Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House resumed at 2 o’clock, p.m.

Mr. M. Shulman (High Park): On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, two days ago the Minister of the Environment (Mr. W. Newman) accused me of improper action in revealing certain materials to this Legislature and to the public.

Today, just a few minutes ago, I received two research papers, one from the Journal of the American Medical Association, and the other from the food research laboratories of the health protection branch of the Department of National Health and Welfare in Ottawa. The second one contains indisputable proof that animals that drink water containing asbestos have that asbestos penetrate the bowel and accumulate in the brain and other organs.

The first paper, from the AMA, states it found that the rate of cancer of the rectum is higher in areas that have a high asbestos content in the water. Their conclusion is that at this time, in 1974, no one can conclude that there is no cancer hazard related to drinking water that contains a high asbestos count, sir, and I suggest it is not only improper, but extremely dangerous, for the Minister of the Environment to mislead the public.

Mr. J. A. Renwick (Riverdale): Resign. There is no answer to a question of privilege.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I don’t see that as a question of privilege. It doesn’t prevent the member from doing anything or carrying out his duties as he sees them. As to the facts, I cannot rule on that.

Mr. J. N. Allan (Haldimand-Norfolk): Mr. Speaker, I would appreciate the assembly welcoming 75 students from the Port Dover Composite High School in the riding of Haldimand-Norfolk.

Hon. W. Newman (Minister of the Environment): Mr. Speaker, this is on a point of order, I guess. I think the hon. member for High Park, who rose on a point of privilege, was not in the House last night when I referred to three reports --

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): It is not a point of order -- it cannot be a point of order.

Hon. W. Newman: -- that were on my desk which indicated there was not any problem. I talked about it last night.

Hon. A. Grossman (Provincial Secretary for Resources Development): He listened to the member; let the member listen to him.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): He should make a ministerial statement.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Statements by the ministry.

OIL AND NATURAL GAS PRICES

Hon. W. D. McKeough (Minister of Energy): Mr. Speaker, I wish to comment briefly on a sequence of events having to do with oil and natural gas. Events have moved so fast that I fear all of the implications may not be fully appreciated.

Let me be specific. First: The federal government is not at present proceeding with its proposed Petroleum Administration Act, Bill C-32, which sought authority to set prices for oil and natural gas moving in international and interprovincial trade.

Second: The government of Alberta made certain concessions to producing companies in the matter of royalties and bundled into the statement an indication that Alberta would unilaterally increase oil prices, the implication being that the oil companies would gain greater returns and increase production, but not at the expense of Alberta revenues.

Third: The proposal that natural gas prices should be indexed to the price of oil seems to be gaining an increasing acceptance in Ottawa and the producing provinces. It carries the implication of very large increases in the price of natural gas, which would grow only more rapidly if oil prices are allowed to rise further from the current $6.50 level at the wellhead.

Fourth: There is a growing awareness that Canada will not produce enough oil or gas to meet our domestic requirements and that shortages will appear within this decade. Indeed, in terms of natural gas, present shortages are restricting the normal growth of demand.

I would urge hon. members to reflect quietly on these facts, these trends and developments.

There appears to be some easing of the tension between the federal government and the government of Alberta. That’s true, and it is desirable. But neither government apparently intends to reduce the amount of revenue that it is withdrawing from the petroleum industry. Instead, they are proposing that more money should be divided; that implies that the price must rise. So Alberta and Ottawa are moving to resolve their problems largely out of the pockets of consumers throughout Canada.

Mr. S. Lewis (Scarborough West): Yes, they have.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: The implication is that higher prices will call out additional supplies and so tend in the direction of ameliorating the very serious question of security and adequacy of supplies.

That is the carrot to make the consumer accept the higher prices. But we, sir, have already run after that carrot. That is exactly what the increase from $3.80 a barrel to $6.50 a barrel was supposed to do.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: We accepted that increase -- we accepted increases in the price of natural gas -- with modest protests because of the urgent need for securing additional supplies. But then the producing provinces moved in, the federal government moved in and those dollars -- paid by the consumers -- were consumed. There was nothing left to call out the additional and needed supplies.

I ask, sir, are we to play the same scene a second time?

Mr. Lewis: And we answer “No.”

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Ontario is opposed to the jockeying up of natural gas and oil prices for the enrichment of government --

Mr. Lewis: The minister is sounding more like a socialist every day.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- at the expense of security of energy supply for our citizens.

Ontario deeply regrets the fact that the government of Canada -- admittedly abetted by the persistent opposition of other parties in the House of Commons -- has faltered in its proposal to assume the power of controlling oil and natural gas prices moving in inter-provincial and international trade.

This is crucially important to the people and the Province of Ontario and to all consumers of energy. I would ask the indulgence of the members, sir, while I discuss, at modest length, some circumstances under the following general headings:

1. Economic impact of higher energy prices.

2. The crude oil price agreement.

3. Natural gas prices and supply.

The magnitude of the impact of price increase is staggering. For example, a dollar per barrel increase in the wellhead price of crude oil costs the consumers of Ontario approximately $180 million a year.

Mr. Lewis: The minister has discovered that, has he?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: This is paid by the people of this province. Relating wellhead price changes to changes at the gas station is an inexact science, but I note that the industry has stated that a $2 increase per barrel for crude at the wellhead implies an additional six cents a gallon for gasoline in Metro Toronto. That is close enough to our own calculations.

The precise figures are less relevant than the grim fact that higher prices would have a pervading and detrimental effect on both the national and Ontario economies. It is inescapable that higher prices will worsen Canada’s most pressing problem -- inflation. And we are already experiencing the impact of the latest price increases.

Mr. Stokes: This is the second time in two days the minister has agreed with us.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Since last January, crude oil prices have increased $2.70 a barrel at the wellhead and the field price in Alberta of natural gas coming into Ontario has increased by 22 cents per mcf. We will be even more conscious of the implications as we live through the current heating season.

Let me talk for a moment about the crude oil price agreement. It was, and it is, our understanding that the $6.50 per barrel price of crude oil in Canada would be maintained inviolate until the existing agreement among first ministers expires, and that prior to any future price increase there would be a further meeting of first ministers.

In this respect two points are worth making.

First: There has not yet been time to fully assess the impact of the price agreements made earlier this year, pending the conclusion of the 1974-1975 heating season; and yet there appears to be a mood to surge forward in the direction of higher prices.

Second: There is no evidence to support a belief that the $2.70 a barrel increase in crude oil wellhead prices has improved the prospect of future supplies. Indeed, the recently published report of the National Energy Board confirms that we will not have on stream those domestic supplies of crude oil needed to satisfy our domestic demand, and this shortfall will occur within 10 years.

I wish to underline that it was the Ontario understanding that the agreed increase in the wellhead price of crude oil to $6.50 a barrel would tend to compensate for higher costs of finding and/or developing supplies of oil and would contribute to ensuring adequate oil supplies for Canadians.

I have noted that this expectation was aborted by the actions of the government of Canada and the producing provinces. This situation should be corrected. Certainly we welcome the initiative of the government of Alberta in taking steps to encourage increased exploration and production within the borders of that province. We invite a similar initiative from Ottawa.

But two things cry out to be acknowledged.

First: Until there has been time to fully assess the impact of the increases in the price of oil agreed to earlier this year, there should be no further increase.

Second: Until a satisfactory compromise has been worked out between Ottawa and the producing provinces, no increase in price can by any stretch of the imagination be warranted.

Mr. Lewis: Good Lord. Doesn’t he recognize that the last price increase that this government submitted to couldn’t be warranted either?

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Ontario recognized that the costs of finding and producing some supplemental oil supplies may be such as to inhibit development of some supplies at current price levels.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Why doesn’t the leader of the NDP just say “Good”?

Mr. Lewis: We did say “Good.” How often do we have this opportunity?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Specifically, it is becoming increasingly apparent that inflation has made necessary higher price levels if new operations designed to extract oil from the oil sands are to be economic. But this does not mean that such prices should prevail for oil from existing sources or sources that are less costly to develop.

I now wish to deal with the important and urgent question of natural gas prices. Ontario consumers are already faced with a major increase in the cost of heating their homes as a result of substantially higher field prices for natural gas reached this year. In Ontario terms, a 10-cent increase per mcf for natural gas siphons more than $65 million a year out of the province.

Again, higher prices should contribute to secure supplies. That’s regarded as a central function of price in the marketplace. But the current National Energy Board hearings are revealing a growing consensus that Canada’s established natural gas supplies will be unable to meet demands during the last half of this decade.

There is an irony in all this: there is evidence that producer expectation of higher future prices have contributed to a deterioration in current supplies. Expecting higher prices, producers may be reluctant to commit available supplies to market or to make vigorous efforts to sustain existing levels. And I use the word “may” because it is only a very strong suspicion.

Mr. Stokes: Tommy Douglas said that five years ago.

Hon. J. R. Rhodes (Minister of Transportation and Communications): Who is Tommy Douglas? Is he the fiddle player from Moncton?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Ontario has not inflexibly opposed all price changes. We have acknowledged the need for some increases in natural gas prices. The average level of 44 cents, which is included in the rates TransCanada Pipe Lines Ltd. now charges Ontario distribution companies, is high; it is twice last year’s level. But in order to resolve the problem of price, we have considered that in the circumstances of today the current level is not unreasonable. Significant increases above that level are unreasonable.

Mr. Lewis: Right.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: However, much higher prices are being talked about. In a report dated Aug. 19, 1974, the Energy Resources Conservation Board of Alberta stated that the field value of natural gas, as of June 30, 1974, was $1.09 to $1.19 per mcf. I underline that this was its perception of value and was not a selling price.

However, under the Arbitration Act of Alberta, as recently amended, arbitrators appointed to redetermine field prices pursuant to a gas purchase contract, must take the field value -- determined in a manner similar to that used by the Alberta board -- into account when fixing the field price of natural gas.

So unless Bill C-32 is enacted quickly, the process of the redetermination of field prices will begin and move swiftly to conclusion by the spring. The field values mentioned could well become field prices effective on Nov. 1, 1975, as a result of the Arbitration Act of Alberta.

Certainly field price levels equivalent to the field values suggested by the Alberta board could damage the economic prospects -- the economic fabric -- of this nation.

At the National Energy Board hearing in Toronto on Dec. 9, 1974, I reiterated that finding agreement with respect to natural gas prices among the producing and consuming provinces, there was no alternative to the imposition of a field price for natural gas by the federal government. I repeat that again today.

We have been negotiating for some two years. I think the effort has been sincere and serious by all participants. We have not arrived at an agreement. I attribute no blame. On economic questions, interests can be in conflict and people of good will and sincerity can disagree quite honestly. But persistent disagreement calls for the involvement, in this specific case, of the government of Canada. We take this position, recognizing the historic and constitutional responsibilities of the government of Canada and the provinces with respect to natural resources.

We anticipated this responsible and necessary federal involvement when the government of Canada sought authority to impose reasonable field prices for natural gas moving in interprovincial and international trade in its proposed Petroleum Administration Act, Bill C-32. But, under pressure from the opposition, the government seems to have abandoned its convictions and the rug was jerked out from under the feet of the consuming provinces.

Permit me, sir, to be very specific in my few concluding remarks.

The government of Ontario regrets that the federal government has postponed proceedings with the legislation currently before Parliament, which would give the federal government authority to act quickly on the matter of petroleum and natural gas prices, an item of the very first order of importance when measured in terms of the interests of the nation.

The government of Ontario strongly urges the federal government to proceed with this legislation as early as possible.

Members of all parties in the House of Commons are urged to ensure speedy passage of this legislation in a form that will permit, in the absence of intergovernmental agreement, the mandatory imposition by the government of Canada of reasonable prices for natural gas and petroleum for the benefit of all Canadians, producers and consumers, through the serving of the national interest.

ROYAL COMMISSION ON BUILDING INDUSTRY

Hon. R. Welch (Provincial Secretary for Justice and Attorney General): Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the report of the royal commission on certain sectors of the building industry which was conducted by His Honour Judge Harry Waisberg.

This royal commission was constituted pursuant to a proclamation of the Lieutenant Governor, dated March 28, 1973. The events leading up to the royal commission are, of course, well known, Mr. Speaker. The full and thorough consideration given to those events is manifest in the report itself, and we are indeed indebted to the commissioner and his staff for their prodigious effort in bringing to light the various facets of the subject matter of their inquiry.

I wish to assure the members of the House this afternoon that the law officers of the Crown have worked closely with the investigating staff of the commission, as a result of which certain charges have already been laid. There are some matters in the report which are currently under police investigation, and I expect further charges to be lair I in the near future.

The commissioner’s recommendations with reference to labour-management relations in the sectors of the building industry which formed the subject matter of this inquiry will be considered, of course, by the Minister of Labour (Mr. MacBeth).

EXPROPRIATION REPORT

Hon. Mr. Welch: While I am on my feet, Mr. Speaker, it is with some satisfaction that I table the report on the Expropriations Act prepared by Mr. R. B. Robinson, QC.

In June of this year, when I appointed Mr. Robinson to undertake this inquiry, my principal concern was the achievement and maintenance of a proper balance between the general public need for expropriation and the protection of the rights and reasonable expectations of persons affected by the procedures involved.

Although I have not yet had an opportunity to review his recommendations in depth, it would appear from the report that Mr. Robinson’s mandate has in large measure been achieved.

The report examines the performance in practice and the practical effectiveness of the Expropriations Act during its six years of operation and makes specific recommendations with respect to certain deficiencies which have been found to exist. Recommendations are made with reference to inquiry hearings, large-scale expropriations, costs, and the operation of the Land Compensation Board. The report also proposes amendments designed to resolve ambiguities and supplement definitions, and generally offers suggestions, Mr. Speaker, to make the statute a more refined and useful instrument for both affected individuals and expropriation authorities.

It is my hope in tabling this report this afternoon that its recommendations will be carefully studied and comments directed to me so that the full benefit of the beneficial changes suggested can be appropriately achieved within the near future.

SOLID WASTE DISPOSAL

Hon. W. Newman: Mr. Speaker, I would like today to table the report of the solid waste task force.

Mr. Deans: This is good.

Mr. T. P. Reid (Rainy River): Tabling himself, is he?

Mr. Deans: How appropriate.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. W. Newman: In order not to inconvenience the members with this material, it will be in their mail boxes; it is being put in there now.

Mr. R. F. Ruston (Essex-Kent): Christmas greetings.

Hon. W. Newman: A few weeks ago I announced a comprehensive programme for the reclamation and recycling of solid waste which included as an immediate step the construction of six primary recycling planes in major urban areas of the province. To complement that initiative, I am tabling today the consolidated report of the solid waste task force.

To date the government has accepted and implemented all of the recommendations of the milk packaging task force and is accepting 14 of the 16 recommendations of the beverage packaging working group. The government will not implement, for the time being at least, the recommendation that retailers stock carbonated beverages packaged in refillable containers in the same sizes and brand type as they offer in non-refillable containers or the recommendation that the deposit price for beer containers be increased.

Mr. R. Haggerty (Welland South): What about the Liquor Control Board?

Hon. W. Newman: The present deposit price of beer results in over 96 per cent of the beer bottles being returned and a deposit increase is not expected to affect this return rate appreciably.

Specifically, Mr. Speaker, detachable flip-top openers on metal carbonated beverage containers will be phased out over the next 12 months. Development of non-detachable openers or other alternatives to the detachable flip-top openers has reached the point where viable alternatives will be available in the near future.

Other recommendations which have been accepted and which will be implemented are:

1. Soft-drink companies and vendors will be encouraged to promote the sale of soft drinks in refillable containers.

2. The price of the contents and the refillable container deposit are to be shown separately at the point of sale.

3. A mandatory minimum refundable deposit will be established for all refillable containers.

4. All refillable containers produced after a fixed date shall show the words “money-back bottle.”

5. Soft-drink companies and vendors shall be urged to sell soft drinks in convenient, sturdy carriers.

6. Vendors shall be required to refund deposits on refillable containers.

7. Vendors shall be encouraged to post notices in conspicuous places in their premises outlining the obligations of the vendor to return deposits.

8. The soft-drink industry shall be urged to reduce the number of container sizes and to develop standard refillable containers by the time the metric system is introduced in Canada.

In a number of jurisdictions, both in Canada and in the United States, legislation has been introduced over the past few years aimed at reducing the amount of litter produced by beverage containers. We have reviewed all of the significant legislation of this kind now in effect in North America and have visited most of the jurisdictions to assess the impact of that legislation. In most cases the contribution of beverage containers to the volume of litter has been reduced as a result of the legislation.

Many of the techniques developed by other jurisdictions are quite ingenious and effective as far as they go. No jurisdiction to date, however, has combined, as Ontario is doing, the recycling approach with consumer choice of refillable and non-refillable containers and with positive action to induce greater public awareness and disapproval of those who litter.

I have already met with the industry on the need for a specific action programme. I shall be meeting with the industry again --

Mr. Haggerty: What about the Liquor Control Board?

Hon. W. Newman: -- to develop the specifics of this programme, and I have every expectation that the industry will co-operate voluntarily and that it will not be necessary to legislate. I shall also be encouraging soft-drink manufacturers to give some consideration to recompensing retailers for the cost of handling returnable containers.

The solid waste task force also recommended that the government establish a waste management advisory board, and I shall be releasing the names of the members and the board’s terms of reference within a few days.

I am happy to say that today I have with me in the House Mr. Bob Woolvett, who is chairman of the solid waste task force and who worked with the various groups. He is in the Speaker’s gallery. With your permission, Mr. Speaker, if he would stand up, I would like to say thank you to him and his committee for the great job they did.

COMMUNITY SERVICES FOR MENTALLY RETARDED

Hon. R. Brunelle (Minister of Community and Social Services): Mr. Speaker --

Mr. Stokes: Après vous, Alphonse.

Hon. Mr. Brunelle: -- this is a statement in reference to the expansion of community services to the mentally retarded. I mentioned this briefly this morning during our supplementary estimates, and this is to elaborate on what I said.

Last March, I introduced to the House the Developmental Services Act to expand our community services for Ontario’s mentally retarded persons. That Act provided a basis for review and re-evaluation of the province’s overall mental retardation programme. In response, the cabinet yesterday increased its funding of mental retardation, as provided by the following existing Acts:

1. The Vocational Rehabilitation Services Act, covering the operation of 130 sheltered workshops for mentally and physically handicapped.

2. The Day Nurseries Act, currently providing aid to parents of 1,400 handicapped children in special developmental centres and day nurseries.

3. The Homes for Retarded Persons Act, providing residences within communities for mentally retarded persons.

Briefly, Mr. Speaker, here are the main details of the funding increases, all of them retroactive to Oct. 1, 1974:

1. The sheltered workshops for the mentally and physically handicapped can now receive capital grants and operating subsidies up to 80 per cent of approved costs -- instead of the former 20 per cent. An additional $4.6 million will be allocated on the basis of productivity and initiative demonstrated by individual workshops.

2. Present subsidies to developmental centres, daycare centres and special schools for handicapped children have required parents to pay excessive fees to make up cost differences. Too, parents wanting day nursery care for mentally or physically handicapped preschoolers have had to pay about 35 per cent higher fees than those charged for other children. This seriously undermined our objective of assisting these children at an early age. Therefore, the province will assume 100 per cent of the subsidies for care and training of school-aged handicapped children. It will also provide a subsidy for pre-school-aged handicapped children so that their parents will pay no more than other parents.

3. The final area for increased funding is the acquisition or construction of new community residences for the mentally retarded. These will provide permanent and temporary lodging for handicapped persons while integrating them into normal communities. In this area, capital grants are increased to 80 per cent, up to a maximum of $15,000 per bed, for both new construction -- including land -- and for acquisition and renovation, as approved by the ministry.

Mr. Speaker, I have described three breakthroughs in funding. They are significant, but only as a beginning. The problems of the handicapped are considerable, affecting thousands of individuals and their families throughout Ontario. In order to assist the development of the required community services, my ministry has hired, since April 1, 19 co-ordinators to work closely with parent associations across this province. Speaking of associations, I especially wish to thank the Ontario Associations for the Mentally Retarded for their ongoing and outstanding efforts and initiatives.

