Hansard Transcripts 1984-Mar-27 | Legislative Assembly of Ontario

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: On Thursday last, the member for Simcoe East (Mr. McLean) stood in his place and read a report from the standing committee on general government reporting one bill, Bill 142, An Act respecting the City of Barrie and the Township of Vespra.

It has occurred to me that this Legislature has not had its formal motion striking committees in this term. While I am aware that there was a motion put at the end of the previous session to allow the bill to go out for hearings and to be reported back, it seems to me it causes an air of awkwardness for a member to stand in his place and report from a committee that has not yet been struck by the Legislature.

I would like you to take under consideration whether it is proper for a member to stand and present the report from a committee when this session of the Legislature has not yet struck that committee. Perhaps you would think upon that and give us a ruling on that matter.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I might just iindicate that my friend seems to be needlessly nitpicking in a situation where he knows it was fully agreed that certain bills would be sent out to committee for study during the winter break and those bills would be reported back to this Legislature on instruction of the committees that had duly, legally been constituted by this Legislature and that report could be made in here.

He is nitpicking if he suggests it was wrong for that report to be presented to this Legislature. There was one other report on a very similar situation, concerning three bills of the Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry), which was received here yesterday by this Legislature and causcd those bills to be placed here.

The only thing that may be wrong is that there may have to be a slight change in wording; but to suggest that somehow somebody had done something that is not correct and that was not agreed to by his party would be completely against the facts, and I think the House should realize that.

We set up a procedure that would allow those bills to be studied and reported back here. If the member wants the House leaders to look at it, we will look at it to make sure the wording is correct. I think my friend is trying some more delaying tactics on a bill he does not like.

MEMBERS' EXPENDITURES

Mr. Roy: Mr. Speaker, on a point of privilege: I would like to correct the record. It involves information being decimated from this office. I should not say "decimated" -- it is disseminated.

Mr. Conway: It is probably the truth.

Mr. Roy: Yes, I think I used the right word on the first occasion, because the information comes from the office of the member for Ottawa South (Mr. Bennett). Information is being given to residents of Ottawa comparing the travel and accommodation expenses of four different members: the member for Ottawa West (Mr. Baetz), the member for Ottawa South, my colleague the member for Ottawa Centre (Mr. Cassidy) and myself. The member for Ottawa South is attempting in this particular information to show that his expenses are about half as large as those of anybody else, including those of the member for Ottawa West.

There is no attempt by the member to show that his travelling expenses are hidden in his ministry's budget; there is no attempt to show that his accommodation expenses are going to accumulate capital gains. There is no attempt to do that.

I think the record should be corrected. The information that is being spread around Ottawa by the member for Ottawa South is misleading and inaccurate.

Mr. Speaker: Having listened very carefully and very attentively to the alleged point of privilege, I would have to rule that it s not a matter of privilege.

Mr. Cassidy: It is a cheap shot. Mr. Speaker. The ministry used public funds to print that stuff.

Mr. Speaker: No.

NOTICE OF DISSATISFACTION

Mr. Speaker: Before we proceed, I would like to advise all members that, pursuant to standing order 28(a), the member for Parkdale (Mr. Ruprecht) has advised me of his dissatisfaction with the response of the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Brandt) to a question. That will be heard this evening at 10:30.

COMMISSIONERS OF ESTATE BILLS

Mr. Speaker: I further beg to inform the House that the Clerk has received from the commissioners of estate bills their favourable report in the following case:

Bill Pr42, An Act respecting the City of Peterborough.

ATTENDANCE OF MINISTER

Mr. Speaker: I have been asked to inform the honourable members that the Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry) will in all probability be late in arriving this afternoon. Any remarks pertaining to the death of Chief Justice Laskin will be delayed until he arrives.

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

NORTHERN ONTARIO SECONDARY SCHOOLS

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, yesterday my colleague the Minister of Education (Miss Stephenson) tabled her ministry's response to the Allan report on small secondary schools in northern Ontario.

2:10 p.m.

As the members will recall, that report's findings drew attention to the fact that small secondary schools in remote northern Ontario were in some cases disadvantaged by virtue of their distance, lower enrolments and financing capabilities. Specifically, the report stated that 'the gap between the programs in the schools in the study and those in larger communities in the north and south is becoming wider."

I am sure the school boards identified in the report welcome the minister's announcement that the Ministry of Education will provide additional funding to address some of the needs of these small, remote secondary schools.

I am pleased to announce today that the Ministry of Northern Affairs will also be providing funds to help small secondary schools acquire improved facilities in the areas of technical and home economics studies, computers. art and music. My ministry will provide 90 per cent of the capital costs of such facilities.

Three million dollars have been allocated for the program over the next three years.

Mr. Bradley: You are finally listening to the opposition.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: We are listening to northern Ontario. That is who we are listening to, not the opposition.

Mr. Speaker: Never mind the interjections, please.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: The members and the people from northern Ontario have asked for this and we have responded, as a sensitive government always does.

This program recognizes the importance of improving the quality of education through improved facilities in ensuring the long-term social and economic strength of our remote northern communities. With the Ministry of Education, we are helping to ensure that no secondary student in northern Ontario is disadvantaged in terms of skills training or career goals simply because he or she happens to live in northern, rather than southern, Ontario.

Let me end by acknowledging the support and thoughtful input this program received through the Allan report from the affected school board trustees themselves. Their own aspirations for quality education in the north were well reflected in Rodger Allan's excellent report.

VISITOR

Mr. Kerrio: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker:

I am sure you and the assembly would like to recognize a former member from Niagara Falls, Mr. Arthur Jolley, a colleague of mine in the construction business before either of us went into politics.

ORAL QUESTIONS

ADHERENCE TO INFLATION RESTRAINT

Mr. T. P. Reid: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Labour. I am sure he is aware of the cases involving the Sensenbrenner Hospital workers and the Etobicoke Public Library employees who received wage settlements that were deemed to be in excess of the restraint legislation guidelines established by the government opposite. I am sure he is also aware of the ridiculous suggestion made by the Treasurer (Mr. Grossman) that the workers of Sensenbrenner forgo their lunch and coffee breaks for a few years as a means of paying back this "overpayment."

Within that context, I wish to draw the minister's attention to the case of Dr. Alan Wolfson, who is at present his assistant deputy minister. Dr. Wolfson was appointed chairman of the Ontario Manpower Commission in September 1981 under order in council 2692/81. This order established Dr. Wolfson's per diem rate and also set out specific guidelines governing Dr. Wolfson's remuneration.

How is it that Dr. Wolfson can violate the guidelines of this order in council, resulting in an overpayment to him far in excess of that received by the workers of Sensenbrenner, yet no one in the government asks him to repay this money, let alone suggests he give up lunch and coffee breaks? Is this government telling the people of this province there is one set of rules for the workers of Sensenbrenner and Etobicoke and another for highly placed friends of the government?

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: Mr. Speaker, it is true that Dr. Alan Wolfson was appointed to the chairmanship of the Ontario Manpower Commission and recently has become an assistant deputy minister within the Ministry of Labour. We feel very privileged to be able to recruit that type of person to our ministry and he has already shown his value to us in many ways.

I was unaware of the circumstances the honourable member has brought forward today, because I was assured at the time of the change in his responsibilities that all of the financial matters had been worked out and had been checked with the appropriate parties. Therefore, I would withhold any further statement until I have had an opportunity to look into the allegations made by the member opposite.

Mr. T. P. Reid: We have gone through this a number of times. The same thing happened with Dr. Chant under the Ontario Waste Management Corp. It is another example of the members opposite not knowing what is going on.

Can the minister explain, not only to this House but to the people of the province, why it was that when Dr. Wolfson's violations of the order in council were discovered, the government in September 1982 -- a year later -- instead of asking him to pay back the money, simply changed the rules for the assistant deputy by writing a new set of guidelines under order in council 3037/82? That must have gone before the cabinet.

Why can the minister show no flexibility whatsoever with the workers in Sensenbrenner and in Etobicoke, but the cabinet and the minister himself can so easily change the rules for someone working directly for him? What kind of example does the minister think he is setting for the rest of the workers of the province who have come under the iron heel of the restraint program?

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: I am not aware that the rules have been changed. It is an allegation by the member. It is something I have promised to look into. At the moment, the member is making a great number of statements that I am not sure are accurate. I am sure he intends them to be accurate, but I would like to have the opportunity to look at the circumstances.

Mr. Rae: Mr. Speaker, if there is an iron heel the Liberal Party voted for that iron heel, not once but three times, when it comes to the actions of the Inflation Restraint Board. Three times they were there standing up for that iron heel. Let them not start talking about an iron heel.

The question I have for the minister has to do with the comments that were made by the member with respect to the Sensenbrenner workers. Given the fact that the suggestion of the Treasurer with respect to the payback agreement could be said to be in violation of the Employment Standards Act, has the minister sat down and discussed with the Treasurer the legality of the proposal that he was making for the payback of the Sensenbrenner award?

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: Mr. Speaker, the answer is no.

Mr. T. P. Reid: One thing this Liberal Party has never done is called the workers of Ontario "stupid."

Mr. Speaker: Order. Question please.

Mr. T. P. Reid: The better known the leader of the third party becomes, with comments like that, the farther the NDP goes down in the polls.

Mr. Speaker: And now for the question please.

Mr. T. P. Reid: While the minister is looking into this situation -- which I would have thought would have come across his desk since the orders in council, as I understood, were passed by the cabinet and brought forward by the minister -- I wonder if at the same time he could explain the following.

If Dr. Wolfson was to be paid on a per diem basis, submitting monthly statements as the order in council requires, why were no dates worked by Dr. Wolfson recorded for almost seven months of billing?

Could the minister also explain how Dr. Wolfson could bill the ministry for being in two places at the same time without anyone in the ministry questioning this; i.e. on the Ontario Manpower Commission and the Advisory Council on Occupational Health and Occupational Safety?

2:20 p.m.

Could the minister report to the Legislature at the earliest convenience? I hope the minister will put this in the context of what the government is doing to the other workers in the province.

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: I will be pleased to report to the Legislature because I am confident that all the necessary steps were followed to comply completely with the policies of the government.

I have been in the Ministry of Labour now a little more than two years. I am constantly impressed by the degree of accuracy and determination the staff use in complying with the manual that is provided to us, and I am sure there is a reasonable explanation for this whole matter.

I am glad the member has seen fit to write out his question in complete detail. It will give us an opportunity to answer in a like respect.

FOOD LAND GUIDELINES

Mr. Riddell: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Agriculture and Food regarding the government's lack of commitment to land preservation and the inadequacy of the Ontario food land guidelines.

I might just say I am pleased to see that the minister is healthy and well, as I asked you about last Friday, Mr. Speaker, and that he is back again to participate in the legislative process.

Mr. Speaker: And now for the question.

Mr. Riddell: My question pertains to the minister's approval of the destruction of 4,000 acres of prime agricultural land in the city of Brampton. The minister will recall that in answer to many questions we have asked him on previous occasions on the rationale for the population forecast to justify this level of urbanization, he stated: "We will be doing that within the food land guidelines, looking very carefully at the projections of growth and need in that municipality."

How can the minister reconcile his statement with the comments of the director of his food land preservation branch, who has indicated that he did not attempt to evaluate the population estimates and who stated: "We're not in the demographics business. We have to rely on the city council's plan."

Will the minister now admit that the only reason he does not want to examine the population projection is the fact that it was increased from 266,000 to 344,000 only to justify the inclusion in the urban boundary of the 4,000 acres on the basis of a presentation to a closed council meeting by Mr. Ron Webb, a name that I am sure rings a bell, who was acting for the developers?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the honourable member's welcoming remarks. It is nice to be wanted.

Just so the public record is complete, in answer to the member's question I wish to remind the House that there are a number of elements of that particular official plan amendment that one should consider.

First of all, there is a proposal in that official plan amendment to designate about 900 acres for industrial purposes; my ministry, after evaluating the proposal in line with the food land guidelines, has decided to oppose that proposal at the Ontario Municipal Board.

There is also a proposal in that official plan amendment to designate a certain area -- I forget the acreage -- for estate residential. We are opposing that, again because we believe it is in direct conflict with the food land guidelines.

With respect to the proposed designation of 4,000 acres of land for residential development, essentially what we have done in the ministry is to accept that there will be growth; there will be demand and need for more single-family housing in Brampton in the future.

Because nobody can definitively predict exactly what that growth will be, since obviously it is subject to so many factors in the economy, in responding to the official plan amendment we in the ministry took the position that the development of this 4,000-acre parcel of land should be phased in a way that will retain, until such time as it is needed -- depending on whether the current estimates of growth are high or low -- as much of the agricultural land as possible.

We did it in this way to avoid the possibility of a hotchpotch development of that 4,000 acres, which would have made the rest of it unworkable. In fact, I am told a great deal of it even now is not worked, but we want to be sure that as much as possible of that land is available to be worked for as long as possible.

Mr. Riddell: The minister is skating on thin ice, because he knows Brampton has no phasing-in policy. Absolutely no criteria have been laid down for this so-called phasing in the minister is talking about.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: My understanding is --

Mr. Stokes: It is a point of disagreement.

Mr. Speaker: Order. It is clarification.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: My understanding is that when the council of the city of Brampton received our comments it accepted that there should be phasing for that site.

Mr. Riddell: The minister also stated to us, "Where we get involved is when the plan has finally been submitted to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, and we then contribute our portion of the many comments which are gathered to make a decision on it."

Can the minister explain why he has not commented on the loss of another 800 acres of prime farm land immediately adjacent to the Brampton lands, in the town of Caledon? The matter has been referred to the OMB without his comments and a hearing date is already scheduled for April 30. Why has he, whose job it is to enforce the food land guidelines, not already taken a strong position on this matter in favour of preserving farm land?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: The Caledon official plan amendment number 38, if my memory serves me correctly, has several components. One is for industrial designation on the west side of Highway 10, and another is for residential with various densities on the east side of Highway 10, north of the Brampton city limits.

I know our staff have met with officials of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, and I will check to see whether our comments have been sent to them. I have discussed with our staff what those comments will be, and I will be glad to get more information for the member.

Mr. Swan: Mr. Speaker, what the minister has just said and what he is permitting in Brampton are clear violations of any of the principles of food land preservation. They simply ensure that any developer will get land wherever he wants it and that there is not going to be any shift to growth off the best food lands in this province.

The minister has stated he is going to tighten up the food land guidelines. Is he going to wait until after this hearing on Brampton so it will not interfere with his developer friends getting permission to develop those 4,000 acres? Will he make a public statement right now that, in general, class 1, 2 and 3 lands should have priority and should be preserved for food land preservation in this province?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, I remind the honourable member that he is, of course, selective in his reading and in his understanding of the situation. There are certain significant parts of that official plan amendment, as submitted by the city of Brampton, to which my ministry is opposed and which we will be opposing at the OMB hearing. I take it that what he is saying is --

Mr. Swart: The excess will not be developed for 50 or 100 years.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Is he ready to listen any more than in the past five sessions? Unless he is saying there will never be any more development in southern Ontario, I think he has to accept --

Mr. Swart: Oh, come off this.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: His own private member's bill from four years ago is essentially our policy. His own private member's bill of 1980 requires that the municipalities with the primary responsibility for land-use planning should make certain evaluations: first and foremost whether the particular development is required, whether it be residential accommodation, commercial, industrial or whatever; and second, whether there is an alternative to using good agricultural land. It is exactly the same as our policy; so he should not try to pull the wool over people's eyes.

2:30 p.m.

Mr. Riddell: I hope the advisory council which the minister is endeavouring to establish will advise him that one per cent of the land mass of Ontario is prime agricultural land and half of that is found in southern Ontario.

With that in mind, will the minister not agree with us that his approval of this large-scale development in Brampton and the plans for Caledon, which include a total of 7,800 acres of class 1 agricultural land in the Premier's (Mr. Davis) own backyard, offers a perfect example of the lack of commitment by this government to the preservation of agricultural land and of the inadequacies of the food land guidelines?

Will the minister not take a serious step in toughening those guidelines? Will he not endeavour to preserve the little agricultural land we have in this province?

Hon. Mr. TimbreIl: I could point to some members of my friend's own party who have contacted me when there were applications in their constituencies, where we have opposed the use of prime agricultural land, to see whether we would not soften our stand. I am thinking in particular of a couple of years ago when I was contacted by three or four members of the party opposite to see whether we would not back off. We did not and we would not.

The Ontario food land guidelines have been extremely effective in controlling the development of agricultural land. The guidelines come down to two very basic questions, as I indicated in answer to the member for Welland-Thorold (Mr. Swart). First, there is the question of whether the proposed development is needed. In the case of Brampton, we have accepted that there will be a need for more single-family housing in that municipality. We have not accepted that there will be a need to designate certain land for estate, residential or industrial, and we are opposing those things.

Having established that, the second question is whether there is an alternative. In other words, is there poorer land on which to put it? In the case of Brampton, there is not. If there were, that would be where we would be insisting the development should be directed.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION PROGRAM

Mr. Rae: Mr. Speaker. my question is to the Deputy Premier, the Minister responsible for Women's Issues. I would like to ask him about the so-called voluntary affirmative action program, which is the linchpin of the government's efforts with respect to affirmative action in the private sector.

