2014 Legislative Session: Third Session, 40th 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)

Thursday, October 9, 2014

Afternoon Sitting

Volume 15, Number 6

ISSN 0709-1281 (Print)
ISSN 1499-2175 (Online)

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2014

The House met at 1:35 p.m.

[Madame Speaker in the chair.]

Routine Business

Introductions by Members

Hon. T. Lake: I have two sets of introductions today. First of all, as many members in the House know, as we see a lot of purple in the House today, October 5 to 11 is Mental Illness Awareness Week. Joining us today are members of the B.C. Schizophrenia Society. They provided a nice lunch for us today to raise awareness of schizophrenia and the challenges that are faced by family members dealing with that particular challenge.

In the gallery we have Dave Halikowski and Jane Duval, the president and the executive director of the society. With them are Jamie Graham, the former chief of police of the Victoria and Vancouver police departments, and Dr. Bill MacEwan, the head of psychiatry at St. Paul’s Hospital. We’re very glad to have with us today, as well, Eve McBride and Bill McGee, who are parents of a son dealing with schizophrenia, and they shared their story with us. Would everyone please make them very welcome today.

Also with us today…. I had the opportunity to meet a very special person. She serves as the chief medical officer for England and the chief medical adviser for the United Kingdom — Prof. Dame Sally Davies. She is here today with the Canadian high commission, Trade Commissioner Caroline Martin, and also representatives of Genome B.C. — Alan Winter, Brad Popovich and other colleagues from Genome B.C.

We had a very interesting discussion. Dame Davies is working on ebola response in the U.K. so has to cut her trip short, but we exchanged some very good ideas on how to use genomics to help patients all over the world.

Would the House please make these very special guests welcome today.

L. Popham: It is my pleasure to introduce a class of grade 11s from Claremont Secondary today. Claremont is in Cordova Bay in Saanich South. They are representing the Institute for Global Solutions. It’s a first in British Columbia in the public education system. It’s more than an academic offering; it’s an entirely new way of thinking.

IGS is less about the problems and limitations and more about the tools, models and ideas that already exist to overcome problems such as climate change. Students quickly come to realize that another world is not just possible, but it’s here, and we only need to put the pieces together.

They’re here with their teachers, Mark Neufeld and Graeme Mitchell. I’d like to point out one special student that has a very special place in my heart and fills my heart with joy, and that is my son Kye Popham. They have a very specific part that they’re dealing with around democracy, and part of that is interacting with politicians from all parties.

Claremont Secondary School, welcome to your Legislature.

Hon. R. Coleman: Today we’re joined by two guests that are no strangers to politics but politics south of the border — Greg and Donna Lucas. Greg Lucas now serves as a California State librarian who covered politics for many years at the San Francisco Chronicle as bureau chief. Donna Lucas is one of California’s most prominent communications executives, who served as the governor of California’s deputy chief of staff, the chief of staff to the first lady of California and as state press secretary to the President of the United States. Would the House please make them welcome.

[1340]

D. Eby: I have a couple of very exciting and personal introductions to make today. When my beautiful partner, Cailey, and I discovered that we were pregnant, I made a commitment to the Minister Responsible for Labour that I would bring the baby by at some point. We are good to our word.

Today, up in the gallery, my beautiful wife, Cailey, and my son, Ezra, are here. I get a little choked up even just introducing him. This is his first question period and, hopefully, not his last. So everyone, if you could be on your best behaviour — a very impressionable age.

Hon. S. Anton: I am pleased to rise today to support Conflict Resolution Day, which is October 16, 2014, and the efforts underway within British Columbia during the week of October 11 to 18 to promote the use of conflict resolution. Conflict Resolution Day is intended to promote the awareness of conciliation, mediation and the other ways we can look at dealing with conflict and achieve more peaceful methods for resolving disputes.

I am also pleased to introduce and recognize the representatives from B.C.’s private mediation community, as well as representatives from the Ministry of Justice’s public mediation service.

Joining us in the House today is Kari Boyle, executive director of Mediate B.C. Kari is joined by Marlene Russo, a Victoria lawyer, mediator and the new mediation adviser in the Victoria Justice Access Centre; and Michael Lomax, Victoria lawyer and mediator and member of Mediate B.C.’s board of directors.

From the Ministry of Justice we have Dan Vandersluis, executive director of family justice services division, and Wendy Morash, family justice counsellor from the Victoria Justice Access Centre.

Conflict resolution professionals in the private and public sector, as represented by these individuals today, do an important amount of work on behalf of all of us in this province, and we thank them for that. I ask the House to make them feel welcome.
[ Page 4650 ]

J. Horgan: Joining us in the precincts later today — and that’s later today because I didn’t want them to think less of the chosen profession that I’ve adopted — will be my in-laws. Andy and Jenny Mast are coming to visit from Ontario. They come to see the building, and we may bump into some of you in the hallways. Be cordial, be kind, be pleasant and speak well of me.

Statements

MANUFACTURING WEEK

G. Kyllo: I am very proud to stand in the House today to proclaim the week of October 12 to 18 as Manufacturing Week in British Columbia.

The proclamation reads:

“Whereas in British Columbia manufacturing cuts across all sectors of B.C.’s economy, with more than 60 percent of the province’s exports in value-added manufacturing goods; and whereas every dollar spent in manufacturing contributes $3 to the economy; and whereas manufacturing in British Columbia provides well-paying, high-skilled employment to more than 163,000 people across our province; and whereas there will be almost 90,000 job openings within manufacturing by 2022 and wages in the manufacturing sector are 15 percent higher than the provincial average; and whereas it is important to remember manufacturing matters and everything each citizen encounters on a daily basis was created, designed, developed and produced by a manufacturer.”

And you’re going to love this part.

“Now know ye that we do by these presents proclaim and declare that October 12 to 18 shall be known as Manufacturing Week in British Columbia.”

Introductions by Members

K. Conroy: Back to introductions, I’d also like to introduce somebody who’s going to be here a little later on in the proceedings. I am really happy to introduce our daughter-in-law, Jayme Jones. She’s from Castlegar. She’s going to be here with her mom, Vivian Hadikin, a tireless advocate from Langley, and our newest grandchild, four-month-old Moss Conroy Jones. I guess it’s baby day today here.

Moss is here in Victoria helping his mom go to school, and she doesn’t get out of class till three at Royal Roads. So I’d like the chamber to please join me in welcoming them here later to the chamber.

Also, Madame Speaker, with your indulgence, October is a really special month to our family. I want to make a few acknowledgments. Today is actually our granddaughter Daira’s 14th birthday, so happy birthday to her — she’s our oldest granddaughter — along with her brother Ryen. It’s his ninth birthday. Tomorrow is our grandson Eric’s 11th birthday, and on Monday it’s our granddaughter Aydenn’s eighth birthday. On October 19 our other granddaughter, Alexia, will be turning 14.

In addition to all of those, Grandpa Ed will turn 68 on the 21st. A few weeks ago Ed said to me that he didn’t think that he would turn 58, never mind 68. So I wanted to acknowledge his birthday but thank the people that have made that possible.

[1345]

I want to remind everybody: if you are not an organ donor, please consider becoming one. It’s very easy. Go onto B.C. Transplant. You can sign up. It’s an incredibly simple procedure to do, and it could save a life.

I also want to remind you, while you’re home for Thanksgiving, to consider donating blood. Canadian Blood Services says they are low. It’s a situation that’s quite desperate. It’s a very simple and easy donation. It doesn’t cost you a thing but an hour of your time, and you could very likely save people’s lives. So think of Thanksgiving and think of doing something like that.

Please join me in congratulating my grands and my husband on their birthdays in October.

Hon. N. Letnick: I have one set of introductions and an announcement. First, I’d like to introduce fine individuals from the Premier’s riding of Westside-Kelowna who are here to watch question period: Aaron Derickson, Chris Derickson, Phaidra Jenner — and I’m apologizing for the pronunciations, obviously — Adrianna Tournat and Raven Mikuletic. They are joining us so they can see firsthand all the great work that we do in the House. Would the House please make them feel welcome.

Since we’re in the announcement phase, I’d like to take this opportunity to announce that on Saturday my son J.P., after a very short courtship of one year, is marrying Jennifer…. Joanna — oops. [Laughter.] Yes. Maybe I’ll get it right the second time, because afterwards we’re going to China to repeat the wedding in January.

A. Weaver: I’d like to get back to announcements of people who will be here later in the day. Joining us will be a fine young gentleman named Sky Losier, who is a member of the B.C. Youth Parliament and is presently in my riding attending the University of Victoria. He’ll be here with my constituency assistant, Judy Fainstein.

I’d also like to join my colleague from Saanich South in welcoming the global studies class here. I have the great honour and pleasure of speaking to global studies at Claremont tomorrow in one of their classes in the morning. Please welcome both the potential people coming down the road as well as global studies again too.

With your indulgence, hon. Speaker, I’d like to also announce that I have no further announcements.

Hon. P. Fassbender: There have been lots of birthdays and new lives that have been celebrated. But I rise today to honour a lady who has just celebrated her 98th birthday. That’s my mother-in-law, Dorothy Chevalier. She watches question period, and she is writing letters to members opposite about the quality of questions because she’s a really passionate watcher.

Happy birthday to Dorothy Chevalier. Please join me in giving her a big round of applause.
[ Page 4651 ]

M. Hunt: Not like some of the members opposite, I have here two of my favourite constituents from Surrey-Panorama, who also happen to be my parents-in-law. My mother- and father-in-law, Ordean and Hilda Sobdy, are present and accounted for in the House and are sitting with my lovely wife, Ruth. I would ask the House to please welcome them to the precincts.

Hon. D. McRae: Before I begin my introduction, I want to say to the Leader of the Opposition, who I often see giving tours: when I see your in-laws wandering around the building later today, I will commit to be nothing but cordial to them.

Interjection.

Hon. D. McRae: I’ll be cordial. [Laughter.] Thank you for drawing it out there, Leader of the Opposition.

I do have the honour of having a visitor from the Comox Valley in the House today. I have Bev Skwernuik in the House. I guess it must be in-law day, because she is actually accompanied by her father-in-law, Allen Kennedy. Would the House please make them welcome.

[1350]

G. Kyllo: Joining us in the House today are board members and staff members of the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters Association. They are Marcus Ewart-Johns, vice-president of B.C. Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters; Kevin Davis, director, membership of strategic partnerships; Douglas Forst, president of CMC Industrial Electronics; Steven Peel, vice-president of operations at Ironside Design Manufacturing; Dan Reader, president of Murray Latta Progressive Machine; Ron Walsh, president of Humble Manufacturing; Doug Taylor, CME representative on Vancouver Island for Pacific Business Intelligence Ltd.; and Craig McIntosh, CME national board of directors and executive chairman of Acrylon Plastics.

These folks, through their hard work and dedication, have raised the profile of manufacturing through special events organized during Manufacturing Month, a national campaign celebrating manufacturing across Canada. Join me in giving them a very warm welcome.

Introduction and
First Reading of Bills

BILL 3 — CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY
(STONE AND TIMBER) SETTLEMENT ACT

Hon. R. Coleman presented a message from Her Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Canadian Pacific Railway (Stone and Timber) Settlement Act.

Hon. R. Coleman: I move that the Canadian Pacific Railway (Stone and Timber) Settlement Act be introduced and read a first time now.

Motion approved.

Hon. R. Coleman: I am pleased that Canadian Pacific Railway and the province have recently reached an agreement regarding the disputed ownership and value of timber and stone rights on 145,000 hectares of Crown land and 68,000 hectares of private land in the Kootenay and Okanagan regions.

Consistent with the agreement, the act will extinguish CPR’s interest in historic timber and stone reservations. The proposed legislation will allow the province and affected landowners to apply to amend land titles, cap compensation to CPR to the amount in the settlement agreement and validate previous decisions made by the province regarding these reservations.

Under the agreement, Canadian Pacific Railway will receive $19 million in compensation for relinquishing all claims to timber and stone reservations and to land that was transferred to the province decades ago but incorrectly remains in the title of the historic railway.

The province granted land to three railway companies between 1892 and 1908 to subsidize railway construction. These rail companies reserved timber and stone rights for their own use when they sold the land to third parties in the early 1900s. These reservations were not recognized in many subsequent land transactions, and many of them were not registered in the current land title system.

Canadian Pacific Railway become the successor to the assets of these historic railways and owners of the timber and stone reservations in 1956. In May 2013 the CPR filed a lawsuit that sought confirmation of its ownership of the reserved timber and stone resources, and it also sought damages for past actions of the province, the landlord and tenure owners.

Uncertainty regarding these timber and stone rights has raised management challenges for the province, CPR, landlords and forest tenure holders since the situation came to light in the early 2000s. Clarifying the ownership and the value of the timber and stone reservation on land titles for about 1,600 parcels of land through the courts would have been time-consuming and expensive.

In early September this year, CPR and the province reached an agreement to settle this issue. The proposed legislation will clear up the uncertainty regarding the land status of CPR timber and stone reservations on Crown land and private land, and will support resource management throughout the region.

I move that the Canadian Pacific Railway (Stone and Timber) Settlement Act be placed on the orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 3, Canadian Pacific Railway (Stone and Timber) Settlement Act, introduced, read a first time and ordered
[ Page 4652 ]
to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

BILL M202 — ELECTION FINANCE
AMENDMENT ACT, 2014

V. Huntington presented a bill intituled Election Finance Amendment Act, 2014.

V. Huntington: As the government will be examining municipal election expenses this fall, it is appropriate that I reintroduce legislation that seeks to remove corporate and union donations from the electoral process in this province.

The integrity of an election is fundamental to democracy. There is a growing public conviction, however, that our elections are increasingly financed and influenced by special interests. It is a conviction that undermines not only the very legitimacy of our democracy but also our trust in the institutions of government.

Madame Speaker: Member, are you introducing first reading?

V. Huntington: I beg your pardon. I move that the bill intituled Election Finance Amendment Act, 2014, be introduced now and read for the first time.

Motion approved.

Interjection.

[1355]

V. Huntington: Once more with feeling. I’ll start on the third paragraph.

British Columbia has the dubious distinction of being the largest Canadian province with no restriction on who finances our political campaigns. We have the worst campaign finance legislation in the country. Anyone in the world and any organization in the world can donate to our political parties and our candidates with the intent of influencing the outcome of our elections. It is troubling, and it is dangerous.

This bill reasserts the principles of our democratic values by limiting the right to donate to the very people of British Columbia we report to — the individual voter. The Election Finance Amendment Act is a practical change that will show all British Columbians that we honour their vote and that we will be accountable to them and only to them.

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

Bill M202, Election Finance Amendment Act, 2014, introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Statements
(Standing Order 25B)

ASSISTED DYING

K. Conroy: In 1993 Sue Rodriguez, suffering from ALS, asked the Supreme Court for compassion and the right to choose how and when she died. They refused. Next week the Supreme Court will hear arguments that say the present law contravenes the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and that medical help to die is a human right.

The world has changed dramatically since 1993. Assisted dying is now legal under strict criteria in a number of jurisdictions. Public attitudes have also evolved. A poll released yesterday said that 87 percent of British Columbians, 85 percent of the disability community, 80 percent of Christians and 85 percent of health professionals are all in favour of assisted dying. This summer rank-and-file members of the Canadian Medical Association voted overwhelmingly in favour of allowing doctors to make their own choices in caring for dying patients.

The October 15 hearing is based on the Carter case from B.C., which involved the late Gloria Taylor — who, like Ms. Rodriguez, was afflicted with ALS — and Kathleen Carter, who wanted help dying because of a degenerative spinal condition.

For me, the Carter case is about Gloria, who grew up in Castlegar, wanting help to die when ALS made her life unbearable. In 2011 Gloria, along with the family of the late Ms. Carter, joined forces with a doctor in the B.C. Civil Liberties Association. Together they rechallenged the prohibition against assisted death.

In June 2012 Justice Smith delivered a judgment that struck down the law in Canada, gave parliament a year to introduce new legislation and granted Gloria an exemption to seek medical help in dying. I am sure many of you saw the media clip of Gloria crying with relief when she heard the decision and thanking God for answering her prayers.

Sadly, Gloria died of an infection in October 2012. But that wasn’t the end of her legal case. A year later the B.C. Court of Appeal overturned Carter.

So next week, once again, the courts will hear the arguments for and against dying with dignity. I think we would all be wise to remember the words of Susan Rodriguez when she asked more than 20 years ago: “If I cannot give consent to my own death, whose body is this? Who owns my life?” Hopefully, the courts will agree with 84 percent of Canadians and 87 percent of British Columbians.
[ Page 4653 ]

AMANDA TODD AND
PREVENTION OF CYBERBULLYING

J. Thornthwaite: October 10 is World Mental Health Day, an annual campaign in which health ministries and wellness groups across the globe promote mental health advocacy, education and awareness, and provide information on the supports available to those who are suffering. For British Columbians, that date is particularly important because it coincides with the anniversary of the passing of Amanda Todd.

Amanda took her life in 2012 after suffering years of bullying and abuse at the hands of on-line tormenters. Her passing drew international outrage and sparked a movement bravely championed by her mother, Carol, to shine light on the effects of on-line bullying and exploitation. That movement, the Amanda Todd Legacy, promotes anti-bullying education, supports programs for youth with mental health problems and continues Amanda’s dream of helping kids who suffer from on-line abuse.

To coincide with World Mental Health Day and to show support for the Amanda Todd Legacy, many groups will be taking part in the second annual Light Up the World Purple campaign. The initiative encourages businesses, organizations and schools to do something purple to support anti-bullying education.

Starting tomorrow, and today for our MLAs, many iconic landmarks will be illuminated with purple light, including the CN Tower, Telus World of Science, Rogers Arena, the B.C. Legislature and the municipal halls of the city and the district of North Vancouver.

It’s because of initiatives like this that we are making headway in the fight against bullying and we are armed with more insight than ever before.

[1400]

It’s fitting that the Internet, the very instrument used to abuse and bully so many, is now the main tool used to educate and prevent abuse. Tomorrow let’s all wear purple and support those who are suffering by working together to end suffering. Let’s all light up the world purple.

JIM SINCLAIR AND LABOUR MOVEMENT

S. Simpson: Today one of British Columbia’s most influential citizens, B.C. Federation of Labour president Jim Sinclair, announced that after 15 years in office he will not be seeking re-election when the federation enters its convention this November.

I have known Jim for many years, going back to his days when he worked in the fishing industry for the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union. Jim has dedicated a lifetime to supporting working people, their families and communities in British Columbia.

Whether as a journalist, organizer or advocate, for over 35 years Jim has been providing leadership in the ongoing efforts of the labour movement for supporting fairness for farmworkers, to increase the minimum wage and to support workers in places like Ikea where you have long, extended, difficult disputes. His leadership has supported workers in unions through many of these difficult disputes.

Jim has helped bring people together. He has built common cause in the diverse leadership of labour, and he has provided a strong voice for their efforts, an excellent example being his efforts on behalf of all the affiliates during the recent education dispute. Jim’s leadership left no doubt that the BCTF had the whole labour movement with them, and that solidarity, I believe, was critical to achieving a negotiated settlement.

