the health authorities — what's called the transformation fund, whereby again we can move on some of the shared services or some of the new approaches to the distribution of clinical care, which can make for a stronger health care system overall.

You know, I think the prognosis is good. I think the $120 million was a helpful step towards that.

[1615]

We know that the $1.5 billion–plus lift to base is going to be critical for health authorities. Within of course your guidance, hon. Chair, I'm always happy to hear more from the opposition Health critic with respect to the opposition NDP vision for how health care should be funded.

Apparently I've excited the member. He has two thumbs up to that opportunity. I'll look forward to that. As the member will tell you here, because I can see he's about to embark on, I think, an extensive dissertation on this area. This is something that I know British Columbians have been looking forward to for some time, hearing what the NDP's vision for health care is. I know the member is willing to provide it.

It is about choices. The fact that, yes, this government has made a choice to provide 90 percent of every incremental dollar to health care is a choice. So the member may tell us that there are different choices we should be making. Maybe we should be expanding taxation. Maybe we should be increasing fees.

An Hon. Member: Liquor prices.

Hon. G. Abbott: Maybe adjusting liquor prices. That's possible. I know liquor prices are coming up quite a lot in question period, so it's clearly quite a concern for the opposition.

We're always happy to hear different visions of how we can improve health care, but I like the track we're on.

A. Dix: The question was…. We'll come back to it very specifically. The Vancouver Coastal Health Authority ran a deficit. We have this exchange every year now — it's become kind of an annual tradition, and I'm delighted these supplementary estimates give us a chance to explore it again — where the minister says: "The health authorities can't run deficits. I give them enough money. They can't run deficits." They do run a deficit. In fact, it's in the plan approved by the Health Minister. He says again "They may run deficits, but they can't run deficits."

I think the question that set off that most recent flight of fancy, which I would love to respond to at length…. We're going to have plenty of opportunities that I look forward to. I know that the minister, like me, has received an invitation to debate.

I've received an invitation to debate with him in the middle of March, I think, sponsored by the B.C. Health Coalition. The estimates may still be going on, so we may not be available at that time for that. As I recall, I accepted, and the minister didn't. He had something else — all that is fair enough. I'm sure we'll have many opportunities to debate.

I look forward to those opportunities throughout the campaign. It's going to be very interesting and compelling. But the question was, and we're back on the $120 million: is Vancouver Coastal Health running a deficit this year? Are they projecting a deficit for next year, and are any other of the health authorities? Northern Health said they're about $121,000 down for this year, and the Vancouver Island Health Authority is on the edge of deficit as well.

So the question is: is Vancouver Coastal Health running a deficit? If so, what is the latest projection for that? How is that impacted by the $120 million? Is Fraser Health expected to run a deficit, or as the minister I think asserted, they were going to just balance. With this additional $40 million, they're just going to balance. Jack and Mary, the accountants at Fraser Health, will be very happy with that. They're going to balance.

What about Northern Health, what about Vancouver Island Health Authority, and what about Interior Health Authority? That was the question that I just asked.

You know, I don't get to control the answers; I just get to ask the questions. That's the question, and I'll leave it to the minister to do his best with that.

Hon. G. Abbott: Well, I'll do my best to hide my disappointment at that response, because I sensed that we were going to hear something about the choices that the NDP would be making around health care and other services.

You know, when you've got a special light in your hand, you don't want to behind it under a bushel for too long. The longer that you can expose.…

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: This little light of mine — yes, yes. The more you can let that light shine, the longer the public will have to try to understand what that light is.

Don't hide on my account, particularly, and don't let the strictures of this debate confine you from sharing some of that vision with us. I think the citizens of British Columbia will find it enormously beneficial in terms of….

[1620]

An Hon. Member: And illuminating.

Hon. G. Abbott: And illuminating as well, particularly if one extends the light metaphor. Illuminating as well. Yeah.
[ Page 13963 ]

In terms of the deficit, our anticipation now is that Vancouver Coastal will be running a deficit for '08-09. At one point they were forecasting a $35 million deficit. They have been working very hard to try to reduce that. Our understanding, at least as of the most recent quarter, is that they were looking at a $28 million deficit, but they are continuing their work to try to bring that deficit down.

They have committed to attempting to balance, and I hope that they are able to do so. All the other health authorities, we hope and believe, will be balancing. I think among those…. I'm sure for none of them balancing is easy, but our expectation is that they can and will balance.

A. Dix: Just so I understand, the minister is saying that clearly…. It's interesting news that the other health authorities will all balance their budgets in the coming fiscal year. It's his view — and this is what appears in the plan — that the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority will have a $28 million deficit, which is on top of $44 million and $35 million, pushing them into a $100 million accumulated debt.

Perhaps the minister can explain this to me. Last year, when I asked him about the deficits, he said: "You know, you always want to spend more money." But in fact they are spending more money. They're running a deficit, so they are spending more money. They spent $100 million more. Can the minister just explain to me how this works?

Presumably, he could go back and eliminate that deficit. It wouldn't have any effect on spending, but he could have had a supplementary estimate that would eliminate the deficit. He says it's $28 million. It was $35 million. It was $44 million the previous year. He could do that. The money has been spent, so it's just the approval of the spending of the money that would be in question — right?

At some point the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority or the Minister of Health — presumably, after the next election the next Minister of Health, whoever that might be — will have to consider getting approval of this Legislature for the overspending. It's the Legislature at some point, unless the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority….

Given the continuing demands of the health authority, they're not going to start having surpluses where they're going to draw down the deficits, I assume. I don't think that's likely to happen. So at some point in the future as this deficit grows and grows from $44 million to $79 million to over $100 million…. They suggest in the coming years $91 million and $108 million in pressures that are unfunded, so I presume that number will go up at some point.

The minister is suggesting that he will come into the House and do another supplementary estimate that deals with that. Otherwise, the only way that they would deal with it, presumably, is eventually run a surplus and then draw it down themselves, which doesn't seem likely given the pressures that the minister has described, where all of the health authorities are right on the edge of balancing.

Can the minister just explain to me how that works? They keep running deficits, and presumably they keep operating because the new money comes in, in the next fiscal year. They can keep going paying it forward like that. Can he explain how it works when a health authority runs a deficit?

The government has repeatedly said that this is impossible and that it won't happen. Sometimes it seems to give permission, and it doesn't. This time the government clearly is giving permission to the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority to run a deficit, as they have in previous years, because presumably, the service plan that was tabled by the health authority has been signed off by the minister.

My question is: how does it work? Has the minister effectively signed off for the third consecutive year on a deficit at the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority?

[1625]

Hon. G. Abbott: Hon. Chair, perhaps I should be seeking your guidance on this point. I am glad to answer the member's question. What does the anticipated deficit at Vancouver Coastal Health mean? I'm glad to answer that.

The member asked a bunch of questions. Would we come back into the House with another supplemental estimate, or would we do this, or would we write it off, or would we do that? Those seem to me to be areas of future policy which go well beyond the scope of what one would expect for debate on the question of the $120 million supplemental estimate.

But I'll answer the member's question, and if you have any guidance that you could provide to the House with respect to that, I think it would be appreciated.

In terms of the deficit, the deficits would remain what's termed an "accumulated deficit" against the Vancouver Coastal Health balance sheet and financial statements.

A. Dix: I mean, the direct relevance here is clearly…. The minister said it in his answer. It's not my answer, but it's his answer. The minister said — and I don't think I'm quoting him unfairly — that the $35 million that went to the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority was provided to help them deal with these very fiscal issues — to reduce the deficit that we were talking about. And the consequences of that deficit are significant.

That's exactly, presumably, why the government voted the $120 million. I think it's fair enough. It's one of the purposes. If they hadn't received the $120 million, presumably if all of the health authorities are close to
[ Page 13964 ]
balancing, then they would all run into deficits or have had to cut services.

[H. Bloy in the chair.]

I guess that's the question for the minister in terms of the budgeting, which this $120 million is part of. He presumably received the service plans from the health authority. Part of the response to the initial service plans, the ones that came in April, would have been this $120 million. I think the minister has acknowledged that publicly, although I don't want to misquote him, and he can speak for himself, I'm sure. But this was part of the response to the initial arrival of the service plans.

He would have seen the service plans, seen the deficit. So my question is — and it's directly relevant to this $120 million debate: did the minister sign off on the service plan that included a deficit for Vancouver Coastal Health Authority this year in the context of this $120 million supplementary estimate?

Hon. G. Abbott: The Vancouver Coastal Health Authority committed to attempting to balance. That is what they've committed to do, and that is what we expect them to do.

Again, to the member's earlier questions and this one, the $120 million was possible because of our revenue situation. It would not be possible today to do the same thing. Those revenues are not there in the same way.

But in terms of the service plans. I know, again, the member looks at service plans and concocts all manner of dilemmas and boogeymen around them. But what we do with service plans, and I know…. I don't know whether the former NDP government…. Did they have…? I'm not sure if they had service plans that one could compare against. I don't believe so. I don't believe the former government had service plans.

