Orders of the Day

Hon. M. Farnworth: I call, in this House, continued estimates debate for the Ministry of Finance.

Committee of Supply

ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF FINANCE

(continued)

The House in Committee of Supply (Section B); S. Gibson in the chair.

The committee met at 2:29 p.m.

On Vote 25: ministry operations, $267,491,000 (continued).

[2:30 p.m.]

S. Bond: My co-critic for Finance and I are pleased to have the opportunity, once again today, to work through some important issues related to the Finance Ministry. I thank the minister and her staff for the work that was done yesterday, and also to our colleagues who participated.

The minister does have, as I said yesterday, a bit of a road map, which we have provided to her and to her staff. We will, however, at this point, continue to have some of our MLA colleagues participate in the debate. We thank those who participated yesterday. So we’ll begin this afternoon, and then we’ll have a series of MLAs. We’ll begin this afternoon with our colleague from Kelowna-Mission.

S. Thomson: I appreciate the opportunity this afternoon to have a brief opportunity for a couple of questions. I thank my colleagues for providing that opportunity, and thank you to the minister for being available for these questions. I will add my comments, as well as my other colleagues have, thanking the minister for all the work she’s doing under the current situation.

My questions are… I’ve just got a couple of questions. They relate to the speculation tax. The minister will well know our view on the tax and the fact that we maintain the view, in its current implementation, current application, that it was ill-advised, and it continues to have a negative impact and should be rescinded, or at least allow the municipalities the choice of opting out of the application of the tax.

My first question relates to a specific file, and then my second question will be more of a general policy question on the speculation tax. The first question…. It’s a specific situation. It’s one that we’ve communicated to the minister previously. The minister has responded and provided us with an answer, not the answer we were hoping to hear. But I wanted to raise the issue today, in referring to this specific situation, because I think it shows a situation where the application of the tax is really not meeting the objective and is creating some very, very negative impacts and a situation that is not fair.

This is a file. The minister may be familiar with it or may remember it. It is the McBratney file. This is a constituent who purchased a house here in 2003. In 2017, she, for job purposes, had to move to Australia. She left the house here, kept ownership of the house and kept it available for her three children who live in the house and are working here in Kelowna and living in the house. Unfortunately, she’s been caught in the rules around the satellite family situation. She is now being hit with the speculation tax, because her three children that are living in the house individually don’t meet the three times the market value of the rent earnings criteria in order to achieve an exemption from the tax.

Here we have a situation where we have a single house being left so that her children can be in the house, continue their work here. This constituent now has a situation where she has, really, only three options.

[2:35 p.m.]

One is to kick her children out of the house and put them out into finding some place in the rental market and then renting the house out so that she can get the exemption; selling the house, which would, again, have her children have to move out of the house and into the rental market; or pay a $12,000-a-year speculation tax.

We appealed to the minister on this situation to look for an exemption for the application of the tax in this situation. The response was no, sorry, the rules around satellite family and earnings apply here, and there is no exemption to be provided for this.

My question to the minister is: does the minister feel that this situation is fair and that this is a situation that was intended on the speculation tax and that, in this case, she would view my constituent as a speculator or the house as vacant? It’s a speculation and vacancy tax, and clearly, she is not speculating. The house is not vacant. It is being lived in by her three children, and forcing them out of the house and into the rental market is going to exacerbate the problem. It doesn’t appear to be meeting the objectives of the speculation and vacancy tax. Would the minister consider this situation and the answer in this case as being fair to my constituent?

Hon. C. James: I know we’ve had many conversations about the speculation and vacancy tax. I appreciate the member continuing to raise the issues on behalf of his community. He does a very good job of doing that. I know we’ve had an opportunity to be able to discuss these issues, not only individually, but we’ve also had a chance through the mayors’ meeting that we have once a year with all the mayors of the communities. Certainly, the mayors in Kelowna are raising the issues that they see as well.

I won’t speak to the specific file, because I obviously don’t have the information in front of me. But the issue of satellite families on a broad perspective relates to families who bought real estate here and are not paying their taxes in British Columbia. They’re paying their taxes in other places. They have family living here who are benefiting from the services and supports in British Columbia, but the owner of the real estate is not paying their taxes here.

[2:40 p.m.]

Again, I won’t speak to the specifics. I will, again, look at the issue, as the member has said.

Once a year…. That meeting will be coming up again this coming fall. We certainly will be listening to the concerns that come forward and some of the anomalies, as the member raises, and reviewing those pieces. We did, based on the last meeting that we had with mayors. There were some adjustments made for communities that only had water access.

Those were issues that were raised by the mayors. We were able to make some of those adjustments. Military families was another issue. Those adjustments were made based on the issues that came forward.

As I said, I expect we’ll hear some of those issues again when we meet with the mayors this fall.

S. Thomson: Thank you to the minister for the response. I recognize that you don’t have the specific file in front of you. As I said, we did get our response from the minister on this particular situation. But I think, as the minister commented, anomalies in the application of the tax seem to be the order of the day in many cases.

There isn’t a good appeal process in the current application of the administration of the tax in order to deal with those anomalies, which I think are very legitimate. That’s why I asked the question around it to the minister. Did the minister feel that this was a fair outcome of the application of the tax in this situation, where it is going to force either the sale of the home or taking the children out of the family home and forcing them out into the rental market in order to meet an exemption for the tax? It really seems counterproductive to the purpose here.

My second question, and thank you again for the opportunity, relates to a number of concerns we’re hearing from many constituents and owners in the area. It relates to the situation around the current impacts of the COVID-19 situation on the rental market in the area. The minister will know that with restrictions on travel, the opportunities for vacation rental have dropped off very, very significantly, with many international students potentially not returning this fall to university at UBC Okanagan here and Okanagan College. This issue I know has come up before. It was raised yesterday in the discussion around the estimates about what the revenue impacts are on post-secondary educational institutions there.

What’s happening is that many owners are finding themselves in a situation where they may not be able to get the normal rental income and rental opportunities for those properties as a result of the COVID-19 impacts and would suddenly find themselves falling out of the ability to get the exemption around meeting those minimum rental requirements.

My question to the minister is: has the minister turned her mind or started to think about this issue going forward and whether or not there will be consideration around this in the declaration process going into 2021, for 2020, in terms of being able to meet an exemption from the speculation tax if you are unable to rent the property under what would be normal circumstances without the impacts of the COVID-19 situation?

I think it’s something that is going to become more apparent as we move forward. So my question again is: has the minister thought about this? Is it something that’s on her radar, something to think about going forward in terms of the speculation tax policy and the declaration process for 2021 for the situation in 2020 as a result of COVID?

[2:45 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I appreciate the member raising the issue around vacancy rates in communities. It’s early going yet, and certainly we’ll be monitoring it, as we do. We monitor as part of the speculation and vacancy tax. We monitor the vacancy rates. We monitor housing in communities. And just a reminder that the areas that are under the speculation and vacancy tax were chosen because of the tight housing market, because of the challenges because of the vacancy rates. Certainly, we’ll be monitoring those pieces as we go along, and I expect we’ll hear some feedback from the mayors when we meet with them later in the fall.

As I said, it’s too early yet to know. We haven’t seen those kinds of spikes in vacancy rates yet. Again, the idea for rentals is to ensure that people who live here in British Columbia have the ability to be able to have a home in the communities they work in. We expect that that kind of need will continue and that you won’t see that huge shift. But certainly, we’ll be monitoring as it goes along.

The Chair: Member for Kelowna-Mission, was that your last question?

S. Thomson: Yes, Mr. Chair, it was.

The Chair: I’ll entertain questions from other members at this time.

S. Sullivan: Thank you to the minister and also my colleagues from Surrey and Prince George–Valemount for giving me a very short time here. I do have a number of questions which I think, because they’re all related, I’ll wrap up into one, first of all, because they’re all related to house taxes.

Your government is entering its fourth year. Thirty economists from CMHC studying for over a year concluded that the rapid rise of house prices was caused by increased population, rising incomes and low interest rates, exacerbated by lack of supply due to government policy. It recommended changing government policy to allow the market to work and create more supply.

Now, your government took a different approach. Escalating house prices were caused by foreign, mainly Chinese, homebuyers; money launderers; and speculators. And for over three years, you have implemented a host of taxes and measures to root out Chinese foreign buyers, money launderers and speculators.

The result is that today house prices are up 10 percent. The exception is high-value homes, which have dropped in value because of [audio interrupted] taxes. Because property taxes are based on assessed value, this has shifted the property tax burden onto people with affordable homes. Investors from around the world have heard the message they are not welcome in British Columbia.

Is the minister willing to reassess her strategy, accept the conclusion of the federal housing economists and the scapegoating of foreigners and instead remove government policies that obstruct the creation of more housing supply?

[2:50 p.m.]

The next question. The first NDP government in the 1970s brought in rent controls. The result is that almost no dedicated rental housing has been built in the last 50 years other than a few buildings with special incentives; 80 to 90 percent of all dedicated rental housing today was built before those first rent controls were implemented.

These buildings are aging and are in great need of repair, which will cost building owners a lot of money, and your government has pulled down and reimposed a very severe form of rent control at a time when insurance is skyrocketing and the pandemic is forcing many more costs. This despite the fact that economists on both the left and the right agree that rent controls harm renters and investors.

More than three years later the results are in. Rents have increased by over $2,000 per year. Will the minister recognize the harm that her rent controls are bringing to renters and adopt policies that economists on the left and the right agree will enable the rental housing market to work once again?

Another question. The empty homes and speculation taxes were brought in because of media reports that up to 50,000 homes, mostly single-family, mainly on the west side, were sitting empty in Vancouver. It turns out that there are 20 empty homes in Dunbar and 30 in Kerrisdale.

More than half of all empty homes are actually empty condos downtown that are used throughout the year by investors and families, some by U.S. families who at one time saw B.C. as a refuge from anti-foreign ideologies in their own country. Remember that the supply of downtown condos is practically unlimited, as it is easily increased by government policy.

There are many U.S. citizens who were contributing and active members of our communities, some of whom were active investors creating jobs, who have, sadly, left Vancouver for good — but not before they were exposed to very, very disrespectful audits where people can actually go into their closets to look at their clothes. One good friend who has been a tremendous member of the community was forced to go through three audits. Others now can’t get into Canada to live in their homes for the amount of time that would be needed because of COVID. I’m wondering what would happen with those.

