Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House met at 1334.

Prayers.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

VILLAGE OF EGANVILLE

Mr Conway: I would like to rise today and pay tribute to the residents of an historic community in my constituency, namely, the village of Eganville, which this year is celebrating the centennial of its municipal incorporation in 1891.

In a very personal way, I want to pay tribute to the community for the organization of its centennial efforts over the past number of months, but most especially for its efforts in the course of the summer, during which time it hosted a spectacular series of centennial events, culminating in a marvellous ecumenical service and parade on the Sunday of the long weekend in August.

In a very personal way, I want to pay tribute as well to Mr Gerald Tracey of Eganville, who was the chair of the centennial committee. That committee worked incredibly diligently over the course of three years. In addition to their efforts previously referred to, they constructed a spectacular waterfront park in the heart of the village of Eganville along the shores of the beautiful Bonnechere River, as well as producing a history book highlighting the history of this very famous community in my part of eastern Ontario. I have a special word of congratulations to Mr Tracey and his colleagues at the Eganville Leader, who published a 225-page centennial supplement to their July 24, 1991, edition.

As the local member, I want to pay particular tribute to the marvellous history of that community and to the almost incredible volunteerism that made this centennial celebration the spectacular success it so evidently was.

RED HILL CREEK EXPRESSWAY

Mr Turnbull: Last night I was one of 400 people who attended a fund-raiser for the continued fight against the government's decision to axe the Red Hill Creek Expressway. Of the six NDP MPPs invited to attend this event, none had the courage to face the people. The Conservative Party is the only party in this House that has consistently supported the construction of the Red Hill Creek Expressway.

There can be no argument about the tremendous economic and social benefits this highway would bring to the region of Hamilton, and $70 million has already been spent on this project and is now just wasted money.

The party that always billed itself as one in favour of consultation cut off this important project without consultation or good reason. The government has broken its fundamental promise to listen to the people and be fair in its action. As one speaker, a steelworker, said last night, "The NDP has been in opposition so long they are now in opposition to the people." The very competence and moral fibre of the NDP is questioned by its actions in this matter.

What I saw last night was an incredible amount of citizen anger and energy focused on the task of trying to have this government listen to reason and right. Governments have an obligation to make decisions that are seen to serve the best interests of its citizens. This ruling fails that test. I urge the new Minister of Transportation to review his government's anti-expressway stand.

UNITED WAY CAMPAIGN

Mr Martin: Today I would like to congratulate all those individuals across Ontario, and particularly in Sault Ste Marie, who are devoting their time and energy to the United Way fund campaign. During these difficult times, particularly in my own riding, we must support and encourage the efforts of the United Way volunteers. This fund drive is a 99% volunteer effort. What we must remember is that without a strong volunteer network, human care needs would not be sufficiently met.

In Sault Ste Marie, we are facing a difficult winter. The demand is great and the challenge for the United Way volunteers is even greater. I encourage all those who are presently employed to recognize these fundamental needs and come out and join these volunteers. I urge you to contribute to this vital cause in our community and across the province.

Our theme this year at the United Way in Sault Ste Marie is appropriate in light of our present situation. This theme is, "Let's Pull Together." I am personally asking that we, as a caring community, support our local United Way fund campaign. Let's truly pull together.

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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

Mrs Sullivan: New Democrats whom I have met and others who are members of the party must be reeling in dismay at the environmental record of this government, because it is truly one to be ashamed of. There is no sense of what the Minister of the Environment's rules are or what they will become, since the minister puts forward inconsistent and disconnected rhetoric in virtually every area.

Her statement on the municipal-industrial strategy for abatement is a perfect example. It is a vague reiteration of environmentalist lingo, and while it was being put together fully one year was lost in dealing with toxic discharges into our waterways.

If a total loading reduction approach is to be taken, where are the minister's interim load reduction targets? Where are her time lines? If elimination in the manufacture, use, generation and release of toxic substances is to engendered, where is her list of toxics that must be phased out of industrial use? What reporting mechanism is to be utilized? What kind of centralized data bank will be required, and what information will be made public?

There is a need for a systematic, coherent process involving government, industry, municipalities and the public, a process that specifies the timetables and the legal mechanisms for bans and phase-outs and analyses the volumes of toxic chemical use, the availability of alternatives and the process changes required.

None of these are on the table and there is no indication of when they will be. We have waited for a year while we have simply heard rhetoric.

Time lost is air and water polluted, and that is this government's record: adding to the environmental problems and not solving them.

GARBAGE DISPOSAL

Mr Jordan: I rise today to bring to the attention of the Minister of the Environment yet another injustice that is being done to eastern Ontario. Seven municipalities -- Smiths Falls, Carleton Place, Pakenham, Prescott and the townships of Beckwith, South Elmsley and Kitley -- are being dealt a raw deal over garbage.

The municipalities, because of new regulations set by the Minister of the Environment, are facing a $20-per-tonne increase for continued garbage disposal at the Carp landfill site. At $90 per tonne, the municipalities are already paying a $44 premium above the regional rate of $46. The $20 will be added to the $90 rate.

To a town like Smiths Falls, the January 1 increase would result in an $80,000-a-year expense and force additional taxes on residents who are already paying over $600,000 in unsubsidized dollars on waste disposal.

The Ministry of the Environment is forcing the municipalities to dispose of their waste in Carp, but is driving costs out of control. Constantly changing rules set by the ministry has made locating a waste disposal site a nightmare over the past 20 years in Lanark-Renfrew. The responsibility lies with the minister.

KOREAN HERITAGE DAY

Ms M. Ward: Today I would like to pay tribute to all Ontarians of Korean descent.

Five years ago, the Ontario government proclaimed October 4 as Korean Heritage Day. On this Saturday, October 5, the Korean Canadian Cultural Association of Metropolitan Toronto will be celebrating Korean Heritage Day at its community centre at 20 Mobile Drive, which is located in my riding of Don Mills.

The Korean Canadian Cultural Association of Metropolitan Toronto has a membership of over 2,500 people. The association provides information and referral services for immigrants, seniors and those in need. English as a second language training and other educational programs are also offered.

Korean Canadians are one of the smaller ethnocultural groups within Canada in terms of population size, but they have made significant contributions to our economic, social and cultural life. Many of them are active members in the professional and retail business sectors of our economy. I know the members of this House who are from Metropolitan Toronto can look around their ridings and find Korean Canadians operating successful businesses in their communities.

The Korean heritage is rich in folk traditions. They have brought us their music, dance, cuisine and crafts. This week is a fitting time for us all to applaud Korean Canadians for their successful integration into Canadian society while preserving their cultural heritage. Let us wish them a joyful celebration on Korean Heritage Day.

OPP CUTBACKS

Mr Bradley: I had the opportunity last Saturday to be in downtown St Catharines on the main street, St Paul Street, as the Niagara Grape and Wine Festival parade was going by. It was indeed a beautiful parade. We had the lovely floats it has become famous for. We had the smartly marching bands which come each year. We had everyone who was part of the parade, but something was missing: It was the hum of motorcycles I could not hear and the pipes and drums I could not hear.

The Golden Helmets of the Ontario Provincial Police added so much to that parade over the years. So many people commented on its wonderful part of Ontario tradition. Then I listened for the OPP Pipes and Drums. They too were absent from the parade, as they are absent across Ontario now because this government has decided to destroy this vestige of history and heritage in this province. Indeed, the last time they performed was in Perth when the Premier was present. The St Catharines Senior A fastball team members told me how much they enjoyed the Golden Helmets at that time.

With Prince Charles and Lady Diana coming to Ontario, how appropriate it would be to return the Golden Helmets and the Pipes and Drums to our province.

TECHNOLOGICAL TRAINING

Mrs Cunningham: I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the London Board of Education for stating its long-range plans to update and expand technological education in London schools.

Trustees approved a comprehensive plan to extend education and technology from grade 1 to grade 12. The plan is comprehensive and considers the age and ability of the students. For example, in grades 1 to 6 eventually every classroom will have a technology corner where tools and materials will be available for projects, much like most junior classrooms now have a reading corner. The same kind of idea, an extension of opportunities to young people in technological studies, will extend to grades 7 and 8 and again the curriculum in grades 10 to 12.

In their deliberations they underlined the fact that mandatory grade 9 technical studies courses are not an option for this government but something the government should move towards quickly. Co-operative education programs have been expanded. This board has been a leader in this province in working with the business community and industry and the unions.

I urge the Minister of Education not only to take a look at what is happening in schools in the London board and around the province in technological studies but to work very carefully with the Minister of Colleges and Universities, who is also Minister of Skills Development, in making a comprehensive program realistic to all young people across Ontario.

PETERBOROUGH ECONOMY

Ms Carter: I want to draw the attention of the House to the consequences to Peterborough of free trade, the high dollar and related federal government policies.

Local trade unionists realized years ago that jobs would leave if tariffs were removed. Outboard Marine, Raybestos, Nashua, Alfa Laval, Purity Packaging, Johnson and Johnson and many others have pulled out. General Electric has downsized. Two more firms have gone in the last couple of weeks, Kendall and A-L Stainless. Within the city, nearly 16% of all children are on social assistance. The real unemployment level is also 16%.

I want to thank all the groups in Peterborough, such as the Peterborough Social Planning Council and the many agencies and volunteers, beginning with the United Way, which are fighting these trends and assure them the government at Queen's Park is working with them. We established a wage protection fund. We are improving retraining programs and social services. We will protect the rights of workers and do all we can to create good new jobs.

There are some exciting new growth points in the Peterborough economy. A locally based firm is making energy-efficient light fittings and another is developing high-tech metering equipment. Our GE factory may take on a new lease of life with energy-efficient technology. All these developments will not only provide jobs but also help in the urgent task of protecting our environment. We will work together for a better future.

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STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

ENVIRONMENTAL BILL OF RIGHTS

Hon Mrs Grier: I wish to take this opportunity to advise the members of the Legislature about the progress of the environmental bill of rights and the next stage in its development.

My commitment to this bill has long been a matter of record in the Legislature. Our goal is simple but of profound importance: to give the citizens of Ontario the right to act to protect the environment.

I am pleased to advise the Legislature today that I have now established the minister's Task Force on the Ontario Environmental Bill of Rights. This task force is made up of representatives from business, environmental groups and government. The members will draw upon their expertise and experience to design a draft bill.

The task force is co-chaired by my deputy minister, Gary Posen, and Michael Cochrane, a senior counsel with the Ministry of the Attorney General. Members of the task force are Bob Anderson from the Business Council on National Issues, George Howse from the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, Rick Lindgren from the Canadian Environmental Law Association, John McNamara from the Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Sally Marin from the Ministry of the Environment, Paul Muldoon from Pollution Probe and Andrew Roman of the law firm Miller, Thomson.

Co-chair Michael Cochrane will also meet directly with groups that have a special interest in the proposed bill, such as the Ontario Federation of Labour, the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, the Association of Municipalities of Ontario and the Canadian Bar Association.

I believe this is a balanced and thorough way to proceed in the development of this bill. Because the bill is closely related to many other pieces of provincial legislation, it requires a detailed and careful drafting of its provisions and a complete understanding of its implications.

Everyone on this task force has agreed to work within the framework of some principles which I have indicated are fundamental to this bill. These include the public's right to a healthy environment; the enforcement of this right through improved access to the courts and/or tribunals, including the enhanced right to sue polluters; increased public participation in environmental decision-making by government; increased government responsibility and accountability for the environment, and greater protection for employees who blow the whistle on polluting employers.

Our earlier consultations, which were with the public, an interministerial committee and an advisory committee of 26 organizations, concentrated on a broad discussion of principles. This task force will focus on the specific provisions of a draft bill. When the draft bill has been completed, there will be a further opportunity for public review.

In closing, I would like to thank the members of the task force and the members of the Legislature, whom I welcome in joining me in delivering this important reform to the citizens of Ontario. Representatives of this task force are in the gallery today. I would like them to stand so that they can be recognized for the hard work I know they are going to do.

ASSISTANCE TO FARMERS

Hon Mr Laughren: I am about to make an announcement on agricultural assistance. The Minister of Agriculture and Food is not here right now, but he will be here later on in question period to answer any questions, just on the outside chance that members have any questions of him.

At the start of this session of the House, the Premier outlined the challenges that lay ahead for the government in the economic renewal of this province. In his statement, the Premier noted that rural communities in Ontario are in difficulty due to the collapse in farm incomes. He renewed this government's commitment to work with farmers towards the renewal of the rural economy. Agriculture is and remains a key sector in the province's economic renewal strategy. We have always maintained that a strong provincial economy depends on a healthy agricultural and rural economy.

Everyone is well aware of the serious financial difficulties Ontario farmers are facing. Low commodity prices, low yields, high grain supplies, a severe drought in parts of the province, the effects of free trade and gaps in govern-ment support programs have all combined to create this financial hardship. It is a hardship that affects many producers. The fruit growers have had cheap fruit dumped in Canada. Grains and oilseeds producers have suffered low prices because of international trade subsidies driving down world prices.

The Minister of Agriculture and Food has toured the province this summer, about 25 counties and districts in total. He has seen the severity of the drought and has listened to the financial plight of farmers and their families. His parliamentary assistants have also met with many farmers and farm groups and have discussed their findings. Our colleagues in the rural caucus have regularly shared the concerns and needs of their constituents with the minister.

In response to these consultations and in keeping with our commitment to renewing and revitalizing the agricultural and rural communities of Ontario, we are pleased to announce today that the Premier and cabinet have approved the emergency assistance package for Ontario farmers for 1991. The program will consist of the following components.

First, there will be additional funding to our existing 1991 farm interest assistance program. Earlier this year we announced a $50-million farm interest assistance program to offset interest costs to Ontario farmers. The program was well subscribed and funds fully committed. Consequently, we are adding another $11 million to benefit all applicants to the program.

Second will be a payment to grains and oilseeds producers, as originally requested by the commodity council, equal to their premiums in our provincial farm income stabilization program for these crops. This premium exemption will provide $15 million to participating grains and oilseeds producers.

Third is a payment to producers of edible horticultural crops equal to 1% of net sales as calculated under the net income stabilization account for the 1990 tax year. This 1% payment amounts to $5 million for producers of edible horticultural products.

Fourth, we will negotiate with the federal government to include apples, honey, onions and fur as eligible commodities under the net income stabilization account program. The province will contribute 1% of eligible net sales for these crops for the 1990 tax year, which amounts to $1 million.

Fifth, we will provide $3.5 million to farmers and farm families experiencing financial stress from market prices or drought. Details of this component will be determined after consultation with farm groups.

Together, these components of the assistance package amount to $35.5 million in assistance to alleviate the difficulties faced by our farming communities.

The Minister of Agriculture and Food has spoken to the federal Minister of Agriculture, Mr McKnight, about this package. We have emphasized that our province has been singularly hard hit by the current recession. Yet despite our declining revenues and difficult fiscal situation, we have drawn on our resources once again to aid our farmers. We call on the federal government to live up to its commitment to provide financial assistance to Ontario farmers in these extraordinary times.

We recognize that money is not the solution to all the problems pressing on our farms and farming communities. We know that this money alone is not enough, but for the present it is what we can offer in times of very tight provincial budgets. We remain confident that this new injection of funding, coupled with the cash flow which will result from the interim gross revenue insurance plan payment, will help bridge financially troubled farmers until next year when long-term programs take effect.

We wish to acknowledge the efforts of farm organizations, local farm groups and the rural caucus in bringing to the attention of the public the need to direct new money towards agriculture in Ontario, even in these times of limited resources.

Although this package is designed to alleviate short-term difficulties, we will continue to have discussions with our farm and rural community leaders to develop long-term options for the economic restructuring and renewal of the agricultural sector of Ontario.

Interjections.

The Speaker: The normally quiet member for Quinte is blocking his good colleague.

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RESPONSES

ENVIRONMENTAL BILL OF RIGHTS

Mr McClelland: No doubt the member is excited, and as a former Minister of the Environment, he well ought to be.

A year ago, the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore was sworn in as minister. She made a commitment as she travelled this province throughout the campaign. Among those promises she made, the very cornerstone of her environmental policy was the introduction of the bill of rights.

A year later, she is advising the House today that she is putting together a ministerial committee. I wish it well. She has great people there, tremendous resources. But where is the bill of rights she promised immediately to the people of Ontario? She travelled the province and told them she was going to do it. When the minister was in opposition, she stood in her place and hammered away at the government of the day, asking for that environmental bill of rights. She tabled one when she was in opposition. With all the help she has from the bureaucracy, all the able people she has, she still has not been able to produce. The member for Halton Centre has put a good bill before the minister. Why can she not do it?

Furthermore, the minister has had the opportunity to do it. It is amazing that the minister has not been able to produce in the time she has had.

I also want to draw to the minister's attention and ask, in spite of all the good people she has in there, where is some representation from the agricultural community? Farmers are very concerned about the impact this bill may have on their operations. They have been left out in the past. They were left out of the advisory committee she introduced in this House on December 13. The farmers are wondering when she is going to talk to them, when she is going to include them in the discussions.

On December 13 she announced an advisory committee and we have not heard yet what it has done. Where have they been for the past few months? What have they done? She has enunciated that it agreed with the broad principles. Is she going to allow this group to build on the work it has done? Is she starting afresh? When can we expect her to introduce her legislation -- a year, two years, three years? What does "immediately" mean to the minister? Where is it? She has not reported back to us on what she has done. I want to know what kind of work she will be doing.

I wish her well. The people she has are great people, but let's get real here. When she and the Premier travelled the province, she talked about what she was going to do immediately. She put that in her agenda for power. She put it to the people of the province. They expect action. They have waited a long time. She will do well with these good people. It is too little, too late. The minister has lost it in terms of what she said she was going to do.

ASSISTANCE TO FARMERS

Mr Cleary: We are pleased on this side of the House that the government has finally recognized the crisis in agriculture. Our party has worked with farm groups throughout the summer and the fall to stir the government to action. The five-month delay in the announcement has caused serious problems in the agricultural community. Farm leaders appeared before the standing committee on resources development, criticizing the government's inaction. It is no wonder that farm leaders believe the government has no long-term commitment to agriculture.

The government today announced $35 million of the $124-million gap in financial support that farmers face this year. Farmers will be left to face the reality of dealing with the rest of the crop themselves. Farmers in Essex county, facing over $40 million in crop damage, will be wondering how $3 million in extra assistance will allow them to keep farming. Farmers will be disappointed to learn that the announcement does not contain the provincial funding for NISA that they demanded.