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: Be that as it may. What we do when we invite the health authorities to submit service plans is that we say — and we actually say "please" at the start of the sentence: "Please identify risks and pressures which your health authority may be subject to." We actually go out to them and we say, "Please identify your risks and pressures," and they are invariably good enough to come back and give us a whole list of what they believe may be risks and pressures in their plan.

Fair enough. By them identifying those risks and pressures, we're able to try to better manage programs, funds and opportunities for the health authorities to deal with those risks and pressures. But we are not in the business of concocting Orwellian reports that say: "Everything's just peachy, and we'll never need another dollar, and the population pressures are going to go away regardless of what we do." We don't want that. We don't expect that. We want them to tell us their risks and pressures, and they do that in a very fulsome way.

[1630]

Again, I think that's a useful part of understanding what we do. But it was not, as the member suggests, that I received some early service plan results and said: "Oh my god, we've got to give them $120 million." Every year there are pressures. Every year we know that if we can make some early investments on diagnostics, on surgeries, on some of the range of things….

I can talk a little bit more about Vancouver Coastal at this point to perhaps be useful for the member. How did VCHA spend their money? They've been able to address a 3.3 percent increase in emergency room visits, address a 2.5 percent increase in ambulatory care visits — that normally involves, as the member knows, minor surgical procedures — increase day care surgical cases by more than 3 percent and increase residential care hours by 5 percent.

Like Fraser Health, Vancouver Coastal has also, I think, a very proud record in terms of the surgeries that they've been able to undertake. As examples — and this is since fiscal '01-02 — they have increased angioplasties by 16 percent, cataract procedures by 18 percent, day-surgery cases by 15 percent, MRI exams by 63 percent and CT scans by 65 percent. So there's good work being done in all health authorities, and having that incremental $120 million was helpful towards that.

A. Dix: As I say, on the supplementary estimates — which, as the minister says, essentially are used broadly in the health authorities to deal with…. I won't say the minister said this. I'll say that the chair of Fraser Health says it.

For example, he said, referring to the $120 million: "It will help to ensure we balance our budget." They had a budget shortfall, and the $120 million helped them balance the budget. That's what the chair of Fraser Health said.

I guess what I want to focus on, because the minister talked about…. He didn't magically get the service plan. He got the service plan, and he didn't magically say there was a problem. I suspect, going back to governments in the 1970s, that these inter-year discussions took place. They may not have magically started in 2001.

In any event, the minister received the first service plans, He had said the previous year, when he released them in October having received them in March, that he would try and do better in subsequent years. He then said in July, when he provided the $120 million, that the service plans were indeed coming in October. Subsequent to that, the service plans, which of course are paid for out of the estimates and the supplementary estimates for the health authorities….

The head of Fraser Health said: "We're still waiting to hear back from the government on the acceptance of the
[ Page 13965 ]
plan." This is the plan for this year — this fiscal year, the one starting April 1, 2008, and ending March 31, 2009. But when did the Fraser Health board chair say this? He said it on December 9, 2008.

My question to the minister, and I've asked it a couple of ways, is to explain this process — how it happens, how the process is that he accepts the service plan. Remember, in the case of Vancouver Coastal Health, what he's doing is accepting a deficit which he said he would never accept previously. I'm just trying to understand the process here around this $120 million supplementary estimate.

Perhaps the minister can explain to me when he approved the service plans, when the most recent version of the service plans was written. Presumably, they were written after the $120 million, but they relate directly to the expenditure of the $120 million. Maybe the minister can do, as he often does, a tour d'horizon and let us know how that works.

Hon. G. Abbott: Again, it may be a case here where I welcome the advice of the Chair and the Clerk with respect to what the bounds are around supplementary estimates for this $120 million.

[1635]

I want to be helpful. The member knows that invariably I am helpful in estimates, because it's a process I love, and it's a process that I know he loves. That mutual affection for estimates kind of binds us together in quite remarkable ways. That having been said, it may well be that the guidance of the Chair would be appropriate here.

Just to get one point clear, though, Mr. Chair. We didn't accept the deficit. We accepted their commitment that they would do everything possible to eliminate the deficit. They have been reducing it, and we're continuing to see progress with respect to deficit reduction. So that is pleasing and appropriate to me.

In terms of the timing around the service plans, the member is right to upbraid me with respect to the timeliness of the release of the service plans. Fair enough. But they did get a $120 million lift midway through the fiscal year, and service plans, I'm sure, were adjusted to reflect that additional $120 million.

I do accept the member's suggestion that if they could come out more quickly, that would be a wonderful thing, though I won't be argumentative about the point.

A. Dix: But the $120 million, and its relevance, is directly referenced in all the service plans, and they're directly relevant to it. I just had very specific questions for the minister about the process, because that $120 million and how it would be adjusted as a midyear adjustment in the service plan is reflected in all the service plans.

At some point that had to be approved by the minister. In fact, Mr. Barefoot said on December 9 that he was waiting for the acceptance of the plan.

We'll just use the minister's theory of these things for a moment. When we're talking about the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, in '06-07 he accepted their best efforts to reduce the deficit. That was his position, and they ran a deficit.

Then in '07-08, same thing. He accepted that they were trying not to have a deficit. Even though he didn't accept the deficit, it happened. The same thing has happened in '08-09 and presumably will happen in '09-10 and in '10-11 if, by some terrible circumstance, the government is re-elected.

My specific question to the minister on the service plan, though, which of course deals directly with the $120 million in question, references it and presumably is in some ways required…. The acceptance of the service plan is a key requirement for the health authorities, so I think that puts it in the ballpark of relevance — if I may make that case to the minister. Then can he tell me at what point he approved the service plan, including the $120 million in terms of supplementary estimates? At what point did he do that?

Remember, Northern Health Authority got $5 million out of this $120 million. They got $5 million. Even though that's obviously a more significant share than $5 million would be in the Fraser Health budget, it's still $5 million. I think that's what the number is in the plan. Is he saying that it took them months and months and months to produce the service plan and put it on his desk to make that adjustment for the $5 million?

We know that's not true, because the date August 28 appears on the service plan that they sent to the minister. They had already done the new version of the service plan. So my question to the minister is: after the $120 million, when did the health authorities table with him their service plans? And what was the process for approving them, given the midyear adjustment of the $120 million?

Hon. G. Abbott: It's the health authority boards that approve the plans, not the minister. The minister accepts them and posts them, but the boards approve the plans.

When the health authorities received the $120 million lift, I'm certain they set about revising their service plans to reflect that. We receive the revised service plans from the health authorities at different intervals.

[1640]

Staff review them. We work through any issues that may be residual in the plans with the health authorities, and over a period of time, depending on how quickly all the issues can be worked through, they come to a point where they can be accepted and posted.

A. Dix: The minister talks about the health authority boards signing off on the service plan. I would ask the minister, for our edification in the debate, whether he
[ Page 13966 ]
would table in the House the original service plans prior to the supplementary estimate.

The boards of the health authority, as I understand it, in April provided the minister with service plans. He received them, as I understand it. The minister is shaking his head. That sometimes indicates agreement when I'm up, so you never know.

But that's the question I have. Will he table in the House the original service plans? Those were presumably approved by the health authority boards, which is a public agency. Does he have any problem in letting us see what he saw, letting the public see what he saw in April? That's the delay in the process.

I want to ask the minister more generally about that, because it directly relates to this $120 million. Why is it that it takes until December, setting aside…?

Let's acknowledge that the minister is starting from scratch on July 28. Let's assume that, although I don't think that's the case here. But why does it take until after December for the minister to accept the service plan when in theory, if the minister wasn't accepting the service plan, there would be very little time in the fiscal year to make changes to the plan?

Hon. G. Abbott: The service plans are complex documents that are the object of much discussion between the ministry and the health authorities. The minister…. The member may have suggested that. I shouldn't call you minister.

The member said at some point: "If in some circumstance the government was re-elected…." The fact of the matter is that in every circumstance, the government is going to be re-elected. So you can look forward to that and perhaps even keeping that same seat — that comfortable seat on the opposition side of the House — for a long, long time yet. That's a delightful thing, I'm sure.

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: Yes, you personally. I mean, after the job you've done as opposition Health critic, I can't imagine…. I'm sorry, hon. Chair. I'm perhaps straying just slightly from the topic.

The service plans are very complex documents. We did not receive a draft even in April. It was well beyond April before we saw any service plan proposals. But it is an iterative process, and ultimately we are able to accept and post those service plans.

It seems to me that we're having an enormous exchange of information here, when I'm not sure exactly what the point is that the member hopes to make. If the member is making the point that we provided the health authorities with $120 million because we believed they had pressures that could be assisted by the $120 million that good economic management made available to us, he's right.