With the co-operation of such organizations, we come close to our goal of community-based programmes to lessen the burden of being a handicapped person in our society of alternatives and opportunities.

CENTRAL ONTARIO LAKESHORE URBAN COMPLEX

Hon. J. White (Treasurer and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs): Mr. Speaker, tomorrow the Deputy Treasurer will be releasing the report of the central Ontario lakeshore urban complex task force. This proposal for the central Ontario region has been prepared for the advisory committee on urban and regional planning by a joint task force which included municipal and provincial planners.

This report is not government policy but is the basis of recommendations to a committee of provincial officials; the Advisory Committee on Urban and Regional Planning being a committee of 12 deputy ministers, chaired by the Deputy Treasurer.

The task force report is being released so as to permit public discussion and detailed examination before any firm policy recommendations are made by the advisory committee to the government. Only after such public discussion will the advisory committee be able to assess the task force’s recommendations realistically.

This approach is a reaffirmation of the pledge to open, participatory planning which this government has made to the people of Ontario. We are convinced that we will emerge with better plans because of such broad discussion.

Included in the report are some options, concerns and difficulties as identified by the municipal and provincial planners. These comments by the task force members to the Advisory Committee on Urban and Regional Planning are included to enable all those affected to consider the difficult issues involved in broadly based planning.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): We wondered why all the ministers were here today.

Mr. Deans: They are planning to go home soon.

INDUSTRY LOANS

Hon. C. Bennett (Ministry of Industry and Tourism): I have a reply to a question which I believe, because of its length, should be in a statement I was asked a question regarding the development corporations by the hon. member for Thunder Bay and --

Mr. Lewis: The member is not here.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: -- and by the hon. member for Fort William (Mr. Jessiman) and I believe it would be well to break down the situation of the development corporations so they are more properly understood.

Mr. Lewis: Yes, do be rational.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I thank the members for the opportunity to report to the House and to the citizens of Ontario the tremendous progress made by the Ontario Development Corp., the Northern Ontario Development Corp. and the Eastern Ontario Development Corp. for the period from April 1, 1974, to Nov. 30, 1974. The three development corporations have lent a total of $51 million, representing 344 loans.

As I mentioned to the member for Thunder Bay in my reply the other day, you can distort statistics if you do not look at the entire picture. Today, I will present the entire picture, and I know all members of the House will be pleased with the information.

There are many categories of loans; I will list them with the appropriate development corporation and give the dollar volume of the loans, together with the percentage apportioned to the development corporations.

Industrial mortgages: ODC, 23 loans, $5,420,000, 61 per cent; NODC, 11 loans, $2,231,000, 25 per cent; EODC, seven loans, $1,209,000, 14 per cent.

Pollution control loans: There were only two, and they were both through the Ontario Development Corp. for $275,000.

Tourist industry loans: ODC, 47 loans, $6,155,000, 42 per cent; NODC, 58 loans, $6,038,000, 41 per cent; EODC, 27 loans, $2,551,00, 17 per cent.

Small business loans: ODC, 48 loans, $1,703,000, 72 per cent; NODC, seven loans, $237,000, 10 per cent; EODC, 12 loans, $435,000, 18 per cent.

Venture capital loans: ODC, six loans, $318,000, 86 per cent; NODC, no loans; EODC, one loan, $50,000, 14 per cent.

I would draw your attention to the next area, Mr. Speaker, because it is available to any industry in the Province of Ontario wishing to expand its opportunity in export markets.

Export support loans: ODC, 34 loans, $7,297,000, 85 per cent; NODC, one loan, $20,000; EODC, six loans, $1.3 million, 15 per cent.

Mr. Stokes: Well, therein lies the tale.

Mr. J. F. Foulds (Port Arthur): Does the minister think that justifies his position? What kind of nonsense is this?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Mr. Speaker, the NODC loan under export support is available to anyone in the province; it is not a development loan but is to help industry to expand.

Mr. Foulds: It just points out the flaws and weaknesses of the programme.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: The next programme, the Ontario Business Incentives Programme, was announced by the Premier (Mr. Davis) in the summer of 1973. It was designed to encourage industrial and tourism development by providing incentives such as interest rates lower than prevailing market rates.

Mr. M. Cassidy (Ottawa Centre): Say that again. Say it again.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: These loans, as the members know, are to be repaid; and the repayment provision is for deferment of both principal and interest for a period of time as directed by the boards of directors.

The interesting category is this one, sir: ODC, four loans, $976,000, six per cent; NODC, 30 loans, $7,612,000, 48 per cent; and EODC, 20 loans, $7,196,000, 45 per cent.

Mr. J. H. Jessiman (Fort William): What a record!

Hon. Mr. Bennett: If the member for Thunder Bay subtracts the export support loans from the ODC, he will find that more money was lent through NODC than through ODC.

Mr. Foulds: That’s a big if.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I would like to compliment the board of directors of NODC for their genuine interest in the economic wellbeing of the north, so evident by the number of loans they have dealt with this year.

Mr. Lewis: What was the definition of the business incentive loan?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I will reiterate that loans are not made unless an application is made to one of the development corporations, Mr. Speaker. However, I do say that northern Ontario has been treated well by the Northern Ontario Development Corp., as the complete statistics now show. The Eastern Ontario Development Corp. has been in existence for a short period of time, but obviously it is already having a beneficial impact on the economic well-being of eastern Ontario.

The activity of the development corporations is evident when you look at the 12 months of 1972-1973 when a total of $24 million was lent, while from April 1 to Nov. 30, of 1974, eight months, a total of $51 million has been lent by the development corporations. Let me say to the members of the House, the development corporations will continue to be aggressive in helping industrial and tourism development in the Province of Ontario.

Mr. Lewis: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, if I may, sir. I wonder if the minister who just spoke -- there was some noise in the House -- could he just take a moment to repeat the one paragraph describing what the Ontario business incentive loan was? I think it was the last loan programme. He referred to the Premier making an announcement.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Mr. Speaker, back in June of 1973 we announced the Ontario Business incentive Plan under all three development corporations. The development corporation had the opportunity of reviewing the applications and deciding on those applications the sum of money that should be lent to them. They had the opportunity also to recommend to the minister and to cabinet that the repayment of the loans could be deferred for a period of time and the interest effective thereon could also be deferred for a period of time -- but they were expected to be paid in full as far as the principal was concerned.

CONDOMINIUM MORTGAGES

Hon. D. R. Irvine (Minister of Housing): Mr. Speaker, during my supplementary estimates debate yesterday I undertook to reply to the member for Downsview as quickly as possible and the member for Wentworth as quickly as possible.

I would like to address my remarks now to the member for Downsview, but before going into detail in answer to the questions raised, I would like to make several general points.

First of all, the member has applied a set of rules in existence today to transactions which occurred two or three years ago, under very different circumstances, when such rules were not in existence.

Second, all the units he mentioned are condominium apartments and the rules that applied at that time to single and semidetached houses on HOME-leased lots did not apply to condominium units.

Mr. V. M. Singer (Downsview): The minister admitted yesterday that the rules did apply to condominiums.

Mr. Renwick: How can the minister answer specific charges with generalized statements such as that?

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Third, he has related a 1971 interest rate to today’s --

Mr. Renwick: Why doesn’t the minister save his breath?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: -- interest rate and come to the conclusion, which is erroneous, that these purchases were subsidized. They were not.

I am sure the hon. member will recall that in 1971 and 1972 there were a large number of condominium units --

Mr. Renwick: The minister should stop stonewalling and sit down. Get on with it; we have got enough of that.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: -- which came on the market in Metro which resulted in a very depressed market for such units.

To be more specific, on March 31, 1972, OHC, though Housing Corp. Ltd., had mortgage commitments for 13,927 units, of which 9,782 remained unsold. At that date, the specific projects he has singled out, Crescent Town and Flemingdon Woods, were faced with that situation.

Crescent Town had been on sale for 55 weeks and only 227 units out of a total of 1,416 had been sold. Flemingdon Woods had been on sale for 43 weeks, and only 156 units out of 1,794 had been sold.

The mortgage commitment for these units was issued March 31, 1970. We are therefore discussing a mortgage commitment given out four years ago. The initial rate to the builder was at 9.5 per cent, but the rate to the purchaser was at 8.75 per cent, as interest rates at the time of marketing had dropped. This matched the direct lending rate of Central Mortgage and Housing Corp. under the National Housing Act.

The long-term borrowing rate of the province at that time was 7.95 per cent, which was the cost to Housing Corp. Ltd.; so therefore the 8.75 per cent on the mortgage in question was not subsidized. In fact, this rate more than covered our costs, although it was slightly below the prevailing market rate at that time.

In the original contract there were sale price restrictions and resale restrictions. On May 16, 1972, faced with the marketing difficulties at that time, OHC removed these restrictions to make the product more salable.

These mortgages then became no different from federal direct lending under the National Housing Act, and there is no restriction today on anyone owning more than one of these units any more than there is on anyone owning more than one unit financed under the National Housing Act. It’s the same thing.

In particular, let’s take the case, Mr. Speaker, of David and Heather Morris, which was raised by the hon. member yesterday. The Morris family purchased their initial unit -- unit 3, level 21 -- in Crescent Town at 60 Pavance Linkway on April 1, 1972, and still live there. This year the Morris family bought three other units at 5 Vicora Linkway in Crescent Town from the original purchasers. They have done nothing illegal: there are no restrictions on resale from the original purchaser who bought two or three years ago, nor can we make today’s regulations apply to the mortgages given out at that time under the commitment which was issued much earlier.

The cases raised by the hon. member in connection with Flemingdon Woods fall into the very same category. For new condominium highrises, the prevailing regulations were reinstated on May 27, 1974.

In summary, then, Mr. Speaker, these mortgages have a 35-year term, similar to the NHA direct lending at that time. So as to encourage marketing at that time, there are no resale restrictions and there is no legal impediment to their free trade.

OBLIGATIONS OF H.O.M.E. PURCHASERS

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Now I shall reply to the member for Wentworth, who asked the question: “Can OHC be aware of a situation whereby a man buys a HOME plan house, doesn’t live in it himself but leases it out to tenants . . . and the corporation does nothing about it?”

Mr. Speaker, in reference to the hon. member’s question yesterday regarding the purchase of a HOME plan house in Bramalea and its subsequent occupancy by a tenant family, it is not quite accurate to say, as he did, that the corporation has taken no action.

In November, 1973 Mr. Iftkar Kalyani submitted an application to Central Park Developments for the purchase of a four-bedroom house under ORG’s lot-lease programme in Bramalea. The mortgage application, together with a credit report, indicated that Mr. and Mrs. Kalyani met the requirements of the programme and the mortgage application was approved by OHC in January.

Following the completion of the house in March, 1974, however, Mr. Kalyani, without obtaining permission from OHC leased the house in April to Mr. and Mrs. Tom Nancekivell, I believe for a rental of $275 per month. His monthly payments were $267.17.

The first indication OHC had that the Kalyanis were not occupying the house occurred in May, when the Nancekivells described the situation by telephone and later in a letter to OHC. A series of notices to Mr. Kalyani outlining his breach of covenant brought no response from him until a letter of July 8, in compliance with the legal requirement to provide 45 days’ notice for such action, informed him that his lot-lease would be terminated on Aug. 30.

A series in interviews followed between Mr. Kalyani and the lease administration staff. In the course of the discussions Mr. Kalyani was informed that if he was not prepared to live in the house he would not be permitted to retain the property. Mr. Kalyani responded by selling the house and, in accordance with the terms of the lease, when his application to assign the lot lease to a new purchaser was received, the land was reappraised, increasing the monthly ground rent payment to $131.35 from the original $88.67.

A review of all documentation relating to the planning purchase of the property and its subsequent sale is currently under way and there is a possibility that legal action will be taken.

The hon. member also made reference to a number of houses in the same area being vacant since spring. This is true in a few instances and it results principally from changes in personal plans of the original purchasers. These houses are either in the process of being retrieved or being sold to new persons.

Mr. Speaker: Oral questions.

The hon. Leader of the Opposition.

OIL AND NATURAL GAS PRICES

Mr. R. F. Nixon (Leader of the Opposition): I’d like the Minister of Energy to give us a bit more information based on his statement. Does he not only feel that that bill should be proceeded with forthwith, but it should lead in fact to a marketing board establishment at the national level which would have the power not only to impose pricing on a national basis but to control all aspects of marketing, as was his recommendation, as I recall, earlier in 1974?

Does he still feel -- this is really a supplementary based on the first question -- that the marketing board type of control would be in the best interest of the situation that we now find, which was his recommendation, I believe, in February of this year?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, I can think of a number of questions which I might have been asked. That’s certainly not the one I was expecting.

Mr. Lewis: That is true.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: I hadn’t thought of today’s statement in terms of solutions which we may have suggested in the past. I think we have suggested a marketing board approach in the past. It was on the basis that there would be consumer and producer representation, representation from the consuming and producing provinces. I rather suspect we’ve passed that point.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Supplementary: Since we are passed the approach where consumers and producers are going to work together on some sort of rational marketing legislation, what can be done, in addition to simply circulating the strongly held position of the Ontario government in this regard, to bring the matter under control? What is the minister proposing to do besides simply stating his strongly held views?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: We have communicated our views, or are in the process of communicating our views, to both the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources and to the leader of the official opposition.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary, if I may: Having finally after all these months and years declaimed that he thinks oil prices are high enough, how does the minister intend to make that part of the statement stick? Does he intend to adopt the Nova Scotia position, giving to the Energy Board or an equivalent commission the authority to control prices. Does he intend to challenge the federal government constitutionally, should prices go up? How does he intend to give substance to his assertion?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, all the Nova Scotia legislation realistically does is give the authority to control what happens within Nova Scotia at the refinery and at the retail level.

Mr. Lewis: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: It has nothing to do with the cost at the pump.

Mr. Foulds: Which pump?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: At the well rather. The refinery markup and the dealer markup are becoming increasingly a smaller portion of the total price. Roughly, out of a 65-cent price for gasoline, probably somewhere in the neighbourhood of less than 20 cents is attributed to a refinery or to the dealer margin. Most of it is now at the wellhead, or a good chunk of it, of course, is taken off in provincial gasoline taxes.

As to control of what goes on at the refinery, I think most reasonable people would agree that the refinery margins in the last 10 or 15 years have been very, very narrow and that the profits of the oil companies have not been made at the refineries nor have they been made at the pumps. They have been made at the wellhead.

Mr. Renwick: No, they have been made as an integrated operation, and the minister knows it. Don’t try to divide it up.

Mr. Lewis: They’ve been made from the consumers, who pay the price.

Mr. Speaker: Order please. The hon. minister is answering the question.

Mr. Deans: Not very well.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: There is no question that the consumer has paid the price. But what we could control either at the refinery or at the pumps is not where the problem is, if I can put it that way.

Mr. Renwick: In the food industry the government doesn’t make this argument.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Those people over there would control everything.

Mr. Lewis: I knew this was coming -- a little spasm on Thursday afternoon.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: They would control everything.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: It is the festive season. I suspect tomorrow they’ll want to set up a royal inquiry and a permanent price inquiry --

Mr. Lewis: Indeed, on Christmas tree nationalization.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: No, into turkeys.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please, the member for Huron with a supplementary.

Mr. J. Riddell (Huron): Mr. Speaker, apart from the marketing and supply aspect of this overall energy problem we appear to be having, when is the ministry going to put more emphasis on controlling demand through energy conservation methods, rather than placing all its concern on trying to increase supply for an increasing demand? Are you aware, Mr. Minister, that Ontario uses twice as much energy per capita --

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I think you have placed your supplementary question.

Mr. Riddell: -- as compared to the European countries?

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Riddell: What about energy conservation?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, I indicated in the course of the bill on the energy corporation a week or so ago --

Mr. Stokes: Does it involve sweaters?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- that I expected in a couple of months time we would have a very comprehensive statement -- not on energy conservation; we prefer to call it energy management -- working towards the sort of things which the hon. member has suggested. But we reject that the conservation of energy can best be achieved by higher and higher prices. We don’t think that is appropriate.

We also reject as a government that the way to energy conservation is to legislate. We happen to believe over here in education and taking our time; and I’ve indicated some of the things that various government departments are doing, and doing very well.

Mr. Cassidy: Educate the oil companies, educate big business.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: We will not be legislating on this side of the House greater and greater demands on our citizens, nor are we going to sit back and see higher and higher prices bringing about energy conservation.

Mr. Renwick: Tell the oil companies.

Mr. P. D. Lawlor (Lakeshore): So what is the minister going to do?

Mr. M. Gaunt (Huron-Bruce): Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Deans: What is the minister going to do?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Gaunt: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Lewis: When one takes away the minister’s bombast, what is left? What is he left with?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Huron-Bruce may place his supplementary.

Mr. Gaunt: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary of the minister.

Mr. Lewis: What’s left? Look at the price of turkeys; look what happened.

Mr. Renwick: He wants a royal commission on the price of turkeys.

Mr. Gaunt: Wouldn’t the minister consider it appropriate to show some leadership with respect to energy conservation? And wouldn’t a good place to start be right in the government buildings which surround the environs of this place?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, I indicated several days ago, in response to a question, that no ministry in this government -- and in my view no organization within the Ontario economy -- is doing a better job than the Ontario Ministry of Government Services by way of reducing their energy demands.

Mr. A. J. Roy (Ottawa East): That is not so, and the minister would have us --

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: It’s cold in my office.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: They are setting a very fine example.

An hon. member: Sure they are.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: And I am sure either we or the Minister of Government Services (Mr. Snow) will be reporting in due course on the very successful efforts taken by this government to conserve energy.

Mr. Speaker: Does the Leader of the Opposition have further questions?

OHC BRIBE CHARGES

Mr. R. F. Nixon: With the Attorney General not available to comment on the two reports that be put --

Mr. Roy: That is contempt of the Legislature.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: -- before us a few moments ago, I’d like to put a question to the Solicitor General, who is already throwing up his hands and shaking his head, but he has already commented on this matter.

On page 113 of Judge Harry Waisberg’s report he says, as follows: “It should be clearly understood that those who give are at least as blameworthy as those who take.” He is referring to those people who proferred bribes which were accepted by officials of the Ontario Housing Corp.

Does the minister agree -- presumably he would -- with this finding of the judge? And is he aware that the government is going to reconsider its position that they will not be charging those who proferred the bribes to the officials of the Ontario Housing Corp.?

Hon. G. A. Kerr (Solicitor General): Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Downsview asked me pretty well the same question a few days ago. I indicated that the Attorney General would be making a statement on this in due course in respect to all the OHC prosecutions --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Where the devil is he?

Hon. Mr. Kerr: -- and I would suggest that, as he will be tabling this report today, questions of this kind be directed to him?

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Well where is he?

Mr. Singer: Where is he?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Interjections by an hon. member.

Mr. Roy: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, would you not feel it is in contempt of this Legislature for the Attorney General to present two reports -- one report on violence in the construction industry --

Mr. Lewis: It is just indifference.

Mr. Roy: -- and one on expropriation, and not stick around to answer questions?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I have no control over the minister’s presence. The hon. member for Scarborough West.

Mr. Lewis: May I ask of the Solicitor General: I was under the impression charges would be preferred against those who were clearly criminally complicit in the offering of the bribes. Is he saying that is not yet resolved?

Hon. Mr. Kerr: No, Mr. Speaker, as I indicated the other day, this investigation is not completed. There is a possibility that the charges will be laid, as asked by the hon. member for Downsview and the leader of the NDP. But that investigation isn’t completed There are still hearings and trials to be held, and the Attorney General has indicated in the House that be will have a full answer to that question.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Roy: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker, of the Solicitor General. Can he explain the pattern of his government whereby in all these cases only the person who accepts the gift -- whether you talk about Ontario Housing or Dibblee Construction in Ottawa, or in the construction industry now, Mr. Speaker, at no time has anyone offering or giving a bribe been charged, and clearly they are parties to this offence under section 383 of the Code. How is it that no charges have ever been laid against a person who offers or who gives a bribe?