Is the minister aware of the circumstances surrounding the implementation of the program at one company -- and there are a number of other companies on which we are attempting to get information with great difficulty because the information is not released by the minister -- with respect to the resignation of the co-ordinator of the affirmative action program at B .F. Goodrich in Kitchener?

In appearing before a forum on October 18, 1983, some months ago, Alida Burrett summarized the inadequacies of the program as follows: "The reality is the gap between having a program in place and implementation. This gap is huge. There is no legislation which requires a private firm to move beyond studies. Their efforts look great, but it can mean nothing beyond an exercise in public relations without any accountability."

What steps is the minister taking to see that the so-called voluntary affirmative action program carried out by the 250-odd employers involved in it has real meaning? What steps is he taking to see that it is something which is real and not simply a public relations sham, as is clearly evident in this case?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, obviously I am not familiar with all the details of the private company to which the honourable member makes reference. However, the speech from the throne is quite clear with respect to the continuing commitment of this government to the whole principle of equality of access to the work place. That emphasis will be stepped up.

The most effective way in which we establish our credibility is as an employer ourselves and through the record of the government of the province in this regard. We will accelerate our program with emphasis on its voluntary nature and encourage the private sector to follow the example of the government as an employer.

As the member points out, the question of having access to information from the private sector is one that concerns me as well. When we deal with the private sector, there is a certain confidentiality about it, and to work with them we undertake to respect that area of confidentiality. So we do have some difficulty in follow-up with respect to the actual implementation of programs.

I am convinced that the record of the women's bureau, formerly with the Ministry of Labour and now with the women's directorate, is certainly worthy of commendation. I do not hesitate for a moment in agreeing that we should accelerate this program. I would like to see some further steps. As the member will recall, some emphasis is placed in the speech from the throne on what the government itself will do with school boards and crown agencies in this regard.

I think the most effective program now is to continue to provide the leadership we do and to work with the private sector in the ways that we have and will continue to do.

Mr. Rae: It is perfectly clear that the voluntary program the minister is talking about is just words. It sets no targets. It sets no requirements. There are no requirements with respect to publication or information. There is no way for the public to know just what this so-called voluntary program the minister is so proud of means.

We have a particular example of one person who clearly feels she has been spending a lot of time on a program and who feels the reality just is not there. In her sincerity, she felt obliged to resign from the company because she feels so strongly about the failure of action to follow the words.

The minister's only response is to say that he wants other companies to do the same thing; he wants other companies to get involved in the program.

Just what is the program? What are the targets? What is the meaning of affirmative action if it does not have any real substance or any cutting edge in law? What is the meaning if it is only a bunch of words so that the minister can add the number of companies involved in the program? What does that all mean if the program does not add up to anything?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I am sure it will come as no shock or surprise to the leader of the third party that I do not agree with the conclusions he draws on the basis of one example from the private sector.

If we can just clear all that away for the time being, I welcome the opportunity to remind the member that the objective of the voluntary program in so far as the private sector is concerned is to concentrate on the almost 900 employers in this province who have 500 employees or more. At the moment, about 245 of those employers, after consultation with the ministry and working out the details, have voluntarily committed themselves to programs of equal access with respect to hiring, training and promotion -- called, for want of another term, affirmative action.

I think that record is very clear and very commendable. That progress results in 33,000 women in this province being involved in employment with these companies and, I hope, benefiting from the programs put in place against that principle. We will continue to work with the private sector in this regard, holding up the justice and fairness of doing so and providing our own --

Mr. Rae: There is no standard and no requirement.

Hon. Mr. Welch: There is so. There is a whole formula that is part of the consultative process.

As the Minister of Education (Miss Stephenson) reported in this House yesterday in response to a question, in a couple of days we will be dealing with the education community to step up efforts with respect to affirmative action there.

When it comes to rhetoric and unsubstantiated comments, the member would win the prize this afternoon. I would be glad to present him with a medal after question period.

The results are quite clear: 33,000 women and 245 companies in the private sector responding in a voluntary way, with a commitment in the speech from the throne to step up this activity in the name of equality of access for women in the work place. That is a pretty proud record under the circumstances.

Mr. Wrye: Mr. Speaker, the minister fails to comment that it is a total of 245 companies after eight years of voluntary affirmative action. I would not call that very great progress.

Let me ask the minister about his own targeting within his own civil service right here in Ontario. The minister stands in his place and trumpets the affirmative action program we have right here.

If the affirmative action program we have in place at Queen's Park is so effective, why has this government cut back on the number of targets for affirmative action within the civil service by one third, by more than 100 positions? Can the minister explain what kind of message that is sending out to the private sector?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker. now that the honourable member has changed from the private sector to the public sector, he is making reference to the last report, tabled just prior to the consideration of my spending estimates, when I joined with the Minister of Labour to discuss this matter.

2:40 p.m.

I hope the member is not standing in his place to suggest that the record of this particular government is anything to be ashamed of with respect to affirmative action.

I invite this member to compare the record of this government with any other government in this country or any other government on this continent. I would ask him to take a look at the record. He knows very well that in the administrative module alone we set an objective of 30 per cent representation by the year 2000. We have reached that 16 years early. Why should we be particularly embarrassed by that? We should be very proud of what we are doing and we should be encouraged by what we are doing to provide that type of leadership to the private sector.

Mr. Martel: When in doubt, yell.

Mr. Wrye: When the government is cutting back, yell.

Ms. Copps: Thirty per cent in the year 2000 is a disgrace.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Rae: The only information we have, because the government has denied us access to facts in the private sector, access to any information, and the minister has told us why, is the information that those people who have the courage to come forward are prepared to come forward and give.

Let me ask the minister to comment on the following facts with respect to this company, which is part and parcel of the government's program that he wants to extend. When he talks about extending the program, he is talking about revving up hot air. That is the government's program at the present time.

Women are clustered in the lower-paid positions, primarily secretarial and clerical; 191 out of a total of 213 women, or almost 90 per cent, earned between $11,000 and $15,000 in 1983. In 1983 only 20 of 367 employees in higher categories, in professional and technical jobs, were women. In training, management nominated a total of only four women for development courses compared with 184 men during the years 1979 to 1981.

That is the reality in terms of information. I would like to ask the minister what is so affirmative about the program going on in this particular company'? What is he doing to see that there is actually some reality in the kind of program in Ontario which he is puffing about?

Hon. Mr. Welch: May I remind the leader of the third party that one of the reasons this party in government enjoys the confidence of the private sector in so far as its working programs are concerned is that it respects understandings and commitments. If confidentiality is one of the conditions under which we continue this program, then we respect it and we do not walk into this House and give evidence we do not respect those understandings.

I am in no position to comment on the details of a particular company. I have already commented to him about specific examples. I thought question period was time during which we would talk about general policy matters. There is absolutely no question in my mind that this government is committed to the whole concept of equal access to advancement in the work place. Our record speaks quite loudly in this regard and we will be judged by our deeds in this matter and not by any other comments. What we should do is invite him to join with us to help extend this particular program.

Mr. Rae: How can anybody assess the value of a program when the minister is not even prepared to table any of the material with respect to what is actually going on'? That is the reality. He is covering up for the private sector. That is why he has lost his confidence. That is what he represents in the House.

EARLY RETIREMENT

Mr. Rae: My second question, Mr. Speaker, is to the Minister of Labour. It has to do with the plight of the older worker in Ontario.

With respect to the position of a number of older workers, the minister will know there are 32,000 workers who are over the age of 55 and who are now unemployed. He will also know there are more than 500,000 workers over the age of 55 who are employed, many of whom would like to take an option of early retirement, if it was made available, in order to allow younger workers to get into the work force.

Given the seriousness of the kinds of changes to which even the government itself referred in the throne speech, can the Minister of Labour explain why there is no mention in the throne speech of specific programs with respect to making early retirement possible and giving compensation, training and whatever is possible to those workers who are over 55, who have been laid off and who have very little prospect of finding new employment in the labour market today?

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: Mr. Speaker, I agree with the leader of the third party about the severity of the problem. It is one I have raised in the Legislature on more than one occasion.

The question the leader is asking is somewhat related to a question asked by the member for Hamilton East (Mr. Mackenzie) on Friday of last week. I started to answer that when question period ended, but I was not able to complete my remarks at that time. What I started to say was that last Thursday the Treasurer (Mr. Grossman) and I met with Mr. Pilkey, the president of the Ontario Federation of Labour, and some of his colleagues. One of the items we had on the agenda and wanted to talk about with Mr. Pilkey and his colleagues was this very matter. It is one about which we asked him to submit some thoughts to the Treasurer in advance of the final compilation of the budget.

Mr. Rae: It is all very well for the minister to say he is asking for proposals. I would like to ask him what he is proposing to do. What is the government proposing to do about a major social problem which it has utterly and completely ignored? We have gone through an economic life change in this province without addressing the question of early retirement. It has been addressed in every other major industrial country with the exception of the United States in terms of a change in public plans. I would like to ask the minister why there has been no public response from the government of Ontario with respect to a major social problem in this province.

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: While perhaps there has been no public response to the problem, there has been a great deal of study, concern and proposals put forward and it has been discussed at a very high level in this government. I do not say this on the basis that things are great, or anything of that nature, but I would like to point out that the situation itself is improving.

I want to preface my remarks by stating if there is even one plant closure, that is a disaster, but the plant closures in 1983 as compared to 1982 approximated a 61 per cent decrease. In other words, 19,143 employees in 186 establishments in 1983 were involved compared to 49,385 employees in 346 establishments reported in 1982, an improvement of 61 per cent in plant closures. As a result, the problem of the elderly, which was very predominant in those closures, has improved somewhat.

I am not saying that is a proper answer to the question. It is not a proper answer and it is not a complete answer, but it is an indication that the problem has improved dramatically in the past number of months.

Mr. Mancini: Mr. Speaker, with more than half a million people out of work in Ontario, those figures read by the minister mean absolutely nothing. Since the minister really made no comment in the most recent debate of the Ministry of Labour during the estimates concerning the very important matter of early retirement, I want to ask him whether or not he has within his own ministry some plans or proposals that have been presented to him for his consideration and whether or not he will allow those plans or proposals to be seen by the Legislature.

Second, I want to ask the minister whether or not he knows the total figures of moneys spent by his government, the Conservative government, to create short-term jobs that lead to nowhere, and whether or not that money could be used to encourage people to retire early and, therefore, create an opening for a long-term job which would give a person an opportunity for stability and to earn a living and plan a life for himself.

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: I find that a little surprising coming from the honourable member. To talk about short-term job creation, this government in the past year spent $110 million under the Canada-Ontario employment development program. That is not taking into account the money that was spent on capital projects that were advanced and so on.

Ms. Copps: For hotels, for Sault Ste. Marie developments. What happened to Hamilton?

Mr. Speaker: Order.

2:50 p.m.

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: The COED program accounted for some 28,000 jobs in this province in the last 12 months. Granted, most of them were of a short-term nature, but many of those part-time jobs became full-time jobs.

I would also like to point out to the member that money -- $220 million in total from the two levels of government -- prompted contributions from the municipalities, from the private sector and from the nonprofit sector of a total of $183 million, which was added to the $220 million. It also had a ripple effect as far as goods and services were concerned.

I do not apologize and will never apologize for that COED program. There was a lot more to it than simply grass-cutting. A lot of pretty fine edifices have gone up in various communities across this province.

Mr. Rae: I do not think any member of this House can claim any monopoly of concern for what is going on. In terms of the minister's own riding and of the ridings across this province where there is a severe problem for the older worker who has been laid off, or whose company has left town and who is left with literally nothing, I simply ask the minister to consider that there is little possibility for retraining because it is very hard to get into those programs. The waiting lists are long and are skewed towards younger people.

These people are not getting adequate retirement pensions. Many have no pension plans at all. Half the workers in this province have no private pension plan whatsoever. They do not qualify for any public pension plans until they are 65. What is happening to those workers and what is the government going to do for those people? There are tens of thousands of them in Ontario. They have been there for a long time, and it is time the government moved to do something for those people.

Hon. Mr. Ramsay: I agree completely with the statement the leader of the third party just made, that no single member or party in this House has a monopoly of concern for the plight of those workers.

SKILLS TRAINING

Mr. Peterson: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Education about the confused and contradictory educational policy of her ministry.

The minister sat by, prompting the Premier (Mr. Davis) and giving him misleading information, as we discussed Ontario's contribution to skills training on Friday in this House. She will recall that in his response the Premier said we were relying on the community college system as the major thrust in our skills training area and that it was an important part of government policy.

How could the minister sit back and tolerate that kind of response by the Premier when she was fully apprised of a secret report in her ministry, dated 1981, that said the community college system would have to expand by at least 20 to 25 per cent to accommodate the young people who wanted access and wanted the proper skills training? How can she, as a minister, allow the Premier to perpetrate that kind of false information?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, I believe the honourable member is confusing factual information or his interpretation thereof. We do not have secret reports in the Ministry of Colleges and Universities. There was a report, which I think was initiated by the presidents in the system, that made a projection which has not come to fruition, but as a result of the projection and of the concern that was expressed, there was a considerable input of support for the college system, which has allowed it to meet the demands placed upon it.

I do not believe any young person in this province who has really wished to participate in a college program either through the skills development area or as a post-secondary program has been denied a place in the college system. If the member really wants to know, as of the end of September 1983, 50 per cent of all the programs in the colleges of this province still had places available for students, at a time when he was complaining that there were not enough places for post-secondary students in this province.

Mr. Peterson: Let me quote from the report of the Task Force on College Growth, a report completed in 1981 but never made public by the ministry. It said: "It seems reasonable to assume that a substantial portion of the 50,000 not accepted in 1980-81 were, indeed, qualified students who wanted to attend a non-quota program with excellent career opportunities. Indeed, it is interesting to note that if only one in five of these unaccepted applicants is a qualified applicant to a program with good career possibilities, the college post-secondary operation would have to be 20 to 25 per cent larger to accommodate them."

That is the minister's report, which was not made public. If she does the mathematics, she will understand she has cheated, according to her own report, roughly 10,000 students a year for the last few years, denying them skills training and opportunities to participate meaningfully in the work force. That is her report, not mine. Why would she not make it public? Why would she not inform the Premier so at least they can have a meaningful discussion about the crisis we face in job training in the province?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, the honourable member has made some quantum leaps in logic, as usual, from the reported word to a totally illogical conclusion.

As a matter of fact, if he would like to inspect the records of the college system and the records of the applications, he would find those predictions were not carried out. They did not come to fruition. There has been support for the college system in a way that has provided the colleges with the capacity to meet the requirements of the students.

If the Leader of the Opposition would like to bring me the names of students who have not been able to be admitted to college programs, I would be delighted to look into it. I would love to see one.

Mr. Peterson: I will bring them to the minister.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: All right. Would he like to give me one name? I would be grateful. As a matter of fact, that report, which he said was secret, was not secret. It was shared with the rest of my cabinet colleagues.

[Later]

Mr. Peterson: Mr. Speaker, on a point of privilege: In response to our last discussion, I quote from the London Free Press of September 10, 1983, where it says, "'As many as one half of Ontario community college applicants are rejected because of program and space limitations,' Fanshawe College president Harry Rawson has speculated." Again, the ministry is wrong.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Speculating.

Mr. Peterson: Does the minister want me to go on and read some more?

Mr. Speaker: No. Order, please. It is hardly a point of privilege.

HOSPITAL BEDS

Mr. Swart: Mr. Speaker, I would like to put a question to the Minister of Health. He must be aware of the serious bed shortage at the Welland County General Hospital, which results almost every weekend in people on stretchers, either in the halls or in the emergency department. The weekend before last there were 11 people held on those stretchers, some for more than 24 hours, with such maladies as strokes, fractures and emergency surgeries.

I presume he is also aware that a man drowned in a bathtub last fall, at least partly on account of a shortage of nursing staff and an inoperative patient alarm system, according to the coroner's inquest jury. The hospital and the doctors are now being sued by the family for negligence in wrongly classifying the death as a suicide.

I presume he is also aware that 10 days ago one of the heavy emergency stretchers tipped over on a patient when he was trying to get out of it and gave him injuries which could have been fatal. He must be aware the news media in the area are demanding that steps be taken to resolve the deplorable situation.

Mr. Speaker: Question, please.

Mr. Swart: Is he also aware there are 30 beds closed, which the hospital executive director says could be made operative in a few weeks if funds are committed by the government? In view of this very real crisis in Welland County General Hospital, will the minister immediately authorize those 30 beds to be opened?

Hon. Mr. Norton: Mr. Speaker, as I am sure the honourable member is well aware, I do seek, receive and respond to advice from representatives of the local community on district health councils across the province. I am aware the district health council in that area is in the process of finalizing a report, with recommendations, which is to be forwarded to me in the relatively near future.

3 p.m.

On the basis of preliminary information I have received, I understand it is likely they will be recommending additional extended care beds for that region. It would appear at this point that part of the problem relates not so much --

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Supplementary.

Hon. Mr. Norton: No, I have not finished, Mr. Speaker. I was simply sitting down in response to your call for order.

Mr. Speaker: I was being distracted by the conversation flowing back and forth. We will give you half a minute to complete your answer.