Many of the farm groups we met with are going to be very disappointed. They are going to say it is just another patch on the boot. Anyway, I hope the Treasurer has good luck dealing with the federal government. He has said there are some things he is going to do in agriculture, and I wish him all the best and hope the good message keeps coming, because this is just a stopgap measure until the new programs kick in. Maybe he will get generous and announce a few more things for the agricultural community.

MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS

Mr Bradley: I was interested in the statements that were made today because I was waiting with baited breath for yet another statement that would be made to the House by the Minister of Energy. I did not know whether it would relate to the statement made by the Treasurer or to the statement made by the Minister of the Environment, both of which were interesting statements for which we made very good responses.

But there was a statement I was waiting for from the Minister of Energy and I thought with the news media all sitting here, he would perhaps want to make this particular announcement to the House today. We are quite willing as a party to extend the time of statements for ministers, if necessary, so he can make his statement.

ASSISTANCE TO FARMERS

Mr Villeneuve: The $35.5 million is certainly better than nothing, and I understand that because of a debate that occurred right in this Legislature yesterday, the package was enriched by $15.5 million this morning. So I guess it does help from time to time to jar them, and if we need a prod, we will use a prod. However, there is a recognized need out there of $194 million just to meet the falling commodity prices, and it was exactly outlined by both the Ontario Federation of Agriculture and the horticultural producers. Quite obviously we have a major shortfall.

It is amazing that this government had $151 million for de Havilland and it had $250 million for communities in northern Ontario such as Kapuskasing and Elliot Lake, but worst of all, it had $515 million of additional income to civil servants in the province. The $35.5 million pales in comparison to that kind of money. That is for 60,000 farm families that are out there producing to make sure that everyone is well fed in Ontario and producing lots for export.

The Minister of Agriculture and Food, when he made the statement in Mississauga at 12:30, said the presentation by Essex county farmers yesterday had no bearing at all on his statement today. That is how this government listens to the public. The farmers made an excellent presentation and showed why $20 million just for drought assistance is absolutely required in Essex county, but the minister said their presentation made absolutely no difference to him or his government. That is how they listen.

Some 60,000 farm families will say, "Thank you for the $35.5 million," but it will not save their farms from going under. I say to the Treasurer, the minister and the Premier that they are going under, and it is a rather sad situation. As a matter of fact, it is a shame.

ENVIRONMENTAL BILL OF RIGHTS

Mr Cousens: The Minister of the Environment may have forgotten that on May 15, 1989, she had all the answers with regard to the environmental bill of rights, and even the Liberals came out with the identical bill. The minister should not rush it. She should take her time, do it right. She made the promises before she got in there, but she should do it right. We are faced with the fact that she had all the answers at one time, and now I am afraid of what she is going to do.

She has what she did before. She had all the answers then. She should come along to this House now and understand at least a couple of the points that should sink in.

The first is that her bill encourages the use of the courts to address environmental issues and environmental harm. The minister should think twice about how she is going to use the courts. Her bill encourages a breakdown in the relationships between the environment, municipalities and other groups. She should make sure that when she comes out with her environmental bill of rights it is not going to be nearly so destructive as the Liberal bill of rights or the ones she brought in before. She should allow some common sense to creep in. May she, who has been selected, come out with some bright ideas that will help this government, which is going down deeper and deeper in the hole.

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Mr Stockwell: Under her regime, the Minister of the Environment has taken this province to a sad low. She stood in this province during the campaign and made promises she could not keep. The minister promised people at Keele Valley and in Mississauga she would not expand landfill sites without full environmental hearings. She did not tell the truth. She stood in front of the people of this province and said --

The Speaker: The member for Etobicoke West should not be suggesting that another member of the House is not telling the truth. Would you withdraw that statement.

Mr Stockwell: I will withdraw that she did not tell the truth.

I do not think the minister was being forthright with the constituents in this province. She promised the bill of rights. She has not delivered on the bill of rights. The minister has the piece of legislation before her. I do not know what is taking her so long. It is not being fair to the people. It is not being fair to the environmentalists. I do not know what is taking her this length of time.

VISITOR

The Speaker: Before continuing, members may wish to welcome to our midst this afternoon, seated in the members' gallery west, a former member of the assembly from Kitchener-Wilmot and a former minister of the crown, Mr John Sweeney.

ATTENDANCE OF PREMIER

Mr Bradley: I rise on a point of order -- a point of order which was raised by former members of the House such as Ian Deans and Elie Martel and the present government House leader -- to ask where the Premier is today and to register a complaint with the government that the Premier has not been present in the House to answer questions on a number of occasions, surely one of the most important responsibilities a Premier has. I recognize that he can play national statesman, because that is a role the Premier has to play, and that he has other things to do, but surely a person who sat over here and wanted the government to be accountable would be present in the House on more occasions than this Premier.

Hon Mr Cooke: I certainly appreciate the comments from the House leader for the official opposition, but I think it is fair to say that the attendance of the cabinet and of the Premier has been absolutely outstanding. We have respect for this place and we have respect for the process, and we have shown that by our attendance. I think the House leader for the official opposition should be a little fairer than he seems to be this afternoon.

The Speaker: To the point of order raised, while the Speaker has many duties and responsibilities, taking attendance is not one of them. It is time for oral questions.

Mr Elston: I find it interesting that most of the announcements that have been made recently by this government have not been made in this House. I would think that should come to the attention of all the people who think this place is supposed to be where the people do their business.

In any event, just before I start my questions, I would like to thank the Minister of Agriculture and Food, who I know now has gone to the wall twice with his cabinet colleagues, first, at the retreat up at Honey Harbour to try to get agriculture on the list of the 10 top items they should deal with and, second, with respect to the funding that has been announced. I want to thank him for that, as I have undertaken to do on any occasion when I think some work has been done for the benefit of the province.

ORAL QUESTIONS

BUDGET

Mr Elston: Let me deal first of all with my favourite minister, the current Treasurer. The Treasurer has noted that his deficit increase above and beyond the reckless $9.7-billion level which he talked about in April 1991 is the result of, among other things, pension deficits, forest firefighting, increased use of health care and welfare costs, but he has not yet been able to tell us the numbers that are associated with any of those problem areas to any degree of accuracy, although he does go out to the media from time to time and drop more specific hints about the numbers.

Can the Treasurer commit to us today that when he delivers his expenditure statement tomorrow, he will give us a program-by-program accounting of all the increases in each of the program areas that he has underlined as problematic for his budget plan?

Hon Mr Laughren: I do appreciate the question again from the leader of the official opposition. It is my intention tomorrow to provide more details to the Legislature not only on the pressures that have been mentioned here but on some of the others as well that are not in such large numbers but nevertheless are there as pressures. Yes, I think the member will get the details he is seeking tomorrow. When the second-quarter finances come out, there will be even more details than that, of course, but I think we are going to provide tomorrow the kinds of details the leader is seeking.

Mr Elston: It is very helpful for us to get the issue of the problems before us after the minister tells us about what solution he is giving us. It does not help us prepare to assist him in his dilemmas.

But I would like to indicate that, after repeated questioning yesterday, the Treasurer finally admitted that he had at least a few management principles which he was applying to the examination of his expenditure crisis. He did not tell us what they were in here, but he did tell the media that it was a "use it or lose it" type of principle he was applying in some cases.

Can the Treasurer tell us that basically what he was telling his ministerial colleagues was, "If you don't spend your budget, we'll take it back," and as a result any of the efficient people who are managing their expenditure crises better than others are going to be penalized to make way for those administrators who are not performing well? And can he tell us whether or not there are any other management principles which he is applying along with the "use it or lose it" guide?

Hon Mr Laughren: While I do think that this community and the province are well served by the tabloids that are published in Toronto, they are not always spot on. I do not recall ever using the term "use it or lose it," at least not in a polite way. I want to assure the leader that what we are trying to do as we try to contain our expenditures is to do it in a very sensitive way and in consultation with the people who are recipients of the service and also the people who deliver the service. We are very serious about going through this exercise in a more sensitive way than I think other jurisdictions have done in the past.

Mr Elston: In addition to the types of line-by-line examinations, or perhaps more program-by-program examinations, which he will give us tomorrow, will the Treasurer undertake today to us that he will refer his expenditure plan to the standing committee on finance and economic affairs so that we can examine him and his minions, either in treasury board or in the Treasurer's department, who have put together this program so that we can understand where the principles have been used effectively or whether there have been any real principles at work?

Hon Mr Laughren: First of all, I certainly have no objections to getting advice from all members in the House and, of course, members opposite as well. On the matter of referring it to the standing committee, I would make one suggestion only, that the matter go to a meeting of the House leaders to determine, with the Chair of the standing committee, if that is what they want to do.

Mr Elston: I hope I heard the minister say he is not opposed to that so that we can get on with the work of the committee, but I do not think he really said that. I hope he is in favour of it.

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NURSING HOMES

Mr Elston: My next question is to the Minister of Health. It has been described by the Treasurer and reported in the tabloids recently that there are some problems with respect to quality care for our senior citizens in the province and in fact there are some crises being spoken about.

I would like the Minister of Health to tell me that the seniors who are resident in nursing homes across this province are not at risk and, if she finds that there are people at risk in those nursing homes as a result of financial difficulties, what action she intends to take to guard their safety.

Hon Ms Lankin: I think the issue that the member raises is an important issue for all members in the House. There has been a lot of attention lately in the media with respect to the funding levels of nursing homes and the fact that a number of nursing homes in the province are facing very difficult situations right now. I think 12 to 14 are actually in receivership, and there is some suggestion that there could be many more that would go into receivership except there are no buyers at this point in time, so the banks have sort of stepped back from that as a tactic.

It is a very serious situation that we face, and I think we have been looking at it with respect to the redirection of long-term care and levels of funding to care for our seniors in the various types of homes as being a very important part of that reform. The question that gets raised, by virtue of the problem they face, is whether they can wait that long. I think that we see light at the end of the tunnel, and they do in terms of stabilization for the beginning of 1993. The question is between now and then.

The one thing I have become convinced of, as a result of which the Ontario Nursing Home Association actually sees some hope, is that we are the first government to say to them that we believe they are right in the claim they have been making for a number of years, that the level of care required by patients in nursing homes is in fact of an equivalent nature to those in other types of homes. As a result of that, I have undertaken to look at this issue and to try to do something in an interim way.

Mr Elston: I again would want the minister to tell us that none of the seniors in residence in any of those facilities are at risk. Second, since she has described the problem as one between then and now, then being the time when the new funding mechanism comes into place, would she describe to us what she intends to do to prevent any seniors falling into the risk category and what she intends to do to take care of any potential staff layoffs which could jeopardize the level of care those people are receiving?

Hon Ms Lankin: There is a lot of information here and I do apologize. I did not address one of the specific points of the honourable member's question.

At this point in time our analysis is that there are no seniors who are at risk, and we are ensuring, if there are any homes that we think are in that sort of situation where they would be looking at closing the doors, we have a plan in place. However, I do not think that is sufficient, and I would like to move to have a bit more of a comprehensive response to the problem between now and then. I am looking at whether or not we are able to do an interim phasing-in towards level of care funding. As the member knows, that has been announced for January 1993. I am hopeful we might be able to do some phasing towards that.

It is a very difficult fiscal time, as the member has heard, and he has been pursuing that line with the Trea-surer. I am not in a position to tell the House today what steps I might be able to take, but I am pursuing that and I hope to be able to inform the House in the very near future.

Mr Elston: What is first and foremost necessary is that everybody should understand that the current government has postponed the implementation of the level of care funding formula. It was supposed to take effect very soon, but the government has put it back to 1993; what that means in fact is that some of the lending institutions are now concerned about whether or not they can carry the operation.

My concern is that, between the time when the minister acts to take the problem of funding away from the people who are administering the nursing homes that are in receivership or otherwise, she guarantee us that no senior who is currently resident or about to be resident in any nursing home will be left at risk, and that she share with us the emergency plans she has put together to take effect if there are staff cuts which jeopardize the care of seniors in those homes.

Hon Ms Lankin: First of all, on the issue of the delay, moving new levels of care funding to 1993, that is part of the redirection of long-term care. Perhaps I was not clear enough in my previous answer to say to the member that in fact I hope in the next fiscal year we will be able to take steps to move towards that so the delay will not be felt in the same way. What I am actually working on right now is whether in the short term, or immediately, there is some sort of assistance we might be able to give, and it is a very difficult proposition.

The member talks about pointing out there is that delay and says that should be made very clear. I know everyone wants this to be a kinder, gentler place, and everyone is saying we should not point fingers, but I do have to point out that the reason we have this problem is because no government has ever agreed that nursing home clients require the same level of care funding as clients in homes for the aged or charitable homes. This government recognizes that and is committed to that, and we have said it publicly for the first time.

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

Mr Jackson: I have a question for the Minister of Community and Social Services. The Premier, late this summer, indicated to the Canadian Press that our social welfare system in this province, as administered by the minister, needed some changes. To quote him directly, "'We are simply going to have to do a better job of cutting down on the bureaucracy, cutting down on the overlap and the amount of administrative confusion and try to get services delivered more efficiently,' Mr Rae said."

Given that the Premier has used every word except the word that every mayor and municipality in this province has used, and that word is "accountability," could the minister please advise this House what new initiatives and what specific recommendations she is putting in place for greater and enhanced accountability on the issue of the social welfare dollars that are spent in this province?

Hon Ms Akande: This question is one which has been emphasized again and again not only by the Premier but also by the ministry staff and by me myself.

The real issue here is that we have initiated several steps towards making this a more accountable system. One of the things we are focusing on is the use of the computer material and the sharing of that information so the information that is collected through various other systems, such as unemployment insurance and others, will also be shared through the welfare system when people move off that unemployment insurance listing.

We have moved in a way so that our workers have more meaningful contact with the social assistance recipients to the extent that they will be counselling them and moving to support them back into the workforce and back into training and other skills areas.

Mr Jackson: Today is October 1, and it marks the day on which 63 of the 88 recommendations contained in the SARC report are put into effect. The concerns expressed by mayors in municipalities all across Ontario are still out there; they have not been addressed. They have legitimate concerns such as, what direction is this ministry giving on recommendation 33? I will read that into the record: "Employable persons, age 16 and 17, who are in need and who are living outside the family home should be eligible for assistance unless there are special circumstances that indicate that they should not be eligible."

My understanding from the government's last communique is that this is an as-of-right recommendation and guideline from this government and that the onus is on the very workers who are managing the public purse to prove it, and not the applicant or the recipient having to prove that need.

These are fundamental questions which some mayors in this province have referred to as an outrageous recommendation in the absence of a framework of accountability. I ask again of the minister, when is she going to publicly state in this House and advise municipalities how she is going to bring an accountability model to these social assistance reforms? When is she going to talk publicly on this issue?

Hon Ms Akande: In fact, there is a framework of accountability that we have discussed in this House and that we have in fact stated we seek to extend.

The recommendation the member raises here in the House as one of great concern to the mayors of many municipalities has been the subject of discussion with many of those mayors, and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario has come to meet with us around it. We have not implemented that recommendation today, October 1, which was the slated day, because we are developing a better implementation strategy. It might be noted that this implementation strategy is being done in concert with, discussion with and consultation with the very mayors to whom the member refers.

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Mr Jackson: I do not doubt for a minute that the minister is terribly concerned about this issue, but the facts out there are that the municipalities do not know where she stands on this issue. Today the Treasurer had to stand in this House and talk about substantive cuts in spending in this province, and the Minister of Community and Social Services and the Minister of Health control some 50% of all expenditures that occur in this province.

This is a legitimate question that municipalities have raised for the minister. It is a legitimate question for any member of this House to ask the minister what she is doing about accountability. The truth is that the single largest contributor to property tax increases in this province this year is the growth in the cost of our social assistance programs. We have an obligation to those people to understand that there has to be an accountability in this system.

In light of the fact that there have already been cabinet document leaks that indicate the minister's programs with SARC improvements were not accurately costed, in light of the fact that the Treasurer has put an order out to all cabinet ministers to look at restraint, I ask her again, when will she assure the property taxpayers in this province that she has a system of accountability in place which will ensure that our social assistance system support net does not turn into a social service assistance safety hammock?

Hon Ms Akande: I will repeat for the member that in fact we have developed an accountability framework and continue to refine it and extend it, and so we shall, and we shall be talking about it in this House. I will also remind the member that it is in recognition of the fact that we are responsible for people that we are determined this recession will not be carried on the backs of the poor, that we are determined to focus our view on economic renewal and that we have set our course as we have.

I wanted to tell him then and I will tell him now that we are developing and improving an implementation strategy for the 16- and 17-year-olds. We are committed to ensuring that families are maintained where it is appropriate but that 16- and 17-year-olds are not in danger of suffering abuse if their being on social assistance is more appropriate.

LABOUR LEGISLATION

Mrs Witmer: My question is for the Minister of Labour. The sweeping changes to the Ontario Labour Relations Act, as outlined in the Burkett committee report and his own cabinet submission, have alarmed businesses across this province. Having received no concrete answers from either the minister or the Premier about what changes their government plans to proceed with, businesses in this province are either putting investment decisions on hold or are looking very seriously at transferring their operations elsewhere, to another jurisdiction. The uncertain investment climate he has created by the release of these two documents is having an extremely negative impact on job creation, not only for today but for years to come.

In order to repair some of the damage that has already been done by the uncertainty surrounding these proposals, I would like the minister to provide us today with some straight answers to my questions. The cabinet submission states that the minister intends to introduce legislation prior to the end of this year. Could the minister specifically indicate to us today when he intends to bring forward his legislation into this House?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I am sure the member recognizes that any document that goes to cabinet and that is to outline a consultative process has to go through the cabinet first. That will be done as soon as we can make the arrangements.

Mrs Witmer: I am extremely disappointed that the minister's response continues to be vague. It is simply not acceptable. If we are going to give the business community an opportunity for further investment and to create further jobs in this province, we need some answers.

In response to my question last Wednesday, the minister said: "We do not have a set position or a recommendation as yet." However, we have the minister's signature on a cabinet submission, and that included 61 specific recommendations. The minister's signature on that document, which seeks cabinet approval for the amendments, would seem to indicate to me that this government has very set views on this matter.

The Speaker: Would the member place her supplementary, please?