Hon. Mr. Kerr: The only thing I can say, Mr. Speaker, is that at this time of year --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: At least he is guilty before the recipient.

Hon. Mr. Kerr: -- it’s better to give than receive.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. P. Taylor (Carleton East): On a point of order.

Mr. Speaker: A point of order.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order please. The member has a point of order.

Mr. P. Taylor: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We know that the government is short of a leader, but could somebody on that side tell us who the acting Premier is today?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: That’s a non-question.

The Leader of the Opposition; further questions?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Oh, he is a riot, he is a real riot.

Hon. W. A. Stewart (Minister of Agriculture and Food): The member will never be that.

Mr. B. F. Nixon: That is the answer. That’s why the minister is over there.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. B. F. Nixon: Is somebody going to answer that? Is anybody going to comment on that?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I remember the Attorney General was designated assistant Premier many months ago. It’s when he stopped showing up.

WINDSOR TEACHERS’ DISPUTE

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I’d like to ask of the Minister of Education if he can report on the state of the negotiations between the teachers and the board in Windsor since he personally took part in them. Is there any chance that the formula that was used elsewhere, this final offer acceptance arbitration, might possibly be of some assistance in that circumstance?

Hon. T. L. Wells (Minister of Education): Mr. Speaker, all I can report to the hon. member is that there will be some more meetings with both groups later this afternoon.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions?

Mr. E. J. Bounsall (Windsor West): Supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Windsor West.

Mr. Bounsall: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Can the minister inform the House whether or not the spending ceilings imposed by the province on education is having any effect on these negotiations?

Hon. Mr. Wells: All I can say is that the school board has said many times that spending ceilings were no problem in the particular situation in Windsor.

Mr. Lewis: Really.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: As a supplementary, if I may, Mr. Speaker: What about the situation where the final offer arbitration was used and according to the chairman of the board --

Mr. Foulds: It’s still a form of arbitration.

Mr. B. F. Nixon: -- it will, in fact, break the ceiling, or the budgetary requirement?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I have learned from long experience that no one really knows where they will actually end up, insofar as ceilings and limitations are concerned, until the final financial statements are in. That’ll probably be some four, five, six or seven months hence, and we’ll have to see at that particular time.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Supplementary: Since the statement from the chairman of the board did not seem to be equivocal, and although of course he has not had the experience in dealing with these matters as the minister has, the minister is saying that he is categorically wrong.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Oh, no, I am not saying that he is categorically wrong. I didn’t say anything of the kind. I just said that I don’t think anybody can tell at this particular time --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: He says he can and that the ceiling is broken.

Hon. Mr. Wells: If that of course was the case he could easily make that come true. That prediction could easily come true by say, spending surplus money in other budget accounts. Until the books of the board are finished and the --

Mr. Lewis: That is right.

Mr. Foulds: That’s what they are doing in Thunder Bay.

Hon. Mr. Wells: -- year is finished off and the financial statements are in it’s very difficult to know.

I’ll just tell my friend that I think he’ll recall we had some discussions with the Metropolitan Toronto School Board a couple of years ago which resulted in their saying they’d need a loan of about $8 million in order to balance their books for that year. We agreed to a loan of $8 million. In actual fact when the books were closed and things were balanced at the end of the year, they took a loan of $1.9 million.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition, further questions?

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Yes, I’d like to ask the --

Mr. B. Newman (Windsor-Walkerville): Supplementary.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I am sorry.

Mr. B. Newman: Could the minister inform us whether the COLA proposition of the teachers is the drawback towards settlement in the Windsor situation?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I don’t think I should comment on any of the terms and things that are being discussed by the parties.

Mr. Speaker: A new question from the Leader of the Opposition.

ROUTE OF PETROLEUM PIPELINE

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Is the Minister of Energy in contact with the federal officials about the status of the famous pipeline that was required, and probably still is, on emergency basis to provide crude oil to the Montreal and eastern market? Has that status changed in the last few days? Are the hearings that were supposedly to be held on its location and its effect on the farm community been postponed?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: I am just going by recollection but I think the hearings as to the environmental considerations of the route were completed a month or so ago. I don’t think the board has issued its report; I am not sure of this. The next hearing -- if, as and when it’s to be held -- will concern itself with the charges.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: The status has not changed?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Not that I am aware of, but if I am wrong, I will certainly get the information and correct it tomorrow.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Scarborough West with his questions.

OIL AND NATURAL GAS PRICES

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I would like to come back briefly to the Minister of Energy and ask him again: Has he any specific proposal to put to the Legislature at all which would give substance to his public declaration that gasoline, home fuel oil and natural gas prices generally will not be allowed to rise in Ontario? How does he intend to effect that if he meets resistance from the federal government or the Province of Alberta?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Well, then we don’t. It’s as simple as that. What we have been trying to say to the hon. member is that the control of natural gas or oil at the wellhead does not lie within the power of the Province of Ontario.

Mr. Renwick: We are not talking about the wellhead.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: That power could be given to the government of Canada if it enacts Bill C-32. We are calling upon them to enact Bill C-32 and get on with the job. If they don’t, then I think the picture --

Mr. Lewis: Then we pay.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- then we pay, and I don’t think that there is anything that we can do in this province.

Mr. Lewis: All right. That’s interesting. Suppose the federal government doesn’t act, Mr. Speaker; are we going to do nothing in the Province of Ontario to regulate those prices which are within our control and which the consumer pays? Will we exercise no restraint on the oil companies at all in that margin over which Ontario has control?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, we already regulate the natural gas companies and what I have indicated to --

Mr. Lewis: I understand that. I said oil companies -- gasoline.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- the member, who has this fetish about regulating, is that --

Mr. Lewis: That’s right. Where the oil companies are concerned, it is a fetish.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- I am in favour of regulation when I think something is going to be achieved, but when most of the selling price of a product is determined outside of this province, I don’t see why we need to go through a great, useless exercise which will not achieve very much. If that’s what the member likes to do, if he wants to build up a bigger and bigger bureaucracy and regulate everything, let him go to it; just let him go to it.

Mr. Renwick: It is so in the natural gas field and the minister knows it. He regulates it here.

Mr. Lewis: Look, the minister made a marginal statement.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: In answer to the hon. member’s question, Mr. Speaker, I say this, that the proportion relating to what goes on at the refinery -- which may, or may not, be in Ontario -- and what goes on at the dealer level, the retail markup --

Mr. Renwick: There are some refiners in Ontario, and the minister knows it.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- is just about the same proportion as what goes on in the selling of bananas. Does the member want to regulate bananas -- because most of it is done outside this province?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Gaunt: Don’t dare regulate turkeys.

Hon. Mr. Stewart: They are regulated now.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Scarborough West.

Mr. Lewis: It is interesting that both turkeys and bananas should come to the minister’s lips so quickly.

Given the control, given the location of natural gas, what is the difference which he can describe between bringing the natural gas companies under the regulatory authority of the Ontario Energy Board -- Canadian corporations, it should be pointed out -- and exempting from regulation, any regulation, the multinational oil companies -- American companies, it should be pointed out?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Well, my hon. friend knows the answer to that and my friend knows completely that the natural gas companies in this province are granted by the Ontario Energy Board under an authority of a statute passed by this Legislature --

Mr. Lewis: Yes.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- a monopoly in a certain part of the province.

Mr. Lewis: Yes.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: In the case of gasoline and heating oil, we have something like --

Mr. Lewis: What’s the difference?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: -- seven or eight competing companies. My friend knows nothing about competition.

Mr. Lewis: Competition?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: He knows nothing about competition. He doesn’t know anything about competition.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions?

GASOLINE PRICES

Mr. Lewis: Yes, I have another question of the Minister of Energy. When was the last time he saw competition in prices to the consumer in Ontario between, let us say, Imperial Oil and Shell? Tell us. Tell us of the competition.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: I could take my friend out to a pump right now and show him 10 different prices in this city. He should open his eyes; let him open his eyes and take off --

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Renwick: Don’t be ridiculous.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: There are differences in prices in gasoline in this province. There was an excellent story in the Windsor Star.

Mr. Lewis: Between the south and north there are differences.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: There are differences of 10 and 15 cents at the pump. If he takes off his pink-coloured glasses and goes out and looks at the pumps he will see some competition.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Foulds: Don’t suggest those differences are with the same company between the north and the south.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Scarborough West has the floor. Would he please continue?

Mr. Lewis: I’m taking the minister’s statement to the solid waste task force, Mr. Speaker, because that’s what’s left of it.

Interjections by hon. members.

EXPROPRIATION REPORT

Mr. Lewis: May I ask of the Attorney General, who has deigned to return to the majesty of the chamber, a question on his expropriations report? Since the Expropriations Act report indicates pretty strongly a criticism -- virtually a condemnation -- of the expropriation procedures used in the North Pickering community project, what will he now do by way of legislation to ensure that it never happens again without a public inquiry or indeed somehow to reinstate the public rights which have been lost by so many citizens in North Pickering?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I don’t know if I’m prepared to accept the assumption that the commissioner was that violently critical under the circumstances.

Mr. Lewis: It’s right here. I didn’t say violently. Don’t use extreme language. Don’t use hyperbole. Let the minister contain himself.

Hon. Mr. Welch: I know the member is trying to get over his encounter with the Minister of Energy and I’ll give him time.

Mr. Lewis: I will survive it. When I want to tone down, I turn to the Attorney General.

Hon. Mr. Welch: I want to assure the member that there is no competition between the two of us to have any more models from him at all.

Mr. Lewis: If I want an indirect answer, I ask the Attorney General a question.

Hon. Mr. Welch: If he will allow me, I’ll answer the question.

Mr. Lewis: Yes, I am sorry.

Hon. Mr. Welch: The commission does raise some concerns that were expressed by a former Minister of Housing with respect to large-scale expropriation, that the Act itself did not seem to lend itself to that type of large-scale acquisition.

Mr. Lewis: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Welch: I am sure the member would understand that was one of the reasons that prompted the review of the Act in the first place. I can assure him, in keeping with the spirit of the statement read at the time of the tabling of the report, that those recommendations, along with comments such as his own and public response generally, will be taken into account as we give some consideration to what changes may be necessary in the Expropriations Act as a result.

Mr. Renwick: What will the government do to right the wrongs to the people in North Pickering?

Mr. Lewis: That is the question, Mr. Speaker. Is there anything in the world that might be done, given what is said in this report about individual expropriation procedures used in a massive acquisition? Is there anything that might be done for those who have suffered inappropriate expropriation to the tune of an expenditure of $166 million on many thousands of acres of land? Can the minister try to correct the injustice which was perpetrated?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I think that’s an interesting way the question is put. I don’t know that there are inappropriate expropriations in that situation.

Mr. Renwick: It says so. Read it.

Hon. Mr. Welch: All I’m talking about is that as far as justice and compensation are concerned the procedures are quite clear with people who are involved in that particular situation.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions?

HOUSING STARTS

Mr. Lewis: Yes, I have one last question of the Minister of Housing, if I may, Mr. Speaker. Is the Minister of Housing aware that the housing starts in urban Ontario in November, according to CMHC, were down 4,217 units or 45 per cent from last year; and that we can now predict a total output of 87,000 units in this annual year or, because the minister likes to use fiscal year now, a total of 82,000 units for the fiscal year? Now that we’re 20,000 to 30,000 units down from last year, where do all the OHIP starts and OHAP starts and everything else fit in?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I am well aware of the figures that the hon. member is relating, and I’m awfully glad to have this opportunity to say that finally I’ve been able to communicate directly with the federal minister responsible for housing.

Mr. Lewis: Did this minister pick up the phone?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: I was able to get the message across, maybe a little bit more forcefully than I had in the letter, that we did need funding in Ontario. I believe he is making an announcement today which says that the allocation for the limited dividend programme will be increased substantially. Therefore, we will be able to have funding which we needed long before this. At least, we’re getting co-operation now, and I appreciate the co-operation that the hon. minister has given me in this regard, because I think we do all have to work together.

Mr. Lewis: By way of supplementary: Is the minister saying that when Barney Danson gives him more money for, of all things, limited dividend housing -- a pretty unsuccessful programme for the last decade -- this is going to compensate for the continual lag to which he seems to be attached?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I think any funding that we get from the federal government is of some assistance. We hope to get more; we’ve asked specifically for more funding, for mortgage funding. Certainly one can’t object to the fact that we now have additional mortgage money available on this particular programme. We may be successful in obtaining further funds from the federal government, and I won’t give up my endeavours to get some.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions? A supplementary?

Mr. Cassidy: In view of the reduction of more than 20,000 in urban housing starts this fiscal year, how many units does the minister expect to see begin under the limited dividend project to which he just referred?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I haven’t got a crystal ball. I can only hope that we can achieve as many starts as possible. It all depends, as I have said many times before, on the co-operation which we receive from the municipalities. The developers have come to us with all kinds of proposals -- we have them on record right now. So the developers are ready to go with housing starts this fiscal year of 1974-1975, and in 1976-1977.

Mr. Lewis: The housing policy is a failure.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: But we have to have the co-operation of the federal government and the municipalities in regard not only to funding from the federal government but we have to have the municipalities agreeing to a logical impost charge against the development, regardless of where it may be.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Downsview.

CONDOMINIUM MORTGAGES

Mr. Singer: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Housing. Doesn’t the minister find the statements he made today rather peculiar -- ?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: No, I don’t.

Mr. Singer: Well, all right -- in view of these facts:

1. The fact that when I posed the conditions to the minister yesterday in my speech and asked him if they were correct, he said yes; --

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Or today.

Mr. Singer: Yesterday, before I launched into the details, I asked him specifically and he said yes.

2. The fact of the inclusion in the HOME mortgages of clause 21, which gives to OHC the right to take back the mortgages if there is an assignment which they don’t like;

3. The fact that the minister is unable to table the forms that are presently used;

4. The fact that there is no statement of his present procedures as yet so that nobody, apparently, knows them;

5. The fact that the minister knows we tried to get from him and from his department a statement of these procedures over the last 10 days and none was forthcoming;

6. The fact that there is no statement as to whether or not this giving of a little bit off the interest rate was compensated for in any way and no financial statement as to how much it cost the taxpayers of the Province of Ontario;

In view of all those facts, doesn’t the minister find his answer substantially lacking in answer to the points I put forward yesterday?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I think I have to start off by saying that I guess I didn’t read it very clearly. I will send the member a copy of the statement which I read to the House. I am sorry if he didn’t hear it all, but really what he has said is exactly the opposite of what I read out.

Mr. Breithaupt: That’s probably the case.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: We didn’t subsidize -- I say that for one thing --

Mr. Singer: The minister said the rate was a little less -- he didn’t say how much it was.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: No, no, no. Read the statement. I will give the member a copy of the statement. There is no question of what I said.

An hon. member: He is wasting the question period.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: The fact that we have certain rules today --

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: They have to pay attention.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Yesterday during the estimates I said the rules that the member read out were applicable to today, and he said “fair enough.” I didn’t say they were applicable to 1970 or 1972.

Mr. Singer: Hansard will speak for itself. There it is.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: The regulations are administered by the Ontario Housing Corp. They are the ones who decide as to the guidelines. The regulations are in front of the member -- he read them out. So therefore everything that he has said is in direct contradiction to what I have already given him.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Singer: Absolute stonewalling.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: All the member has to do is read the statement and he will know that what I said was the truth.

Mr. Singer: The minister is stonewalling. He is not going to get away with it.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: I am not trying to.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Windsor West has a question.

ROYAL COMMISSION ON BUILDING INDUSTRY

Mr. Bounsall: A question of the Minister of Labour, Mr. Speaker: Is the minister going to take immediate action on Judge Waisberg’s strong condemnation in the royal commission report on the building industry of the lengthy and very expensive certifications, arbitrations and jurisdictional disputes, and his recommendation to lower the automatic certification from 65 to 50 per cent?

Hon. J. P. MacBeth (Minister of Labour): Mr. Speaker, I have not yet had an opportunity to read the Waisberg report. During this time of goodwill in the Christmas season I think it will make good seasonal reading. I am looking forward to it.

An hon. member: He has a strange sense of humour.

Mr. Lewis: How come he gets a hardcover copy?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: I was objecting, Mr. Speaker, because some of the members had copies before I received a copy.

Mr. B. F. Nixon: Looks like a popular novel.

Mr. Breithaupt: Reads that way, too.

Mr. Lewis: Why isn’t there a picture of the member for High Park on the back?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: I think that it should have been.

Hon. L. Bernier (Minister of Natural Resources): It is the member’s report.

Mr. Lewis: Why isn’t his name in the report?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Maybe he’s lucky it isn’t in the report.

Mr. Breithaupt: Perhaps the member for High Park could do the book review.

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Although I only got my copy of the book a few minutes ago, I was favoured with a copy of the summary recommendations. I think there are many recommendations in there, Mr. Speaker, that we’ll be pleased to carry out. The member from Windsor has suggested that we carry out one of them and wants to know how quickly we’ll carry them out.

I think there are some recommendations that union people particularly will not welcome with as much alacrity as perhaps the one pointed out by the hon. member. But I would say that we have already taken some action in regard to recommendation 14, which reads in this way: “That the number and variety of bargaining units be reduced and that province-wide and multi-trade bargaining be encouraged.”

We have already appointed Mr. Donald Franks as a commissioner of the ministry to commence investigation and to see what he can do in co-operation with the Construction Industry Review Panel.

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, in the spirit of Christmas, why doesn’t the minister just say “yes”?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Well, yes, we’re going to do many of these things -- many of them.

Mr. Bounsall: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: A supplementary.

Mr. Bounsall: When the minister is doing his thinking and giving consideration over this Christmas vacation, will he think about the recommendation that the welfare plans in the construction industry be administered by one province-wide agency? At the same time, will he consider the long-standing feeling by employees in the province that they should have some representation and say in the administration of their pension plan funds?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Is the member asking me if I will consider that?

Mr. Bounsall: Yes.

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Yes.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Revenue has the answer to a question.

SALES TAX ON CHILDREN’S CLOTHING

Hon. A. K. Meen (Minister of Revenue): Mr. Speaker, on Dec. 2 last the member for Waterloo North (Mr. Good) asked me a question regarding the application of retail sales tax on children’s clothing sold in sporting goods departments and stores.

I should point out to the hon. member that, under the Act, children’s normal street-wear clothing is exempt from tax when sold in the designated size ranges, regardless of whether it’s sold in clothing or sporting goods stores. Examples of sports clothing that ca be purchased, tax-exempt, in children’s sizes are sweaters, jackets, jerseys and T-shirts; bathing suits; ski and snowmobile suits; riding habits; baseball, football and basketball pants; baseball, golf and other sports caps and hats. Also exempt are things like Balaclavas and ski caps, toques and other elastic headgear.

Specialized sports clothing in children’s sizes though, is not exempt from tax. Examples of taxable specialized equipment and clothing would be baseball and football helmets and that kind of thing; baseball, boxing, golf, hockey and ski gloves; and padded and protective wear. Sports equipment such as bats, balls, hockey sticks and so forth is also taxable.

I should also point out that provision has been made for schools to buy these items of clothing and equipment completely exempt of tax for use in organized school events.

All footwear, regardless of style or size, as hon. members know, is exempt from tax if sold for a price of $30 or less a pair. Exemption applies to sports footwear such as running shoes and skates, ski boots and ballet slippers, but doesn’t include things like snowshoes and swim fins.

It’s come to my attention, in the course of detailing this for the hon. member, that a number of retail outlets apparently have misinterpreted these guidelines. My retail sales tax branch will be issuing a bulletin as quickly as possible to all retail outlets involved in the sale of sporting goods and clothing in order to make this matter clearer.

If the hon. member for Waterloo North has any specific case in mind where he feels tax has been incorrectly applied in the case of sports equipment or clothing, I would be pleased to hear from him and provide a specific ruling if it’s required.

Mr. Stokes: What about toupees worn by sports?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Mr. Speaker, I have the answer to a second question. Would it be in order for me to give that reply as well?

Mr. P. Taylor: On a point of privilege, Mr. Speaker --

Mr. Speaker: What is your point of privilege?