Given what we know now, will the minister reassess the arguments that led to these taxes, seek the advice of real, mainstream economists and act on their recommendation?

Finally, government policies have restricted the supply of housing in Metro Vancouver and beyond. Why do economists believe that relaxation of these policies would dramatically increase the supply of housing?

We have recently seen what the market would deliver if there were no government policy disincentives. The Squamish land called Sen̓áḵw is exempt from both municipal and provincial taxes and policies — no rent controls, no foreign buyer taxes, no empty homes taxes. The result is highrise rental buildings on a tiny piece of land that will provide housing for thousands of people.

Will the minister take the example provided by the Squamish people and recognize that if government gets out of the way, the market will provide all the housing British Columbians need, with a little extra for foreigners who want to enjoy this province as well? Those are my questions.

[2:55 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: To the member, thank you for the questions. I recognize that a number of these questions and a number of these issues also reside with the Minister of Housing. I’m sure that if the member had had some interest, there would have been an opportunity to be able to ask those questions there. I will touch on a number of pieces. There is work that both the Housing Minister and myself have done together around the housing file.

There is no question…. I would dispute the member’s comments that there wasn’t a housing issue in British Columbia. There was a very large housing issue in British Columbia. Anyone that the member would have talked to would have raised the concerns.

We heard those concerns as we came into government, about the lack of affordable housing and the crisis that that was causing in communities around our province — not simply a crisis for the individuals who didn’t have homes, who were struggling to be able to find affordable housing and who were spending all of their income on housing but also, in fact, a crisis for our economy.

Businesses weren’t able to recruit employees because they couldn’t find affordable housing. They’d get a great employee on the hook, a wonderful person ready for their company, who would then look at the real estate page and decide to go somewhere else. We lost that productivity. We lost that talent. We lost that experience in British Columbia.

There is no question that there is not one solution to address the housing crisis. It takes a number of solutions, which is exactly why the Minister of Housing and myself developed a 30-point housing plan to address both supply and demand. We did, in fact, work with a number of economists, a number of economists who had specific expertise in the area of housing as well, as well as others who put forward their ideas.

Yes, we did bring in some tax measures to, in fact, address some of the speculation, not related to specifics around individuals and where individuals are from but for people who are utilizing the housing market as speculation, who are using it to be able to simply create dollars for themselves rather than create homes for themselves or for others in British Columbia. So yes, we did bring in a speculation and vacancy tax.

Certainly, we have seen, in the first year of the tax coming in, some very good results. Again, this is a tax — and I’ve said this often — where, my hope is, we see those tax dollars dropping because people are renting those empty, vacant places out.

The member mentioned the fact that there were not empty single-family homes, or few of them, but that there were empty condos. Well, whether it’s an empty single-family home or an empty condo, that has a huge impact on communities. We heard that over and over again — what the hollowing out of a community does, what kind of an impact that has on the entire neighbourhood and the challenges that that creates. So yes, we did, in fact, look at addressing that particular issue.

The member mentioned rental housing. In fact, between 2017 and 2019 — so three years — we’ve created 29,000 rental housing units. The previous government created 25,000 in the previous decade. Again, we are, in fact, increasing both supply and demand, addressing both of the pieces and building rental housing.

I want to correct a piece. The member mentioned that property taxes go up with housing values. They don’t, in fact. They tend to go up with inflation. The mill rate gets adjusted to be able to address some of that piece. So that piece does get addressed.

[3:00 p.m.]

I will say to the member that I recognize that he is passionate about his views around housing, and I would agree to disagree on many of the points that he has raised. I think the fact that we’ve been able to look at the kinds of housing opportunities we have — we’ve been able to look at a mix of supply and demand, and we’ve been able to look at a 30-point plan to address it — really is the proof around the challenges and around the hard work that’s being done by our government.

M. Morris: Good to see you, Minister.

I had a constituent come into my office a while ago, about a month or so ago, Tom Coffey. He’s the president of Premium Truck and Trailer in Prince George. He’s got outlets in Williams Lake, Kamloops, Kelowna and Terrace as well. He came in to me extremely concerned over the invoice for the 2019 employer health tax that his company had received in April. It was for $197,693. That was after he had already paid $83,175 for MSP premiums for 2019 as well, on top of the $73,000 or $74,000 that he paid in 2018.

He’s quite concerned over that, particularly into 2020 and COVID. Although his company is still operating in the various outlets that he has, truck sales have dropped down a bit, and the trailers, but he’s still maintaining his businesses. He’s concerned. He has 130 employees at this particular time, and he feels he has no choice but to permanently lay off probably 25 to 30 of those employees in order to make his company survive through this COVID crisis and meet the demands that he has. He’s very concerned about that. I’ve had two or three other companies within my riding as well come to me within the last six weeks or so, also concerned about that.

One of my questions to the minister is: have all the companies in British Columbia received the invoice for 2019 EHT in April of this year? Has the minister considered any kind of mitigating opportunities to lessen the burden on these companies? A lot of them are going to go broke. A lot of them are going to cease to exist. A lot of people are going to be out of work unnecessarily because these companies no longer have the movement. I’m just looking forward to any comments that the minister could offer with respect to that.

[3:05 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: Thank you to the member for the question. I guess I’ll just take us back for a couple of minutes and then address the specifics around the assessment and what we’ve done around the COVID action plan on that piece.

As the member will know, we did eliminate MSP premiums. We phased them out. We reduced them — cut them in half for 2018 and 2019. We eliminated the revenue coming in from medical service premiums, which was about $2.7 billion. In EHT revenue, in employer health tax revenue, we bring in $1.9 billion. So there is, in fact, a savings across the province when you’re looking at the savings from the amount that was coming in from MSP and the amount we’re collecting from EHT.

That, in fact, is a tax cut for businesses and for individuals when you look at the elimination of those dollars. Obviously, huge supports to individuals, and also getting rid of a tax that was, quite frankly, very difficult to administer and very frustrating for individuals who would move jobs. Some employers paid, and some didn’t. This is a much fairer process, and it’s a process that other provinces use, as well, rather than the medical service premiums structure. So that change occurred.

The member mentions: was there anything we could do to assist with the pressures that businesses are facing now, related to COVID? We have, in fact, deferred the employer health tax payments to October 1. That’s being reviewed currently. As I’ve said, as we look at the recovery plan, as we look at what supports are still needed, we’ll be looking at that October 1 date. But that is in place already.

We also gave businesses…. Many of these businesses that pay the employer health tax obviously have properties, as well, and pay property tax. We reduced the school tax portion of property taxes at $700 million. That’s not a deferral. That was actually a tax break that we provided to businesses, because, again, we know there’s a cash flow issue, and deferrals still come back to have to be paid. So in that case, that’s a $700 million cut that we provided directly.

The individual…. Again, I don’t know the specifics of the case, but the member mentioned that they had received their assessment for 2019, so they may have already filed. There isn’t a requirement not to file. We just gave the option for people to not file until October, to defer. This individual may have gone ahead and filed. Regardless, we’ve had a number of people who’ve just filed anyway and been able to make their payments or wanted to make their payments.

M. Morris: I appreciate the answer, Minister. Thank you.

That’s all the questions I have. I’m going to turn it over to Chilliwack-Kent now.

L. Throness: I have several questions about child care that I would like to put to the Finance Minister. First of all, the first concern is the throne speech. In the throne speech, the government talked about child care for all who need it, but it omitted the NDP platform promise for child care to every parent who needs or wants it.

I’m wondering if the Minister of Finance can clarify the throne speech language for us. Will child care subsidies be available to parents based on need only or for all parents who need or want those subsidies?

[3:10 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: The member, I’m sure, has canvassed these issues with the Minister of State for Child Care. That’s where the questions, obviously, and the specifics and the discussion would go.

I have to say it’s one of the areas…. Certainly, as a member of the government, I’m very proud of the work we’re doing around a quality, accessible child care system for parents in British Columbia. It’s a critical piece.

COVID has certainly, I think, reminded us of the critical nature of child care and the need for child care in our province. So I’m very proud of the work that we’re doing in the area of child care. I’m very proud of the investments we’ve put in as well.

L. Throness: I would simply note that the minister did not answer my question — whether child care will be available based on need, according to the throne speech, or based on the NDP platform. I would simply request that she answer that question.

I want to move on to ask if the government is going to retain its commitment to the amounts it promised toward child care. It’s on page 9 of February’s budget. This might have changed because of COVID. Are the numbers $674 million toward child care this year, $679 million next year and $684 million in ’22-23? Is the government still committed to those numbers being spent on child care?

Hon. C. James: Yes, as I mentioned, how proud I am of our hard work and the minister’s work on child care. There are no changes to the budget.

L. Throness: I want to move on to ask a question about the future. Spending on child care is static for the next three years, at about $680 million a year, as the minister has confirmed.

At the end of ’22-23, the government will be halfway toward its ten-year plan for universal care. What is the minister’s forecast of the total annual cost of universal child care?

Hon. C. James: I think the member knows well that we do three-year budgeting cycles, and we will be going into the budget process this fall. We’ll obviously be looking, as we do each and every year, at our priorities as government, at where the resources are, at what situation the province is in, and making those decisions based on future years. That will come along. Again, as I’ve said, this is a key priority for us as government, a key priority for British Columbians.

COVID has, in fact, made it even more important and has certainly made people more aware of the critical nature of child care — not simply as a smart investment for families, which it is, a smart investment for women getting back into the workforce, which it is, and a wise investment for children, in providing quality for children as they move into the school years. It’s also a very smart economic investment to be able to provide support for our economy, for people to get back into the workforce, for women to be able to make that connection. To address the issue of supports for families, you’re going to have a much more productive workforce if people know their children are well cared for in affordable, quality, accessible child care.

L. Throness: I just have two more questions. The greatest shortage in the field of child care right now is the shortage of qualified early childhood educators. The government is spending $26 million per year on wage subsidies for them, which is just 4 percent of the total spent on child care per year. Why is the minister spending the smallest amount on its biggest problem?

[3:15 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: Again, I certainly hope that the member had some of this discussion with the minister of state, who I know would love to answer these questions passionately, as well, on child care.

