2011 Legislative Session: Fourth Session, 39th 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)
Monday, March 5, 2012
Morning Sitting
Volume 31, Number 1
ISSN 0709-1281 (Print)
ISSN 1499-2175 (Online)
CONTENTS | |
Page | |
Orders of the Day | |
Private Members' Statements | 9693 |
Importance of the Chinese community to the B.C. economy | |
R. Lee | |
J. Kwan | |
The value of our forests | |
N. Macdonald | |
J. Rustad | |
Health care investments in Surrey | |
D. Hayer | |
J. Brar | |
Putting families first | |
C. Trevena | |
J. Thornthwaite | |
Private Members' Motions | 9702 |
Motion 31 — B.C. credit rating and borrowing costs | |
B. Bennett | |
B. Ralston | |
J. Rustad | |
J. Kwan | |
J. Yap | |
D. Donaldson | |
R. Howard | |
B. Simpson | |
R. Sultan | |
M. Mungall | |
C. Hansen | |
MONDAY, MARCH 5, 2012
The House met at 10:02 a.m.
[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]
Prayers.
Orders of the Day
Private Members' Statements
IMPORTANCE OF THE CHINESE COMMUNITY
TO THE B.C. ECONOMY
R. Lee: I would like to talk today about the economic contributions to British Columbia made by those of Chinese ancestry.
[D. Black in the chair.]
While the economic contributions to our province by British Columbians with British, Dutch and Russian origins are often documented, the history of those with Asian ancestry, especially Chinese, is not well known and is often forgotten due to the lack of recorded history and to practices of discrimination that remain a black eye to many today.
The history of the Chinese Canadians in our province is a long one and spans almost as far as the earliest European settlers. Records show that in 1788 an English merchant captain called John Meares left Guangzhou, China, for Nootka Sound to help establish a permanent British presence and trade for sea otter pelts.
Included in his charge were up to 50 Chinese labourers whose job upon arriving on what is now Vancouver Island was to hunt otters, build outposts and repair ships. Captain Meares brought the Chinese workers over as an experiment but quickly found them "hardy and industrious, as well as ingenious." While at Nootka Sound not only did they perform their tasks with aplomb; they also helped build the North West America, the first non-aboriginal ship built on the northwest coast of the continent.
The first foray into what is now British Columbia was short-lived, however, as Spanish forces arrived and expelled the British and Chinese labourers. While many of the Chinese returned to China, the fate of all is actually unknown. It's believed that some remained and integrated into the First Nations communities.
As for the North West America, it was renamed the Santa Saturnina, and nearly 225 years later, its legacy lives on, as Saturna Island is named after the ship.
The next foray into B.C. by Chinese settlers occurred during the gold rush in the late 1850s and marked the establishment of a continuous Chinese community in B.C. — and Canada, for that matter. The wave of Chinese migration from across the Pacific and from California was rapid.
The population of Chinese people in Vancouver Island and British Columbia by 1860, established there, was estimated to be around 7,000. By the 1880s Victoria was home to the largest Chinese community in Canada, and today it is home to the second-oldest Chinatown in North America after San Francisco.
While many of the Chinese went to work in the coal mines, often carrying out dangerous tasks that others refused to do, others were employed in factories, worked in the forestry industry, in fish canneries or were tailors or cobblers. Others decided to get into commerce for themselves and set up shops that competed with European rivals, including the mighty Hudson's Bay Co.
Perhaps the best-known example of the Chinese contribution to the gold rush took place in Barkerville in the Cariboo. Barkerville was once the largest city in North America west of Chicago and north of San Francisco. Chinese settlers were an integral part of Barkerville and made up about half of the population by 1885. The Chinese community in Barkerville built cabins for Chinese miners and operated businesses that sold groceries, hardware, clothing and equipment for mining.
The community also established nursing homes in addition to benevolent associations that provided social services and also resolved disputes without using the court system — interesting. Today, Barkerville is home to the largest collection of pre-railway Chinese buildings anywhere in North America and has one of the largest Chinese archival collections in Canada.
Barkerville is also very important to the Chinese community. It is so important that a travelling exhibit called "Who Am I?" — featuring historical photographs, dioramas and also interactive computer kiosks — will tour China in 2013. That's next year. There's little doubt that Chinese immigrants to British Columbia must be considered nation-builders.
Perhaps a little bit better example of this is their work on the B.C. section of the Canadian Pacific Railway. The commitment to build the CPR was a precondition of British Columbia joining Canada, and this should have been a source of pride for all who worked uniting our country and creating an economic corridor that linked the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean.
For Chinese immigrants, however, and for Chinese Canadians who were born in our country, it marked the beginning of a period of discrimination and humiliation. About 17,000 Chinese toiled building the CPR. Most were paid between a third and half as much as white workers. By the time the CPR was completed in 1885, between 600 and 700 Chinese workers had died.
Later that year, after the Royal Commission on Chinese
[ Page 9694 ]
Immigration and pressure from newspapers, the labour movement, politicians of the day and others, a head tax was imposed on all Chinese people who sought to enter Canada. While the Chinese had always faced discrimination, they were the only people required to pay the tax. Despite an initial drop in Chinese migrations due to the $50 head tax, the number of migrants from China started to rise again in 1890.
J. Kwan: I'd like to join this debate and, first of all, thank the member for Burnaby North for raising the issue. Of course, there is no doubt that the Chinese community has contributed significantly to Canada, to British Columbia, to our communities.
They have, as the member was talking about, the connecting of the country from coast to coast to coast as their contribution, in the building of the railway. I should note, as well, the Chinese labourers who came and participated in that work. Oftentimes, history tells us, they were engaged in some of the most dangerous work, with very little compensation in pay, and of course suffered tremendous discrimination at the worksite. This is the history of that. There is no denying it, Madam Speaker.
That said, the Chinese labourer continued to work hard, only to later on face a very discriminatory move from the federal government of the day. That was the placement of the head tax. We now know there's a huge history behind us, in the sense that the government has recognized the wrongdoing of that discriminatory law and has made an apology to the Chinese community in that regard.
In terms of other areas in the history of the Chinese community related to the building of our nation, the building of our province and the building of our communities across British Columbia, I think it's very important to recognize, in today's universe, the work of Bill Chu, who has really done tremendous work with his organization, the Canadians for Reconciliation Society. Bill has been a significant force in trying to bring attention to the historical injustices to the Chinese community, but more than that, he wants to move forward so that we can recognize the wrongdoing, admit those wrongdoings and move forward into the future.
As we know, in the city of New Westminster, the mayor, Mayor Wright, most recently made an apology to the Chinese community in that regard. There have been some issues, particularly in the history of the Chinese community in New West, of burial sites that had been forgotten, if you will. Bill has spearheaded that and brought that issue to the attention of the New West council, and they have since, of course, made an apology in relation to that and in moving forward for the future.
The important part of all of this is not so much to just raise the issue around the wrongdoings but, rather, to simply say that what we have to do is to learn that history, to understand that history, pass on that history to younger generations for the future so that people can continue to build harmoniously for the future. Bill has been very strong in advocating for educational curriculum changes so that British Columbians and Canadians in future generations can learn about the past and recognize that history. I certainly support Bill's effort. In fact he has held many, many events in the community calling for action from the government.
In the spirit of the member for Burnaby North, who wants to recognize the contributions of the Chinese community, I urge him to urge his government also to undertake the work that Bill Chu has embarked on and to effect those kinds of changes that, I think, would really pay tribute to the Chinese community in a significant way.
I also want to just touch base on a variety of different things in our communities where we have seen the Chinese community's contribution in building our province and our communities. Aside from economic contributions, of course, we know as well culturally, the bridging of the multicultural societies of British Columbia and Canada…. The Chinese community has also been a major force in doing that.
Recently we've just celebrated the lunar new year, and we saw the lunar new year as a festival not just for the Chinese community but for every community in British Columbia and the multicultural mosaic and the fabric of who we are.
In that brilliant lunar new year parade that took place, we saw participation from people from all different nations. It was particularly exciting to see the aboriginal community involved in that as well, as we do have many things in common with the aboriginal community. To that end, really, kudos to the organizers in effecting that celebration and bringing communities together.
As we celebrate the contributions of the Chinese community economically, we should recognize also their cultural contribution as well.
R. Lee: I would like to thank the member for Vancouver–Mount Pleasant for her remarks. It is important to bring our history in B.C. into the classrooms so that more people will learn about it.
I also should mention that my grandfather also came to this province during that period when the head tax was imposed. My grandfather, Kwong Quai Lee, came during that period as a farmer. In 1913 he arrived in this province.
I would like, today, to also recognize some of the community members in the Chinese community who helped build this province. Businesses found in our province, actually, are running and employing a lot of British Columbians — it is not hundreds but thousands of British Columbians — and pump billions of dollars into the economy. I would like to recognize their success.
For example, David Choi helped form and also is the
[ Page 9695 ]
CEO of the Royal Pacific Realty group, western Canada's largest independent real estate organization, with over 1,100 agents. He is also the national chair of the National Congress of Chinese Canadians.
