Hansard Transcripts 2001-Dec-13 | Legislative Assembly of Ontario

Mr Wayne Wettlaufer (Kitchener Centre): This is another bill that I'm presenting in the interests of my interest in multiculturalism, but in no way do I want to take away from the importance of this particular one. While it celebrates cultural diversity, it also celebrates the Nikkei heritage. I would like to start off by reading part of a letter that I received from Betty Moritsugu, who is the chair of Nikkei Heritage Day, 2001. She says:

"Dear Mr Wettlaufer,

"On behalf of the committee, thank you very much for considering a private member's bill this session to establish our heritage day as a provincial observance. We are also most grateful to the Honourable David Tsubouchi for supporting your proposal....

"The name of the day: we have called it Nikkei Heritage Day from the outset seven years ago to make it clear, at least within our community, that this is a celebration of Japanese-Canadian heritage with no direct connection to current-day Japan. (`Nikkei' means `overseas Japanese' and is used by us to mean the Canadian variety, of course. `Nikkei' also is a short word that easily fits newspaper headlines.) `Japanese Heritage Day' does not make that distinction, which is why it has not been used from the start. If absolutely necessary, `Japanese-Canadian Heritage Day' could be used, but for publicity and promotion purposes it is somewhat cumbersome.

"Nikkei Heritage Day is not celebrated on the same day in September each year. Rather, for the convenience of the attendees, it is held on the Sunday nearest to the anniversary of the Japanese-Canadian redress settlement of September 22, 1988. We hope the floating date of the observance will not clash with the terms of provincial recognition."

Japanese immigration to Canada began in 1877. It was not unlike other ethnocultural immigrations to Canada. They came here for the prospects of greater wealth and opportunity. They brought with them their talents, whether they be agricultural or fishing, but also craftsmen and traders. Many at that time were unskilled, but those who came to Ontario were not unskilled. They were the professionals of their day.

The initial immigration was young, male and single, but later these young men brought their wives over, they had children and they put down roots. By 1941, 60% of the Japanese community was Canadian-born. While many of them, as I said before, were low-skilled, the others were not low-skilled. Nevertheless, all of them held down low-paying jobs. They didn't receive any more than a half to two thirds of the pay that whites received in comparable jobs.

In 1922, the federal government had limited the number of fishing licences that would be issued to Japanese, therefore limiting their opportunities. The Japanese, whether they were born here or whether they came here as first peoples, the Issei, were subjected to racism. They were considered slightly better than blacks, but they were considered definitely less than whites. Early immigrants to Canada were denied the right to vote, with the exception of the few military veterans after World War I.

We have the second generation, the Nisei, who were born in Canada. They were not unlike other Canadians. They wanted what the whites wanted, they were motivated by materialist values, success in chosen careers, and many of them earned university degrees. Nevertheless, the good jobs were still closed to them.

I'd like to focus for a moment on the cultural shock that all immigrants have. Parents come here and they know their own culture. The children don't know the culture, especially those who are born in Canada. But in the Japanese culture, the kin the family, was most important. Women were submissive to men, marriages were arranged, children were supposed to be submissive to their parents' authority and their conduct was always according to the dictates of family honour. Imagine the culture shock. But the Nisei put family traditions behind them and adopted Canadian practices.

Then of course, we had World War II, and this is where I think my interest stems from this issue. About 15 or 20 years ago, I was travelling on a highway out west and it happened to go right beside where the Japanese Canadians were interned. These Japanese Canadians lost all of their property, they lost all of their assets; the William Lyon Mackenzie King government of the day didn't have enough money, it said, to pay for the internment of these immigrants, so their own assets were used to pay for it.

I looked at the conditions that the Japanese Canadians suffered in this internment camp in Canada, and it was not unlike those conditions that Canadians suffered overseas in concentration camps, in internment camps. I thought, how is it that this happened right here in Canada?

After the war, most of the Japanese were moved from the west to Ontario. They were dispersed throughout Canada, but most of them came to Ontario. Four thousand of them were actually deported to Japan. The Japanese Canadians, the Nisei, were absorbed into the social fabric of Canada. They were integrated. They intermarried.

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Then, of course, we have the Sansei, who are the third generation. They, as well, have become even more integrated and have intermarried even more. They are the grandchildren. They receive formal instruction in Japanese folk arts in order to learn their Japanese culture, again, much like other cultural groups who have come to Canada, because folk arts are no longer an automatic part of their culture.

Once victims of racism, bias and few in number, the Japanese Canadians have succeeded in life like very few others. In one of the books I was reading, I couldn't help but recall the 1976 Grey Cup game. I remember Bill Hatanaka running back a record-setting punt return in the Grey Cup game. But there are many other Japanese Canadians who have succeeded beyond all belief.

Yuki Yoshida, who is from Montreal and Toronto, won an Academy Award in 1977 as the co-producer of a short-subject live-action movie.

Our own David Tsubouchi, who is Chair of Management Board now and has served in many other capacities, is a success story right here in Ontario.

We can't forget the martial arts and the discipline that the Japanese Canadians have brought to this country. My own daughter took one of the forms of martial arts. There is no doubt in my mind that the discipline of that martial arts training has contributed to her success.

Where once the Issei, the unskilled, immigrated to Canada, we now have a new generation of Japanese, the Shin-Ijusha, coming to Canada. They are the best educated and most highly trained overseas immigrants coming to our country.

Toyo Takata ends his book Nikkei Legacy by saying, "No other community of Canadians faced a greater challenge and endured. Indeed, they triumphed." I don't know if any other community of Canadians faced a greater challenge, but certainly they faced a major one, and they did endure and triumph.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): I appreciate the opportunity to participate in the discussion this morning on what I think will be a non-controversial and multi-partisan debate, I don't say non-partisan, I say multi-partisan, because all members of the Legislature will want to join in the support of this legislation, An Act to proclaim Nikkei Heritage Day.

The member for Kitchener has outlined a history which is checkered in this country, a history of Japanese Canadians in this country: checkered because of the early experiences and the experiences during wartime that people of Japanese descent had within the confines of the country we know as Canada; indeed, within North America.

To jump right into one specific issue, I've listened to some of the interviews that have taken place with people who have been elected to various offices in Canada and the United States. I was watching the other day, about a month ago, I suppose, an interview with a Japanese American legislator on that occasion, who described the experience of his family, the circumstance being that here were people who were in Canada and were of Japanese descent and were good strong Canadians, who were placed under suspicion by the government and by many in the population simply because they happened to be of Japanese descent, although they resided in Canada. Canada is a country that over the years, and particularly in recent years, has welcomed people from all around the world. We expect, and we have found this to be the experience, that overwhelmingly the people who come here become part of the Canadian fabric. They are individuals who contribute as individuals, rather than as people of a particular descent or ethnicity, though we always hope and encourage, in our country, that they will share their heritage with others.

Certainly the experience of many Japanese Canadians, particularly in wartime, in the Second World War, had to be one that was tempered with a lot of disappointment. Even in communities such as St Catharines, I am told by people of Japanese descent, good friends of mine in St Catharines, they were told they weren't wanted. There were people within the communities who did not want people of Japanese descent in St Catharines and in other communities. I found that astounding I suppose because that era had passed as far as I was concerned. I was particularly disappointed to hear that and, as I say, astounded to hear that.

There's an old saying, "Some of my best friends are...," and coincidentally some of my best friends indeed are people of Japanese descent, very good friends of mine whom I encountered through growing up and in high school in St Catharines, as personal friends and people who have worked on my campaigns over the years. So I've had a pipeline to some of the history of Japanese Canadians. Although there is not a concerted effort to reflect on a daily basis on those experiences, if you're prepared to ask, people of Japanese descent will share with you what they experienced, particularly during time of war.

We recognize that during a time of war things happen that are very difficult for people who happen to be of an ethnicity where perhaps their ancestors, perhaps even some of their relatives, in another country may be at war with us. But to see people taken from their homes and put in internment camps simply because they were of a particular ethnicity, in this particular case Japanese, as you reflect on that today, you reflect with a good deal of concern and sorrow that in a democratic country such as Canada, which supposedly welcomed people from around the world, that would be the case.

The member for Kitchener mentioned voting rights. He will correct me with a nod or a no -- was it not until 1947, I notice, that voting rights were granted to people of Japanese descent after the war? Here again are people who have been Canadians first. When I speak to my friends who are of Japanese descent, when you cross a border to go to a hockey game or something of that nature, of course they say "Canadian," because they are Canadian. Everything about them is Canadian. There is not a denial of ancestry at all, but they are Canadian, just as all of us adopt that Canadian mode, particularly as we're here for longer periods of time.

Japanese Canadians, as other Canadians, and as my friends in the Japanese community, would not want me to stand in this House and extol the virtues of the Japanese as though they're the only people who have done these things, but I'm going to tell you that from a position of being shunted aside and treated not particularly well in their early days in this country, to today, we have seen the kind of integration, the kind of progress, the kind of involvement in various aspects of out community that we would want to see for people of Japanese descent.

The member focused, and he did this with another bill that he brought before the House, on the role that individuals from one community, as we say, have played in this country. Many countries in the world over the years -- it's changing now -- have excluded people from other countries. They've really wanted to be a country where the people were all of one ethnicity. Others were looked down upon and there were immigration barriers that were set up.

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Canada, and to a certain extent the United States as well, being in the New World, have welcomed people from other countries. So when you walk down the streets of Toronto or Montreal or Vancouver -- I say this because it's usually the larger cities immigrants tend to come to to begin with; that seems to be the tendency -- you will see that we have people from around the world in this country now.

We benefit immensely from that. I know it's a hard adjustment for some, particularly for those who live in communities where everybody looks the same and may be from a similar background. They sometimes wonder whether this is the route we should go. Of course we recognize the huge benefits that immigrants have brought to this country over the years.

Jim Coyle, in one of his columns in the Toronto Star some time ago -- I clipped it out and I saw it the other day; I was reviewing it -- talked about what they said about each group as that group came to Canada, how they tried to peg them as being lazy or radical or something of that nature. He mentioned all the different groups that had come, and what they said about the Irish, what they said about the Scottish, what they said about the French when they came to Canada, or people of Polish decent or any other country. The point he was making was that the complexion of Canada is changing over the years and people are saying things about the new wave of immigrants now that he points out were said about immigrants years ago.

We've found that all have come together in Canada. We've become an international country. We have wonderful connections with other parts of the world. Certainly our relationship with Japan is a strong relationship, but again I emphasize that although people of Japanese decent may have relatives in Japan, my experience is that as with others who have come to this country, they are Canadians first.

We want to encourage people to share that culture. One of the great advantages we have in this country is that we do that. While we ask people to be Canadians first, we ask them as well to share their culture and their history with us. We learn so much about others in the world by having them come to our country and not simply assimilate -- although, as I say, we want people to be Canadians first -- but become part of the education process about people and their culture.

The Japanese culture is rich in tradition. There is, I think, a better understanding of it today than before because of many of the documentaries we get to see on television, particularly with PBS in the United States, TVOntario and the CBC, which do documentaries on various people who have come to our country, or we're able to read about those individuals.

It is important in a country that while we may not dwell excessively on the past, we recognize what happened in the past and the lack of justice that was part of the history of Japanese Canadians in this country. There was an effort in 1988 to try to redress that and I thought it was appropriate. Again, there were people who were resentful of that particular effort, but I think that when there has been a wrong perpetrated upon one particular group in our country, it's important that we indicate our sadness about that and indicate an apology as these things have happened in history. It doesn't mean present-day Canadians should have a guilty feeling; it is, however, important they be aware of what has happened in the past so that, we hope, it will not happen in the future.

It was a difficult time. When I talk to people, particularly elderly people who tell me what happened, as a Canadian I feel a good deal of regret about that. Imagine, simply because you happen to be from a particular ethnic background, you are taken from your home, you lose many of your assets, you're often separated from those you love, you lose the friendship of those in your community and you are interned in a particular camp. Even though you are a Canadian, you happen to be a Canadian who may have come from a country or whose ancestors may have come from a country which was at war with the United States, Canada and much of the western world.

So I want to say to the member that I'm pleased he brought forward this bill today. I think it's going to be important that the Sunday closest to September 22 each year is proclaimed Nikkei Heritage Day. The act will come into effect when it receives royal assent. I find it hard to believe, though I cannot speak on behalf of all members of the Legislature, that we would not have unanimous consent of this House for this piece of legislation. I think it's not simply because we are attempting to pander to any particular group or to court favour with any particular group. I think it's because it's positive for this country and positive for the people who have come to this country from Japan.

Our relationship has grown over the years. If you talk to Canadians, you will find that many of their children are now in Japan. One of the things they're doing, among others, is they're involved in the teaching of English. There have been marriages that have happened in Japan or in Canada, but we still have people who can communicate, interestingly enough, through computers, through the Internet, through e-mail with one another almost instantly. I'm not a master of technology, but we can even see images of people.

Mr George Smitherman (Toronto Centre-Rosedale): That's an understatement.

Mr Bradley: "An understatement," says my colleague.

We can even see people on a screen. This is something the member for Kitchener and I as youngsters would have heard about as, shall we say, science fiction. But today we have the opportunity to communicate instantly of course with writing, but also with our voices and pictures so we can actually see the person at the other end. That's the marvellous part of being able to communicate. I say that, because I know a number of my friends have children who are living in Japan today.

So that relationship grows stronger. People who have gone on exchanges -- the Rotary Club, for instance, has an international exchange program -- have found it a fascinating country, a wonderful country to visit. The warmth of the welcome they receive is truly marvellous.

So I think it's important that we in this country, in this province, recognize the heritage of the people who came from Japan to our country. I think this bill will do so, and I think each time of the year on that day we will be allowed to reflect on that heritage in a very positive way.

Ms Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth): I rise to speak not just for myself today, but on behalf of the New Democratic Party. Although this is private members' hour and sometimes we vote differently on some of the issues before us, I would say we all support Mr Wettlaufer's bill before us today, Bill 140, An Act to proclaim Nikkei Heritage Day. I think this is a long time coming, actually, and I'm very, very pleased to see it before us.

I want to pay tribute for a moment to the National Association of Japanese Canadians. I don't know if many people here are aware of the work they do in our communities. I'm sure Mr Tsubouchi, who is here with us today, would be very aware of this association and the work that they do. They have a mission statement, and their mission statement is:

"To promote and develop a strong Japanese Canadian identity and thereby to strengthen local communities and the national organization; and

"To strive for equal rights and liberties for all persons; in particular, the rights of racial and ethnic minorities."

Their vision is for "a strong, unified community founded on diversity and committed to human rights for all for the enrichment of Canada." Their priorities are to advocate for human rights, to strengthen communication, to build bridges, to strengthen Japanese-Canadian identity, to do effective fundraising -- always important -- and to strengthen local chapters, and they have done tremendous work.

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Perhaps we're not aware of the work Japanese Canadians have done on the issues around human rights. They've been a very strong voice in that area by developing a strong public voice and profile on human rights issues, with priority given to Canadian issues, group issues and Aboriginal rights. Again, I'm not sure if people are aware that Japanese Canadians have worked and continue to work very hard on equality and Aboriginal rights. They have worked very hard over the years to make people aware of their own history -- not just the history -- to present injustices. They are out there supporting groups or seeking resolution of historic wrongs by supporting and resourcing a national human rights committee with a proactive strategy and communications plan.

They have a tremendously strong organization. They have local chapters that sponsor and resource outreach initiatives at the local level, and provide technical assistance, knowledge and experience to support local activities to develop a varied program of activities with a wide range of appeal.

So this organization is out there doing all kinds of tremendously important work. Because of this bill before us today, we have an opportunity to pay tribute to the National Association of Japanese Canadians and thank them for the work they are doing now and have been doing, sometimes very quietly, but very effectively, often in the background. But they're out there, and they're a very strong organization.

We've talked a little bit about the evacuation of Canadian Japanese or Nikkei from the Pacific coast in the early months of 1942. I guess it was one of Canada's greatest shames in our entire history. On the eve of Pearl Harbor, we had about 23,000 people of Japanese descent in Canada, primarily in British Columbia. A lot of the Japanese Canadians were foresters and fishermen, miners and merchants. They were treated -- and we know this is well documented -- with suspicion and hostility, and they were targets of ongoing, unremitting discrimination and sometimes were subjected to great violence. Then, as we all know, in the sad history of the war, when war was declared on Japan in December 1941, there was a huge outcry and a push to literally rid British Columbia of what they called the Japanese menace. This became a huge outcry, and tensions mounted. Then in 1942, the Ottawa government caved in to this racist outcry and interned Japanese citizens.

I had the incredible privilege and joy, so to speak, to share living quarters back in the early 1980s with the well-known writer Joy Kogawa. Everybody here, I'm sure, is very aware of her famous book, Obasan. I lived with Joy when she was writing that book. She would disappear for hours and hours and hours a day. I had no idea at the time what she was writing. I knew she was writing something very important. She had that writer's look about her all the time. She was frequently preoccupied. We were very close friends, and still are. She's a tiny woman, too. We shared clothes and spent a lot of good times together. Then when Joy --

Mr Garry J. Guzzo (Ottawa West-Nepean): You might take some credit for it.

Ms Churley: Yes. I want to pay tribute to Joy today. If you haven't read her book -- she's written several other books, and books of poetry, since then -- I recommend that you do so. Her book, Obasan, which was published in 1981 -- I guess this is what she is best known for -- tells the story of what happened through the eyes of a child. She tells the shameful story of the internment of Japanese Canadians during the Second World War. This book is considered by many to have been a catalyst. I know there are many other people from the Japanese Canadian community who can claim credit and were catalysts as well, but I believe her book -- and many others share this view -- was a catalyst for the eventual redress in 1988 of the wrongs done to Japanese Canadians.

I want to read some of the things Joy said when she was talking about her book, and what happened to her family when they were dragged from their homes, separated and put in camps. She says:

"Betrayal is part of the human story. We take a group of neighbours and demonize them. During the Second World War, we Japanese Canadians were the demonized people of the day. Our entire community was uprooted and relegated to the cesspool. The racism I imbibed as a child was profound. For years I was proud to be `the only Jap in town.' It was an invisible racism, my self-perception was of unworthiness, inferiority, ugliness. The watchword when I was growing up was assimilation. We were quite successful at getting lost."

She says that her book is strongly autobiographical and, like Naomi in the book, she said, "I became a person who would not speak, would not ask a question, did not expect to be heard."

She goes on to say, however, talking about her heart-wrenching experience -- we can't even imagine what that must have felt like -- "`You can't compare the events of the European Holocaust with what happened in North America.' She would ... compare the Holocaust to the atomic bombings. Both spawned `the sense of hopelessness that flows from an evil that is unimaginable.'"

Again I would recommend to people, if you have not read this book, Obasan, please read it. There are other tremendously well-written novels and accounts of the horrible events that took place and what our Canadian government did to the people of Japanese descent in the war.

Since September 11, concerns have been expressed by the New Democratic Party, and others who have written about it, about racial profiling; concerns about some of the things that have happened in this country, in this province and indeed in my own riding to people of Arab decent or to people who some think look like Arabs, to people of colour; some of the terrible racist things that have been done to them personally. People have been spat upon, have been physically attacked and their property damaged; the fear that people have been feeling since the events of September 11.

Of course, nobody is talking about or even contemplating doing to the Arab and Muslim community what we did to Canadians of Japanese descent during the war, but the incidents that have happened and the kind of fear and in some cases loathing that has exhibited its ugly head since September 11 has certainly brought back some of those memories and fears and concerns. We learned a lesson from that time to never, ever take such horrible action in this country again toward any of our citizens.

But there is still concern about the federal Liberal Bill C-36, which many of us believe strips Canadians of their civil rights. When we're talking about these issues, there's always a balance. Certainly after the horrible terrorist attack in the US, all people, including people of Arab and Muslim faith, believe that the balance needs to be tipped at this time, to some extent, between our civil rights as people of this country and the need for our safety and security. I don't think there's anybody who argues with that, including our Arabic and Muslim citizens, because many Muslims and Arabs died as well in the attacks on the US. But we have to be very, very careful to not tip the balance too far in favour of security, as I believe Bill C-36 does, which is why our New Democratic caucus in Ottawa struggled so hard to get amendments to get a sunset clause made on the bill. We must constantly be very, very careful to not tip the balance too much in favour of security because innocent people can get caught up in that web of security and be held in prison, not being able to exercise the civil rights that we're all used to and depend on and expect in this country.

I want to end by saying again to Mr Wettlaufer that I'm very pleased to have an opportunity to speak to this bill today and very pleased that the bill is before us and very pleased that I've had the opportunity on behalf of my caucus today to express my appreciation for the incredible contribution that our citizens of Japanese-Canadian descent have made to this province and indeed to this country.

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Hon David H. Tsubouchi (Chair of the Management Board of Cabinet): I'm pleased to see, first of all, the students from St Maria Goretti school in Scarborough who joined us for this very important discussion.

A couple of years ago I was in Thunder Bay, travelling and doing a few speaking engagements with my good friend Jim Doherty. Jim, who is associated with the military museum in Thunder Bay, asked me to visit the military museum, and we dropped by. The first thing I saw as I walked into the room was a scale model of the POW Camp 101, which my father was placed in during the Second World War. I explained the story to the people in Thunder Bay. A few months later, at the request of Mayor Ken Boshkoff, I attended Thunder Bay again. There they presented me with a print of a flower growing through the barbed wire, along with the actual barbed wire that surrounded the POW camp that my father was in. By the way, my colleague Michael Gravelle from the Liberal Party was there as well. I want to express once again my heartfelt thanks to the people in Thunder Bay, because that was probably the most meaningful presentation that I have ever been at in my life. I passed it on to my father, who appreciated it as well.

Many other speakers have talked about the relocation, and the relocation, through my father's eyes -- he was telling me that the Mounties knocked on the door and told him he had to leave the next day with only the possessions that he could carry. Can you imagine trying to decide which of your possessions you needed to take, aside from warm clothing for the cold winters that we have in Canada? The only thing that I have left of my grandfather's is a very tiny sake set that they were able to keep.

They were herded like cattle and quite frankly, as the speakers have said, all our property was sold. None of the money was given to the Japanese Canadians; it was all confiscated. Like my mother, Fumiko Takahashi, and my aunt, Haruko Bando, they were taken to internment camps, Lemon Creek in their particular case.

I wanted to express something about the POW camp. I want to start by just giving a quote from a book called POW Camp 101, written by Bob Okazaki, who unfortunately passed away last year. This is the quote: "The end result of the evacuation program was the complete eradication of our Japanese community from Canada's west coast. The evacuation dragged our community down into a whirlpool. While we were held back, other minorities began to politically and economically excel. Those of us who could become leaders were oppressed and subdued. Now, some 50 years later, the Japanese Canadian society I once knew no longer exists." That's a really sad commentary on the conditions.

I might say the reason why my father, Tom Kiyoshi Tsubouchi, whose prisoner of war number was 606, born Canadian along with my uncles on my mother's side, John Akira Takahashi and Hideo Takahashi, whose numbers were 578 and 579, all born Canadians, were in that POW camp was that if they decided you were a leader in the Japanese Canadian community in BC or if you were in a group of protesters -- who were not protesting the confiscation of their property or the relocation and transportation into internment camps but the fact that they were being separated in Vancouver before the transportation; that's the only issue they were protesting -- you were placed in a POW camp, as my father was.

My grandfather, Chozo Takahashi, at the age of 55 was the very first Japanese Canadian to die because of the transportation. He died in Winnipeg. My uncle Akira wanted to get off with him to see to the funeral, but they wouldn't let him do that so he was buried in a pauper's grave somewhere around Winnipeg. Despite all this, the Nisei community, the Japanese Canadians, were pretty philosophical about it. I guess there's an expression they use in Japanese, Shigata ga nai, which basically means, "What can you do about it?" Despite all the wrongs that were committed against my father personally, he's a very proud Canadian, as are members of the Japanese Canadian community. They're very proud to be Canadians and they continue to be to this day.

I'll end by quoting from a book called Maple, which is a group of Tanka poems, which is a form of Japanese poetry which, by the way, was translated by my uncle, Hideo Takahashi. I'll give you the English translation in a second.

Remarks in Japanese.

Which means:

The frequent moves and relocation were unavoidable.

Such are the evils of war.

With hope,

Toronto is now final home.

That's the way the Japanese Canadians view Canada, that this is their home. They're proud to be Canadians.

From the bottom of my heart, I thank the member from Kitchener Centre for taking forward this bill, which not only has meaning to the Japanese Canadian community in this province, but has great personal meaning to me. Thank you, Wayne.

Mr Toby Barrett (Haldimand-Norfolk-Brant): Before I begin, I would ask members to recognize the students of Holy Cross academy in Woodbridge.