Hon. W. Newman: What sort of privilege does the member want now?

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, day after day these ministers come to the House and, as I said yesterday in this House, the Minister of Housing consumed more than 20 minutes of opposition time this week.

An hon. member: Oh, sit down.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. P. Taylor: The Minister of Revenue has just consumed four minutes of the question period. This is opposition time, Mr. Speaker.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): The member asked the question. Sit down.

Hon. Mr. Stewart: He doesn’t want an answer.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I have noticed also that some of the questions are quite lengthy and complicated and multiple in nature. Some of the answers may be a little long, but I think the ministers have generally --

Mr. Lewis: I told you we should have won that by-election.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I’ve heeded the request that lengthy answers be given as statements before the orders of the day.

Mr. E. Sargent (Grey-Bruce): ’Tis the season to be jolly.

Mr. Speaker: I can see no offence in this. The hon. member for St. George has a question.

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S YEAR

Mrs. M. Campbell (St. George): Thank you. To the Provincial Secretary for Social Development: In view of the number of inquiries I have received, would she at this point please specify what funding is available for women’s events, beginning possibly in two weeks time or three weeks, for International Women’s Year? What are the rules of eligibility? May I have them now please?

Hon. M. Birch (Provincial Secretary for Social Development): Mr. Speaker, I believe that information will be available early in January.

Mr. Lewis: Supplementary: Given that information, why did the minister not table today the first annual report of the Ontario Council on the Status of Women?

Hon. Mrs. Birch: I will be doing that, sir, when the proper time arrives.

Mr. Lewis: Oh, the minister is going to do it later.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Port Arthur.

JOHN SEELEY

Mr. Foulds: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In view of the decision yesterday by the board of governors of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education; and in view of the public and editorial concern expressed by many people, including academics, that the board has not appointed Mr. John Seeley and refused to give reasons for not appointing him; end in view of the minister’s own statements during the estimates which implicated him in taking a part in that non-appointment, can the minister assure this House that he will see to it that an independent inquiry board comprising other than officials of OISE or officials of his ministry -- will review this case and give reasons for the decision not to appoint John Seeley?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: There is an example of a short question.

Mr. Breithaupt: A short answer is coming.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I have full confidence in the board of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education --

Mr. Lewis: He shouldn’t. It is a political decision and it is contemptible.

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I have full confidence in the board. I understand they had a full and thorough discussion on it, and they’ve acted within their legislative and legal rights under the legislation.

Mr. Speaker: Order please, let the minister answer the question.

Mr. Lewis: No, they wouldn’t stand up to that inquiry when they excluded an academic on political grounds. It is despicable.

Mr. Foulds: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Supplementary.

Mr. Foulds: Supplementary: If the minister has such confidence, and in view of some statements in the press that the appointment was not made because of Mr. Seeley’s political opinions, is the minister prepared to table in this House the documents that led the board of governors of OISE to this position, and will he table a covering statement with that?

Hon. Mr. Wells: I think, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. member should approach the board of governors of OISE and ask for that information.

Mr. Lewis: Oh sure.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I am informed that they had a full and reasonable discussion on the whole matter, on Dec. 17 and that they --

Mr. Lewis: We are not fans of Seeley, but they made a political decision they shouldn’t be allowed to make.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I point out to the hon. member that under the Act, the board of governors has the very definite responsibility to hire and not to hire personnel -- and they are acting under their rights given by this Legislature.

Mr. Lewis: That’s right. That’s true.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Agriculture and Food has the answer to a question.

Mr. Foulds: Supplementary: Does the minister not accept his responsibility to administer that Act?

Mr. Cassidy: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Our time is, just about up. We have had one or two supplementaries. It is time you placed a new question.

Mr. Lewis: One supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Agriculture and Food.

EGG SUPPLY

Hon. Mr. Stewart: Mr. Speaker, on Dec. the member for Huron asked me a question about supplies of eggs. I took the question as notice. There was some evidence of some egg scarcity at the time when the question was asked. However, it now appears that there are sufficient egg supplies to meet market requirements.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Ottawa East.

ROYAL COMMISSION ON BUILDING INDUSTRY

Mr. Roy: Mr. Speaker, a question of the Attorney General: First of all, I take it he will consult with the Solicitor General regarding the previous questions asked by my leader in relation to the building industry report.

But my question to the Attorney General is this: Is he communicating with the Attorney General of Quebec on violence in construction? Is there any exchange of information or common approach to curbing this violence in both provinces -- in view of the evidence that is being disclosed by the commission in Quebec at the present time; in view of the evidence that we’ve heard in this report, and in view of the commission’s statement on page 107 where it says “there is a common thread running through all the previously described acts of violence” in both provinces?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I can assure the hon. member and the members of this House that our investigations are quite extensive in this regard.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Wentworth.

OBLIGATIONS OF H.O.M.E. PURCHASERS

Mr. Deans: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Housing, resulting from his answer to my question of the other day. How can it be that, notwithstanding the efforts of Ontario Housing to contact and to bring Mr. Kalyani into line with the law, he was able to proceed to sell the house? Is there not a requirement within the contract that he receive permission to sell the house? Did he receive the permission? If he did receive the permission, how then can the minister make the statement that he went ahead and sold the house?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I will just read one part of my statement -- I’ve given a copy to the hon. member: “Mr. Kalyani, without obtaining permission from OHC, leased the house.” I went on to say that Mr. Kalyani responded to our request by selling the house in accordance with the terms of the lease. Mr. Kalyani and his wife did not obtain any benefit from the sale of the house.

Mr. Deans: None?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: No. No benefit whatsoever.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Revenue has the answer to a previous question.

SALES TAX ON VEHICLE TRANSFERS

Hon. Mr. Meen: This answer will be even shorter than the last one, Mr. Speaker. On Friday, Dec. 13, the hon. member for Waterloo North asked me a question regarding the collection of retail sales tax by motor vehicle licensing agents. I would advise the member that the motor vehicle agents of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, acting as agents of my ministry, collect retail sales tax based on the value of the automobile being registered.

Sales tax is collected by these agents in the form of cash or cheque and a receipt is issued for such payment. Declarations of value are filed with the motor vehicle agent at the time the retail sales tax is paid, and these forms are subsequently forwarded to the district offices of the retail sales tax branch of my ministry. An audit of the cash handling aspect of this procedure is carried out by the Ministry of Transportation and Communications on a regular basis. In addition, the auditors of the retail sales tax branch of my ministry review the value of declaration forms completed by the automobile purchaser to ensure the accuracy of the declared value compared to current market values.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Grey-Bruce.

Mr. Sargent: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Transportation and Communications.

An hon. member: He just stepped out.

SS NORISLE

Mr. Sargent: Then I’ll slant this toward the House leader: Since talking to the minister I have been informed that the mayor’s office in Owen Sound has received a letter from the ministry regarding the SS Norisle, that they want it back unless we use it for a museum. In view of the fact that they want $6,500 back for this scrap that was sold for ballast, where do we stand?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: On board.

Mr. Roy: It should be a museum.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Mr. Speaker, in answer to that question, I can say very definitively that I know of no letter from the government demanding the vessel back.

Mr. Sargent: Not from the House leader.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Inasmuch as I intervened initially to secure the boat for the city of Owen Sound, I shall see that it remains there. In regard to the second half of the question, I’m not apprised of that information.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Sandwich-Riverside.

TRUCK LOAD COVERS

Mr. F. A. Burr (Sandwich-Riverside): Mr. Speaker, a question of the Solicitor General regarding uncovered gravel trucks on Highway 401 in the vicinity of Milton: Why are these trucks being passed through the weigh scales? And why is the law still not being enforced, despite assurances given to the hon. member for Waterloo North on Nov. 18?

Hon. Mr. Kerr: Mr. Speaker, as I indicated at that time, the Minister of Transportation and Communications is amending regulations requiring loaded trucks to have a tarp or a cover over their load. At the present time, the only thing the police can do is to charge a truck operator in the event that he loses any part of the load; if it’s dumped in the road in any way. But until that happens there is nothing the police can do, pending the amendment in the regulations. It’s my understanding that the Minister of Transportation and Communications will be bringing those regulations in at any time, requiring that the loads be covered.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Housing has the answer to a question asked previously by the member for Downsview.

RENT INCREASES FOR GAINS RECIPIENTS

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I have a reply to a question during the supplementary estimates that the member for Downsview asked concerning the GAINS programme and the decline in revenue of a tenant.

Mr. Singer: Yes, about Mr. Handleman.

Hon. Mr. Irvine: The member for Downsview was referring to a senior citizen resident of the Lawrence Heights housing development whose rent, he said, would increase from $38 to $48 a month on Jan. 1. An interim rent scale of senior citizens was announced Aug 8, 1974, at which time a single person on GAINS was guaranteed an income of $2,600 annually. This figure has since been increased, as members know, to $2,700 annually. The tenant’s rent will be raised Jan. 1, 1975, to $45 a month inclusive of Hydro. In addition, he will be charged $1.50 for cable television for a total outlay of $46.50.

At the time this tenant’s rent was assessed at $32 -- and that’s what he pays at the present time -- he had an income of $163.10 monthly. In addition, he was assessed $1 for master television and tenant service and paid approximately $6 for Hydro, for a total monthly outlay of $39. However, although the tenant’s outlay would increase from $39 to $46.50, his monthly income has increased from $163.10 to $225.

In other words, out of an income increase of $61.90, only $7.50 is for accommodation and improved television reception facilities. Combined payments to senior citizens from federal-provincial sources, and not only from GAINS, increased in the period between March, 1973, and October, 1974, when a freeze on OHC rents for senior citizens was in effect.

Since a portion of the increase in income was designed to meet the shelter costs, the interim net scale was developed to establish the principle that part of the increase in income was to pay for shelter costs.

Mr. Singer: By way of supplementary, would the minister not agree that, notwithstanding --

Mr. Speaker: The oral question period has more than expired.

Mr. Roy: When is the minister going to answer my question on the order paper?

Mr. Speaker: Petitions.

Presenting reports.

Hon. Mrs. Birch tabled the first annual report of the Ontario Status of Women Council.

Mr. Lewis: Without comment? Are there no comments about why the minister won’t give them enough staff to do that?

Hon. Mr. Stewart tabled the report of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1974.

Hon. Mr. Welch, on behalf of the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Clement) tabled the annual report of the property rights division of the Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations, which included the annual report of the director of land registration.

Hon. Mr. Irvine tabled the annual report for 1973 of the Ontario Housing Corp., Ontario Student Housing Corp. and Housing Corp. Ltd.

Mr. Cassidy: After the estimates as usual.

Mr. J. A. Taylor from the standing administration of justice committee presented the committee’s report which was read as follows and adopted:

Your committee begs to report the following bill with certain amendments:

Bill 55, An Act to prohibit Unfair Practices in Sales to Consumers.

Mr. Speaker: Shall this bill be ordered for third reading?

Mr. Lawlor: No.

Mr. Speaker: I hear a no.

Mr. Lawlor: No, committee of the whole House.

Mr. Speaker: I understand it can only go to committee of the whole House. It is so referred.

Motions.

Introduction of bills.

MUNICIPAL ACT

Hon. Mr. White moves first reading of bill intituled, An Act to amend the Municipal Act.

Motion agreed to; first reading of the bill.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Which we will pass today.

Hon. Mr. White: Mr. Speaker, this bill contains a number of amendments to the Municipal Act. Of particular interest is an amendment to enable us to implement an agreement between the government of Ontario and the government of Canada with respect to regulating of taxis carrying passengers from the Toronto International Airport.

Another amendment permitting municipal control of objects placed on sidewalks will allow municipalities to deal comprehensively with such disparate items as transit shelters, newspaper boxes and sidewalk sales, and to do so without specific provincial legislation.

Other amendments clarify municipal authority to tow cars parked on private property when those cars are blocking a fire route, and liberalize the provisions for changing the status of an area from that of an improvement district to that of a village or township.

There are a number of amendments with respect to municipal financing also included in the bill. Among these is a provision to remove the requirement of departmental approval in the exercise of certain municipal powers with respect to reserve and sinking funds. Furthermore, the Municipal Act is amended to clarify that telephone company receipts under traffic agreements are taxable, and to provide a procedure for allocating the taxes on these receipts to municipalities.

It should be noted as well that municipalities have been prohibited from imposing a licence fee on trailers that are assessed under the Assessment Act. With respect to this amendment, provision is also being made for refunding licence fees which have been paid on such trailers. As well, the minister is being empowered to pay compensation under certain circumstances because of this particular change.

I am going to suggest, Mr. Speaker, that this bill go to the standing committee, because, frankly, while we have arrived at the best solution available to us as a result of a court decision in September which would empower municipalities to license mobile homes which have wheels on them, and to assess as a conventional home mobile homes without wheels on them, there is some feeling in my own self that this section might be improved upon, perhaps with the help of MPPs and other persons affected.

Under other financial revisions to the Act, the authority of municipalities to invest temporary borrowing funds will be extended, and counties will be authorized to issue debentures on behalf of constituent municipalities upon request and upon county agreement.

Finally, mention should be made of the addition of an alternative method, similar to that established for the regions, for the apportionment of costs for county purposes. This addition provides further for the payment of such costs by local municipalities on an instalment basis when a majority of those municipalities so desire.

GIFT TAX ACT

Hon. Mr. Meen moves first reading of bill intituled, An Act to amend the Gift Tax Act, 1972.

Motion agreed to; first reading of the bill.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Mr. Speaker, this bill simply implements the provision in the budget of April 9, 1974, to permit a multiple number of gifts of farming assets up to a maximum aggregate of $50,000 with, of course, provision for filing of appropriate reports as such exempt gifts are made. Perhaps I should add that I don’t propose to have this bill proceed through second reading and the rest of the legislative process until after the new year.

ONTARIO HUMAN RIGHTS CODE

Mr. Cassidy moves first reading of bill intituled, An Act to amend the Ontario Human Rights Code.

Motion agreed to; first reading of the bill.

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the bill is to prohibit discrimination in the rental or sale of housing accommodation against families with children or against any person because of his age. The bill is intended to stop the increasing practice of establishing “adult only” buildings, which is particularly harmful to families because they have higher expenses and more need for living space than single people and couples, and are, therefore, at an economic disadvantage in seeking housing accommodation.

Mr. Speaker, this practice is now prevalent in Toronto, it has crept into Ottawa both in rentals and in condominiums, and it’s something which I fear could really affect families across the province.

Mr. Speaker: We don’t debate the bill at this time.

Mr. Cassidy: In order to balance the obligation to accept children, the bill permits landlords to set a limit on the number of occupants of any dwelling unit, provided that the limit is not less than one person per room. Housing that is limited to senior citizens aged 60 and over is also exempted.

Mr. Speaker: Orders of the day.

Clerk of the House: The 16th order, House in committee of supply.

SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, MINISTRY OF EDUCATION

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Windsor-Walkerville.

Mr. B. Newman (Windsor-Walkerville): Would the minister mind explaining the purpose of the $55 million? It will probably save a lot of questions later.

Hon. T. L. Wells (Minister of Education): Mr. Chairman, every three years the actuary makes a valuation of the teachers’ superannuation fund. The last valuation was made as of Dec. 31, 1969, and it was completed in September, 1971. This actuarial report showed an experience deficiency in the fund, as of the valuation date, of $49,175,000. According to section 2(3)(c) of the Ontario regulation 103/66 made under the Pension Benefits Act, 1965, such a deficiency must be liquidated by special payment over a term not exceeding five years from the date of which the deficiency was determined.

This amount here, Mr. Chairman, represents the experience deficiency plus the interest rate that has been paid on it, and it comes to a total of $55,909,800. Now, the interest paid on the back payments varies with the years involved and it reflects the rates which the payments would have earned for the fund had the payments been made on schedule at the end of each year. They weren’t made on schedule and are now being made in one lump sum, but the interest is being calculated as if they had been made at the beginning of January of each of the years when they would have been due.

Mr. D. M. Deacon (York Centre): At what rate is that interest being calculated?

Hon. Mr. Wells: The interest rate was calculated at six per cent, 8.57 per cent, 7.86 per cent and 8.06 per cent for the different years. Thus the fund is really at the present time placed in exactly the same position as if the payments had been made on the dates when they were due. So this really is -- I suppose you could use the term -- a technical matter which is required under the pension benefits legislation and which is being paid in accordance with all the rules and procedures. That money is now going into the fund.

Mr. Chairman: Shall vote 2701 carry?

The hon. member for Port Arthur.

Mr. J. F. Foulds (Port Arthur): I have just one comment on it, if I may, Mr. Chairman. We had an opportunity during the estimates to discuss the fund, but I would just like to get from the minister, if I could, a reconfirmation that when we resume this session in the coming year we will have an opportunity to have the full superannuation board, before a standing committee of the Legislature simply to have an exchange of views and opinions and to elicit some of the necessary information about the running of the superannuation fund that has arisen over the last year because of various documents of the OSSTF and the OTF and other groups. Could the minister reconfirm that?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Certainly. That was my intention.

Mr. Deacon: Mr. Chairman, I just want to ask the minister the basis on which those particular interest rates were calculated. What was the basis of arriving at the 6.85 and the other interest rates? Was it an average market interest rate?

Hon. Mr. Wells: That’s the interest rate my colleague the Treasurer (Mr. White) mentioned when he talked about the investment of the funds. I think it is the interest rate for the year preceding that the government is paying on its bonds, I think that was the calculation of the interest rates. That’s not the current year, but the year just past.

Mr. Deacon: Is that the interest rate the government had to pay on the market place or on its bonds, say, that it sells to OMERS or another captive fund?

Hon. Mr. Wells: It is the rate that the government is paying on its bonds.

Mr. Deacon: Yes, I realize that, but the government’s rate on the bond market that it pays on its bonds to OMERS is one rate, but what it has to pay in the Ontario market when it markets some bonds -- which it hasn’t done for some time -- on the Ontario market system, is that the rate at which they are basing their calculations? I want to be sure that this is an honest interest rate based upon what prevails in the open market.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I am sorry I haven’t got the section here to read from the Act, Mr. Chairman, but the Act was amended and it is the first one that the member quoted.

Mr. Chairman: Vote 2701 carried? The hon. member for St. George.

Mrs. M. Campbell (St. George): I have just one question. In view of the fact that we are now dealing with the matter of the superannuation commission and funding, has the minister given any further consideration to that group of teachers who have been forced to take an early retirement by reason of ill health and who have not as yet caught up with the advances which have been made to other teachers in the same field?

Hon. Mr. Wells: That along with other things, Mr. Chairman, is under consideration. We haven’t any changes to announce in that particular regard at this present time, but they are all under consideration.

Mr. F. A. Burr (Sandwich-Riverside): Mr. Chairman, has the minister worked out any further plans about future across-the-board increases, as opposed to percentage increases, should there be future raises?

Hon. Mr. Wells: That also is still under consideration, Mr. Chairman. I recall our discussion in the estimates about that and there is a committee meeting about that particular matter.

Vote 2701 agreed to.

Mr. Chairman: This completes the supplementary estimates of the Ministry of Education.

SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, MINISTRY OF HEALTH

Mr. Chairman: Vote 2801. The hon. member for Ottawa East.

On vote 2801:

Mr. A. J. Roy (Ottawa East): Mr. Chairman, the first question I would like to ask the minister is a question that he was asked following his last estimates. Where is his annual report? Does he not think it fair that before we consider such estimates as these that we should have his annual report and we should have --

Hon. F. S. Miller (Minister of Health): You have had it.

Mr. Roy: For this year?

Hon. Mr. Miller: You have had it, sir, for several days.

Mr. Roy: Yes, several days. It’s about time.

Mr. W. Ferrier (Cochrane South): He doesn’t read his mail, I guess.

Mr. Roy: Can I get a chance to read this?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Roy: Well, there is nothing funny about this. You bring in an annual report two days before your estimates: Why didn’t you have your annual report prior to your major estimates two months ago?

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Most of us knew it was here.

Mr. Roy: Well, you keep hiding it. You didn’t brag about it very much. As a matter of policy why don’t you bring in your annual reports prior to the major estimates, instead of waiting so late after the major estimates?

