CONTENTS
Tuesday 15 February 1994
Intended appointments
Miriam Kavanagh, Ontario Highway Transport Board
Mary Lynn Biggley, Kingsville Police Services Board
Nicholas Childs, Brant District Health Council
Margaret Elizabeth Stacey, Custody Review Board
António Augusto Azeitona, Custody Review Board
Myrta Rivera Sahas, Waterloo Regional Police Services Board
Donna Lailey, Agricultural Research Institute of Ontario
STANDING COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT AGENCIES
Chair / Présidente: Marland, Margaret (Mississauga South/-Sud PC)
*Vice-Chair / Vice-Président: McLean, Allan K. (Simcoe East/-Est PC)
*Bradley, James J. (St Catharines L)
Carter, Jenny (Peterborough ND)
*Cleary, John C. (Cornwall L)
*Curling, Alvin (Scarborough North/-Nord L)
*Frankford, Robert (Scarborough East/-Est ND)
Harrington, Margaret H. (Niagara Falls ND)
Mammoliti, George (Yorkview ND)
Marchese, Rosario (Fort York ND)
*Waters, Daniel (Muskoka-Georgian Bay/Muskoka-Baie-Georgienne ND)
Witmer, Elizabeth (Waterloo North/-Nord PC)
*In attendance / présents
Substitutions present/ Membres remplaçants présents:
Abel, Donald (Wentworth North/-Nord ND) for Ms Harrington
Hansen, Ron (Lincoln ND) for Ms Carter
Hope, Randy R. (Chatham-Kent ND) for Mr Mammoliti
Jackson, Cameron (Burlington South/-Sud PC) for Mrs Marland
Johnson, Paul R. (Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings/Prince Edward-Lennox-Hastings-Sud ND)
for Mr Marchese
MacKinnon, Ellen (Lambton ND) for Mr Frankford
Sterling, Norman W. (Carleton PC) for Mrs Witmer
Clerk / Greffière: Mellor, Lynn
Staff / Personnel: Pond, David, research officer, Legislative Research Service
The committee met at 1000 in the Trent Room, Macdonald Block, Toronto.
INTENDED APPOINTMENTS
The Vice-Chair (Mr Allan K. McLean): I call the government agencies committee to order. We're dealing with intended appointments.
MIRIAM KAVANAGH
Review of intended appointment, selected by third party: Miriam Kavanagh, intended appointee as member, Ontario Highway Transport Board.
The Vice-Chair: The first appointment we have is Miriam Kavanagh, if she would take a seat up at the front. You have the opportunity to make an opening statement if you wish, or we can go right into questions.
Miss Miriam Kavanagh: Go right into questions.
The Chair: We'll go right into questions. As it's a selection by the third party, Mr Sterling will lead off, for 10 minutes.
Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): What qualifies you to take on this position?
Miss Kavanagh: My legal training is probably the main answer to that. I've been practising now for 14 years. I have a corporate and commercial real estate practice with a very heavy emphasis in aircraft-related and airline-related matters, which of course is a transportation area as well.
Mr Sterling: What is your understanding of the amount of time and effort that will be required on this board?
Miss Kavanagh: As far as I know, this is a part-time position. It would be a couple of days a month, and I would know in advance so that I could book and plan my time accordingly.
Mr Sterling: I see. As I understand the highway transport board, its business has been falling off over the last number of years because of the new legislation dealing with the regulation of commercial trucking. What is your understanding that their main business is now?
Miss Kavanagh: Regulation of the bus industry.
Mr Sterling: Have you had any experience with that industry at all?
Miss Kavanagh: No, I have not.
Mr Sterling: Do you have any political affiliations at all in the past?
Miss Kavanagh: No, I do not.
Mr Sterling: You've never been a member of any political party?
Miss Kavanagh: No, I have not.
Mr Sterling: And your practice of law, where are you located?
Miss Kavanagh: Where do I practise now? At 70 University.
Mr Sterling: And you intend to continue practising there?
Miss Kavanagh: Yes, I do.
Mr Sterling: So this would just be a part-time --
Miss Kavanagh: That's right, yes.
Mr Sterling: Are you by yourself or are you with other partners?
Miss Kavanagh: I'm a partner in a small firm. There are five lawyers in it.
Mr Sterling: And there wouldn't be any problem in dealing with that?
Miss Kavanagh: No. I've spoken to my partners and they've encouraged me, actually, to pursue this.
Mr Sterling: How did you find out about this position?
Miss Kavanagh: I was contacted by David Edgar, who is an assistant to the minister. He had spoken to a friend of mine, and that was how the connection came in. I think they were looking for somebody with legal training.
Mr Sterling: Why was the connection made to you? I'm just interested, because you don't seem to have any expertise directly related to their duties.
Miss Kavanagh: I think it's because of the airline side, the transportation nature of that, which is basically the movement of passengers and goods, the same as buses. I have that connection.
Mr Sterling: What kind of work are you doing there? Administrative work or administrative law?
Miss Kavanagh: No, I do the corporate and commercial side of airline-related things, tremendous amounts of aircraft leasing.
Mr Sterling: For large or for small or --
Miss Kavanagh: For regional carriers and for charter operators in Canada, lots of work into the United States, lots of stuff across Canada. Our firm has a specialty in doing airline-related matters, so we get lots of Canadian clients.
Mr Sterling: How long have you been called to the bar?
Miss Kavanagh: Called in 1980, so for 14 years.
Mr Sterling: And you've never had a problem with the law society?
Miss Kavanagh: No, I haven't.
Mr Sterling: I have no further questions.
Mr Daniel Waters (Muskoka-Georgian Bay): You stated that you worked with airlines and not with trucks and buses. When you work with the airlines, from what I'm able to grasp, it seems you do a lot of, shall we say, negotiating.
Miss Kavanagh: That's correct.
Mr Waters: So you bring those skills with you to this type of thing dealing with bus travel, which, as you stated, is movement of people, or trucking, which is the movement of goods. You'd be bringing with you those negotiation skills and indeed all the things you've learned with the airline industry.
Miss Kavanagh: That's correct.
Mr Waters: Do you have any feeling about whether the regulations on buses are adequate at this time?
Miss Kavanagh: I find that one very difficult to answer, in that I am pretty new to this industry.
Mr Waters: I was just curious about that. Do you see any new issues coming forward, maybe a change in direction for the bus and transportation industry? Working with the airlines, I would assume you're constantly seeing change there. Do you think the same thing will happen commercially in the ground modes of transportation?
Miss Kavanagh: There seems to have been a trend in the past towards deregulation. Whether that would continue, I don't know.
Mr Waters: Based on the experience you have with airlines, do you think that's good or bad for us?
Miss Kavanagh: I think a certain amount of regulation is necessary. The marketplace will sort itself out to a certain extent, but it still needs some parameters to work within.
Mr John C. Cleary (Cornwall): Welcome to the committee. You must have some ideas about some of the regulations and what you would like to see, especially in the bus transportation end of it, important to you evaluating public necessity and convenience. Do you have any views on some of those things?
Miss Kavanagh: It seems to me that public necessity and convenience would turn on the facts that are presented at the time, and you would have to evaluate those facts and make a decision accordingly.
Mr Cleary: I'm sure that you, being a lawyer, would have some views on the present state of the bus regulations.
Miss Kavanagh: Again I have to say that I'm not as familiar with the bus industry as I hope I'm going to get to be. I feel it would be a bit presumptuous of me to even answer that question.
Mr Cleary: Are there only three members on your committee now?
Miss Kavanagh: No, I believe there are seven or eight. I think the act says it's three, but that number has been expanded to seven or eight. I was just asking that question this morning, actually.
Mr Cleary: We've heard a lot of stories from some of our transportation companies about the longer transports; some were bitterly opposed to that. Would that fall under your mandate?
Miss Kavanagh: It's just the extraprovincial movement of trucks. I don't believe it's the length of trucks or licensing of trucks. If they want to move from one province to another or across Canada, that is reviewed by the board, but I don't believe the other is.
The Vice-Chair: Thank you for appearing before the committee this morning. That was one of the quicker interviews. We wish you well in your endeavours.
Miss Kavanagh: Thank you very much.
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MARY LYNN BIGGLEY
Review of intended appointment, selected by official opposition: Mary Lynn Biggley, intended appointee as member, Kingsville Police Services Board.
The Vice-Chair: It would be interesting to know if Mary Lynn Biggley is here this morning. She is. Please come forward and have a chair. You have the opportunity to make a small presentation if you'd like, or we can go right into questions.
Ms Mary Lynn Biggley: I would like to take the opportunity to thank you. This is certainly a privilege at this time, when we are looking at community policing, when the educational systems are looking at partnerships to look at the issues of youth violence, of community violence. It is indeed an exciting time to be here.
Mr Cleary: Welcome to the committee. How did you become interested in being a member of the police services board?
Ms Biggley: Actually, it started a few years back. I live in a small town, as you know. Kingsville is about 5,000. Indeed, community policing is very important because there is a such a close liaison. The real interest came with my responsibilities at the Essex County Board of Education in equity issues, in human rights, in youth and the role models they needed within our community.
While I had submitted my application some time ago, I was confirmed that the right decision was made after working in direct liaison with our county police detachments, the OPP and the city of Windsor detachment, in a joint human rights investigations course with police services and the Essex county board and St Clair. It confirmed that there was indeed an importance of community partnerships.
Mr Cleary: How did you find out about the opening?
Ms Biggley: It was advertised in our newspaper.
Mr Cleary: Now that you're going to be on the commission, anyone I've ever known who got on always thought changes were needed. What changes would you like to see?
Ms Biggley: Definitely more community policing, and to broaden the scope and the understanding. It has been a philosophy within police services, but I'm not sure that has been communicated effectively to the community we service.
Mr Cleary: Some tell me -- maybe not in your particular area, but in other parts of Ontario -- that they figure auxiliary police could play a larger role in some things with police departments, especially ladies auxiliary police. What are your views on that?
Ms Biggley: On auxiliary policing? You caught me: I certainly wasn't prepared for that. I think there is a role for auxiliary policing. As I mentioned, I come from a very small town, a very small detachment. Auxiliary policing would definitely be a new concept for that particular detachment.
Mr Cleary: Thank you very much, and good luck.
Mr Randy R. Hope (Chatham-Kent): Thank you for coming before the committee. I'm just down the street from you guys, in Chatham.
A couple of questions about amalgamation. I'm wondering how familiar you are with the restructuring of policing in Kingsville. The Windsor Police Services Board is trying to amalgamate all the smaller communities and saying, "We'll handle the operations for you." I'm just wondering about your viewpoints on the structural aspect.
Ms Biggley: I think the economic status within this province in every cranny and sector has indicated that we no longer can operate individually, that we have to work in partnerships.
I am concerned with small detachments which are struggling to be competitive or to maintain the same standards as the larger detachments; for example, wife assault, sexual abuse. We're asking our smaller detachments to be experts in all fields, whereas larger detachments have the funding to have experts and you can devote your time and energy to being knowledgeable in all areas.
I would have to say I do promote a form of partnership. I'm not saying complete amalgamation, but certainly it is worthy of investigation and review.
Mr Hope: You brought up in your opening remarks the human rights aspect. I would like to ask your views on employment equity, as we in rural communities are now trying to be reflective of our communities, trying to put women, visual minorities, into our police services. I wonder about your views on employment equity.
Ms Biggley: My responsibilities at the Essex County Board of Education include employment equity, anti-racism and human rights issues.
As we are looking at the projections for this province, not within the next year or so but as we move towards the year 2000 and beyond, if we don't start looking at our target groups within employment equity and the role that women can play in supporting the positions that are going to be available in the future -- I say women, but I mean all members of the target group. Definitely women and other members have a particular role in policing, as they do in other sectors, in their relationships with the clients we service, in terms of the mannerisms in which they would approach their responsibilities in policing. Definitely, I am very supportive of employment equity.
Mr Hope: You mentioned wife assault. As one who's taken an interest, even before being elected, how familiar are you with the new policy? I wonder if you could comment on the new policy.
Ms Biggley: The new policy for police services: I have skimmed over the policy for police services. Those who initiated the policy certainly deserve to be credited for that. I will be taking part tomorrow evening, in fact, in a wife assault/violence against women and children seminar.
