Orders of the Day

Private Members’ Statements

GROWING INVESTMENT IN
RURAL RESOURCE COMMUNITIES

D. Barnett: It gives me great pleasure to post the following statement on behalf of my constituents of Cariboo-Chilcotin: growing investment in rural resource communities.

[R. Chouhan in the chair.]

While this subject is of particular interest to the people of the Cariboo-Chilcotin, rural investment is crucial to the entire region of northern British Columbia. As policy-makers, we must never lose sight of the fact that people of rural British Columbia are deeply connected to the land. Rural British Columbians depend on the land for their very livelihood.

When a wildfire or a flood sweeps through an entire community, devastation is felt long after the fires have been put out or floodwaters have receded. I continue to see it in my own riding of Cariboo-Chilcotin to this day.

You can be assured, Mr. Speaker, that many more members of this House can attest to how lives can be changed forever with little or no warning. This makes attracting investment to rural British Columbia all that more important. Policy-makers must also appreciate that rural B.C. is deeply connected to the resource economy. Agriculture, mining, oil and gas and forestry are all directly connected to the land.

While many may not want to acknowledge that most of the wealth of this province comes directly from the ground, it is, in fact, the truth. It has only been a few weeks since the LNG Canada announcement. The cheers of joy coming from places like Kitimat, Terrace and as far away as Fort St. John — we can still hear the voices because these communities are now on the cusp of an entirely new export industry.

In the Cariboo, ranchers are directly connected to the land. Very few people appreciate the fact that our ranching industry could not exist without grasslands in this province.

When the 2017 wildfires swept through the Cariboo and other ranchlands in the province, the immediate concern was the evacuation of people and animals directly in the path of the fires. But when the fires were extinguished, ranchers not only faced the loss of fencing and animals; they also lost valuable grasslands that feed their cattle. We had to rely on people as far away as Alberta to keep animals fed in the short term. That’s how vital the land base is to people like ranchers, so when you see stories in the media calling for the end of the beef industry because of its effect on the environment, there are a few facts that people should be aware of.

[10:10 a.m.]

It was the grasslands that separated large tracts of forest from the path of wildfires. And while we depend on forests to absorb carbon in the atmosphere, few are aware that grasslands, unlike trees, sequester carbon underground. Grasslands also recover faster from wildfires than forests, making our connection to the land all that more important.

For those of us who belong to the Agriculture Committee, we are well aware of the need to attract investment in abattoirs in the north to make our ranching industry more productive. As Kevin Boon of the B.C. Cattlemen’s Association likes to say, it is rural B.C. that feeds the whole province. Therefore, it is critical that we attract investment to rural B.C.

Our forest industry also deserves attention. It’s bad enough to face the threat of spruce beetle and pine beetle. The forest industry has also lost vast tracts of timber stock that took 20 to 25 years to regrow only to see all that investment go up in smoke in 2017 and 2018. Now we are racing against time to harvest as much timber as we can from wildfires and beetle-infested areas before the shelf life of that wood expires.

Our mining industry is in equal need of investment, but we can’t help these industries unless the private sector can be assured of a stable business environment. Government can play a role by encouraging more investment in rural B.C. through lower taxes. As policy-makers, we should pay attention to what the government’s own task force on small business is saying. The cumulative tax burden being placed on rural B.C. through increased carbon tax and the looming employer health tax is having a negative impact on investment in rural British Columbia.

I look forward to the member’s reply.

N. Simons: It’s a pleasure to respond to the member’s statement, the member for Cariboo-Chilcotin. I think she’s pointed out a number of important issues that affect rural British Columbia.

Of course, we’ve heard mention again of the wildfire situation that affected our province two years in a row now, and in a more sustained and dramatic way than ever in the past. I’ll remind her that our community in Powell River–Sunshine Coast was the place where we lost the life of an individual who was fighting fires, John Phare. The impact of wildfires affects us all. Our province as a whole stands together with the people of those communities impacted in these past couple of years.

I couldn’t agree more with the statement that we need to invest in our rural communities. That’s what I would be proudly talking about as a member of the government who did not see fit to close hundreds of schools in our rural communities, who did not see fit with closing 24 courthouses in the last ten years.

These are the things…. The people of this province recognize not just the importance of a diverse and strong economy based on our rural resources. We also rely on the important impact of government in our communities: our schools, our roads, our courthouses and our public institutions that serve the people of this province. We know that our rural communities are strengthened by having a strong and permanent workforce, a base of economy that can withstand the ups and downs of our resource economy.

That’s why it would be wise to continue to invest in our school system so that families choosing a rural lifestyle won’t have to consider and contemplate that their children will be on buses for large parts of the day, every day. Or that, when they need to go to another community, they aren’t impacted by the disintegration of our rural communities and our rural cities.

When we see a company like Greyhound withdrawing from rural B.C., it’s a response to what has happened already in those communities. It’s not because there’s a lack of investment in the resource industries. It’s because the structures around those resource-based communities have been weakened.

I think that when we talk about lowering taxes, we have to recognize that has an impact. We’ve managed to eliminate the Medical Services Plan fee on residents. That’s a great savings for individuals and families. In some respects, we have to recognize that that’s benefited the entire province. But when we invest in government services, and when we invest in services that help communities, they help rural communities as much as they help urban communities.

[10:15 a.m.]

I think that a government with foresight protects the government’s investments. It protects the land that the government, that the people of this province own as a province. It was our schools in our rural communities that suffered previously. It was our courthouses, our judges and lawyers and our individuals who are experiencing complications in their life through criminal court or through family court. Those are the people that benefited from government services and government investments.

I would ask that the member recognize that government continues to invest in rural British Columbia. They have invested in the past. They continue to invest in rural British Columbia.

I’m proud to be representing a community that has two pulp mills. Both have been threatened under previous years of economic change. Now we have an investment — just last week — which showed that not only is there confidence in our rural economy; there’s a confidence in our rural economic sectors.

We support communities as they struggle with the challenges of climate change. I think that that’s what is expected. The people of the province expect a proper investment in our rural communities. That’s what we’ve been doing. That’s what we’ll continue to do. It’s for the betterment of our entire province that we invest appropriately in our rural communities. I’m proud that our government has done so.

D. Barnett: As I mentioned during the opening part of my remarks, the cumulative tax burden being placed on small business is having a negative effect on investment in rural British Columbia.

As October 14 to 20 is Small Business Week in British Columbia, it should be noted that the government’s own task force on small business indicated that northern and rural British Columbia is being disproportionately hit by the increase in carbon taxes. We have to travel significantly further between destinations in rural B.C. simply because we have to drive to work, drop kids off at school and even just attend medical appointments.

The high cost of carbon taxes is going to hit our rural economy especially hard, and the carbon tax is set to rise each year for the next three years. Right now virtually every province in Canada is currently backing away from the federal government’s national carbon tax.

So why is British Columbia going to keep jacking up carbon taxes to meet a national standard that won’t even exist three years from now? If this government is serious about encouraging and attracting investment in rural British Columbia, we should be looking at tax relief as an incentive.

A few weeks ago I did write an editorial about public funding for rural British Columbia. A few years ago I was the minister responsible for rural development and brought in a multi-million-dollar rural development program to assist smaller communities in British Columbia.

The current minister objected to some of my comments, but I wanted to make a point. Municipalities and regional districts are crying out for an economic recovery plan in response to the two worst wildfire seasons in our province’s history. The Minister of Forests has only a short window of opportunity between now and the next fire season, and we in rural British Columbia are calling for action now — not five years from now, not even ten years from now, but now.

Deputy Speaker: Member.

Just a reminder to all members that these statements in the morning must be non-partisan.

In that spirit, I recognize the member for North Coast.

BEAR-VIEWING INDUSTRY

J. Rice: Okay, thank you, hon. Speaker.

Klemtu is a small community on the central coast of B.C. It has a small population of about 350 people and is home to the Kitasoo/Xai’xais First Nations people. It’s very remote, accessible by boat or seaplane only, in the heart of the Great Bear Rainforest in my riding of North Coast.

Fishing and forestry are the traditional economies here, but a new economy in tourism is changing lives in this remote part of B.C. A trip to the Spirit Bear Lodge in Klemtu is a trip of a lifetime. The bear-viewing opportunities are plentiful, with opportunities to view spirit or kermode bears, black and grizzly bears, as well as coastal wolves, whales, eagles and other wildlife.

Doug Neasloss, chief of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais, says they’re trying to shift the way they do things, and doing things like tourism is a perfect fit for their community. It employs a diversity of people — men, women and children — whereas the resource sectors traditionally employed only men. Tourism employs boat operators, tour guides, cooks and logistical staff in Klemtu.

[10:20 a.m.]

Chief Neasloss says: “Every family in my community is impacted by tourism, and that’s been extremely positive for the entire community. People get to learn the territory, their stories, and they come back a bit more fulfilled from tourism than they would other industries. I think we need to do whatever we can to protect those investments, create some meaningful jobs for the community. If we don’t have that, we have challenges.”