An hon. member: Even the Minister of Health shouldn’t take nine months for that.

Mr. Ferrier: They might inform the opposition too much.

Mr. Roy: I don’t quite understand the other increases, but this amount in vote 2801 for finance and information services; why did you need extra funds for that? Did you give wage increases there or what?

Hon. Mr. Miller: I can explain that, Mr. Chairman. The $918,000 relates entirely to the new drug benefit programme. When the original estimates for the programme were put in, it was a brand new programme and they were not estimated by the Ministry of Health. A round figure for the delivery of the drugs was put in, but not for the set-up of the service and the administration in the first year. These figures all relate to the initiation of the service of the drug benefit plan.

Mr. Roy: I take it they are just for the administration set-up of it and they’re not, in fact, paying for drugs.

Hon. Mr. Miller: That is right, yes.

Mr. Roy: Who pays for that?

Hon. Mr. Miller: I believe you will find that there were figures in our previous estimates that did cover the actual costs of the drug plan, which appear to be accurate -- in other words, the dispensed prescription drugs -- to this point in time.

Mr. Roy: Can you explain to me then when you’re setting up your budget, your estimates for the total year, how you can set up a programme whereby you estimate how much it’s going to cost you for drugs and you don’t estimate it all? At least, it doesn’t appear to be in the estimates, according to your answers here, for the administration of the programme. That doesn’t sound very logical.

Hon. Mr. Miller: I think you’ve got a good question. I asked the same one, as a matter of fact. New programmes that are discussed or initiated, as this one was, in the budget statement by the hon. Treasurer, the ministries are not able to as accurately assess total administration costs as they would if they had the time to plan the programme prior to budget announcement. We simply did not have the input that we would normally have had in calculating this part of the cost.

Mr. Roy: Mr. Chairman, while we’re on that topic and the minister having given an explanation for this item, I think he’ll agree with us that seems illogical that you would set up a drug programme and not have any estimates for the amount of the administration. Does that have anything to do with the confusion and the panic that you spread across the people who were the recipients of that programme?

I don’t think any of the members here can recall receiving so many phone calls about a particular programme and the panic and the confusion and the distress that was spread -- especially upon the senior citizens in this province, who were the recipients of this programme. They were going to drug stores and being told that certain drugs were not itemized on the list. So they were faced with the prospect of either paying it out of their pocket or going back to the doctor’s office to get equivalent drugs. This morning, my colleague from Windsor-Walkerville told us of a situation where a particular drug was not on the programme and an individual had to pay something like $40 a month out of his very limited income.

I want to say to the minister that any benefits you might have gained by establishing this type of programme -- and we felt it was necessary -- you’ve lost by the confusion, the panic and heartbreak on the part of these individuals who had to go through all this turmoil. I’m only talking about the recipients. I had half the pharmacists in Ottawa calling me up about the programme. It took a great deal of time to explain to these individuals why they couldn’t get pills the same colour as before, and other matters. It gets to be a psychological element. There was confusion caused to the doctors as well.

I want to say to the minister that it appears clear from my discussions with the pharmacists, the doctors and the people who are the recipients of this programme, that you did not have sufficient discussions to iron out any problems envisaged. It would appear very clear, for instance, that somebody in your ministry had a certain theory of what he should do, but he did not have sufficient practical input to envisage some of these problems.

I want to say to the minister, and repeat again, that I don’t think there has been another programme initiated since this government was returned to power, since 1971, that has caused so much confusion and so much panic among the recipients of a particular programme.

Any benefit that you might have had by establishing the programme was lost because of the confusion caused. I want to say to the minister that I’m not satisfied that all the matters are ironed out yet in that programme. There are still drugs where it is questionable, for instance, whether you can get an equivalent drug, or whether they are even on the list.

For political reasons, or whatever, you announce a programme and then nothing much is done in establishing it. All at once you’re faced with a deadline and it’s spread on the community -- and then you sort of work by trial and error. Surely as a responsible minister and as people who are responsible within a department, you should be able to foresee some of these problems.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, I am quite aware of the problems that were faced by the pharmacists and by the public when a new programme came on stream. They were predictable. In fact, our staff said they would happen.

The validity of the drug formulary is something you can argue at length. It did have a lot of practical input into it, contrary to the statements made by many of the professionals, either prescribing or dispensing prescriptions.

I have visited the drug quality and therapeutics committee at least once since this bill came out and the plan came out. I have told them I encourage the continuous updating of the formulary.

I can tell you that every person who practises is quite sure that unless he is on the board that makes the decisions the rest of the people are in an ivory tower. It is as simple as that. I can only take you to the people who we’ve asked to come in and give us advice. Certainly you will find academics on it, but at the same time you will find people who are familiar with the day-to-day problems of both medicine and of pharmacy.

It happens that the Ontario Medical Association, which is the group representing the physicians in Ontario, still endorses the formulary as it stands. It does admit that many of its individual members do not. One of the problems they’ve been trying to get across to their individual members is that perhaps they need to question the validity of prescribing some of the drugs that aren’t on our plan. As I’m sure the member for Oshawa will agree, that is sometimes a pretty touchy thing, because doctors have got into the habit of prescribing certain pet drugs which tests show are not necessarily as good as they think they are.

Mr. R. Haggerty (Welland South): But it is agreeable to the patient.

Mr. Ferrier: The member for Oshawa (Mr. McIlveen) wouldn’t do that.

Hon. Mr. Miller: I would like to feel that when I give away money of the Province of Ontario, it will be for drugs that are necessary.

An hon. member: It should be.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Parkdale.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Just a second, I’m not through.

If I drew a curve of the problems of the plan, it would start at a very high level and would drop down quite quickly, because it has done just that with time. We felt we had at least a six month, perhaps a nine month and perhaps even a year, period of time when we needed to modify our position as experience proved out and people got used to the plan. The most traumatic thing was the change in the colour or shape of a specific pill for many a person getting it.

Mr. Roy: And combination drugs.

Hon. Mr. Miller: The second was the combination drug issue, and that still is a very valid problem on which I’m keeping an open mind. Economically and from the medical point of view, we can justify the formulary as it stands. We have the endorsation of the OMA on that.

In the one or two examples you can go to in which drugs contain three or more ingredients, the economics break down.

But most certainly when you go to the more common items, those for high blood pressure for example, that do combine things like diuretics and compounds like methyldopa, they seldom contain the right balance of drugs for a specific patient. I’m told this, and I hope I can get somebody to nod their head up and down.

Mr. Haggerty: You twisted your neck the last time.

Hon. Mr. Miller: You may nod your head that way, but I wouldn’t look backwards for support.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Generally, there is some titrating or some balancing of the needs. I know because I’m undergoing that very process right now were they are trying to adjust me to a change in hydrochlorothiazide -- would that be right sir? -- and methyldopa.

Mr. Roy: Is that what’s wrong?

Hon. Mr. Miller: I’m taking those materials as components and they have to be balanced until my particular case works. To assume that a drug company that prepackages a fixed combination in a pill of a given size has the right combination is not good medicine.

Mr. Ferrier: The company has been ripping the patients off for years then.

Hon. Mr. Miller: I can only tell you that when you buy those two compounds on a competitive basis, they are cheaper than if you buy them in a pre-mixed package.

Mr. S. Lewis (Scarborough West): It says something, doesn’t it?

Hon. Mr. Miller: That was one of the issues that was very difficult to discuss. I’ve said this to the pharmacists of Ontario many times, I appreciate that they were left explaining both frontwards and backwards.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): It is hardly fair to them.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Well a good many of them objected to the philosophy of the plan, regardless of its detail. They simply didn’t want government being the purchaser. And, unfortunately, That’s a tough issue, but I think government had a duty to supply free drugs to the group it chose -- the people in the lowest wage scale, those on family benefits, senior citizens on GAINS and GIS. If that philosophical approach hasn’t been acceptable to every pharmacist, I’m sorry. But I do feel it is my duty and obligation to provide those drugs, and I do believe the patients are more satisfied now that they are getting used to the plan.

We are adding drugs. There will be a new formulary out in January and probably another one around April. I can only assure the members that I am carefully weighing the combination drug issue in particular, and that I am willing to practise convenient medicine rather than good medicine if we find old people can’t cope.

Mr. Roy: I just want to say to the minister, Mr. Chairman, that I appreciate it’s not easy to bring in a programme, but you’ve made some admissions, which as an opposition critic, I find somewhat frightening. Either you did not foresee the impact of it or the problems that were going to be caused, and that’s planning with ignorance and without forethought, and you should be criticized for it. If you could predict that you were going to have that kind of problem, having in mind the recipients were by and large older people and people of this nature -- and including the problems anticipated for the pharmacists and the prescribing physicians -- if you were able to predict that to some degree, I’m suggesting to you again that what occurred is not a very good operation by the government. It borders on negligence that you were prepared to accept that kind of flak and cause that kind of panic across the community and say, “we are going to solve it in a matter of months” or whatever.

I really think that where your programme broke down is that you did not have sufficient consultation with the pharmacists; that they didn’t have sufficient prior notice of this. I don’t have all the figures here, but there was a meeting with the Ontario Pharmacists’ Association -- the dispensers -- I think maybe a week before the programme was, in fact, established.

I had all the figures before, Mr. Chairman, but I don’t have them here. Anyway, there was not sufficient time given in advance notice. I would suggest to you that you could have cushioned this blow somewhat by educating the public on what your plans would have been by giving them some sort of advance notice so that people would say, “look madam, your pills might have changed colour but we are giving you equivalent drugs.”

You’ve got to consider people of that age -- and in fact all people, not only the senior people. It gets to be psychological, this thing, taking a red pill instead of the green one, and taking the combination drugs and so on. I tell you, the people who were calling were not people who were calling for nothing. I felt they were sincere people who were extremely concerned. We’ve had example after example cited here about people who were really disturbed. It caused panic in their lives. I say to you there is no excuse for that. If you could predict it, that is no excuse. And if you could not, well, that’s not very good administration on the part of your ministry.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Obviously, the member is using very ideal words. If he feels he could get the story to an individual recipient of a drug before such time as he or she comes in for that drug, then I would like to know how he would do it.

Mr. Roy: Well, you have some idea who the people are.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Frankly, you can put advertisements in newspapers from now until the end of time, you can put newspaper articles in and you can discuss them, but until such time as the person --

Mr. Roy: When it suits your purpose, you put advertisements in.

Hon. Mr. Miller: We did send all the stuff out to the dentists and the druggists, and we did send it to the doctors; and it turned out that, like many other people, they didn’t read a darned thing until they were faced with the project.

Mr. Ferrier: You were spending a lot of money for nothing in a lot of this advertising.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Parkdale.

Mr. J. Dukszta (Parkdale): Through you, Mr. Chairman, just to make a point on the thing that was just being discussed: One way of solving this problem, of course, is if you have universal coverage of all the drugs for everyone -- or at least starting at the age of 60, according to your programme -- then you probably wouldn’t run into this type of problem.

I have only about three comments and a couple of questions, but I wonder if you can tell me what percentage of the money we have to vote here for the operation of hospitals and related facilities is actually going to the hospital workers.

An hon. member: That’s another vote.

Mr. Dukszta: Sorry. Can I rephrase the question by saying what would be the approximate percentage of the total supplementary estimate?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, if you look at the total of $213 million that I am asking for today, there is $195 million for the operation of hospitals and related facilities, and almost all of that, say 90 per cent of that total, will be for salaries.

Mr. Dukszta: Well, there was a reason I was asking. I have spent some time, and so has this party, in supporting and urging you to do it; and it would be completely inconsistent for us now to question that part of the total, so, obviously we support it. But that does not stop me from making a couple of other comments on completely related fields.

One of the comments I want to make, which I think has some relevance to our overall rising costs, is related to your annual report. On page 15, in the first column, there is a series of figures indicating the percentage of OHIP claims as related to percentage of population. Let me just pick out two salient areas.

In Toronto, where the percentage of claims is 40.3, the percentage of population is 27.5. By way of contrast, in Sudbury the percentage of claims is 5.5, while the percentage of population is 7.5. There is a completely different relationship. I assume it doesn’t mean the people in Sudbury are much healthier. All it really means is that more physicians and more elaborate services are present in Toronto than there are in Sudbury. So your own figures point out how distorted is the availability and accessibility of medical resources when comparing a large urban centre like Toronto with Sudbury.

If you have any other explanations for why it should be so, maybe you could offer them. Then I will have one more question.

Hon. Mr. Miller: No, I think you have the right interpretation. I don’t know that I have solid statistics to back this up, but the other day I was looking at an internal study made for me which compared some of the costs of health service per capita in the north and in the south and admissions to hospitals in the north and admissions to hospitals in the south. Two fairly similar towns, Sault Ste. Marie and Oshawa, were compared, and it was interesting to note that we were spending twice as much per patient in the north as we were in the south.

Mr. Dukszta: That is understandable in areas like Thunder Bay and in the real north, but not in Sudbury, which is a town. It’s still significantly less in terms of the percentage of claims and the percentage population. If you are concerned about cutting the services of the physicians according to the proportions that you have been drawing -- so many doctors for so many patients -- obviously you have to start with Toronto and only then move to Sudbury which, according to this thing, is grossly undermanned in terms of physician power. Well I think my point is made.

On the other thing, I want to refer back to something you have been dealing with during the last two days, which is the cut in funds to the general hospitals, and specifically the cuts --

Mr. Chairman: Perhaps we could leave the hospitals until vote 2803.

Mr. Dukszta: It is a fairly general point, Mr. Chairman. I am talking generally in respect of hospitals, because I think it involves general cuts that have been extended now throughout the whole field, really. I thought it fitted better to the general remarks like this.

Hon. Mr. Miller: In our last estimates debates, we did roam across them. I really don’t mind which way you do them, but we apparently started out doing them item by item. It might be easier if we stuck to an item-by-item basis with this limited number this time and therefore have this discussed at the appropriate vote.

Mr. Dukszta: I was going to limit myself. I was going to keep my remarks all together.

Hon. Mr. Miller: That is great, then. I will be glad to accept it.

Mr. Dukszta: If I can get in my last remark, then that will be the end of me, so to speak, Mr. Chairman.

Hon. Mr. Miller: If I could count on that, I would let you keep on speaking.

Mr. Dukszta: You can count on that, yes.

You have suggested cuts and in fact are implementing in the general hospitals a two per cent cut. I know that recently you have seen a deputation from social workers from Toronto General Hospital who have been concerned that their department especially has been hit. Instead of the two per cent cut going across the board and hitting all the departments and the whole function of the hospitals, only one department has been hit.

Mr. Chairman: With all due respect to the member for Parkdale, this is the first item on the very last vote that we are discussing --

Mr. Dukszta: I thought we agreed that I could get this in.

Mr. Chairman: You can leave that. We are not going to be that long on items. Just hang around for a while.

Mr. Dukszta: Okay, I will leave it.

Mr. Chairman: The member for St. George.

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Chairman, I would like to just carry on for a moment on the drug programme which has been the subject of lead-offs in GAINS. The one concern that I have may not be really related to either good medical practice or any other good practice, but I would like once more to draw your attention to the people who are in their late 70s and 80s who have had a composite drug over a period of time and then find themselves with a series of pills. I still have the ongoing concern that I stressed before that they often do not remember what pills they have taken, or they may take more of one than another, and I wonder if the minister has taken that into consideration.

I am not prepared to condemn this programme. I welcomed it when it came in. I was deeply concerned about the problems which it created but I just feel that in these cases, surely it would be better to let people at that age continue with that which they have been used to rather than running the risk that they will not be in balance, if that is the correct terminology, by using separate sets of pills. I have witnessed the situation on more than one occasion when an older person was trying to remember which pill had been taken at what time. I would ask that some allowance be made.

I have another question. Mr. Chairman. which is global in nature, and I wonder if it should come now or at the end of the estimates. May I just put the question and then if you think it is out of order you will say so.

I would like to know whether the ministry has in fact conducted any research as to the global costs of the health programme, having in mind those portions which have been transferred to welfare -- to Community and Social Services -- having in mind the fact that much of extended care is still funded through that ministry rather than this. The programme for the retarded has gone and it seems to me that there should be some effort to try to assess the global health cost and not have them mixed with other ministries, which rather tends to diffuse the issue. If that question is not there now, I will leave it for later.

Mr. Chairman: I think this should come under information services, but this is the only place you could ask the question under the present vote.

Mrs. Campbell: Thank you. I would appreciate an answer.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, I recognize the first problem. On an individual basis we have waived the requirement for the specific drugs to be given and we have permitted, by special order, a prescription to be dispensed that doesn’t have drugs in the formulary. I’m still quite willing to do that. But even more importantly, I am keeping aware of the very real problem you’ve just posed. I agreed it is the most serious problem of the breakdown. I have trouble, at my young age, keeping track of some of the ones I take.

Mr. B. Newman: You are 29-plus.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Thank you; 29-plus. So, I do appreciate the problem. I am giving that very deed consideration. I would say that sometime in February I’ll have to come to a final conclusion on principle on that.

Mrs. Campbell: Feb. 14, no doubt.

Hon. Mr. Miller: My heart’s in the right place.

Now, as far as global costs: yes, I’ve been studying not. only those costs -- and I can’t give them out of my head -- that are in my budget and paid for by government, but even more importantly the issue of what health costs are yet borne by the public that aren’t included in government plans.

I can tell you that about 75 per cent of the total costs of health related programmes are paid for by government today. About 25 per cent -- according to our best estimates -- are paid for by the individual on a cash basis, or some other basis of his own, but not involving government; private insurance plans or something of that nature.

Sn that if I had a budget of $2.5 billion this year in total, you should add probably a third to that and say that the health care costs of Ontario are in the neighbourhood of $3.3 billion to $3.4 billion a year -- if that gives you the global picture.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Windsor-Walkerville.

Mr. B. Newman: Mr. Chairman, I wanted to make a few comments, especially concerning the drug programme. The minister did make mention, as did others, of the traumatic experience that an individual, especially an elderly individual, goes through when simply the colour of the pill is changed because the original pill was not in the formulary and a substitute had to be used.

But there was another traumatic experience that many of the citizens experienced. That is, when they went to the druggist to get the pill, and then all of a sudden were told that it was not on the formulary and they were going to have to pay for it. To me, there should have been some liaison or some communication with the doctor when he first prescribed the pill; stating the pill was not on the formulary and that the senior citizen would have to pay for the pill.

Hon. Mr. Miller: There was.

Mr. B. Newman: Well, maybe there was through your ministry; but it wasn’t in many instances as far as the patient and the doctor were concerned in the various municipalities. That is one of the complaints that was registered to me, Mr. Minister.

Hon. Mr. Miller: May I speak to that just for a second? I feel very strongly on that point because I made a plea to the Ontario Medical Association as early as Oct. 7 or 8, when it became obvious that certain people who didn’t like a state plan at all were doing their darnedest to upset people.

Now, they did have the information and they would make statements like, “I’d rather lose my patient than change my prescribing habits.” I thought the people who made those statements were being irresponsible; I asked the Ontario Medical Association to advise me as to whether we were right not they were right. They assured me we were. I said, “Fine. As an association of responsible people, I would like your endorsation publicly of the principles that we’re trying to come tip with here.”

We had sent them the information. Many of them claimed they didn’t have it, then checking back they found they had. I know they’re busy people and I know they often don’t read the things that come in; but surely the professional had the duty to do the very things you are referring to. If we hadn’t sent them that information we would certainly be open to criticism, but we did.

Mr. B. Newman: Well, Mr. Minister, what you say may be true and I may be criticizing the wrong individual. But I’m concerned about the senior citizen who went to have a prescription filled and then was told that it would cost $7.50, or some other amount.

Now, for three months prior to that, that senior citizen understood that prescription drugs were all going to be paid for. They had been getting this drug for months and paid for quite often by the local welfare office. Now, all of a sudden, they get into the pharmacist’s and they find that they have to shell out. They didn’t come prepared because they knew or they understood that the plan would have paid for all of the prescription drugs.