Mrs Witmer: The minister has indicated he is going to issue a discussion paper for 8 to 10 weeks. I would like to ask the minister, when will the discussion paper be released and will it contain all 61 recommendations?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: First, I think the member will recognize that any submission to cabinet to set up a discussion paper will have possible recommendations, will have options, will have directions the government may wish to take. I am also certain she will recognize that the intent of any consultation we set up is to see whether or not, given the kind of economic conditions that exist in this province of ours today, we can do anything that will replace the confrontational approach between business and labour that has been there for a good many years now in Ontario with a co-operative and consultative approach, which is exactly what this government is trying to do. One of the ways to do that is by making sure that you are going to involve workers and working people in the decisions that are going to affect them and the future of plants and jobs in this province, and that is exactly what we are trying to do.

Mrs Witmer: I am pleased the minister recognizes the uncertain business environment. Certainly we have no further wish to increase the confrontation. We are looking for consultation. But I want the minister to know that businesses across this province are forming coalitions to express their concern. They are telling the minister that these proposals are ill-timed and they could have very serious consequences on future business investment in the province. We have Project Economic Growth, with 100 businesses that are concerned. We have the More Jobs Coalition, with 40 companies. We have the All Business Coalition that represents 25 business associations.

The Speaker: Would the member place her supplementary, please?

Mrs Witmer: These companies are devoting a great deal of time and effort to get this government to listen to their concerns. They are concerned about the future of jobs in this province. What, if anything, will these changes the minister is proposing do to seriously create more investment and the much-needed jobs in this province?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I want to tell the member that I welcome the forming together or the positions from any of the various groups she is talking about and any of the various coalitions that may organize on this. I would hope, however, she recognizes that to make the kind of changes we want to make in Ontario, it takes two to tango. You simply have to listen to what is there, present your views and then make sure you represent both sides of the equation, workers and employers, in the discussions, because workers have a lot to contribute.

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LAKEFILL

Mrs Caplan: I know the Minister of the Environment is very embarrassed today with her announcement, as she should be. She has also been known over the years for her opposition to lakefilling. I remember over the course of time she asked many questions in this House on the sub-ject and she even prepared a press release entitled "Fishable, Swimable and Drinkable." This press release was tabled in May 1988 and it contains the following statement:

"Lakefilling has changed the shape of the shoreline. It has created bays where contaminated water is trapped and has reduced the wave action that previously scoured the area. The accumulation of sediments presents a serious problem and no level of government has yet addressed it."

That was in 1988. Will the minister tell the House today whether the practice of lakefilling ceased when she became minister last year?

Hon Mrs Grier: No, it did not because many projects were under way and being completed, but what has ceased is the wholesale approval of new lakefilling projects that change the shoreline, create embayments and trap contaminated sediments. What has changed is lakefill quality guidelines which will make sure that in the projects being completed, the fill that goes in is not contaminated.

Mrs Caplan: The truth is that since the minister took office, over a million cubic metres of lakefill have been dumped along the Toronto waterfront. There has been no sign that the activity is slowing down. In fact, it may increase in the wake of the Metro Toronto and Region Conservation Authority's East Point Park initiative.

This activity, I would suggest to the minister, is curious in light of what she has just said. The Crombie commission last week released its report entitled Shoreline Regeneration for the Greater Toronto Bioregion. The document contains extensive discussion on lakefilling and it has three recommendations. I would ask the minister today to consider those three recommendations: (1) a moratorium on new lakefill projects, which would allow operations to continue at existing sites, (2) increased restrictions on material used in lakefill and (3), which I know will appeal to the minister, an absolute ban on lakefill. Given the minister's past statements and her statement today, an obvious ban on lakefilling would be her choice.

The Speaker: Would the member conclude her question, please?

Mrs Caplan: In the interests of fairness, will she adopt the recommendation and when will the decision be announced? Because of her knowledge, I expect --

The Speaker: Order.

Interjections.

The Speaker: I appreciate the member's interest and the question was quite detailed. Perhaps on another occasion when we have extremely detailed questions, it might be better suited to the Orders and Notices paper. I am sure all members are also aware of the fact that we are trying to conserve time.

Hon Mrs Grier: I will try to be as precise as possible. Let me assure the member that no final approval has been given for East Point Park with respect to lakefilling for that project. Second, let me point out to her that where a project had been begun, it would have been far more dangerous to the environment to suddenly stop with an unprotected edge of fill for those projects that were under way when I took office, as opposed to completing the contours and preventing further erosion of the fill. Third, I am sure the member and all members of this House are aware of this government's support for the recommendations of the Crombie commission. The recommendations in his shoreline regeneration report I have read with interest, and look forward to responding to specifically when we have had an opportunity to review them in detail.

LANDFILL SITES

Mr Stockwell: My question is to the minister responsible for the greater Toronto area. I have a letter from Metropolitan Toronto solicitor Ossie Doyle. He has reported to the Metropolitan works committee -- I am not sure if it is in camera or not, but from the solicitor -- outlining numerous statutory approvals and legal impediments involved with the extension of the Keele Valley landfill site.

Just to itemize a few, the minister has problems with Environmental Protection Act approvals, the Ontario Water Resources Act, the Aggregate Resources Act, the Lakes and Rivers Improvement Act, the Municipal Act, official plan amendment and zoning bylaw amendment under the Planning Act, approvals under the Regional Municipality of York Act, approvals under the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto Act, the Metropolitan Toronto and Region Conservation Authority and Metro's contractual agreements with Vaughan.

These could tie up the expansion of Keele Valley for years and years and years. How does the minister propose to get past all these acts, some that were put in place to ensure environmental sensitivity, when approving specific projects? How is the minister going to get around the three to five years, potentially 10 years, of time taken up in the courts so she can have Keele Valley expanded so it can accept municipal waste in the not-too-distant future?

Hon Mrs Grier: I am sure the member has had an opportunity to review, if not memorize, my statement to the House earlier this year when I outlined the program of this government and the actions we would have to take in order to solve the long-standing crisis of GTA waste. I am pleased to be able to inform the member that omnibus legislation, in accordance with the policies I announced at that time, will be introduced in this House in this session.

Mr Stockwell: I find it unbelievable that the minister would legislate away every one of these acts. They are designed to protect neighbourhoods, regions and municipal governments maybe from environmental holocausts, for all we know, with respect to expansion of sites. The minister is not allowing one minute of hearings on either of these sites in Britannia or Keele Valley.

The most ironic part of all is that the solicitor of Metropolitan Toronto has suggested on the last page of his statement that if the minister introduces her environmental bill of rights -- that joke she just came forward with here today about putting it off for a little while longer -- her first piece of legislation will be to introduce her environmental bill of rights and her second piece will be to exempt Keele Valley and Britannia from it.

Is it not the ultimate hypocrisy for her to stand on this side of the House for five years crowing about an environmental bill of rights, introduce it, and in the very next piece of legislation exempt two sites with not a minute of environmental assessment hearing? How does she respond to the residents with that statement being made?

Hon Mrs Grier: I will not respond to the rather extravagant hypothetical question contained in the latter part of the member's question, but I would like to assure him, and I think he has known me long enough to know, that I take no pleasure in the actions I had to take to try to resolve the crisis we inherited. Emergency legislation in order to make sure there is not waste on the streets of Metroplitan Toronto is not something I do with relish, but something I do because it is environmentally safe and sound.

Interjections.

Mr Cousens: This is very upsetting.

The Speaker: Yes, indeed. We have managed to hit that first axiom again. There will always be questions we do not like and responses we do not like. I ask that members attempt to have a calm and reasoned approach to question period. It is time for a new question.

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GAS LEAK IN JARVIS

Mr Jamison: My question is for the Minister of Natural Resources. As he is aware, on Thursday, September 26, the city of Nanticoke initiated a state of emergency for the municipality of Jarvis due to a gas explosion and continued gas leaks. The entire town was evacuated. While all the residents have returned, there is still a number of outstanding issues, outlined in the council's resolution I sent yesterday to the minister. MNR and Ministry of the Environment experts were available onsite and were tremendously helpful with the emergency situation. Can we expect this help and expertise to continue?

Hon Mr Wildman: The member's concern for the people of Jarvis is certainly well known to me, as he raised these issues immediately at the time of the disaster, right after it happened and throughout the weekend. I know he has been involved with the municipality and the mayor in attempting to ensure that the concerns of the people of Nanticoke are resolved. As the member indicated, MNR staff have been onsite ever since the beginning of this situation and lending their expertise for the short term to the municipality.

With regard to the resolution passed by the municipality of Nanticoke, the Ministry of Natural Resources is leading the technical committee which will respond to the recommendations with regard to the short-term study, and will assist the municipality in how to deal with the situation. We expect the interim report to be available on Friday and hope the final report for short-term measures will be available by the end of the month.

There are five members of the Ministry of Natural Resources staff assisting the municipality, in addition to staff from the Ministry of the Environment and the Ministry of the Solicitor General. The government is also considering how we will deal with the cost implications of the study by the technical committee.

Mr Jamison: This response has been swift and helpful. I would like to ensure this will continue as the situation moves into a preventive stage. It has been identified that the gas leak was a natural occurrence and that there is a potential that this could recur in the future. I would like to know what steps the ministry is taking to address the needs of this community.

Hon Mr Wildman: As the member knows, the Ministry of Natural Resources is co-ordinating the work on the long-term strategy involving the ministries of the Environment, Municipal Affairs and the Solicitor General. We will review the recommendations of the technical committee and determine how to implement its recommendations for the longer-term strategies to deal with the problems of naturally occurring gas leaks. As I said, we will be looking at the long-term funding implications and the sources of funding. The technical committee group will be meeting in the next day or two, and I will keep the member and the House informed of its progress.

ONTARIO HYDRO RATES

Mr McGuinty: My question is for the Minister of Energy. For some time now the minister has been pushing and shoving Bill 118 along; this in the face of overwhelming opposition we have heard from organizations such as the Municipal Electric Association, the Association of Major Power Consumers in Ontario and, perhaps more important, from ordinary ratepayers.

The time is certainly ripe for any kind of statement the minister might care to make. It was certainly ripe prior to the beginning of this question period.

In any event, the provisions the ratepayers are in opposition to are, first, that they allow the government to direct Hydro to do things that have no relation whatsoever to Hydro's mandate to supply power at cost and, second, that they allow this government to force Hydro to pay for some ratepayers to switch to natural gas at the expense of others who stay on the Hydro system.

In light of this overwhelming opposition, will the minister not concede that his bill is fundamentally flawed and either withdraw it completely or amend it to reflect the public will?

Hon Mr Ferguson: This bill was originally introduced for first reading back in June. After being appointed, I suggested I was prepared to consult and listen to all parties, all stakeholders affected. Having had the opportunity to speak and meet with the Municipal Electric Association, I had a much better appreciation and understanding of its concerns. They understood the government's position. Essentially, I asked the MEA, "What is the biggest difficulty you have with this bill?" They replied they were concerned that the government, for example, could direct Ontario Hydro to assume the SkyDome debt. Any reasonable-minded individual would know that is not the intention of the bill. The intention of the bill is to direct Hydro in order to fulfil the mandate of the government of the day.

As a result, I have asked both opposition parties to permit me to take five minutes today to present some remarks and introduce some minor amendments that will be brought forth in committee, which will assure the MEA of its concerns as well as put to rest its fears about what might possibly happen and further clarify the government's position on this matter.

Mr McGuinty: It is indeed unfortunate that all we have is a hint of what the minister's intentions are when he could have seized the opportunity earlier today to advise us fully of his intentions.

We have another concern as ratepayers in this province in addition to our Bill 118 concerns. We are concerned about the track record this government has set with respect to its initiatives at Elliot Lake and Kapuskasing. How can this minister argue that $65 million donated to the northern Ontario heritage fund is associated somehow with Hydro's mandate to supply power at cost? Our party is concerned that this behaviour might be repeated in the future.

Will the minister assure this House and the people of this province here and now that our Hydro bills will never again under this government reflect any costs other than those related to Hydro's fundamental mandate to supply us all with power at cost?

Hon Mr Ferguson: The purpose of this act is to bring Hydro under control and provide direction where in the past no direction whatever existed. The goal and objective of Hydro is to provide power at reasonable prices. Essentially, what has to be fundamental in Hydro's mind and in this government's mind is to obtain the best deal we possibly can on behalf of the ratepayers of Ontario. That is the goal, that is the objective and that is what we as a government are going to achieve.

REMARKS BY APPOINTEE TO POLICE SERVICES BOARD

Mr Runciman: My question is for the Solicitor General and concerns an NDP appointee to the police services board of Peel region. The minister's appointee, Mary Nnolim, in a recent Toronto Star article charged that Peel regional police routinely lie in court to protect fellow officers. The alleged comments of his appointee have, in the view of the police services board, "sullied the reputation of our police by calling into question the integrity of its police officers."

As the minister should know, the board has asked him under provisions of the Police Services Act to authorize an immediate investigation into this situation, and its request last week was endorsed by the Peel regional council. Could the minister tell us how and when he intends to respond to the request?

Hon Mr Pilkey: I have received an official request that the commission conduct an inquiry under section 25 of the Police Services Act, as has been indicated by the member. I am pleased to inform him we are presently reviewing all the material we have received and as soon as a decision is made I will inform the member and this House.

Mr Runciman: I am not sure what information the minister has to review. He has had this request in front of him for more than a week. This is an NDP appointee who apparently has made some comments that are having a very negative impact on the Peel Region Police Force, and certainly the Peel regional council is very concerned about this as well.

The minister has the authority. I emphasize again that this is an NDP appointee. Many communities right across this province are concerned about individuals who will be appointed by this government to police services boards. It is sending out a very bad message not only to communities but to policemen and policewomen across this province. In my view he has an obligation to act quickly. If the minister deems that this individual did make these comments, in my view he has an obligation to remove her from office.

Hon Mr Pilkey: I agree with the member that there is an obligation to review. In fact, the matter will be reviewed, as I indicated. I will be pleased to report back the factual findings of the circumstance. I do not disagree with the member.

RENT REGULATION

Mrs Mathyssen: My question is to the Minister of Housing. There are tenants in an apartment complex in the northeast part of my riding who have been battling their landlord for several years to have him comply with municipal work orders to bring the buildings into conformity with the Ontario Building Code. This highly publicized case has been dragging on for several years while the landlord has pursued a number of appeals of these city repair orders.

My question is on behalf of these tenants who feel they are fighting a losing battle in their attempts to force the landlord to accept his responsibility to the occupants of his buildings. Tragically, during this process they have met with derision, contempt and racial harassment. What is our government doing about new provisions for the enforcement of maintenance standards to remedy this situation?

Hon Ms Gigantes: In response to the question raised by the member for Middlesex, I would like to express my personal regret to those tenants that they have not, under existing legislation, been able to get satisfactory action from the government of Ontario.

We are going to be moving forward on the question of adequacy of maintenance. Within Bill 121 there are two provisions. The first says that if there are outstanding work orders, as there have been in this case, there will be no allowance for the landlord to increase rent while those work orders are outstanding. Second, under the new legislation, tenants will be able to make application to have the rent lowered where maintenance standards are not being met.

Mrs Mathyssen: When can tenants look forward to this protection and what can they do in the meantime?

Hon Ms Gigantes: We will be bringing forward the legislation for clause-by-clause consideration early this fall. We hope to have it passed by Christmas and in place by relatively early in the new year, in the spring. In the meantime, I am going to go back over the file on this particular apartment complex and try to find out whether under existing legislation we can provide more effective enforcement for these tenants.

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SABRINA PANETTA

Mr McClelland: My question is for the Minister of Community and Social Services. I want to say at the outset, and reflect a sentiment that is written in editorials in my local newspaper and indeed is expressed by the family in question itself, that it is unfortunate a family has to take its personal tragedy to the press and make it public to deal with an issue. I am speaking of the Panetta family situation. Members will be aware of the case of young Sabrina Panetta, a nine-year-old who weighs some 16 pounds, whose physician has said she is terminally ill. She is on a day-to-day basis. Her physician has indicated the best hope for her to extend her short life is to do so at home. The minister has the power to do something about that.

I want to acknowledge the work done by my colleague the member for Yorkview. We went to the minister on a non-partisan basis and tried to establish an order in council that would allow this young child to die at home. I do not know how to put it more bluntly to the minister.

I have held this little child in my arms. I ask the minister if she is prepared to consider and to reconsider. She has the power to issue an order in council that would allow this little child to die at home with her parents, where they want her to be. What is the minister's response to that position I put to her?

Hon Ms Akande: Indeed it is a tragic case. It is a case about which we have been very concerned and the staff in the ministry have done a great deal of work. We have been in consultation with the doctor. We have been in consultation in terms of finding out from the doctor exactly what the bottom-line needs of this child are in order to ensure that if the child were taken home, she would not be at risk.

We have received a great deal of conflicting information. The member should recognize, though, that we already have in place services that are paid for, a housekeeper for that family. We have offered to this family to extend the special services at home to the fullest extent. We have offered the family placement in a group home near the family home so that in fact the child can be taken home for every weekend.

The Speaker: Order.

Hon Ms Akande: I will continue my answer after this.

Mr McClelland: What the minister has said she has done is all well and good. I appreciate that and the family appreciates it. That is not the issue at hand.

The issue at hand is this, and she has summarized it well: There are conflicting reports. But the family physician who has dealt with this child consistently over the past nine years since her birth says that one of the fundamental factors that has contributed to her wellbeing is the care and the nurturing she receives at home. That is undisputed evidence from that physician.

I have a letter here that was sent to the minister on September 26. So that it does not get bogged down, I am going to ask one of the pages to bring it over to her. I want the minister to read the letter. It is from the Panetta family. They say to the minister: Please take time out of your busy schedule, contact the doctor and find out the facts from the child's physician personally.

There is also a letter here which says as follows, "Premier Bob, why can't the province of Ontario grant my daughter's only wish when it is within your power to do so?" This is a nine-year-old child who is literally living day to day. Weekends are meaningless at this point in time.

I urge the minister, I implore the minister to personally look into this matter and not to leave it with her staff. Some of her staff were very concerned about this and they have been sidetracked. They have been pushed off the case. I wonder why. I will leave that for the minister to determine. Would the minister look at it, please? Would the minister talk to the family, talk to the physicians? The minister has the power to do something about it. The minister and her staff are the people who stood there and said they care about people.