Applause.

Mr Barrett: Thank you, Speaker, for this opportunity to address Nikkei Heritage Day. I know some may wonder why I, as the member for Haldimand-Norfolk-Brant, would feel it so important to address this bill. I do not have many Japanese Canadian constituents. I only know two families, the Kobyashis and the Hinatsus, in my hometown of Port Dover. The families moved to Port Dover, a commercial fishing town, for some of the reasons we heard Mr Tsubouchi outline this morning. These families have had a great and positive influence on Port Dover.

Secondly, when I worked in Toronto back in the 1970s as a farm boy -- at that time, you had a put a bankroll together if you wanted to keep farming -- I was literally adopted by the Hatashita family. People who were involved in marshal arts back in the 1970s would know the Olympic reputation of Frank Hatashita and his contribution to judo. I rise in the House to honour the reputation of those several Japanese Canadian families that I have known personally. It is important to me to indicate my respect for their contributions and, through these families, to thank all Japanese Canadians and to indicate my support for a Nikkei Heritage Day.

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As we know, Japanese Canadians are a very important part of society in Canada. Despite suffering through property and monetary losses at the hands of our federal government during World War II, Japanese Canadians, as Mr Tsubouchi has indicated, have gone beyond that and continue to make significant contributions. I think of architecture. I mentioned judo and other martial arts and of course Japanese food, which is a very important part of my diet.

As I indicated, my hometown of Port Dover has benefited immensely from the influence of the families, the Hinatsus, the Kobyashis. Even after he retired as game warden, Les Kobyashi continued to monitor the pier at Port Dover well into his eighties.

I spent a number of years in company with the Hatashita family. Frank Hatashita tolerated me in his home, not because I knew anything about judo -- it's probably just as well. He had a pretty fierce reputation and I was not seen as a threat. I know many people had a great deal of respect and fear of Frank Hatashita. Frank Hatashita loved to cook Japanese food, and I loved to eat it. There are many other stories about Frank, and I can discuss these with the Honourable David Tsubouchi later.

We know it was 124 years ago that the first Japanese person set foot on Canadian soil, by boat of course across the Pacific, landing in British Columbia. I think back to a beautiful painting Frank Hatashita had of his commercial fishing boat that was seized. Frank Hatashita had an affinity to my hometown, Port Dover, a commercial fishing town. Both my sisters married commercial fishermen, and to seize someone's boat is akin to seizing someone's farm. I can only begin to imagine the devastation on that man to lose his boat.

One aspect of Japanese culture -- I did a fair bit of reading with respect to both architecture and landscape architecture and a few years ago I built my own house. I also did a fair bit of what I refer to as bulldozer landscaping, much of it based on the concept of "form follows function." It's a principle I picked up from my association with the families I've mentioned and I have found that it has served me well in political life as well.

The Japanese cherry is another gift from overseas. The blossoming cherry trees of spring have special significance, many now a permanent fixture in much of Ontario and Canada and truly a testament to nature's beauty. Thanks to Les Kobyashi, again of Port Dover, we have a grove of cherry trees that have been planted over the years. I had the pleasure of showing these trees to the Honourable David Tsubouchi a number of years ago.

We have heard mention of self-defence -- aikido in its many forms: judo, kendo, karate. Again, Port Dover has an outstanding judo club and has had for a number of years.

I regret time does not permit me to continue and I will wrap up by indicating that we all owe a debt of thanks to Japanese Canadians for their many contributions. I call on this government to recognize the legislation that's put forward today, and I personally thank the positive contributions that Japanese Canadians have had both on me and on my community.

Mr Joseph N. Tascona (Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford): I'm very pleased to be able to speak in the limited time that has been left. I am proud to be able to stand with respect to the act to proclaim Nikkei Heritage Day. Certainly the history of this goes back to Pearl Harbour in World War II and also Hong Kong. I could share a personal note, that my father served in the Canadian army. About the time of Hong Kong, when they were recruiting in Winnipeg, where my family is from, he tried to get accepted for the Winnipeg Rifles who went over to Hong Kong. He wasn't accepted for service and he subsequently served out east, where he was accepted for service. It obviously would have had a profound effect on my life, because I might not even have been here.

I would say this on two fronts, one from my local experience with the people of Japanese heritage: it has had a profound effect on me. The people at Izumi restaurant do great charity work throughout the city of Barrie with respect to fundraising for people and the Barrie and District Association for People with Special Needs. The investment that has been brought into the area gives some backbone to the economic base of Simcoe county. There is the Honda plant, and other Japanese investments from different companies. Looking at the contribution they've made, it's been significant not only from a social perspective but also from a business perspective.

There is my interest in Japanese politics. I studied it at McMaster University with great interest. I think it's a fascinating study in terms of the Japanese political structure and their history.

I want to share, for all the people who are listening here today, that there's a tremendous book out by Pierre Berton, Marching as to War: Canada's Turbulent Years, 1899-1953. He has in there, I think, a very objective account of what happened to the Japanese people who lived in this country and were citizens of this country. He views it as, here we were fighting in World War II for peace and democracy, and we were interning 23,000 people from their homes and putting limits on their mobility across the country.

The greatest tragedy is that this program that was put in place by the federal government through Mackenzie King and Louis St Laurent did not end until 1949, four years after the war ended. So the prejudice and the views that were held in that day certainly were not helped by the government of the day in terms of dealing with a policy that was the antithesis of what it was fighting for in World War II.

The Acting Speaker: Response?

Mr Wettlaufer: I'd like to thank the members from St Catharines, Toronto-Danforth, Haldimand-Norfolk-Brant and Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford, and the Chair of Management Board, the Honourable David Tsubouchi, for their contributions to the debate this morning.

The comments relating to modern-day immigrants suffering the same insults, and particularly how since September 11 the members of the Arab and Muslim community have suffered, really bring home the importance of what I'm trying to do here today, and that is not just to recognize a very important ethnocultural group in our community, but to celebrate the cultural diversity we have in this country and in this province.

We had a terrible period during the war and immediately subsequent to the war. Brian Mulroney, the Prime Minister of Canada, said on September 22, 1988, when the federal government redressed, or certainly attempted to redress, the wrong of that period, "I think all members of the House know that no amount of money can right the wrong, undo the harm and heal the wounds." We know that. The Chair of Management Board said there is tremendous pride among the Japanese Canadian community in being Canadian. He outlined his own family's suffering, and in spite of that he talked about the pride his own father and his own uncles have in being Canadian.

No one is trying to right a wrong, but it's to recognize the pride that Japanese Canadians have in being Canadian and in being citizens of this province.

The Acting Speaker: Thank you. This completes the time allocated for debating ballot item number 39. I'll place the questions relating to it at 12 noon.

Hon Rob Sampson (Minister of Correctional Services): On a point of order, Speaker: I think it is important for you know that from the city of Mississauga we have Christ the King Catholic school here watching this very important debate and I'd like to welcome them.

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GRAVESITES OF FORMER
PREMIERS ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001
SUR LES LIEUX DE SÉPULTURE
DES ANCIENS PREMIERS MINISTRES

Mr Peters moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 143, An Act to preserve the gravesites of former premiers of Ontario / Projet de loi 143, Loi visant à conserver les lieux de sépulture des anciens premiers ministres de l'Ontario.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): The member for Elgin-Middlesex-London.

Mr Steve Peters (Elgin-Middlesex-London): The first Premier of Ontario after Confederation in 1867 was John Sandfield Macdonald. Macdonald was known in his ministry for considerable distinction. He was frugal, yet creative. Despite opposition assertions to the contrary, he was no puppet of the Prime Minister of Canada.

Our second Premier, Edward Blake, served for two years. One of Blake's distinctions was that he not only served in the federal House of Commons and as Premier of this province, but also went on to serve as an MP in the British House of Commons.

Under Sir Oliver Mowat's leadership, Ontario truly came of age economically, socially and politically. Agriculture was modernized, the importance of industry was recognized, educational and scientific areas were cultivated, urban problems were addressed and for the first time trade unions were accepted as part of society.

Our fourth Premier, Arthur Sturgis Hardy, is probably best remembered during his days as the commissioner of crown lands because it was through him that Algonquin Park was established.

Sir George Ross was very active in making sure the public education system was overhauled and improved. He also started to deal, for the first time, with the controversies existing between the public education system and the separate schools.

Sir James P. Whitney was our next Premier. During Whitney's term, the administration began Ontario's first publicly owned hydroelectric system. I won't comment on what's happening to that today. He set the University of Toronto in a firm financial position. He passed groundbreaking workmen's compensation legislation. He also created the Ontario Railway and Municipal Board, which I know my friend Mr Colle is most interested in. He also enacted fair but tough liquor legislation.

Sir William Howard Hearst played a very important role because he much expanded this province. In 1912 the Keewatin territory was added to Ontario, which increased the size of this great province of ours by 56%. I think probably the greatest thing under Hearst's leadership was the enfranchisement of women; women were first allowed to vote. He also enacted prohibition, established a department of labour and authorized the construction of the Queenston hydroelectric plant.

E.C. Drury was very active in the agricultural community and was involved with the United Farmers of Ontario. His administration was noted for its important social legislation and also its strict enforcement of the Ontario Temperance Act.

George Howard Ferguson personified Ontario in the 1920s: a mix of 19th century values and 20th century ambitions. As Premier, he set the beginning of the great industrialization of this province.

George Stewart Henry during his tenure provided this province with its first highway system, and paved highways increased from 670 kilometres to almost 4,000 kilometres.

My favourite, because he's from my riding, is Mitch Hepburn. Mitch implemented a number of populist measures, including auctioning off all the government limousines and selling off the Lieutenant Governor's quarters. He was active in the iron ore industry and helped make improvements there. But probably his greatest accomplishment was the compulsory pasteurization of milk.

Gordon Daniel Conant served for a brief period in 1942 and 1943. He was very productive in the Legislature but unfortunately could not heal some differences within the Liberal Party.

Harry Nixon also served as Premier of this province, and I think one of Nixon's lasting legacies is the fact that his son continued to serve in this Legislature and his granddaughter, Jane Stewart, continues to serve the people of Canada today in the federal government.

George Drew was the Premier who acted as both Minister of Education and Premier. For many of us, he was the beginning of the Tory dynasty that lasted in this province for so long, as we all know. He's the man who set it off.

Thomas Laird Kennedy -- his grandson, Ted Chudleigh from Halton, is a member of this Legislature today -- was a homespun man, and he was popular and respected among the farmers of this province.

Leslie Frost's government initiated progressive legislation in health, education and human rights, and encouraged growth in the private sector through fiscal policy and public investment.

John Parmenter Robarts was a strong advocate for individual freedom and defended provincial and human rights. He also laid the groundwork for the community college system and helped open up two more universities in this province.

Frank Miller, whose son Norm serves in this Legislature today, was very active and involved in the Ministries of Health, Natural Resources, Treasury and Economics, and did much to help lead this province.

These are individuals who I firmly believe deserve recognition. No matter what political stripe they wore, these were individuals who led this province and helped to shape it. I think it's of extreme importance that we pay tribute to these individuals, that we say thank you to these individuals.

Before I came into the Legislature today, I walked down the halls. You walk up the front stairway and you start to see the portraits of the former Premiers. You walk down the hall on the second floor to the Premier's office and you think of the countless hours those individuals put into this job and what they did to try to improve things. To them we say thank you.

One of the things that truly bothers me as a Canadian is that we often don't realize what we have in our own backyard. We don't think about our own heritage enough. We see the great flag-waving in the United States, but we don't do that in Canada for some reason. We think our history is trivial, but it's not trivial. We've got a great history, a history that is worth promoting.

My intent with this legislation is that we take that step and move forward to recognize those individuals. For myself, it started with a visit to Mount Pleasant Cemetery. I was touring this wonderful cemetery on Yonge Street north, and as I went through I saw a Canadian flag and a small plaque at the gravesite of Mackenzie King. It struck me that we're recognizing the Prime Minister and the other Prime Ministers because of federal legislation that Roger Galloway, the MP for Sarnia-Lambton, helped to put forward in 1998. It was enacted in 1999. I thought that if the federal government could recognize the contributions of former Prime Ministers, we as the province of Ontario should be working toward recognition of the former Premiers of this province.

You can just imagine some of the great debates that have taken place in this Legislature since it opened in 1892, and the Premiers sitting there and having to answer in question period. If the walls in this very chamber could talk, the stories they could tell. I think every one of us recognizes that.

I know there is some concern about one aspect of this legislation, and that is some privacy issues. It certainly was never my intent to go into a cemetery without dealing and working with the cemetery. It certainly was not my intent to act against the wishes of any family member who may have some concerns. But I don't think they will, because I think we should all be proud of the contributions those individuals have made. We should recognize them not only for this generation but for future generations.

In many ways we do need to understand the past and look at the past to know where we're going. I see this as a step forward, where we as a province will recognize those contributions, where we can say thank you to those individuals who have served this province with distinction as Premier and we can say thank you to their families too, because every one of us knows the hours a politician puts in. We need to say thank you and we need to pay tribute. It's my intent, with the preservation of gravesites of former premiers of Ontario, to give these premiers the recognition they truly deserve.

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Mr David Christopherson (Hamilton West): I'm pleased to add my voice in support of the bill. I think that it's well intentioned. Quite frankly, a lot of people would find it surprising that we don't do this now. Here we are, on the brink of 2002, and there really isn't this kind of recognition.

The reason I wanted to speak to this was just to add a personal experience. Not that long ago I was in Kingston with a friend and we were travelling around and came across a sign that said, "The Gravesite of Sir John A. Macdonald," of course the founding father of Canada, of Confederation. It piqued my interest. We pulled over, walked up and looked at the site, and I was really disappointed. I say this because I'm sure it's something we've all experienced from time to time.

After a few minutes of looking at the site and, quite frankly, how pathetic the site was in terms of the recognition deserved by such an important, crucial historical figure as Sir John A. Macdonald, the first thought I had was, "You know, the Americans would do this a lot different." They might go to a little further extreme than we would, because we have different approaches to patriotism and our history, but nonetheless, the point in my mind was, "This is so sad."

We want to do so many things on the world stage, and have done so in the past. I see some young people here today. In the future, hopefully they'll be leading our nation into even greater glories, if you will. To begin that process without even properly recognizing Sir John A. Macdonald really bothered me. That's why I wanted to take a moment to come in here and speak to this, because it bothered me.

It bothered me that as a society we didn't care enough about our history and have enough pride in our history to ensure that we reflected proper respect and remembrance of the first Prime Minister of our nation. To apply that here, to ensure that Premiers, whether one personally agrees or disagrees with their policies, are recognized, that that office is respected, that the office of Premier is an important part of our parliamentary tradition and certainly a key role in our governance structure -- again, we as Ontarians should take some pride in our history. We can't expect the following generations to have the feelings about Ontario and Canada that we have without giving them some significant symbols of what that has meant to previous generations.

All I really wanted to do was put on the record that I'm glad Mr Peters brought this forward. I commend him for doing so. It's one of those small things that will not likely appear in a whole lot of media, but it's the right thing to do. I think Mr Peters -- I'm assuming this will pass at the end of the day -- will have left his mark by ensuring that as a people and as a society we are leaving our generational markers in place for future generations to learn from and be respectful of. Again, my congratulations to Mr Peters. I'm glad this is here; it's the right thing to do. It's long overdue.

Mr Frank Mazzilli (London-Fanshawe): It's certainly a privilege to rise and speak on this bill, as parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation. I want to thank the member for Elgin-Middlesex-London for coming up with this initiative and this idea. As he said, the federal legislation, which did virtually the same thing with some more complexities to it, was only done a couple of years ago so this isn't a situation where somehow in this country this was being done in other provinces or at a national level; it's something that's been neglected by everyone. I also want to thank him, not only for the initiative of the bill but for the history lesson itself, through his 10-minute speech, one that I certainly found very informative.

Ontario at the present time does have the Ontario Heritage Foundation provincial plaque program, which is different from what is being proposed by the member from Elgin-Middlesex-London. In fact, that plaque program recognizes Premiers, and there are plaques for 14 Premiers in this province. However, they're located either in their birthplace or in their constituency. As you look through the schedule that the member has attached to his private member's bill, it's somewhat different. People obviously choose their resting place in locations that are not, in some cases, their birthplace, that are not in the constituencies where they have served throughout their time.

Part of the educational program that I received through your speech was the pedigree of the former Premiers and how that is still represented in this Legislature today through the grandchildren and children of those Premiers. After hearing the member from Elgin-Middlesex-London, it's a wonder that some of us who do not have that type of history in our bloodlines, if you will, have ended up here. At some point, that may also change.

The one thing that the ministry has acknowledged, and the member from Elgin-Middlesex-London will acknowledge, is when the federal program was initiated, it started out with $500,000, and that has quickly gone to some $1 million. So these are initiatives that will have to be looked at. The bill certainly does not explain how and who will pay for certain items of preservation. I suspect that once the government takes on these initiatives, the taxpayers of this province will have to look at those issues.

One thing I will say is that the member has come up with the initiative and the thought of respecting and acknowledging former Premiers of this province, and I believe in that concept. I'm certainly proposing that the ministry have a look, and if they need to write a government bill that does the same thing, I would be supportive of that initiative, where it does require money to be spent.

I know my seatmate Norm Miller from the great riding of Parry Sound-Muskoka, where his father represented this Legislature as Premier of this province, certainly wants to speak to this important issue. All in all, I want to congratulate the member from Elgin-Middlesex-London. I think we can work through the issues of privacy and funding for this important initiative, and I hope that at some point in the near future, we can have an act that will respect former Premiers of this province.

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Ms Caroline Di Cocco (Sarnia-Lambton): It is with great pleasure that I rise and speak today on my colleague's bill requiring that the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation mark gravesites of former Premiers of Ontario. I believe that my colleague Steve Peters has brought forward this bill because he has a commitment to heritage. As the critic for culture and heritage for the Liberal caucus, I would also like to state that I certainly have a very strong commitment, as does Dalton McGuinty and the Liberal caucus, to heritage and culture.

I believe it's these small steps that we as legislators can bring forward, these types of bills, that actually leave a legacy for our future generations. I want to thank Steve Peters for bringing forward this bill. A few years ago, as Steve indicated, in my riding, we commemorated -- or we unveiled, if you'd like; I don't know how else to put it -- the gravesite where Alexander Mackenzie is buried. He was the second Prime Minister of Canada, and he also was an MPP, a member of provincial Parliament. There was a year when he was both MPP and MP and he served in both capacities at the same time.

What it showed us in Sarnia, what it did by having this gravesite as part of a national heritage designation, if you want to call it that, was it gave the opportunity for the community to understand better some of its roots. Not only did we as a community look at the history of this second Prime Minister -- most of the community didn't know the second Prime Minister of Canada had been a resident of Sarnia and had worked and lived in Sarnia-Lambton -- it provided us, as people in Sarnia-Lambton, the opportunity to take a look at where we come from, what helped to build us as a community, what helped to build us as a nation. It had a remarkable impact, in my view, in helping us, as residents of that area, to better understand that past and to look at where we are today.

I took a look at one of the clips I saw from the London Free Press on December 4, which was a thumbs-up and talks about how "Peters's plan must not be buried." It says, "Our past is often ignored. Let's hope somebody pays attention to Steve Peters tomorrow.... [As] it stands, anyone stumbling across the St Thomas grave of Mitchell Hepburn wouldn't know it marks the resting place of an onion farmer who hated pomp, appealed to immigrants and led Ontario from 1934 to 1942."

I believe it's important, fundamentally important, to us as a society to ensure that we preserve our past. Steve Peters has already spoken about some of the achievements of the past Premiers in Ontario, so I won't reiterate that. He already said that for the record. But one of my biggest concerns in this province is that this whole aspect of culture and heritage seems to be dealt with, in my view, with a great deal of indifference in this Legislature, on a bigger scale. That concerns me a great deal, because I think indifference to heritage and indifference to culture lessens us as a society. Unfortunately, we're losing much of our heritage here because we don't have a Heritage Act that has teeth. That word is not spoken; I don't believe it has been spoken in this Legislature for all the time that the Conservatives have been in power.

Culture and heritage has had the deepest cuts as a ministry, deeper than that of the environment. First was culture and heritage and second was the environment, which indicates to me the priorities, or lack of priorities in those sectors. It's an unfortunate non-understanding, in my view, of the value of culture and heritage.

I believe that ministries in a government are like a mosaic, and I'm going to use my analogy of how I believe we should be treating all the various ministries. What I believe is that a mosaic is made up of many, many parts. Some of the parts are larger, some of them are smaller, some of them are more colourful and brighter, and some of them are less colourful and bright, but we need every single piece to complete the whole picture. That's one of the rationales, that although culture and heritage are not at the forefront of the urgent priorities of the province, they should nonetheless be important, because it is important as a part of who we are as a people.

This initiative by Steve Peters, I believe, shows not only his commitment to history but his commitment in preserving that sense of identity that we need. We always talk about, as Canadians, we don't have a sense of identity. But we do. We just unfortunately either take it for granted or we treat it with this terrible indifference. I'm going to say it again: I want to thank Steve for his initiative, and I'm hoping that this Legislature will pass this bill for third reading, because it certainly will leave a legacy that will be felt and be appreciated much more in the future than it probably is today.

I want to talk a little bit about some of the losses of heritage, losses of identity that we're seeing day to day in this province because we don't have the political will to really address this whole aspect of heritage with any substance. We have our first Parliament buildings, for instance, in the riding of my seatmate that many groups are trying desperately to save, many groups are trying desperately to attain funding to assist, because we also have to put some dollars into the preservation and maintenance of our heritage in this province.

This is the only province that doesn't have a provincial historical museum. We have seen a number of the community museums across this province being literally devastated because of the deep cuts, and many small museums that preserve that history of those small communities have been whittled away, with $5,000 taken away here, $10,000 taken away there. It's impossible for them to maintain that service because there's always this sense, "These museums should be making money." Well, there's another service that they provide. They're not a business in the way other businesses are, and one of the, if you want to call it, very narrow perspectives that I often see is that certainly the government knows the cost of running these small museums, but unfortunately it doesn't equate the value of what it is to have a museum in a small community.

In my view, in these instances it's being penny wise but certainly pound foolish long-term, because this is also a part of an industry that creates a tourism attraction. If you have a sense of identity in our communities, if you have a strong sense of history in a community, that's what makes that community interesting. That's also what makes the province interesting. It makes it unique from another community. It gives it a sense of identity. So the long-term intangible benefits as to the value of having that sense of identity will also translate into a very strong economic return as time goes on as another industry in the areas.

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I was up in Moosonee, for instance, in James Bay. I needed a day or so to relax, and I took the Northlander up to Cochrane and then from there I took the Polar Bear Express and went up to Moosonee. It was my couple of days of quiet and enjoying the area.

I was speaking to someone from the Ministry of Tourism, and he mentioned to me how there is now this initiative just recently to promote tourism in Ontario. Then I equated it back to my trip that I took up to Moosonee and also the constant fear that the Northlander may be shut down. We know there's a section in the new budget bill that was passed to allow the Northlander commission to be able to regulate whether or not they're going to shut down the Northlander. I've certainly heard the debate.

So on one hand we want to promote tourism and we want to promote these, if you want to call them, unique niches that are nowhere else in the world, yet the actual infrastructure that's going to take you there is in a precarious state today. That's because there isn't this holistic approach. I believe it was Jane Jacobs who said that when you take one piece out of this habitat, there are many other things that are going to be impacted by it.

When I was up in Moosonee, I noticed that there was a huge history of the Hudson's Bay Co in Moose Factory. But it was in terrible disrepair. It had fallen into disrepair, and one of the reasons, of course, is because there has been no fiscal support to maintain that after -- I believe the last time was the centennial year. So there doesn't seem to be any interest to develop and maintain that heritage infrastructure or the heritage identity of this province, but there is the big push to promote or to market the tourism niche. In my view, one will fail without the other.

Having this initiative of preserving as a beginning -- and again I commend my colleague -- this provincial history at least starts to give us a bit of a sampling, across the province, of how we have evolved politically in this province and some of the gains that were made. One of the interesting aspects about this kind of provincial history is that we're dealing today with many, many of the debates and discussions that were dealt with in the 1800s and early 1900s. It's interesting, because when I was reading about John Sandfield Macdonald, the first Premier, he talked about how he feared Toronto's domination of his St Lawrence Valley region. He had this sense that Toronto was going to take over in priority.

There was another one here that I also thought was quite interesting. It's about Sir Oliver Mowat and the fact that under his leadership, Ontario came of age economically, socially and politically. Agriculture was modernized, the importance of industry was recognized and educational and scientific areas were cultivated. You could take those words and I believe you could put them in today and they would still be relevant to what government is trying to do and the intent of what every party puts forward as a platform.