Hon. Mr. Norton: I am sure the interruptions are not making it any easier for the honourable member opposite to hear my comprehensive answer.

Hon. Mr. Davis: We want to hear it, too. Tell us all.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Pardon?

Mr. Speaker: Never mind the interjections.

Hon. Mr. Norton: The problem, as I perceive it at this point, subject to whatever impact the recommendations of the council may have on my perception, is not so much with the shortage of beds in Welland hospital as with the allocation and distribution of extended care beds in the area. As I understand it, the fact is that a number of the beds in the Welland hospital are occupied by persons awaiting placement in longer-term care facilities.

I also would draw to the member's attention something that may well assist in alleviating this situation, which is the allocation in the region of 21 new nursing home beds and 39 additional beds to the West Lincoln Memorial Hospital in Grimsby --

Mr. Speaker: Your time has expired.

Hon. Mr. Norton: -- which were approved but are not yet operational. Once they are operational. it is our expectation that they will relieve to a large extent the pressure on the beds at the Welland hospital and therefore address in part the situation of supply.

Mr. Swart: The minister must be aware that the recommendation of the health council for some 60 additional beds requires a total construction of new facilities, which will be at least two years down the road.

Is the minister not aware of the comments by Geneva Lewis of the health council when she said; "They are asking for space at the hospital and they have space. It just doesn't make any sense at all that they don't get it. It is stupidity"? If that does not convince the minister that those existing beds should be opened up to meet the need --

Mr. Speaker: Now for the question, please.

Mr. Swart: -- perhaps the minister will give a favourable reply to the Tory executive in the Welland-Thorold riding, which is meeting tomorrow at noon with the hospital board; in fact, they are meeting in camera. Perhaps the minister would explain why the Tory executive asked for that in-camera meeting.

Would he use his influence with the member for Carleton (Mr. Mitchell), who is slated to be there as well, to open the meeting to the media so that the public will know whether they are trying to help solve the problem or whether they are simply trying to shut up the executive director of the hospital board?

Hon. Mr. Norton: It is not hard to come to the conclusion that the member and his esteemed leader were educated in the same school of rhetoric. The ease with which he uses the word "stupid" is becoming more and more evident. In fact, if the member were a little more careful in the way he assesses actual situations in his constituency and elsewhere in this province, he might find more sophisticated language to use.

I have no knowledge of a meeting between, if I heard the member correctly, the Tory executive and the hospital board. Is that what he said? I have no knowledge of any such meeting and I have no authority to recommend to the hospital board or to the Tory executive what the nature of their meeting might be.

If the member has views he would like to have taken under consideration by those parties to the meeting, I would suggest that he communicate them to the board of the hospital or the members of the Tory executive.

Mr. Swart: On a point of privilege, Mr.Speaker: The minister implied that I had said it was stupidity. I was quoting Geneva Lewis, who was appointed by that government--

Mr. Speaker: Order. The member made that quite clear when he put the question.

Mr. Epp: Mr. Speaker, the minister is aware that the regional municipality of Waterloo has asked for additional nursing home beds and, since the district health council asked for 115 beds and none has been provided to the region in recent years, I am wondering whether some additional beds will be provided. I would refer particularly to the town of Elmira, which has asked for additional beds. The town built an addition to a home, based on ministerial statements of the last year or two that it would be allocated some beds, yet no beds have been allocated.

Would the minister first indicate, in a very positive sense, that additional beds will be provided within the next six months? If he cannot indicate that, will he at least indicate that he will meet with residents of that home and with some other people from Waterloo to indicate exactly what the policy of the government is with respect to additional beds?

Mr. Speaker: That is hardly supplementary. Answer very briefly.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Yes, Mr. Speaker.

Obviously, at this stage in the process I would not be making any commitments with respect to specific allocations of beds. I assure the member that the decision with respect to the allocation of beds is made on a priority basis, based upon the information supplied to us by district health councils in support of their recommendations.

Obviously, at any given time we do not get an allocation adequate to meet all of the expectations and projections across the province. Therefore, we try to address the most evident need, the greatest need, first.

I can assure the member that his area will receive full and fair consideration in that process, along with the other requests from district health councils across this province.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, with your permission, I wonder if we could revert to statements at this time in order to hear a statement from the Attorney General and someone from each of the other parties.

Mr. Speaker: May we have the unanimous consent of the House to revert to statements?

Agreed to.

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

DEATH OF CHIEF JUSTICE OF CANADA

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: Mr. Speaker, it is with a profound sense of personal loss and regret that I formally inform the House of the death of the Right Honourable Bora Laskin, Chief Justice of Canada.

Chief Justice Laskin passed away yesterday in Ottawa at the age of 71. A native of Thunder Bay, Bora Laskin put his stamp on Canada's jurisprudence. He had a full and active life, marked by numerous accomplishments across a wide range of endeavours. In particular, his judgements in the area of constitutional law in the past decade earned him a special and lasting place in the history of Canada itself.

A prolific scholar and superb lecturer, Bora Laskin was one of the leading law professors of his generation. He taught at Osgoode Hall law school and was a founding father of the University of Toronto law faculty. During his academic career he distinguished himself in the fields of constitutional and labour law. As a labour arbitrator and conciliator, he was known for his concern to safeguard the rights of all parties before him.

Bora Laskin's career would have been a major one if he had stayed as Canada's most distinguished academic lawyer, but at age 57 he was appointed to the Ontario Court of Appeal. For five years he brought a dazzling erudition to a broad variety of legal cases.

In 1970 he was named to the Supreme Court of Canada and, in an unprecedented move, in 1973 he was appointed the 14th Chief Justice of Canada.

His modesty and the court's collegiality would make it perhaps inappropriate to speak of "the Laskin court." Nevertheless, the last 11 years have seen great changes in the work and profile of the Supreme Court of Canada. The court now has the constitutional authority, the administrative capacity, the intellectual ability and the philosophical willingness to rewrite Canadian jurisprudence.

3:10 p.m.

Major reforms have been made to the court's case load. During Chief Justice Laskin's term, the court has had to face problems concerning freedom of expression, the anti-inflation program, native rights, discrimination, the cruise missile, family property rights and a host of federal-provincial disputes. On all these issues, Bora Laskin's voice was clear, compassionate and powerful. He spoke for fairness, for the principle of legality, to preserve equilibrium in federal-provincial relations and to make Canada a more just and humane nation.

In the 1981 constitutional reference, the court had to face the most important case in its history. The case raised profoundly difficult and sensitive legal issues. As I wrote last year, "It was an unenviable position for any court, given the enormous political consequences of their decision."

Under Chief Justice Laskin's leadership, the court ruled it was legal to patriate the Constitution without unanimous provincial consent. The court's legal ruling had dramatic impact on the political process. It broke the logjam and started the talks that led to our new Constitution.

It is a sad irony that as Canada enters a new era, Chief Justice Laskin's views on the new Constitution will no longer be heard, that in the interpretation of the charter, where he could have made a final major contribution to Canadian jurisprudence, his voice is silenced. It was a voice that spoke of civil liberties, of dedication to the rule of law, of a passionate commitment to Canada. He transformed Canadian law in so many ways. He made the Supreme Court a prominent, creative and vital part of our nation.

Even with his judicial duties, Bora Laskin continued his service to the academic community. He was a governor of several universities, chairman of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education and chancellor of Lakehead University throughout the 1970s. He was a leader of Toronto's Jewish community, active for many years at Holy Blossom Temple.

He once said he had been very fortunate with his family. Together with his wife Peggy, he raised a fine family. Both daughter Barbara and son John may take pride and satisfaction in the achievements of their father.

On behalf of the government and the members of the Legislature, I extend our deepest sympathies to them and to the other members of the family.

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Speaker. there are three communities that today mourn the passing of the Right Honourable Bora Laskin, Chief Justice of Canada.

There is the community of his family, for whom no eulogy or utterance of comfort can abate an unabatable loss. There is the community of lawyers and jurists, not only in this country but worldwide, for whom his lifelong endeavours represented striving in, and with, the law at its very highest reaches. Finally, there is the community of all Canadians, to whose benefit, with every ounce of physical and intellectual strength, his work was dedicated and this dedication was a blessing.

Of the function of the Supreme Court, he once wrote that "[it is] to oversee the development of the law in the courts of Canada, to give guidance in articulate reasons and, indeed, direction...on issues...of national concern

For more than a decade, that was his burden. He bore it with sensitivity, compassion and resolve. For more than a decade, that was our good fortune. The more than 20 honorary doctorates he received are evidence of his stature in the communities of higher education throughout Canada, in the United States and in Israel.

The tragedy of his passing is heightened by the irony that now, as we move tentatively from dawn to midday of a new constitutional era, his sensitive guidance and resolute direction will be absent. In the months and years to come, there will be many untested, darkened passageways lying in wait for the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The legacy he imparts to all Canadians is the brilliance and clarity of that devoted legal mind whose light, undiminished through time, will illumine those untried passages.

It is the inevitable melancholy of our fate today that we must say to the community of all who mourn, along with his work, along with his scholarship and along with his loving devotions, his memory too will now be for blessing.

Mr. Rae: Mr. Speaker, it is with a sense of personal loss and I think on behalf of the loss of a great many Canadians that I speak today of Chief Justice Bora Laskin. If I might speak personally, he was a remarkable presence. He took not only great intellectual command of any situation, but he was a man of great humour and personal charm.

It so happened that circumstances were such that Chief Justice Laskin and I lived in the same apartment building when I was a member of Parliament and he was the Chief Justice of Canada. We would meet quite often and discuss, not matters that were before the court but always what was going on in public life. He and his wife were always a tremendous influence in pointing out some of the ironies and absurdities of certain political and legal situations, but with a tremendous sense of fun and a great sense of people and of Canada.

I would like to speak about three major contributions Chief Justice Laskin made as a scholar and as a jurist. First, one has to speak of his tremendous contribution to legal education, not only in this province but in Canada. When that little band of scholars took the very difficult decision to defy the Law Society of Upper Canada, to form the University of Toronto Law School and take on the establishment, Bora Laskin was right there. He was very much involved in creating what he felt was an approach to legal education that had real integrity, independence and gave an academic and real depth to legal education in Canada. It is fair to say that, together with Cecil Wright and other people at that time, he transformed legal education in Canada. It is much to his credit that he did so.

The Attorney General has made reference to the extraordinary contribution Mr. Laskin made as a labour law arbitrator. As all law students recognize who came after his time on the bench and who studied labour law, he is the father and dean of labour law and jurisprudence in all of Canada. It is perhaps worth remembering that if anybody can be said to have developed as an arbitrator the common law of the shop which gave to the average worker a sense that he had a right of appeal and a right to some freedoms under law, it was the body of arbitration law which Bora Laskin had so much to do with. It was an application of law that applied equally to employers and employees.

One of his great efforts was to get away from the old idea of management rights and to see a new relationship between employers and employees as equals. He lost that battle because others who were at that time above him in the courts of Canada decided management rights had to be preserved. Nevertheless, he struck an important blow which we are going to come back to in jurisprudence in this country with respect to finding an equal balance between workers and employers in the work place.

He also put a strong obligation on the part of unions. There are a great many people who will remember what he did with respect to the illegality of strikes during the course of a collective agreement that had a great impact on the new jurisprudence in Ontario and Canada. As a jurist, he made an enormous contribution to our jurisprudence, as stated by the Attorney General. He was an outstanding judge on the Court of Appeal and he was an outstanding Chief Justice of Canada.

3:20 p.m.

We have lost one of our most distinguished citizens. Ontario has lost one of its proudest sons. The Jewish community has lost one of its greatest representatives in this country. It is with an enormous sense of sadness that I speak today, but it is also with a sense of joy at a celebration of a remarkable and wonderful life during which he gave so much to others.

Mr. Hennessy: Mr. Speaker, I wish to join in expressing my condolences to the Laskin family and to Mr. Saul Laskin.

Bora was born and raised in Thunder Bay-Fort William many years ago. It is not generally known that he was an outstanding ball player and could have played major league ball.

I would like to join with my colleagues in expressing our condolences to Saul and members of the Laskin family. We feel deep sorrow at the passing of such a great Canadian. It will be a loss to Canada and the citizens of Thunder Bay.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you. We will revert to question period.

ORAL QUESTIONS (CONTINUED)

STUDENT TESTS

Mr. Bradley: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Education concerning province-wide, compulsory, standardized tests.

I did not have an opportunity to attend the press conference yesterday but from the reports I received, no one seems to be any the wiser as to exactly what the minister is proposing.

Last week, the minister said the tests would be used in every Ontario elementary and high school, forming part of the student's academic record. We have heard about five different versions of this, and I am wondering which one is the correct one. Is it Ed Stewart's version? Is it Duncan Green's version? Is it the Premier's version? Is it Dr. Stephenson 1? Or is it Dr. Stephenson 2?

In other words, are the tests to be compulsory? Are they to be standardized? In which grades are they going to be used? What is the minister going to use them for?

Perhaps the minister could clear up a lot of confusion for more than just the member for St. Catharines.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, I refer honourable members to a very lucid account of yesterday's explanation written by an excellent woman reporter representing the Canadian Press, Jane Harrison, which is available to all members. It clearly and precisely outlines our position relating to the tests.

Mr. Bradley: Everyone else seems to be confused, but the minister has chosen one person who apparently is not confused.

The minister has suggested this is an extension of the Ontario assessment instrument pool. A publication put out under her name, called the Ontario Assessment Instrument Pool, says, "The Ontario assessment instrument pooi is not designed nor should it be used for purposes of teacher evaluation or for the comparison of individual schools or school boards."

I have two questions emerging out of this. If it is an extension of the Ontario assessment instrument pool, why are suggestions being made now that it might be used to compare individual schools or school boards?

The second part of my question is, why did the minister not consult those who deliver education services before she made this announcement? Was it simply a late Gallup poll that had to be inserted into the speech from the throne?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: I have no idea, because the Ministry of Education has not been involved in a Gallup poil since 1979, when we participated in a national Gallup poll related to the objectives of education from coast to coast. The honourable member may not be aware of that, but it happens to be factual.

I have said quite clearly that the foundation of the province-wide testing mechanism is the Ontario assessment instrument pooi. That pool has been in the process of development since 1976. It has been developed as a result of the co-operation and activity of a significant number of teachers. It has been field-tested in a very large number of schools -- I cannot give the names of the schools, because I do not know them as a result of the agreement made regarding the testing and validation process -- by teachers within the system who have been ensuring the test questions are valid, good and useful so that we have been able to develop a provincial norm for all the tests in the pool.

It is the purpose of the consultation process that we will ask the opinion of those involved in the school system with all sorts of points of view about it -- from trustees to parents, parent-teacher associations, administrative officers, teachers and others -- about the appropriate way to integrate the testing mechanism into the school system for the benefit of the students and for the benefit of those who are concerned about and interested in the record of the students.

There is no doubt that the test instrument will be used in support of the educational program of all the children within the school system, at least from grade 4 on at this point. I cannot tell members about grade 3 and below, because we are not making any predictions about that until a special study of the early educational program has been completed in about two years' time. But it will be used for the benefit of all the children at some time each year during their educational process.

Does this make it mandatory? I suppose it depends on one's definition of "mandatory." Will it be used as an indication of the rite of passage from one part of the education system to another? That is what the consultation process is all about, and that is what we will be determining.

I really would refer the member to the excellent articles that Louise Brown and Jane Harrison have produced.

ONTARIO PROVINCIAL POLICE INVESTIGATION

Mr. R. F. Johnston: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: During the month of December an unfortunate incident took place in this House involving the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Drea) and the member for Hamilton Centre (Ms. Copps), a certain matter having to do with the divulging of names and information about the registry.

The Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry) told us during question period that he would get us information at the earliest opportunity. Later on he was heard to say that he would have a report for this House before we came back. We have not received it, and I am wondering whether it is just being hidden someplace or other or whether we are going to get a report on the Ontario Provincial Police investigation. I am quite concerned that the commitments made to this House have not been kept.

Ms. Copps: Mr. Speaker, on the same point of order: If the member for Scarborough West or any other member is truly concerned about the discussion of this investigation or if he is simply interested in scoring political points, I have a copy of the taped interview between me and the OPP, which I would be happy to allow any member of this Legislature to hear.

CORRECTION OF RECORD

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, may I have a point of clarification? There is an article in the Toronto Star --

Mr. Speaker: I point out to the honourable minister that we do not have any provision for points of clarification. However, I will be pleased to hear a point of order.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: There is an article in the Star loosely based on the exchange between the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon) and me yesterday. Unfortunately, the Star article states that I am sponsoring the conference at the end of this week.

That is not true. It is being sponsored by the Federation of Women Teachers' Associations of Ontario and my colleague the Minister responsible for Women's Issues (Mr. Welch), plus women teachers in other federations. The conference is not going to last 10 days; it is going to last two days.

Mr. Allen: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker:

The next time I stand up to make a point of order that is really a point of information or clarification, I hope you will indulge me.

Mr. Speaker: Just for the clarification of all members, the minister rose to correct the record. and that is certainly allowed.

Mr. Rae: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I wish to correct the record. In the course of the exchange I had with the Deputy Premier (Mr. Welch), he made reference to a certain number and I made reference to a certain number with respect to how many companies were involved in the so-called affirmative action program of the government.