If he wants to move right through to that point, perhaps we're quicker to agreement than we thought. It's a fascinating issue, debating how service plans evolve. I'm sure that tens and tens of British Columbians are hanging on this debate we're having, learning fascinating things about service plans that they never believed they would learn. But I'm not sure where we're going with all this.

[1645]

The Chair: If I could remind the member, all members, that we're talking about the supplementary estimates and that the questions should be directed towards the allocation of the $120 million.

A. Dix: As the Chair will know, because I'm sure he's read in detail the service plans, the $120 million and the issue around the allocation of that $120 million occupies words, if not paragraphs, in those service plans.

It's just a very simple question. The minister may want to make a meal of it, but it's a very simple question. I think he likes to give these long dissertations in terms of answers.

The Northern Health Authority service plan was provided to him on August 29. Can he tell us when the service plans are posted that include the discussion of how the health authorities were going to use the $120 million, when they were provided to him and when he accepted them? That's a very simple question, really, to the minister. It's a point of fact, and it's a point of interest to those people who are trying to discern what the government is doing in terms of health policy.

Hon. G. Abbott: I'm glad to get the member any degree of detail around the Northern Health Authority service plan — when it was received and how it evolved in the course of the months following. The money was only allocated, though, on July 31, so it wouldn't have been August that we received their supplemental service…. That must have been the original that you're showing to me.

At any rate, I don't want to be difficult or uncooperative with the member. I'm glad to get him any degree of detail that he seeks around dates and words and stuff that might have been looked at in the Northern Health service plan. I'm glad to provide him with whatever information he feels would be beneficial to his understanding of the Northern Health service plan.

A. Dix: I didn't want the minister to believe I was only talking about the Northern Health service plan. It just happens to fall in front of me on my desk here. There's a date on it, and that date is August 29, 2008. The service plan makes reference to the July supplementary estimate which we're debating in the House and talks about how we're spending it. That's why we're discussing
[ Page 13967 ]
this. Presumably this is the service plan. The one that's posted is the one that's approved.

Really, I'm delighted that the minister will tell me more information, if he can get it, on the dates he decided to approve the service plans. Let's list them all just for certainty in terms of the minister's answer: the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, the Fraser Health Authority, the Vancouver Island Health Authority, the Northern Health Authority and the Provincial Health Authority. If the minister can provide that, that's no problem. I'll just move on.

Hon. G. Abbott: Just to be entirely constructive about this, health authorities were required to submit their annual service plans and detailed budget working papers by April 14, 2008. Each health authority's BWPs must align with its service plan and with government's priorities.

Following consultation with ministry staff, NHA submitted a revised service plan in May 2008, which addressed minor deficiencies. On August 13, 2008, NHA was advised by the ministry of an additional one-time funding allocation for 2008-2009. To account for the one-time funding allocation, NHA submitted an amended plan on August 29, 2008. In response to requests by the minister's office in November and December 2008 for additional revisions, NHA made additional revisions. The final revised plan was re-approved by the NHA board chair on January 15, 2009.

A. Dix: That's wonderful. If the minister would be so kind to provide the same information for the other health authorities, which he can read into the record or not read into the record as he sees fit, that would be wonderful.

The relevance of the process for people — maybe for people working for the health authority as well…. The minister makes much of the fact that the service plans exist.

[1650]

He has suggested, I think, that the reason they're late this year — and we'll grant him that; they're later this year than they were in 2007-2008 in publishing those service plans — is that this $120 million that we're debating in the estimates is there.

The question I have for him is: why so late? Presumably, the service plan for the health authority, while it may not be generally interesting to everybody — the minister talked about tens and tens of people — would be useful information for at least those working for the health authority to know. It became available for this year last Thursday. That's when the minister, in his wisdom, chose to post them on the website.

I guess the case I'm making — which is directly relevant to the $120 million in funding provided, which is dealt with in all of the service plans — and asking is: why does it take so long to provide the public with this information?

Hon. G. Abbott: Again, I'm not sure what the point is here. The service plans are large and complex documents. We want them to be accurate. I'm sure the member would take great umbrage were they inaccurate.

We strive for accuracy. We strive for clarity. We try to ensure that all the issues are appropriately flagged, that risks and pressures are clearly identified, and that mitigation strategies for managing those are identified. All of that is good, appropriate, sound public policy.

In the case of Northern Health Authority, which the member cited as an example, the final revised plan was approved by the NHA board chair on January 15, 2009. As the member noted, it was posted, I believe, sometime last week.

A. Dix: I suppose it's the service plan for 2008-2009. Does the minister think that a process where the plan for the year is finalized nine and a half months in the year…? Whatever the plan is, there's going to be in-year adjustments. We know that. But a process that leads to the plan for the year being finalized on January 15 — is it the right approach?

That's the question — and whether, in fact, it would not serve the public better if the initial service plans were made public so that everyone could see the issues in question early in the year and that people who work for the health authorities — who, in fairness to the minister, will find out about the health authorities' priorities in other ways — may actually like to see before the year ends.

It seems to me that posting them publicly at the end of February, when the fiscal year is about to end…. That doesn't seem to me, anyway, to be — even assuming the $120 million, which is dealt with in all these service plans…. Even assuming that, that doesn't strike me as a process that's working well.

I might point out to the minister that when the minister tabled them in October of 2007, in the 2007-2008 years, the minister said at that time that he wanted them to be out earlier, I think. So we're a year later. These are the service plans containing the $120 million in funding, and they're much later.

So I want to ask the minister — I mean, finalizing January 15, which is nine and a half months into the fiscal year: does he think that's the right approach?

Hon. G. Abbott: I'm surprised to hear this question again, because earlier I acknowledged that it would have been good to have it out earlier. But one of the consequences of the $120 million infusion was that there were some revisions of service plans that were occasioned by that.

[1655]

I didn't disagree with the member's premise that it would have been good to have them out earlier. I don't for a moment disparage that premise.
[ Page 13968 ]

Again, I'm not sure what we're arguing about. Perhaps we're going down some lane here that later will reveal all to me. I don't dispute that it would have been nice to have them out earlier. But again, we had a $120 million infusion. That changed things.

I hope the member is not suggesting that somehow the interests of health authority employees and others would be served by having partial or incomplete or inaccurate service plans posted. I don't expect that anyone would benefit from that. There's a process here, and it may not be a perfect process, but I think it's a pretty good process. I think it's really a lot better than no service plans at all, which I believe used to be the case back in the day — back in the 1990s.

I don't know. Maybe they were a perfect instrument back then, and we've forgotten all about them. Sometimes things are so perfect that you just don't remember them. I just don't recall any service plans at all, never mind a flawed one, from the 1990s. But if there was, I'm sure I can be reminded of that and rightly chastised for it.

Again, service plans are important, but one of the things that has changed dramatically over the years is that if you look back a decade in this province, health authorities often didn't even know what their budgets were until June, July or August. They had no idea what their budgets were, never mind what the service plan looked like. They had no idea what their budget was going to be.

So we've come a long ways. I know the member strives for perfection, and I'm glad that in his relentless way he drives me on to try to achieve something closer to perfection. I think that we're glad to try to do that, in terms of the timeliness around service plans.

A. Dix: I think maybe the problem, I'd say to the minister, was the word "plan." If you come out with your plan after the year is over, it's more of a retrospective than a plan. That's all. One would hope, if it was the plan for this year, that you might table it early enough in the year that it would actually be a plan as opposed to a retrospective document.

What makes it relevant to the minister…. I know that the minister is very hesitant, except for occasional ventures into the 1990s, to go outside the scope of the supplementary estimates. What makes it relevant, of course, is that in December of this year — in the time when the money was being spent here in the plan — the health authorities were told that for next year….

They were originally told not to prepare service plans. Then they were told: "You don't have to worry about service plans even starting the process till the end of February." It would appear — if, as I say, the rare chance occurs and the government is in fact re-elected — that January 15 might look like an optimistic time for next year.

I wanted to lead in because the minister…. Over the next number of days as we explore this very general $120 million supplementary estimate and how it's spent in various areas….

How we're going to explore this. I think the first area…. I know the minister doesn't just have staff in the room. He's got staff beyond the room — that's possible, anyway, that it's in some other room — watching the debate. Let's say that one of the things we'll be doing later today is that my colleague from Delta North will start to talk about the implications of how this $120 million fits into seniors care and residential care.

I wanted to just give the minister an opportunity. We talked quite a bit about Vancouver Coastal Health and the fact that their share of the $120 million, the $35 million, was being used to close the gap on the deficit and that Fraser Health — at least according to the chair of Fraser Health — was being used to close the gap on the deficit. We spent some time on those.

[1700]

I wonder if the minister can talk to us a little bit about the other health authorities. PHSA didn't get any of this money, so the three other health authorities…. According to their service plan, the Vancouver Island Health Authority focused much of their funding on costs associated with the opening of facilities, I think that's fair to say.