Mr Hope: Once the committee proclaims you're on the police services board, then what will be the makeup of the board? If you are sitting on the board, would you be the sole female on the board?
Ms Biggley: No, I will be the second female on the board.
Mr Ron Hansen (Lincoln): What would be your priority in community policing? What area would you like to get into to make an improvement in what you have in Kingsville right now?
Ms Biggley: Definitely our first area of concern, and I mention it because I was invited to the last police services board meeting as a member of education, is to look at the concerns we have in our town over youth violence. That doesn't indicate that we have problems such as in larger areas; perhaps about 1% to 1_% are known to the police and are repeat offenders.
Our great concern is about the fringe group or the middle category. It is targeting on the youth, our future generation, those people who will govern our town and our community, that we need to focus on right now. We need to set role models for positive policing opportunities. We also need to set positive role models to show these kids that it's okay to be okay, it's okay to stay away from violence and drugs.
As I said to the police chief and the chairman of the board at our last meeting, this whole generation we have right now is angry, has no hope and has no vision. When you live in a small town where there are no services, no pool, no community centre, no teen group, what can we expect? They're exerting their frustrations, and unfortunately, the exertion is in an very negative manner. We need to strengthen our community policing primarily towards out youth as our first focus group.
Mr Hansen: Do you agree that the police officers should be out of the cruiser and on the street?
Ms Biggley: Definitely.
Mr Hansen: And possibly having a coffee at one of the cafeterias of one of the schools? He's more visible in the community than isolated in a cruiser.
Ms Biggley: Absolutely.
Mr Hansen: What type of training? You've mentioned some areas. Are there important training areas with youth that these officers need? The other thing you have to consider about training is budget: It costs money. Looking at the budget on training, what would be your first priority?
Ms Biggley: Are your speaking specifically of the youth area?
Mr Hansen: What is your own priority? You were talking about youth as one of your priorities. That could be the priority.
Ms Biggley: I'm asking my teachers to give of their own time. I am so linked to youth and policing and conflict resolution and violence prevention. Without any prior knowledge, I would like to focus on police understanding youth and more effective communication skills. When I speak about communication skills, it's not only for youth but for the public in general, in conflict resolution, in mediation, in downplaying an incident before it becomes a violent incident. All officers -- male, female, in cruisers, out of cruisers -- need that kind of in-servicing. We need to reduce our expenditures, and expenditures come when you're laying charges. If they can be out there as community police officers, networking -- they need to understand how to network. Police officers are those people who are used to having the authority, are used to having the power. In a small town they are seen as the power players in the community. We need to show them a different style of communication.
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Mr Hansen: As you know, the OPP and the regional police and the local police forces will be issued semiautomatic guns. Do you feel this is necessary? You know the reasons they were issued, but what are your feelings?
Ms Biggley: I understand recently that gas station attendants and police officers rank in the same death rate, but I do believe our officers need to be prepared in an instance where they would need that. If you're putting them in a disadvantaged position to begin with, the message is out there on the streets. But also with that there has to be some very strong training and in-servicing so they are capable of handling those weapons. I'm not saying they're not at this point, but the concern for the public is that they will use them randomly or in a moment of panic.
Mr Waters: You were talking about policing in small communities. Myself, coming from a small one, one of the things I would like to see us do is get ahead of the police. I would like your ideas of what small communities can do to deal with the situation before there's police intervention. I believe that in small communities, per capita population, the crime rate is probably higher than it is in the big cities. It isn't as violent, but the vandalism on main streets and things like that. I find there's nothing for our children to do. In big cities there are a lot of free things or relatively cheap things you can access, whereas you can't play anything, can't do anything in a small town without paying. What can we do in small towns?
Ms Biggley: I can tell you what we're doing. We are looking at developing a community-based task force, and this was initiated by education, within my responsibilities as projects officer. We are forming a partnership with the police. I will share with you that on our first visit, I was concerned about the traditional police approach, which is a very direct, no-questions-asked, "We will do this" type of approach, whereas I'm looking at it from another: Let's look at prevention.
You're certainly right that in a small town, while there is that good group of kids, you're noticed and you stand out, you don't blend in with the community. We're looking at developing the community action plan. With the other female member -- she and I are quite well acquainted -- we are looking at a youth centre which will be not only a games/sports/activities/social centre but also a leadership centre, with police definitely involved.
The Vice-Chair: We'll move on to Mr Sterling.
Mr Sterling: I'm going to give a bit of my time to Mr Bradley, because he was late coming in.
The Vice-Chair: In this committee we're allowed 10 minutes each. If you want to transfer some time, we have to have unanimous consent from the committee at that time.
Mr Sterling: I thought I controlled that time. Never mind. I'll follow your leadership.
How many people are on the police force in Kingsville?
Ms Biggley: I believe there are eight officers. I'm not certain of that.
Mr Sterling: What is your budget?
Ms Biggley: I do not know; I have not taken time to access that information.
Mr Sterling: I find that odd. One of the big problems we're facing in our communities is high property taxes, which are basically the financial support for our police. How are you going to pay for these expanded services you've been talking about getting the police involved in?
Ms Biggley: As you'll recall, my comment was that this is a community action plan we're looking at. I know the Solicitor General's office has a focus on community policing and that there are mandates that will come down internally, through that stream, for the definition of community policing. The other activities are community-based. We are looking for funding, and certainly in a small town there's a great deal of community support to make these things happen.
Mr Sterling: Have you ever volunteered in terms of a community policing endeavour?
Ms Biggley: Certainly my responsibilities at the board, though not on a direct volunteer basis, were beyond --
Mr Sterling: So you've never given freely of your time to do that?
Ms Biggley: There hasn't been anything in our community to do. The whole focus of community policing and the implementation is new.
Mr Sterling: So you have now no idea of the costs? You don't even know how many police officers there are in town?
Ms Biggley: That's correct.
Mr Sterling: What qualifies you to sit on this police commission?
Ms Biggley: If you look at my background in terms of equity issues, human rights, employment equity, anti-racism, I do feel I have contributions in those areas.
Mr Sterling: Are you a member of any political party?
Ms Biggley: Under human rights, when we're looking at equity, if that's a bona fide job requirement I would be happy to answer that.
Mr Sterling: I'm asking you if you are a member of a political party.
Ms Biggley: No.
Mr Sterling: Have you ever worked for a political party?
Ms Biggley: No.
Mr Sterling: I'm troubled by your remark that gas station attendants and police officers have the same risk in terms of death rate. Maybe they are, but I'm troubled by that in terms of an attitude you're expressing, that you're not empathetic to the dangers police officers place themselves in each day.
Ms Biggley: That perhaps was a misinterpretation. I made that quotation from a recent newspaper article that was in the Windsor Star this past week, when they were talking about the same issue I was questioned on. I certainly understand the dangers. I've worked closely with Windsor police services. I know what the danger is. I have a son who wants to be a police officer, and has from the moment he knew that police officers existed.
Mr Sterling: What do police officers get paid in Kingsville? Do you know?
Ms Biggley: I'm not familiar with their budget structure.
Mr Sterling: Thank you very much.
The Vice-Chair: Do we have unanimous consent for Mr Bradley to use the time? Thank you.
Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Thank you to Mr Sterling for that consideration.
My first question deals with the issue of nepotism. It has been alleged that on a number of police forces in Canada one of the ways one has a good chance of getting a job is through having someone else on that police force. The rate can be as high as 27% or perhaps as low as zero, I don't know. Do you believe there should be a circumstance or a ruling whereby if there's one member of a family who is a member of the police force, no other members of the family should be permitted to be a member of that police force?
Ms Biggley: I believe that may be important now as we're looking at an employment equity strategy within police services, because you tend to hire relatives or like people. That does not open the doors for women and visible minorities.
Mr Bradley: Do you believe the police force composition, in terms of employment equity, should reflect Kingsville or Toronto?
Ms Biggley: Definitely Kingsville.
Mr Bradley: Do you believe a police force should have to fit provincial criteria in this regard? Should that override a local component? In other words, if the provincial goal were one and the local goal were another, which should override?
Ms Biggley: I believe each community needs the autonomy. Therefore, you should be looking at local, guided by provincial, criteria.
Mr Bradley: I don't know what the toughest tavern is in your part of the province, but let's make up a name of a tavern.
Mr Hansen: Bradley's Tavern.
Mr Bradley: The XYZ Tavern, and a big brawl takes place. Should every member of the police force who is a member of the active police force, not the civilian force, be able to break up the brawl in that tavern? In other words, should that person be physically able to break up a brawl at the toughest tavern in Kingsville?
Ms Biggley: Are you heading towards another employment equity question?
Mr Bradley: Yes.
Ms Biggley: In employment equity hiring practices, employment equity is not to give preferential treatment; employment equity does not mean hiring lesser candidates. There is a minimum qualification, a bona fide qualification, and if a police officer is required -- and I use that as a term; male, female or whoever -- they need to have those minimum qualifications. The safety of their fellow officer is at stake. I'm not at any moment suggesting that a female should get in with lesser qualifications.
Mr Bradley: Do you think there's a danger that if we spend all our time trying to make our police force totally reflective of our community, in fact we'll have a circumstance where some members of the police force get to direct traffic and others get to break up the brawl at the tavern?
Ms Biggley: I would hope not, because if the chief is allowing that to happen, then he's not fulfilling his mandate as a chief, and I say "he" because our chief is a male.
Mr Bradley: In terms of budget, should the Ontario Police Commission have the right to overrule the local elected authority on the police budget? Someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that's always been the way, that you go to the Ontario Police Commission when you don't like what the local council gives you. The chief says, "If I don't get this, crime will be rampant in downtown Stittsville," which is in the other end of the province, but the chief will often say this.
Do you think what should override is the local elected body's view of the budget, or should there be an appeal to the Ontario Police Commission, which can then overrule the local body and slam the local taxpayers with a tax increase as a result? That's a pretty loaded question.
Ms Biggley: It is.
Mr Bradley: The last part of it was loaded, but it's the only way you get a really good answer. With guests, they tend to give better answers then.
Ms Biggley: I do know our mayor has said that taxes will not be increased. I do know, working in a provincial organization, that there are many mandates coming down, and I'm not so sure that people in small towns -- and I say that coming from a city environment; I haven't lived in Kingsville my whole life -- sometimes they do not have the global view. I would certainly like to see the police commission with an alternative, for there to be some mediation. I'm not saying overruling, but at least some mediation whereby we might come to an agreement.
Mr Bradley: If there's an increase in that budget as a result of an appeal to the Ontario Police Commission, do you believe the provincial government, as it is an Ontario Police Commission, should then have the obligation to make up the difference between what the locally constituted police services board and the Ontario Police Commission have to say about the budget?
In other words, if it were -- I'll pull a number out of a hat -- $10 million agreed to locally, and the chief and others go to appeal, or perhaps the commission itself goes to appeal, they go to the Ontario Police Commission and it says, "Yes, we're going to approve $11 million," do you think that $1 million should come from the province if it's prepared to stick the municipality with that much more?
Ms Biggley: I can't see that our province would be willing to do that at this time, and I guess my answer would be no, that we all have to take responsibility for services in our community.
Mr Bradley: So the local taxpayer would take the blast, even though a provincial body had made the decision.
The Vice-Chair: I want to thank you for being before the committee this morning. Your time is over. I wish you well.
Our next appointment is Nicholas Childs, who is the intended appointee as a member of the Brant District Health Council. Is Nicholas here? He's not due to be here until 11. We'll recess for 10 minutes.
The committee recessed from 1034 to 1045.
The Vice-Chair: I call the government agencies committee back into session to continue with our reviews.
NICHOLAS CHILDS
Review of intended appointment, selected by official opposition: Nicholas Childs, intended appointee as member, Brant District Health Council.
The Vice-Chair: Our next review is Nicholas Childs, an intended appointee to the Brant District Health Council, if he would come up to the front. You have the opportunity to make a statement or a short speech, but we like to ask questions. It's up to you. No opening remarks? Then we will proceed with questions.
Mr Bradley: How did you become aware of this particular appointment? Were you approached by a government member or was it made known to you by the government that this position was open?