I thought that you should have phased this in. In other words, rather than, all of a sudden, starting on Sept. 1 to make the individual pay for all drugs that are not on the formulary, maybe you should have extended that over a three-month period of time. You should have stated “We will fill out the prescription this time, but we will not fill it out after Oct. 1” and with some of the other drugs maybe after Nov. 1, and then the third set of drugs after Dec. 1, so that the impact would a have been so hard and so financially heavy on many of the senior citizens.

Mr. Roy: Good point.

Mr. B. Newman: I don’t think that that would have been complicated. It may have cost some money, but if we are going to look a the overall benefit of the programme to the senior citizen, we should let the senior citizen know that the drug he has been receiving now for months and maybe even years is not all of a sudden going to be cut off and is not such that he is going to have to pay for it. If you had an alcoholic and, all of a sudden, you decided you were going to rehabilitate him by cutting off his access to alcohol, that individual would probably be climbing walls for the first few days after not, having access to alcohol.

I think you really should have phased in the programme rather than coming out with it as abruptly as you did.

There is another thing I think maybe you should have done. You knew that certain drugs by common name were not going to be on the formulary, such as laxatives and so forth. I think the senior citizen could have been advised that a drug was a laxative and was not going to be accepted in the formulary and he was going to have to pay for it on his own. Remember, also, Mr. Minister, that a lot of these drugs, even though they were not on the formulary, were paid for by the local welfare offices, and now, all of a sudden, they are not.

Those are the comments I wanted to make to the minister concerning the plan. I hope that when he introduces the new formulary there is some advance publicity given, so that not only the doctor knows, but also the senior citizen may know that certain drugs will not be on the formulary and, as a result, will not be accepted for payment and that the senior citizen or the disabled will have to pay for that drug himself or herself.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Thunder Bay.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It never ceases to amaze me when we are talking about things here in the south we get the member for Windsor-Walkerville talking about a problem with a specific drug or the administration of a certain programme. I have to get up and speak on this vote, not because I am faced with the same problems as the member for Windsor-Walkerville, but simply because in the north we don’t have the personnel to administer the programmes we are talking about in these votes.

I want to make the minister aware that the largest centre of population in the riding of Thunder Bay, which is the largest riding in the Province of Ontario, doesn’t even have a pharmacist.

Mr. Ferrier: What place is that? Manitouwadge?

Mr. Stokes: That is Manitouwadge. I have sent a letter to the minister within the last few days -- I don’t know whether it was brought to his attention or not -- about a plea by the representative of the College of Pharmacy in the city of Thunder Bay, who appreciates what the problem is. The problem confronting the largest town in my riding, Manitouwadge, is to attract a pharmacist and to make it financially attractive enough so that he will stay around.

We have suggested that you either come up with a kind of incentive programme for pharmacists in the same way that you have come up with an incentive programme for doctors and dentists or, where that is not possible, have a mobile pharmacy where you can go around and sell drugs that are prescribed by doctors, wherever they may be located.

We actually have people who have to send by mail anywhere from 200 to 350 miles to get a prescription filled. When somebody needs drugs in a hurry they just can’t wait a week or 10 days for it to sort its way through this maze that we call our postal system.

It seems to me that every time we talk about something that represents an expenditure of funds here in this Legislature, I sit and listen to some of the detailed problems that are confronting members and their constituents here in southern Ontario. But it’s a whole new ball game in many, many areas in northern Ontario where they don’t even have the personnel to dispense the drugs.

Sure, if we had the personnel to dispense the drugs I suppose I’d be talking about the same things as my friend from Windsor-Walkerville does, but we don’t even have a pharmacist. What’s the minister going to do about it?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Have you a doctor in Manitouwadge?

Mr. Stokes: Two of them.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Are they dispensing physicians?

Mr. Stokes: Physicians?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Yes. You see, wherever we haven’t got a pharmacist we made the agreement that the dispensing physician who traditionally has played this role gets paid exactly the same premium as the pharmacist would for dispensing.

Mr. Stokes: The physicians have dispensed some of them, but they’re hoping that they will be able to attract a pharmacist, so they’re not starting to stock all of these things in the hope of being able to attract a pharmacist. The College of Pharmacy has taken an active interest in this. But to date they haven’t been able to persuade somebody to go into what is the largest centre of population in my riding.

I think you have it in your power to make it financially worthwhile for somebody to go in there and practise. You’ve got a level of income for dentists below which their income can’t fall if they’re participating in your incentive programme. You have the same thing for doctors. Since this is an integral part of the health delivery system, and of health protection and disease prevention, I think that you should consider making a similar programme available for pharmacists.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, I think it’s my duty to see that drugs are available, but I don’t know that it’s necessarily my duty to guarantee a pharmacist specifically, if by guaranteeing the payment to physicians I can accomplish the same net objective at a lower cost. The physician does get the $2.05 that the pharmacist would get if he’s in an area where a pharmacist is not currently available. We will pay him on exactly the same kind of basis, so he gets his professional fee plus the dispensing fee that he otherwise wouldn’t be entitled to have if he were in an area where a pharmacist existed.

We are working with other colleges -- optometry and pharmacy. In fact, I helped at least one town obtain a pharmacist not too long ago on that kind of a basis. I’m quite willing to try specifically on your behalf. I’ll give no promise except consideration to the incentive system, because the pharmacist has more ways of making money than his straight profession, as a dispenser of drugs. I think I have to bear in mind the commercial aspects of his business as well as the professional aspects when I get into that kind of an agreement.

I want to say one thing, though, to all of you who have complained about the plan. We talk about these problems that existed as if they were the great bulk of the things. They are not. They’re the small minority. Think back to when you had the problems with OHIP when it came in. I can only tell you that the great bulk of the people are getting $20 million worth of free drugs that six months ago they did not get.

Surely that is a major step forward. Surely that deserves some commendation, and thank goodness from time to time we actually get some.

Mr. Chairman: The member for Kent.

Mr. J. P. Spence (Kent): Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask a question in regard to the supply of drugs to the patient. Is it true the ministry will pay only for a month’s supply of drugs for a patient? Of course, we have some complaints where we have those who are on a disability pension, unable to drive and with no motor transportation, and we have those who tell us they have to drive 25 miles in order to get a certain drug. It would be less costly if this ministry could give consideration to allowing some to buy two months’ supply, which would cut down the cost of getting these drugs.

The minister might answer another question, while I’m on my feet, in regard to the fee to the doctors who prescribe the drugs or medicine to the patients. It has been brought to my attention it is according to the distance from the first pharmacist that the doctor is paid. Now one doctor is paid half the fee and another doctor 10 miles away gets the full fee. People wonder what the difference is. The doctor doesn’t need to drive, so why would they not all get the same fee?

Hon. Mr. Miller: I’ll answer the two questions, if I may. Yes, we limit to a 30-day supply the amount that any one prescription billed under the plan can have. The average quantity of time that a prescription given by a doctor covers is 22 days, so we are covering more than the average duration of the prescription.

The reason for keeping it to a 30-day limit is that eligibility is based on a month-by-month voucher.

There is a turnover of 10 per cent per month, I’m told, in at least the FBA section of the plan. I don’t know if it is the total number of the 550,000 or of just the FBA section. It is on the total, which means we have a 55,000-person turnover per month.

So there is some problem in giving people who may not be eligible prescriptions in advance. The druggist can do that, in a sense, on a his risk basis, and I know a number have. They have given basically three months’ or two months’ supply. I had one call me the other day, and it made me wonder just how the person became eligible for the plan, but he said, “can I give such and such a patient six months’ supply of a drug so they’ll have it with them while they are in Florida for the winter?”

Mr. R. F. Ruston (Essex-Kent): It is pretty tough if you have to get drugs for six months before you go to Florida.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Just how that person got to be an FBA beneficiary or a GIS beneficiary I’ll never know, but there you go.

Mr. Deacon: What if they are living with their families down there?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Oh I recognize there could be circumstances, but I had to smile a bit when that was asked of me.

Mr. Stokes: They are entitled.

Mr. Deacon: It raises a question.

Hon. Mr. Miller: The other issue was the question of the amount we pay a doctor. We pay dispensing physicians $1 in a community that is either within a reasonable distance of or served by a pharmacist. We did that as a disincentive on a professional conflict-of-interest basis, because I don’t think a doctor should be profiting from the sale of a prescription. Therefore I say it is his duty to decide not on the merits of how much he makes but on the need of the patient as to whether that patient should or should not be given a prescription. So we have a disincentive built in for doctors. They have to go through all the red tape for $1, and if they’re willing to do it, then we assume there was a need.

Mr. Spence: Yes Mr. Chairman, but if a doctor is twice the distance away then he would get twice the fee. Is that right?

Hon. Mr. Miller: He gets the $2.05 if he is in an unserviced community. We have to make arbitrary decisions as to when a person is within a reasonable distance and when he is not. I know there will always be some conflict, but strangely enough there is very little.

Mr. Stokes: Two final questions. You didn’t respond to my notion that perhaps we might solve the pharmacist problem by a mobile pharmacy.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Stokes: Well, hopefully it is mobile all the time.

Mr. Roy: It’s only 300 miles away, but at least it’s mobile.

Mr. Stokes: Yes, at least it is something that is mobile and able to travel.

Another question arose in my mind as a result of your last remark. What would you do in the case of a doctor who continues to dispense drugs even though there is a pharmacist in the community?

Mr. Roy: Cut him off.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Under the definition of the practice of medicine, the physician is permitted to dispense.

Mr. Stokes: In the absence of a pharmacist?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Any time! It is part of the things that doctors have traditionally done over the years. The issue isn’t whether he comes to your house at 12 o’clock at night and says, “here are two pills,” or “here are 50 pills.” There have been doctors -- particularly among the older ones -- who grew up in the tradition of running their own dispensary and looking after almost all the drug needs of their patients. These people have traditionally made a profit out of it over the years.

Mr. Stokes: I know one who even set up a dummy company for income tax purposes.

Hon. Mr. Miller: We simply say that we feel there are inherent conflicts of interest in encouraging the dispensing of drugs by the same person who prescribes them.

So, we are putting this disincentive in. We are making them keep all the records, use the proper safety containers, and everything else; but they just get what we estimate to be the very bare cost of having performed that service, which is $1.

Mr. Chairman: Shall vote 2801 carry?

Vote 2801 agreed to.

On vote 2802:

Mr. Roy: May I just make one comment on this vote, Mr. Chairman, to the minister? When we are talking about the question of disease prevention and health protection I find somewhat ironic the contradictions that exist between one department and various other departments -- and I intend to go into it in more depth when we discuss, under vote 2803, the question of curbs and ways that we could save money in our health care programme in this province.

For instance, I said to the minister some time ago that one of the ways of saving money is in the area of health protection and disease prevention; in other words people keeping fit, people avoiding accidents, people doing a variety of things. Now, I’ve not seen your ministry -- and I’m repeating what I said in the original estimates -- take any sort of initiative about asking people, for instance, to keep fit; or encouraging some form of programme for people across this province to keep fit, I’ve not seen your Premier (Mr. Davis) --

An hon. member: He stopped smoking.

Mr. Roy: -- or other members of the cabinet setting any example in themselves. You see, we rely on the medical profession to tell people to keep fit.

Mr. Ferrier: He took off a whole lot of weight. He used to be pudgy, but now he is quite trim.

Mr. Roy: I’m not going to criticize the minister personally for the shape he is in, but there are other people in your cabinet. For instance, in Ottawa last week -- it was sort of humorous -- there was a front-page photograph of some of your ministers who were down there last Wednesday. There was a group asking for curbs on smoking in certain public areas, and there on the front page was the Minister of Government Services (Mr. Snow) with a big cigar, you could hardly see him for smoke. The Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Bernier) had a cigar as well; the Treasurer had a cigarette going and the Solicitor General (Mr. Kerr) had a pipe going. And the brief was to these people, about limiting smoking in certain areas.

What I’m talking about basically is a programme to encourage people to keep fit and the example set by your leader and your ministers to citizens across the province on how to keep fit. That is the first point, Mr. Chairman, I want to make to the minister. Surely you have to set an example.

It’s all very well to tell people, you know, but it’s really as bad down here as what happened last week in Ottawa, where you had the Minister of Finance talking of certain curbs and saying he was going to talk to certain people about the question of restraints and things of this nature, and then came the increases to the federal members, which surprised many of us here in this House.

Mr. Deacon: Fortunately they have reconsidered.

Mr. Roy: Yes, they have reconsidered their position and I think --

Mr. Ferrier: Almost makes you wish you had got that federal nomination.

Mr. Roy: Not at all, not at all. I spoke publicly against it and about the example they were giving.

What I am saying to you is that it’s all very well for you to preach and to say all sorts of things and to talk to the people, but you really haven’t done very much by concrete example.

Another example I can give the minister is that I think you probably take the position that enforcing the use of seatbelts in motor vehicles is going to be one way of preventing serious injury and, of course, limiting the cost of health care. In fact, wasn’t there a picture of you sitting in your motor vehicle with the seatbelt on? And yet although your Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Rhodes) and your leader said this was going to be mandatory some time ago, we haven’t heard anything about it since.

Are you putting pressure on that ministry to take that step? We have had a consumer report presented at the federal level very recently which said this would prevent injuries. I don’t know how many millions of dollars we are spending as a direct result of motor vehicle accidents and on the victims of motor vehicle accidents.

What I am saying, Mr. Chairman, to the minister, is that basically he is all talk. He does certain things, he makes public statements for political purposes, bot he is not doing very much.

Mr. Ferrier: Has the minister given up swimming?

Mr. Chairman: Is vote 2802 carried?

Vote 2802 agreed to.

On vote 2803:

Mr. Chairman: Vote 2803. The member for Parkdale.

Mr. Dukszta: Just one question. Can I return to that point I was making in the beginning, through you, Mr. Chairman, to the minister? I just wanted to bring again to your attention -- as you know, we have been dealing on this matter together, rather indirectly -- I have appreciated that you have taken such a personal interest and action, and were so accessible to that deputation from the Toronto General Hospital when they came to tell you about the difficulties their department will have once the cuts go in.

Now the cut which you are proposing is two per cent for the whole hospital budget, which in a way is the right policy -- the hospital expenses have to be cut; a number of active beds have to be removed. But it is advisable surely, and I’ll just leave you with this point, when you are making this type of a decision to move from bed care towards the ambulatory type of care in the community, that the very services which will make sure that the beds are kept empty -- the social and preventive services -- will not be cut by an act of an administrator who is not able, maybe, to affect the well-entrenched medical territorality in a hospital. The administrator might be unable to cut that but is quite able to cut, because of its lack of power, a department which in your own terms, I think -- in terms of preventive health -- is more important.

I am just going to give you an example, I think, of how it works in an emergency room. Quite often, in spite of what we say about the active beds in emergency rooms in general hospitals, people get admitted, not necessarily because of an acute medical need, but because there is nowhere else for them to go. But with a department of social work, the social worker on duty in an emergency room is a person who usually has contacts and is able maybe to arrange for a bed outside the hospital, which is invariably cheaper.

Now I can’t translate this into figures obviously, but cutting out these services will put an extra pressure on the active beds nevertheless, and I would predict that if you allow this type of approach to continue, if you don’t intervene in it, we will have more pressure on active beds, not less, and all your other programmes in ambulatory care will suffer.

Again, I just hope you do intervene in that situation, because I think in the long run it could become a very serious situation for all general hospitals in a city if this approach were adopted, as was adopted by the administration of the Toronto General Hospital.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, the two per cent constraint was a pretty necessary one. It was based on the initial 1974 estimate of expenses, not the final approved budget after the salary inflation took place. I think you saw that at the Toronto General, the hospital you are mentioning, it amounted to $790,000 a year. Two per cent of my budget -- well each per cent today is $15 million in the hospital budget, so one doesn’t dispose of a per cent lightly. It has a tremendous effect relative to many other people’s operating budgets.

I arrived at that figure to some degree arbitrarily, but only after discussion, full discussion, with the Ontario Hospital Association as to what might be a possible amount for hospitals to absorb this year.

It was my hope that the two per cent could be taken out of administrative and non-medical areas of costs -- or as we have said, to trim the fat out of the system a bit.

I think it is safe to say the hospitals felt the fat was all gone because they have gone through three or four years of fairly minimal budgetary increases. But after three days of negotiations, they agreed that a fixed two per cent budget reduction was acceptable to them. To give the hospitals of Ontario a great deal of credit, they have all submitted their 1975 budgets already. They all submitted them on time, that is Dec. 2, 1974.

In the main they lived within the constraints. Not all of them did. Those that didn’t are going to be advised of that. We feel they have been co-operative.

Mr. Stokes: Including those in Thunder Bay.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Now at that point in time a hospital board is charged with the responsibility for administering its own operation. I find it very difficult for me to start ordering them to take the money out of one part or another part.

The commitment I made to your group the other day was not to interfere in the management of any hospital, but to make them aware that I had heard the delegation. I think you know that was my commitment. That part I will live by. In fact, I understand that we are available to see the delegation -- either my parliamentary assistant or I, and it will probably be he who sees them rather than I -- but we are available to discuss any other details they have. I recommend to them, as I would recommend to any other group that thinks the hospital made an unfair decision, that their normal recourse is through the management; that these deal with within their hospital, not through the Ministry of Health imposing an order on the hospital. That is how boards are constituted. I think it’s dangerous for me to assume that I have the right to interfere in their internal processes.

Mr. Stokes: Those decisions are made on your budgetary restraints. They have a right to object.

Mr. Chairman: The member for Ottawa East.

Mr. Roy: Yes, Mr. Chairman. The item that we are about to vote on, of course, is the major one in the supplementary estimates. It is an amount of $198 million. It is just staggering that we are just going to take a few minutes for this. I suppose it’s like the few minutes we took for the $2.3 billion budget that we discussed a few months ago.

This has to be said, Mr. Chairman, to the minister, that it’s high time we got a bit of action out of him. The gestation period normally takes nine months. You have had 10 months. You are a bit late. Maybe there is something that’s going to happen.

Mr. Chairman, we used to deride the minister’s predecessor, the hon. member for Quinte (Mr. Potter) when he came in with his famous supplementary estimates of $50 million. You really make him look like a rank amateur. My God, you are coming in with four times the amount, and all the while we have had a succession of health ministers who have talked about constraints. How often did we hear that from your predecessor -- constraints?

Mr. Stokes: That is to pay for hospital workers.

Hon. Mr. Miller: On a point here; you are then, of course saying we are wrong in giving any salary increases to the hospital employees of Toronto this year?

Mr. Roy: No, we derided you for having kept the hospital workers in a closed shop and a strait-jacket. You had forced them into a situation where they couldn’t strike, and yet you would put ceilings on them. It bordered on negligence what you were doing to these people.

But that is not the situation. What we are talking about is cutting out the fat in other areas. We are saying to you that if you had reorganized your ministry it would cut fat; I think it’s cynical of you to suggest that we were against wage increases for the hospital workers, the nurses, the technicians and so on, especially when one considers the gap between them and other health professionals, such as the doctors. The gap has increased between the doctors and the people at the bottom end of the scale. There was no fuss when you gave the doctors an increase.

Mr. Chairman, we’re talking here to a minister who is the successor to a line of ministers who have been talking about constraints. But have we seen any constraints? The minister was the first to admit that he was not controlling his Health budget. He was crying to the public all fall about the need to bring in constraints, but I can recall his predecessor saying in this House on a regular basis that he had a constraint package somewhere.

Mr. Chairman, we on this side of the House must say to the minister that it’s time for some action. You know, the minister mentioned the hospitals; and while we appreciate that these supplementary estimates are mainly for the wage increases, I say to him that he should have forseen that that was inevitable. How long did he think he was going to keep the hospital workers at the rate they couldn’t live on? How long did he think he was going to have them respect the law which did not allow them to strike? And how long did he think they were prepared to accept the ceilings that he had imposed on them? The minister placed them in an impossible situation.

The minister’s excuse is that he had to give these people an increase. What we’re saying to him is that this was inevitable and, in the light of that, he should have been looking at other areas. I don’t mean just this minister; this should have been done over a period of years. But he should have brought in some of the constraints that his predecessors had talked about.