Jim has always believed that the labour movement has a greater obligation to the broader society and to achieving greater equality and fairness for all. That has been reflected in his work over the past 15 years as the voice of the labour movement of British Columbia.

I know that this is not a retirement for Jim as much as it is a decision to move on to other challenges and opportunities that will continue his life’s work. I trust that we will all wish Jim and his family the very best in whatever future endeavours are on his horizon.

Good work, brother. A job very well done.

REGISTERED DISABILITY SAVINGS PLANS

L. Larson: I rise in the House today to recognize October as the first Registered Disability Savings Plan Awareness Month. We have set out to become the most progressive place for people living with disabilities in Canada by 2024. When barriers are removed and people with disabilities are able to contribute to their communities, we all benefit.

Accessibility 2024, our ten-year action plan, consists of 12 building blocks to move forward on. One of those building blocks identified is financial security. This building block sets a goal for B.C. to have the highest savings rate in Canada for people with disabilities. This includes raising awareness about the registered disability savings plan. The RDSP is a long-term savings plan designed by the government of Canada to help people with disabilities and their families save money for the future.

I’m proud to say that B.C. was the first province to support the RDSP. Part of this support included ensuring that people could open an RDSP and also keep their full income or disability assistance. Today people in B.C. hold nearly 20 percent of all of the RDSPs in Canada.

This month and beyond, our goal is to spread the word about the benefit of RDSPs and encourage people with disabilities, their friends and families to use this tool to help them save for the future. We’re looking forward to working with leaders in financial and disability communities to develop a centre for financial expertise. Please
[ Page 4654 ]
join me in recognizing October as Registered Disability Savings Plan Awareness Month.

ERADICATION OF POVERTY AND
WORK OF COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS

M. Mungall: In 1993 the world began observing October 17 as the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. Going back to my days working with the Nelson Committee on Homelessness and the Nelson Food Cupboard, I would remember that some people would come up to me and say that it’s impossible to eradicate poverty. It’s always existed. It’s never going away. Maybe that’s true. Maybe it’s not.

To dream that we can eradicate poverty rallies us to action. It brings us together to do something to make our communities, our regions, our countries a better place for everyone.

[1405]

To dream that we can eradicate poverty forces us to acknowledge the truth in these words by Nelson Mandela: “Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is man-made, and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.”

We can eradicate poverty. Each one of us in this House and at other levels of government and each one of us in our communities has a role to play.

Here in Victoria, Faith in Action brings people from all faith communities together to work for social justice and an end to poverty. In Vancouver, groups like the B.C. Coalition for Poverty Reduction, First Call and ACORN do their part to bring awareness that an end to poverty is possible. The Family Tree in Kamloops and Maple Ridge’s Friends in Need Food Bank do the same. In the Kootenays we take pride in being caring communities, with organizations like the Gleaners, Salmo Community Services and the Kaslo Food Hub.

Without a doubt, the groups that take poverty head-on each and every day throughout this province are countless. Their work shows leadership and determination and are proof positive that together we can eradicate poverty.

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY

G. Kyllo: I rise in the House today to talk about the success of the manufacturing sector in B.C. and in celebration of Manufacturing Week, October 12 to 18.

Let me begin by sharing some of the successes of the B.C. jobs plan, with a near-record 2.3 million people working in our province today, GDP growth at $7.2 billion and a 32 percent increase in exports since the launch of the jobs plan just three years ago. The jobs plan is working. Manufacturing plays a significant role in delivering these results and is highlighted in the B.C. Jobs Plan — 3 Year Progress Update, released just last week.

Manufacturing in B.C. contributes nearly $14 billion to B.C.’s economy, employing over 163,000 British Columbians and paying, on average, 15 percent more than the provincial average. It’s continuing to grow — 5 percent just in the last year alone.

Manufacturing companies of all sizes are creating employment across our province. In Cranbrook, Mrs. Palmer’s Pantry produces an amazing pita chip, so popular that it’s being carried on major airlines. In Campbell River, Daigle Welding and Marine manufactures world-class aluminum boats with recognizable customers like the Canadian and U.S. coast guards. With headquarters located in my riding of Shuswap, Tolko manufacturing produces quality forest products that are distributed worldwide.

These companies, along with 12,000 other manufacturing companies located across B.C., provide skills training and apprenticeship opportunities for many British Columbians. Manufacturing truly plays a significant part in growing B.C.’s economy.

In closing, I encourage members from both sides of the House to join me in celebrating Manufacturing Week, visiting a manufacturing company within their respective ridings and thanking them for the great work that they do in providing employment and helping to grow B.C.’s economy.

Oral Questions

PUBLIC INFORMATION AND
INVESTIGATION INTO TAILINGS POND
BREACH AT MOUNT POLLEY MINE

J. Horgan: This government has a very deliberate policy when it comes to mining. It starts with deregulation. At the middle there’s more deregulation. At the end, of course, more deregulation. Despite internal evidence that this course is wrong-headed, the Premier continues along that path.

The result is 25 million cubic metres of toxic tailings leaving the Mount Polley tailings ponds and entering Hazeltine Creek and Quesnel Lake. When it happened, on August 4, shortly after that the Minister of Mines said: “It was just water and some sand — just water and some sand that left the dam.”

Fortunately, the University of Northern British Columbia scientists have a more informed view. They now advise us that there is a kilometres-wide plume of toxic material deep in Quesnel Lake. It’s moving back and forth with the winds toward Quesnel River, which will lead to the Fraser River, which will lead to the Lower Mainland.

[1410]

My question to the minister, or any minister over there who is able to answer: why is it that in response to this disaster, there has been just a trickle of information for the public, just a trickle of information for the people of
[ Page 4655 ]
Likely to better understand what their future holds for them? Doesn’t the government surely have a higher responsibility than to cover this up?

Hon. M. Polak: Thank you to the member for the question. I will get to the answer to the question. I only want to begin by offering, because it is topical and in line with it, the most recent results with respect to water sample testing, which actually were taken in order to target the suspended-solids plume that the member references.

This has just been posted today. The results for water quality were below the drinking water guidelines, with the exception of total aluminum, which was slightly elevated. Results were also below aquatic life guidelines, with the exception of copper, which slightly exceeded the chronic guidelines at all sampling sites.

There is no evidence of adverse health effects for aluminum levels above the guidelines. At the time of the sampling — and this is what we are working on together with UNBC and with the researchers from the Quesnel River Research Centre — I’m advised, biologists noted that the water temperature in Quesnel River was colder than previously recorded, and the site was quite cloudy. These characteristics, I’m advised, indicate a thermocline tilt which occurred, and that is where colder water from the bottom of the lake pours out or sloshes over the sill between the lake and the river. Those tilts are caused by water current.

I will note that all of these test results have been shared with the local First Nations, First Nations Health Authority, Interior Health — which is where we get the health advice on this — and the Cariboo regional district, and all of the results and explanations are publicly available on our website at the dedicated Mount Polley webpage.

That is the latest in terms of testing results from Mount Polley, just as a general piece of advice. And I will be pleased after question period to table quite a large volume of testing results that we have available.

To the member’s question: why is there — in his words — only a trickle of information? Well, I’ll provide for him what information has been provided over time and is now currently available on our webpage, and I’ll leave it to members to judge if they think this is only a trickle.

Ministry staff, with respect to water, have collected 83 water samples, and this is only our ministry staff. First Nations have been collecting samples. UNBC has been collecting samples. Officials, qualified professionals have been collecting samples for the mine. We have collected 83 samples. Interior Health reaffirms that the water located outside the impact zone remains safe to drink — all of that on the website, all of that to the communities and First Nations.

Fish tissue. Ministry staff have collected nine sets of fish tissue samples as of September 23.

J. Horgan: Well, I have to say that sounds like a little bit more than sand and water. It sounds a little bit more like a disaster to me. It sounds like 25 million cubic metres of sediment that was being held and separated from the natural environment, which is no longer there, is now in the natural environment — a disaster by any definition.

I’ll direct my question to the minister responsible for emergency preparedness, the Attorney General, the minister responsible for public safety. Is it her view that this sand and water that has become voluminous information on slightly elevated levels of heavy metals…? Is it her view that people like Peggy Zorn, who has been operating a tourism facility in Quesnel Lake for many, many years and now has a toxic plume literally at her front door…? Is it appropriate for the government, in a disaster situation, to not inform the people — not just of what they’re finding after the fact but what contributed to that disaster in the first place?

A case in point would be, for example, the inspection materials that the ministry should have undertaken over the past five years. We asked for that material on day one. On day one the official opposition said: “Release every single scrap of paper you have with respect to the regulatory responsibilities of government.” That did not happen. So my question to the minister of public safety: why not?

[1415]

Hon. M. Polak: I would just emphasize for the member the importance of the distinction between information that is provided that is critical to health and human safety…. All of that information — testing results, the reports and the data that we get back from that — has been made public. In some cases it has been physically driven out to the town of Likely and handed out to people individually, because that was the best way to get them the results.

There’s a distinction between that and information that could potentially jeopardize the investigations that are being undertaken, three of them: the independent panel, an investigation under the chief mines inspector and, in addition to that, an investigation under the auspices of the conservation officer service.

I know that I, in the Ministry of Environment, have been advised by the superintendent of the conservation officer service not to release certain documents because in the view of the superintendent they could jeopardize the investigation. I have, as well, a letter from the chief inspector of mines also advising that the release of certain documents could jeopardize the investigation.

The members opposite may take that lightly, but for the people of Likely and the surrounding area…. They want to know that this investigation — all three of them — is going to get to the bottom of this and that actions are going to be taken as a result. I am not going to jeopardize what they deserve in terms of answers by not relying on the advice of these investigative professionals.
[ Page 4656 ]

Madame Speaker, I’ll be happy to table the letter from the chief mines inspector after question period.

Madame Speaker: The Leader of the Official Opposition on a supplemental.

J. Horgan: It’s certainly a familiar refrain with this government as they investigate themselves and then advise the public: “We can’t possibly release any information until we’ve completed the investigation of ourselves.”

There is ample evidence, discovered in libraries just down the street from Likely, of concerns about the tailings pond dam as far back as 2010. The consulting engineer on the file booked out in 2011. That strikes me as an alarm bell for government to respond to concerns about the consulting engineer leaving a ten-metre fissure in the dam. That strikes me that it would require a response.

What do we get from the government? “In the fullness of time we might tell you about that.” So through you to, sadly, not the appropriate individual but to someone on that side: why in the world would you not let everything out so the public can make their own informed decisions on what happened and why it happened?

Hon. M. Polak: I appreciate that the member wants to find answers to what happened at the Mount Polley mine, what happened in the case of that disaster. I appreciate that all of this House wants to know that answer. People who live in Likely and the surrounding area want to know that answer.

When it comes to the release of documents…. The member asks: “Why can’t we release all the documents?” I will, rather than providing him with my answer, provide him with the answer from the chief mines inspector from a letter dated October 6, 2014 — an excerpt:

“Government must protect the integrity and independence of these investigations to ensure we determine how the breach occurred and that we do not compromise the integrity of the collection of information and evidence.

“For that reason, I have advised the Ministry of Energy and Mines, as has the Ministry of Justice, not to release or comment on materials directly or indirectly related to the Mount Polley investigation, including annual dam safety inspection reports submitted by Imperial Metals in accordance with the health, safety and reclamation code for mines in British Columbia.”

N. Macdonald: There are 60 to 90 tailings ponds, and what this government has demonstrated is that it has no ability to tell the people of British Columbia honestly…

[1420]

Interjections.

Madame Speaker: Members.

N. Macdonald: …that they are on top of the file and that they can speak to the safety of those tailings ponds. That’s the reality. There is a timeliness here.

On August 8 the Mines Minister said: “I’ll take personal responsibility for what happened if it’s our ministry that has been negligent.” Personal responsibility, for a minister, means he’ll resign. Now, I could give five or six examples, but I will give just one.

There was an e-mail to the former deputy minister outlining how understaffing in government could lead to negative results, and it specifically names tailings ponds as a risk. That was in 2010, four years before the spill. Knowing a problem exists and doing nothing about it is the definition of negligence. It explains why Liberals are trying so hard to prevent any information about this disaster being released to the public.

The question is for whoever is speaking for that side. Is the information about this disaster being suppressed as a futile attempt to save the Mines Minister’s job?

Hon. M. Polak: The member may take lightly the risks that are associated with the release of information when investigations are ongoing, but I would just like to point out to him for his consideration the further words of the chief mines inspector.

“Public release of information related to the tailings facility at Mount Polley may impact investigations by tainting evidence of persons yet to be interviewed or reinterviewed. Published reports may also adversely affect our investigation techniques and procedures.

“In addition, releasing the reports may adversely impact any ensuing prosecutions by tainting the evidence of witnesses who may testify and by rendering the issues before the court more difficult.”

I want to emphasize for the members on the other side the independence of the investigation, in particular, under the conservation officer service. The conservation officer service has a major investigations unit. They are working in conjunction with the RCMP, with environment officers from Environment Canada and with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. They are independent law enforcement agents who have the independent ability to recommend charges to Crown.

Madame Speaker: Columbia River–Revelstoke on a supplemental.

N. Macdonald: The mines inspector is not this minister’s…. That’s not her file. Cutting a ribbon in Surrey should not be more important than the job here, being accountable here.

Calvin Sandborn from the University of Victoria’s Environmental Law Centre says that it “verges on the absurd” to claim that the government is restricted by the investigation from releasing public records. Government is trying to hide the fact that there have been significant cutbacks in inspections in mines — 50 percent cutbacks.

Here’s what I know about Elkview mine. The Premier said that there have been no cutbacks in the inspections of major mines. Elkview mine, a major mine — from 1994 to 2002 there were, on average, 12 inspections per
[ Page 4657 ]
year. You go, by contrast, between 2002 and 2013, and they’ve dropped to an average of three inspections a year — and one year, no inspections.

That’s the regime we are currently under in this province, so who knows what we would find if we had Mount Polley’s inspection records? Two months on, why does the government continue to suppress even the most basic information about the Mount Polley disaster?

Hon. M. Polak: The member seems unaware that the conservation officer service is the primary natural resource law enforcement agency in the province. It is their responsibility, under the Environmental Management Act, to conduct an independent investigation. In fact, they are trained in specialized investigative techniques, and they focus on just these types of cases.

[1425]

What I’m hearing from the member opposite is that he seems to think that rather than relying on the advice of independent officers who are conducting legitimate investigations…. He believes that instead of relying on their advice, somehow we should just ignore it and that all the warnings about the risks to the investigation should be ignored.

If that’s what the member thinks that we should do, if the member thinks that we should not rely on the advice given by independent law enforcement agents, then he should say so.

COMMENTS BY PREMIER ON
TAILINGS POND BREACH
AT MOUNT POLLEY MINE

K. Conroy: Yesterday we asked the Premier to honour her commitment to stand shoulder to shoulder with the people of Likely, to clean up the mess left as a result of these Liberal government policies — policies we’re well aware of. She’s good at saying things that she wants to say, but then she says whatever she wants.

The people of Likely haven’t forgotten the Premier’s promises. We have a letter from Skeed Borkowski. He runs the Northern Lights Lodge. He told me that his business has been devastated by the Mount Polley disaster. Skeed says: “I am very bitter. Every single day Sharon and I look onto this once pristine lake and see this pea-green stuff flowing past our property, our home, our life, our retirement. I look to my left, to my right. Funny, I haven’t noticed the Premier standing beside me.”

The Liberals need to stand up. They need to live up to the Premier’s promises. Or is this just another example of photo op politics?

Hon. M. Polak: I can’t describe to you the feeling that one gets when seeing the devastation that’s occurred in that area and then, in turn, seeing the faces on those individuals. It’s indescribable, the feeling that it gives you and knowing that you’re going back home to a place where you have no concerns about the safety of your water or about the livelihood of the businesses around you. Worst of all, of course, it’s something that happened that they had nothing to do with and that they certainly didn’t deserve.

There’s no question that there will have to be ongoing work cross-ministry. It’s already begun. Everyone is aware of the people on the ground from enforcement ministries like ours, from the Mines Ministry, but there have also been people on the ground from the Ministry of Jobs, Tourism and Skills Training. There have been people from the Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation working with First Nations.

Just not that many days ago I once again visited Likely, together with my colleagues, the one from Cariboo-Chilcotin and the Minister of Community, Sport and Cultural Development — who, by the way, was able happily to provide the Likely Chamber of Commerce, in response to a request from them, with $50,000 of government funding to help them in their plans to try to revitalize what has been and should continue to be a thriving tourism sector in the area.

We have been on the ground from the beginning. We have continued to be. We will continue to be on into the future.

POLLUTER-PAY PRINCIPLE AND
TAILINGS POND BREACH
AT MOUNT POLLEY MINE

S. Chandra Herbert: The Premier likes to claim that polluters must pay for the pollution that they put into the environment, but the government staff make clear that that’s simply not true. The head of B.C.’s environmental emergency program says in an e-mail that we’ve obtained that the polluter could “ultimately walk away if it so chose, leaving either restoration undone or the province to identify funds and undertake the required restoration planning and work.”

In other words, the B.C. Liberals have left the people of B.C. on the hook to pay for the Mount Polley disaster should the corporation walk away or fold. That could be hundreds of millions of dollars that British Columbians are on the hook for because of the B.C. Liberals’ failure.

[1430]

How can the minister stand and how can this government stand and claim polluters must pay when they know that it’s simply not true?

Hon. M. Polak: In British Columbia we take the principle of polluter-pay very seriously. We have the statutory authority to compel polluters to pay, and when polluters are found to be responsible, we expect them to pay. We take them to court when they don’t, and we enforce injunctions when they have not been able to pay.
[ Page 4658 ]

This is what I’m finding rather difficult to put together — that is, the apparent outrage of the member with respect to our ability to hold Imperial Metals to account. I’m trying to reconcile that with the approach of his leader at the UBCM, when in his speech he pointed out that we were being much too hard on Imperial Metals. “I think Imperial Metals is doing the best they can with an absolutely tragic situation, and they need the cooperation from government.”

COMMUNICATIONS WITH FIRST NATIONS
ON TAILINGS POND BREACH
AT MOUNT POLLEY MINE

S. Fraser: The William decision makes it crystal-clear that First Nations must be kept involved in issues involving their territory. It’s not an option. Well, it’s been two months since the disaster at Mount Polley, yet I have a letter from five First Nations chiefs wondering why they’ve been kept in the dark.

Chief Mike LeBourdais of the Whispering Pines First Nation, Chief Judy Wilson of Neskonlith, Chief Michelle Edwards of Cayoose Creek, Chief Francis Alec of Ts’kw’aylaxw and Chief Darrell Bob of Xaxli’p are looking for the barest information, anything more than has appeared in the media.

Can the Minister of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation explain why First Nations leaders have been kept in the dark on what’s happening — purposefully kept in the dark — with this cleanup of this disaster? How can he justify that?