Mr Nicholas Childs: No. There was an advertisement in the newspaper, the Brantford Expositor.
Mr Bradley: And you applied from that. I'm trying to remember how these appointments work. Was your appointment recommended by the district health council, or was this separate from the district health council?
Mr Childs: I'm not sure I really understand that.
Mr Bradley: It used to be that when the government tried to make appointments to health councils, the local people would say, "You don't have the right to do that. We do it," so you perpetuated the people who were there for ever and ever. I had almost been convinced from that that if it weren't locally proposed, somebody wasn't going to be appointed to the district health council. That is not the case in your case?
Mr Childs: What happened was that I applied through the newspaper, took in a résumé to the health council office, got called and sat before three or four -- the executive director and a couple of, I think, former council members. I had an interview process with them.
Mr Bradley: With whom?
Mr Childs: With the executive director of the Brant District Health Council, Catherine Knipe, and with a couple of -- I believe they were former health council members, and there may have been one person present who was on the council at the time.
Mr Bradley: Are you a member of a political party?
Mr Childs: Yes.
Mr Bradley: Is that the New Democratic Party?
Mr Childs: Yes.
Mr Bradley: That answers that question. Do you believe that influenced the fact that the government was prepared to accept your appointment or entertain your appointment?
Mr Childs: I don't think so, no. I've been involved with social service agencies for a number of years. When I met with the executive director and the individuals when I had my interview, the response I made to some of the questions they asked me were influential in their wanting me to be on the council.
Mr Bradley: In the Legislature for many years, of Conservative and Liberal governments, the party to which you belong used to ask questions which suggested there should be a much larger infusion of funds into the health care system. Today as the government, the minister brags, along with the Treasurer, that the increase has been minuscule in the budget of the Ministry of Health. Now that it's 1994 and now that there's an NDP government in power, do you believe we should be trying to restrict the growth in the budget of the Ministry of Health to 1% or 2%?
Mr Childs: I don't know that I'm actually qualified to answer that question. All I'm going to be doing is giving an opinion. With it, like everything else, there are restraints. With councils, with a lot of things, you look at the budget you've got and try to do the best you can with it.
Mr Bradley: Looking at the best you can do with it and the conditions which exist in your part of the province, what have you seen as the effect of the government restraint program, whether it's the social contract or the general government restraint program, on the delivery of health care services in your part of the province so far?
Mr Childs: It seems to have cut back -- and I'm not on the health council, so I'm just speaking as Joe Public -- on the amount of money coming into the community to deal with some of the problems that arise. People are having to look for different ways, newer ways to use the dollars that are already there to try to meet the needs of the community.
Mr Bradley: There have been people out there advocating, for want of a better term, that user fees -- everybody has a different name for them, but in essence I call them user fees -- should be utilized as one way of getting more money into the system. Do you believe that, as some people advocate?
Mr Childs: That would depend on, say, a study or something that would get done to find out whether user fees would actually make a difference. Some studies report back that user fees may not make that much of a difference, so it depends on what the aim is, if it's trying to prevent something.
Mr Bradley: Yes, a deterrent fee.
Mr Childs: That's right, if it's being used as a deterrent or being used to increase revenues. But it's not something I have sat down and thought about long and hard and really studied; just a top-of-my-head answer.
Mr Bradley: Proposals have been coming forward now that suggest that as a job creation activity -- because people in various parts of the province, your part of the province, my part of the province, are desperate for jobs -- and perhaps to attract so-called top people in the medical field, private clinics should be established which would charge people from other countries to come in to utilize that clinic and that that infusion of money could be used not only for the private owner of that clinic, semi-private perhaps, but that money could go into the system. Are you philosophically opposed to setting up those kinds of things? There are proposals now in your area and mine for those kinds of clinics.
Mr Childs: An interesting question.
Mr Bradley: It's a tough one, I know.
Mr Childs: I don't know. I'd have to look at the pros and cons; I'd have to weigh it up. I wouldn't say I'd be totally dead set against it, but like I say, it would need further deliberation. I'd need to look at it closely.
Mr Cleary: I've had an opportunity to sit on a subcommittee of the district health council on different projects and work with our hospitals and with groups that thought they needed a service in our community and worked very hard to get it there, but the district health council was totally opposed to it and it never happened. What do you think your job is on the district health council? How would you work with groups like that to make sure they're heard and they get their input into a project for a community?
Mr Childs: Total community needs obviously have to be looked at, and these days you've got to prioritize and say, "How can we?" You want to try to meet all of the needs. I guess it's an idealistic way of looking at it. You don't want to isolate any particular groups or any concerns that people have, but prioritizing -- you've got to look at the local community issues. Some things in some areas are much more important, so they may need looking at. But it's going to depend on the inclusion of all parties involved -- action committees, groups, subcommittees -- getting all those people together at the table and having a look at all the issues and resolving it from there, as opposed to maybe just one branch or one arm of a committee coming out and saying, "We think this," and then people not looking at it properly.
Mr Alvin Curling (Scarborough North): What do you feel you can contribute to this council? What skills do you think you have that could make this council more effective?
Mr Childs: My background, as I mentioned before, is that I worked with youth extensively for about eight or nine years, teenagers, group homes and different things, doing counselling. I know there are a lot of youth issues being looked at that I've got some background on, and I would bring something in that sense. Also, I spent four years working with the unemployed through the Ontario help centres. There's a chronic unemployment problem in Brant county, and there's an area that I think is being missed. It's not just getting someone a job; there are a lot of other areas being looked at. That background is also going to be conducive.
Mr Cameron Jackson (Burlington South): Mr Childs, have you ever run for the NDP?
Mr Childs: No.
Mr Jackson: Are you an active member?
Mr Childs: What do you mean by active member?
Mr Jackson: A card-carrying member, you attend meetings, you participate on committees.
Mr Childs: That's a hard question. If that were the definition of "active," I'd say no, I'm not an active member.
Mr Jackson: I'll pursue the question about your strengths with children's services. As you know, the future role for the DHCs probably will entail control over a certain-sized envelope of moneys. The role of DHCs is in transition, and certain groups are going to fare better than others in the hands of a DHC. Mr Bradley pursued the notion of user fees, but user fees can happen in a variety of ways when programs erode and final pickup is with the private sector.
I'll give you an example: speech pathology services. The hospital board cuts it back, so who provides the service? Our DHC in our local hospital just killed our children's speech pathology program. I have 120 people on waiting lists, and the lady who was told by the hospital, "We don't want your program," is now charging $80 an hour. I've got families making $16,000 or $18,000 a year, and they're coming to me in tears because their child has absolutely no hope whatsoever of seeing a speech pathologist for a year.
In my view, your philosophical background could be a strength in that issue. It's certainly "not in my backyard," because people are just allowing this to happen. I wonder to what extent your bias might be an asset in those areas, and whether you might wish to comment about your concern. These are legitimate private sector interests, when it seems the system is quickly cutting those services where psychiatric support, counselling support, and a whole host of programs for young people and children are provided by the private sector. It's just that the DHCs are now in a much more powerful position to say which programs get cut, and I watch that trend as being somewhat distressing.
Mr Childs: If I get on the health council, I'm going to be involved with a group of people, and the total needs of the community are going to come down, as I mentioned before, to prioritizing. But yes, bringing somewhat of a -- I don't know if I would call it a bias, but a perspective, maybe, on children's services and youth services, on what I have seen, so at least I can bring that to the table and maybe open up some areas that may not have been open beforehand.
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Mr Jackson: Well, you are going to be on the health council, Mr Childs. There's no question about that.
The other area of concern is that the government recently delisted long-term care services, took them out of the OHIP formulary of insured services, and has implemented a rather massive and huge increase, $150 million across the province, for seniors. That seems to be an area of huge vulnerability. As you come as a young man with an interest and background in youth services, how are you going to be able to counterbalance this huge loss of ground that seniors have experienced with respect to medically necessary services, extended care and long-term care services? This is now at a very critical point in DHCs because they're looking at the models for the delivery of the service provision programs.
Mr Childs: Frankly, I haven't had a lot to do with studying the long-term care issues and those kinds of things, so I'm ignorant as to some of the specifics that are going on. As an employment counsellor, I spent a lot of time working with those 55 and up, so I know of the concerns that have come out of that area.
Mr Jackson: You know how frustrating it is to find services for them.
Mr Childs: That's right, very much so. I do have some background there, so it's not totally weighted down by my --
Mr Jackson: I'm encouraged to hear that. Mr Childs, good luck and thank you.
Mr Hope: First of all, your political affiliation really doesn't mean a whole lot to me, whether you're a Liberal or a Conservative or a New Democrat. I'm concerned about your role and responsibility to your community, as the obligation of the district health councils is going to be expanding their role and their mandate in providing services to their community. I would like to know your understanding currently of the practices going on in the DHC, and how you see your role and responsibility on the DHC to provide services to your community, the people you live with.
Mr Childs: Probably the most focused thing I could talk about is the community-based advisory committee, because that's a subcommittee I have sat on for a few months, and some of the areas we've been involved in there are injury prevention, health promotion, those areas; instead of waiting until after it happens, trying to get it before it happens and prevent some of the problems that arise that cost a lot of money to fix. There are also a lot of mental health areas in the community. There are a lot of addiction areas that need to be addressed in Brant county. Those are three of the areas that I know something about. I know there are other areas and other issues, but not sitting as a council member, they're not things I've really delved into in any great detail or at any great length at this point.
Mr Hope: Are you familiar with the time that will be allocated towards the DHC, with its expanded role and mandate; how you're going to be able to judge your schedule to meet the workings of the DHC?
Mr Childs: I know there's a tremendous time commitment, which I think is key. There's no getting around that, and that's very important. I'm self-employed right now, so I can work my schedule around the commitment I would have to give for that. There are council meetings, obviously, some of the subcommittees and various other committees and roles we have to play in the community. Yes, it's a great time commitment.
Mr Hope: I was reading your résumé. I find it very impressive, and you've talked about a lot of the things -- dealing with youth, with employment, which are all factors of health -- you've done over the time period. My colleagues have some questions, but I would just like to say your political relationship doesn't mean anything. When I look at the résumé, whoever did the selection looked at the work you've carried out and found an important role in the future of the DHC for the area. I'd just like to congratulate you.
Mrs Ellen MacKinnon (Lambton): I suspect that one look at my face will tell you what in the world I want to talk to you about. You've alluded to it a little bit. Long-term care is very near and dear to my heart, and I get a little nervous when I hear somebody say it's about that critical or something.
Have you by any chance done any studying in regard to the long-term care that the government has brought out? We've had a couple of studies or reports come out recently.
Mr Childs: I've glanced over the joint task force summary that was done, and I say glanced over it. Really, the answer would be no, I haven't studied at length any of that. I know it is a critical area. It's something the Brant District Health Council is putting a lot of time and effort into. I know it's a great priority.
Mrs MacKinnon: You answered my next question, what role you see the Brant county health council playing in the long-term care. I think you've already answered my question. The best of luck to you.
Mr Hansen: Maybe I missed the answer and you've given it already, but your wish list: "If I wind up being appointed to the district health council, what would be the first thing I would like to do?" I know your area is with youth, but it could be something else. You've given your background, but what would be your number one wish for district health council to do? Sometimes we're not able to achieve it, but a wish, working with the council, not that you are independent.
Mr Childs: You're talking about one specific area where I would say, "Come along and fix that"?
Mr Hansen: That you would say, "This is why."
Mr Childs: Honestly, I'd have to say there really isn't one area. Five years ago I would have said children's services. Now I've been exposed to so much more that it would be an extremely difficult list to even start.
Mr Hansen: Just your number one priority. There are so many issues to be addressed, but we always come into some --
Mr Childs: I honestly couldn't pick just one issue. The focus of the unemployment and mental health -- if I were to really encapsulate and say it covers every area, then it would be the area of mental health, maybe looking at expanding what's done there. I'm not sure. That's probably been the focus of my work, in those kinds of areas.
The Vice-Chair: Thank you very much for appearing before the committee. We wish you well.
I don't believe our next delegate, the intended appointee to the Custody Review Board, is here. We could recess for 10 minutes maximum and have a subcommittee meeting, if Mr Waters is here.
The committee recessed from 1108 to 1114.