Cindy Lee is also the founder and CEO of T&T Supermarkets. Since the first two stores opened in 2003, the chain has rapidly expanded and today operates more than 20 stores, including locations in Ontario and Alberta, directly employing thousands of people.
Benjamin Yeung. Peterson Investment Group is one of western Canada's largest developers, whose influence can be seen in Vancouver skylines, with the Shangri-La, the Fairmont Pacific Rim and Woodward's redevelopment.
Bing Thom, of course, is one of Canada's most renowned architects and has helped define west coast contemporary architecture, whose designs include the Surrey Central City, the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts and many large and small residential developments.
I should also mention the economic contributions of the H. Y. Louie empire. The company, whose roots can be traced back to 1903, when Hok Yat Louie opened a modest general store in Vancouver's Chinatown, is now the second largest family-owned business in B.C.
THE VALUE OF OUR FORESTS
N. Macdonald: Our public lands are our most valuable publicly owned asset, likely worth a trillion dollars in total, with $250 billion for the timber resource alone.
Let's use 2001 as a starting point for an experiment in forest management. I'll make seven quick points in the time I have here. The results of that experiment are in.
First point. Despite the rhetoric, despite promises, 35,000 forestry jobs have been lost here in B.C. So the facts there speak of the failure of the experiment.
Second point is with waste. In a five-year period, if marketable logs left in B.C. forests were loaded on logging trucks, they would stretch from Victoria to Halifax and halfway back again. At the same time bioenergy cannot get this fibre. Again, the facts speak of failure.
The third point: raw logs, or the underutilization of the resource that we have. Last year, 2011, 5.5 million cubic metres of choice, unprocessed logs left Vancouver Island and the coast. That's enough wood in one year that, if loaded on logging trucks, they would stretch from Victoria to Thunder Bay. At the same time that 32 mills are shutting down on the coast and Vancouver Island, over 80 mills are opening in locations to process B.C. wood, away from British Columbia. Again, the facts there speak of a complete and utter failure.
The fourth point is around revenue from logs. Over 53 percent of the trees felled in B.C. paid minimum stumpage — so 25 cents for a telephone pole–sized log. A full logging truck would bring in enough for a fancy coffee at Starbucks. That is what we're getting for the resource. It's not surprising, then, that forestry loses money, when in the '90s it used to provide over $2 billion to public revenues. B.C. Timber Sales, set up to get a measure of the market value of forest products in the province, loses money, unbelievably. Again, the facts speak of failure.
The fifth point is with compliance and enforcement. Forest Practices Board says that the 2002 legislation means that the rules, in practical terms, are not enforceable. Despite promises, when that legislation was put in place, of jail time and million-dollar fines — not one million-dollar fine and no jail time. So compliance and enforcement — I mean, the fact of it is that staff has been cut. The rules are vague and unenforceable. It's not only the Forest Practices Board. The Auditor General, in his recent report, said the same thing when he looked at 15 stewardship plans in the last number of years. Again, the facts speak of failure.
The sixth point is around wildfire. With climate change and beetle kill, the dangers of wildfire increase. The Filmon report called for interface fuel management. Since 2003, 5 percent of the work identified to protect communities has been done — 5 percent in that period. Again, the facts speak of failure.
The seventh point is on forest health. The Auditor General, the Forest Practices Board, forest professionals all say that inventory is out of date. The fact is that 74 percent of the land inventory is inaccurate. We don't know. We don't know what we have out there.
With silviculture, in 2002 this government removed the legal requirement to replant and cut the budget for replanting by 90 percent. So the land unplanted, that should've been replanted by the provincial government, could be two million hectares. But who knows, actually? The debate is whether it's one million or two million.
There was a time when a Minister of Forests could phone and get an accurate number. We're in a place now where we don't know whether it's two million or one million. If it was one million, it's still a massive number. Again, the facts — or lack of facts, in this case — scream of failure.
Prior to 2001, like I say, a minister would know. The government response to this, that one issue, speaks about the response to all of these issues — to do nothing. In the case of forest health, over the next two years there is a cut of $20 million. So here we are.
I think that despite all of that we are still pretty lucky. There is no jurisdiction in the world that wouldn't trade our problems…. We still have a trillion-dollar asset, and that is the 94 percent of British Columbia that is publicly owned. We get to work in it. I know that the responder is from a rural area and has the same passion that I do for the land. We get to walk in it. We get to fish, to camp, to hike on our public lands, but we need to take our public responsibility seriously.
This House has an obligation to recognize the challenges on our public lands. We need to make the case
[ Page 9696 ]
with the public for proper stewardship of our land, and we need to do the work so that 50 years from now people in British Columbia will have the wonderful asset that we have — land that provides timber but also clean water, runs of salmon, lands that are teeming with the rich diversity of plants and animals. I say that we take up that challenge. Let's produce facts that speak of success and love for the land, and let's start to do that now.
J. Rustad: I want to thank the member for Columbia River–Revelstoke for raising this issue and talking about forestry. I think this is probably the fifth or seventh time, or something like that, that we have debated, back and forth, forest policy. I always enjoy the opportunity to rise and speak about it, especially with the member. He has that passion around forestry, and he has some ideas around it. I think it's healthy to have the discussion in this chamber.
I want to start off by perhaps quickly addressing the seven points that the member has raised. Coming from a rural area…. I have forestry as a background and have pretty much been in and around it most of my life, with the exception of being in politics. But when you're in politics, you're involved in pretty much everything, it seems to be, particularly when you come from a rural area — anything to do with the land base.
The member says 35,000 jobs were lost over the last period of time. You know, it's interesting. I'd love to know what his solution is around that. There has been some job loss around it. There have been some mills closed, particularly up in the northwest where it's uneconomical. There have been some job losses down along the coast, and some challenges around there. But once again, it's not over fibre supply. There is lots of fibre, but it's uneconomical.
The member, in one of his other points, talks about log exports. I had a meeting with Western Forest Products just the other day, talking about log exports. About 10 percent of a stand that they take ends up going to log export, but it pays the freight to allow them to even go in and access that wood to make it available for the mills, the seven mills that they operate. What they said is, "If we weren't allowed to do that, the impact on our mills would be phenomenal. We'd probably have to shut down. We'd lose, probably, about 350 jobs just from that component alone," because that is wood that comes out that can't be utilized, that is in excess, that they can get a price for and that helps to support what we're doing here locally.
The member says: "Maybe we should shut down all the log exports." Well, that's fine, if you want to do that, but 60 percent of the jobs in the forest are directly associated with harvesting. So for example, up in the northwest where it's uneconomical to use the type of fibre that's up there, you're talking about putting a lot of people out of work. I find that argument quite interesting when the first point, he says, is about jobs.
The other thing I'd just, of course, raise about this is that during the 1990s, when the NDP had an opportunity to talk about forestry, they had a forest and timber accord where they promised over 22,000 new jobs. And what happened? We ended up losing 13,000 jobs. We're without jobs again. Government can't force the creation of jobs.
I'd also like to just quickly talk about…. He talked about waste that's left in the forest. I agree. There is a problem with some waste that's left in the forest, particularly in the pine areas. There's a lot of wood that's left behind that we'd like to see utilized. That's why we're seeing the growth — significant growth — in pellets and in pellet industry.
In my area, particularly out in Burns Lake, we have a new pellet plant that's gone in there that is the largest in Canada, and we've proposed to grow to become one of the largest in the world in terms of pellet production. They only get about 40 percent of their fibre — or used to get about 40 percent of their fibre — from Hampton. Of course, we had the tragedy that's happened in Burns Lake around that. But the rest of that was going to come from residuals that are left in the forest, so we're doing and making a lot of headway along that.
Around the other points, particularly inventories and enforcement and those sorts of things. The member is suggesting we need to throw more money at this. Well, we already…. Since 2001 we've invested over $1.3 billion in forestry. We've got $70 million annually that goes into forest health and those sorts of things. The question is, is it enough?
The member opposite would say: "It's not. We need to throw more money at it." But I would say that is a red herring, because governments…. When you're looking at education — which we'll be debating later this afternoon — and when you're looking at health, there are so many demands in there that it's tough to get the money for forestry.
But here is something that we should be looking at, Madam Speaker: area-based management. When you look at TFLs, for example, Dunkley Lumber's TFL, and when you look at woodlots — West Fraser's TFL — in all of those cases, they've got better inventories. They are producing more wood off of the land base than we are off our Crown lands. Their investment in silviculture is much higher. The amount of return, the level of care, the level of enforcement and forest health issues are all much better. Dunkley Lumber has a policy: "There will be no tree that falls in the forest that doesn't go through our mill and be processed."
What I'm suggesting to the member is that we need to stop thinking about our traditional forests in this way. We need to be thinking about a better way to manage. When you look at Sweden, when you look at other jurisdictions that have area-based management, they have much bet-
[ Page 9697 ]
ter results than what we do.
That is what we need to be getting for. That's the type of thing we need to be looking at in the future of our forest industry to truly be able to evolve our forest industry and support a healthy growth in the future. So I hope the member has some opportunity to speak to those.