Chief Neasloss, along with other coastal First Nations, was instrumental in the protection of bears, raising the issue about the incompatibility of viewing grizzly bears in the same estuary as trophy hunters shooting bears. Chief Neasloss and others would be taking tourists out from across the globe viewing wildlife, and they would find bear parts lying on the ground — bears with their paws and heads chopped off for a trophy. He says: “We’ve proven several times that bears are worth more alive than they are dead.”

The community wants sustainable jobs and a move towards a conservation-based economy. They also want a diversity of jobs. Sustainability is really important in everything we do. I just think there are so many benefits to having people back on the land again, and the water. That’s where they want to be. They want it out in their territory.

“My people get paid to be themselves. They get paid to show people their culture and territory, and I think that’s what they want to do.” Chief Neasloss also told me he thinks it’s important to tell other people about the cultural and economic importance of tourism to his people.

I’m really glad to see the NDP taking a position on the trophy hunt. It’s not just about protecting bears; it’s about supporting local communities and economic opportunities for our local communities. It’s bigger than bears. It’s about survival for our communities.

This is just one example of the importance of the bear-viewing industry to British Columbia. I look forward to the member’s response.

J. Thornthwaite: I rise today to respond to the member opposite’s remarks on bear viewing. This industry is growing rapidly, and it’s a wonderful activity for people of all ages and backgrounds. It is sustainable, and it supports many different conservation efforts.

There are approximately 15,000 grizzly bears in British Columbia. This is about a quarter of the entire North American population. B.C. is host to some of North America’s last remaining places where large predators and their prey maintain a balance that has lasted for millennia. Grizzly bears are a key part of these systems. They’re an important umbrella species, as ecosystems that support healthy grizzly bear populations will be able to sustain other species.

There are about 60 bear-viewing operations spread across British Columbia. The industry is growing. The top eight grizzly-bear-viewing operations brought over 7,400 visitors to B.C. in 2016, up from 5,100 in 2010. Two-thirds of these visitors are foreign visitors. Of these, one-third say they would not come to B.C. if they could not view bears.

Bear-viewing operations offer considerable employment opportunities in remote, economically challenged areas. So far in 2018, according to Destination B.C., we have seen more than 3.4 million international visitors to B.C., with an additional 3.5 million coming from the U.S.

I myself have been on two bear-viewing excursions. I took part in one in the Khutzeymateen with Ocean Adventures and another with many of my colleagues here in the House to Knight Inlet. Every year I attend the events that the Commercial Bear Viewing Association hosts here in the Legislature, and I will continue to support this vibrant industry as it grows.

According to the sector, it generates approximately $15 million annually in economic activity. This activity is in partnership with First Nations groups, creating jobs and stimulating economic growth in many communities.

I have been on safaris in nations like Kenya, where I’ve viewed many different types of wildlife in a safe, sustainable environment. People travel all over the world to take in the breadth and the beauty of Africa and its wildlife. There is so much to see. But there is a caution.

With the growth of bear viewing and wildlife viewing in general, more and more companies are coming on board and perhaps not necessarily attending to the delicate balance of taking their customers on a once-in-a-lifetime experience versus the potential of the destruction of their habitat and the animals’ way of life to live, to feed and to reproduce.

[10:25 a.m.]

I applaud the Commercial Bear Viewing Association for their efforts to come out ahead of this issue and work with governments, stakeholders, First Nations and other groups to regulate the industry so that environmental pitfalls can be avoided. Education is key, and a knowledge of this delicate balance and best practices is what is needed now.

The Bear Viewing Association is currently working with the Indigenous tourism industry and governments to expand and build in their local communities, to protect not just the bears but the entire ecosystem of wildlife, the environment and the local people who live there and want to stay there and thrive in their own local communities. We should thank the bear-viewing industry for their work for all British Columbians.

J. Rice: Thank you to the member opposite for her remarks. I’m happy to hear that we are in alignment on the value of the bear-viewing industry to British Columbia. I just had my memory jogged that after you had done your visit to Khutzeymateen Grizzly Bear Sanctuary, we did meet for a coffee in Prince Rupert many years ago, so thank you for reminding me of that.

There are approximately 50 bear-viewing companies in the province, with clients from around the world. Grizzly bear viewing is primarily centred on the central coast or in the Great Bear Rainforest, but there are operators in the Kootenay region as well.

A report written by the Centre for Responsible Travel in 2012 states that within the Great Bear Rainforest, bear-viewing companies “generated more than 12 times more in visitor spending than bear hunting.” The report said that viewing in the Great Bear Rainforest alone was worth $15 million to B.C.’s economy. I think those numbers we have are just the factors of the contributions for the Great Bear Rainforest.

Bear viewing is really important to the communities within the North Coast constituency. As you know, many of the communities that I represent are rural, remote and First Nations. It’s also culturally compatible with a lot of First Nations in the Great Bear Rainforest.

Again, I thank the member for her remarks, and I’m glad that we’re aligned in our support for the bear-viewing industry in B.C.

THE URGENT NECESSITY TO WIDEN
HIGHWAY 1 THROUGH THE FRASER VALLEY

L. Throness: It’s a privilege today to speak to the necessity of widening the Trans-Canada freeway through the Fraser Valley. This is a big, big issue where I come from.

We had an election a year ago. It seems like a long time ago, but it was only 15 months ago. We all had political platforms, and there was a line in our platform related to transportation that reads as follows. We promised to “complete the six-laning and build interchanges between 216th and 264th streets on the Trans-Canada Highway.” Now, that work would no doubt have already begun if we had gotten the mandate to do that. But it’s undone, and that’s why I’m here today.

In developing the context for my motion, I had a look at data on cities around North America, and I found a very surprising and interesting fact. Although America has a population of 326 million people, it is a nation made up of smaller cities. In fact, there are only two cities in the United States, Los Angeles and New York, which are larger than the city of Vancouver and the GVRD combined, which number about three million people.

When you combine the size of American and Canadian cities, Vancouver is the fifth-largest city in North America. That’s quite a distinction. But there is another distinction that is not quite so illustrious, and that is that we are the only city over a million people in North America to have only one way to enter and exit, one main way, and that is through the Fraser Valley. That guarantees us ever-increasing congestion as the city grows.

Even worse, we are the only city in which the main highway has only two lanes in and out. I hate to think what it would be like in an emergency like an earthquake or a major storm. It would be a nightmare. But even when it’s not an emergency, even on an ordinary day, we are in a perpetual state of gridlock. I can say that with authority, because if I have to go to a meeting in Vancouver, I now have to allow myself three hours to get into Vancouver. I build time for gridlock into my normal plans.

I want to talk for a moment about traffic volume. I requested and got some statistics on volume at various points along the freeway, and this is what I learned. Traffic counts have increased everywhere over the past five years along the highway, but near Chilliwack, they’ve increased more than anywhere else.

[10:30 a.m.]

The Ministry of Transportation has a counter just west of the Vedder Canal, which is a few kilometres out of Chilliwack. Over the past five years…. there are now 7,400 more cars that travel that road every day toward Vancouver on the No. 1 freeway. That’s an increase of 16 percent in five years. The latest data we have from 2017 says that there’s an average of nearly 53,000 vehicles crossing the Vedder Canal every day. Some days there will be fewer; some days there will be more. It’s an average. But when you add it up, that’s 19 million vehicles every year going just one way — west, from Chilliwack toward Vancouver.

That is a staggering number of trips. West of Abbotsford, the count is up to 78,000 vehicles per day. At 200th Street, it’s 83,000 per day. The daily vehicle count all over the Fraser Valley is rising by about 1,000 vehicles per day every year. That’s 365,000 additional vehicles on the road every year. The freeway was built in 1964. It was hardly designed to carry this kind of volume.

Now I want to move on to talk about traffic congestion for a moment. In 2017, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce commissioned a report, which was appropriately entitled Stuck in Traffic for 10,000 Years, that looked at traffic congestion in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. It said that every year motorists are spending a total of 10,000 extra years stuck on the highway in traffic jams in those three cities alone.

Vancouver’s part of that was 10 million hours, or 1,141 person-years, stuck on the road every single year. We in Vancouver have the honour of having four of the top 20 traffic bottlenecks in Canada.

Now, spending hours on the road is a huge lifestyle issue. It’s a big safety consideration, but it’s also an economic problem. Here’s what the report said: “The economic impacts of congestion in the Lower Mainland extend far beyond those living and working in the Metro Vancouver area. With an increasing amount of Canada’s trade destined for Asia-Pacific countries moving through the Port of Vancouver, congestion in the Lower Mainland impacts the competitiveness of businesses that rely on the efficiency of Canada’s Asia-Pacific gateway to export their goods.”