MARGARET ELIZABETH STACEY
Review of intended appointment, selected by the third party: Margaret Elizabeth Stacey, intended appointee as member, Custody Review Board.
The Vice-Chair: Our next intended appointment is Margaret Elizabeth Stacey, if you would take a chair at the front. You have the opportunity to make an opening statement, or we can go right into questions, whichever you prefer.
Ms Margaret Elizabeth Stacey: The only opening statement I'd like to make is that the drive up from Picton was beautiful today. The sun was shining -- such a change.
The Vice-Chair: That's positive. Mr Jackson, questions?
Mr Jackson: Ms Stacey, what is your interest in the Custody Review Board?
Ms Stacey: I've been involved in the service end of the criminal justice system for many years, and I've worked a lot with both systems. In the adult system, there seem to be many checks and balances to assist the adult offender. With the young offender, in a comparatively new system, there don't seem to be that many checks and balances. I saw the role of the board as perhaps becoming one of those balances in the system.
Mr Jackson: Recently, the auditor identified serious problems with the processes of placement for young offenders. Of course the Custody Review Board is in a critical position in that regard. How familiar are you with the auditor's report and what comments would you make about it?
Ms Stacey: I'm not familiar with the auditor's report per se. I am familiar with the problem of placement for young offenders. I've been involved both in establishing an open custody facility for the older young offenders, and I also have seen the problems locally with youth being sent out of the area. I also realize that in times of fiscal restraint it's very difficult to provide those services.
Mr Jackson: Last week we met with the auditor and spent a week discussing this. We found out that the recidivism rate, return offences, is that as high as half the total population of 3,000 young offenders in a given year are back in the system. It was reconfirmed by the ministry staff, what I've been trying to say for a couple of years, that we mix our young offenders inappropriately, in my personal, biased view; have a murderer in with a truancy case and so on and so forth.
The Young Offenders Act allows for a degree of latitude, but in budget restraint and in the absence of this philosophical commitment to change that component, what is it you think you could do to ensure that first-time offenders, who are actually usually third-time offenders by the time they are in the young offender system, can get a chance at not being exposed to more difficulties because of their placement? I'm very concerned about all the criticisms: the mixing of the population by age, above and below the age of 16, by the seriousness of crime. I think society and everybody who walks the face of the earth can tell the difference between a serious crime and not a serious crime, but under the Young Offenders Act we're not supposed to see them as serious crimes. We're supposed to see them as conflicts with themselves.
First of all, do you agree with some of those sentiments, and would you use that as your conscionable view of placement in your role on the board?
Ms Stacey: One of the things that was stressed when the act was first introduced was that it was supposed to respond to the needs of the offender. It seems to me that regardless of the actual crime, it's the needs of that young person and how they can best be responded to with diminished resources.
The other thing is that the system seems to forget that the offender isn't an integral part of that system. It seems they should have a voice in possibly attempting some remedy that will help their situation in their own future. The Custody Review Board, more than any other part of the system, could possibly provide that involvement of the offender in the system by a certain amount of advocacy and by monitoring, at the child's request, the dispositions that are being made.
Also, I think there's a role for them in advocating the provision of services and drawing to your attention and to others' attention the lack of services and the problem the board itself encounters in its deliberations.
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Mr Jackson: But this board, which you will be appointed to, does not report to the Legislature. It reports to the minister.
Ms Stacey: Yes, but I think an informed minister has a much stronger voice.
Mr Jackson: Not according to the auditor. Agreed?
Ms Stacey: I haven't read the auditor's report, as I've commented to you.
Mr Jackson: Well, the auditor was extremely critical. The auditor expressed the exact sentiment, to the word, that you just expressed, because we're dealing with accountability within the legislation. To have a 19-year-old murderer in with a 13- or 14-year-old young girl who's just been introduced to prostitution and has been a runner, in my view, is an absolutely disastrous formula. It is occurring in our detention facilities for young offenders far too frequently while they are waiting for the so-called legal system to process them.
I wish you well with your appointment. I've shared with you my concerns, and I hope it becomes a conscionable imperative for you as well to look at a couple of these areas. I highly recommend you examine the auditor's report and last week's committee deliberations, which was an examination of the ministry's response, the auditor's input and all three political parties. Thank you for coming to Toronto today, and good luck with your appointment.
Mr Hope: Dealing with the Custody Review Board, I heard Mr Jackson's comments about the Provincial Auditor. The Provincial Auditor raises concerns about how the system has been run for many a year, not just since this government has taken office.
The act you'll be working under is a federal act, and I know you understand your role and responsibility, as I've looked through your résumé and the involvement you've had. Just so I'm clear, what you'll be doing is that if an inmate -- or a participant in one of the programs, as I would refer to it -- feels, in that young offender's opinion, that the facility he's being sentenced to is not going to serve justice, you will go before that young offender to listen to his concerns?
Ms Stacey: Yes.
Mr Hope: What gives you the qualities to be able to listen to the concerns of that young offender?
Ms Stacey: Primarily, many, many years of experience in dealing with offenders, but dealing with them in a way that's slightly different from the ways the administration has had to deal with them. I've dealt with them as an advocate in the community in attempting to harness services, harness programs, find things that suit the needs of that young offender and find some way of helping them reintegrate into society. That's my training, that's my job, that's what I've done: listen, try to hear what they're saying and then try to find a way, a process, that comes up with the best solution for everyone concerned.
Mr Hope: But that process only allows you to make recommendations. You're not a decision-maker. Legislative research always does a lot of work for us in these committees. Their document says the provincial director, who works within the framework of the federal legislation, has a 95% agreement ratio with it. Do you find that because you bring a new flavour, a new idea, to the board that there might be lack of understanding from the provincial director, or do you think you'd be able to close that gap up, instead of 95%, putting it at a 100% ratio?
Ms Stacey: Wouldn't that be wonderful?
The other side of this is that the young offenders haven't always been listened to and they haven't been heard. If they were being better represented, if they were listening more to the staff and to the young offenders, it might not be a 95% agreement, and you might in the end have to look again at what's going on. But it's relatively new legislation and there has not been a process in which many of those applications have come forth. I hope more do.
Mr Hope: I take it by your résumé that you've been around. I don't mean that in a sarcastic way, but you've been around the world, everywhere; the St Leonard's Society, which I'm very familiar with, one of the projects they have in Chatham. You've been involved with BC. I guess your view and where you make a good fit into being a part of this review committee is that you've had not only the province of Ontario's understanding of it, but you've now also incorporated all of Canada and even outside the borders of Canada.
Ms Stacey: Yes, but the most important part for me is that I've always represented a community, that I've always been part of a community, trying to represent that community's response to many things that happen in the criminal justice system. Our young offenders have to come back into their communities in the end, and the community has to be involved in the process just as much as the young offender is.
Mr Hope: Dealing with the review board itself, do you think there ought to be more public awareness of what you actually will do, if the committee agrees to it, so there is an understanding of what your role and responsibility actually is and who has the final decision-making process? I believe some believe that you're the final decision-maker, but you still have somebody you have to answer to.
Ms Stacey: There's a tremendous amount of education all over the map that hasn't been done yet and remains to be done. I'd like to be part of that.
Mr Paul R. Johnson (Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings): Ms Stacey, I'm glad to hear you had a safe and enjoyable journey from the county to Toronto. It's always nice to see constituents when they make the journey out of the county.
Two questions, one related to the size of the board. I must admit, I didn't realize it only takes one member of the board to constitute a quorum.
Ms Stacey: Nor did I.
Mr Paul Johnson: I just wondered if you had any opinion about the size of the board and whether maybe there should be more than one person constituting a quorum. It would seem that from time to time you could have a single person making decisions.
Ms Stacey: It would seem that way. I'm not completely familiar with the process; of course I hope to become familiar with it. The only thing I can compare it to is the kind of situation that happened with the National Parole Board, which is a federal organization, and where eventually, depending on the seriousness of the situation appearing in front of them, they had more or fewer board members in attendance. I think it may be possible at some point, if you have a particularly notorious or difficult case, that you would have to call in more than one board member.
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Mr Paul Johnson: That more or less leads into my next question. People in the province of Ontario are concerned about the Young Offenders Act and the fact that offenders' names do not have to be made public. There are two opinions, obviously diverse, with regard to this. Sometimes the nature of the crime is very serious, in the opinion of the public and probably in the opinion of everyone, and I was wondering if you had an opinion with regard to the public's perception that there is a need to identify dangerous young offenders. I don't know if we would want to go so far, necessarily, as indicating where they might be staying in the province, but simply identifying who they are so their communities would know that. One might suggest that where there are dangerous young offenders, their communities usually know anyway, even though it may not be reported in the media. I was just wondering if you had an opinion on that.
Ms Stacey: I was just going to respond that in any community that's generally known.
Mr Paul Johnson: Then do you think it's the media that are upset they can't report it?
Ms Stacey: They've been in the Court of Appeal saying that for weeks, particularly about the Teale case. I can only say that, on the other hand, you don't want to get into a situation like the one you've had in Kingston recently, where people have been picketing indiscriminately in front of Kingston Penitentiary. Certainly chiefs of police have taken the step of publishing names right off the bat if they're concerned about public safety. I think you have to differentiate between public safety and the public's desire for gossip, sometimes. If it's an issue of public safety, that should be the paramount thing, but not just a desire to know or a desire to discuss.
Mr Paul Johnson: Thank you very much. Have a safe trip back.
Mr Curling: Have you ever visited a detention institution where young offenders are being held?
Ms Stacey: Yes.
Mr Curling: Could you give me your impression? Do you feel it's an area that is conducive for young offenders? Did you observe anything where you felt improvements could be made in the institution?
Ms Stacey: I'll be very, very careful to distinguish between "institution" and a place where young offenders are being held. I've certainly visited many small facilities where young offenders are being held, where there are no more than 10, 12, 13 young offenders with specific programs in place. In those facilities, you can make great efforts to make it a homelike situation where there's some relevance to the young offender in it. On the other hand, when you get people who have very serious needs and are seriously disturbed, you tend to get into a larger institution with much more rigid structures, but again the only way of delivering those kinds of programs to those serious offenders. I hope we could always aim towards the small, but small isn't economic, and consequently we tend to get institutions, places where some people can get lost in the numbers. It's quite difficult.
Mr Curling: Even beyond being lost in the large institution of, say, the east detention centre, there are many cases I have seen and which have been reported to me of abuses by having two or three together in a cell; that the seasoned young offender, if you want to call it that, has abused, sodomized the first-time young offender. Some vicious things are happening there. I don't want to say it's wide-scale.
The reason I ask you if you've observed anything there for improvement is that I was thinking about staffing, for instance. I know one of the most impossible places to staff is especially the late shift, the night shift, where at some hours in the morning, at 3 in the morning, when there are two or three in a cell, people can be attacked. Did you, in your visit, see any neglect or need of some support in staffing there? Was it your sense that they need more staff?
Ms Stacey: It came to my attention in that my own philosophy, when I was running halfway houses, was that I would rather put my best staff on the midnight shift than during the day. We could cope during the day, but if crises were going to happen, they were going to happen at night. It's exceedingly difficult to get the best-qualified staff to work those night shifts, and yet that's when all the trouble goes down and that's when things happened.
The other difficulty I had was in providing culturally relevant services to the people in the institutions. I was fortunate that I was able to make my staff quite broad. But I've gone into other institutions and I couldn't understand why anybody would find anything to relate to in them. They were all middle-aged white men, no female staff, no visible minority staff in those institutions, but the offenders were represented right across the board. There are many areas in which it can be improved, particularly the qualifications and skills of staff who are on at night and the cultural relevance of the services being provided.
Mr Curling: This is an extremely important role you're taking up as a member of the board. The time allocated even to talk with you and exchange ideas and get some of your ideas is quite limited, so I will be jumping from one thing to the other.
For instance, my colleague on the government side raised the point about the board membership; that there is the possibility for 15, but there may be about four now on it and only one makes a quorum. If we're assessing a human life or making an assessment about whether one has parole or where one should go, it always needs another individual's opinion while we are there: "Did you pick up that nuance from that individual we've been interviewing? Did you see all that?"