It is my understanding on the basis of discussions between my staff and the Ontario women's directorate, confirmed this morning, that the figure of 245 mentioned in the speech from the throne, to which the minister referred again today, in fact includes 18 school boards and nine municipalities. If that is not correct, I ask the minister to stand up and correct that part of the record. But it is my understanding that this figure of 245 includes some 27 groups that are not private companies.

3:30 p.m.

Mr. Speaker: That is hardly a point of order or of privilege.

Mr. Rae: I corrected the record because I made reference to a number in my question to the minister. I think the number I mentioned was roughly 250. I wanted to make it clear that is the figure I was talking about.

Mr. Speaker: The member can pursue that during question period on Thursday.

PETITIONS

REASSESSMENT OF PROPERTY VALUES

Mr. Cureatz: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition, which I would ask be directed to the Minister of Revenue (Mr. Gregory), concerning reassessment of property values in the town of Newcastle.

EQUAL PAY FOR WORK OF EQUAL VALUE

Mr. Conway: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to present a petition on behalf of 10 electors in the great electoral district of Renfrew North.

"We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

"Whereas women in Ontario still earn only 60 per cent of the wages of men; whereas women are still concentrated in a very small number of occupations; and whereas unanimous approval of the concept of equal pay for work of equal value was expressed in the Ontario Legislature in October 1983,

"We petition the Ontario Legislature to amend Bill 141 to include equal pay for work of equal value and to introduce mandatory affirmative action."

Mr. Newman: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition which reads:

"To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

"We petition the Ontario Legislature to amend Bill 141 to include equal pay for work of equal value and to introduce mandatory affirmative action."

This petition is signed by teachers from various schools in the city of Windsor.

Mr. Pollock: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition from the Status of Women Committee of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation, district 19, in Belleville, which reads as follows:

"To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

"We petition the Ontario Legislature to amend Bill 141 to include equal pay for work of equal value and to introduce mandatory affirmative action."

Mr. T. P. Reid: Mr. Speaker, I am glad to read into the record a similar petition based on the resolution of my colleague the member for Hamilton Centre (Ms. Copps).

It is addressed: "To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

"We petition the Ontario Legislature to amend Bill 141 to include equal pay for work of equal value and to introduce mandatory affirmative action."

This petition is signed by a number of my constituents from Fort Frances and Devlin, Ontario.

MOTIONS

HOUSE SITTINGS

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that notwithstanding any previous order, the House will sit in the chamber on Wednesday, April 18.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that when the House adjourns at six p.m. on Wednesday, April 18, it stand adjourned until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, April 24.

Motion agreed to.

PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BUSINESS

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that notwithstanding standing order 64(a), private members' public business be taken up on Wednesday, April 18.

Motion agreed to.

STANDING COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC ACCOUNTS

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that the membership of the standing committee on public accounts ordered on December 16, 1983, continue until further ordered.

Motion agreed to.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

OMBUDSMAN AMENDMENT ACT

Hon. Mr. McMurtry moved, seconded by Hon. Mr. Wells, first reading of Bill 13, An Act to amend the Ombudsman Act.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: Mr. Speaker, the legislation I have just introduced responds to an anomaly that was recently discovered in the Ombudsman Act.

The Ombudsman Act requires the Ombudsman to retire upon reaching the age of 65. The act also, by incorporating certain provisions of the Legislative Assembly Retirement Allowances Act, requires an Ombudsman to serve for five years before being eligible to receive a pension. It is apparent that if an Ombudsman is appointed after attaining his 60th birthday, it will not be possible for him to receive a pension.

Accordingly, the bill I have introduced will permit an Ombudsman to serve a full five years regardless of the age at which he or she is appointed. In this way the pension entitlement of ombudsmen will be protected without any exception being made to the general rule that a minimum of five years' service is required before a pension can be payable.

ARBOREAL EMBLEM ACT

Hon. Mr. Pope moved, seconded by Hon. Mrs. Birch, first reading of Bill 14, the Arboreal Emblem Act.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Pope: Mr. Speaker, Ontario will be the first province to have an official tree. The initial move to find one began in 1980 with the proposal by the late James Auld to the Ontario Forestry Association when he was the Minister for Natural Resources. A tree council established for that purpose considered 30 different species before choosing the white pine as the most suitable.

CITY OF KITCHENER ACT

Mr. Breithaupt moved, seconded by Mr. Sweeney, first reading of Bill Pr6, An Act respecting the City of Kitchener.

Motion agreed to.

3:40 p.m.

KITCHENER-WATERLOO COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ACT

Mr. Breithaupt moved, seconded by Mr. Epp, first reading of Bill Pr11, An Act to incorporate the Kitchener-Waterloo Community Foundation.

Motion agreed to.

WOMEN'S ECONOMIC EQUALITY ACT

Mr. Rae moved, seconded by Mr. Martel, first reading of Bill 15, An Act to provide for Affirmative Action and Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Rae: Mr. Speaker, this is the same bill I introduced last fall as a private member's bill. The bill was blocked at that time when the Conservative members voted against it and enough Liberals stayed away for the vote to ensure its defeat.

Unlike last fall's resolution, this bill is in two parts. The first part is modelled on the Occupational Health and Safety Act and would require every employer in the province to establish an affirmative action program to identify and eliminate barriers to economic equality in the work place. The second part consists of an amendment to the Employment Standards Act to require equal pay for work of equal value.

The bill is designed to deal at the same time with the two major contributors to the substantial wage gap between men and women, namely, discrimination in wage and salary rates and the concentration of women in lower-paid jobs. According to the most recent available figures, women's earnings average only a little over 60 per cent of men's.

Both parts of the bill are binding on the crown and its agencies as well as on private sector employers. In parallel with similar provisions in United States law, the bill requires an approved affirmative action program and compliance with the equal pay provisions as a condition of any government contract, grant or loan.

Mr. Martel moved, seconded by Mr. McClellan, first reading of Bill 16, An Act respecting a Register of Ontario Land Information.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Martel: Mr. Speaker, the bill would authorize the creation of a public register showing the ownership of all privately held land in Ontario, the use of the land and whether its owner is a resident or a nonresident of Canada. Every owner, purchaser or vendor of an interest in land in Ontario would be subject to a reporting requirement.

OAKVILLE YMCA-YWCA ACT

Mr. Kerr moved, seconded by Mr. J. A. Taylor, first reading of Bill Pr17, An Act respecting the Oakville Young Men's Christian Association and Young Women's Christian Association.

Motion agreed to.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the amendment to the motion for an address in reply to the speech of the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the session.

Mr. Rae: Mr. Speaker, I very much appreciate this opportunity to reply to the speech from the throne. I think it was George Orwell who wrote, "Political language is often an instrument for concealing or preventing thought rather than expressing it." In this year when we are all rereading Orwell to the extent we are, it is perhaps appropriate to remember that phrase as we plough our way through the densities of the throne speech. There are many parts of the throne speech which really require translation.

I know it is the view of the Premier (Mr. Davis) that there should only be one official language. I was delighted to see, however, that both French and English were used in the throne speech. I am going to be spending most of my time attempting to translate the English portions of the throne speech because they are the parts that require some elaboration and understanding in terms of what is actually happening.

As one would expect, the speech starts on a high note. It starts by observing that we are in the middle of "a year of special celebration and rededication." Then it goes on to say, "This is the 200th anniversary of the first major settlement in Ontario." That requires some translation. It is not really the 200th anniversary of the first major settlement. There were a number of settlements in Ontario. There were enormous settlements of native people and then settlements established by French settlers as they came across Lake Ontario on the great fur trading routes.

This is the 200th anniversary -- I am speaking hyperbolically but only slightly -- of the foundation of the first Tory riding association in Ontario. That is what we are celebrating. What we are celebrating is the arrival of the first Tories in Ontario, and I think it is important. The idea that we are celebrating the fortieth anniversary was bad enough, but now the government is trying to tell us it has been here for 200 years. That is a point worth making.

I am not taking anything away from the fact that, in response to the number of quite genuine criticisms that were made of this proposal, the government has now turned it into a general celebration of all our heritages. I, for one, certainly intend to participate in those celebrations to the extent the government makes possible.

I do not know what arrangements are being made for members of the opposition to partake in the celebrations. I do not know what plans the Premier has brought forward for us to celebrate the arrival of Her Majesty and of His Holiness the Pope. However, I want the Premier to know my schedule is being set aside. Those days are being kept perfectly clear. Any time the Premier wants us to participate in any of those events, we will be there, ready and willing.

3:50 p.m.

I even composed a song that I was able to play for a number of school children in Windsor, which was a positive, joyful effort. It was regarded as such a success it was played twice on the six o'clock news. I would be very glad to offer it to the Premier. If he wants an official song written by the New Democratic Party, we will be more than pleased to provide it. I dare him to play it on the air. It compares favourably with "Preserve it, conserve it," or "Davis can do it," or "Good things grow in Ontario." It has as much zap as any of the jingles they have inflicted on the province over the last few years.

The throne speech, having touched the high note, then moves on and talks about the circumstances we face in Ontario. It talks about the rise in manufacturing shipments, the expansion of retail sales and the so-called expansion in employment. It refers in particular to the automotive recovery as if -- and the Premier is perfectly well aware of this -- what the government of Ontario has done with respect to the automobile industry had anything at all to do with the --

The Premier is shaking his head. He says he cannot be held responsible for the recession in the automobile industry. I have heard him time and again say, "Do not blame us for what is going on in the auto industry." How many Tory cabinet ministers have we heard say: "It has nothing to do with us. It is the fault of Ottawa. It is the decline in trade in the United States"? Now we have the Tory party turning around and saying: "How clever we are. We are taking responsibility for the revival of demand for larger cars in the United States." We are not going to let them get away with that.

If that was not bad enough, we turn to page 4. Having spent a long paragraph pointing out the importance of the car industry -- there is no argument from this party about the importance of that industry -- it then goes on to say the mining industry in the north is "extremely robust."

There has been a decline in employment in the mining industry from 40,000 jobs in 1977 to 31,000 in 1983, a decline of 9,000 jobs. That is a very substantial decline in available jobs in that industry. To describe that as robust is not simply obscuring thought, it is twisting thought. It is not true. It is not the case. In community after community across the north, one finds a very uneven pattern in employment. There is profound concern in a great many communities across the north that jobs which once appeared to be stable and secure are no longer stable and secure.

It then goes on to outline the marvellous things that are happening at Hemlo. It was bad enough that the government took credit for the revival of trade in the United States for the automobile industry and tried to claim credit. With respect to Hemlo, the Tory government is trying to take credit for an earthquake that took place 5.5 million years ago to say that somehow it is responsible for that. That was before the arrival of the first Tory settlers in the province. It goes back even before George Drew. That is a long time ago. That is before pre-Cambrian society.

The Premier was sitting here with the speech, forcing the Lieutenant Governor to read the thought that somehow he can take credit for the existence of gold in northern Ontario in the Hemlo district. It is astonishing to me that we would have that approach from the government of Ontario.

There is a lot of other banality in the chapter described as "Our Circumstances." The entire throne speech is worthy of Beatrix Potter in the effective use of fantasy. But the most marvellous piece of fantasy, and the statement I like, is that the only reference to housing in the whole speech said that rising real incomes in what is described as an improved mortgage market will make for dramatic increases in demand for housing.

I suppose it depends on whether one is a lender or a borrower as to whether the mortgage market has improved. A lot of people have to be borrowers when it comes to buying houses. I know a little about that. I say to the Premier in all sincerity that the mortgage market has improved --

Mr. Nixon: l hear the member's new house is not in his riding.

Mr. Rae: Neither is the Leader of the Opposition's (Mr. Peterson). The member knows that perfectly well.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mine is; Main Street.

Mr. Rae: Carefully arranged. Let us look at this so-called improved mortgage market. It has improved for lenders, it has improved for the banks and it has improved for the trust companies so close to the government. The government has done such a good job of regulating and keeping in close touch with them. It has improved for the private lenders in our society. It has not improved for the borrowers in our society and it has not improved for the people in our society who are trying to buy their first house.

If we look at the inanity and the insanity of the interest rate policy that is being imposed on the people of Canada by the gentleman whom I call Bouey XVI, members will know that the interest rate policy in this province is going to get worse. For the government to say that the mortgage market has somehow improved, I guess it depends on their perspective.

We have over there the party which very effectively represents the lenders of this province; it very effectively represents the banks and trust companies. From their point of view, it is an improved mortgage market. From the point of view of the average borrower, it is no longer an improved mortgage market.

The government should have been aware of that when it came time to produce the throne speech. They should know there is very real concern that mortgage rates are going to be going back up, creating greater difficulties for the average home buyer. I would much prefer to be on the side of the average home buyer in terms of what is going on in this province than on the side of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce or the Royal Bank or the Royal Trust corporation when it comes to talking about an improved mortgage market.

The speech then talks about a number of economic challenges that are facing the province and, Lord knows, we have enough of those. It says the government is going to be a friend of positive change, whatever that means, and then it establishes three goals with which it would be very difficult for anyone to disagree. I do not claim to understand fully the workings of the Liberal mind or the Liberal Party, but I dare say they would agree with the three goals.

I think any rational person would agree with the three goals. They want to improve the access for young people and women to the benefits of economic growth and challenging work; that is a goal which all of us can accept. They want to reinforce the ability of industry and mature workers to meet and master change; again, a statement of such general goodwill and bonhomie that one could hardly object to it. They also want to ensure a steady improvement in our quality of life and in the quality of government services.

The trouble with establishing goals in the throne speech, and they have set these out very clearly, is it allows us -- those of us who are trying to understand and assess exactly what the government really is doing -- to test the government's achievements against the goals. I do not know whether this is part of the assessment instrument pool technique. I am not quite sure what that is and I dare say the Premier and half the people who have been trying to figure out what is going on are not quite sure.

We know that testing is a very controversial and difficult subject for the government. They have a different program and policy every day, depending on whether it is Dr. Stewart, the deputy minister, the assistant deputy minister, the minister, or the Premier himself talking about it, but we are going to have to apply some very basic tests to the government in terms of meeting and establishing these three goals.

With respect to improving access for young people, let us test that. Let us see what they are doing. Let us have a hard look at what they are proposing. With regard to the women of this province, I think we have already seen in the last few days in this Legislature just how phoney the government's approach is.

As for reinforcing the ability of industries and mature workers to meet and master change, the Minister of Labour (Mr. Ramsay) today was not able to show us a single positive program that is being put forward by the government to deal with older workers, mature workers as they are called.

The third goal is the ensurement of a steady improvement in our quality of life and in the quality of government services. It has come time to look at what is happening with our environment. With the failure to invest in our resources, the failure to invest in our people. and the very real problems that exist in the health care system, I think we are going to be able to see how real the problems are with respect to the quality of life and the quality of government services.

It is time we called this government's bluff. They have established themselves as experts par excellence in words that have no real meaning, in phrases that are absolutely empty of content and in programs that have no substance. I believe this is a government whose basic achievements have at some point to be set up against the goals which have been established.

4 p.m.

For example, let us look at the youth employment situation. Let us look at what the government is proposing with respect to youth unemployment. The words are fine. "To countenance for long massive youth unemployment would be unconscionable and would diminish Ontario's future vigour. Simply, economic renewal without meaningful work for our young would be a cruel illusion." It should not be "would be a cruel illusion," it is a cruel illusion today.

It is a cruel illusion for the high school kids I was talking to at 12:30 today who said: "We do not know what to do. There are so many unemployed today and four years later it looks as if it will get worse." A sense of pessimism is sinking in to the younger generation and getting deep into our school system. That has to be not only a concern but also a terrible blot on the province itself.

Then the government turns around and says, "We should appreciate that our economy created 49,000 new jobs for young people during the past year." There is no mention of how many of those jobs are part-time. Those statistics conflict with the Statscan statistics we have, but that is an argument I do not want to get into.

There is no mention in the new program of the numbers of people who are unemployed and no mention of how many people the government is hoping to employ. They have described a situation in which a generation of kids is coming out of school without a sense of optimism and confidence in the future. They have described a situation in which we have this terrible structural problem with the number of younger people who are unemployed, but they have thrown them pretty well nothing in terms of the substantive programs they are describing.

The only direct increase in funds they appear to be talking about is in very limited programs that provide only short-term opportunity and do nothing to deal with the fundamental problem, which is the absence of a modern and integral approach to the question of skills training.

They are suggesting an increase in funds for the Ontario career action program, a program, I would remind the Premier and the members of this House, that pays kids $100 a week. It is a minimal program paying kids barely more than the welfare rates in Ontario. The major program they are putting forward is an expansion of OCAP. There is no mention of how much. If they doubled OCAP, they would be creating 12,000, 14,000 or 16,000 jobs, but for the 163,000 who are unemployed they have hardly touched the problem. It is a 10 per cent solution that hardly gets to grips with the real problem.

Then the government says, "Our youth employment counselling centres will be expanded significantly." Counselling for what? If there is no work available, they can have as many counsellors as they want. They can have as few windows as they want. If they have one window and one person giving the greatest counselling advice in the world and there is no work available, what is the point?