I certainly hope this Legislature will pass this bill. I want to say this is a good step forward. I'd like to see a lot more initiatives such as this. Thank you, Steve.

Mr Michael Prue (Beaches-East York): There is absolutely nothing in this bill that would cause me or should cause anyone else to vote against it. It is a bill that will help to preserve the heritage of this province. It will help to recognize people who need to be recognized. It will help to recognize people who need to be recognized. It will help the general public to understand the final resting place of many great individuals and, I think just as importantly or perhaps more importantly, to have a sense of the historical perspective of those people in the life of this province.

Heritage, unfortunately, has never been a high prerogative of this government -- or any government, I would say -- in Ontario. One can go all around the province and find places where heritage has not been accorded the degree of commitment that one would expect and in fact that one sees in many other places in the world and even many other places in Canada. One need only go to Quebec City to see the whole development of their heritage, of the downtown and lower town of Quebec City, to understand how the preserved heritage in that municipality and in Quebec itself, as a province, has been restored, kept and nurtured. It's a whole joie de vivre about not only who they are today but who they have been over the centuries.

I am glad to see that this may be one small step that will get Ontarians thinking of how important heritage is to our community. Unfortunately in our community over the past, buildings have been torn down or modified so that they can no longer be enjoyed or understood. The legislation in this province in terms of heritage is extremely weak. As of the passage of the new Municipal Act, municipalities have no more authority than they have had for 149 years in terms of preserving their heritage. All they can do is delay the destruction of heritage buildings by six months -- nothing else, nothing more, period. That is sad.

In this province, historical bodies have been starved of money. There is no money to plaque, there is no money to educate the public, there is no money, or very little money, to do the work of explaining to Ontarians and Canadians and people around the world the uniqueness of this province: how this province has played its role in Confederation, how this province has been home to hundreds and millions of new immigrants, how this province has developed from what was a wilderness just a couple of hundred years ago when the first people came. I'm not talking about our native people -- they were here already, of course -- but when the first European settlers arrived, this was very much a wilderness. Life was very hard and it was a very difficult place in which to live. But they carved out of that wilderness the place we see around us, the wonderful place we call Ontario.

This province is also a sad place where museums are forced to close because there is no money. It's already been stated that museums are not even opened. We are the only ones without a provincial museum to talk about our heritage and our past. Museums are closed. I think recently of the heritage museum in Toronto that had to close called the Pier, down on the waterfront, I guess about a kilometre from this location. It had to close for the mere amount of about $100,000 because there was no money left in the municipal coffers to keep that museum going. Things have been underfunded to such an extent that a museum and heritage site of international recognition in the east end of the city called the Brickworks has never been able to fully open. It has a park surrounding it, but the buildings lie in ruin. There has never been any money to maintain them or fix them up or get them going again.

The original Parliament buildings have never been properly dug up and only now are attracting some interest. Fort York is having highways go all around it and has never been able to develop, although that was the site of one of the great defences of this country in 1812.

In this very Legislature, I don't think we have paid enough attention to heritage. There was a bust of Agnes McPhail, who was not only the first woman to be elected to the House of Commons in Ottawa in 1921, where she served with distinction for more than 20 years, but she was also -- and many people do not remember this -- the first woman elected to this Legislature in 1945. No woman was elected to this Legislature until 1945, and she was one of two elected that year. There was a bust of her outside the Premier's office. I don't know what happened to it but I understand one day someone brushed by it and it fell over, was damaged and had to be removed. It has been broken now for many years. There is a process that has to be undertaken to restore that bust and to get the necessary funds, but it involves legislative committees and money and it involves debate in this Legislature to replace it, and it has never been done. I hope the Legislature, hearing the debate today on the importance of heritage and the importance of recognizing Premiers, might also recognize that remarkable woman, the first one to be here in this Legislature, and find the necessary funds as well to make sure that bust, that statue, goes up in its rightful place.

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The Premiers, of course, all should be remembered. It is much more important to remember them in the local municipalities from which they came, much more important for people to see it than merely to read about it in history books, and much more important than merely to have the portraits hung here on the walls. Of course, the portraits are already here on the walls. Those who are lucky enough to come into Queen's Park, those who have a tour of this building, will see the portraits of all of the Premiers. They hang on the wall and everyone is proud and everyone is happy to see them here. But in the far-flung areas of the province where the Premiers might be buried, very little is known.

My colleague talked about going to Kingston to Sir John A. Macdonald's gravesite. I have myself visited the gravesite of another Prime Minister, Lester Pearson, in Quebec overlooking the Ottawa River. It's a very simple grave; there is no real plaque or monument or anything that would signify that that man, who was a great Prime Minister of Canada -- there is nothing there.

There is nothing really there about the Premiers of this province either. They must be acknowledged and there must be plaques placed at or near the gravesites. But I am also suggesting that if the Legislature can find the funds, there should be a grove or an area somewhere here in Queen's Park -- and there's a lot of land -- where a duplicate plaque should also be put. I think that would be a really good idea so that all of them are available to people who may not ever come inside the Legislature but could see those plaques when they were out walking in the park or in among the flowers, the things that people often do around this park.

There was a good accounting by Mr Peters, the member for Elgin-Middlesex-London, of the Premiers. I don't intend to go through all of those, but in the time left to me I would say I was doing some research about some of the Premiers and wondering what to say. I came across one about Premier Whitney which I thought, in view of the announcements yesterday on privatizing electricity, might be of interest to the members opposite and maybe some others watching.

I read directly from a quote from the Honourable Brenda Elliott, what she had to say about Premier Whitney and electricity back in 1996. I would like this to be remembered about Premier Whitney, and perhaps an opposite plaque might, in 20 or 30 or 50 years' time, be said of someone else.

She says: "In the early years of this century, how to develop the electricity potential of Niagara Falls was the hot issue at Queen's Park. Everyone had an opinion, but the controversy ultimately boiled down to a struggle between two groups. One group supported the development of Niagara Falls by private sector interests. The other favoured developing Niagara Falls with public money.

"Ironically, it was the Liberals of the day who supported private sector power. The Conservatives, led by James Whitney, supported publicly funded development of the falls.

"In the provincial election of 1905, the public power supporters -- led by Whitney's Conservatives -- were elected, despite warnings from prominent financial papers in New York and London that these people were dangerous radicals, perhaps even socialists. Imagine that.

"One of the members of Whitney's cabinet was a young minister without portfolio -- Adam Beck -- whose name became synonymous with the cause of public power. In 1906, despite continuing controversy, the government pushed the Hydro bill through the House and Beck was named the first chairman of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario."

I'm going to have to skip down to the end due to time.

"That magical moment, 90 years ago, serves to remind why we are here tonight. The electrification of Ontario and the part that Ontario Hydro played in that process are important aspects of our past. And they are part of our collective heritage, as a province and a society.

"For nearly a century, Ontario Hydro has provided high-quality service to the Ontario public, bringing the countless benefits of electricity to the people of this province. For that we must all be grateful.

"On behalf of the Premier and the government, as well as the people of Ontario, I want to take this opportunity to thank the Ontario Hydro board, its management and staff, for their tireless commitment to serving the people of Ontario. You, and your colleagues who have preceded you, have made our lives better -- and brighter."

I was talking about James Whitney, and I hope the plaque somewhere says something good about his having done that. We need to save our past. This is a good bill to do a little part of that. I welcome it, I support it and I thank Mr Peters for his initiative.

Mr Norm Miller (Parry Sound-Muskoka): It's my pleasure to rise today in support of Bill 143, which has been put forward by Steve Peters from Elgin-Middlesex-London. Of course this bill is of personal significance to me as my father was Premier of this province back in 1985.

My father did many things. It was always mentioned that he sold cars. He was a chemical engineer. He was the member for Muskoka from 1971 to 1986 and he served in the government, first as Minister of Health, then as Minister of Natural Resources and as Treasurer -- he was probably best known as Treasurer for five or six years -- and he was Premier for a fairly short length of time, starting in 1985. Even though he was Premier for a short time, there was nothing he was more proud of than being Premier of this province.

I think it is very fitting that all those past Premiers, all 17 or 18 of them, be recognized and their contributions to this province recognized. That's why I very much support this bill put forward by the member for Elgin-Middlesex-London. I know he's very much interested in history. I believe he has a degree in history and that's probably why he developed an interest in this specific bill.

In 1999 there was a federal program that was started to recognize the gravesites of Canadian Prime Ministers, and that was the National Program for the Grave Sites of Canadian Prime Ministers. They have a brochure so that those interested in finding those sites can do so, and there's a Web site and other means of assisting people who are interested in the history. There were complaints from people trying to find out about many of our past prime ministers and that's why that bill originated. There is a cost, I think a reasonably significant cost in the case of the federal program. I believe it has cost about $1 million, but the ongoing cost to run the program is something like $100,000 per year.

This bill requires the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation to mark the gravesites of former premiers of Ontario, and permits the minister to make agreements for the care and preservation of these gravesites, including marking them with plaques and with the Canadian and Ontario flags. As I think of my father and how proud he was of being Premier of this province, I'm sure he would love to have his gravesite marked in such a way. I just think of how proud he was to have had the honour of serving as Premier of this province.

It should be noted that the Ontario government currently has the Ontario Heritage Foundation plaque program, which recognizes important events, buildings and people, including former premiers. In fact, 14 of them have plaques marking either their birthplace or somewhere in their constituency telling about them. So the Ontario government has taken some efforts to remember our history, but this would be an important addition to that existing program.

Another important aspect of this program, as put forward by Mr Peters, is that it would only be done in consultation with the families and with the direct support and cooperation of the families of the deceased, so there has to be that co-operation.

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It is also worth noting that this program can be introduced immediately. It does not need legislation to go forward. That's certainly worth noting. It is going to be a positive way of commemorating Ontario's history. It is also worth noting that Bill 143 may conflict with the Cemeteries Act, so that's something that would have to be dealt with, and there are additional resources required to implement the program.

As you look down the list of all the past Premiers -- John Sandfield Macdonald, Edward Blake, Sir Oliver Mowat, Arthur Sturgis Hardy, Sir George William Ross and Sir James Pliny Whitney -- many had unique lives and contributed greatly to the development of the province of Ontario. I think it is very much worthwhile remembering that history.

It's interesting to note there are three located in Mount Pleasant Cemetery alone: Sir William Howard Hearst, Sir Oliver Mowat and George Howard Ferguson, three former premiers in that one cemetery.

The member from Beaches-East York said that the Ontario government doesn't recognize history, doesn't contribute to museums. I'd just like to relate that my own personal experience has been --

Mr Prue: I didn't say that. They don't do enough.

Mr Miller: Don't do enough. In my experience in Parry Sound-Muskoka, I've been to the Parry Sound museum three or four times since being elected, in the last nine months. It's a very active museum. I'm usually there to announce some form of funding through a government program. I'd just like to mention my experience has been different.

In closing, I'd like to thank Mr Peters for bringing this bill forward. My father would be tickled pink. I'd like to personally thank him for bringing it forward. It's a great way of remembering all that the past Premiers have done for this province and I hope it is implemented.

Mr Joseph N. Tascona (Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford): I'm pleased to speak on this initiative. I would say it's a positive initiative that's been put forth by the member. It doesn't need legislation for it to actually come in place. Be that as it may, I want to mention that the Ontario Heritage Foundation, which is a non-profit agency of the government of Ontario, has been established and has done great work with respect to preserving, protecting and promoting Ontario's rich and varied heritage. Most likely that would be the agency to implement this piece of legislation if it goes forward.

An Act to preserve the gravesites of former premiers of Ontario is the initiative we are looking at here today. The Ontario Heritage Foundation already has a provincial plaque program. I'd like to make reference to some of the initiatives they have because one touches close to home, which is my riding of Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford in Simcoe county. The only Premier to have unveiled a plaque commemorating himself was the Honourable E.C. Drury, Premier during the administration of the United Farmers of Ontario from 1919 to 1923. It was unveiled in 1962 at Crown Hill in Simcoe county. I also know the family of the Honourable E.C. Drury, certainly Bob Drury, who served with distinction as the warden and also the reeve of Oro-Medonte, and other members of the Drury family who are in Simcoe county.

As part of the plaque program of the Ontario Heritage Foundation -- I know the member is from this area of St Thomas -- there are even plaques for animals. Jumbo, the famous circus elephant, was killed by a train in St Thomas in 1885. There's a plaque in St Thomas commemorating that. That's part of the work that has been done by the Ontario Heritage Foundation.

The local marking program that they also have at the Ontario Heritage Foundation is part of the work. I think the public should be aware of the tremendous work that is done by the Ontario Heritage Foundation in terms of bringing about, promoting, preserving and protecting our heritage. Certainly there are ways to participate in that. I know they've got a Web site and other means of being connected in terms of the programs they provide, which have probably enriched the history and culture of any riding in any part of this province.

This is an initiative on Ontario's heritage that, as I said before, is a positive initiative. The former Premiers of Ontario -- the member from Muskoka spoke very eloquently about his father, Frank Miller, who was one of that our Premiers name. What we need to keep in focus is the tremendous sacrifice that any person makes, in particular our Premiers, with respect to entering public life in terms of the challenges they face and the good works they do. Being a father of four young children, I think it's important for our young people that we know and emphasize our heritage, so they have a background and a rooting in our province and appreciate what has gone before, so that we can learn from our history in terms of moving this province forward.

Mr Peters: I'd like to thank everybody who has participated in the debate today and, most importantly, my colleague from Parry Sound-Muskoka, because he lived the life and seen the contribution his father made to politics. We also heard how proud he was of his father, that he had served as Premier of this great province.

Bill 143 would recognize the 18 graves of former Premiers and would also forever recognize future graves of Premiers living right now -- we've had 22 Premiers serve this province. And nothing was intended to the Premier at all; it's sheer coincidence that we're debating this bill today as the Premier is about to depart this Legislature. We thank the Premier for the contribution he has made in serving the citizens of Ontario.

Of interest too -- and the member from London-Fanshawe spoke about it -- is the prominent role the London area has played in bringing forward Premiers in this province. You look at Robarts, Peterson, Blake, Ross and Hepburn -- all within about 20 miles of each other. Those great seeds that were planted in the London area have served this province over the years.

I would ask that everybody support this bill, because this is a bill that truly does recognize those contributions of former Premiers in a non-partisan way. More importantly, it will preserve for future generations how important it is to recognize the past.

With that, I will close. To all my colleagues and to everyone in Ontario, I wish the best through the holiday season and into 2002.

The Acting Speaker: This completes the time allocated for debating ballot item number 40.

NIKKEI HERITAGE DAY ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001 SUR LE JOUR
DU PATRIMOINE NIKKEI

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): I'll now place the question related to ballot item number 39.

Mr Wettlaufer has moved second reading of Bill 140, An Act to proclaim Nikkei Heritage Day. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Pursuant to standing order 96, this bill will be referred to the committee of the whole House.

Mr Wayne Wettlaufer (Kitchener Centre): Mr Speaker, I'd like to have this go to the standing committee on general government, please.

The Acting Speaker: Mr Wettlaufer has asked that this bill be referred to the standing committee on general government. Agreed? Agreed.

GRAVESITES OF FORMER
PREMIERS ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001
SUR LES LIEUX DE SÉPULTURE
DES ANCIENS PREMIERS MINISTRES

The Acting Speaker (Mr Michael A. Brown): We'll now deal with ballot item number 40.

Mr Peters moved second reading of Bill 143, An Act to preserve the gravesites of former premiers of Ontario. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Mr Steve Peters (Elgin-Middlesex-London): I seek unanimous consent to refer Bill 143 to the standing committee on general government.

The Acting Speaker: Agreed? Agreed.

All matters relating to private members' public business being complete, this House stands adjourned until 1:30 of the clock.

The House recessed from 1201 to 1330.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE POLICIES

Ms Caroline Di Cocco (Sarnia-Lambton): As this is the last day we sit in this legislative session, I'd like to recap some of the effects of the extreme neo-Conservative policies in my riding and across this province.

In 1997, it was the Conservative government that created the largest toxic hazardous waste dump in Canada in St Clair township. Today, Ontario is the only jurisdiction in North America that does not treat hazardous waste before it is landfilled.

Sarnia-Lambton has seen 14 schools closed because of a flawed funding formula created by the current Conservative regime. Parents, students and members of my community have watched helplessly as one school after another closes, tearing the heart out of neighbourhoods.

Today, 70% of people who need home care need it because they are released from hospital too quickly, yet home care has been cut. Yet Cabinet Office's costs have increased by 116%. This government has borrowed $10 billion for tax cuts and added $22 billion to the debt.

The ultimate question after six years of uninterrupted, unprecedented growth: have we seen an improved health care system, a stable and improved education system or better environmental protection? The answer unfortunately is no.

ACHIEVEMENTS OF PREMIER

Mrs Julia Munro (York North): I'm pleased to be able to take this opportunity to reflect on the achievements of our Premier, Mike Harris, and his commitment to York North during his time as party leader and Premier.

Mike's 20-plus years at Queen's Park have included more than 11 as leader and six as Premier. Mike has always spoken and acted consistently on the issues affecting us all: eliminating the deficit, cutting taxes, creating a more efficient and accountable government, increasing health care spending, and enhancing community safety.

In my riding of York North, families have benefited from the Premier's direct approach. My riding of York North has always figured prominently in setting the course of action for our province and our party. In March 1990, at the annual general meeting of my riding association in the Sharon arena, Mike spoke to our membership about becoming leader of the party. Five years later, in March 1995, he spoke to us at the Briars. This time Mike was leader and I was the candidate for Durham-York. In June 1999, he chose Newmarket to announce the election, and ours was the first campaign office he visited. Just a few days before his announcement, he spoke to us at the home of Mike and Leah Springford in King township.

Under Mike's leadership, we have all made great strides. I'm sure all of you will join me in expressing our thanks to Mike Harris for his dedication to the people of Ontario. Thank you, Premier.

ONTARIO MUNICIPAL BOARD

Mr Mike Colle (Eglinton-Lawrence): People all across this great province are fed up with the Ontario Municipal Board, this government's anti-democratic dinosaur that overrides local taxpayers' and local governments' decisions in favour of developers who routinely bypass local councils and go directly to their friends at the dreaded OMB, where the same special interests, with their deep pockets, can afford to spend millions of dollars hiring the best lawyers and consultants money can buy to impress the nameless, faceless OMB, which even Judge Kennedy in London recently blasted, saying they denied the people of London natural justice. Even the OMB in London sent a lawyer to court in support of a developer's application against the good citizens in London.

The OMB has become a huge money pit as a result of the increased powers given it by this government. It routinely overrides and disregards the wishes of the people, whether it be in allowing a development on Niagara fruit land, development in High Park in Toronto, demolishing affordable housing or building apartments on beautiful Reservoir Hill in London.

It's time to rein in this anti-democratic dinosaur and give our communities back their voice in planning and shaping their local communities.

ACHIEVEMENTS IN
TORONTO-DANFORTH

Ms Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth): I live in and represent an incredible community: the riding of Toronto-Danforth. I could stand here today and talk about all of the bad things that have happened in my community as a result of the so-called Common Sense Revolution, but what I want to talk about today and congratulate the citizens of my community on are our successes in fighting the Harris destructive agenda.

Our community, all of us working together, were successful in keeping the Riverdale Hospital open, despite this government's attempts for two years to shut it down. We won that fight. We fought the Harris government and we won it together.

We, together, in the community of Riverdale and East York stopped the closing of 11 schools that the Harris government wanted to do. We got together as a community and we fought back and we fought back hard, and those schools are still open, thanks to the good work of the people in my community.

We were successful in keeping the NDP's financial commitment to expand the South Riverdale Community Health Centre. The minister of the day from the Harris government finally went ahead and continued to give that funding, which of course would have fallen apart once the NDP left office, but the government did listen to us and provided that funding.

Finally, because I don't have time to go any further than this, we were successful in getting a third councillor in East York due to the hard work of the residents of East York after the forced amalgamation. Frances Lankin, Michael Prue and myself, working together with the citizens, fought the Tory government and we got the third councillor in place.

I congratulate the citizens of my riding for being able to take on the Harris government, fight back, and win.

SANTA CLAUS PARADES IN
DUFFERIN-PEEL-WELLINGTON-GREY

Mr David Tilson (Dufferin-Peel-Wellington-Grey): One of the many pleasures I have in representing the riding of Dufferin-Peel-Wellington-Grey is the fact that I get to participate in a number of different and unique Santa Claus parades held throughout the riding.

In the past month I've participated in six parades, with the seventh and final one happening this weekend in Holstein. The only parade I was unable to participate in this year because of a conflict was in Arthur.

Some parades are large, detailed affairs, while others are intimate local events. Both seemed to be enjoyed equally by the audience. The Holstein Santa Claus parade is always a unique experience that is enjoyed by young and old. In Holstein, the parade is non-motorized, so every imaginable sort of transportation is used to entertain the crowd.

If you haven't had the opportunity to attend this fun day, I would encourage you to do so this year. As a father of a three-year-old just discovering the excitement of this holiday season, I would recommend the fastest way to get in the Christmas spirit is to join or watch a Santa Claus parade.

To all of the organizers in Bolton, Orangeville, Shelburne, Erin, Grand Valley, Arthur and Holstein, thank you for taking the time to put together these wonderful symbols of the season.

To all the members of the Legislature, Mr Speaker, and to you, as well as the constituents watching from home, I would like to wish you all the best of the holiday season. May your homes be filled with family and friends as you celebrate this wonderful time of year. Merry Christmas and happy new year.

CONSTRUCTION LABOUR MOBILITY

Mr Jean-Marc Lalonde (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell): My statement today is addressed to the Minister of Labour. Minister, last Monday you held a press conference in Ottawa on the Quebec-Ontario construction labour mobility agreement that you signed two years ago. From day one I have told you, Minister, that Quebec would never respect this agreement. I think this was just a big publicity stunt. Now you agree with me, and I quote: you said that the agreement doesn't work.

Well, Minister, when I told you that I had hundreds of examples of Ontario construction workers who were having problems working in Quebec, you didn't take me seriously. Here are a few examples.

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On the Champlain Bridge in Ottawa, Ontario heavy-equipment operators were let go when they reached the middle of the bridge. They couldn't continue working. How about the Ontario construction workers who were fined $2,000 each for having construction tools in their cars parked on the Quebec side while working on the Ontario side? I could give you hundreds of examples such as this.

The solution is to stop all Quebec contractors from working in Ontario. You must do it now, before the bridges are closed again by the Ontario workers. Minister, bring back Bill 17, and don't tell me you can't enforce it, because right here I have the proof that this bill can be enforced.

ACHIEVEMENTS OF PREMIER

Mrs Tina R. Molinari (Thornhill): It is my pleasure today to pay tribute to our Premier, Mike Harris, for the great job he has done in putting Ontario in the right direction.

Mike Harris began his term as Premier in 1995, campaigning on a number of promises, one of which was tax cuts for Ontarians, and he delivered on the tax cuts and many more. Setting the standard of keeping promises through his six years as Premier was unprecedented. He has changed the face of politics by being a politician who actually did what he said he was going to do: more jobs; tax cuts; 600,000 people off welfare; back-to-back balanced budgets for the first time in close to 100 years; the first Premier in over 40 years to win back-to-back majority governments, a testament to the people of Ontario's belief that our government, under his leadership, would keep the promises we made.

When our world changed on September 11, it was Premier Mike Harris who showed the strong leadership that was needed at such a difficult time.

Premier, in your final days as Premier in this House, you once again have shown your leadership by fighting for not only the health care of the people of Ontario but also the people of Canada. You are the only leader who has been helping working families in this province. I would like to thank you on behalf of all Thornhill residents and Ontarians for the outstanding job you have done in serving this province. I've been proud to serve under your leadership.

AUTOMATION OF SOCIAL
ASSISTANCE SYSTEM

Mr Michael Gravelle (Thunder Bay-Superior North): I want to inform the Legislature and the public today about the shocking increase in taxpayers' money that's being spent on the automation of the province's social welfare system. To say the costs are spiralling out of control is a massive understatement. We already know that ministry payments to Accenture, formerly Andersen Consulting, have reached a staggering $193 million. We also know that that money was well in excess of the cap that the government committed to spend on the project, and in fact the payment should never have been made until still-unproven savings were confirmed.

But it now turns out that the Accenture rip-off is just the tip of the iceberg. We have since discovered an additional $280 million in costs associated with this failed automation project paid out to firms such as MFP Financial. So while the government says it can find no more money for health care, they paid out almost half a billion dollars to unsuccessfully automate a system that still doesn't work and has garnered no clear savings for the government.