As land has become more scarce and expensive in Vancouver, companies are locating further outside of Vancouver. Then they need to bring their goods to port through the Fraser Valley. One company in Chilliwack, as an example, told me that they were doubling the size of their output and that they were going to put, as a result, 20 more trucks on the No. 1 Highway every single day. They were insistent, obviously, that the road needs to be widened.

Because of the economic gains associated with less traffic congestion, I think that the widening of the Trans-Canada would pay for itself in a fairly short while in economic gains alone. For example, the Port Mann Bridge saves an hour per day in commuting time. Every hour less spent sitting in gridlock on the road is an hour that can be devoted to productive work that will generate higher income, increase profit margins and pay taxes to support the programs that we all need.

Now I want to move on to talk about collisions, because safety is also an important issue. I asked for information about collisions on the No. 1. It turns out that there were 76 serious collisions involving human injury westbound and 66 serious accidents involving injury eastbound — 142 in all last year. That is a seriously bad record. It means that once a week, a commuter every day can expect to see a serious accident on the No. 1 that involves injury.

There are thousands of fender-benders not counted in those stats, and there are many more slowdowns, which have no apparent reason. I run into them all the time. Maybe there’s an accident on the other side of the road, or maybe a police car is stopped on the side of the road that people slow down for. All this takes time and money, and it makes life just plain miserable for hundreds of thousands of British Columbians.

This is a slam dunk in terms of public policy. It is obviously in the public interest to widen the freeway. I can’t imagine a policy reason that the government might have neglected to do this. A year ago, when I questioned the Premier, he was noncommittal, and I keep wondering why.

I look forward to the government — to see what they will answer.

J. Brar: I’m very pleased to rise in this House today to provide my response to the private member’s statement made by the member for Chilliwack-Kent regarding the urgent necessity to widen Highway 1.

[10:35 a.m.]

I’m very proud to say that our government is making huge investments in transit and infrastructure to keep people moving. We have announced funding to expand rapid transit in the Lower Mainland, including Surrey LRT, that will provide easy access and reliable public transit to the people in the Fraser Valley.

We are moving quickly to replace the Pattullo Bridge to keep commuters safe in the Lower Mainland, on both sides of the Fraser River. We are also making sure that infrastructure projects deliver lasting benefits to people and communities in the province. We, the members on this side of the House, strongly believe that accessible transportation infrastructure for people in B.C. is very important.

The Highway No. 1 expansion is a key priority for our government. Our government has a real plan for making improvements on Highway 1, and let me tell the members what we have already done on Highway 1 during the past year. We have eliminated the tolls on the Port Mann Bridge. We are making life more affordable for people who cross the Fraser every day. This is fantastic news for commuters and commercial drivers, who will benefit from this change. A driver who commutes to and from work each day on the Port Mann Bridge will save approximately $1,500 a year. A commercial truck driver who makes one round trip a day will save almost $4,500 a year.

Secondly, our government is widening Highway 1 to four lanes west of Golden, around 20 kilometres.

Thirdly, Koksilah Bridge on Highway 1 near Duncan is receiving seismic upgrades, improving the safety of the bridge for people travelling this section of Vancouver Island. The members are happy here.

People travelling near Chilliwack, the riding of the member who has put forward the motion, and Hope, along Highway 1 — those people will soon enjoy an easy drive, with 42 kilometres of highway improvements which started last summer. The Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure continues to make progress on the Highway 1 lower Lynn improvements that will help revitalize connectivity through the North Shore and ease congestion issues there.

The list goes on. That’s what we have done in just one year. We will continue to make improvements, as I said before, on Highway 1. But I would like to talk about the record of the previous government. They had been in power for 16 years.

What we see if we look at the record of the previous administration…. We see the record of the previous administration for making improvements on Highway 1 is not very impressive. It is clear that improvements on B.C.’s most important connection to the rest of Canada were never a priority for the previous administration. They promised in 2012 to speed up work on this highway in order to improve safety and reliability. They only upgraded just 13 kilometres of the highway by the year 2016. So in four years, they were able to improve only 13 kilometres.

The previous administration also made life more difficult for people by imposing an unfair toll on the Port Mann Bridge. Our government eliminated the tolls to make life more affordable for the people. Our government has been putting people first. We are investing in transit and infrastructure to keep people moving in the province…

Deputy Speaker: Member, let’s keep all statements non-partisan, please.

J. Brar: I’m just going to conclude. Thanks, Mr. Speaker.

…including the Fraser Valley, which the member is referring to.

To conclude, our government is committed to improving the services that people depend on and to building a strong and sustainable economy that supports jobs in every corner of the province.

L. Throness: The government has given cold comfort to my constituents, but I want to continue on to talk about another complaint that I get regularly. That is about large trucks on the freeway. They’re a problem, both anecdotally and statistically.

[10:40 a.m.]

Many times I have been driving on the freeway myself and have been passed by long semis with very heavy loads, travelling 110 kilometres an hour in the rain and wind on a dark day, tailgating small cars in the fast lane. I’ve seen that many times. I shudder to think of what would happen if someone would make a wrong move. In a split second, we could have a catastrophe. I received the latest complaint just last week about this, and my constituent called for a slower speed for large trucks on the freeway.

It was reported in July that long semi-trailer truck units using the freeway have increased from 1,000 in 2014 per day to 1,700 in 2017. That’s an increase of 70 percent in just three years, as businesses increasingly locate in cheaper areas outside of the GVRD but then have to drive in through the GVRD to receive and deliver goods. It’s not going to get any better; it’s just going to just get worse.

There are a few things that the government could do to alleviate traffic congestion. One thing they could do is introduce ride-sharing, but the government has refused to do that. It has stalled on it. We don’t know if it’s ever going to happen.

We could bring more rapid transit to the Fraser Valley, perhaps by bus, but this isn’t happening either. In 2015, the former government established the Fraser Valley Express, which has been a great success and in 2017 was expanded. At the very least, our government could further expand this service.

The main thing the government could and should and must do is to put in its next budget its immediate plans to widen the freeway right through, I would say, to Whatcom Road past Abbotsford. Now, some would argue that this would not actually reduce congestion, but I beg to differ. Every time I pass 200 Street where the former government widened the freeway from two lanes to three, you go from tight congestion and slowdowns to sudden traffic freedom. Suddenly there is room to move for everybody. The congestion is gone. You can relax and enjoy the ride as you head down to the Port Mann Bridge unobstructed.

This is not just in the interest of a few British Columbians living in Chilliwack. This is in all British Columbians’ interest — for workers, for retired and other residents, for tourists, for business traffic from B.C., business traffic from other provinces. It’s good for everybody.

I say, in conclusion: widen the freeway. Do it now. Do it to reduce the congestion, to reduce collisions, to enhance our economy and simply make life easier for hard-working British Columbians who want to spend time with their family instead of wasting it watching the back bumper of the person in front of them.

HIGH-SPEED INTERNET

B. D’Eith: First, I’m pleased to report that the tour of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services is complete. We did 14 cities in 11 days with over 200 presentations, and we travelled all over this amazing province. I did want to take the chance to thank the members on the other side and the Third Party for participating — and, of course, Jennifer Arril and her staff at the Clerk’s office and the amazing people at Hansard.

This year we did things a little bit differently. We met in community halls and local venues, and these included Old Massett Hall in Haida Gwaii, the Songhees Wellness Centre in Esquimalt, the Kiwanis Performing Arts Centre in Dawson Creek, the Trail Memorial Centre and the Mission Library, amongst others.

It was interesting, because we relied on the Internet to carry out these meetings. There’s no doubt that connectivity is a challenge in rural and remote B.C. It was noticeable outside of the urban areas. Many of us take high-speed Internet for granted, living in urban areas, but lots of British Columbia simply doesn’t have the same sort of access.

In today’s world, connectivity is actually foundational to how we live, how we work and how we play. Reliable, affordable high-speed Internet services connect people to the entire planet now. In fact, broadband access provides people with more opportunities to learn, do business, access services and stay connected. This is particularly true in the rural and remote and Indigenous communities where it’s needed the most. Reliable and affordable connectivity is no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity. There are a number of benefits.

First, connectivity is essential for economic development. In the past, highways and railways kept growing our communities. This infrastructure opened the rural areas to the world and created jobs and economic opportunity. Connectivity — digital connectivity — is critical for growing these local economies. It helps businesses grow, creates jobs and markets their products and services internationally.

[10:45 a.m.]

The Finance Committee was in Trail as part of our tour, and the new digital technologies you could see there are being developed to reduce the environmental impact on manufacturing and creating innovative local companies. For example, local entrepreneurs’ Metal Tech Alley is creating high-value products from what previously would have been manufactured waste. Actually, connectivity was the foundation of this type of work, and it helps that community to create good-paying jobs, environmental benefits and has helped to grow the economy. Connectivity is also really helpful in British Columbia for visitors around the world, which helps drive our amazing tourism industry throughout the province.