Hon. M. Polak: I’m pleased to advise the member that we have been working together with the Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation. But from the very beginning we’ve also been meeting with First Nations — obviously with a key focus on the Williams Lake Indian Band and Soda Creek but also reaching out to others — not only through meetings that we have called together but also, for example, with respect to testing results, etc., releasing those and working together with technical experts from the First Nations Health Authority, and also those that we have assisted with financial assistance that we provided to First Nations in order to hire some of those experts.

In addition to that, the review of the long-term plan for Mount Polley, along with their compressive environmental impact assessment, has been under review. We have involved in that both the Mount Polley environmental working group, which has arisen as a result of the letter of understanding with the First Nations in the area, and also the Mount Polley science advisory panel.

In both instances we have representation from First Nations from the area. We are continuing to try and work through all the best channels we have to provide the most up-to-date information for all First Nations affected.

ENVIRONMENTAL MITIGATION POLICY AND
STRATEGY FOR TAILINGS POND BREACH
AT MOUNT POLLEY MINE

A. Weaver: It does not serve the public interest to either overestimate or underestimate the scale of what happened at Mount Polley. We know that on August 4, 2014, the tailings pond breached, and we know that 25 million cubic metres of water went into Hazelton Creek, Polley Lake and Quesnel Lake.

We also know that on August 5 the MOE issued a pollution abatement order to Mount Polley Mining Corporation ordering them to comply with a detailed list of requirements pursuant to section 83 of the Environment Management Act.

In May of this year, just weeks before the Mount Polley incident and after extensive consultation with a variety of stakeholders, the ministry developed both a policy on and accompanying procedures for mitigating impacts on environmental values.

My question to the Minister of Environment is this. The government has an environmental mitigation policy and procedure. Is the government applying them to the Mount Polley disaster as part of the pollution abatement order? And if not, why not?

[1435]

Hon. M. Polak: I thank the member for the question. We would not ordinarily apply the environmental mitigation policy and procedure to a situation like this, simply because it’s really designed for activities that avoid, minimize, restore or offset what we see as foreseeable impacts of developments when we’re in the planning phase.

However, in this instance — and, of course, it’s unprecedented — I’m advised by staff that as they are reviewing the long-term remediation plan and the comprehensive environmental impact assessment, they’re finding that these guidelines are proving very useful as tools in order to fully develop that plan. It doesn’t directly relate, but it certainly is a part of the review that the ministry, along with other agencies, is conducting on the long-term plan.

Madame Speaker: Oak Bay–Gordon Head on a supplemental.

A. Weaver: I recently visited the Mount Polley region, and I spoke there with residents, First Nations, mining officials, limnologists, geologists, geochemists — those who use the word “thermocline” and those who talk about seiches and upwelling. Numerous British Columbians have also independently contacted me.

It’s clear to me that British Columbians want to know what government plans are in place to deal with any local environmental impacts, deal with local social impacts and deal with the significance that this event has had on
[ Page 4659 ]
the B.C. mining industry, a pillar of B.C.’s economy.

My supplemental question is this: will the government please outline its environmental, social and economic mitigation strategy for dealing with the repercussions of the Mount Polley tailings pond breach?

Hon. M. Polak: Of course, the member has very eloquently articulated just the breadth of the impact of this disaster. It really does take a holistic approach. I will touch only briefly on the responsibilities of other ministries and then outline what’s next in terms of the Ministry of Environment.

I mentioned earlier on that the Ministries of Jobs, Tourism and Skills Training and Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation have had people in the area working directly with communities, with First Nations. In terms of mining, I know that the Minister of Energy and Mines has been in regular conversations with leaders in the mining industry broadly, about the issues this presents for them.

For us…. It’s very important for me to acknowledge the work of some very key people — that being the Quesnel River Research Centre through UNBC and also one of our key staff people, Jennifer McGuire, who is the head of our regional operations in environmental protection.

We have, as a result, arrived at a couple of working groups, one of which, the environmental working group, you will be aware of from the letter of understanding that we have with the two First Nations. There’s also the Mount Polley science advisory panel — I’ll just, quickly — representative scientists from DFO, MOE, FLNRO, Environment Canada. There’s industry, of course, First Nations and other university researchers.

Lastly, in the end they will review the plan. The first phase will take us to June of 2015. The rest of the plan will take us from June of 2015 out into the future. All of that will be made public when the reviews are complete.

[End of question period.]

Tabling Documents

Hon. M. Polak: I rise to table documents mentioned in question period. I have the letter from the chief mines inspector, and I have the most recent water results from Mount Polley.

[1440]

Petitions

M. Mungall: I rise to present a petition of hundreds of people who have signed on to endorse the Faith in Action working together for social justice covenant.

B. Routley: I have a petition here of 328 individuals. The petition of the undersigned David LeMarchant of Shawnigan Lake states that there has not been an increase in disability rates since 2007. “Your petitioners respectfully request that the honourable House have government explore the feasibility of increasing disability benefits to keep pace with inflation, thereby reducing health care costs — for example, hospital emergency services — or by cutting government waste and/or the reallocation of government communications and advertisement funding to pay for disability increases.”

Orders of the Day

Hon. M. de Jong: Continued debate on the throne speech.

Throne Speech Debate

(continued)

S. Simpson: I am pleased to get the opportunity to continue my comments in relation to the throne speech. I had a chance before we broke for lunch to talk a little bit about my constituency and about the great staff I have and the wonderful support that I get from my family in the work that I do here.

Talking, though, about the throne speech, I want to talk a little bit about the speech itself and about some of the key issues that we have in front of us as we move forward over the next period of time.

The throne speech was an interesting document. There’s no question about that. I’ve had the opportunity to sit through a number of throne speeches in the almost ten years that I’ve been here, and this one was hardly one that I would call defining. It was about 18 minutes long from start to finish, give or take.

It truly made no commitments of any kind in the speech that were substantive in any way, and it seemed to spend a lot of its time backtracking from the Premier’s claims, particularly around LNG, that we’ve started hearing. Those claims now are being diminished as much as possible, it appears, by the government side as we await the legislation that’s coming in the next few weeks.

People will recall those claims. The Premier claimed a trillion dollars of activity, a $100 billion prosperity fund that would be used to make us debt-free. That was on the side of the bus. Of course, we have record debt in this province. We’re going to eclipse $70 billion here in the not too distant future. How on earth there’s any notion of getting to debt-free…. Maybe there’ll be an explanation there. Maybe we’ll see that in the regime that gets put forward. But not many people are believing that sign pasted on the side of the bus any longer about debt-free.

It also claims at one point — the Premier’s claim, I think, when she was up to eight or nine LNG plants…. The numbers seemed to elevate every day. There, of course, would be 100,000 jobs there, and maybe we’d even
[ Page 4660 ]
get rid of the sales tax. I think at one point the Premier claimed LNG would end our need for a sales tax. I haven’t heard the Premier recently talking about the end of the sales tax. As a matter of fact, I haven’t heard the Premier talking about 100,000 jobs. I hear the Premier talking about the challenges around this more and more.

It was interesting. The Minister of Finance — who pays attention to these things, I’m sure — talked about the Premier’s comments when he was questioned about how on earth she could lay all these claims when we’re learning, very quickly of course, that none of them are based in fact or substance. I think the Minister of Finance called them aspirational claims — a hope and a prayer, I guess, but not built in any way on any foundation of fact or evidence — and that’s troubling.

[D. Horne in the chair.]

I understand that the Premier did this in order to win an election. I understand that. But to have continued down this road post-election and to be suggesting to people that in fact any of this is founded in any kind of evidence or truth is remarkable. It’s remarkable.

[1445]

The reality is this. This would have been the time to say: “This is a tough business, LNG. Prices are dropping. We have lots of competition that’s way ahead of us in terms of their development. If we strive and work hard, maybe we’re going to get a plant or two. That’s a good thing. Maybe we’re going to get a plant or two, and we should take advantage of that opportunity. But we also need to do it properly. We need to do it properly.”

I did hear the Premier the other day taking her Enbridge conditions and flipping them over and making them now her LNG conditions. We’ll talk a little bit about that. But this is a problem. It was a problem with LNG, and it’s a problem with how the Premier dealt with that.

One of the real challenging parts of this is that this is a conduct from the Premier that is hardly exclusive to LNG. We had the Premier introduce the jobs plan with quite a bit of fanfare back in 2011, suggesting that we were going to have the greatest jobs plan in the world. We were going to lead the country in private sector job creation. Everything was good.

Those numbers, of course, never got realized. We have struggled ever since then in private sector job creation in this province. We’ve struggled for a whole bunch of reasons, but it has been a struggle. The Premier said a while back: “Well, you know, these things take time. Wait till 2014. In 2014, we’re going to be good to go.” Well, we’ve waited till 2014, and the evidence is in.

The evidence is in from Statistics Canada. The evidence is clear: the second-worst record in private sector job growth in the country since the plan was announced in September 2011. It’s not that we aren’t the best; it’s that we’re not even in the game.

The other challenge that Stats Canada tells us, of course, is not only are we having a struggle finding the jobs and getting people the opportunities; we have the third-worst record for wage growth in the country over that period of time as well.

Those people who are earning — in a province that’s a pretty expensive place to live, in many parts of this province — are not seeing the growth in their paycheques. They’re not seeing their wages grow. As they struggle with increasing prices and increasing costs and increasing demands on their pocketbook, they’re seeing no support at the paycheque level in terms of any kind of increases.

What you’re doing is squeezing that middle class more and more all the time, but the Premier isn’t prepared to acknowledge that. Instead, we get the rhetoric that we’ve heard.

The Premier talked about and wrung her hands about temporary foreign workers and about doing something about that. Well, the latest I heard was the Premier at the board of trade suggesting the answer to the temporary foreign worker problem is to change the name and call them something else. That’s what she had to say at the board of trade: “Change the name.”

There was no discussion about how we move to encourage those workers, if they’re needed in this province, to come and bring their families and make British Columbia their home. No talk about that at all. That would have been, really, an important thing to do. Instead, it’s: “Change the name of the program, and maybe we’ll be good to go.” We know that for all that talk…. Prepare to sign a deal with China that says we’re going to open the door to more temporary foreign workers if that’s what it takes to get your buy-in.

Debt management. We talked about debt management a little bit. The government and the Premier claimed throughout the election campaign and post-election campaign — a big sign on the side of the bus: “Debt-free” — that we were heading for being debt-free. Well, all the evidence says the debt grows and grows and grows.

Lots of that money gets spent on important stuff. There’s no question about that. The issue is the claims of the Premier, the claims of the Liberal government, over what’s happening. It’s say one thing and do another. Now, I will admit the Liberals have been getting away with that for a decade, but we’re seeing it probably at a level that we haven’t seen before with the current regime.

[1450]

We really need to start talking about how we address some of these issues around jobs and around economic development. The Leader of the Official Opposition, in his comments to the Union of B.C. Municipalities, talked about economic development, talked about resource development, specifically talked about LNG. He talked about what the aspiration should be.

If we’re going to have economic development in this province, we need to measure what constitutes suc-
[ Page 4661 ]
cess. The first success has to be good-quality, family-supporting jobs. That’s got to be the first objective. We need to see that.

The second objective. We know there is lots of economic growth that isn’t jobs-driven. It’s growth without jobs. We see a lot of that. If we’re going to see that, then we need to see real value back for British Columbians, particularly in the case of resource industries — value that enhances our ability to deliver on health care, to deliver on education, to deliver on programs that will reduce inequality, reduce poverty. That has to be an objective.

We’re going to be looking to see whether there’s anything in relation to how we ensure those quality jobs and that value when we see legislation here in the next few weeks, as it affects LNG.

The other things that we talked about here. One was First Nations. The Leader of the Official Opposition said we need to build those meaningful partnerships with First Nations. We all know the William decision. We all are beginning to start to understand what that decision means. There’ll be lots of work to be done. I suspect there’s another court case or two to be had as this sorts itself out. But we all know that has to happen. For that to happen, that means building those partnerships with First Nations.

But the partnerships aren’t going to simply be about signing a deal. They’re going to be about creating opportunities for training, opportunities for young people in the First Nations community, young aboriginals, to get the skill sets they need to be able to move into jobs in these industries that are on their territories and be able to be successful and bring that wealth back to their communities to help support their communities in the growth and evolution of their communities. That’s what First Nations want. Those deals have to be found. They’ve got to be part of the mix.

We need to be sustainable. There is no question. All resource industries, pretty much doesn’t matter what it is…. When you extract or exploit a resource, you are going to have some kind of impact — on water, on habitat, on air, on the environment — and that impact is probably not going to be positive. That’s the reality of resource industries.

It’s a reality that we need to balance. It’s here. It’s going to happen. We’re going to continue to, basically, be carried by the resource sector in this province for many decades to come, I suspect. We need to do this in a sustainable fashion, in a fashion that really is about best practices.

We’re going to have to see what that means when we see legislation here sometime in the coming weeks, where the government is going to, presumably, give us some insight, through the legislation, about how they deal with the environmental questions related to LNG. We know it has to be sincere, and it has to be real. It’s not easy. It’s a challenge. There are cost implications there. We’ve already seen the challenges related to that. That’s part of the problem with the whole LNG exercise.

I don’t know how many people who work around the sector, business people who I’ve had the opportunity to speak to about LNG and get their advice on where they think this sector is and is going…. To a person, almost, they shake their head at the way the government played its hand at the beginning of this, the way the government essentially said, “We’re all in on LNG,” from day one. “We are all in. This is the only thing. This is our only economic development strategy, and we’re going to ride this horse to the end.”

All good, except when you play poker, if you throw your cards face up and the other person has their cards in their hand, you’re probably in trouble. That’s exactly what the government did here.

[1455]

That’s exactly what the government did with the LNG discussion. We are seeing it now as the government gets jammed heading towards whenever this legislation will appear, sometime this session. We increasingly know that this negotiation has been going on between the government and the potential investment groups. We know that the government is getting hammered at every turn and has very few options because of the way it has positioned British Columbia in this discussion.

It’s unfortunate. The Premier says that her government knows how to negotiate. I don’t know anybody in negotiations who lays all their cards out on the table before they start the discussion. That’s exactly what’s happened here with LNG.

We know that there are a number of other issues that revolve around this. They have an effect here, but they have an effect on the broader part of our society. One of the areas that I have some responsibility in, in my critic area now, is around training and skills training.

We have the blueprint. The government produced the blueprint for training. It has finally come around to understanding that the government undermined training in this province back in the early 2000s after coming to power. They essentially gutted ITAC, which was the vehicle at that time, and put in place another model — a model that excluded labour and that largely excluded the educational institutions from the discussion around training. The result of that was a dismal situation, which there is now a scramble to get back and try to correct. The blueprint is the effort to do that.

There are some problems with the blueprint, and I’d just note a couple of them. First of all, there are no new resources. To say that we need to correct this problem — that we need to invest in skills training, that we need to create these opportunities — and then to not put new resources in place is very problematic.

Instead, though, the government says: “Where are we going to find the dollars for this?” They go to Advanced Education, and they essentially say to
[ Page 4662 ]
Advanced Education: “Take 25 percent of what we give you, move it over to skills training over a period of time, and tell us what you’re cutting to do that.”

We now hear people in those institutions — from the presidents of the institutions to board members to deans to others — who are saying they’re worried. They’re concerned. They don’t exactly know how this is all going to work yet, but they’re very concerned that they’re going to be cutting programs in an institution that already has many challenges. Every institution, we know, has little extra money. They’re not flush. They’re in tight, they are challenged, and they’re now being told to cut more.

One of the things that we should know is that we need the skills training. We need to train those people who need specific trades and skills training, but we also need people to know how to learn. That’s about your curiosity. It’s about knowing how to learn, how education and to value education…. Sometimes that falls under liberal arts programs. Those are the programs that will get hurt by this, I suspect. That’s what we’re going to find, and it’s a mistake.

It’s a mistake to hurt those programs. When we talk about reducing inequality and talk about poverty, the government talks about the jobs being the solution, instead of poverty reduction.

Well, if you’re going to get there, you know that education becomes important. It’s a full-blown education. It’s not just skills training. That’s a very important component, but there’s the rest of education. We are going to see over the next couple of years how much damage has been done to those institutions and to the fundamentals of the education system as they’re obliged to move those dollars over to skills training.

The other challenge we have is around apprenticeships. The skills training model says that in your foundational classes you get the basics at your desk in class. Then you’ve got to go out and go to work and be mentored and really get to learn the tools — a very important, very critical piece. What we know about that, of course, is that there just aren’t enough spots to do that.

[1500]

There’s a whole array of reasons for that. We get some in industry who say: “Look, we’re pretty good. We’re a pretty good player. We have apprenticeships and that. But we have people who we compete with who just poach folks out. They don’t invest in apprenticeships, and they just poach our people after we train them.” That’s a problem. We need to address that.

Mostly, we need to figure out how to get more spots. This is where it becomes a problem with the government. In the public service — the Crowns, the municipal sector, the SUCH sector of schools, universities, health care, colleges…. We have just over 300 apprenticeship spots today in that part of the public sector — 330-odd apprenticeships spots, based on May 2014 numbers.

That number is terribly low. In the Crowns, half of those are in B.C. Hydro, and about two-thirds of B.C. Hydro’s are all line jobs. Then there are about 30 or 40 apprenticeships for electricians.

We’re not seeing those apprenticeships. If the government is serious, we have to ask why there’s been no work done at this point — no work done to create a situation where, first of all, we begin to oblige the public service to increase the number of apprenticeships directly.

But why aren’t we looking at things like project labour agreements on those billions and billions of dollars that we spend on government construction and capital projects? Why don’t we have project labour agreements that say apprenticeships are going to be part of the deal, and you’ve got to frame apprenticeships into your proposal? Why aren’t we doing that?

We’re not doing it. As a result, it’s a very serious problem for young people, particularly, coming through the system and trying to determine where they’re going to find that employment opportunity to complete their apprenticeships.

The other issue is we’re seeing cuts in English as a second language. Those cuts are being reduced…. At Vancouver Community College, in Vancouver, 25 percent of their programs are disappearing because they’re largely ESL.

Well, we are a country built on immigration. We are a country built on a whole diversity of ethnicities. We have lots of people who are coming here, looking to make this their home, looking to build their lives here, and they have challenges with language.

How on earth we think it makes sense to reduce English-as-a-second-language programming at any time in this province is beyond me if you want those people to be able to accomplish their objectives, to meet their dreams and aspirations and make the contribution they want to make by being able to take the skills and the expertise that they often brought with them to this country and put them to good use. They need that help on language, and they’re not getting it here.

Part of the challenge, too, that we see with the question of LNG, has been all the other sectors that have essentially been ignored.

I’ve had the chance now to meet with a few chambers of commerce in the last little while. I’ve been travelling a little bit and meeting with chambers and economic development groups, and it’s been really positive. I’ve learned a lot of good things.