It gets worse still. We've just learned that the ministry will be hiring more outside consultants to operate this new system for an additional three years. Apparently, this is happening because the ministry's own staff have somehow, inexplicably, not been trained to operate the new and still problem-plagued system.

Minister Baird, you've got to come clean on this scandalous boondoggle. How many more millions of dollars are you going to rip off from taxpayers to justify this disastrous project? The bill to taxpayers keeps going up, administrative costs are rising, and there are no savings attached to this venture. This is a mess. It must be exposed and it must be stopped.

EID UL-FITR

Mr Bob Wood (London West): Over one billion Muslims throughout the world have been observing a month of fasting and inner reflection during Ramadan. Ramadan ends with the sighting of the new crescent of the moon, and is celebrated by the festival of Eid ul-Fitr.

Literally the festival of breaking the fast, Eid ul-Fitr is one of the two most important Islamic celebrations. Eid ul-Fitr is a day of joy and thanksgiving. At Eid ul-Fitr, people dress in their finest clothes, adorn their homes with lights and decorations, give treats to children and enjoy visits with friends and family. A sense of generosity and gratitude colours these festivities. Although charity and good deeds are always important in Islam, they have special significance at the end of Ramadan. As the month draws to a close, Muslims are obligated to share their blessings by feeding the poor and making contributions to mosques.

Eid ul-Fitr also honours the universal values that are embodied in Islam -- love of family and community, mutual respect, the power of education and the deepest yearning of all: to live in peace -- values that can bring people of every faith and culture together and strengthen us as a people and nation.

I know I speak on behalf of all members of this House in extending our best wishes and greetings to the Muslim community in Ontario as they celebrate this auspicious occasion. To our Muslim friends: Kullu am wa antum bi-khair. In Arabic that means, "May you be well throughout the year."

REPORTS BY COMMITTEES

STANDING COMMITTEE
ON JUSTICE AND SOCIAL POLICY

Mr Carl DeFaria (Mississauga East): I beg leave to present a report from the standing committee on justice and social policy and move its adoption.

Clerk at the Table (Mr Todd Decker): Your committee begs to report the following bill, as amended:

Bill 98, An Act to proclaim May as South Asian Heritage Month and May 5 as South Asian Arrival Day / Projet de loi 98, Loi proclamant le mois de mai Mois de l'héritage sud-asiatique et le 5 mai Jour de l'arrivée des Sud-Asiatiques.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Shall the report be received and adopted? Agreed.

Pursuant to the order of the House dated December 12, 2001, the bill is ordered for third reading.

Mr DeFaria: I beg leave to present a report from the standing committee on justice and social policy and move its adoption.

Clerk at the Table: Your committee begs to report the following bill, as amended:

Bill 105, An Act to amend the Health Protection and Promotion Act to require the taking of blood samples to protect victims of crime, emergency service workers, good Samaritans and other persons / Projet de loi 105, Loi modifiant la Loi sur la protection et la promotion de la santé pour exiger le prélèvement d'échantillons de sang afin de protéger les victimes d'actes criminels, les travailleurs des services d'urgence, les bons samaritains et d'autres personnes.

The Speaker: Shall the report be received and adopted? Agreed.

Pursuant to the order of the House dated December 12, 2001, the bill is ordered for third reading.

MOTIONS

HOUSE SITTINGS

Hon Janet Ecker (Minister of Education, Government House Leader): Pursuant to standing order 9(c)(iii), the House shall continue to meet until midnight on Thursday, December 13, 2001, for the purpose of considering government business.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please say "aye."

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members; this will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1348 to 1353.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 83; the nays are 8.

The Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Hon Mrs Ecker: Mr Speaker, I would just like to ask on behalf of all the members here if your staff would let us know how the page is doing later today.

COMMITTEE SCHEDULE

Hon Janet Ecker (Minister of Education, Government House Leader): I seek unanimous consent to move a motion -- which has been circulated across the floor -- without notice, relating to committee meeting times during the winter adjournment and to have the question on the motion put without further debate or amendment.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Is there unanimous consent? Agreed.

Hon Mrs Ecker: I move that the following committees be authorized to meet during the winter adjournment, and notwithstanding prorogation, as follows:

The select committee on alternative fuel sources, to consider matters relating to its term of reference pursuant to the order of the House dated June 28, 2001;

The standing committee on finance and economic affairs, from February 25 to 28, 2002, inclusive, and from March 4 to 8, 2002, inclusive, for pre-budget consultations, and on April 4, 2002, for the purpose of report writing;

The standing committee on justice and social policy, for up to two weeks, to consider the following bills: Bill 10, An Act to revise the Limitations Act; and Bill 31, An Act to facilitate the making, recognition and variation of interjurisdictional support orders;

The standing committee on the Legislative Assembly, to consider parliamentary reform, pursuant to the order of the House dated October 15, 2001; and

The standing committee on public accounts for up to 12 days during the month of February and during the first week of March to complete report writing, consider private members' public bills and to consider the annual report of the Provincial Auditor; and

That the committees be authorized to release reports by depositing a copy of any report with the Clerk of the Assembly during the winter adjournment or between the second and third session of the 37th Parliament, as the case may be, and that in any case the Chairs of the committees shall bring any such reports before the House not later than the first sessional day reports from committees may be received when the House next meets.

The Speaker: Mrs Ecker moves that the following committees be authorized to meet during the winter adjournment:

The select committee on alternative fuel sources, to consider matters relating to its term of reference pursuant to the order of the House dated June 28, 2001;

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The standing committee on the Legislative Assembly, to consider parliamentary reform, pursuant to the order of the House dated October 15, 2001; and

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

VISITORS

Mr Mike Colle (Eglinton-Lawrence): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I'd like to welcome to the House staff and students of Vaughan Road Academy, including the brother of one of our pages, Andrew Persaud. His brother Raymond is here also from Vaughan Road Academy.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): We do have a number of members who -- we will probably treat this like a budget; we don't introduce all the members, because there are too many. It would take all afternoon, and I'm sure they would rather listen to some other things. But we do welcome all our colleagues who are here.

TRIBUTES TO THE PREMIER

Hon Robert W. Runciman (Minister of Economic Development and Trade): Mr Speaker, I believe we have unanimous consent for each party to make some brief remarks on the occasion of the Premier's last day in the Legislature and for the Premier to speak in response.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Is there unanimous consent? Agreed.

Hon Mr Runciman: It is a great honour and privilege for me to rise today on behalf of the Progressive Conservative caucus to pay tribute to Premier Mike Harris on what is likely to be the last sitting day of the Ontario Legislature with Mike Harris as Premier. This is a day to say thank you to a Premier and a leader for a job well done and to recognize the significant contributions he has made to our province. So there is, of course, an element of celebration today.

But there is also a touch of sadness, especially for me as a fellow member of the class of `81. I'm starting to feel old. There are just two of us left on this side of the House who were elected in March 1981 and have been in this place ever since, over 20 years, almost 21; a long time. I want to say a few words about those early days.

Mike Harris was recognized as a comer from his first days at Queen's Park. Premier Davis gave him the opportunity to be a parliamentary assistant and to train at the foot of a politician who knew the secrets to advancement: the member for Sarnia, Andrew Brandt. That tutelage paid off when on February 8, 1985, Mike Harris entered the cabinet of the late Premier Frank Miller, a wonderful man for whom all of us had the greatest respect.

Mike Harris served as Minister of Natural Resources, and I sat beside him in my capacity as Minister of Government Services. One thing that struck me back then was his air of understated confidence. It was the confidence of someone who listens hard to understand the aspirations of the quieter folks who really make Ontario work. It's a powerful strength that others have underestimated at their peril and to their regret.

After the Liberal-NDP accord of 1985, Mike Harris served as our party's House leader. Those who were here at the time will vividly remember that that was a difficult and disheartening time to be a Progressive Conservative MPP. After the 1987 election, it got even worse. We were down to just 16 seats, our leader had been defeated, and many of us had been re-elected by the smallest of margins: 198 votes in my own case. But Mike Harris as our House leader was a tower of strength and a source of inspiration during those dark days.

Then in 1990 he took on a job that few people aspired to, leading a third-place party mired in debt and with few prospects. Sound familiar, Howard? But Mike Harris did take on that job, and almost immediately, David Peterson decided to call a snap election before our new leader had a chance to raise any money or find any candidates or come up with any new policies. We all know how that turned out. Premier Peterson was right that we wouldn't have time to develop a detailed policy platform, but Mike Harris made the crucial decision to fight that election on the one clear promise to cut taxes. In that campaign he earned the name "The Taxfighter," a badge of honour to this day.

No one would have predicted the outcome of that election, not even my friends in the current third party. But one important thing that I think of, again in retrospect, is that Mike Harris was underestimated. There's a story from that election that the late Colin Vaughan, a CityTV reporter, filed a report on the first day of the campaign as Mike Harris's tour bus, dubbed "Taxfighter One," pulled away from Queen's Park. Colin closed his report by saying, "There goes Mike Harris. Who cares?" Well, I think Mike Harris has always had a talent for being underestimated that has served him very well.

I also think that the period between 1990 and 1995 was a critical period if you really want to understand the success of the Harris government after 1995. Mike Harris led a caucus of 10 veterans and two newly elected, enthusiastic rookies. You'll remember that, Mr Speaker. We were still in third place, but I can tell you quite sincerely that our leader instilled and developed in our caucus, in our staff and in our supporters a sense of vision, a sense of mission, a sense of teamwork and a recognition of the critical importance of going out and talking to and listening to the people of Ontario.

Mike Harris led by example. He led by example in showing a respect for the views of ordinary Ontarians who for too long had been lacking in elected leaders. I believe that's been his key to success all along. As an aside, Mike Harris was an extremely well travelled party leader, and it may have been that familiarity with the names of the rivers, lakes and bays of the province that inspired Mike Harris in May 1991 to read into Hansard the name of every body of water in Ontario. On that occasion, the Taxfighter was attempting to prevent passage of the NDP budget, with its tax hikes and $10-billion deficit. That may go down as the last great filibuster in this House. It was very inspirational, Mr Speaker, as you remember.

This emphasis on keeping in touch with the people on Main Street goes to the heart of Mike Harris as an MPP and as a party leader and to his success as Premier. He always remembered that it was the people of Nipissing who sent him to Queen's Park and the people of all the communities, large and small, across Ontario who put him in the Premier's office. They trusted him to represent them, and he was committed to making sure that trust was honoured. That, I believe, is the heart of what Mike Harris is about: a promised made is a promise kept.

By the time Mike Harris ran in 1995, the biggest political hurdle he or any other leader had to overcome was the strong feeling Ontarians had that it simply didn't matter who they voted for. Over the previous decade, they had been fundamentally and systematically let down by all parties, who said one thing to get elected and did quite another once in office. That undermined the credibility of the process in the minds of our citizens. Mike Harris restored that confidence by seeking clear mandates, forcing honest debates and by keeping faith with the millions of Ontarians who gave him their trust. He said what he was going to do. He made no apologies for it. Even when the experts said, "It's impossible; it'll never happen," he told everyone who would listen. And when he was elected, he did exactly what he said he would do.

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Support or oppose his policies, everyone must concede you always know where Mike Harris stands and you can always count on him to keep his word. In 1995 that was radical, that was new. I believe Mike Harris has fundamentally changed politics in Ontario, and in Canada as well.

Ontario, because of Mike Harris's leadership, has changed. Because of Mike Harris, Ontario is a better place. I'm just going to briefly mention a few of those highlights: 192 tax cuts since 1995, more than 800,000 new jobs, nearly 30,000 new business start-ups, more than 600,000 Ontarians off welfare, the largest single expansion of parks and protected space in our history, the elimination of the deficit and breaking the yoke of onerous taxation, and much, much more. All of these things form a lasting legacy.

But I also want to speak of another legacy, a legacy which is personified by the presence with us today of Premier Harris's two sons, Mike Junior and Jeffrey. All of us in this chamber today, I believe, got into politics not because we sought the spotlight but because we wanted to make a difference. We wanted to make our neighbourhood and our hometown and our province a better place for ourselves, for our families and for those who come after us, to secure a brighter future for our children. I say through you, Mr Speaker, to the Premier, there can be no greater legacy than to know that you have made Ontario a better place for your own two sons and for all of our children and for the generations of Ontarians that come after us. Premier, you have made a difference.

While Mike Harris will be stepping down as Premier with the thanks of a province that has benefited so much from the turnaround he has led, his will continue to be an important voice in the future of Ontario and Canada. We know that he will continue to speak from his heart because he loves his province and country, and we will be thankful that he will, as always, speak his mind, because his ideas are the right ones for our future.

Premier, you have given more than 20 years of your life to public service, you have made many personal sacrifices and you have earned the chance to take control of your own time again, to go fishing with your sons, to enjoy the beauty of our great outdoors or to spend it however you choose. The Progressive Conservative caucus has been proud to have you as our leader in opposition and in government and we all wish you every success in your future endeavours. Premier, Mike, thank you for all you have done for us and for our great province. Godspeed.

The Speaker: The leader of the official opposition.

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I'm going to do a couple of things today which I am not accustomed to doing. I am first going to say some nice things about the Premier and I'm going to quote Brian Mulroney.

Interjections.

Mr McGuinty: I did not vet this speech with my caucus, and I sense an insurrection of some kind here.

Let me begin with Mr Mulroney. He said that in politics you need two things -- friends and, above all, you need an enemy. The truth is, the Premier and I have been adversaries. No matter the occasion, neither of us would shy away from that truth. But while we've not shared the same views, we certainly have a few things in common.

For one thing, we have shared this House. Michael Dean Harris has been a member of this Legislature for a remarkable 20 years. The member for Nipissing was first elected to the Legislature in 1981, and was re-elected in 1985, 1987, 1990, 1995 and 1999. I know that I speak for every member of my caucus when I say that of all those elections, we enjoyed the ones in 1985 and 1987 the most. Joking aside, that is a testament to the Premier's obvious political skills. Mr Harris has been a very shrewd, very tough and very successful adversary. Mr Harris's Nipissing constituents have re-elected him no fewer than five times. Our first job is to serve our constituents, and Mr Harris's constituents have clearly felt well served.

There's another bond that the Premier and I share, one that few people can completely appreciate. We've both been opposition leaders in the Ontario Legislature. That's a job that I know we both consider a privilege. But there are days, Mr Speaker, there are days. When you're travelling this great province in the dead of winter speaking to massive crowds, sometimes numbering in the tens, you can develop a little humility.

Let me tell you a true story. In the early 1990s, the very early 1990s, Mike Harris visited Carleton University, which was then in my riding. Before coming to town, Mike Harris's picture was posted around the campus, advertising the opportunity to meet with him. Little did I know then that this would be a harbinger of things to come -- this advertising, I mean.

When the day and hour arrived, only one person showed up to meet with the leader of the third party. Mike Harris sat down and gave that one person one full hour. I know that Mike Harris got the job of Premier the old-fashioned way. He worked for it.

I have very fond memories of Mike Harris's days in opposition. Government members who were not there in those days would not recognize the then Mike Harris. Unlike me, he was always deferential to the Premier, and he never, ever made it his job to get under the Premier's skin. Heaven knows why it was that Bob Rae once said of Mr Harris, "He's never really recovered since being turned down from the lead role in Jurassic Park." That comment was surely uncalled for. I can assure all those elected since 1995 that Mike Harris was never obstructionist, unlike the opposition of today. There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever that it was purely a love of nature that compelled him to read the name of every lake and stream into the record of the Legislature. But even after six and a half years as Premier, Mr Harris continues to relish the role of opposition leader. I know that, and boy do my federal colleagues know that.

The member for Nipissing has served long enough in this House to serve with two generations of McGuintys. Like my father and like so many backbenchers in this Legislature, past and present, Mr Harris was underestimated by the political centre and the establishment. He wasn't given much of a chance to become leader by the so-called Big Blue Machine, and he wasn't given much of a chance to become Premier by the pundits.

That certainly didn't change when he took over his party. People forget what a mess that party was then in. Membership was down, morale was low and the debt was sky-high. Mike Harris turned his party around, and he turned it into a machine designed in his own image: aggressive, confident and uncompromising. Many people scoffed when he brought forward his Common Sense Revolution. Mike Harris didn't waver, and voters responded.

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Whatever our political views, those of us who have felt underestimated from time to time respect Mike Harris's abilities to overcome the limitations placed on him by the so-called experts of the day. And whatever our political stripes, those of us who have taken on the task of modernizing a political party respect the member's abilities to turn a political organization around.

The member for Nipissing -- and this is not hyperbole -- transformed his party. He also transformed politics in Ontario. The electorate has always wanted to hear our ideas, but now those ideas must be crystal clear and simple. The sound bite it more important than it was. The backdrop is more important than it was. The ad is more important than it was. The message is more important than it was. The fundraiser is more important than it was.

Political scientists and journalists have already filled books debating these changes, but few would dispute that the member has transformed politics.

In 1995, some things did have to change, and Mr Harris undertook to attempt that change. We all know that we on this side of the House have thought -- we know of what we've thought of that attempt, its content and its style and its consequences. I'm on the record on it. I'll have more to say on that front in the future. I look forward to making that case to Ontario voters. But this is not the occasion for that; it's an occasion to mark a decision Mike Harris made some 20 years ago, a decision to choose public life, to choose politics to fight for one's beliefs. It's a choice that takes courage, that brings great personal rewards, but that can also exact a price.

Andy Rooney, humorist of 60 Minutes fame, once said, "The only people who say worse things about politicians than reporters do are other politicians." And that's true, but politicians are uniquely qualified to understand the impact those things can have on our families. I know that as tumultuous as your time in public office has been, Premier, you and the people you care most about have also been through a great deal. I pay special tribute to your family, and especially to your two sons, Mike Jr and Jeffrey, for the sacrifices they have made.

Premier, I and my caucus wish you well in your personal life, and we support your request for privacy after politics. It's a short walk from this side of the House to that one, but you and I know how difficult and challenging a trip it can be.

I wish you the best on your next journey beyond politics. To the member for Nipissing, I say farewell.

Mr Howard Hampton (Kenora-Rainy River): Speaker, I want you to know at the outset that members of my caucus, when we were told that we were going to have a few words to say about the Premier today, indicated that this was going to be a caucus thing, and so they have some things they want to say, too, in addition to the few words that I want to say.

I have been in this Legislature since 1987; in fact, the member for Nickel Belt and I were both elected in 1987. I just want to point out to the Premier that I remember when you were over here with your 17 members. I want you to know that I actually did the numbers after you went to the much larger constituencies in 1995, and under the larger constituencies the 17 would have been seven. I just wanted you to know that, if you do the numbers.

In remarking upon some of the comments that have been made already, I and some of our other caucus colleagues were here for many, many, many hours as you read in the name of every lake and every river in Ontario into Hansard. We actually learned something from that manoeuvre. You will remember that during the megacity amalgamation debate we followed your manoeuvre and we read in the name of every street and avenue in the city of Toronto for 11 days and 11 nights without recess, without anything so much as a washroom break. You'll also remember that immediately after that you changed the rules so that no one could follow your manoeuvre again. So some of us have learned from your manoeuvres, and I have to say that, while it was painful to listen to the lakes and the rivers, I'm sure it was equally painful to listen to the streets and the avenues for 11 days and 11 nights.

I want to acknowledge, though, in the brief time that I have what I think is the single biggest contribution that you have made to public life in Ontario. I want to acknowledge the debate that you have created, and it is a debate that now rages through every city, every town, every village, every hamlet of this province, and it is a debate which will go on after your time as Premier.

The debate that you have started is a debate about what should be public and what should be private. Yesterday the issue was very clearly, will we have a publicly owned electricity system or will it be privately owned, and what does that mean for people's lives? You have started a debate about whether there will be a public education system or a more private education system, and what does that mean for people's lives? Legislation that was introduced yesterday: will we have public utilities in charge of the distribution of water and sewage treatment or will we have greater private control and private involvement? In the area of health care, will we continue to have a publicly funded, publicly administered system, or will our system become more and more private?

This is a debate which I think all of us acknowledge rages everywhere in Ontario society today. It is not possible to go into a coffee shop, a gas station, a supermarket without hearing someone raise some aspect of that debate. I think people need to acknowledge that you were very clear, and you have been very clear, about your position and the reasons for your position and the outcomes that you believe in. You have not tried to soft-sell this; you have not tried to finesse it. You have been very clear in the positions that you've taken. If I may, I believe this is actually a healthy debate. It is a debate that needs to happen in Ontario today.

I said that my colleagues wanted also to join in, and I hope you will recognize, and we recognize, that when a party leader leaves office in Ontario there is a tradition in saying our farewells. We put partisanship and politics aside for a moment. We acknowledge contributions. I want you to know that this has been a bit of a challenge for our caucus. However, after a great struggle I can tell you that we have decided to abandon the partisanship of this, though I think you will recognize certainly the politics of what we are about to say.

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Mr Rosario Marchese (Trinity-Spadina): Premier, to mark your retirement, the NDP caucus prepared this small tribute to your departure because, for us and for you, it's like the Sound of Music. We apologize for any discordance that may occur to all present here, and to you, Premier, and we do this with some trepidation and a great deal of modesty. Bear with us.

We're going to do it without music, because the discordance would be greater.

One, two, three:

Dough, you'll go make lots of dough

Rae, no longer seems so bad

Me, I'm not at Osprey Links

Fa, some golfing with the lads

"Ah so," the word you never said

La, you're off to la-la land

Ti, with tax cuts for your friends

That will bring you back more dough, ho, ho, ho

Dough, Rae, me, fa, so, la, ti -- go!

Applause.

The Speaker: The Premier of the province of Ontario.

Applause.

Hon Michael D. Harris (Premier): Mr Speaker, I get the feeling the ministers are trying to run out the clock on question period. OK, I'll stay.

Applause.

Hon Mr Harris: I'll stay for a few minutes.

I am reminded today of the words of one of the greatest philosophers of our time, and you would understand that I would pick this great man as one of the great philosophers of our time, Yogi Berra, who said, "It's not over till it's over." That's not for a few months yet. I have lots more to do, but before it's over I have lots of people to thank, so let me start today by thanking some in this Legislature.

First, the members of our caucus, both past and present: I am touched that so many past are able to join us in the Legislature today. I know it hasn't, for all of you, always been easy. Many of the decisions that we've made have been difficult. Many of them have caused controversy. Many of them have affected your lives and the lives of your staff. Many of them have made it difficult even to get to work some days. They've not been without controversy, but we took those decisions and we implemented them with pride because we sincerely believed -- in fact, we knew -- that they were in the best interests of the people of Ontario. I want to say to my caucus, again, those who have been with me throughout this period and those still in the House, that I thank you for allowing me to always count on your support, your advice and, most importantly, your friendship and your loyalty.

To my colleagues across the floor, we have debated, we have disagreed, but I want to say this: I have never doubted nor ever impugned any motive of any one of you at any time, at any stage, or doubted your commitment to the people of this province or your dedication to public life. You have proven time and time again that this Legislature is a place where the citizens' voices are heard, where their battles are fought, and where their ballots do matter.

Today I particularly thank you, Dalton, for your very kind comments. I've never actually been leader of Her Majesty's loyal opposition. I don't ever want to be, I don't wish it on anybody, but I know a fair bit about the hectic life you lead. I know something, as you indicated, of those town hall meetings in these large halls with 10 people. In my case, on more than one occasion, it was one person. I know how demoralizing it can be sometimes when you have a terrific message and you can't get it out to the people. It either doesn't get covered, or it doesn't get read or listened to, or it gets not what you believe it certainly deserves in attention.

I also know how much the travel means, from one's riding in Ottawa to Toronto and then of course, as leader, all across the province. I know how much your kids miss their dad. I want to say I admire and respect those, not only who run for office, any political office, but those who, particularly in this Legislature, on many occasions have to leave home to come here, and then I particularly admire those who are prepared to leave. I know that Leader of the Opposition is often a one-person show. I know how challenging it is, because I was in the official opposition, not as leader, and I know how even less attention was paid to us there. So it's an awesome responsibility, and I thank you for the kind words today.

I thank you too, Howard. I know I'm not supposed to use first names in here, but all you can do is throw me out. I'm on my way. I would like to say that I have not heard one member on all sides of the House -- I've heard complaints about rule changes, but I've not heard anybody come to me and complain about the rule change that stopped the all-day or all-week filibuster as a vehicle.

I have experience as leader of the third party and I didn't like it. It's hard work. I have experience, as you know, of no money in the party coffers to help you travel and get your message out. While they often don't pay enough attention to those very interesting viewpoints of Her Majesty's official opposition, it is an even greater challenge to get something you believe in very strongly before the public.