The second thing I wanted to talk about is how connectivity is helping people learn and train. High-speed Internet is a powerful tool for people to learn and train for employment. For example, students in the Interior Heavy Equipment Operator School in Lake Country are now able to access an on-line curriculum to help them learn and complete their studies. This training helps students access good-paying jobs and grow local economies. Connectivity is also helping people get jobs closer to home and remain home in their communities, which actually helps families to stay together.

A third area of connectivity is health care. Telehealth improves access to medical services that would not otherwise be available in rural communities. However, it relies on high-speed, affordable Internet to do this. It’s actually estimated that by 2020, 20 percent of primary health care encounters in Canada will be delivered virtually. Some people are already using these services, and it actually results in less travel, less money spent on hotel stays, wear and tear on vehicles, and other money issues and time. Now, more than ever, it’s vitally important to connect rural, remote and Indigenous communities to ensure that people in British Columbia can use telehealth services.

The fourth piece is simply social inclusion. In many cities, broadband access is a fact of life, but like electricity or tap water, it’s actually expected there. People expect it when it’s needed. Most British Columbians actually benefit from this high-speed Internet access, but many people in rural areas and Indigenous communities are trying to catch up. No matter where you live in this province, everyone should really have a level playing field for Internet access.

Connectivity helps friends and families stay together and brings them together when they’re living far away. Granisle is a village in Babine Lake in the north interior of British Columbia, Canada, to the north of Topley between Burns Lake and Houston. Access to high-speed Internet helps this remote resource-based community diversify and thrive. This is important.

The next issue is Indigenous people. Improving connectivity will actually help the government to commit to true and lasting reconciliation with Indigenous people. Today only 30 percent of rural and 25 percent of First Nations in Indigenous communities have sufficient Internet access to fully participate in the global digital economy. This is well below the national average. Increasing connectivity also helps preserve the First Nations culture and language and connects elders and artists with students from around British Columbia.

It gives youth and families comfort, knowing that young people can remain in their communities and connect with the world. By bridging the digital divide between urban centres and rural and Indigenous communities, we help ensure that the economic and social benefits available by connectivity are enjoyed by all British Columbians.

Sixth, emergency management. Connectivity is literally a matter of life and death in an emergency. Reliable voice and data communications are critical to helping first responders during floods, tsunamis, wildfires and rock slides. First responders rely on real-time data to assign resources to help people, and the public depends on networks for early warning notifications.

In conclusion, reliable and affordable high-speed Internet services connect people to the entire planet and is essential not only for our urban areas but for rural, remote and Indigenous communities as well.

B. Stewart: It’s a pleasure and an honour to stand before this House and talk about something that the member for Maple Ridge–Mission has raised about the issue, and the ongoing issue, of Internet connectivity here in British Columbia. As a former member and minister responsible for this file at Citizens’ Services, I have to say that the team at NetWork B.C. has done a fantastic job in keeping up with a file that continues to…. The growth and demand and requirements continue to outpace government’s ability to deliver on this to rural and remote communities.

Most of us use the Internet every day for our lives, whether for work or study, for news and entertainment and to keep us in touch with family and friends. Although B.C. is one of the best places in the world to live, there are still rural areas that lack some of the same Internet connectivity. Or speed is really the issue now.

[10:50 a.m.]

I’m glad to see that it’s reported in a recent KPMG report that in B.C., over 92 percent of the province meets the CRTC target of 50 megabytes per second. Therefore, the opportunities that the rest of the province has will be accessible as we continue to increase that number. Why is that challenge there — the demand for speed? It continues to grow at a pace that government has not been able to, necessarily, imagine — the fact that technology continues to demand even faster movement of data.

This is why our previous government not only prioritized working to fix connectivity issues in rural B.C; we had partners like Bob and Christine and Chris Allen of ABC Communications in rural and remote communities. I’m talking about real rural and remote communities, whether it’s Quesnel, Williams Lake, 100 Mile, Alexis Creek — off-the-grid communities. Even in my own riding on Westside Road, they had a connection down in that area. It’s also to work with industry to develop our province as a world leader in technology, in research and development — how we can advance Internet connectivity through better technology.

When we left government, B.C. was an internationally renowned place for growing innovative technology companies and was a destination for technology investment. The B.C. Liberal government strategy for technology in the province was known as the B.C. tech strategy. It was a key component of the B.C. jobs plan and a key to building a competitive, diversified, export-oriented economy. As part of the B.C. tech strategy, the goal was to see that every British Columbian had access to high-speed Internet by the end of 2021. When we left government, we were working with all other levels of government and the private sector to help make this happen.

High-speed Internet provides British Columbians in rural and remote communities with better opportunities to do business, learn and access services and stay connected. I had the privilege…. One of the very earliest high-speed Internet connections was right outside of here in Victoria, in Port Renfrew. The day they flipped the switch to provide high-speed Internet to a community that is connected for tourism, for the people that fish there and for the people that live there….

Rural communities do deserve the same support and investment as urban areas. As part of the B.C. Liberals’ rural economic development strategy, we provided $40 million to expand the connecting British Columbia program, which would expand and enhance the Internet connectivity to currently unconnected and underserved areas of the province. This program brought faster broadband speeds, which helped create new economic opportunities in areas outside of the Lower Mainland and denser populated areas and helped lay the foundation for new investment and jobs in burgeoning tech sectors in places like Prince George.

Little is it known by many of the members in this House that there are pockets around Prince George that have no high-speed connectivity. It’s because of the nature of the way that the communities grew and the fact that the sightlines are not there so that they can be connected.

Under this program, nearly $10 million was allocated to more than 25 projects that will help improve and expand Internet services in around 200 communities and locales around the province.

B. D’Eith: Thank you to the hon. member for Kelowna West for his comments. As far as high-speed connectivity, as I’ve said before, it’s essential to economic development. It’s really a fundamental building block for the new digital economy.

I’d be remiss to not bring up my own riding of Maple Ridge–Mission, where a lot people from the Lower Mainland are moving out to and which is up to 75 percent commuters. But we need to be able to retain and build jobs in our own community. Maple Ridge is still struggling to get fibre optic, for example. How can we…? Unless we build it, they won’t come. This is an issue right around the province, and it affects all of our ridings.

[10:55 a.m.]

Connectivity also helps people learn and train in their communities, and these training opportunities would help lift people up that otherwise wouldn’t have been in rural, remote and Indigenous areas. It connects and brings health care to underserviced communities. The future of health care includes telehealth. Connectivity will access health care for people around the province, saving money, time and probably lives.

Social inclusion. Living in a remote B.C. town can be isolating. Connectivity will bring the world closer and allow people to have really have that connection with their families who are out of town and with people around the world.

Indigenous communities. Connecting Indigenous communities to broadband Internet will really help us fulfil true reconciliation. Communities depend on connectivity for emergency management. Connectivity is simply vital to our first responders.

With all of those things in mind, let’s look at what’s happened. Since 2018, the government has announced more than $83 million in federal-provincial and other partner funding to improve connectivity in B.C. This will help 187 rural communities, including 69 Indigenous communities, in getting closer and reliable access to high-speed Internet.

More recently the government launched a new intake of the connecting British Columbia program. Local governments, Internet service providers and community organizations are applying for up to $16 million in grant funding to help get rural, remote and Indigenous communities connected with high-speed Internet. The goal is to work with all of our partners — federal and local governments, Internet service providers and telecommunications companies — to bring the same level of Internet enjoyed by those in Vancouver and Victoria to smaller communities.

Reliable and affordable high-speed Internet services connect the world. It’s very important for us. It’s essential for local economies, for job creation, for diversification. It’s important for wellness. It’s important for our families. Who knows? If we get proportional representation, we might have more progressive candidates who can bring more Internet to our communities in rural B.C.

Hon. C. James: The House will now consider Motion 27.

Deputy Speaker: Hon. Members, unanimous consent of the House is required to proceed with Motion 27 by the member for Langley East without disturbing the priority of the motions preceding it on the order paper.

Leave granted.

Private Members’ Motions

MOTION 27 — HIRING PRACTICES
FOR INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS

R. Coleman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was all ready to do that. Thank you for saving me some time.

The discriminatory hiring practice that we’re talking about this morning comes from a personal reality for me, from a conversation I had a couple of weeks ago with a gentleman in my riding.

Deputy Speaker: Member — Member. I then move the motion.

[Be it resolved that this House condemn discriminatory hiring practices for all infrastructure construction projects, including those using public funds.]

Now you can carry on. Thank you.

R. Coleman: Thank you. As I said, Mr. Speaker, I was having a conversation with a gentleman in my riding about this particular type of hiring practice, and he referred to it as union raiding, because he happens to be a member of a union that worked on the Golden Ears Bridge.

[L. Reid in the chair.]

Even though he indicated to me his uninspired voting pattern, which was not to vote for me in the riding of Langley East — it shocks me sometimes that I don’t get all 100 percent of the votes in my riding — he was really quite concerned that people understand what this is about. He feels that it divides British Columbians when you do something like this. It divides unions, becomes union raiding between unions and actually divides that movement, as well, as you go forward with things that are unfair. He believes in fairness, and he believes in equality.