There is not a member in this House who cannot point to the kids coming into our offices with applications, with questions on their minds, not knowing where to turn, whether they are graduates from university or community colleges or kids who just left high school and have no access to the kinds of jobs that 10, 20 or 30 years ago they would have had access to in our society.

When it comes to the question of youth unemployment, the approach that appears throughout the speech is the identification of the problem, which we all knew they were going to be able to do because they have done their polling. They have done their assessment of the situaton. The government is very sophisticated in its capacity to gather information and to know where the problem areas are. Some of us see them a few months later, but we have all seen the Decima polls that show where the government is vulnerable and where it is particularly strong.

They do the assessments and make the judgements in the areas where they are vulnerable, such as job creation, education, spending, the problem of fiscal responsibility and so on. But what bluff has to be called? Having identified the issue, they have ads and fancy brochures and all sorts of publications about the problem. They have people downstairs offering information and government propaganda with respect to it, but there is no substance. There is no recognition of a genuine problem that is going to require a substantial investment of public and private money if we are going to solve it.

We are in the middle of an economic life change in this province the like of which we have not seen since the 1930s. If we are going to deal with that life change effectively, it is going to require a dramatic change in program, a dramatic change in approach, a dramatic change in the way we manage the economy and the way we provide for each other.

It is going to require a return to community values. It is going to require a return to a sense of sharing. It is going to require a return to a sense of the importance of public investment as well as of private investment and a defence, if I may say so, of the old-fashioned idea that government is there to do a job, to lead, to provide hope, to provide help and to provide a chance to people who have no chance in our society.

If we look again at what the government has said, and if I could just return to the effort of translating, I am reminded that the government talks about things like industrial change; that is the next chapter that comes on, "Industrial Development."

Now, when we do it, it is called spending, but I want members to listen to how the Tories describe spending. They say we must have 'many initiatives designed to maintain and extend our social capital."

Who can disagree? But the translation of it, when we look at the actual proposals that are coming forward, is, "We are going to spend more in Tory ridings in order to keep some of our people working for a very short time." That is really what they are talking about. Again it is a complete discrepancy between what is needed, what is required, and what is being done.

Mr. Kerrio: They are spending more per capita than the New Democratic Party members.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. The member for York South has the floor.

Mr. Rae: Let me give members another example of a sentence that requires translation. "In addition, we will intensify our efforts to attract American tourists to Ontario." The only translation of that is, 'We are going to start advertising more in the United States in order to encourage people to come to the province." That is the sum total of the substance of the government's policy with respect to tourism: more advertising.

Having said that we are in the middle of an economic life change, the Tory party in its own way seems to be saying there are major changes happening in the province and there is going to be a need for major reform.

I find it ironic that, having identified a problem again, they come to talk about technological change and the importance of government providing some kinds of assistance.

Listen to this. There are some things here that really do require translation. "With the growing mobility of capital and technology" -- that means the number of multinational companies disinvesting in Canada, the number of companies that are taking their money out of the country and closing down plants; that is what "mobility of capital" means; it means that capital goes on strike, leaves Canada and Ontario and goes elsewhere -- "our people will be the critical arbitrator of our wellbeing."

I defy the Premier to tell me what that means. "Our people will be the critical arbitrator of our wellbeing." Of course they will; they have been ever since we established a political democracy in this province.

I am going on because I think these sentences deserve to be read, parsed and truly understood.

"Good government cannot protect our working people from change itself, but it can equip them with the ability to change" -- the ability, yes, to go from being employed to being unemployed -- "and to continue to enjoy rewarding, valued employment."

4:10 p.m.

The point I am making is this. As has been described, and as the Premier and every member must understand, employers and plants that were previously secure sources of employment, in his riding as in everybody's riding in this province, are no longer that way; plants that were previously hiring are not hiring any more and plants that previously had 10,000 or 12,000 employees no longer have anywhere near that number. Look at every basic industry in this province and we see a substantial pattern of the reduction of employment opportunity; which is not temporary, it is permanent. It is a permanent change. It is a life change.

What do we have? Do we have any reform of the social security system proposed in this speech? None at all. Do we have any mention of the importance of early retirement or of the importance of giving a chance to workers who have been laid off or who have been set aside by their employers? Do we see any mention of the need to give them a chance? There is nothing at all. Do we see any legislation with respect to plant closures? There is nothing at all.

Do we see any reference to the committee the Minister of Labour established under Don Brown? Where is Don Brown's body and Don Brown's report with respect to what is happening to workers and bankruptcy in the province? It was supposed to report in December. It was supposed to tell the workers of this province who have been affected by bankruptcy and who have been affected by change that there was something the Ontario government could do. That was the promise held out to us when the Minister of Labour appointed the committee and got the problem off the government's back for a while. There has been no action, no mention of it; not a word, not a peep.

I want to tell the Premier that if he drives along Lawrence Avenue, as he is heading out west, and I do not know in which direction he drives home but I am sure he goes in a westerly direction, he would see a number of plants that are closed. If he took the trouble, he could go along Lawrence Avenue West. If he was out at a party meeting somewhere, perhaps in the riding of the Minister of Education (Miss Stephenson) discussing, as I am sure he does, the very meaning of the tests which the minister is attempting to impose on Ontario, after he has had his discussion of those tests he could drive along Lawrence Avenue. If he does, he will pass a number of plants that are closed.

One of the plants which is closed is the CCM plant. That CCM plant went bankrupt. I do not think there is a person in this House who has not seen a CCM bicycle or who was not a proud owner of a CCM bicycle. Over the years, that company was allowed to go downhill.

Most observers who have looked at it -- and I have talked to a number of local business people in the area -- say those who were responsible for the company skimmmed off from the company. For a time, they did not reinvest in it. In 1982 the machinery was the same as in 1910 and 1930. There was no reinvestment and the plant eventually went belly up, but it went belly up in a way that deprived the workers of any severence pay. It went belly up in a way which reduced the workers' pension benefits because the company had not been paying money into the pension plan for a number of years. It went belly up in a way that has left literally dozens of those workers still unemployed today, more than a year after the plant closed.

More than a year after the plant closed, people are still coming into my riding office and asking, "What can you do for me about the pension plan?" We are still waiting for answers from the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Elgie) about the pension plan to which there were no contributions from the company. We are still waiting for answers about an adjustment for those workers. There has been absolutely no protection provided for those people, many of whom were people who worked for the company for 30 and even 40 years.

That is what change means to those workers in Ontario. This is not some abstraction that circumstances will be a little different. That is what change means. We have had a government which has been sitting on these major social changes for the last five years and has done absolutely nothing about them. There has not been a change in employment standards law. There has not been a change in the pension law. There has not been a change in any aspect of our social security legislation during that entire time which would give workers of that kind a single opportunity, a chance, a dime, a nickel, or anything at all. That is a disgrace.

That is something which eventually is going to make the people of this province very angry, because they are going to start to see that for all the fine talk about coping with change and government being a friend of change, the government has been a friend of change which has left lots of workers without any sense of chance, hope or opportunity. That is the tough reality in this province. There is not a member on this side who cannot go back to his riding and quote examples of exactly the same situation.

The government sat by and said, "It is a change which is going on outside in the rest of the world and there is nothing which can be done." The government has made no response in a social way and has made no response in a human way to give a sense of opportunity to those people.

The government has said it is a federal problem and it is something which is going on in the United States. They are now starting to take credit for the change for the first time because they see some signs of recovery in parts of Ontario. They are saying, "Look how clever we have been. Look at the recovery that is happening," as if the recovery had anything at all to do with what they have done in the last four or five years. It has nothing at all to do with what is going on. I see the Minister of Education sitting there, quietly marking her papers. She is trying to pass her exam. I do not know how successful she will be. She is assessing her instruments.

I noticed with interest today, in something that came across my desk, that the Premier has been invited by the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education to the Jackson lectures. As I am sure all the members know, these are lectures that were established by OISE to recognize world authorities on the subject of education, experts on education.

In its wisdom and independence, the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education has appointed one William G. Davis as the Jackson lecturer for 1984. That is a display of independence and courage on the part of OISE which I think will stand it in good stead for many years to come. The world expert, William Grenville Davis, on the subject of education. I defer to the Premier's world expertise on this subject and look forward to hearing his profound thoughts as they are expressed in an entirely nonpartisan, nonpolitical way. He is not to be there as a political person at all, simply as a world expert.

I look forward to sharing in his world expertise. I have not read any of his books on the subject. I have not had a chance to read any of his learned tomes on the question of education and educational opportunity but, since this is to be an entirely nonpartisan occasion, I am sure he will take the opportunity to give the kind of world-expert approach for which he is so well known.

I am sure he will be spending nights writing, sweating to get that out. The midnight oil will be burning on Main Street in order to get that speech out there. I am sure no other people will have a hand in the production of it, certainly not the Minister of Education. She will not be writing it.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Why does the member not come and listen? He might learn something.

Mr. Rae: I received an invitation. I do not know whether that will be possible or not, but I will certainly do what I can.

Hon. Mr. Davis: The member said he would scrap his whole schedule.

Mr. Foulds: That was for the Pope and the Queen. Boy, the Premier does have ambitions.

Mr. Rae: I know the Premier has a very high view of himself. I know he does pontificate but I had no idea he assumed that, having pontificated, he was elevated to the status of a pontiff. I am surprised to hear him saying it.

The approach to higher education that the Minister of Education has set out is henceforth going to be selective. That is the watchword now. We are going to have a higher education program that is going to be selective. I think one could say the whole approach of the Tory party to education is selective. The approach to the whole question of education has been highly selective. It is based on streaming, on a kind of elitism which is eating its way through the system and denying opportunity to younger people.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: That is not true.

Mr. Rae: Just listen to what I have to say. I know the Minister of Education does not like listening to another point of view, but it is another point of view.

There are actually people in Ontario who do not agree with the minister's policy and who are not terrified of her response. Her approach to higher education has been so selective that now literally hundreds of kids who want to get into university cannot do so. Congratulations. The minister has made it a very selective process. She talked to the universities -- and I see people over there shaking their heads. She talked to people at York University. She can come down to my riding and talk to the kids who applied to the university and who now are getting a response saying: "We are sorry. We cannot let you in. You are going to have to leave town."

These are kids who do not want to leave town, whose parents cannot afford to send them out of town, whose parents can afford to have them at school and at university only if they are going to be living at home. Those are the kids who are being treated selectively by the Tory government of this province. That is the approach to selectivity the minister is imposing. That is what selectivity is all about.

4:20 p.m.

The minister may not like it but when we were debating Bill 127 I said to her that she cannot have it both ways. She cannot be cutting back and not take the consequences of those cutbacks. The consequences of her cutbacks and the consequences of her selectivity are a denial of opportunity. It is written, as surely night follows day. That is what she is doing and that is what she has done to the educational system because of her cutbacks. That is what she is doing to the higher educational system because of her cutbacks, and it is something that is going to be a subject of major debate in this province, because we are looking at very different approaches between her party and ours when it comes to the future of education in this province.

All the minister's reforms are directed towards students who are academically bound. She has ignored, systematically and totally, the interests of students who are vocationally or technically oriented. Even the Ontario assessment instrument pool she has established, the Premier said the day it was announced in the speech from the throne and then withdrawn, put in again, explained and then re-explained, is not going to be applying to technical subjects

Hon. Mr. Davis: What is more, she is right. Mr. Rae: She is about as far right as one can get.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: No, I am not. That is only your assessment.

Mr. Rae: There is a major difference of opinion. I do not know what assessment she is using or what pool she is using, because it changes from day to day. Why did Ed Stewart have to explain it to everybody?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: When?

Mr. Rae: The minister is not keeping up with her own clippings. I am surprised. I would have thought that somebody with her ambition would know all about what is being reported in the press about her every day.

Hon. Mr. Davis: It may come as a shock to you, but not many of us on this side of the House spend as much time reading clippings as you do.

Mr. Rae: I know how to read. The Premier has people to do that for him.

Mr. Martel: He has flunkies to do that.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: That is what Ed Stewart is for.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I do not read clippings.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. The time is yours, members, but the member for York South --

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Rae: Nothing could be clearer, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Martel: The Premier should relax.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You are interrupting your leader, Elie.

Mr. Martel: You and Bette have been doing that all afternoon.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I heard the same speech in the mid-1960s.

Mr. Rae: I am having a good time. I do not mind being interrupted. I am a simple soul trying to understand this document. I am trying to understand the government's policy. I am trying to understand what it wants to do. It seems to want to send a signal. It is very clear what it is trying to do when it uses the phrase "provincewide testing." It is trying to send a signal out to particular people in the community who think the answer to what is going on in our educational system is simply to get tough.

The Minister of Education is a very effective symbol. She is not a token, as she was described so mistakenly by the Hlouse leader of the official opposition. She is not a token but a symbol, and the government is trying to send out a message through that approach. But when people start asking: "What does it actually mean? What tests are you going to apply? What are you going to be doing? What are you talking about?" they reply:

"We are not talking about anything. We are talking about a program that has already been in place for three years."

If it has already been in place for three years, why is it being announced in the speech from the throne? If it is not a new initiative, why is it being proposed to the people of the province as if it is some kind of new initiative? If it is a new initiative, what is new about it?

All of us have to explain ourselves sometimes, but the minister had a process that started last Wednesday. She had ministry officials scuttling around saying, "No, it does not mean the instrument pool." We phoned them, and we had the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation phone them.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, on a point of privilege --

lnterjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, but no official or member of the staff of the ministry said it was not the Ontario assessment instrument pool. It is the Ontario assessment instrument pool, and that was stated clearly right from the beginning.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I wish you would try to understand these things, Robert.

The Deputy Speaker: I remind the members there has been a near imputing of falsehood back and forth.

Mr. Rae: No, not at all.

The Deputy Speaker: You are talking about the ministry, and that is fine. However, will you clarify it in your response?

Mr. Rae: No, Mr. Speaker. With great respect, I do not impute motives for a moment, and let me explain to you why. I do not think the civil servants in the ministry, or indeed in the Premier's office, knew what was going on. I do not think they understood what was going on. I do not think they were told what was going on. I certainly would not want to imply for a moment that the government itself knew its collective mind on this particular question.

What I am saying is what I know, that there has been total and utter confusion with respect to what the policy of the government is with respect to these tests. To whom were they designed to apply? Exactly when are they going to be introduced? When are students going to be taking them? What effect are they going to have on the average assessment of a student? I do not think that is an unfair comment.

We have had contradictory statements between the Premier and the Minister of Education, the Premier saying they would not be used in the question of whether or not a student had passed and the minister herself stating they would be one of the things taken into account.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: They would be part of the student record.

Mr. Rae: They would be part of the student record. All right. Then the minister is looking at a change that takes place day after day with respect to exactly what it is that is being introduced.

I know the minister does not like it.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: We will do an I information session for you to understand what it is. Okay?

Mr. Rae: I can understand. It is frustrating.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: I would be delighted to entertain you with that, absolutely delighted.

Mr. Rae: I know it is difficult when there are people out there who do not agree with her. It is so difficult; I know it is difficult; I know it is hard for her. I appreciate how difficult it is for her having people out there who actually do not understand what it is she is trying to do.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Would you like to have one tomorrow morning? Obviously you do not understand.

Mr. Martel: Ah, that is it. We do not understand.

Mr. Rae: Everybody is out of step but the minister; that is the approach we have to take.

Mr. Foulds: Even the Premier.

Mr. McClellan: The Premier is the one who is out of step.

Mr. Foulds: The Premier is going to set it straight in his world-renowned lecture.

Mr. Rae: Let us look at this thing. They have got themselves in a pool, and they are not going to be able to get out of that pool for quite some time because the proposal has not yet really been clarified, if I may say so.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: I invite you to read Miss Harrison's report and Louise Brown's report. It is very clear. It takes a woman to understand.

Mr. Rae: Have another seminar explaining the statements that were made over the last week. Have a symposium. Have a seminar for all of us that will allow us to deal with this problem.

Mr. Martel: Have you missed anyone today yet, Bette?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: You, Elie. I have not started on you yet.

Mr. Martel: Oh, I surrender. I am a coward.

Mr. Rae: Let me say this: the minister has done to the House leader of our party what no other member of our caucus has been able to do. I congratulate her on that -- temporarily.

Mr. Martel: I surrender.

Mr. Rae: He has surrendered; he has not surrendered to anybody else before.

M. le Président, avant que le premier ministre ne prenne son congé, puisque je sais qu'il va s'en aller, je veux dire un mot au sujet de la référence à la Cour d'appel sur la question des droits de l'éducation minoritaire.

J'étais fier d'être chef de mon parti et de pouvoir être représenté à la Cour d'appel pendant cette présentation si importante sur la question des droits minoritaires.

I would like to say to the minister that when it comes, again, to an embarrassing moment for the government where the right hand of the government did not know what the left hand of the government was doing, I wish she had been there as the Minister of Education to hear the Court of Appeal when they asked why the Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry) was referring a matter to them when the amendments were introduced two days before the end of the session, before we had a chance to look at it. before we had a chance to debate it, before we had a chance to do anything.

The government introduced the amendments to the Education Act, which were not part of the reference to the Court of Appeal. I am sure the minister must have known -- did she know the Court of Appeal was going to be considering something in January that was different from what she introduced in December?