Indeed, in her answer just a short while ago, the minister said her job was to help people. Here is a nine-year-old child who needs the minister's help, and the Premier's. The minister can do it. She should do it.

Hon Ms Akande: That child is indeed receiving our attention. As a matter of fact, rather than staff being sidetracked, more staff have been added to the focus. The important issue here, in terms of the confusion of medical information, is that we must be absolutely certain this child is not at greater risk if taken out of the hospital. We have no confirming information from the medical practitioner that will allow us to believe that. We have asked for it repeatedly.

In addition to that, in order to assure this family and to give it all the support we have, we have also promised that if we had that confirming information, we would do whatever we could to support this child's being at home as much as possible. If the member has information which will confirm this situation, I suggest he make it available to me.

TVONTARIO

Mrs Marland: My question is for the Minister of Culture and Communications. Yesterday TVOntario's chairman and CEO, Bernard Ostry, offered his resignation and the minister accepted it. When asked at her press conference about a severance package for Mr Ostry, the minister said the matter had not been discussed. Given the litany of excesses at TVOntario under Mr Ostry's leadership -- $35,000 for nine televisions, $1,800 for parties at his home, $607 for a dinner party for three people -- I would suggest that Mr Ostry has already helped himself to his severance benefits. Taxpayers should not have to provide him with a severance package.

What does the contract say for Mr Ostry -- I do not want the minister to hide behind the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act -- and is the minister going to give him some kind of sweetheart deal, or will the minister promise the people of Ontario that she will not in fact give him a further severance package?

Hon Mrs Haslam: I can assure the honourable member that there is no settlement package from the Ontario government, commonly called the "golden handshake." While the member might not want to be governed by the freedom of information act, I on the other hand must be. I can assure the member I take very seriously the position of the taxpayers in this option.

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Mrs Marland: If this minister took very seriously the position of the taxpayers, she would not be allowing Mr Ostry to stay on for another two and a half months.

I am also concerned about the response of the TVO board of directors on this whole issue. On the one hand, we have the TVO board of directors supporting the excesses and actions of their chairman, Mr Ostry. On the other hand, we have the auditor saying, "Several of our findings prompt questions as to the adequacy of administrative practices, in particular those related to the feasibility of major projects and the exercise of prudence concerning travel and other business expenses."

Also, the director of finance for TVOntario said: "For the third year in a row, there has been inadequate planning and control in the management of leasehold projects. Firm estimates have not been obtained for projects, nor have the expenditures been monitored. Consequently the actual information is available after the fact, which can cause potential overruns."

Given this information, a board that continues to show strong support for a chairman who had to resign obviously is not a board that I would expect this minister to support. Does the minister support a board that obviously does not know what is going on, or is she going to ask for the resignation of those board members?

Hon Mrs Haslam: This is amazing. First the member says, "Would Mr Ostry please resign." Mr Ostry has resigned. Now she wants the entire board to resign. If the member wants blood, she should go to a slaughterhouse. That is not my style. I have every confidence in the board. This is a healing process and I intend to work with that board.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order.

ROAD CONSTRUCTION

Mr Hansen: My question is for the Minister of Transportation. Residents in my riding are concerned about the traffic congestion on residential streets caused by trucks bypassing the Queen Elizabeth Way. For many years now, the town of Grimsby has requested that the MTO extend Clarke Street from Nelles Road easterly to Book Road to ease traffic congestion. What attention is the minister giving this matter?

Hon Mr Pouliot: Mr Speaker, I had, and understandably so, with respect, some difficulties hearing the question. I believe the member was concerned about the situation that actually concerns all of us, that of Grimsby.

I appreciate the member for Lincoln's diligence regarding this matter, and yes, we are right on top of the issue. I have asked our parliamentary assistant, the member for Windsor-Sandwich, along with MTO officials, to meet as soon as possible with the mayor of Grimsby, his worship Nicholas Andreychuk, to look at the situation with the understanding that the township of Grimsby will be the proponent of any new road construction. Therefore, we encourage them to seek our expertise, to seek our reputation in terms of road construction.

Interjections.

Hon Mr Pouliot: The point is very well taken. I do apologize for the noise around us. Standing order 20(b) should have allowed me better time to present. Thank you kindly, Mr Speaker.

TUITION FEES

Mr Daigeler: I appreciate that I still get an opportunity to ask my question, even though, Mr Speaker, I would appreciate perhaps that in future question periods you would be a little bit tougher on the amount of time being used by the members to pose their questions or for the replies by the ministers.

My question is to the Minister of Colleges and Universities. In a recent letter to the minister, the Ontario Federation of Students had this to say about his leadership:

"Frankly, Dr Allen, Ontario students expected a great deal more from you and your government. When you in-creased tuition fees in violation of your own party's policy, we were disappointed. When you threaten to take away what little funding you have promised us, we are outraged."

The students are very concerned that the minister will hit them with a major tuition fee increase soon. Traditionally in this province, as the minister will know, tuition fee increases were tied to the increase in transfer payments. Can the minister confirm today that this policy will be maintained? In other words, can he confirm that tuition fees will rise by only 2% if transfer payments will increase by only 2%, as the minister has advised the university presidents?

Hon Mr Allen: I would ask the member to do his own research as to the performance of the minister and the ministry over the past year. He might come to a slightly different conclusion than the students he has quoted. Indeed in that respect, I met, for the first time of any Minister of Colleges and Universities, with all the representatives of all the student councils of all the universities of Ontario for a full day to discuss their concerns with them. We went over this question in great detail.

-What I want to say to the member in regard to that and what I want to say to the students is that inasmuch as we have not completed our evaluation of the circumstances of the system at this point in time vis-a-vis our revenues and our capacity to respond, therefore it is not possible for me at this point to confirm any policy with regard to tuition fees.

Mr Eves: On a point of personal privilege, Mr Speaker: On behalf of the Minister of Energy, perhaps the Speaker could inquire whether the tirade by the Minister of Culture and Communications did any permanent damage. None is apparent, but --

The Speaker: Point of order?

Hon Mr Ferguson: If I might, Mr Speaker, very briefly, I am going to send the honourable member one of the new energy-efficient light bulbs that we have for one of the brightest comments we have heard in this Legislature in quite some time.

The Speaker: Who said this is not good theatre?

I have had an opportunity to review Hansard from Thursday last, and under the circumstances which resulted from question period, I will now allow the member for Parkdale to pose a question to the minister concerned.

EXPO 98

Mr Ruprecht: This is directed to the Minister of Tourism and Recreation. One of the fundamental rights that we have and must maintain as members of Parliament is to ensure that we can ask questions on commitments by this government in questions of tax incentives or whatever that has to do with money that is being spent.

The Minister of Tourism and Recreation to this point has not come clean and told this Legislature just how much money he has committed to help Expo 98, how this money is going to be spent and whether provincial investigators and inspectors will be hired. All we know is what the minister has decided to drop while he is walking down the hall or what we read in the press in terms of rumours and innuendo.

I ask the minister today to make a statement in this House and tell us specifically what he has in mind so that we are informed as well.

Hon Mr North: At this point, what I can tell the member across the floor is that we are going to spend $400,000.

Mr Ruprecht: As the minister can see, that may not be good enough. As he knows, Metro council recently made a decision, last Wednesday. They made clear what they are going to spend: $150,000, specifically itemized, and $250,000 five weeks from now.

The Minister of Tourism and Recreation comes to the House today, after having had notice over months to tell this House specifically how he will allocate this money. I think we have a right in this Legislature to know specifically about the innuendoes in the press where the minister has said he is going to hire a host of investigators to co-ordinate the finances among three levels of government. I want to know, and we have the right to know today, is he spending that $400,000 on a host of investigators or will he spend that $400,000 specifically on Expo 98?

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Hon Mr North: I would like to tell the member across the floor that I do not put out innuendoes or any of these things. He has spent a lot of time, wind and water filling up this House with all kinds of statements about whether or not we are hiding. It is innuendo this, innuendo that.

The bottom line is, at this point we are going to spend $400,000. We have put together a fairly decent bid, I believe. We have put together partners, for the first time, on a decent bid. We have got partners from all three levels of government. We have partners from the private sector. We have Max Beck, who runs Ontario Place, who incidentally is the man who is co-ordinating all of this at this point, and we have a lot of good things happening.

If the member thinks there is some value in bringing this to the House every other day and making a big thing out of it, fine. I hope he enjoys it. It is good for his politics. That is great. The bottom line here is, we put together a very good bid and I see it going together well. We are after the bid and we wish to win it.

PETITIONS

NURSING HOMES

Mr Daigeler: I have a petition here signed by some 19 residents of the Ottawa-Carleton area. They came together some two weeks ago at a rally of 900 people, very concerned about the lack of funding for nursing homes in this province. They have asked me to put forward this petition:

"We, the undersigned, request that the government of Ontario immediately rectify the inequity in funding between nursing homes and homes for the aged. We strongly support the Ontario Nursing Home Association in their efforts to provide better care for nursing home residents through increased funding."

I am pleased to sign this petition.

Mrs Y. O'Neill: I too have a petition with 19 names, and I would like to affix my name as well.

"We, the undersigned, request that the government of Ontario immediately rectify the inequity in funding between nursing homes and homes for the aged. We strongly support the Ontario Nursing Home Association in their efforts to provide better care for nursing home residents through increased funding."

OATH OF ALLEGIANCE

Mr J. Wilson: I have the privilege of presenting a petition to the Legislature of Ontario that reads as follows:

"Whereas the Queen of Canada has long been a symbol of national unity for Canadians from all walks of life and from all ethnic backgrounds; and

"Whereas the people of Canada are currently facing a constitutional crisis which could potentially result in the breakup of the federation and are in need of unifying symbols;

"We, the undersigned, respectfully petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to restore the oath to the Queen for Ontario police officers."

That is signed by some 50 residents in my riding of Simcoe West in the towns of Wasaga Beach and Stayner, the village of Angus and the townships of Sunnidale, Essa and Nottawasaga, and I too affix my name to this petition.

NURSING HOMES

Mr Grandmaître: I also have a petition:

"We, the undersigned, request that the government of Ontario immediately rectify the inequity in funding between nursing homes and homes for the aged. We strongly support the Ontario Nursing Home Association in their efforts to provide better care for nursing home residents through increased funding."

I have signed this petition.

OATH OF ALLEGIANCE

Mrs Sullivan: I have a petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario reading as follows:

"Whereas Her Majesty the Queen at her coronation in 1953 took a personal oath to the people of Canada, and Canadians have always reciprocated with oaths of allegiance in service to the people of the sovereign; and

"Whereas it is our right and duty to take oaths of allegiance in service in such form; and

"Whereas Ontario regulation 144/91 made under the Police Services Act, 1990, denies Ontarians this right;

"We, the undersigned residents of Ontario, loyal to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Canada, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to resolve that His Honour the Lieutenant Governor in Council be requested to revoke Ontario regulation 144/91 and restore the traditional oath of service to Her Majesty for police personnel in Ontario."

I have affixed my signature to this petition.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

POWER CORPORATION AMENDMENT ACT, 1991 / LOI DE 1991 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LA SOCIÉTÉ DE L'ÉLECTRICITÉ

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 118, An Act to amend the Power Corporation Act.

Suite du debat ajourne sur la motion visant la deuxième lecture du projet de loi 118, Loi modifiant la Loi sur la Societe de l'electricite.

The Speaker: When we left off last day, the member for Brampton North had the floor.

Mr McGuinty: That is correct, Mr Speaker. He had every intention of continuing speaking to the matter today and we are just making efforts now to bring him in.

The Speaker: Do we have unanimous agreement to wait for a moment?

Agreed to.

Hon Mr Cooke: Perhaps the more appropriate way to go would be to allow our member to speak and we will agree to give the floor back to the member when the member for Victoria-Haliburton has completed.

The Speaker: Okay.

Mr Drainville: It gives me a great deal of pleasure to rise in the House today to speak on Bill 118, An Act to amend the Power Corporation Act.

Last week we heard from a number of members in this House, and in that period of time there were many questions that came up about the rationale of why the government was approaching this particular bill in this particular way. There were also criticisms, if I might say, about the government's approach, and its lack of consultation I believe has been raised by a number of members.

I have to say that consultation, at least in the parliamentary forum, is not something that just happens before the drafting of a bill, but rather also something that happens when the bill is coming before Parliament and when it goes into committee stage and afterwards. In terms of that consultation, we have been very responsive, I believe, as a government to the criticisms that have been put forward, as well as to the comments that have been made by the general public on where we can increase the bill's effectiveness. I would like to talk a little bit about that as I begin my remarks today.

There has been considerable concern and indeed misunderstanding about the scope and nature of provisions in Bill 118 regarding policy directives of this government. During the committee stages of this bill, it is the government's intention to move changes that will address this misunderstanding and will clarify the government's intentions.

The key to Ontario's new energy future is the implementation of the government's new energy directions. The primary goal of these new directions is to protect the environment while ensuring that the province continues to have a reliable supply of energy at reasonable prices.

Ontario Hydro has a unique role in helping the government meet new energy policy objectives. Ontario Hydro and the government must work together to meet the commitment to concentrate more of our resources on controlling growth in the demand for energy and to ensure that we use energy efficiently.

The changes that will be moved during committee will make it clear that the intent and the purpose of the legislation is to provide the framework for this new partnership and to remove the barriers to the implementation of new energy directions. The changes will ensure that the government's policy directives will be applied to matters within the scope and the mandate of Ontario Hydro as set out in the Power Corporation Act.

It is my understanding that the government proposes to change sections 2 and 6 of the bill to make it perfectly clear that any policy directives that are issued must relate to the corporation's exercise of its powers and duties under the act and not lead to an extension of those powers and duties by means of government directives.

The government shall also move some minor wording changes to section 4 of the bill, dealing with the substitution of other forms of energy for electrical energy. These changes will clarify the government's intentions and address the misunderstandings surrounding this matter.

Fuel substitution is an important element in the government's strategy to make Ontario more energy-efficient. The government is determined to proceed with amendments to the act that will enable Ontario Hydro to encourage --

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The Speaker: The member for Victoria-Haliburton, sorry to stop you in midflight, but we have a point of order.

Mr McGuinty: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I appreciate the member's comments, but they are more appropriately delivered by the minister in the form of a ministerial statement. That is the exact information we were seeking earlier today. It is unfortunate it is being given at this time by the member and not by the minister so that I could properly respond to it.

The Speaker: We are in second reading debate, I understand, and all members of the House have an opportunity to contribute their ideas and thoughts, unless I have misunderstood the member's point of order.

Mr Conway: On that point of order, Mr Speaker: I was in the lobby for a brief moment, but I think the member's point of order has to do with the fact that what we are getting now are amendments to a central piece of legislation, and those amendments can only be moved by either the responsible minister or his parliamentary assistant. I have a great deal of regard for the member for Victoria-Haliburton, but in this case I do not think he is either.

Mr Drainville: If I might clarify the situation, I have discussed this with both the parliamentary assistant and the minister in terms of the remarks I was going to be making today. This is not moving the amendments; rather, it is giving indications of the government's goodwill about some of the criticisms and some of the issues that have been raised. If the honourable members think that is anything except food for discussion, I am sorry, they will have to take that up with the minister. But I believe it is my prerogative as a member of the House, in discussion with the minister, to bring forth these comments.

The Speaker: I appreciate the point raised by the member for Renfrew North. I was listening carefully to the member for Victoria-Haliburton, who spoke about amendments which will be placed, it is his understanding, when the House is in committee. There is nothing out of order about any member speaking about items which will subsequently be placed as amendments, provided the member does not attempt to move them as amendments during second reading debate.

Mr Conway: If I might speak to that, Mr Speaker: I do not intend to prolong this, but I will certainly be spending a lot of time over the next 12 hours to prepare a point of order for tomorrow. I have been here 16 years and I have heard a lot of interesting things procedurally, but never this.

We are all aware that the government is planning to make some changes, and I respect that. Our standing orders provide ministerial statements. Ministers are getting up all the time and indicating changes or additions to policy. I am simply making the point, and I will say this and sit down: Never in 16 years in this Legislature have I been witness to a situation where government policy, in this case significant government policy, is being changed and the first word the House hears of that change is from neither the leader of the government nor the responsible minister but, in this case, the estimable member for Victoria-Haliburton, who is neither Minister of Energy nor parliamentary assistant. I think that is a first in the annals of the Legislature. It is something I want to spend some time researching over the course of the next 12 hours.

Hon Mr Cooke: I would like to respond. I am out of breath because I saw the member on the floor on the TV downstairs. I think he knows -- I certainly know his House leader knows -- that we discussed this matter yesterday in a House leaders' meeting. I indicated that we were going to make a request today, when the debate on this bill resumed, for the minister to make a statement, and I was asking the two opposition House leaders for unanimous consent so that could be done by the minister. We needed unanimous consent because the minister had already spoken on leadoff on this bill.

The policy initiatives referred to by the member have already been communicated to the opposition parties. I was informed today just before question period by the House leader for the official opposition that he would not grant unanimous consent. The third party agreed that it would grant unanimous consent. So the only way we could communicate this matter during the debate on Bill 118, which is the appropriate time to do it, was with the member who has just spoken.

I think we made our best effort to communicate to the Legislature quickly and promptly, but I cannot do it the way the member for Renfrew North refers to if I cannot have the co-operation of the official opposition. If it does not want to co-operate, we had to try to communicate it some way, and I think this was the appropriate way to do it.

Mr Conway: On that point, Mr Speaker, if I might, I want to raise this additional point: The member for Windsor-Riverside knows perfectly well that the standing orders of this Legislature provide something called ministerial statements. This afternoon there were some six to seven minutes left in the time ordinarily allotted to the Treasury bench for ministerial statements. It is absolutely the case that this is the more appropriate way to have announced what the government wants to announce.

He is quite right that I am the person denying unanimous consent. The reason I will deny him unanimous consent in this fashion is that we are about to get a major policy announcement from the government. In my view, that should come from the responsible minister. Failing that, it should come from his parliamentary assistant. Without any doubt, it seems to me, it should come first as a ministerial statement. There was sufficient time remaining today after the Treasurer and the other minister spoke in that period. I might add that the responsible minister has been questioned on two or three occasions in the last 25 or 26 hours. He made absolutely no hint of the change that the member for Victoria-Haliburton is now about to introduce.