I'm not going into policy today. I'm not going to rehash any of those areas. I appreciate all the things that have been said. I want to say, though, to both the leaders of the opposition that I thank you for your kind and very warm wishes and send-off today. I wish you both the very best in your lives in a very difficult job. I stop short of wishing you the political success that gets you on this side of the House, but in everything else in life, I wish you the best.

Bob Runciman, my friend of close to 21 years now, spoke on behalf of my caucus colleagues, past and present. As you heard, he and I are the only two left on this side of the House of the class of 1981. The class of 1981 was 22 members. We went all across that back row. We thought we needed oxygen up there at that time. There had never been a fourth row in the Legislature. This was before the renovations took place. We were higher up in those days, as well.

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When we came into this Legislature, there had been six years of minority government, and we heard a lot about the realities of March 19 -- that's when we were elected. I don't want to get into a lot of the details; many of you in opposition heard that. When the same kind of compromise wasn't required, when a majority government could move on without the give and take there had been in minority governments for six years, the answer was always, "Well, those are the realities of March 19." I would just say that the realities of March 19 became the realities of May 2, 1985. We learned a lot of lessons from the realities of March 19. The realities in 1985 were smaller opposition and third-party status. We needed to learn a lot, and we did.

I want to say thanks to the people of Nipissing, who have repeatedly shown their confidence in me, who have helped me keep true to my roots, who I hope are still willing to share the best fishing spots with me now when I have more time. I remember how I felt when I was first elected to this House. I remember feeling both proud and very humble: proud because my friends and neighbours had chosen me, humble because I realized how much they were counting on me to get the job done and scared because I wasn't exactly sure how to go about it all. Walking through those doors for the very first time, I realized that the people of Nipissing had placed and given me a sacred trust that had to be deserved and had to be earned and re-earned each and every day. So I say thanks to the voters of Nipissing.

To all my friends from Toronto, my friends from North Bay, my friends from all across the province: you've helped me, you've supported me, you've encouraged me, you've educated me, you've financed our party and you've made me laugh when I really needed somebody to make me laugh. There are a lot of days, particularly in opposition, and a lot of days in government, when one needs cheering up, and I'm glad that a number of you are able to be here with me today.

To my staff over the years, I know that you have given it all to me as well. It's been more than a job to you; it's been a cause. I want to thank you for the long hours, and I want to thank you for the professionalism. I still chuckle when I have to sign the timesheets to meet all the labour codes, standards and rules and regulations of the 37½ hours, and I wonder on which three days of the week you put in those 37½ hours. But that professionalism and that commitment has always meant a lot to me, and I think it's meant a lot for your professionalism in your field, because it has been a cause for all the staff I've worked with. I do have to say that for putting up with a sometimes very slightly grumpy boss on the very odd occasion, I thank you.

To the officers of this Assembly, the Speaker, the Clerk and all those who work hard to keep the democratic process running smoothly, you've served the members of this House well, me included, over those 20 years, and by doing that, the people of this province. I thank you for all your dedication.

I too believe that Ontario has the best civil service in the country, bar none. I want to thank all of them for their professionalism, for their dedication to serving the people of this province, for their willingness to move forward with an agenda. Many have said we made changes, many changes. It required a professional civil service to implement those changes.

Of course, my thanks to my family: my father, who I still think of almost every day; my mother, who still knows how to keep me in line; my sister Mary, who couldn't get off work today; and my brother Sid, who was able to get off work today, for their advice and support. I'm especially glad, of course, that Mike Jr and Jeffrey are here today. They inspired me, they tested me -- it's great training for question period. I'm delighted that they were able to join me.

I'll have other opportunities, I think, to talk about my more than 20 years as a member of this assembly, but today is my last opportunity to speak in this special place as Premier. As much as I have loved serving as Premier, I do want to say that I have loved being a father even more. So of course, I look forward to having more time to spend with my sons.

I want to thank the people of this great province. It has been an honour to serve you, it has been an honour to work alongside you, and I thank you for your support. Over the last six and a half years I've been constantly amazed at the strength and the warmth of the people of this province.

I want to mention a couple -- young people like Joey Hache, who has been a real inspiration to me and to those around him. I met Joey when he was just 15. He had contracted hepatitis C through a tainted blood transfusion. While I have known him, he has battled courageously, not only with his disease but in the fight to ensure that all hepatitis C victims were compensated.

I remember the hard-working young families like Dave and Krista White of Barrie. Like all parents, they have high hopes for their 11-month-old son David. I want to thank them for sharing their dreams for David with me, for reminding me why we must continue working to strengthen Ontario, to remind me what we must do for future generations.

There have been many, many others, everyday people in towns across this province who have inspired me. I've met them in coffee shops; I've met them in the Legion halls; I've met them, sometimes, one at a time, sometimes thousands. It has always amazed me, I think, that the people of this province chose a small business person from North Bay -- no political experience, not a political family, no involvement in youth politics, no desire to be involved in politics. I'm always amazed that you picked me as your Premier.

So I say to all the people of this province, thank you for giving me the opportunity, the opportunity to serve. Thank you for sharing your ideas and your advice with me. Through it all, your words have encouraged me. I received them every day. Down every street in every event, I received words of encouragement. Yes, there was the odd time I received some contrary viewpoints. But through it all, I received mostly encouragement. And that has meant more to me -- I say that to Ontarians all across this province, some whom I have no idea who you are. I don't know your name, but those words when you came up to me meant a lot to me.

This province has come a long way in the last six and a half years. There is still much more to do to make Ontario stronger. I'm going to continue working hard to build an even brighter future for everyone in our province. In whatever capacity the future holds, I will continue to serve as I always have, and that's with great pride in our province, with great confidence in our people, with great hope for Ontario's future, and with a great deal of thanks for having been given the opportunity of a lifetime: the opportunity to serve the people of Ontario as their Premier.

My friends, thank you.

Applause.

LEGISLATIVE PAGES

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Just before we begin, I want to say to all the members, first of all, that the page who had a little problem is fine.

This is also the last day for all our pages. Please join me in thanking the pages for a wonderful job.

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ORAL QUESTIONS

CANCER TREATMENT

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): I will make every effort now to return to the norms to which we have become accustomed.

My question is to the Minister of Health. This morning the Provincial Auditor issued a damning report on your privatization of after-hours cancer treatments in Ontario. The auditor said that you used a secret and closed process that broke the rules and that led to someone with an obvious conflict of interest getting the contract. You actually gave the contract to the vice-president of Cancer Care Ontario. That's the public organization which was having trouble meeting the demand for cancer treatment in the first place. On top of all that, the auditor said that taxpayers were actually paying more for these cancer treatments than if Cancer Care Ontario had been delivering the service itself.

Minister, what are you going to do now that you know it was a bad deal for cancer patients and for taxpayers?

Hon Tony Clement (Minister of Health and Long-Term Care): I feel honoured with the question. I would say to the honourable Leader of the Opposition, he certainly knows how to clear a room. I do appreciate the question.

From my point of view, I want to say for the record that of course we welcome the Provincial Auditor's value-for-money audit. We supported it from the very beginning. We want to ensure, of course, that tax dollars are spent prudently. I want to say to the honourable member that the reports that came out from the Provincial Auditor do support the fact that the cost of radiation treatment in the after-hours clinic is approximately $14,000 lower per patient than the treatment that would have been available in the United States, which is where these patients were going before the after-hours clinic was opened. That is clear from the auditor's report; that's what we said from the very beginning. The Provincial Auditor has supported our case that it is better to treat people closer to home and at less cost to the taxpayer of Ontario.

Mr McGuinty: Minister, the important figure here is this: you are paying $500 more per patient in the private system than if you had provided that treatment in the public system. Yes, the treatment that you've got is cheaper than in the US, but it's not as cheap or as inexpensive as we could provide it for here in Ontario in the public system. That's the point. That's the point the auditor was making. You have ignored repeated warnings about the way you got into this contract and you have consistently defended this deal many times over in this Legislature.

The auditor has now said it was a bad process, and on top of that it's a bad deal for taxpayers. How can you justify paying $500 more for cancer treatments in the private sector than we could have delivered here in the public system?

Hon Mr Clement: Actually, the honourable member's figures are a bit faulty. The differential between the after-hours clinic and regional cancer centres is about $100 per patient. But that's if you can get in. The problem with the system as it was before the after-hours clinic was approved by this government was in fact they couldn't get in. They did not have treatment; they did not have access; they did not have a local Ontario solution. The only alternative, which the honourable member seemed to want to support, was going to the United States, going to Buffalo, going to Cleveland, at $14,000 a patient. The Provincial Auditor has confirmed that was the case. We support the findings of the Provincial Auditor; we support the cost differential that he in fact has concluded is far more in favour of establishing an after-hours clinic than the alternative which was on the table.

Mr McGuinty: Minister, why don't you take responsibility for creating this mess in the first place. Shortly after you were elected, you delayed opening cancer centres and you shut down education programs for our radiation therapists and our oncologists. You gave us the waiting lists, and the Provincial Auditor today tells us that they aren't getting any shorter. So what did you do in the face of this crisis that you created? You resorted to your usual first resort: you looked to the private sector. The Provincial Auditor tells us that you didn't get that right. We're paying more in the private sector than we could have paid in the public system. So you screwed up what we were doing in the public system and you screwed up your attempt to bring this around in the private system. You've got it wrong on both accounts. How can you justify our paying more to have cancer treatment provided for in the private sector than we could have done in the public sector?

Hon Mr Clement: I again state for the record that the alternative that was presented to this government was either longer and longer waiting times here in Ontario or going to the United States. That was the status quo. We did change the status quo. We did have an after-hours clinic. We are proud of the fact that we have eliminated the requirement to go the United States for cancer treatment.

But the honourable member doesn't have to take my word for it. Here are the results of the surveys done for those cancer patients who have used the clinic: 99% said they received excellent care; 95% would recommend the clinic to family or friends if they needed treatment; 90% said they had lots of support from other health professionals; 93% said they felt comfortable talking with physicians about their problems. Those are the people of Ontario who are happy with the clinic. They are happy to receive compassionate, excellent care in the province of Ontario. We're with the people of Ontario. We are proud of that result.

HOME CARE

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): My question is for the Minister of Health. In a few hours you're going to complete your hostile takeover of home care in Ontario. Bill 130 gives you all the power over home care, and I assume that you're going to be using this now to fix the suffering that you have inflicted on our families. I want to present you today with three specific cases of Ontario families.

First of all, there's Mr Frank Derango from North York. He's 67. He suffers from cancer. His 92-year-old mother is being released from hospital in two weeks. She is very frail and she suffers from Alzheimer's. She's going to need a lot of care when she comes home, as I'm sure you'll understand. Mr Derango has been told that his mother will not get any home care -- none. He has cancer. He'd like to care for his mum, but he can't because he is too sick. Now that you're taking all the power over home care in the province, will you be issuing a specific direction to get Mrs Derango the care that she needs?

Hon Tony Clement (Minister of Health and Long-Term Care): To the associate minister.

Hon Helen Johns (Minister without Portfolio [Health and Long-Term Care]): Thank you very much for the question. As you know, the bill hasn't even been accepted by the House. We have second and third reading to go today in the House. But let me say that our goal with respect to Bill 130 and in the future with all health care is to ensure that we provide the quality of care necessary to ensure that the people of Ontario get the services they need, in whatever avenue that leads to. With the new legislation today, we're going to be talking about an advisory council that takes into account hospitals, community care access centres, long-term-care facilities and community support services. We intend to integrate all those to make sure that there are services for the people of Ontario.

Mr McGuinty: You are underfunding home care, you are eliminating local representation, those good community activists who are looking after our parents and grandparents. You wanted home care; you're getting home care.

Here is the case of Mrs Agnes Winterbottom from St Catharines. She's in her 80s, she's blind, and she's had her home care hours cut. She was embarrassed to have to tell us what the cuts are going to mean to her. Do you know what they mean to her? She's now only going to get one bath every seven days. She would like to get two baths a week. You have $500 million for private schools. You have $2.2 billion for large corporations. You tell me, now that you've got the full responsibility for home care, knowing there is that much money available out there, what directive are you going to issue to ensure that Mrs Winterbottom gets what she wants, which is nothing more than two baths a week?

Hon Mrs Johns: Let me say that our goal is to ensure that people in the province get quality care as close to home as we can offer it, so we will continue to work to do that.

But let me say that the opposition leads us to believe that this government hasn't put substantial dollars into health care and especially into community services and home care. In 1995 the budget was $600 million. Today it is $1.17 billion, an average increase in that time of 72%. We're going to use those dollars effectively to make sure we provide quality services across the province. That's our goal.

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Mr McGuinty: Madam Minister, when are you going to admit that demand for home care has skyrocketed because you're discharging people quicker and sicker than ever from our hospitals? Your funding is not keeping up with the demand.

Here's another case: Mrs Gould. She's 90 years old. She lives here in Toronto. She worked and paid taxes until she was 82 years of age. That's a remarkable accomplishment. She now has angina, she suffers from skin cancer, and she has a great deal of difficulty walking. Her daughter helps her with things like groceries, cooking and housework.

Do you know what she wants help for when it comes to home care? She wants a bath. She'd like to get a bath once a week. She's now paying for home care at a personal cost of $1,300 a month. She only makes $22,000 a year. You've got money. You've got half a billion dollars for private schools; you've got over $2 billion for large corporations. Now that you have taken full responsibility for delivering every service under the home care file here in Ontario, what are you going to do to ensure that Mrs Gould and people like her get their fundamental needs met, like having a bath in their home?

Hon Mrs Johns: We brought forward Bill 130 because we needed to make some changes in community care access centres in the province. Our commitment to the people of Ontario is to provide quality services, and we intend to do that. We intend to make changes internally within the community care access centres to ensure that dollars are pushed down to provide services for the people of Ontario. I look forward to working with the Ministry of Health, the boards at the community care access centres, the CEOs and the new executive directors at the community care access centres, because I know that together, in partnership with the communities, we can continue to provide solid, good services for the people of Ontario. That's our objective, and if the bill is passed this afternoon, I intend to work with all my partners to ensure that happens.

COMPETITIVE ELECTRICITY MARKET

Mr Howard Hampton (Kenora-Rainy River): Mr Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Energy. The sale of Hydro One means much higher prices for consumers and very big fees for your friends on Bay Street.

When I questioned you before about privatizing our electricity system, you said it wouldn't lead to much higher prices. You said there isn't the electricity transmission capacity, the electricity transmission lines, to move electricity out of Ontario and into the markets in the United States. But now your scheme to sell off Hydro One means exactly that, and the corporate directors of Hydro One have said that. This will free them up to build transmission capacity into the United States, where prices are much higher. Why are you following a policy that will lead to much higher prices for electricity in Ontario?

Hon Jim Wilson (Minister of Energy, Science and Technology): the honourable member, surely to goodness, knows that Hydro One is a regulated monopoly regardless of who owns it. The Ontario Energy Board sets the distribution and transmission rates in this province under this government. I know that under previous governments the Ontario Energy Board did not have the power to do that, but since 1998, under the Electricity Act passed by this Legislature, the Ontario Energy Board sets the distribution tariff and the transmission tariff. Therefore, things are the same in that area.

Second, it is Floyd Laughren and the Ontario Energy Board that have asked Hydro One to build another 1,000 megawatts of transmission line into the United States. Why? Because we want competition. And do you know what? Every once in a while electrons will flow this way and bring cheap power to the people of Ontario, and every once in a while electrons will flow that way, surplus power will flow that way, and bring cheap, clean energy to the people in New York, for example. Every day on my watch, for four years, we provide the power at peak time in New York City. We have been --

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): The minister's time is up.

Mr Hampton: Minister, you know full well that a company that's selling electricity into New York City at double the prevailing price in Ontario has no interest in lowering their price to sell in Ontario. Similarly, a company that's selling into Boston at three quarters more than the price in Ontario has no interest in lowering their price to sell into Ontario. This is about privatizing Hydro One. They build, as their corporate directors have said, the huge transmission lines into the American market. Then the private generators like British Energy or TransAlta or whoever else can take the private power they now have and sell it into the American market can say to Ontario consumers, "If you want power, you pay the price we're getting in New York."

The large manufacturers in Ontario, when this was just theory, used to support your scheme to privatize, but now Dofasco has come out and said that when they look at the real numbers, they're opposed because they know prices are going to go up. Why are you threatening industrial jobs in Ontario by following a policy that leads to higher prices?

Hon Mr Wilson: I wish the honourable member would stop misquoting John Mayberry, the present CEO of Dofasco. I've met with John Mayberry. John Mayberry is very supportive, as of last Wednesday, including in his op-ed piece. On three occasions in that piece he says, "I'm supportive of opening the competitive electricity market in this province." His problem is that we haven't gone fast enough and that we haven't sold enough of Ontario Power Generation to have enough competition so Dofasco can shop around for prices. And he's right. I agree with John Mayberry.

But if the honourable member wants to keep getting in our way, then the fact of the matter is there's not going to be any competition, because he keeps scaring away the competitors and he won't let them build electricity lines to get the electrons in here so we can have some competition. I ask that for once in his life he just listen to what he's saying, and what he's saying doesn't make any sense at all. It's very difficult to answer his questions; in fact, almost --

Mr Hampton: Minister, we can read John Mayberry's comments, we can read very clearly what he said: that your scheme, your dirty deal, is going to lead to higher prices for his company and for every consumer in Ontario. We understand clearly that this can mean jobs at Dofasco, jobs at Stelco and jobs at a lot of other industrial producers in this province.

But you know, it's going to rip off consumers in another way. This is today's reaction from Bay Street about your decision to privatize hydroelectricity in the province. One Bay Street executive said about the fees they could earn on the Hydro One privatization, "We're all just trying not to pee our pants with excitement." That is Bay Street, which stands to make $200 million in fees just for breaking up these public companies and selling them into the private sector. My question to you, Minister, is, tell the consumers of Ontario why they should have to pay an additional $200 million just so your Bay Street friends can have some excitement.

Hon Mr Wilson: I don't know where he does his banking. I don't know how he ever paid a mortgage. I don't know how he ever got this far in life. I can't change the whole world. Fees are charged for IPOs. They are public fees. They'll be part of the prospectuses filed. We'll try and get the lowest fee possible, if that's what he's driving at. But the fact of the matter is that hundreds of people will be called upon to offer shares to the people of Ontario, to those who want to buy them, and yes, there are some fees for that.

The fact of the matter is that this deal, in terms of fees, will be no different than the thousands of deals that happen every day in this country. It makes this economy work. It makes the province work. It puts people to work. The NDP party is the only one that doesn't understand all this stuff. Why am I the only guy in the House that has to sort of educate them every day?

CANCER TREATMENT

Ms Shelley Martel (Nickel Belt): I have a question to the Minister of Health. This morning the auditor noted the following, that no effort was made by Cancer Care Ontario to determine if after-hour cancer services could be provided in the public sector, no effort at all; CCO violated the mandatory requirements of Management Board's procurement directive; CCO did not take the necessary steps to prevent the perception of conflict of interest; the contract has a most unusual clause which gives the private operator first right of refusal on any future private after-hours clinics established at other cancer centres; CCO kept the issue under wraps as long as possible to prevent the media from making it a political issue; finally, the performance bonus paid per case to the private operator is significantly higher than the bonus paid per case in the public sector.

Minister, where was your government during this fiasco, and will you now say that these services will be provided in the public sector?

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Hon Tony Clement (Minister of Health and Long-Term Care): The honourable member obviously has read the report, and there are some procedural issues that the Provincial Auditor has kindly highlighted for this House. There's no question that the auditor made the conclusion that it was the right policy, with some procedural questions. The honourable member is correct in saying this was not the procedure that we had indicated was necessary for Cancer Care Ontario. I can tell you that the Deputy Minister of Health indicated to Cancer Care Ontario that they had to follow Management Board of Cabinet procedures, and the Provincial Auditor found that they did not follow Management Board of Cabinet procedures.

This is indeed most concerning. We will be consulting with Cancer Care Ontario, which is of course an independent agency, at the earliest available opportunity to make sure they understand the rules and procedures that we follow in the Legislature and that we follow in the government. I thank the honourable member for highlighting a point where in the future some improvement must be made.

Ms Martel: If the truth were told, the minister would know that Cancer Care Ontario was told to follow Management Board directives after your government approved the deal. Where were you when this was happening? There is clearly evidence in the auditor's report that your government knew nothing about what was going on and didn't care.

The two important points from the contract are as follows: that CCO made absolutely no effort to look at what it would cost to provide these same services in the public sector, and your government didn't direct them to look at that either; secondly, it's very clear that the taxpayers of Ontario are paying significantly more per case to that private operator than would be paid as a performance bonus per case in the public sector, and that is clearly referenced on the chart the auditor has included in his report.

I ask you again, in light of the evidence that has been provided, will you now demand that these services be provided in the public sector?

Hon Mr Clement: No. In fact, let me quote from page 2 of the report from the Provincial Auditor: "The private after-hours clinic ... has enabled CCO to treat more patients close to home. In addition, the cost of radiation treatment at the after-hours clinic is approximately $14,000 lower" -- I know that's Canadian dollars, but $14,000 lower -- "per patient than treatment in the US." That's the conclusion of the Provincial Auditor.

Let me offer the conclusions of patients. One writer indicated, "Those opposing this approach to treatment of cancer are either ignorant of this situation or are simply political opportunists." Another writes, "The offer of treatment at Sunnybrook hospital greatly relieved any anxiety I was feeling at the time and has made the treatment process much less stressful." Another writes, "We are so impressed with the excellent quality care and services which you and your staff [at Sunnybrook] provide."

That's what the patients in Ontario are saying about cancer care treatment after this decision was made. We're on their side.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): My question is to the Deputy Premier. Working families in Ontario are facing a crisis when it comes to affordable housing. You will know that the vacancy rate here is less than 1% and bulldozers are now lined up to convert that precious stock of affordable housing into high-priced condominiums.

My colleague Michael Bryant put forward a bill that would give back the city of Toronto's power to protect affordable housing. Let's admit it: there is a crisis when it comes to affordable housing in Ontario. Your government has done virtually nothing during the course of the past six and a half years. Here's a simple idea put forward by my caucus colleague. It won't cost this government a single penny.

Now the Premier has said -- and he's on the way out, but you're going to be stuck with the consequences of this. Here's an opportunity to allow something to go forward, something the city of Toronto wants which will help them meet their concerns about making sure more families have a continuing supply, no matter how small it might be, of affordable housing. Minister, we understand where the Premier is on this. Will you support my colleague's bill to make sure there's more affordable housing in Toronto?

Hon Jim Flaherty (Deputy Premier, Minister of Finance): No, I will not support the bill. Private Bill Pr22 is a departure from the policy of our government. This bill, while it may not directly conflict with the Tenant Protection Act, goes against the spirit of the act.

We believe in the development of affordable housing, and I can tell the member opposite that the news is good in that area, not only in Toronto but elsewhere. Developers now are interested in rental housing again. Interest rates are relatively low, as the member opposite should know. There's interest even from some of the labour folks in looking at agreements with respect to making housing affordable.

There's a problem in Toronto and the problem -- I'm sure the member opposite appreciates it, and the members from Toronto sitting opposite and on this side of the House certainly appreciate it -- is that the taxation rate is in excess of 400% higher on rental properties than on single family homes in the city of Toronto.

Mr McGuinty: Minister, you don't have to stand there and describe the problem for me. Your responsibility is to fix the problem. We've got somebody on this side of the House who's trying to fix the problem. It won't cost you a single penny. It's something the city of Toronto wants.

Let's take a look at your government's record. After six and a half years, rents -- way up; affordability -- way down; vacancy rates -- minuscule; your mark when it comes to dealing with housing issues in Ontario -- an "F."

We have a positive proposal that's going to help Toronto's working families in a very real way. It's going to preserve affordable housing stock. The Premier said he was against this. I have no idea why he said that. You're going to be stuck with the consequences. It's a good idea. Why don't you recognize it as such? Let's do something for Christmas. Let's help Toronto's working families. Let's preserve affordable housing.

Hon Mr Flaherty: This is an issue that requires full and open debate, which private members' bills do not provide. If we're going to reduce taxes, as this government is proud of doing in Ontario, we ask the city of Toronto to address that issue. If you really want to do something to assist the affordability of rental housing in the large amalgamated city of Toronto, look at that multi-residential tax class rate. It's four times the residential tax rate. It makes it very difficult for any developer, when they do their costing on the affordability of the development of rental housing, to end up with a positive answer. It's getting better with lower interest rates now, but that's a major tax challenge that needs to be addressed by the city of Toronto.