He worked on the Golden Ears Bridge as a tradesperson, but his union is not included on the list of the 19 that presently is before our House, not related to this motion. Now he feels he’s locked out of private sector projects simply because his union is not good enough, even though it was good enough to build a bridge in British Columbia.

His perspective is this. He worked really hard last year. He put in a lot of overtime. He got to the point where he paid over $40,000 in income tax last year, $40,000 out of his pocket, to various levels of government. He paid the carbon tax. He pays the Metro gas tax, which in my area right now is pretty high. Given the taxes on gasoline, it’s $1.619 a litre for gasoline in the area of Langley East.

[11:00 a.m.]

His only comment about the Metro taxes is: “I’ve been paying this for decades, and now they want to give me a substandard transit system from Surrey to Langley. They want to go to light rail instead of giving me the SkyTrain that we all deserve. I don’t know why we’re spending money, billions, to take something out to UBC when people in the valley can’t get there from here.”

The other thing is that he also pays taxes. He pays federal taxes. He pays provincial taxes on gasoline. He pays property taxes. He paid for taxes on the basketball he bought for one of his girls two weeks ago. He pays taxes on the soccer balls. He pays taxes on the hockey equipment. And he pays those taxes thinking that they are going to a government that would be fair in how they would dispose of them — fair on health care, fair on education. But he also believes it might just be fair in the employment environment. And he’s very disappointed.

He was getting his winter tires the other day. He pays taxes on his winter tires. Then he brought up that he pays an environmental deposit. I explained to him: “Yeah, that’s one you might want to look at, given the fact that it has a multi-billion-dollar surplus in the environmental account for tires that you’re paying the environmental tax on, and we’re not recycling old tires. Those millions of surplus are just sitting there, and you keep putting it in there.”

This guy loves his family, and he loves his province. He is loyal to the union he’s been a member of for over a decade. He understands he pays his dollars for the reason to have fairness that that money will go out into public sector projects, to improve infrastructure in B.C., health care, education. What he can’t understand is why what comes out of his pocket isn’t good enough to be fair to him and his family if he wants to work on public sector projects.

His comments were this: “They’re stealing my money. They’re stealing my union. They’re stealing my kids’ future. I don’t think these people understand that fairness means everybody — all unions, all organized labour — has the right to bid and work on a public sector project in British Columbia.” And he went one step further. He said: “I think all British Columbians, in spite of whatever labour relations they’ve got within their organization, should also be treated fairly.”

M. Elmore: I’m very pleased to rise and respond to the motion moved by the member for Langley East. I’m very proud about the commitment of our government to bringing in community benefits agreements.

I want to talk about what the current situation is today. Where is B.C.? How did we get here, and what’s the way forward? It’s very telling when the B.C. construction industry today has a shortage and vacancies of more than 20 percent over last year in terms of the need for skilled workers. The numbers speak for themselves. Listen to the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association of B.C. They found that between 75 percent and 90 percent of companies in British Columbia cannot find enough skilled workers. Of the current apprentices in B.C., just 5 percent of apprentices in trades are women.

So that’s the situation. We’ve seen just a continued decline, and that’s the record of 16 years under the B.C. Liberal government. I would characterize it as a crisis of a shortage of skilled workers, and I don’t think that anyone can dispute that. That’s the record due to the B.C. Liberal government, when they came in, in 2002, cancelling the apprenticeship training program in British Columbia.

We’ve just seen drops in the numbers in terms of trained apprenticeships and trained workers in British Columbia. That’s the situation we have today, created by 16 years of mismanagement. I would characterize it as incompetence in terms of mismanaging the apprenticeship training of skilled workers in British Columbia that has wide-ranging impacts, and not only in terms of the number of apprentices and opportunities for those individuals to develop skills and to have access to good-paying jobs. It has impacts in terms of driving up costs because of the labour shortage and also detriments to local communities.

[11:05 a.m.]

Our government, recognizing that, has brought in the community benefits agreements. Now, what do the community benefits agreements achieve? First of all, the priority is to put local workers first in line for these projects. So to make a commitment for workers in those communities, on projects right across British Columbia in every single constituency, to have an opportunity to work, to gain skills, to work in an apprenticeship and to build a skilled labour force — targets of 25 percent of apprentices. That’s going to benefit local workers.

There’s a priority, as well, in terms of local procurement, so that local companies can also benefit. When you’ve got more local workers from those communities working — with a good paycheque, making good wages — they invest in their communities, and there’s a benefit for the whole community. In addition, it provides certainty in terms of the contractors and those projects, because the wages remain fixed.

That’s a big contrast with what we saw with the record of the previous Liberal government dismantling our apprenticeship system and going to low-bid. We hear, and I’m sure we’ll hear, some arguments that low-bid is the way to go. The record is that under the low-bid model, because they weren’t controlling for costs, we had hundreds of millions of dollars in overruns — astonishing overruns under the so-called low-bid system.

It clearly wasn’t working for taxpayers. It wasn’t working for workers. It wasn’t working to develop skilled workers in British Columbia. It wasn’t working for local communities, and community benefit agreements will address that — addressing training, ensuring that there are opportunities so that we can encourage all workers.

I heard the previous member talk about the principles of justice and equality. It’s not justice and equality for a few, but it’s for all British Columbians — and for British Columbians right across our province, in all communities — to benefit. This is not going to reverse 16 years of incompetence and mismanagement in British Columbia, but we have to start and make a commitment to B.C. workers for opportunities in this province when we have local projects investing in our communities.

That’s our commitment we’re going to make: to build British Columbia and to move forward for benefits for British Columbians in our province.

M. Bernier: I was all prepared, actually, to go on a certain train here with my comments, but after listening to the member for Vancouver-Kensington, I’m going to switch it up here a little bit. I do find it quite interesting that she forgets that for the past 16 years we had the best economy in all of Canada, thanks to the government that we had. We had some of the best job growth in all of Canada. We had some of the best investments in all of Canada. I think one of the things that we really need to highlight is the fact that it’s not about one or the other….

Interjection.

M. Bernier: I appreciate being heckled. Obviously, she agrees with the comments I was just making, and she can’t defend them.

Here’s one of the things that I find very interesting. I have a feeling that some of the members opposite have not even read their own document that they’re out there now touting. They’re out there talking about community benefits. They’re talking about people having to live within 100 kilometres to, hopefully, work at that. I’m thinking now…. The member opposite just said that anybody who lives in Tumbler Ridge, 125 kilometres away from Dawson Creek, now can’t work on all the major projects that come out of Dawson Creek. How is that a benefit to my region?

I look at this, and I look at what we’re trying to accomplish here. This is not about a select few. This is about the hard-working companies, private or union. This is about the hard-working families, the people who wake up every single day, who want to go to work to put food on the table for their families. They don’t sign up for saying, “I’m only going to work for this company or that company,” but: “I’m going to work for the company that is going to treat me right, that’s going to pay me right and that’s going to help me put food on my table.”

This has gone down a track that we shouldn’t have even been talking about. Eighty percent of the companies in British Columbia are non-union and do an amazing job, hiring tens of thousands of people a year. They deserve to have just as much of an opportunity as anybody else.

[11:10 a.m.]

For the government to say that the only people that are qualified to train apprentices are union is flat-out wrong.

When I started my apprenticeship…. I’ve got a couple of apprenticeships that I’ve done. The first one I did in the construction trades was with a non-union company. I spent a couple of years building houses — went through that. They did, I would say, a great job in my apprenticeship. I still have those skills to this day. Then my next trade was with a union company.

I spent 25 years in union and non-union environments in trades that I learned. At no time did I say: “Wow, I got a better training environment from one group than I did the other.” That is flat out wrong. For this government to say that the only people that are qualified are the select few that they’ve chosen is an insult to companies and to the people of British Columbia.

I have the luxury, in my riding, to have a lot of people working. I have one company I’ll share a story about quickly that does 95 percent of the work for the Ministry of Transportation, in my riding, for the entire Peace region. It’s a non-union company, 80 people. They’re the company that gets called every time a road washes out, every time a bridge washes out, every time there’s an emergency. But they’re now being told that they probably can’t bid on any of these jobs.

Interestingly, there’s no company in the Peace region that can do this other than this company. They’re being told now that they might have to unionize if they want to keep working, which they flat out say that don’t think they should have to do after decades of building their company and employing families all around the Peace region.

Interjection.

M. Bernier: I’m being heckled, saying it’s for the duration of the job. The members are obviously not even understanding their own document that they’re putting forward. Unless they’re saying that every single job that’s going to be happening in the province is under 29 days. Then they don’t have to unionize. Obviously, I’m interested to see. I guess that’s the platform of the NDP government. They’re not going to be building anything large anymore in the province, just small projects that you can work on for 29 days.