Don't you find that having a quorum-of-one board is a tremendous burden placed on that individual? That should change immediately. At least two people should be there to assess or make any recommendation, because we're all human beings and we all make mistakes or have a perspective or bias coming to a judgement. Would you, now that you're becoming a member of the board, recommend that at least two people should meet to make any decision on an individual?
Mr Hope: They're not making it about parole.
Mr Curling: It doesn't matter about parole. It's the decision about moving people to an institution or not. We're not talking about parole. Did I mention parole?
Ms Stacey: Yes.
Mr Curling: Well, okay.
Ms Stacey: The Custody Review Board is not like a parole board in that the parole board can make a decision which will effect a release. The Custody Review Board only makes recommendations. As has already been commented, 95% of the time -- so far -- they've been in agreement with the provincial director. If a system were to come along where it was possible to have the kind of consultation etc, yes, of course I would endorse that.
But I really want to quarrel with your use of the words that it's a "tremendous burden" on one. It's a tremendous responsibility for one person, but a well-qualified person might not find that a burden. They might find it something that was well within their capability. It seems to me that it's quite different from what I've been involved in before, and I think it's really important therefore that there be a Custody Review Board and that you do this kind of thing, so that it becomes better known to you and you make recommendations.
Mr Curling: The thought of parole came to mind in that if I am in an institution that is not maximum security and I'm moving from that institution to maximum security, it's almost like being sentenced in a harsher reality.
Ms Stacey: Absolutely.
Mr Curling: It's not parole, but these are very important decisions.
Our briefing notes state that 95% of the cases that have been passed on from the provincial director to the board are normally -- I don't want to call them rubber-stamped -- agreed upon, or similar decisions are taken that say what the provincial director has done is okay. Do you feel it's necessary, for maybe only that 5% of the cases where you may say, "We have to change that decision from the provincial director"? With that margin of error -- mark you, it's human lives we're talking about -- that 5%, it seems to me all the board does, or that individual does, is just look at that case and say, "That's fine." Or, to put it another way, the provincial director is doing an excellent job. Do we need the board?
Ms Stacey: Or do we need the provincial director?
Mr Curling: Well, I would say we need the provincial director. I'm not quite sure about the board, but the other one does most of the hard work anyhow.
Ms Stacey: It's the 5% that would worry me more than anything else. Donald Marshall was 1%. Those are the people who we have to protect; it's those cases. Fortunately, there are not many, but those few cases are the ones that have to be considered and have to be looked after, because of the rights of the young offender involved.
The Vice-Chair: Thank you for appearing before the committee this morning. You've enlightened us. I would like to thank you and wish you well.
The committee's adjourned until 2 o'clock this afternoon.
The committee recessed from 1141 to 1405.
The Vice-Chair: I call the government agencies committee to order to further review intended appointees.
ANTÓNIO AUGUSTO AZEITONA
Review of intended appointment, selected by government party: António Augusto Azeitona, intended appointee as member, Custody Review Board.
The Vice-Chair: Is Mr Azeitona here? Have a seat at the front, please. You have the opportunity to make a few opening remarks if you would like to, or we'll go right into questions.
Mr António Augusto Azeitona: We may as well go right into questions.
Mr Waters: If I remember correctly, you've been appointed by us to the Custody Review Board. What qualifications do you bring with you that would suit you for this?
Mr Azeitona: Since leaving community college, I've been a front-line family service worker with the Catholic children's aid for about seven-and-a-half years, and just recently I've been involved with the foster care department of the Catholic children's aid doing a recruitment project for them among the Portuguese-speaking population.
Mr Waters: One of the things we discussed this morning, which I would like your opinion about, is that the quorum for a board meeting is one member. At present, I believe there are four members on the board, and the maximum is 15, but for the purposes of the board holding a hearing, quorum is considered as one member. Do you feel one member is adequate, or do you feel there should be more than one member?
Mr Azeitona: Personally, I feel that to have a quorum you should have more than one member there, but if the legislation says or the committee says that one is enough, I'd just have to go along with what is recommended. It can be open for discussion later on among the committee.
Mr Waters: One thing I've always found fascinating about the board is that it has powers only to recommend, that if it holds hearings and recommends something, that doesn't have to be followed up. I was wondering whether you felt the powers of the board should be enhanced to some point where indeed it has more power, or whether you feel the power the board has now is adequate.
Mr Azeitona: Personally, my understanding is that with the recommendation, the powers the board has right now are enough. To make it more mandatory or more forceful recommendations, I'm not sure the board can make those recommendations. At present the way I look at it, not having sat on the board, is that having just a recommendation, recommending whatever the board wants to the provincial director is sufficient at this time.
Mr Waters: This is your CV. Not only have you some expertise in alcohol and drugs, but working with older-adult centres and a whole raft of things. I didn't realize that until I was glancing through, exactly how wide and varied your background is. You would be able to bring those types of things and concerns, drugs and alcohol, which is indeed a problem our young people have that leads them to be where you will be doing these hearings.
Mr Azeitona: When I applied for this committee, I put some thought into why I would want to be involved, and part of what you said was one of the reasons. I have experience as a front-line worker in child welfare, with juveniles, and understanding their problems, understanding the problems of their parents, and then also understanding the addiction problem, and yes, I also work on the addiction area.
Mr Waters: I know it isn't exactly part of what your job will be, but prevention is always part of a person who has the interest you have; indeed, it would be nice if you didn't have to sit on this committee at a regular interval. I was wondering if you felt there was anything as a society we should be moving towards when we talk about addiction, especially with our young people, everything from smoking through alcohol and drugs. Do you think there are things we can do, and do better, that would keep some of our young people out of this? I believe the increase has gone from something like 300 juveniles to 1,000 juveniles a day in the province who are held in custody pending hearings.
Mr Azeitona: If you had the optimum scenario and there were a lot of moneys and so on, yes, prevention probably is the key, for addiction or any other thing. So yes, in addiction, my recommendation would be that if you do prevention work, that would be a good scenario.
Mr Waters: A dollar spent might save $10 in the case of drugs.
Mr Azeitona: If you can prevent, that would be the positive outcome, that if you spent $1, you'd save $10 in the long run.
Mr Waters: I have no further comments. Thank you for coming.
Mr Curling: Have you ever visited any of the detention units for young people?
Mr Azeitona: I'm familiar with 311 Jarvis, the detention unit.
Mr Curling: Have you ever visited the west detention centre?
Mr Azeitona: East detention, west detention -- I probably only have made it as far as the entrance.
Mr Curling: West detention holds the young offenders.
Mr Azeitona: No, I've never gone inside.
Mr Curling: I presume you plan to go there.
Mr Azeitona: What the Custody Review Board does is to conduct the hearings where the youth is, and if the youth is at such a detention, one has to go there.
Mr Curling: I'm sure your appointment will be approved. I recommend to you as one of your first priorities to visit the west detention area, because there are things coming out of there that don't sound too right, and you will be making recommendations to the provincial director about where individuals go.
My interview with you is just to get some more information from you. The perception out there is that crimes by young offenders are at a high, and of course it is said that it is not that high, about 4% higher than three or four years ago. I come from a riding in the Scarborough area, Scarborough North, where the perception is that this is so, but it's really not. Do you feel the young offender crimes being committed are on the upswing?
Mr Azeitona: Personally, I feel a lot of crimes the young offenders commit were committed before, but now people probably talk more about it than before. You have things like the media and so on getting on the bandwagon. Crimes by youth have always been there. Are they worse than before?
Mr Curling: No, more in numbers, that more crimes are being committed by young offenders now than before. Is it on the increase?
Mr Azeitona: It could be on the increase, but I don't think such an increase is astronomical. This is my personal opinion. I could be wrong.
Mr Curling: Do you feel that the schools are reneging on their responsibility to deal with infractions of the law in their community and in many instances are calling in the police to deal with things they could deal with, that the police are being called in to deal with cases that could be dealt with inside the school system? I'm talking of things like zero tolerance, which may eventually affect many of the people you're reviewing or making recommendations about. I know it sounds outside the mandate of your work, but you're going to have an impact on those you review as they're charged with any criminal act. Do you feel the responsibilities in the school system are not being properly handled?
Mr Azeitona: I think the school system by itself cannot address the issue of zero tolerance. Even though assaults happen in the school, the community has to address that issue. Youth problems are a community issue, and school is just a part of it. But to think that bullies, if you want to use such a term, weren't around before, many years ago, would be a mistake. They've been around, but I think now we're being more sensible and we're not accepting a lot of that type of behaviour.
Mr Curling: I'm going back to the board representation, the number of members on the board. One of my colleagues raised that question. Do you think your job would be more effective if two board members sat down to review a case and make recommendations instead of one? You said you'd much rather see two than one. The quorum being one, you'd rather it be more. Do you think it would be more effective if you had two people sitting down and reviewing a case?
Mr Azeitona: If you have two people, you probably can get a better opinion; it's better to have two heads thinking than just one. But if the regulation has been set up that one is enough, then we have to address the regulations.
Mr Curling: I want to wish you all the best in your appointment. It's a challenging one. As the year goes by, I'm sure you will be challenged and can meet your challenge in the best way you can.
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Mr Jackson: May I call you António?
Mr Azeitona: That's fine.
Mr Jackson: Thank you. António, we have seen increases, substantive increases actually, in young offenders in the province, and I suspect you've seen all sides of that, working with the children's aid society. You investigate crimes against children, but you also investigate crimes that children commit against other children, is that not correct? Have you had occasion to work in that field specifically with the Catholic children's aid?
Mr Azeitona: Yes.
Mr Jackson: So you're familiar with the process of going to court, where you are advocating for the victimized child but also you are proceeding under the spirit and intentions of the Young Offenders Act for, say, a child sex offender who is a child himself. You've had experience in this area.
Mr Azeitona: Yes.
Mr Jackson: In your field, it must be very difficult to deal with that. Are you able to separate, in those cases, the responsibilities associated with addressing the needs of the young offender when you're at the same time addressing the needs of the child who's been victimized?
Mr Azeitona: It becomes difficult at times, because in front of me I'll have two children, basically.
Mr Jackson: Chances are you wouldn't have responsibility for both cases. Is that not true?
Mr Azeitona: No, you won't have responsibility for both cases. If it's a case I'm working on, I'll be responsible for that child. The other child will be brought before the court under the Young Offenders Act, yes. But as a social worker, it would be hard to separate sometimes. A social worker to some extent is a parent. Here you have a minor who's caused some damage or problem to another child, and it's really hard not to look after the wellbeing of both kids at the same time.
Mr Jackson: We have problems with our system as it differentiates between -- victims depend on who is the victimizer. I know children's aid societies are receiving differential treatment before the courts depending on the age of the child they're proceeding with in various matters. This came up last week in committee hearings as well, unrelated to this appointment. There may be some compelling arguments there for inclusion of an additional person to be a hearing panel as opposed to a single hearing officer for custody.
Do you have any comments about the changing look of our young offenders in this province, the tendency to be more violent, the tendency to -- one of our committees attended a corrections institution, and they were very open to admit that there was a huge increase within a given cultural group; a specific country of origin was mentioned. That surprised me, but they felt it was a serious problem for that institution and for that age group. I wonder if you're seeing that similarly within your own responsibilities within Metro Toronto as it relates to child offenders.
Mr Azeitona: The issue about a special cultural group being more prone to violence than other ones --
Mr Jackson: That's not what I'm asking you. I'm asking you in a trend, which is an observation. There are some cultural groups who have emigrated from an extremely violent society, but they're not violent by nature. It is the circumstances, their immediate history, where war has been a daily part of their entire life, but culturally that's not in their makeup. I didn't refer to that. I was referring to the trends, simply your observations, whether you're observing changes. How long have you been a social worker with children's aid?
Mr Azeitona: I was with children's aid for seven and a half years.
Mr Jackson: So you've been able to determine certain trends with your clients.
Mr Azeitona: The primary clientele I worked with were Portuguese-speaking, so my experience would be with the Portuguese-speaking clientele. If I were to see a trend, it would be an increase in Portuguese juveniles getting in offences and so on. It would be very speculative on my part.
Mr Jackson: That's all relative anyway, to immigration and to a whole matter of factors. Thank you very much. I appreciate your candid responses.