EMPLOYMENT STANDARDS LEGISLATION

Mr Jerry J. Ouellette (Oshawa): My question is for the Minister of Labour. I've recently been informed that the CAW union holds schooling days for GM workers in Oshawa. In these classroom sessions, the CAW's been explaining to the auto workers that the legislation for the 60-hour workweek will harm General Motors workers in the next contract renewals. The union fears that the automotive companies will use this new legislation as a bargaining tool and that the auto workers could possibly lose an important benefit because of this legislation. Minister, what can be done to clarify this misconception with the unions?

Hon Chris Stockwell (Minister of Labour): To the member for Oshawa, when you invited me to Oshawa to speak with the CAW about this piece of legislation, I took you up on it. We met with the union, with the union executive and the rank and file members. They asked the questions and we responded to the questions -- both of us -- and they seemed satisfied at the end of that meeting that it wasn't going to affect their collective agreements.

Let's understand a couple of things. The Employment Standards Act is a floor. Virtually all collective bargaining agreements improve the standard; they force the standard even higher. Collective bargaining means that if the union wants to collectively bargain a workweek, they can do so. That binds the union and the company to that work week. They've been doing it for a number of years.

In previous incarnations, before this bill, you could always work extended hours -- 48, 56 -- you'd just get a permit. That was always allowed to be done under collective bargaining. Absolutely nothing has changed. If the union wants to work longer workweeks, they should tell their employers and their employees and their union brothers and sisters that that's what they're going to negotiate. If they don't want it, don't negotiate it.

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Mr Ouellette: First of all, I'd like to thank the minister. He knows very well that I made a commitment that I wouldn't vote for the legislation until after he came out and spoke to my constituents on the issue, and he did do that. We did 500 phone calls, we asked every councillor, we asked all the unions to come out. He did a great job explaining it to them.

Minister, can you assure my constituents that this new legislation pertaining to the 60-hour workweek will not affect them negatively?

Hon Mr Stockwell: Obviously I believe it to be a positive bill. I believe the permit system was inadequate: it was breaking down, it wasn't being vetted and checked enough. I know there was opposition on the other side on the House that claimed the sky was falling with respect to the 60-hour workweek. Obviously it isn't. Of all the calls we take in the Ministry of Labour, the Employment Standards Act has received less than 1% of the calls we've been getting since it was proclaimed.

The bill is a good bill. Collective bargaining is the right way to go about it. If unions want to negotiate a longer or shorter workweek, they can do so of their own free will through collective bargaining. They could do it before the Employment Standards Act was introduced; they could do it after the Employment Standards Act was introduced.

With great respect to the union leadership out there, I think they're operating under a misconception, or possibly potentially they're trying to disseminate information they know is inaccurate. That can't happen. We know it can't happen. When they finish this round of bargaining, the workers are going to find out that nothing really has changed.

ONTARIO DRUG BENEFIT PROGRAM

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Thunder Bay-Atikokan): My question is for the Minister of Health. Minister, since you have already indicated this week that funding for the treatment of seniors who are going blind is not a priority for you, I think I can predict your answer to my question today, but it's nevertheless important to ask it.

Remicade is a new medication that has proven to be highly effective in relieving the symptoms of severe rheumatoid arthritis and advanced Crohn's disease. Remicade received approval from Health Canada last June, and unfortunately we know that it'll take months longer before you'll cover it in Ontario. Unfortunately, while you wait, very ill patients, people who were actually getting treatment when Remicade was on clinical trial, are having to go without that treatment because they can't afford to pay the cost out of their own pockets.

The added tragedy is that rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn's disease attack younger people, and they spend their whole lives trying to cope with this disease. Minister, this medication has proven that it can give people back a life. How long will you keep making people wait or making them pay to get relief from the debilitating effects of rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn's disease?

Hon Tony Clement (Minister of Health and Long-Term Care): As the honourable member probably is aware, the drug to which she refers has been approved for certain procedures by Health Canada and not for certain other procedures, for certain conditions and not for certain other conditions. It still has to go through a process through the Drug Quality and Therapeutics Committee in Ontario to be approved for the procedures or the conditions that perhaps the honourable member was referring to. I'd be happy to check on that, but that is my recollection off the top of my head.

Certainly once it is through that procedure, through that scientific analysis, then the government is seized of the issue and will respond in due course.

Mrs McLeod: Sadly enough, the auditor has told us that Ontario is one of the slowest provinces in looking at the benefits of new medications for patients.

Minister, in the case of Remicade, the concern isn't just how slow you are in approving a new medication; the concern is that you have decided that you're going to punish hospitals that continue to provide treatment to their patients. Hospitals could not turn these very ill patients away. They believed they were legally allowed, and furthermore that they were authorized, to provide treatment in that hospital setting. Your ministry is now planning to claw the treatment costs back from the hospital budgets. University Health Network, as one example, has been told that they will have to pay back $38,000 out of the hospital budget because they dared to keep treating their patients.

Minister, it is unbelievable that you would actually punish hospitals because they just couldn't deny treatment that their patients needed. Will you withdraw this threat and allow hospitals to continue to provide treatment until you make Remicade available through the drug formulary?

Hon Mr Clement: I do have a bit more information for the honourable member. We have approved the Remicade drug for Crohn's disease but not for rheumatoid arthritis. I was right when I said that the DQTC is reviewing it. The decision has not come down.

If hospitals or any form of medical professional are in some way disseminating the medication, they are perfectly at right to do so, but we cannot cover the drug under the rules to which, the honourable member knows full well, until the drug goes through the appropriate analysis -- scientific, independent, third-party analysis -- for its application to rheumatoid arthritis. That is the status of that particular file.

ONTARIO'S LIVING LEGACY

Mr John O'Toole (Durham): My question is to the Minister of Natural Resources, Minister Snobelen, who is approaching his seat now, which is occupied by Tim Hudak.

Minister, Tuesday of last week -- December 4, to be exact -- I was listening to the CBC and they were reviewing the CSR, the Common Sense Revolution. I found that I was surprised, if not disconcerted. Jerry DeMarco of the Sierra Legal Defence Fund was commenting in a positive environmentalist aspect to the Common Sense Revolution. He said, "The creation of several hundred new parks and reserves was certainly a good thing ... something that previous governments had struggled with and failed at."

Could you tell me, should I be surprised and worried about this particular comment from the CBC, specifically from the Sierra Legal Defence Fund, at this time?

Hon John Snobelen (Minister of Natural Resources): I'd like to take advantage of this opportunity to calm the member for Durham just before Christmas. I know he's concerned about this, but I can reassure him that I have every confidence that the Sierra Legal Defence Fund will continue to sue the government of the day over issues on an ongoing basis.

But I think the point is that everyone recognizes the major accomplishment, no matter what group they're from, of Living Legacy: 378 new parks and protected areas, a little over six million acres of land protected for future generations. Especially I believe they recognize the accord between the environmental community, the forest industry and the government as being unique in the world. This has required leadership from each of those communities to make this accord possible, but that leadership was made possible by the strong leadership, the sense of commitment and direction provided by Mike Harris, and that's part of his legacy.

Mr O'Toole: First of all, I have to say I was surprised. The CBC -- I thought I was on the wrong channel for a moment, but it may be something to do with their strike.

Minister, it's great to know that we have so much to be proud of that's being protected and sustained, and you should take some credit for that. You're protecting it for our children and for future generations to enjoy.

However, I live in southern Ontario, specifically Durham riding, where there are large tracts of land already developed in many cases. What is being done to protect land in southern Ontario for future generations, not just in my riding but across the great province of Ontario?

Hon Mr Snobelen: I thank the member for the excellent question. A member opposite commented that he was listening to the wrong channel, listening to the CBC. I don't know what that means.

I can say, speaking for all those who live in the south, that there has been significant ground gained in the term of this government. There are significant allocations of financial resources in 2002 to acquire even more land, but so far I think people will be familiar with acquisitions of important environmentally sensitive property on the Niagara Escarpment, the Lynde Marsh, the Rouge Park, certainly. This all adds to Living Legacy.

Some members opposite have from time to time called the Premier the Governor of Ontario. I think with this record of protecting the most precious parts of our natural environment for future generations, Premier Harris might be remembered as the Teddy Roosevelt of Ontario.

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): New question? The member for St Catharines.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): I would have thought the Warren Harding, Mr Speaker, but let me go to the Minister of the Environment with a question.

Minister, I've been informed there's something very concerning --

The Speaker: I'm sorry. I apologize; I have the wrong person. I was looking the wrong way. If we could stop the clock for a minute. There's about 10 seconds. The member for Beaches-East York.

MUNICIPAL WATER AND SEWAGE
SYSTEMS LEGISLATION

Mr Michael Prue (Beaches-East York): My question is to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. Is he still here? If he's not, I'll go to the --

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): If you could hold on. Keep the clock stopped for a moment, please.

He's not? To the Deputy Premier, I suspect, then.

Mr Prue: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. Mr Deputy Premier, I've had a chance to read the Sustainable Water and Sewage Systems Act which was distributed yesterday. I have to put it to you that I think this is a cynical attempt to use the tragedy at Walkerton as cover for your agenda to privatize municipal water and sewage systems. Specifically, section 23 of that document gives the minister the extraordinary power to allow the private sector to order elected municipal governments to privatize the operation of their water and sewage plants, or even to sell them off. That's the private sector giving the order.

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The bill also says that if you don't like the municipal plan, that is, if the minister does not like it, he can substitute his own, or, even worse, he can have the private sector implement plans drawn up by a non-elected company bent only on profit and at the trough to make decisions for municipal governments.

Deputy Premier, will you swear today before this House that it is not your intention to privatize any municipal water and sewage systems against their will?

Hon Jim Flaherty (Deputy Premier, Minister of Finance): There are a host of ways municipalities can use the private sector to deliver water and water services. Nothing in this legislation changes that. Municipalities must decide on their own what is in the best interests of their particular municipality in terms of their circumstances and how they can best deliver services and maintain infrastructure.

The challenge here, as I'm sure the member opposite appreciates, is that not all municipalities in the province of Ontario have adequately kept up their infrastructure with respect to water and sewers. Full cost pricing will assist in accomplishing that goal. I'm sure he shares that goal with me, that all of the municipalities in this province would have high standards in terms of the delivery of water and sewer services.

The Speaker: Supplementary?

Ms Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth): Minister, full cost recovery may be a noble goal but, as you know, the road to hell is often paved with good intentions, and you are now on that road. What you should be doing to prevent another Walkerton is bringing in the New Democratic Party's Safe Drinking Water Act.

I'm asking you now, will you at least agree to amend the bill to ensure that it does not allow the province to force municipalities to privatize their water and sewer plants because they have no other way to raise the money to ensure full cost recovery? You had better make that commitment, Minister, because I'm telling you, mark my words, if you do not agree to change this bill so that can't happen, the New Democratic Party of Ontario will fight you every step of the way. I guarantee you the public will be on our side and we will win. So make that commitment today.

Hon Mr Flaherty: A former colleague of the member opposite, Betty Disero, the chair of the city of Toronto's works committee, had a look at this bill. She says, "The impacts of the legislation on Toronto will be minimal. We do that already, have full cost recovery. All water and waste water, it pays for itself." That's the quote from her.

Speaking about the road to hell that you referred to, it was the road to hell when the NDP was in government in this province and when the Liberals were in government: high spending, high taxes, creation of massive public debt, pushing off taxation to the next generation. That's the road to hell. That's what this province has recovered from in the last six years, after 10 years of Liberal and NDP fiscal mismanagement that we have finally corrected, and now we have a solid foundation in Ontario that we can build on.

Merry Christmas.

TOXIC WASTE TRANSPORT

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): The finance minister forgot to mention the $22 billion that the Conservative Party put this province in debt.

My question is for the Minister of the Environment. There's something strange happening in Ontario with toxic waste. You will know that the Alberta facility called Swan Hills was specifically constructed to deal with toxic waste, but there is toxic waste in the form of benzene sludge apparently being transported from Swan Hills, which one would think would be able to handle that substance, to the province of Ontario to, I understand, the Laidlaw facility in Mississauga. To my knowledge, the Laidlaw facility in Mississauga doesn't have a way to deal with benzene sludge, benzene being a carcinogen and dangerous at any exposure at all. Can the minister tell us what is happening with that sludge coming from Alberta to Ontario?

Hon Elizabeth Witmer (Minister of the Environment): I would be pleased to take the information that has been provided under advisement in order that I can provide the member opposite with all the information he requires.

Mr Bradley: I hate those answers. I think I gave one or two of those at one time.

I want to get back to the question. Keep in mind, and the Minister of Labour knows this, Alberta specifically built this facility to deal --

Hon Brad Clark (Minister of Transportation): For PCBs.

Mr Bradley: Not for PCBs, but all toxic substances. Now we find there's a toxic substance that is being shipped from Swan Hills, a toxic waste facility, through Ontario, making its way to Mississauga, the Laidlaw facility. The trucks are so contaminated they have to be decontaminated when they're finished delivering it there, and I'm surprised -- I've given the minister time to go through her briefing notes to find the page on benzene or Laidlaw. I would like to know, if she's found the page, if she can possibly explain to the people of Ontario how benzene sludge, a carcinogen, a very dangerous substance, is making its way into Ontario, and where on earth it would be treated. I think there's potentially danger to the public here. I thought the minister would have an immediate answer.

Hon Mrs Witmer: I appreciate the situation that has been shared with me, and I know the member has a very keen concern for the protection of the environment, having been Minister of the Environment himself in a previous government's life. I will certainly, as I said in my first question, endeavour to find the answers to the questions and the situation that have been posed, and I will be sure to respond as quickly as possible.

PROGRESS OF SANTA CLAUS

Ms Marilyn Mushinski (Scarborough Centre): I have a very important question today. In fact, it's perhaps the most important question of this session. It's addressed to the Minister of Northern Development and Mines. As Minister of Northern Development and Mines, I want you to shed some light on a particular issue that has recently been brought to my attention by a constituent of mine, who is particularly close to my heart; he's five years old and his name is Cameron and he happens to be my grandson. I'm sure, as well, your own children, the Newman children, have expressed some concern with respect to Santa's progress this year, especially in light of the unseasonably warm weather we've been having. Minister, as we all know, their excitement and anticipation is shared by many children, not only in my constituency or yours of Scarborough West but we know in many areas of the world.

As the minister responsible for northern development and mines and obviously for the North Pole area, and therefore the best qualified to address this concern, could you advise me and especially my five-year-old grandson on what steps have been taken to ensure prompt delivery of toys to children this Christmas Eve?

Hon Dan Newman (Minister of Northern Development and Mines): I thank the member for Scarborough Centre for the question. This is indeed a question that weighs on the minds of children across the province, from north to south and east to west, including the Newman children in Scarborough Southwest.

Mr Steve Peters (Elgin-Middlesex-London): Blame the feds.

Hon Mr Newman: I know the members opposite, including the member from Elgin-Middlesex, think I'm going to blame the federal government for this in my response, but I want him to know that the federal government's NORAD Web site is actually helpful in tracking Santa's whereabouts.

As minister of the north, I've been advised that Santa's now in the midst of checking his list and checking it twice, ensuring that all the kids have been nice. He's working hard with the elves to put the finishing touches on all the toys. I'm also told that Rudolph and all the other reindeer have had a few test runs recently and will be ready for their long journey to homes across the province on Christmas Eve.

1540

Ms Mushinski: Thank you for that response, Minister. I'm sure that my grandson and your children are very interested in that, and I'm particularly happy and relieved to hear that Santa and his elves are on schedule to ensure a joyous and happy holiday for children in this province.

As we know, there is a tremendous amount of effort involved in getting the perfect gift for each child. I'm wondering if there have been any suggestions that you may have received from the North Pole as to how we as parents, grandparents and family members may be of assistance in Santa's overwhelming task.

Hon Mr Newman: Well, in talking with Mrs Claus and the elves recently, my staff have advised me that with the long flight by sleigh, Santa is often hungry and is quite fond of snacks. A cookie and a glass of milk always go over well with Santa.

Santa is also looking to moms, dads, grandparents and teachers across the province for last-minute advice on who's been naughty and who's been nice. So the message to kids across the province today is that there are only 12 days left till Christmas Day, and Santa knows of all the girls and boys who have been good or bad.

I would like to wish all Ontarians a happy holiday season and a safe and prosperous new year. As for the Newman children in Scarborough Southwest, they had better be good, because dad has a direct line to Santa.

HEALTH CARE FUNDING

Mr George Smitherman (Toronto Centre-Rosedale): Following up on that note, I have a question for the Minister of Health. It concerns the slow rate of progress with respect to a couple of health-related projects in my riding. One is the Sherbourne Health Centre, which, years after the forced merger of the Wellesley Central Hospital, languishes awaiting signoff from you. As well, your earlier announcement to attempt to push a massive homeless shelter on to the Princess Margaret site -- Smitherman House, as the Minister of Labour, who apparently is leading this file, likes to talk about it -- has evolved into an exciting proposal that's ready to give new life to this enormous former hospital site. Long-term-care beds have been approved; affordable housing units, as you requested, have been created; and housing, in the form of condominiums and townhouses, is designed to help pay for it.

But I'd like to ask the minister -- I wish some of the people were here who were here earlier, like Leslie Noble and other great constituents of Toronto Centre-Rosedale like Ernie Eves and Isabel Bassett; they'd want to know, in the spirit of Christmas -- why is it that this minister refuses to sign off on these projects and allow them to move forward to the benefit of the residents of Toronto Centre-Rosedale?

Hon Tony Clement (Minister of Health and Long-Term Care): I thank the honourable member for the question, and I certainly wish all of his constituents a very merry Christmas, a happy Hanukkah and a successful Ramadan and Eid, of course, and other religions I haven't mentioned that have any form of holiday around this time of year as well.

I can tell you that the Sherbourne Health Centre is intended to serve various communities. It will serve the homeless and the underhoused, the gay and lesbian community, and mental health groups in the area. We have been meeting biweekly with the SHC board to work through some of the capital and operating issues since May of this year. There are still a number of issues, but I can tell you that the government has been there for some of the operational expenses and some of the capital development. I will reply on the shelter issue in the second part of my statement.

Hon Chris Stockwell (Minister of Labour): Can I? Can I?

Mr Smitherman: I see that the Minister of Labour wants to horn in on the territory of his colleague, but I'm going to go back to his colleague. I appreciate the words he has offered with respect to the Sherbourne Health Centre, except that the real story here is that Sherbourne has continued to offer all the information and answer all the questions your ministry staff have asked, and yet, as the attempts for this approval go up the chain of command in your ministry, they continue to get rebuffed. I'd ask you to pay some personal attention to this. I asked a question of the associate minister about two months ago, and quite frankly, progress in the time since has been quite anemic.

With respect to the issue of the Princess Margaret site, our demand there was that it not be operated as a massive shelter. The proposal the community has been involved in is an excellent one, and I would ask you, Minister, what is the delay in signing off on that so that the long-term-care beds and the affordable housing units and the market housing can be developed soon?

Hon Mr Clement: I am absolutely astounded that the honourable member is standing in his place in this House and fighting, at this time of year, against the shelter of our homeless people, shelter space in the city of Toronto. I cannot express fully my shock and astonishment with the honourable member on this side of the House.

As Minister of Housing, I worked with the Minister of Labour, I worked with the Minister of Community and Social Services to bring this shelter to the homeless in Toronto, to be there in their hour of need, in their months of need in the wintertime.

On this side of the House, we are with the homeless people. We want to have the shelter. We want to have Smitherman House up and running for the homeless who need that kind of help. That is the spirit of Christmas. That is the spirit of this holiday season. We will not let the Grinches on the other side steal that away from them.

PROBATION AND PAROLE SERVICES

Mrs Julia Munro (York North): My question today is for the Minister of Correctional Services. Just recently, I came across a Web site which some probation and parole officers have set up. On this Web site, probation and parole officers claim that due to a lack of staffing and funding for community corrections, public safety is being put at risk. They claim that under our government, probation and parole officers in Ontario have the highest caseloads, and as a result, there are not enough staff to manage this.

Minister, I also notice that your office numbers have been listed on this Web site for anyone who wished to call with their concerns on public safety. Can you tell us what the Ministry of Correctional Services is doing to address these concerns?

Hon Rob Sampson (Minister of Correctional Services): I want to say I welcome any comment from the probation and parole officers across the province of Ontario, because public safety is indeed this government's top priority, which is of course why, early on in my appointment as Minister of Correctional Services, I did meet with representatives of the Probation Officers Association of Ontario to talk about the understaffing challenge that they have had in other governments, under the Liberal government and the NDP government. That's why in 2000, we committed to add 165 new probation and parole officers across the system throughout the entire province. That's a 25% increase in the number of staff.

Mr Dominic Agostino (Hamilton East): They're not hired.

Hon Mr Sampson: I say to the member opposite, it will take the work caseload down from just over 100 now to 80 which, by the way, it has never been at in the history of this province, especially under the jurisdiction of the Liberals and the NDP.

Mrs Munro: Thank you for your response, Minister. As part of the May 2000 budget, $18 million was announced as part of your ministry's expansion of the strict discipline model for community corrections. I know that my constituents in the riding of York North will be happy to hear that their tax dollars are being spent by this government in their ongoing commitment to make our communities safer to live in.

Minister, can you tell us more about the strict discipline model for community corrections?

Hon Mr Sampson: There are, of course, two areas of business that we're running, one in the institutions, which is the actual jails throughout this province of Ontario, and then a sizable number -- it's about 65,000 individuals -- are sentenced to community sentences across the province of Ontario. They are supervised by men and women across this province in probation and parole offices around this province, in the justice system.

As I said in answer to your earlier question, we are expanding the human resources in that area to make sure that the caseloads are as manageable as possible, given the restrictions of the --

Mr Agostino: They're not hired yet.

Hon Mr Sampson: I say to the member opposite, it takes a while to bring in 165 individuals across the system and to make sure they're properly trained. We're at 80 now of 165. I think the member opposite would expect us to snap our fingers and put unqualified people in probation and parole offices across the province. I'm sure he wouldn't want us to do that. We are making sure that there are qualified people there to implement a very important program in this province, one which implements a strict type of corrections system, not only in the institutions but across all the probation and parole offices in this province.

SPECIAL EDUCATION
LABOUR DISPUTE

Mr Howard Hampton (Kenora-Rainy River): My question is for the Minister of Education. The minister will know that at the Keewatin-Patricia District School Board, special education assistants have now been on strike for seven weeks. The issue is, because the board does not receive sufficient funding for special education, they've cut the hours of the special education assistants from seven hours a day to five hours a day. That's as much as a $3,000-a-year pay cut. What is the Minister of Education going to do so that this board has sufficient funding to fund special education and give the special-needs children the attention they deserve?

1550

Hon Janet Ecker (Minister of Education, Government House Leader): I've been very concerned about the time it has taken to resolve this particular labour dispute. Obviously when there are disagreements between school boards, as the employers, and the workforce, it is always very difficult and very unfair to the students when that kind of disruption impacts on them. We've been quite concerned about how long this particular dispute is taking.

As the honourable member knows, it is between the employer and the employees, in this case the school board and the employees, and I would very much encourage them to do what they can to resolve this issue. All school boards are asked to do the same thing that we at the provincial government, municipal governments and many other organizations do: try to allocate their resources to live within their budget. I understand that's a very difficult decision for all of them to make, but it is their responsibility to try to resolve this.

Mr Hampton: Minister, you know that their ISA funding, their special education funding, is frozen at a level it was a couple of years ago. You know the need there. Your government has to address this.

But you have to address something else: while they don't have enough money in the special education envelope, apparently your government has given them lots of money in the executive and supervisory pay envelope. While the board doesn't have enough money for special education, they were, from 1998, able to increase the pay of their director by some 9%, from $100,000 a year to the neighbourhood of $120,000 a year, and they now have five superintendents who are paid over $100,000 a year.

How can your government provide the money for supervisory pay, such that we now have a board with five supervisory officers being paid over $100,000 a year, but you refuse to provide the funding for the children with special needs so they can have the special education resources that they need and deserve? How can you do one and not the other, in particular when it's special-needs students who are not receiving the funding they deserve?

Hon Mrs Ecker: I agree with the honourable member. That's a very valid question. I would encourage him to direct that question to the people who have made that decision, and that is the Keewatin-Patricia board. The school boards have received additional monies over and above enrolment growth. He talks about being frozen. What we have done is given school boards guarantees that they know at least how much money they have. There's a floor there for declining enrolment boards. Indeed, we have increased special education funding on many, many occasions, a 17% increase.

Many school boards around this province have chosen to allocate even more money for special education, because they see it as being a very important priority. It is their decision to take resources and put them into that pay package as opposed to special education. If that's what the parents and the honourable member are advocating, I would encourage them to ask the school board that question.