This is an insult to the people of British Columbia. It’s an insult to the hard-working families and companies who have been building British Columbia for decades. All they’re asking for is a fair shake, a fair chance. Let the bids fall where they are. Anybody who has the qualifications to bid on a job should be allowed to do that. Anybody should be able to hire those families. They should not be forced to join a political party that’s, I would say, part of the 19 groups that the NDP have chosen.

That is completely wrong. That is not how democracy works. That is not fair to the people and the companies of British Columbia.

D. Routley: I suppose it would be unparliamentary for me to take off my jacket and reverse it, but that’s what we see on this side of the House: the former government that, with its clone speech, reverses its principles and its values politically, hops from one position to another as suits it and stands in hardhats in campaigns with the very unions that the previous member called political parties.

What we feel we have an obligation to British Columbians to do is to provide prosperity. You don’t provide prosperity by cutting people’s benefits. You don’t provide prosperity by giving massive tax advantages to the most wealthy while those who will be working on those projects have paid for 16 years with increased fees, with increased taxes, with reduced services.

We aim to turn that around. We aim to increase opportunity. We aim to deal with a labour shortage that was ignored by the previous government. We aim to answer the 75 percent of construction companies who say they can’t recruit enough skilled labour. We will be creating more skilled labour in these agreements not with imported foreign labour but with people who live in these communities in British Columbia.

That is important. That’s why more than 70 percent of British Columbians support these decisions. These will be good jobs. Yes, the workers will join a union. They are perfectly free to leave that union at the end of the job. This is scare tactics and scaremongering from a government that has such a terrible record when it comes to public projects.

[11:15 a.m.]

What we feel we have the obligation to do is leverage maximum public benefit from every single public dollar that gets spent. That includes providing the project but also benefits to the local communities, benefits to the workers and benefits to the bigger economy by training the workforce of tomorrow with the people of British Columbia today. That’s what we’re doing.

This is the way a government can have a role in letting the communities prosper, letting the economy prosper, letting every British Columbian prosper. That’s our idea of success. Any company can bid on these projects. No company is excluded, union or non-union.

There is a long history of labour agreements in public projects in this province, including the Socreds. That member played, in short pants as a young man, with the future Socred Premier of the province. That Premier, who you played with in the backyard, Member, had…

Deputy Speaker: Through the Chair, Member.

D. Routley: …the good sense to have agreements for projects that delivered them on time, just like these agreements. It would be fair. It would be a failure, in fact, to guard the public interest to do any way otherwise.

We aim to provide prosperity to British Columbians and to communities. We have a responsibility. I don’t see why the B.C. Liberals don’t see their responsibility, didn’t see their responsibility, in the end, in the government time they had, to actually squeeze out every benefit of every public dollar for every British Columbian. That’s our goal. That’s what we’re up to doing, providing 25 percent apprenticeship hours on these projects.

Compare it to the record of that government. Port Mann Bridge — $1.5 billion proposal, $3.3 billion delivery, $1.8 billion over budget. Northwest transmission line — $404 million proposal, $712 million delivery, $212 million over budget. B.C. Place roof — $365 million proposal, $514 million completion, $149 million over budget. Vancouver Convention Centre — $565 million proposal, $900 million delivery, $355 million over budget. How can British Columbians prosper when their public money is wasted the way that former government did in their time?

We have a different idea. We think that every time a British Columbian looks at their paycheque and they see their income tax deducted, they will know that that money is public money, and it is going to support them and their neighbours, their community, their economy, workers here — not the 30 Costa Rican workers who worked on the Canada Line for $4 a day, 12 hours a day. Those were the conditions delivered by that former B.C. Liberal government. We’re doing better.

T. Redies: I’m pleased to rise to support the motion before the House. The ability for workers to choose to work for a union or not, or to work for different types of unions, has been the hallmark of the stable and productive construction sector in this province for many decades. This reflects a widespread belief that a democratic, non-discriminatory workplace is more efficient, fairer and assures a better use of taxpayer dollars.

Under the NDP’s new framework, a new Crown corporation — the B.C. infrastructure benefits inc., or BCIB — will apply “priority hiring rules that will solely benefit the NDP’s main supporters, the building trades unions, in public sector contracting worth tens of billions of dollars.”

In addition, employees will be required to become part of and pay dues to one of these 19 unions within 30 days of hiring. Non-union construction companies and those with unionized employees who aren’t part of the building trades will be frozen out. This framework seems designed to take B.C. back to the 1990s’ restrictive and regressive project labour agreements that were a miserable failure in this province.

I’m not against unions. Unions have played a very important role in the history of the labour movement and the province of B.C. They’ve helped balance the rights of workers against unscrupulous companies in the 19th and 20th centuries. These unions also helped usher in the 40-hour workweek, which I’m sure we can all appreciate. However, I don’t think I’ve ever worked 40 hours a week, but maybe I never belonged to a union, and that’s why.

All joking aside, I fundamentally believe in the rights of individuals to choose whether or not to belong to a union or to be able to choose the union they want to work with. Last time I looked, we live in a democracy in B.C.

[11:20 a.m.]

However, with the introduction of this labour framework, the so-called community benefits agreement — or more aptly, these union benefit agreements — the NDP government is dismantling the fundamental rights of construction workers to choose which union to work with or whether or not they work for any union at all, just to be allowed to work on large public infrastructure projects. That is not a democracy; it’s a dictatorship.

Moreover, under this framework, union workers will also be hired before non-union workers, regardless of whether they are Indigenous, locals or women. This framework will also force apprentices to work for wages that are below — yes, below — minimum wage. How is that fair?

Forcing workers to join the building trades unions as a quid pro quo for the support these unions gave the NDP during the last and previous elections is something that all British Columbians should be shocked and dismayed with. This is an attack on democracy. It’s a shameless attack on workers’ rights to choose where and who they work for, whether or not they want to belong to a union and whether or not they want to work for these 19 unions who the NDP have given priority, as the winners, in this public infrastructure lottery.

It seems that the government and the building trades unions feel the best way to grow labour and, specifically, the building trades members is by mandating their use on public sector projects. But why is that? If the value proposition of these 19 unions is so strong, why can’t they get workers to join them? Why do they need government to force membership in their unions as the only way to work on a public infrastructure project?

Maybe it’s because most workers in construction today don’t want to belong to a union or their 19 unions in particular. Otherwise, why would 85 percent of construction workers in B.C. not belong to one of these unions already?

Now, the building trades would have you believe that they are the only unions that train apprentices. This is just patently incorrect. In fact, the Independent Contractors Association is the single largest sponsor of apprentices in B.C. It’s not the building trades. That makes sense, because the building trades unions only represent about 15 percent of the construction labour in this province.

The exclusion of all union and non-union construction workers on public infrastructure projects is not going to lead to the training of more apprentices. It’s just going to increase the costs of these projects. I’m not the only one who thinks this. According to the ICBA, with this discriminatory labour practice, the government “has embarked on a 1970s-style project labour agreement framework that is a sweeping infringement of workers’ rights and patently unfair to non-union and non-affiliated union contractors.”

These union benefit agreements are a travesty not only to workers’ rights but also the rights of taxpayers who expect government to manage their tax dollars wisely. Independent analysis has shown that this could add as much as $4.8 billion more to the cost of public projects or $4,000 for every family in this province. How does that make sense?

I just want to say that this is not the 1970s. It’s not the 1990s. It’s the 21st century.

M. Dean: There’s a construction boom in the communities in and around my constituency of Esquimalt-Metchosin. In fact, there’s so much construction going on that we’re hearing about firms poaching skilled workers from other construction sites and rival firms.

Last year the B.C. construction industry had over 8,000 job vacancies, and a recent ICBA survey found that over 75 percent of companies can’t find enough skilled workers. What happens as a result? Labour shortages drive up costs. They limit diversification of the workforce on top of limiting employment opportunities, in the long term, for British Columbians.

This has been going on for years. This major skills shortage has been building and building for years and years, and it was ignored by the previous government. Well, we intend to fix that. We’re going to make sure that the best value of taxpayer dollars is experienced by all British Columbians through our community benefits agreements. It addresses the skills shortage. We’re taking action. It ensures that we’re training the next generation of workers while also supporting local economies and thriving communities, as local workers spend money at local businesses.

[11:25 a.m.]

I have to emphasize this. Any company can bid on these contracts. What I’m really excited about is how these agreements will increase the participation of women, Indigenous workers and apprentices. It helps them provide for their families and further their career path. CBAs provide incremental and prioritized opportunities for the participation of Indigenous people and other traditionally underrepresented groups — think women — on government infrastructure projects. It’s in a safe environment that is free from discrimination and harassment and, therefore, more likely to be successful.

Let’s think about it. Currently women make up only 5 percent of apprentices in the trades. The CBA model offers an opportunity to increase women’s employment in trades by including the overall 25 percent target ratio on projects for apprentices. This is fantastic news for programs like the ITA’s women-in-trades training program. It works with employers to sponsor women for apprenticeship placement. Without apprenticeship targets, there are few incentives for employers to hire and train apprentices, one of the causes of the skilled worker shortage B.C. is facing.