I would remind the member that we are seeing people now express interest in going into the field of early childhood education because they see hope in this province, because they see opportunity once again, when it comes to child care, which they had not seen for a great many years.

I, in fact, was living in Prince George when the early childhood program in 2002 was shut down at the college because people didn’t see an opportunity to be able to work in this field because they didn’t see investments being made in this field. We now see investments, critical investments, long-term investments being made in a quality, accessible, affordable child care system for parents and for children in British Columbia.

We are making investments, yes, as the member mentioned, in wages. We’re making investments in bursaries and supports for people who want to access training. We’re expanding training spaces because, again, an early childhood education system needs quality early childhood educators, and we’re investing in that area as well.

The Chair: Does that conclude your questions, Member?

L. Throness: I have one more question, Chair.

Finally, I want to change topics and ask about the low-wage redress. As the minister well knows, there are thousands of non-union workers in the social service sector who don’t get the same pay as their union counterparts, even though they often work right alongside one another.

I want to add to that another category, the essential service workers in independent living residences who deliver the same care as in publicly funded retirement facilities, yet they don’t get pandemic pay.

When will the minister equalize pay between union and non-union workers and between independent centres and publicly funded retirement facilities? When will she do that?

[3:20 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I think, as the member knows, there have never been equalized wages between non-union and union. There’s always been a differential, whether we’re talking about benefits, whether we’re talking about pension, pieces that are negotiated by unions. But we also recognize that there are recruitment and retention issues, particularly in the social services field, so $10 million has gone to the social services field to address the issue of recruitment and retention in the non-union sector.

We also have the social services round table, which is looking at broader issues — not simply the wages piece, but some of the other challenges when it comes to recruitment and retention, because we know how critical the not-for-profit sector is to providing services. So that round table is continuing their discussions with the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction around other ideas and other approaches that could be used beyond the $10 million to look at recruitment and retention as well.

L. Throness: No further questions, Chair.

T. Wat: I appreciate the opportunity to ask a number of questions on Vancouver Chinatown to the Finance Minister.

Vancouver Chinatown businesses are struggling to survive with few targeted COVID-19 supports from the federal and provincial governments. What is this government doing to support Vancouver Chinatown small businesses?

Hon. C. James: Thank you to the member for the question. I think we know that small businesses across the province really are struggling. There’s no question that COVID-19 has had an impact on individuals, on small businesses, on the economy in British Columbia.

As the member will know, we put out our COVID-19 action plan in March to provide immediate support. We tried to ensure that our programs would support the federal programs and fill gaps. That’s really what we were looking at to make sure that businesses had the widest opportunity to be able to access programs.

I’ll run through a few of those pieces, for the member, of business supports that were put in place. We have a whole other list, of course, of individual supports for individuals. Many of those small business owners also access some of the individual supports because of the challenges that they were facing as well.

For businesses, for example, the employer health tax payments, as we talked about earlier with your colleague, have been delayed. Those have been deferred until September 30, 2020. That makes, again, a support, and those are being reviewed currently right now as well.

[3:25 p.m.]

We also extended tax filing and payment deadlines for the provincial sales tax, for PST, for municipal and regional district tax on short-term accommodation, the tobacco tax, the motor fuel tax and the carbon tax — again, until September 30, 2020. Those make a big difference for businesses that were closed and didn’t have staff in place, for example, to be able to ensure that they could get their filings done.

The EHT provides support for individual businesses when it comes to cash, but the payment deadlines and the tax filings made a big difference for businesses that didn’t have people in place to be able to address getting those filings done or have key staff who were able to do that. They won’t be hit with penalties, and that deadline has moved along.

We also delayed the increase to the carbon tax rate again to October 1. The application of PST to sugary drinks has been delayed. Again, those decisions will be made as part of the recovery plan.

Then the other largest support that was provided to businesses, of course, was the 25 percent, on average, reduction in the school portion of the property tax. That’s the portion that’s collected by the provincial government. We gave that 25 percent reduction in tax for most businesses. That’s not a deferral; that’s an actual cut. That was $700 million in a cut to provide businesses with support. Again, that’s a piece that was a direct help to businesses in the support during this difficult time.

T. Wat: Thank you to the minister for repeating all of the COVID programs for business, but this is really cold comfort for businesses in Chinatown. Jin Li has run her Chinese Art Crafts for 15 years in Chinatown. Come September her shop will be shutting down permanently. It’s because the programs that the minister was mentioning just now could not help her at all.

I hope the minister can listen to all of the challenges facing Chinatown. Chinatown is supposed to be a national historic site, designated in 2010. Also, this government is joining hands with the Vancouver municipal government to apply for UNESCO designation for the historic Vancouver Chinatown. In addition, this government has openly announced its commitment to establish a Chinese-Canadian museum in Chinatown, even though no location or details were given.

Yet this government has not paid attention to the loss of cultural heritage businesses — to protect the historic Vancouver Chinatown. The federal government has provided other key cultural areas, such as Granville Island, rent relief in federally owned buildings. Will this government also provide rental support for B.C. businesses in municipally owned buildings who are not eligible for Canada emergency commercial rent assistance?

Hon. C. James: I certainly am certain that every member in this Legislature shares a passion for Vancouver Chinatown. Certainly, as a Victoria resident, I can tell you the passion is shared with Victoria Chinatown as well and the support for the contributions that those businesses make to not only our cultural importance in our community but our economic importance as well.

[3:30 p.m.]

The member mentioned the issue of the federal program in place for landlords to be able to access rent. There is no question that there have been challenges with that program, and in fact, we as a province have raised those challenges with the federal government, as other provinces have done.

[R. Chouhan in the chair.]

The program relies on the landlord applying, not necessarily the tenant, and often the small business is the tenant. So we did put in place…. We are putting in resources to support people through that program — $79 million towards the federal program.

We also put in place, as the member will know, a ban on evictions for tenants when the landlord could apply for the program, fit the criteria for the program and did not. They are not able to evict those tenants because they had the opportunity — again, encouragement for those businesses, for those owners to be able to apply for the program. But there’s no question that the federal program had some real issues with it and real challenges that were there.

The one other piece I would just mention, of course, is the economic recovery plan that is coming this fall which, again, will continue to provide support, just as we’ve been doing from the very beginning. The $1.5 billion is an additional payment towards economic recovery, because I think, as we all know, economic recovery has been occurring since COVID has started.

If we don’t have a good-quality health plan, we can’t address economic recovery. If we don’t put supports in place for people, for individuals, we don’t have a good recovery plan. So those additional dollars will be coming this fall as well.

T. Wat: Again, thank you to the Finance Minister for describing different kinds of economic support programs. But again, the fact is that Chinatown businesses are not getting any help. That’s why many of them are leaving. Quite a number of them are leaving.

As I said earlier, we are applying for a UNESCO designation for the historic Vancouver Chinatown. Has the minister considered if the application would be considered by UNESCO if most of the businesses promoting culture, arts and crafts are forced to leave Chinatown because they don’t have any targeted support from this government?

Hon. C. James: Again, I agree with the member around the historic Chinatown, both Vancouver and Victoria and, in fact, other places around the province. It’s part of why we’re so excited about moving ahead with the Chinese museum and looking at a hub-and-spoke model to be able to provide support not simply to Vancouver but, in fact, to Chinatowns and the Chinese community and the history and culture around our province — to be able to recognize it. We’re very pleased to be able to do that.

I appreciate the member’s concerns. We share those concerns for the businesses in Chinatown, for the businesses across British Columbia, the impact that they’ve faced because of COVID. That’s why we put the programs and supports in place. That’s why we put the cut, when it comes to property taxes, in place. It’s why we’re continuing to look at our economic recovery as well.

T. Wat: Thank you to the Finance Minister for talking about her passion for the historic Chinatowns both in Victoria and Vancouver.

Let me put on the record…. Let me ask once again on behalf of all of the small businesses in Chinatown, even though Chinatown is not my riding but because I’m a Canadian of Chinese descent, and I’m very passionate about the historic Chinatown there. I think I need to speak on behalf of them, even though I’m not their MLA. I’m disappointed that their MLA is not bringing this up.

Once again, what step will this government take to help businesses in Chinatown endure this crisis? And what tailored option will they provide for this historic and culturally significant area so that this historic Vancouver Chinatown will not go down the drain?

[3:35 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: As I said, everyone is concerned. I’m sure everyone shares the passion for small business in our province. Whether it’s in historic Chinatown in Vancouver, whether it’s small businesses in communities in rural B.C., this is an issue, in fact, for all British Columbians when it comes to the impact of COVID-19.

We are providing a number of supports. I’ve mentioned the pieces around deferrals of taxes, around deferrals of payments, where people have been given both the support through cash flow, as well as the support through not having to make filings, through the $700 million plus for property tax, which is, as I said, a cut, not simply a deferral. And we’re continuing to look at those supports for economic recovery as well.

P. Milobar: A couple of questions of various topics, all somewhat relating to the environment, though, and carbon taxes for the minister here. I canvassed this quite extensively with the other two ministers.

I guess on the first question, it took a while, but I was able to establish with the Minister of Environment — and he acknowledged, full stop — that the Ministry of Environment, with a government in a minority situation, propped up by the Green Party, has seen its environment budget cut by $4.6 million this year. I’m wondering why the minister would have authorized a cut to the Ministry of Environment’s budget of $4.6 million.

[3:40 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: Thanks for the question. I’m guessing…. Again, I wasn’t there, obviously, for the Ministry of Environment estimates, but I’m presuming the member is talking about the adjustments that were made, in fact, to every ministry.

Last year the member will remember, when I announced the budget, I announced that I requested all ministries to make sure that they were looking for efficiencies across government — mainly administrative costs, things like consulting contracts, those kinds of things, less than 1 percent of operating expenses across government — and every ministry was expected to find those reductions, travel included, in those costs.

The Ministry of Environment was expected to do that as well. They also received, as the member knows, CleanBC funding, and they also received $24.9 million in new capital expenses.

P. Milobar: Well, in the Ministry of Environment, 50 percent of their cost structure is actually wages for staff to provide services to the public. So $1.8 million of the cuts actually came to B.C. Parks, and we are now seeing that B.C. Parks is in dire straits, with everyone trying to get out and lots of complaints about the lack of services in there.