N. Macdonald: Well, I thank you for the opportunity. Just in the few minutes that I have to respond…. This is, again, an opportunity that the member and I have had to describe and to talk about an issue that I know we both share passions around. We both live in areas where the public land is there. Both have friends and neighbours — and in the member's case — who've worked on the land.
Look, the member has raised a number of ideas. I know that he has worked on a biomass committee, which is interesting work. We have said in the past.… I feel that, given the opportunity, after the next election we need to set up a committee of members from both sides to sit on a permanent forestry committee, because the decisions that we make now and the direction that we go now is not something that fits into an electoral cycle. The investments that are made now show up in 60, 70, 80 years, but it's something that we have to do properly.
The member raised a number of things. I think with raw log exports we're talking about balance. In the 1990s there was one million cubic metres that went out. We need to work towards a situation where it's not like it is now, with 5.5 million cubic metres going.
We do need to get inventories. A part of the case that we have to make as rural MLAs is that these are wise investments. The member for Kootenay East talked about the dirt ministries being starved for money. The amount spent on Health and Education — those budgets have doubled. The amount spent on dirt ministries has gone to one-half. You know, there is growth in some areas, and there is a clear lack of investment in other areas.
The sound management of B.C.'s forests is a matter of utmost public importance. Moving forward, we have to do better. We must think long time, and we need to make the case, particularly as rural MLAs, of the importance of our public lands.
I thank you for the opportunity and thank the member for his participation.
HEALTH CARE INVESTMENTS IN SURREY
D. Hayer: As long as I remember, Surrey has been one of the fastest-growing cities in British Columbia. Very soon it will be the largest city in British Columbia. As you can imagine, the growth places tremendous pressure on the public infrastructure and services such as health care.
Unfortunately, since 2001 previous governments failed to invest in health care in Surrey. As a result, health care facilities failed to grow with the population growth in Surrey. Since 2001 our government has worked tremendously to remedy these problems and to invest a record amount in health care infrastructure and services in Surrey.
In fact, construction is now underway on the largest single health care investment in the history of this province. More than half a billion dollars is being invested to upgrade and expand the Surrey Memorial Hospital. That is historic. It is monumental. But this is only a drop in the bucket.
Prior to the expansion of Surrey Memorial Hospital we invested more than $237 million to build the Jim Pattison Outpatient Care and Surgery Centre hospital on Fraser Highway and 140th Street. Not only does this facility ease congestion at the Surrey Memorial Hospital and other facilities around the region, but it is also an example of our government's commitment to health care improvement and health care innovation.
Officially opened last May on time and on budget, the Jim Pattison outpatient hospital and daycare centre makes accessing important health care services more convenient for all patients. The one-of-a-kind medical care centre provides CT and MRI scans, biopsies, X-rays, numerous diagnostic procedures and, of course, much-needed surgeries in one single stop.
The Jim Pattison Outpatient Care and Surgery Centre's enormous capacity, which can handle more than 450,000 patients per year and has a capacity to expand to 650,000 patients per year, will reduce the wait times and ensure that Surrey residents receive health care quickly and conveniently and close to home. It will make the lives of Surrey residents and residents of the Lower Mainland much better.
In Surrey people now have access to a world-class health care system, and when Surrey Memorial Hospital's huge expansion is complete, they will have even greater access. The new critical care tower, new emergency department and renovations to Surrey Memorial Hospital represent over half a billion dollar investment in health care in Surrey to accommodate current demand and future growth. This is historical investment.
When construction is complete, the total number of acute care beds at Surrey Memorial Hospital will increase to 650. That represents a 151-bed increase. What's almost most important will be the expanded capacity at Surrey Memorial Hospital, like the 48 neonatal intensive care units for high-risk infants, the children's emergency department, with embedded pediatric pharmacy and Canada's first in-hospital Ronald McDonald house space for families. To comfort families, each neonatal bed will have its own room with space for families to visit or stay over.
Other medical floors will include an enlarged intensive care unit, high-acuity beds, a special stroke unit and the ability to offer patients bedside hemodialysis. The hospi-
[ Page 9698 ]
tal will also offer a dedicated perinatal centre, additional academic space and an expanded maternity department, including a second maternal operating room for births of new babies, and expanded space for support services.
Surrey Memorial's new and expanded emergency department will be almost five times larger than the current one. It will alleviate congestion and streamline care by having separate tracks for pediatric patients, mental health patients, seriously ill or seriously injured patients, and those patients with minor ailments or minor injuries. To ensure that critical care patients get to hospital as quickly as possible, the new eight-storey tower will have a helicopter pad on its roof to be ready and equipped to deal with any emergency in Surrey. This means Surrey residents will receive prompt care during possible life-threatening illness or illness.
The unprecedented investment at Surrey Memorial Hospital will ensure we meet the needs of Surrey residents now and in the future. But let me be clear. Health care also goes beyond the structures.
Our Minister of Health has diligently visited patients in hospitals and held meetings with health care professionals and health care providers and medical professionals across the province to ensure we are meeting the needs of patients. Based on those consultations, he has undertaken a number of initiatives to improve health care in Surrey and across British Columbia.
Recently he has taken an unprecedented step to tackle elder abuse and committed to creating a seniors advocate. Highlighting the plan includes stabilizing benefits and protection to all seniors residential care clients. Clients' detailed senior residential care facility inspection reports and assisted-living residential investigative reports will be available in detail.
The Minister's actions are to aid our seniors, and they will go a long way towards relieving stress for our seniors, creating protection for them and, in turn, hopefully reducing the need for them to require hospital care.
Health care investment in Surrey also extends to lending a hand up to individuals in need. The Quibble Creek health care and the Phoenix transition housing centre both contain 52 supportive housing units and 15 short-term transitional recovery beds. Plus, the building will also include Fraser Health's recovery and assessment centre with 25 beds for men and women requiring 24-hour recovery and assessment services. These 25 beds will help.
Primary care and substance abuse and mental health clinical services will be available there. The centre will be a safe, sheltered environment to assist individuals recovering from drug addictions. Clients will be supported by an interdisciplinary team of professionals, including nurses, substance use support workers and outreach workers.
In Surrey we have seen particular investment and improvements in additional services in helping the homeless and those at risk of homeless.
Deputy Speaker: Thank you, Member.
D. Hayer: I'll wait for the opposition's response, and then I'll continue.
J. Brar: I'm very pleased to respond to the private member's statement made by the member for Surrey-Tynehead. There are a couple of things I agree with the member on, and I would like to put that at the very front.
The first one is that I agree with the member that Surrey is the fastest-growing community in the province and we kind of welcome every month about 1,000 new residents to the city. That has been happening for the last many, many years. The second one is that health care remains the most pressing, important issue for Surrey families. So we agree on that piece as well.
But when it comes to the record of this government, I would like to go back to 2001 when the government took over. They made the promise to B.C. families and certainly to the families of the fastest-growing community of Surrey that they would provide the best health care when you need it and where you need it.
In fact, after the election they did the opposite. They started closing hospitals and emergency rooms. They closed St. Mary's Hospital. That put extra, extra pressure on Surrey Memorial Hospital, which was already over capacity. There were huge lineups and wait times when people went to the emergency room.
That's what they did after the first election. And in the next election in 2005, during the middle of the election, the then Premier, Gordon Campbell, went to the city of Surrey to make a promise to Surrey families again, and that was to build a new emergency room. That was the promise made during the middle of the election campaign. The construction was to begin in 2008, with the completion date in 2010.
Again, that was before the election. After the election the Premier went to the city of Surrey again to make another announcement, and the announcement was basically to delay the construction of the new emergency room from 2010 to 2011. Then they delayed the construction from 2011 to 2012. Then they went back again, and they delayed the construction of that new emergency room from 2012 to 2013.
Then the party went through the leadership race, and they elected a new leader, a new Premier, and the new Premier went to the city of Surrey. I was very excited to hear her. I thought: "There will be a change. The new Premier probably is going to fast-track this facility, at the end of the day." But I was very shocked to hear that the new Premier again delayed that construction from 2013 to 2014.
This facility was supposed to be ready in 2010, as per their promise made in 2005. Now they've delayed to 2014. The most shocking, painful thing for the people of Surrey
[ Page 9699 ]
is when they still hear from this government, "On time, on budget," after these many delays. And they still keep saying that. The minimum thing they owe to the people of Surrey is just being honest with them, to say that this has been delayed because of whatever the reason.
The other thing they did in this budget…. The last government, about 15 years ago, acquired a piece of land at the corner of 152nd and Highway 10 to build a new hospital. That was 15 years ago, and since 2001, when this government took over, we have probably welcomed over 100,000 new people to the city of Surrey. That's a significant population growth.
I was shocked to see, and the people of Surrey were shocked to hear, that they have put that land on sale. They have put that piece of land, to build a new hospital, on sale in this fastest-growing community in the province, where we are way behind building new infrastructure and new services for the people of Surrey, to serve the fastest-growing community in the province. That's what they did.
The school board of the city of Surrey is looking for new places, for new pieces of land to build new facilities. And this government is selling the piece of land which was bought by the previous government 15 years ago. So that's what they are doing, and they're talking about building new capacity for the people of Surrey.