Again, my point is that, in my view, it is not appropriate and, I think, out of order for a private member -- an outstanding private member none the less -- to advance government policy, particularly significant changes in government policy, as a first order of business without the minister or the parliamentary assistant hinting that the change was about to be made.

I find it additionally peculiar that we should be engaged in this kind of chicanery in the context of a bill where the government says it wants both energy policy and Hydro itself to be more public and more accountable. What they want to do is announce a major change in the direction of their Hydro policy. That is their right. I respectfully submit to you, sir, that the better way is to do it in ministerial statements. They had six minutes of that today that they chose not to use. Never in 16 years have I ever known a private member just willy-nilly, in the course of a routine debate on behalf of the government of which he is not a cabinet minister, to make a significant policy announcement first.

The Speaker: Rather than debate the point of order that was raised, I take seriously the matter the member raises. If I understood him properly, he volunteered to do a bit of work on this. I will be reviewing Hansard. I will be reviewing the events that have unfolded this afternoon. If the member for Renfrew North or any other member of the House would like to provide some thoughts on the matter, I would be delighted to receive them.

Perhaps at this juncture we could continue. The understanding was that the member for Victoria-Haliburton will have the floor until the member for Brampton North reappears. He would then wind up his remarks and the member for Brampton North would have the floor, because he had it on the previous occasion.

Mr Bradley: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I know how carefully you observe what goes on in the House. During the period for responses to the statements made by government, because I did not want to be out of order, I made allusion to the fact that we were expecting a statement from the Minister of Energy which would be a fundamental, substantial change in a bill that has been put before the Legislature. Even if it required the extension of the period of time for ministers' statements, we as the opposition and I as House leader were quite willing to agree to that.

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What has happened, quite obviously, Mr Speaker -- I do not ask you to necessarily make a judgement on this -- is that the government is embarrassed by its retreat on this bill and has decided it wants to do it through the back door at a time later on, when the news media are gone, when they are not in the press gallery. We have seen examples of it happening: An announcement the member for Mississauga South was involved in was made in a press conference downstairs. But now, when there is bad news in the minds of some, good news in the minds of others, but bad news for the government because it has to retreat, it wants to retreat to a position where it has a private member -- a backbencher, even though he is sitting in the front benches -- make an announcement of government policy at 3:40 in the afternoon, when no media are around here.

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

The Speaker: On the same point of order?

Mr Elston: Not quite on the same point, Mr Speaker. It is with respect to whether it is within the ambit of the member for Victoria-Haliburton to carry on debate at this time when he is privy to knowledge that the rest of the members, backbench members and the rest of the House, are not privy to. He has been given advance notification of material which should have been made available to us. With an advantage that is, to us, substantial, he is going to enter the debate. It will not allow us as members to either counter or agree with his assertions, because there is nothing in our hands that would allow us to deal effectively with the points he raises.

The whole issue of inside information has afflicted this administration from almost the very moment of its inception. We had it with respect to the leak of prior information to Mr Hinkley in Hamilton, now a mayoral candidate, where he got information about the Red Hill Creek Expressway which of course put him and his colleagues in the New Democratic caucus of the Hamilton city council at an unfair advantage. We have had it with respect to other materials in this government's administration. Here we have it now, where the minister has been questioned in this House this very day by our critic, the member for Ottawa South, who has received not a hint that there are substantial changes or, if I were to agree with the government House leader, the fine-tuning now alluded to -- not only alluded to but asserted by the member for Victoria-Haliburton.

How unfair this type of operation is to our House is without precedent. It is a very unkind act this administration has done to the people when we are dealing with a fundamental difference of opinion about how Bill 118 will affect the current and the about-to-be-formulated policy with respect to energy consumption in Ontario. What is more important for us is that we have been told that a set of facts exist under the current Bill 118 which promote increased costs for energy consumers, particularly electrical energy consumers, as they are fully subject to the new implemented programs of Hydro under the auspices of this New Democratic government.

How we can be expected as members of the Legislative Assembly to defend both the taxpayers of this province and the ratepayers of Ontario Hydro under yet-to-be-announced or made-public amendments to this series of amendments is beyond me. In that way, my point should have been a point of privilege. My privileges as a member have in fact been violated by this type of government activity.

I have been willing, and I have spoken it most often, to co-operate with this administration to pursue the business of the province on a cordial and co-operative basis, but if this is the way in which the government pretends to treat us as opposition people who are required to defend the public, then we cannot but fail to co-operate when the time comes. How can they spring this stuff on us in the middle of a day when this was well established last week to be a debating day for Bill 118?

Hon Mr Cooke: No, it wasn't. You changed it because your Labour critic can't be here. Get your facts straight.

Mr Elston: When they change their direction, things do not amount to being fair ball.

I have to apologize to the member. Our Labour critic is ill, and that is one of the reasons this is reprogrammed, but it still does not alleviate the necessity for us to know what the government pretends it will next do with this legislation, so that we can carry on a reasonable debate. That is the point. I think it will not be fair for that member to carry on, nor will it be fair for any of those members over there who have advance notice of what that government is doing, to our disadvantage. I think those members should uphold our rights as the minority to make sure that our privileges are not breached because of this transgression by that administration.

Hon Mr Cooke: Mr Speaker, there has been an accusation made --

Mrs Marland: It's our turn.

The Speaker: Whoa. Just a minute, before we get too carried away here. I am listening carefully to the points of order. I would appreciate if there is any new material that would assist the Speaker, I would be pleased to hear it. But I have mentioned -- I realize some members were not in the House at the time -- that I will reserve judgement on this. I have taken the point seriously. I think it is my responsibility to try and get the debate rolling again and to recognize the member for Brampton North. If there is additional information from the member for Mississauga South, I have not heard from the third party yet.

Mrs Marland: On the same point of order, Mr Speaker, I realize that the member for Victoria-Haliburton has been put in a difficult position by his government. The fact is that because of a rescheduling of House business today, we are here to debate Bill 118. However, apparently the government policy as prescribed in that piece of legislation now is going to be radically changed, and if that is the case, then we are no longer here as opposition members debating Bill 118 as we know it in its printed format on the floor of the House. So personally I take very strong exception on behalf of our caucus to this avenue we are now walking down with this socialist government.

Hon Mr Cooke: That is not what your House leader said.

Mrs Marland: I think it is really unfair, and I say to the government House leader who is contradicting me as I speak, which is a great courtesy on his part, that we are in a position here where we are ready to debate Bill 118. We have not given unanimous agreement for the Minister of Energy to bring in an amendment and we certainly have not agreed that a backbencher, which I say with due respect to the member for Victoria-Haliburton, now be the messenger.

I am not about to kill the messenger, but I certainly think this government makes a mockery of the traditions of Parliament and the rules of procedure. If they want to make a major amendment to this garbage piece of legislation known as Bill 118, then why do they not do it properly? But as has been said by other members of the opposition, what we are now entertaining this afternoon is totally unacceptable. It is also unprecedented, and I would ask you, Mr Speaker, to rule on whether or not the statement from the member for Victoria-Haliburton on Bill 118 is in order, in light of the fact that those areas to which he is now speaking are not in fact contained in that bill today.

The Speaker: On that same point of order, the government House leader.

Hon Mr Cooke: Very briefly, Mr Speaker, I just think it is important, because of the points the leader of the official opposition has raised, to make a couple of things clear to you when you are determining whether this is an appropriate point of order or not.

I met with the opposition House leaders and shared the information with regard to Bill 118 with both opposition House leaders at 5 pm yesterday afternoon, so any accusation in this House that there are some games up and that we are not sharing information with the opposition parties is really unfair of the leader of the official opposition. I shared that information with him yesterday, about an hour after I was informed, as government House leader, about the changes that were going to be announced with regard to Bill 118.

I then asked, since we could not do Bill 70 today because the Labour critic for the Liberal Party is ill, if we could do Bill 118, and I asked if the minister could make a statement at the beginning, since we were debating Bill 118, indicating some changes, not radical changes but some changes to the bill in response to the Municipal Electric Association.

Both opposition House leaders said to me that they would discuss the matter with their caucuses today and get back to me with regard to unanimous consent. The House leader for the third party called me at the lunch hour and indicated that his caucus agreed with unanimous consent. That was the phone call I got from the member's House leader.

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Then the House leader for the official opposition came to me at approximately 1:40 and indicated to me that they did not agree with unanimous consent and thought instead that we should do a ministerial statement. A ministerial statement could not be prepared at 1:40 and properly distributed in accordance with the rules, so the best way to do it and the only way we could do it to inform the House was the way the caucus proposed.

I take the criticisms from the official opposition party very seriously, and I can assure the official opposition that we will not do this again. We will make sure that it be done outside the Legislature if they will not agree to have it done by unanimous consent in the House.

Mr Conway: On that point, I want to make a final observation. I have to pay due regard to what my friend the member for Windsor-Riverside has said. I was not at the meeting. I know some of the instructions, and I am very pleased to see the member for St Catharines here, because on the basis of what I know, I think the member for Windsor-Riverside has, and not for the first time in my experience, presented a highly personalized and very idiosyncratic version of the truth.

The Speaker: If there is new information, the member for Brampton North.

Mr McClelland: I want to comment if I may. You asked for some assistance, Mr Speaker. In my own humble way I will attempt to do that on two points, first on a point of privilege and second in terms of a point of order, on which I would ask you, if necessary, perhaps to recess and rule.

On a point of privilege: I had adjourned the debate on 23 September and accordingly, but for the fact that I was detained outside, I would have commenced the debate this afternoon.

I am a private member who has a responsibility to represent the people of Brampton North, who have entrusted me to do that. I have a broader responsibility in terms of my exercise of that responsibility in this Legislative Assembly to respond to legislation that will dramatically impact this province for some time to come. It has significant implications to many many people. My responsibility and my privilege, entrusted in me by my seat in this House and by the people of Brampton North, are to comment and to do so on an informed basis, as is customary and expected in the parliamentary process.

We are here today in a position where I am to resume the adjourned debate and respond to a statement given by a member which I have not had an opportunity to review, which is to be considered in the context of the debate that I have the privilege of continuing. I would suggest to you, Mr Speaker, that my privilege to continue effectively and responsibly in dealing with this has been breached.

On a point of order: Surely, given that the minister was here today and had the opportunity to put a statement forward and to provide us with the framework within which I could at least respond and perhaps if necessary change the comments, and perhaps even be persuaded that maybe my view was not entirely correct -- indeed, how could it be, if this is a substantive change?

The government House leader says it is a small, cosmetic change. I happen to have a different opinion, and I am entitled to have that opinion, I say with respect, Mr Speaker. I suggest to you that it is a matter of, first, order and, second, privilege. I put to you that if we were to proceed without the minister's statement, my privilege as a member to continue this debate effectively is being violated, and I ask you to rule on that, Mr Speaker.

The Speaker: With respect, I have heard a lot of information, which I am very pleased to receive.

Mrs Marland: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker --

The Speaker: If there is new information, fine. Otherwise I can reserve on this and we can move on and recognize the member for Brampton North to continue the debate.

Mr Eves: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I would just like to reiterate what was my understanding of the House leaders' meeting that I went to.

I think the government House leader is quite correct in stating that he brought forth this information at 5 pm yesterday and asked the two opposition parties if we would agree to revert by unanimous consent to have the minister -- nobody else -- bring forward some statement as to how he was going to address a resolution and some concerns that the Municipal Electric Association had at a meeting I believe it had this past Sunday.

We on our part agreed that we would give unanimous consent, provided that both opposition critics also had an opportunity to respond with equal time and thus speak twice on second reading debate. We also indicated that during ministerial statements would be the most appropriate time for the minister to make such a statement. There was some concern apparently whether the minister would be here today in time. I note that the minister did make it for question period today.

The only point I would like to make is that surely the most appropriate time would have been during ministerial statements. That is why we have provisions for them in our standing orders. There was ample time today for the minister to have made such a statement and for replies by both opposition parties. I just think that perhaps in the future -- we have learned a lesson here -- we can all abide by the standing orders that we have all, by consensus, agreed to have in the first place. That is the purpose of ministerial statements and responses.

The only thing I do not think was appropriate on the part of the government House leader was the fact that he indicated that in the future we will just do it outside this chamber. That is not the point; I think he has missed the point. The point is that there is a period of time called ministerial statements and there is a period of time for responses. There are rules that all three parties have agreed to by consensus. I would suggest that we just put this behind us and get on with the business of the House.

Mr Bradley: There is a different version of history, or interpretation of history perhaps is a better way of putting it, by the government House leader than by myself on what took place at the meeting. The member for Parry Sound may speak for the Progressive Conservative Party; he does not speak for me.

My understanding was that the government House leader presented a piece of paper at the meeting which was from the Municipal Electric Association, I believe, and said, "We would like to introduce some amendments in compliance with this demand from the Municipal Electric Association."

I indicated at that time that the government has the right to make any amendments it wanted but, when asked about when it should be done, clearly indicated that the best time to do it was during the time allotted for ministerial statements and that if additional time were required, we would give additional time if the government had other statements. I did not even indicate that we would be wanting extra time for response on our part. I also indicated I would discuss this with our caucus this morning, which I did.

It is our view, as I have expressed earlier, that a significant change of government policy -- as I interpret this to be; the government may not -- a significant change in a bill and a significant change in policy should in fact be announced in the period for ministerial statements, when the news media are all here, when the action is taking place in the Legislative Assembly, instead of being left until later on in the afternoon.

Members can see there is nobody at all in the press gallery right now, there are only a few people in the public galleries and it is an excellent time for a government to sneak changes through if it wants to. I am not saying this government is doing that; I am saying it is an excellent opportunity for a government to do that. I would not want to suggest that motive for this government, but certainly that is a conclusion that some would draw.

If the minister were to stand up in the House and announce these changes to his legislation in a public way tomorrow, I would be more than happy to see that happen. If it took additional time tomorrow for ministerial statements, on behalf of our party, I would be happy to allow additional time for that purpose. What I am concerned about is that, when it has something embarrassing, the government tries to do it somewhere else -- later on in question period, gets a private member to do it, a press conference or out in Mississauga.

The Speaker: New information? The member for Mississauga South.

Mrs Marland: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: The government House leader had the arrogance to say a few minutes ago that the member for Mississauga South was wrong in her recollection of what the House leaders had agreed to. I would appreciate the government House leader's apologizing to me since he has now heard what the agreement was. The agreement was for the minister to make the statement in the ministerial statements period of routine proceedings in the afternoon.

I think it is impossible for us to continue to debate Bill 118 this afternoon when we do not have the opportunity to have a copy of the speech of the member for Victoria-Haliburton, which is bringing into this House an initiative and a change in policy as contained in Bill 118, the bill we are familiar with, which we were willing to come into this House this afternoon to debate.

Mr Speaker, I would appreciate your ruling on what exactly is the bill that we will be debating this afternoon, with or without the change in policy of this socialist government.

The Speaker: This is new information. The member for Halton Centre on the same point.

Mrs Sullivan: Mr Speaker, I am rising on a point of privilege. I believe that my privileges as a member of the Legislature have been breached. I intend to speak on this bill and participate in the debate on Bill 118, and in order to do so, I need full and complete detail on the government's policy and approach on this particular issue.

To date, the government has officially made that known through the introduction of Bill 118, which is what we are debating to this point, but what we are hearing today is not from a member of the executive council who participated in setting that policy and introducing that legislation, but from a member of the caucus who is not a part of government. I think it should be recognized that the government introduces the bills, which are public bills. This member is not a part of that government.

What the member appears to be telling us is that the government has a significant change in its direction on this bill. However, those changes he is discussing are not being presented to us by government. In effect, a member of this chamber who is not a part of this government has been privy to information in advance of other members of this chamber.

I believe that is a breach of my privileges as a member, and indeed a breach of the privileges of all the other members of this chamber.

The Speaker: The member for Brampton North: I trust this is new information.

Mr McClelland: Yes, it is, Mr Speaker. It is something that I would ask you to consider and something you said in your closing comments.

Mr Speaker, you said before my friend the member for Mississauga South spoke that you would make a judgement and proceed with the debate. I say with great respect that to do that completely nullifies the point of order and the point of privilege I brought to you. If you were to rule that I must proceed at this present time, with the greatest of respect, you certainly cannot have considered my point, it being that I as a member have had my privileges violated.

If it is a point of privilege with respect to my being able to proceed on the substantive portions of this bill, if it is being changed and you are telling me to proceed on this matter but you will reserve judgement until later, how then can you come back to me in the event you say that my point is well taken and say, after the fact, "You were right, but I am sorry, you have had your kick at the can."

Furthermore, Mr Speaker, I draw your attention to the standing orders, which I think you would be pleased to have brought forward at this point in time. I suggest it is potentially possible for significant cost issues to be raised with the statement being put forward here, the change in direction.

Is it appropriate, in terms of the orders of this House, for a private member to stand in his place and bring forward a statement that may have significant financial implications with respect to the introduction of this bill and the change? I put that question to you, Mr Speaker. I ask you to consider ruling, not at the present time but to hold it in reserve and stand this issue down. If you rule that I must proceed, then you cannot, in fairness, have dealt with my issue.

The Speaker: I always appreciate it when members are familiar with the standing orders. I assume all members are. Second, members may be aware that for better or worse, the Speaker is not aware of House leaders' agreements nor is he privy to those discussions.

I have listened very carefully. The point raised by the member for Brampton North is taken very seriously and I will reserve judgement on this. The House stands recessed for 10 minutes.

The House recessed at 1604.

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The Speaker: Indeed, as is the tradition in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, the three House leaders have reached an agreement as to how we should best proceed, so there is not a point of order to be dealt with. While I appreciate the very swift progress that was made, it would be very much appreciated if the discussions involving the three House leaders could take place outside the chamber, rather than having to debate in the chamber the concerns that each individual House leader has. Having reached the agreement then, I understand the member for Brampton North once again has the floor.

Mr McClelland: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I would say at the outset that I find myself at somewhat of a disadvantage, but having said that, I will proceed as best I am able, simply to summarize some comments I put forward in this place on September 23.

We hear today that there will be a change in the fundamental nature of the legislation, in my view, that would indicate that any directive given by the cabinet to Ontario Hydro must be within the mandate of Ontario Hydro. I welcome that as good news if in fact that is the case, and I will be interested to see precisely how that is done.