I’m going to tell you about Jackie. Jackie is a young woman who lives in my community. I’ve known her for a few years. She has told me how excited and optimistic she is feeling about this new direction of the new government. She spent years training to be a professional and certified electrician. This was against the odds of people telling her she couldn’t do it, of having to fund her training herself and of tolerating sexism every day in the workplace. Now she’s a highly respected and employed electrician who is just the kind of professional that we need to train and employ, and she’s in her own community.

This model moves away from the low-bid model that previously existed. That was a model that saw projects go hundreds of millions of dollars over budget: the Vancouver Convention Centre, $335 million over budget; the B.C. Place roof and renovations, $149 million over budget; the Port Mann Bridge project, $1.8 billion over budget.

I’ve received calls from British Columbians who are really concerned about this pattern of overruns. They say it’s at the expense of B.C. taxpayers, and it sends a signal that government contracts are a gravy train for contractors who play the system.

Our agreement sets wages for the duration of the project and prevents strikes or lockouts and has a proven track record. Since 1963, 17 B.C. Hydro dams have been built using PLAs. Every project was constructed on time and on budget.

It’s time to make our infrastructure investments work for the people of B.C. Community benefits agreements em­power workers, strengthen local economies and put people first.

P. Milobar: It gives me pleasure to rise to speak to this motion.

It’s always interesting when we hear the titles of some of these initiatives over the last little while. It’s interesting to me because…. The title is “community benefits agreement.” When you poll people and ask about a community benefits agreement…. Most people, if they haven’t looked too deeply into the details of a community benefits agreement, would think that that concept sounds fairly reasonable.

I do find it very interesting that we now have the NDP, very much so, pitching trickle-down economics as the saviour for local economies.

However, the problem with the title “community benefits agreement” is not that there will be benefits to local communities. I think everyone can agree that that would be a good thing to strive for. It’s not that there will be apprenticeship training. It’s not that there will be a focus on trying to get Indigenous and female workers into the workplace in non-traditional areas where they may not have previously had easy access to get into. Those are all laudable goals, and I think that’s something that most people, when asked, would agree is a good concept.

You can do that within your tendering documents. You could make that a condition of your scoring, on how you come out, so it’s not just low bid. You can put a scoring matrix in there asking contractors whether or not they have provisions for apprenticeship training, how many of their workforce will be female and how many of their workforce will be Indigenous or a combination of any of those.

[11:30 a.m.]

If you don’t feel confident that you’ll get enough uptake by any of the people bidding, you can make it a condition of the contract, when they’re bidding, that they have to actually have those things in place. Those concepts within the so-called community benefits agreement — I would suggest most people actually understand and most people say that that would be a good thing.

There is already training going on, on other projects and by non-union companies within these sectors as well, because those companies actually need workers trained as well for them to be able to continue to do work and bid on work within the province of B.C.

The problem with this so-called community benefit agreement isn’t any of those things. The problem with this so-called community benefit agreement is that in spite of all of those laudable targets being possible, there had to be a provision put in that not only said your company will have to be unionized within 30 days if it wants to keep working, but it has to be one of our select unions that has donated heavily over the years that has to qualify. So the other unions, suddenly, are no longer valid. I believe the term has been they’re “turkeys.” That is where the fundamental problem with this lies.

It’s not about whether or not to train or not. People can train. They do not have to be forced into a union. They do not have to see government-sponsored rules put in place that create unions raiding other unions to make sure that those unions can increase their numbers.

Talk about going back in time, back to the good old days of unions when they used to go out and try to raid each other’s memberships to build up their own numbers. Now you have government-sanctioned union raiding happening all under the guise of a community benefit agreement.

I say it’s under the guise of the community benefit agreement, because if it was a clause that the government would be so fundamentally proud of something as making sure that everyone is mandated to join a union within 30 days of starting on a project, the government would not be tap dancing around that provision every time it comes up. They wouldn’t be trying to pretend that provision doesn’t exist. They would actually be signing up with pride and acknowledging that, in fact, everybody will become a unionized worker.

In fact, if this was such a good deal, why are they limiting it to just a couple of projects? Why is this not across the board for every government project out there? Because they know it’s unworkable. It’s a direct payoff to select unions that want these specific projects, and that’s simply the case.

That is why, fundamentally, there is a massive problem when it comes to this. It’s discriminatory towards people who want to be able to go to work, be gainfully employed, and do the work that they take a lot of pride in but have chosen, to this point in their careers, to not work in a union environment or to work for a totally different union. That is totally fine. Those companies still win bids. They still work on projects. They have work out there.

The only people that seem to be benefiting from this are the union insiders within those unions that have arranged this with the government to make sure that they have government-sanctioned raiding of other unions.

J. Brar: It is indeed an honour once again to stand up in this House to respond to the motion introduced by the member for Langley East with regard to the hiring practices for all infrastructure projects, including those using public funds.

Let me begin by saying that the B.C. Liberal’s claim that non-union workers will be cut out of working on government projects is completely false. It is completely false. I’m very surprised to actually see two very senior members who have been a member of the cabinet in the previous government standing up in this House and speaking to this motion and making those false claims.

I urge every member on the other side of the House to read article 1 of the agreement. I’m saying this to you, and I’m also saying to the people watching this debate. It states very clearly that any company can bid on these projects. No company is excluded, whether union or non-union. It states very clearly. I think it’s a simple language. English is my second language, and I can understand this. I hope the members on the other side can understand this also.

[11:35 a.m.]

The real issue is that British Columbia is facing a major skill shortage challenge. That was ignored by the previous government for 16 long years. We have a real plan to address this skills shortage to make life better for the people of British Columbia.

A recent survey conducted by the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association of B.C., ICBA…. The member knows that association very well and respects that association very well as well. That association found that over 75 percent of companies cannot find skilled workers in B.C. That’s the problem we are facing.

I would like to emphasize the effect of this skills shortage that we have in B.C. It does impact the economy of the province, and it drives the cost of projects for taxpayers. That is exactly what happened under the B.C. Liberals for 16 long, long years. Taxpayers paid huge cost overruns for public projects they built during the 16 years.

I’ll give you a few examples. The Port Mann Bridge was estimated to cost $1.5 billion, but the actual cost at completion was $3.3 billion, $1.8 billion over budget under the Liberals. The Vancouver Convention Centre, originally budgeted at $565 million, ended up costing taxpayers $900 million, $335 million over budget.

The skills shortage is a serious problem. In order to fix that problem, our government has announced community benefit agreements. That’s what these members are talking about. That is a very important part of our plan to create good jobs for people in communities across the province.

Let me tell you, the community benefit agreements are intended, first and foremost, to benefit the people of this province. These agreements put qualified people who live within 100 kilometres of the project first in line for work. That’s what’s going to happen under these agreements. Hiring local people means putting food on the table for B.C. families. I fail to understand why the members on the other side are so opposed to jobs for their own constituents. I fail to understand that.

Community benefit agreements also diversify our workforce by hiring more people from underrepresented groups, such as women and First Nations. These agreements also include an overall 25 percent ratio on projects for apprentices. This creates opportunities for young people and ensures we are training the next generation of skilled workers.

Community benefit agreements will help to ensure that projects are completed on time, on budget — not like the Liberals have done.

M. Stilwell: Twice a week I drive 151 kilometres between my home in Parksville and the Legislative Assembly. It takes me roughly two hours along the Vancouver Island highway corridor, which was partially constructed in the 1990s. It’s quite a beautiful drive. I love the Island. I love where we live, but certainly, the traffic is something to be desired.

When the $1.3 billion expansion of Highway 19 was proposed in 1994, the NDP government of the day chose to award lucrative procurement and construction contracts solely to Highway Constructors Ltd., which was a new provincial Crown corporation. The exclusive contract ensured government control of hiring and recruitment. Not surprisingly, the construction workforce was union-only.

A survey of unionized workers at the time revealed that women accounted for less than 3/10 of 1 percent of the construction industry provincewide. Indigenous labourers were represented marginally better, at roughly 1 percent, and visible minorities, as few as 2-2/3 of a percent.

Nonetheless, the Harcourt government of the time persisted with a union-only hiring policy.

[11:40 a.m.]

The women who were working on the jobsite for more than a month were obligated to enrol with the union or risk termination. They had no choice. Those who chose to join the union still faced a bizarre and bureaucratic hiring process. In fact, often single working mothers who were unionized were laid off. Then they were rehired once the union membership was confirmed. And female workers were actually coerced into sacrificing their earnings in order to pay for the union dues.

There was an independently commissioned assessment of the project’s human resources practice that determined that over $9.5 million worth of pension contributions were unlikely returned to the workers on whose behalf they were made.