The last point I want to make is about the new outpatient hospital built by this government. That was, by the way, also delayed. There's a serious challenge about the staffing issue. This government has no plan to build new staffing and to have new staffing for that facility. I would like to hear the member on that one.
D. Hayer: I appreciate the comments from the member for Surrey-Fleetwood. It's good to hear. He's here to respond to it because he lives in Surrey, and I live in Surrey. We have seen a lot of changes. Let me remind the member for Surrey-Fleetwood. In the '90s, when I was the president of Surrey Board of Trade, we had the president of the Surrey Memorial Hospital as my vice-president on the Surrey Board of Trade. Every week he used to tell me: "Dave, we have difficult problems at Surrey Memorial Hospital. We are almost bankrupt every week because we're not getting enough funding from the provincial government."
I was surprised. I remember seeing huge lineups there. Sometimes people had to wait two days to see a doctor. The hallways were full of patients. I remember taking my dad there. I remember when my grandma was sick and she passed away at Surrey Memorial — how difficult it was and how challenging it was. Health care has been a problem for all of the western world, and it has seen challenges in all different governments. We try to do our share to improve it.
As the member has acknowledged, we are spending over half a billion dollars on the new Surrey Memorial Hospital tower, which will make the emergency five times bigger than the current one. This is good news. Also, it will have extra beds in there, a new children's emergency. As the member has acknowledged, it's good to see the new Jimmy Pattison outpatient hospital is open on Fraser Highway and 140th Street.
Even this member, when we started, used to say this will never happen. I used to have people come talk to me all the time. He said: "Some members from the opposition are saying that it's not happening. It's just one big hole, and nothing will happen." Actually, the hospital got built. The hospital got opened.
The workers I talk to regularly enjoy it. They love it. But sadly, in the 1990s, when the NDP was in power, they cut down the number of health care professional spaces in nursing, and the doctors. We have doubled the number of doctors' spaces, and we have doubled the number of nursing spaces.
So it's taking a little while. It can take five years to get a nursing degree. We are getting more professionals. It's getting better. But we are not only just improving the health care needs of the people; we have also looked particularly at the people who are vulnerable, who might need help because they might have a chance of becoming homeless or they are at risk of being homeless.
We have opened facilities for them, because we believe if people have homes, it is better for them. We have also provided more funding in home care, and we are more proactive in making sure seniors are looked after, if they want to stay at home or, if they want, in seniors facilities.
We have increased the number of facilities for seniors. The member has seen in his riding, which he moved to from Panorama Ridge, so many facilities for seniors which we built. I went to other facilities, talked to all the seniors. Many of them I meet regularly. They are really good.
In conclusion, I want to thank the member for agreeing with me, that we have made lots of arguments. I look forward to talking about and discussing this more.
PUTTING FAMILIES FIRST
C. Trevena: This morning I'm speaking on the topic of putting families first. What I'd like to do in these few moments I have is to try and examine ways of how we can make this more than just a political slogan and put some real meat to this. I hope that, in the response from the government's side, we can have a real debate. One of the very sad things is using families, which are the core of our society, as a political game and just using a banner rather than having a real essence to what is meant by putting families first.
One of the real problems when we look at this as an idea is looking at the reality of life in British Columbia at the moment. The reality for life in British Columbia is
[ Page 9700 ]
the fact that we have a massive amount of child poverty. I know that on this side of the House we often quote this and on the government's side of the House they often deny it, but I do think that it is worth repeating.
The reason we do repeat it is it's significant that for eight years we have been the highest province with child poverty. It is a statistic that I wanted to raise today because we are talking about families. You can't talk just about a child alone. A child isn't poor alone. A child comes from a family. Whether it's a single-parent family, two-parent family or grandparents raising the child, it's still a family. A significant number of families are poor.
I think one of the very worrying aspects of this is that out of those poor families, almost half of them have at least one parent working. We're talking of thousands of children who are growing up in families where one parent is working, but they are described as poor — who are below the low-income cutoff, who can't afford to either feed themselves or house themselves. New clothes are a complete luxury. Anything like going out is just off the radar.
This is really, really frightening, for a government that says they are putting families first, that they can allow this to continue. What I would hope to see is that we look at a greater sense of how we can deal with poverty. So 48 percent of poor children live in families where at least one parent is working — 48 percent. For those families on assistance, because they can't find work or are not able to work, it is significantly higher.
The cost of living in B.C. is huge, and wages are low. Wages are low across Canada, according to the OECD, but in B.C. they are particularly low. This state of poverty has been reflected in a report that was published last week by the Dietitians of Canada. I would think the dietitians must be one of the most non-partisan groups that you can think of, in the country.
They published a report last week called The Cost of Eating. They found that families cannot afford food and that they are spending almost half their income just to buy food. This is not even healthy food. It's the cheapest food they can get. Many families then rely on food banks, which I think, as all members of this House know, are a band-aid and not a solution.
The report reads: "In 2011 the provincial average cost of the nutritious food basket for a family of four is $868.43 a month. Those earning minimum wage, receiving income assistance or facing other challenges — high rents, child care or transportation — struggle to find ways to purchase food, as well as meet other basic needs." That's B.C. in 2012. People are struggling to put food on the table. The average in the province is $868. In the Lower Mainland we are talking about $944 just to put food on the table.
The cost of food, obviously, isn't government policy. But things that are government policy, which they could address, are introducing a poverty reduction plan. We have one tabled. If they want to look at a template, they can look at ours and work with us. Also, real rental housing — not just shelters for the homeless, not just emergency housing but a real, affordable housing strategy.
We've also got to look at other aspects. We've just had the budget tabled, in which we've seen MSP rates go up 4 percent. That, for a family, is over $730 a year extra that they're going to have to pay for MSP. I know that the government says: "Oh, we've got lots of people who don't pay MSP, or lots of people are covered in their plans from their employers." Well, many people actually aren't covered by plans by their employers. They're not covered by unions, because there has been a move for deunionization. And many people just simply cannot afford it.
The government will say: "We've got the subsidies; 800,000 people either don't pay MSP or are subsidized." Well, that is so telling, because that's 800,000 people who are actually categorized by this government as being poor. That isn't putting families first. Putting up MSP isn't putting families first.
The other issue that is detrimental for families at the moment is child care — access to affordable, accessible, high-quality child care. Again, the government might say that they've been helping because they've increased it, and they've lowered the income cutoff, which expands the number of people getting child care. But they have actually reduced the number of people who can afford to get child care. We are in a situation where it is untenable.
You get women who don't work because they can't afford to work and pay for child care. It is better for them to stay at home, which adds to the poverty that their families are living in. So you get a family that is living on one wage because the wife simply cannot afford to pay for child care.
A family-first approach, putting families first, would have a really strategic approach on incorporating an early care and learning system into our society, which has affordable, accessible, high-quality child care. It would establish this system in a way that really would entrench it.
You're also not putting families first when you look at the increased costs of living that the government has controls on, such as the taxation. We have seen in this budget that the HST is still there, and I'm going to be examining some of the economic impacts of this when I respond.
J. Thornthwaite: I rise today to respond to the member for North Island. Thank you very much. Our Premier put, as a first priority, families first — not just as a political slogan, but everything that we do on this side of the House looks at families. I am a part of the cabinet committee of families first. We are mandated to look at every single thing we do with a family-focused lens.
One of the actions that the B.C. government has taken to reduce poverty is the creation of Canada Starts Here,
[ Page 9701 ]
the B.C. jobs plan. It's working, and we've had lots of accolades from folks out there that are saying that this is working. We've got the Seaspan announcement that has 4,000 jobs. The Premier was in China and India to generate more business, profile and investment. It's working. The new LNG announcement — 14,000 jobs. The Evergreen announcement — 8,000 jobs. Eight new mines, nine expansions. The Red Chris mine in itself would provide 8,000 jobs. So there's a job program going, and that's what we're doing.
The other thing is that British Columbians do have the lowest overall tax burdens. The member did mention taxes. One of the first things that Premier Clark did was increase the minimum wage. That means that those full-time employees that were earning minimum wage before will now receive an additional $4,000 annually.
Let's talk about taxes. A two-income family of four earning $90,000 paid $6,234 in provincial income tax in 2000. Today that same family pays $3,166, which is a tax cut of 47 percent. A two-income family of four earning $60,000 a year paid $3,272 in provincial income tax in 2001. Today that same family pays $1,302 in provincial income tax. That's a 60-percent tax cut. A two-income family of four earning $30,000 a year paid $1,000 in provincial income tax. Today that family pays no provincial income tax. Individuals earning up to $119,000 now pay the lowest income taxes in Canada, and an additional 325,000 people now pay zero provincial income taxes. That's important.
The other thing that the member had mentioned was with regards to a child poverty strategy. Recently our Minister of Children and Families announced, with the UBCM healthy communities committee, a joint initiative on poverty. This project will focus on addressing poverty in seven communities by developing action plans that reflect the needs and resources of the community. The project will depend on partnerships between the provincial and municipal governments, local community organizations, service providers and business representatives to develop strategic, measurable plans focused on reducing poverty, mitigating its effects and supporting services for low-income families.