Might I suggest that having done that, the government has fundamentally changed the very nature of this bill. If they have done that, if they have recognized that, if they have gone back home and talked to some people and found out this is not going to fly, then they should reconsider the whole thing. It is a fundamental change, in my view, to the whole principle of the bill. It is one of the three significant points put forward by Bill 118, and they have taken one out, apparently. We will have to wait and see what actually comes to pass with that.

I think it is consistent. There is a tremendous amount of parliamentary tradition that would say that when you fundamentally change the nature of a bill, you do one of two things: You either kill it or you start afresh. I think they are determined to go ahead with certain aspects of it, and that means they have to change the bill significantly. Better yet that they do it all over.

We have a situation here where the cabinet is now going to say, "We give you a directive within the mandate of Ontario." We will be interested to see how that plays out, for the minister to stand in his place and say: "Let's not be absurd. I am not going to use by any means the authority we would have pursuant to Bill 118 to make directions to Hydro that have significant policy implications."

All we have to do is look at history, at what has happened over the past few months. Over the past few months, that is exactly what has happened. The bill has not even yet had second reading in this place and the minister is doing the very thing. He stood in his place and said: "I'm not prepared to do that. The directives coming from cabinet are going to have to be within the strict mandate of Ontario Hydro," which my good friend the member for Ottawa South has said is very clear and plain: to provide energy, electricity, at cost, to the consumer in Ontario. Having said they are going to ensure that any directives do that, history tells us in just the couple of months past that they have done anything but, that they have gone significantly beyond that mandate.

I say to the people of Ontario that with the appointee of the current government demanding a salary of some $400,000-plus, they want to put increases of at least 11% to the people of Ontario. They are saying: "Don't worry about this. We're not going to give you any directives that aren't going to fit nicely." The people of Ontario have to wonder what is being said here, "What are these people in government, the current New Democratic government, trying to tell us?" "We're not going to do it, but don't worry. We've already done it." The people of Ontario have to ask themselves that question. What is going on here for a government that says: "Don't worry. It won't happen in the future. By the way, we're sorry we have already done it a couple of times"? The bill is not even proclaimed yet or even had second reading.

All the while they are talking about significant rate increases to the people of the province, "It's all right for my friends to come into a new job at $400,000-plus a year." I just wonder how well that sits with the people, certainly back in Brampton North.

We had some discussion a few moments ago about my privileges here in this House. One of the responsibilities I have is to represent the people of my community and suggest in this place that they are not getting a good deal.

I do not know exactly what is going to be forthcoming from the minister in his statement tomorrow, but I do know this. I know the chairman of Ontario Hydro has said: "You're going to look for very significant increases this year. Over the next three years, you can expect 44% or more increase in your hydro rates." I think the people of Ontario have a right to know that. I think they ought to have put to them very plainly by this government that, "We are going to hit you with significant costs." They ought to know that.

I will tell them again and again until my friends opposite in government understand that the people of Ontario are not prepared to accept that kind of hidden tax. If you voted NDP, I say to the people of Ontario, what you are getting is taxes that are being put to you through your hydro rates by virtue of this bill. If you like that happening, then re-elect this government when you have that opportunity a few years down the road, because you have not seen anything yet in terms of the costs that are going to be coming to you either directly or indirectly. I suppose I object to that more than anything else.

I think any government at any level is going to take a lot of criticism for increasing taxes, but that is the cost of leadership. I have said before in this place that if they are going to do it they should stand up and do it forthrightly and directly. They should not slide it off on Ontario Hydro. They should not slide it off on the monthly billings that people across this province are going to get coming through the mail or on their automatic billing plans from their local hydro commission. That is not the way to tax people in this province. The government should rethink this in terms of what it is doing to people who are desperately trying to hang on to jobs.

Many people in my community are losing their homes. I have never had the kind of traffic in my four short years here as I have had in the past few months in terms of economic hardship. They say, "Well, what's 11% on my hydro bill?" This is what it is: When you do not have anything left, when there is no money in the cookie jar, 11% is sometimes the final straw. There are people who are barely hanging on and the government is going to add to their cost of housing, 44% over three years.

My backbench friends should think of that when they go back home. The people who put them in, who gave them the responsibility to represent them here, do not want a 44% hydro tax increase. I use that word advisedly, because that is what is happening. It is not power for cost. It is not provision as mandated by Ontario Hydro. This is an opportunity for the government to do its northern development program -- all well and good; my seatmate from Elliot Lake is delighted that the government has responded to a need in that community.

But let's be forthright about it. Let's do it the way the government is entrusted to do it, up front, not sliding this tax through people's mailboxes in the form of Ontario Hydro rate increases. They should not insult the people of Ontario by hitting them with that kind of increase and saying, "The friend we brought in to run this organization is worth $400,000-plus a year." They should not insult them that way. People are tired of that kind of thing. They are tired of the new limousines; they are tired of them having their offices renovated.

I stood in the House today and asked a question of relative insignificance in terms of dollars and cents, and all the while thousands of dollars are being spent at another ministry in terms of office renovations. People do not like that. The government has to understand that they are not going to sit back idly and accept it from the government, so it should reconsider that.

I say to the people of Brampton North that I will not go back to my community without having voiced my opinion as strongly and as emphatically as I can that the people of my community ought not to have a 44% increase in hydro rates over the next three years, as projected by the friend of the New Democratic Party who is now at the helm of Ontario Hydro, that large institution. People cannot afford it and they will not accept it willingly.

I want to talk very briefly about what the government is going to do with this. The government has the majority and it says: "We're prepared to go to public hearings. We want to get this bill in quickly because we've got to get this money flowing. In fact, we've got to continue what we're doing, but we'll put this to public hearings."

The minister is not here right now and the government House leader, unfortunately, is not here right now. I want to know what they are talking about when they talk about public hearings. Are they talking about Toronto? Are they talking about a committee room down the hall at Queen's Park where they can invite a few people, energy consultants or people from the natural gas industry, who are happy about this bill which is going to increase hydro rates by 44%?

I am still amazed that on September 23, when I debated this, the minister stood in his place and said, "The people who sell natural gas are happy that we're increas-ing." Is that not a wonderful surprise? Of course they are happy. I would be happy too if one of my competitors were having a 44% increase in the product he was supplying.

What kind of people are they going to invite to the public hearings and where are they going to do it? Are they going to do it just down the hall here? Are they prepared to take it to the people of Ontario? Are they prepared to go to Victoria-Haliburton, I say to my friend opposite, and let the people in his community tell him what they really think about it? Are they prepared to go to northern Ontario, to Cochrane and areas, and hear what they want to say about this increase? Are they prepared to go to rural southwestern Ontario, where farmers who have tremendous energy costs are struggling, and say to them, "If you want to voice your displeasure, come on down to Queen's Park and we'll listen to you"?

I challenge the government that if it is going to go to public hearings it should take it to the people of Ontario across the province and give them ample opportunity to put their case before the government so it has a sense of how they really feel about this.

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I could go on at length, but there are other people who want to speak, and I already had an opportunity a couple of weeks ago to voice some of the concerns I have. I simply want to say in summary that I find this to be one of the more distasteful things I have experienced in my years here.

I do not mind taking the heat for tax increases, as I did in the former government as a backbencher. That is what I get paid for. I say to members opposite, take it. Be prepared to stand up and say, "That's what we're doing and here is our rationale for it." They should not slide it off through the mailbox, I say to the Minister of Natural Resources, by saying, "We're just going to up the ante a little bit month to month on your hydro bill." If they want to do something, they should say they are doing it and stand up and deal with it on a direct basis.

I would hope as we have this new act -- it is being changed somewhat, I think in large measure due to the very wise thoughts put forward by my friend the member for Ottawa South. He put forward a very compelling case. I am delighted that the Minister of Energy has responded and considered, apparently, the member's position that the mandate of Ontario Hydro ought to be the framework within which government policy is enacted through the vehicle of Ontario Hydro.

I am delighted that this apparently is going to happen. I am anxious to see it. I maintain that I would have liked to have had the opportunity to address it more fully. I would have liked to have seen what it was before I was required to continue the debate here this afternoon.

The people of Ontario are not going to be happy about this. I will go back to my community and say I have put it very plainly to the government that I think it is wrong. I think it is doing a disservice to the people of Ontario. I think it is doing a disservice to them in terms of the immediate cost. I think it is doing a disservice to them in terms of the impact it may have, and I believe will have, in terms of the attractiveness of business investment in this community. I think it will regret very significantly the day it pushed this forward.

If they are going to do it, I implore them to at least hold public hearings in a broad range geographically across this province. Go to each region of this province and hear what those folks will say. Go to the people of Elliot Lake, I say to the Minister of Natural Resources, and ask them how they feel about the appropriateness of having the program his government has put in place for Elliot Lake paid for by all the people of the province through their hydro rates. I hope the government will have the courage of its convictions and go forward to every corner of this province and allow the people to express their concerns and their views with respect to this legislation.

I hope the government will reconsider. It reconsidered in part; that is a good start. It should rethink the whole thing and make sure the people of Ontario get what they have always had: power at cost, provided to them in an efficient manner. Let's have that as part of a comprehensive energy policy which we need very badly to build the kind of economy we need for Ontario and for the kids in this province who are looking forward, hopefully, to a happy future here.

Mr McGuinty: I want to reinforce some of the statements made by the member for Brampton North. In particular, although we are spending a lot of time addressing what the bill does, we are not addressing one of the major issues we are all facing which this bill does not address, that is, this business of our rates and the substantial hikes we have to contend with.

Our rates are going up 11.8% next year. This year they went up 15.6% due to the combined effect of the goods and services tax, and they have been predicted to go up over 44% over the next three years by the chairman of Ontario Hydro. We now know that Ontario's residential ratepayers are paying on average 33% more than ratepayers elsewhere in Canada. Our industrial and commercial ratepayers are paying on average 60% more than their equivalents elsewhere in Canada.

The question we have for the minister is, what is he doing to help control these rate hikes? What is he doing to ensure that our existing ratepayers are going to be able to manage these increases? What is he doing to ensure that we are going to keep Ontario an attractive place for investors, who will be comparing the different jurisdictions with a view to determining who charges the most for hydro? We have farmers, single-parent families, all trying in the context of a recession to manage these. Of course, when it comes to hydro, we cannot shop elsewhere. We have to buy our electricity from Ontario Hydro. This bill does nothing whatsoever to address those spiralling rate hikes.

Hon Mr Wildman: I always enjoy the comments of my friend the member for Brampton North. I have heard his remarks and I know he feels very strongly on this issue.

I want to put before members of the House the question in regard to his comments about this bill: Why is it considered unusual or surprising that a government in this province would indeed believe that Ontario Hydro should be used as a development tool in directing development across the province? This is certainly nothing new. Ever since Sir Adam Beck in 1905 dreamed up the idea of Ontario Hydro, it was conceived and thought of as a development tool for the province.

Frankly, this is not unusual in Canada. Everyone in this House is aware, particularly my friend the member for Ottawa South, that Hydro-Quebec is used as a development tool by the government of that province. It is quite a legitimate approach, just as we might use transportation, infrastructure, just as this country has always used things like railways as a development tool. We have always believed in this large country, with the resources we have, the distances we have and the problems of climate we have, that we should indeed make certain that the agencies of government are used in such a way as to try to deal with those distances and those disadvantages we face in many parts of the province. That is what this bill will do. This bill will make it possible for Ontario Hydro to become part of the economic solution in this province, rather than continuing to contribute, through price hikes and so on, to the economic difficulties we face.

Mr McClelland: I will be brief. I appreciate the historical reference made by the honourable minister, the member for Algoma, to the advent of Ontario Hydro in 1905. I suppose I wait with some relish to hear the historic rendering the member for Renfrew North will afford this House and the people of Ontario as he reviews the history of Ontario Hydro and indeed speculates on the future of it in light of Bill 118.

The honourable minister said in his concluding remarks that he did not want Ontario Hydro to be part of the problem by contributing to rate hikes. The minister will know that this is not only exactly what is going to happen, but it is going to happen with a greater percentage increase than has ever been occasioned in this province before. I would suggest to him that I agree with that portion of his statement. Very soon, the people of Ontario are going to see those bills coming in. They are going to wake up and smell the coffee and say: "Boy, you're right. We don't want to see Ontario Hydro becoming a problem in terms of our household expenses, in terms of our business expenses, in terms of the investment climate in this province." It is one more ingredient in the mix that says: "Are we sure we ought to come to Ontario? Do they really know where they are going in terms of energy costs?"

One of the great competitive advantages we have had in this province is being put in jeopardy. I say again that the people of Ontario ought to know that. I urge them to respond, to take action, to call their members, to write to their members or to the Minister of Energy and the Premier of this province and demand the opportunity to put their case before a committee of this Legislative Assembly that will travel to all parts of the province, hear the good people of Ontario and understand their displeasure about what is taking place, I say again, somewhat insidiously, through the implementation of Bill 118.

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Mrs Marland: As I rise today to take part in this debate on Bill 118, An act to amend the Power Corporation Act, I have to wonder somewhat whether this bill is going to be allowed to proceed in its present form or whether the government, in the interim of public hearings after second reading, may have come to its senses. That they have come to their senses is what we might have heard today from the Minister of Energy had he been prepared to make his statement.

However, it seems the government is rushing from bush fire to bush fire in a piecemeal fashion with all its legislation. I understand the little situation that occurred earlier this afternoon was the result of a motion passed by the Municipal Electric Association on Sunday, and here we are on Tuesday afternoon, 48 hours later, and we have a government that is running. Let's hope that instead of running backwards they are willing to look forward, and in looking forward to the future recognize that this province will not have any future if we go down this slippery road Bill 118 would take us.

Particularly, I think it bears merit to read into the record the resolution of the Municipal Electric Association, to which we understood the Minister of Energy was going to try to respond today. We now have assurance that he is going to respond tomorrow. That motion of the Municipal Electric Association reads as follows:

"That the provincial MEA publicity campaign against Bill 118 (Power Corporation Amendment Act) be discontinued, if the Minister of Energy, within the next 48 hours, makes a suitable statement in the Legislature clearly committing the government to restrict the proposed power to direct Ontario Hydro to matters in the act, and commits to effective consultation on the criteria for, impact of and implementation of subsidies or loans for fuel-switching,

"And further it is noted that this does not preclude presentations to committee hearings focused on operational matters regarding the bill,

"And further, the chair and president should write the minister welcoming the new openness and looking for further future co-operation."

I am sure that now, since the 48 hours have elapsed, the members of the Municipal Electric Association wonder whether they can trust this government at all. I think the members of that association share with us, as Progressive Conservatives, in our caucus many of the same concerns about what this bill is exactly about.

When we look at what Ontario Hydro has been under the Power Corporation Act, we can respect the fact that it always has been an arm's-length corporation. It is very significant now when we have the current socialist government wanting to dip its hand right into the cookie jar and control Hydro rates so that if they need more money all they have to do, through the amendments to the Power Corporation Act, which is what Bill 118 is all about, is to cover off any areas they are interested in having more income from.

Is this not rather significant when one reads what the bill actually says? The fact is that this bill gives the government powers over Ontario Hydro. This government has protected itself by appointing its own person to head Ontario Hydro, so it does have control at the top. But the concern we have is that the whole issue of policy as to the future of the provision of power in Ontario will no longer rest with the major provider of power, namely Ontario Hydro. It will be totally under the hand and within the arm of this socialist government.

We know this government is very open about its anti-nuclear stance. We recognize that any government that is against the nuclear generation of electricity in 1991 is a government that is totally in the Dark Ages, to use a pun. We also know that the people who know how much electricity is needed in Ontario today and have very accurate projections of how much will be needed in the future know we cannot provide that amount of electricity and meet those load demands with only coal-fired or fossil-fuel-fired thermal units in combination with Hydro generation.

As an aside, it might have been refreshing if this government had come in with a bill changing the name rather than the direction of Ontario Hydro, because it is rather a misnomer. It is a power supplier, and since the majority of electricity is no longer generated by water, it would be appropriate to change the name of the corporation. That is a direction we would support.

The fact that this bill makes major changes in the operation of Ontario Hydro is something the public of Ontario will never know until it starts receiving its Hydro bills with increased rates, when the public of Ontario no longer has the privilege and opportunity of receiving electricity at cost. It has always been the policy that whatever it costs to generate electricity, those costs and those costs only would be borne by the consumers of electricity.

We have a bill which is doing a number of things. First of all, it is making the chairperson of Ontario Hydro the chief executive officer of the corporation and that would be effective this past June. Any actions taken by individuals other than the chairperson who represent themselves as the chief executive officer will not be binding on the corporation.

If we ever need an example of how wrong it is to have the chairperson and the chief executive officer of an agency or corporation being the same person, we have it in TVOntario. I suggest to the government that where the chief executive officer of a corporation reports to the chairman of the board and is his or her own boss, this is absolutely senseless; it is irresponsible. If this government were really following the rhetoric we have heard from it in opposition in all the years of its history in this province, I think the last thing it would do is to make the chief executive officer also chairman of the corporation, but that is what this bill does.

The bill also increases the membership on the board of directors of Ontario Hydro from 17 to 22. We understand that is purely so they can make their own NDP appointments and have control over that board -- pretty straightforward logic on their part. If they want to control the policies of Ontario Hydro and therefore control the future direction of the supply of electricity in this province -- and regardless of whether they accept the fact that they will be putting us in the dark, literally -- they have to control the board. They have simply done that by increasing the number of appointees to the board.

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Another thing that is unique is that they are appointing the Deputy Minister of Energy as a non-voting member of Ontario Hydro's board of directors. Now I accept that he is non-voting, but we would think that if this corporation were to be an arm's-length corporation, the way it was founded and intended to be when it was originally established, as soon as you appoint a deputy minister to the board of directors, you eliminate that arm's-length relationship. But bear in mind, of course, that this is exactly what this socialist government wants. They want to control Ontario Hydro because they want to use the Hydro rates to pay for their social agenda.

We know and everybody who has looked at this knows very clearly what is going on. The sad part is that the public of Ontario will not know until it is too late. Mind you, I am quite sure the public of Ontario will remind this government that they are not to be taken lightly when it comes time for the next election.

This bill also allows the Minister of Energy to issue policy directives approved by the Lieutenant Governor in Council that would be binding on the corporation. For people listening or watching, we perhaps should just explain what this means, because this is the most significant part of Bill 118.