Perhaps the minister can take us through, as we sort of finish this general opening to these days of debate, what the $5 million the Northern Health Authority spent was used for, what the $17.5 million the Vancouver Island Health Authority spent was for, what the Interior Health Authority's allocation was, what the focus of those specifically were, because we haven't talked about them as much, although we will over the next few days.

Hon. G. Abbott: I'm delighted to hear we're going to have days for this. This is such a delightful time. It's almost like full estimates, having days to deal with $120 million in supplementary estimates. That's fabulous. Really looking forward to that. I guess it may be withdrawal from never getting any questions in question period any more. I guess this is an opportunity to get that attention that one craves every day in question period and rarely receives in more recent days. I'm delighted to hear that the days ahead will be filled with Health subestimates, as that will be fascinating indeed.

To begin, I just want to correct the member's characterization about how the Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal Health share of their $120 million allocations were utilized. I don't believe, and I know I didn't ever agree with the member's suggestion, that they were used exclusively to reduce potential deficits. In fact, I read into the record earlier, and I won't do it again, in response to the question of where did VCHA spend their money, a number of statistics, etc., with respect to emergency rooms, ambulatory care, and so on.
[ Page 13969 ]

I did the same for the Fraser Health Authority. Again, I will spare the House the necessity of reading that again.

In terms of the Northern Health Authority, which I think is the next area that the member wanted to canvass, where did NHA spend their money? They were able to address a 25.5 percent increase in ambulatory care visits. They were able to increase day care surgical cases by more than 6 percent, and they were able to increase residential care hours by 2.9 percent.

Those were three of the ways that the $5 million was invested by Northern Health Authority. Just for the record, Northern Health Authority has been able, through the period up until '07-08, to increase cataract procedures by 23 percent, increase day surgery cases by 21 percent and increase CT scans by 16 percent. So the big one has been to deal with the very dramatic 25.5 percent increase in ambulatory care visits.

I'll pause there. The member may have more questions, or if he wishes, I can move on and discuss the other health authorities, but I'll stop with North. Then if he has additional questions…. No, keep going? I'm on a roll?

The Chair: Please direct your questions and answers through the Chair.

Hon. G. Abbott: Thank you, hon. Chair, for that assistance.

In terms of Vancouver Island Health Authority, they were able to utilize their investments to address a 1.3 percent increase in ambulatory care visits. They were able to increase day care surgical cases by more than 5 percent. They were able to increase assisted living personal care hours 3.2 percent, and they were able to increase residential care hours more than 18 percent.

[1705]

So that was where they largely directed their investments, although the year continues, as we talked about earlier. For the record, I think it's useful to note that over the period since 2001-2002, VIHA has increased coronary artery bypass graft surgical procedures by 9 percent. They've been able to increase cataract procedures by a whopping 35 percent. They've increased day surgery cases by 19 percent. They've increased MRI exams by 186 percent, and they've increased CT scans by 114 percent. So again, this is very effective utilization of incremental dollars by Vancouver Island Health Authority.

Finally, just to complete the regional health authorities, where did IHA spend their money? They were able to address a 1.5 percent increase in emergency room visits. They were able to address a 2.4 percent increase in ambulatory care visits. They were able to increase day care surgical procedures by 3 percent. They were able to increase assisted-living personal care hours by 3.6 percent, and they were able to increase residential care hours by 5.6 percent.

In the period since 2001, IHA has increased cataract procedures by 30 percent, increased day surgery cases by 23 percent, increased MRI exams by 355 percent — that's amazing, and I'll tell you in a moment how they were able to do that, because I know the member is fascinated by this particular area of health service delivery — and they've been able to increase CT scans by 106 percent. So again, I think, making very good use of their incremental resources.

In the case of MRIs, this is a fascinating story to me. Back in 2001 when we came into office — and I'm from the interior, as you know, from the Shuswap area, so I know and feel this acutely, as they say — there was one MRI machine in the entire interior and north of British Columbia.

It used to be loaded onto a truck. It would go to Kelowna, and then it would go to Kamloops, and then it would go to Prince George. It rotated around the interior and north of British Columbia. Of course, it made it very difficult during the 1990s to get an MRI.

But you know, it's wonderful. Since 2001 we now have a permanent MRI in Prince George, a permanent MRI in Kamloops, a permanent MRI in Kelowna, and now there's an MRI, I believe, that moves between Penticton and Cranbrook. That's a dramatic increase, and that is the way we've seen such a spectacular increase in the number of MRI scans in the Interior Health Authority.

A. Dix: The Minister of Health…. In his own health region they report that MRI wait times are four times longer than they are in Ontario. I know he's very proud of a record where they do it four times faster in Ontario than here. Equally, he talked about Vancouver Island. Just before I give way to my colleague for Delta North, the minister has inspired me with his lengthy efforts in this past thing.

We're talking about their performance indicators — not my performance indicators, their performance indicators. Surgical wait times, cataracts, significantly outside acceptable range. Surgical wait times, hip replacement, significantly outside acceptable range. What does that mean? It's bad.

Percentage of community-based clients admitted to residential care within 30 days, significantly outside acceptable range. What does that mean? It's bad.

Food satisfaction — well, this is not a surprise — significantly outside acceptable range. That means bad. Food satisfaction contract, residential care sites, considerably outside acceptable range. That means bad.

Hon. Chair, these are the targets that the government itself sets in those two health authorities. So we're going to have an enjoyable time over the next — I don't think it's going to be several — days.

I know that the minister was about to say, and he caught himself: "What's $120 million?" Well, it's a lot of money, in fact. These are significant fundings. There are
[ Page 13970 ]
health authorities and public agencies that receive billions of dollars in public money.

[1710]

More important than that, the issues at stake are real issues for seniors in residential care, for seniors who need home support and who will see cuts — in the very Interior Health Authority he was talking about — in home care and home support this year, according to the IHA's own plan. They matter to people, and that's why we're having the debate here. I know it might be a little bit inconvenient, although I think the minister enjoys these debates.

In any event, we're going to move on — we can, unless the minister wants to have an exchange there — to my colleague from Delta North, to start down seniors care across the health authorities as they're affected by this $120 million, which is one of the most general allocations in supplementary estimates. It goes into, as the minister says, all facets of the services provided by our health authorities. It will not be a lengthy debate, as an estimates debate might be, but a reaching debate.

So my colleague from Delta North…. Or do you want to respond?

Hon. G. Abbott: My drive for accuracy always compels me to correct the record where the member may be at some deviance from reality. I think this is certainly the case on some of his recent assertions.

The Interior Health Authority's wait for MRI scans is not four times the province of Ontario, and the member knows that full well. That's simply not the case. It may have been back in 1999 when the one MRI machine cruised around the province between the Kelowna, Kamloops and Prince George sites, but it's certainly not the case today.

I know the NDP caucus requested information from Interior Health. Interior Health sent them some information which they subsequently advised was incorrect, and the member should work from the accurate information that he now has.

MRI wait times are not four times what they are in Ontario. That is simply not the case. They would be like four years long if that was the case, and it's not the case. IH strives each and every day to improve MRI wait times, and I think they are working effectively to reduce that.

I don't support these kinds of drive-by assertions about wait times, because I think they're unfortunate and misleading. Here's the reality, and this is reflective of fiscal '07-08. We've made additional improvements since then, but these were the numbers as of '07-08. This is a comparator with fiscal 2000-2001.

Knee replacements have gone from 2,922 to 6,370, a 118 percent increase. Hip replacements have gone from 2,892 to 4,575, or a 58 percent increase. I think we're now over 11,000 annual hip and knee replacements in the province of British Columbia. Every year becomes a record year in terms of the number of hip and knee replacements.

Of course, that's a whole other story. I'm sure that in the full estimates when we get back, when the opposition is returned in its rightful place in the opposition after the election, we will have a fulsome debate around these things.

Cataract surgeries increased from 31,215 to 44,301, a 42 percent increase in the number of cataract surgeries over that time; angioplasties from 4,427 to 6,869, a 55 percent increase. Here's another, again, comparator, this time between 2007-08 and 2001-2002. We have improved to nine weeks for open-heart surgery, compared to 15.1 weeks back in '01-02; 11.1 weeks for a hip replacement, compared to 18.7 weeks back in '07-08; and 17 weeks for a knee replacement compared to 25.4 weeks back in 2001-2002.

[1715]

I just wanted to clarify the record with respect to that. Each and every day we make progress in respect to wait times. We've seen enormous efforts directed by the health authorities towards reducing wait times. We've had the health innovation fund. We've had the innovation and integration fund. We had the Richmond Hospital hip and knee project, which yielded lots of great information about how to efficaciously manage operating rooms.

We've got the Centre for Surgical Innovation at UBC, which is not only a place where now, I think, something like 1,700 incremental hip and knee replacements are done annually, but it is also a place where surgeons from throughout the province learn the contemporary techniques and management of surgical capacity.