In last year’s budget mid-year, when most of the programs would have already been delivered by B.C. Parks because it was September, the minister mandated that the Ministry of Environment find $6.76 million in savings in a budget that was predominantly already spoken for within that fiscal year.

This year the minister approved $4.6 million worth of cuts to the Ministry of Environment, for a grand total of just around $11 million worth of cuts to the Ministry of Environment over the last two years — again, by a minority government propped up by a Green party. I guess I’ll ask…. I don’t think we’re going to hear any other rationale for why the minister would have authorized that type of a cut two years in a row to the Ministry of Environment.

However, when I questioned the Minister of Transportation around Transportation cuts — and there are conflicting answers between the Transportation Minister and other statements made by the Minister of Finance around the same time — it came to light that B.C. Transit also saw a funding cut in this year’s budget to the tune of $4.5 million. That was verified by the Minister of Transportation to me in her estimates as well. So a $4.5 million cut to B.C. Transit.

When I asked if funding would be restored in full next year, as the Minister of Finance had committed to in one of her comments around the funding cut for this year, the rationale was that B.C. Transit had surplus funds to use. Well, B.C. Transit has around $40 million worth of surplus funds. So for the Minister of Finance to then say that they’re going to get all of their funding back next year, but they’d still have about $36 million in a reserve fund….

[3:45 p.m.]

We’ve seen a cut of $4.5 million to B.C. Transit for all communities outside of the Metro area. Can the minister confirm whether or not, indeed, they will be back to full funding that was originally charted out in the three-year plan before this cut came? And if not, what will the new amount be? It should actually have seen a $6.5 million bump next year. If they get held to the same line as this current year’s budget has now delivered, that would be about an $11 million cut to transit over the last two years as well.

Hon. C. James: The member is correct about the $4 million from transit and the commitment that they made to utilize surplus funds. They felt they had surplus funds. They were able to utilize those, which meant that all their commitments were continuing on.

Any decisions about the budget, obviously, will happen during the budget process, as they do in each and every year. We go through all of the ministries. We go through all of the commitments. We go through all of the programs. We go through all of the requests. We make those decisions as we go through the budget process. We’ll do that for transit, just as we do for every ministry.

P. Milobar: That’s, frankly, disappointing. I’m not sure how much stock, then, the public needs to take any time a minister speaks at a podium at a media event.

The Minister of Finance made it very clear, shortly after it was discovered that there was this cut this year, that B.C. Transit would see their funding brought back in full the following year. Today we’re hearing the minister say: “Well, maybe not.” So I’m not sure what the point of having press events and answering questions from the media is if your answer can change from week to week or month to month on commitments.

Organizations and cities, in particular…. I know very well the planning length and horizon that transit takes with municipalities and how complex it is. They need to have that type of certainty.

Perhaps the minister could provide a little bit of insight, then, into the confidence and supple agreement and the inner workings of how this all unfolds. Given that we have established that there was a $4.5 million cut to transit this year and given that there has been an $11 million cut to the Ministry of Environment over the last two years…. How much consultation is done between the Minister of Finance and the Green Party as the final budget document gets approved to move forward to the Legislature?

Hon. C. James: First of all, there was no cut to transit. In fact, Transit had reserves, and they’re using their reserves. So there was no cut to transit.

On the issue of CASA, I in fact sit on CASA along with the Minister of Environment, as our two representatives. We have meetings every couple of weeks, every few weeks throughout the year. We put an agenda together, and we talk about issues that are current.

[3:50 p.m.]

When it comes to the budget process, the opportunity for our partners in the CASA agreement to bring forward their priorities is there for them. They talk about their priorities, and then, as usual, cabinet makes the final decisions.

P. Milobar: Again, it’s concerning, I guess, that there does not seem to be as much sway within the CASA agreement when it comes to environmental issues as one might expect from a Green Party and a former head of the Sierra Club, the Environment Minister.

In terms of the transit cut, I’m not going to continue on with this. I did canvass it at length with the Transportation Minister. The cold reality is…. Surely, the Finance Minister has been around government for long enough and, even as a school board trustee, would understand this as well. If you take the core funding dollar figure and reduce it, it’s a cut. It gets harder and harder each year that happens for government to find the makeup money in the following year’s budget.

If the funding is not reinstated back to the original plan next year, for next year’s budget, that means the government would have to come up with $6½ million in one year to try to get back to the current funding level that Transit has been planning with municipalities around. The year after that, it gets worse. It gets to be closer to $7 million or $8 million or $9 million that suddenly has to be found, in any given fiscal year, to try to bring the funding back into play.

It is a little disingenuous — maybe that’s a good word to use — around saying that it’s not a cut when we all know how much more difficult it is to try to get those dollars back to original levels once they go a budget cycle or two without being refunded back to the full amount.

On to the carbon tax, though. The ministry yesterday had mentioned that the total drop for the section is $382 million. To divide that out, it’s $117 million for fuel and $265 million for the carbon tax. This does not include the decision to delay until October 1 the carbon tax increase that was in place.

Can the minister confirm that the $265 million drop in carbon tax revenues is not related to the freezing of the funds? Is it actually just on a reduction of people travelling less and carbon tax revenues being collected in the first place?

Hon. C. James: Yes, that’s correct.

P. Milobar: The freeze started on April 1, when it was supposed to go up to $45 a tonne and it was kept at $40 a tonne. That has only been committed for the first two quarters of the year.

Can the minister confirm, by my recollection — a little of this is off the top of my head — that for every $5 increase of carbon tax, it generates around another $220 million a year, $240 million a year? Is the minister saying there’s an additional $120 million of lost revenue by freezing the carbon tax at $40 over this six-month period to October 1?

Hon. C. James: The number in the July update was $117 million — so close to the $120 million the member was mentioning — for six months, from April 1 to October 1.

P. Milobar: October 1 is when the $45 is slated to now come into effect, unless the government decides to not bring it in and extend the freeze.

[3:55 p.m.]

We’ve been dealing with COVID now for several months. At what point will the public actually know, ahead of October 1, whether or not that $5 freeze will stay in effect? Will it be right at the deadline of October 1 or will it be in the next few days that government will have made a decision on whether or not to forgo the other $120 million of that carbon tax increase for the rest of the year?

Hon. C. James: As the member will know, the economic recovery plan is coming in the fall, in September. We certainly are looking, right now, at reviewing all of those as part of the economic recovery, and the impact on businesses, and making those decisions.

P. Milobar: Well, my understanding is that the economic recovery plan is tied to the 1.5 billion of unspent dollars that were identified back, I believe, on March 23, at the special session of the House, as part of the overall $5 billion funding envelope that was approved that day.

Is the minister saying, then, that if there’s going to be an extension of a freeze, that $120 million would come out of the $1.5 billion? Otherwise, I don’t see why something that’s not affecting the $1.5 billion would need to wait for the plan, if it’s actually not part of the $1.5 billion that plan is dealing with.

Hon. C. James: Just to be clear with the member, as we are developing the economic recovery plan, we are, obviously, spending time looking at and listening to businesses and organizations about the impact that COVID has had on them, which, obviously, impacts what we do with the taxes.

Taxes are separate and apart. Those are expenditures. The 1.5 taxes are separate and apart. They, obviously, have an impact on the information that people are providing to us about the impact of COVID, which is why it’s being considered, through this time period, as part of the impact on businesses.

P. Milobar: Further to the carbon tax and the thought process around freezing versus reducing or changing, I’m going to read a quote from back on April 9, 2009. I’m sure the member is familiar with that time frame. It was the halcyon days of Axe the Tax and making sure that the public understood that the Finance Minister, who was leader at the time, most certainly did not support a carbon tax in British Columbia.

In fact, the quote was: “Mr. Campbell’s gas tax is unfair. It doesn’t work, and it comes at the worst possible time for B.C.’s economy. Eliminating the gas tax makes it easier to balance the family chequebook and provides British Columbia with a needed economic stimulus.” This is, of course, under the backdrop of the 2008 crisis. We’re in April of 2009.

Arguably, I think most people would agree that the economics that we’re faced with right now are much more dire than they were even in 2008. In 2009, when the Finance Minister made this quote, the quote was based on a $10 carbon tax which was coming in. In the minister’s own words: “It doesn’t work, and it comes at the worst possible time for B.C.’s economy.”

Why was the decision made to only freeze the carbon tax at $40 when we have a Finance Minister who thought a $10 carbon tax, during bad economic times, was a bad idea?

[4:00 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: As the member will know, we have a commitment to raise the carbon tax to reach $50 a tonne on a consistent basis, $5 a tonne each year. We felt in the crisis, in the middle of March, when COVID was hitting businesses and individuals, that it made sense to look at a freeze and then reassess it, depending on the impacts on our economy and on businesses.

P. Milobar: The question is: why was there not a move by government to actually reduce? We were ahead of schedule to implement, to get to the federal mandate of $50 a tonne. It does not have to be got to, by any stretch, for a couple of years now. It would be just as easy to suddenly go from a $20 carbon tax back up to a $50 carbon tax, just as the minister said it would be that easy to suddenly put an extra $5 million or $10 million back in the B.C. Transit budget a couple of years down the road.

Again, the Finance Minister has made it very clear in the past that the tax during a bad economy is not a good thing. That was at $10. Why was the decision made to keep it at $40, instead of reducing it back down to try to provide some extra relief for homeowners and businesses on a carbon tax that the revenues were already going to be taking a beating on anyways?

Hon. C. James: I have already answered that question. We’ve made a commitment, as government. We want to look at ensuring that there is consistency. Businesses have talked about the importance of that reliability. That’s exactly why we are freezing it so that we can do that reassessment. As I mentioned already, we have the commitment, when it comes to the carbon tax. We were in March. We were in the crisis, and we wanted to provide immediate support. Freezing it made for the best decision, to be able to then review it as we move into the fall.

P. Milobar: Well, actually, that was a perfect segue, non-answer from the minister, talking about businesses as well, because yesterday the BCBC came out with their Low Carbon Advantage report. It’s a lengthy report. It’s about 95 pages. There’s an executive summary that’s about 12. There’s quite a bit of interesting work in there.

This is a group that had been working with government for quite some time leading up to the budget, and all of a sudden, they were no longer working with the government as the budget was being created. Given that the government did not follow any of their recommendations, I can see why the government suddenly decided: “This is yet another group that we’ll consult with and ignore, so we might as well just cut ties with them.”