LEGISLATIVE USHERS

The Speaker (Hon Gary Carr): Just before we begin petitions, this is the last day for our student ushers, and I'm sure all members would like to join in wishing our student ushers all the best in their endeavours and in thanking them.

PETITIONS

SCHOOL CLOSURES

Mr Gerard Kennedy (Parkdale-High Park): I have a petition to the Legislature of Ontario.

"Whereas the Toronto Catholic District School Board has decided it is forced by Ontario government policy to close several schools that would not otherwise be closed;

"Whereas the schools in question are all providing valuable education services to the children of their immediate communities;

"Whereas the schools in question are not more expensive to run, but rather have been targeted due to a questionable provincial formula designed to generate surplus real estate;

"Whereas the negative effects of closing upon the students include walking excessively long distances, being unable to obtain Catholic education, the breakup of their learning community and losing essential special programs;

Whereas the negative effects of closing on the local communities include the loss of centres for community activities, lower real estate values, encouraging private schools and the future costs of new school facilities to meet future needs;

Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario and the Ministry of Education to:

"(1) Immediately acknowledge that the provincial school closing policy is unfair and harmful and not suited to Toronto and many other areas of the province;

"(2) Stop the unnecessary and premature closure of schools by changing the Education Act and regulations to permit school boards to close schools only when it is clearly in the students' best interests."

It's my pleasure to affix my signature to this. I know these sentiments are shared by parents and school boards all around the province.

CHILD CARE

Ms Shelley Martel (Nickel Belt): I have child care petitions from my friends at Caring for Kids in Mississauga; Building Foundations, Beamsville; Sheridan College ECE in Oakville; More Than Child's Play in Toronto; Umbrella Day Care in Pickering; Georgian College ECE, Orillia; and Mohawk College. They read as follows:

"Whereas an internal government document indicates the Conservative government is considering cutting the regulated child care budget by at least 40%;

"Whereas the same internal document indicates the government is also considering completely cutting all funding for regulated child care and family resource programs in Ontario;

"Whereas the Conservative government has already cut funding for regulated child care by 15% between 1995 and 1998 and downloaded 20% of the child care and family resource budget on to municipalities;

"Whereas further cuts would run counter to the support identified for regulated child care and family resource centres by Fraser Mustard and Margaret McCain;

"Whereas the Conservative government received $114 million this year for early childhood development and will receive $844 million from the federal government over the next five years for the same;

"Whereas Ontario is the only province which didn't spend a cent of this year's federal money on regulated child care;

"Therefore, be it resolved that we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly as follows:

"We demand the Conservative government guarantee the current child care and family resource budget is secure and will not be cut under this government's mandate. We demand future federal Early Years funding be invested in an expansion of affordable, regulated child care."

I agree with the petitioners. I affix my signature to this petition.

CRUELTY TO ANIMALS

Mr Carl DeFaria (Mississauga East): I have a petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario that reads as follows:

"Whereas the Criminal Code of Canada considers animal cruelty to be a property offence; and

"Whereas those who commit crimes against animals currently face light sentences upon conviction; and

"Whereas those who operate puppy mills should, upon conviction, face sentences that are appropriate for the torture and inhumane treatment they have inflicted on puppies under their so-called care;

"Therefore, we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"That the Ontario government petition the federal government to move forward with amendments to the cruelty of animal provisions in the Criminal Code as soon as possible."

I affix my signature to this petition.

LONDON HEALTH SCIENCES CENTRE

Mr Steve Peters (Elgin-Middlesex-London): In recognition of the time, I have a petition signed by over 500 people who are extremely opposed to the closing of the 18 services at the London Health Sciences Centre. On their behalf and on behalf of thousands of other people concerned, I submit this petition.

Mr David Caplan (Don Valley East): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I seek unanimous consent, notwithstanding the standing orders, to extend the time for petitions to the full 15 minutes.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr David Christopherson): Thank you. I'll put that to the House. Do I have unanimous consent to extend the petition period? I heard a no.

ADOPTION DISCLOSURE

Ms Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth): I have petitions related to adoption disclosure reform. They read:

"To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas in Ontario, adopted adults are denied a right available to all non-adoptees, that is, the unrestricted right to identifying information concerning their family of origin;

"Whereas Canada has ratified standards of civil and human rights in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child;

"Whereas these rights are denied to persons affected by the secrecy provisions in the adoption sections of the Child and Family Services Act and other acts of the province of Ontario;

"Whereas research in other jurisdictions has demonstrated that disclosure does not cause harm, that access to such information is beneficial to adult adoptees, adoptive parents and birth parents, and that birth parents rarely requested or were promised anonymity;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislature of Ontario to enact revision of the Child and Family Services Act and other acts to permit adult adoptees unrestricted access to full personal identifying birth information; permit birth parents, grandparents and siblings access to the adopted person's amended birth certificate when the adopted person reaches age 18; allow adopted persons and birth relatives to file a contact veto restricting contact by the searching party and replace mandatory reunion counselling with optional counselling."

I will affix my signature because I support this petition.

1600

The Deputy Speaker (Mr David Christopherson): Take your seat. I'm sorry, John, but it was your seatmate who denied the extension. It being 4 of the clock, pursuant to standing order 30(b),I am now required to call orders of the day.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

REMEDIES FOR ORGANIZED CRIME
AND OTHER UNLAWFUL
ACTIVITIES ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001 SUR LES RECOURS
POUR CRIME ORGANISÉ
ET AUTRES ACTIVITÉS ILLÉGALES

Resuming the debate adjourned on November 7, 2001, on the motion for third reading of Bill 30, An Act to provide civil remedies for organized crime and other unlawful activities / Projet de loi 30, Loi prévoyant des recours civils pour crime organisé et autres activités illégales.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr David Christopherson): Pursuant to the order of the House of December 11, I am now required to put the question.

Mr Baird has moved third reading of Bill 30. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour will please say "aye."

Those opposed, please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. This will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1601 to 1606.

The Deputy Speaker: Members take their seats, please.

All those in favour of the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ayes

Arnott, Ted

Baird, John R.

Bartolucci, Rick

Beaubien, Marcel

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bryant, Michael

Caplan, David

Chudleigh, Ted

Clark, Brad

Clement, Tony

Coburn, Brian

Colle, Mike

Cordiano, Joseph

Crozier, Bruce

Cunningham, Dianne

DeFaria, Carl

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Dunlop, Garfield

Ecker, Janet

Elliott, Brenda

Flaherty, Jim

Galt, Doug

Gilchrist, Steve

Gill, Raminder

Gravelle, Michael

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hardeman, Ernie

Hoy, Pat

Hudak, Tim

Jackson, Cameron

Johns, Helen

Johnson, Bert

Klees, Frank

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Levac, David

Marland, Margaret

Martiniuk, Gerry

Maves, Bart

Mazzilli, Frank

McGuinty, Dalton

McLeod, Lyn

McMeekin, Ted

Miller, Norm

Molinari, Tina R.

Munro, Julia

Murdoch, Bill

Mushinski, Marilyn

Newman, Dan

O'Toole, John

Ouellette, Jerry J.

Parsons, Ernie

Peters, Steve

Phillips, Gerry

Pupatello, Sandra

Ramsay, David

Runciman, Robert W.

Sampson, Rob

Sergio, Mario

Smitherman, George

Spina, Joseph

Sterling, Norman W.

Stewart, R. Gary

Tascona, Joseph N.

Tilson, David

Tsubouchi, David H.

Turnbull, David

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Wilson, Jim

Witmer, Elizabeth

Wood, Bob

Young, David

The Deputy Speaker: Those opposed to the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Nays

Bisson, Gilles

Churley, Marilyn

Kormos, Peter

Marchese, Rosario

Martel, Shelley

Martin, Tony

Prue, Michael

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 74; the nays are 7.

The Deputy Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Be it resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

Mr David Ramsay (Timiskaming-Cochrane): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I seek unanimous consent to call government order G135, to be called for second and third reading without debate or amendments.

The Deputy Speaker: You've heard the request for unanimous consent. It is agreed? I heard noes. The unanimous consent is denied.

1610

COMMUNITY CARE ACCESS
CORPORATIONS ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001 SUR LES SOCIÉTÉS
D'ACCÈS AUX SOINS COMMUNAUTAIRES

Resuming the debate adjourned on December 6, 2001, on the motion for second reading of Bill 130, An Act respecting community care access corporations / Projet de loi 130, Loi concernant les sociétés d'accès aux soins communautaires.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr David Christopherson): Pursuant to the order of the House of December 10, I am now required to put the question. On November 28, Mrs Johns moved second reading of Bill 130. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please indicate by saying "aye."

Those opposed please indicate by saying "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. It will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1611 to 1616.

The Deputy Speaker: Those in favour of the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ayes

Arnott, Ted

Baird, John R.

Barrett, Toby

Beaubien, Marcel

Chudleigh, Ted

Clark, Brad

Clement, Tony

Coburn, Brian

Cunningham, Dianne

DeFaria, Carl

Dunlop, Garfield

Ecker, Janet

Elliott, Brenda

Flaherty, Jim

Galt, Doug

Gilchrist, Steve

Gill, Raminder

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hardeman, Ernie

Hudak, Tim

Jackson, Cameron

Johns, Helen

Johnson, Bert

Klees, Frank

Marland, Margaret

Martiniuk, Gerry

Maves, Bart

Mazzilli, Frank

Miller, Norm

Molinari, Tina R.

Munro, Julia

Murdoch, Bill

Mushinski, Marilyn

Newman, Dan

O'Toole, John

Ouellette, Jerry J.

Runciman, Robert W.

Sampson, Rob

Spina, Joseph

Sterling, Norman W.

Stewart, R. Gary

Tascona, Joseph N.

Tilson, David

Tsubouchi, David H.

Turnbull, David

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Wilson, Jim

Witmer, Elizabeth

Wood, Bob

The Deputy Speaker: Those opposed to the motion will please indicate by rising and being recognized by the Clerk.

Nays

Agostino, Dominic

Bartolucci, Rick

Bisson, Gilles

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bradley, James J.

Bryant, Michael

Caplan, David

Churley, Marilyn

Colle, Mike

Cordiano, Joseph

Crozier, Bruce

Curling, Alvin

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Gravelle, Michael

Hampton, Howard

Hoy, Pat

Kormos, Peter

Kwinter, Monte

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Levac, David

Marchese, Rosario

Martel, Shelley

Martin, Tony

McGuinty, Dalton

McLeod, Lyn

McMeekin, Ted

Parsons, Ernie

Peters, Steve

Phillips, Gerry

Prue, Michael

Pupatello, Sandra

Ramsay, David

Sergio, Mario

Smitherman, George

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 49; the nays are 37.

The Deputy Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Pursuant to the same order of the House, this bill is ordered referred for third reading.

HEALTH PROTECTION AND PROMOTION
AMENDMENT ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001 MODIFIANT LA LOI
SUR LA PROTECTION ET LA PROMOTION
DE LA SANTÉ

Mr Levac, on behalf of Mr Dunlop, moved third reading of the following bill:

Mr Dave Levac (Brant): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I seek unanimous consent to call Bill 105 for third reading without further debate.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr David Christopherson): Is there unanimous consent? I hear agreement.

Pursuant to the order of the House of December 12, I am now required to put the question.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please indicate.

All those opposed, please say "nay."

The motion is carried.

Ms Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth): No.

The Deputy Speaker: Oh, yes.

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

I thought for a minute you didn't have enough support there.

Call in the members. This will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1620 to 1650.

The Deputy Speaker: All those in favour of the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ayes

Agostino, Dominic

Arnott, Ted

Baird, John R.

Barrett, Toby

Bartolucci, Rick

Beaubien, Marcel

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bradley, James J.

Bryant, Michael

Caplan, David

Chudleigh, Ted

Clark, Brad

Coburn, Brian

Colle, Mike

Crozier, Bruce

Cunningham, Dianne

Curling, Alvin

DeFaria, Carl

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Dunlop, Garfield

Ecker, Janet

Elliott, Brenda

Flaherty, Jim

Galt, Doug

Gilchrist, Steve

Gill, Raminder

Gravelle, Michael

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hardeman, Ernie

Hodgson, Chris

Hoy, Pat

Hudak, Tim

Jackson, Cameron

Johns, Helen

Johnson, Bert

Kennedy, Gerard

Klees, Frank

Kormos, Peter

Kwinter, Monte

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Levac, David

Marland, Margaret

Martin, Tony

Martiniuk, Gerry

Maves, Bart

Mazzilli, Frank

McLeod, Lyn

McMeekin, Ted

Miller, Norm

Molinari, Tina R.

Munro, Julia

Murdoch, Bill

Mushinski, Marilyn

Newman, Dan

O'Toole, John

Ouellette, Jerry J.

Parsons, Ernie

Peters, Steve

Phillips, Gerry

Prue, Michael

Pupatello, Sandra

Ramsay, David

Runciman, Robert W.

Sampson, Rob

Sergio, Mario

Spina, Joseph

Sterling, Norman W.

Stewart, R. Gary

Tascona, Joseph N.

Tilson, David

Tsubouchi, David H.

Turnbull, David

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Wilson, Jim

Witmer, Elizabeth

Wood, Bob

Young, David

The Deputy Speaker: Now those opposed to the motion will please rise and be recognized by the Clerk.

Nays

Churley, Marilyn

Marchese, Rosario

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 80. The nays are 2.

The Deputy Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Be it resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

VISITORS

Mrs Sandra Pupatello (Windsor West): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I'd like to take a moment to introduce to the House Andy and Pat Brown, who are the grandparents of the page from Windsor West, Eric Brown.

COMMUNITY CARE ACCESS
CORPORATIONS ACT, 2001 /
LOI DE 2001 SUR LES SOCIÉTÉS
D'ACCÈS AUX SOINS COMMUNAUTAIRES

Mrs Johns moved third reading of the following bill:

Bill 130, An Act respecting community care access corporations / Projet de loi 130, Loi concernant les sociétés d'accès aux soins communautaires.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr David Christopherson): We now have a 60-minute debate on third reading of Bill 130, with the time being split equally among the parties. Does the minister wish to lead off?

Hon Helen Johns (Minister without Portfolio [Health and Long-Term Care]): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.

The Deputy Speaker: Just a moment while everyone clears out. Stop the clock, please.

Members, please, either out of the chamber or take your seats. There are too many members standing. Thank you. Minister?

Hon Mrs Johns: Change is never easy. Passage of the Community Care Access Corporations Act, 2001, would bring change to the governance of CCACs. Because it directly affects only boards of directors of CCACs and the chief executive officers, Ontario's families would initially notice little difference. People would receive the same level of service they currently do.

In the long run, however, we are confident that these governance changes, if passed, will lead to an improvement in services. Inequities and inconsistencies in the existing system would be smoothed out and eventually eliminated in our pursuit of our long-term goal of ensuring that the right people receive the right services at the right time.

Understandably, there has been some concern among current board members and CEOs about the governance changes. I hope I have been able to alleviate some of that concern during the discussions and debate we've had over the past few weeks. I think we are all aware that we are partners in the enterprise of providing better home care for the people of Ontario.

Many current board members have already demonstrated their commitment to the community care access centre process. I understand, for example, that some board members took leaves of absence or vacation time from work when the CCACs were first established back in 1997 in order to get them up and running. Their contributions proved invaluable; their devotion, commendable. We would welcome their applications to bring their enthusiasm and effort to the new boards through OIC appointments. Continuity in the system would only enhance the CCACs, should they decide to continue their commitment to the system they helped to create and that we now are refining.

The other governance changes affect the CEOs of the community care access centres. They also will become order-in-council appointments, and they will now be known as executive directors. Their role, while different from that of board members, will be equally challenging and demanding. The management and administration of a multi-million dollar enterprise demands skills in diverse management fields such as finance, contracts, human resources, policy and operations, and of course community relations.

As most in this chamber are aware, the merger and restructuring of home care programs and placement coordination services in the mid-1990s was the first step toward creating one-stop shopping for community care.

Many CEOs performed superbly in the role of getting their CCACs integrated and motivated as single entities tasked with the successful development and delivery of home care to more than 400,000 people. Now it is time, with this bill, to enter a new phase in the life of their entity, so important to the provision of home care to the people of Ontario. Home care's role is a vital link in our long-term goal of creating a seamless health care system, so that no one falls between the cracks and it in effect becomes impossible as you move through the integrated system.

To ensure that this happens, in the legislation we have also asked to create a mandatory community advisory council, which will be chaired by the community care access members and will contain representatives from the hospitals, the long-term-care facilities, the community support services in the community, plus the community care access centres. This will help to ensure coordination and co-operation among health care providers in the province and in community care especially.

Although we seek a number of changes, such as placement coordination regulations and common assessment tools for case managers, they are not part of this bill per se. Still, the governance changes that we're asking to make today, that we're proposing today, should make the implementation smoother and make the system more coordinated.

Let me dwell for just a minute on case managers.

Interjections.

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The Deputy Speaker: I'm sorry, Minister, I going to have to interrupt you there. Could you take a seat for a moment. There are really too many conversations going on here. It's not way out of line, but we're heading that way. So if we could take our seats, and if any loud conversations could be taken outside the chamber, it would be much appreciated.

Hon Mrs Johns: I was just starting to talk about case managers. Not everyone is aware that case managers are either nurses or therapists who often bring many years of clinical expertise to their task. Their role has been and will continue to be a challenging role. We have every confidence that the governance changes outlined in Bill 130 will help them better fulfill it and they will be very successful at it. We all know that when everything is done well, the case manager's function at the community care access centre is all but invisible to the public. But those who provide the care know well that coordination and communication among team members in the delivery of care could not be done without the hard work and dedication of those who fulfill the case manager's role.

Compared to hospitals and some other aspects of the health care system, community care access centres are basically a new institution. While home care goes back to the prior century as a service, particularly as it was delivered at that time with community nursing, the role has expanded and broadened into a much more complex and cost-effective approach in meeting people's needs as close to home as possible. None of us will be able to meet those needs alone. Together we have accomplished much in the past. Together we can accomplish much more. Our combined ultimate goal is better service for community care access centre clients, the people of Ontario who require home care. The passage of Bill 130 today would help us along the road to attain this goal.

The Deputy Speaker: Further debate.

Ms Caroline Di Cocco (Sarnia-Lambton): I will be sharing my time with the member for Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Aldershot and also the member for Windsor West.

In regard to Bill 130, I'd like to state for the record, in the few minutes that I have, what this bill actually does. It basically renames community care access centres to community care access corporations. In my view, it's a way of taking ownership. The government is going to appoint executive directors, just like they're doing to school boards. They want control from Queen's Park.

Another issue is that all directions for care are going to be directed by the government. Unfortunately, there's going to be no local input. Because the members and some of the directors of CCACs have been very outspoken, basically they're going to end up being fired because they have been outspoken.

One of the issues that really is concerning to me is the fact that community care is now provided to many people across this province and, yes, it is the Conservative government which put community care into place in this fashion. Unfortunately, they didn't manage it very well, and they're still not managing it well, but they do want control and they want to gag the people who are providing that service in our communities.

We still have a lack of nurses who are willing to work in home care, and we understand that there still are no standards being set by the government as to what services should be delivered.

Let's remember as well that community care was put into place because it was supposed to be a per patient delivery or per patient cost that was going to be dealt with. In actual fact, because they're letting people out of hospital so quickly, there is more of a need for home care; people are quite ill when they get home from the hospital because they're discharged so quickly. As a matter of fact, it's the hospital discharges now that account for 70% of all cases. This means that we've got more acute patients requiring intensive care.

So what does this government do? Instead of dealing with the management -- in other words, being able to address some of the issues about the competition at local levels, or being able to manage it so that we've got standards across the province when it comes to home care -- instead of dealing with the equity issues when it comes with the nursing care that is being provided by community care, they decide, "You know, it's costing us more money than we thought, so we have to somehow take a look at the bottom line." They don't look at the per patient service that they had committed to initially when they founded community care access centres.

What they've done now is said, "We are working harder because we've got more patients to deal with" -- or lack of funds, so they're going to have to cut that service." Then, when they complained that they had to cut the services because the resources weren't there, they decided, "Now we're going to have to control. We're going to appoint who we want on those boards to ensure that there are going to be no negative comments coming out of the boards with regard to the accounting from the government."

I have to say it's really unfortunate, in a time when we need community care so badly and where it's really saving a lot of dollars, that this government doesn't seem to understand that you have to work with the sector instead of against it.

The Deputy Speaker: I need some guidance here. I got the impression from the official opposition House leader that he preferred that all his speakers were en bloc, but I see you deferring to the third party. I am easy; either way is fine with me. Do you want to go in rotation? With that in mind, the member for Timmins-James Bay now has the floor.

Mr Gilles Bisson (Timmins-James Bay): First of all, I apologize to those who are watching. I don't have a tie on. I've got a cold and I'm not feeling too well, so I'm going to keep the tie off today. I know when you are speaking in the House you should wear a tie, and I just wanted to explain why not.

Mr Rosario Marchese (Trinity-Spadina): Are you attacking the --

Mr Bisson: I am attacking our House leader on this one. No, no, just teasing.

There are a couple of things that I want to put on the record, and it's unfortunate that this bill is time-allocated, because I know that all of our caucus -- Mr Marchese, Mr Prue, Mr Martin and all others -- want to be able to speak on this bill because you, Mr Speaker, and all members in this House are affected by what the government is doing here.

Simply put, the government is introducing this bill for one simple reason: that is, to fire the existing boards that are now serving as boards for community care access centres across the province and also to have the ability to fire the executive director where the cabinet so chooses. I think that is one of the most despicable things this government has done, because what they are doing is exactly the point that Mr Marchese makes: they are politicizing the process at the community care access centres.

What has happened is simply this: the government created the community care access centres back in 1995-96. The community care access centres have been charged with coordinating long-term-care services in our community, something that is commendable, something that all parties can agree on. When we were government we had started this whole process under Bob Rae, where we did the redirection of long-term care and we were going to create what were called MSAs. The government didn't like that model because the NDP would have put it all in the public sector.

The government said, "No, we're going to scrap the MSA model and we're going to move over to the private sector model of community care access centres where there is a public board," but they basically go out and give contracts, by and large, to either public or not-for-profit or private sector bidders on services that are given out.

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What has happened is that these boards have gone out and pulled all the services under the umbrella of the CCACs, which is a good thing. So when seniors or other people need services at home, rather than running to the various agencies out in the community, trying to figure out, "How do I get a nurse to come and take care of my sick family member or myself? How do I get home care? How do I get Meals on Wheels? How do I provide the specialized care a person needs to be able to live at home independently?" the CCAC takes care of all that. That's commendable. I think we all agree on the role of CCACs.

But what has happened since the government created CCACs is that they have not kept the budgets flush enough with money to meet the needs of the communities. For example, the Cochrane District CCAC, which is in the riding I represent, has had their budget flatlined, except for a few increases for pay equity and other issues they had to deal with by way of legislation. As a result, the CCAC, because they have the same amount of money now as they did some years ago, is having to provide services in the community without adequate funds to meet that need.

Simply put, what we have now is that people are living longer, they're needing more care at home, hospitals are discharging people quicker and are putting a strain on long-term-care services in the community, and the CCACs have been struggling to meet the needs of the community.

I want to bring to the attention of the House a couple of issues, a couple of cases I have in my own community. Mr and Mrs Lyrette live on Commercial Avenue. I've known this family for a long time. Mrs Lyrette unfortunately suffered a stroke about a year and a half ago. She is now living at home. She's living independently with her husband, and the daughter, Rosalynne, is taking care of her mother as best she can, along with Philippe and Denise, her son and daughter-in-law, who live next door. They're doing the best they can, as a family, trying to meet the needs of Mrs Lyrette.

Originally when the mother was discharged, home care was supposed to be given for four hours a week, to provide nursing care and a bit of respite care for Mr Lyrette, because Mr Lyrette is, I believe, about 80 years old and is ill equipped to take care of his wife all the time. He's in pretty good shape, but it's a heck of a strain to put on an 80-year-old man to take care of this woman all the time. So the family has been doing what they can to pitch in and serve.

Unfortunately, because of the lack of funding at the CCAC, they are now only able to provide one hour of care to Mrs Lyrette and are talking about dropping her down to a half-hour of care, which is barely enough to make ends meet. The problem with that is, you've got an 80-year-old man, Mr Lyrette, who, if he is charged with having to do everything, is quite frankly going to get sick himself.

I say to this government, you're the ones who created the problem. Here are Mr and Mrs Lyrette, who are not able to properly get the amount of care they need because of the government's refusal to fund CCACs to the level they need.