The Vice-Chair: Thank you, Mr Azeitona, for appearing before the committee today. Your review is complete. We wish you success.
MYRTA RIVERA SAHAS
Review of intended appointment, selected by official opposition: Myrta Rivera Sahas, intended appointee as member, Waterloo Regional Police Services Board.
The Vice-Chair: Next on our agenda is the intended appointee to the police services board of the regional municipality of Waterloo, Myrta Sahas.
Mrs Myrta Rivera Sahas: I don't have any opening remarks. It's good to be here and I'm looking forward to this exercise. Perhaps I should say it's my birthday today. That explains all the sequins.
The Vice-Chair: Happy birthday.
Mrs Sahas: Thank you.
Mr Bradley: We're always curious on this committee how people found out about the position and how they were appointed to this position. How did you find out this position was available? Did the local MPP connect with you or anything like that?
Mrs Sahas: I guess it's best to subscribe to the Kitchener-Waterloo Record.
Mr Bradley: A good paper, I'm told.
Mrs Sahas: I saw it advertised in the paper and I applied. That's how I found out about it. Why I applied is another story.
Mr Bradley: Were you given any indication by anybody about why you were selected? Did they say, "We liked your application for the following reasons"? What were they looking for, in your view, when they were trying to get somebody to serve on the board as a provincial appointee?
Mrs Sahas: I don't think any of the individuals with whom I have spoken have said to me that I was chosen to participate here today for any particular reason. I don't recall any.
Mr Bradley: There are new challenges that face police forces in municipalities of any size. If you said 20 years ago, "What does a police force face?" there would be a substantial difference from today. In your view, what are some of the differences in 1994 as compared to even 10 years ago that a police force in the Kitchener-Waterloo area and the regional municipality of Waterloo would have to face, or perhaps issues that have come to the forefront for police forces, wisely, as we get into the 1990s?
Mrs Sahas: I don't know how many of you have ever gone to the regional municipality of Waterloo. If you haven't, I suggest you come. It will be wonderful to have you. I'll show you around.
Mr Bradley: Wonderful place. Their hockey teams are too good.
Mrs Sahas: Even 10 years ago, you could see when you were walking on King Street the local constable just walking around and shaking the doors in the stores to see whether they were locked. It was a quaint activity that would take place at night, but it gives you an idea of how the place has changed, how our community has changed.
It certainly has almost doubled in size in the past 20, 23 years. There are a lot more of us, so even policing a larger group -- most people who don't live in our region think of Kitchener-Waterloo as rural. We're certainly not that. We're a big city and we have all the problems of a big city. Our community is also becoming more multicultural. There's a lot more diversity. Most people used to think of Kitchener-Waterloo as a German town, but you are more likely to hear Vietnamese or Spanish spoken in the street. That also brings new challenges to our police services.
Mr Bradley: I see you were executive director of the Kitchener-Waterloo Multicultural Centre from 1990 to now. You would get a better perspective than some on some of the new challenges facing us. What do you think a police force can do today to deal with those challenges you see? At the multicultural centre I know you normally deal not only with people who have been here for some time but a lot of work is done with recent immigrants, whether they be refugees -- you work hard with refugees who come in -- or other immigrants who come in and desire your services. What do you think the police services board could do to meet some of the challenges you see out there?
Mrs Sahas: One thing the police services can do is to continue to encourage the police to become involved in learning about policing an increasingly multicultural society; to give all the support possible to the police to do this; to encourage training where training is available, and to encourage partnerships in the community. I could tell you of several partnerships in the community where we can do a lot of this training in a far more painless way than in other communities, and a lot more cheaply, too.
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Mr Bradley: Certainly all governments are looking for those things, as efficient as possible and as effective as possible.
There are certain issues that police forces deal with today because they're more in the open than they were a generation ago. One of them is family violence, particularly, if I could narrow it even further, violence against women. A dozen years ago, there was less heard about it; it was kept under wraps even at home. Many women would not want to talk about it because it was somehow considered to be shameful. Today that's different, fortunately. We're seeing those changes. Police forces are working hard to do it now, but how can they better address those needs of family violence? How should a police force be dealing with that?
Mrs Sahas: Before I tell you what things we could do together to address those problems, I would like to say that we all have to be careful that we don't put all the onus of solving the social problems of a community on the police force.
Mr Bradley: Good comment.
Mrs Sahas: They're there to police, and that is an extremely complicated and sophisticated task in today's world. We have to let them do that job and then expand to do other things. There has to be a lot more community support. My own experience in Kitchener-Waterloo, and that's the area I'd rather speak to, because that's where I live, is that there is an enormously successful network of family violence prevention and education systems. I'm very pleased to participate in it, and I'm very pleased to report that the police are at the forefront of participation in that network. We meet at least once a month, and there are a lot of things happening in that area. It's often the police department carrying the ball, quite literally. It's very nice to see.
Mr Curling: I like your approach and the comment you made a while ago that too often we try to have the police solve all the social problems. But there's a concern in regard to the police. I want you to give me an update about what progress they are making with regard to employment equity. Do you think they are making good progress, or do you think they could be more assertive about it? What is the status there now?
Mrs Sahas: The status there, as everywhere else, has to be looked at from the point of view that if there's nobody retiring or leaving and we're replacing people based on attrition only, it's difficult to do.
Having said that, my own experience with our local police services dates back many years. In 1990, for example, I participated and led race relations and equity training with the police department. It took 17 weeks. I was working with one platoon per week, about 30 people per week, over a 17-week period. My impression there was that the people at the supervisory level were 100% in favour of employment equity, in spite of the fact that it's going to bring all the ordinary problems people can invent or can say about it.
When the people at the bottom perceive the people at the top as backing something, and research, especially in equity and in race relations, has proven this time and again, when I perceive my supervisors as backing something and being in favour of it, it's a lot easier for me to start understanding it myself and backing it. That is my general answer.
I'm pleased to know personally a good number of police officers from minority backgrounds, black, Chinese. We hired -- I say "we" because I live there -- our first Laotian police constable not long ago, and there are a number of Indian men as well. We could have more women, definitely, but again, this takes time. The women we are hiring are extremely competent and feel extremely comfortable with their peers. I think that says something for our community. You could hire a lot of people, but if they don't feel comfortable as officers, it wouldn't be successful.
Mr Curling: You mentioned employment equity being access and coming into the workforce. Sometimes we tend to forget training within the force and sensitivity to the diversity of the community, plus the promotion aspect. Are they doing enough there, do you think, in regard to promotion and training?
Mrs Sahas: One is never doing enough training anywhere, but I think the force is committed to training. As I say, I myself have participated in it on a number of occasions. The training philosophy of at least some of the individuals I know on the force is that it's better to give ongoing training -- and they're committed to that -- than to pull someone out and say: "You're now going to be trained. By the action of the whole experience we're going to give you eight days of training, and now you will be trained." There is a commitment from what I understand to ongoing training for everybody.
Mr Jackson: Let me say at the outset that I'm very impressed with your responses. I think you bring a necessary perspective to police service boards which we haven't always seen in the appointments so far. That's encouraging.
I do, though, want to pursue a line of questioning which in no way I want you to feel awkward about. Increasingly, I'm seeing in jurisdictions concerns about victimization and that certain groups in society are being victimized. For me, the more I learn about this and the more I respond to it and listen to it, the more I sense that the notion of equity should be that it not necessarily reflect the community -- which we would hope wouldn't have the need of a police service, in the ideal community -- but that it mirror more closely those who are victimized.
In this area I'm concerned that we have a disproportionate amount of victimization occurring -- this can be by gender, by country of origin -- and this has an effect on reporting, which anyone will tell you, and I'm sure you're aware of it. Because of your multicultural background and your interests in working with new Canadians, I want to ask you how you feel about assisting a community that's being victimized, which doesn't feel the police services are reflective of their needs simply because they are disproportionately victimized. How do we identify that and how do we help them? This is different from simply just reflecting.
Mrs Sahas: Of course. When you're talking about a segment of the community being victimized, are you referring to a particular visible segment or to the majority, who are starting to feel, "Hey, who's representing me?"
Mr Jackson: For example, there was a CBC Radio show last week which indicated that Asian crime has one of the highest victimization rates because it's targeted to Asian Canadians and that their incidence of reporting is one of the lowest. That concerns me, that they are so fearful of reporting the crime.
For proactive policing to be really proactive policing, we should be trying to determine how we tear down the barrier of fear. Maybe that means keeping statistics, maybe having an Asian crime unit, maybe having more officers who speak a specific language because they are going to meet more victims per se. We know there are disproportionate amounts of victimization, just as there are disproportionate amounts of crime.
The debate to date has been focused on crime. I'm trying to get the debate focused on victimization, because it's the area that I see more and more people expressing concern about. I just want to get your feel on that from your unique position.
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Mrs Sahas: It's an interesting question. I'd like to have more time than just this to think about it and to answer it. It speaks to something I hold very dearly. I think multicultural centres and immigrant settlement organizations and other organizations like the one I'm honoured to direct could play a better role, a more important role in this area. For too long, multicultural centres -- let's be frank -- have been interested more in folk art, costumes, dances, food.
Mr Jackson: Language.
Mrs Sahas: I can make shish kebabs with the best of them. I'm a member of the Greek community, and we built our church on shish kebabs.
Mr Jackson: We built our church on perogies, so you know.
Mrs Sahas: Okay. I think it's about time for us to spend more time educating our own communities on what our rights are in this new country. Specifically, my own definition of multiculturalism has to do more with removing the barriers that prevent full participation in Canadian life. If we did our job from that perspective of removing the barriers, maybe one of those barriers is being afraid of what the consequences might be of reporting crime to the police. The short answer is education.
Mr Jackson: In the CBC documentary, of the three people who were on, the one thing everybody could agree on was that issue, that leaders of cultural communities should be speaking out against crime as it is targeted and directed against their community. They seem hemmed in, not able to respond, because it's misinterpreted, yet what's needed is for those leaders to speak out.
Your last point deals with a controversial issue which has emerged in the media, the suggestion of possible differential treatment for domestic violence based on country of origin; that this was a cultural understanding, that violence in a family meant one thing in one country of origin and it means something different under our laws.
I'm sure you've been familiar with some commentaries that have come out from the National Action Committee on the Status of Women and others. We've had various police officers respond to say that they feel that no one group in society is inherently violent, which I agree with. I think this is something that police services boards are going to have to grapple with, because there are some within the multicultural community who are arguing that their crimes should be treated differently: "If we were at home, we would be literally selling our daughter's marital rights to somebody. We would be choosing their spouse. We would be determining the age at which it is acceptable to marry." Those kinds of things are not necessarily immediately transferred to our culture with open arms but they're carried with these people.
Mrs Sahas: And it takes a long time. The first thing that an immigrant chooses when he comes to a new culture is the material things. We'll buy the microwave, perhaps, and the French provincial furniture long before we absorb certain cultural expectations of this new world. That happens. It would happen to us if we moved to India.
Mr Jackson: But my question to you has to do with your training that you are currently doing and your position on a police services board, where the board officers are coming forward and saying, "What are we supposed to do in these situations on domestic violence?"
Mrs Sahas: My response is that if it is against the law in this country, it is against the law in this country, and it is this country we're dealing with. Sensitive though I may be and a trainer though I may be, if a man is speeding he has to be stopped, and it's not enough to say, "I don't speak English." That would be a comparable situation again. We cannot say that because he doesn't speak English he doesn't know that he was speeding, and it's the same thing with other things. If it is the law, it is the law.
Now, how we treat the criminal is different. The presumption of innocence, the fact that he has to be treated with respect, the fact that undue violence should not be used, that's one thing, regardless of whether he's black or polka dot. The other thing, that's different.
Mr Jackson: Thank you very much. Mr Chairman, I think this is one of the finest police board appointments we've had in a long time.
Mr Curling: Hear, hear.
Mr Robert Frankford (Scarborough East): It sounds as though a lot has been done in Waterloo and that there's a lot of sensitivity to the multicultural community before you're there. Do you have any other particular things you would like to be promoting as a member of the police board?
Mrs Sahas: Yes, I would. It's something that's already a minor triumph of ours, of our own particular office, but I'd like to share it with you because it's something you might want to ask questions of other nominees in the future.