This is what the B.C. Business Council had to say in their report: “…the B.C. government does not include the Business Council of B.C.’s request for protections for emissions-intensive trade-exposed industries in Budget 2020.” Why, to the minister, was the request from BCBC to make sure that energy-intensive industries were protected…? Why was that request denied?

[4:05 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: We have continued our discussions and are continuing our discussions with BCBC and with other businesses, community organizations and others across the province around how we ensure that the carbon tax is working, and we provide the support that is needed, and that we also change behaviour. So we will continue those discussions.

The member mentioned the BCBC report that came out with requests for consideration, and that will be part of our discussion and part of our ongoing work that we do on a regular basis with BCBC and going into the budget, as well, coming up.

P. Milobar: Well, thank you. The report is very clear. It’s titled Low Carbon Advantage, and it speaks to the fact that B.C. does have an advantage in terms of a low-carbon structure of how our energy sources and manufacturing compare to a global scale. There’s one graph that shows that two days of output of emissions in China is the equivalent of a full year in British Columbia. So it speaks to specifically the carbon tax and the low-carbon advantage that British Columbia has.

The underlying theme of it is actually overall competitiveness. Overall competitiveness of our industry, across the board — any type of resource industry or manufacturing industry — to stay competitive, not just on a global scale but also within our own borders and within our own continent.

They have concerns about Alberta’s tier system of protections for intensive industries. They say that it creates a fairly significant competitiveness gap between our two provinces, which will hinder economic recovery.

We do know, especially in the Peace region and other areas of the province close to the Alberta border — the Kootenays and that — that we’re already seeing resource-based companies starting to move over into Alberta to base out of there and come back in on a contract basis and work in British Columbia to the detriment of our provincial economy. One can hardly fault them when there’s tough economic times, and there is a very clear tax competitive advantage right across the border.

Again, is the minister concerned that there is becoming a bigger gulf between British Columbia and Alberta, in particular, when it comes to competitiveness around our exposed industries?

Hon. C. James: Competitiveness is a critical piece of ensuring that businesses are looking at British Columbia and seeing us as a good place to invest, a good place to be able to expand their businesses, to bring both new opportunities and existing opportunities here. In fact, we continue as a province to have a very competitive tax system that’s recognized also by the rating agencies. If you take a look at our credit attribute, that’s related, in fact, to our competitiveness when it comes to a tax system. Small business tax rate, again, very low — competitive across the country.

[4:10 p.m.]

I think it’s also important to recognize, and businesses are very clear about that, that taxes are one piece they take a look at. They also look at a number of other attributes when they’re looking where to invest. They look for a well-trained, well-educated workforce.

Again, huge dollars we’re putting in, in providing supports for adult basic education and providing supports for English language learning to be tuition-free so that people can go back and retrain, so that we can ensure that we have good quality, well-trained workforce.

Businesses look at real estate costs. We are, again, working hard to be able to make that affordable for businesses. They take a look at good-quality schools and good-quality health care. I’m not going to go through all the investments we’ve made in that area. But again, part of business competitiveness is ensuring that when people look at the range of attributes that they’re looking for…. They look for a competitive tax system, which we have. We also have the bonus of the other pieces that I mentioned.

P. Milobar: They’d also be looking squarely at the highest personal income tax rates in Canada, I believe, for their workforce if they’re a well-paid, highly skilled workforce, with this government’s increases in this budget.

The minister did mention some of the non-monetary things they look at, as well, when they’re going to either locate, expand or just continue to operate at their current level — period — without shutting down. We’ve already seen a great many lumber mills shut down and leave because of a non-competitive environment, highest cost structure in North America for them to operate under, under this government. Yet we still see mills operating in Alberta and other provinces, let alone in the States, where our mills are shutting down and moving to.

In the report, it actually says, to the minister’s point about how it’s not just the taxes that they look at…. The report also calls for government to fundamentally “transform the regulatory system to create efficient and effective regulatory processes.” Will any of that be part of the recovery plan?

Hon. C. James: We have had an exceptional response to ideas on economic recovery from business organizations — the report the member is talking about and a whole number of other reports across the province from business organizations, community organizations, labour and business. It’s been really quite exceptional.

Yes, part of that is looking at competitiveness and looking at regulatory structures and efficiencies that could be found there. Certainly that’s all part of the conversation on economic recovery.

P. Milobar: Well, it’s interesting. The minister says that the conversations are ongoing. This report makes it very clear — and I referenced it earlier, as well — that the government was working with the BCBC on low-carbon strategies and an energy-intensive, exposed industries strategy until February, until the budget was starting to be put together and created.

Then it went radio silent. The government no longer wanted to engage with BCBC and talk to them about their concerns around a low-carbon strategy moving forward. In fact, none of their proposed ideas found their way into the budget. I even started this whole line of questioning pointing that out. It says it right in their report from yesterday — that it was ignored for Budget 2020.

It’s interesting for the minister to stand here in August and say that discussions are ongoing when the organization releases a report yesterday that makes it very clear that they have not been talking with government since February.

I’m not sure what consultation this minister thinks they are having with BCBC and all the signatories to this report. But the signatories to this report are pretty extensive and long. It’s Port of Vancouver, Rio Tinto — these are all partners — COFI, CAPP, LNG Canada, Paper Excellence, Teck, Woodfibre, Parkland. It goes on and on — MNP, Mosaic Forest Management, Cenovus.

There are quite a few industries represented here that, in their own report issued yesterday, said they hadn’t talked to the government since February, when the government decided to detach away from consulting with them and go their own path with a budget.

[4:15 p.m.]

The report also calls for a clear investment attraction strategy that promotes the compelling value proposition of B.C.’s low-carbon-content commodities and creates a welcome door for investment. Will this be part of the plan?

Hon. C. James: Well, in fact, we have talked to a number of those groups and organizations over the spring as part of the Premier’s economic task force, and we are continuing that work. And as I said, we are going into the budget process. We are looking at economic recovery. A number of ideas have come forward through that process, and they’ll be considered through that process as well.

P. Milobar: I must say, I get that sometimes plans might not have a lot of details shared well ahead of time. One would hope that a statement that’s calling for a clear investment attraction strategy that promotes the compelling value proposition of B.C.’s low-carbon-content commodities and creates a welcome door for investment…. The minister can’t even commit that their government will create an open door, a welcome door for investment as part of an economic recovery plan.

It’s hardly a large state secret that would be divulged today for the Minister of Finance to stand up and say: “Of course we want to have a welcome door for investment, of course we’re going to try to make sure our regulatory processes are streamlined so that people can feel confident of investing in British Columbia, and of course we’re going to try to use our low-carbon advantage that we have” — it’s very clearly laid out in this report — “to try to attract investment and try to strengthen our existing industry moving forward in a way that actually does accomplish some good on a global scale.”

Again I will ask the minister…. The low-carbon advantage report states that without the exposed industry and trade-exposed protections, we, as in British Columbia, will increase global GHG emissions. Does this concern the minister at all? And if so, why have there not been added protections in Budget 2020?

Hon. C. James: I would refer the member — and I know he knows this — to the announcement that the Premier and I made around the economic recovery plan and the values that matter to British Columbians, the values that we are utilizing as we go through the economic recovery plan. Those values include CleanBC. They include Indigenous relations and reconciliation. They include environment and climate change. They include innovation. They include competitiveness. They include revenue for government.

Those values are the values, as the member has been talking about, that will be utilized as we look at priorities for economic recovery. I am confident in both the advantages I have talked about that we have in British Columbia, as well as the businesses and the individuals and the people in this province, to build a strong economic recovery for our province.

P. Milobar: Well, it’s interesting that the minister would say that. It all sounds good in word. In practice, it seems to be totally opposite. At the same time that the minister is saying, “Of course we agree with a lot of that in terms of trying to attract innovation and get our economy rolling again,” that’s under the backdrop of 23 new or increased taxes to business and innovators at a time of a global pandemic. That’s the backdrop of the highest individual income taxes, provincial income taxes, in the country.

[4:20 p.m.]

That’s under the backdrop of a B.C. Business Council report that was issued just yesterday that totally contradicts what the minister just said — that very clearly spells out that competitiveness, not just on the low carbon side but in general, is an issue. That is the underlying theme of that report. The report states that the profit margins of our industrial sector are significantly lower — 11 to 87 percent lower — when compared to their competitors. Up to 87 percent lower profit margin — and that’s with the new and improved tax rates coming in higher and higher every year.

The minister can say that all of those things are important to this government, but they’ve added to the regulatory burden through various acts that they’ve brought in. They have added to the cost structure of all these businesses. Then when the Business Council is trying to come forward with some proactive suggestions — this was even pre-pandemic — to get the government to make sure that we stay competitive, they get disengaged by the government as the budget is getting presented. We understand why now: because none of their recommendations were acted upon in Budget 2020.

Again, the report states that avoiding carbon leakage must be a priority. Will that be part of our economic recovery plan — to prevent carbon leakage?

Hon. C. James: I want to correct the member, because he’s talked about personal income tax and high rates. I think it’s important to put the facts on the table. In fact, B.C. has the lowest personal income tax up to $140,000 across the country, one of the lowest small business tax rates and a very competitive corporate tax rate. So I just think it’s important to correct the record for the member.

Again, I am pleased, as I always am, to see reports coming forward and ideas coming forward from businesses. We will, as I said, be reviewing all of those and all of the good ideas that have come forward during the economic recovery process and going into the budget for 2021.

[4:25 p.m.]

P. Milobar: That, frankly, didn’t work for this group for Budget 2020. That was pre-pandemic. This group was working in good faith with government, bringing forward recommendations for industries that were struggling already by virtue of this minister’s own budget that was tabled back in the spring, pre-pandemic.

There was a lot of worry about going into deficit with that budget. There was already acknowledgement by this minister that the economy was slowing down, that people were starting to contract and that industry was in trouble. Certainly, the forest industry struggle was no great secret — or, hopefully, it wasn’t — to government with what was going on with mill closures and curtailments and everything else. That was under that backdrop, and they were ignored.

I guess the question to the minister is: why did it take a pandemic and $1.5 billion of emergency money for the minister to now say that some of these concerns may actually be actioned? Why were they not actioned when the minister was already worried about an economy slowing down and a budget slipping into deficit?