The Deputy Speaker: This really is not question period.

Mr. Rae: It is taking time to sink in.

Interjections.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: No heckling, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Rae: I do not mind this, Mr. Speaker. I just think it is important for us to know that again it is an instance where the minister clearly did not know what was on the Attorney General's mind.

She should have seen the face of the Attorney General's lawyer when he was asked by the Court of Appeal, "Is the Attorney General aware what the implication of the introduction of that legislation is going to be for the consideration of the reference?"

She should have seen his face; it was a study. It was a study because she herself introduced this legislation without any apparent consultation; or if there was consultation, then the conduct becomes even more inexplicable.

4:30 p.m.

I say to the minister, with great respect, when it comes to French language rights in Ontario in the field of education, the minister's and the government's failure to do the simple thing -- to provide, in terms of governance, the same rights to French-speaking people in Ontario as are given to English-speaking people in Quebec -- is a blot on its performance and on its record.

The government is going to continue to have the same situations in Windsor, Penetanguishene and Michipicoten that we have described in this House -- that long litany where an aggrieved minority is forced to go on its knees to the government of Ontario to get minority language education -- until it does the simple, basic and direct thing, which is to give the French-speaking people in this province the right to run their own schools. What is wrong with that?

I assumed that was what the minister was talking about in that sort of epoch-breaking introduction to her estimates. She talked about the threat to western civilization and the end of the world and Rome and Greece. I assumed she was referring to French-language governance.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Assuming is always a dangerous thing to do.

Mr. Rae: I have no idea what she was referring to. She was either referring to that or to heritage languages. It is very hard to tell. I do not know. All I know is she is sending signals out there and everybody knows what those signals are.

The signal the minister should be sending out to the French-speaking people of this province is:

"We are going to give you the same rights as the French community in Quebec gives to the English in terms of governance of their schools." It is a much simpler and more direct process. It would effectively depoliticize and do a great deal to reduce the controversy. It is an area that is going to plague this province for some years to come if something very swift and direct is not done about it.

I cannot resist saying that the last two chapters of this document are described as serving the community. I think there is another chapter which talks about getting value for money -- no, that is all part of serving the community. I am sorry, it is sometimes hard to know exactly how the government is going to be packaging these things.

It talks, for example, about remaining "vigilant in the protection of Ontario's birthright, the environment," but its says there may be a need "to reform, from experience, the processes in our regulatory framework." If that were coming from some other kind of government, one might say:

'That is a smart thing to do. It is going to try to simplify some processes and provide for some deviations."

It is worth pointing out that from a review of the prosecution activity of the Ministry of the Environment -- something that would not take an awful lot of time to review -- it appears that from April 1, 1982, to August 30, 1983, there were 60 fines laid against different companies and ibdividuals. The total amount of these fines collected by the ministry was $125,000, which meant the fines averaged approximately $2,000.

Since the Deputy Premier (Mr. Welch) is here now holding the ship of state almost alone, apart from a couple of his colleagues, his finger amply placed in the dike, I again refer him to March 2, 1984, when a study found that polluting was more profitable. This was a study done by that radical group of public interest researchers called Peat Marwick and Partners of Toronto and commissioned by the Ontario government. It says:

"Fines that have been levied for conviction of pollution offences in Ontario have in many cases been almost trivial. Even where fines against a single polluter have totalled as much as $35,000, they have usually amounted to only a fraction of the compliance costs."

That is the world this government is operating in. Instead of having the polluter pay, it pays the polluter to pollute. The fines established are so minimal, the laws are so inadequate and the regulatory structure is so unprepared to deal with the problem of pollution that even its own consulting study finds that it is more profitable to pollute in Ontario than it is to comply with the law.

That is the situation described by one of their independent studies that was commissioned at great expense, I am sure, from a consultancy firm, the contract for which I am sure was tendered very carefully so we know we got value for money with respect to that piece of advice. The question now is, what is the government going to do about it? That is the March 2 study.

Many of us might have thought that, having commissioned a study and having been told by the study that there is a problem, the government would have responded in the speech from the throne. It would sense that Peat Marwick is not to be ignored and should be taken seriously. Instead, we got a statement that more mediation is going to be introduced so there will be more compromising with the polluters. Now we are going to see a steamlining, modernizing and pruning of government regulations that will be pursued energetically this year.

Nothing is said about enforcement or about the problem in our society that pollution has become more profitable than complying with what is going on. There is just a statement that it is going to start pruning. That is the government's response -- pruning regulations. That means fewer fines, less prosecution and less vigilance in protecting the environment.

I am glad it is 1984. One really has to be an expert in doublethink and Newspeak. The government says, "While we remain vigilant in the protection of Ontario's birthright, the enviroment" -- in case we were not quite sure what Ontario's birthright was -- "we are prepared to reform, from experience, the processes in our regulatory framework." There is not a peep about enforcement or about what needs to be done.

Then there are grand words in the speech about what is happening to our forests.

I must confess I find it sad to have to say these words, but I was travelling from Kapuskasing to Sudbury after I had been visiting with the Sensenbrenner workers. That was a group of individuals to meet, an unhappy and angry group of people who talked about their reaction to the political process and the response they got from the Treasurer (Mr. Grossman).

I vividly recall the day when, having waffled on a question, the Treasurer went out of here and said they would not have to pay it back. He said he could not imagine a world where they would have to pay it back. He could not imagine that unfairness. Then they ended up in a situation where he suggested they work coffee breaks and work for free at lunch hour. People do not work for free in Ontario. It is against the Employment Standards Act for an employer to ask one to work for free. We have come out of those days of -- I would not even say of the 19th century. It is a long way gone. He cannot impose that kind of settlement and he knows it.

That was just a diversion from what I was getting at. It was while I was in the airport that I picked up a copy of Northern Ontario Business. There was a supplement on forestry. There was a long and extensive interview with that independent expert on the subject of our forests, the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Pope).

I had always thought he was somebody who had a sense of fair play -- and I am choosing my words as carefully as I can in the circumstances -- yet when I read the things he says here about the task force that his party established on forestry and I look at the number of statements he makes in his report that are simply untrue, I am absolutely astonished.

For example, he says, "In spite of what you were hearing in 1982 about a shortage of wood, by the end of 1983 you had the NDP task force and the industry themselves finally admitting that the problem was not a shortage of mature timber."

The minister should go to Hearst and talk to the operators there as well as the operators in a number of other communities in Ontario and get a sense from them as to what their concerns are about the future of available and merchantable supplies.

4:40 p.m.

The question is not the number of trees; the question is what can we use the trees for. Who has access to those trees. Who has rights to those trees? The minister knows that. He knows we know it. He knows that is what we said in our task force report. He knows that is the problem.

He is saying we are no longer saying something we have said before. He said our task force fell flat on its face in northeastern Ontario. I wish he had been there when we met with the mill owners in Abitibi and Kapuskasing. I wish he had been there when we met with the workers and talked to them about a number of problems we had. I wish he had been there when we spoke to the people in the communities about the difficulties in northeastern and northwestern Ontario.

I just say to the minister, as I will say to the Deputy Premier since he is here representing the government, if the minister has something he wants to tell us or some new figures he wants to give us, let him give us the figures. All I know is there is a major problem in terms of the future of a merchantable supply of timber. There is an enormous problem because of the lack of investment and the lack of reforestation. There is also an enormous problem because the minister has cut back on the ability of the ministry to give us the information we need to know.

I want to pay tribute to the member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Laughren) for the kind of work he has done as the chairman of our task force. I want simply say when it comes to the question of the integrity of our information and the integrity of the approach of the member for Nickel Belt versus the information the minister is not even prepared to table in this House -- just as the Deputy Premier is not prepared to table the information with respect to affirmative action -- I say to the minister, and I mean it quite sincerely. I am prepared to trust the member for Nickel Belt over the Minister of Natural Resources any day of the week.

I find it ironic in this speech that when they talk about serving the community they manage to talk about it without mentioning the Canada Health Act and without mentioning extra billing. They do that without mentioning the controversy, which I think is a real one, not only coming from our party but also coming from many people in the community, about the concerns about chronic care and the operation and extent of private profit operations in the chronic care field. I think there is a whole range of subjects which has not even been touched or covered by the minister or the government. I find that astonishing.

Since they are complaining about it and saying they are going to be $50 million to $60 million short and they are going to have to go out and raise more money, I find it astonishing that they would not mention it in the throne speech. The very same week the throne speech came out, the Treasurer was going around the province talking about how much money he was going to have to raise and how much taxes were going to have to go up. Why was there no reference to that in the speech from the throne?

Why was there no reference in the speech from the throne to this major public debate on the subject of extra billing which has been going on for the past number of years? Why was there no coming to grips with the changes that are necessary in our health care system? There was nothing at all. The only thing they referred to was the need to do some things about kidney operations and soon, about which they will have no disagreement from us.

Every year the government chooses a particular area of the health care field to focus on and attempt to highlight. I do not object to that. I think anything that focuses public attention on that aspect of health is a good thing, but why not talk about the basic problem in the system, which is the the absence of long-term beds and the resulting fact that the system is backed up? Every Minister of Health should be aware of this problem by now.

We had the previous minister's consultation process which went on around the province. In the throne speech there is not a word about it, not a peep, not a mention. There is no mention of the Canada Health Act, and I cannot understand it.

The Tory's position on extra billing is so popular -- I mean the government's defence of extra billing. They have seen the polls. They know 80 per cent of the people are opposed to extra billing. I cannot imagine why, having seen those polls, the government would not state its courageous position that it believes in extra billing, supports extra billing, thinks extra billing and user fees are part of the system. supports those fees and supports the imposition of fees. I am surprised we did not have a defence worthy of the National Citizens' Coalition coming from the government of Ontario with respect to the health care system.

I find the silence on the subject of extra billing unbecoming to a government which, surely to goodness, is going to defend to the last degree, to the nth degree, the right of each and every doctor to maintain his sacred relationship with his own wallet. The Tory party has believed in the doctor-wallet relationship and the sacredness of that relationship for a long time.

They resisted medicare, hospital insurance and every single major advance on the subject of the provision of health care. I am astonished the government of Ontario did not join the Ontario Medical Association and the National Citizens' Coalition in their statements and the outrageous bunk they have been perpetrating on the people of the province. I am surprised they do not have the courage of their private-profit, free-enterprise, malarkey views with respect to health insurance and the future of health care in Ontario. Why keep it such a secret? Why keep their light under such a large bushel?

Why do they not come forward and take that battle and go out to the people of Ontario? I challenge them. Let us have an election tomorrow on the subject of extra billing. Let us have their defence on that issue and let us get it out. Let us go out and sell to the people of Ontario the right of each and every one of them to pay directly to the doctor and to pay whatever the doctor wants to charge whether he happens to be any good or not. Let us have an election on that theme. I am surprised they are so shy. I am surprised they are so silent.

Let us have some advertisements. Those guys have been playing golf with the doctors all these years. Why do they not do something for those people? They are leaving them out there on a limb to dry. I cannot understand the kind of approach they have taken.

There are two final points in this speech I want to refer to. I find it ironic. I have gone through a number of these areas. These are the last couple of pages of the speech. Here one really needs a dictionary to understand exactly what it is they are talking about.

Interjection.

Mr. Martel: You have disturbed the member for Cochrane North (Mr. Piché).

Mr. Rae: I am sorry if I disturbed the member for Cochrane North. I did not mean to disturb him.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Cousens): Order.

Mr. Martel: That is about the fifth interference from the chair today, and not one on this side.

Mr. Rae: I appreciate seeing the Acting Speaker in the chair.

I want to quote this stuff about value for money. I want the government to hear its own words because it is important for the members to hear exactly what is being said. "While our growing population has increased the need for services, public sector employment has steadily declined and public sector wages have risen responsibly." They are describing one of the miracles of modern times.

They then go on to say that the burden of government spending and our deficit are the lowest per capita in Canada and that there has been a general increase in what they describe as productivity in the public service. We now have the Tory definition of productivity.

If a teacher is teaching 15 students, he is less productive than if he is teaching 25 students. If he is teaching 25 students, he is much more productive. If there is one children's aid worker for 40 cases, that worker is much less productive than if he had 100 cases. This productivity can only go up. With the cutbacks in education, in social services and to the public sector in general, the prospect for increase in productivity is infinite.

One could have 500 kids in a class and one would have the most productive teacher going. One could have 600 or 700 kids as wards of one children's aid worker, and he would be the most productive children's aid worker in the world. The prospect for an efficient public sector literally knows no boundaries.

4:50 p.m.

The government has defined productivity in such a way, and I want to congratulate it for it. It is something which defies ordinary common-sense analysis, but it is one which, nevertheless, has a certain terrifying logic to it. I see the Chairman of Management Board (Mr. McCague) is trying to come to grips with exactly what his job is. Perhaps we will better understand it when he does. I wish him well in trying to determine what it is and in working it out with Peat Marwick or whoever else is going to be telling him, perhaps the Premier, the Deputy Premier or -- I am sorry the Provincial Secretary for Justice (Mr. Walker) is away -- one of those real apostles of restraint. This is a real Michael Walker, hard-line, Fraser Institute, "let us get them down and dirty" approach to government spending.

When they start talking about govermnent efficiency, let us be under no illusion about what they are talking. They are talking about less service, a worse education system and children being left in circumstances that some people might even find posing a certain problem in terms of the very quality of the service. The implications of this are very clear. A children's aid worker who has 15, 20, 25 or 30 kids is not productive, but somebody who is taking care of 100 is a productive worker in the public sector. What outrageous arithmetic. What appalling mathematics. What an approach.

Mr. Rotenberg: What nonsense. The member is outrageous. The speech does not say anything about that. He is making it up.

The Acting Speaker: Order.

Mr. Rotenberg: He has no idea what he is talking about. He has nothing to say and he is making it up.

Mr. Rae: I say to the minister I am delighted --

Mr. Rotenberg: He has nothing to sell; so he makes up fiction. He has no facts at all.

Mr. Rae: The member should read page 27 carefully, line by line --

Mr. Rotenberg: You read it carefully. It says nothing about that.

The Acting Speaker: Order, the member for Wilson Heights (Mr. Rotenberg).

Mr. Rae: He should take his time. It is turgid and difficult.

Mr. Rotenberg: It is very simple, but he is too simple to understand it.

The Acting Speaker: Order. The member for Wilson Heights has been warned.

Mr. Rae: Perhaps the member for Wilson Heights, whose voice is as coming from the angels, will listen for a moment.

The speech from the throne says: "While our growing population has increased the need for services, public sector employment has steadily declined and public sector wages have risen responsibly." When the government passes an iron-heeled law, as I think it was described by members of the temporary opposition over there, it is amazing how responsible people can be. When they get fined or thrown in jail if they ask for anything more, it is amazing how that makes for a responsible climate in terms of bargaining.

People have risen responsibly. What a miracle. The government passes a ukase-like piece of legislation and then turns around and says, "Look how responsible the workers of this province have been." If the government thought they were responsible, why did it introduce that kind of legislation? The government should not play games here.

The throne speech says that "public sector employment has steadily declined and public sector wages have risen responsibly. Consequently, our productivity has clearly increased..." That is what it says. That is only what it can mean. That is the mathematics of despair, and that is what this government is practising; it has produced declining quality of service and declining investment.

It goes on to say that "productivity is an ongoing responsibility and further measures will be taken to enhance the value of services for each tax dollar. Also" -- as if that was not enough -- "we will work closely with the agencies which receive provincial funds to consider value for money in their operations." There is nobody out there who will be free from the thoughtful, intelligent, reflective, sophisticated technique of this juggernaut. The fewer workers we have and the more things they have to do, the more productive they are. That is tremendous.

The throne speech points out that many of the expenditures are transfer payments. It says, "The autonomy enjoyed by these agencies carries with it the responsibility for effective financial and administrative stewardship through modern management practices such as value-for-money auditing."

I know I have said a lot in this House about nursing homes, and I will continue to say a lot about them, but I often wonder why the operation of the nursing homes of this province has never been subject to the same degree of scrutiny with respect to transfer payments as virtually any other recipient in the whole of the public sector. The government does not give that kind of laissez-faire to boards of education, children's aid societies, municipalities or any group, autonomous, semi-autonomous or whatever, that is receiving that extent of public funds.

To whom does it give autonomy? To whom does it say it cannot even look at the financial statements? To whom is it the former Minister of Health, now the Treasurer, said. "We are not going to require any further steps in terms of financial accountability"? The private-profit operators in the public health sector, the nursing home operators of this province, are going to be the only ones excluded from this kind of requirement and the only ones who, historically, have been left out.

I wonder what kind of value-for-money assessments they are making of the advertising they are doing? I wonder what kind of approach they are taking to see they get a genuine response to the money they are spending.

I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that of course there is an argument about the nature of the public sector and about the role of government. But I want Mr. Speaker to know this, and I know and the government knows it perfectly well. They read the Decima Research polls. We have all seen the polls that say: "People do not believe in big government any more. Therefore, if you are speaking on behalf of public expenditure, you are swimming against the tide in terms of public opinion."

It is a funny thing about public opinion. I have spoken to a lot of people across this province and they always say, "I do not like to see so much public expenditure." But then they say, "Where I work, it is a problem."

If one talks to teachers, they might say: "You are spending too much money on health care. You should be spending more on education." When one talks to people, as I have done, in management in hospitals, they say: "Gee, the money they are wasting on education is appalling. What they should be doing is focusing more money on the hospital system."

The minister knows -- and everybody across the floor knows -- there is a tremendous amount of support in this province for the integrity of public programs. I say to the government of this province that it is only the rich who can afford a poor government. Yet it is a poor government we are getting today in terms of the quality of service, the investment in the future and the need to provide for all of our people. Cutbacks come with a cost.

The government may take some pride -- I think it is wrong to do so -- in the fact that its per capita spending is the lowest in all of Canada. It may take some pride in the fact that it has managed to starve the universities more than any other province over the last 10 years, or that in comparison with any other province it has imposed an inordinate burden on the local taxpayer with respect to education. It may take some pride in that, but I think the people of this province are going to be fed up with that approach. They are going to start saying, "Look, there are some forms of spending which are not just spending; they are an investment in our future."

When one looks at cutbacks in education and skills training, at the failure to invest and at the failure to get involved, one is looking at a saving that is not a saving. One is looking at an enormous increase in welfare, an enormous increase in crime and a decline in opportunity. I say, with all respect, that a government which has failed, as this government has, to provide for a healthy climate of public investment, which has failed to be smart about the public investment it is making and which is failing basically to invest in the future is a government that is not worthy of the confidence of the people of this province. I think that is a very basic message.

I confess, as somebody who is baffled sometimes by public opinion polls -- and some weeks are more baffling than others -- that I know what the public mood is out there with respect to government programs and government expenditure. But I also say I am proud to be a member of a party that is not afraid, unlike some other parties I can think of, to say, "This is what has to be done, and we have to generate a fair tax system if we are going to do it."

There is no magic answer to it. But if we do not generate these kinds of programs and provide this kind of opportunity, it is those less well off in our society, the average working people, the unemployed and the elderly people who will be left without services and without opportunity. That is the kind of program I am proud to support. I will support that and speak on behalf of that as long as I have a voice with which to speak.

I could not help laughing when the government said it was looking forward to supporting the United Nations' choice of 1985 as International Youth Year with the theme of participation, development and peace. This is what it says in the throne speech: "Those principles are the signature of a youthful heart." This government does not have a heart -- youthful, old, Geritol-like, or otherwise. Its knees are weak, its stomach has gone, its courage has departed and it is old and tired.

5 p.m.

I find it ironic. This is a government which is literally doddering into the 1980s and 1990s, which is attempting to revive ruling by sloth, by neglect, by polls, by advertisements, by the oldest and phoniest kinds of con games, whether in programs for women, for youth or for older workers. It is a government that does not simply not have a youthful heart; it does not even know what a heart is. It does not have a mind to play with, and it does not have legs on which to stand. That is the truth.

I have gone on at some length because, as over my political life I have studied the speeches from the throne of Liberal governments and of Tory governments, both federally and provincially, I feel very strongly there is a terrible similarity about them. It is a similarity that fundamentally is a failure to recognize that people now have higher expectations in terms of programs and performance from their politicians than they may have had in the past.

There are things that are not in the throne speech as well as things that are. I want to mention three in particular.

I talked earlier about the absence of any reform of our social security system to deal with the reality of unemployment, plant closures and what is happening out there, the changes that really are happening. There is not a single mention of the fact that accompanied by these changes has been a tremendous explosion in pure and simple poverty in Ontario.

We cannot have the number of people on unemployment insurance and welfare that we have had for as long as we have, or the low wages that have been paid to so many people for so long without having an explosion of poverty and a growth of tremendous inequality in our society.

I want to pay real tribute to the member for Scarborough West (Mr. R. F. Johnston) for the work he has done in our party in focusing attention on the issue of poverty. We are going to continue to focus attention on that issue. It will be a subject of real concern for us in the forthcoming session.

Wrapping up as quickly as I can, I also find it ironic that in addition to omitting any mention of extra billing in the Canada Health Act, the government also failed to mention the major investment decisions which it is making. Ontario Hydro; the government has given everything to Hydro. It has socked so much away to Hydro, it is spending so much on Hydro, on this unnecessary new construction at Darlington -- and the Deputy Premier must know it -- that it does not seem to give itself the leeway to invest in anything else.

Again, I am surprised that in the speech from the throne it would not have given a ringing endorsement of the tremendous foresight of the government of Ontario in putting literally all of its eggs, in terms of energy investment, into the nuclear project. I am surprised the government would not have pointed out that, together with the Soviet Union, the government of Ontario is ossifying its future in terms of energy growth. It is giving an energy future to this province which is about as smart as giving a body cast to a ballet dancer. It is setting our future in concrete in such a way that it is going to be very difficult for future generations to pay for, and it will live to regret it. It is a decision which is wrong, inflexible and unwise and which, even from the sheer hard economic point of view, does not make any sense.

Finally, I want to close by saying that what I find missing or absent from this speech is a sense of the future of this province. If I talk to young people today and to older people, as I have suggested, I find there is a willingness to consider not the politics of more, but the politics of different, the politics of change, genuine change, recognizing that we are in very different circumstances from the 1950s, 1960s and the 1970s, and that very different kinds of sacrifices and decisions are going to have to be made.

Our party is going to continue to put forward proposals such as the one we put forward on early retirement, on the need for work sharing, for genuine equality between men and women in the work place, for major reforms in our social security programs and on the need for new forms of investment, much more creativity in going after new forms of capital and creating new jobs. That is the sense of the future the people of the province want to see.

They are going to regret very deeply the kind of approach the government is taking; the complete absence of any sense of wanting to provide leadership, the complete absence of any sense of wanting to give real, genuine hope, a real change of heart on the part of all of the people in the province to see that not only are sacrifices shared but also that opportunities are shared. That is not the kind of future being portrayed in the speech from the throne. That is not the kind of future which is there for a great many people.

Therefore, I would like to amend the motion that was put forward in the amendment by the Leader of the Opposition yesterday.

The Acting Speaker: Mr. Rae moves, seconded by Mr. Martel, that the amendment to the motion be amended by adding the following immediately before the last line:

"And further condemns the government for:

"Following the example of the Liberal government in Ottawa in cutting back on funding for social housing, education and health care programs;

"The inadequacy of its efforts in affirmative action and, in particular, its failure to require affirmative action programs for all employers of 20 or more people;

"Continuing to ignore the need for strong legislation on plant closures requiring full disclosure and public justification of closure decisions and protecting fully all workers affected;

"The continued failure of the government to provide for early retirement for older workers;

"Its failure to begin the major reform of the social security system that is needed to cope with the devastating economic changes taking place in the province, and in particular, its failure to advocate a major expansion of the public pension system in Ontario and in Canada, including the Canada pension plan;

"Its total neglect of the problem of poverty and of the need for tax reform, causing extreme hardship for growing numbers of families and individuals;

"The lack of any commitment on the part of the government to community economic development and to generating new forms of social capital for investment in job creation;

"Producing a plan for the Niagara Escarpment which completely retreats from the principle of protecting this unique resource in areas like the Beaver Valley;

"Failing to follow the example of other provinces in introducing a red meat stabilization program;

"Its failure to eliminate extra billing by doctors;

"Its failure to shift resources to a not-for-profit model in the provision of nursing home care and its refusal to require any genuine accountability on the part of private nursing home operators for either the quality of care or the expenditure of public funds;

"Its refusal to provide for lifetime indexed pensions for nonoccupational losses such as pain and suffering resulting from compensable injuries under workers' compensation."

5:10 p.m.

Mr. Treleaven: Mr. Speaker, it gives me pleasure to make some comments on the speech from the throne. Coming after other people, one has a certain opportunity to reply.

I might say to the last speaker, although I can speak only for Oxford county in regard to youth counselling in Woodstock, the leader of the third party referred to youth counselling as being unimportant and unnecessary if there were no jobs. During the first year of operation of the Woodstock youth employment office, the majority of the young people registered were placed in jobs. If Woodstock is any indication of provincial expectations, there certainly is some real purpose in youth counselling.

Another point I would like to mention was the non sequitur the leader of the third party used in regard to the productivity argument. That is something lawyers do in court.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Do not attack lawyers, please.

Mr. Treleaven: He is one, although he may not have practised in court. If he examines the wording on page 27 of the throne speech, he will find he has used a non sequitur. Where it says, "Consequently, our productivity has clearly increased, much to the benefit of the public," that is quite clear. He is certainly off on a lawyer's delight. There is a crude expression lawyers use that I will not repeat in this House.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Oh, go ahead.

Mr. Treleaven: No, I certainly will not.

I would like to address a few remarks on two of the justice subjects referred to in the speech from the throne and on one other subject.

The viability of our justice system ultimately depends upon the degree of confidence people have in it, the level of support they are willing to give it and the degree of legitimacy they assign to its decisions. A society and a community can survive many things, but when a community comes to believe its system of justice no longer reflects its values, no longer effectively addresses its concerns, unless something is done to rectify that situation the community has taken a big step towards disintegration.

Fortunately, we are not yet faced with that situation in this province. I believe the people of Ontario still have a great deal of confidence in our justice system and a great deal of trust in our enforcement agencies and courts. I believe that confidence is justified and will be enhanced and strengthened by new initiatives in the justice policy field announced in the speech from the throne.

These initiatives directly address matters of concern to my constituents in Oxford, matters that I suspect are of concern to people all across the province. I speak here of two particular issues: the control of pornography and victim justice.

In his remarks to this House last week, my friend the member for Sudbury (Mr. Gordon) told us pornography had grown to become a $10-billion industry in North America As all members are well aware of the nature of some of this material, I will not dwell on just how repugnant and disgusting it is. Suffice it to say, in my view and I believe in the view of my constituents, this type of filth is morally and socially unacceptable and must be subject to some form of control.

I have always found it peculiar that in a case where some ingredient in a product is found or is even suspected to have caused cancer in rats, we immediately move to have the product removed from the shelves and the use of the suspected carcinogen banned. In most such cases we hear no complaint about the rights of the producer of the product to use that ingredient, should he choose, or the rights of the consumer willing to run the risk of cancer to purchase that product, should he so elect.

Consider the case where the product in question is hard-core pornography, a product that some evidence shows leads to violent sexual attacks on women and children -- that is, assaults against women and children, not against female and young rats. Let us try to control this product -- it is pornography I am referring to -- a product that has perhaps caused more pain, suffering and humiliation then all the cyclamate ever used.

Some condemn us for violating rights; some argue that the link between pornography and violence has not been proven, that the evidence is not reliable. It is a peculiar thing that in the case of a substance that has even the slightest chance of causing cancer the cry goes up to have it removed from the market, but in the case of pornography some would have us wait and do nothing until we are absolutely certain this product is causing someone some physical harm and is definitely causing attacks.

I am not prepared to wait, this government is not prepared to wait and I see no need to wait. This material is hate literature directed at an entire sex, half our population.

Mr. Wildman: How do you define it, though?

Mr. Treleaven: The definition, of course, comes in the Criminal Code under federal jurisdiction.

Mr. Wildman: Okay, then. You have it in the Criminal Code. What are you worried about?

Mr. Treleaven: It is not working, I might say to my friend the member for --

Mr. Wildman: Algoma.

Mr. Treleaven: -- Algoma. It not only degrades women but also demeans a society that tolerates it.

We need not make apologies for arguing in favour of a system of control of pornography that reflects the values of our community. We need make no excuse for decency. We should also have enough confidence in our common sense to realize that we would know, and the people of the province would know, if the power of censorship were being abused.

We in this province have made an effort to exert some degree of control over the pornography trade. In 1981, for example, the Ontario Provincial Police set up Project P. Since its inception, that small unit has laid over 400 charges under the obscenity provisions of the Criminal Code; all but 40 of those charges have resulted in convictions. Four hundred is not very many with all the porn and videotapes, etc., that are coming into Ontario. There are probably 400 videotapes coming in the mail from British Columbia daily.

By stressing its support for the Ontario Board of Censors, this government has shown its determination to combat this obnoxious and poisonous social cancer. It is an effort that I believe deserves the support of all members.

Another issue involving the administration of justice that has attracted much public attention of late is the issue of victim justice. The public has grown increasingly concerned that a drastic imbalance has developed in our justice system between the rights of the accused and the rights of the victim. This has led to the feeling that the victim is actually doubly wronged. First he is the victim of the criminal, then he is victimized by the system. The pilot victim witness assistance programs, which this government has started, have proved to be useful and have helped not only the individuals involved but the courts as well.

It is my understanding that the Attorney General has plans in place, depending on the availability of funding, to expand the witness assistance program into every county and district in Ontario. I would say to the government that the expansion of the program should be our priority in the justice policy field.

5:20 p.m.

As you know, Mr. Speaker, the theme of Community Justice Week in Ontario this year is "Justice for victims." This will give all of us the opportunity to make ourselves more aware of the needs of victims of crime and how those needs can best be met in our system.

The other subject I wish to address, which does not come within the justice field, is the reference in the speech from the throne to the simplification of procedures in the environmental protection field. The leader of the third party referred in his remarks to the reference in the speech from the throne to the government's intention to deal with the processes in our regulatory framework. Later, that paragraph also refers to streamlining the costly complexities of procedures now mandated by our environmental laws.

As the member for Oxford, I have seen my county struggle with the establishment of a landfill site for 13 years. Since the matter is currently before the courts and may remain there for several more years, I welcome the government's plan to seek ways of expediting the environmental protection procedures while protecting the rights of all citizens.

As municipalities grow larger, the not-in-my- backyard syndrome also increases. When municipalities were small, each looked after its own waste disposal, considering it 'our garbage." I am glad to see the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Brandt) here, actually paying some attention.

Hon. Mr. Brandt: Listening.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: As are we all.

Mr. Treleaven: Thank you. As larger bodies became responsible for waste disposal, the view became prevalent that it was no longer "our garbage," but "their garbage." At present there is only a disadvantage to a local community or municipality becoming a site for waste disposal of a larger municipal body; there is no offsetting incentive.

I can well remember the comments of many of the residents of smaller municipalities of perhaps 3,000 or 4,000 residents when a large industry located in their township, such as Canada Cement Lafarge in the township of West Zorra. A lot of the residents said they were lucky to get it and lucky to have it because their residential taxes were approximately halved.

There was an incentive to the people of West Zorra to have that industry in their township, even though there was a certain dust problem, a noise problem and certain inconveniences. Perhaps if there were some incentive such as grants or decreased municipal taxes to the affected people, residents of local municipalities would view with greater enthusiasm the establishment of questionable developments nearby.

I commend these thoughts to the members of this Legislature. The speech from the throne demonstrates this government's commitment to progress. It has my support and, I hope, the support of all members.

Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to congratulate you as you continue your duties in the chair, and onerous duties they are, particularly on occasion in this chamber. I know that as we go forward in the session we will probably all have the opportunity to discuss some changes in the rules of the House that we ought to be looking forward to.

As a committed Progressive Conservative when you are not serving in your impartial duties, you will realize that representatives of your party in one of the western provinces have inaugurated a new procedure which they have found extremely effective in blocking government policy. I am thinking particularly of a situation where the Progressive Conservative opposition refused to answer the call of the bell to take part in a vote. In so doing, the government was eventually persuaded to prorogue the Legislature and abandon the policy directed towards accepting French as an official language in that province.

For a person interested in the rules of parliament and in the British tradition, this must be of some substantial interest. If our traditions permit an opposition party, in this case the official opposition, not to respond for many days to the bells which are ringing to call the members to vote and make it impossible for the government to conduct its business, then it seems to me that all of us must be concerned about how we are going to conduct the orderly business of this province.

Members may recall it was the official opposition in the House of Commons in Ottawa which first embarked on this procedure. It is a procedure which, once embarked upon, really has no end. Any opposition party, whatever its political stripe, is bound to face an occasion sooner or later when it feels that all of its armoury must be thrown into the legislative battle either in support of a position or, most usually, in objection to a position brought forward by a government.

In the case of the western province, the government had an overall majority and still its will was completely thwarted by the opposition, which refused to answer the summons of the bell.

We have discussed the possible solutions to such a continuing problem in our own House, because the same rules that have been used in the House of Commons and in Manitoba would apply here. If the government of the day -- these usually reasonable, thoughtful and moderate people sitting opposite -- were to bring in legislation which the opposition felt simply could not be accepted, particularly where a convincing argument could be made, then every bit of our armoury would have to be brought to bear.

I can assure members, strong argument could be made that following these now substantial precedents in the House of Commons and in the Legislature of Manitoba, one of the opposition parties would simply fail to return and answer the call of the bell. I do not know what the government could do about that other than to finally dissolve the House.

In the instance in Manitoba, that alternative was not available to the government of the day. It realized its program in this connection was basically unpopular in the province and if it were to decide the situation by dissolving the House, it would lose the government itself. So in this instance, discretion was the better part of valour or courage. It decided simply to abandon its strongly held position in support of bilingualism and the opposition carried the day.

Without getting into a discussion of the merits of the case -- which comes up in this House from time to time -- I would simply draw to Mr. Speaker's attention that it must be a matter of concern for anyone in this House, or even in this province, who is interested in an evolving parliamentary system. During the past 12 months, the standing committee on procedural affairs and an ad hoc group made up of the three House leaders and a few others have been trying to come to grips with a suitable solution.

Naturally, for any opposition party to give up the right not to answer the call of the bell is giving up a very strong piece of political response indeed. Normally, this could be considered only if the government party were able to give something to put in its place.

As far as we in the Liberal Party were concerned, we felt that at least one of the areas of discussion ought to be a procedure inaugurated in this House to permit the opposition parties to order the business of a standing committee which would have investigative powers. We would not be able to do this on any and all occasions; only on specific occasions established under the rules. It would be very similar to our ability to bring forward no-confidence motions during the course of a Legislature.

Under the standing orders, the official opposition can bring forward three no-confidence motions, and a third party can bring forward two no-confidence motions; so they can select the business to be debated on those occasions.

5:30 p.m.

It is interesting to note that even though we have that rule, neither opposition party has used it to the full in recent years. I suppose the argument has always been that we should not use up all of our arrows in that connection in case something more important comes up towards the end of the session.

I simply refer to that because in my view it is the sort of precedent that could have been used with the agreement of the government party to allow a process whereby matters that require some investigative review by a standing committee could be sent to these committees with the understanding that the opposition would order its business for at least a limited period of time.

We got to the point where we worked out the hours and the comparative rights between the official opposition and the third party. It seemed to be a very fair and equitable procedure.

The one instance which I thought was a very good example was the trust companies matter. Members may recall during the last session there was a considerable discussion about the administration of trust company regulations and legislation, and while we had an opportunity to question the minister in the House about this matter, we did not have a process whereby we could refer the matter to a committee where officials of the ministry could be summoned before the committee and be required to give evidence. We were up against a stone wall there.

If the process I had put forward as an alternative to our rules had been in effect, it would have been the right of the opposition to send the matter to a committee for a hearing of something like eight or 10 hours with the right to call witnesses. Obviously the government party did not want that to happen and, as a matter of fact, they successfully stopped it.

On the other hand, one must bear in mind that it is our responsibility in this House to use the rules as effectively as we can to achieve the aims that we think are worth while. The aim of having a full and public discussion of areas of policy that might be, God forbid, embarrassing to the government of the day is an obvious part of what we consider our duty.

We were thwarted in having any change in the rules accepted in that connection. It is obvious that members of the cabinet council were not prepared to accept that additional responsibility to defend their actions as the holders of the seals of government in the various portfolios.

We are not prepared to give up our right to impede or even stop the business of the House on occasions where we feel it is necessary or even essential.

I simply put this before the Speaker or anybody else who is interested in it. It is simply a matter of time -- far distant time, I would hope -- until this House grinds to a stop, using the precedents now established in the House of Commons and the Legislature of Manitoba. In both instances, the Speakers have established a precedent that I presume will be followed by the Speaker in this chamber.

I could not imagine that, without concurrence on all sides, a procedure would be accepted. If anybody wants to take thought ahead of time to avert such a situation, surely we ought to be in a position where, through the procedural affairs committee or an ad hoc group, we could come to some agreement that would enable us to order our business here in a more effective and useful way than we have in the past.

I also want to take a few moments of the time available to me during this debate to briefly describe a trip I took in recent weeks in response to an invitation by an ad hoc committee of this House known as the Ontario Legislature Committee on Soviet Jewry. It has three chairpersons who share the responsibility for informing members of the House of the situation affecting members of the Jewish community in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which is of great interest and concern to members of this House either directly or in response to interests expressed by our constituents.

The member for Wilson Heights, who is one of the co-chairmen of the group, approached me in February and said the committee was interested in organizing a group that would travel to the USSR to meet members of the Jewish community in that country who had applied for visas to emigrate from the USSR, in most instances to join their families in Israel. In most of these circumstances in recent months and years, the visa applications had been rejected by the Soviet authorities

These people, who are normally called refuseniks by themselves and others, had found themselves in very difficult circumstances in their own nation. As citizens of the Soviet Union, they felt they had the right to apply to emigrate from their country under the Helsinki agreement on civil rights, particularly to move to their homeland, Israel, and in many instances to complete the family circle when members of their family had already left the USSR and other countries to take up permanent residence and make a home in Israel.

As a matter of fact, during the latter years of the leadership of Comrade Brezhnev, the First Secretary of the Communist Party, emigration was quite free. During the middle 1970s, as many as 50,000 Soviet citizens a year were allowed to emigrate to Israel. With the death of Brezhnev and the ascendance of Comrade Andropov, the matter changed quite dramatically.

It is difficult to determine what prompted this change other than the fact that Mr. Andropov had in his political background the leadership of the secret service of the Soviet Union, the KGB. When he became ruler of the nation, as First Secretary of the Communist Party, he placed his colleagues from the KGB in positions of leadership, direction and importance in the other police services and in other parts of the administration of the nation.

It may have been his personal attitude or it may have been a collective decision that the emigration of Jews from the USSR should definitely be restricted. It was restricted to the point that last year just a few more than 100 were allowed to leave the country. This meant there were between 40,000 and 50,000 individuals who had applied for emigration visas and had been refused.

In many instances, this refusal was accompanied by very stringent repression of the individuals and their families. We talked directly to refuseniks who had been fired from their jobs on the day of their application and whose sons and daughters had not been allowed to continue their higher education. There were all sorts of instances of harassment that were almost unbelievably difficult to comprehend.

I will not take the time of the House to refer in detail to individuals we met other than to say that our group, which had more or less been put together by the Ontario Legislature Committee on Soviet Jewry -- and I will talk a bit more about that group in a moment -- had the pleasure, and certainly the very interesting experience, of meeting about 35 individuals, often with members of their families, in the cities of Moscow and Leningrad as well as Riga in the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic.

The reception we got from the refuseniks was uniformly very good. I should say as well that while we had been warned the officials of the USSR might be less than enthusiastic about our purpose, there was no occasion when we were overtly interfered with in any way.

Mr. Stokes: I thought they took some tapes from you.

Mr. Nixon: I am going to say something about that. They would have taken those tapes from anybody trying to smuggle them into the nation. I say that with some levity because the tapes my honourable friend refers to were taken from a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation program by none other than Stephen Lewis himself, that great democratic socialist, who had been author and spokesman for an excellent program on the Holocaust. It was thought that four tapes involving this program might very well be taken in for the utilization of anyone who might be interested in hearing them.

5:40 p.m.

When I was going through customs at the airport in Moscow, all my belongings were very carefully searched, if the members can imagine such a procedure, and among --

Mr. Stokes: Not your person, just your belongings.

Mr. Nixon: They stopped at that; they showed very good judgment, too.

When they found these tapes, they very politely indicated to me that it would not be possible to take them into the Soviet Union. I remember the words of the official well. He said, "Would it unduly inconvenience you" -- I thought it was a nice way to put it -- "if we asked you to leave these tapes in our possession until you leave the country 11 days from now?" He was so polite and so friendly in that connection that, of course, I said, "I do not know how I am going to get along without Stephen Lewis's tapes for the next 11 days, but there they are."

Just as a footnote to a footnote, I should say that when I was leaving the country 11 days later, I pursued the officer who had taken them away from me but, unfortunately, he was not on duty. Although I had all sorts of official-looking documents that I was flapping around in front of everybody's noses, the only response I got was "nyet," whatever that means, and I did not get the tapes.

To get back to the point, there were those who, particularly before we left on the trip, were saying, "Of course, others who have gone this route have been followed by officers of the KGB, or by some other officials or by a surveillance group, and you may well be harassed in your travels." Such was not our experience. It may have been that all they had to do was look at our group to realize we were innocuous. There are those who would be quick to say that.

I can certainly tell the members that the trip was worth while in many respects. The aim of the trip was to visit the refuseniks, to listen to their stories, to try to elicit from them some response that we might have, either officially or unofficially, in this Legislature or in this community. I want to say something about that before I conclude my remarks.

It is interesting to note that some of the refuseniks had been arrested, tried and convicted for crimes against the Soviet state. In most instances, the crime was the teaching of the Hebrew language and the Jewish culture to small groups of young people who would gather in individual homes. This is illegal in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics for reasons that are not apparent to anybody, but must be valid for them. In many instances, upon conviction these people would be transported thousands of kilometres to work camps in Siberia. Their hard-labour conviction would normally be followed by a lengthy period of exile in cities well removed from their families.

I should say -- and this was brought to our attention by the refuseniks themselves -- that the judicial system applies the law and a sentence is handed down which, I understand, is appealable, but eventually is enforced. At least the sentence is determinate. We met some people who had served their sentences and returned to their families.

We had an opportunity to talk not only to the refuseniks, but to other Russian citizens about their lifestyles. I had my eyes opened considerably. Moscow, Leningrad and Riga are magnificent cities which are well kept. The people on the streets are well clothed, are certainly healthy looking and when we had an opportunity to get past the normal reserve, we found them friendly and interested in what we had to say.

Another footnote is that many of the people we met could speak three or four languages. We, as citizens of Canada, having been educated in the marvellous province of Ontario where the Minister of Education keeps telling us we have one of the best systems in the world, were unilingual at best. I always feel embarrassed when this occurs. Of course, I have only myself to blame for lack of application. The Minister of the Environment, however, having much more of a political commitment and being upwardly mobile instead of being like myself, is probably taking French lessons because he never knows when he is going to need them.

As I say, this is a footnote. I continue to be impressed at the education systems of most other countries in the world, with the exception of the United States, which has the same plague we have in a narrow-minded approach to language education. Wherever we went in the Soviet Union, there were people who could speak to us in our language, at least to some extent. I found that impressive.

I should say also that the cities themselves were, without exception, very clean and well served by public transportation. In the instance of Moscow in particular, I felt there were some perquisites for the members of the government that would make even members of the Tory party front benches here blush, because their cars are much bigger than the modest Oldsmobile 98s and super Chryslers that these people drive. Not everybody has a Zil, but I would think if the Minister of Labour, who seems to be paying some attention, ever got a look at one of those Zils, he would have one imported for his personal use without delay. They are enormous, gorgeous, black limos, the type of car which only the Mafia drive in this jurisdiction.

There is one thing they do have that perhaps the Minister of Health (Mr. Norton) might be interested in. They have curtains over the back window and along the windows at the side. I would be damned if I knew what went on in there, but perhaps the ministers of the government would be able to enlighten me. There is a driver in the front, one of the comrades -- everybody is equal in that country -- with an electric window separating him from whatever is happening in the back.

What I thought the members opposite might be interested in -- the cabinet ministers here in Ontario -- is that in the wide streets of the capital of Moscow the fast lane is reserved for government cars. I thought perhaps that was an idea the ministers might like to fool around with. The senior members of the government do not even have to stop at the red lights. An officer is there, no doubt warned ahead by radio, and he is tootling away on his whistle, and God help a person if he does not get out of the way because the speed limits do not apply to those people either. It is very impressive. I feel the government of the day here in Ontario is moving rapidly in that direction.

The Kremlin itself, the seat of government, is open to tourists. We were not allowed to go in through the Spasskaya gate, through which only the members of the politburo go in these cars. It is quite interesting for an ordinary person, a little guy from Brant county, to stand there by the side of the road and watch these senior members of the government streaming into the Kremlin in order to carry out their duties.

Interjection.

Mr. Nixon: It is not Shawinigan. As a person who likes to drive myself, the part that really impressed me was their complete independence of any of the rules of the road having to do with speed. I should say that caught my attention; there is no doubt about it.

Also, it is apparent there are certain stores that are available only to senior members of the government. Very near our hotel was one of these stores where, in the afternoon, the government limousines would be parked outside while the ladies of the senior communist households went in to get the groceries for the next little while.

I spoke about the people being well dressed. I really did have that impression. One thing everybody has is a gorgeous fur hat. It is pretty cold over there, although during the time of our visit, just two or three weeks ago, the temperatures were much milder than they were here. We are quite used to going out without hats in cold weather, being virile men of the north as we all are, but if one goes out without his hat in Moscow, it is almost like going out without one's pants from the way people look at one, as if they are thinking: "What is that person doing? He must be crazy. Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the cold without their hats."

5:50 p.m.

The hotel accommodation was uniformly good. As a matter of fact, the buildings looked as though they had been modelled after Sutton Place where I hang out myself on occasion, when I can scrape together the $92.50 for overnight -- that is with movie.

The hotels were generally built on that basis, but I found that their television was a bit restricted. They have three channels in colour, and I saw several interesting programs involving how to prune an apple tree. I took careful notes because that is the sort of thing where language does not interpose itself; there is no difficulty there in picking out the nodes, the branches and the dichotomy.

I do not want to drive all my friends out of here before adjournment, but I should mention the food. There is certainly no shortage of food as long as one likes sturgeon and chicken, and fortunately I like them both. Actually, they have excellent Russian champagne. It is not as dry as I am used to, but when one is eating a lot of caviar, one has to have something to wash it down.

Interjection.

Mr. Nixon: Well, after all, we had heavy responsibilities assigned to us by the committee chaired by our colleagues. But there has to be a time when one recharges one's batteries, particularly when one is working hard and listening to the comments made by people whose concerns one is sent there to respond to. I guess it is time I got back to that and stopped rambling about some of my personal observations.

Perhaps just before I leave my personal observations, I should say we did have an opportunity to visit some exceptionally fine museums of art. My own experience, formed, I suppose, by visits to many of the major capitals of the world, is that the Hermitage museum in Leningrad is probably the finest museum on earth.

It was interesting to note when we were doing some reading before this that when the revolutionaries burst into the Winter Palace in 1917 and started rushing through the rooms, which had been furnished by Catherine the Great and her predecessors and successors, some of them started grabbing valuable golden objects and art pieces. The local story goes that one of the revolutionaries got to the top of the steps and started yelling out, "These belong to the people." The cry was picked up and down the great corridors, halls and galleries of the palace and everything was put back. As I understand it, everything is still there the way it was in 1917.

I should report as well that in most instances these great palaces and buildings that the government had decided should be maintained are very well maintained indeed. The Hermitage itself, partly made up of the Winter Palace and the rest of the structures, is in very good shape. It is an extremely beautiful building and certainly is a great source of pride to the Russian people. It is something everybody should visit if he ever has the chance. The same is true of the museums in Moscow.

It is difficult to determine what we can do to alleviate the problems the refuseniks are experiencing at present. In each case we asked them with as great attention as we possibly could and we listened to their answers, and they varied to a considerable degree. Some of them felt the very fact we had visited them, know them personally by name and know their phone numbers and addresses -- and I intend to communicate when I can -- is in some sense an insurance policy that they will not be accused on trumped-up charges of crimes against the state. They felt this at least was valuable. They also feel, of course, that an interest in their plight by anyone in the western world is at least of some value to them.

Of course, they cannot apply to leave the country unless they have a direct invitation from another country that is prepared to take them. In most instances they want to go to Israel, but it is difficult for them to engineer and arrange for a proper invitation, which must come fresh in all respects every six months so that their application to leave the USSR remains valid. One can imagine the elaborate paperwork and difficulty that entails. We may be able to be of some assistance to them.

My own feeling is that the only good thing which could happen in the future would be for us somehow to return to detente. The degeneration of the relationships between East and West, essentially between the USA and the USSR, is greatly to be regretted.

I do not know what we in this House can do about it. I know the blame lies on both sides; so there is no point in us trying to lay the blame. If Reagan says something bad, the USSR and its leadership will respond with something worse. If a sabre is rattled on this side, a cannon is loaded on the other side.

If there is a lesson there, it is that we should start thinking of the so-called East as being equal in all respects to the so-called West. Their hopes for peace are as valid and as strong among the people we talked to as our own. Yet their response to warlike behaviour on this side is just as bristly and as aggressive as our own response to a warlike stance from the East. As long as we treat them, in our own minds, on a different, and perhaps lower level than our own, I do not believe detente, as such, is going to have a chance.

I was not a great fan of President Carter, but at least his attention to human rights and civil liberties and his consummate effort at least to have a policy that would lead to detente must deserve our respect.

Mr. Stokes: How do they justify Afghanistan?

Mr. Nixon: I do not know whether Afghanistan can be justified any more than Vietnam or Grenada. If they start throwing eggs at each other, there is plenty of ammunition.

As a matter of fact, I heard somebody say there is some concern about the increased influence of the Muslim population in government and in the population demography of the USSR. We would wonder why they would be concerned about that, but one story is that they are concerned about it.

Afghanistan had a communist government, but it evidently had Muslim approaches to policy that somebody in Moscow did not like. Somebody thought it was worth going in and adjusting the government so they did. It was an oppressive invasion and continues to be. There are people in Afghanistan who are heroic fighters against this invasion. That is something that is going on.

Our response was to not go to the Olympics in Moscow. Frankly, I regret that, but this was the policy enunciated by the leader of our country and by the leaders of the United States and other countries. We may have a certain feeling of regret now. Yet experts say that in these negotiations a threat must be opposed with a threat or strength.

It is almost six o'clock and I have only covered my subject very superficially. I would like to continue on a later occasion.

On motion by Mr. Nixon, the debate was adjourned.

The House recessed at 5:59 p.m.

March 27, 1984