Today workers get to choose autonomously whether or not to join a trade union, and they don’t deserve to be discriminated against for choosing not to. Presently less than 15 percent of the construction tradespeople belong to a union, and that number is continuing to shrink annually. That’s 85 percent of tradespeople who choose not to belong to part of a union.

Employment on publicly funded government infrastructure projects should and must be made available to all British Columbians. Let’s be clear. Government money is taxpayer money. Therefore, the government should feel an obligation to spend it in the best interests of the people, in the most cost-effective way.

A report from the Auditor General following completion of the Vancouver Island Highway project highlighted a series of deficiencies in project design. There were inflated wages, administrative barriers, escalated costs. An additional $72 million was spent on the Vancouver Island Highway project due to a 40 percent increase in labour costs alone. Preliminary cost estimates suggested capital expenditures on the project would remain within a reasonable range of $600 million, but the final build cost ballooned to $1.3 billion.

Meanwhile, infrastructure suffered. Interchanges and on-ramps were dropped to grade, to cut costs. Traffic lights were installed in portions of the highway, which triggered congestion. I hear from constituents all the time about their frustration of the slow-moving traffic that could have been avoided if the highway had been built properly in the 1990s.

Now a familiar dilemma presents itself. Metro Vancouver’s Pattullo Bridge is overdue for replacement, with an estimated build cost identical to the Vancouver Island Highway project. Similarly, the B.C. NDP have already announced their plan to prohibit non-unionized workers from earning a living on this jobsite. This summer’s announcement of the supposed community benefits agreements for public works projects is a throwback to the 1990-era construction rules, imposing those union memberships on hard-working contractors.

Modern pay differential between union and non-union tradespeople is negligible, and compulsory membership expires once government contracts are completed anyways, so there’s no added benefit to the community. Simply put, let workers who want to work; let women who want to earn, earn; and let non-unionized labourers on the jobsite. Don’t force them to be part of one of the 19 approved unions after 90 days. People have the right to work and the right to choose.

R. Leonard: I’m eager to speak on the motion being put forward today by the member for Langley East, but I feel the need to begin by reinforcing two facts, not political machinations: (1) any company can bid on public contracts, and (2) any British Columbian can work on the projects that are put forward.

Now back to the motion. I’d like to draw attention, first, to the language used in it. I refer specifically to the use of the word “condemn.” That’s pretty strong language but ironic, given the lack of action on the part of the previous government to end discriminatory practices that have proliferated in the building trades. I’ll touch on a couple today.

I’ve had the opportunity over the past year to meet students both at the high school level and at post-secondary who are interested in and training in trade and technology — one female at the high school, less than a handful at the post-secondary institution. We heard earlier that women make up just 5 percent of apprentices in trade.

[11:45 a.m.]

I couldn’t be prouder of these young women who are visibly strong and confident in becoming workers in what, at this time, is often an unwelcoming and hostile environment.

We were all invited to a women in trades and technology reception months ago to meet women from a number of trade unions who are on a mission for change. They introduced us to the real challenges that women face, both entering the sector and dealing with the discriminatory attitudes and behaviours on the job.

There’s an expression in the Bible about taking out the log in your own eye before you go looking for a speck in your brother’s eye. In the face of obvious, systemic discriminatory practices that have excluded women from participating — women, who make up nearly half of the paid workforce overall — I think the members opposite would do well to consider what they did or didn’t do in the 16 years that they had as government to end discriminatory practices in the trades. Today this government is not shying away from our responsibility to end gender discrimination.

When the Liberals began their 16 years as government, the first thing to go was the Ministry of Women’s Equality. The former ministry catalogued the positive results of a decade of attention to closing the income gap and opening up opportunities for women in new occupations. For more than a generation following, though, there was a glaring loss of focus on cultivating equity for half of B.C.’s workforce, and it shows with a widened income gap and a lack of progress in opening jobs for women.

Paying attention is how change begins. In the trades, community benefits agreements create that change. Discriminatory practices, of course, extend beyond gender. Community benefits agreements, or CBAs, are a purposeful vehicle to prioritize hiring and training not only women but others who face discrimination in the trades, like persons with diverse abilities and Indigenous workers. The use of CBAs is how government works to halt the insidiousness of racism, misogyny and hate by active inclusion, rather than turning a blind eye.

It’s also worth talking about apprenticeships when addressing discriminatory hiring practices in construction. Under the previous government, it’s no secret that the apprenticeship system was left in tatters. They decimated staff levels at the provincial apprenticeship branch from 120 down to 12. They created apprenticeship programs and then eliminated nearly 40 percent of them, including a native residential construction worker program.

Training program requirements were reduced after being pressured by some shortsighted employers who didn’t want to shoulder the costs of training their own workforce, a workforce they would need to keep their companies alive and thriving.

All the cuts and shortchanging has produced a severe shortage of apprentices. I’ve been out in my community just in the last couple of weeks and have been meeting young workers who are desperate to find apprenticeships to work as sheet metal workers, as auto mechanics.

British Columbians, as workers, should not be discriminated against because former governments abandoned them. CBAs begin to redress the wrong of the previous government’s abandonment of apprenticeships, ensuring that when public funds are spent on public infrastructure, British Columbian workers will not be told: “You need not apply.”

G. Kyllo: It’s my pleasure to rise to address this very important issue. People have been coming to British Columbia to seek their fortunes, build their lives and invest in their communities for over 150 years. As they put down their roots, British Columbians expect that their government will use their tax dollars wisely. They expect to see a good return on their hard-earned dollars, and when projects are created through public funds, British Columbians expect equal opportunity and access to those projects.

Unfortunately, that is not what we’ve seen as of late. Thus far, we have seen members on the opposite side of the House set restrictions on public projects so that their union friends can receive a massive payday — and with good reason. Members on that side of the House have received nearly $2.4 million from trade unions. I guess it’s finally time to pay them back.

[11:50 a.m.]

Through their union benefits agreement, they have shut out hard-working British Columbians from working on projects like the Pattullo Bridge. Since reducing the agreement, the total cost of the Pattullo Bridge project has increased by 4 to 7 percent, $100 million, with no added benefits or features. This is by their own admission. Industry analysts suggest that the number could be closer to 15 to 20 percent.

We already know what happens when government creates a monopoly on public projects by looking at places like Montreal. A 2004 study released during the Charbonneau Commission revealed that the city could have saved 20 to 30 percent on its construction contracts if the bidding process had been more competitive. Instead, they used the same handful of contractors over and over, much like the 19 unions that members on that side of the House have preselected in their union benefits agreement shortlist.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

In cities across Ontario, studies again have confirmed that costs were increased by 20 to 30 percent when government created project labour agreements that exclusively benefited a small group of select unions and contractors.

I think it’s important to note that through their open consultation, there was no consultation whatsoever with the progressive unions in British Columbia. Organizations like the Christian Labour Association of Canada, Canada West and other progressive unions were not consulted or invited to the table.

We shouldn’t even have to look across the country to know that these types of agreements lead to massive cost overruns and lower-quality projects. We’ve already experienced this firsthand with the Island Highway, which featured $72 million in additional costs due to union hiring hall policies, interchanges replaced with traffic signals and four-lane stretches reduced to two.

We’re headed down a dark road where billions could be used to line trade union pockets. The one thing that all of the union benefit agreements have in common…. It’s twofold. One, taxpayers get charged more and receive less. Two, competent private sector companies get shut out of public projects. None of this sounds like a good deal for British Columbia.

Now, there is a federal court challenge that’s been initiated, expressing grave concerns about the manner in which this agreement has come forward. Among the signatories of the petition are the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association, the Vancouver Regional Construction Association, the Progressive Contractors Association of Canada and the B.C. Construction Association.

As well, the B.C. Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and the Christian Labour Association of Canada have signed a petition, along with several B.C. construction companies, as individuals.

To quote ICBA president Chris Gardner: “We filed this petition in the B.C. Supreme Court because the union-only hiring model the NDP government has rolled out is unfair and discriminatory.” He goes on to say: “You have 85 percent of the construction workforce in this province who are not affiliated or represented by building trades unions and, therefore, are facing some really stark choices as tendering goes forward with the $1.4 billion Pattullo Bridge project.”

In my home riding of Shuswap, announced two years ago along with the former Minister of Transportation at the time, is a $162.7 million highway expansion project of Salmon Arm west. We’re really concerned about the lack of consultation and the fact that this project will likely have cost overruns. In questioning the minister, we asked if there would be additional dollars put in the budget to ensure that the original scope of the project would be met. We were told that the budget for the project has not changed.

From the minister’s own admission, she’s indicated we’re going to see cost overruns — between 4 and 7 percent of increased cost due to this new CBA agreement. The concern we certainly have is that either the project scope is going to be rolled back or the project is going to come in over budget.

Noting the hour, I will take my seat and ask for adjournment of the debate.

G. Kyllo moved adjournment of debate.

Motion approved.

Hon. C. James moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

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

The House adjourned at 11:54 a.m.