But one of the things I’ve also learned — and this is from people who are pretty sympathetic to the government on most cases — is a frustration that they have. If they’re not involved in the LNG business and they have challenges, economic challenges of their own, they’re having a very tough time getting the ear of people in government in a way that is helpful to them and in a way that allows them to solve their problems and maybe get a little bit of support or guidance from government in doing
[ Page 4663 ]
that. They’re finding that very problematic.

We need to have a more rounded approach to the economy, and that means all sectors, including LNG.

I think I’ve got a minute left. Just to close, we need to challenge inequality in this province. Challenging inequality means reducing the range between those who have and those who don’t. That means strengthening the middle class. We need to do that by strengthening all sectors of the economy and focusing on jobs. We’re not seeing that in this throne speech. We have not seen that to this date with this government.

[1505]

Our hope here is we’re going to see that. We’re going to start to move in the direction of reducing inequality. We are going to find a way to strengthen this province. That means moving forward, telling people what the truth is, being straight-up with people, not using rhetoric to muddy the waters in terms of how challenging some of these issues are. That seems to be the practice on the government’s side these days. It’s time to get past that — help British Columbians to achieve their real objectives, be straight with them. That’s what we need right now.

Hon. J. Rustad: It is truly an honour to have an opportunity to stand here today and respond to the throne speech — obviously, in support of the throne speech. It truly is an honour to be able to be able to be here and to be able to represent my constituents. My riding is a great riding. There are lots of really interesting and positive things happening within my riding, and it’s always a pleasure to have a chance to be able to stand and to talk about a little bit of that.

I want to start, though…. There was something that one of the opposition members said, the member for Columbia River–Revelstoke, how he said he wasn’t happy about being here. I don’t know whether he said that out of context, but I can’t understand how you would want to be able to do this job and yet not want to be in this House — to be able to say that. But perhaps the member for Columbia River–Revelstoke will have an opportunity in the future to be able to clarify that particular statement.

Across my riding there are many things that are happening, but I want to take a moment at the beginning, actually, to send my thoughts and prayers out to workers who were injured just today.

There was an incident that happened at the Pinnacle pellet plant in Burns Lake. There was an incident where there was a maintenance crew, from what I understand, that was in working, and a fire broke out. One of the workers was seriously injured and has been flown down to Vancouver for treatment with burn injuries. Two others were injured, and they’re being treated in the hospital in Burns Lake.

The fire crews and ambulance crews were on the scene as quickly as they could be. They did great work. The crews on the ground actually were able to get the fire out before the fire crews responded, so there wasn’t significant damage. But I know that for the people that were injured and for their families, this is a very, very difficult time — and especially also for the community, reliving, you know, an incident that obviously had occurred a couple of years ago, and it was quite a significant scare.

Moving on from that, though, I do want to carry on with talking a little bit about my communities and, in particular, some of the things that have been happening over this past year.

In the community of Burns Lake, we are celebrating a new hospital that is reaching completion. We are hoping…. It appears that it will be opening ahead of schedule, on budget, and so that’s something that we’re looking forward to being able to celebrate in Burns Lake.

As well, just this past weekend I had an opportunity to be in Burns Lake to celebrate the new multiplex facility, a sports facility that adds a tremendous amount of diversity for that community in terms of the services it can offer to its people in trying to both attract people to the community as well as being able to retain people. It’s a great facility. If you get a chance in Burns Lake to stop by, they’ve got a climbing wall and squash courts and other things, and like I say, it’s a great addition.

Beyond that, across the riding we have a tremendous amount of work that’s happening in transportation. I think there’s in the vicinity of $12 million that is being spent this year on a variety of projects — road improvements, safety improvements along highways, resurfacing, as well as a new passing lane between Vanderhoof and Prince George that will help through an area that has typically had some challenges, and, as well, a deceleration and acceleration lane for a truck pullout, an area where trucks pull out at the top of the hill for a brake check.

All of these, of course, are part of ongoing work that continues in my riding around improving transportation and safety.

In addition to those, in the community of Houston, what we have seen this year is that Canfor has done significant capital upgrades in their mills. We’ve also, of course, seen the Huckleberry mine expansion and the work that’s going on there, as well as a water quality improvement project that we were able, through gas taxes, to provide some funding. That will significantly improve water quality for that community.

[1510]

In the community of Granisle, one of their wishes is being able to get high-speed Internet and cell service, and I’m pleased that just recently, through the meetings at UBCM, it appears as though we’re going to be able to see that high-speed cable extended into the community, which will be a great benefit for the people in Granisle.

In Fort St. James we’ve got a power plant that is in the process of being constructed. That’s a great addition for the community. It uses wood waste to be able to create energy and creates additional employment as well as
[ Page 4664 ]
more of a diversification for the forest industry in there.

In Vanderhoof currently we’ve got some funding that went out for flood protection. They, of course, had just completed a power plant associated with the L&M Lumber mill in recent times.

In Fraser Lake there is a significant upgrade going on at the Fraser Lake sawmill and a power plant that is going into that facility.

There’s a tremendous amount of work that is happening throughout the riding, and I must say that I’m excited about seeing these types of things and these types of activities in the riding.

One of the things I do want to touch on also very briefly is small business and the small business activities. In Burns Lake just a short time ago there was the celebration of the small business awards for community involvement and for the various activities, the types of things that drive the real heart of communities and that really help to build the character of communities. Those awards will be coming up shortly in Houston as well as in Vanderhoof, and I know that there are plans to look at doing those awards in Fort St. James.

I was quite surprised, when you think about the driving force that small business is for so many communities, that the member for Cowichan Valley, who gives very colourful speeches, would come out and talk about going to a chamber event in celebration of this and his reference to snobs and clowns. I can’t understand for the life of me why the opposition would not understand the driving opportunities and benefits and real strength that small business brings to communities. Perhaps the member for Cowichan Valley will have an opportunity in the future to clarify those comments as well.

Overall, the way I’m trying to characterize the type of activities that are going on is really talking about building hope and optimism for the future. That’s really what the throne speech focused on: what we need to do to help build the economy, to help move this province forward and to be able to attract the kinds of opportunities like liquefied natural gas.

When the member for Skeena spoke, I could hardly believe that he was representing the area of Kitimat. Kitimat is a community that is bustling with activity, that has gone to zero vacancy rates. People are moving in. There are tremendous amounts of training and jobs and investment that are happening there, and he characterized it as nothing but problems and challenges. It’s very obvious why the members opposite just don’t get what we need to do to be able to build strength in an economy in this province.

I thought I’d take a moment now to talk a little bit about my ministry and the types of things that are happening there. There’s been a tremendous amount of work that is going on within my ministry as well as a significant amount of work that will be going on in the near future.

In particular, though, I’d like to take a moment just to talk about a Supreme Court decision that had recently come down, back in June. The Supreme Court came out and made the Tsilhqot’in ruling, which defined for the very first time aboriginal title in British Columbia.

This is a significant case that creates a new class of land within this province, and it also creates a tremendous opportunity. It’s one that I think is important to recognize and to celebrate, both from the perspective of what the case does but also in terms of the Tsilhqot’in people themselves and the long struggle they had in terms of defining this aboriginal title land.

The opportunity was created. We sat down with the Tsilhqot’in people and with the Premier just in early September. We actually created a letter of understanding which will talk about how we’ll be able to mutually work together to bring life to this decision, to understand how we can manage on the land base and how we can work together — so a very exciting time. I look forward to being able to carry forward and do that work.

[1515]

That has also led to another very interesting event that happened just about a month ago, which was a gathering of over 400 aboriginal leaders from across the province with the Premier and our entire cabinet. This is the first time this type of thing has ever been able to occur. We had some great discussions that went through that meeting.

In particular, it highlighted a lot of the things that First Nations want to work on — the types of things that we can bring together and work together and also the types of things that we need to be thinking about as we build a future and as we look to form those partnerships. It’s those partnerships that we have been working on now for quite some time.

Across British Columbia, with First Nations, we have now entered…. Just in the last year or so we’ve signed over 200 significant agreements on the land base with First Nations and hundreds of other agreements that we’ve signed over the last nine years. These are agreements that talk about everything from how we will do shared decision-making, how we can manage wildlife, the types of ways that we do consultation and work together, as well as revenue-sharing on things like forestry and mining and natural gas operations as well as clean energy.

We’ve seen tremendous growth in terms of our relationship and the ability for First Nations to be able to engage in the economy. It’s something that I’m very proud of, both of our government and the work that we’ve been able to do within our ministry.

Specifically, though, I also want to take a moment to highlight treaty nations. As we’ve gone out and we’ve entered into these agreements with many nations around the province, we’ve been working very closely with nations to advance treaty opportunities through incremental treaty agreements. We’ve been working on a number
[ Page 4665 ]
of agreement-in-principle offers that have gone out that we’re hoping we’ll be able to make some progress on.

Also, celebrating things like the work that Tsawwassen is doing. Tsawwassen as a nation has gone out and created funding, brought together an opportunity that could never have happened before — an opportunity that’ll create literally thousands and thousands of jobs in construction as well as thousands of long-term jobs as they build out commercial and residential opportunities within the Tsawwassen community. They’re engaged in building infrastructure that’s needed to be able to support this — working, of course, with governments and their local neighbours as well as other First Nations in terms of trying to fulfil this dream that they’re building.

Tsawwassen is not the only one. Just recently we signed an agreement with Nisga’a, which is around property taxation, which really opens the door for Nisga’a to be able to pursue economic development, to be able to welcome industry, to be able to do business within their territory, giving that sort of definition and certainty that I think all industry is looking for within the province.

There’s much more to talk about, I think, with those nations. Those will be stories that I think we’ll continue to see unfold in the coming days and weeks.

One of the most significant opportunities, certainly, that is there for First Nation communities is, really, liquefied natural gas. We’ve been out engaging with First Nations right across the north, from those that are on the coast, throughout the Interior side and up, of course, in the northeast where gas is being extracted. There’s a huge potential for jobs, for training and to see benefits that can really change lives, that can make a significant difference for First Nations people.

We’ve already entered into agreement with 15 nations around the Pacific Trail pipeline project. We’ve entered into benefit-sharing with two of the coastal nations, with Lax Kw’alaams and Metlakatla, around Grassy Point and the sole-proponent opportunities that are there. We’ve entered into land agreements with the Haisla that open up their opportunities to be able to embrace and engage with LNG proponents.

Up in the Peace country we have economic benefit agreements that see revenue-sharing flowing to the First Nations that we have those agreements with, even though those were at a time before liquefied natural gas was thought about.

They need to be updated. We are up and engaging with them, talking about what we need to be putting in place and working through those types of agreements so that we can make sure First Nations right across the north can benefit, not just one time from the activities but ongoing, seeing the types of things that can happen and the training and what it can do, really, to change those communities.

[1520]

Clean energy, though, is one other thing I certainly want to be able to touch on. First Nations across the province are excited about clean energy.

We have entered now, I think, into 24 or 25 revenue-sharing agreements with 19 nations. We have engaged in agreements to be able to help with capacity funding to be able to provide nations with the opportunity to be able to explore these. We’ve provided now well over $5 million in funding for those types of opportunities. What’s really encouraging, though, is to see what businesses have done, how they’ve engaged, how they have come right from the ground level to include First Nations and work with them as partners to build out those opportunities.

I’ve just touched on a few of those sorts of things that we’re working on. We set a goal back a few years ago — I think it was in 2011 — with the jobs plan, and we talked about creating ten new non-treaty agreements with First Nations. When I had the opportunity to take on this ministry, the Premier gave me a task to add ten more to try to reach 20 of these agreements by 2015.

I’m very pleased to announce today and to tell people that we’ve actually now surpassed that significantly. We’ve actually entered into 47 of these non-treaty agreements with First Nations, and all of these agreements are designed around really working as partners — respecting First Nations’ culture and history, understanding how we can build those partnerships and what we need to do to really unleash the economic potential for First Nations and non–First Nations alike across the province.

Through the jobs plan and our updates on that, we’ve set new targets. Over the next ten years we’ve got a target to reach 15,000 new employment opportunities for aboriginal people across the province. As we know, aboriginal populations are the youngest population, with about 50 percent under the age of 25. It’s a significant opportunity, I think, for aboriginal communities and a significant opportunity for businesses to be able to engage and to really find that workforce that can help build their future.

We’re working with First Nations off reserve, are continuing with our off-reserve aboriginal action plan and engaging and bringing partners together right across the province to be able to provide the services for aboriginal people off reserve.

We’re also engaged with First Nations on our goal of a violence-free B.C. We’ve entered into a memorandum of understanding with the First Nation leadership around taking some action. That was something that was driven by what we call MACAW, which is the minister’s aboriginal advisory committee to me on aboriginal women. They brought forward this idea. It’s a bold idea in terms of how we can work together, and I think it’s important. That type of work is critical, I think, in terms of how we continue to work together to try to build healthy and safe communities that everybody can feel welcome in.

Once again, I really enjoy having the opportunity to be able to be here, to be able to say a few words in support of our throne speech, to be able to talk about some
[ Page 4666 ]
of the great things that are going on across the province but also, in particular, to be able to highlight some of the things that are happening within my riding and some of the real potential that we have in the future.

Just in closing, I’d like to, as always, mention my wife. I spend a lot of time, unfortunately, away from home. The job is very demanding, and I very much appreciate her support. So to my wife, Kim: I love you very much. Thank you, as always, for your ongoing support.

To the people of my riding: thank you so much, once again, for putting your confidence in me to able to come down and to represent your voice to make sure that our issues are at the table and part of what we need to do to help to build not just our riding but a better province.

Deputy Speaker: I believe the member for Burnaby-Lougheed wants to seek leave to make an introduction.

Introductions by Members

J. Shin: Today I have the pleasure of introducing our wonderful guests that are coming all the way from South Korea, from Hwaseong city. Hwaseong city is a large city consisting of half a million people. It also boasts the highest income level per capita in the country, and we are looking at eager parents of international students from Korea that we have here in B.C.

Hwaseong city also turns out to be a sister city for Burnaby, so I’m very excited to have them here and, of course, to welcome Mr. Chun, who has brought the delegation over. So if the House would please make them feel very welcome, I would appreciate it.

[1525]

V. Huntington: I seek leave to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

V. Huntington: Due to the rather extended nature of introductions today, I missed the opportunity to meet with a school group from my riding. Joining us today in the House are 12 adults and 28 students accompanied by the coordinator, Ms. Sabrina Fast, from the South Delta Home Learners.

South Delta Home Learners represent approximately 80 families in south Delta with children of all ages who are enrolled as either home-based learners or registered as home school students. The home learners support these students and their families through meetings, events and field trips such as today’s tour of the Legislative Assembly.

I ask the House to join me in welcoming them to the Legislative Assembly.

Deputy Speaker: The member for Burnaby-Lougheed wants to make an addition. Is leave granted?

J. Shin: I apologize. In my hurry, I forget to mention the names of the delegation. I’ll be very quick. Jinhee Pak, Okja Kim, Hoi Ja Jeyn, Seo Boon Jung, Gyeongja Joen, Sunseon Choi, Yeonsoo Kim, Ansu Choi, Byeongseok Oh, Bokyung Jung, Joon Wha Sim, Dong Hee Kim, Yeonyeo Sim and, of course, Soo Chang Chun are here today. Because I speak Korean, I made it look really easy for everybody.

Debate Continued

A. Weaver: As I sat in this chamber on Monday listening to the government lay out its vision for our province, the turning point we find ourselves in and the chance we have to develop our LNG industry, I was reminded of the day I decided to run for politics.

I never thought I’d be standing in this chamber speaking to you. I’m trained as a scientist, not a politician. Yet having spent a career studying the physics of the atmosphere and ocean and the science underpinning past, present and future climate change and climate variability, it became harder and harder for me to sit on the sidelines.

Over the years I’ve given hundreds of presentations about the challenge of global warming to diverse audiences around the world. Many, if not most, of my presentations have been in front of youth, both in my university classes and out in our public schools. I’ve spoken about the need for economic policy to ensure the internalization of externalities associated with the release of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. I’ve praised leaders, including a former Premier and cabinet ministers, who have taken bold steps to introduce such policies.

I’ve pointed out that the predicament we face is perhaps the greatest of all tragedies of the commons. Every individual in the world shares the atmosphere. Presently it is in the best interest of every person in every household in every municipality in every city in every province in every country in the world to do absolutely nothing about global warming, since the cost of action is borne by the individual yet the cost of inaction is distributed amongst seven billion people globally.

There is only one equilibrium solution to this and other tragedies of the commons, and that is collapse. Perhaps the most common question I get asked after my presentations is: what can a single individual do to be part of the solution to global warming? All too often we read about the increased severity of climactic events knowing at the same time that we are contributing to climate change. People are getting discouraged.

I’ve invariably responded with two answers. I point out the power of the pocketbook and targeted consumer purchasing. I point out the importance of participating in our democracy. The latter I would target most pointedly to the youth in the audience. Only between 30 and 40 percent of youth between the ages of 18 and 24 vote in, for example, federal elections. Those being elected do not
[ Page 4667 ]
have to live the consequences of the decisions that they are making, yet those who will have to live such consequences are not participating in our democracy.

I suggest to the youth of the audience that in addition to changing their own habits, the best way that they can make a difference is to elect people into office who demonstrate the courage and the leadership to deal with the challenge of global warming.

If those who are running aren’t going to address the issue of intergenerational equity and the sustainability of our social, economic and environmental systems, then they should consider standing for election or finding someone who is willing to stand. After giving that response over and over to so many young people, I eventually came to terms with the fact that I had to take my own advice.

[1530]

My work on global warming and past, present and future climate change and climate variability has allowed me to see firsthand the potential that B.C. has to develop a leading 21st-century economy. From our access to cheap renewable energy to our educated workforce to our innovative business community to the quality of life we can offer here, together with British Columbia’s natural beauty, we have an opportunity to develop in our province into one of the most prosperous jurisdictions in the world.

But such a vision requires real leadership, leadership that is honest about the challenges and the opportunities in front of us, real leadership that also takes the challenge of global warming seriously, understanding the need to build a sustainable, diversified and resilient economy for this generation and the next.

It is with this in mind that I stand here today deeply disappointed and profoundly concerned about the direction our government is going. Those of you who know me know how important I believe it is that we change the tone of conversation in the Legislature. We must be willing to support good ideas, regardless of who they come from. We must have the courage to make decisions based on evidence and not the other way around.

I’m not one to sling mud for the sake of it. Our challenges are too big, and the consequences are too profound for that. Opposing for the sake of it does nothing to rebuild the trust and cooperative relationships we so desperately need in our political system. So when I say I’m profoundly concerned about the direction our government is going, I say that with sincerity.

Let’s start with the government’s vision on LNG. I want to turn now to the binary choice that was laid out before us in Monday’s throne speech, and I want to talk about what that vision will really mean for British Columbians.

The undeniable truth is that British Columbians have been sold a bill of goods that is not based in reality. In an election where the government was set to fail, a Hail Mary pass was thrown. It was packaged in a message of hope and opportunity so compelling it couldn’t be ignored: 100,000 jobs, $1 trillion to the GDP, a $100 billion prosperity fund, the elimination of our provincial debt, thriving hospitals and schools, and the end of our provincial sales tax.