Hon. C. James: I’ve talked, and I can go through the COVID relief programs that were put in place. I can run through the supports that we have given to business in our budgets, including the PST on electricity, a whole range of reducing the small business tax rate, child care and housing investments, which are investments for business and for competitiveness as well. We will continue to review, as we do for all the ideas that come forward as we move into Budget 2021, the reports that have come forward.

The Chair: Would you like to break? Okay. The House will be in recess for ten minutes.

The committee recessed from 4:26 p.m. to 4:37 p.m.

[S. Gibson in the chair.]

S. Bond: Thank you to the Finance Minister for responding to the questions of our colleagues. I appreciate that.

I do want to do just a couple of follow-up questions before we launch back into what will be now some consecutive hours of questions from the co-critic and myself.

The minister went out of her way several times with my last colleague to say that it was important for her to make sure that the record was correct, so I’m sure she’s going to want to think carefully about her answer related to housing units. The minister knows full well that her statement, that they’ve built more units in three years than the Liberals did in 16, is simply not accurate. The minister knows that. Maybe the talking points say that, but we know that’s not true. It’s simply not true.

In fact, the B.C. government’s very own reports show that barely 3,000 units have been opened by her government to date, and we know that it’s going to take them 100 years, at the rate they’re going, to make up, to actually deliver on the promise they made for British Columbians. So that is not correct, and I would hope the minister would take a moment to think that response through.

However, I digress. I wanted to follow up on the questions that I appreciated from my colleague from Kelowna-Mission about the speculation tax. Maybe the minister could provide for us a sense of how the economic recovery situation will impact the government’s outlook on the speculation tax.

[4:40 p.m.]

The minister has said consistently that these are different times. There’s uncertainty. There’s volatility. We know that the economy certainly isn’t what it was just months ago, so could the minister outline for us how she thinks the economic recovery situation will impact her particular approach to the speculation tax?

Hon. C. James: We had a little bit of a discussion about this earlier, just around the speculation and vacancy tax and whether there was any shift, whether COVID would have any impact. Again, it’s early going yet.

We do have the mayors meeting coming up this fall. That will be a good opportunity. As the member will know, we gather data for that mayors meeting. We provide information around vacancy rates, around the tax, around the impact of the tax. So we’ll have all of that data. I think, just as we’re monitoring all of our measures, we’ll monitor this measure as well.

I do think it’s important to recognize that we did see some behaviour shifts between the first year of the tax and this year. We’re seeing tax that was paid in one year, and then this year you see the tenants in the place and an exemption around tenants. So that’s a positive sign.

Again, we want to make sure that we’re looking at the impact. I think the mayors meeting will be a good opportunity to hear directly from the communities, as well as be able to have all the data that we provide for that meeting to the mayors as well.

S. Bond: Thank you very much. I appreciate that response from the minister.

I know that she recognizes how very strongly we feel and argued against this version of a speculation tax. It sounds to me like that answer leaves room for adjustments and making changes. Is it fair to say that the minister has an open mind about looking at additional changes, adjustments, perhaps even contemplating, once again, the necessity for this type of tax?

[4:45 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I think the consultation, the work we did on the specifics of the tax, putting the principles of the tax out first and then providing an opportunity to be able to get feedback before the final information was there, shows the open approach we’ve taken to this new tax. As I said when we introduced the speculation and vacancy tax, this is a new tax in British Columbia. The goal is to get rid of empty homes, to be able to have homes rented out, to have people to have homes in communities.

If there are different ways of doing that and if there are things that need to be adjusted, we’re more than happy to do that. In fact, we did do that after the first mayors’ meeting. There were a couple of very specific areas that came forward — water-access-only communities, only accessible by water, and the issue of the military families. Those were issues that were raised. Those were changes that were made. So I think we as a government and myself as Finance Minister have shown that open approach, and I look forward to the mayors’ meeting coming this fall as well.

S. Bond: Certainly, it wasn’t just communities that came forward, as I would recall. The opposition actually had to work very hard to help get the government’s attention on some of those issues.

The Minister of Housing actually cited a one-time increase in Metro Vancouver’s secondary rental market as a result of the speculation and vacancy tax. But it appears that those units are all rented now, and the vacancy rate in the secondary market is still at 0.3 percent for Metro Vancouver. So does the minister, who is responsible for the tax, expect year-over-year increases in rentals? And if not, what does she intend to do if the rental supply stagnates?

Hon. C. James: Again, I said this when the 30-point housing plan was introduced. I’ve said it as part of the discussion and debate we’ve had here as well. There is not one measure that’s going to fix the housing crisis. It’s not possible to have either one tax or one measure that’s going to address the multitude of challenges that are facing the housing crisis. This is going to take a comprehensive approach, which is why the Minister of Housing and myself put together the 30-point plan to be able to have a comprehensive approach to the challenges of housing.

Do I believe that the speculation and vacancy tax is one of those measures that contributes to helping the housing crisis? Yes, I do. I have talked to people specifically, and we’re starting to see it in some of the data around behaviour shifts, where people who left places vacant have now put them in the rental pool so that they don’t have to pay the tax. Good for them; they don’t have to pay the tax. Good for the person who’s renting the place because they’ve now got a place to be able to live and hopefully work in their own communities.

Yes, I do believe it contributes. I don’t think, alone, any one measure is going to address it. But yes, I do believe it does have a positive impact.

S. Bond: Well, I appreciate hearing that. We certainly remember — painfully, actually — the various versions of the spec tax and who was in and who was out and where the boundaries were arbitrarily drawn. It wasn’t exactly an illustrious start.

I think that monitoring it is one thing. I guess the minister’s comments about needing a comprehensive approach are probably a pretty good segue into asking her….

[4:50 p.m.]

At this point, the minister has rejected tax incentives for market rental housing. Is that a position that she still holds? Is that something that she is contemplating thinking about as she monitors the situation and looks at the effectiveness or a need to enhance the housing strategy that the government has?

Hon. C. James: The member mentioned tax incentives for rental market housing. There are a number of ideas that have come forward in looking at rental market housing. I know the Minister of Housing is very focused in this particular area with building rental housing. There are a number of measures that can be taken, and I think, as we’ve talked about already, we are certainly open to looking at a range of measures. One measure isn’t going to fix it. So if there are other measures, certainly, we’re open to considering other measures.

One of the examples, of course, that has been quite successful is the building of housing on universities and, once those housing units are built, the opportunity to be able to move people from affordable rentals in communities to campus is going to make a huge difference. We’ve seen that already at a couple of universities where a building was bought and is providing housing. So there are a number of different areas. I know the Minister of Housing, of course, is actively engaged in this, but as I said, no ideas are ruled out to try to address the crisis that we’ve seen.

S. Bond: I wanted to clarify something that the minister just said. I think it’s an important point. The minister said previously, and has said consistently, that the communities that were impacted by and that were actually included in the speculation tax were chosen because they had low vacancy rates. Maybe I misunderstood, but there seemed to be a sense that vacancy rates don’t matter or have lesser importance in the minister’s comments.

Could the minister clarify that? She’s been very consistent in saying that the reason that those particular communities were selected, even though there was a lot of controversy about who was in and why they were in…. Some were taken out, and some weren’t, and borders were adjusted. Do low vacancy rates matter when it comes to the speculation tax? That’s certainly something the minister has been quite straightforward about previously.

[4:55 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I’m not sure what the member is referring to, but obviously, vacancy rates are a critical part of the criteria. In fact, the member is quite right. I’ve said that and continue to say that — that that, in fact, had a big influence on the speculation and vacancy tax. Again, if we can encourage people to not pay the tax and put their homes in part of the rental pool, that addresses part of the vacancy tax, so there’s no shift, from my perspective, in that direction.

S. Bond: Thanks. I’m going to just switch to a couple other topics before I hand off to my co-critic for some questions that she’ll walk us through. I want to talk a little bit about tax revenue, and I want to focus for a moment on the LNG Canada project. I want to ask the minister some very specific questions and hopefully, between her and her staff, they will be able to provide us with the answers.

Since 2018, an average of one-third of LNG Canada contracts have gone to B.C. businesses, while the rest have gone to companies from Alberta, Ontario and internationally. When you look at the Ministry of Finance’s economic scenario, it assumes that 60 to 75 percent of corporate income will be allocated to B.C. for tax purposes.

About one-third of the contracts awarded on the LNG Canada project have gone to B.C. companies. Is this lower than the minister anticipated in her economic modelling for the project’s provincial revenues?

[5:00 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I can’t speak to the specific numbers that the member has. The Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources would have the specifics around the contracts, but from the accountability end at Finance that the member is referring to, which is the contract that was signed, the assumptions from LNG are unchanged.

We continue to monitor those assumptions. They have not changed. The plan is still on track. There was a pause during the early stages of COVID. They’re now ramping back up again. So at this stage, as I said, they’re unchanged. We continue to monitor the agreement that’s in place.

S. Bond: All right. I take it from that answer that the minister is saying that the April 2019 economic model is still accurate for calculating revenues today.

Hon. C. James: I think I know what the member is asking — if any of the assumptions have changed from 2019. They have not. Those assumptions continue to be unchanged.

Obviously, we do economic modelling. We work with, obviously, Energy, Mines and all the ministries, but we also consult with LNG as well to make sure that that’s part of it.

Then I think, an important piece that’s to remind…. I know the member knows this, but for anyone who might be listening, a reminder that there’s no revenue from LNG built into the budget. Those numbers wouldn’t shift, because there isn’t any revenue built into the budget. Obviously, there’s activity revenue, but there’s no direct revenue from LNG, until the plant is up and operating, that’s built into the budget at all.

S. Bond: Thanks. I just have one other question on this particular topic, and then I’ll move to another question on a separate area. That’s the issue of employment. Certainly, there was an economic model, and it looked at employment of British Columbians.

I know the minister must be aware of the fact that a group of local businesses in the northwest have written an open letter saying that they are being unfairly excluded from LNG Canada contracts. In fact, they point out in their letter that out-of-province companies have disproportionately benefitted from work that could’ve gone to local companies. They’re very concerned about that, and they’ve actually requested that the Premier initiate a review of how contracts are being tendered and managed by the project manager.

My question is to the Finance Minister. Would she support such a review?