Interpreters who work for the police department in just about any city in Ontario receive no training of any kind; they are only checked to see whether they're fit for human consumption, essentially; we check to see whether they have a police record or not. And yet -- let's say it's a case of family violence -- no matter how much I train the interpreters we work with at the multicultural centre, the police interpreter, the first interpreter who goes to a domestic dispute, to a call, is an untrained person who simply may speak both languages and who doesn't know about confidentiality, who doesn't understand wife assault issues, doesn't understand about the presumption of innocence even, or anything like that.
One minor example -- I know we're running out of time -- is that I recently interviewed an interpreter who wanted to work for us, and he said to me, "I've been working for the police in such-and-such a city and I was very, very good." I asked, "Give me some examples of why you are very, very good." He said, "I could always get the criminal to confess." "Tell me, how did you manage that? We should bottle it. I'd like to patent it." He said: "I would tell them" -- this gentleman was from a southeast Asian country, let us say -- "especially if it's a woman, `You'd better tell the truth because otherwise they're going to take you in that room and shave your head.' So right away the woman would confess."
I mentioned this to a friend of mine who is a police officer in that particular city, and he was flabbergasted, he was astonished. We have to do something about training our police officers. In our own city, in Kitchener, we're going to be doing it at no cost to the police. Maybe we can talk about that later on, some other time, but it's really quite an exciting opportunity we have here.
Mr Frankford: I was wondering when you were talking about that, is it most appropriate that those interpreters should be part of the police? Since one might be getting into the judicial system and the rights of the accused and fairness, should they perhaps be working for a legal clinic or for you or for some other --
Mrs Sahas: They could, yes. Right now they're freelance interpreters, as interpreters just about anywhere in the province. The point is that we pay them, and we pay them a good wage, actually, not a bad wage, so we have the right to demand a quality of service, and we're finally, in this province, in a position to make that kind of requirement. The Ministry of Citizenship has some excellent initiatives, and if we start coordinating more what is happening we will get quite far.
Mr Frankford: Have you given any more thought to the question of crime statistics, which are often thought to be only about the status of criminals, but I think can also quite usefully be statistics on the victims?
Mrs Sahas: Unfortunately, I have not. I'm not aware of the statistics in our community. I often do see the victims of crime in our own organization. I don't want this to stay only to working with minorities -- I mean, that's what I do -- but there's a lot more we have to do with that. Even in the case of a violent man who abuses his wife, if you ask me, they're both victims.
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Mr Hope: First of all, I'd like to say happy birthday.
Mrs Sahas: Thank you.
Mr Hope: Second, as I was listening very closely to your answers, you're sounding very confident about what you say. I'm surprised that back in 1986 and 1989 you didn't take an active role in the police services board then. The legislative research document says the Kitchener-Waterloo police force has been very progressive, and I thought we would have had the model police force in place by that time. You do reflect a lot of things I hear coming from a number of community groups. I just want to say that what I've heard today is going to be an extra asset to the Kitchener-Waterloo police services board.
There's something I'd like to get into. How familiar are you with the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act?
Mrs Sahas: Not very, but let's try something.
Mr Hope: I'll just stay away from it, if you're not. It was just a matter of opinion I was curious about, if you were.
Mr Bradley was trying to find out political relationships when dealing with public appointments.
Mr Bradley: Not in all. Not interested, in this case.
Mr Hope: You're not interested, in this case. Want me to ask the question?
Mr Bradley: No, because it's a non-partisan appointment.
Mr Hope: You talk about the relationship of police officers in the community, the confidentiality. You've really said an ideal police force. I have to ask whether in your opinion a police officer should be allowed to participate in politics.
Mrs Sahas: It's an interesting question. I have thought about that for a long time. I don't think I have an answer that's etched in stone. I believe police officers are human beings and citizens and, as such, we shouldn't disfranchise them. They still have the vote. I'm not sure we should say, "No, they cannot run." Enormous care has to be exercised, however, perhaps in whom we hire, first of all. Enormous care and wisdom has to be exercised by a police officer regarding what kind of statements he is making or what kinds of political alliances he might be taking. You're all politicians and you know that once in a while --
Mr Hope: I'm a statesman. They're politicians.
Mrs Sahas: We all understand that alliances have to be made and that a policeman has to remain free from owing anything to anybody. In that sense, the jury's not out on that yet, but I support the province's leadership in that so far.
Mr Hansen: Down in Niagara, we have a problem with the police budget. I would like to know from you what your priorities would be, maybe what could possibly be cut from policing. One statement came out in Niagara that to solve the budget problem, lay off 140 officers, just as an example. What would your priorities be on the police commission? I heard some of your community priorities, but what would you be your main three priorities that you wouldn't cut?
Mrs Sahas: I wouldn't cut down on training, and I wouldn't cut down on the tools, whatever they may be, that a police officer needs to do his duty to the community. The third one -- I'm almost tempted to say invite me in six or eight months to come back and tell you what the other one would be, in that I haven't been on the commission yet and I'm not sure that I know everything, so I would be speaking perhaps unwisely.
But on those two things especially I would not want to compromise: all the training that a police officer needs -- and when I say a police officer, I mean everyone in the police -- and all the tools that are needed. We cannot tie people's hands behind their back and then say, "Go and police."
Mr Bradley: Hear, hear.
Mrs Sahas: As with every bureaucracy -- I know because I manage a centre, and when I write my budget, I put office supplies. Hey, I have an enormous office supply budget because there's one way I can play with the budget, by having that. I think we all have frills of that nature in any budget where that's how we can protect ourselves from cuts. I'd like to go and see what those are before I give you the third answer. Come visit me in six months and maybe we can talk some more.
Mr Hansen: It's a very important part of the job.
Mrs Sahas: Yes, it is.
Mr Hansen: Not being there yet, I guess it's a little difficult. But you read in the paper what's been going on in past budgets, or you might be taking a look at the upcoming year, and I thought maybe you had some thoughts on that. With a brother in the Niagara Regional Police and myself being on a police force, I've always been one to support the police in a lot of their endeavours. The type of training you're talking about is ongoing, not that you get a whole lot of training at the beginning and forget about the training continuing. It's very important that that officer out on the street, and I think this is what you're saying, is trained in how to handle different situations.
What do you think about the new semiautomatic guns that have been awarded to the OPP and, later on, to the other police in Ontario?
Mr Bradley: I never thought I'd see an NDP government do that.
Mrs Sahas: I just hope they don't issue me one, okay? I'm a very non-violent person, but you never know what I might do with one.
What we hear is that they're safer, and we'll have to try it, like any piece of technology. Sometimes with toys, we get a little silly maybe sometimes, too quickly. But if it's going to make it safer for the police officers in my community, I'm willing to give it a try. That's what I know so far. Again, I'm giving you semi-ignorant responses because I don't know exactly all of what I might get a chance to learn next year.
The Vice-Chair: Thank you very much for appearing before the committee. We wish you well.
Mrs Sahas: It was a pleasure. Thank you.
DONNA LAILEY
Review of intended appointment, selected by government party: Donna Lailey, intended appointee as member, Agricultural Research Institute of Ontario.
The Vice-Chair: Good afternoon. Have a seat in the front, please. You have the opportunity to make an opening statement if you wish. If not, we'll proceed with questions.
Ms Donna Lailey: I do not wish to make an opening statement. I'd like to thank everyone for giving me this opportunity, and I hope I'll be able to answer the questions you wish to ask.
Mr Bradley: I should tell you, Mr Chairman, that we have a member of royalty before us today, a former Grape King.
Interjections: Queen.
Mr Bradley: No. It's called Grape King.
Ms Lailey: I'll talk with him later.
Mr Hansen: Welcome to the committee. Mr Bradley said "Grape King," but you're the Grape Queen.
Mr Bradley: She was king and queen both.
Mr Hansen: I thought Helen Lenko was Grape Queen with her husband the one year, shared the title. Anyhow, glad to see you here.
Being appointed to the Agricultural Research Institute of Ontario, what do you think you can bring forward, maybe your current area of research or other areas of research that have to be done in Ontario in the agricultural field? Can you tell me why we should be looking at you as a member?
Ms Lailey: I don't know why you should be looking at me, but I have lots of strong feelings towards research in agriculture. If we're going to compete on a global scale on a level playing field, a lot of research has to be done and it has to be done on all commodities, not just in my field. A lot of it is competitiveness in these fields, whether it be in pesticides, whether it be economically, whether it be environmental. We have to compete at all levels, and without research we will not be able to.
Mr Hansen: Do you feel we should spend more money on some of the winners we have out there? I know you were taking a general effort to take a look at everything, but --
Ms Lailey: I don't even think it's necessary to spend money. The thing I've learned so far, since being involved with the research -- I was in Guelph for three days and I was so impressed with what has happened in research so far at the Guelph university level and what they're doing.
If I recall, research in the past has been done -- I can give you examples. For instance, there was someone in the province doing research on plums for six years, and by the time the research is done, the plums are out of the ground. With this new policy that's in place, the way I understand it anyway, we have professors working on a project, and if it becomes obsolete or not necessary any more, he can be taken from there and put in another field and he's not locked in. There's the freedom to go from one commodity to another, which I find really exciting. I think in the long run, in terms of money, it will be cheaper to do research.
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Mr Hansen: Do you actually see the institute playing a broader, more public educational role aimed at the consumer? How might this be accomplished? Not just the research, but how to get the product out there to the consumer. Consumer research, not just cultivating and insecticides etc. Do you feel this is part of the institute?
Ms Lailey: I definitely do. I do, because the farmers I know involved in farming communities -- farmers like to farm. They don't like to market. We have to get our farmers in tune with what is happening in the marketplace, to make them think: This has to be presented in this way; this has to be cleaned in this way. It's a mindset in the farmer, and I think that takes research and education to get our farmers on line in that respect.
I can give you an example of that. At the moment, with the help of the Ontario government, we're doing research with Vision Niagara on the hospitality industry, why they don't serve or whether they are serving Ontario products in their restaurants. We want to know why and how, and if not, can we make it easier? Then we're going to interview farmers to see if they are willing to go to that market and look after that market. I have a feeling that where we're going to find our biggest problem is in that field, because farmers do not think as marketers.
In my business, which is the grape and wine industry, it's a different story. I think we've done a marvellous job -- with the help of government, mind you -- in marketing of our wines in Ontario.
I went to California not too long ago on grape tech and wine tech. The people involved in the wine marketing aspect were disappointed in what they experienced, but the people who did the grape tech were disappointed that the research going on in the grape aspect of it was horrendous compared to what's happening here. The marketing people thought they could cope quite nicely, given the amount of money the California grape industry has, I suppose, but even without that, they felt what they were doing in marketing was quite positive compared to the research that needs to go on in the agricultural.
Mr Hansen: Coming out of Niagara, you would be associated with quite a few of the other commodities, the plums, the peaches, the grapes, the apples, the vegetables and everything else. You have a good knowledge of the total food basket of Ontario in this particular area.
Ms Lailey: Yes, I do.
Mr Hope: I was looking at your résumé, the specific area you have an interest in, and you've also been part of the teaching profession around school and education. As we talk about agricultural research, we have to talk about education of our young children so they understand where the cob of corn they find on the grocery shelf comes from, or the tomato they find on the grocery shelf, or the package of chicken in the freezer.
You started talking about the marketplace, and that's all great. I've heard since 1980 that farmers have been talking about the marketplace, and what I've heard farmers say is that we need farm-gate pricing before we can actually get our work above minimum-wage standards.
But I want to talk right now about the users of a product, the consumer. We have to inform them about technology, what it actually costs to produce food. I'm wondering about your views on reaching our young people, to have appreciation for our agricultural products, from beef to pork to normal vegetables.
Ms Lailey: You mean to think Canadian?
Mr Hope: Yes. Ontario, preferably.
Ms Lailey: Maybe you don't want me to talk about marketing, but it is a marketing process to make people believe in what we do, that the peach we grow is as good as the peach from Georgia, for instance. I think it comes from believing in what we're doing and bringing our children up with this kind of thinking and education. It has to happen in our schools and it has to happen in our homes, and it isn't happening. At the moment it comes down to dollars and cents and, can we compete in that area?