I have another case, Mrs Plouffe, a long-serving member in our community who has volunteered for everything. Mrs Plouffe built almost every organization in our community over the years. She has been a volunteer extraordinaire. She has given to her community all of her life, and all she wants is one of the services, because she can't get around. She lives independently at Le Mirage, at 44 Borden in Timmins. She wants to have somebody go out and do her shopping, because she can't get to the grocery store every week to get her food. Again, the CCAC, because they don't have enough money to provide for the need, have said, "We're taking that service away from you, and we're also reducing the home care you get." So now Mrs Plouffe, who for years gave to her community and would like to get something back, is being told by this government, "No, you can't have it, and if you don't like it, go live in a long-term-care facility." For Mrs Plouffe, I think that is a terrible option. She is still able to live independently at home and will do so for many years if we provide her with the services she should be getting from the CCAC.

This government's response is what? Myself and other members of our caucus have gone to the minister -- I know Mr Prue has brought this to the minister -- and said, "We need more money to be able to provide the dollars in our communities to CCACs so people like Mrs Plouffe and Mr and Mrs Lyrette are able to get the kind of services they need." The government's response is, "Ah." You know what? The CCAC boards themselves are starting to make some noise that the government should give them more funding. So the government says, "Let's fire the boards." They don't want to get criticism from the volunteer boards that are there now, serving on behalf of the their communities. So the government's response is not to give money but to fire the boards. I say to this government, shame on you. It is the wrong thing to do. Those people are volunteers. That's like a hospital board. These things are like a hospital foundation. They sell memberships. We elect people from our communities and those volunteers go and serve on behalf of the community for various aspects. Community people, business people, people who are consumers, come on to the board as volunteers.

Mr Steve Gilchrist (Scarborough East): But we're not making any changes.

Mr Bisson: I know Steve Gilchrist doesn't care because he's a right-wing neo-con who thinks the government should do this. I don't have a problem; I understand where you're coming from, Mr Gilchrist.

I am saying this government is basically firing those hardworking volunteers who have served our CCACs well in order to provide services to the community; people like Jacques Côté, who is the head of that board of the CCAC, who lives in Hearst and is a long-standing member of the community.

Interjection.

Mr Bisson: Yes, I've still got two minutes. I've watched the time.

Mr Gilchrist: Send the resumé in.

Mr Bisson: Mr Gilchrist says, "Send the resumé in." This is the contempt that the government has for volunteers in the community who are working on behalf of CCACs. Jacques Côté, years of service to the community, has volunteered his services since the CCAC has been there, has worked hard to provide services to the Cochrane district as a board member and as the head of that board. He is now being told, at the end of all of this, "You have to try to reapply for your job. Only if the government approves will you then be reappointed back to that board again." Mr Côté's answer is, "The heck with you. I want nothing else to do with this. I find this a slap in the face," he says to me, "and I want nothing to do with it."

So you're killing volunteerism in our community, people like Jackie DeLuca. Jackie DeLuca, who serves on this board, has been doing so since the board has been there, works hard on behalf of the community, has volunteered for years on all kinds of organizations across our community in the city of Timmins, has served on the council of the city of Timmins, has done all kinds of work as a volunteer, is saying, "Gilles, all I want to do is serve my community. I believe in the services of the CCAC and I want to be able to volunteer and give of my time to those people in our community who need my services as one of the board members on the issues of CCACs." This government is saying, "No, if you want to serve, you have to come and reapply, because only if the minister thinks you're going to be a good board member who will not speak out to the government," and I would say a Tory member, "are you then going to get back on to the board."

So I say to the minister, you're wrong. That is not the way to run CCACs. Appointing CCAC members should have nothing to do with political affiliation. You shouldn't have to be a Tory bagman to get on to the particular board. It should be about volunteerism and a willingness to be able to serve your community. I say to this government, shame. This is wrong. I will vote against it and I will do all that I can to stop it.

Mr Ted McMeekin (Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Aldershot): I want to begin on a different tone. When my dad was very, very sick a year ago, in fact was in need of palliative care and lived in the Hamilton area, the area served by our CCAC, he received, in spite of the strike there, from some very caring people a lot of the help that he needed to get through his final days. I'm forever personally indebted to those wonderful, underpaid, overworked people who went the second mile, even though they had every reason perhaps not to, given the labour disruption there brought on by the managed competition of this government, which by the way went an incredible way to destroying a historic, helping outreach network that has yet to recover: the VON, with its 85-year history in our area, now having to work down in Niagara Falls.

The CCAC concept of using the giftedness of community and dedicated volunteers could have worked, had it received the kind of direction and guidance and support they needed, if the government had had the right look in their eyes. Instead, when they looked for direction, they were ignored. When they looked for guidance, they were denigrated. When they wanted to work in partnership, they were sniped at. And when they said, "The need is growing far faster than we can respond," their funds were frozen. That's the simple truth of it, the black and white of it.

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We had a lot of meetings with CCA folk in Halton and in the Hamilton area, countless meetings where we heard the heart-wrenching stories, as things have got even tougher in the last year, of the kinds of services they are no longer able to provide.

I got a letter just the other day from the associate minister of health about the SAM program in Ancaster. There are some 85 seniors there. After telling me all the reasons why you couldn't help, you said in your letter that you hoped we found your letter helpful. Madam Minister, it wasn't helpful; frankly, it was a disgrace. We've got seniors in Ancaster in desperate need. Seniors who ought not to be institutionalized are going to be institutionalized shortly if we don't find a way to rescue the program. We'll do what we do well in Hamilton and we'll have our Friday morning meeting with the mayor and some others and see if we can rescue this thing, but no thanks to this government.

I can't help but feel that this bill is another step to abandoning the frail and the elderly in my riding. Instead of helping the most vulnerable people, we see a government dedicated to moving from non-involvement to centralized micromanagement of this service. I think in the long run that's going to really hurt the delivery of service here.

It's not much different than what this government has done to special-needs students, who used to find in their schools the supports they needed to learn and enjoy school, to be equipped with the skills they needed to survive and thrive in society. But they began to fall through the cracks, and this government has done its twofold approach: first, it denies responsibility, and then when everybody starts falling through the cracks, they start pointing fingers again.

It's part of this no-fault insurance they have. Whenever anything goes wrong, the only person not at fault is the government over there. If you can, you blame the feds. The feds have said over and over again, "Let's get to the table and talk about home care standards so we can add that to the national health care basket." The feds can work with people like Ralph Klein and even the separatists in Quebec to do that, but not with this government, I'm sad to say.

Real people are going to be hurt by this legislation: our mothers, fathers, grandparents and innocent children who require the specialized services they need to develop their potential. We're hearing from all kinds of people in my constituency about their opposition to Bill 130, particularly members of the CCAC who often, out of fear, are afraid to speak out to this government. I think the government has found a way of dealing with that. I think fundamentally what this bill acknowledges is that this government has failed. Their policy has been a failure and they are going to cover up now by removing those people who are prepared to talk about that failure and replace them with people who either won't speak out or are so committed to toeing the party line over there that we just won't see things happen.

In conclusion, the people of Ontario should be afraid of this legislation. It's going to take Ontario home care in a direction that's purely dollar-based and not patient-focused. But what can we expect from a government that understands the cost of everything but the value of nothing?

Ms Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth): I think I can say for all of my caucus who are here today, as our member from Sudbury, Shelley Martel, our critic for health, has said many times in this House --

Mr Rick Bartolucci (Sudbury): Nice try. Her riding is Nickel Belt.

Ms Churley: Nickel Belt; thank you. Shelley Martel has said that this is a hostile takeover, and that's exactly what it is. The members know exactly what is going on here. I have met with community care access from East York and people from community care of Toronto, and they are saying the same thing to me. They are appalled and very upset by this, because it happened out of the blue. There were meetings taking place with the minister in good faith to talk about some of the changes they were working on, and they were pleased to see the government was recognizing some of their issues and working with them to resolve them. Then, out of the blue, this piece of legislation came forward. What is does is take away community control from the boards in their very diverse communities. They're the ones who know what's going on in the communities. They're the one's who are in touch with the needs of the people.

We know what's been happening. The New Democratic Party has been calling on the government over the past few years to give more funding to the CCACs. For instance --

Mr Gilchrist: We have.

Ms Churley: No, you haven't. What you used to do over the years, because you were not giving them enough money, was fund their deficit. What you actually did recently was just stop funding that deficit. So, for instance, East York, where there's a very high population of seniors and therefore a very high need, a very big demand, for those services, is already under tremendous stress and people who need the care are not getting it. Those hard-working women, mostly, are doing their best. Lots of them by now are working overtime, because of their compassion for their clients, and not getting paid for it. They're low-paid workers doing the most important work in our society and they're actually working overtime for free right now because they are caring. We have called on the government repeatedly to sit down and look at the difficulties in funding, particularly in the East York Community Care Access Centre.

The Toronto Community Care Access Centre, if you will look at their records, has been doing a very good job and coming in on budget. They are absolutely appalled and very, very angry about this hostile takeover.

I say to the government that what you're doing is wrong. We know why you're doing it. There's no secret; you can't make any excuses. What you try to say is that this is good for the CCACs and good for their clients. The reality is, you got tired of hearing the people on the community boards complaining over and over again about the fact that there wasn't enough funding to take care of these very vulnerable people. You got tired of hearing it, and what do you do to stop hearing these complaints? Those complaints were legitimate. These are the people who are in their communities and see that the needs aren't being met. Elderly people, who in some cases are bed-ridden, are not getting the baths they used to get, aren't getting their houses cleaned. They're slipping on stairs, on floors, because their houses aren't being cleaned and the floor gets slippery. They're falling down and injuring themselves and ending up in hospital. All kinds of horrible things are happening to people because the funding isn't there.

What I find completely appalling about this is that the government just brought in a new tax cut for big corporations in this province and here we have our most vulnerable citizens -- the disabled and the frail, elderly seniors -- being left to their own devices and not getting the care they need. It's absolutely disgraceful and the government is going to hear more about this. It isn't going to work. You're going to be hearing more and more in your own ridings from people. Ministers, it's going to happen in your ridings too. It's not just happening in opposition ridings. It is happening all over the province. Ultimately, you're going to have to deal with the funding crises in these community care access centres.

But, in the meantime, to be taking over those boards and to be removing the community-based people -- who have the expertise, who know what their communities need -- is absolutely outrageous. The minister should be ashamed of herself -- the entire government should -- for taking over community-based boards that are working for the people, that are willing to work with the government -- in fact have been in the process of working with the government -- to tighten things up, to deal with some accountability issues. They were working in good faith and then this bill came out of the blue, to everybody's shock.

I'm going to leave the last few minutes for my colleague from East York.

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Mr Gilchrist: I just want to make a few comments, to put them on the record. We're hearing an awful lot of rhetoric, as usual, from the other side and very little of substance about the bill itself and about how the funding has really changed for home care services since 1995. In 1995, when we were first elected, the budget was $600 million in this province. This past year it is $1.17 billion. For the mathematically challenged, that is a doubling of the budget for home care services.

When the members opposite wail and moan, as they so often do, they always leave aside the fact that we have outstripped the increase in population and outstripped inflation. We have dramatically increased access to home care services all across this province. What they also don't mention, though, as they suggest that somehow this is trammelling local communities, trammelling the volunteer spirit, is that there isn't one CCAC in Ontario that has a membership of more than 200 people. When I look at Scarborough, with a population of 600,000, if you're suggesting that somehow those 200 people represent an appropriate cross-section of all the people who care about this important service, that is a fraud.

Let's talk about the CCAC that has actually fixed its membership at --

The Deputy Speaker: Order. I'm going to have to ask the member to withdraw the use of that word.

Mr Gilchrist: It was not in direct reference to any member, but I certainly withdraw it.

Anyone who would make that assertion is clearly not in sync with the facts. The reality is there is even one CCAC in the province that has fixed its membership at 25 people. You want to talk about closed doors, you want to talk about denying democracy, they've done it in spades.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that we're the government that established the CCACs in the first place, just four years ago. So it is totally appropriate, having seen what has happened in Hamilton -- maybe that's the worst-case scenario, where third parties have now come in. I suggest to anyone who wants to deal honestly with the issues that were presented in the auditor's report, with the huge problems of mismanagement and misallocation of funds, whether or not it is the only one that has so grossly mismanaged or is just the worst of many, I don't think should give us much reason to pause.

The fact of the matter is it is totally appropriate for a government to continue to fine-tune initiatives, as we are doing with the composition of the CCACs.

The fact of the matter is there will continue to be the appropriate representation from the community. I am very saddened that, up in Timmins, the member seems to think there will be no other people who have any interest in serving on the CCAC board. I submit to you, without suggesting I have a crystal ball, that there will be any number of people more than interested in participating in a process that guarantees that money starts going to the clients, not to the administration.

In my riding, I have had individual clients come in, and yes, indicate they've had a reduction in service these last few months. I remember the very first gentleman who came in. The member opposite was happy to name names, so I'll name this gentleman. Mr White, who lives in my riding just a couple of blocks away from where I live, was cut back from three baths a week to two. When he called the CCAC headquarters, he went up the totem pole: five different people, five managers overseeing his specific caseworker.

So the members opposite are comfortable with a system that would put that many bodies back at head office, dealing with paperwork and dealing with who knows what issues back there, when there's only one person out in the field delivering the actual service. I think that's wrong and I am going to support this bill.

Mr Bisson: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I would ask for unanimous consent that we take that Hansard and send it to every CCAC board member and executive director across the province.

The Deputy Speaker: I heard a no. Has the member finished his remarks or does he wish the floor back?

Mr Gilchrist: I've finished my remarks, thank you, Mr Speaker.

Mr Michael Prue (Beaches-East York): I would like to say that it was a pleasure to have heard the previous member, but I cannot say that. Really, I cannot. The CCACs are boards of economic management in part. They have a responsibility to take the budgets they are given and to spend the money wisely. I would think that all members of the House would agree that the overwhelming majority of CCACs do exactly that. They try to live within the budget and they try to do the best job they can. The members who are on the board attempt to do the best job that is humanly possible, given the magnitude of the job that must be done and the limitations on the money that is available to do it. They try to make ends meet. They try their very best as a board to cooperate. However, they have been chronically underfunded.

Yes, they were created by the Conservative government, after much prodding from the previous government. Yes, they were created in an attempt to try to manage the very many services that many community groups were providing, but they were never really given the assets to do the job. They were underfunded from the first day. They had to be bailed out by the government, who did not give them sufficient funds. They had to pay them the money, and this year, when they stopped paying the money, the problems started to arise. That is the nub of the whole problem here.

I know that this bill does not deal just with the money for the CCACs. This bill primarily deals with who is going to sit on the board of directors. I would acknowledge that people need to be on the board of directors; we would all acknowledge people who have financial experience need to be on board of directors. But what the government is forgetting is that this limiting of the number of people and the way they're going to be chosen is going to cut right into the heart of the community and right into the heart of the user groups. That is what the problem is. You are going to cut into people who rely on the service. You are going to cut into families who understand the necessity of that service and what the difference is between having three or four hours a week and having one or no hours a week. They understand, as people in this room will never understand. They understand what it means not to have a bath, they understand what it means not to go out and get their groceries, they understand what it is not to get the laundry done or the sheets changed. They understand all of that and they will not be there because all of this is being wiped out in order to talk about the economies.

I listened to the speech of the member opposite and a case comes back to me. He doesn't want his last name used, but he's a war veteran. His name is Andrew. He has Alzheimer's. His wife looks after him. She looks after him to the best of her ability. She has had to stop working. She has taken an early retirement to look after her husband, a man who served this country in times of war and to whom we have a huge debt as a society. She had eight hours of service not a year ago. They came in and helped her four days a week, two hours a day, which allowed her to look after her husband, to do the grocery shopping, to clean the house and to do other things that were necessary. She has been cut back to one hour a week. She can't even go out to do the groceries because she can't leave him alone for more than one hour. She can't even get there. That is the human cost of this and that's what the boards need to be talking about and that's why community groups need to be there.

We have other problems. I've run out of time, but we have other problems that we're going to continue talking about, if not in this Legislature, then out there in the streets.

Mrs Sandra Pupatello (Windsor West): This has been a very long and difficult bill to deal with in this House and out in the community. I want to speak tonight on behalf of the people from Windsor West and the people from across Ontario who have called us and asked us mightily to fight this bill. They have told us that the way services are delivered in the home today is not adequate. They have said, whether it be the CCAC board chairs, those who didn't want to speak publicly because of fear of retribution -- and that's a small point not to be lost on the government or on members of the public. Never before have we found individuals in volunteer positions doing yeoman's service in delivering a massive program that is essentially a virtual hospital. It used to be that these attendant home programs really weren't life and death. Since the early 1980s, or even before, they have turned into the extension of hospital care in the home.

Let me just say that in my hometown, just like across Ontario, what used to be 30% of the caseload that would deal with hospital discharges that percentage has now flipped completely, so that 70% of the caseload is now hospital discharges. So this government policy, which slashed beds, slashed staff, fired nurses and cut budgets of hospitals since they became the government, forced people out of hospital sooner. Those people had to go somewhere, and where they went was into the home care system.

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At this same time in 1997 this government created CCACs, yanked all those services as that used to be delivered across the province and turned them into this organization with a competitive bidding process, which frankly caused many of the problems, because in introducing this we got rid of many organizations that had been in the business of home care service delivery for decades, for generations. So in Windsor West and in many places, our own VON nurses, who were very well respected, our specialty nurses from VON, lost to the system because the VON did not win in that competitive bidding process.

Let's not forget, out of respect to these organizations, that competitive process that lost to Ontario years of service and years of experience in the nursing field. We saw the Red Cross across the province in many instances lose in the competitive process when it was put up against a private company that drove for a lower cost.

Here we are today, where in some communities from the very get-go those community boards came together to act as patient advocates as their caseload was rising and as the acuteness of those patients was rising. No longer were they just Mrs Smith, who needed a little bit of housekeeping to help her stay in her home, or Mrs Jones, who needed just a little bit of help to take a bath a couple of times a week. These cases were much more urgent now. They were people sent home from the hospital with a double mastectomy, sent home with tubes and pads. They ought never to have been sent home that soon, and in the past they weren't. But in this day and age of getting them out as quick and as sick as possible so they wouldn't be on the hospital budget any more, because the hospital didn't have the funds to care for them, this was the acuteness level that had risen in home care.

We were concerned at the time, and we brought this forward: did those home care nurses have the training to care for this new higher level of acuteness? The nurses would call us and say, "You can't believe what we're dealing with in the home. These patients should never have come home." In the long run it cost the system more, because often these people would be sent back through the emergency room, which by this time didn't have the room to take care of these people any more.

These community boards began to lobby and began to advocate, first behind the scenes. But that wasn't going anywhere, because the government refused to listen. And while this government talks about what funding increases there were, it refuses to acknowledge how massively the exponential rise in the caseload was, and the acuteness, and therefore more expensive care that was required -- more money than this government was prepared to give. Bob Fera from Sudbury, with our own MPP Rick Bartolucci, led the charge in Sudbury to say, "What about Sudbury? What about our advocates here? We're telling you what our communities need." This government refused to listen.

We're back here today, and this government's answer, after six different ministers having the file on home care -- year after year a minister change; year after year not having the vision to see where they wanted to be in home care -- we get dropped a bill like Bill 130, which is a hostile takeover, a gag order on all those community representatives who acted as patient advocates. Gone is the opportunity for me and my colleagues and our community leaders to show up at an annual general meeting and see an audited statement as to where those funds were being expended. We were able to do that in Windsor West. That's why in Windsor we called for a management audit of our own initially, because they weren't acting as advocates. And they changed. Why did they change? Because we could go back to the law as it was in the creation of CCACs.

This government had the power in the law that it created to take care of every problem of CCAC management across the province. For every example of mismanagement this government chooses to discuss, it was always within their rights to go in there and say, "Abide by the law." Instead they drop this bill in this House, because they were not prepared to deal with board members who became quite sophisticated and quite experienced to say, "This isn't about us; this is about your funding levels."

To make matters worse, this government brought in its own review, the PricewaterhouseCoopers review, and claims that this review became the basis for the gag order bill that they dropped. Let's see what this big review requested and recommended at the end.

Number one in areas for improvement: "need for more resources." Number two was inconsistencies in the policies and practices. That's the standards in home care which our party called on from the beginning. We said that you needed benchmarks in service. Did this government give them to us? No. We said that we needed to address funding levels. Did this government give this to us? No. And we called on this government to take care of our frail and elderly people. Did this government answer that call? No, they did not. Instead we are left, near the Christmas season with days to go before we have left Queen's Park, not knowing how this government is going to come forward to take care of our seniors.

We have been here, some of us, seven years; some of us longer. We have not seen such an example of a dictatorial government prepared to institute a gag order on the very people who are meant to take care of our seniors, I say to Mrs Tice, who took the time to write to me from Toronto. It's not just about Windsor West or just about Sudbury; this is across the board.

She said: "As a senior of our community, I declare to you that this bill should be withdrawn." Hear, hear, Mrs Tice. We agree with you.

I say to Mindy Gorman from London, who wrote not just to me but to the minister from that riding, and she told her plainly, "You cannot do this to our home care system."

We heard from people across Ontario, and I declare today that this bill shall not go forward. On this basis, I call for an adjournment of the House. I move adjournment of the House.

The Deputy Speaker: There is a motion before this House to adjourn the House.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour, please indicate by saying "aye."

All those opposed, please say "nay."

In my opinion, the nays have it.

Call in the members. This will be a 30-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1748 to 1818.

The Deputy Speaker: All those in favour of the motion will please stand until counted by the Clerk.

Pray be seated.

All those opposed to the motion will please stand and remain standing until counted by the Clerk.

Please be seated.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 37; the nays are 47.

The Deputy Speaker: I declare the motion lost.

Pursuant to the order of the House dated December 10, 2001, I am now required to put the question.

Mrs Johns has moved third reading of Bill 130, An Act respecting community care access corporations.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour, please say "aye."

All those opposed, please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. This will be a five-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1820 to 1825.

The Deputy Speaker: All those in favour of the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ayes

Arnott, Ted

Baird, John R.

Barrett, Toby

Beaubien, Marcel

Chudleigh, Ted

Clark, Brad

Coburn, Brian

Cunningham, Dianne

DeFaria, Carl

Dunlop, Garfield

Ecker, Janet

Elliott, Brenda

Galt, Doug

Gilchrist, Steve

Gill, Raminder

Guzzo, Garry J.

Hardeman, Ernie

Hodgson, Chris

Hudak, Tim

Jackson, Cameron

Johns, Helen

Johnson, Bert

Kells, Morley

Klees, Frank

Marland, Margaret

Martiniuk, Gerry

Maves, Bart

Mazzilli, Frank

Miller, Norm

Molinari, Tina R.

Munro, Julia

Murdoch, Bill

Mushinski, Marilyn

Newman, Dan

O'Toole, John

Runciman, Robert W.

Sampson, Rob

Stewart, R. Gary

Tascona, Joseph N.

Tilson, David

Tsubouchi, David H.

Turnbull, David

Wettlaufer, Wayne

Wilson, Jim

Witmer, Elizabeth

Wood, Bob

Young, David

The Deputy Speaker: All those members opposed to the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Nays

Agostino, Dominic

Bartolucci, Rick

Bisson, Gilles

Bountrogianni, Marie

Boyer, Claudette

Bradley, James J.

Bryant, Michael

Caplan, David

Churley, Marilyn

Colle, Mike

Cordiano, Joseph

Crozier, Bruce

Di Cocco, Caroline

Dombrowsky, Leona

Duncan, Dwight

Gravelle, Michael

Hoy, Pat

Kennedy, Gerard

Kormos, Peter

Kwinter, Monte

Lalonde, Jean-Marc

Levac, David

Marchese, Rosario

Martel, Shelley

Martin, Tony

McLeod, Lyn

McMeekin, Ted

Parsons, Ernie

Peters, Steve

Phillips, Gerry

Prue, Michael

Pupatello, Sandra

Ramsay, David

Ruprecht, Tony

Sergio, Mario

Smitherman, George

Clerk of the House: The ayes are 47; the nays are 36.

The Deputy Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Be it resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: I have two points of order. I did see the House leader for the third party first, and then I'll come to you.

Mr Peter Kormos (Niagara Centre): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Please permit me to introduce to this House Saro McKenna, home from her studies at Oxford University in England, with her mother, Sheila McKenna.

The Deputy Speaker: And the House leader for the official opposition?

Mr Dwight Duncan (Windsor-St Clair): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I seek unanimous consent to place a motion to call government order 90, resuming the debate adjourned on December 10, 2001, on the motion for second reading of Bill 90, An Act to promote the reduction, reuse and recycling of waste.

The Deputy Speaker: You've heard the request. Is there unanimous consent? I heard a no.

Report continues in volume B.