[5:05 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I think this question, obviously, should be addressed by the specific ministry and minister who’s responsible. We, obviously, are committed to making sure that there are opportunities for British Columbians. That’s important in any investment in British Columbia.

Again, the specifics — I can’t speak to the specifics. The member should really refer that to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources.

S. Bond: Well, thanks for that. Interestingly enough, it’s the Finance Minister who often refers and speaks to job numbers that come out once a month, so I would suggest that this actually does matter, to the Finance Minister and to the entire government, as we talk about direct benefits from projects of this nature. It’s not the only project that we’re hearing that concern being expressed about. We’re hearing it in other parts of the province as well.

I will move on, because we have a lot of ground to cover. I’d like to ask the minister about an advertising-related question, if she wouldn’t mind, please. What is the total amount of COVID-related ad spending so far this year?

Hon. C. James: This fiscal we have spent $2.2 million on public awareness and information campaigns on COVID. That would be everything from developing the COVID-19 website that is in place and keeping that up to date. We have all of the programs and services listed on that website.

[5:10 p.m.]

We also have federal government links for people to be able to get the website. Then, of course, the health care campaign — so washing hands and staying home when you’re sick. All of those campaigns are included in this $2.2 million. It’s really public awareness and information campaigns around COVID-19 and the programs that were in place for people to access.

S. Bond: Thank you to the minister for that response. I appreciate it. Perhaps she could tell me whether or not that funding was in addition to other ad program spending. Is there a budget line that continues for other government spending, and is the $2.2 million in addition to other advertising expense?

[5:15 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: The fiscal year budget for GCPE for advertising is $3.6 million. The $2.2 million is over and above that. That’s separate and apart from that. The $3.6 million is their annual budget. The $2.2 million is from the COVID contingency budget, and those are additional dollars on top of the $3.6 million. That would be the year’s budget for GCPE for advertising.

S. Bond: Thank you to the minister for that response. I’m going to ask…. The minister can respond in her next answer to both of these, perhaps. I’m wondering if it would be possible for the minister to provide us with a list of the specific ad campaigns that were authorized, related to COVID-19.

She’s not going to surprised that I ask this question, because I know that when they were on the opposition side, we heard about it all the time. Perhaps she can let us know whether they were reviewed internally or externally to ensure that there was no partisan content. Again, if she could give us a list of the campaigns that were authorized, and what the review process was.

I want to, as my wrap-up question for now on the ads section…. For the period of June 2019 to July 2020, the B.C. government Facebook page has spent over $350,000 on Facebook ads. Could the minister let me know how that compares to the previous 12-month period, and maybe just give a bit of a sense of how decisions are made? How are demographics targeted? How is microtargeting decided? Who in the ministry or in government looks after looking at demographics and how those Facebook ads are targeted?

Again, those two pieces. A list of the COVID spending campaigns — were they vetted? Then finally, a little bit about the Facebook ad spend, how it compares and on who makes decisions about the demographics and the microtargeting.

[5:20 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: For a couple of the pieces — I know the member understands this — we’ll get back on the specifics. We don’t have that information with us but happy to get back to the member around the COVID advertising piece as well as the Facebook advertising and the specifics around that. I’ll make sure that we get back to the member on those pieces.

On the advertising and whether there’s any kind of vetting of the advertising that happens, yes, there is. Any government information campaigns that have a value of over $250,000 are actually reviewed by a third party. They’re reviewed by Advertising Standards Canada, ASC. Those standards make sure that they’re reviewed against non-partisan advertising criteria before they go forward. So they actually get reviewed before those go forward to make sure that it’s objective, factual and free from partisan bias and that it’s providing information to the public.

Yes, those do get vetted — as I said, anything of a value of more than $250,000.

S. Cadieux: Good afternoon, Minister.

Partway through 2019-20, the minister issued savings targets to all ministries in the range of approximately $300 million. Can she share now with the House what those amounts were on a ministry-by-ministry basis?

[5:25 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I’ll start with the approach that was taken in ’19-’20. I think the member will have heard me say this in the budget presentations as well. This wasn’t about finding dollars removed from ministries to come in to the centre, for example, or to reduce down the budget. It was about targeting dollars that could be reallocated to ensure that we could provide for the priorities of government. These were reallocations within the budget, so we didn’t track them. They won’t track.

The ministers were expected to find reallocations, as I talked about earlier — the efficiencies that they could find through travel budgets, through advertising, through external contracts — to save those dollars to be able to reallocate them and spend them on the priorities within their ministry that they felt needed to be done. It wasn’t a matter of recognizing those dollars and pulling them back in. It was actually just a reallocation within the ministry budgets for the ’19-20 year.

S. Cadieux: I’m having trouble following the minister on that. If spending is a priority, if the priority actions of government required a certain amount of money, that would have been budgeted for in the 2019-20 budget. But halfway through the year, after the first and second quarter, I believe, results were in, the minister decided to direct ministries to pull back their spending on, as she says, things like travel budgets, which certainly our government has done in the past, when needed.

There are things that are more flexible than others, because otherwise, one is not going to be able to spend the money one intended to spend in each ministry on ministry priorities. It is because one is overspending one’s budget or is not meeting one’s revenue targets that one then needs to find $300 million in savings.

What the minister is saying is that she didn’t pay attention, then, to what ministries were spending on or where they were reallocating the dollars within their budgets, which, again, I find difficult to believe, because one would know which programs and services one was not going to be able to deliver if one didn’t find savings elsewhere. I find it fairly troublesome that the minister doesn’t want to answer those questions, because it’s about transparency in the budgeting process.

If we think or understand that the minister and ministers couldn’t meet their priorities and their revenue and spending projections last year, and then we’re supposed to now be…. We’re debating a budget and estimates on a budget that we already know is fraught with difficulty for other reasons, but how are we to have any confidence in the numbers that the minister did indeed present pre-COVID if she’s saying she didn’t track what ministries spent their savings on?

[5:30 p.m.]

That is concerning, because we know that despite adding four new taxes in this budget — bringing the total to 23 new or increased fees and taxes under this government — the Finance Minister also cut or froze 13 ministry budgets. Have those cuts and freezes on those ministry budgets proposed or set forth in the 2020 budget document remained in place, or has the minister needed to reallocate money to those ministries this year?

[R. Chouhan in the chair.]

Hon. C. James: I’ll answer the last part of the question first, which was the ’20-21 base budgets. They remain as presented in February. There have been no changes to those base budgets. There have been obvious pressures related to COVID that have been faced by ministries, and those will come out of the COVID supplementary budget. The members will have seen those as programs have been announced and those supports have been put in place. So those would come from the COVID contingency, but there is no change there.

The pressures and the priorities for ministries…. You know, this is certainly no different than the past government or any past government has dealt with, which is that as the year goes on, ministries may face pressures. They may face areas that they set as a priority, and they’re expected to find those dollars within their base budget. They’re expected, as ministers are, to look at their base budgets and to, as we directed, look at the administrative savings they could find in things like outside contractors or travel and utilize those dollars to be able to provide supports that they were facing. That’s their responsibility, just as it is for every minister.

Do we constantly track ministry budgets? Of course, that happens on an ongoing basis. But this is no different an approach than has been taken by governments of all political stripes over many, many years.

[5:35 p.m.]

S. Cadieux: Thank you, Minister. That’s a little clearer. But, in fact, partway through last year Treasury Board sent letters to each ministry outlining the amount of targeted savings for their particular ministry.

So either every ministry of government was coming to the Finance Minister saying, “I have so many priorities, and they’re not in my budget, and I need more money,” and the minister said, “Well, you’ll have to find that in your budget,” or Treasury Board was looking at the overall realities of the budget and saying: “Well hey, we look like we’re going to be short $300 million. We better get ministries to pull back on their spending.” So yes, indeed, they pull back on that spending in things like travel or administrative expenses in order to put it towards the things that are most important, like direct services, which, of course, we all support.

Certainly, we’ve done that in the past. But that is different than saying it’s for the priorities of government. There was a $300 million hole to fill, which is why letters went out from Treasury Board itemizing how much money each ministry needed to save. That’s because the overall global government budget was going to be out of sync with what was proposed.

We know those letters went out from Treasury Board. Can the minister please share what those amounts were on a ministry-by-ministry basis?

[5:40 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I understand why the member is looking at each of the ministries and trying to make a determination there. I think maybe the easiest thing is we can certainly…. I’ll take it on notice. We’ll make sure we get that information to the member around the requests that were made of each of the ministries when it came to those savings amounts. There were obviously some adjustments that went on, from the amounts that were requested, but happy to take that on notice and get that information to the member, if that would help with the clarity around ministries managing their existing budgets and being able to do that.

S. Cadieux: Thank you, Minister. That would be fine.

What we’re trying to get at here is we’re working with a situation where we don’t…. Everyone has acknowledged that the budget really doesn’t mean very much this year, yet we’re trying to get clarity to make sure we’re doing our due diligence as opposition to make sure we have a picture of where things were, what the expected programs and services of government were, what the expected spending was. Then when we move into the supplementary estimates in just a little while, we’ll have questions about that spending and how that impacts ministry budgets, of course.

Of course, as the minister said in a previous answer, the budgets that she has put forth for the ministries, which include cut or frozen budgets for 13 ministries, along with a significant $250 million-ish increase in taxes, to get to a balanced budget proposal earlier in February…. That’s curious. If government planning wasn’t good enough last year, and people, in September, were needing to save 3½ percent or more in ministries to make the budget work…. Then we’re lessening those budgets in a large portion of the ministries in this budget year, and then, on top of that, we have COVID.

What we’re trying to get at is: how sure can we be that government can manage its spending appropriately? When we talk about how there are pressures and “that’s coming out of the COVID support money,” well, I’m prepared to look at the money that the Legislature provided government for spending on COVID and COVID-related expenditures, and ultimately we’ll get to recovery dollars as well. That’s important.

[5:45 p.m.]

We all agree there’s a unique situation here that necessitated unique action. But that money and those spends need to be separate and apart from propping up ministries that couldn’t manage their budgets. When the minister, I think, was asked a week or so ago in debate on budget measures implementation and the COVID bill, we spoke about and we asked: “Well, has the minister directed ministries to pull back spending at all this year?”