There are lots of great things happening in the health system in British Columbia, and I know all members of the House would celebrate that.

A. Dix: Just on diagnostics, I mean, the Canadian Medical Association in their report said it was 30 days in Ontario. The averages in the Interior Health Authority — which were on their website for a year, which we asked questions in different months about and which the minister never corrected — said that depending on the community, they went anywhere from 120 days to 240 days.

It's not just the Interior Health Authority, by the way, I'd say to the minister. In its MRI wait-time performance indicator, the Vancouver Island Health Authority says Ontario has a 30-day wait, and it has a 13.1-week wait, which is, of course, in that case, if my math is correct, more than three times longer in the Vancouver Island Health Authority than Ontario. The source of both of those informations is the Vancouver Island Health Authority.

We'll get back to diagnostics, because I'm looking forward to this debate. I'm going to give way to my colleague from Delta North.
[ Page 13971 ]

The Chair: Member for Delta North, if I could remind you that we're doing the supplementary estimates for the Ministry of Health Services, Vote 37. If you could direct your questions towards the allocation of the $120 million.

G. Gentner: Just to begin, you know, it's an interesting situation, this exchange between the Health critic and the minister regarding hip replacements and knee replacements. There are many constituents in my area who, strangely enough, share not only knee problems but also hip, and they go hand in hand. I hear it often enough that those who are waiting for hip replacements and on a long waiting list are invariably, because they're putting extra pressure on one leg….

After waiting a long time to finally get a hip replacement, they're in probably waiting another year in order to get a knee replacement. You know, it comes down to one thing. It's really a question of prevention and how we deal with these issues quickly.

Regarding seniors, which is my file, we hear the horror stories over and over and over about seniors waiting to get out of hospitals, extended care units, etc. I know one instance, and this is relative to the budget because he's still waiting. He's still in Surrey Memorial Hospital. He's been there for months and months and months, and he was hopeful to go to a facility called Newton Regency. He found out later that the beds have been removed slowly through attrition, and he's still lost within the system.

In this supplementary budget — and, hopefully, the minister will have the opportunity now to explain to me what the merits are — there is really no specific funding to address the crises in seniors care, nothing to build more residential care, nothing to improve the quality of care and nothing really for home support.

Could the minister tell me whether he agrees with that statement or not.

[1720]

Hon. G. Abbott: The member at the outset suggested that his constituents were waiting longer for hip and knee replacements than had been the case. I presume he was referring back to NDP days in the period between 1991 and 2001, and that is simply not the case, as I said earlier. In 2001, an 18.7-week wait for hip replacements. It's now down to 11.1 weeks. Knee replacement was 25.4 weeks, now down to 17 weeks.

I also utterly refute the member's suggestion that there has been any kind of diminution or deterioration of seniors care in the province. That is simply not the case. Both qualitatively and quantitatively we have seen huge, huge improvements versus the time of the NDP back in the 1990s. I know the members don't like to address facts, but the fact was that people were waiting up to a year.

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: This member wants to get in on the debate. I'll look forward to that. Just try to relax, Member, and formulate some coherent questions that I might address. I certainly would welcome that, if you can put some coherent thoughts together.

Interjection.

The Chair: Member. Member, please.

Would the member for Maple Ridge–Pitt Meadows allow the person who has the floor to continue comment. If you would like the floor, you may have the floor without interruption.

Minister of Health Services, please continue.

Hon. G. Abbott: The wait time for residential care in the late '90s or early 2000s was one year. That has been reduced as a consequence of incremental additions, investments in residential care and assisted living, from a low of 18 days' wait to…. The highest, I think, now is around three months. So there's been a huge improvement in terms of the timeliness with which seniors in British Columbia can access that care when they need it.

The member, in his dialogue, also referenced bed cuts. Well, I don't know what bed cuts he was referring to, but the champion in terms of bed cuts was the NDP government in the 1990s, which cut some 3,500 acute care beds. The member can refer to a UBC study on that, or he can refer to the BCMA study with respect to that. That, again, is a fact.

In terms of other investments, I think it's also worth noting that we're investing more financial resources in home and community care. This year health authorities estimate they'll spend $651.2 million for home care and home support services for B.C. seniors, and that is a 61 percent increase since 2001.

In the final portions of the questions the member said: "Well, what does the $120 million have to do with that?" I should just note — and this was in the record earlier — that for the Interior Health Authority, one of the things they were able to invest in with their share of the incremental $120 million was to increase residential care days 5.6 percent, to increase assisted-living personal care hours 3.6 percent.

In the case of the Northern Health Authority, they were able to increase residential care days 2.9 percent; in the case of VCHA, increase assisted-living care hours 5 percent; in the case of VIHA, increase assisted-living personal care hours 18 percent and increase residential care days more than 3.2 percent.

Again, the $120 million was incremental to the between $13 billion and $14 billion that was invested in health care in the major budget. It wasn't in and of itself the one-shot answer to all challenges, but as I said in my
[ Page 13972 ]
earlier discussion with the opposition Health critic, it was a remarkably useful investment which was able to produce a number of beneficial outcomes.

[1725]

G. Gentner: It's enlightening to hear the minister talk about events of early 2002-2003, etc., which really have no relevance to this budget. Obviously, he's engaging in comparables, and that's exactly where we'll go.

We'll talk about comparisons. We can talk about Liberal math and how they've been able to mesh together what's known as units versus long-term care beds. Included in that, of course, the ministry is including supportive housing.

The interesting part, too, is that the minister talks about what the BCMA says, but he doesn't talk about the broken promise that this government has today relative to the 5,000 so-called new long-term care beds.

According to the BCMA, there was a net decline of 533 beds between 2001 and 2007. Can the minister explain how he's going to rectify that in this supplementary budget?

Hon. G. Abbott: I'll be guided by the Chair as to when we deviate beyond the bounds of appropriate debate around supplemental estimates.

Let me say this to the member. It's unfortunate that he wasn't able to come out to the Gorge, right here in Victoria, earlier today, where we celebrated the opening of Selkirk Place.

An Hon. Member: Was he invited?

Hon. G. Abbott: I don't know. Perhaps he couldn't….

An Hon. Member: I wasn't.

Hon. G. Abbott: Oh, I'm sorry. I apologize if you weren't invited.

Interjections.

Hon. G. Abbott: Oh, you weren't invited either.

The Chair: Members. Members. Thank you.

Hon. G. Abbott: We were celebrating 235 additional residential care beds for the province of British Columbia, and 171 of those 235 will be under contract with the Vancouver Island Health Authority. I'm sure all members of the House would celebrate that.

I know that members of the House desperately attempt to disparage the fact that we have completed our commitment. The members will recall that in the 2005 election we committed to 5,000 incremental residential care and assisted-living beds.

Interjection.

Hon. G. Abbott: No, that's exactly what we committed to in 2005, Member. I know he doesn't like it, hon. Chair, but those are the facts.

One of the things that they have real difficulties with is reconciling their reckless and irresponsible ideological views with reality. While that may be unfortunate, it is something that they're going to have to do.

Today we celebrated over 5,800 incremental residential care and assisted-living units in the province. We've not only exceeded our goal by 800, but 5,800 total. In addition to that, of the substandard stock that we inherited from the NDP government of the 1990s, we have remediated some 6,000 additional units over and above those 5,800.

The members love to spout rhetoric in this area, but there is a huge gap between the NDP's rhetoric on this subject and the NDP's performance on this subject. They have consistently failed the seniors of British Columbia. I'm proud of what we have been able to achieve, both qualitatively and quantitatively, in terms of provision for seniors care.

G. Gentner: It's interesting how the minister continues to mesh or go way beyond the original promise of 5,000 long-term care beds. It's interesting how he's now able to introduce other assisted-living units in order to fulfil their so-called promise.

The minister talks about the so-called opening of Selkirk in this area. Could the minister explain to us how many beds were closed at Aberdeen in this area?

[1730]

Hon. G. Abbott: It has nothing to do with these estimates, Mr. Chair.

G. Gentner: The minister was making a comparison between what happened today and the previous…. He has brought the comparison talking about the 1990s, and we're doing a comparison between this budget and the previous budget. So again I ask the minister: how many beds were closed at Aberdeen? Or is he afraid to admit he actually closed beds at Aberdeen?

Hon. G. Abbott: The member can raise this in estimates when they come up. He can raise this in question period tomorrow if he wishes. I could get my first question period question of this session, potentially, out of just such an inquiry as this in question period.

I'll be guided by you, hon. Chair, and the Clerk with respect to whether the member's question is in order or out of order.

The Chair: Member for Delta North, I'd like to ask you to direct your questions towards the allocation of
[ Page 13973 ]
the $120 million in the supplementary estimates for Vote 37(S).

G. Gentner: Regarding what had happened in the previous…. I know that's bad karma. I want to remind the minister that his government closed 196 beds at Aberdeen and 14 beds at Glengarry and 70 beds at Gorge Road for 112. I can go on about the other beds that were certainly closed here — 208 beds at James Bay Lodge.