As we all know, that pass was caught, and we now have a government that is trying to deliver on its political promises, whatever the cost and whatever the risks to our province.

The problem is the economics simply aren’t there to support an LNG industry on the scale of what was promised. I’ve been pointing this out for nearly two years now. The supply gap is too narrow. A recent Peters and Co. report estimates that while LNG will increase to more than 500 million tonnes per annum by 2030, LNG supply will at the same time reach 800 million tonnes per annum.

In the time since the government first announced its LNG plans, we’ve already seen Russia sign a $400 billion, 30-year agreement with China. We’ve seen the U.S. Gulf Coast become the most efficient place in North America to build LNG plants. Other jurisdictions like Australia, Malaysia and Qatar have already established LNG export industries. We have seen Talisman sell its assets in B.C. We’ve witnessed Apache pull out of Kitimat LNG, and just this week we saw Petronas threaten to pull out of the Pacific NorthWest LNG project.

We know that drilling in the dry-gas fields in and around Fort Nelson is grinding to a halt, and we know that the only thing sustaining the drilling efforts around Fort Nelson in the Montney Formation are the condensates. These are transported to Alberta to be mixed with bitumen to form pipe-ready diluted bitumen. There is no market for our gas as the market is saturated with supply. These developments do not bode well for a hypothetical windfall from LNG.

While the government continues to base its promises on five to seven LNG plants, industry has clearly and consistently said that it only expects between one and three. If the industries that are building the LNG plants say that the economics are not there to support five plants, then where is the government getting its numbers from?

If we are to speak of leadership, as a throne speech does, then we cannot ignore one of the most essential qualities of any leader: having the courage to be honest, honest with British Columbians about the risks and consequences of government’s decisions and honest about the reckless hype of government promises. Unfortunately, as the economics underpinning the government’s LNG promises continue to crumble, that courage, that leadership is absent, and it is British Columbians who will ultimately pay the price.

[1535]

Petronas’s announcement this week is perhaps the best example of this. The announcement makes it clear that the only way we will land this industry is if we agree to their demands of lower taxes and minimal regulations.
[ Page 4668 ]
It’s truly shocking to see a state-owned company try to pressure our government to give away our natural gas resources, and even more worrisome is to know that the real negotiations are all occurring behind closed doors. We will only know what has been given away as a cost of landing a political promise when it is too late to change course.

Yet the government’s gamble goes further than this. While our government doubles down on LNG, it is leaving other industries by the wayside. Our film industry, our high-tech industry, our tourism and our forestry and fishing industries are all being ignored by a government that is dead set on its LNG ambitions. The fact is this government has no backup plan. We have staked our jobs, our health care, our education, our debt repayment and so much more — all on the gamble of an LNG windfall.

But I ask you today: what if the LNG industry is correct? What if we only get one or two LNG plants? What if those plants aren’t realized until the mid 2020s? What if we don’t get the windfall this government has promised? Is gambling the creation of new jobs, the adequate and sustainable funding of our education and health care systems and the repayment of our debt on the back of a risky promise the right thing to do? More importantly, is it demonstrating real leadership? I don’t believe that to be true.

Our challenges are too big and the consequences too profound to ignore the evidence. We need a new vision for B.C., one that begins with true leadership, leadership that is grounded in the courage to be honest with British Columbians, to recognize our overzealous promises and to move forward responsibly.

Let me start with the diversified economy. In contrast to the vision laid out in the throne speech, a true 21st-century economy is marked by a focus on developing diversified industries that provide local, high-paying and sustainable employment over the long term. Rather than relying on a single industry in one part of the province to provide prosperity for British Columbians’ future, true leadership demands an approach that develops varied opportunities across the province.

First and foremost, leadership requires developing a better approach to how we work with our province’s First Nations that is grounded in respect and in line with recent rulings like the Tsilhqot’in decision. While the full implications of this ruling are still being discussed, I believe it is critical that we view it as an opportunity to explore an unheralded age of partnership with First Nations.

We must move away from the notion of accommodation to one that embraces the right of First Nations in British Columbia. We must accept the challenge laid out by Justice McLachlin in the ruling when she wrote: “The governing ethos is not one of competing interests but of reconciliation.” Only if we take seriously this opportunity for cooperation can we move forward with trust in this important relationship.

This same leadership will also require an honest conversation about how to develop a diversified low-carbon economy. Let me give an example. We know that the returns to investment will be highest for those who seize the opportunities of the 21st-century, not the 20th-century, economy. Windfalls will be enjoyed by those who move first with vision, not latecomers to a developed market. We are far too late to be significant players in the LNG export market. That ship has sailed.

Instead, we should be identifying and seizing B.C.’s competitive advantages. One area of the economy in which B.C. possesses an enormous competitive advantage, if nurtured, is the clean technology sector. This competitive advantage is shared with other jurisdictions in the region, and our neighbours to the south have already distinguished themselves as leaders in the 21st-century economy, reaping the benefits that this will provide.

California is embracing the changes to their electrical grid that are necessary to prepare for a massive influx of renewable energy that will flood the grid by 2020, and it’s not solely out of concern about climate change either. They know that it is crucial for making responsible investments of taxpayer dollars into the grid and that they need to be embarking on this strategic planning now.

Washington is joining California in leading the push for increased cost-effective energy storage capacity to improve the efficiency of off-peak energy producers, like wind. Washington is also using policy tools to craft win-win situations in which both the consumer and the utility can benefit from installing clean technologies, like rooftop solar and small-scale wind, making it economically attractive for the utility and affordable for the consumer to install them.

[1540]

For example, on May 4, 2009, Governor Christine Gregoire created the clean energy leadership council, tasked with developing strategies which would accelerate the state’s transition away from fossil fuel to create a “21st-century economy.” These strategies would accomplish this goal by building on Washington’s competitive advantages in clean tech to attract new investment and create new partnerships, all with a focus on creating green jobs in the state.

Washington’s approach was based on a very clear idea — one that, arguably, used to be present here in British Columbia. Washington aligned both private and public sector efforts in order to develop “market-leading clean energy solutions that could be replicated not only in Washington but beyond its borders.”

The council focused on determining and building on Washington’s competitive advantages so that it could accelerate the funding and deployment of market-driver initiatives in these areas. Each competitive-advantage area was addressed with a parallel action plan. One, align clean energy policy and regulation. Two, accelerate high-profile clean energy development. Three, create a focal
[ Page 4669 ]
point for clean energy economic development. Their approach is working.

This past summer BMW announced an expansion to the Moses Lake carbon fibre plant which would see a tripling of its capacity. BMW uses the plant to produce carbon fibre ribbon employed in its i8 concept sustainable car. BMW cited the access to cheap, renewable power and the ability to create a green supply chain using sustainable energy as the reason for their investment in Washington. There are 200 21st-century jobs from just one investment.

Let’s move to Oregon, where on April 19 Gov. John Kitzhaber proudly proclaimed: “It is time to once and for all say no to coal exports from the Pacific Northwest.” Here, of course, he’s referring to thermal coal exports, not metallurgical coal exports, which are relevant to B.C.

For Governor Kitzhaber, and for me as well, it’s not just about saying no. Here’s what Governor Kitzhaber said just a few days ago: “Oregon has the challenge and opportunity to transition to clean, renewable energy like wind and solar because it will help the environment and create good-paying local jobs that cannot be outsourced.”

Oregon’s vision is paying off. Google, a company that sees itself as a powerhouse of the 21st century, wants to ensure that it has access to clean, renewable energy. Oregon was able to provide Google with price certainty, and so the company invested $1.2 billion in the creation of a major data distribution centre in The Dalles. These are another 80 21st-century jobs from just one other investment.

Recently the Canadian Geothermal Energy Association released a report outlining the extent of the opportunity that B.C. has to produce geothermal energy. Looking at only a portion of B.C., this study clearly shows that we are missing a massive opportunity to tap a renewable resource. In fact, B.C. is the only jurisdiction in the Pacific Rim’s Ring of Fire that is not producing geothermal energy.

We stand to gain by building on the expertise that our neighbours have already developed in these areas. Yet there is still so much room to grow in this sector, to improve upon current technologies and policy innovations.

We need to learn from what has worked for our neighbours and craft that into a made-in-B.C. approach that respects the unique characteristics of our economy, our environment and our energy needs. A made-in-B.C. approach will require bold leadership to bring industry leaders, academics and government to the table to lay out a new vision for the energy system that a diversified 21st-century sustainable economy will require.

This vision will also require a serious look at the mandate of B.C. Hydro. Its scope should be expanded to allow for the production of geothermal power. Its role could also be expanded to facilitate the partnering of industries with clean energy producers, both existing and new, that want access to long-term stable pricing for their electricity needs.

In B.C. we have what many other jurisdictions do not. These are our legacy dams, the rechargeable batteries of the 21st-century energy grid that can be drawn upon when the other intermittent sources are not producing electricity. In essence, the same leadership, innovation and natural advantages that could provide us with the opportunity to become North America’s centre for clean tech, can be harnessed to develop new opportunities, including those within our traditional industries like forestry.

Now on to jobs. When we singularly focus on LNG, we fail to value the sectors in B.C. that actually exhibit promise for growth. The number of jobs in digital media and life sciences are either greater than or on par with those in the oil and gas sector. There are three times as many jobs in information and communications technology than in oil and gas at present in B.C. Why are we not looking to further develop these already thriving sectors? They do not represent the same risky gamble as LNG, and they could help us attract and retain skilled workers.

[1545]

The focus of jobs by the government solely on LNG is a focus on exclusion, not inclusion. Instead of banking on empty promises, why do we not look instead to industries like clean tech, a sector that is already characterized by fast growth? From 2012 to 2013 investment in the clean tech sector tripled in Canada. Canadian individuals and businesses alike recognize the opportunity clean tech poses, even if our government does not. Furthermore, clean tech provides us with a rare opportunity to both mitigate climate change by reducing our emissions and to adapt to it with more resilient and localized energy systems.

Instead of tying our jobs and our children’s jobs to the boom-and-bust cycle of fossil fuel industries, we should instead be looking at the long-run growth in clean industries. Rather than promising our youths positions in a hypothetical LNG industry, imagine if we trained our graduates to retool the B.C. economy for 20th-century industries.

British Columbia has a highly educated workforce that is prepared to take up the challenge and capitalize on the opportunity that transitioning to a 21st-century economy presents, but to ensure that this workforce is sustained, we need to think carefully about from where it comes and whether or not we are valuing and considering carefully enough the intrinsic link between our education system and our workforce.

I committed this summer to make education my number one priority. In fact, it should be everyone’s number one priority. The education of the next generation is the foundation of our society. If we want responsible and educated citizens who can adapt to a changing world and a changing economy, then we must ensure that our education system is being properly resourced and that teachers are properly supported.
[ Page 4670 ]

I find the claims that we have six years of labour peace with teachers to be greatly and profoundly misleading. What we have is six years to completely reimagine the relationship that exists between government and teachers. We must use this time to engage all stakeholders and figure out how to create the trust between these partners that has been missing for far too long.

We must also ensure that the education system is properly funded. Teachers, without any doubt, are the single most important profession in our society. To burden them with unsustainable working conditions is to do a great disservice to such an important profession, a disservice that is, in turn, extended to our children. The government has made choices about how education is funded. At a time when GDP has grown in B.C., revenue to government has not kept pace, and we have seen funding for education fall, as well, as a percentage of overall GDP.

I think it’s time we make a different choice. By demonstrating real leadership in B.C., we could have renewed focus on returning to a truly progressive taxation system. The same leadership should be used to have an honest conversation with British Columbians about how we currently fund education and how we can ensure that adequate funding is restored to our schools.

Now we come to funding government services. This same leadership needs to be extended to truly protecting core government services. Protecting core government services is about more than simply ensuring the existence of a funding source. It’s also about ensuring that the funding source is resilient enough to go coast through the boom-and bust-cycles of a single industry.

A diversified 21st-century economy will provide that resiliency. It will offer British Columbians the certainty of knowing that even if one industry or revenue source declines, they will still be able to access the top quality health care and social supports that we are so proud of. It will offer us the comfort of knowing that our quality of life is not contingent on the boom-and-bust cycles of the fossil fuel roller-coaster.

Yet it goes further than this, to include what we ask of British Columbians as we fund these services. Over the last few years we have seen a clear shift away from our progressive income and corporate tax system to a more regressive system of service fees. We’ve seen MSP premiums, B.C. Hydro rates and ICBC rates continue to rise while the government siphons off non-existent profits to pad their books. All of this, of course, is done to maintain the illusion of low taxes.

Unfortunately, that illusion is being built on the backs of those who can least afford it. It asks lower-income families who are struggling to put food on the table and the middle class to pay more while giving a break to those who could afford a higher contribution.

Real leadership is about making the tough choice to raise the funds the government needs through the progressive tax system and not through a regressive fee system, even if doing so isn’t politically convenient.

In conclusion here, in the end all this comes back to leadership. While I commend the government for laying out a plan for developing new opportunities in B.C., I would challenge whether this plan actually represents the leadership it claims to represent.

[1550]

Fundamentally, it is for this reason that I now bring forward my amendment to the throne speech, which is:

[Be it resolved that the motion “We, Her Majesty’s most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, in session assembled, beg leave to thank Your Honour for the gracious Speech which Your Honour has addressed to us at the opening of the present session,” be amended by adding the following:

“and that the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia accepts the responsibility of demonstrating the leadership to choose growth, to move forward and create a legacy for our children, but also recognizes that this leadership means not gambling our future prosperity on a hypothetical windfall from LNG, and instead supports the development of a diversified, sustainable, 21st century economy.”]

Deputy Speaker: The member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head on the amendment.

On the amendment.

A. Weaver: I’ve moved this amendment because I believe that true leadership requires more than gambling on external market forces. It requires having an honest conversation based on realistic expectations and a plan that has more than one avenue to success. I believe that to put all of our eggs in one basket is a reckless approach to developing our economy.

To hype expectations to an extent that simply cannot be realized is both misleading to British Columbians and undermines the certainty so often sought after by business and industry. I’ve heard from both industry and education leaders who are concerned that they need to redevelop their development strategy to align with this government’s singular focus on LNG. Where does that leave them when this government fails to deliver LNG to the extent which it has promised?

A better approach, and the approach I seek to highlight in my amendment, would be to promote a diversified, sustainable economy where our prosperity is not derived from a single source but, rather, by creating an interconnected and resilient economy.

I think it’s important to note that the approach to developing the 21st century economy that I highlight in my motion does not exclude a vibrant, local natural gas industry. In tandem with investments in clean technology, the use of natural gas domestically could help offset far dirtier fuels. We could convert our diesel truck fleets and our B.C. ferries to run on natural gas, slashing greenhouse gas emissions and creating jobs in the process.
[ Page 4671 ]

Leadership means having the courage to be honest. There is room for compressed and liquefied natural gas, but it must fit into a broader vision of a sustainable economy.

Global warming is part of the 21st century’s reality. It’s already affecting every single British Columbian and will cost the government more every year that we choose inaction. In the 21st century the jurisdictions that embrace this new reality and make addressing the mitigation of and the adaptation to global warming part of how they develop their economy will find great prosperity over the long term.

Now is the time for British Columbia to take control of our own future. Instead of enslaving ourselves through reliance on hypothetical exports of a commodity that may or may not find a market elsewhere, we could and we should show leadership in the development of a diversified, sustainable 21st century economy.

Deputy Speaker: Seeing no further speakers….

M. Farnworth: Just to confirm. It was my understanding that a member of the government was going to respond to this. If not, then I’m quite happy to take my place.

Deputy Speaker: I don’t see any member of the government standing.

M. Farnworth: It’s my pleasure to take my place and speak to the amendment that’s before the House, the amendment to the throne speech that the government tabled just this week. It’s an interesting speech that was delivered by the Lieutenant-Governor outlining the government’s vision, if one can call it that, for the coming session, for the coming future.

The government, as has been pointed out by the member from Oak Bay, has developed a fixation on liquefied natural gas. It is the prime focus of their economic vision for this province.

We on this side of the House have said for quite some time now that we need to be looking at British Columbia’s economy in all its component parts — not just on the basis of LNG, not put all our eggs into one basket.

[1555]

Rather, we need to have a diversified economy that focuses not just on resource development, not just on LNG but on things such as technology, on resources such as forestry, on manufacturing, on our film and television, on our tourism potential — an economic strategy that delivers on the strengths of not just one region but all the regions of British Columbia.

We know historically in this province that we have been subject to the boom-and-bust cycles that occur in the resource industry. That’s nothing new. The challenge for us in this province is to build on the strengths of the component parts of British Columbia’s economy. That is one of our key criticisms of this government’s economic vision — that it has not been doing that. That’s why we have been speaking against the throne speech.

At the same time, we now have an amendment to the throne speech, moved by the member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head, which outlines his concerns around the throne speech. A number of those concerns are clearly in line with the thinking of our party.

In fact, many of the critiques that he raises we have been raising on this side of the House for many, many years — issues around technology; issues around diversification; issues around creating and building a knowledge economy in British Columbia that builds on our strengths of an educated population, builds on our strengths of our location on the Pacific Rim, builds on the strengths of our talent and our people and, most of all, builds on the diversity that already exists within our province.

When I read the amendment…. I mean, there are parts of it that are very much in line with the thinking of the opposition. The challenge, though, is still that if you pass this amendment, in essence you are saying that the vision that was put forward by the government is a vision that could be supported even with these changes.

The government, as we have pointed out, has promised the world to this province on the basis of the development of LNG. They have literally promised it will pay for our provincial debt. It will pay for Hydro’s debt. It will pay for TransLink’s debt. It will pay for our health care, our education. It will literally put a pony in every yard and a rainbow over every house. That has been the approach that this government has taken. They have promised the world.

At the same time, we have heard from industry itself that you cannot take it for granted, that the promises that the government has made are unrealistic — which, again, brings me back to this amendment.

The member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head says that LNG could be part…. There is a role for LNG locally within British Columbia. We are a market of four million people. Natural gas right now provides a significant amount of revenue to the province of British Columbia, and we are seeing our markets disappear south of the border with the development of shale gas.

What we have said and what we have articulated is that we also see a role for natural gas in our local markets, to see that develop. We think that’s important. That’s important in terms of keeping with the diversification of British Columbia’s economy. But we also believe that there is a role and a place for liquefied natural gas in terms of our export market, that there is an opportunity there for this province.

One of the things that is missing in this amendment and is also missing in the throne speech is that I think some of the things we have said, as the official opposition,
[ Page 4672 ]
need to be in place as we develop LNG and see the development of LNG in the province of British Columbia. We want to ensure that LNG projects in British Columbia expressly guarantee jobs and training opportunities for British Columbians. Nowhere in this throne speech is that really acknowledged. Unfortunately, it’s not explicitly acknowledged, either, in the amendment.

[1600]

We have four key points to support the development of LNG in this province, and that’s number one: ensuring jobs and training opportunities for British Columbians.