I can recall that the minister’s predecessor, the member for Quinte, instructed hospitals to close beds and cut services. What has happened to that? What about the alternative health care facilities? Apparently, by your own admission, that hasn’t worked. In the opening of your estimates we discussed the fact that apparently there has been no reflection in the system of the alternative health care facilities that were established and that cost something like $100 million. And what about your predecessor’s famous constraint package? We’ve never seen that.

Mr. Chairman, we say to the minister that it’s all very well for him to go around and talk about difficulties in the Health ministry and how, if it keeps going at this rate, it’s going to bankrupt the province and so on. But we waited for some sort of action from not only the minister’s predecessor but also from the hon. Bert Lawrence, who talked about the same thing. We have waited, but we still haven’t seen anyone take a hard decision. To do so requires some political courage, Mr. Chairman; there’s no question about that. I’ve discussed that with the minister before.

And that is what is so cynical about it. Nothing is going to be done until the next provincial election. The word is out: You’re not going to take any steps that will muddy the waters or fluster an area of the community. You’ve been doing a good job since 1971 of flustering and annoying many areas of this province. Of course, for political reasons, you’re not going to accept your responsibility. You’re not going to show, I suggest, any political courage in doing so.

I want to direct the minister’s attention to an article that appeared in the Toronto Star on Dec. 9, 1974. It is an article by one Robin Bagley, who is the chairman of the department of behavioural science, faculty of medicine, University of Toronto. In it he talks about the need for a co-ordinated health care plan for a just society.

He looks at health care in relation to escalating costs, and in terms of having no curbs and no one apparently having any controls on them. He states -- and I quote:

“At no time have specific aims about levels of health, or ways to achieve these, been publicly stated by any government in Canada.”

When the minister talks about the people at the bottom end of the scale and whether we would have objected to an increase in salary in view of the increase in the budget and the supplementary estimates, I think, Mr. Chairman, it is significant that in the proportional wage increases by certain health professionals, the gap that has been created over a number of years, instead of being reduced in fact has increased. Looking at this, it says:

“The income gap between well and poorly paid health workers has not held constant but has widened. In 1962 the gap between doctors’ average net income and staff nurses was about $12,000; by 1969, it had risen to $24,000. The gap in 1962 between doctors and nursing auxiliaries was $13,143; seven years later it was $26,613. Even with the higher wage settlements and inflation, the disparity has risen by some 100 per cent.”

That is what we have been talking about. Every time you are prepared or you make some sort of noise -- and the noises have been coming two ministers ago, two predecessors ago -- and you say that you are going to take some hard decisions, that you are going to take some steps to curb health costs, some o the more wealthy and some of the major professionals in this province have made you back down; and this is famous. For instance, the medical profession said to you: “You are not going to tell us where we are going to practice, who we are going to see, and how we are going to get paid.”

I have discussed this with the minister a number of times, Mr. Chairman, and as much respect as I have for him on a personal basis, I am starting to wonder whether the member for High Park (Mr. Shulman) wasn’t right when he asked for your resignation two weeks after you had the job. I thought he was exaggerating a little bit but I am starting to wonder. You are a very personable individual, but surely you are going to have to take some action pretty soon, because you are not going to do it just by talking. I suppose you are going to get a lot of flak from members in your own party, but surely the health of this province is more important than any political expediency.

Mr. Chairman, on this point the article goes on to say why there have been no curbs imposed. I would encourage the minister to read this. One of the points suggested by the author here is to state what is proposed, say, in the Mustard report -- the coordination of health professionals working together. For instance, there is the question of the hospital setting as a health centre rather than just as some place where you put people who are very sick, you put them in bed there. Again you failed on that.

For instance, your predecessor Lawrence had suggested that health centres might be a good idea. Your second predecessor, Potter, came along and torpedoed many of the projects that were under way. Now you seem to be encouraging it again. Mustard, of course, in his report, is encouraging this type of practice.

This is why you have had inconsistent policies throughout. Just look at the policy, for instance, in relation to denturists, if you want to see flip-flopping back and forth.

Mr. Chairman, the author of this article goes on to say:

“A recent study by the US Navy shows that there is a proliferation of health jobs with extensive duplication of work functions. With no lowering of quality of patient care, 50 work categories were reduced to 16. Based on a nine-year in-depth study of the work of a group of doctors, Dr. Wolfe and I found that the average family doctor, if his way of work was reorganized, could carry a list of 4,000 patients. This step would require the transfer of some 40 to 50 per cent of the work he now does to colleagues with shorter training who would work in a team arrangement with him.”

These are all some of the matters that I mentioned in the original estimate. Mr. Chairman, the author goes on to say:

“Considerable political courage will be required to introduce new measures.”

It is sad to say that here we are going along, having thought things were bad under his predecessor Potter when we saw a $50 million estimate, and now we are looking at something just in the area of hospitals of $198 million, and we are going to spend a few minutes on it. But I think these things have to be said, and it is sad to say that I hope we don’t reach the point some time where our health delivery programme in this province is really seriously jeopardized because a succession of ministers hasn’t had the guts to do something rather than give us only talk.

Mr. Chairman: The member for St. George. No -- excuse me -- the member for Cochrane South.

Mr. Ferrier: Mr. Chairman, I would like to say that my understanding is that the majority of this vote is for increased wages to hospital workers, and I must say that I’m very happy to be in a position to vote on an item like this, because this has been the year when there has been some significant catchup in the wages paid to our hospital workers. Perhaps it’s far from being ideal but the catchup has gone on in hospitals across the province. For that reason I’m happy to see that they’re getting it and I don’t object in any way to the voting of money that is going to go to them.

There is a question or two that I might ask. The former Minister of Health had intimated that there were certain members of the medical profession who perhaps could be put on to a salary basis rather than a fee for service -- such as radiologists and pathologists. I wonder if the minister might say if there is any movement in that direction, if they have come to any conclusion as to what category or position they might decide to put on a salary basis rather than the fee for service -- which can be extremely lucrative at the same time they are using our hospital facilities, which are being provided for them by the public purse?

Another thing concerns extended care and it’s a little bit of a parochial thing. Do you know if there is any more action or feedback to you from the group in my riding as to chronic care facilities in Timmins? With that, I won’t prolong the debate.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, salary contracts rather than a fee for service are sometimes made with two groups, at least in hospitals, and those are most often the pathologists and the radiologists, if that type of agreement is entered into. I suspect if you look at the average monthly income of those two groups you’ll find they head the scale every month.

One reason they head it, of course, is the very large technical component in both of their fees, because they sometimes use other people and equipment to perform the procedures for which they’re paid.

Mr. Stokes: Yes, and each finger is a procedure.

Hon. Mr. Miller: We do have, for general practitioners, or group practices, the health services organizations which do have as their base a salary or a capitation form of payment rather than a fee for service. These are not being encouraged but they’re being discussed with groups that show interest in them across the province. I say “not encouraged” because any statistical data to date has, sadly enough, shown that there are not any savings at all in these mechanisms -- in fact, that cost of health care delivery goes up, in many cases, under these forms of payment.

I can’t answer any specific question on the chronic care for the Timmins area. I can only say I’ll look into it for you and try to get you an answer.

Mr. Ferrier: Could I just get some clarification on what you said? You mentioned this capitation procedure that you had with some physicians. Are you referring to the community health clinic in Sault Ste. Marie or St. Catharines? Are you saying that there’s no saving in that kind of an operation, in that kind of a way of treating patients?

I understand, and I haven’t seen reports for a couple of years, but at one point it seemed extremely significant that the health care costs were considerably lower in terms of lesser use of hospital beds and prevention that was taking place by this kind of delivery of health care. I’m intrigued by what you say. Do you mean that you are getting studies that don’t indicate a saving from that kind of practice?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Yes.

Mr. Lewis: What, community practice?

Mr. Ferrier: Are you in a position to table any reports or give us some details?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Not yet, because they are very elusive.

Mr. Ferrier: I hope you will be in a position before too long to substantiate that with statistical studies, because it goes against what we’ve been told and been led to believe up until this point.

Hon. Mr. Miller: We are trying very hard to get the statistical base that you are talking about to tell us which is the better way. I can only say that I, like many others --

Mr. Stokes: You arrive at a conclusion and then get a statistical base to justify your actions.

Hon. Mr. Miller: No, as a matter of fact, I had exactly the same impressions that the member for Cochrane South just expressed, that there were probably very great savings available through these mechanisms but, unfortunately, it would appear that there are not. We will be as sorry to see that as I’m sure you would be, because it has been one of the pet academic theories that this was the way to go about health delivery.

Mr. Ferrier: I understand there has been a study done of the St. Catharines community clinic which has just come out recently. Have you seen that study? I would like to get a commitment from you to table or make available some of the background material on which you are basing these statements. I’d like to see the St. Catharines study if it is available, and to get much more detail and particulars, because I must admit I’m pretty sceptical of just what you said. I’m always open to being convinced but I’d like to see the facts to convince me.

Hon. Mr. Miller: I can assure you that I haven’t got a pre-determined point of view in this. I am very anxious to see accurate, hard figures that show me one of several things and that we get better health care for the dollars we spend. I’m told that the preliminary studies are as I say and that I’m right. Once in a while the minister, off the cuff, is right.

It will be during 1975 that we have the final studies on them. I saw preliminary figures the other day that we discussed with the people involved. Because they were preliminary, we frankly felt that it wasn’t wise to release them -- not because they would embarrass us, far from it; there is nothing to embarrass us in them at all -- but simply because they can perhaps cause some problems to the clinics that are involved in the experiments and we just don’t want to disturb the set of circumstances until we finish the study.

I think I mentioned in my last estimates debate that we were trying for the first time to make a pretty good, controlled study of the total cost of health for the patients involved in these clinics, and not just the services delivered at the clinic, which are pretty easy to tie down. You can take the total cost, divide it by the total number of patients and you’ve got the cost.

There are other factors. How many tests are ordered? How many admissions to hospital occur? How do these compare to the other forms of practice and so on? Those kinds of data are coming to me. They were, unfortunately, a long way from good on the first basis. The hardest thing of all is quality. We can argue forever about whether the quality of care is better or not, but if we are putting more people in hospital under one form than we are in another form, I start to question whether the overall quality is better.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for St. George.

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Chairman, I’d like to say in the first instance there is no question that the Liberal Party was very pleased to see that the hospital workers did receive the additional wages to which they had long been entitled. However, one of the things that the minister said today leaves me in some distress -- that is, his attitude to hospital boards. I know that I will probably run afoul of my colleague from York Centre, but philosophically we are not apart.

In a smaller area it is possible to have hospital boards which are related closely to the community and which take responsibility in looking at the hospital and at the type of delivery of health service that a community wants. My concern is with the large hospitals in the city of Toronto.

I have served on two of those boards and, actually, to say that they are accountable is really not that accurate. They are run as I presume a board of directors runs a banking institution. It is very difficult for many to really have any input into the overview of that hospital or its concerns.

I certainly don’t want to denigrate those who have served. They have been citizens who were concerned. Usually they have contributed personally of their fortune to the hospitals. But I think in this day and age we have to stop looking at the hospitals as they were when they began, and look at them as they are today, in receipt of tremendous sums of money.

There is really no public accountability of a board. It is true they have to get their budgets through you, but surely it is important that there be some form of public accountability when they are handling the kinds of funds that are available. At the least there should be ongoing consultation between you and the ministry, so that you can be assured the hospital is not only cutting out fat but also cutting into any inefficiencies that may exist.

The concept of hospitals hasn’t really changed all that much over the long years. It has become more sophisticated, but in the initial stages it was really a case where a hospital was developed for those who were wealthy; in the case of the poor it was as a charitable act. This can no longer, of course, be the philosophy in this century. I can’t help but feel there is much too much stress put by the minister on the autonomy of hospital boards which don’t reflect the total reeds of the community.

I asked the minister if he were reviewing admission policies from hospital to hospital in Toronto. He did not seem to understand what an admission policy was at that point. I would hope by now he may have had an opportunity to discuss this situation with his staff so that we could be assured that all people are entitled to the same respect and to the same programme, since the public has so much input into the hospital costs.

I would like to give a for-instance. It is one of the things which has disturbed me, and I have taken it up with the hospital involved. This of course is not so much admissions, but it goes to the way in which a patient receives treatment.

It happened that a former nurse broke her leg on a Sunday in Toronto. She found out that she had made a very serious mistake when she went to the first hospital, which was the closest, in order to have the leg put into a cast. She was told t come back on Thursday, because they didn’t have people there to look after that on Sunday. And she wound up going to Hamilton to have a leg placed in a cast.

It seems to me that we shouldn’t be in that position with the revenues that are flowing into the hospital coffers today. I can’t believe, but I would like to be reassured, that no hospital is prepared to use the patients who enter for student purposes without the consent of the patient; and that that consent is sought regardless of the financial ability of a person. I would hope that the minister would at least look into that situation.

In the matter of extended care the minister is very much aware of my concerns. I don’t think there is very much that I can say except that if hospitals are forced to cut back on their social services, I would like to know what programme they have to ensure that in a major hospital, such as Toronto General, the patient is not lost in the shuffle in getting into the extended care programme.

I would like to understand, too, what happens in the case of a nursing home where a patient is put on extended care. I wonder what kind of overview there is from the ministry in view of the per diem rates that are paid to first ensure that the patient is in fact placed on extended care and, secondly, that his ministry is not duplicating to a nursing home the moneys paid by the patient to the nursing home.

I have drawn to the attention of this ministry one case in point. The person in the ministry to whom I was speaking was rather startled to find that a person placed on extended care through ministry funding was still, in fact, required by the nursing home to pay something in the neighbourhood of $526 a month because there had been no real overview by the ministry.

I would hope that that kind of situation doesn’t happen too often. I think we have to at least hope that the moneys are used for the purposes for which they are intended, and that we are not in a position in where we are allowing duplication and waste to take place.

Finally, on the matter of psychiatric services, I have two comments. Both are matters that concern me deeply. One is the policy of trying to bring certain patients into a community without adequate consideration of the effect on the family which is required to take them back into the home.

I would cite a case in point, one which was known to someone who was a consultant in your ministry, Dr. Appleton. I don’t know whether he still has a capacity there. But this is the case of a woman who is apparently deeply disturbed. There seem to be various diagnoses of her condition, all of which imply, at least to my mind, that there is a good deal of mental difficulty but, because of the policies of this ministry she is not accepted in a hospital. She has been in the home with her mother, who is in her late 80s, and another daughter, who is herself under tremendous pressure as a result of this.

In discussing this matter with a doctor on staff of one of our hospitals, he felt and stated that this kind of policy was one which you wished to put into effect and then tried to get doctors to concur in and that, in fact, it was not very different from the Hitler twilight sleep that we have known in the past. Certainly, what it does to a family is horrendous.

I hear another criticism and I regret that I have not been able to get to do enough of a study in depth to know whether the allegations are correct or not. In increasing numbers I am hearing that in least one of our Ontario hospitals the decision as to whether or not a patient will be admitted seems to devolve more and more, not on the psychiatric staff but on the social works staff. I would like an explanation of that. Also, it seems to float as to whether or not treatment will be available.

Those are my comments, Mr. Chairman, as briefly as I could make them on this section.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, the admissions policy the member talked about is under review. I asked both the Ontario Hospital Association and the College of Physicians and Surgeons to look into practices of admission. People entering teaching hospitals, in the main, are expected to be available for clinical study. Without this kind of basis for teaching of medicine, we wouldn’t have any medical students. I understand that it is always the right of a patient to refuse to be used for study. That is an inalienable right, and the patient only needs to be aware of that if there is any question as to that right.

On extended care, of course, from time to time, we catch the odd home or the odd person who has charged us and charged the patient too. I have known of at least one licence to be revoked on this basis. I understand action has been taken within the last very few days on another possibly similar case. I can only tell you that in general we are made aware of these very quickly, because families somehow are aware that charges are being made against their parent’s estate in excess of the amount they predict. We originally set the amount that they can pay for semi-private or private care, as you know. If it exceeds that amount, any person has the right to ask us for an audit, which we will gladly do.

Psychiatric policies of return to the community are one of the most difficult areas we have. You may recall the recent case where a person on a loosened warrant committed murder. I can assure the House -- and I haven’t made this statement in the House before -- that no person will now be released on a loosened warrant to the community without the police being aware, without specific instruction being given to the hospital to which that person is returned so that conditions must be monitored, or without contact being guaranteed between the hospital and that person while be or she is in the community. We will have a guaranteed link with those patients who are on a loosened Lieutenant Governor’s warrant.

That is only a very small percentage of the people involved in psychiatric release to the community. For the others, we are doing our best to have an out-patient basis.

The problem is: where do you keep a person for his benefit, in the community or in the hospital? There is still a fair amount of argument on this. I think Queen St. Mental Health Centre has been for some time running an interesting study to determine when the patient recovers the fastest -- whether it is with the patient being within the hospital or in the community. It does require adequate homes, and that’s the weakest of all the links, because it is exceptionally difficult anywhere to find either communities willing to have homes for groups of emotionally disturbed people or individual homes willing to take them. I can only say that this is a community responsibility that we have to make communities aware of; that we simply can’t have people kept in institutions or left without adequate care because we can’t find simulated residential homes for them. It’s an essential step all the psychiatrists tell me, in the rehabilitation of mentally ill people.

I can’t comment upon the admissions policy at psychiatric hospitals, except to say that the whole treatment of a patient in a psychiatric hospital today is generally done on a group basis, where you have a team of different disciplines working together and it is not automatic that the physician is the leader of that team. So, it may well be, in certain cases, that the leader of a particular team that may be involved in admissions -- and I want to verify this -- may not necessarily be a physician.

Mrs. Campbell: One question, if I may, Mr. Chairman, flowing from what the minister said: If, in fact, it is the policy of this government, one, to try to reduce costs -- and being a Scot, I love to see that thrust -- and secondly, perhaps to give more creative care to the psychiatric patient the decision is made to put that patient back into the community; if we do that in order to improve things, why then is the municipality faced with trying to accommodate to government policy, to enable the government to effect savings in costs, as well as, hopefully, the rehabilitation of the patients? Why is it left, as it is, apparently, mostly in this area, to the family itself, which is often in the poorest position to be able to cope with a person in that condition, either financially or emotionally?

Could I have an answer to that?

Hon. Mr. Miller: I don’t know that the statements you’ve made are factual to that degree. I would say that we’re trying very hard to find places where we’re not throwing the onus on the family, because we recognize in many instances that the basic seat of the emotional distress lay with the family; that was the cause of the trouble. And while we’re trying to simulate the family conditions in other places, this often runs into the stone wall of municipal zoning, as you know. If I face any stone wall in trying to improve a programme, that’s it right now.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Windsor-Walkerville.

Mr. B. Newman: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to ask of the minister a few questions concerning the general hospitals and related activities. Apparently there is $195 million allocated for the operation of hospitals and related facilities. Surely some of that money would actually go to things other than salary increases?

The minister is quite aware of my approaching him back quite some time ago for the establishment of a six-bed burn unit at Metropolitan Hospital. The minister looked very favourably at the establishment of the unit. The minister knew that the firemen in the local community had a fund-raising drive and were able to raise, from my information, sufficient funds to support their portion of the establishment of the burn unit. In fact, I think to date they have $140,000 cash. But before they could set up the unit in the hospital, I understand there would be the need for either some design changes or structural changes to the hospital. Is the minister prepared to assist the hospital so that they can go right ahead with the development of the burn unit at Metropolitan Hospital?

Hon. Mr. Miller: As the member well knows, not only did I approve that programme but I visited the hospital. I saw the floors that they wanted to change. They said there were minimal structural changes required, they were buying some equipment and they would start the programme. I know of no stumbling block that we are holding in their way. I could be wrong. If I am, I would like the specifics of it either through my own staff or from you.

Mr. B. Newman: Could I suggest to the minister that he check with his staff because Mr. Charlie Leighton of the fire department in the community, did have a meeting with your officials on Monday of this week and they are a little concerned that there may be a delay in the development of this burn unit.