But we don't want to talk about the dismal record of this Liberal government. It's quite obvious. Regarding this so-called wonderful announcement today, can the minister…? We're speaking of relevance to this budget. How much of this budget actually goes towards the announcement today?

Hon. G. Abbott: Nothing. Zero.

G. Gentner: You attended the opening. Was that not paid for your staff? Was that not part of the budget, or is that not part of the supplementary?

The Chair: Member, I'd like you to direct your question towards the allocation of the $120 million in Vote 37(S). Member, do you have a question?

G. Gentner: So I have it correct that today's announcement has nothing to do with the supplementary budget? I want to repeat that question.

Hon. G. Abbott: That's correct.

G. Gentner: How much of this supplementary is going towards seniors services, including long-term care facilities, in each authority?

[S. Hammell in the chair.]

Hon. G. Abbott: As I explained to the opposition Health critic earlier on, the $120 million was added to the budgets of the regional health authorities in July. They were advised of it in July. They have been, over the course of the remaining portion of the fiscal year, disbursing those dollars to a variety of programs to ease pressures for the future.

As I've noted on numerous occasions in response to the opposition Health critic, assisted-living care and residential care are a part of that, but there is no breakdown with respect to that. In fact, some of the dollars are still being disbursed, as we are not yet at the end of the current fiscal year.

G. Gentner: Can the minister explain why he doesn't have a running ledger on where this money is going?

Hon. G. Abbott: We don't break down the health authority budgets on a day-by-day and dollar-by-dollar basis.

G. Gentner: That's obviously a weakness of this government. And it has been made very clear by the Auditor General that the information systems and gathering information are what is expected and that hopefully, this government would improve upon.

[1735]

Frankly, I don't know how you can come up with a $120 million budget without having that information before you. In fact, it's quite remarkable how this minister and this ministry can conduct themselves without having a handle on what's coming in and what's going out.

I'm wondering, though. Can the minister explain to me how much of this $120 million is actually going towards capital projects for long-term care?

Hon. G. Abbott: First of all, the $120 million is not a budget. It's a supplement to the overall budgets of the health authorities. It comprises about 1.5 percent of their overall budget for fiscal '08-09. In terms of how many dollars towards capital — zero.

G. Gentner: Therefore, can the minister explain to this House how much of the $120 million is going towards operations of long-term care?

Hon. G. Abbott: As I explained earlier, it all went to operational functions. We do not have a precise breakdown with respect to that.

G. Gentner: But the minister does have a breakdown of the percentage to each authority, relative to the long-term care operations.

Hon. G. Abbott: We have a breakdown of the allocation to the authorities, not with respect to long-term care.

G. Gentner: Why is it that the ministry hasn't done their homework?

Hon. G. Abbott: The question is an absurd one. That is the short answer to that question.

G. Gentner: If it's absurd, the answer is equally absurd because, frankly, I don't understand how you can come in this House and suggest you're going to spend $120 million without knowing where it's going. It's quite remarkable to me that this minister can stand up and say that it's absurd. I'll tell you what's absurd. This government is absurd.

I'm wondering, though. VIHA has a new target of minimum standards of staffing of 3.24 hours. Does this supplemental actually address and assist VIHA?
[ Page 13974 ]

Hon. G. Abbott: We don't believe that's relevant to this discussion, hon. Chair.

G. Gentner: I'm lost here. I'm sorry. Can the minister explain to me why he believes it's irrelevant? I'm intrigued by his answer. I'm just wondering why the minister feels that question is irrelevant.

Hon. G. Abbott: Hon. Chair, perhaps you can guide the chamber as to the rules around relevance. I'm sure the Clerk can assist in this as well — can advise me and the chamber about the rules around relevance in this subestimates debate.

G. Gentner: I'll try again. The Vancouver Island Health Authority has a target to create standards of 3.24. Now, the minister assists authorities to assist them in their staffing standards, while the rest of the province or authorities is about 2.8 hours.

So I'm wondering how much of the supplementary, a percentage or whatever, is going to assist VIHA to make its target.

[1740]

Hon. G. Abbott: In terms of the Vancouver Island Health Authority, home and community care, the community portion of that — and this is the overall budget — is $172.1 million. The home and community care residential portion is $285.1 million. The total for home and community care is $457.3 million for home and community care in Vancouver Island Health Authority.

In terms of the $120 million, we did not disburse that to the health authorities saying that you had to spend X on residential care or Y on diagnostics or Z on surgical procedures. We gave them the discretion to utilize those funds to best effect within their health authorities.

G. Gentner: So this supplemental doesn't support VIHA as a target. Is that correct?

Hon. G. Abbott: Not specifically, no.

G. Gentner: The Chair could rule this question out of order. I'm curious, though, nevertheless.

When does the ministry foresee…? Hopefully there is some planning money underway for various authorities. When does the ministry foresee that VIHA will reach its goal of 3.24 hours?

Hon. G. Abbott: I seek the guidance of the Chair with respect to the member's question.

The Chair: Member, could you clarify your question, please?

G. Gentner: I'm wondering, with the current budget we're debating, how much money is being put towards the planning impetus regarding staffing hours and VIHA's target of 3.24 hours.

Interjections.

The Chair: Minister, you will withdraw.

Hon. G. Abbott: Maybe the member would like to withdraw as well.

Interjections.

The Chair: Hold it, please, Members. Order, Members.

Would you withdraw also.

An Hon. Member: Yes, absolutely, Madam Chair.

The Chair: Thank you.

Interjections.

The Chair: Members, Members.

Member, could you clarify the relevance of the question so that I can understand — in terms of the budget?

G. Gentner: We're trying to find relevance in this budget, and it's not all spelled out, and that's why we're here. The question was that VIHA has a target to achieve 3.24 hours of staffing time per long-term care facility.

The question I have is: within this budget, does the ministry provide money to put towards planning for VIHA or see if VIHA can find money to plan, and when will it meet that target of 3.24 hours?

Hon. G. Abbott: To the first part of the member's question, no.

G. Gentner: I believe, therefore, the minister doesn't want to answer the second part of the question.

Regarding universal standards, I want to ask the question on this budget, the supplemental budget. How much money is allocated to the increased costs for routine maintenance of care — example, eye examinations in long-term care facilities?

Hon. G. Abbott: Zero.

[1745]

G. Gentner: So there's no money coming for these increases that seniors, particularly on fixed incomes, may be burdened with.

How about, relative to that, pharmacy costs, increased costs? We saw what happened at Cowichan Lodge and others, where seniors are being moved to other — shall
[ Page 13975 ]
we call it? — facilities. This is a growing concern. It is happening; it's a trend. How much in the supplementary budget is the ministry seeing as we go towards the increased costs of pharmaceuticals to seniors in long-term care?

Hon. G. Abbott: Again, the member needs to, I think, appreciate that the health authorities got an average 6 percent lift in their budgets in fiscal '08-09. They address a range of issues with that. We're here to debate the $120 million supplemental estimate, and I don't believe there is, within that $120 million, any funding for what the member's referenced.

G. Gentner: So can the minister explain to me how seniors are getting these add-ons, these user fees at these new facilities, being transferred? How they will bear the costs if it's not included in this budget?

Hon. G. Abbott: User fees have nothing to do with the $120 million.

G. Gentner: The minister is correct, and that is the point. We are now seeing more and more of services passed on, downloaded onto seniors who are being moved from not-for-profit facilities into private facilities. My question is this. Do all authorities have the same subsidy for these new, higher, extra costs?

Hon. G. Abbott: I'm failing to understand the question that the member is asking in relation to the $120 million number.

Perhaps we can get some guidance from you, hon. Chair.

G. Gentner: I'll try again. Do all authorities receive the same percentage of subsidy to help with the extra costs relative to seniors staying in long-term care?

Hon. G. Abbott: The member is asking a question about general public policy with respect to the funding of, I presume, residential care facilities. I think that is an appropriate and interesting thing to canvass within the bounds of the broader estimates process.

But I'll be seeking your guidance, hon. Chair, as to whether it is relevant to the discussion of subestimates of $120 million.

The Chair: Member, you need to keep your questions relevant to the $120 million supplemental budget that's in front of us.

G. Gentner: I certainly will.

The question is regarding…. With the $120 million supplementary, the question is this, quite frankly. With all the additional costs…. Many of these are, of course, needed costs for recreational therapy, inadequate monitoring of dietary needs. These are things that are mounting up, and seniors are losing out, so to speak, on these essential needs. However, most of this, or some of this, is being passed on to seniors.

Again my question is: under this budget, do all authorities receive the same subsidy for these costs for seniors in long-term care facilities?

The Chair: Member, your question is more appropriately placed in the budget, in the larger budget of the Ministry of Health.