This is the part that allows the Minister of Energy to issue policy directives approved by the Lieutenant Governor in Council. Everyone knows that a policy directive approved by the Lieutenant Governor in Council is in fact a policy directive by the government of the day. We in opposition, with a majority government -- which we unfortunately have at the moment with this socialist government -- have no power to control what those policy directions will be. The fact is the bill says that whatever those policy directives are, approved by the Lieutenant Governor in Council at the direction of the Ministry of Energy, they would be binding on the corporation.

The irony in this part of the bill is that we might as well do away with the board of directors, even though I have already said the board of directors is going to be controlled by the members appointed by this socialist government. We might as well do away with the board of directors, because whatever is allowed to the Minister of Energy through this bill would be binding on the corporation. If by some fluke the board of directors of the corporation decided it wanted to disagree with a policy directive from the Minister of Energy, it would not matter, because if that initiative or direction had been approved by the Lieutenant Governor in Council, then that is the direction it would be.

I want to speak for a few minutes on one of those major policy directions. In order to do that, I want to refer back to the standing committee on estimates of Monday, February 11, 1991, at which time the then Minister of Energy, the member for Peterborough, was before that estimates committee.

I was asking the Minister of Energy on what information she based her opinion that we should not have any more nuclear power plants in Ontario. It was very interesting to hear her response, because she referred to the fact that there was evidence about them being unsafe. I just want to read for a moment a quotation from page E-37 of those estimates in Hansard.

"Mrs Marland: I mean, you said on the subject of nuclear generation, 'We're not going to commit ourselves too deeply until the results are heard.' Then you go on to give an example by saying that the source of the uranium is in mines which are unsafe, and I am trying to get very clear from you what your arguments are. Are your arguments against nuclear generation because the mining of the energy source is unsafe?

"Hon Mrs Carter: There is a certain risk involved in it, I think, yes, even with the best conditions made possible. I do not think any mining is altogether safe and healthy and, of course, when you have radioactive dust as a complication, that does certainly increase the problem. But there are, of course, other related concerns. The health of the miners is not the only one.

"We have the problem of the tailings which are deposited on the surface and which either can blow around or leach into waterways and so on. That is quite a serious problem, I think, certainly south of Elliot Lake. Then, of course, at the other end of the nuclear fuel cycle we have the disposal of the used fuel, which is also a problem that we have not totally managed to solve at this point. So to focus attention on the actual power stations is not to realize the full extent of the problems that we do have with nuclear power.

"Mrs Marland: Would you agree, Minister, that a moratorium is pretty significant? I mean, what is your interpretation of the word 'moratorium'? Would you agree that 'moratorium' is a pretty significant word in its intent?

"Hon Mrs Carter: Yes, I certainly would. It means something is put on hold until further notice.

"Mrs Marland: Right. So when you say you are not going to commit yourselves too deeply, would you agree that a moratorium is a pretty deep commitment?

"Hon Mrs Carter: Yes, but it is only a moratorium on the development of new nuclear power."

The problem with the discussion and the debate on nuclear power is that the people who are making passionate arguments against nuclear power almost link it to all the other hazards known to the use and application of nuclear energy. Suddenly the whole situation gets out of the world of relativity.

When I went on to ask the minister if they were looking for alternative generation and about the fact that looking for alternative generation was not a unique idea, she said: "We have quite a range of shorter-term options. Our favourite one is to use less."

This brings us to the whole crux of the problem of a government controlling Ontario Hydro. There is not one member in this Legislature who would not agree and, I hope, who does not practise using less electricity. I hope every one of us has done all the things that we possibly can in our homes and apartments and places of residence to conserve on the use of energy.

What is really significant is that when I went on in this same standing committee on estimates meeting to ask the chairman of Ontario Hydro whether or not the demand for the future supply of electricity in Ontario could be met without any further nuclear generation being built in Ontario, his response was very significant. I would like, for the record, to quote Mr Franklin on page E-38:

"I understood that if we are faced with CO2 limitations, they may be announced in 1994 but they would not click in, I do not think, until post-2000. I may be wrong about that, but my colleagues will correct me if I am. So I think the CO2 limitations were more troublesome for us when we are talking about post-2000, which after all is kind of what our demand-supply plan really is all about.

"Our view, as expressed in that plan, I do not think has changed. We may be able to debate the timing of new generation and things like that, but our view is expressed there that when that time comes, if we rely on fossil fuels for base load, we will not be able to meet what we see to be pending CO2 limitations.

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"We have to remember that 28% of our plant will become obsolete and not in existence during this planning process we are talking about. So we not only have to meet the increasing growth, we have to replace what we have. I think the debate is not whether you need new generation, but when you will need it. How long can you postpone the date?

"In our view, as we expressed in that plan, we have taken our best judgement on what load growth will be, what we can get from non-utility generation, what we can get from conservation, etc, what we can get from hydraulic, how much we can buy from other provinces, and we have come to the conclusion in that report, after five years of study, that somewhere in the year 2002-03, in that area, we will need another major generating source. I do believe that if we rely on fossil fuels to do that and these limitations come on that we are talking about, we will bump our heads on those limitations. It is a question of when."

Mr Franklin was the chairman of Ontario Hydro. I say with respect to this government that if it thinks any one of these members in this House today or any of the cabinet ministers, who are not in this House today, think they know more about meeting the energy demand needs and the forecasts for this province than Ontario Hydro, which has studied it for five years, then they are really out to lunch. It is unbelievable that anyone in 1991 can sit there and realistically say, "No, no, we can't have any other nuclear generation." The argument we hear, of course, is that it is unsafe, it is expensive and everything else.

I wonder if any of the people in this House know anyone personally who is dependent on electricity to live. I do, and perhaps, Mr Speaker, you do. You only have to visit someone who is dependent on electricity to live. I am not talking about the luxury -- if they think it is luxury -- of light, heat or cooling. I am talking of the need for electricity to generate a life-sustaining piece of equipment. Certainly those people in an emergency situation have had to transfer to auxiliary power, but on a long-term basis, those people's lives depend on electricity.

Mr Duignan: Remember Chernobyl? Remember Three Mile Island?

Mrs Marland: I hear the member for Halton North asking, "Remember Three Mile Island?" I would have credited this member with more intelligence than to make that comment, because yes, I do remember Three Mile Island, I do remember Chernobyl and I do know a little about the generation in the nuclear plants that have been built and owned and operated by Ontario Hydro.

If the member for Halton North does not have the benefit of that knowledge, then he is the loser, because the little I know about the Candu reactor is that it has horizontal fuel rods, not vertical ones. In Chernobyl and Three Mile Island the vertical fuel rods were the contributing cause to the problem. In Three Mile Island it was not a meltdown, but in Chernobyl it was a meltdown. If the member knows anything about anything, he should speak, but if he does not, he should not make inane comments that have no significance in this House.

I am not an electrical engineer. I do not pretend to know about the generation of electricity. But I will tell members one thing that I wager no other member in this House did. At the time of Chernobyl -- I may be wrong, but I think it was April 1986. I stand to be corrected if that date is incorrect; I am trying to remember. In any case, I recall that it was some time in the spring perhaps of that year. I went to Darlington in August that year. I had not visited a nuclear generating plant before. Because my constituents were suddenly fearful, concerned, wondering if a Chernobyl could happen in Ontario or indeed Canada or the United States, I felt I had an obligation to go and find out something about nuclear generation. So I took a camera crew and I went to Darlington and I spent 10 hours filming, for the benefit of my constituents, a record of how a nuclear plant operates in Ontario. From that 10 hours of filming, we made a concise, 30-minute presentation.

I was doing this as a layperson with a public relations person and an engineer from Ontario Hydro who could put the technical language into language that the layperson, which was myself, could understand. I asked questions about safety in the design of the Darlington nuclear plant. I asked how we could tell the people of Ontario that they did not have to fear a Chernobyl accident in Ontario with Ontario Hydro's operation with the Candu reactor.

I understood at the end of 10 hours -- I say again in a non-technical format -- why there are differences. I learned at first hand what the built-in safety design is of Darlington, how much additional cost there is to the design and construction of a nuclear plant in Ontario today that is purely attributable to the safety features. We could probably build these plants for half the cost if we did not invest in all the additional design costs that are directly attributable to safety.

For the sake of the member for Halton North, who threw out that comment a minute ago about Three Mile Island -- he might be interested to know this -- one thing they have at Darlington is a whole structure of volume of space contained within walls into which all the air from the area of the reactor can be transferred.

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Where the reactor sits in the Darlington plant I think is called a vault. Maybe my colleague the member for Lanark-Renfrew will know this far better than I, but I think where the reactor sits is a vault and it is in a very large volume of space and, therefore, a large volume of air. The safety feature is that immediately adjacent to this is another large structure. It is just like a big empty can. In the event of a malfunction of that reactor, the air is removed from that area and contained in a standby space so that there is no concern about that air, with any hazard associated with it, as an emission. There is no risk to its being released into the atmosphere.

Before I went to visit Darlington, I probably was ambivalent about nuclear generation, but I knew the reason the Candu reactor was as popular as it was all around the world was because of the safety design built into it. In fact, I felt reassured, as did my constituents who later told me, after seeing that film, that finally they understood why nuclear generation was expensive. But they also recognized that if we are talking about the future of our province and the growth of our province, we need nuclear generation.

Interjections.

Mrs Marland: If these members who are prattling on now with their interjections would care to show me the courtesy of not interjecting and maybe waiting until they get an opportunity to speak, they could rebut my information if they have more accurate information. If they wish to debate the information I am giving them, if they wish to defend the position they hold, that there will be no further nuclear generation of electricity in this province because of unknown risks or safety, and put at risk the very safety of the people who already live here who cannot live without electricity, then that is on their shoulders; it is not on mine.

The fact is that if we want to say to the people who live in Ontario: "Don't have any more babies, because we can't deal with the growth of our province. We can't have any increase in our population. We can't invite anyone here to build industry and develop our commerce and retail sectors because we won't have any electricity for them" -- when the chairman of Ontario Hydro refers to its demand-supply report, which took five years to develop, and says we cannot be dependent on fossil-fuel generation, are these members willing to be at the end of the telephone when we get our first brownouts and then our blackouts, when people are in crises, in emergency situations because we are out of electricity?

The fact is that this socialist government, which wants to be all things and do all things for all people, will not have any resources to do that. They will not even have the resources that exist today, because industry and commerce will be gone. Industry and commerce will leave this province because there is no question that without a supply of electricity, industry and commerce are not interested in establishing in Ontario.

Any of the members who have a rebuttal to the former chairman of Ontario Hydro, and if their rebuttal is that they can meet the load-demand projections for the next decade with conservation, then they really are living in Alice in Wonderland. I would hope, with respect, that none of them is going to stand up and say, as did their former Minister of Energy, that the load-demand requirement will be met through conservation.

Yes, we should conserve and we should increase our conservation of electricity. We should be doing that in any case. I can tell members one thing that is going to force the people of this province to conserve their electricity is going to be the rates they will be paying after this socialist government piles all its social agenda and social services expenses on to our Hydro rates and uses Ontario Hydro as a cash cow from which to extract indirect taxation.

In fairness, I should read into the record a letter to myself from Hydro Mississauga, because this Bill 118 is very significant. For those members who would like a copy, I would be more than happy to send a copy over to them. The letter is actually dated September 11, 1991, and reads:

"Dear Mrs Marland:

"On behalf of Hydro Mississauga, I am writing to express our opposition to Bill 118, An Act to amend the Power Corporation Act, which is being considered for second reading by the provincial Legislature this fall.

"Bill 118 threatens to destroy Ontario's long-cherished principle of power at cost by making electricity rates a new source of tax revenue for the provincial government.

"Under Bill 118, the provincial government would be able to issue policy directives that bypass the democratic legislative process, are binding on Ontario Hydro, and that could force Hydro to do things that are outside its current mandate -- the provision of safe, reliable electricity. In addition, Bill 118 would force Ontario electricity consumers to pay for these policy directives through their rates. This is unacceptable.

"We also object to the sections of Bill 118 that permit Ontario Hydro to subsidize fuel substitution through electricity rates. This is unnecessary, as market forces alone are enough to encourage certain types of fuel switching.

"Hydro Mississauga supports the campaign of the Municipal Electric Association (MEA) to change Bill 118 in the areas of policy directives and fuel substitution. The MEA position paper is enclosed for your information.

"Bill 118 is flawed legislation that sets dangerous precedents and allows a new hidden 'tax grab' by the provincial government.

"We urge you to speak to Energy critic Leo Jordan on this subject and look forward to your support in our fight to change Bill 118.

"Sincerely,

"Alan E. Bradley, PEng

"Chairman."

It is copied to T. Jennings at the MEA and is on the letterhead of Hydro Mississauga, Mavis Road, Mississauga.

I think it is significant to recognize that this letter from Hydro Mississauga is only one of hundreds this socialist government will have received by now from those people around this province who are responsible for retailing electricity. It is one thing for the government to control Ontario Hydro and to have the power to use the Ontario Hydro rates as a tax grab for its own Treasury, for its own budget to spend money on whatever its priorities are, but the fact is the people who end up with the responsibility at the next level of administration in dealing with the people of Ontario who purchase electricity are the local utility administrators.

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Alan Bradley, as chairman of Hydro Mississauga, is saying, without a partisan bone in his body -- I could not tell members what political party Alan Bradley belongs to; I can tell them he has been chairman of Hydro Mississauga for a very long time. He is also supported by very excellent individuals who sit as commissioners on Hydro Mississauga, including Mayor Hazel McCallion, the mayor of Mississauga, and Mr Ron Starr. These are people who, for reasons of personal commitment to the service of the people of Mississauga, have said they are concerned about Bill 118.

They are not saying some of the partisan political things that I am saying because I am free to do that; they are simply representing their customers. It is the local utilities that retail Ontario Hydro's product. It is the local utilities that then have to be the retailers of electricity and collect the money for the cost of that electricity. They are saying they do not mind collecting the costs of electricity rates, of hydro rates, but they do not want to have to collect additional costs which may be applied by this socialist government.

Immediately following the September election of last year, the chairman of AMPCO, the Association of Major Power Consumers in Ontario -- and I do not think it would take much imagination by the members of this House to recognize who the major power consumers of Ontario are -- Mr Lounsbury, who is now retired, commented: "Without nuclear energy, this province is finished industrially. Industry won't grow at all."

Mr Lounsbury later stated: "There is a gradual movement of business development out of Ontario. This is cur-rently in the form of carrying out plant expansion outside rather than inside Ontario. The future availability of a reliable source of electricity at cost has become a major concern."

The people who are responsible for the supply of electricity know full well that there is no one in Ontario today who can live without the use of electricity, unless we are willing to step back into the Dark Ages and go back to coal lamps, maybe even horses and buggies. Maybe when we pull into a gas station to fill up our car we will be happy to operate a hand pump. Any kind of example in our daily lives without electricity, I suggest, would be almost impossible.

We are actually in a situation where the supply of energy has become something we absolutely take for granted, and maybe on that score we have been guilty in the past of taking the availability of that supply for granted. We have not conserved enough, we have not realized how important are all the simple things we can do in our homes, in our offices and in our industrial plants, such as turning off unused lights and equipment that uses electricity when it is not in use.

Some of those things we have not done in the past because we have not had enough of an emphasis on conservation, but I think to suggest that through conservation alone we will meet the increased demand for electricity in this province is totally unrealistic.

On the subject of how we have perhaps wasted, all of us, electricity in the past, I would like to say that AMPCO has defended itself against critics who have cited its members for unnecessary waste of electricity.

The member for Peterborough in her address to AMPCO's annual meeting this year stated that Ontario industry must utilize available technology for the reduction of electricity. AMPCO has responded by citing numerous awards its members have received from Ontario Hydro for their efforts in reducing power consumption. So this minister, who thinks it is realistic to meet the demands for electricity in the future by conserving, obviously does not know what has been going on.

Members can be assured that industry that is dependent on electricity is not going to waste it. Industry that relies on electricity at the cost that it is today, before this socialist government get its hand in the cookie jar and puts everything else on the hydro rates, as I said a few minutes ago, probably has as its greatest operating expense its electricity bills. For that reason alone, they would be conserving as much as they possibly could, and therefore reducing their costs.

The Municipal Electric Association is becoming increasingly concerned with the overall deterioration. They are concerned about what is going to happen with all these plants that need replacement and refurbishing. They have just spent almost $3 billion refurbishing the Lakeview generating plant in my own riding of Mississauga South. That is a coal-fired thermal unit. As Mr Franklin says in his comments, "The cost of repair and refurbishing to our existing plants is going to be a very big expense item that has to be faced."

This government is saying: "We don't need nuclear. We're fine with what we've got." I do not think this government realistically has looked at how old our plants around this province are.

Also, I think it is important to comment on the fact that the Premier has taken a very active role in the Energy portfolio, which is very unusual. That has been demonstrated by his appointment of Mr Marc Eliesen without consulting the member for Peterborough, the then Minister of Energy. Do members not think it is rather significant that the Premier decides who the new CEO will be and does not even consult with the Minister of Energy? Of course, she is no longer the Minister of Energy; nevertheless, at the time she was. I think that was very discourteous.

Since the Hydro-government affair has been an ideological battle to this point, the transition of a few key players will not initiate major changes. Interest groups such as the Association of Major Power Consumers in Ontario and the Municipal Electric Association are concerned about the future of Hydro's power-at-cost pricing formula. The throne speech of November clearly outlines the government's intention to supply power at reasonable cost to users; not at cost -- at reasonable cost.

There is growing speculation in the business community that Ontario Hydro could become an indirect taxation arm of the government. Given the NDP's celebrated position on corporate taxation, businesses, particularly the AMPCO members, fear they will be targeted for higher user rates.

It is pretty straightforward, it is pretty black and white what is going on here. The fact, as I said earlier, that this government increased the number of board members so it could have control -- not only appointing the chairperson, which was its prerogative, but making him CEO and then increasing the number of board members -- all this is a tactic, pure and simple, for this socialist government to control the provision of electricity in Ontario.

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Hon Mr Hampton: You get no marks for repetition.

Mrs Marland: I am glad the Attorney General is listening. I really appreciate the fact that he, as busy as he is, has time to pay attention to my speech. He is probably in the House doing his House duty, I would suspect, but I appreciate that he is here listening to what I am saying, because as a member of the cabinet, and I would think a heavyweight member of the cabinet as the Attorney General, perhaps he will be able to sit at the cabinet table and convey the concern we have for the future of electricity in this province, how we are going to get it and how much it is going to cost.