I don’t have to go into any discussion concerning the merits of the unit, the uniqueness of the unit, what it can mean as far as the delivery of health services is concerned. That is all well known. So I would suggest to you, Mr. Minister, that you look into it and see if it can be expedited so that the unit can be established. The moneys are there as far as the firefighters are concerned. I understand there is some delay in your ministry.

I wanted to ask one other question of the minister, and that is, when a patient is transferred from a local wing of a psychiatric hospital to the Ontario Hospital, regardless of the patient’s age, why is the family not notified? They claim that if the individual is over 18 years of age there is no need for notification. Maybe there is no need, but from a compassionate point of view I think it would make good sense to have the parents of the individual notified. It did disturb two different people in my community enough to write to me concerning this. I express this to the minister to see if that type of problem can be overcome.

Hon. Mr. Miller: It seems proper that they should be notified if they are easily available, unless they have disappeared, as sometimes is the case. I would agree with you that they should be notified.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Sudbury.

Mr. M. C. Germa (Sudbury): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to spend a little time on talking to the minister regarding our extended care programme. I know the minister has received various letters from me as a result of complaints of constituents.

Because these facilities are in private hands and because they are motivated on the profit principle, they require more policing, I suspect, than what the minister is granting them. I know the minister has received numerous letters from me regarding complaints about food service and about staffing. Certainly, once the matter is raised the minister does send in an inspector, but I would be interested in knowing about the kind of continuing and ongoing inspection in these particular nursing homes.

I am also interested in having the minister explain to me the requirements for gaining entry into these Extendicare nursing homes. I will recite one case, which I brought to the minister’s attention, wherein two patients were transferred from the North Bay psychiatric unit and they ended up in the Extendicare nursing home in Sudbury. Because of shortage of staff there are no male attendants on duty on the night shift in that particular institution. There are females only, who cannot physically take care of themselves. You will recall that one of the females in attendance at night got pounded by one of these persons who had been admitted from the North Bay psychiatric unit.

I must say that you are putting people in a hazardous position when you have an institution of this size with no male attendants whatsoever to subdue an unruly person who has just been released from a psychiatric unit. I just wonder how these people were admitted to our Extendicare institutions. It is unrealistic that a person should have to go on compensation for three or four weeks because she was not strong enough to man-handle a patient. Those institutions do not have the necessary facilities for handling people who are unstable, as far as their mental capacity is concerned.

We took the minister’s name in vain this afternoon when I was talking to his confrere, the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Brunelle). We were talking about the Sudbury nursing home where we have retarded children who have been admitted to that particular institution from the Rideau regional psychiatric unit. We discussed the fact that this building, even though it is a new building, warm and well-lighted, is really not the proper place for retarded children who had been confined to an institution such as Rideau regional. The only defence the Minister of Community and Social Services could make was that it had met the criteria as set down by the Minister of Health. I just wonder what the criteria are then from the minister for looking after retarded children, because I think the environment they’re in now in the Sudbury nursing home is really not that which is proper for retarded children.

I had the occasion within the last month or so to pay a visit to this particular institution. There was a whole floor, the fifth floor, full of retarded children who had been transferred in from Rideau regional. On duty that night on that particular floor were two young women, neither one of them a registered nurse. The only credentials they had were as registered nursing assistants. There was no registered nurse on duty in that building that night. There was only one registered nurse on the staff. She works dayshift. This whole institution then runs with the expertise that registered nursing assistants have.

By the way, this girl, who was in charge of that particular floor and who had custody of about 40 retarded children, was earning the grand sum of $2.45 an hour. This is what the profit motive in the nursing home is doing to the employees, when a young girl, barely out of school, has to accept the responsibility of 40 retarded children, some of them bigger than herself, for the grandiose sum of $2.45 an hour.

Mr. F. Laughren (Nickel Belt): Shame.

Mr. Germa: When I asked her why she didn’t get a union in she intimated that the management, who happens to be a former back-bencher on the Conservative side, Mr. Gaston Demers, one of the owners --

Mr. Foulds: Who is he?

Mr. Germa: -- could fire people faster than they could sign union cards and, therefore, she had to work for $2.45 an hour.

I think that’s a horrendous responsibility to bring on a person to have to accept that type of responsibility and the hazardous situation she was in in the middle of the night. She admitted right then that there were no restraining devices in that particular institution to restrain some of these retarded children, if it became necessary. There were no male attendants on in that entire institution to restrain people who became unruly. Yet this situation exists in at least the two nursing homes that I am familiar with and that I have paid personal visits to in the city of Sudbury.

As for the food problem, you have a letter on your desk right now, or will have, regarding a complaint about food service and delivery of food in that particular institution.

Maybe those retarded kids can live on hot dogs but the aged citizens on the geriatric floor, the sixth floor, claim that they cannot live on the hot dogs which are being served. That or bologna seems to be the staple diet.

Mr. Laughren: I have had complaints too.

Mr. Stokes: What about that cheap ham? Is that going in there?

Mr. Germa: Yes, they get “fine ham.”

Mr. Foulds: Do they get maple syrup?

Mr. Germa: I used to live in a boarding house where we had five different kinds of bologna. The first night we’d have round bologna. The next night they would cut it in half and she would call it half-moon bologna and we had fried bologna the next night. You can dress up all these things and create a different menu but, fundamentally, you’re just getting schinkenwurst, as I think they call it in the trade.

Hon. Mr. Miller: That accounts for your speech.

Mr. Germa: Another problem I’d like to ask the minister about is the formation of district health councils. I don’t see anything in the supplementary estimates regarding district health councils. We are waiting desperately in the city of Sudbury to bring some rationalization into the delivery of health services. I think until such time as we get an overall umbrella body controlling these particular hospitals which are vying for credibility and vying for power -- we know that the emergency ward at the Memorial Hospital is on the verge of being phased out. I understand the minister is basing that decision on the fact that there are not enough people using the emergency ward. But in the Sudbury General Hospital the average waiting time to get into emergency is about three hours.

I don’t know whether that is connected with another problem which I see, in that the government ambulance service in the city of Sudbury is run and controlled by the Sudbury General Hospital. Is the hospital using the ambulance service to keep their emergency ward full? I’m asking the question, not making accusations, but I think that until such time as we get a district health council and the ambulance service can be used as an independent service, not controlled by any one particular hospital, especially when I know and see the competitiveness that we have in these three particular hospitals in Sudbury -- is the ambulance service being used to augment the emergency ward in the Sudbury General Hospital?

The Minister of Community and Social Services said this afternoon: “Well, you know how northern Ontario is -- we don’t have certain facilities for looking after people.” When we were talking about retarded children, he said: “We just don’t have the facilities and we have to improvise.” There is an acknowledged lack of health delivery service throughout northern Ontario.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Germa: Just a moment, Mr. Minister. I’m going to read from your annual report just a couple of statistics which you placed on our desks a short while ago. It has to do with claims payments under OHIP. I see here on this chart on page 15 that the city of Toronto, which has 27.5 per cent of the Ontario population --

Hon. Mr. Miller: That has been done already.

Mr. Germa: I beg your pardon?

Mr. Chairman: That’s been gone through earlier on in the estimates.

Mr. Germa: Was there an answer given to this particular question?

Mr. Chairman: Yes.

Mr. Germa: I’ll read it in Hansard. But I’d like to put Sudbury’s figures on the record.

Mr. Chairman: They were on the record, too.

Mr. Germa: I will check that out, but has the minister rationalized why there is such disparity in moneys being put into the system in southern Ontario vis-à-vis northern Ontario?

Mr. Foulds: That’s the fundamental question.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, I did read those in. I pointed out that the cost per patient in your area is roughly twice the cost per patient in the south.

Mr. Foulds: And whose fault is that?

Mr. Germa: That’s probably why we need a district health council -- to get rid of some of the competitive atmosphere up there. Competition creates high costs -- I’m sure you are aware of that.

Hon. Mr. Miller: Those are non-profit organizations.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Scarborough West.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Chairman, I want to deal very briefly with two hobby-horses which will invite no particular response from the minister -- one with enormous brevity and one to take a couple of minutes on.

I want to use this vote to reiterate something which I know the minister agrees with and which I think many members of the House agree with. Whenever we talk about psychiatric services in the province, one of the most vexing problems is the need to redistribute those services from the monolithic hospitals into community-based settings and the very real resistance that exists in so many communities to different models of mental health care.

I think that unhappily there are even some members of the minister’s party -- I won’t stoop to name them -- who are themselves opposed to community-based mental health. They don’t understand the importance of moving out of the medical model and into the community, and have given encouragement to some of the most obnoxious and objectionable ratepayer groups who have the capacity to resist social change of a useful and important kind wherever it might occur.

I am still of the opinion, Mr. Chairman, and put it to the minister, that the only way we will overcome the kind of mindless prejudice that is focussed on mental illness and mental retardation for kids or for adults from some community associations, ratepayers’ groups and even supposedly mature politicians, is to pass general legislation which requires municipalities to permit the establishment of these homes. The regulations can, of course include within them distances, geographic locations, zoning and so on, but that it would be impossible for any given council, any given ratepayers’ group, simply because they were perverse and of a kind of antisocial spirit, to prevent the establishment of such a setting.

Now, Mr. Chairman, the other hobby-horse I want to ride is one which preoccupies many of us on this side of the House increasingly and relates to the expenditure of -- what? $195 million, did you say? This is for general hospitals and related activity for the wages for hospital workers.

Mr. Chairman, I want to use the opportunity to put briefly on the record the continuing impression that the public sector bargaining, which the hospital workers dispute represented, is on us with a vengeance. The hospital workers triggered it, as it were; but we immediately moved into prolonged teacher negotiations, the transit workers, the social workers with Big Brothers -- and now we are right in the midst of the civil service negotiations.

Mr. Chairman, it is a strongly held conviction of this party that when you are dealing in the public sector with public sector employees, the rules of the game have to change. One of the reasons we are in such trouble in public sector negotiations in Ontario is because we are applying the principles and the techniques of industrial sector bargaining to the public sector predicament. It’s just wrong, Mr. Chairman, and it has to change.

It is interesting to note that the Ministry of Health at the most senior echelons, and the Minister of Health himself, were vastly more effective in bringing an end to the hospital workers dispute than were the conciliators and mediators of the Ministry of Labour -- because they are simply not attuned to the questions of public sector bargaining.

Public sector bargaining, Mr. Chairman, is characterized by a couple of facets which simply are not true in the industrial sector.

First of all, for many people -- hospital workers and civil servants being obvious examples -- the ultimate strike weapon is removed in advance. When you remove a strike weapon from people, or the ultimate economic threat, you have to build into your collective bargaining apparatus much more candour and much more flexibility. That’s No. 1.

No. 2: When the public, the large public dares the consequences of a collective bargaining breakdown, then it means again that the collective bargaining process has to be much more adaptive and much more flexible than it is in an industrial sector dispute.

The industrial sector is characterized by manipulation, by wheeling and dealing, by preposterous demands on both sides, which are then gradually diminished by 11th-hour tightrope walking; by all of the things to which they have been attuned for the last 40 or 50 years. They work well in the industrial sector, but don’t work at all in the public sector.

Mr. Chairman, that has to be altered. What we are seeing now with the civil service negotiations is really a reflection of that, if I may say. I hope it’s not a mistake to talk about the civil service negotiations while they are taking place. As a matter of fact, they are quite germane -- because the two most militant sections of the civil service are the correctional people and those in the psychiatric hospitals.

As a matter of fact, if we are talking about money for psychiatric services or in this province, even with emergency services provided by a responsible civil service association, the most unhappy consequences would be felt in the area of the psychiatric hospitals.

What is needed in these fields is a change. Surely that is what is harassing the civil service negotiations; threat and counter-threat, ultimatum and counter-ultimatum, surely that’s what’s harassing the civil service negotiations, negotiations in public in the Legislature. That’s no way to conduct negotiations. That’s the industrial formula, not the public sector formula.

May I say in passing, Mr. Chairman, that happily today the Civil Service Association reduced its demand to 29 per cent, as I understand it, which therefore allows us a margin within which an agreement can surely be reached. I’ll say no more about it.

I want to add this in terms of this vote: I really believe, Mr. Chairman, that we should establish a public sector mediation group, probably responsible to the Chairman of the Management Board, or reporting through the Chairman of the Management Board, perhaps even reporting through one of the secretariats, whose job would be to intervene in advance of and during and dispute with the kind of sensitivity and flexibility which would allow us to avoid the kinds of confrontations that are apparent in the industrial sector.

We could use it in the teachers’ disputes. We could surely use it now. We could use it with the civil service. We could have used it with the hospital workers. We could have used it with the social workers in the social agency in Toronto which was afflicted by a breakdown for seven weeks. I must say, Mr. Chairman, that I really think it would make a great deal of sense.

I point out to you, sir, that it’s the Minister of Education who has to run down to the Royal York or wherever it is over the dinner hour to try to be an arbiter in the dispute between the Windsor board and the Windsor teachers. It was the Minister of Health who had to intervene in the hospital workers’ dispute. I have no doubt it will require a ministerial intervention in the civil service.

Therefore, within the public sector bargaining -- and this vote is the classic example of public sector bargaining -- there must be established a work group equivalent to the conciliation and mediation group of the Ministry of Labour which will see public sector bargaining as a process of candour, of forthrightness, of directness -- where you are dealing with people who don’t want the manipulative, ritual, mystical process; where both sides don’t start either absurdly low or absurdly high; where there is a sense of public accountability during the bargaining; where people can deal with hospital workers, teachers or others who don’t understand so much of the ritual that is characteristic of Stelco and the Steelworkers or GM and the Auto Workers. They understand none of that process. They want none of that process. They respond to direct and flexible human intervention.

Now that we have got the public sector bargaining upon us, I just want to appeal to you -- and I use this vote as the device --

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): That kind of bargaining without a strike too.

Mr. Lewis: Okay, I am not challenging that. I am saying that with the public sector right on us now, full flush, let us not use the old industrial sector techniques. When this fracas of the civil service is over, I will concede to you. I won’t do it now; but after it’s over, I’ll concede to you certain position on both sides --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: We aren’t far apart. We aren’t far apart on our thinking.

Mr. Lewis: -- that I thought were unnecessarily paralleling the industrial sector, where they have no application at all. Certainly we can never go through another tightrope act, as the minister was subjected to and the public was subjected to in the hospital workers’ dispute. That should not happen again. I submit to you it wouldn’t happen in the public sector if we adopted a rationale and an approach profoundly different from those that characterize collective bargaining elsewhere. I don’t want to refine it further. I think there are some rather explicit refinements that can be made and some details that can be added, but I think this is the appropriate place to make the point.

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Minister, do you want to reply?

Hon. Mr. Miller: No, not at this time.

Mr. Stokes: I have just got two very brief --

Mr. Chairman: No, the member for Huron-Bruce has the floor.

Mr. M. Gaunt (Huron-Bruce): Mr. Chairman, I just want to raise a matter with the minister that has been raised a number of times before in the House, but I think it is worthwhile to draw it to his attention again on this occasion, particularly in view of the fact that I got a letter from one of my constituents, a medical doctor, who feels just as strongly about it as I do. I do not want to read letters into the record, Mr. Chairman, but on this occasion, with your permission, sir, I would like to do so at this time.

Mr. Chairman: We will have to find out what is in it first.

Mr. Gaunt: It is addressed to me and it says:

“As president of the Huron county medical society I wish to bring to your attention a few factors which in recent weeks have become quite disturbing to our membership inasmuch as we look upon these as being particularly dangerous and destructive to the profession as well as not being in the best interests of the public as a whole.

“This problem has to do with the recent tendency to close the staffs of hospitals across the province; for example, the recent North York problem with Dr. Schiller and the Scarborough hospital with a similar problem, where qualified individuals were denied privileges to practise their profession despite the presentation of acceptable qualifications. This problem is now more intensified by the recent problems manifested at Victoria Hospital in London, as well as other examples elsewhere in the province.

“We understand that there are specific problems that affect individual hospitals and their respective boards and medical staffs, but we feel that since hospitals in the province have become funded by public moneys the tendency should be to open the staffs, not to restrict them.

“The potential abuses are too restricted staffs, are protean, and give rise to the building of private and selective spheres of influence and the building of professional dynasties which we believe are not in the best interests of the public as a whole.”

Then he goes on to talk about why he feels this way and why, if doctors are licensed to practise medicine, they cannot do so. Why, having been licensed in the Province of Ontario, is it then up to the medical board or staff at any given hospital to make the judgement as to whether a particular medical doctor can practise in a particular hospital? He makes the point later on in the letter that if it’s a question of qualifications, then that surely has to be dealt with by the College of Physicians and Surgeons, and that those standards and qualifications will have to be raised.

It is not up to the hospitals, either the boards or the medical staff at any particular hospital, to make the judgement as to whether any particular doctor is allowed to practise. Having graduated from medical school, having successfully passed the examinations, surely that person is then qualified to practise in a hospital of his choice.

So, I say to the minister, I think this is a problem that has cropped up periodically. It seems to be increasing in momentum. I think it’s happening more frequently and I think that the ministry is going to have to deal with this problem. If a lawyer, for instance, graduates, he can practise in any of the courts in Ontario, certainly in Canada.

Hon. Mr. Miller: He has to have a client first.

Mr. Germa: So does the doctor.

Mr. Gaunt: But the doctor has to, too.

Mrs. Campbell: He opens his office first.

Mr. Gaunt: The doctor opens his office. Undoubtedly he will get clients. He will want to admit those clients into the hospital, and if the medical staff at the hospital says “No” then he’s plumb out of luck. Frankly, I don’t think it’s right and I think the ministry is going to have to come to grips with it. I don’t think the appeal procedure that is now operational under the Act is working and I am wondering, in the minute remaining, what the minister is going to do about it.

Hon. Mr. Miller: First of all, Mr. Chairman, I do disagree obviously.

Mr. Chairman: Before the minister answers, the member for Thunder Bay has one question he would like to ask. Maybe you could answer them both at the same time in the time remaining.

Mr. Stokes: Since I think, by unanimous agreement, we are going to pass all of those estimates at 6 o’clock, I have only one brief question I would like to ask the minister within this vote. The minister or his representatives have on their desks now a realistic submission from the McCausland Hospital board in Terrace Bay asking for immediate consideration of an application to expand their hospital, in keeping with the $200 million expansion by Kimberly-Clark in that community. Will the minister assure me and the board that a positive answer will be forthcoming as soon as possible so they will be able to get on and plan for the expansion of that much-needed and urgent facility in the town of Terrace Bay?

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Minister?

Hon. Mr. Miller: Mr. Chairman, I couldn’t possibly answer the hon. member for Huron-Bruce’s philosophical point in a minute. I can only tell him that the doctors themselves by no means endorse the position that was stated in the letter that you were given. But that wouldn’t be my reason for accepting it. I can only tell you that if I’m going to get doctors to go to places like those we just talked about, then we can’t let them all practise where they want to. That’s a fundamental part of it. We’re going to have to get them where we need them.

I am prepared and I am planning steps to solve the problem. Until such time as I have had the opportunity to have these pass through the normal channels -- which in this case involves the federal as well as the provincial government -- I really can’t do any more than say I rate the problem as a very important one.

Now for the other one. To promise a positive reply would be very dangerous. I will simply be glad to review the problem and do my best to assist, relative to other priorities I face.

Vote 2803 agreed to.

Mr. Chairman: That completes the supplementary estimates of the Ministry of Health.

Hon. Mr. Winkler moves the committee rise and report.

Motion agreed to.

The House resumed, Mr. Speaker in the chair.

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Speaker, the committee of supply begs to report it has some certain resolutions.

Clerk of the House: Mr. W. Hodgson from the committee of supply reports the following resolutions:

RESOLVED: That supply in the following supplementary amounts to defray the expenses of the ministries named --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): Mr. Speaker, I think that since we have the supplementary estimates before us, and since the detail of it and the repetition will appear in the votes and proceedings, we could dispense with the actual reading of the motion.

Resolution concurred in.

Clerk of the House: The third order, House in committee of the whole.

It being 6 o’clock, p.m., the House took recess.