What we’re asking is exactly this. We are partway through a new fiscal year. We are in a unique circumstance where things are very much not normal. Last year, they needed to issue a directive for ministries to save money at this time of year, yet we asked the question of the minister during the debate on those bills, and the minister said: “Our priorities haven’t changed at all. We aren’t pulling back on spending because services need to be delivered.”

I don’t disagree. I’m not for a moment suggesting that government pull back on essential services to British Columbians, but government travel is not an essential service to British Columbians in most cases. Administrative spending on Post-it Notes is not, necessarily. I don’t think that the public would see that as a necessary expenditure, unless…. If we could save it last year, we could certainly save it this year, is what I’m getting at.

Has the minister contemplated issuing similar Treasury Board letters to ministries this year about administrative savings?

[5:50 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I want to start off with one piece that I think is important, again, for clarification. The member is talking about ministries that have budgets reduced. I think she mentioned 13.

I think it’s important to recognize — and I know the member knows this, but for the public or anyone else watching — that there are a whole number of different reasons that you may see annual budgets change, year to year. Yes, it can be changes in previous budget decisions. It could be the timing of payments or the timing of programs. A program could have finished and been completed. Therefore, the budgets will come forward as being reduced, but in fact, that program is finished or completed. That makes a change.

Time-limited projects that are in place, changes to previously planned expenditures, new budget decisions. I just think it’s important to recognize that there’s a whole variety of reasons that you may see shifts in annual budgets.

Then, just to come back to the efficiencies, the member talked about the discussion we had around the legislation and whether this is a time to pull back on spending. I appreciate the member saying that’s not the direction she’s looking for, but she wanted to raise the issue.

I think that is important, as I said then. It is important right now to make sure that we’re putting the supports in place, for people and for businesses, to get the economy going. But that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t spend every dollar wisely. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be efficient with the dollars we have.

The efficiencies that were requested in ’19-20 are efficiencies now built into the budget. Those efficiencies continue on this year. That’s actually built into the budget. So it’s not necessary to give a direction. We’ve given those efficiencies permanently into the budget. So ministers are expected, again, to look at how they manage their own budgets through travel, etc.

As I talked about earlier, it’s early to shift budgets yet. We may see some ministries having savings in their budgets over COVID. There may be some shifts that happen there. Again, that will be work…. As we look at Q1, Q2 and future economic statements, we’ll be able to see those shifts.

There’s already an expectation, based on last year and going into this year, that the fiscal adjustments are built in. As I mentioned earlier, they were a little less than 1 percent of government’s operating expenses, so about $260 million. That’s already built in and expected to be found through efficiencies continuing on.

S. Cadieux: Thank you, Minister. Yes, that is what we’re talking about. We’re talking about the efficiencies that can be found from year to year.

Certainly, as ministries build new programs, change programs and adjust things, there is always a need to look back again at whether or not there is room to make adjustments in efficiencies. We did it on an ongoing basis, and I expect that this minister will want the ministries and the budgets she’s responsible for to do so as well.

It’s good to hear her say that. It’s good to know that, in fact, those savings do continue this year in the sense that there’s $260 million in savings that are persisting from last year.

I chuckle a little when the minister bristles a little bit at explaining to me about ministries having cuts or freezes going from year to year. I can remember many a time when we were presented with the now government in opposition perpetuating that budgets had been cut in ministries when entire program areas had been moved to other ministries, and the budgets had moved with them, and it could be tracked.

[5:55 p.m.]

This is not the case this year. We haven’t seen $1.8 million come out of the Environment parks budget and go into some other budget for parks. We haven’t seen that. We, in fact, see a cut to the parks budget this year. Those things are real.

That’s our job here — to point out the things that government doesn’t want to see or doesn’t want the public to notice. That is our job. It’s our job to look at those efficiencies and further efficiencies that could or should be found going forward in a new spending year, especially when we are going to, in very short order, move on to looking at an additional $5 billion in spending, which is for a very specific purpose and isn’t meant to prop up ministry budgets.

We’re going to want to make sure that that is, in fact, what is happening — not to provide government with a new opportunity to spend money they didn’t spend in their budget because they want it to balance, but that it is, in fact, money spent in response to the pandemic, as was promised.

Before we move on, I’ve got one further question. The minister touched on it a bit — that it’s early in the year and we don’t know yet. Maybe some of these things have happened. Does the minister have a sense yet whether or not there have been any administrative savings or administrative or capital costs related to public servants having to work from home or choosing to work from home or needing to work from home since March?

[6:00 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: We aren’t hearing any concerns. We’re not hearing concerns coming forward from ministries about additional costs or pressures that they’re facing for people working at home or any pressures in that area, so that’s not something that’s being raised. I know we’ll get into this when we discuss the supplementary vote. Obviously, we’re hearing concerns around COVID costs that are coming up, but not related to employees working from home.

S. Bond: I appreciate the opportunity to ask a question. I’m asking this on behalf of one of my colleagues. I want to sort of add this in at this time before we move on to some discussion about supplementary estimates No. 1, the COVID action plan, the $5 billion.

The question to the minister is: what amount, if any, is there in the budget for compensation for private land owners, businesses, ranchers, guide outfitters — any of those groups who have been displaced by the Williams title case in the Chilcotin? Can the minister give us a sense of…? Does she have a budget allocation for compensation in that particular situation?

Hon. C. James: If I could get the details from the member on behalf of the member she’s asking the question for, I’m happy to get back to them. We obviously don’t have the specifics around this in front of us, so I’m happy to get the details and then get back to the members specifically as well.

S. Bond: Well, thank you for that. We very much appreciate it — obviously, significant concerns about people, businesses and ranchers being displaced. The member wants to ensure that there is a compensation package — or how that will be managed — so I’m very much happy to have that member reach out and provide some specific details. I appreciate the opportunity to have asked that question on their behalf.

Obviously, a significant part of the work that the minister and the government have been concentrating on is the COVID-19 action plan — basically, the $5 billion that was announced and agreed to. We’re going to move into that section. We’ll begin the discussion at this point and then continue it tomorrow. Let’s just start with, perhaps, some of the general principles or initial statements that the minister made about the fund. I’ll ask a question, and then I know that my co-critic has a number that she would like to ask as well.

When the announcement was made — and it was basically captured under pandemic spending — that the fund was going to be divided up and the minister made the statement, it was something along the lines of: it will be $2.8 billion for people and $2.2 billion for businesses. Can the minister tell us if that is still the case?

[6:05 p.m. - 6:15 p.m.]

Hon. C. James: I know the member will be interested in getting into the specifics of the programs and services and the dollar spending, so I’ll make sure we have that for tomorrow as well.

To go back to the member’s question. She asked about the $5 billion and the division between the dollars that were there for individuals, which included services and specific financial relief, and then dollars for businesses, which included the amount for the economic recovery. So as we’ve started developing the programs, we’ve started breaking them down, and I think that’s the breakdown that I’m sure the member would be interested in. I’ll make sure, as I said, that we do that work before we come back together again tomorrow. We’ve got the information. We’ll just get it in one place, because I’m sure the member would be interested in it.

The $5 billion continues. And the way we’ve grouped it now is — we started developing the programs: critical services and immediate financial relief, which is $3.5 billion, and $1.5 billion for economic recovery, as we’ve talked about. We also have now made sure that included in there is the one-time enhancement, the climate action tax credit. These are tax pieces, so separate and apart from the $5 billion. The member will know this from the July update as well that we put out. And then $733 million, which are the other tax reductions and the payment relief measures, again, are tax measures so are separate and apart. That’s $6.23 billion.

I think, again, we’ve talked a little bit after the July statement came out around the tax reductions and the business reduction that we gave around the school tax. I can go through that individual list, but I’ll leave it to the member to maybe give direction around the kinds of things that she’s interested in so we can make sure we have that information as well.

S. Bond: Thank you to the minister for that. Yes, we are going to, obviously, want to have some discussion about the specifics of the $5 billion. And to be honest — trying to sort out the minister’s comments, where basically the split was $2.8 billion for people and $2.2 billion for businesses. We are going to want, and the public deserves, an accounting of whether or not that description is accurate.

[6:20 p.m.]

The funding for businesses originally included the $1.5 billion economic recovery fund, and then the assumption was that if you add $700 million, you’re getting up to $2.2 billion for businesses. That was related to the property tax cut. That is now being described as outside the $5 billion.

Again, I think that…. Maybe the minister can speak to that $2.2 billion. Obviously, she’s made a commitment to do some work to sort of come up with the lists of the simple math. You know, that’s how the announcement was described. We want to make sure that the accounting lines up with the public statements that the minister and the government have made. I think that’s fair — to have a good sense of the $2.2 billion.

Perhaps we’ll start with that. The original economic recovery fund was designated as $1.5 billion. Can the minister confirm that the $700 million is separate and apart from the $5 billion allotment?

Hon. C. James: Member, that’s correct. I updated that in the July update in the economic statement. The tax pieces, as I mentioned, the $733 million, were separate and apart from the dollars that were there within the $5 billion.

S. Bond: Okay. Well, I appreciate that. Tomorrow we’ll start with trying to figure out the $2.2 billion for business — what exactly that is, what it looks like, what people and what businesses can expect. Certainly, there has been a lot of discussion about what the needs are for businesses across British Columbia.

I know we’re getting close to the end of the time that we have today, so maybe I’ll just add to my comments earlier on behalf of my colleague. The member for Cariboo-Chilcotin will certainly be providing the details around her question in writing to the minister. Hopefully, that will work sufficiently for the minister to provide the details that she wants. Hopefully, the minister can just confirm that that’s acceptable. We’ll ask the member to send those details over.

Then, of course, we’ll continue our discussion tomorrow on the $5 billion.

Hon. C. James: Yes, that works. That’s helpful, I think, if the information comes directly from the member, and then we can make sure we get the information back.

Just to confirm, I certainly expect and committed to the public that we would continue to be transparent about the dollars that are being spent, the $5 billion — where those dollars are going, where the specifics are and where the supports are going for individuals and businesses. I’m happy to have that discussion, starting tomorrow.

With that, hon. Chair, I move the committee rise and report progress and ask leave to sit again.

Motion approved.

The committee rose at 6:23 p.m.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

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

Hon. G. Heyman moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

Mr. Speaker: This House stands adjourned until 10 a.m. tomorrow morning.

The House adjourned at 6:25 p.m.