[1750]

What we're debating is the $120 million supplementary estimate in front of the House right now. So you need to keep your questions to that $120 million.

G. Gentner: Regarding a recent report from the B.C. Medical Association, page 42 of Bridging the Islands: Re-Building B.C.'s Home and Community Care System:

"British Columbia's home and community care system is in a state of decline. While the reduction in residential care beds would not necessarily have been wrong if also accompanied by an increase in community-based care, provincial data show a simultaneous decrease in home care and home care services, the very services that evidence suggests are the most cost-effective and best able to promote aging in place."

Can the minister identify how much money — he's obviously recognized this problem — is being directed to rectify this?

Hon. G. Abbott: As I've said this point at a number of occasions in this discussion, we did not direct the health authorities in how they would expend their portion of the $120 million. We said to the health authority: "We recognize pressures. We recognize that you may wish to disburse this in different ways which reflect the situation that you face in your individual authority."

If the member or the opposition disagrees with the proposition and thinks that every dollar of the $120 million allocation should have been specifically directed, that's fine. They should get up and say that. That's fine, but to make suggestions here about what this report says or that report says…. Again, I think, first of all, it's more germane to estimates.

I certainly don't agree with every conclusion that was reached in that BCMA report, but it was also a report that had much to say about the 1990s as well, and I suspect the member might not agree with some of that. Again, the decision government made was to add $120 million. We did not direct the health authorities on how that should be expended.

G. Gentner: Obviously, the government made a decision on how much money it was going to allocate for long-term care vis-à-vis through the various authorities. What was the yardstick the ministry made to decide
[ Page 13976 ]
how much money should be given to those authorities for long-term care?

Hon. G. Abbott: I've just said that we did not prescribe or direct where they expend their dollars. I don't know how much clearer I can be than that.

G. Gentner: We're talking about accountability. It would be interesting to know, really, what authority the ministry has on how that money is being allocated. It's carte blanche, so to speak, and it's an interesting answer nevertheless.

But I want to ask the minister: what is the difference? We're talking about $120 million. I want to know: what is the difference between the daily per-diem rate for not-for-profit and for-profit long-term care facilities for this budget?

Hon. G. Abbott: Again, I seek your guidance with respect to relevance, hon. Chair.

The Chair: Member, the standing order requires that your debate be strictly relevant to the estimates that are in front of us. Member, can you re-ask your question or rephrase it so that it's relevant?

G. Gentner: Okay, hon. Chair.

Out of the $120 million, how much is being awarded in the province for the daily per-diem rate for non-profits?

[1755]

Hon. G. Abbott: The per-diem rates are set by policy, by practice, by contract. I don't understand the relevance of the member's question to the $120 million. It appears to me that it is irrelevant to the question.

G. Gentner: It's very relevant, because we don't have universal standards in this province. We don't have any standards to decide who gets what and why. We've had examples coming from various credible validators that this is all wrong. We were hopeful that we would be moving into a 2009 budget, and the supplementary is here to, hopefully, address it.

I disagree with the minister, hon. Chair. It's very relevant. It's so relevant, in fact, that that's why we're here. We're here to defend or discuss the allocation of $120 million, and I think it's very important that we understand what the province is doing in this budget and how it's actually studying the difference between the daily per-diem rate for one organization versus that of a private organization.

I was hopeful that in this budget the ministry would be having some discussion and some money set aside for a report on how they allocate the difference, finding some universal standards on how they find the difference, between the daily per-diem rate for a not-for-profit and for that of a for-profit long-term care facility.

Hon. G. Abbott: I seek your guidance, hon. Chair.

G. Gentner: I didn't quite hear the answer.

Hon. G. Abbott: I said: "I seek your guidance, hon. Chair."

The Chair: Member, your questions will be relevant to the estimates that are in front of us, and they are the $120 million supplementary estimates.

G. Gentner: Hon. Chair, I still haven't received a previous answer — the yardstick on how the ministry determined the amount of money that went to each health authority for long-term care.

Hon. G. Abbott: As I've twice now previously noted, we did not use a yardstick. We did not prescribe or dictate what portion of the $120 million that health authorities used for that purpose.

G. Gentner: It certainly surprises me how this ministry can conduct such a huge budget without having the answers before it, something so obvious about how you determine money that's to go to each health authority and how you determine whether there is some equity and equality in the delivery of service between one authority versus the other. It's just unbelievable, frankly.

There is something recent that we're hopeful we can find in this supplementary budget. The minister is well aware of what has transpired in my community, my Fraser Health Authority area — that of Zion Park Manor, which slowly, through attrition, is being shut down.

Can the minister explain to me whether or not he is putting an additional $6 per diem into assisting Zion Park, to keep it alive? Or will he just allow it to close down by June? It's been my understanding that the ministry has been in correspondence with the Fraser Health Authority on this issue.

Hon. G. Abbott: None of the $120 million was allocated for this purpose.

G. Gentner: So the minister is saying that eventually Zion Park will not receive any funding and, also, funding for special care units throughout that's covered in this supplementary budget.

Hon. G. Abbott: That is incorrect, and again, it goes to the separation — as you've been very patiently observing, hon. Chair — between the subestimates and the general estimates for the Ministry of Health Services.
[ Page 13977 ]

G. Gentner: Can the minister tell us how many beds will be reduced at Zion Park lodge by the time this supplementary budget is completed — by March 31?

Hon. G. Abbott: I've already said that this is irrelevant to the $120 million.

[1800]

G. Gentner: There is a direct relationship to the ministry. Zion Park is somewhat being covered — or being challenged — under the Hospital Act, as opposed to the community care act, and therefore the special care unit at Zion Park in Cloverdale is being phased out. We talked about the residential care, but can the minister come forward and tell us that this budget will — or will not — supply funding for the retention of the special care unit at Zion Park?

The Chair: Member, you have followed this line of questioning for a while, and the minister has repeatedly answered your question, so I would like you to move on to something that is more specifically in line with the $120 million that is the supplementary estimate.

G. Gentner: The Ministry of Health Services currently allocates about $2 billion annually to five regional health authorities to deliver home and community care service to more than 100,000 clients. I'm interested to know that the audit from the Auditor General — which came forward in the last part of the fall here of 2008, I believe — focused on the activities of the Ministry of Health Services for 2007-08 up to March 2008. This is the statement from the Auditor General: "We completed our analysis of evidence by May '08 and released the first draft report to the ministry on August 1."

So the ministry has had some time. It's in the time frame that has evolved in order for the minister to make a decision on how to deal with the supplementary budget. I'm just wondering: how much does the supplemental reflect the Auditor General's concerns as outlined in the report?

Hon. G. Abbott: It is entirely unrelated.

G. Gentner: Is the minister suggesting that the audit that was concluded and given to the ministry has so little relevance that the ministry would not see it worthy of embedding in the supplemental?

Hon. G. Abbott: Sorry, I didn't understand the question. Perhaps the member could repeat it again.

G. Gentner: Again, the ministry had lots of time to review the suggestions that came from the Auditor General regarding home and community care services. This is a very important report that the minister had in his hand — regarding the lack of information systems and how we had to improve the delivery of services and sharing the information systems with health authorities.

We just spent some time hearing from the minister how irrelevant it is and that once he passes on the money to the health authorities, he doesn't really know where the money goes. We know from the Auditor General's report that there is a way, a suggestion how to streamline it.

The minister has had this information in his hands for some time, and he had the ability to take those recommendations from the Auditor General and bring them forward into these supplementary estimates. I'm wondering if he took heed to those suggestions and if it's incorporated in any way in the supplementary budget.

[1805]

Hon. G. Abbott: The health authorities were advised of the $120 million infusion in July. I'm not sure, again, what point the member is attempting to make, but there was no relationship between the Auditor General's important report around seniors care and the systems designed to assist us with seniors care, and the $120 million. They are unrelated.

G. Gentner: I'm just wondering regarding residential care facilities that are not covered under the umbrella of the licensing act, which creates differences in the oversight and treatment of similar facilities across the province. Does the minister agree, or is that sort of rolled into the supplementary estimates?

Hon. G. Abbott: It would seem, to my eye…. I appreciate your advice on this, hon. Chair, but it would seem to me that those two important issues are entirely disconnected.

G. Gentner: Can the minister explain how he feels that there's a disconnect here?

Hon. G. Abbott: I'll leave it to the Chair to conclude whether there is relevance and connection between the two items.

Point of Order

J. Brar: Point of order, please. Madam Chair, we have the supplementary estimate debate. The purpose of the debate is very clear. The ministry has allocated $120 million towards different health authorities, and the critic from the opposition is asking questions, has the right to ask the questions and actually has a responsibility to ask the questions.

What I see for the last half an hour is the minister standing up and answering no questions, and I think that's a serious issue. This happened yesterday. It's happening again today.
[ Page 13978 ]

This is a democracy. We have the right to ask questions, and if this is not relevant, I think it is the responsibility of the minister to explain as to why that particular question is not relevant rather than saying it is not relevant. So I would urge you, Madam Chair, to provide direction and ask the minister to start answering questions.