I've been with a man who's doing beef and turkey. He grows it, he processes it, he sells it, he does everything. He has gone to conferences in the United States, and he comes back so excited because he says we can compete, compete easily with the wage and so on. I came back from Napa Valley where it's $55,000 an acre to bring in an acre of grapes; $15 an hour for labour is what we're told.
We can compete. It's the mindset out there, I think. And we have to be honest about this: We have things they don't have, but we also -- and to get the positive approach through to the public about what we're doing and that we can be strong and do it. We can do things in the grape and wine industry that they would love to have in California. They would love to have my Chardonnay in California, because it's a balanced product; it has acid.
Mr Hope: One of the things is the chemicals being used in the United States versus the chemicals we use here in the Ontario, plus the environmental aspects. I'm wondering about your opinion about agriculture and the environment and their relationship.
Ms Lailey: It plays a big part in society. In the last five years, just on my own farm, I have cut my pesticides probably in half. I spray no insecticides. I use pheromones in my vineyard.
It's sort of like the Coalition for Responsible Drinking, which I serve on; the people are making the big issue the harmful use of alcohol. It's the same as the harmful use of pesticides, but we in agriculture probably know better what goes on those things than anybody else in government or anyone else in the community. If you asked a farmer about his spray program in the last five years, the decrease -- he's very much aware of the spray business. But there is a place where research needs to be done badly. I was so impressed with the area in California where they were going to grow cover crops in their vineyards so it would attract the biggest pest they have in their vineyard to the grasses or whatever they were growing. That is the sort of research we need.
You brought up the idea of the chemicals that come in on food from other countries. This is an issue you've all dealt with. We are not allowed to spray those chemicals, but we're all allowed to consume them, which doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Either it's free for everybody to use them or we don't allow any that have these sprays on them coming into this country.
Mr Hope: I would have asked your opinion about the NAFTA agreement over chemicals, but I don't have enough time.
Mr Cleary: If you don't mind, I'll call you Donna, because that's a familiar name in my household.
Ms Lailey: Sure.
Mr Cleary: Reading through the material I have in front of me, you say you have a 20-acre grape farm, and then you said the man you work with -- is he into the beef and turkey?
Ms Lailey: I don't work with him. He's a man I met on the research board just last week. I spoke with him and we were comparing notes and wondering if we could compete in a global market in agriculture in Ontario. That is what we were discussing. He felt and I felt very strongly that we could.
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Mr Cleary: I know you people have gone through tough times in your area, but I understand everything is under control and going well now.
Reading this, I wasn't sure whether you were into the wine or just the juice. It's the wine you're into?
Ms Lailey: I get into wine sometimes. What I do is I process grapes and sell juice, wine juice, to home wine makers who enter competition. This may open another can of worms right here.
Mr Cleary: We could talk about some of that.
Ms Lailey: I'd like to talk about it, if we could.
Mr Cleary: Some of the things I'm going to ask you have been partially answered before. What do you think the Agricultural Research Institute of Ontario should focus on, and what would be your priorities?
Ms Lailey: I know down the road, and it's not very far, the environmental issues are going to be a prime concern, but competitiveness has to be addressed. Politicians must get sick and tired of listening to farmers say they're no longer viable. We've dealt with several commodities from my area, searched it high and low, and if we cannot compete in that commodity, maybe we have to substitute another commodity in that area if we wish to keep that lovely green belt around the Golden Horseshoe. Maybe we can't grow peaches, if we cannot be viable and competitive.
Mr Cleary: You mentioned advertising and being competitive. One thing I think we all see now is the way they're promoting New Zealand lamb. I understand we're having a problem because there are companies that want to buy a thousand all the same size, for Easter, and we can't do that. They say we can't, but I think we can. That's a big issue now, and I just wanted to mention that.
The other thing we hear a lot about with respect to competitiveness from our farmers, from different commodity groups, is the minimum wage. Do you have any views on that? I live on the border of another province, and I know its minimum wage is somewhat different from ours and it would give that other province a bit of an edge. Would you care to comment on that?
Ms Lailey: Everyone in rural Ontario needs to have a living. I really feel strongly that if they work on farms, they need a living. This is where we come down to competitiveness again, because if a farmer is not viable, he cannot pay more, but if he's viable, it's not difficult for him to pay a minimum wage or $10 or $20 an hour or whatever.
I feel it has to come through research. If we can produce more for less, we can pay more for the people who work for us. I feel very strongly that, for the people who work for me, if I had to go home and feed four children on less than minimum wage, you just can't do it. Another part of our research board is keeping rural Ontario viable, not just the farmers, and we are looking into the studies of that at the moment in the ARIO.
Mr Cleary: This has been touched on a bit before, but I want to ask you again. I had an interview the other day, and the one who was interviewing me had to ask me three times before I answered properly.
The Vice-Chair: Until you gave them an answer they wanted to hear.
Mr Cleary: It was on an issue I would sooner not talk about anyway.
Do you feel competitiveness might be compromised by the environmental standards and regulations? I know my colleague touched on it.
Ms Lailey: Do you mean, in order for us to go competitive, we will sacrifice environmental issues?
Mr Cleary: Right.
Ms Lailey: I don't think we can. There's another thing along this line. I met with some federal people the other day and we were talking about this competitiveness issue. My concern and my question to him -- we go into negotiations, as a marketing board, with the farmers and the producers. We spend three days negotiating the price of grapes, when 63% of that price is tax and there's only a very little bit for us to negotiate. I may be off topic here, but this is an issue where we have to be, in my field, competitive in that range.
I've lost my train of thought. I think I got off topic. What was your original question?
Mr Cleary: My original question was on the environmental issues.
Ms Lailey: Oh, yes, getting back to the federal government. We asked him if he could send us info on maintaining a level playing field, on what happens in pesticides in France, Germany. What do they give their farmers, what support payments? These are issues we would like to have. We've tried and tried to get this information from different areas, as a marketing board. If anybody here has any info on that, it would certainly help us to develop our agriculture field in the wine business.
Mr Bradley: I want to ask a thousand questions, but our time is limited. The question I'll choose is intensive farming.
We are requiring, as a society, of our farmers that they be extremely competitive, that they produce a lot to compete with everybody else. The result is that in many cases there has been a lot of use of pesticides and, second, there is very intensive use of the soils. Do you see further research into the effect of this intensification of farming on the soils in any particular area? It is alleged by some that as we force farmers to be more competitive, to produce more, in fact we are having a detrimental effect on soils.
Ms Lailey: This is an interesting thing we were told last week, which was a positive for me: the research that has gone on in soybeans or corn, either one. With the technology they have, they can go over a field and, if you have a 100-acre field, see the amount of corn that came off this area, the amount that didn't come off this area, why it didn't and so on. Maybe this part wasn't planted another time because it was too low or too high, or I don't know what. With the technology we have, rather than planting a whole field and then averaging, which is what we always do, now we may be capitalizing on smaller areas, preventing erosion on hills, whatever.
There's a lot of space for research in that area, not necessarily expanding size but that what we do, we do well and increase the volume. Maybe we don't get more. Say I continue to get 100 tonnes of grapes every year, but maybe I'm only going to use half the land. To me that is real progress, because we are reserving land and maybe we can plant cover crops to offset and all kinds of things. That's the sort of thing where there's a lot of space for research.
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Mr Sterling: I'm interested in your appointment, and I think you'll make an excellent member of the institute. I look at their budget for 1992-93 and it shows a budget of $45 million. Some $28 million of that is to the University of Guelph. Does that all come from OMAF?
Ms Lailey: I just went through all of that. A lot of it comes from OMAF, but there's also the university side that comes in to support some of that. I don't know the percentage, but OMAF does put an awful lot of research money in.
Mr Sterling: This institute was created in 1962. I'm always a little suspicious of old institutions, in some ways, in terms of whether they've outlived their usefulness and can be replaced or done with something more efficient or better or whatever. Having been involved very much in governance issues at our federal-provincial level and very interested in the outcome of our country and the future, I've always thought research functions would be better handled at the federal level. If you have a federal government, you've got to have something for it to do. It seems to me to make sense that for health, for pesticides, chemicals, for research, we'd probably be better to centre that in a federal government, because what's good for a chicken in Ontario is good for a chicken in Quebec or whatever.
Ms Lailey: I'd be terrified to let that happen, because we would be dealing with wheat, I know that, would be doing great research, but the wine industry? There are only two places in Canada that we can grow tender fruit. If the federal government were responsible for this -- you probably know an awful lot more about it than I, but being part of Ontario, I feel you would be more concerned about what's happening to your food base in Ontario.
Mr Sterling: I just worry that there's a possibility of duplication with the federal government, a possibility of duplication with other provinces that have agricultural industries as well. What do you do to avoid that now?
Ms Lailey: That's a good question. I am really aware of that also, especially with what's happening now, when money is short so we're cutting back. But then there's this disbursement of funds to do research, these little Band-Aid approaches that we're doing to find out. I said to the man from the federal government the other day: "How often do you meet with the provincial government? I am sure there's a project going on right now in this very area." He said, "We're meeting next week." But that is a real concern of mine too.
I also think it was a positive happening when I listened to the professors at Guelph last weekend telling us how they have revamped their program. In the past, as I explained before, we just had isolated pockets that went on and on and on and just sucked in money and energy and nothing really ever came out.
The other project that needs to be addressed and researched, from my point of view, is that these people may do the research, but do they ever get it to the source? I know they have done research in the Vineland research station for years and years and years, but to try to get that so that it's functional on my farm is not an easy task.
Mr Sterling: I have a nephew who has worked in Agriculture Canada for some time. He was telling me that part of the problem is that the work Agriculture Canada is doing, the money our taxpayers are spending there, is under attack as soon as there is a cut because they are not close enough to the producer and in some cases their work is on a long-term basis. It's sort of a two-edged sword. I don't know the answer, but what I'm saying is that I think that Agriculture Canada and the research institute and all the other research establishments in other provinces should be singing from the same hymn book.
Ms Lailey: I think it's going to happen.
Mr Sterling: I don't know how best to do this. I know there's been more faith in the past in provincial control of programs because they've been able to deliver them better, but you still have to think about this other part. I mean, $45 million is not a small piece of change. We have to be concerned that we're getting our best bang for the dollars.
Ms Lailey: I understand what you're saying. It's very --
Mr Sterling: The federal guys are getting cut off because you are the people who are liaising directly with the agricultural industry, so you have the federal people who are not getting to the bottom because we're undercutting them. I don't know.
Mr Chairman, you're from an agricultural community. Would you like to ask a question or two? I'm sure you have some.
The Vice-Chair: I have a couple.
Mr Sterling: I'll give you a bit of our time, as you're from our caucus. The Vice-Chair: The Chairman doesn't very often get the opportunity, but sometimes it is a prerogative when you're the Chair that you can ask the odd question or two.
I'd like to ask you about insecticides. It's a very important part of growing our products today. I heard you say you've cut yours by half. Would that be a sample of what's going on in the region, that they are cutting back on their insecticides?
Ms Lailey: Farmers are more aware, mainly because of everything we read and hear and see. The publication from the Ontario department of agriculture has certainly emphasized that. I've been farming for 25 years and I know farmers looked at that book as if it were the gospel. If it said, "Spray every 10 days," they sprayed; whether or not there was anything out there, they sprayed. But that whole thinking has changed, and that was brought about because people have done research and, "Maybe we don't have to spray when there are no insects or there's no fungus."
The Vice-Chair: I farmed for 30 years and never sprayed.
When you were in the Napa Valley, did you visit Sam Sebastian's vineyard?
Ms Lailey: Yes, I did.
The Vice-Chair: Good samples there, aren't there?
Ms Lailey: There are good samples, but there are a lot better in other places.
The Vice-Chair: I want to thank you for coming before the committee. I think you'd make an excellent candidate in the riding of Lincoln in the future. Thank you very much for attending.
Mr Hansen: Thanks, Al.
Ms Lailey: Thank you.
The Vice-Chair: That concludes our review of the intended appointees, if you would like to do them in one motion to concur.
Mr Waters: So moved.
The Vice-Chair: No opposition to having them done in one motion? Seeing none, everyone in favour? Carried.
The committee is adjourned, and the subcommittee will meet right now.
The committee adjourned at 1528.