This is indicative of the fact that we can simply not have a one-size-fits-all. This program, by the way, is supported and endorsed by the Representative for Children and Youth.
The focus will be on designing innovative services, within the current fiscal climate, that meet the needs of low-income families vulnerable to poverty, and the project will focus on families with children living in poverty. Once the project has been implemented in seven communities, it will be evaluated and expanded to 20 additional communities per year, with the goal of having a site in all 47 local service delivery areas. As you can see, Madam Speaker, we are working on anti-poverty strategies.
The other thing that I just wanted to mention as well that supports the family-first initiative within the budget that was just mentioned before is the tax credits for kids, the tax credits for arts and fitness, enhancements to the homeowner grant, the B.C. seniors home-renovation tax credit, the B.C. first-time homebuyers bonus — $10,000 — and the B.C. new housing rebate threshold increased to $850,000. These are all to help families.
On top of that, what did the Premier announce? A review for CLBC, a Minister of Justice Green Paper for everybody to comment on justice, the local government auditor general — all of these things are for families. I'll let the member respond, but the bottom line is that our government does take families first, and we are working to conclude in that.
[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]
C. Trevena: I found it very interesting to hear the member for North Vancouver–Seymour discussing the Premier's family-first focus. I found that it unfortunately was, as I said at the beginning, empty slogans and rhetoric without any foundation — so much so that the member had to read a complete press release from a ministry without actually…. This is something that hasn't been established and is very localized at the moment. And she is, again, talking about the jobs plan as the cure-all.
I think the member wasn't listening to my earlier comments that many of the people living in poverty — many of these families who need support from policies that work to support families and not just cynical slogans — are working. B.C. has low wages. These are working poor families. These are families who are not going to benefit from getting the equivalent of about $25 for sports classes or music classes for their kids, because they can't afford sports classes or music classes for their kids.
The member also talked about taxation. She forgot to mention that we still have the HST, introduced very cynically in 2009 immediately after the election, putting a huge burden on the cost of living for many, many B.C. families. This was definitely not a families-first approach.
If the new Premier had any real gumption and wanted to put any strength behind her political slogan of families first, she'd have said straight away that we are putting families first, and the first thing we're going to do is get rid of the HST to ensure that people can actually afford to live and be able to buy that basket of food that I was talking about in the first part of my speech.
As far as jobs are concerned, we have many people working in low-paid jobs, who are in poverty and not being supported through families first. In addition to this, we have people who are having to break up their families to go and find work either out of province or in another area of the province, because there isn't any work in their communities.
[ Page 9702 ]
That is part of the continued idea that we should export our resources rather than use them for secondary manufacturing and value-added. If we could create jobs in our own communities, we could keep families together and keep a better strength for our communities.
I've got to say that I think it's been exceedingly cynical of this government to try to say it's putting families first when the evidence is clearly to the contrary. Families do not come first under this government. Instead, it's the friends of this government who come first. It is too often the corporate insiders, and it is simply too often a lust for power, a lust for just grandeur, rather than anything that is substantial for families.
Hon. I. Chong: I now call private member's Motion 31.
Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members, unanimous consent of the House is required to proceed with Motion 31 without disturbing the priorities of motions preceding it on the order paper.
Leave granted.
Mr. Speaker: Just before we get started, Members, I want to add that both the government Whip and the opposition Whip have agreed that members will speak for five minutes, and five minutes only, and will be timed.
Private Members' Motions
MOTION 31 — B.C. CREDIT RATING
AND BORROWING COSTS
B. Bennett: Hon. Speaker, the motion this morning reads:
[Be it resolved that this House support taking the necessary measures to ensure the Province maintain its AAA credit rating to keep borrowing costs down for the Province.]
[L. Reid in the chair.]
I'm going to focus on three reasons why the province's credit rating is important not just to government and people who are elected but to ordinary British Columbians. The first reason is that bad credit means that you can't borrow to invest in long-term infrastructure like roads and hospitals and schools, while good credit means that you can. So that school that members want in their community or that new health clinic or those passing lanes — they get built with borrowed capital dollars. If your credit rating is bad, either you won't be allowed to borrow, or the interest rate will be so high that you won't be able to afford it.
B.C.'s triple-A credit rating allows the province unparalleled access to capital markets and investors around the world. Unlike other jurisdictions, B.C. can access low-cost money to build our roads, our hospitals and our schools.
The second reason that a triple-A credit rating matters to ordinary British Columbians. Bad credit means the taxpayer pays a higher rate of interest. Good credit means the taxpayer pays a lower rate of interest. The price that B.C. pays for those borrowed capital dollars that I just talked about is lower than the price paid by most Canadian provinces and, in fact, is lower than most nations on earth pay.
Our interest rate for B.C. is actually about 35 basis points lower than Ontario. Let me give you an example. On the $8.5 billion borrowing program for this upcoming fiscal year — a borrowing program that will help fund schools, roads, health facilities and other priority capital projects — a one-point change would add as much as $4.25 million annually in higher interest payments.
For those who think that a credit rating is only important to bankers and accountants, they should think again. B.C.'s triple-A credit rating means that B.C. can tax less and leave more money in the pockets of those hard-working British Columbians who earned it.
The third reason that a triple-A credit rating is important to the average B.C. taxpayer. A high credit rating leads to more investment and more jobs. A low credit rating leads to negative growth, no investment and no new jobs. That's where the rubber hits the road for families in British Columbia. A credit downgrade such as the NDP caused multiple times in the 1990s would kill the confidence of investors in our economy.
I challenge any opposition speaker to dispute the premise that if investors lose confidence, they stop investing. When they stop investing, the economy slows down and unemployment increases.
The reality is that investment is liquid, and it is smart. Investment flows to where it is likeliest to find a safe home and a probable return. Policies that send a message that discipline is out of favour, a message that a government will scratch every itch its constituents have, will be heard around the world in every financial market. That is precisely what happened in British Columbia in the 1990s, although members on the other side are very busy these days rewriting the history.
Notwithstanding the efforts of the opposition to revise their own history as a stunningly bad government, and setting aside for now the facts in black and white on the budget papers of the last 20 years, let's allow a financial agency from outside our borders to assess the fiscal management of this government.
I've heard in this place several opposition members claim over the past week that this government will not balance the budget in 2013-14, despite exceeding nine of ten budget targets. In reconfirming B.C.'s triple-A credit rating recently, Standard and Poor's noted that the province "has the solid revenue and expenditure flexibility
[ Page 9703 ]
necessary to achieve a balanced budget by 2013-14 and to manage its tax-supported debt burden."
The question for the public is who to believe — the unbiased, apolitical, professional financial community outside British Columbia or the now leader, former NDP backroom adviser to the fudge-it budget regimes of the sorry 1990s.
Does a triple-A credit rating matter to the future of B.C.? This side of the House says that it does, and now we will find out if the opposition agrees or disagrees.
B. Ralston: Certainly, the credit rating is one measure of the fiscal reality here in British Columbia. But I think a more important one, and perhaps less objective in the sense that it was set up by the B.C. Liberals themselves, is the Progress Board. The member opposite wants to make some comparisons between this decade and the previous one. Let's look at what the B.C. Progress Board said about B.C.'s decline in standing in Canada over the last ten years.
This is a task force, an agency, put together by the B.C. Liberals and appointed by order-in-council. So it's close to the government — so close that the news was so bad that the new Premier has done away with it.
But let's look at their last report, summing up the decade — gone from fourth to fifth place in the economy, from third to fourth place in personal income and from fifth to seventh in jobs. That's set out in their own terms, measured by indices they set up themselves, and perhaps in this case really not properly named "progress," because the steps on those important economic measures were backwards.
Also, if you look at a recent report compiled and released by B.C. Statistics — another government agency, although that's staffed by public servants…. B.C. Stats reviewed the data and found that B.C. has the largest income gap in Canada, with the bottom 20 percent of British Columbians earning just 7.7 percent of what the top 20 percent made and well down from the 22 percent seen in the 1990s. So those are the B.C. statistics, an important measure of economic inequality here in British Columbia, and it's now the worst in Canada.
It's well documented that inequality has a number of deleterious effects on social well-being and indeed on economic well-being. Societies that are more unequal have higher crime rates, higher levels of chronic disease and a number of other indices of the lack of social progress that relate to inequality.
Let's look further at other economic measures besides the credit-rating measure. The annual average growth in jobs between 2001 and 2011 was just 1.7 percent compared with 2 percent between 1991 and 2001. Between 2001 and 2011 B.C. average weekly wages grew more slowly than in any other province — 29 percent versus 36 percent for the Canadian average.
It's fine to isolate one measure, but there are a number of others. Certainly, the progress report does set them out in some detail. It's, frankly, no wonder that the incoming Premier decided to do away with that rather inconvenient news set out by the progress report about the backward steps in the economy, personal income and jobs taken over the last ten years.
J. Rustad: I want to thank the member from the Kootenays for raising this issue. In my opinion, it's a very important issue which is around our triple-A credit rating.