Hon. G. Abbott: To the member's assertion, it is not for the members of the House to decide what is relevant or appropriate to answer. It is for the Chair, who guides us in the course of these debates. I find, actually, the member's suggestion offensive to the Chair and the House — that somehow we are being guided inappropriately on that matter. But again, I welcome your advice.

Interjections.

The Chair: Members. Members, order.

Interjections.

The Chair: Order, Member. Member.

A point of order has been made. Standing Order 61, which is the standing orders of the House, requires that the debate be strictly relevant to the question at hand. So the debate must, according to section 61, be relevant to the $120 million that are the supplementary estimates, rather than a discussion of the budget in general.

So I am asking the members to keep their questions and their answers and the debate relevant to the supplementary estimates and hold back the questions on the general budget debate for that debate.

[1810]

Debate Continued

G. Gentner: The Auditor General of British Columbia — in his report of 2008-09, in his executive summary — stated:

"In 2005 the five regional health authorities agreed to transition from the existing management information system and establish their own client information systems to meet the revised and more comprehensive reporting requirements. However, only one of the five authorities has done so. As a result, the ministry's access to information on home and community care is at risk, and it does not have the information it needs to plan and monitor the system effectively. Furthermore, the ministry has not set and communicated clear time lines to the health authorities for the replacement of the existing system."

We are talking again of a need for a $120 million infusion to ensure that the ministry meets its obligations and the recommendations from the Auditor General. How much in the supplementary budget is going towards the replacement of the existing system, as suggested by the Auditor General, and why do we only have one health care authority that is meeting these requirements?

Hon. G. Abbott: I have observed now three times in these supplemental estimates that none of the $120 million is used for capital. The opposition Health critic raised that point early on. It is clear that none is used for capital. So clearly, for replacement of equipment in this area, the 120 has no application.

G. Gentner: I'll try again. Maybe we can just talk about operating, as opposed to capital. Within the operating budget, you do reports and investigations. The Auditor General did make these suggestions. He didn't do them without great thought or foresight, and obviously the minister has had those — the report — before him. If he doesn't want to talk about capital within this operating budget of $120 million, what is being allocated towards meeting the recommendations from the Auditor General?

Hon. G. Abbott: I'm always pleased, as I said earlier, to hear how the representatives from the New Democratic Party and the official opposition would wish to disburse $120 million were they to have it. The $120 million was to address front-line pressures in the health care system. It was not to replace capital equipment in health authorities.

G. Gentner: It's interesting — the denial of the minister that he doesn't want to go there with the recommendations from the Auditor General. But I have to remind the minister. This is the ministry's response to the recommendations from the Auditor General, and it seems to me that we would have seen this within the supplementary budget: "In conclusion, we concur with the findings and recommendation of the Auditor General's report and are committed to ongoing improvement in our role as steward for home and community care services in British Columbia." This was in response to the recommendations, and this happened well before the supplementary could have been adjusted.

Again, my question to the minister…. I just want to make it on record that it certainly wasn't in the 2009 budget. We'll debate that, hopefully, soon.

It wasn't there in the 2008 budget. But there is nothing in this supplementary budget that's going to deal with at least a look. I'm not now talking about infrastructure improvements. I'm just looking at a report that the ministry has underway between now and the end of March 31 that's going to deal specifically with the recommendations of the Auditor General to improve proper information flow to and from all the authorities so we can get into proper planning of health care in this province — relative, in particular, to that of seniors.

It's time that we should see an infusion of money that would help assist this reporting system, again, recommended to us by the Auditor General.
[ Page 13979 ]

My question to the minister is again: is there not at least a report being conducted through this supplementary budget to address the concerns of the Auditor General?

[1815]

Hon. G. Abbott: Hon. Chair, again, it's not a budget. It is a supplement to the budget. I don't think that I could, again, possibly say, as patiently as you have on so many occasions during this discussion, how one should try to address what the $120 million does, rather than what it does not.

Again, if the members opposite think that it should have been used for a different purpose, they're welcome to say so, but the $120 million didn't help us solve the mystery of cold fusion. It didn't help to put a man on the moon. There are, like, thousands of things that the $120 million did not do.

If the member wants to give me a list of things that he thought should have been done, I think that would be fascinating, but this is not the venue in which one would debate the very important report from the Auditor General, with respect to the infrastructure around seniors care. That is clearly the kind of thing that one would engage in — and, I'm sure, engage in intensively — in a full estimates debate.

G. Gentner: I appreciate the minister's list of priorities and how the Auditor General's reports probably reached his file 13 basket.

I want to talk briefly about the care inspection reports. We've seen what's been going on. We've waited for some time for these reporting-out systems that the minister had promised for some time ago, and we are looking also at the residential care inspection reports — recommendations, of course, from many, many spheres of our health care community.

The health authorities are now posting inspection reports for adult residential care facilities, dating back for some time, but they're quite incomplete, and the summaries of the reports are not actually showing the hazard ratings.

I'm wondering if the ministry, with this add-on, this $120 million supplementary budget, will be continuing to expand on this program so health authorities — and again, this is relative to all health authorities — can assist him with an electronic registry to show the public, to search facilities by location, not only by facility name but its rating systems. That's what our understanding was — that the ministry was going to promise this by the end of the year. We're now into a supplementary budget that, hopefully, will address it. Can the minister respond?

Hon. G. Abbott: The member may wish to address questions around residential care licensing and the reporting thereof in the estimates of the Healthy Living and Sport Ministry, where those now reside.

Again, I'm always glad to be guided by the Chair. This just seems strikingly irrelevant to what we're supposed to be talking about here, Hon. Chair, but again, I seek your guidance.

G. Gentner: The minister enters an interesting new form where we've seen the changeover from one ministry to the other, namely that of the transition to the Healthy Living ministry. I'm just wondering. In the supplementary there are ongoing transitional costs and, of course, when you do a major reorganization, you will see continuous funding needed to complete that.

Can the minister advise the House how much money of this supplementary budget is going towards that continuous transition?

Hon. G. Abbott: Zero dollars and zero cents.

The Chair: Minister, pardon?

Hon. G. Abbott: Sorry. I was so keen to get that answer in there.

Zero dollars and zero cents, Hon. Chair.

A. Dix: Well, I was just going to admire my colleague from Delta North for getting such a precise answer at long last from the Minister of Health.

The minister will, of course, know that, as we continue the debate tomorrow, we're going to focus in on some of the very pressures that he spoke of with respect to the health authorities. The minister will know, of course, that, in spite of the infusion of federal funds that we've seen in the last decade, support for health care in British Columbia has dropped from second place to eighth place in Canada.

[1820]

We know that that has real consequences for people who deliver health care on the ground, whether those people are doctors, nurses, health science professionals, health care workers or whoever. It has real consequences.

In this fiscal year if you're looking precisely at this $120 million estimate that's put forward by the government, you will recall — and the government members will recall — the discussion we had about these very budgets and these very budget items — what, in fact, everybody said to the minister going into the fiscal year. They said to the minister that the budget was inadequate.

They said that the base was inadequate, and you can see it not just in the budget and this supplementary estimate, which broadly touches everything the health authority does. You see it, in fact, in this year's budget as well — the same elements reflected.

So when you have $120 million that we all know was designed to try and get the government from July
[ Page 13980 ]
through the election without facing the consequences or as significant consequences to their policies…. When we know that, I think that's an issue of concern.

We know that this notion of dealing with operating problems in the way that they have in this supplementary estimate is not a sustainable way of dealing with health care. They giveth, and they taketh away after the election. That really describes the actions that are directly relevant to this supplementary estimate, what they've done here.

They are giving, and then they are taking away. They didn't add this to the base in any way. In fact, this $120 million…. The minister has repeatedly said and it is reflected, in fact, in the health service plans of the various health authorities…. The fact of the matter is — and you see the consequences of it, as my colleague from Delta North has said, in seniors care — the lack of capacity of the health authorities to deal with the demands.

You talk about the front-line pressures that we're talking about that drive this supplementary estimate, not just for long-term care — where programs have been repeatedly broken — but home care and home support. These are issues that the government has failed to respond to.

The reason we have this supplementary estimate is that the government in previous years has failed to act on these demands. Going forward — because they're giving this money and then taking it away — we're going to see this demand in future.

Hon. Chair, I see your colleague the Speaker in the chamber, so I guess we'll continue with this debate tomorrow. I move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.

The Chair: The motion should be that the committee rises, reports resolution and asks leave to sit again.

Motion approved.

The committee rose at 6:24 p.m.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

The Committee of Supply, having reported resolution and progress, was granted leave to sit again.

Hon. G. Abbott moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

Mr. Speaker: This House stands adjourned until 1:30 tomorrow afternoon.

The House adjourned at 6:25 p.m.

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