When you look at the diversity and you look at the size of our province and you look at the regions in our province, you see how important that is. One only has to read today’s Vancouver Sun and the article in there — how median income in this province has declined by a third since 1976 and is one of the worst in the country for men in the province of British Columbia. That’s because of a loss of high-skilled, well-paying jobs that has occurred in much of the resource sector in British Columbia.

We want to ensure that development that takes place benefits the people in this province, that they get the skills and training they need to take advantage of those opportunities. That’s crucial, and that was missing in the throne speech.

In the throne speech it talked about the burgeoning middle class in China. You know what, Hon. Speaker? I couldn’t care less about the burgeoning middle class in China. What I care about is the declining middle class here in British Columbia. We need to stem that decline, and we do that by creating opportunities for British Columbians with the wealth that exists in this province. That’s what we need to be doing.

The second point that I want to raise in terms of the development of LNG and resources in general in this province is that we want to receive a fair return for those resources that belong to us, the people of British Columbia. A fair return for our resources. That fair return is…. We’ll fund our health care system. It will fund our education system.

That has been the basis upon resource development in this province since we were created in 1871 and under every government. But the challenge that has been out there is that the current government has promised, as I said earlier, literally the earth, the wind, the moon and the stars to the people of this province in terms of revenue from LNG.

[R. Chouhan in the chair.]

The position that we have stated consistently is that we need to be realistic with British Columbians. We need to be realistic with British Columbians that LNG is not the be-all and end-all, but it can be part of a comprehensive strategy, not just in terms of a local industry but in terms of an industry that does export to parts of the world where our product is in demand.

That’s why we’re concerned, and we are waiting with anticipation for the legislation that will be tabled at some point in this House around that tax framework. The government in last year’s budget laid out how they expected the tax rates to look, and yet we are hearing that that’s not where it’s going to end up, that in fact those rates will be declining.

The skepticism on this side and in much of the public is…. As the Leader of the Opposition said yesterday, is Petronas busy writing that tax bill for the government so that it can be tabled when the House resumes later this month?

Let’s be clear. The promises that the government made in terms of revenue, the promises that the government made in terms of all the wonderful things that were going to happen were based on a set of numbers and assumptions. They were present in the budget. So when you lower them, you lower the potential revenue that we as a province are going to receive. And when you do that, you have to start taking the promises off the table because you can’t fund them.

[1605]

In fact, I think the government is already starting to realize that, in the change of language that you’re already starting to see. The Premier…. It’s no longer “We need LNG now to fund our operating budget” — not for new things but “to fund our operating budget.” That’s a huge change from “no debt in 15 years.” We are now starting to see the change from: “Well, it was 15; we wanted five.” Now we’re hearing one, maybe two, maybe three.

People are asking questions. Does the government really have a vision, or was it all just hype? That throne speech does not dispel any of that. It doesn’t put forward a realistic vision of how LNG can fit in an overall economic strategy in this province, which is what we need. It’s a vision that’s outlined that just says: “This is what we’re doing. It’s all LNG at the expense of other sectors of the economy.”

The other two points that, we believe, need to be important in terms of our development of LNG — again, it’s why we do not and will not be supporting the throne speech but also why we cannot support the amendment — are that First Nations are clearly respected and are partners and that we recognize their right to share in any benefits that flow from the resource.

One of the interesting, fascinating changes that we have seen in the discussion around resource development in this province has been the muddying that has been taking place over the last few months, particularly from the Premier, between pipelines for natural gas and pipelines for bitumen or oil. First Nations want to participate, and the previous minister who spoke from the government outlined some agreements that have taken place.

We want to see First Nations participate. But there are too many examples of First Nations who feel — not just
[ Page 4673 ]
feel, but who have found — that their rights, through court cases, have been ignored. Too many cases where they continue to not be consulted. Too many cases where they’re not partners. That must change, and again, that’s why we cannot support the throne speech. Again, with the amendment, it’s one of the issues that I think the wording doesn’t address.

A diversified economy isn’t just centred on the Lower Mainland or southern Vancouver Island. A diversified economy builds, as I said earlier, on the strengths of all the regions in this province. For many parts of British Columbia, their key, main strength from yesterday, today and into the future are the natural resources that are the bounty of their particular region — whether it is forestry, whether it is mining, whether it is petroleum, energy reserves. Those are all part and parcel of the wealth of this province and need to be included in a diverse economic strategy.

The final point, I think. This part is also absolutely critical. That is: it protects the development of LNG. Indeed, all resource development protects our land, air and water. Again, in the throne speech that’s not there in the way that we believe that it should be there.

[1610]

One only has to look to the record of the government over the last several years in terms of deregulation and, where there is regulation, the lack of resources to enforce those regulations.

We’ve had the issues around Mount Polley, Lemon Creek and other rivers and streams in this province that have been impacted — in the case of Mount Polley, by a tailings dam collapse; in the case of other areas, significant spills that have caused significant environmental damage — issues relating to the state of our forests and our ability to even understand the nature of the inventory that we have in this province — the inspection of mines and how often they’re inspected.

We have not seen the necessary investments in those areas to do what either the government talks about or even the amendment would like to envision in terms of a diverse economy. Again, whether it’s the amendments or the throne speech, it’s not something that we can support.

As I said earlier, at the beginning of my remarks, there are parts of the amendment that we do not take issue with. We all, certainly on this side of the House, want to see a diversified, sustainable economy that takes us into the 21st century. But it needs to be more than that.

It needs to be something that recognizes and understands that different regions of this province have strengths and assets that need to be part of that diversification — whether it is forestry in the Interior, whether it is our mineral resources throughout much of this province, whether it is our petroleum or our energy resources in northeastern British Columbia and the opportunity that LNG has for us, not just locally but also in the export market.

Our educated population allows us to go forward in areas of clean tech and innovation, for which we already have established, I think, a first-rate reputation, whether it is in digital media, whether it is in film, whether it is in television, in our incredible scenery in this province, in tourism.

All of those things together, combine with the talents of our people and, most importantly or just as importantly, policies that are designed to foster them, including the investments in the skills and training required to take advantage of the opportunities but also in the regulatory function and regulatory responsibility that government has to ensure level playing fields, that environmental standards are maintained and kept and the well-being of our province.

For all those reasons, we will be voting against the amendment. We will also be voting against the throne speech.

I thank the Chair and the House for their attention, and I look forward to the comments of other members.

[1615]

[Madame Speaker in the chair.]

Madame Speaker: Hon. Members, please take your seats to assist in the taking of the division.

[1620]

Amendment negatived on the following division:

On the main motion.

Hon. P. Fassbender: I rise today in support of the throne speech. But before I get into my specific comments about the throne speech, I also want to just share a couple of personal things if I can.

[R. Chouhan in the chair.]

Firstly, I want to thank my wife, Charlene, my sons, Steve and Phil, their wives and my grandsons for their support, especially over the last couple of months. It was not only a trying time for all of us in British Columbia, but the families of those of us that seem to find ourselves on the front lines indeed do bear a lot of the weight of those challenges.

I also want to again recognize my mother-in-law, Dorothy, who I know is watching. She turned 98 last Thursday. While physically challenged, she is indeed as sharp as a tack. She watches question period every day. She reads all of the newspapers.

[1625]

In all of my married life to my wife and the time I’ve known Dorothy, she is never afraid to share her perspective and her opinion with me. Again, I want to wish her a happy 98th birthday. I know that she is committed to being a support for me, as she always has been.

I also want to thank my constituency staff — Brittany Comrie and Preet Parhar. Preet is currently on maternity leave, and she just recently had her first child, named Mason Karam Singh Pattar. He was 7 pounds 5 ounces. I saw pictures of him, and I think he’s going to take up bodybuilding, along with his father, Dharm — who is quite good at it, and he shows it with all of the six-pack that he carries around. I also want to thank Carmen Gaisford, who joined our constituency staff when Preet took maternity leave.

You know, it is very hard on constituency staff as well. In my role as the MLA for Surrey-Fleetwood and as Minister of Education, my constituency staff worked extremely hard during, again, a very trying time — when there were demonstrations and actions sometimes that did not indicate the professionalism that I hold for the teachers of this province, when things, I think, a couple of times got out of hand.

That said, they continued to serve the constituents of my riding, Surrey-Fleetwood, on issues that they had in dealing with government and getting the services that they need in order to live their lives.

I’m proud to be the Minister of Education, and I’m proud to be a member of this government. I know that we are again, in the province of British Columbia on October 22, going to be celebrating We Day. That will be held in the city of Vancouver. I know there are going to be many inspiring speakers for the young people of this province. Actor and humanitarian Orlando Bloom is going to be there, Selena Gomez, Sir Ken Robinson, Olympian Silken Laumann. Music is going to be provided by Hedley and Shawn Mendes and a number of other groups.

I know that event…. While it is a very exciting event for young people, I think the most important thing that both Marc and Craig Kielburger started was to inspire young people to be engaged in community, whether they are working in their neighbourhoods or participating in humanitarian efforts around the world. I want to thank again the organizers, the sponsors, the Kielburgers and anyone who has been involved in the past with We Day and who’s going to be involved on the 22nd of October. I know there are going to be thousands of young people participating and being inspired to make a difference.

I also want to say that during the trying times that we had because of the labour dispute…. I want to stand here today and say that I am proud to have been part of working with our negotiating team, with the members of this government and caucus and also with the negotiating team for the BCTF, who came to a negotiated settlement, a long-term settlement that bodes well for us working together in a collaborative and cooperative way to build on this great education system that we have.

I want to thank everyone who had the patience to allow us to move through a labour situation and negotiations that brought us to a negotiated settlement, where we were not prepared to give up the responsibility of making decisions, through an arbitration process, to a third party, when we were not prepared to legislate and stay on the pattern we had in the past — to legislate agreements and then find ourselves again in a situation of litigation as a result of that.

[1630]

I also want to thank the school trustees, the parents and the students of this province for allowing us to move to a place where we could have a negotiated settlement, and I want to thank Teresa Rezansoff and the members of the BCSTA executive, who held all of our feet to the fire during that time so that we could reach that negotiated settlement.

I know that education is one of the most important things we can do in any part of our society, that the future of our economy and the future of our province and our communities is going to rest on a well-educated, well-prepared group of young people who are going to move into the leadership as they take their place in our society. It’s a critical role for us to take seriously.

I believe that as a result of that negotiated settlement, we are going to be able to now focus on the very things that I’ve heard many members on both sides of this House speak about, and that is about finding a way to deal with the complex situation that we have in classrooms in this province, to deal with issues of composition and how the classrooms of the future are going to look.

The greatest challenge that we have in that is recognizing that the classrooms as we see them today do need to
[ Page 4675 ]
look different tomorrow. I don’t think there is a simplistic answer to that, because the issues in our society are complex. I do not believe…. Our government has clearly stated that education can’t fix all of society’s challenges, but we play a critical role because, indeed, the classrooms of our schools, the teachers of our province have to deal with some of those complex society issues that we do face.

I know, clearly, that the teachers that I have met and have the utmost respect for are dedicated to wanting to provide the best education possible. All of us in this House clearly recognize that investment in education is very important. That’s why this government over the years has had record investments in our educational outcomes. We continue to be committed to looking for new paths forward and providing, as the resources are available, the necessary resources to realize those goals and objectives that we have.

I also think it’s important to say that during the labour dispute we often found we focused on what’s wrong as opposed to what’s right. I passionately believe we have a very good education system in this province. But it isn’t just my opinion. It is recognized as such by independent, third-party studies from around the world that have looked at our education system and said B.C. — not only anecdotally but because of research that’s been done — performs the best of most countries in the world.

We can’t rest on that laurel. We can’t stay where we are today. We indeed need to look to the future, and our government is committed to developing and to refining a new and exciting vision for education based on the B.C. education plan that was introduced not that long ago. That is based on the principles of individualized learning, meeting the individual needs of students, dealing with complicated composition issues in classrooms.

We are committed to doing that. That is not going to be possible unless we have the economic force in this province that is going to help to resource that and other critical parts of our society, including health care and other social endeavours.

[1635]

We’re going to work hard to develop an economy that is diverse. I found it very interesting. I’m quite pleased that I was able to get up after the member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head had his comments about the throne speech and then proposed his amendment — and also listening to the member from Coquitlam, as I perceived he danced a bit about the issues….

I saw that the member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head clearly spoke to the key issues that are important in the province. That is the environment. That is the economy. That is a diverse economy. That is about First Nations issues.

I can stand here today without any hesitation and say this government has never put all of our eggs in one basket, as the member from Coquitlam has stated. It is absolutely not true. If you look at the economy of this province, if you look at two subsequent balanced budgets, they are based on the fact that we have a diverse economy, that we have a thriving mining industry, that we have a thriving forest industry, that we have the fastest-growing sector in technology in any part of this country.

When you see that we have companies like Sony, like Microsoft, making decisions to invest in the province of British Columbia, that’s not one basket, that’s not two baskets, that’s hundreds of baskets — and great opportunities for the people of this province and the young people that we’re training in our education.

You know, we hear always from the members opposite that we have not met our jobs plan. The facts speak otherwise, but here is what is important. We have developed a skills blueprint not just based on LNG but on a diverse and a growing economy that recognizes all of the areas of our economy, not just one, that celebrates the great contribution made by small, medium and large-sized industries and businesses.

I found it interesting when we had the member for Cowichan Valley stand up in this House and say that the members of the chamber of commerce were snobs, clowns and whiners. That is disrespectful, at best, to the people who build small businesses, who represent them in this province and who work tirelessly at providing the very jobs that the members opposite always complain that we are not developing. They are being developed by those people in small businesses, by those members of chambers of commerce, who are not snobs, who are not clowns, who are dedicated, hard-working taxpayers that contribute to the economy of this province.

If you look at our skills blueprint and you look at the data that the Minister of Jobs and her team have developed, working together with the Ministry of Advanced Education, the Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation, that work with the Ministry of Education to provide the opportunity…. And I’ve heard it said by members opposite, in their opposition to the throne speech, that they want a vision for the province.

Well, I challenge the members opposite to read the skills blueprint, which is filled with vision and opportunity and clear opportunities for young people in this province to get jobs, to get training, to be able to raise themselves into a place of success.

[1640]

That’s what the skills blueprint is all about, and not only that, we are delivering on that. In my ministry alone we have hired 12 people in the northern part of this province and on the LNG corridor to go into schools, to talk to young people about the diversity of skills and opportunities for careers, not just in LNG but in forestry and in all of the other sectors of our economy.

We are partnering with the very people that were offended by the comments made earlier today by the member opposite — the B.C. Chamber of Commerce, who want to work with us, who want to engage with students
[ Page 4676 ]
in schools, who want to provide job-shadowing opportunities, who want to get them engaged to see the breadth of the opportunities that we have in this province.

This government has been a champion of small, medium and large business across the spectrum of opportunities. That is why there are opportunities for young people. That is why our economy is going to grow. I know that our vision, as a government, for the future of this province is built on a solid economy, is built on a vision that is not only a vision that we put out there for the people of this province but a vision that can be realized.

We know that LNG is only one of the components of the future of this province. We clearly recognize it is an immediate opportunity, and that is why the Minister of Natural Gas, the Premier and the team are working as hard as they are to negotiate something that will ensure that we can realize that timely opportunity.

I heard again the member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head talk about the glut in the world market. What he didn’t speak to is the research that shows that the amount of need there is in the world in the coming years far exceeds any capacity we have today. That is why British Columbia is seizing this opportunity. That is why British Columbia is going to be in the market and be successful. It is only going to provide more of a catalyst for other sectors of our economy to grow.

I know that even in my own riding, in Surrey-Fleetwood, there are business people who see a clear opportunity to capitalize on the LNG sector by providing the goods and services that that sector needs.

When I think about the great community of Surrey that I am proud to represent, I also know that this government has invested over $290 million since 2001 in 49 capital and seismic projects in our schools. We’ve acquired 12 additional sites. This year alone we completed four capital projects to add more spaces in Surrey that represented $44.2 million. Just a few weeks ago we announced another $64.6 million, of which $45.6 million comes from the province and the other $19 million from the local school board. We are building a new high school and renovating and expanding two elementary schools.

When you look at contributions to my community from this government, because of our balanced budget and because of our strong economy, I look at $512 million — the critical care tower at Surrey Memorial Hospital. I look at the second-largest emergency department in the country. I look at the fact that we doubled our neonatal intensive care beds from 24 to 48. We put in other additional facilities, including a new birthing unit with 13 new beds.

I say to all of the members of this House and the people of British Columbia: you have a government that has a clear vision. It has a clear plan.

[1645]

Not only have we already delivered two balanced budgets, but we’ve made significant investments in transportation, in health care, in education, in post-secondary education, in other social services. The reason we’ve been able to do that is that this government delivers on its promises. It delivers on its economic platform. It ensures that it does it in the best interests of all British Columbians, and all British Columbians benefit from the vision and the foresight that this government has had in the past and will continue to have in the future.

H. Bains: It is always an honour and privilege to stand here and speak my mind on behalf of my constituents of Surrey-Newton about issues that are important to them. This is an opportunity, also, to look at what direction the government is taking when we are speaking on the throne speech. As we all know, this is the agenda that the government lays out through the throne speech.

It was with all the anticipation during the entire summer that we would be coming back for a very, very rare fall sitting, that there might be some substantive agenda that the government might be working on and, through the throne speech, send their message to the public that they actually have some vision and a direction to deal with some of the important issues, in their throne speech, that the people have been waiting for, for so long.

Once again, this was one of the shortest throne speeches that I have witnessed since 2005 when I first was elected. Very hollow. There’s hardly any substance in the throne speech. I guess the question comes: why? I mean, there’s a whole government. The cabinet is spending all kinds of taxpayers’ dollars. You would think that you would come in here and, through the throne speech, you would hear them lay out their agenda.

What are they going to do about our forest industry? What are they going to do about our education system? What are they going to do about our post-secondary education? What are they going to do to deal with escalating crime in many communities in the province? What are they going to do about the environment? What are they going to do to protect health and safety of working people in this province? Did you see and hear anything in this throne speech? None. None whatsoever.

One thing that they spared us this time: fewer lofty goals, fewer of those big mottos that they would throw out there. I remember them calling it the seniors session. They called it the children and families session. They had all kinds of…. I also remember they called the Interior the heart, right? It’s something that you look for and see if there’s something in there.

Well, let’s take a look at what they have tried to do in this throne speech. Heartlands — there are no more heartlands. They don’t talk about that anymore. Look at the LNG. Compare the last throne speech to this throne speech. The last throne speech: “It will create 100,000 jobs in British Columbia.” We all heard that. It would eliminate provincial debt altogether, a debt that has escalated at the highest rate in the history of this prov-
[ Page 4677 ]
ince during the time that this Premier has been in this position — from $45 billion to $69 billion. They call that fiscal management.

[1650]

Those are the facts. The Minister of Education was speaking about facts. Those are the facts. A $45 billion debt has risen to $69 billion. There’s no denying. They can’t stand up here that that’s not true. That is in the books, their own books.