I want to thank the comments from Surrey-Whalley because it was very revealing. What did he think about the triple-A rating? Well, there are all these other things that need to be dealt with. In other words, it has no value whatsoever for the opposition.
That's a very important point to be making here, and it's a very important point that the member opposite just said. What they basically said is that it doesn't matter how much you spend. It only matters around all the other indicators. That is what Greece has done. It didn't matter how much you spend.
I sat down and talked with the ex-president of UNBC around debt and debt management, and you know what he said? He did a thesis on this at one point, and he said: "You know, debt is never a problem until it is."
It's a very important distinction. It may sound obvious, but the point is that you run along with a triple-A credit rating. Things are going well. You're managing your economy well. You're managing your spending well. You go off of that track, and what happens is it starts a quick spiral down.
You just look at what they have to do in Ontario right now in terms of trying to manage their budget and get to a place where they can actually say with credibility that they can get back to balanced. It's nasty. That's the only way to say it. It's nasty what they have to do. I'd love to hear the opposition stand up and say what that will do to some statistics that he just mentioned around what the impact in that province will be.
I can tell you something, Madam Speaker. The critical component of a triple-A rating is the confidence it sends to the investment community around the world. So when you want people to reinvest in mills, to invest in new mines, to invest in things that are job creation in this province, which help to pay for health care, which help to pay for education, which keep our economy strong, which support families…. One of the biggest things they look at is what the stability is in the government. What's the stability in their spending? They need to know that things aren't going off a cliff.
There are a lot of the people today, particularly those investors in Europe and other jurisdictions that are looking and saying…. Where should they invest? Where can they make sure that they have stability? It's interesting
[ Page 9704 ]
because people say: "Triple-A rating — what does that mean?" There are only a few countries around the world — matter of fact, there are a dozen right now — that have triple-A rating. Out of that, there are a number of them that are — they're on the verge over the next five years or so — going to be downgraded.
Japan, for example — triple-A credit rating. But their debt-to-GDP ratio is astronomical — 235 percent. I read one book that described it as being a bug in search of a windshield. They've got real problems coming forward.
You've got Germany. Germany is on the outlook right now, and if it continues on with its spending, it's going to be downgraded. The U.K., with what it's doing and it's spending…. It's going to be downgraded.
What does that mean, and how does that translate to everyday folks? Well, you think about it as going to a bank to get a mortgage for your home. So you're going to go to the bank, and they look at your credit rating. If you've got a really poor credit rating, they're going to say: "Sorry. No, we won't lend you the money." If you've got a credit rating that's iffy, they'll say: "We'll lend it to you, but you're a higher risk, so we're going to give you a higher interest rate."
But if you go in and say, "You know what? We've met all of our budget plans" — and in B.C. we've met ten out of 11 plans; we blew it one year when everybody else did as well — the banks say: "You know what? We'll give you the best rate possible because we know your fiscal plan. You will get a return."
When you look at infrastructure, for example…. There's one quote. I like to use Facebook a lot, and I posted this question over the weekend because I wanted to get some response. They said:
"Doesn't having a triple-A rating mean that borrowing money to pay for infrastructure upgrades like the Sea to Sky Highway — taking out those killer corners — and the Port Mann expansion all mean that interest rates are the lowest they can be? Other provinces like Ontario and countries like Greece, Portugal and Spain should come to B.C. and learn how to improve their government financial systems so that they aren't continually bleeding red ink."
There are many other comments along those same lines from Facebook comments. And yes, there are some comments where people say, "Well, don't worry about it. We just need to be spending more" — like the opposition is. But clearly, throwing money at problems, being fiscally irresponsible, is a path that leads to fiscal devastation.
You look at what's happened in Greece. You look at the decisions that have to be made in Ontario. The only way you can avoid that is to continue to have solid fiscal discipline and good plans. A triple-A credit rating is the measure that says your government is doing the right thing; it is on the right track and should continue that way.
J. Kwan: It's interesting in terms of the debate to talk about really, I guess, reading history as the government members want to read it and interpret it in the way in which they want to interpret it. So let's actually really review the record around economic performance.
As my colleague the Finance critic mentioned earlier, I think one of the key factors that we should look to…. Just so everybody knows in this House, and those who are watching this debate would know, the review and assessment on the government's economic capacity actually came from the very board, the Progress Board, that was set up by former Premier Gordon Campbell.
One of its last reports — in fact, I think it was the last report — made an assessment over the last ten years of how the B.C. economy had performed under the B.C. Liberals. Let me just cite a couple of items that I think are worth highlighting for the record. These are not my numbers, I want to say very clearly, but rather numbers that came from the Progress Board.
The report card from the B.C. Progress Board, established by former Premier Gordon Campbell in 2002, is an independent assessment of the government's performance using quantifiable measurements. Based on 21 key indicators set up by that board, initially chaired by David Emerson, it has been a disappointing decade. That is the truth of it.
The board compares B.C. with other provinces. The goal, it is said in this first report, was to see this province first or second in Canada in key measurements. So how have we done in some of those key measurements? Employment would be one factor to look at. Another area would be personal income tax. Productivity of the province as a key measurement, if you will, around that.
On personal income. B.C. has actually fallen from third to fourth place under this government. In productivity, a key measure, it has fallen from fifth to seventh amongst other provinces. This is a report from the independent Progress Board that was set up by former Premier Gordon Campbell.
The other measure that it looked to is the GDP. It says that the government wanted, in its first reporting for B.C., by 2010 to be the first or second in expanding its GDP per capita, personal income and jobs. And guess what. The Liberal government failed on those very measurements. The very goals that they had set out, they had failed to achieve.
Now, those weren't the only measurements that the Progress Board looked into. They measured other things as well — social and health measures, key measurements. They found that it has fallen from the sixth-worst province for poverty to last under the B.C. Liberals. Infant health, as measured by low birth weight rate, has gone from second to fifth. Greenhouse gas emissions per person, supposedly a priority for this government, have gone from third-best to fourth. In these key measurements of the government's performance, they have actually failed in what they wanted to achieve.
We don't really have to look at these numbers to tell
[ Page 9705 ]
the story. We can just look around us to see how things are going. Take, for example, a key industry sector in British Columbia — the forestry sector. Let's just look at the government's policy around that as it relates to jobs for British Columbia. More than 40 percent of the trees logged on B.C.'s coast were exported as raw logs.
What does that mean, Madam Speaker? That means we have not added value to those logs to create jobs in British Columbia for B.C. workers. That's what it means. That's the equivalent of exporting B.C. jobs outside our province. Under this government about 40,000 jobs have been lost in this sector, and 70 wood processing plants have closed — less spending on forest reforestation, less wealth and revenues for our communities. You've just got to ask: how's it going on the progress for B.C.?
J. Yap: It's an honour to take my place in this debate on the motion put forward by my good colleague from Kootenay East.
First of all, I'd like to address some of the comments that the member from Mount Pleasant just finished up. She did talk about the forest industry and the challenges in the industry, but she forgot to mention that of course this is in the backdrop of the worst recession in a generation impacting the housing market in the United States, our number one customer for lumber.
She didn't mention that, of course. But just to put some balance into the debate before I leave the forest industry, under this government we've seen an incredible increase in exports to the fast-growing market in China, where we've increased to record levels our exports of lumber. But you know, lumber and the forestry sector are important industries in British Columbia that have benefited from the focus on looking after our economy of this government.
In the last ten years we have seen over 400,000 jobs created in the province of British Columbia. Contrast that to the 1990s, when the opposition were in government for two terms — that decade when the NDP were in power, including the current Leader of the Opposition in a very senior role. That was a time when 50,000 people left the province of B.C. to find jobs outside of the province. That is one of the realities that we will have to continue to remind British Columbians of as they think about the contrast between that side of the House and this side of the House.
The motion today talks about a triple-A credit rating. You know, British Columbians who are busy working and raising their families may not think on a daily basis about a triple-A credit rating. I think it's important that we put it in the right perspective, as colleagues have in their earlier comments. A triple-A credit rating, as has been said, ensures that British Columbia has the lowest cost of borrowing that's possible. That is the best credit rating you can have for a jurisdiction.
It means that our borrowing costs are the very lowest. It means that we pay the lowest rates on the needed borrowings. And the borrowings, I should add, are at a very reasonable level — in fact, very conservative levels — unlike the case in the 1990s when we saw debt-to-GDP levels, which is the total amount of taxpayer-supported debt compared to the size of the economy…. That ratio was increased, under the NDP, to as high as 26 percent in the 1990s. Today the forecast is to keep it in the range of 18 percent, a very conservative and important level given the current economic and financial turmoil that we see around us.
This government is providing that leadership to ensure that the triple-A credit rating is protected, because it ensures that B.C. will remain a safe harbour for investments. A safe harbour for investments means more jobs — more jobs that sustain families around neighbourhoods and in communities — and that helps build a great British Columbia. That's why I'm speaking in favour of this motion.
I thank all of my colleagues on this side of the House for speaking today to support this motion that ensures that we send a signal that a triple-A credit rating is important for British Columbia, for the people of British Columbia and for our economy.
D. Donaldson: Well, credit ratings are one way of measuring performance, but many distinguished economists say that the government should not be fixated on them at the cost of topics that deserve more attention.
Joseph Stiglitz is a professor at Columbia University, a recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics. In an article called "To Cure the Economy," he writes: "Government plays a central role in financing the services that people want, like education and health care, and government-financed education and training, in particular, will be critical in restoring competitiveness in Europe and the U.S. Both have chosen fiscal austerity, all but ensuring that their economies' transitions will be slow."
Let's take a look at that — education and training in this government's budget just recently released. The Industry Trade Authority cut by at least $9 million. A decrease in the Ministry of Advanced Education's budget, not even keeping up with inflation over the next three years. All northern colleges in a deficit situation, each with more than $1 million in deficit due to a decade of underfunding by this government.
Northwest Community College serves 27 First Nations communities in an area of the province that has great potential in mining. Huge unemployment issues in these communities, and the response by this government is, as indicated in the budget, to decrease skills-training opportunities available through the local college system. NWCC has the award-winning School of Exploration and Mining, but they're unable to achieve core funding from this government, so they can't make more than
[ Page 9706 ]
year-to-year commitments.
Education and training are one way of measuring performance of government. There are many other ways. Child poverty rates would be one way to decide if what you're doing is making a difference. B.C. continues to have the worst child poverty rate in any province in Canada, seven years in a row.
Another way to rate performance is how you're doing in growing the middle class in society — in other words, reducing the disparity gap between the very rich and the very poor. Well, a B.C. Statistics report that just came out in January, called Mind the Gap, found: "Compared to other provinces, B.C. ranked dead last in 2009, with the largest gap between the top 20 percent and the bottom 20 percent of income earners." So there are a couple of ways of measuring performance that make a difference in people's daily lives.
There are more traditional ways. The B.C. Progress Board, appointed by this government but recently eliminated by the new Premier, had its last benchmark report. It ranked B.C. — compared to Canada, throughout Canada in 2010 compared to 2000 — worst ranking for the economy compared to ten years ago, a worse ranking on personal income compared to ten years ago, a worse ranking on jobs compared to ten years ago. Again, these are performance indicators that measure differences in people's daily lives, and all are worse off now in this province compared to ten years ago.
Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz emphasizes education and training as important tools to restore competitiveness and reinvigorate the economy. He concludes: "Eventually the world's leaders — and the voters who elect them — will come to recognize this. As growth prospects continue to weaken, they will have no choice. But how much pain will we have to bear in the meantime?"
How much pain, indeed, because of this government's 11-year record of failure on the economy.
R. Howard: It's a pleasure to stand this morning and speak to the motion, which has to do with protecting our triple-A credit rating. It's an important subject for us moving forward, and it's interesting to hear the opposition slowly starting to come out and talk to us about what they believe.
I know they've been very hidden about the budget that they've prepared but don't want to talk about, and they've been very hidden about the net zero that is in front of us in the teachers contract, the BCTF contract. It's good to have these debates so we can start to understand what kind of spending promises the New Democrats will make.
I want to talk about the importance of the triple-A credit rating, because it speaks to fiscal management. We've come through a very difficult period. There's been a worldwide recession, as we all know, yet the government of British Columbia has maintained its triple-A credit rating, and it's done that as a result of a decade of disciplined fiscal management.
Those are tough decisions that get made day in and day out. It would be easy — as a matter of fact, it's very tempting…. As a councillor with the city and as an MLA with the province, you hear all sorts of very good causes for money. It is very tempting to open the purse strings of government and give money to all these very worthy causes. So it takes a disciplined management approach to this — one that we're very proud of.
The Finance Committee. I had the opportunity to chair the Finance Committee this year. We toured the province, and we heard from all over the province the importance of maintaining this fiscal prudence, the importance of maintaining our triple-A credit rating. We didn't just hear from business groups; we heard this from individuals who felt it was important that government properly mind the cupboard.
I had breakfast the other day with a business guy who had been through a tough year. His company had to lay off a few people. The money that he typically sets aside for vacation — he had to have another look at that. He looked, and he thought about his savings accounts. He looked at his registered education savings plans and his retirement savings plans. They decided they were going to have to forgo a vacation this year to make sure they could top up those accounts for their future.
This was a gentleman that was very appreciative of the fact that this government was being fiscally prudent with its funds, and it gave him confidence. We hear from all over the province that people appreciate a government that they have confidence in, that will meet their targets that they set over the years.
If we look to the business of meeting targets, then — as has been said in this House many times — as a government, we have met nine out of ten of our budget targets. Nine out of ten times we've posted our budget targets, and nine out of ten times we've hit them. We did miss one. As has been well recognized, almost every government on the planet missed it at the same time.
Let's cast back to the '90s and what happened in the '90s with the opposition members. Well, what do you know? They hit two of ten; they missed eight out of ten. Eight out of ten times they said, "This is what we're going to do," and they didn't do it.
They can revise all the memos they want, but I refuse to let them revise history and start to talk about themselves as prudent managers of the economy. It just wasn't so. I lived through the '90s, and we had 50,000 people leaving the province. This vast province with all of its resources got turned into a have-not province. It was a very difficult time.
We always have to keep in mind that we make lots of claims, and they make lots of claims across the aisle. What does the rest of the world think? Well, let's have a look at a few of them. From the Investment Industry
[ Page 9707 ]
Association of Canada: "This government is not prepared to tolerate a continued escalation of the debt burden that will be left to younger generations."
What did the Certified General Accountants Association have to say? They say the taxpayer-supported debt-to-GDP ratio will reach a high of 18 percent in 2014-2015. "Despite this increase, B.C. should maintain its triple-A credit rating. This disciplined approach puts us in good company with the federal government, avoiding the financial crises of nations like Greece, Ireland and Portugal."
We look across this country. Closer to home, places like Ontario are having great difficulty.
B. Simpson: Some days I feel like I should come in here with a referee's uniform to referee the duelling decades that goes on all the time in here under the guise of debate.
This motion is about triple-A rating and the government doing everything it can to keep triple-A rating. It's not about debt management. It's not about deficit management. It's not about spending. It's about simply doing what is necessary to keep the bond agencies happy — the bond agencies that are under investigation for incorrectly labelling derivatives as triple-A, for incorrectly dealing with banks that failed and giving them triple-A.
The member for Nechako Lakes indicates that debt is only a problem when it becomes a problem, goes on to say that Germany and Japan are in dire straits and points out they still have their triple-A credit rating. If that doesn't devalue triple-A credit rating, I don't know what is. That's a single point of argument that says it doesn't mean a heck of a lot. I guess it's okay that you've got it until you don't, if you use that logic.
The triple-A credit rating is given by bond-rating agencies that missed the last two major financial meltdowns, that are under active investigation in the United States for basically setting up the derivatives scheme that caused the collapse that we're still experiencing today. Yet this government seems to be myopically focused on one grade, triple-A, while they ignore the F that they got from the Ombudsperson on seniors care. They ignore the F that they got from the Auditor General on taking care of our forests. They ignore the F that they got from the child and youth advocate for not protecting children that did not have to die. Triple-F will be the legacy of this government, not triple-A.
A triple-A credit rating, as the members of opposition have pointed out, fails to take into account all kinds of things that actually matter to British Columbians at the household level.
It does not take into account the fact that under this government, British Columbians have lost earning power, and that under this government, increases have occurred in household debt because their disposable income has been eroded. It doesn't take into account the increasing fees. As these individuals have paid less in income tax, they've paid much more in fees. That's not taken into account in triple-A credit rating.
Triple-A credit rating does not take into account or speak to whether taxpayers are getting value for their money, whether the government is focused on the public good or the private good, whether it's seriously addressing things like systemic poverty or climate change. It doesn't do that.
The assertion by members of the government, possibly soon-to-be opposition, and the minister and Finance Minister that B.C. is a safe harbour is laughable. Everybody knows we have not resolved the First Nations rights and title issue and that the fundamental question of the ownership of the land base and the resources is unresolved. That sends a shiver through the world investment community, and this government knows it.
This government knows that it has bogged down permitting by successive cuts to the dirt ministries. This government knows that its environmental review process is the laughingstock and that it has to be revisited all the time. We are not a safe harbour. We haven't resolved the fundamental issues of how you get investment on to the land base.
The idea that the triple-A credit rating is what we should all be paying attention to is also laughable in the sense that this government has successively increased the debt load in this province.
Yes, while they can applaud themselves that they're getting the lowest possible interest rate on that, interest payments have increased under their jurisdiction, the overall debt has increased under their government, and as a consequence, because of their debt management, we have less every year to put into the public services.
Triple-A credit rating does not prevent us from rebalancing our revenue with our spending. In fact, I think the only way B.C. will avoid losing its triple-A credit rating, in any government, is to bring more revenue in, in a way that doesn't scare away investment — that can be done — and to make sure that we have good public services.
R. Sultan: The member for Cariboo North has accurately pointed out the less-than-satisfactory progress we've made on land claims negotiations with the First Nations and also accurately points out that that uncertainty creates shivers in the international investment community — only exceeded, in my opinion, by that same international investment community reading Hansard this morning and seeing the comments from the members opposite.
It's as if triple-A doesn't matter. They are quite right to point out that this is not the be-all and end-all of how government should conduct its affairs. In fact, it's merely a report card, shall we say, on how government conducts
[ Page 9708 ]
its affairs by independent observers such as Moody's and Standard and Poor's. Why should we really care about their opinion?
Well, their opinion matters a great deal because those judgments, whether it's triple-A or a C rating, which I believe Greece has now fallen to, are used by investors both here and abroad as measures of, shall we say, the economic competence of a particular political jurisdiction, in this case British Columbia. The impact of losing that triple-A rating, yes, has significant monetary consequences in terms of the interest rate. But in the grand scheme of things, the interest rate differential paid — the increase in interest rates moving from, say, triple-A to double-A — isn't going to break the bank.
What is really important is the signal it sends to lenders and investors who are making everyday judgments about how to pump credit into the system or, in fact, to sit on their hands.
What is the problem in the world today? In very large measure, it's the fact that people who otherwise would be investing money — private and government, for that matter — are sitting on their hands because they're frightened to death about losing their money, so they do nothing. The central banks of the world try to overcome their caution by flooding the system with monetary reserves and driving down interest rates.
We have in effect now in the United States close to zero interest rates. The chair of the Federal Reserve the other day confirmed that, to the degree he can control it, he plans to keep them there for another couple of years. It's astonishing, but they're desperately trying to pump up the enthusiasm for people to invest in factories, in houses, in new apartment buildings and so on — not, so far, with a great deal of success.
This is the so-called liquidity trap that Mr. Keynes referred to back in the '30s where in fact many of the same conditions prevailed. It is an illustration of the inability of central banks to really manage the economy. They don't have many tools, and pumping more money into the system isn't doing the job.
We have the irony today…. It seems to me I picked up the Globe and Mail — was it? — this morning talking about the fact that Canadian corporations are sitting on something like half a trillion dollars? Did I lose a zero digit in that recollection? I'm not sure. But the point of it is that everybody in the economic sector, except for us poor consumers, is sitting on a lot of cash and they're not doing anything with it. They're waiting and hoping for a signal that the good times are coming back again.
That's the real significance of the triple-A credit rating. It's an indicator that in fact British Columbia, where the economy is still functioning very well — almost uniquely, you might say, in the world….
It's an astonishing episode that we're facing — that we have things so good, we can argue about the tweaking of the system, not that we have huge unemployment, companies going bankrupt on every street, and economic chaos prevailing.
Look around the world and see what's happening in the United States, what's happening in Europe. See what problems Japan is facing. British Columbia is a very unique situation, and why is that so? It's because we have the confidence of the investment community. We have the confidence of our people. They continue to spend. Maybe they're spending too much. That's the lesson of the triple-A.
M. Mungall: I think this is a very interesting and important debate to be had, namely because the concept around a good credit rating and having a triple-A credit rating is, in and of itself, not a bad thing. But the rhetoric around this and the way in which it's used have not told the whole story of British Columbia.
In fact, it makes me think about some of the CBC ads when they talk about the news. What they'll do is focus in onto one part of a picture, and then they'll expand out and out, and they'll talk about how important it is to see the entire picture to understand what's going on. So in B.C. we have a triple-A credit rating, and that is a good thing.
The member before me spoke about it being a report card, but it's only one page of the report card. In fact, for any child going home with a report card and only showing on the front page, "Mom, look; Dad, look. I got three As," well, the parents might start thinking: "Wow, that's fantastic." Then they start to go on to the other pages that the teacher had to send home because the child didn't bring them home, and you read the rest of it. You find out that the story is much more complex than three As.
You have things in B.C. on our report card: highest child poverty eight years running. Homelessness has increased close to 400 percent. Seniors care — the Liberals just got a big, huge F when it comes to seniors care.
Every year West Coast LEAF and other organizations come together to do an analysis on B.C.'s ability to meet the convention on eliminating all forms of discrimination against women. Where do we stand? Not very well when it comes to access to justice for women — a big, huge F.
I think another important point to bring up is that B.C. has the highest interest rates on student loans, and no surprise there that we have the highest student debt load west of the Maritimes and the fastest-growing student debt load out of anywhere else in Canada.
So as I was thinking about that and about the variety of measures that former colleagues have brought up that tell the rest of the report card, the bigger picture of what's going on with B.C.'s economy, who's all benefiting from B.C.'s economy? Indeed, economic boom — for whom?
When we look at that bigger picture, it makes me think of a bit of a story. When I thought of student debt,
[ Page 9709 ]
I thought of this. For many students, when they first enter university or college, on the week of welcome there'll be many trade booths from a lot of student clubs and student organizations, but there are also places where you can go and apply for credit cards.
At 18 years old, 19 years old, first time out of the house, applying for credit cards, and they are approved. When they start out, everything is shiny and great. So they go to the pub, and they buy all their friends a round of beer. They keep doing that for the whole month, and they are popular. They are popular with the people in the pub, very popular.
But then the bills come in. The bills for food — they're on their own. The bills for housing, the bills for hydroelectricity, tuition bills, which have jumped in this province because of the B.C. Liberals. There's another thing on the report card. The bills for student fees, the bills for books — they all start coming in, and what do we have? You have a crisis.
Not everything is looking so good, but that student with their credit card is still looking great at the pub. Wouldn't it be ridiculous if they chose to cut their food, to cut their housing and not pay for all of their books but continue going to the pub and buying everybody a round of beer? That's what the Liberals are doing. They're making sure their friends are doing well while the rest of British Columbia is…. And a triple-A credit rating is no excuse.
C. Hansen: I just want to pick up where the last member left off. Actually, what we saw during the decade of the 1990s under an NDP government was an entire government running on its credit card and, really, not with regard to who was going to pay for that credit card. I think the analogy of spending it at the pub instead of being able to spend it on necessities has a lot of parallels, as well, because what we saw was the debt being run up year after year after year, and we saw government literally trying to pay the costs in society without any regard for where that money was going to come from.
[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]
I think the member for Cariboo North said that the triple-A credit rating is not about debt management, not about controlling spending. I have to fundamentally disagree with him. It's all about that. If we don't have proper debt management, if we don't control our spending, what we will see is our debt-to-GDP ratio starting to rise, and our triple-A credit rating will be compromised. So the triple-A credit rating is very much a leading indicator in terms of the health of a government, its ability to pay for its debts and the cost of the interest that is going to be charged on those debts.
In the ten years that I was a member of executive council, I think probably just about every year I was part of the meetings that took place with the debt-rating agencies when they came here to Victoria.
Typically, each of the three major credit-rating agencies would send a team to B.C.: Moody's Investors Service, Standard & Poor's and Dominion Bond Rating Services. They would, each of them on different days, spend an entire day working with officials at the Ministry of Finance, going through all of our budget papers, looking for the vulnerabilities and, most importantly, looking for the strengths.
In the 3½ years that I was Health Minister, I was part of those meetings. Health was one of the biggest concerns they had, because what they were not seeing across Canada were provincial governments generally that were prepared to deal with the rising pressures of costs of health care.
During that decade British Columbia went from being one of the highest per-capita spenders on health in Canada to one of the lowest. That was something that I think really caught the attention of the bond-rating agencies — and our willingness to actually come to grips with the costs of spending in government.
We did that. We actually ramped down the rate of increase in health spending and at the same time drove some of the best health outcomes of any province in Canada. That's something that we can be very proud of.
I can remember in one of our meetings when I was giving a heads-up to each of the bond-rating agencies that our debt-to-GDP ratio was going to bottom out and we were going to see it start to increase again because of the global economic challenges. This is what one of what those officials with the bond-rating agencies said to me. He said that B.C. was the least of their worries because we had a track record and because we were delivering on our budget, on our debt reduction plans, unlike the NDP government in the 1990s.
The triple-A credit rating is important to investors. As I met with investors in New York or in Asia, there were two things that really stood out for them. One was the degree to which we were building our trade relationship with the Asia-Pacific region and the degree to which we were reducing our dependency on our exports into the United States. The other thing that really caught their attention was the triple-A credit rating.
For the investors around the world, that is a huge signal to them. It's one that really engenders a sense of confidence in British Columbia and the future of the economy in British Columbia and the stability of government and our ability to live within our means in this province, which is something that's vitally important.
So we now have it from the NDP members that they don't see the triple-A credit rating as being important. I think they need to take a second look at that, because it is vitally important. I think the public in British Columbia
[ Page 9710 ]
want a government that's going to protect their economic interests and protect the economic future of British Columbia. I can tell you that on this side of the House we put that credit rating as being an important signal in terms of where we are and what we represent to the rest of the world.
C. Hansen moved adjournment of debate.
Motion approved.
Hon. I. Chong: I thank all the members for their statements.
Hon. I. Chong moved adjournment of the House.
Motion approved.
Mr. Speaker: This House stands adjourned until 1:30 this afternoon.
The House adjourned at 11:57 a.m.
Copyright © 2012: British Columbia Hansard Services, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada