Orders of the Day

Hon. M. Farnworth: In this chamber, I call continued second reading debate on Bill 12.

In Section A, Douglas Fir Room, I call continued estimates debate for the Ministry of Advanced Education and Skills Training.

[S. Chandra Herbert in the chair.]

Second Reading of Bills

BILL 12 — PROPERTY LAW
AMENDMENT ACT, 2022

(continued)

On the main motion (continued).

Deputy Speaker: Recognizing the member for Skeena.

E. Ross: Thank you, hon. Chair. Welcome back to the chair.

Previous to the break, for those thousands of people that are watching at home — millions — I actually started my speaking points on Bill 12, the Property Law Amendment Act. I was speaking, really, to the lack of transparency coming from this government, mainly because there are no details in this bill.

We’ve seen this before, where the government is actually leaving most of the details up to regulation. We’ve seen it in Bill 14. We’ve seen it in Bill 22. Really, we owe British Columbians more than that, especially as MLAs. When we come down here, we’re elected to understand the details of this so we can go home and explain it to the people of British Columbia, including the people of Skeena.

Therefore, I conclude my remarks, hon. Chair, and thank you for this time to speak.

Deputy Speaker: Seeing no further speakers, I call the vote. I’m not sure if the minister wanted to come back to speak to the bill or not.

I recognize the Minister of Social Development and Poverty Reduction.

Hon. N. Simons: In the interest of ensuring we give the appropriate opportunity, perhaps a short recess?

[1:35 p.m.]

Deputy Speaker: Again, seeing no further speakers, it’s now time for the proposed vote on Bill 12, I believe it is, the Property Law Amendment Act.

Division is called.

[1:40 p.m. - 1:45 p.m.]

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Mr. Speaker: Members, the question is the second reading of Bill 12.

Second reading of Bill 12 approved on the following division:

YEAS — 52
Alexis	Anderson	Bailey
Bains	Beare	Begg
Brar	Chandra Herbert	Chant
Chen	Chow	Conroy
Coulter	Cullen	Dean
D’Eith	Donnelly	Dykeman
Eby	Elmore	Farnworth
Fleming	Glumac	Greene
Heyman	Kahlon	Kang
Leonard	Lore	Ma
Malcolmson	Mark	Mercier
Osborne	Paddon	Popham
Ralston	Rankin	Rice
Robinson	Routledge	Routley
Sandhu	Sharma	Simons
Sims	A. Singh	R. Singh
Starchuk	Walker	Whiteside
	Yao
NAYS — 27
Ashton	Banman	Bernier
Cadieux	Clovechok	de Jong
Doerkson	Furstenau	Halford
Kirkpatrick	Kyllo	Lee
Letnick	Merrifield	Milobar
Morris	Oakes	Olsen
Paton	Ross	Rustad
Shypitka	Stewart	Stone
Sturdy	Tegart	Wat

Mr. Speaker: Member for Saanich North and the Islands.

A. Olsen: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was waiting for the resounding round of applause.

Mr. Speaker: Just a second. Member, have a seat.

Minister of Finance.

Hon. S. Robinson: I move that the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House to be considered at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 12, Property Law Amendment Act, 2022, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

Mr. Speaker: Now, Member for Saanich North and the Islands.

Question of Privilege

A. Olsen: I rise to speak to a question of privilege that I raised last Thursday with respect to comments that were brought in this House in question period on glyphosate by the Minister of Forests.

On Thursday, March 31, I asked the Minister of Forests about glyphosate spraying in B.C. In response to my question, the minister said the following regarding glyphosate.

“I’ve done a lot of research on this. We’ve also been…. There are questions about glyphosate use in forestry, and the effects of glyphosate on human health have been really extensively reviewed by international regulatory agencies, including Health Canada, with the conclusion being that exposure to glyphosate does not pose a carcinogenic or general toxic risk to humans. It remains an important tool for establishing conifer or conifer-deciduous mixed stands and ensuring future timber supplies.”

[1:50 p.m.]

I rose on this point of privilege immediately after question period. I raise this question of privilege to highlight that the Minister of Forests’ comments regarding the safety of glyphosate are misleading. The minister led the House to believe in her comments that the science on glyphosate is complete. However, had the minister done the review, she would know that significant concerns with the safety of glyphosate remain.

As the Minister of Forests opened her defence of the safety of glyphosate by saying, “I’ve done a lot of research on this,” it then follows that the intent of the comments made by the Minister of Forests was to intentionally mislead the House. Following a cursory review of various studies reviewing the safety of glyphosate, I would not feel comfortable in any way stating, as the Minister of Forests continued: “…with the conclusion being that…glyphosate does not pose a carcinogenic or general toxic risk to humans.”

Glyphosate is an herbicide used on many products, including agricultural crops such as wheat and soybeans and lumber crops. It has been and continues to be used on B.C. tree farms.

The Minister of Forests justified the use of glyphosate, saying that it is “an important tool for establishing conifer or conifer deciduous-mixed stands and ensuring future timber supplies. That said, the use of this herbicide in B.C.’s forest sector has declined significantly in recent years, as foresters use a variety of approaches to manage competing vegetation, including manual, mechanical, burning, biological and herbicides. The glyphosate use in forestry has to comply with B.C.’s Integrated Pest Management Act, and steps have to be taken to minimize impacts on environment, including in fish-bearing streams.”

Glyphosate is the key chemical compound in Roundup, and the terms are often used interchangeably, though Roundup is a brand name. The dangers of glyphosate on human health have been widely debated.

The WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer found “strong evidence that glyphosate is likely to be carcinogenic to humans.” The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency determined glyphosate to be non-toxic to humans; however, the EPA utilized non-peer-reviewed research commissioned by Monsanto.

Nearly 100,000 plaintiffs in the United States have received settlements from Bayer, the owner of Monsanto, to the tune of $10 billion.

The minister stated that international regulatory agencies and Health Canada have ruled that glyphosate is not carcinogenic or toxic to humans. It is irrefutable that there is at least some danger associated with glyphosate. It is also irrefutable that powerful actors with a stake in continued glyphosate use have influenced the body of research on the chemical.

On February 7, 2022, the Federal Court of Appeal ruled that Health Canada didn’t follow its own rules for regulating pesticides and herbicides. There are concerns that evidence used to authorize the use of glyphosate was influenced by Monsanto, the makers of Roundup. Monsanto was bought by Germany’s Bayer AG. Bayer has faced multiple lawsuits in the United States from Americans claiming Roundup gave them cancer. Bayer is appealing one of these cases through the U.S. Supreme Court. Health Canada is reviewing the ruling.

In 2022, just this year, numerous countries have restricted or banned the use of glyphosate in response to health concerns, including cancer litigation that occurred in the U.S., or have implemented plans to transition away from glyphosate. Eight out of ten provinces in Canada “have some form of restriction on the use of non-essential cosmetic pesticides, including glyphosate.”

Glyphosate was authorized for use in the EU until December 2022 and is currently under review to re-evaluate its safety.

Germany, the home country of Monsanto’s parent company, Bayer, has decided to phase out glyphosate entirely. In 2019, the German cabinet approved legislation to ban glyphosate by 2024.

Further determination will be made based on evidence submitted by the EFSA, which is the European Food Safety Authority, and the ECHA, which is the European Chemicals Agency. Targeted consultation by the ECHA on potential hazards of glyphosate began on March 29 of this year, and will conclude just in a few weeks, on April 14, 2022.

[1:55 p.m.]

In July 2020, Human Rights Watch discussed the lack of credibility of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s assessment of glyphosate. The EPA declared glyphosate to be non-carcinogenic and non-toxic to humans. However, the EPA relied on non-peer-reviewed research commissioned by Monsanto, which fundamentally differed from studies taken by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. I note that we’re wearing these pins because April is also Cancer Month.

In 2020, of that year, despite continuing to assert that Roundup is safe, Bayer agreed to a $10 billion settlement for at least 95,000 claims against it. As of March 7 of this year — just last month — it is estimated that there are still 30,000 lawsuits against U.S. Bayer’s Monsanto that have not been settled. There are further concerns around migrant farmworkers being left out of Roundup cancer compensation due to precarious citizenship status and fears of deportation, citing the likelihood of far more cancer-related cases against glyphosate.

In 2019, an article published in Environmental Sciences Europe assessed the discrepancy between the EPA finding that glyphosate is safe and the IARC finding that glyphosate is dangerous. The authors concluded that the organizations reached such different conclusions because the EPA relied on unpublished, commissioned studies, while IARC relied on peer-reviewed studies.

A March 2017 discovery in a lawsuit against Monsanto releases evidence that Monsanto recruited scientists to co-author reports defending the safety of glyphosate. The evidence also demonstrates a friendship between Monsanto and a senior regulator in the American Environmental Protection Agency.

March 20, 2015. The International Agency for Research on Cancer, the arm of the World Health Organization, finds strong evidence that glyphosate is probably carcinogenic to humans.

There are four criteria when raising a question of privilege.

One, that it be raised at the earliest opportunity. I believe that I meet that criteria, as I stood immediately following question period to raise the question of privilege.

Two, it must be a matter directly concerning the privileges of the House, committee or member. It does, as it concerns misleading statements by a minister.

It must be raised to correct a grave and serious breach. The goal of this is to highlight that at the very least, the science on the use of glyphosate has not been settled. The science is not settled on it. There are many, many concerns raised around the world and even here in Canada.

And it must be raised in order to seek a genuine remedy that the House has the power to provide and for which no other parliamentary process is reasonably available. I believe that we meet that criteria as well.

If an allegation of misleading the House must meet these three criteria — that the statement is, in fact, misleading; that the member must have known that the statement was inaccurate at the time the statement was made; and that the member must have intended to mislead the House…. I contend that the minister, in opening the comments, stated that she had done a lot of research on this issue. The member must have known the statement to be inaccurate.

If the member had, in fact, done a lot of research on the issue, then they would have found a litany of studies, just like we did, to at the very least demonstrate that the science on glyphosate is far less than complete or far less than settled.

Therefore, point 3, the member must have intended to mislead the House. I contend that in making the statements that the evidence lands in favour of glyphosate, the minister was trying to defend the use of glyphosate by the forestry — indeed, her Ministry of Forests.

Hon. M. Farnworth: I thank the member for his dissertation. I would make the point that in reviewing that lengthy dissertation, you would find that it is, in fact, not a matter of privilege but, rather, a dispute over the facts.

[2:00 p.m.]

More importantly, hon. Speaker, I would also ask you to review the sections dealing with questions of privilege and remind those who want to raise the issue that the matter is to be submitted in a brief written response. What we have had today is anything but brief, or I would say that it certainly wasn’t briefly written.

The other point I would also ask is in the review of the presentation itself and the use, in my view, of the words “deliberately misleading,” which I think the Speaker may well find to be unparliamentary.

Hon. Speaker, I ask, in your review, that you review my comments and find that it is, in fact, not a question of privilege.

Mr. Speaker: Member, you have further comments.

A. Olsen: Just that as part of raising a question of privilege, I have to demonstrate….

Mr. Speaker: It’s okay. You don’t have to justify that, Member. I heard your comments. That’s okay.

A. Olsen: No, I have a motion.

Mr. Speaker: Okay, sorry.

A. Olsen: I do have all the written evidence that I referred to in my comments, which I will deliver to the Table. I have prepared, as per the requirements within the question of privilege, a motion that should you find this to be a breach of privilege, it be referred to the Select Standing Committee on Parliamentary Reform.

Mr. Speaker: The Chair would like to thank both the member and the minister for making their comments. I’ll take it under advisement.

Hon. M. Farnworth: I call, in this chamber, committee stage, Bill 6, Budget Measures Implementation Act.

Committee of the Whole House

BILL 6 — BUDGET MEASURES
IMPLEMENTATION ACT, 2022

The House in Committee of the Whole (Section B) on Bill 6; S. Chandra Herbert in the chair.

The committee met at 2:04 p.m.

On clause 1.

The Chair: I recognize the hon. Finance Minister.

Hon. S. Robinson: Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. It’s good to have you here joining us.

I have a number of staff members who are here, and there’s going to be a number that come through as we plow through this significant bill. I have Doug Foster here on my right. I have Fisnik Preniqi on my left and Chris Ferguson-Martin, who is sitting behind me.

I look forward to taking questions from the hon. member.

[2:05 p.m.]

P. Milobar: Thank you to the minister for this 133-clause bill that thankfully is not 133 clauses left to regulation. We’ll get right into it and try to get some understanding of some of these clauses.

In clause 1, it appears to be amending section 2.2 of the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act by adding extra years in. Can the minister please explain the rationale for needing to make this amendment?

Hon. S. Robinson: I did catch the zinger. I hope we don’t have too many of those.

I think this is serious business, having this bill before the House. Recognizing that we’re going to have an opportunity to go through it clause by clause I think is part of doing good governance here.

I appreciate the member’s question in terms of explaining what this clause is about. The member might recall last year, when we recognized that we were going to see deficit budgets for the in-year term, given the fact that we supported British Columbians through a significant pandemic — we supported businesses; we supported communities — and that, in fact, we were going to be continuing to provide services for British Columbians in a deficit situation.

This clause extends what we brought forward last year by one more year. You can see in the budget that we have declining deficits over the fiscal plan. This just makes sure that we’re consistent with the legislation by suspending this particular clause for one more year.

P. Milobar: This is amending the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act. Clause 2 in that act says: “The main estimates for a fiscal year must not contain a forecast of a deficit for that fiscal year.” This is now section 2.2.

Can the minister confirm, then, that section 2.2 did not exist before last year? It was added in as an amendment provision to enable deficit budgets by the government.

Hon. S. Robinson: Yes, last year was the first time, and it was a result of the pandemic.

P. Milobar: I’ll refer back a little bit, I guess, between the two questions I’ve asked already — that is, why the need (a) to amend and (b) to extend the dates. I understand and fully recognize that the budget book goes up to ’24-25 — that this year’s estimates are based upon, that Bill 6 is based upon. However, usually you need to amend or extend or clarify if there is a punitive provision if a clause is not met.

Had this amendment not been brought in this year, what would be the punitive measure? What would be the consequence to government for not fulfilling what is actually clause 2 in the current act?

Hon. S. Robinson: We would be going against the intent of the legislation, and this is about making sure that we’re consistent.

P. Milobar: Just to get clarification, in the existing act, without this amendment, it appears the consequence for not following the act, for not following clause 2 of ensuring non-deficit budgets would be ministerial holdbacks. Is that not correct?

Hon. S. Robinson: This has nothing to do with ministerial holdbacks.

[2:10 p.m.]

P. Milobar: Can the minister, then, point to, in the act, other than intent, why there would be a need to specify dates? In other words, last year the amendment was brought in, specifically to deal with the budget and the three-year fiscal plan that was being presented, to circumvent clause 2 in the existing act. If there’s no actual repercussion for not fulfilling clause 2, what is the point of having an amendment? What is the point of amending the amendment a year later to add yet another year of the ability to have a deficit budget if there’s no actual consequence in the ministerial accountability act?

Hon. S. Robinson: The proposed amendment ensures that the new three-year fiscal plan remains in line with the legislation. Although the deficit prohibition only applies to the next fiscal year in the estimates ’22-23, the amendment provides clarity that the deficit prohibition exemption will apply to all three years of the fiscal plan.

P. Milobar: For certainty’s sake, if this amendment did not happen, what would be the breach? What would be the problem? If there were no other changes in the financial Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act, what would be the problem if this is strictly a clause to show intent of the government?

It seems a strange way to embed in legislation an amendment to strictly speak to something that, to hear the minister say it, is at her discretion to do or not do, because there’s no actual accountability measure in an act that actually has the word accountability in its title.

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, the amendment really is about making sure that we’re consistent with the plan. We are saying to the public that there is an anticipated deficit over the three years and making sure that we are consistent with the legislation, making sure that the legislation reflects that and that we are able to have this discussion so that those watching at home understand and are clear that we are expecting to have deficit budgets over the next three years. We are amending the legislation so that we are consistent and that the public knows that we are expecting, over the fiscal plan, three years of deficits.

P. Milobar: Well, this is the section where we’re amending the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act. It’s not a long act. It’s only got ten clauses in it, 11 if you count the commencement date from 2002. The first actual clause in it is about the prohibition against deficit budgets. “The main estimates for a fiscal year must not contain a forecast of a deficit for that fiscal year.”

That’s the original bill. Last year 2.2 was added in, which is: “The prohibition in section 2 [prohibition against deficit budgets] does not apply to the main estimates for the 2021-2022 to 2023-2024 fiscal years.” This year we’re adding in ’24-25.

The reason it’s important is because, as I say, this is an accountability act. This is an amendment to an accountability act. The fact that it’s called accountability…. You can’t have accountability without a consequence if you don’t deliver.

The whole purpose of the budget measures Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act is to prevent deficit budgets. It was actually brought in because of problematic budgeting when this government was last in office.

[2:15 p.m.]

Therefore, the whole act that was created, and the accountability piece to measure whether or not there was accountability, all relates to ministerial salary holdbacks. That’s the only trigger of any type of accountability in the act.

Again, I guess I’ll ask the minister. Given that, shortly, we’ll be dealing with other sections that remove that accountability measure, what is the purpose of having the charade of adding an extra year to an amendment when future clause amendments are going to remove the need in perpetuity to have a balanced budget?

Hon. S. Robinson: You know, what we’re doing right here in this very moment is really about making the legislation transparent for the fact that we are anticipating presenting deficit budgets for the next three years so British Columbians know that’s, in fact, what they can expect. We are committed to reviewing this annually. Hopefully, it won’t be the case, but we are certainly moving into recovery mode as we continue to transition through this pandemic.

I want to remind the member opposite that there was a section 2.1 that was repealed, from the years 2008 to 2010. The B.C. Liberals actually brought in the identical legislation after the global financial meltdown because they, too, found that they needed to amend this legislation. That was repealed shortly after because they were able to get back to balanced budgets, and we expect to be able to do the same thing.

P. Milobar: Yes, the global economic meltdown certainly did hit governments, and there was an understanding as to why deficit spending may need to happen, and there was an understanding last year, when this came forward, why deficit spending may need to happen.

Can the minister clarify, then, when 2.1 was inserted in and amended, was there also an amendment to withhold ministerial holdbacks and remove those provisions, as there is in this bill?

Hon. S. Robinson: This section has nothing to do with holdbacks. This is just about amending tabling of balanced budgets.

P. Milobar: Okay. Let’s try this another way. Is the minister, then, saying that there is no intention of having deficit budgets after ’24-25 from this government?

Hon. S. Robinson: Our intention is to continue to budget in a thoughtful and strategic way, making sure that the services are there for British Columbians when they need them but also being very careful around how we steward tax dollars, recognizing that those are precious dollars.

[2:20 p.m.]

I can’t speak to what might happen after this fiscal plan. Right now we have the next three years. This is what our anticipated spending looks like. The next budget will have, certainly, more to say about how we see the recovery transpire and how we see this pandemic continue to evolve.

Clause 1 approved.

On clause 2.

P. Milobar: Clause 2 deals with section 3 in the act. It’s a very short section, 3(1): “The salary otherwise payable under section 4 of the Members’ Remuneration and Pensions Act to each member of the Executive Council” — which is cabinet, for those at home — “must be reduced by 20%.” Then section (2) is: “A reduction in salary, under this section, of a member of the Executive Council is to be restored, in full or in part, to the member as provided in, and subject to, sections 4 and 5.” We’ll get to those sections later.

I guess the question to the minister is…. In this, the amendment is striking out the 20 percent and substituting 10 percent. Then we’ll get on to striking out sections 4 and 5. This is actually the accountability piece, the consequence piece, to running a deficit budget. It was that executive council — the Premier, the cabinet — was to see a 20 percent holdback. The amendment being suggested by the minister is 10 percent, from 20 percent.

That’s significant because the 20 percent is made up of two different components of 10 percent. The one that’s being struck, the 10 percent that’s being struck, is based on the overall budget being in deficit or not — the same overall budget that just had the years added to ’24-25.

If the minister says that they’re committed to getting back to balance, if the intention is truly to get back to balance, why was this clause not amended to exempt up until ’24-25, to match up with the amendment in 2.2 and actually have a stop date on it, instead of changing the payment structure for cabinet in perpetuity?

Hon. S. Robinson: I listened to the member’s question very closely. What I find actually quite interesting is that a deficit holdback measure, we believe, sends the wrong message. It prioritizes austerity and cuts to important programs.

I think back to cuts that were made in 2001-2002 to sexual assault programs, for example, and to programs ending violence against women. I was working the front lines; I remember those. It was based on this idea of holdback. So members chose to collect their 10 percent because of the collective holdback, which is what we’re proposing to end here, over providing services to vulnerable women. From my perspective, I think that’s a wrong motivation.

We are keeping a 10 percent holdback from ministers, because they’re expected to live within their budgets. They have a responsibility and accountability, to cabinet and to all of their colleagues, to make sure that they are living within their means. It’s allocated in their budget letter. There continues to be an expectation, on all ministers, to make their decisions wisely, to do their work and to achieve their goals within their means.

[2:25 p.m.]

We also have a thing called an election; it happens every four years. That is the ultimate accountability.

If British Columbians are satisfied with the government delivering the services, making the wise decisions, thinking thoughtfully about where to invest and how to support people, how to make sure that the services are there for them when they need them — whether it’s sexual assault services or services to end violence against women, health care services, child care services, all those things that we rely on — then it really is up to the electorate to make the decision about whether or not the government has been doing a good job in stewarding tax dollars and investing in the things that matter to British Columbians.

P. Milobar: The minister talked about everything but answering the question. I’ll try it again.

The minister seems to be trying to have it both ways. On the one hand, saying that clause 2 in the existing act is about sending a message to the public about trying to be fiscally responsible and have balanced budgets. On the other hand, we just dealt with an amendment to 2.2, which was brought in by this government to enable themselves to have deficit budgets — and, in fact, has added another year to that.

At the same time that they’re adding another year, the minister was trying to make it sound like their full intention is, the following year or years soon after, to be out of deficit. She just answered about making sure that programs are funded without worrying about deficit. So the minister is trying to have it both ways on this.

The question was: why the provision, if we already have a provision acknowledging a deficit with an end date year in it, literally right at the clause before this clause in the act? Why was there not simply that acknowledgment on the holdback provisions — that the holdback provision is suspended until ’24-25 to align with the changes in 2.2, acknowledging the deficit spending? Why was that holdback provision not suspended with an end date? Why is that holdback provision completely removed, ensuring that cabinet will see a 10 percent raise?

The minister will say it’s not a raise. In any job I know, if you change the rules by legislation to ensure that you have more money in your bank account every payday, that’s a raise, plain and simple.

Why has the date not been put in to make it clear that the ministerial responsibilities would match up with the overall changes that were made in the section preceding this, in section 2.2?

Hon. S. Robinson: Well, the member will know full well that it is not a raise — he anticipated my comments — because it’s a holdback.

[J. Tegart in the chair.]

Again, I think it sends the wrong message, because what it says to cabinets is: you should choose to get your full salary over making sure that people have the services that they need. Which, to me, is a selfish way of doing governance. I think that it shouldn’t be part of the thinking about doing good governance. I think British Columbians expect, their cabinet expects, their MLAs to be making wise decisions based on their needs, on them, and what they need when they need it. Not: “Gee, we shouldn’t make this decision, because then I don’t get my holdback.”

I didn’t sign up to do this work for that reason. I signed up to do this work because British Columbians, I think, need a government that puts their needs first. The risk of this holdback legislation in this way suggests that members of cabinet can put their needs first, which is — and I know that the member will agree — not appropriate, and it should never be the case. I’m sure that all members of the House would agree with that, but it does create that risk.

When I think back to the choices that previous governments have made around cuts to vital programs — cuts to support vulnerable women, cuts to health care services, cuts to child care services, cuts to schools, cuts to education — so that members of the executive council can get their full pay, I think that’s a terrible motivation.

[2:30 p.m.]

What we’re doing is saying members of executive council should be making the right decisions because they’re the right decisions to be made at the time. That’s what this is about.

Madam Chair, welcome to the chair. It’s nice to see you here.

P. Milobar: Well, this has been in place for 20 years. The interesting part with the minister’s last answer or speech or a combination of both is there didn’t seem to be that passion of principle when they were budgeting based on an extra $2.7 billion surplus left by the previous government.

There didn’t seem to be that passion of principle in the budget after, the budget after, the budget after or the budget after. In fact, this new-found passionate principle from the minister is on the sixth budget introduced by this government. This is the sixth budget we’ve dealt with. This is the first time this has come up.

Remarkably, it comes up in the act of governing when difficult decisions that have to be made by any government of any political stripe need to start being made. What a convenient time to find that passion for this principle, because this wasn’t waived in any other previous times under this government.

We’ve had other amendments come through. Just last year we had to have the budget introduced after the fiscal year started because the minister couldn’t get it delivered, even with the legislated one-month extension that was brought in by her predecessor.

Just last year an amendment was brought in about deficit spending. Didn’t touch the holdbacks then. Didn’t seem to have the same concerns about ministerial decision-making based on their paycheque.

Frankly, I think that’s a fairly…. I don’t know what the right word is. I was going to say “offensive.” I’m not sure “offensive” is right, but we’ll go with “offensive.” It’s a pretty offensive way to characterize cabinet ministers from all political walks of life over the last 20 years and their decision-making.

It makes it sound like the minister says they would have actually done more spending over the previous five budgets if only it wasn’t for those nasty holdbacks. They would have been in deficit spending sooner if not for those deficit holdbacks.

Why hold back? Maybe that’s why we don’t have $10-a-day child care six years in. According to this minister, other ministers wouldn’t want to spend that extra dollar to provide that program because they wouldn’t get their pay. So we’re going to remove that out.

Again, the question. The minister keeps flipping it back to decision-making. The question is: why the removal of this clause in perpetuity, as opposed to having it align with the changes in 2.2 that have specified years that the budgets will likely be in deficit?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, the deficit holdback measure, we believe, just sends, frankly, the wrong message. The member talked about how it’s been around for 20 years. Well, people have been hurt for 20 years because previous governments insisted that they collect their holdback. That was their priority, and they made budget decisions based on that.

I think British Columbians expect their elected members and their executive council to make decisions because they’re the right decisions at the time, not because they are motivated to collect a holdback.

Again, I just checked with staff here to ask: “Any other jurisdiction have this?” The answer is no. It doesn’t exist anywhere else. It’s only here.

[2:35 p.m.]

Now, in terms of what we’ve experienced in this pandemic, none of this was planned. None of this was anticipated. We’ve had some significant challenges around what that means for health care, what that means for safety, what that means for how we live our lives.

How long is it going to be with us for? I don’t think that any of us expected to be here two years in, still masked up. These are, I think, difficult times for many. But I also think that it gives us an opportunity to determine or assess what makes sense. Frankly, this deficit holdback measure, again, sends the wrong message.

The member and I are not going to agree on this. I think he thinks it’s a good measure, because clearly, he thinks it should be in there. He thinks that that’s what’s going to keep government decision-makers making the right decision.

We’ve been making, I think, the right decisions since 2017 — certainly, March 2020 — when we had to make the difficult decisions, really difficult decisions, about what to do to protect people, knowing full well that we had to spend money that we didn’t have. It was going to create deficit. The holdbacks weren’t part of our conversation. It was about doing the right thing.

I believe that whenever anyone puts their name forward to be part of government, to be part of this place, they’re going to make decisions because they’re the right decisions to make, not because there’s a holdback incentive to make the right decisions. So fundamentally, we just think it just sends the wrong message, and that’s why we’re removing it from this legislation.

S. Furstenau: Just following this discussion, back and forth, and trying to understand a little bit from the minister’s perspective, the argument being made is that the holdback is sending the wrong message. It’s not included in decision-making. The minister just indicated that there’s no other province, apparently, that has this kind of legislation.

My question is, then: why keep the legislation at all? Why have it go from 20 percent to 10 percent? Based on the argument that the minister has made, it shouldn’t exist at all.

Hon. S. Robinson: There is one useful mechanism in there. One useful mechanism. That is when ministers get their budget letter. They get a budget letter that says: “Here’s your bucket. Here’s what your allocation is for the year to do the spending, to deliver the services. The expectation is that you’re going to do your work within that allocation.”

If they don’t, it’s about them being accountable to their colleagues and each other, because it means that money has to come from somewhere else if they overspend. So there is a mechanism for the ministers to make sure that they are being accountable to each other and to their colleagues, and it’s within that context that it makes sense.

S. Furstenau: Following along that argument, the mechanism of….

Is the minister suggesting that without the legislation, the holdback legislation, there wouldn’t be the mechanism of a minister being provided with their budget bucket?

Hon. S. Robinson: No, they’ll get their budget letter that has their allocation, but the expectation is that they live within their allocation, so that by the time we get through the year, they haven’t gone beyond their allocation, because if they do, then we have to find the money from somewhere else, and that would create challenges within government.

This is about holding each other accountable and making sure that they know that there is a penalty within government for not following through and living within the allocation that they’ve been given.

S. Furstenau: I guess I just am somewhat confused by the argument here. On the one hand, in responding to the critic for the official opposition, the argument is that the holdback part of the legislation really isn’t responsible, because it moves the ministers’ minds off of the work at hand and serving the public, but then on the other hand, I’m hearing a justification for it because it keeps the ministers responsible and accountable to each other.

[2:40 p.m.]

Honestly, I’m just trying to figure out what the argument is for reducing the holdback, based on what we’ve heard from the minister, as opposed to removing it. I don’t think the mechanism for getting a clear indication of what a minister’s budget is would be removed if this holdback were removed.

I’m a little bit stymied by whether the minister sees this as net positive to have this budget holdback piece for the ministers, or net negative. How are we navigating these two sides of this argument?

Hon. S. Robinson: I want to make sure that the member understands. We may be talking about two different parts of holdback. There’s the individual holdback, the ministerial holdback, that is really about ministers having full control over…. They know what their mandate letter is, they’re given their budget allotment, and they make decisions within that framework about how to spend those resources. They have full control over that.

When I think about the overall holdback for the overall budget, which is different than the ministerial holdback, which is an individual holdback…. This 10 percent is really, when you think about deficit spending, beyond government’s control.

The global meltdown, the crisis that happened in 2008, wasn’t the fault of any one government. I mean, there were multiple challenges with it that other governments, I think, had influence in, but it impacted British Columbia not because government made decisions but because we are a small jurisdiction in a global economy. The pandemic, fires, floods are the sorts of things that no government has complete control of. Things happen, and then we have to respond. It’s how we respond, I think, that is really critical to taking care of people, taking care of the citizens who count on us to make the right decisions.

It’s in that context that we are seeing this differently. When a minister is given their mandate letter, when a minister has made their various requests of Treasury Board, when a minister takes a look at their strategic plan, when they do their estimates, there’s a framework for those dollars. They have complete control over the decisions that happen within their ministry, and the expectation is that they’re going to follow through on their plans. If they overspend, that’s about a choice that they’ve made and not because some external event happened.

If there is an external event, I expect that they would come to Treasury Board. They would come to government, and other plans would be made. That would be certainly well within their opportunity to do that. But the expectation is that they are making decisions based on all the things that they can control, and they need to be making those decisions wisely.

P. Milobar: A lot to unpack there over that exchange.

The minister’s answers to the Leader of the Third Party were describing and justifying the holdback that is actually being removed. She said it keeps cabinet responsible for each other, because if one minister starts to deficit-spend, other ministers would have to make up, out of their unspent funds, to keep that minister whole.

[2:45 p.m.]

That’s the concept around the holdback that’s being removed right now. It’s that as a collective — as a collective — you don’t go into deficit spending. It recognizes that you might have to move some dollars around as an overall cabinet, but you don’t go into deficit spending as priorities might shift throughout a year. You make amendments.

Again, I come back to it. The minister touched on it in her last answer. When world events happen, you may slip into deficit spending. It has happened in ’08. The bill was amended; the act was amended. It’s happening with COVID. The act has been amended. This is the first time in the 20 years where we’re seeing a permanent change that directly increases cabinet pay, with no end date — to get back to the accountability piece.

Now, this is called the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act. The first few clauses here are actually dealing with the balanced-budget part. This holdback deals with the balanced budget; the holdback removal deals with the balanced budget. The ministerial holdback, the ministerial-accountability part of the act, is in a few sections down, where the individual minister is responsible for their individual ministerial spending.

On the balanced-budget side, it ties into the very first question asked by the Leader of the Third Party. What is the purpose of keeping the charade of clause 2 of the existing act that says: “The main estimates for a fiscal year must not contain a forecast of a deficit for that fiscal year”?

That has now been amended by section 2.2, two years in a row, by this government. With the further erosion of the last piece around balanced budget — which is the consequence piece in the act, the removal of the 10 percent holdback — why was there not an end date to match up with 2.2 around the holdback?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, I want to reiterate that this is not an increase in pay. This is just about sustaining the pay, and it’s about eliminating a holdback.

The individual holdback that we just talked about…. We just canvassed it with the Leader of the Third Party, along with the mandate letters — we believe fundamentally are sufficient for keeping government on track, making sure that people are making the best choice possible in the circumstances.

Again, we’ve certainly seen — I’ve experienced, and I know that others have experienced — what happens when previous governments, in order to get their holdback, have made cuts. That’s, I think, the wrong motivation for making decisions.

Taking action here to make sure that we have accountability through individual holdbacks, as well as mandate letters…. Of course, every four years there’s an election. That’s sufficient for accountability.

P. Milobar: Well, it’s very clear the minister feels that she’s entitled to her entitlements, but the reality is that they’ve been government for a quarter of the 20 years we’re talking about. This is the sixth budget. This is the first time this has come up.

The minister references “because it leads to poor decisions.” Could the minister point out some poor decisions that have been made by her government over the previous five budgets? Is that why we don’t have $10-a-day child care? Is that why we don’t have a $400 renters rebate that has been in her mandate letter for the last two budgets?

[2:50 p.m.]

What poor decisions were made by this government, over the last five years, that would have precipitated the need to give cabinet a 10 percent raise so they will do their job appropriately?

Hon. S. Robinson: We haven’t made any cuts. In fact, we’ve been growing programs in a really big way.

The cuts I’m referring to are the cuts to sexual assault services. The cuts I’m talking about are cuts to women fleeing violence — the fact that there hasn’t been any funding when the other side was in government. In fact, there were cuts. Not just not funding, but there were cuts made to existing programs so that they could meet their balanced budget legislation and not suffer a holdback. To me, that’s horrifying. That vulnerable people, that choices were made….

Governments all make choices. By doing this, we are making sure that that kind of thinking doesn’t happen again, that choices will be made based on the interests of the people that we serve, that individual ministers will be held accountable because they will be given their allotments and an expectation over which they have control to make sure that they’re being accountable to themselves and to their cabinet. They’re being accountable to the mandate letter, accountable to the Premier and accountable to British Columbians. Then, of course, we have elections every four years, which is the ultimate accountability.

P. Milobar: Again, the question to the minister, to get a better understanding of what the thought process is to lead us to this amendment that sees a 10 percent raise for cabinet, was based on her answer around poor decisions that get made if this stays in. The question was around poor decisions.

Governments do have choices. Governments do have to make those. I notice that under the previous Finance Minister, there wasn’t deficit spending. There must have been choices that weren’t followed through on to ensure that there wasn’t deficit spending. There must have had to be financial decisions made around things like $10-a-day child care not being implemented until the federal money came in with a dump truck at twice the cost, at $20 a day, and it may or may not actually move forward.

There had to have been decisions made about it, twice promised in elections. The minister references elections every four years. Twice, the $400 renters’ rebate was promised. There must have been a financial decision made by government to not follow through and make that choice to not provide people with what a campaign promise was. In fact, it’s in this minister’s mandate letter — the $400 renters rebate. This is her second budget. So her choice has been not to fund that program that’s in her mandate letter even though she’s giving herself the ability to deficit spend.

The minister is saying that, in the past, poor decisions were made strictly so ministers could get their bonus based on a balanced budget. This is the first year that would change. They have had five budgets up to this point. What poor decisions were made? What poor choices by this government were made? What programs were left unfunded so that this minister and her colleagues, over the last five years, could ensure that they got their full pay that they’re entitled to?

Hon. S. Robinson: I believe I’ve answered these questions. We continue to believe that deficit holdback measures do send the wrong message. It prioritizes austerity and can influence choices to make cuts to important programs, even in an emergency.

We think, and I believe — and I believe that all members believe — that people put their name forward to run for office to make decisions based on what British Columbians need. A holdback, particularly in a place where you have no control over world events…. Who could have anticipated that Russia would go into Ukraine and have impacts now on other movement of goods, energy prices, etc.? It impacts British Columbians.

[2:55 p.m.]

I believe that all governments should and ought to make decisions that are in the best interest of the people they serve, not because there’s a holdback or not a holdback. So we fundamentally believe that a holdback measure does send the wrong message, and that’s why we’re eliminating it here.

P. Milobar: Can the minister not see how the public…? Certainly the feedback I’ve been getting from the public — and that’s who we all ultimately serve — in a time of record inflation, for our current generation…. I was too young to remember, of any significance, the ’80s, when things spiked really bad.

The public, who are finding their grocery bill ever increasing, who are finding trying to fill up their gas tank that much more problematic, who are seeing their rents…. In the minister’s own riding, rents are up $4,500 a year for someone looking for a rental accommodation. Record housing prices. Interest rates starting to move up. All of those issues facing people, with the stress of COVID.

Can the minister not see why there might be questions as to why this is the right time, this is the year that cabinet and this minister felt it was appropriate to amend the legislation to ensure that their pay packet has an extra 10 percent in it, regardless of what is happening to rest of the economy and the rest of their budgeting and the rest of their programs that they’re rolling out?

Hon. S. Robinson: I do talk to people in my community. There are certainly challenges, and there had been challenges when we formed government. That’s why we continue to invest in British Columbians, and we’re going to keep continuing to invest in British Columbians.

This piece of legislation is about a holdback measure that the former government put in place in 2001. It gave tax breaks to the wealthiest and then made significant cuts to services, and they could collect a holdback. From my perspective, I think that’s the wrong thing to do.

The member talked about why we didn’t look at this sooner. Well, we’ve been pretty busy with the pandemic, and we continue to be busy with the pandemic. Recognizing that governments make choices and our choice is to correct something that, I think, fundamentally is flawed, we are fixing a piece of legislation that we think fundamentally is flawed.

We want to make sure…. We’ve made unprecedented investments over the last years to support people. We’re going to keep making investments. The member was, I think, mocking — I think is the right word — the fact that we are working together with the federal government to deliver child care faster than we were able to do just as a provincial government. We were well on our way, but them joining with us is good for British Columbians.

At the end of the day, we’re hearing from parents who are saying: “My goodness. I’m saving $800 a month.” I just received a note from somebody who was saying: “This is huge for me.” That’s a good thing. That is good for British Columbians.

The reason that the federal government was able to partner with us so quickly is because we were ready. We had the infrastructure in place. We’ve been building this out for five years. We said it was a ten-year plan. I know that the member is going to try to mock us again for not having achieved a ten-year goal in five years, but we’re well on our way, and $20-a-day is way better than when it was $50 a day.

Mocking progress, I think, is really unfortunate. I don’t think that people send us here to mock good work for British Columbians. That’s really unfortunate.

The same thing on the housing front. We’ve been investing significantly in housing. I know that there continues to be challenges on the housing file. We’re continuing to work every day to make sure that we’re delivering even more.

The pandemic certainly changed the dynamics, in a way that I don’t think any of us anticipated. We didn’t predict the pandemic, and predicting how people’s real estate choices are impacted by the pandemic was certainly not anticipated.

[3:00 p.m.]

The fact that we’re investing $7 billion in housing over ten years, with 32,000 units of subsidized housing well on their way…. Every week there are more opening. Even in Kamloops, there are some really good projects that have been happening there as well.

We are seeing housing starts. We are at record levels — like, record levels. I believe it’s 47,000 units last year, which is unheard of in our history. So things are firing on all cylinders. I only wish that we had gotten into government sooner so that we could have gotten started on this important work sooner.

P. Milobar: Well, $10 a day is…. There are only about 2½ percent of the spaces that are needed by parents to date. So I think that the parents looking for child care, six years in, would hope that there was more than a 2½ percent progress rate, at this pace.

We could unpack a whole lot there, but let’s try to stay focused in on the actual topic at hand, which is the ministerial holdback. The minister seems to be trying to veer away from it, and I can understand why, because it was confusing to me why we would have never seen this with former Finance Minister Carole James’s budgets, bringing it forward.

You know, the minister is right. We did, during the financial crisis, put a hold on the balanced budget. To my understanding, cabinet still saw a pay cut during the financial crisis, during those times. They held to that provision, unlike this.

Can the minister confirm to me what the commencement date of this change to the holdback is? It appears to be actually backdated to 2021, April 1, not 2022, April 1. Can the minister confirm that this would actually include last year as well?

Hon. S. Robinson: For ’21-22.

P. Milobar: Sorry. Just to be absolutely certain for the viewers at home…. When we talk fiscal years, it can sometimes get confusing, especially when you tag in ’22 to the answer. My understanding is…. When I look at page 47, clause 134, the commencement chart, it says that sections 2 to 7 commence April 1, 2021. So when this passes, cabinet will receive the 10 percent from last year that has been held back and automatically qualify for their 10 percent on this year. Is that correct?

Hon. S. Robinson: It’s for the years ’21-22 and for the next three years going forward.

P. Milobar: I’m going to try this, then. Are we dealing with Budget ’21-22 today, or are we dealing with Budget ’22-23 today?

Hon. S. Robinson: We are dealing with legislation. We are not dealing with the budget.

P. Milobar: I really don’t know why the minister won’t just provide a straightforward answer. She must be so proud of this. You would think that she would want to.

Is this amendment dealing with provisions for Budget 2022-2023, or is it dealing with provisions for Budget 2021-2022?

[3:05 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: This is legislation, and this legislation commences for the budget year ’21-22 on a go-forward basis.

P. Milobar: Again, just to get absolute certainty, because I know that this is what the minister is saying, and I don’t know why she won’t say it in a way that’s easily understood for the viewers at home…. This means that the 10 percent increase to pay for deficit spending of the budget for ministers will take effect, will be retroactive to April 1, 2021, despite the fact that we’re sitting here on — what is it? — April 5, April 6, 2022.

There is a year of retroactive pay due to the ministers with this amendment. Is that correct?

Hon. S. Robinson: Well, the existing holdback provisions did result in penalizing ministers in the ’19-20 year as well as the ’20-21 fiscal year for deficits that occurred in those years.

There was a lot of, I’ll say, activity to support British Columbians through the pandemic. There have been, historically, holdbacks as a result of this. What I think is not very good legislation, but we followed it.

This change is for the ’21-22 fiscal years. It’s always a look back, for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2022, which just passed. It’s always based on public accounts, which don’t get completed until August of this year. So it’s always a look back. That’s why this legislation is here before us in April, because the determination of the balanced-budget legislation will be looking back on the year and letting us know what the impacts were.

P. Milobar: Wow. I’ve heard of creative bookkeeping before. This is a creative answer. The bottom line is…. The minister referenced it — that there was the ’20-21 holdback, which this amendment will now reinstate.

Public perception…. And the minister knows full well that public perception…. When a bill gets introduced in April of 2022 and every other provision that I can see in this bill takes effect, commencement of 2022 or later, except for a couple that go way back to ’13 and 2018…. We’ll get to those later and figure out what impacts those have. Those provisions don’t personally impact the pay for ministers, yet this one does.

All of the conversation from the day the budget was introduced till now has revolved around the conversation and the assumption that this is a looking-forward provision, not that it was going to be a retroactive pay raise for cabinet.

The minister can correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure, in fact, that government has actually even acknowledged that their holdback still took effect as an act of solidarity with the public during COVID. We’re now hearing that that ’20-21 fiscal year holdback is not actually going to happen, because this will take commencement on April 1, 2021.

[3:10 p.m.]

For the budget year that just ended on Thursday, this will provide cabinet with their holdback funds because of the commencement date of April 1, 2021.

Hon. S. Robinson: The member keeps referring to the year ’20-21. That’s done. That fiscal year is long gone. What we are talking about is ’21-22.

The way it works — maybe the member isn’t aware; I know that some of the members have been ministers — is that the holdback happens throughout the year. The 20 percent is held back until the public accounts review of the province’s books after March 31.

It is a look back, for sure, and the public accounts don’t come out until the summer. In summer of 2022, we’re all going to see the public accounts. British Columbians will have a chance to look to see how government did. That’s when they look at the closed books for March 31, ’22, so it’s a ’21-22 year.

It will be determined in August-ish. August usually is when we see those books that look back on how government did. What this legislation is doing: it’s eliminating that holdback portion so that in August, when they review, there will be the 10 percent individual ministerial look to see: did ministers live within their means? If they didn’t, then there is the holdback. For the collective, the holdback will not exist. It’ll just be for the individual ministerial holdback.

P. Milobar: Oh, I fully understand the dates and fiscal dates. So the minister can try to spin that way all she would like. I’m not asking about the day the minister will get her $10,000 cheque in her bank account.

What I’m asking is…. The commencement date very clearly says April 1, 2021, which means that for the last fiscal year that just ended on Friday morning — not that long ago, contrary to what the minister says, way in our rearview mirror — the concept of this being removed was introduced in the budget document for 2022-2023. The public perception — and there has been zero correction from the minister, to this point, of any public statements made — was that that was a go-forward change, a go-forward amendment to the legislation.

The minister can try to spin all she wants, but the minister knows full well when something is put in a budget document for future years, the first question that people don’t ask is: “Oh, does this involve something that happened three years ago, or is that for the current fiscal, moving forward?”

[3:15 p.m.]

The public expectation was that this holdback that results in more pay for ministers, regardless of performance, would be for starting the year 2022-2023, because that’s where it first shows up in the budget document. This piece of legislation wasn’t tabled ahead of the budget document. The first reference we got to this was in a budget document that is a forward-looking three-year document, not a backward-looking document.

The minister can try to slough this off and make it sound like: “Well, we won’t get our payment until August.” The reality is that this has been structured…. We are dealing with a piece of legislation, in April of the fiscal year 2022-2023, that will confer a benefit on cabinet and the Premier for the fiscal year 2021-2022. That’s the year that this change will actually commence — last year’s fiscal. Is that accurate?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, when we bring forward laws in this place, they begin, typically, when the law is passed and gets royal assent. That’s when the law passes. It passes — ideally, this session — on a go-forward basis.

The go-forward happens when the public accounts get reviewed. It isn’t reviewed yet. Passing the law now means go forward on a go-forward basis. So it’s in that context that we don’t know yet — the books are closed — if it’s a deficit budget, technically. I believe it is, but there are lots of moving parts, revenues, that certainly came in, in making sure that we have all the pieces put together.

I know that, for the members opposite, they fully understand that it takes a significant amount of time, for the people that are on either side of me, to close off the books, to make sure all the bills are paid, to make sure that the revenues are recorded appropriately. Then it gets scrutinized by the Auditor. The Auditor will follow, and we will be following, the laws as they proceed forward.

I know that the member is chuckling. He might think this is funny, but this is, from my perspective, serious business, around making sure that we have laws that reflect the values of British Columbians.

That’s what this is. It’s about the value of a government that delivers important programs because that’s what people need, not because there’s a holdback that is going to force cuts, which I think was perhaps a motivation of other governments. It certainly hasn’t been a motivation of ours, but I do think that it runs a risk of being a motivation. I think that’s just not good legislation. So we are proposing the change here.

I appreciate the questions that the member is going to continue to ask me about it, but this is really about changing the law, making it happen on the commencement date when it becomes law. Then any activity that happens after that date is reflected in the law. It’s within that context that that would happen.

P. Milobar: One more time. The whole premise of this, the minister said, was to ensure good decision-making by government, that the minister is not making a decision at the expense of the public. The first we see this concept is in the budget document for 2022-2023.

[3:20 p.m.]

It would be understandable if the minister and the rest of cabinet, in cabinet meetings that are confidential, in discussing the upcoming budget for 2022-2023, said: “You know what? This holdback is problematic for us, because we’re going to be deficit-spending. We want our full pay. So in our programs in 2022 moving forward, we can’t keep having this.”

That would actually align with what the minister’s earlier statements were, about this newfound priority of decision-making, to align with the budget document that first came out — that is for 2022-2023 up to ’24-25 — which is why we amended 2.2. But the decisions in fiscal year ’21-22, when this is going to take commencement on, happened more than a year ago.

Now, technically, we didn’t even see the budget until a month from now, last year, because it was two months late. But the budget creation, the concerns about deficit spending, the discussions of cabinet, would have all happened last year at the same time. Yet despite the fact that this act was amended last year to account for deficit budgets, the holdback concept wasn’t raised. It wasn’t brought up. It wasn’t amended. It was this year, and it was talked about in the context of a budget and was talked about in the timeline of that budget.

I think the public deserves a straight answer from the minister — not about the date that the public accounts will verify 2021-2022, not about the dates that they’ll get their extra cheque, their retroactive holdback pay that they are now ensuring will happen. I don’t think the public’s really concerned if it’s August 5 or August 14 that the minister gets her extra $10,000 that this will provide. That’s not really the issue.

For a government that’s routinely called the most secretive in Canada, to not even get a straight answer from the minister that this is retroactive, that the commencement date ensures ministerial holdbacks for the fiscal year ’21-22 will retroactively be removed, resulting in a guaranteed 10 percent extra pay, regardless of performance for ’21-22…. The fact we can’t even get that as a simple answer out of the minister is shocking.

If she is so proud of this removal because it liberates cabinet to make better decisions, and it’s not about their pay, I look forward to the minister acknowledging this and maybe acknowledging that, in fact, we could amend this and have it take effect April 1, 2022 — like people would have been expecting in the first place, after only first hearing about it in budget document 2022-2023.

Again, why the retroactive pay aspect to this amendment? Why was it not just brought in forward as an amendment last year, or why was it just not acted upon and actually kept at the 2022, April 1, commencement date?

[3:25 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: First of all, I want to thank the member for acknowledging what he referred to as ministers receiving their full pay. I think that that’s really critical here.

I know that from a partisan perspective, the spin on it has been a raise, and it’s not the case. It’s a full pay. You can go online and see what the pay is for ministers. It really is a holdback. It’s a punishment for not achieving certain goals, which…. It’s about penalizing, when, in fact, ministers have no control over the pandemic, have no control over a global meltdown crisis. I do think it was unfair for members on the opposite side, when they were in government, to have been penalized when they had no control over a global meltdown.

In that respect, I want to thank the member for finally acknowledging that this is about receiving full pay. The amendment does remove the existing collective holdback provisions, so that ministers aren’t penalized for making the right decisions. Again, I tabled the budget February 22, which was still in the middle of the calendar year that we were operating in. We were continuing to make decisions throughout that time within that fiscal year, which did end on Friday. It’s really, I think, important.

Again, I want to acknowledge and thank the member for finally acknowledging that this is about penalizing ministers, who do a really difficult job — make difficult decisions — in the context of a global situation, recognizing that the question is, should they be penalized as well as, perhaps, motivated to not make the right decision. So it’s within both of those contexts that we are bringing this forward.

P. Milobar: Well, it is a raise. Yes, it’s a raise that gets you to what the pay chart says is 50 percent of an MLA’s salary for being a minister. I guess the question, then, to the minister is…. Last year the cabinet created a budget with the understanding that the holdback provisions that we are now amending were in place. They did that with the understanding that they were in place for the budget year ’21-22.

Now here we are, and we have the bill in front of us that is actually saying it doesn’t matter what you thought you were going to get paid for ’21-22. We didn’t actually amend the legislation last year when we were making other amendments to it. We’re going to make sure, in April of 2022, that you get back pay.

I guess the question is, if this is such a critical amendment to ministerial decision-making in times of deficit, why was this not an amendment for last year’s fiscal, very clearly spelled out as an amendment for last year’s fiscal? Again, the first we heard about this was the budget presentation and was, in fact, in the budget document for fiscal 2022-2023, with no mention of fiscal 2021-2022.

Hon. S. Robinson: Well, I believe I answered the question already, in terms of…. You know, we tabled the budget on February 22, 2022. We were still in the context of the previous fiscal. I was listening to the member complain earlier about the fact that we delivered the budget last year later than normal. It sounds like now, he’s asking questions about a previous budget.

I’m not quite sure I understand his desire to go back and talk about a budget that we debated last year. Right now, what we’re debating is legislation that we’re bringing forward, and the actions that need to happen in this coming year do reflect on last year’s budget. We recognize that there’s still process that happens with the ’21-22 budget.

[3:30 p.m.]

Removing this holdback will have impacts on the last year, because we presented it in that fiscal year.

P. Milobar: Well, the reality is this was presented February 22. This bill was presented to this House on February 22, along with the budget. We didn’t have second reading until March 10. Again, nothing in this bill and nothing in the budget document — which were both presented on the same day, both of which almost exclusively deal with Budget 2022-2023 — had any clear reference that this was retroactive to the previous fiscal year. Budget documents don’t get presented that way in this House — never do.

[S. Chandra Herbert in the chair.]

March 10. We have second reading. The minister says: “Well, we first tried dealing with this — we first presented it — in the last fiscal. It must have been clear.” Yet we don’t get to committee stage on it until April. March 10 is second reading. We don’t get to committee stage, conveniently, until after we’re into the new fiscal, and the minister tries to wrap herself in, “Well, we didn’t take our time to discuss it,” when we don’t control the schedule of when bills come forward.

They wonder why more and more people are saying that this government displays arrogance. Something as simple as the minister standing up and being forthright and using language that she knows the public will easily understand in terms of how they would get paid, how they would view this if this was happening in their workplace, that the conditions of their employment have changed as such that they’re guaranteed 10 percent more pay…. They would go home and tell their significant other that they just got a raise: “Conditions of my employment changed. I’m guaranteed 10 percent more. Oh, and you know what? It counts for last year too.”

The minister knows, based on the commencement date in this bill, for this holdback change, that’s exactly what’s happening. She refuses to give the five-million-plus people in British Columbia that are struggling with day-to-day costs right now a straight answer that herself and her cabinet, based on this provision, will have no holdbacks for last year.

Could the minister answer this then. Based on this provision in this bill, before this provision, as public accounts wraps up the 2021-2022 fiscal, cabinet would have had 10 percent of their salary held back. They were in deficit. We’re assuming that we’re in deficit, based on updates, fiscal updates. That 10 percent wouldn’t have been paid out. Based on this provision, the minister is saying that the ministerial bump in pay of 50 percent of what an MLA is paid, and the Premier’s bump, which is I believe is 90 percent of what an MLA gets paid…. That would be paid in full instead of what it would have been, which would have been 40 percent without this provision — for last year’s fiscal.

[3:35 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: First of all, the member was, I think, complaining — I think that that would be an accurate characterization — about not getting to committee stage until now. But I want to remind the member that we were expecting and hoping to get to this committee stage on March 31, but apparently, there were other bills that they chose to spend more time on debating.

It was scheduled to go to committee on Thursday, actually, and it….

Interjection.

Hon. S. Robinson: Well, no, this was on the list, but apparently that took a lot longer, and there were hoist motions and other such things that delayed us from getting here.

Just in terms of the member’s question, I do want to point out that after this bill is done, the 10 percent holdback will be returned, and the 10 percent will still be held back, based on how things play out with the public accounts that we won’t see until August.

P. Milobar: Could the minister, then, clarify…? I think what I heard is that the 10 percent holdback existing that’s being removed no longer would rely on public accounts in August. Strictly, just the ministerial individual budget will be held back for public accounts. So that means that once this is passed through this chamber, cabinet will see an extra $5,500 for last year’s fiscal, regardless of what the financial performance and public accounts say for their overall performance of the province, and then that will continue on in 2022-2023.

Hon. S. Robinson: That’s correct — on the 10 percent — but I don’t know exactly when accounting would be able to make that happen. But that’s how we expect it would play out.

P. Milobar: Again, I don’t think the public really cares what date you get the money in the bank account. All they want to know is that you’re actually getting a retroactive pay raise, and that sounds exactly what the minister just confirmed. I guess that’ll probably end my questions on section 2.

The Chair: Shall clause 2 pass?

Division has been called on clause 2.

[3:40 p.m. - 3:45 p.m.]

Clause 2 approved on the following division:

YEAS — 50
Alexis	Anderson	Bailey
Bains	Beare	Begg
Brar	Chant	Chen
Chow	Conroy	Coulter
Cullen	Dean	D’Eith
Donnelly	Dykeman	Eby
Elmore	Farnworth	Fleming
Glumac	Greene	Heyman
Kahlon	Kang	Leonard
Lore	Ma	Malcolmson
Mark	Mercier	Osborne
Paddon	Popham	Ralston
Rankin	Rice	Robinson
Routledge	Routley	Sandhu
Sharma	Simons	Sims
R. Singh	Starchuk	Walker
Whiteside		Yao
NAYS — 26
Ashton	Banman	Bernier
Cadieux	Clovechok	Davies
de Jong	Doerkson	Halford
Kirkpatrick	Kyllo	Lee
Letnick	Merrifield	Milobar
Morris	Oakes	Paton
Ross	Rustad	Shypitka
Stewart	Stone	Sturdy
Tegart		Wat

On clause 3.

[3:50 p.m.]

P. Milobar: I must say, first off, that was an interesting vote. That’s the first time I’ve seen cabinet not cheer for something that they voted for. Given that it’s a pay raise, I guess that’s why. It was interesting hearing from some cabinet ministers that they feel justified now on the banter that they get paid the same as the opposition leader. I guess, maybe, that’s the true motivation versus decision-making.

Anyways, on clause 3. This is repealing section 4 of the act. Section 4 of the act is about payment of half the holdback for achieving collective responsibilities, and it’s repealing it in its entirety. I’m assuming that that’s because this is the collective responsibilities piece, not the overall individual ministerial holdback piece.

Hon. S. Robinson: With the elimination of the 10 percent holdback for executive council collective responsibilities, there is no need for section 4.

Clause 3 approved.

On clause 4.

P. Milobar: Clause 4 deals with section 5 of the bill. This is about repealing, amending, half of the reduction — 20 percent reduction — under section 3 and substituting it with the salary reduction under section 3.

So this is about maintaining that 10 percent holdback for ministerial individual performance of their own ministerial budget?

Hon. S. Robinson: Yes. That is correct. This is a consequential amendment. It holds the 10 percent individual responsibility.

[3:55 p.m.]

P. Milobar: Earlier the minister had alluded to: “This is an important accountability piece.” This holdback is an important accountability piece because it will put pressure on that minister and other ministers to stay within their own ministerial budget, because otherwise, other ministers are going to have to make up the difference so that everyone can still get their pay and not have a holdback.

Would it not just be one individual minister, if they overspent in their ministerial budget, that would be subject to the 10 percent holdback provision, not cabinet as a whole?

Hon. S. Robinson: It doesn’t relate to all of cabinet. It relates to that individual minister.

P. Milobar: I guess I’m trying to understand how that makes it a better accountability tool for cabinet as a whole than the provision that has just been stripped away — for a retroactive pay raise, I might add.

If ministers aren’t achieving their target, surely the Minister of Finance, who’s ultimately responsible for those targets, would be able to either enforce the holdback or, even more punitive, ensure the minister no longer receives the 50 percent pay increase by making sure that they are no longer a minister if they cannot be fiscally responsible with their own ministerial budget.

I guess the question is: what is the point of this, other than a charade of making it look like there’s accountability, if every other accountability provision has been stripped away at this point?

Hon. S. Robinson: Well, first of all, I don’t determine who’s in cabinet. That’s the purview of the Premier.

The member, if he thinks it’s a charade, and it was his government that brought it in, might want to talk to their new leader about that. He was around when that was the case, if I recollect.

We’re keeping this piece because, as I said earlier, when individual ministers are given their budget letters, there is an expectation that they’re going to manage their own individual pressures and priorities over the year within that fiscal framework that they’ve been given in their budget letter. They have a responsibility, collectively, because it is one budget, but everyone gets a piece of it. They have a responsibility to manage appropriately and make the decisions — and they’re hard decisions — within their budget letter requirements.

There is a holdback that…. Again I’ll explain to the member that we don’t actually see, at the end of the day, where things are with everyone’s budgets until after public accounts, which doesn’t happen until August. So it’s important that we have that process so we can see where each ministry lands. It helps keep the ministers focused on making sure that they are being very wise and thoughtful about the decisions that they make on a day-to-day basis.

P. Milobar: Well, that’s interesting. Previously we heard that holdback provisions lead to poor decision-making for cabinet members because they have the threat of not earning as much money if they don’t deliver on what their mandate is in terms of spending and stay within the parameters that are laid out for them.

Is the minister now saying that on an individual ministerial level, they make good decisions with a holdback, not poor decisions like they would if it was a collective holdback?

Hon. S. Robinson: As I said earlier, this is about when ministers put together their plan for the year. It’s based on certain parameters that we all agree to. It gets detailed in their budget letter, so we understand what they’re going to be spending their dollars on. It’s a collective decision-making.

The expectation is that they’re going to be sticking with that plan, unless, of course, something changes and they come back to Treasury Board. They come back, and they get some recognition that things change, and they do change. So we work together to do that.

It’s also really important to make sure that people are paying attention to their budgets, that they recognize that the decisions that they made have implications. This is the piece that helps them make those decisions.

[4:00 p.m.]

What I was speaking to earlier was around the wholesale idea of whether or not you should be making cuts to services in order to collect your collective holdback. That’s a government decision, and that is very concerning.

In this case, what we’re doing is making sure that people are watching the decisions that they make closely over the year, to make sure that they can continue to deliver what they say they’re going to deliver when they put together their budget framework and that they are living within the expectations that are in their budget letter.

P. Milobar: If that leads to good, thoughtful, hard decision-making by an individual minister, surely if every single minister of cabinet is operating under that premise, then all of their decisions are in that lens. That means that when they get together as a collective, the collective decision-making must be good, but we heard the minister say it results in poor decision-making, with the previous clawback.

The question, though, the original premise of the question, was around…. I don’t think the bill, as we operated with the bill when we were in government, was a charade of a bill, an act. I think that with these changes, the minister has made it a charade of an act — of being able to point to something to try to show the public that maybe, kind of, ministers are being held accountable.

Why not just remove everything? Why not just get rid of the act? We have provisions now, year after year — amendments — to remove the need for non-deficit budgets. You’ve removed, with the last standing vote, the provision for collective holdbacks. The last remaining piece of a holdback — of any type of accountability measure, of any type of consequence for not doing your job — is this piece.

The minister can correct me if I’m wrong, but it sounds like the minister has been saying, several times now, that if one minister thinks that they’re going to be overspending, there’s the ability either for Treasury Board to just go into deficit to top up that minister or for a different minister, who might be underspending on their budget, to do their fellow cabinet minister a solid and do an internal transfer, with the approval of cabinet and Treasury Board, from one ministry over to the other, to make sure that everyone can get their 10 percent raises that year. The minister won’t call it a raise. The public will probably think of it as a raise, in that case.

Can the minister confirm that there is nothing in this to prevent ministers from helping out a fellow minister to collect their holdback by doing internal transfers between ministries to make sure that all of them wind up hitting their number, regardless of what was going on?

Hon. S. Robinson: The fundamental thing here is about expectations of a minister managing to their budget, and the expectation is that they will manage to their budget. They ought to, and my colleagues, I believe, can and will do that.

[4:05 p.m.]

It’s very different when you’re faced with a pandemic or any other global crisis. You have falling revenues, or you’re anticipating falling revenues. You need to have massive investments, massive amounts of COVID relief, in order to keep people as whole as possible. Then penalizing a cabinet for making the right decision, I think, is a problem. They shouldn’t be penalized for making the right decision in that context. So it is very, very different in terms of understanding and expectations about decision-making.

The member may not know that cabinet ministers can’t sort of do one-offs because they help a friend out. That’s not how it works. There is a process, and they need to be able to make the case for where in their budget things haven’t been working. They have to come to Treasury Board.

There is a process. It’s not one supporting one another. There is an accountability mechanism internally, in order to understand why there is a change or why there is a change in demand for more budget resource. So there is an internal process for making that happen, if that’s what’s needed. It isn’t always accommodated. I can put that forward as a Finance Minister.

P. Milobar: To be clear, there is nothing in the amendments — there is nothing in the existing act — that prevents ministers from coming to an agreement to transferring within themselves to make sure that each minister can officially not be in a deficit position within their ministry, and be able to collect their 10 percent holdback — the only holdback that is remaining in this whole bill?

Hon. S. Robinson: The votes are the votes. They can’t do that.

P. Milobar: I’m confused, then. Could the minister clarify? Earlier, several times, she’s alluded to…. It makes for ministers to work together, and if one’s starting to feel pressure within their ministry, within their mandate that they were supposed to spend, others can help. It leads to….

Those were some of the answers she was giving the Leader of the Third Party. So I’m just confused. Which is it? We’ve heard two totally different versions of how ministers are to operate with their budgets.

Hon. S. Robinson: What the member might not be aware of is that when there is a change, if there is a need of a resource — for example, in Health, there is an anticipated challenge — then the minister has to come before Treasury Board to see if they can access contingencies in order to make something happen that was a priority. So there is a whole process that needs to happen in order to deliver additional resources, so that the minister can deliver more service.

However, if that’s the case, and a decision is made to support that ministry with those resources, it might mean that another minister that was hoping that they could access contingencies can’t, because there is just no more contingency. That’s the challenge that any Finance Minister has when someone overspends in some way. It means that we might not be able to deliver on some other service, or deliver on some other crisis or challenge that may materialize in any given year.

That is why we have contingencies, in case some things do come up in any given year, so that you have the ability to respond to British Columbians. This is always the tension. It’s, I think, every Finance Minister’s challenge that they have through all the years, and right across the nation as well.

P. Milobar: We operate in a pretty dog eat dog world of politics, even within own parties, where you have back benchers that are eyeing up ministerial seats and would love to be a minister, and think that ministers’ roundabout answers and things of that nature maybe aren’t cutting it and wish that they had that job and could do a better job. You have ministers that wish they were ministers of other portfolios.

It’s human nature. It happens in every workplace. You have people that want to get up into the management ranks or not, or get a promotion and maybe think that their co-worker didn’t deserve that promotion. That’s not that uncommon.

[4:10 p.m.]

In fact, I mean, even the former Finance Minister…. You know, the minister talks about the holdbacks as if it leads to bad decision-making, especially because of the pandemic. Well, this is what Carole James said on July 28 of 2020: “We felt the priority needed to be on putting together recovery for people in this province, and that’s where we put our focus.” Why they didn’t change the holdbacks.

We spent the better part of a little over two hours here talking about holdbacks today on the back end of COVID, which we all hope we’re on. Not on the front end. July 2020 was right in the thick of things. So priorities can change. Perspectives can change from minister to minister.

I guess the question is: is the minister suggesting that the remaining 10 percent holdback…? Apparently the first 10 percent, which we just saw get repealed retroactively, was for bad decision-making. This is for good accountability decision-making, this 10 percent.

Would it be fair, though, to say that if you’re perpetually an underperforming minister, the threat of being replaced, the threat of being demoted, the threat of being moved out of cabinet, which comes with a 50 percent pay bump over what an MLA makes, should rightly be all the motivation you actually need if you’ve already gutted out all of the other accountability measures as they relate to the financial part of your job as a minister? The need to be not in deficit is gone until at least 2025. The holdback to work as a collective group is gone permanently.

There are still more than enough ways to ensure that a minister…. Surely we can entrust a minister of the Crown, with all those other back pressures of job performance, to do their job. What is the purpose? We have an act that is 11 clauses, and we’re amending one, two, three, four, five, six, seven — at least seven — eight, nine, ten…. We’re amending everything in it.

At what point will the minister just not admit that this government doesn’t want to adhere to a balanced budget and ministerial accountability? Everything we’re dealing with here is to gut that legislation. Yet now we’re coming up, and the minister is clinging to justification for why a holdback is the holy grail of ministerial accountability after two hours of saying the exact opposite.

I’ll go back. I’ve asked this question similar ways. Why the charade? Why not just tell people: “We have no plan on being out of deficit. We’re not going to have any holdbacks on our ministers. We’re making sure that happens”? We can go back in Hansard and find several different times the minister has alluded to the fact that will happen for her ministerial colleagues. You can go now to Treasury Board and ask for any sum of money — ask to make that minister whole so they can get their holdback — because you’re allowed to be in deficit.

This bill was all interconnected. It’s not anymore. Why was the bill just not repealed? Why is the minister clinging to this last 10 percent holdback as some grand accountability measure for her cabinet?

Hon. S. Robinson: I think it’s really important to make a distinction between meeting a budget and setting a budget. With this change, ministers can collectively decide whether it’s appropriate to run a deficit in order to invest in British Columbians and meet their needs and provide the services that they need. Once the budget is set — once it is set, and it’s voted on in this House — ministers are still responsible for staying within their voted budget, and that’s a fair expectation.

[4:15 p.m.]

Now, the member is smiling and looking a little churlish over there. I’m not quite sure what part of that he doesn’t understand. I think the public understands the difference between making a collective decision to say we need to go into deficit because we have major flooding, have significant challenges around a pandemic…. There is a significant crisis that needs significant resources, and we, collectively, are going to make a decision that we are going to engage in deficit spending in order to help people get through this difficult time. And this is how we’re going to do that.

The expectation for the minister is: “You, Minister A, are going to be delivering these services. This is what it’s going to cost, so here’s your budget.” The expectation is that they’re going to be making those decisions within that context in order to deliver that service. That’s, I believe, a way to hold everyone responsible for what the decision is and what their commitments are to the people of British Columbia.

P. Milobar: Well, I chuckled because the minister seems to forget about the billions of dollars of unallocated contingency funds in her budget.

Could the minister clarify, then, that if a minister was overspending in their budget and needed to go to Treasury Board, as long as it was within the envelope of that passed budget, the approved budget that comes through this chamber, and as long as it has allocated contingency funds — cabinet, Treasury Board, the minister, likely just the minister…? We’ll get to that in clause 11 of this bill. Treasury Board could approve the extra dollars and still be within this funding envelope that just got approved, the overall funding envelope, because there are billions of dollars of unallocated dollars in the budget.

Is that a funding avenue available to ministers to convince the Finance Minister, the Premier, the Treasury Board, the cabinet to release some of those contingency funds, unallocated contingency funds, to ensure that whatever minister it is that’s making the pitch would then be no longer in deficit for their ministry for that fiscal year and would be eligible for their 10 percent holdback?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, the member may not appreciate the role of Treasury Board in making sure that any decisions that they make have to fit within certain parameters. Any minister who has come up against a crisis or an unusual circumstance — that is why we have contingencies, that all governments have contingencies.

It’s related to, certainly…. I’ll speak to the pandemic and recovery contingencies, which is the larger contingency that we have. It has to be pandemic recovery–related.

Again, I know that the members of this House can appreciate things continue to change and evolve. Certainly, if I can speak to last fall with the changing nature and how to stand up extra clinics if we needed to do vaccination, it’s having that pandemic and recovery contingency available so that when the Health Minister said, “We need to stand up vaccine clinics, and this is how much it’s going to cost,” or “We need to have additional people in long-term care, making sure that everyone is safe,” we need to have some budget access.

We created that contingency to make sure that we had the ability to be flexible and adaptable based on what was happening in the moment. So it’s within that context that we have the pandemic and recovery contingencies.

[4:20 p.m.]

It’s the same thing for businesses. As they were required to be closed because of public health — making sure that we could help businesses through the relatively short period of time. I’m grateful it was a relatively short period of time that they could get a grant to help them to pay some of their bills.

It’s within that context that we had ministers making a case for how they would use the money, in what ways they would use the money and how they would be accountable for the money so that they could deliver the services that British Columbians count on.

P. Milobar: Well, I guess it’s fitting that the minister went to the pandemic fund. Just like that answer, I’m hard pressed to find anything that the government doesn’t point to the pandemic, over the last two years, as a reason for something. So I think a minister would probably be able to figure out some reasonable way to find some reason to need that so that they could actually get their 10 percent holdback and ensure that they get their pay bump for that fiscal year.

The question, though, was really about the ability to tap into those excess funds, because the minister, in a previous answer, made it sound like once the budget is set and voted on, that’s the envelope of money, and no, ministers still need to manage within their own money, and it’s not as simple as saying that there are some excess funds to tap into through Treasury Board and that.

I guess the question to the minister, then, is would the minister have to go to all of Treasury Board and have all of…? Is Treasury Board designed to be that firewall, to be that sounding board to make sure that a large portion of cabinet and some other members within government are putting a look and a broad set of eyes on that decision about whether or not a minister should get a little bit of change in their budgetary area and their mandate so that they can actually ensure that they are still meeting the test of collecting their 10 percent holdback?

Does that have to be done by all of Treasury Board? Is that what makes it a stronger firewall — having those types of decisions funnel through that larger body and making sure that there are multiple eyes and multiple opinions discussing it?

Hon. S. Robinson: Treasury Board is the body that takes a look at any requirements for resources. Even if a member of cabinet wanted to use existing dollars and move it to some other program, it still needs to come before Treasury Board, because Treasury Board has a corporate look at what’s happening. Our practice is that not only does it go to Treasury Board to be ratified, but we’ll also take it to cabinet.

P. Milobar: It sound like the minister is saying that the firewall — the good-governance, good-decision firewall — from a minister potentially overspending, from a minister needing top-up money to get their holdback is Treasury Board, which consists of a large portion of cabinet and other voices from within government MLA ranks, and then cabinet itself.

The Treasury Board piece is the strength of that collective skill set of diverse opinions, ideas and ministerial responsibilities looking at the request and putting it in the context of other things going on within the overall budget. That process with Treasury Board is meant to be the firewall to ensure that the integrity of this 10 percent holdback is met with good decision-making by ministers.

[4:25 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: I believe I answered that, and it’s correct.

Clauses 4 to 6 inclusive approved.

On clause 7.

P. Milobar: I thought, since this is the last clause being amended in the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act, I should probably stand up and correct the record for my own comment just a few minutes earlier. I referenced that every section of the act was being amended, which seemed a little ridiculous to still even keep the act in place, when in fact, I notice that this is amending section 8 in the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act, and there are actually nine clauses in the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act.

I just wanted to correct the record — that, in fact, we were only amending eight of nine clauses in the act, not all nine.

Clauses 7 to 10 inclusive approved.

On clause 11.

P. Milobar: This is the clause that deals with changing the Financial Administration Act and amending it, essentially, to delegate Treasury Board to enable the Finance Minister or the chair or vice-chair — I believe the Environment Minister is currently the vice-chair — to essentially be able to make decisions that Treasury Board would normally make, make them in isolation of Treasury Board, and proceed things forward.

Can the minister explain why the need to bring this forward and essentially give her the ability and the power to unilaterally make decisions around things like transferring dollars to make sure a minister stays whole so they can get their holdback, when she just literally, three minutes ago, said that the designed firewall for good governance is all of Treasury Board reviewing and discussing and engaging and looking and making those collective decisions?

Hon. S. Robinson: The amendment will help streamline some of the work of Treasury Board, especially for minor but urgent items. It’s not easy to get everyone together in an urgent fashion. So what I think is really important for the member to understand is that it’s the Treasury Board itself that will determine what can be delegated. So the Treasury Board will understand, in terms of what kinds of items can be delegated.

[4:30 p.m.]

As well, the Treasury Board will prescribe how decisions that are delegated get reported back to Treasury Board. At the end of the day, Treasury Board has full confidence and gets to…. They’re the final arbiter of how those decisions get made, and everything gets reported back to them.

P. Milobar: The minister, I believe, even in second reading comments, had referred to minor things. Is there anything in this change, this clause, that caps either the fiscal or the amount of years of a commitment or any of the decision-making that the minister may be able to do? Is there anything that actually defines what the minister keeps referring to as minor decisions?

Hon. S. Robinson: There’s nothing in the legislation that has a cap. It is up to Treasury Board to make the determination about what can be delegated.

P. Milobar: Treasury Board will be the sole decider of what powers the chair or the vice-chair may have. They could have full powers, or this could just be nothing more than enabling legislation. Is there anything in here to prevent Treasury Board from granting full powers to the chair or the vice-chair, other than where it’s about the regulation in (6)?

Hon. S. Robinson: This is really about making the business of Treasury Board work more efficiently. Treasury Board is not abandoning their responsibilities and doesn’t have an interest in doing that. This is about Treasury Board determining which items can be delegated for a decision, with the chair and/or the vice-chair, so that decisions can be made quickly.

They will also be determining how those decisions get reported back to Treasury Board so that Treasury Board has all the information, from a corporate perspective, of any decisions that the chair or vice-chair has made, given the delegated authority.

P. Milobar: Is there anything in this that would compel Treasury Board to release publicly what those new provisions and powers would be for the chair and the vice-chair to be able to action?

Hon. S. Robinson: The short answer is no. The board will be the ones to decide which items can be considered by the chair or the vice-chair and will decide the reporting structure that will go back to the Treasury Board, as the ultimate arbiters of the decision-making.

P. Milobar: Well, it sounds like a wonderful place, where everyone has an equal voice at the table and everyone comes to the same conclusion and moves forward, and there’ll be hearty, robust discussion about the powers that the Finance Minister should or shouldn’t have.

Political realities in Canada being what they are, Premiers’ offices and Prime Ministers’ offices wield a heck of a lot of power and influence in government. They control, as the minister said earlier, who’s in cabinet and who’s not, who’s on Treasury Board and who’s not, who has profile or not. They control a whole heck of a lot. They could also pretty much make it clear, through the Premier’s office, what powers the minister will or will not have delegated to them by Treasury Board, especially given that this is a piece of legislation.

[4:35 p.m.]

This isn’t just a one-off. This doesn’t expire when this minister is no longer the minister. This is how Treasury Board would be designed to operate moving forward.

It’s probably a bit of a broken-record question, given the lack of detail in so many different bills, but why not have the definition of what the new powers on something as critical as the fiscal responsibility…? And as we heard from the minister, the importance of having that group decision-making to firewall the decisions, to make sure that the financial interests are being examined properly, that projects are being approved properly on their merit, not just on a political whim…. Why was there no certainty and clarity?

There’s quite a bit of certainty and clarity when I read through the Financial Administration Act on how Treasury Board is supposed to operate, how they’re supposed to interact with the comptroller general. A lot of certainty, a lot of clarity. Nothing here.

Why do we not have a better sense of what powers and authorities would be delegated to the minister? The minister has said, repeatedly, minor. She must have some idea of the power she would like to have extra. Why is there no certainty and clarity on something as fundamentally important to the overall spending and operation and decision-making of government as Treasury Board on an amendment like this?

Hon. S. Robinson: I just want to read into the record the powers and functions and duties of the Treasury Board, which is section 4(1):

“The Treasury Board must act as a committee of the Executive Council in matters relating to the following: (a) accounting policies and practices; (b) government management practices and systems; (c) government financial management and control, including expenditures and assets; (d) evaluation of government programs as to economy, efficiency and effectiveness; (e) government personnel management; (f) other matters referred to it by the Executive Council.”

That’s already in there.

What we’re saying is that, at times, there are situations that require expediency or you’re not able to get your members of the Treasury Board together in a timely manner in order to move a project forward to the next stage or respond to an opportunity that might be presenting itself that has a deadline. The Treasury Board members can create a framework that says: “Under these circumstances, we can give authority to the chair and vice-chair, and we expect them to come back within this time frame, within this context, in order to report back the decision that was made and how it was made and in what context.”

Ultimately, all of this comes back to Treasury Board.

P. Milobar: Well, they may make it that way. But, the point being, they may not. The legislation allows them to not have to do it that way. That’s how this minister would like to see it happen.

That’s why I’m asking this minister, based on this being her amendment on powers that she is seeking from Treasury Board, why there was not more certainty to limit those powers and circumstance.

The minister obviously has clearly thought through circumstances or has experienced it. The previous minister didn’t seem to have a problem with it, but the previous minister didn’t have a problem with the holdbacks either.

The confidence starts to be undermined, both with the answers around holdbacks, with a budget that gets delayed a month, with provisions that won’t be known, that Treasury Board will or won’t confer to the minister. This is a fundamentally significant change to how financial decision-making by any government of any political stripe will be moving forward — massively different.

To hear, because it might be in times of emergency, that cabinet members who just retroactively voted a pay raise find it difficult to get to a meeting in a timely fashion, to approve something that would help British Columbians in a time of crisis, is shocking.

[4:40 p.m.]

It’s shocking. If that was the power that was being asked for, it should just be spelled out that the minister is asking for the power to be conferred during a state of emergency or a natural disaster — to bypass Treasury Board. But that’s not what’s being asked for here. It’s open-ended.

The minister read section 4 of the act that this is amending, and section 4 of the act has three pieces to it right now. This adds a (4), (5), (6), (7) to it.

“The chair or vice chair to whom a power, duty or function is delegated may not delegate that power, duty or function to another person.” That makes a lot of sense. That’s clear. That’s (5).

“(6) Subsection (4) does not authorize the chair or vice chair to exercise an authority conferred on the Treasury Board to enact a regulation as defined in the Regulations Act.” That’s pretty clear. That restricts the powers.

“(7) Section 12 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act applies in relation to a power, duty or function delegated to the chair or vice chair as if the power, duty or function were exercised or performed by the Treasury Board.” That deals with everyone’s favourite thing, with privacy and information.

But (4) is the problem. The amendment: “The Treasury Board may delegate to the chair or vice chair of the Treasury Board any of the powers, duties or functions of the Treasury Board under any enactment.” So it’s not minor. It’s pretty serious. We wouldn’t have the membership on Treasury Board that we do if it weren’t meant to be, as the minister acknowledged in her previous section when I asked, that it could be that firewall of decision-making.

The other piece of the act that interrelates quite heavily, actually, with Treasury Board is the comptroller general’s office. Given the power that this change actually can create in section 4(4) and the financial oversight problems it could create, was the comptroller’s office consulted on this change of legislation?

Hon. S. Robinson: This has nothing to do with the comptroller general’s office. Again, I want to point out to the member that the Treasury Board may delegate, but the Treasury Board could choose to not delegate anything. They could choose to not delegate anything. So I think that this is about respecting members of Treasury Board, respecting their time, respecting their commitment, acknowledging….

There are times when there are questions that the Treasury Board tables. “You know what? This is the kind of decision that we didn’t need to come together for, that we would have delegated to the chair or the vice-chair — using their time to look at more significant decisions, where there needs to be some more robust discussion.”

An example I think about is a project that has already received Treasury Board blessing to move to the next phase. Does that really need to go to all of Treasury Board for more discussion? Or we’ve already heard from Treasury Board, they support the project moving forward, and it just needs to move to the next phase. There is an obligation to take it back to Treasury Board.

Building in the framework and the opportunity for Treasury Board to say: “Under these circumstances, the chair and vice-chair can make these decisions, and this is how they’re going to report back to Treasury Board….” It’s important that Treasury Board understand what decisions have been made. Again, this is really up to Treasury Board to make the determination of what they feel comfortable with.

[4:45 p.m.]

P. Milobar: Well, the comptroller general is linked in with Treasury Board, in fact, under “Duties of the comptroller general,” 9(e) in the act: “evaluate financial management throughout the government and recommend to the Treasury Board improvements considered necessary.”

I am asking: is this an improvement that the comptroller general thought was necessary?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, this has nothing to do with the comptroller general. The comptroller general has their own powers. This is about how Treasury Board makes decisions about what comes before the full board and what can be delegated to the chair and the vice-chair.

Treasury Board, having the responsibility, can make that determination. That’s what this is proposing — that they can make the determination to not only identify the criteria for what decisions can be delegated to the chair and the vice-chair. They also will determine, and can determine, how that gets reported back.

As the member alluded to the comptroller general, all of these decisions will go forward to the comptroller general as a package. In terms of how Treasury Board makes its decisions, that is unique to just the Treasury Board.

P. Milobar: Again, this is a…. I know the minister wants to slough this off as it’s just going to be minor if it’s even enacted or acted upon. It’ll be enacted, obviously, but whether or not it is acted upon is left up to question. I’ll remind the minister that the Milburn report on Site C actually pointed out lax Treasury Board oversight on a project that is now $16 billion. That was with full Treasury Board oversight.

Under this change, is there anything preventing Treasury Board, with this amendment, from saying: “Minister, vice-chair, you guys can solely…. We confer to you the ability to deal with Site C independently of Treasury Board. Just report back”?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, I want to remind the member that Treasury Board is a subcommittee of cabinet, and what we’re proposing here, again, is to make sure that the Treasury Board has the ability to make sure that it runs efficiently. When there are a lot of decisions to be made and lots of activity happening, then it can get challenging to work through and have the robust discussions, when you have a very full docket.

The Treasury Board having the ability to make some determination and put some parameter around those items that can be delegated to the chair and the vice-chair is good, I’ll say, organizational efficiency, making sure that we can continue to move forward on what one might consider minor items. Ones where, for example….

I’ll come back to a project that has received the blessing of Treasury Board, and it’s moving forward. It’s now going through the next phase. It needs to come back to Treasury Board, or they need to do a report back to Treasury Board. To bring the full board back to hear those reports, Treasury Board could say: “On the report backs, we’ll leave that to the chair or the vice-chair.”

Again, the mechanism that it still has to come back to Treasury Board and be reported out in some way provides the Treasury Board with the efficiency it needs and has the accountability still there, because it’s got to come back to Treasury Board in some framework.

[4:50 p.m.]

As well, our practice is to also take that to cabinet so that there are many opportunities for many eyes, many ears and many opinions.

P. Milobar: However, the decision would’ve been made, the project would be proceeding, and authorizations would be given by the time it’s reported back to Treasury Board, with this amendment, because it’s conferring the power and the functions.

“The Treasury Board may delegate to the chair or vice chair of the Treasury Board any of the powers, duties or functions….” It sounds an awful lot like approvals, and the minister keeps downplaying: “It could be minor. It might not even be actioned. It’s just an extra tool for us.”

The question to the minister. Who asked for this tool? It hasn’t appeared before. Was it Treasury Board that asked for this tool? Was it the minister that asked for this tool? Was it the Premier’s office that asked for this tool? Who exactly was clamouring and wanting this amendment put in that opens the door and gives the ability for the Finance Minister to be the sole decider of things happening at Treasury Board?

Hon. S. Robinson: I provided examples to the member about how active the Treasury Board is, whether it’s new programs, a change in programs, reports back. There’s lots of demand — I think that’s the word — on Treasury Board time.

Being able to delegate…. Again, it’s Treasury Board that gets to do the delegation. It’s the full board that gets to have the discussion about what would be appropriate to delegate, what would be appropriate to not delegate, what the expectations are of the board that would need to come to the full board and what parameters would be used to make the determination about what doesn’t need to go to the full board.

That is a discussion of the full Treasury Board, as well as how that will get fed back in and what the timeliness would be, around getting those decisions back to Treasury Board and how that would play out. That’s work that the Treasury Board would need to do. This amendment gives the Treasury Board the ability to do that work so that it can be a more efficient body.

P. Milobar: Of the last few questions, neither has been actually answered. The first one that wasn’t answered was whether or not this gives the Treasury Board the ability to say that a project like Site C is now under the purview of the chair and the vice-chair. Just report back. That was the first question: was it avoided?

The second question, the most recent question, was: who asked for this? There have been answers from the minister that makes it sound like this might not even be actioned by Treasury Board. One would assume they must have discussed something like this ahead of time, that there are some thoughts as to how it could be utilized as a tool.

We’re not going to know. We’re not going to have a release. We’re not going to find out what the new powers will be, despite the fact that existing powers are very clearly spelled out in a public legislative document. As to changes moving forward to how much power the Finance Minister does or doesn’t have as the chair of Treasury Board, those will be kept secret.

The best we can get for an answer from the minister today is: “Well, it might not actually get used, and it will probably only be used for minor things. There’s really not too much to worry about because Treasury Board will decide that anyway.” It has already been taken to task for lax oversight on a very large capital project. “Well, we didn’t really even bother talking to the comptroller general, because he doesn’t really have any say in anything like this anyway” — even though he’s kind of supposed to be the oversight for financial controls.

[4:55 p.m.]

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that you haven’t checked with the Auditor General either, on whether they think this is a good idea. It’s not that they control Treasury Board. I understand that, to make it clear to the minister. But you would think that you might want to get some of their professional advice on what they think might be good governance practice ahead of time on something as fundamental as this.

I go back to the most recent question. Who asked for it? Was it the Premier’s office? Was it the Finance Minister? Was it Treasury Board?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, this is a tool to help the Treasury Board be more efficient in its work and, as well, I think, be more effective in its work, in that it can focus on the stuff that, I would suggest, would be more important to have debate over when there’s a variety of opinion. The Treasury Board would make the determination about which projects — what kinds of projects, what kinds of decisions — could be delegated. Each Treasury Board will have its own framework that it works within.

Again, the way that this legislation is written is that “Treasury Board may delegate….” So that’s a choice of Treasury Board. Not only is it a choice of whether or not to delegate, but if they are going to delegate, of what parameters, and what that looks like coming back — how that gets reported back to Treasury Board.

I believe I have answered the questions around what the role is and what the opportunities are. This is just about creating a tool, should the Treasury Board find that it would be useful, especially around what, I would suggest, would be more timely decisions that need to be made.

P. Milobar: Well, I’ll take from that answer that they may be able to confer the power, to be the sole Site C oversight, into the hands of the minister. But the minister has not answered the question. The question has not been, the last couple of times, about what powers, the magnitude of the powers….

We’re talking about changes that the minister has acknowledged will not be made public once they’re made, which is astounding, because if Treasury Board makes the decision to fund things, those announcements get made. When Treasury Board decides to fund something — to build a project — it’s not done in a silo. There is an announcement: “Oh, at some point in the future, we’re building something.”

[J. Tegart in the chair.]

My concern is that the new powers the minister will have are going to be decided in isolation by Treasury Board. That has been well established by the minister. I get that. But they’re not going to be made public. The reason there’s a concern is that we can’t even get a direct answer, from the minister, on who asked for this.

The question is very straightforward. Who requested it? Who got the legislative drafting going on this? Who wanted clause 11 in Bill 6 created? Was it the Premier’s office? Was it the Finance Minister? Was it Treasury Board?

[5:00 p.m.]

The Chair: Minister.

Hon. S. Robinson: Welcome back, Madam Chair.

Again, the final arbiter of all of this is really the Treasury Board. As chair of Treasury Board, making sure that the work of the Treasury Board can be done efficiently and effectively and using the talents and the skills of those that sit around that table well is, I think, critically important.

Giving the Treasury Board the ability to have a delegating authority that it sees fit and — again, I want to emphasize — that the Treasury Board members see fit…. They have a responsibility, and there are times when it’s wisest to come before the full board. It’s already been blessed. It needs to go through the next phase.

Does it need to be fully reviewed with all the same voices, or can it be delegated to the chair or the vice-chair for them to move it through to the next phase with a mechanism so that it comes back to Treasury Board so that Treasury Board understands, sort of, what stage it is in?

That’s really, I think, what this is about. It’s about making sure that a body of the cabinet, a subcommittee of cabinet, continues to do its work and that it can do its work efficiently and effectively.

P. Milobar: Let’s try this again with no preamble. Who asked for clause 11 in Bill 6, the Budget Measures Implementation Act, to be drafted and inserted this year into this bill? Was it the Premier’s office? Was it the Finance Minister? Was it Treasury Board?

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, I will say to the member that making sure that Treasury Board works efficiently and effectively is really important. We have feedback from our colleagues about what their frustrations are. I technically sign off on it, because as Finance Minister, this is a bill that I have to sign off on if there are any changes.

I want to assure the member that this is something that we have witnessed as, at times, being challenging. In order to get through all the work of Treasury Board, this is a tool to help us be more effective and more efficient.

P. Milobar: I didn’t ask who signed off. I asked: who asked for it to be drafted, and who felt the need that this was missing? Was it the Premier’s office? Was it the minister? Was it Treasury Board?

Hon. S. Robinson: I believe I’ve answered the question.

P. Milobar: With respect, the minister has not answered the question. It’s a very clear and straightforward question. It was not about who signed off. Obviously, the minister signed off on things in a bill that she is sponsoring. Whether she wanted to sign off or not is not up for debate. That is not the question.

The question was: who felt the need? Who said: “This is an important piece that we need to have done, that we need to get drafted, that we need to get inserted into this year’s budget act”? Was it the Premier’s office? Was it the minister? Was it Treasury Board?

Hon. S. Robinson: I signed off on the bill, which makes it my bill. If the member has a hard time understanding how that happens, perhaps we can spend another 45 minutes talking about how that happens as well.

P. Milobar: Thank you. Challenge accepted.

It’s a very simple question. I don’t understand the hesitancy to answer it. Then the minister is going to wonder why we have concerns that an amendment that will have the ability to give her complete control of Treasury Board, if Treasury Board so chooses to give her, but she won’t have to report out that that change has been made…. She wonders why the public — why good governance principles are at stake with something like this.

[5:05 p.m.]

I’ll ask again a very straightforward, clear question. Who wanted this drafted and created to put in this bill — drafted, created, not signed off on — the Premier’s office, the minister or Treasury Board? I’m not asking for their motivation. I’m just asking who asked for it to be started and initiated.

Hon. S. Robinson: Again, I, as a minister, as the chair of Treasury Board…. Let’s start there, because I wear two hats. I’m the chair of the Treasury Board. I’m also the Finance Minister. As the chair of Treasury Board, I am responsible for making sure that that board runs efficiently and effectively, that it meets regularly, that I facilitate robust discussion.

There are times where there is either not enough time to have robust discussion or the decisions…. There’s frustration from the members about why it’s coming back to Treasury Board because there really isn’t the need. So it’s being responsive to some of the comments of Treasury Board and being responsive to my colleagues — and then, of course, as Finance Minister, having to sponsor bills. It’s two different hats.

The staff recommendation for consideration was identifying if there was delegated authority that would allow the Treasury Board to make the determinations and recommendations to the chair and vice-chair to have the ability to see some decisions made that would then come back to Treasury Board at a later date as part of their responsibility and report back — that that might be a way to facilitate the efficient and effective operations of Treasury Board. So this is a tool that Treasury Board can use, should they determine that that would be a more efficient and better functioning of the Treasury Board and their time.

The other thing I want to point out is that if at some point the Treasury Board felt that that wasn’t what they wanted, they could change that, because that would be within the purview of the entire Treasury Board as well.

P. Milobar: So 15 minutes, 20 minutes of multiple questions — a pretty straightforward question of: who suggested this go in? — and the best we come up with is: “Staff told me to do it.”

I can appreciate staff advise all the time. I think the public service is very professional, very skilled at what they do. I don’t take issue with that at all. It makes you question why the minister would take 20 minutes and five questions asked over and over again to come up with an answer like that, when the same staff that would have advised that are sitting around advising what the answers should be to the five questions.

If that’s the case…. What I’m hearing is that the minister was feeling frustrated that Treasury Board didn’t want to meet because it was too inconvenient during emergencies, so she wants to try to streamline things a little. Staff came up with a way to streamline things. Why is there not, then — back to an earlier question — more detail into the types of powers that the minister actually wants, as opposed to any of the powers, any of the duties and any of the functions of Treasury Board?

Hon. S. Robinson: Well, it’s rather disappointing to see how the member decides to characterize what I’ve described as making sure that we’re respectful of people’s time, that we are efficient and that we are getting through a large body of work. It’s very, very disappointing. However, I will say that I have already answered the member’s question.

[5:10 p.m.]

S. Furstenau: Once again, it’s very interesting to listen to this debate back and forth. I keep hearing the words “efficiency” and “doing things efficiently.” One of the most foundational principles of representative parliamentary democracy is actually inefficiency. It’s actually about having more oversight, more transparency and more accountability for decisions that are being made, not less.

The minister said that the Treasury Board is a subcommittee of cabinet, but it also includes non-cabinet members. That’s some parliamentary oversight of executive decision-making. That’s important. How a government spends money is how it exercises power. To hear the Minister of Finance over and over and over again justify transferring that enormous power, providing the capacity in this bill to transfer, to delegate, that enormous power to two people because of efficiency is actually the opposite of what democracy is supposed to be.

I’ve stood up a lot in the last 18 months and talked about democracy in this place because I’m worried about it. I raised this during the briefing. I am alarmed. I am deeply alarmed by this trend of this government towards more and more and more efficiency.

Oh yeah, there are governments that are incredibly efficient because they don’t have to answer to parliaments. They don’t have to bring their legislation forward. They don’t have to have oversight and accountability and transparency. That’s extremely efficient.

Maybe you think, on the other side: “Oh, this is too much. She’s being hysterical. She’s taking this too far.” I wonder whether these decisions are being contemplated about the future of this democratic institution and the implications for that future. It’s not just this government that is providing itself the ability to delegate Treasury Board decision-making to two people. It’s every government after this government.

That is not a strengthening of democratic principles. That is a diminishing. So my question to the minister is: does she think that efficiency aligns with the work of a parliamentary democracy in this province?

[5:15 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: I listened carefully to what the member was speaking to. My argument to her is that when you have so many matters come before you, the risk is that you don’t get the depth on the matters that you need to in the way that you ought to around decision-making, because there are so many matters.

By the Treasury Board making a determination — not the Premier, not the Finance Minister, not the Treasury Board chair and vice-chair but the Treasury Board — making a decision or a recommendation around these matters, where we prefer to have the chair and vice-chair take a look so that we have the opportunity and the depth that is required on these really significant matters, so that we can take the time that we need for robust debate and discussion…

Rather than saying a project that’s already been discussed moving on to the next stage…. It has to come back to Treasury Board. But do we need to have the same discussion over again, or should we be having a more robust discussion on other items that demand attention?

This is really about giving the Treasury Board a tool that allows it to determine where it’s going to be focusing its energies and its deliberations so that it gets the full attention of the Treasury Board in a way that it deserves.

S. Furstenau: The minister didn’t specifically respond to the question around efficiency. Up until now, in almost every response to the critic from the official opposition, what the minister talked about was that this is about efficiency. Indeed, that’s what I was told in the briefing: this is about efficiency.

We are all elected here as representatives. Cabinet ministers, members of the executive, have an additional and enormous burden on them, a burden that they have to accept. They can say no: “Actually, I don’t want that burden.” They’re compensated for that burden. We’ve been talking about that.

I would expect and hope that the members of Treasury Board would recognize that additional burden of being on Treasury Board, of being at the table that makes the decisions about how money is spent in this province — which is, again, the greatest exercise of power — and that they would say: “I take that burden, and I understand that that means, for me, I am going to have to go deep on a lot of matters and on a lot of subjects.”

“That’s what I ran for office to do. That’s, when I accepted my cabinet position and when I accepted my role on Treasury Board…. When I said yes to that, I said yes to deeply understanding how money is being spent, because that’s my responsibility, my burden, back to the citizens that I serve.” Not: “Oh man, it’s a lot. Boy, I wish this could be more efficient.”

Again, I heard the minister’s response, but I am very concerned about this notion of efficiency being a driving principle in decision-making in this government and this Legislature. Efficiency means we get legislation that is a framework. It’s enabling legislation. It doesn’t have the information. It’s more efficient to make those decisions at cabinet. It’s more efficient to make them by regulation.

Efficiency means less transparency, less accountability. Efficiency means the public has less capacity to know, and now efficiency means delegating this decision. This capacity for decision-making allows the Treasury Board to delegate any of its powers or duties. As, again, the critic pointed out, we don’t know specifically which ones — any of them.

Then it’s covered by freedom of information. It means any information about the delegated activities must not be disclosed in an FOI request.

[5:20 p.m.]

Now, I understand that Treasury Board is already well protected under FOI legislation, but I really question why this government, this minister, consider this to be a required change to the legislation at a time like this. I will ask the minister again: is efficiency sufficient enough of a reason to make this change?

Hon. S. Robinson: I appreciate the member’s passion and, certainly, acknowledgment of the enormous burden. That’s why we’re leaving it up to Treasury Board to determine how it wants to do its due diligence and do its accountability and create the space that is needed to do that important work.

There are some decisions that come to Treasury Board that don’t require the same depth because of the nature of the decision or the nature of…. There have been historical deep discussions about various projects, and I’ll use report-backs as an example.

Does it require the same depth of discussion? Perhaps not. It really is up to Treasury Board to determine, again, what it wants, because there are many bodies around that table. As a body, it can determine what it wants to see before it and what decisions it is prepared to delegate to the chair and the vice-chair, recognizing that it will come back to Treasury Board, too, in some format, about how that decision played out. This is really about making sure that the Treasury Board members have the space to do their due diligence on the things that they identify that require it.

P. Milobar: The answers, earlier, to the Leader of the Third Party, really made it sound more “Woe is me,” not so much the minister, because the minister is not getting away from any responsibility. But everyone else on Treasury Board sure is. And gosh darn it, they’re just so hardoverworked…. It’s not fair. It’s not fair.

I had ministers on the standing vote for a retroactive pay raise say they deserve it because the Leader of the Official Opposition makes the same as a cabinet minister, but there’s no holdback. Those ministers work hard. Well, so does our leader. It doesn’t justify changing financial accountability. It doesn’t justify: “We work hard, so we want to try to slough off some of our responsibility at Treasury Board by handing the keys over to the minister.” Again, this isn’t about the Finance Minister, because this is handing the keys to the Finance Minister.

The problem is, in the previous section, that the Finance Minister reiterated, the two or three times that I asked, that Treasury Board is meant to be the firewall. This has no provisions to prevent that firewall from breaking down — none. The Treasury Board may delegate to the chair or vice-chair of the Treasury Board any of the powers, duties or functions of the Treasury Board under any enactment. Yes, the minister would have to report back to Treasury Board at some point that school district X, Y and Z were suddenly getting schools.

Again, we can try to pretend that we don’t know how governments work in Canada, in this chamber. We can try to pretend that Premiers and Prime Ministers don’t have a pretty strong voice as to how things operate within their government.

[5:25 p.m.]

We can try to pretend that a Premier’s office wouldn’t be able to pick up the phone, to the Finance Minister, and say: “We need this project and this project moving now.” We’ve seen it. We know what happens. Guarantee it’s happened under this government. That’s how our system is structured, which is why the firewalls are all the more important.

It sounds like the minister, on the advice of staff, has developed a tool to give her more power but didn’t see fit to tell us what that power will be and has not put anything in there to inform the public, moving forward, what that power will be, despite the fact that it’s amending a Financial Administration Act, which is pages and pages and pages long — 88.

It deals with all sorts of powers and regulations. A whole section around Treasury Board powers and regulations. No detail on this amendment, though. None needed. The problem with that is the act gives an insight into how Treasury Board is structured and the powers that it has, its decision-making powers, and how it’s going to move forward with things in a general sense. This amendment removes all of that.

This amendment, by the minister’s own admission, says that the minister may have whatever power Treasury Board has, does not have to justify it — only in a report of some fashion back to Treasury Board after decisions have already been made because, gosh darn it, Treasury Board’s busy. They work. They work hard.

I didn’t realize we have more hours in a day now than previous governments had. I didn’t realize our province exponentially expanded in growth. Cabinet has always been a very taxing, hours-long job, and staff usually work much longer hours than cabinet ministers. It doesn’t matter what party is in power. That’s always been the case.

As we’ve heard, the honour — the offset to all of the extra work and stress and responsibility and time — isn’t the pay. It’s the satisfaction in knowing you’re making a difference to your province and your communities. That’s why people are supposed to get into public service, be it on the staff side or on the elected side.

Why would the minister refuse to provide any sorts of limits to the powers that Treasury Board would be able to walk away from by conferring those responsibilities to the minister?

Hon. S. Robinson: As I’ve said over and over and over again, Treasury Board has these powers that are listed, and Treasury Board can make the decision based on what it determines its needs are and what it would prefer to see so that it can be both efficient and effective. I believe I’ve said that over and over again.

The Leader of the Third Party didn’t hear the “effective” part. I think that it’s both. Having an effective and efficient Treasury Board is good for the people of British Columbia. It means that we could work more efficiently in making decisions, on getting shovels in the ground.

We’re making up for lost time. There is still lots of work to be done. We’re a government that is very active. We have the largest capital plan ever — building schools, building hospitals, building roads.

There are lots of decisions that come through Treasury Board, so making sure that we can be as effective — emphasizing effective — and efficient as possible is, I think, in the best interests of British Columbians. The Treasury Board can make that determination, and that’s what this is. They already have the power to make the decisions. This is one more place where they can make a decision about how they can best organize themselves around making sure that we’re effective and efficient.

With that, I’m wondering if we might take a five-minute recess.

The Chair: We will recess for five minutes.

The committee recessed from 5:30 p.m. to 5:38 p.m.

[J. Tegart in the chair.]

P. Milobar: Just one more question on this. Again, I can appreciate the minister was wanting to try to…. I can only imagine. She’s the chair of the committee. She’s probably frustrated that things are slowed up because committee members aren’t able to avail themselves of meetings and things of that nature. We’ve had the member for North Coast say that Treasury Board has been a problem when it comes to recovery in Lytton and other disaster areas because it just takes too long.

It’s a shame that during natural disaster recovery, the members of Treasury Board didn’t feel compelled enough to have a little more haste in the work. The minister can get offended by that statement all she’d like, but she can take it up with her own member for North Coast. She’s the one that said Treasury Board is a hindrance or takes too long. I’m paraphrasing a little, but it was along the lines of “Treasury Board grinds things slowly,” and recovery is delayed because of that. That’s the parliamentary secretary for emergency response speaking.

[5:40 p.m.]

I get the frustration the minister might have that Treasury Board can’t be bothered, as members, to work more efficiently and meet in a timely fashion, especially in a time of emergency and recovery. But the work ethic, or lack thereof, doesn’t justify changing the rules to create unlimited authority for the Finance Minister or the vice-chair — in this case, the Environment Minister — developed in a backroom, actioned without the public knowing what those new powers are, how they’ll apply. That doesn’t justify it.

Based on the backdrop of those frustrations that we’ve heard in various answers, to myself and the Leader of the Third Party, why was there just not a restructuring or a discussion with Treasury Board members about the importance of the role and the job and the urgency that they should be actually trying to do the job with versus trying to actually change legislation that’s served very well for a long time, in terms of being that firewall, as the minister even acknowledged in previous answers?

Hon. S. Robinson: I do have to say how disappointing it is to hear from another member — to choose to characterize and attribute feelings and emotions to other members that are, first of all, inaccurate and, second of all, just completely disrespectful of how hard my colleagues work.

Certainly, for me, that’s far more frustrating than anything I do in cabinet or anything that I do in Treasury Board. I think that those kind of characterizations are really disrespectful of all of my colleagues around the Treasury Board table, who work hard every single day to make the right decisions on behalf of British Columbians.

Again, I will remind the member that Treasury Board already has these powers, as a body, and what we’re saying is that if the Treasury Board chooses to delegate because it makes sense for them to delegate so that it can be the best body it can be, then this is an opportunity and this is a tool for it to use when it makes sense for them to use it.

They will still be ultimately responsible for the decisions that are made, because that is the responsibility of Treasury Board, and there will be a report-back mechanism built in as part of that so that they’re fully aware of decisions that are being made. Ultimately, those individuals, my colleagues who sit around the table, at the end of the day, are responsible for all the decisions that come out of Treasury Board.

Division has been called.

[5:45 p.m. - 5:55 p.m.]

Clause 11 approved on the following division:

YEAS — 52
Alexis	Anderson	Bailey
Bains	Beare	Begg
Brar	Chandra Herbert	Chant
Chen	Chow	Conroy
Coulter	Cullen	Dean
D’Eith	Donnelly	Dykeman
Eby	Elmore	Farnworth
Fleming	Glumac	Greene
Heyman	Kahlon	Kang
Leonard	Lore	Ma
Malcolmson	Mark	Mercier
Osborne	Paddon	Popham
Ralston	Rankin	Rice
Robinson	Routledge	Routley
Sandhu	Sharma	Simons
Sims	A. Singh	R. Singh
Starchuk	Walker	Whiteside
	Yao
NAYS — 25
Banman	Bernier	Cadieux
Clovechok	Davies	de Jong
Doerkson	Furstenau	Halford
Kyllo	Lee	Letnick
Merrifield	Milobar	Morris
Oakes	Olsen	Paton
Ross	Rustad	Shypitka
Stewart	Stone	Sturdy
	Wat

On clause 12.

The Chair: Does the minister wish to introduce their new staff?

[6:00 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: I have Renée Mounteney, my ADM for policy and legislation division; Steve Hawkshaw, who’s my tax guy; and Brayden Gulka-Tiechko. He’s here. I want to thank staff for being here to support me.

P. Milobar: I’m glad we’ve switched topics — so that I don’t feel like it’s because of me that we’ve switched staff.

On this Carbon Tax Act…. I know the minister was maybe getting frustrated with some of my questions in the discussion earlier on. But I would point out to the viewers at home, that this is a 133-section bill, and we’re on section 12. Have no fear. I’m not intending that it’s going to be an extrapolation of the time to get us to 12 so far. There are lot of sections that are fairly standard, ones that we would see in a regular year. That’s my understanding, anyway. I’ll have very quick questions on some of them, just to clarify that.

The ones that we’ve been spending time on are the new provisions in the bill. It is important that we spend an appropriate time on some things that are very fundamentally important to the way government will operate financially, moving forward — in my opinion, anyway — to make sure there’s a clear understanding. Legislative changes do live on past ministers. Governments come and go, ministers come and go. So it’s important that we have a broad idea of that concept that’s being presented.

In this case, this is the Carbon Tax Act. It appears to me just to deal with appeal provisions. Now, there are similar appeal provisions smattered throughout this bill in terms of the corrections or the language. Maybe the minister can just give an overview on (a) what this appeal provision is trying to accomplish, and (b) if that’s similar to all of the other references to tax appeals throughout the bill. That way I will know to go much more quickly through those sections as well.

Hon. S. Robinson: The proposed section deems a notice of appeal to be given on the date it is received by the minister, if received at a location and by a manner specified by the minister. It’s so that there is more clarity. This is going to be standard throughout, so that we are making sure that we’re consistent.

P. Milobar: Just at a quick glance, it looks like clauses 12 through 18 are all similar in terms of different acts, but the same premise of what it’s accomplishing.

Hon. S. Robinson: Yes, that’s correct.

Clauses 12 to 26 inclusive approved.

On clause 27.

P. Milobar: Just to clarify that I’m reading this right, in 27, the following part is part 16, the clean buildings tax credit, I’m assuming. If I could just get a clarification on that — that that’s the section we are now in.

Hon. S. Robinson: It’s the Income Tax Act, and we’re dealing with the clean buildings tax credit.

P. Milobar: Thank you. I thought that’s what the following part added and was referring to. I just wanted to make sure before I was off and running with questions on the wrong clause.

[6:05 p.m.]

This appears to be dealing with making sure there is definition and understanding around some clean energy renovation tax credits for people. However, I do notice that there are still things that will be left to regulation. By that, I mean the target EUI, in terms of an energy unit and how those targets will be met.

Can I get a little clarity from the minister? I mean, we have step code provisions, and we have other ways of measuring energy efficiency of homes. Why was there not already an understanding of the thresholds that houses would have to go, from one energy efficiency rating, to improve by one or two units of measure of efficiency to qualify for the tax credit? It seems to be left to be fairly open-ended to future regulation.

Hon. S. Robinson: Madam Chair, I’d like to introduce Mark Gunther, who is here to help with this part of the legislation that we are dealing with.

We are dealing with many different building types, as well as in different parts of the province. It’s very technical in nature. That’s why it’s in regulation. It is very broad, and it changes, depending on where you are in the province. There is already some information available on the website that gives a sense of what the energy efficiency expectations are and will be.

P. Milobar: I’ll be bouncing around a bit, so I’ll try to be detailed as I can about where I am. This is a pretty long clause. It starts on page 6, and it ends halfway down page 12. There are quite a bit of various sections, but they’re all interconnected. Obviously, the staff would know that. They helped draft it.

On page 12, to the minister’s last answer, in 283, under “Power to make regulations,” it sounded like the minister said that, well, there are different types of buildings and that. But this sounds like those still have not been defined and that in fact that will be left to regulation. Is the minister saying that there’s an existing list of classifications, in terms of how the various buildings are being categorized?

[6:10 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: We’ve pulled a list from the guide to actually 100, which is a standard. We are setting, of course, a standard to encourage buildings to improve their energy efficiency. The intended categories and standards are already on the website of the revenue division of the Finance Ministry.

P. Milobar: It sounds like this is just strictly enabling the minister, through regulation, to be able to update, as, obviously, technologies or ratings or classifications modernize, which is bound to happen when you’re talking about energy efficiency and green technology. So that makes sense. I just wanted to clarify that.

In terms of the tax credits…. This would be 272 on page 7. I must admit I start to get a little convoluted when I read technical kind of legislative back-and-forth language of calculations, the way it gets worded out. As a layperson reading it, I see this as eligible expenses qualify for 5 percent tax difference.

Can I get clarification on this section in terms of…? I have a cost of $50,000 for energy efficiencies in my home. It’s just the portion of that $50,000 that would be deemed to be creating the energy efficiency, not the full $50,000. So $40,000 was for energy efficiency, and $10,000 was for new flooring. As an example, it would just be the 5 percent eligible of the $40,000 renovation costs.

Hon. S. Robinson: The member, I think, understands it well. The qualifying expenses will get the credit, and the non-qualifying expenses won’t get the credit.

P. Milobar: Thank you. Starting on page 6, it’s quite an extensive list for qualifying expenditures. Then it says what it does not include. I’m just wondering. This is about energy efficiency. So if you’re in an older home that’s in need of new windows and renovations and things of that nature, would this also qualify you…?

You have an old furnace. You need to replace that as well with some energy efficiency. Obviously, a new technology over a 30- or 40-year-old furnace would be much more efficient, but it still may be burning natural gas. If it’s much more efficient if it’s in conjunction with an upgrade of things like windows or draft prevention, things of that nature — more efficient fans for air movement, those types of things — would a modernized, combustible heating appliance qualify for the tax credit under this change in the legislation?

[6:15 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: If you’re removing something that is old and inefficient and replacing it with something that’s new and efficient, then that would qualify.

P. Milobar: Now I’ll jump forward a few sections with this question a bit, because it’s going to reference it. There’s no other way around it.

Later on, we’re seeing tax changes to fossil-fuel-burning appliances, yet these clauses would enable a tax credit for the replacement of a fossil-fuel-burning appliance as long as it was a more efficient model. On the one hand, we may see a tax increase. We’re also going to see a tax credit availability to people if they’re changing out their furnace?

Hon. S. Robinson: You get the tax credit, and jumping forward…. As the member suggested, we’ll have an opportunity to canvass that, but you would get the rebate as well.

P. Milobar: Reading through, I didn’t see any ceiling in terms of a value of renovations. So is there either a minimum or a maximum dollar value that has to be met or cannot be exceeded to qualify for the tax credit?

Hon. S. Robinson: I just want to take a moment to explain and remind those who might be watching and fascinated by this discussion of a bill that this tax credit really is about encouraging people to make our buildings more efficient so that we are not as hard on the environment and on the climate as we have been. So having a tax credit helps to inspire and encourage investments in reducing the carbon footprint of existing buildings, which we know contributes in a significant way.

There’s no maximum, because we want the owners of large buildings to invest to make sure that they are reducing the carbon footprint of their building. The minimum requirement the member had asked about…. There is a point at which it doesn’t make sense to even fill out the paperwork, if they spend so little that it doesn’t make any sense. So you don’t see a minimum or a maximum here in this legislation.

P. Milobar: Have there been any calculations done by the ministry in terms of the projected cost per tonne saved in terms of what the tax credits are going to cost us versus the amount of efficiency and, therefore, a drop in emissions that will be achieved? In other words, is it going to cost government $100 a tonne to provide this tax credit? Was the modelling $50 a tonne, $200 a tonne?

There must be some sort of a measurable target that’s hoped to be achieved by such an extensive change to tax credits. It goes part and parcel with a whole lot of other tax credits and initiatives, with trying to green thing up. But the one thing we hear a lot of times is that if it’s going to cost X amount of dollars, what is the actual tonnage? What bang for the buck are we getting for this? Was there any modelling done as to that?

[6:20 p.m.]

Hon. S. Robinson: We know that emission savings in older buildings are ours to be had. It’s a significant carbon footprint. In fact, I was just saying to staff it blew my mind when I learned that there are folks here in Victoria who are still on oil heating. That was from when I was a kid, and they still use that here in Victoria, and I was a kid a long time ago.

It’s really hard to measure, given we don’t know what people have, necessarily, and what they’re switching to. In advance, to know and to be able to predict and calculate and model is very, very difficult. Having said that, we are going to be monitoring, going forward, in terms of what tax credits get used and what efficiencies come out of that so that we are monitoring as we go forward with this tax credit.

P. Milobar: I appreciate the minister offering up a softball at the beginning of that answer, but I’m not going to take it. I’m old enough to know not to take it.

In terms of the tax credits, it appears that you would have to claim for it in the year immediately after the taxation year in which the taxpayer completes a qualifying retrofit. I’m just trying to get a sense. So we finish it all up in December of last year, 2021. I have to claim for it in 2022, or there are provisions where I could carry it forward to other years, depending on what my tax situation is in terms of most beneficial to me.

I know there is reference to an 18-month, but I’m just trying to get some understanding for the public as to how this is going to work in terms of the ability of taxpayers. Then I see we’ll likely be noting the hour.

Hon. S. Robinson: The member asked the question about when you can claim for the tax credit. If you finish the work in December ’21, you would claim it in the following tax year.

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

Motion approved.

The committee rose at 6:24 p.m.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

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

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

Hon. S. Robinson moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

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

The House adjourned at 6:25 p.m.