Remember, they also promised that there will be no more sales tax needed because LNG will solve all of our problems. On top of all of this, $100 billion prosperity fund. Did you hear any of that stuff in this throne speech? I didn’t, and I know they didn’t.

But they’re given some notes. They’ll stand up one after another, repeat what they are told to repeat, and they will not talk about these things anymore. The Minister of Education just finished speaking and didn’t talk about the $100 billion prosperity fund anymore. Didn’t talk about elimination of debt through LNG anymore. Didn’t talk about how we don’t need sales tax anymore. Didn’t talk about 100,000 jobs. You would ask: why is that? Well, I think they have seen and came to realize that they could only bluff people so long.

When they see…. It’s public. Apache has left. Suncor has left. Petronas is threatening to leave. Not only that these companies have either left, or they’re threatening to leave…. If you look at the world market of LNG, if they had done it right, if they managed it with competency, you would have an opportunity in LNG, no doubt.

But you know what? Like every other major file, they are going to screw this one up as well. We are seeing it right before our eyes.

They know the United States will be self-sufficient — there are many reports — within the next ten years, self-sufficient in their energy needs. Not only that, they will be in an export position within ten years. Can you imagine? The biggest importer of energy today will be exporting energy. What will that do to the energy prices? What will that do to the LNG prices? I think companies are well aware of that, and this government now knows that the chickens have come to roost, and they have to explain that to the people that they promised the world to, to win the election. That’s the reality.

Other jurisdictions, they have also come to realize, are way ahead of them. In the United States pipelines are already built. They are way ahead in development. Russia already signed a $400 billion deal with China, way ahead of us. Australia — way ahead of us. Qatar. You name it. They are way ahead of us.

People are questioning all the promises that the Premier made, whether they could even talk about it today, never mind realize them.

While they were doing all of this, they ignored all of the other industries that built this province. The forest industry that built this province for 150 years, the forest industry that paid for our health care, our education and other social programs — they ignored it.

Since 2001, according to their own numbers, 151 mills have been shut down. When you look at some of the numbers in the forest industry — jobs compared to the harvesting level in British Columbia, going back to 2003 — between 2003 and 2012 we were harvesting almost the same amount of fibre. But we have about 40,000 fewer jobs. What happened?

[1655]

There’s an answer. We had a record amount of raw log export during this period — a record amount. If you compare that….

Let’s go back to 1997. The log export in B.C. was 269,000. Largely, that was private lands. Largely, that was to create jobs. Compare that to 2012-13: 6.7 million cubic metres. So 260,000 cubic metres to 6.7 million cubic metres of raw logs that had been exported last year.

Talk to anybody. You have sawmillers here in the Lower Mainland, all around the coast. They’ll tell you that they cannot operate their mills at full capacity because they cannot get hold of fibre. In the meantime, we’re shipping 6.7 million cubic metres of raw logs. Again, why?

There’s a surplus test rule that is established by the government. There is a surplus test every time any company wants to ship raw logs out. To monitor that, they have put together a group of experts. It’s called the timber export advisory committee. These are the industry people. They’re experts. Every application must go through them.

Over 100 times within the last couple of years — this is a committee appointed by this minister and this government, a group of advisors who are experts in the industry — they said that the application before them for raw log export does not meet the surplus rule. Over 100 times the minister overruled his own committee. This is how they operate, this government. No wonder 151 sawmills have been shut down in British Columbia during their regime.

We are giving away our natural resources to create jobs elsewhere. Our House Leader talked about what the Liberals would always say: China’s middle class is increasing. Fair enough, because they’re smart about their own people. They are asking this government to allow raw log export so that they can process those logs to create jobs for their own people in their own country. That is the right approach if you are really looking after your own people. But this government allows these big multinationals to write any rule that they’d like to write, and then they’ll say yes.

No wonder the same thing is happening with LNG. Petronas, I understand, is writing the legislation for them to present here, and then they will say yes. It will be good for Petronas, but it will not be good for British Columbians. That’s guaranteed when you take that approach. That’s the problem with what this government’s approach is.

I want to come back to my own community. There’s
[ Page 4678 ]
nothing in here…. Remember, last throne speech they talked about a violence-free B.C. That was one of the big models that they had last time, a violence-free B.C. What did they do after that? The first thing they did in Surrey, where crime is some of the highest in the province, is they went and cut $6.2 million from a specialized RCMP unit.

[1700]

This is a unit that was very useful in keeping many dangerous weapons off the streets and protecting some of the people who otherwise could have been shot — a proactive approach that they were using. But they cut $6.2 million and eliminated those units.

Violence-free B.C., again, gone to the wayside. There’s nothing in this throne speech today — none.

In the meantime our citizens in Surrey are facing some of the highest crime in their neighbourhoods. Myself and my colleagues from Surrey-Whalley and Green Timbers gave them a proposal — what it takes to solve that problem. In fact, I had a discussion with some members on the other side. They said the components of the thing make sense, but they will not proceed with it. Again, saying one thing and doing quite the opposite, saying what they think is politically right, what’s politically expedient, but doing something else.

When we said we need more police, we need a better policing model and we need a community court, in this House the former Attorney General Wally Oppal promised that Vancouver will get a community court and Surrey will get a community court. That is one of the answers to repeat offenders — to go to the root cause of those people to deal with their issues so that we can treat those issues and keep them off the street.

Vancouver got it. When I challenged Wally Oppal at that time — that there is nothing for Surrey in the budget — he said: “No, no, don’t worry. It’ll be there.” I’m sure that Wally Oppal meant…. He was sincere. He wanted to do it, but it’s this government. They’re again throwing roadblocks, and today we don’t have it.

We said we need to deal with mental health. Vancouver’s police chief, Jim Chu, and the mayor — good on them — came to this government and made a case that mental health was a real serious problem. And yes, this government answered that call, and they were given multimillion dollars to put together a comprehensive plan to deal with mental health issues. Surrey has the same issues, and we don’t have a penny from this government. They don’t even come to the table to deal with that.

We said we need…. This government actually deregulated recovery homes back in 2003. Now there are over 250 of those. Each one of them has, on average, about 10 to 12 people in those homes. In most of those there’s no such thing as recovery going on in there. These are basically flophouses.

There are about 30 to 40, maybe 50, that are registered with the ministry, and they are doing a good job. We say that those remaining recovery homes are to be regulated. Nothing, again, from this government. Nothing on affordable housing — nothing. That’s their record — how they say one thing and they do quite the opposite.

There’s nothing about…. The minister — I wish that he could listen to this.

We have 7,000 children in portables in Surrey right now — 7,000. That alone would make one of the largest school districts, if you put them in one block. So 7,000 students are in portables right now. Their record…. Since 2006 not a single penny on capital was approved until recently, about two years ago, when the previous Minister of Education went and made the announcement about $120 million in capital.

The current minister and the previous minister keep on repeating the same announcement over and over. They still haven’t seen that $120 million. They haven’t. They keep on promising them it will be coming. That just shows their priorities.

[1705]

I was so proud to walk and stand with those teachers who took a stand for education in Surrey. I say to those teachers in Surrey: thank you very much for standing up to this government and standing up for education for our children and standing up for the parents, standing up for class size and composition so that we could improve the education of our children.

Education was the foundation of western society or, I would say, for that matter, anywhere. It is the best equalizer to eliminate inequality in any society. But you have to give every child an opportunity to the highest and top-graded education that they can get. But, no, they were too busy bashing teachers.

Bashing teachers, and now they all stand up and say how proud they are about teachers. And this was the government — this was the minister; this was the Premier — that time and again they were telling them how greedy they are, that they’re only looking after their own interests and that they’re not looking out for education. I say to those teachers: thank you for standing up to this government.

It was too convenient for them politically — again saying one thing that they think is popular but doing quite the opposite. It was a mess that was created by this government in 2003 that we were paying for in the last few months, with the work stoppages. It was this government that took away those clauses that were legally and democratically negotiated in their collective agreement.

They took it out with a stroke of a pen, and twice the courts had to tell them that they were wrong, that it was illegal for them to do. Again, they didn’t believe in courts. They don’t believe in teachers. They don’t believe in the public who wants them to deal with those issues. No, because it’s all politics, all the time, and nothing about the real policies that actually deal with those issues.

They were elected to govern. They were elected to come with policies. The politics that they played before the election — fair enough. But now it’s time to deliver on the
[ Page 4679 ]
promises. What are they doing? Saying one thing one day and doing quite the opposite the next day.

I want to say let’s examine post-secondary education in Surrey. The participation rate in Surrey in the south of the Fraser is the lowest in British Columbia, the lowest in the Lower Mainland. It’s about 11 to 12 percent. The rest of the province is like 24 percent. Even other parts of the Lower Mainland is 24 percent. Something’s wrong with that picture.

It’s because of hardly any investment to create more positions in the Surrey area. Remember they promised 5,000 new seats at SFU many, many years ago? What happened? Where are they? Again saying one thing to win votes and doing quite the opposite. That’s not how you govern. The time for politics is over. The election is over. Do something that is good for the people of the province.

Interjections.

H. Bains: They think it’s all funny. But they’re waiting in Surrey. The students and the parents are waiting to build those schools. Where are those schools? Saying one thing and doing quite the opposite.

What’s happening? They want to go back to the last decade, the last century. What is going on?

Interjections.

H. Bains: If you read the platform…. You want to read the platform?

Interjection.

H. Bains: Go ahead and read the platform.

It wasn’t us that took away the right for teachers for class size and class composition — illegally, by the way. Who did that? Twice they were told by the honourable judge, but again, do they agree with that? No, they will not agree with that.

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: One speak at a time, please, Members.

[1710]

H. Bains: The truth hurts, I know, and they don’t like to hear about this. They don’t like to hear about this. I would like you to come to Surrey, any neighbourhood in Surrey, and we’ll door-knock at ten homes and ask them what’s going on in their neighbourhood. Crime, crime, crime. And when they call the police, no one shows up.

Violence-free B.C. that this government said in the last throne speech — what happened to that? Nothing. Saying one thing and doing quite the opposite — another example.

Let’s talk about some of the other issues that I want to talk about. They talked about all these jobs, that British Columbians will have the first chance. They will be the first in the lineup. But guess what’s happening in reality. Say one thing…. What they’re doing? They are bringing in temporary foreign workers to do those jobs. Why?

Interjection.

H. Bains: Yes, more than anywhere else in this country. And guess what. At least in Manitoba they put in place some mechanism so that the abuse and the exploitation that goes on at workplaces can be detected and dealt with. What does this government do? Turn the eye the other way. “Nothing is happening. We don’t hear anything. We don’t see anything.”

In the meantime, those workers who are told that we need their skills, that we need them here, get exploited and abused. And once that happens, they ship them back to their countries. I say to this government: if their skill is needed and if they’re good enough to come here to work, they’re good enough to stay here as real citizens of this country.

What’s wrong with that picture? That’s how this country was built. That’s how I came here. That’s how, Mr. Speaker, you came here, and that’s how many others came here to build this country. They came through proper immigration. They came here and became good citizens and contributed to make one of the best countries in the world. But, no. They want to give their friends cheap labour that can be exploited and can be abused.

That’s not Canada. That’s the Third World, and they are closing their eyes to this. I say shame on them. That’s not what British Columbians are about.

We have seen in the workplaces…. And you know, just going back to that, I will challenge…. I will give you stories where the workers, those temporary foreign workers that are brought here…. First they’re charged fees overseas in their own country. When they come here, they’re not even paid for the first few weeks. When they are paid, they have a mechanism in place so that they pay back some of those wages. What kind of country is that for those workers? That’s not Canada. It can’t be Canada.

In the workplaces. We have dealt with this issue over Burns Lake. Two explosions — one in Burns Lake, one in Lakeland. No one has been charged. No one has been held accountable. Four deaths, 42 serious injuries — and not a single person has been held accountable. No independent public inquiry about what happened. If it was a preventable incident, then who failed to prevent it? We will never know that.

That’s the kind of government that we have seen here. We say that those who are responsible for workers’ health and safety at the workplace…. If they neglect their duty to protect their health and safety and workers get injured or die, then those executives must be held accountable. If it means that they have to go to jail, you know what? That would solve a lot of problems.
[ Page 4680 ]

Since the Westray bill, over 1,300 workers have been killed at workplaces, but not a single criminal charge, never mind convictions. What kind of country and province is this when it comes to the workers’ rights? Are they doing anything about it? They’re saying a lot of good things. They are saying what people like to hear, but they are doing quite the opposite.

[1715]

They know what their agenda is. They will continue to work on that agenda, but they will keep on saying that, as if they are dealing with those issues. Where? I haven’t seen very many cases where I could say: “Yes, they said this, and they are actually doing it.” We don’t see that.

I think it’s about time that government start to govern and bring in policies that actually will deal with issues that affect people, that are important to people, whether they are working people…. Forest industry, mining, crime issues in our neighbourhoods — and we have other issues, like manufactured home owners. Nothing for them either.

S. Hamilton: It’s an honour to have a few moments to speak to the amazing opportunities that we have here in front of us, as were mentioned in the positive and forward-thinking Speech from the Throne.

I’m going to stop there and refer to the comments that were just made by the member opposite for Surrey-Newton. He’s asking questions. He seems to conveniently forget that we also had a throne speech a little earlier this year. In that throne speech we identified issues around education and health care and social services, etc. He speaks like we’ve forgotten all of those promises and commitments.

This is a throne speech that’s been framed around what we plan on doing during the fall session, but we’re still there for the people that need our help with regards to education, health care and social services.

I want to begin, as is customary, by thanking all those who have been there supporting me during the time that I spend serving my constituents and, importantly, those who work in our constituency offices and the voters and supporters who saw fit to give me their trust and send me here to represent them.

Of course, I want to thank my family — my lovely wife, Kristen, and my equally lovely daughters, Paige and Lauren, who support me constantly and tolerate my many absences from home — and also my constituency assistants, Debbie and Kim.

And for understanding that we’re all here in this room together to fulfil the promise of a strong economy and a secure future for all British Columbians…. Since the day we took office, we have all, on both sides of this House, stood side by side to secure a future for our children equal to what our parents and grandparents created for us, bar none.

I’m reminded of an old saying that my grandfather had. We get a lot further when we’re pushing the wagon in the same direction. I’d encourage the members opposite to try to help seize on the opportunities that we have — generational opportunities to move this province forward, not to have our children saddled with the debt that we create. That’s more important to me than anything.

These are exciting times. There’s a real passion that I feel our government has, and that energy is translating into an optimism that we find in all sectors of the province. We are, as was mentioned in the Speech from the Throne, at a juncture where we must choose to grow or manage decline.

One of the most exciting areas where we’re moving forward and where we’re constantly growing is LNG. Now, natural gas is by no means a new industry in British Columbia. I think we all know that. We have an unprecedented opportunity to substantially strengthen our provincial economy. LNG is part of our plan, part of a plan to achieve a debt-free B.C. Revenue collected by government through these projects will support the services we all depend on — like health care, education, infrastructure development and social services.

We will be able to more greatly invest in the province’s future and make it a place worthy of our children. I can’t speak for anyone else, but personally, in my waning years when I’m in that rocking chair on the porch, I don’t want to be in a position of having to explain to my children and my grandchildren why we squandered a generational opportunity and saddled them with our debt. So it’s my intention to do everything I possibly can to ensure their future is both bright and debt-free so they can continue to build on the government’s successes.

[1720]

British Columbia is the second-largest producer of natural gas in this country, responsible for 26 percent of Canada’s natural gas industry. Currently, the sector employs around 13,000 people. B.C. produced 1.6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas over the last 12 months, the energy equivalent of 273 million barrels of oil — dirty oil, dirty fossil fuel.

We’ve got a chance to change that. By choosing to develop the world’s cleanest-burning non-renewable resource and ship it to the world’s fastest-growing economies, we’ve chosen growth. Major global companies have shown a strong commitment to B.C.’s natural gas future. These companies are already making massive investments to prepare for LNG exports. The global demand for liquefied natural gas has doubled in the last ten years, and it’s predicted by experts to increase by another 50 percent in the next seven years. Demand is flourishing.

B.C. is serious about becoming a stable and reliable source of energy on the global stage. This is one of our classic commitments and, I think, a defining moment for the government in many ways. LNG will diversify our economy and provide a significant source of public revenue for decades to come.
[ Page 4681 ]

LNG also specifically affects growth in our communities — more specifically, Delta. This is due in part to the Tilbury LNG facility expansion. In November 2013 FortisBC announced plans for a $400 million expansion of its Tilbury LNG facility, including one additional storage tank and associated liquefaction equipment. The expansion will provide LNG to the transportation market, remote communities and the general marketplace.

The existing facility has been operating safely since 1971, providing gas supply to utility customers during periods of high demand, such as our cold winter days. The project will add approximately 1.1 million gigajoules of LNG storage as well as approximately 34,000 gigajoules of capacity per day.

As the operator of the only two LNG facilities on the west coast out of five in all of Canada, the Mt. Hayes facility near Ladysmith and the Tilbury Island facility in Delta that I was speaking of, this FortisBC facility will be equipped to meet the demands of B.C.’s transportation sector, remote communities, industrial customers and the marketplace.

We’re committed to ensuring that B.C.’s LNG facilities are the cleanest in the world. Natural gas is the cleanest-burning fossil fuel by far. By exporting LNG, B.C. will help to avoid the use of higher-greenhouse-gas-producing fuels such as coal.

There have been many positive impacts of this facility to our province. One major factor it has impacted is the transportation sector. To promote a clean-burning fuel that is abundant in the province, FortisBC has offered an incentive program since 2012 to help B.C.’s transportation sector convert its diesel engines to natural gas.

Fleet operators have made the switch because natural gas is the vehicle fuel that is historically between 20 and 50 percent less expensive than diesel or gasoline, a clear cost benefit and a competitive advantage for B.C. industry. Additional benefits include a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 20 to 30 percent and a reported reduction in engine noise. B.C. is now home to more natural gas fleet vehicles than anywhere else in Canada.

With B.C. Ferries recently announcing its intention to move forward with natural gas for new vessels, the cost and environmental benefits of natural gas as a fleet fuel will go beyond the road. British Columbians will see the number of natural gas vehicles increasing as remaining incentive funds are allocated.

LNG is already being successfully used to power remote northern communities. For example, the town of Inuvik in the Northwest Territories has successfully converted their primary power-generating facility from diesel to LNG.

Since the November 2013 expansion announcement there has been considerable interest for LNG supply from the Pacific Northwest, Hawaii, Alaska and international markets. On Friday, August 8, the Hawaiian Electric board approved the LNG supply agreement with FortisBC. Our abundance of natural gas and our proximity to the Asian ports have rewarded us in British Columbia with the competitive advantage of LNG and that sector, and we must act upon it now.

Because of our commitment to the industry, we’re working during our trade missions. We’re recognizing how fast-growing this industry is, and we’re working with our Asian trading partners to make sure that we’re ready for their investments and their industry. But we have to make sure that we’re getting it right.

The economic benefits in British Columbia are immense, and we will reward all British Columbians in every region with new jobs, with procurement opportunities and with increased government revenues to invest in hospitals and in schools and in transportation infrastructure.