I would like to place on the record some concerns of the member for Lanark-Renfrew. He has a number of concerns. One is that he feels that Bill 118 should be withdrawn and that it is only required to enforce the government's anti-nuclear policy and social programs. He also feels we should restrict the proposed power to direct Ontario Hydro only to matters now within the act, with effective consultation through this House on any directive outside the Power Corporation Act. He feels the fuel switching should be left to the marketplace and that the implementation of any conservation program for customers in municipalities be decided, funded and implemented by the utility commission for that municipality. That all makes sense. The member for Lanark-Renfrew makes a great deal of sense and he comes from a very strong base of experience, as a former staff person with the provider of power in Ontario.

Interjection.

Mrs Marland: I could not hear all of the question from the Attorney General, but I am sure in the two-minute responses he will give me the opportunity to hear the question again.

Simply, what we are dealing with here is very evident. We are talking about electricity and whether this province has a future and whether our future will include the supply of sufficient electricity. The cost of power is a major cost of doing business.

I also believe that government should finance alternative fuel options. I hope this government will see its way clear to getting involved in financing research and development of alternative fuel options. I actually had the pleasure this past week of driving an alternative fuel vehicle; I drove a natural gas powered vehicle. I know, Mr Speaker, that you yourself drive an alternative-fuel-powered vehicle; I think it is ethanol. In any case, I appreciate the fact that you are progressive, Mr Speaker, in driving an alternative fuel vehicle.

During this week while I drove a natural gas powered vehicle, courtesy of Consumers' Gas Co, I actually was delighted to find that alternative fuels are very realistic. I did not know whether I was driving on gasoline or natural gas in terms of the performance of the vehicle. This was a dual-fuelled vehicle, so should I run out of natural gas, I had a little switch on the dash that I pressed and then the engine reverted to gasoline as a fuel.

It just seems realistic, when we are concerned about the downside of generating electricity, even with the equipment we have today in Ontario -- I am talking about the environmental downside in terms of emission from fossil-fuel-fired plants -- that we should all be looking towards and willing to invest in alternative fuel options. But in the meantime, if there is no option -- and I would suggest that for the major industry in this province there is no option other than electricity -- then we had better be sure that electricity supply is there. It must be there for industry and commerce. It would not be very realistic, I would suggest to the Attorney General, to have all our high-rise office buildings in downtown Toronto with candles in their windows.

What we have to talk about is providing electricity at cost. We have to find if there is a way it would become less expensive rather than more expensive. We have to try to find ways to make it more plentiful. We have to realize that energy use at the consumer level, for example, at the household level, should be conserved but has to be guaranteed.

The fact is that in Ontario today we are very secure. We turn on our furnaces, and whether they are oil furnaces, gas furnaces or our houses are electrically heated, there is electricity used in our homes. Our homes are warm in the winter, and for some people who have the luxury of air-conditioning they are cool in the summer. What we have to learn to do is to have the temperature lower in the winter and obviously higher in the summer. But that is a very small portion of the amount of electricity that is used in this province. The major use of electricity is in industry. On that note, I will say to this socialist government that if it thinks it can put on a direct taxation for an indirect purpose such as funding its own social agenda and get away with it, it is majorly wrong. It is majorly mistaken.

The people of this province will not accept a direct taxation by increasing their Hydro rates. They want and expect and have a right to energy at cost because energy is not a luxury. I say to this government that if the Minister of Energy's statement tomorrow says to this House that it is willing to continue the operation of Ontario Hydro as an arm's-length government agency without control from the government of the day, whatever that government is, whether it is this socialist government for the next three years and our Progressive Conservative government following that, I would still be standing in this House saying that government should not control Ontario Hydro.

It is very important that energy at cost is protected. It is very important that the future of energy supply in this province is guaranteed. If this government thinks it is possible to meet low-demand projections of Ontario Hydro without adding new generation sources, then I hope that the first time somebody dies in this province because there is not enough electricity, that person realizes a decision was made by this government that we can only generate with generation from existing plants. If they are happy to pollute the atmosphere by building more coal-fired thermal units and have the CO2 emissions going into the atmosphere, that will be on their heads too.

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They are the party we have listened to for years with their rhetorical comments about being the preservers of the environment, and now we are talking about being conservers of energy. It will all come back to roost. We will find out what they really stand for, what they really mean and if they are capable of setting priorities in the format in which they should be set.

In closing, I wish to quote from an address to the annual meeting of the Association of Major Power Consumers of Ontario in April 1991. Falconbridge Ltd president and CEO, Frank Pickard, stated:

"It simply is no longer a question of whether or not major generating capacity will be required in this province. The only question left is when. Quite frankly, the ongoing uncertainty over energy cost and supply is the biggest issue industry is facing in this province; bigger than any other, bar none. The simple truth is that if we cannot be sure of the supply, we cannot with any confidence plan a future in Ontario."

The president of this major corporation has made a statement that could have been made by any corporate head of any industry or large corporation in Ontario today. The simple truth is that if we cannot be sure of the supply, we cannot with any confidence plan a future in Ontario. This is a government, this socialist government of today, that claims to be interested in the people. This is the government that wants to protect workers and jobs.

Hon Mr Hampton: Gosh, you're repetitive, Margaret.

Mrs Marland: I say to the Attorney General, who finds my comments humorous, that if he wants to protect jobs and his workers, as a socialist government in Ontario, I suggest that he start by protecting the industry that employs them. That industry will not be here if it does not have electricity. They cannot be here if they do not have electricity.

I say also, in fairness to those same workers whose jobs the government wishes to protect -- that is what we hear from the government all the time. They are supposed to be the only people who worry about people, nobody else. No other government, no other party, has ever worried about people, to hear their comments and their platform. If that part is even true, how could the government possibly want to burden these same people with additional costs of living in Ontario today by adding to the cost of the operation of their businesses and their homes by increasing the cost of electricity?

I would suggest that if this government does not protect the mandate of Ontario Hydro today, which is energy at cost, then it becomes a betrayal of the people of this province who were guaranteed in the Power Corporation Act that they would have a supply of energy at cost. But probably what we will find is that this government does not care. It already has almost a $10-billion deficit. It needs more money.

On a personal basis, I think my friend the Treasurer is great, but as a Treasurer with a socialist government, I feel sorry for him. He is looking in one pocket, he is looking in another and he has a $10-billion deficit.

No wonder somebody came up with this idea, "We could control Ontario Hydro and then we could control Ontario Hydro rates." If the government does not care about the people it is going to be putting out of their homes and their businesses, if it does not care about the industries that are going to leave this province because they can no longer afford electricity -- more important, in another decade there will not even be the electricity for them because the government has not planned for the future supply -- if the government does not care about the future of this province, then it should go ahead and pass Bill 118. In so doing, the legacy the members pass on to their children and grandchildren will be a legacy of which I would dread to be a part.

All I can say to the government is that there are some things that should be protected. I think it is the right of the public of this province to live in a clean air atmosphere and to have as part of that atmosphere a reduced amount of generation of electricity that does not pollute by burning coal in our old, antiquated coal-fired thermal units. I say to the government members that if they do not care about those things, they should not go around saying they are the great environmentalists that they are.

If government members care about the fact that people already are taxed to death in this province, that people are hanging on by their fingernails to finance the cost of living in their homes and apartments and other accommodations, that they cannot bear another increase in that cost or any of those costs over which they have no control, then I simply say to them that they should not ask to control Ontario Hydro so they can use this loophole of Lieutenant Governor in Council orders from the Minister of Energy. They should not put the Minister of Energy in charge of Ontario Hydro. Let it stay as an arm's-length corporation and let the people of this province continue, with difficulty -- Hydro rates have had to go up because the cost of operating for Ontario Hydro has had to go up. The government should not add to that burden, which ultimately is passed on to the consumers whether they be business or residential consumers, because in so doing, in the long run, it is going to eliminate their jobs and their ability to buy electricity at any cost.

I appreciate the opportunity of being able to speak to Bill 118. I think rather than be repetitive, as the Attorney General has suggested I might become, I would rather just close by saying to each member of this socialist government in the House today and those members who are not here that the responsibility is theirs. It is not mine, because as an opposition member I am part of a group that does not have the power in this House. The members opposite have the power. They have the numbers in their majority government to realize that Bill 118 should be withdrawn. It is not a piece of legislation any one of them will be proud of in the long run.

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Although the public of Ontario and the constituents of the members' ridings today do not know what Bill 118 is -- they do not have a clue unless they are electrical engineers and perhaps have heard from their professional associations what Bill 118 is about -- the members opposite should not think the public will not know what it is about when the next election is called.

Their constituents are going to come to them and say: "What was wrong with what Ontario Hydro was doing when it was providing energy at cost? Why is industry no longer looking at Ontario to invest, to be established and to create jobs?" Because the first thing industry looks at when it is going to locate anywhere in any province, in this country or in the world is whether there is going to be a supply of energy for its operation.

We have the former chairman of Ontario Hydro, Mr Franklin, saying on the supply of energy, of alternative generation: "So we not only have to meet the increasing growth; we have to replace what we have. I think the debate is not whether you need new generation but when you will need it and how long you can postpone that date."

I say to each one of the members opposite that if they are willing to postpone that date, then they had better be willing to take the full wrath of the people of this province when they are thrown into the brownouts and blackouts that will be the result of their decision on Bill 118.

Also, if the members opposite are not willing to help Ontario Hydro make the investment it needs to replace the equipment that is already outdated and past repair in this province, then they are simply saying: "Don't tell us what is going on. We don't really care. We're antinuclear. We want some way of raising money and we realize that if we control Ontario Hydro by having our own person as chairman and chief executive officer" -- the two jobs in one person -- "nobody answering to anybody, everybody being their own boss, we will control Ontario Hydro by having our own people appointed to the board. The only way we can do that right away is not by waiting for the board members' terms to expire. We'll increase the number of board members."

That is what this government is doing to Bill 118. It is finding a way to control Ontario Hydro. I say to the members opposite it is a dangerous precedent they will come to regret. If each member opposite stands in this House and votes on Bill 118 in the future, I hope he or she will realize what a significant implication Bill 118 is.

I hope the members opposite will not just vote blindly because it is their government's legislation. I sincerely hope they will recognize the significance of the decision they will be making by supporting this bill, because it is historic in its significance.

I say to the member for Cochrane South, who does not even know how many years the Progressive Conservatives were the government in this province -- I do not know whether he has children; he is certainly too young to have grandchildren -- the significance of this decision cannot be underestimated. If he is willing to support this bill, then what is next? What will the next arm's-length organization or corporation of this government? What will be the next one they will decide to control because they seen it as a means of inserting their particular socialist philosophy?

That is not what these corporations were about. If that were the case when we were the government for all those 42 years, we would have chosen to control these government agencies, boards and commissions. We would have been trying to tell Ontario Hydro what to do, but we did not. We chose to establish them under the independent act. As the Power Corporation Act was designed by our government, it was very purposeful in its design so that government would not have the kind of control and interference into an area that was not in the best interests of the province.

Perhaps in its response to my speech today this government will be able to tell me what is next. What is the next government arm's-length corporation they plan to take over so they can get some form of additional taxation?

The Acting Speaker (Mr Villeneuve): I wish to thank the honourable member for Mississauga South for her participation. Questions and/or comments on the member's participation? The honourable member for Oxford.

Mr Sutherland: There is certainly a lot to respond to since the member for Mississauga South spent a long time talking about things, but the thing that kept hitting me was that she kept talking about electricity at cost, and this is certainly an issue that comes up in this discussion on a regular basis.

I would like the member to define what she means by electricity at cost because, quite clearly, as we have been going along we have not been paying electricity at cost while we were supposed to be. It has been a great myth and I think the debt load of Ontario Hydro shows that.

At the same time and in typical Conservative fashion, almost speaking out of both sides of her mouth in terms of saying we have to worry about supply, the member does not say how we are going to pay for future supply and creating future supply. She does not want hydro rates to go up, but she does not have any answers on how we are going to create future supplies of energy. Quite frankly, if we are going to be able to do that we have to start paying the real, true cost.

I do not like it. I know many constituents in my riding do not like it, particularly those on fixed incomes, but the reality is that for the last 10 or 15 years we have not been paying the true cost. We have not been having electricity at cost as the member is saying. I think that issue needs to be brought out and all members, if they are going to be quite frank with their constituents and the people of Ontario, need to deal with that issue in our discussions on the future of Ontario Hydro.

I am sure other members will deal with some of the other inconsistencies that seemed to come through in the member's presentation.

Mrs Sullivan: I was quite taken with the remarks of the member for Mississauga South. I sat with the member on the select committee on energy during the time we were dealing with Ontario Hydro's demand-supply plan. Her arguments about power at cost are telling ones. I suggest to the member for Oxford, who has just commented on the concept of power at cost, looking at the demand-supply plan and the hearings surrounding the issues that were before the committee at that time. The concept is one of long and historical standing. Clearly he did not understand the points the member for Mississauga South was trying to make.

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Mr Turnbull: I would like to congratulate the member for Mississauga South on her presentation. I would like to point out that some of the ways Hydro could save money would be, for example, the pension fund, which is fully funded. If they never paid another penny into the pension fund for the next 10 years, it is still fully funded, and yet this year they are being forced to put $250 million into that fund. Why, when it is fully funded? As well, the new chairman of Hydro, who as a deputy minister was being paid about $135,000 a year, is now being paid $400,000 a year. If these are not reasonable ways of saving money, I do not know what is.

Is the suggestion that he would not do the job of chairman of Hydro for the same sort of money as for a deputy minister? I would suggest that is patent rubbish. But unfortunately this is a party, the NDP, that wants to pay off its friends. All the hypocrisy that was suggested over the years when they were in opposition, of payoffs by other parties, and they do the same thing themselves. Would they please have some consistency? Let's go back to the basic reason for Hydro, and that is to provide power at cost.

Mr Jordan: I too would like to congratulate my colleague on her excellent presentation this afternoon and her interest in the energy supply to Ontario, and on the fact that she took the time to go and spend a full day at a nuclear plant in order to relieve herself of the fears that were so easily instilled in people a few year ago relative to nuclear energy.

I think that if my colleagues on the government side visited our nuclear plants and understood the Candu system, they would not require this bill at all, because they would have no fear whatsoever of nuclear energy. They would have no fear of the storage of our spent fuel bundles. With that knowledge, we could restore to the province an electrical industry equal to the industry we have enjoyed over the life of Ontario Hydro until the present time.

I feel strongly that unless this bill is completely withdrawn -- the government should put its confidence in its new chairman; the government should put its confidence in the people it placed over there. They have a new chairman, a chief executive officer. They have their deputy minister or assistant deputy minister sitting with the board of directors. They have the means of excellent communication and exchange, without giving themselves the right to destroy the Power Corporation Act through directives bypassing the House over to the board without the people of Ontario being aware of it until such time as they see it on their Hydro bills.

Mrs Marland: I was disappointed that more members of the government did not use an opportunity to place on the record the comments they had been throwing out during their interjections to my speech this afternoon. It proves they really do not want to be on the record. They are happy to sit there and throw out the snide comments, but they are not willing to stand on their feet when they have the opportunity and be on the record.

The member for Oxford, who suggested I might be speaking out of both sides of my mouth, should look in the mirror as a member of this socialist government that campaigned on government-run automobile insurance in the last election one year ago. Suddenly, no deal. There are so many areas where this government has to be accountable to the public of this province.

The good news for the public of this province is that all those promises that they campaigned on, including the protection of the environment, have not been kept. The fact is that they think they can fool the people of this province, but they cannot. They can run a campaign and make promises and then not fulfil them, but when it comes around to the scorekeeping and the accounting at the next election, they will find that people do not forget. Whether they backtrack on their promises for the environment -- promises and questions that were raised by their Minister of the Environment when she was in opposition, while she now has let the people of Peel and York and Durham regions down -- those people will not forget, as the people of this province will not forget when they know what the implications of Bill 118 mean to them in real costs of electricity supply.

Mr Drainville: It is again an honour to speak to this House with some revised remarks that I would like to make on Bill 118. I think it would be appropriate just to say that I am very glad to speak to this bill because it is a very important piece of legislation that is being put forward by the government.

I must say that as I was sitting down listening to the honourable member for Mississauga South, I was reminded of the words in Shakespeare's Macbeth that "Fair is foul, and foul is fair." We constantly hear this invective and this venting of spleen from the opposition members, particularly the members of the third party, indicating I might say a lack of concern and commitment on the part of the government in putting forth particular measures.

I want to say that in this measure of Bill 118, the government has been very clear about the mandate it has and very clear about the direction it believes the province should be going in. There may be all sorts of disagreements on the part of the opposition members, and it is certainly their right to disagree, but to say somehow that the government is not considering the issue or is not fair to this issue or has not done its homework is patently false and unacceptable.

On top of that, inaccuracies have been trotted forth in this expose of interest we have heard today in the House, particularly when the member for Mississauga South indicated, or at least implied, some nefarious action on the part of the government in trying to have the chairman of the board become the chief executive officer. I find this incredible, really. I think the word is "incredible." Under the Tories, the very chairperson of the Hydro board was the chief executive officer. That was under the Tory government.

More to the point, I might add that in terms of all the blue-chip companies in Canada, there are very many companies in which the chairperson of the board is the chief executive officer. This is not a strange thing. Coming from the particular perspective of the honourable member for Mississauga South -- that is a Tory perspective and we know, let's say, their penchant for being in relationship with those in the business community -- I would have thought she would know that the chief executive officers are often also the chairpersons of the board.

That being said, I would also like to speak about the member for Brampton North. The member for Brampton North indicated that the hydro rates we are paying in Ontario happen to be exorbitant and that we cannot continue to increase the amount of money people are paying for hydro. I want to say that it is the view of this government, and it has been clearly stated by the ministers, that the amount of money we are paying is indeed great and that we have to get hold of the fiscal dynamics of the present situation. But we cannot see that in a vacuum. The reality is that we have seen over many years that Ontario Hydro has had its own agenda in terms of spending, and that the overruns have been so great that they have not been able to contain them in such a way as to help us fend off this day of reckoning which is swiftly coming.

I see you motioning me, Mr Speaker, and I look forward to speaking again to this House.

The Acting Speaker: Yes, the honourable member will have an opportunity to resume this debate.

The House adjourned at 1800.