[1725]

Stewardship and environment responsibilities will make B.C. global leaders in the energy market by being responsible suppliers through strict emission requirements and First Nation involvements. Our buyers will realize that purchasing B.C. LNG truly is a sensible choice. We’re seeing these opportunities in our community already because of the LNG industry, with hundreds of millions of dollars already being spent.

At this time I also wanted to mention the Annacis Island industrial area, because Annacis and Tilbury Industrial Park jointly give Delta its strength and allow for unhindered industrial and manufacturing development.

Manufacturing drives all sectors of the B.C. jobs plan — in forestry, agrifoods, technology, mining and natural gas. In 2013 alone manufacturing contributed $13.8 billion to the B.C. economy. With investment in growth in the export and domestic markets, it’s anticipated that demand for our province’s manufactured goods and services will grow, particularly in Asia.

Annacis Island and the Tilbury Industrial Park are two of the largest business parks in B.C. and support manufacturing, processing and supply facilities for many high-end industries. What makes these sites unique is the range of industrial activity that takes place. Annacis Island and the Tilbury Industrial Park host everything from bakeries to companies that produce guitar accessories to those that manufacture marine components.

They’re all in the heart of a community that welcomes and supports industry. This is another reason why this government invested $1.5 million to move training programs to a new centre on Annacis Island. Heavy-duty transportation programs offered by the B.C. Institute of Technology and Vancouver Community College are now being taught at the new motive power centre on Annacis Island.

This centre is going to train heavy-duty mechanics, transport trailer mechanics, diesel mechanics, commercial transportation mechanics, railway conductors and
[ Page 4682 ]
forklift operators, among others. These are good, skilled trades that will help British Columbians earn good wages and support their families.

It should also be noted that the majority of manufacturing jobs are permanent, full-time positions with an average wage about 15 percent higher than the provincial average. It makes sense to locate these programs from two schools into one centre focused on heavy-duty transportation.

Students from this new motive power centre will be in demand. It’s estimated that 43 percent of the one million jobs expected to be created by 2020 will require trades or technical training. The new motive power centre, open this September, will play an integral role in the B.C. jobs plan. An estimated 13,000 people are already employed in B.C. in the field of heavy-duty commercial transportation and as diesel technicians and transport trailer technicians.

The opening of the new motive power centre truly marks a new chapter in the economic security of British Columbia and in my riding of Delta North. Manufacturing is a large part of our community and supports many local families and businesses.

Our government is working on revenue-sharing opportunities so that local governments and First Nations can share in the benefits that will come with the growth of the resource sector.

Because of these burgeoning resource opportunities, our government is also investing in our most important resource: British Columbians. We are re-engineering our education system from kindergarten straight through to post-secondary training and beyond to ensure that B.C. youth and B.C. workers are first in line for B.C. jobs of the future.

By 2022 we’re expecting one million job openings in British Columbia, along with an increase in demand for higher skills. More than 78 percent of jobs will require some form of post-secondary education, and 43 percent will be in trades and technical occupations.

As part of our goal to maximize the potential for our existing workforce and our workforce of the future, we’ve developed a detailed cross-government action plan that gives young people a clear and seamless path right from school through to the workplace.

Our plan, the B.C. Skills-for-Jobs Blueprint: Re-engineering Education and Training, shifts funding and programs to a data-driven system where training dollars and programs are targeted to jobs in demand. Not only will our new system be data-driven; it will be outcome-driven as the economy evolves, and we’ll adjust funding and programming.

Our blueprint ensures that B.C. has the trained workers needed to fulfil the top LNG-related jobs and other in-demand occupations. It’s focused on changing culture and attitudes. It includes getting more young people involved earlier in trades and technical training.

Our government currently invests more than $7.5 billion each year in education and training. Re-engineering our system doesn’t mean spending more; it means targeting more of the substantial resources already available to meet labour market priorities.

[1730]

That’s why, starting this fiscal year, we’re targeting over $160 million to do just that. In four years this will reach nearly $400 million annually. Over the span of our ten-year plan, this represents about $3 billion redirected towards training for high-demand occupations.

The blueprint we’ve developed sets out the actions we must take to make the most effective use of our existing resources and future investments in education and training, actions such as doubling the number of ACE IT spaces to 5,000 over the next two years, giving students more choices and encouraging more students to pursue skills and trades training; targeting $270 million annually by 2017-2018 of post-secondary operating grants towards in-demand jobs; investing $185 million in infrastructure targeted for skills and trades training; investing $6.6 million in critical trade seats; reforming the Industry Training Authority so the B.C. trades training system is ready to meet the growing demand for workers; using up-to-date industry-validated data to drive programming decisions; and increasing apprenticeships in high-demand areas.

For kids and parents in the K-to-12 system, we want them to have a head start to hands-on learning so that they’re ready for the workforce or more advanced training when they graduate. For students in colleges, universities or institutes, we’re matching training with jobs in demand and maximizing the space available to provide the programming they need to compete successfully in the workforce.

For people looking to get into the workforce or move up in the workplace, we’re building stronger partnerships with industry and labour to better connect British Columbians with the on-the-job and classroom training they’re going to need to boost their skills or achieve certifications.

Our blueprint for government, industry, labour and First Nations partnerships is also our commitment to deliver the skilled workforce that B.C.’s growing LNG and other sectors need and to create the opportunity for long-term, well-paying jobs that strengthen our families and communities.

Now, I want to go off my speech for a moment and talk about what we’re celebrating in the month of October. This is Small Business Month. This month we’re celebrating all of the contributions that small businesses make to British Columbia.

Ninety-eight percent of businesses in B.C. are small businesses. Fifty-five percent of the private sector jobs exist in small businesses. As a percentage of the entire workforce, small businesses employ 32 percent of the
[ Page 4683 ]
people in this province. In Canada the average is only 26 percent. More people work for small business in British Columbia than anywhere else in the country.

With that said, I have to admit that I found comments made by the member for Cowichan Valley to be insensitive and completely off the wall. I cannot believe that the chambers of commerce in this province have been denigrated and insulted to the extent they were earlier this morning, calling members of his chamber of commerce at a black-tie gala — what were they? — whiners, clowns and snobs.

If we want the quotes from Hansard, the Blues came out. The member for Cowichan Valley: “…whining about whatever problem they have,” “I sure didn’t feel among my people sitting there with a bunch of snobs,” and “call a spade a spade. You wouldn’t believe the letters I received from some of them clowns.” To say that to the people who support and promote small businesses in our community is an absolute travesty.

Let’s talk about some of the people that were at that black-tie gala that the member for Cowichan Valley spoke about.

Let’s talk about Mary Ann Deacon, of the Cowichan Valley Hospice Society. The program for that evening suggested: “A committed Cowichan Valley hospital volunteer since 2001, Mary Ann has provided compassionate emotional support for grief and palliative clients and their families as a key member of the hospice vigil team.” This lady spends her nights, the middle of the night, holding the hands of dying people in the Cowichan Valley hospice. I can’t understand a comment like that.

[1735]

Let’s talk about David Minkow of the Cowichan Kickers Soccer club, another recipient of the Black Tie Award. David took it upon himself to organize the boys and hold regular soccer practices, and he found tournaments we could enter. It’s been a real benefit to our son, and I’m amazed at how dedicated David is. Apparently, David is a whiner. What else is he? I’m sorry — a snob and a clown.

These people aren’t whiners, snobs and clowns. They’re the heart and soul of the community. This is how a community survives. Communities cannot survive without their volunteers and the people dedicated to the small business operations in the communities that they serve. It’s an insult to the chamber and those hard-working volunteers, and by extension, it’s an insult to every volunteer and every chamber of commerce member in this province, because they do pour their heart and soul into providing services to their community.

Truly, I don’t know what our member from Cowichan Valley plans to do when he leaves this chamber when we rise in a few minutes, but if he goes home and he can put his head on the pillow and sleep tonight, maybe I can suggest he gets up early in the morning, shows up on the front steps of his local chamber of commerce, gets down on his jiggery-pokery knees and begs their forgiveness as well as the collective forgiveness of the rest of their community.

Okay, I didn’t get too animated, but I did get in a “jiggery-pokery,” despite my momentary ramblings in support of our chambers of commerce and our volunteers. With that in mind, I’m pleased to speak in support of the Speech from the Throne. The Speech from the Throne is about building a better British Columbia and preparing its citizens for a better and more prosperous future.

D. Routley: I very much appreciate a chance to stand and speak in opposition to this throne speech.

I want to thank the people of Nanaimo–North Cowichan who have elected me. This being my third term in this House, I’m very honoured — as honoured today as I was the first day I walked into this place — to represent citizens who deserve to be heard and have their issues aired in front of their government and have their government have its ear to these issues. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case in any of the years that I’ve served here in opposition to B.C. Liberal governments.

The people of Nanaimo–North Cowichan know whose side I’m on. They know I’m on their side, they know I care about their issues, and they know that every day I’ll fight for them.

I want to thank my dear partner, Leanne Finlayson, for her patience and support.

I’ll get into my speech, which will be shortened by the adjournment, so I will be picking up this speech when we return a week from now.

Today a couple of things happened. The member for Shuswap read into the record a proclamation of the coming week as Manufacturing Week in B.C. He pointed out that 163,000 jobs are supported by manufacturing industries in our province and that these industries pay, on average, 15 percent higher wages. It’s unfortunate during this week that we lost a manufacturing facility, the Nanaimo sawmill, one of now 151 manufacturing sites….

L. Krog: Not just a sawmill — the Premier’s photo op.

D. Routley: Yes, the Premier’s photo op. The member for Nanaimo points out that we lost one of the Premier’s favourite photo ops because of course….

Interjection.

D. Routley: Well, yes, some of them will have jobs. But you know what? In fact, the closure of that mill will lead to more raw log exports and, therefore, fewer jobs.

We have lost 150 mills in this province under the watch of this government. It’s funny, you know. It’s a little bit like new-speak. It’s a George Orwellian reality that we live in here, where we have a jobs plan where the government boasts about increases in jobs in the forestry sector.
[ Page 4684 ]

[1740]

When they took power, there were 88,000 people working in that industry. Now there are 58,000 people working in that industry. Fact is, it slipped to 50,000, so we’re up a little bit from our darkest day, but still, we’ve lost 30,000 jobs under this government, and yet they brag. So it defies understanding how the members on the opposite side can stand up and be serious.

Government under the current Premier and the B.C. Liberals is one of slogan. It always has been. Under Gordon Campbell it was slogans — the great golden goals. There was slogan after slogan that was never had lived up to by the government’s actions.

But now what we have is a government that resembles an Internet scam. “Have you got a credit card that you could give me to in order to free up a bank account in eastern Europe? If you do, you’ll get part of that account.” “I’m lost in Africa, and I need support. Please send me money.” No, we have the current Premier, who leads by promising 100,000 jobs, $100 billion in a prosperity fund, trillions of dollars in a sales-tax-free B.C., a debt-free B.C.

It’s like government by Vince and the ShamWow. It’s a promotion; it’s never a delivery. It’s never delivered. What we have is a government that promises big and delivers small. It sounds good, but they say one thing and then deliver quite another.

We often complained about the sloganism and the lack of depth of delivery from the Speeches from the Throne in the Gordon Campbell era, but at least there was some content, and the place was full. But now the place is empty, and nobody cares, because it is just a bunch of fluff.

In fact, even what we have been promised by this Premier is now backed away from. So 100,000 jobs — we don’t hear that. We hear that it’s a possibility that we’ll have an industry. Having directed the entire focus and obsession of the government towards one industry, you’d think that they might arrive with something to deliver for that industry, but they haven’t.

They haven’t even come through with a finalized framework for the regulation and taxation framework for the LNG industry. We’re still waiting. We’re still waiting, presumably, for Petronas and the other players to write that for them, because this government has so bent B.C. over a barrel in the negotiations, having staked its entire future on delivering this industry, that they have sacrificed any bargaining power this province had.

Rather than government by slogan, the government has now resorted to government by simple acronym, YES-LNG. That should have been the throne speech. That should have been the whole of it. In fact, it was, but they had to fill it up with a bit, I suppose. I suppose it’s good that there were a few British Columbians to recognize at the beginning of the speech so that there would actually be some content to it.

But having spent more than a year beyond the deadline they set to deliver a regulatory and taxation framework for LNG, we arrive at this House, and it’s not even ready. What we hear is that it will be delivered at the end of this session.

I’m sure that it’ll be rammed through without adequate debate, as is the practice of this government in every session. It comes through with any significant piece of legislation at the last possible moment and then rams it through with closure, so that, I suppose, is what we can expect again.

This is a government that has broken its word so many times that it now goes beyond habit. It gets tiring to actually list the numbers of broken promises. But it started a long time ago. It started when they made promises and claims before they were ever elected to government.

They promised things like: “We will not sell B.C. Rail.” Well, you know what they did.

“We will not tear up contracts.” So they tore up the HEU contract, and the members on the other side, particularly the women, should reflect on the fact that that led to the largest mass firing of women in Canadian history. That’s what they did.

They tore up the teachers’ contracts.

Interjection.

D. Routley: How is that a sexist comment, sir? How is that a sexist comment?

[1745]

It might be a sexist act to tear up a contract and lead, by doing that, to the largest mass firing of women in Canadian history. The largest mass firing of women in Canadian history — that’s what this government did. It was a broken promise.

There was the HST, of course, just another acronym. It’s easy to open that file in the minds of British Columbians.

Budget 2009 — $425 million deficit, not a penny more. What was it? It was $1.8 billion. That’s what we had.

Let’s examine the B.C. Liberal performance in delivering on the LNG promise. After all, what is their role when it comes to delivering an industry to B.C.? It is what is in their control. What’s in their control is….

Interjection.

D. Routley: Balanced budget? The phony balanced budget the member refers to, when they’ve robbed B.C. Hydro of a half a billion dollars this year, when every year they force B.C. Hydro to take on debt and then use that debt to prop up the phony balanced budget that this province brings forward? So that’s what they have.

What’s in their control when it comes to the LNG industry? What’s in their control is regulation, taxation and training.

Regulation — well, this is the province that has made itself so famous for deregulation that we’re now the host of one of the worst environmental tragedies in Canadian history.
[ Page 4685 ]

With taxation, they haven’t yet come forward with a taxation scheme that will attract the investments that the member opposite is so busy trying to secure for this province. They haven’t yet delivered the framework that can give the certainty to those industries to deliver funding decisions.

When it comes to skills training, we have the worst completion record in the country. That’s the noted accomplishment of this government — the worst apprenticeship completion rate in the country.

So what’s happening? Apache has left. Suncor has left. Petronas is threatening to leave, and the Premier and her promises have left us bent over a barrel.

What were her promises? So $100 billion in a prosperity fund. No sales taxes in B.C. A debt-free B.C.

Interjection.

D. Routley: Yes, absolutely.

This is from the government that said that B.C. Place would cost us $75 million.

Interjections.

Deputy Speaker: Members. Members.

D. Routley: In fact, it cost us $514 million, and it still leaks.

The Sea to Sky Highway — the first mention was $400 million. What did it end up being? Mr. Speaker, $795 million.

The convention centre — they first told us it would cost $495 million. The member for Chilliwack, John Les, said: “Not a nickel more.” But what was it? It came in at $883 million — $883 million.

[Madame Speaker in the chair.]

And the South Fraser Perimeter Road, $700 million ballooned into $1.26 billion, and just hope you aren’t driving along beside a truck that rolls over on top of you.

Interjections.

Madame Speaker: Order. The members will come to order.

D. Routley: Thank you, Madame Speaker. It’s a pleasure to see you in the seat there.

Bioenergy — we were told that bioenergy in this province by 2010 would generate more energy than Site C would. Well, we know what happened there.

Olympics that would double tourism.

These are all promises from a government that has made its bread and butter the breaking of promises. This House is so tired of hearing this.

The member for Delta North just said that he didn’t want to hand to his grandchildren debt. Well. He said he wanted to give them a head start. Well, we spend $1,000 less than average per student in this province. We’re ninth of ten provinces in education funding — some kind of head start.

Then we look at debt, okay. Debt, when the Liberals took over in 2001, was $35 billion. It was $8,400 per capita. Now in 2013 the debt had doubled to $69 billion, not including the $96 billion in off-balance-sheet Enron accounting that the Auditor General pled with this government to show as debt.

[1750]

That is $96 billion. So the total obligation per capita for citizens of British Columbia is now $40,000. Five times debt-to-GDP is higher. Debt-to-GDP when they came to power was 19 percent, and it’s 20 percent now.

Interjections.

D. Routley: Go look at the books, Members. Go look at the books. That’s the bitter truth.

Madame Speaker: Hon. Member, direct your comments through the Chair, please.

D. Routley: Thank you, Madame Speaker, it will be a pleasure to do that.

This is the B.C. Liberal government that is ignoring my constituents. This is the B.C. Liberal government that ignores the closure of mills. It ignores the students who labour in classrooms that have the worst composition in our country. This is what they’ve delivered to us. This is what they’ve delivered to my constituents. The Hope Centre on Gabriola Island struggles to serve families and every month has to fight to keep its doors open.

But they have enough for a SLAPP suit against a member of the opposition. That’s what this government’s all about. This government is closing schools. In my constituency mills are closing.

Their forest policies have led to raw log exports that have increased from 1 million cubic metres per year when they took power to 6.7 million cubic metres last year. That has cost us jobs. That is threatening coastland industries. A mill in my constituency that is the second-fastest log-peeling operation in North America, a super-efficient operation, is threatened because they can’t get fibre because of this government’s raw log export policies.

Harmac pulp mill, another industry in my constituency that pays $100 million into the local economy in wages, is also threatened for survival because of a lack of fibre delivered to them by policies of the B.C. Liberal government that have led to massive increases in the export of logs right across a chain-link fence from their mill.
[ Page 4686 ]
They stand to lose jobs that are essential to the economy in my constituency because of this government and a succession of Forests Ministers who have not done the job of protecting the public interest. That’s the truth.

I will be back a week this Monday to continue this little lecture to the government of British Columbia. I know that some of the members opposite will look forward to that with great anticipation.

In the meantime, noting the hour, I move…. Well, actually, you know what? You’re all about self-regulation. I’m going to ask you a question as you race to the ferries. How many of you would write your own speeding ticket? Think about that when you think about Mount Polley. Think about that. Will any of you write your own speeding ticket?

Madame Speaker: Hon. Member, through the Chair. Through the Chair.

D. Routley moved adjournment of debate.

Motion approved.

Hon. M. Polak moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

Madame Speaker: I wish you all a grand Thanksgiving. We will reconvene at 10 a.m. on Monday, October 20.

The House adjourned at 5:53 p.m.

[ Return to: Legislative Assembly Home Page ]

Hansard Services publishes transcripts both in print and on the Internet.
Chamber debates are broadcast on television and webcast on the Internet.
Question Period podcasts are available on the Internet.

TV channel guide • Broadcast schedule

Copyright © 2014: British Columbia Hansard Services, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada