CONTENTS
Wednesday 7 September 1994
Intended appointments
Susan Fish, Ontario Municipal Board
Pat Capponi, Advocacy Commission
Charinee J. De Silva, Social Assistance Review Board
Judith Davidson-Palmer, Justices of the Peace Remuneration Commission
Shirley Anne Clement, Social Assistance Review Board
Dianne Crawford, Peterborough Police Services Board
Remi Labonté, Advocacy Commission
Joy Enid Isaacs, Advocacy Commission
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)
Ferguson, Will, (Kitchener ND)
*Frankford, Robert (Scarborough East/-Est ND)
*Harrington, Margaret H. (Niagara Falls ND)
*Malkowski, Gary (York East/-Est ND)
*Waters, Daniel (Muskoka-Georgian Bay/Muskoka-Baie-Georgienne ND)
Witmer, Elizabeth (Waterloo North/-Nord PC)
*In attendance / présents
Substitutions present/ Membres remplaçants présents:
Conway, Sean G. (Renfrew North/-Nord L) for Mr Curling
Jackson, Cameron (Burlington South/-Sud PC) for Mrs Witmer
MacKinnon, Ellen (Lambton ND) for Mr Ferguson
Sterling, Norman W. (Carleton PC) for Mr McLean
Clerk / Greffière: Mellor, Lynn
Staff / Personnel: Pond, David, research officer, Legislative Research Service
The committee met at 1008 in committee room 2.
INTENDED APPOINTMENTS
The Chair (Mrs Margaret Marland): Good morning. Our responsibility as a committee today is to review some intended appointments.
SUSAN FISH
Review of intended appointment, selected by government party: Susan Fish, intended appointee as full-time member, Ontario Municipal Board.
The Chair: We welcome you to the committee, Ms Fish. Have a seat; make yourself comfortable. If you wish to make a brief opening comment or two, you may, or we can just start with rotation of questions by the committee members. I know that you're very at home with the process of this committee room, these hallowed halls.
Ms Susan Fish: Thank you very much for that. I think I will just go straight to questions, if that's suitable to the committee.
The Chair: That's excellent.
Mr Robert Frankford (Scarborough East): We usually leave it to the opposition to ask people whether they belong to political parties here, so I'll pass on that one.
The OMB is an agency that's always of interest in my riding of Scarborough East in relation to the development of the urban form. Could you share some general thoughts about the role of the OMB, the influence of zoning and the sorts of things that you will be doing in a broader sense? I know you've spent a lot of time in rather specific cases, but can you share a broader vision of what you think the OMB can do?
Ms Fish: I think it's fair to say that the Ontario Municipal Board is really one of the government's premier agencies to deal with land use planning and development, certain environmental issues, and of course property taxation, among others, assessment. It is, as many of us who have been in the field for a long time always said, the kind of court of last appeal -- not formally a court, of course -- for either applicants who have come before municipalities concerned about the decision, wanting to carry it forward, or residents and ratepayers or other interest groups.
As a body that's a bit removed from the immediate day-to-day issues that would be faced by the local councillors as they are dealing with the shape of their municipality, it becomes, I think, a very important instrument to take a bit of a second look at those decisions that are appealed and to help guide and shape the development of the province.
Mr Frankford: Can you share any more direct experiences you've had?
Ms Fish: That I've had? Happily so. One gets to an age where when you look back on your CV, you suddenly realize that it's been rather a number of years that you've been involved with issues. In my case, it's nearly 26 years that I have been involved in housing, urban development, and land use and taxation matters, from my earliest days at the Bureau of Municipal Research, a non-profit research organization here in Toronto, in those days directing research and examining a number of problems for municipalities, not just urban municipalities but municipalities right across the province, both urban and rural, and appearing before the municipal board in a professional capacity, preparing briefs and presentations and submissions to the board.
So from the very earliest days of my career that has taken me through municipal planning and development issues, I've been very aware of the board and have had occasion to appear before it. I have not been before the board in the last several years, although my work has taken me in a variety of areas that would be issues that might have been before the board, and land use and development and transportation and environment.
Ms Jenny Carter (Peterborough): You mentioned land use. I am just wondering what your thinking is about the present initiatives in the area of land use planning, including Bill 163.
Ms Fish: Well, I think you'll understand if I suggest that I will leave to the Legislature legislative matters like legislation, and not comment specifically on them.
Let me just say, though, that I think there is general agreement that there's a balance to be struck in the planning process in the province, and that balance is not only between the interests that come forward on particular issues, but it's a balance between what area municipalities see as their futures and what the province sees in its overall directions and, of course, a balance as well, finally, in having decisions made in a timely way and a reasonably predictable way for everyone concerned, whether they are residents and ratepayers or whether they're investors. I don't think I'd want to comment any more specifically than that on particular legislation.
Ms Carter: It does seem that what we're ending up with is a clearer framework so that the municipalities and so on have more freedom because they know what that framework is and they're allowed to get on within it. I'm wondering whether that will ease the job of the OMB, because maybe there won't be as many problems arising.
Ms Fish: I guess I'd say allow me to come back and talk to you after a year's experience or so when legislation is in place and we'll make the assessment then.
Ms Carter: Okay. Is our time up?
The Chair: There is five minutes left. Any other members? Or do you wish to continue?
Ms Carter: Yes, I could ask another question. We all know that the OMB is chronically overloaded, shall we say, that they have case management problems, and this is something that is perpetually being dealt with. What do you think about the OMB's efforts recently to tackle those case management problems?
Ms Fish: Remembering that obviously I haven't been sitting there directly, from what I've been able to observe I think there has been a major effort under way by everyone involved at the board, the members as well as the staff, to try to be sensitive in scheduling, in hearing cases, in moving to a decision and dealing with what has obviously in years past been a real problem.
Clearly, as I said before, having decisions reached in a timely way is the next best thing to having your own way when you're making an application. At least if you get an answer in a timely period, that helps you plan and go ahead. In any organization I suspect that every little bit probably isn't ironed out, but I look forward to being part of the process of ensuring that the board continues to be the kind of responsive agency I think it has been to date.
Mr Gary Malkowski (York East): Thank you for coming to speak to us. Congratulations on this potential appointment. Can you talk specifically in terms of your qualifications and how you see a vision of the OMB, especially in terms of the Sewell report and how you can see some of those recommendations coming into play?
Ms Fish: Hmm. I would not want to comment specifically on the Sewell report, principally because I think that was a report to government that, as I understood it, formed part of the government's basis in bringing forward its legislation, Bill 163, which of course I gather is in front of the House. But allow me to take a few minutes to speak a bit about my qualifications and what I think I would bring to the job.
I said earlier that I have nearly 26 years in the field. That is a career that spans research and analysis, preparation of formal briefs to the municipal board as well as to other agencies, elected experience that has enabled me to deal on the front lines at the municipal level with planning and development matters, that being one of the key responsibilities of municipalities, and as a member of council and chair of a variety of task forces, conducting hearings and dealing with the matters in substance; through my experience at Queen's Park, similarly, taking a broader provincial view of many of the same issues but understanding and appreciating the complexities that the province of Ontario is really made up of and the real differences in her communities as you go across this very large area; as well, spending specific time doing research and acting as a royal commissioner on the Royal Commission on Transportation, dealing extensively with transportation matters as well as conducting formal hearings and doing research; and acting as I have in the last seven years now in the private sector as a policy consultant to government and as a public affairs consultant to corporate interests.
I think that balance that has taken me from the staff side to an elected side, from the private sector to the public sector, provides a breadth of experience and perspective that would complement the board and its members and the work that it does now.
Mr Malkowski: If I can add one other comment in relation to your experience both in private and public sector, can you talk a little bit more about community activism? Have you been involved as a community activist in terms of working in the community and balancing the interests not only of public and private sector needs, but also taking into consideration the community needs?
Ms Fish: Yes, I have worked in the community, but I have predominantly worked with the community. For example, I was the executive director of the Bureau of Municipal Research for four years, from 1968 to 1972. It was a period of real transition for that organization. For the first time in its history, I opened the library to residents and ratepayers and provided assistance and advice to various citizen groups across the province, although predominantly in southern Ontario, who were wanting to raise issues in front of their councils and then later in front of the municipal board or in other areas, and provided a resource to assist what were then emerging community groups without their own independent resources to be able to present their cases and be clear on the issues.
That need to balance, of course, is one that was carried through my elective career, where I dealt extensively with communities and community interests as well as issues of public policy.
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In the seven years that I have been in private practice, my involvement in the community has been through extensive volunteer service. It has not generally touched on the kinds of issues that would come before the board, but you will see from my résumé that I have served on the board of the AIDS Committee of Toronto, Casey House, the Metro Action Committee on Violence Against Women and Children and on various arts boards and heritage groups as well. In each of these cases I have tried to make a contribution of a dual role: on the one hand to assist in fund-raising, which is always problematic for non-profit and community groups, and on the other hand to provide advice and assistance in having those groups present issues of concern in front of governments: provincial, municipal, and occasionally federal.
Again, I think the breadth of involvement that I have and have shown through my volunteer work as well as my career provides a balance and a blend that would be helpful to the board. At least I'd like to think it would be.
The Chair: Thank you for that answer. Mr Conway.
Mr Sean G. Conway (Renfrew North): I'd be quite happy to defer in the order to my friend from Carleton, who is almost drooling here. Would you like to go first, Norman?
Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): No, no.
Mr Cameron Jackson (Burlington South): By all means, Sean.
Mr Conway: You should just try to contain yourself, Normie.
Well, listen, I'm just a fill-in to this committee, but I'm pleased to be here today to say, "Hello, Minister," or ex-Minister. Susan, good to see you. Good appointment.
The Chair: You're allowed to say the same thing.
Ms Fish: Thank you.
Mr Conway: I think this is a good appointment and I just want to say that. I've certainly been watching with some interest some of the recent appointments, I guess the last three that I've noticed, to the OMB, and there are probably more: Helen Cooper, Nancy Smith and now Susan Fish. So we've got three very capable people who bring a strong understanding of municipal government to the board. Certainly I have no doubt at all, in terms of your background and related experience, that you will do this job well. In fact, I can't think of anyone who's brought the mix of experience that you do so ably to this. So I want to just be up front and say that it's not only good to see you again, Susan, but I think this is a good appointment and I congratulate you for it.
Interjection.
Mr Conway: Having said that -- no, we get to Jack Pickersgill-Reville tomorrow -- there are a couple of things I would just like to talk about and get some ideas from you on. Some kind soul, I guess David, prepared a nice paper here that I read about issues at the OMB, and I see the issue of case management backlog. I have yet in 20 years to meet any administrative panel that didn't have those problems, and some have them more chronically than others. One of the impressions I have had watching this process, including the judicial process, is that some people, however able, just do not, as judges or as board members, have the capacity to move these matters along. Can you tell us something about the kind of managerial style you might bring to the board so that with a good background and good intentions you're going to be able to move the agenda along?
Ms Fish: I'll tell you first of all that my background and my formal training is actually in public administration. I maintain professional memberships in, among other things, the Institute of Public Administration of Canada.
The role of the individual member in helping, being part of an agency or a board such as the municipal board and managing case load, really works maybe in two ways, if I could describe it that way. There's the one obvious way when you're sitting and hearing cases. The best I think that a member can do is to act as a good listener and in a fashion that might best be parallel, say, to a good chair, to try and ensure that the people who are coming forward are clear and understand what they are saying and able to make their points.
But the fact of the matter is that the process is a quasi-judicial one, and to a certain extent the period of time that a hearing might take really isn't in the hands of the board member who might be hearing it. It's as much in the hands of the people who are coming forward, the municipalities or ratepayers or other interests, as they may want to examine witnesses or refer things back. That's very much the case I think when you look at a couple of examples that have been chatted about in the paper here and there of hearings that seem to have a terribly long life or go over a very long time. It's often not a function of the board that's had those hearings go for so long but of the people who are arguing and appearing before the board.
But doing everything possible to try and run a fair and sensitive and efficient hearing I think is obviously one role of a board member, and I think that is the kind of thing I would want to learn more about in my early time at the board, sitting with more seasoned members, but would bring I think a good experience of having conducted extensive hearings, particularly as a royal commissioner, which would be perhaps one of the closest parallels.
The other way a board member assists is by working collegially, and that is very much my management style, to work collegially and supportively, to complement the efforts of other members and to try and ensure that to the greatest possible extent my contributions are helpful.
Mr Conway: Should the general public be concerned that in fact we may be loading up the board with very good people but all of whom, or many of whom, seem to be ex-municipal-provincial politicians who, with all that I've said about that experience, might just unavoidably bring that kind of municipal government perspective that in some of these matters may not be what's required?
Ms Fish: Well, I don't think you should be at all concerned if you feel confident that the appointments are capable and qualified and experienced people who are bringing the kind of balance that you want to see at the board. That I would think is the important component, and having had some experience municipally and provincially, in the non-profit sector and in the private sector, would seem to me the kind of mix that you'd like to see on something like the municipal board.
Mr Conway: You said earlier, I think in response to one of the government questioners, that it was your view that you would be quite prepared to leave to the legislators their responsibility and you of course would be happy to just play the more limited adjudicative role. I've never yet seen a former politician who is elevated to an adjudicative role who could in fact meet that expectation. My experience is, once a politician, always a politician. So why should we believe you that in fact you're going to leave unto Caesar that which is Caesar's?
Ms Fish: I guess I would suggest to you that having been an elected politician isn't some kind of disease. It's good public service, after all, and there is more than one kind of public service. Serving on an administrative tribunal like the municipal board is another kind of public service. It demands some of the similar skills, but it also demands a different way of operating and working, and perhaps that involves a little bit of a different discipline, but it may simply also mean it's directing energies to a different end. But you will understand, I'm sure, that for all board members, our chair speaks for the board.
Mr Conway: Oh, I know. I make these observations on the basis of 20 years' experience of dealing with members of the Ontario Municipal Board. I don't want to be any more direct than that, but at least one who was a former colleague of mine comes to mind rather quickly.
Just a final question: The issue of Bill 163 is certainly before the Legislature. Like the member for Carleton, I was spending a very pleasant and restful summer hundreds of kilometres east of here, paying not much attention to the great issues here at the Legislature, if there were any this summer. I don't know that there were. But one day I did awaken to hear John Sewell on the radio, going on at some length about how it is that Bill 163 in fact in key respects didn't reflect the thinking that he had invested in the so-called Sewell report. Do you have any views as to whether or not Bill 163, as you have read it, is in fact going to remove from the OMB many of those cases and issues that have tended to tie the board up in previous experience?
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Ms Fish: I believe that is most certainly the intention of the bill, certainly stated by the minister, but again, while I appreciate that you are inviting me to do exactly what you suggested you feared, former politicians engaging in policy or legislative debate, I really would leave that assessment and the government's own decision as to what it picked up or did not from a report and how it chose to implement it to matters of the Legislature.
Mr Conway: Thank you. Good luck.
The Chair: There's a minute left. No further questions from the Liberals?
Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Just that I'm delighted to see the former member for St George here, the former Environment minister of Ontario. I presume that you'll be reflecting in your decisions your considerable concern about the environment, n'est-ce pas?
Ms Fish: I was very pleased and proud to have been one of your predecessors as Minister of the Environment and the environment is an issue that remains very close to my heart.
Mr Jackson: I guess I'm the only one on this side who isn't a former minister talking to a former minister.
First of all, Susan, welcome. I know you've been careful not to comment on Bill 163, but although I did vacation briefly in the same locale as Mr Conway, I did spend two weeks working on this bill, and it's very clear from the presentations that the feeling about this piece of legislation and its impact on the OMB is such that it vests more power which will be concentrated in provincial decision-making and provincial override and less authority per se with the OMB. That begs several questions as to whether or not your approach is that of a centralist or not of a centralist in terms of planning, but clearly the consensus which is coming forward, whether it's from naturalists or from the OMA and other groups, is that the province gets to direct provincial planning from a controlled position here at Queen's Park.
I guess my question to you builds from the opposite direction from where Mr Conway's coming, because I see less authority, less influence of an OMB decision coming in the years to come after Bill 163 than, as Mr Conway would have us possibly consider, that it was going in the opposite direction. Would you like to comment on either your personal views in terms of centralist planning or if you have any concerns about the growing authority that would be vested in the provincial government that the current OMB now enjoys?
Ms Fish: The very existence of the municipal board for as long as it has been around, which is many years, has really meant that there has been a certain amount of centralization of planning and development decisions in this province, unlike, for instance, some of the other provinces out west that don't have an equivalent institution.
But in terms of the impact of the legislation, let me simply say that I think it's a function of working with any legislation that would affect the board and giving it time to settle in. I don't think there is any other way that I would be able to answer you, except to say that I would certainly look forward as a member of the board to doing everything possible to make whatever the legislative framework is for an administrative agency like that work in the best interests of all of the people of the province, and I'm sure that I echo the chair and my colleague board members' interest in that regard as well.
Mr Jackson: A very candid answer, for want of another word. I was looking for a more fulsome answer when I look at your experiences. I think you're ideally suited for this appointment, given your breadth of experience. You modestly didn't refer to days as a school trustee, which I recall. However, you did participate in a cabinet when some major land use decisions of public policy were carved out for this province, and certainly coming from that experience, whether it was the greenbelt or the Niagara Escarpment Commission or any number of those, without putting a value on them, they were major announcements that could be deemed by some people to be rather intrusive. I guess I was looking for a more fulsome response, given your breadth of experience on the issue, of your views on central planning. But I won't be treated to that this morning, I understand, so unless my colleague has any further questions?
Mr Sterling: I'd just like to congratulate you, Susan, on your pending appointment to the OMB. I think you're ideally suited. I think you have many, many parts of the equation which a lot of other people don't have the privilege or opportunity to be involved in -- politics at the municipal level, politics at the federal level, a key part of David Crombie's commission on the waterfront -- to hear points of view from decentralized and centralized planning. I think you're well suited for the position and I congratulate you on the appointment.
Ms Fish: Thank you very much.
Mr Sterling: Oh, one other question. Although you served as a Progressive Conservative member of the Legislature, what political party are you affiliated with?
Mr Conway: Well, that's a good question. She's what you'd describe now as a Bill Davis Tory, and there aren't any of those left.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr Conway.
Mr Jackson: That's like trying to find a David Peterson Liberal. They don't exist any more.
The Chair: You have an option of answering the question or not, Ms Fish, and I'll leave that decision up to you.
Ms Fish: I think I'll leave that, thank you.
The Chair: Thank you for your appearance before the committee this morning.
PAT CAPPONI
Review of intended appointment, selected by government party: Pat Capponi, intended appointee as member, Advocacy Commission.
The Chair: Our next intended appointment is as a member to the Advocacy Commission, and it's Ms Pat Capponi.
Interruption.
The Chair: Excuse me. I have to advise the people who are present in the room that the rules of the assembly apply to committee hearings and we cannot have any demonstrations or applause or similar activity, so I would appreciate you having regard to those rules of the assembly.
Ms Pat Capponi: If I may, I want to say something just very briefly. This is kind of a momentous day for crazies in this province, and I'd just like to thank people for coming out, crazies and wannabe crazies, for being here today. We as a group aren't the most -- well, we don't live by the rules very well, so please forgive the spontaneous kind of stuff that occurred. Sorry to interrupt.
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Ms Carter: I would like to welcome and congratulate you on this appointment. I do work with the Ministry of Citizenship and I was involved in the hearings on the Advocacy Act, and it's good to see it working its way through and having got to this point. Personally, I can't wait until the advocates are in place and those vulnerable people are getting that assistance that they need.
From where I stand, you're the ideal type of appointment, because the emphasis is on doing what the person the advocate is dealing with wants, listening to their point of view, not telling them what's good for them, what they should be doing, but being able to share their point of view and act on it. I wonder if you could give us some information about your own background that explains why you are very well qualified to do that.
Ms Capponi: I'm a Montrealer by birth, but I came to Toronto in 1978 and spent three months and 11 days at St Mike's hospital in the psych ward there. That was my seventh admission. I was referred from St Michael's Hospital to a psychiatric boarding home in Parkdale, which was on the recommended list of the Queen Street Mental Health Centre.
There were 70 ex-psychiatric patients crammed into that building. It had a licence, and as I said, it was on the recommended list of the hospital, but it was horrendous living circumstances. Most of this I've written about in my book, Upstairs in the Crazy House: The Life of a Psychiatric Survivor.
While I was there, it seemed as though the rest of the world had dug a moat around us. There were people in that home from about 19 to one lady who was over 80, and we had mice, we had lice, we had violence, we had rape. We had I guess all the bad stuff and not much good stuff. You kind of forgot there was an outside world, if you know what I mean. We didn't see people from the outside world, and when on occasion a worker would bring someone to stay at the house, they kind of stopped at the office and didn't go further.
However, after a few years I thought perhaps it might be interesting to see the community. I hadn't realized that there was a community, but I was wandering around and saw at Parkdale community library that there was a public meeting one night, and I went to that public meeting, because the subject was the dumping of ex-psychiatric patients in Parkdale. I thought, "Gee, somebody knows about this house," right? So I went to the public meeting, and it was being hosted by I gather then-alderman Tony Ruprecht, who's now an MPP. He was burying a casket of the current Minister of Health, who I guess must have been Dennis Timbrell. I don't remember.
At that meeting, the residents' associations were saying some very uncivilized things about people living in the neighbourhood, like it was unsafe to go out on the street at night, especially when there was a full moon. Mr Ruprecht implied that his mother was fearful or had been mugged. Businessmen said that people were urinating on their doorways and how come nobody was put into Rosedale. You know, the regular stuff, but at the time it was the first I had heard this, and having lived under the conditions that I had for two years in Parkdale, I stood up and said: "I'm one of the crazy people you're talking about, and it seems to me, rather than saying the kinds of things you're saying, you ought to be looking into the living conditions that people are suffering right here. You ought to be looking into the amount of medication they're on and the fact that the diets are poor and that there's people dying there."
I was immediately accused of being an outside agitator and abnormal, which I thought was very funny, and I went on from there to work with the other alderman. It was Barbara Adams at the time, who introduced me to Peter Goodspeed at the Toronto Star, and we started a series of exposés on the mentally ill, "Nowhere to Go." Every paper used the same title.
From there, to skip along, when Larry Grossman was Minister of Health, I toured him through Parkdale, especially my boarding home, and instead of what Timbrell did, which was to say everybody's entitled to live wherever they want -- it didn't matter that at the time welfare was $218 a month -- Larry Grossman actually said he would take responsibility for the situation, that the government had to take responsibility.
He asked me to sit beside him at a press conference where he announced the formation of the community advisory boards for 10 psychiatric provincial hospitals. He actually asked me to pour him water, which I thought was interesting. At the same time he announced 10 case managers for Archway and the formation of the provincial Psychiatric Patient Advocate Office.
I was very pleased one day to sit with Sheila Copps in the Legislature. We were asking about a community mental health clinic that we had and we were in the dining room of the Legislature and she told Tony to shut up, which made my day, it just made my day. I have fond memories of that.
Mayor Art Eggleton had induced Dr Reva Gerstein to be a one-person task force, the Mayor's Action Task Force on Discharged Psychiatric Patients. I was at the press conference with City TV, as their expert, just so I could ask questions. Through the office of David Reville, who was then our crazy alderman -- he introduced me to Reva Gerstein and subsequently I got on that task force. That report is still in print and some of its recommendations have come a long way, including the Gerstein Centre, a crisis centre.
We did things like, with David, hold a boarding-home lunch at city hall where we had members of the opposition -- I can't remember who was in opposition then frankly; well, I'm sure the NDP were in opposition -- and the mayor come to experience a boarding-home lunch. My sister, who was also at Queen Street, played the landlord and abused people and yelled at people and we had a pharmacist handing out Smarties and taking orders and stuff like this. We also, early on, made quite frequent representation to the Metro social services committee.
I worked at Parkdale Activity and Recreation Centre, which was a large, large, large bowling alley that took most of the folks that other folks gave trespass notices to -- so front-line experience. Then I left there, but while I was there we did Cuckoo's Nest cable on Maclean Hunter with an all-crazy crew. They were trained by the staff of Maclean Hunter to use cameras, to do directing, to do lighting, and they got credit for it.
We even did an all-candidates meeting there and interviewed the head of Queen Street Mental Health Centre and stuff like that, which was quite fun, and had people talk about being involuntarily sterilized, stuff like this, on the air. I also edited and published Cuckoo's Nest paper for about four years off and on, and that was writings of crazies and sympathetic staff in the Parkdale area.
From there, under the Liberals I think, I approached CMHA Ontario, Canadian Mental Health Association Ontario, under its former leadership, suggesting that they would gain in credibility by partnering with me to base me there as a leadership facilitator to go around the province working with people who have been discharged from hospital doing empowerment groups.
They did a budget which was kind of horrendous, and then I found out the government would have funded me without CMHA Ontario, so we had a continuing argument and I was placed at the Gerstein Centre to run the program.
I have been doing that for four years, which has given me a unique vantage point of survivors around the province in a program that was driven, not just driven but created moment by moment by the participants and their needs in the regions that we went to.
I'm probably going on too long and there's probably more I could say, but --
Ms Carter: So you're not a typical bureaucrat, and that is the intention.
Ms Capponi: Yes. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms Carter. I'm sorry, Mr Malkowski also had a question, but we are out of time for the government party. We actually use a stopwatch in this committee because the time allocation per caucus is 10 minutes and it's very difficult otherwise to control the committee and keep it on schedule. We have appointments every half-hour for review today.
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Mr Malkowski: If I get unanimous consent, could I ask her a question?
The Chair: It's up to the committee. Is there unanimous consent?
Mr Sterling: No.
The Chair: There isn't unanimous consent. We have to move to the opposition party.
Mr Bradley: My first question relates to the balance out there or perhaps your view of what role the family should play as a whole. As individual MPPs, we get representations made both by patients and by the families of patients and, as you would well know from your experience, it's often very diverse advice that we get. What role do you believe that the family of patients should play in determining the treatment or the future role of those patients? Should there be any role at all for family?
Ms Capponi: It's interesting. Since I've been doing this for about 15 years, I've had a lot of opportunity to learn through my own mistakes. There was a time when family groups and survivor groups would cross the street to avoid each other. We've had in recent years a good, working relationship with the Manic Depressive Association of Ontario.
But the most learning I've done on this, and I think also my younger sister, Diane, who's also a survivor activist, was with my brother, who contracted AIDS and also suffered from dementia. As survivor advocates, we were put in a very strange position because he was wandering the streets and actually going out to the airport in shorts in winter and saying, "I want to go to Jamaica," and just totally out of it. It was very hard to go through that, to be on the other side, and what we both did was to ensure that his rights were clear and that they were protected, as much as we didn't want to do that.
I explained this to the psychiatrist. If he is capable of making his own decisions and he has a right to do that, all I want to know, and I think all my sister wanted to know, was that he was indeed capable at that moment of making his own decisions. He wasn't. He was certified for some time and the hospital nervously got a professional advocate in to give him his rights, but every step of the way -- and I know how painful that is.
But because it's that painful, simply because it's that painful for family, the right of the patient has to be primary. This doesn't mean that there's no place for family, but sometimes our best interests are in the worst interests of our loved ones because we can't see them often as independent adults. We can't see that lifestyle questions or choices -- you know, they had my brother in restraints and he felt that he'd been in chains. Now that could be a sign of craziness or that could be how he was feeling.
I have a lot of sympathy for family groups and I know the commission will have an advisory group that will include family members, and I'm very interested in that point of view, but primarily decisions have to rest with the affected individual.
Mr Bradley: We encounter that. I can recall -- obviously I won't name names -- a specific case of a mother of a schizophrenic individual who informed me that she would in fact be dead within a year because of the way that she was operating her own life at that time. The mother pleaded with, I'm sure, every politician in the area and every civil servant and everyone who would listen, newspapers and so on, for someone to intervene on behalf of her daughter in this case.
Indeed, I pick up the newspaper and the daughter had been killed by somebody in this specific case. That is the dilemma that we, as politicians, face. I think very likely there were people who have been treated oppressively by a well-meaning or a non-well-meaning family, one of the two.
The other side we get is, what can we possibly do when we reach this point where the laws are such that I cannot do anything about this circumstance and I can see in my own mind that my daughter --
Ms Capponi: I think that's a falsity right there. The Mental Health Act is quite clear. "Imminent danger to self or others or inability to care for self." Right? What we're having is on the basis of interpretation of whatever psychiatrist one goes to and also the fact -- and I think this is most important and this is some of the work we've done with provincial psych-hospital steering committees on their next five-year, 10-year plans.
How do we make hospitals places where people aren't scared to go, because it doesn't help someone to get better or go for help when they need to if they feel that the moment they're in there, they lose all their autonomy. They're going to be, you know, forced against their will to walk around in pyjamas or get rather painful shots. We have to make the places user-friendly again so that people enter with some confidence that they're going to be heard and listened to and not just held so that somebody else isn't going to worry.
There are worse things than dying, I have learned over the years, but also if I can quote David Reville and steal some of what he may say tomorrow, what he said as a father of a suicide is that some tragedies are not preventable. It doesn't mean that you have policies that remove people's civil rights because there are some tragedies.
Mr Bradley: If I were to ask you -- and perhaps I know the answer on this because it's quite obvious to so many people about the services that are available to psychiatric patients and ex-psychiatric patients. There have been many documentaries that have been done on the lack of adequate services. If you were to isolate, and this may be an unfair question, one service that is most required and is at the present time underfunded or simply not available, what would you say that would be?
Ms Capponi: Consumer survivor development initiatives, which have proven -- which really shouldn't come as any surprise, I suppose -- the years I spent on welfare, it wears you down. It totally wears you down and you don't believe you have abilities or anything to offer anyone.
I think it was started under the NDP, I can't remember, but it's specifically targeted funding to psychiatric survivor groups like A-Way, like Fresh Start, like Able Enterprise -- I'm going to miss some of them and they're going to be angry at me -- to employ our folks in areas where they would never, never be able to get real jobs. So here the self-esteem grows. You know, when we were starting out, 10, 15 years ago, people like David and myself, we were told constantly that this is a community who can't: can't do this, can't do this, can't do this. People walk around like they do because they're crazy.
I was at the inquest in Orillia that resulted in the Ernie Lightman report. At that inquest people were saying, "Well, when we dug this guy up, he was" -- well, sorry, but they had to exhume the body because nobody had checked him the first time properly. He'd been beaten and died and the jury was told that the body was in a filthy condition.
When I was on the stand, I said, "You know, it's not because we want to be dirty. You know, it's not because we want to be dirty," and I explained that in my boarding-house, you know, the washroom had no lock, and I don't know, there was like 20 people to one washroom and there was no soap and there were no towels.
That's the kind of thing that comes up, that we need to regain our self-esteem. We need to break through a lot of assumptions and presumptions and prejudice about our community and, to do that, we have to be visible and working and role models for others in our community.
Mr John C. Cleary (Cornwall): Welcome, Pat. The definition of a vulnerable person contained in the legislation, how do you intend to ensure that this will not lead to extremely high implementation cost and possible service inadequacies and potential abuse of the authority granted to advocates under the legislation?
Ms Capponi: All of that is of concern. I don't like the concept of professional advocacy. I don't believe anybody should be an advocate for life, myself aside. I believe in grass-roots advocacy and I made that very clear during the three interviews that I had. For me, the purpose of this kind of advocacy is to transfer advocacy skills to the populations themselves. In other words, decent advocates should work themselves out of a job. I have no interest in establishing an agency that will let live for ever. Actually that's my last idea. That's a dread of mine, and I think you can rest comfortably that I would be very watchful of that.
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Mr Sterling: I'm very concerned about the Advocacy Commission. I'm very concerned about any government agency having as much influence on personal, moral decisions as advocates are going to have across this province. Therefore, I think it's a mistake to have the Advocacy Commission and I voted against this bill. Having said that, I want to know from you what you view an advocate to be. There is no definition in this legislation as to what an advocate is. What are the qualifications to be an advocate in your eyes?
Ms Capponi: Okay. In my eyes, and actually this is part of what went on in leadership facilitation courses, you know, what makes a leader, what makes an advocate? First off, you have to not be out to enhance your own ego. If that's why you're in the business, then you ought to get out. As long as people want to do for other people, then it's an ego thing.
I sort of grew up during the civil rights --
Mr Sterling: I asked what the professional qualifications should be?
Ms Capponi: Well, I'm not talking professional qualifications. You ask me a question --
Mr Sterling: Well, I want to know that.
Ms Capponi: I'm giving you the qualifications I would see for an advocate. I never said they were professional.
Mr Sterling: Well, I want to know what the professional qualifications are for an advocate.
Ms Capponi: Well, I guess we'll see when we advertise.
Mr Sterling: No, you're going to be part of the commission that makes this decision. I want to know what your views are on what the professional qualifications of an advocate should be.
Mr Jackson: If I might, I think he's referring to the people you might hire to go out into the community.
Ms Capponi: Yes, I know he is. I think you'll probably find in the ads that professional degrees are not going to have high ratings. There's more concern with the kinds of advocacy people have done, their motivation, the values they have, after which --
Mr Sterling: What values should they have then?
Ms Capponi: That they take direction from their client, that their primary activity is again to transfer their advocacy skills to groups rather than one-to-one kinds of advocacy which will ensure their jobs for ever, but to do community development of groups and help them get the information they need to do their own advocacy.
Mr Jackson: Ms Capponi, I have worked with David Reville on mental health legislation and boarding-home legislation and have a family member who's a survivor. I have a working knowledge of mental health issues and I have some concerns, given that there are a whole host or series of supports or changes or reforms that are required for clients, patients in this province, which I'm not necessarily seeing evolved at the rate they may have during the latter part of the 1980s, whether it's legal issues, whether it's income support, whether it's supportive housing, whether it's counselling and medical supports in a positive way.
I get a sense, when I talk to mental health groups and to patients, that we're seeing a reduction of access to services. Suicidal patients in my community are shipped many miles away, which is grossly unfair because of the reduction in beds. You know this turf better than I do.
In the midst of all this, now we have an Advocacy Commission. My concern, quite frankly, and I'll put it right out on the table, is that the best interests of the client, using your words, is to take direction from the client. Invariably, dealing with mental health issues, those services aren't going to be in place. What you know as being competent and capable of understanding that person's needs, they don't exist. Where are we now at this point? With a government agency, it'll attempt to be at arm's length -- there's no question about that -- but still it becomes a form of the establishment when it does that. How do we overcome that?
It's almost a cruel irony that we now have a third civil servant in the room telling people, "This is really what this person needs and should have and must have." Yet, we know there's no bed. We know there's no way we can get the income support to them. We know that there's a technicality on the legal definition which people are arguing over. Have you thought that part through and what are your views? What will the promise be for a survivor when there's a recurrence and they need an intervention of an advocate? What are we going to say to them, other than: "Yep, you're absolutely right. This is what you need, but it's not available."
Ms Capponi: Advocacy is not a new concept. There are lots of people, lots of mental health workers who called themselves advocates, and services weren't available then. I remind you, I was sent to that boarding home when Dennis Timbrell was Minister of Health and deinstitutionalization occurred under that, so there have always been people who have said they were advocates.
What the difference is now, what I believe the difference is -- I guess the Gerstein Centre was the first non-medical model psychiatric crisis centre that was set up. We have 10 beds, we have -- we; I'm very possessive -- a crisis team that goes out and sees people who wish to be seen. When they come in, they're not searched, their bags aren't searched. We don't hide the knives in the kitchen. People are treated like people. People are asked, "What works for you when you're undergoing a crisis?" So what it makes me think about is, you don't need to ship people 30 miles, 60 miles, 120 miles away. You can set up a system of peer support at a fraction of any funding. Right? You can have safe houses, and these are things that our movement, the survivor movement, is asking for.
You will find in the movement nobody is saying, "Build another Queen Street, build another Whitby," although we are building another Whitby. We're saying, "Take the funds," which has become, you know, mental health industry. Take the pharmaceutical funding and put it into something that works and what works is the empowerment of individuals to choose the kind of care that works for them, which is very rarely found on -- I don't know -- a psychogeriatric ward or a crisis ward.
Mr Jackson: Ms Capponi, I agree with what you're saying, but is that the appropriate role for the Advocacy Commission to be setting that out?
Ms Capponi: No, no, it's not appropriate. I'm giving you my opinion. I can't tell you what the commission's going to do.
Mr Jackson: But that's not what I asked you, because I'm familiar with your views and I'm rather supportive of the kinds of initiatives. What I'm saying is, in the last four years, for whatever reason, and without pointing fingers, we haven't seen a huge increase in the budgets or expansion of these kinds of beds and supported programs.
My fear is that we're setting out an expectation. So the good news is, we're bringing in psychiatric survivors to participate in an Advocacy Commission who are now going to be setting out this new order, this new way of doing things, to a government which is saying, for whatever reason, "We're just unable to do that." What are we doing by setting up that expectation in the mind's eye of the resident? I used the phrase "becoming the establishment," which is what my concern is.
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I want to raise my final point and then I'll let you finish because we won't have time left. But this notion of advocates, and I'm talking about your role as an advocate for mental health reform in this province over the last 15 years, now becoming part of the system, if I can call it that, which is a fear --
Ms Capponi: A fear on whose part?
Mr Jackson: Well, no. I know what Saul Alinski would have to say about that, but that's not the issue here. The question I want to ask you is, you have participated -- and we've had one window to your experiences at the Clarke Institute, for example. I understand you've been on the board, and we've interviewed appointees to the Clarke Institute.
I support your view that we should not be engaged in electroconvulsive therapy. That's my personal view of the world. Okay? That's how I feel. And yet, I understand that in your role as an advocate, you've been unsuccessful in terms of causing any change or any public uproar on this issue. I ask you, from a personal point of view, what does that mean to your ability to fight publicly and advocate not only on an individual basis but for the kinds of reforms you're suggesting?
Ms Capponi: You've made an assumption that I'm out fighting electric shock. I am not. I have always said that if we start telling people, "Don't do that," then we are no different than the doctors who say, "Do that." What I support is informed choice. That is what I support. I have made no effort to tell people. I wouldn't have it. If people say, "Do you want it?" I'll say no. We're not in the business of intimidating survivors into not making choices. We want the choices clear.
The other thing is, you said, "During the last four years." During the last four years, although there's been a recession, we took a couple of million dollars and ran with it and created jobs for our population, for the survivor population, which has expanded exponentially in terms of working, crazy people who are no longer on FBA, who are no longer on welfare, who are no longer lining up. So I'm suggesting to you that we're not making a promise. The disabled communities themselves are making a promise and a commitment, one to another, not that things will change but, damn, things are changed. Things are changed.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms Capponi, for your appearance before the committee this morning. Ms Harrington, you had a question?
Ms Margaret H. Harrington (Niagara Falls): Yes, Madam Chair. I just wanted to thank the citizens for coming to join this committee this morning and showing their interest in this issue.
CHARINEE J. DE SILVA
Review of intended appointment, selected by official opposition party: Charinee J. De Silva, intended appointee as full-time member and vice-chair, Social Assistance Review Board.
The Chair: Ms De Silva, you may make a brief opening statement, if you wish, or we will just start with the questions of the members of the committee. Would you like us just to start?
Ms Charinee J. De Silva: Yes, please.
Mr Bradley: My first question relates to when an individual is sitting on an agency, board and commission where there are, for want of a better word, adjudicative powers. I suppose one looks for impartiality in those who are making the decisions.
As I look at your résumé, it indicates to me, and you will correct me, I'm sure, if I am incorrect, that you have been an advocate of many different individuals and, it might be, someone who didn't know you may look at the résumé and say, "Well, here's a person who will be more inclined to be granting the appeals on these cases," because many of the people you have defended are people who would be vulnerable in our general system out there to government abuse or something of that nature.
Do you believe that you can be impartial, having been an advocate on one side for a substantial part of your career?
Ms De Silva: Even as an advocate, all the time we are impartial and we try to do justice. There are always two sides. I don't do, or at least I didn't do, social assistance work all the time. I've been at a legal clinic for close to six years and I did other areas of the law as well: landlord and tenant, immigration, mostly landlord and tenant. We always had to listen to both sides and, in my experience, at least about 90% of the cases have been settled. So we do that because we listen to both sides and we try to do justice to our client and be impartial too.
Mr Bradley: Okay. My second question: Obviously we see the amount of tax money going into social assistance increasing substantially as the years go on, and certainly much of that is attributed to the very difficult economic recession we have gone through, but there are some perceptions out there that it's increasing on a permanent basis in certain categories, and one where there has been, at the local level, at the municipal level, some concern expressed by municipal councillors has been that of student welfare.
The concept, of course, of student welfare, most people would agree with -- some people don't -- that a person in a totally abusive situation at home, unable to function there and who wishes to continue on in school is allowed to do so by providing student welfare.
Again, as individual MPPs, we get calls from people who say, "Well, my kid simply doesn't want to follow the rules at home and you give him student welfare," because it's always as though the MPP is handing it to them. "You give him student welfare. He lives with his five friends and they don't even attend school very often."
Do you believe that there is a need to better administer student welfare so that students (a) actually have to go to school to get student welfare and the policing of that, and (b) that it must be how are we going to determine it's a genuine case and not simply a student at the age of 16 saying: "I don't like the rules at home. I want to stay out till 3 o'clock in the morning. I'll precipitate a battle with my parents and away I go." How do we deal with that problem?
Ms De Silva: Student welfare is given if there is financial need and if there is hardship. I personally have not dealt with any cases, but I can just answer your questions on general knowledge, that the welfare office will confirm or make sure that the person attends school and also that he or she is in a real abusive situation to grant assistance. Even after they have granted assistance, as far as I know, it's evaluated or reassessed every six months. I believe the reassessing is done on a more frequent basis now. Earlier it was probably once a year or once in six months, but now they do it more frequently.
So it's not as if a student gets welfare for a few months and then attends school every day and then after a while parties till 3 o'clock. The student will have to prove that he has been attending school, and I believe they even contact either the counsellors or the principals or the vice-principals to ensure that the student is attending school.
Mr Bradley: Municipalities are now beginning to crack down, as they would say, on this kind of what they would feel would be fraud, at least some of the cases being fraud, part of it because the province has indicated it wishes to see a crackdown. Indeed, the Minister of Community and Social Services apparently hired 200 people or so to crack down on welfare fraud.
Yet, municipalities generally feel that what happens is, as soon as they start to crack down and try to target the welfare payments to those who are genuinely in need, they end up going to the Social Assistance Review Board, which then just throws the case out and rules in favour of the person who wants more money out of the taxpayer. So there is a great concern that's expressed by locally elected municipal councillors that their efforts to target social assistance payments to those who are genuinely in need are thwarted by the Social Assistance Review Board. How will that be taken into account when you're making your decisions?
Ms De Silva: I wouldn't say that every person who appears before the Social Assistance Review Board gets a favourable decision. There are so many cases that are turned down. As an advocate, I would always like to give the benefit of the doubt to my client and see how the person could still be allowed to get assistance, but at the same time, we don't represent every person who walks through the door. We always check. It's done in a case-by-case way, and if we feel the case doesn't have any merit, we don't represent. There have been cases where we believe, "No, you don't have a case, and we are not going to represent." If somehow a person like that appears before the board, before me once I'm a board member, I would look into all the merits before I grant assistance.
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Mr Bradley: We are confronted with a situation likely where there will be so much public pressure to restrict government expenditures further and further each year that there will be even greater pressure to target social assistance payments to those who are genuinely in need.
The reason I ask those questions is, I'm of the belief that some of these programs, which are good programs in concept, are going to be thrown out the window, simply by reaction of the public who say they're sick and tired of paying for programs when they see the abuse, and I think of the student welfare one, which I think in concept is a very good one, and it's helped some students. The fear is that the abuses of these programs will result in the loss of these programs, future governments getting rid of them or something of that nature. So that's why I asked that particular question.
Again, what relationship would you be having or would the commission have, if you had your way of running it, in consulting municipalities about the problems they confront in dealing with social assistance? What kind of consultation would you have? You'd obviously want to consult with all groups, advocates' groups and municipalities. Would it be your view that this agency should be consulting on an ongoing basis with these organizations?
Ms De Silva: As far as I know, there is consultation going on. I'm not quite sure -- as you know, I'm not a board member yet, but I know that the clinics are in contact with the board, and even with the municipalities and the FBA officers. The idea in all of us meeting is to see how we can improve the system. I'm not involved in any of the groups myself, so I'm not able to give details, but I know that obviously they are meeting and planning to see how they can control the whole system.
Mr Bradley: There's a form that you have to fill out or you may fill out when you apply for an agency, board or commission. It lists five things that you have to check off: one that says whether you're male or female; a second, are you a visible minority; third, are you a member of an aboriginal group; fourth, are you a francophone; and fifth, are you disabled? Did you resent being presented with that kind of form to fill out?
Ms De Silva: Not really. Whether I resent having to fill out a form?
Mr Bradley: You know, the form that designates you, pinpoints you as to whether you are a visible minority or not, whether you're a woman or not, whether you're disabled or not, whether you're francophone or not. Do you resent filling out a form like that that pegs you in a certain category?
Ms De Silva: Well, if I fit into one of the categories, I don't see a problem.
The Chair: Thank you for that answer. We're out of time, Mr Bradley.
Mr Jackson: Ms De Silva, how long were you duty counsel at the Social Assistance Review Board?
Ms De Silva: I have not started working there yet, I'm just hoping to start sometime next month.
Mr Jackson: Let me understand.
Ms De Silva: I'm still with Downsview legal services.
Mr Jackson: Okay. When I look at what's been prepared here with your application, duty counsel to the Social Assistance Review Board, you haven't --
Ms De Silva: Oh yes, I'm sorry. That was some time ago. I think I did it for a couple of months. There was a project where all the clinics were involved.
Mr Jackson: I'm sorry, all the --
Ms De Silva: All the legal aid clinics were involved, so we would take turns. I think I was there maybe 10 times over a period of six months.
Mr Jackson: Was this to deal with backlogs?
Ms De Silva: No, not just backlogs. They felt there were so many people appearing before the board without counsel, and if there was a situation where a client, an appellant would go in and there was no counsel representing them, then they would come and see me.
Mr Jackson: Who is "they"? If you could be a little more specific, I'd appreciate it.
Ms De Silva: The appellants, the people who are appearing before the board on a case.
Mr Jackson: Social assistance recipients would be referred by the Social Assistance Review Board, that they perhaps should use counsel, and then they'd contact you and you'd come to the appeal and represent them.
Ms De Silva: No. That's not how it worked. We would stay there. There was one room in the office, so if it was my day and I was supposed to be on duty, I'd be there from morning. It's not that anybody would contact me and not that the board would contact me either, but the appellant who's appearing before the board would come and then the board or the reception would say: "Do you have counsel? If you don't have counsel, there is duty counsel just next door."
Mr Jackson: How much did they pay you to sit in and be on-duty counsel for a half-day?
Ms De Silva: We were not paid anything extra. It was just part of our job.
Mr Jackson: You mean the legal aid clinics were providing this as a free service to social assistance?
Ms De Silva: Right. That's correct.
Mr Jackson: To your knowledge, or as a matter fact, do you know that there's no exchange from the social assistance board to the legal aid fund to pay for those legal aid services?
Ms De Silva: To my knowledge, there wasn't anything paid. It was during --
Mr Jackson: Perhaps we can have that checked by the research department. I find the concept -- I didn't know at this point that they had duty counsel who waited there in anticipation of -- you represented anybody who came into that specific location?
Ms De Silva: Right, and let me correct -- they don't have it now. They just had it for a while.
Mr Jackson: Was it an experiment or a pilot project?
Ms De Silva: It was like a pilot project.
Mr Jackson: How did you feel about the appropriateness of such a program?
Ms De Silva: It was helpful to the appellants. Some people didn't even know that there was counsel available.
Mr Jackson: Well, there isn't normally counsel available.
Ms De Silva: Right.
Mr Jackson: It was under the pilot project, so everybody would be surprised. I guess what I'm asking you is, as the vice-chair responsible for administering social assistance review, is it something that you would support actively? As a result of this appointment, you'd be in a position to recommend or to budget for such a service.
Ms De Silva: Definitely. There were many cases where the appellants came to me and it was not something that I could do right then and go before the board for a hearing, so I would request an adjournment and then, if the persons lived in our area, refer them to our clinic or wherever the appellants lived and refer them --
Mr Jackson: You would refer them to another clinic.
Ms De Silva: To another clinic.
Mr Jackson: Could you tell me who referred you to this appointment or who contacted you about the appointment? How were you made aware of the appointment?
Ms De Silva: Two years ago I had applied. I went for the interview but I was not selected. Just a couple of months ago I was contacted by a board member and I was told --
Mr Jackson: Which board member was that?
Ms De Silva: It was Maureen Adams.
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Mr Jackson: There has been a lot of controversy around legal aid use and disproportionate legal aid use, so I'm intrigued by your bringing to our attention this whole issue of the duty roster legal aid to refer to legal aid. Would there be a fair number of adjournments as a result of determining that there was a desire for or need of legal aid?
Ms De Silva: The question was about adjournment. Is that correct?
Mr Jackson: Yes.
Ms De Silva: Right now the board is very strict about adjournment.
Mr Jackson: I'm talking about the time that you were involved. I want to get a sense of that period when you were making those recommendations for adjournment.
Ms De Silva: At that time, if I believed that this person needed representation, it was fair to request an adjournment. That way the appellant would have representation and would have a fair hearing. Otherwise, if the board would not grant an adjournment, the appellant would just have the hearing and most likely lose.
Mr Jackson: But you didn't then become the legal counsel. You were just there as a conduit. You were a referral agency at that point. You were not providing direct legal services. You were assessing the case and saying, "I think you need legal aid," and then you were referring either to your own legal aid clinic or others in the city.
Ms De Silva: That's what I did mostly. I can talk about my experience.
Mr Jackson: You indicate an understanding of the difference now between the numbers of appellants that were occurring while you were in this capacity of the pilot project and today. Can you share with the committee a sense of how many more appeals, deferrals, compared to the numbers that are occurring now? Can you share with us any --
Ms De Silva: I remember going through the annual report a couple of weeks ago. If I'm correct, it's about a 45% increase from the previous year. Although we find that the welfare recipients somehow have decreased slightly, the appeals before the board have increased drastically.
Mr Jackson: I know there were some substantive policy interventions made around social assistance with respect to refugee eligibilities and illegal refugee claimants and that they form a large component of the applications in various parts of this province, in particular Toronto, of course. Did that cause a ballooning of the appeals around the time when this policy decision was implemented, do you recall?
Ms De Silva: The refugee claimants appeals for welfare, yes, that is --
Mr Jackson: When was the change in the policy? I'm trying to fix when you were on this pilot project and when the policy change kicked in.
Ms De Silva: I think the policy change regarding refugee claimants came later. This was within the last year or year and a half. The pilot project was --
Mr Jackson: About when?
Ms De Silva: -- probably about three years ago. I could be mistaken. I know there was some duty counsel project again even after that. It's not to say that there wasn't a project after. There could have been, but I was not involved, because I remember getting a case from somebody who was referred from the duty counsel. The duty counsel referred this person to my clinic and I represented, so that's why I know.
Mr Jackson: Okay. I have two very quick questions about student welfare. To put a fine point on Mr Bradley's question, my understanding is, the way the law is written --
The Chair: Mr Jackson, you're welcome to leave them on the record, but there will not be time for Ms De Silva to answer them, that's all.
Mr Jackson: It wouldn't be fair to put a question on and not give her a chance to answer. Thank you very much.
Ms Harrington: Thank you for coming before us this morning. As you know, in the last six months or so there has been a lot of talk about whether or not we can change social assistance, the Turning Point report and some of the initiatives that have been announced for this year such as JobLink, which gives people the information and then tries to help them get into that first job, and also such things as the Jobs Ontario Training Community Enterprise program, which is especially money set aside to help people on social assistance try to start their own businesses. Those types of initiatives are the direction we're going in at this point in time, and also we have to, of course, get funding from the federal level to assist in this.
I'm wondering if your view of the social assistance system is similar to this, or what vision you would have to improve the system over the next short while, hopefully.
Ms De Silva: I'm aware that the government has made several initiatives and Turning Point is a benefit. I'm also aware that due to financial restraints the government has not been able to proceed on some of them, except with JobLink I believe there is some progress.
I'm not sure how I can improve -- I guess I should first work at the board for a couple of months, get a feel for it and then see how things could be changed. Then there are advocates and there are times that they are frustrated with the system. They're frustrated even with the board, that they should be doing things differently. When we had to wait a long time for a hearing we would make --
Ms Harrington: I wasn't specifically asking you about the work of the board, but your past experience in working with the legal clinic, interacting with the clients and the system, what your vision would be to improve our social assistance system.
Ms De Silva: Regarding appeals?
Ms Harrington: No, just in a broader sense. The initiatives that we as a government have announced this year, the direction that we have said we want to go in over the past three or four years but are not able to without the assistance of the federal government at this time, and hopefully that will be coming very soon. I think the movement is there. I'm just asking you, is that the same as your vision for social assistance in this province or would you like to add what your personal views are?
Ms De Silva: Yes, I would support the view, and I could add that there are so many cutbacks for the recipients, but at the same time I'm aware that cutbacks are the other side of finances. The recipients, for instance, used to get first and last months' rent, special benefits for glasses, for dental facilities, so many benefits that the recipients are not entitled to now. So if there is a way that the people who deserve or who are really in need of that type of assistance would be entitled to those, it will be good.
Ms Harrington: In the last presentation we heard about a whole new change in mindset with regard to dealing with people who have been in mental institutions. I believe there has to be a whole new change and outlook in enabling people to be more self-reliant, self-sufficient, have choices in their lives. This is very difficult to do, but I think the social assistance system is part of that process, that it can't be seen as keeping people down but in effect empowering people. That change in mindset is, I think, what we're talking about when we talk about JobLink and these other initiatives. So that's what I was trying to get at. I'll pass to my colleague.
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Mr Daniel Waters (Muskoka-Georgian Bay): Mr Jackson was talking about a pilot project. I just went back and checked with some people and I understand that was actually a pilot project that was developed under the Liberal government. It was a previous government that did that pilot project. It wasn't something that we had put in place. I also understand that it was funded through the legal clinics. I just wanted to make sure that was clearly on the record.
This is what I would like to ask you: This is an actual case. I won't mention the names. Back in 1982 a couple moved into my riding and lived there for a year. There was a downturn in the economy. Their 16-year-old son moved with them. After a year, the father decided that he couldn't get work in the area and went home to southern Ontario from whence they had come as a family. The son -- and this is 1982, not 1992 -- went on student welfare because he didn't want to go home with mom and dad. I understand that this has gone on for some 12 years now, that I'm aware of, and indeed we've been trying to clean this up.
Getting to Mr Bradley's point about the cost that's put on the local municipalities, and go to SARB for their review, what would be your feelings on a case such as that? Under the present rules, obviously they would be found ineligible. There was no abuse in any way. He openly said that, so he would probably be found ineligible. What would be your feelings on cost recovery or speeding up the process so that indeed that cost wasn't passed on to the municipality for someone who shouldn't have got student welfare? I'd like your comments on that.
Ms De Silva: They had the interim assistance in place. When you file the notice of request for a hearing, then at the same time you request interim assistance. Interim assistance is not granted every time either. There again it's granted if there is hardship and the need is there. In a situation like that, the person probably would not have been granted even interim assistance. Then he appears before the board.
Mr Waters: So under the system as it fits under the rules of today, they're much stricter, then, for young people and that coming on. They have to show hardship and need in order to access those dollars, unlike what they did in 1982.
Ms De Silva: Definitely. They have to show it. It's not every 16- or 17-year-old who's granted assistance. Whatever they give as their reasons for requesting assistance is checked by the welfare officers and, as far as I know, even their investigators.
Mr Waters: Just wanting to stay in Muskoka is no longer a reason. That's a relief. That would be all my questions then. Thank you very much for coming before the committee.
Ms Carter: You've been working with clients and now you're going to be doing a rather different kind of work. I'm just wondering what sort of transition you will have to make to be an adjudicator at the review board.
Ms De Silva: I'm really looking forward to it because it's something that I have liked and wanted for a long time. It will be, I won't say difficult, but different at the beginning because I'm used to representing people and now I'll have to make decisions. As far as I know, there are going to be five weeks of training. I've appeared before the board on numerous occasions for the past six, seven years, so it's not something new. At the same time the transition might take a little while but I'm looking forward to it.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms De Silva, for your appearance before the committee this morning.
JUDITH DAVIDSON-PALMER
Review of intended appointment, selected by government party: Judith Davidson-Palmer, intended appointee as chair, Justices of the Peace Remuneration Commission.
The Chair: Welcome to the committee this morning. This is a selection by the government party. Would you like to start the questioning, Dr Frankford?
Mr Frankford: Good morning. I guess this is an agency I don't think any of us had thought about before. Can you tell us how you arrived at showing interest in the position?
Ms Judith Davidson-Palmer: I was approached by a member of the staff of the Ministry of the Attorney General to inquire whether or not I would be interested in looking at the remuneration of justices of the peace. I think the reason I was approached is because I have done a considerable amount of work in somewhat unusual compensation issues, for example, looking at the wages of homemakers in Ontario. I'm the mediator in a dispute with Bell Canada and its unions at the present time -- so some rather unusual things. I proceeded to discuss this with the ministry and it looked like it would be an interesting and challenging issue to address.
Mr Frankford: Have you had the opportunity of looking into the question broadly?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I've had a brief opportunity of looking into some of the background reports that have been done on the issue, of speaking with various members of the judiciary around some of the questions and issues, but there's a lot more work to be done in terms of addressing some of those issues.
Mr Frankford: Do you have any thoughts yet on the remuneration arrangements?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think the primary function of this commission will be to find a fair and equitable way of looking at the total compensation of justices of the peace. In the sense of coming into this, I think it's important to have a relatively open mind as to what some of those issues are. I have read some of the background reports that have been done on it which look at issues of relativity to other types of similar occupations and so on, as well as the comparative position of justices of the peace in Ontario vis-à-vis JPs in other parts of Canada. I think there is an important issue and I think there has to be an independent examination of it.
Mr Frankford: I really haven't looked at it very closely myself, but if I understand right, there's a mixture of payment methods.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: There has been, yes.
Mr Frankford: There are salaries and fee-for-service.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: That's correct, there has been.
Mr Frankford: Have you had any thoughts on how well the fee-for-service arrangement works?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Given that the thrust at the present time is to move from a fee-for-service, convert it over to a salaried type of position, I think that's a fait accompli. I think that in terms of a salaried kind of position, the important thing is to ensure that the duties are compensated appropriately and that people feel that they're being treated fairly.
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The Chair: Mr Malkowski, and then Mr Waters.
Mr Malkowski: Congratulations on your intended appointment. Could you perhaps inform the committee of your knowledge of the justice system and specifically the role of the justice of the peace in this system?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I have worked previously with the police throughout Ontario, so I have some idea in terms of the operations and how the justices of the peace relate to the police officers. I have looked at the positions and the duties and so on of presiding versus non-presiding justices of the peace, the extensiveness of their role in the legislation they're dealing with, the Provincial Offences Act, the various other mental health acts and environmental acts, the Criminal Code and so on.
I'm familiar with their role in terms of the issuance of various types of warrants, bail hearings, commitments in terms of mental health and so on. I think I have a fairly good idea of the types of duties they're involved with. I'm also familiar with the fact that there have been a number of duties over recent years that have been transferred from judges to justices of the peace, which I think has significant implications in terms of their remuneration.
Mr Malkowski: Just to follow up, could you perhaps explain what kind of leadership skills you have that you'll be able to bring the committee, where you can balance the views and the needs of the justices of the peace with the need for the administration and the remuneration?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: That, of course, is the critical challenge in terms of getting something that's fair and equitable and also affordable. I think, in terms of my own experience, that I have dealt with a number of issues along this line. The current mediation that I'm dealing with at Bell Canada involves significant sums of money which are considerably in excess of what's involved here. I think there's my compensation background, as well as project management experience, as well as dealing with fairly complex situations which have in the past had government policy and financial implications. I've been involved in looking at intergovernmental agreements between the federal and provincial governments, in looking at payouts on skill training and looking at various others issues in total compensation which I think can be applied in terms of experience here.
Mr Malkowski: Thank you. Good luck.
Mr Waters: Being a rural representative, I'm curious how that's going to work. I guess like a number of us who sit in the Legislature, we represent very rural areas of the province, and I would want to make sure that indeed -- because although the job may be the same on paper, it isn't necessarily the reality out there. Quite often, a justice of the peace in rural Ontario, I know within my riding, sometimes drives from Barrie to Midland or Midland to Barrie or wherever. They drive vast distances at all hours of the day and night. I'm wondering if there's any intent to look at rural versus urban, or if there is a need to do that.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: The rural justices of the peace, as I understand it, have made representation to the fact that they feel their job is a broader job because they're more alone out there than, say, people in Toronto. On the other hand, the people in Toronto have indicated that they have a more complex set of duties and more involved kinds of cases.
In terms of determining the fair remuneration, really what has to be looked at is the skill, effort, responsibility and working conditions. In one case it may offset the other, but if they are significantly different, then there should be some accommodation in terms of the remuneration for that. But at this stage it's difficult for me to say whether or not there is a significant difference. You'd have to look into it in some depth.
Mr Waters: The last question is, should it be binding on us as government?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: The judges' commission of course now is binding, and I think that's a difficult question. There is some merit to having an independent commission being binding, obviously, because the purpose of setting up an independent commission is so that you have that kind of advice; on the other hand, recognizing that the government as a whole has to consider all of its financial liabilities, if you come with a significant remuneration package for one sector and not for others, then you create problems for everyone.
Mr Bradley: Maybe we can tie them to MPPs' pay.
Mr Waters: We'd also have to make that binding, Mr Bradley.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Interesting concept. I'm not trying to totally evade the question, but I really think that it deserves more examination before I can make some sort of suggestion in that regard.
Mr Waters: I thank you very much for coming before us. I wish you well.
The Chair: Mr Conway.
Mr Conway: Thank you, Madam Chair, and Ms -- I've got my names mixed up here -- Palmer. I got that partly right; Ms Davidson-Palmer. A very impressive résumé, and this is an interesting subject. I was interested in your comments to the previous questioners.
Like Mr Waters, I represent a rural community and I'm aware of the changes that the JPs in our area are now expected to discharge. They seem to be doing so quite admirably, and I think there is clearly the expectation that we will move to a greater, not lesser, role for JPs. There's no doubt that because it's been such a hodgepodge over the years, the questions of not just mandate but status and remuneration are going to be very considerable.
My experience here over the years is that of course none of this takes place in a vacuum.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Right.
Mr Conway: Most of my provincial court judge friends -- I don't have many, but I have some -- spend not all of their time but a good bit of their time complaining bitterly about how much more work and how many fewer dollars they earn relative to their county court colleagues. I'm stunned at the investiture of time and effort in that comparative question.
I can well imagine how now the justices of the peace will be -- and I think they do have a case. I think they have been jobbed in some ways. I'm sitting here trying to contain myself because I had some discussions this summer with people on the provincial court bench and they made the mistake of telling me some of what they were not doing. Again, it's insidious almost to raise these questions because I know it's that some judicial districts are, quite frankly, easier than others and you've got to set a rule for the entire province.
But I guess one of the questions I have, and it's been alluded to, is what your own view would be as to an appropriate level of remuneration. You've sort of answered that by saying it has to be looked at to a greater extent. I would encourage you to do that, but if I ever were in a situation of real authority -- and increasingly, elected members have no authority in these matters.
I once sat in a cabinet with my friend Bradley where the people I represented actually thought I had something to do with the appointment of judges, and I had nothing to do with the appointment of judges, which at one level didn't bother me, except everybody I represented thought I did. What I'm finding, particularly in the sanctum sanctorum of the judicial and quasi-judicial world, is that people really want to take just about everything away from the politicians except the messy businesses of accountability and responsibility, including who gets to pay the bill.
I don't know who's there now, but in our day in government we appointed a happy band of disinterested worthies, Michele Landsberg and others, good people. They got to make the appointments. The only thing we never did was advertise the fact that that's where the real power was vested. It had nothing to do with the cabinet, it had nothing to do with the Legislature. We got to raise the taxes and pay the bills, which nobody else seemed to volunteer to do.
So I guess my question in all of this is, would you be willing in the course of this mandate to operate within some kind of envelope that said: "I'd like to give you real encouragement on this compensatory matter but would also include an opportunity to recommend a sort of zero-sum game. We're going to provide these levels of income for full-time JPs, part-time JPs, but as part of this consideration we're going to recommend the reduction of full-time provincial court judges by 8%"?
The difficulty we have in this is that since there is basically at best a very diffused game being played here, nobody really sure who's on first and who's on second, the assumption is that the sky's the limit in terms of paying the bill.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think that relates back to Mr Waters's question about the issue of binding. I think the problem there is, the mandate of this commission is solely with respect to the justices of the peace, so this commission cannot make a decision which impacts on the judges, for example.
Mr Conway: But we know of course it does.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Coming back to your concern with respect to the overall budgeting of the government, then obviously what has to happen is you have to look at what happens with the judges, what happens with the justices, what happens with the public service, what happens with all of these people who are calling upon the financial capabilities of the government. That is where the decision of the politicians lies at the present time.
Now, because the binding of the judges is there, you're quite right, it does remove some of your control, if you will, over that particular aspect. However, on the other hand, against that, you've got the whole issue of an independent judiciary, so it's a very difficult question.
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Mr Conway: But there's no question in your mind, as an expert on these matters of compensation, that any decision that is made on the subject of justices of the peace's remuneration will be immediately seized upon by everybody else in the judicial and quasi-judicial fields as the basis for a renegotiation of their income status.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: It happens all the time --
Mr Conway: Absolutely.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: -- in every facet, the private and public sectors.
Mr Conway: I guess I'd just make the point again that we've got to do something about advertising to the world that we have nothing to do any more with any of this except to pay the bills, as crazy and as cockamamy as these bills are getting to be. The poor people in Bracebridge think that Dan Waters has something to do with this, and he doesn't, except vote the tax appropriation.
The Chair: I think Mr Bradley has a question. Did you have another question?
Mr Conway: No.
Mr Bradley: My question is -- and this is perhaps a silly question because you're being appointed -- why do we set up these commissions? We know that there's no money. I just read an article by Martin Mittelstaedt, who certainly couldn't be considered to be a right-winger, talking about "Canada Gets Deficit Wake-up Call" in today's Globe and Mail, showing that we're in an appalling situation in debt.
The government already had all these contracts it set up and then it broke them all, said collective agreements don't mean anything, not because it wanted to be mean but because it has no money. So don't you think the government is unwise to set up a commission to which it cannot listen and still maintain any kind of financial integrity?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think one way or the other a decision has to be taken about the remuneration of the justices of the peace. I think the key issue here is that one of their concerns, and it relates back to what you were saying, is that they have been on the wrong side of the preferential treatment of other occupational groups in the judiciary. I think that somehow a decision has to be taken.
I think the reason for the commission was that there be an independent body which looks at this whole issue. In the context of the overall expenditures the government has to make -- and I'm referring to everybody, not just the NDP, but all of the expenditures that you have to make decisions on -- this obviously has to be compared with other things.
Mr Conway: But judges are different today. Don't talk to me about judges.
Mr Bradley: It seems to me that if you make it non-binding -- if it's binding, that's one thing -- for instance, which a lot of people would probably be in favour of now, all it does is raise expectations, because the Commission on Election Finances every year comes in and says the members of the Legislature should get a huge increase, they're underpaid.
Mr Jackson: They're making less than justices of the peace.
Mr Bradley: Yes. Then everybody just laughs, and says, "Of course, we won't be implementing that." But it does put in the minds of MPPs that they must be hard-done-by because the commission says they're hard-done-by. My point is that if we set up this commission on which you will be sitting, and if it's non-binding, isn't all you're going to do is raise the expectations of justices of the peace and tell them that they're hard-done-by when the government says, "You may be worth it according to the commission, but we're not paying you that because we don't have any money"?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think there has to be some good faith in all of these endeavours. If a recommendation is made and if it is deemed to be one that's fair and objective and also takes into account the fact that we're not in the early 1980s here -- we're dealing with a recessionary environment -- whatever recommendations come out of this particular commission have to be realistic in that context. I wouldn't presume at this stage. I personally wouldn't go into it if I felt that anything this commission recommends is going to be automatically not accepted.
Mr Bradley: Did the government put down any rules as to how you operate in these terms? The big argument now is, the municipalities will say the government should tell those arbitrators that they can't be giving these huge increases. That never really happens except that the government frowns on it and doesn't reappoint them. That's the problem I can see, that if it's binding and it doesn't take into account the ability to pay, something's got to happen there. If it's non-binding, all it does is raise expectations and it's a charade you go through. Don't you think -- and I hate those questions -- that it would be better for the government to simply say what it's paying these people and that's it?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: In answer to your preliminary question about whether or not there are rules, there are terms of reference for this commission but there are not terms of reference which state, "You will not increase the wages, or you will only increase them by 1% or 2%." However, in dealing with compensation issues, whether you're dealing with a major corporation or you're dealing with a government agency, you have to be cognizant of the fact that there aren't unlimited funds to throw at these things. In the context of having an independent examination of the roles of these people and their remuneration, I think this is an appropriate way to go.
Mr Jackson: Ms Davidson-Palmer, I am very much impressed with your résumé and therefore I'm not going to get into your qualifications. I think you're eminently qualified. I do have a series of questions, though, if you could assist me with them.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Certainly.
Mr Jackson: I concur with my colleagues from the Liberal caucus who indicate that any paper you produce is going to have an impact with respect to comparabilities within the justice field. I personally feel that we've got the cart before the horse, because at several inquests, juries in this province have identified serious weaknesses in the delivery of our justice system, serious weaknesses that in fact, according to the Yeo inquest, were a contributing factor in the death of Nina de Villiers in my community, for example. You may or may not be familiar with that case. I am rather disheartened and discouraged that the government's position is, "We have an ongoing educational program," and so on and so forth, but in my view we're putting the cart before the horse.
That leads me to my first question. This sort of academic range or training range or experience range presents itself as the first challenge for you in terms of developing compensation packages because you're dealing with such variety. You're not dealing with a professional association which is compact and tight and is being assessed relative to some other comparability. This is a very loosely defined, quasi-political appointment process. It's really quite unusual. Could you first share with me how you intend to deal with this parallel problem of dealing with targeting salaries when we have clearly identified independently in this province that we have a serious problem in terms of qualifications?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think one of the difficulties with this particular position is that it is defined legislatively in exclusionary terms. It's defined around what they may not do as opposed to, in a sense, what they do. In compensation terms, it's important to define what people actually do and what the qualifications are that they're actually bringing to this. So I think one of the things that has to be addressed here is what the basic qualifications are or at what point you expect these people to be fully competent and to be knowledgeable about whatever range of knowledge and so on.
Mr Jackson: Are you going to deal with that issue in your report?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: It has to be looked at in terms of defining what the job is.
Mr Jackson: Will you be doing a Hay evaluation system or some other variation of that?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I wouldn't necessarily see using a Hay evaluation system. I think there are many different types of evaluation systems and that's --
Mr Jackson: The principle around a Hay evaluation system is --
Ms Davidson-Parker: It's a point factor system which is --
Mr Jackson: Are you going to be looking at that kind of an -- obviously, you're going to be interviewing a cohort group in various corners of the province and you're going to be --
Ms Davidson-Parker: Right.
Mr Jackson: What kind of assessment tools are you anticipating utilizing?
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think what has to happen initially is to identify what the relevant factors and subfactors are in this particular job, so that in determining the specific type of job evaluation method that would be used, you would have to address what kinds of factors are there. Hay has some very specific factors and they may or may not apply that well to this type of position.
I think that's something that certainly needs to be looked at, obviously, how these jobs are going to be evaluated, because in the previous setting it was done in it was largely a market survey and went to market and placed them in between, rather than looking at some sort of evaluation of that position relative to other positions. All of this has to be examined.
Mr Jackson: I appreciate your candour with reference to the exclusionary versus the inclusive nature of the legislation. In my view, that's really where we should have started with this group and not sort of rushed into the compensation component. I haven't found a citizen in Ontario who's satisfied with his or her compensation. I'm still waiting to find one, and when I do I'm sure it won't be a justice of the peace.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think that a good compensation system has significant impact in terms of the motivation of people, in terms of the performance of people and so on. It really is a very important piece in that whole equation of getting a qualified and competent workforce. People feel they're underpaid if they feel that somehow they're being mistreated relative to other people, and then you have difficulties. However, I do accept your point that there are very few people who feel they are appropriately paid in any occupation.
Mr Jackson: My concern emanates from this notion, that I know of justices of the peace who are eminently qualified and I know others who are, on a daily basis, stretching it to embrace fully their responsibilities and it shows. In my view, that's a more critical public policy issue. Compensation can be dealt with in a lockstep method using professionals such as yourself, but the government, whatever government, is impeded by the notion that we're going to set a standard of compensation without a standard of conduct, and that concerns me.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: I think the job has to be described.
Mr Jackson: I guess just finally, there's been a lot of controversy about judges losing their positions because of inappropriate courtroom conduct. As compensation rises that becomes a more critical issue, and the loosely defined confederation of employees, in this case justices of the peace, would have some strong views about issues around workplace harassment and inappropriate conduct. But it is resulting more, through the court of public opinion or through legislation, in automatic dismissal.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Right.
Mr Jackson: Will you be dealing with issues around that and/or its impact or factoring in term of compensation? I know that's done in some organizations -- physicians, in the legal community. There is some factoring in to the notion of automatic professional job loss.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: Yes. That type of situation is not really part and parcel of a review of compensation. However, there is the general question of performance which could come into an examination of whether or not you have performance pay. In the last few years we have sort of gone away from performance bonuses. Because of the recession, there simply isn't the money to make those things meaningful. The issue of performance in terms of total compensation can be built into it --
Mr Jackson: That's what I thought.
Ms Davidson-Palmer: -- but the guidelines in terms of what you would deem to be totally unacceptable behaviour I think are apart from the work of this particular commission.
Mr Jackson: Thank you and good luck.
The Chair: Thank you for your appearance, Ms Davidson-Palmer, before the committee.
The committee recessed from 1215 to 1405.
SHIRLEY ANNE CLEMENT
Review of intended appointment, selected by official opposition party: Shirley Anne Clement, intended appointee as full-time member and vice-chair, Social Assistance Review Board.
The Chair: Ms Clement, if you wish you may make a brief opening comment or we can just start in rotation with questions from the members.
Ms Shirley Anne Clement: Please feel free to start.
Mr Cleary: Welcome to the committee. Local administrators and local municipal people tell me that they're very frustrated that they might turn someone down and then it would go to the review commission and be approved. Would you like to comment on that?
Ms Clement: The appeal process is written into the legislation, and I think it's important that any time a decision is made by the appeals review board that the decision reflect the merits of that particular case and that it be made in accordance with the provisions of the legislation. It's my understanding from reviewing the statistics issued by the Social Assistance Review Board that about 50% of the appeals are allowed and 50% of the appeals are denied. So not every case that goes before the Social Assistance Review Board is in fact allowed.
Mr Cleary: Anyway, these people told me that they were just at a convention recently and there was a lot of frustration there and they find it hard to budget with the process in place. Do you feel that they have concerns? Do you feel that that's the case?
Ms Clement: I'm not clear what your question is.
Mr Cleary: Well, they tell me that the majority or a large percentage of the ones they turn down get approved.
Ms Clement: Well, I understand from the statistics issued by the Social Assistance Review Board that in fact that's not the case, that approximately 50% of the appeals that are heard are allowed and 50% are denied, and the decisions have to be based on the provisions of the legislation and the merits of each individual case.
Mr Cleary: How do you feel about some of the younger people who are getting approved for social assistance who were turned down?
Ms Clement: My understanding of the legislation is that for applicants who are between the ages of 16 and 18, there is discretion provided for the provision of social assistance. The discretion is exercised in instances where there are extreme cases of need, for example, if there is alcohol abuse in the home or if there is evidence of physical or sexual abuse. There has to be some sort of safety net for those young people, because they're beyond the jurisdiction of the children's aid societies beyond age 16.
Again, the statistics issued by the Social Assistance Review Board indicate to me that not all cases of 16- to 18-year-olds who appeal the decisions to deny assistance are in fact allowed. Again, every case, even in those instances, has to be adjudicated on its own merits and in the provisions of the legislation.
Also, it's helpful to look at decisions issued by the Social Assistance Review Board; you look at the body of jurisprudence and make a determination as to what has been the experience of the board, what is meant by the term "exceptional circumstances" when you're making a decision, what warrants the provision of assistance, what the law requires.
Mr Bradley: Do we still have much time left, Chair? Five minutes? My understanding is, and correct me if I'm wrong, that when it was established -- and it was a very good program in terms of meeting the goals that you've mentioned -- at that time the person who was going to receive assistance had to prove that there was abuse. Now the government has to prove that there isn't abuse. Am I correct in that? I was having a discussion with my Conservative colleague Mr Jackson on that. Is that correct?
Ms Clement: Well, the legislation requires that discretion be exercised. When you're exercising discretion, you have to look at the merits of the individual case and say, "Is there a reason for this young person between 16 and 18 to live somewhere else other than the family home?" You look at the circumstances. The kinds of things that you have to be attentive to are allegations of abuse, be it physical or sexual in nature, a family home environment where there is constant use of alcohol or other drugs, a home environment that's not conducive to a healthy lifestyle. But there has to be some kind of evidence when you're reaching a decision; it can't just be on, "I'm not happy at home." You would look at the decisions that have been taken and the kind of evidence that has been considered by the Social Assistance Review Board in rendering those decisions to try and get an idea of the kind of definitions being applied when making a decision to either grant or deny assistance. It's very difficult to generalize in that kind of a situation.
Mr Bradley: Admittedly, it always is difficult to generalize, because we can all think of instances where -- as I say, I think the program's purpose is a very good purpose, and it has helped some students who otherwise might not have been able to stay in school, would have had to go to work full-time in fact to continue to exist. On the other hand, I continue to get calls from parents and from teachers who say (a) that they're not showing up for class or (b) they're simply using it as a lever because they don't want the rules at home. Then you get the five of them together and they have a big smirk on their faces. The other kids say: "This is the way to live. Obviously, we'll have a great time, no rules. I can stay out all night and then I can go to school the next day." This is the concern of the parents.
Then there's the ungrateful taxpayers out there who are really pushing this, which is why I always get back -- and you can't generalize -- to the fact that if it could be targeted appropriately and administered correctly, I think it would have good support. My fear is that if you had a very right-wing government take over, the whole program would be tossed out simply because of the abuses that are taking place. I'll ask you to comment on that.
Ms Clement: Again, in the scenario you raise with respect to school attendance, there are requirements in the legislation that certain criteria be met, and if an individual is denied assistance or their assistance is terminated because they do not meet those criteria, the onus would be on the appellant to satisfy the board that they in fact have met the criteria, either by regular school attendance or that they are looking actively for employment. Whatever the legislation requires, they have to meet that criteria. It's not just a carte blanche grant, saying, "Here's income; you don't need to do anything." With rights come responsibilities, and there are responsibilities spelled out in the legislation.
Mr Bradley: There would be a fear out there -- and I think governments try to look for people who can adjudicate in a fair and impartial way -- that you could have a situation one way or the other, where you either had people who were denying everything and therefore reasonable appellants didn't get what they deserved, or on the other hand, a government could appoint a number of people who are automatically going to be sympathetic to the appellants, and the floodgates are opened. Municipalities tear their hair out over it because they're told by the government they're supposed to be administering this carefully, and then it goes to the Social Assistance Review Board, only to have them overrule what the municipality has done to try to meet what the government says it wanted done.
Ms Clement: At the risk of sounding repetitious, I again will cite the statistics from the Social Assistance Review Board, that we know 50% are denied, 50% are allowed. I'd like to use an analogy, because it has crossed my mind, and everyone who has had an opportunity to read my résumé knows that my background in large part is in advocacy. If we look at the judicial system, judges are appointed after 10 years of service on the bench, either from the crown counsel or as advocates for criminals or whatever. There has to be experience in the adjudicative process to know what the adjudicative process requires.
Therefore, I think that whoever is appointed -- and there's an interview process you go through -- you have to know about the system. You have to render decisions that are impartial. Justice not only has to be done; it has to be seen to be done. Your decisions must reflect the merits of each individual case, and they should stand up to any kind of review that occurs.
Mr Bradley: I suppose an observation would be that, again, I have the fear that in Ontario we're going to see what we had happen out west, and that is, when governments change hands we're going to see mass moving of people in and out of positions, even in the civil service, let alone in agencies, boards, and commissions. I would say that in the best of all worlds a succeeding government should be able to live with most of the appointments that a preceding government has made, whether it's in terms of the civil service or commissions. My problem is that if we see people moving in who are all on one side of an issue, this may not happen. So I guess the best answer to that is, "See me in action; make your judgment." Is that fair?
Ms Clement: Well, again, because of the interview and selection process, I like to believe that I was chosen for my skills, not as an advocate but to have the capacity to be an impartial decision-maker. I would invite you a few months from now to look at my work. I feel very strongly about my professional skills and qualifications.
Mr Sterling: I'm intrigued by the 50% figure which you've used now three times. It's my understanding that a person can appeal to the Social Assistance Review Board as many times as they might wish. Is that correct?
Ms Clement: Well, in order to appeal, there has to have been a decision made.
Mr Sterling: Yes.
Ms Clement: So the decision would have been made either at the initial level -- the second type of appeal that might occur is on reconsideration, but those cases are heard only in very exceptional circumstances. There would have to have been an error in law or fact.
Mr Sterling: So the 50% refusal would include, in some cases, some case which has been heard twice or thrice?
Ms Clement: Twice possibly, I believe, if it's gone to reconsideration.
Mr Sterling: That would count as two, then, wouldn't it, in the refusal?
Ms Clement: I don't know how the statistics were compiled, I'm sorry. I can't answer your question in terms of what those percentages represent. I should have brought the report with me. But in looking at the decision-making process at the board and looking at the statistics that were offered by the Social Assistance Review Board when I applied, my understanding was that the win and loss ratio, or the allowed-denied ratio, was about the same. So I think it would be not correct to say that all cases are allowed or all cases are denied.
Mr Sterling: The rules are pretty clear in terms of who qualifies and who doesn't qualify for social assistance. Is that not correct?
Ms Clement: They're fairly clear, with the exception, again, I think, of the 16- to 18-year-olds. Because the legislation allows for the exercise of discretion, it really is a judgment call in that area. That's probably why that particular category is more problematic. That's my suspicion. It's been a number of years since I've worked in that area, so I can't say for sure, but I know that the regulations and the legislation itself spell out certain criteria. There has to be a need, you have to fall within a certain category in order to apply and qualify for assistance and then the decision is made to either deny or to grant. There have to be reasons that the denial occurs, and those are the reasons that are examined.
Mr Sterling: Do there have to be reasons when you give?
Ms Clement: Pardon?
Mr Sterling: Do there have to be reasons when you grant the appeal?
Ms Clement: Oh, yes, and the reasons would have to reflect the provisions of the legislation as well as the jurisprudence, the body of decisions that have been made previously by the Social Assistance Review Board. They're often very helpful when you're looking at areas of definition or areas of clarification. What has been the past practice within the last 10 years? Those decisions are kept. It's like any body of law where you're looking at the decisions of the courts to be reasoned in terms of, how are these decisions arrived at, how have they interpreted the legislation?
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Mr Sterling: I find 50% an absolutely astounding high figure in terms of allowing appeals. I find that unbelievable. I would have thought the figure should have been around 10%. Either one of two things is wrong: number one is the appeal board being far too lenient or, number two, the system is amuck and it's not clear enough as to what is happening. I just find it astounding that you have a 50-50 chance of reversing what the system says to you if you go to appeal. Don't you find it amazingly high? Shouldn't the system be fairly clear as to who gets and who doesn't get and the social worker's word taken or the teacher's or whatever?
Ms Clement: I think that's why we have an appeal process in the first place: because it isn't always entirely clear.
Mr Sterling: The question is about the percentage. You view it not as being too high?
Ms Clement: In terms of my knowledge of other appeals --
Mr Sterling: You see, my concern on this is that appeal tribunals are sometimes accused of generating their own work. Okay? How do they generate their own work? They start to be very, very gracious about giving out favourable decisions. That's why I have a concern about your tribunal. If you're giving 50%, you're attracting just about everybody who is given a decision to appeal. Does that not make sense to you?
Ms Clement: It's not my understanding of why a board would exist. I think it's important in any system where decisions are made that there be an opportunity to challenge those decisions. In terms of whether it's too generous, in terms of looking at the decisions, they're reasoned in terms of what the legislation provides and what the merits of each individual case are. I can't say that they're too generous or that they're not too generous; I don't know without reading every single decision, but I trust the decisions that are made to be sound ones. They are open to judicial review if they are erroneous. If they're flawed, the courts can look at them.
Mr Sterling: Flawed on a point of law, not on the weight of the evidence. You weigh the evidence, and you make that decision. In terms of appealing anything above you, there's a very minor opportunity for either side to switch it at that stage of the game. Is that not correct?
Ms Clement: Yes, there is an opportunity for judicial review if there's a clear error. But you do have to exercise judgement when you're making a decision, and you have to look closely at the evidence and the merits of that evidence.
Mr Sterling: Well, you're going to be very busy as long as the percentage is that high.
Mr Jackson: I'd like to ask the question from a different angle, but it's the same question, and that has to do with: What does that tell you about either the decisions being made by Community and Social Services or decisions being made by municipalities, that they are generating such erroneous case management that they are coming to you and succeeding, in your mind, to reverse an inappropriate decision by one or either of those levels of government?
Ms Clement: These are my own very personal views, but I suspect that in part there are a number of reasons that the increase in appeals has occurred over the last number of years. Certainly, one is the recession; a greater number of people qualifying for social assistance earlier on. With changes to other legislation, it results in an influx of applications for general welfare assistance. The system is hugely overburdened. The case loads for people who are administering the system are phenomenal.
Mr Jackson: But you appreciate that everyone here, from all three political parties, is keenly aware of the stress and burden, both financially and on human resources.
Ms Clement: Right.
Mr Jackson: My question to you is: What does that tell you about the declining quality of decisions being made by Comsoc employees and municipal employees who are administering social assistance in Ontario? Numbers are numbers, and policy changes are policy changes. I'm simply saying that this huge increase in the number of appeals that you're apparently determining were inappropriately handled by those levels of government, what does that tell you about the quality of work being done on social assistance before it gets to you?
Ms Clement: To me, on the surface it appears -- and, again, it appears; I haven't had enough direct input or knowledge to know for certain that my opinion is the correct one, but I would suspect that there isn't sufficient time to examine the information needed to make a decision about entitlement, whether it be with respect to questions of assets or economic need or whatever criteria, job searches if it's general welfare assistance. All of that information may be brought to the appeal where there hasn't been an opportunity to do it before the appeal is launched. So there are not sufficient resources, I don't think, to gather enough information to make a sound decision in terms of eligibility.
Mr Jackson: Has the presence of legal counsel been a determining factor in terms of being able to assemble those items on behalf of the client? Is that a major determining factor?
Ms Clement: I really can't answer that because I don't know what the Social Assistance Review Board's experience is in terms of the assistance of legal counsel. I think that anybody who's familiar with the legislation would be better versed in terms of knowing what's necessary to appeal a decision that's been made in terms of the kind of evidence that's made or the questions that need to be answered in looking at the decision and the correctness of that decision.
Mr Jackson: Aside from your identification of the pressures on time and the quality of decisions made by ministry staff, what other factor do you consider significant in terms of the reason for the turnaround in decisions and the high ratio of reversed decisions?
Ms Clement: I honestly can't say any other factors that I'm directly familiar with.
Mr Jackson: Finally, do you support the necessity of the implementation of professional accreditation for social workers, since they have such a huge impact on social assistance and social assistance implementation in Ontario?
Ms Clement: The accreditation of social workers? Okay, I'd like to speak to that.
Mr Jackson: By legislation. I notice from your résumé that you had some interest in this political issue and I just wondered what your views were, since as a member of the board you will be overseeing a certain amount of the activities in terms of your own human resource matters.
Ms Clement: First of all, most of the case workers who are employed to administer the social assistance system are not social workers in terms of the understanding of social worker that I would use as a professional social worker. In the quality of decision-making, I don't think it's necessary that they be social workers, but that they have a good, sound knowledge of what administrative law requires in terms of evidence and the requirements of the act and the regulations.
In terms of the accreditation of the profession, I feel very strongly that it's important, but for reasons totally unrelated to social assistance. The best example I can use there is that someone who is holding themselves out as a private practitioner need not have any kind of professional accreditation, so ex-offenders may hold themselves out as youth counsellors, and that deeply concerns me as a social worker.
The Chair: We have three government members: Ms Carter, Ms Harrington and Dr Frankford.
Ms Carter: Could you give us some idea, quite briefly, of the process by which you were chosen for this appointment? We did touch on it very, very briefly, but we didn't really go into it.
Ms Clement: Certainly. I applied to the Social Assistance Review Board after reading an advertisement. It was 1987, I believe. I had worked in the system at that point for about three years as an advocate and was very interested in becoming a decision-maker. I greatly love administrative law and thought that I could offer a contribution. I wasn't selected and it was my understanding at that time the reason I wasn't selected is because they really did require a francophone candidate for northern Ontario. I asked that my résumé be held on file so that if there were opportunities in the future, I would be considered.
As I understand it, my application was pulled from the data bank when there were openings. I resubmitted an application in I believe March or April of this year and submitted an updated résumé because my skills and experience had changed somewhat since then.
The interview process was fairly arduous. There were four people present. It was very analogous to what we go through in the public service, and I had just recently been a manager with the office of the worker adviser and so was familiar with the interview process. As well, there was a written test. The written test consisted of writing a decision based on a case fact and looking at the provisions of the legislation with reference to that particular case. That's the process I went through.
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Ms Carter: So it's been quite rigorous and also you have been interested in doing this for quite some time. It does seem to me that you're very well qualified for this appointment. I just wondered if you could tell us about some of your recent work with social assistance recipients, which is obviously very relevant to this.
Ms Clement: My most recent involvement with social assistance has been primarily in making referrals of injured workers, because I've worked as an advocate for injured workers exclusively since 1987. Very often the clients that I work with find themselves in a position of not having any income. The other thing I've had to do, and my record will stand very clearly on this, is where they've had to apply for interim assistance, to make it very clear to those individuals that if we are successful in appealing the workers' compensation decision, they would have to repay it. Most of the applicants sign waivers so that recovery can be made at the time the appeal is heard and benefits are granted.
I've also had to stay aware of what the changes are in terms of the type of assistance they may qualify for, because sometimes the spouse may be working and having a minimal amount of income, and also needing to know about special assistance if they're a disabled individual, knowing what may be there in terms of special assistance either for medication or for assistive devices to help them with their handicap.
Ms Harrington: Thank you very much for coming. I understand you don't live in the north any more. Are you in southern Ontario?
Ms Clement: No, I don't. I relocated to London, Ontario, in November 1992. I saw it as offering more professional opportunities. I had had an interest in returning to law school and in fact had made application to law school in the spring and had seriously considered going back to school, but then this opportunity came along and I decided it is the kind of career challenge that I'm ready for at this point.
Ms Harrington: I see. I think we all are very concerned about social assistance and its role in our society because traditionally it has been, I think, a cycle, a difficult thing for people to break away from. It's part of our society that I think we as legislators want to change. Personally, I believe we are in the midst of a massive change in the attitudes of our society, and that is towards equity in seeing that you can't categorize people, that you have to give equal opportunity to people and eliminate restrictive traditions. I think that's obviously what we're in the middle of now with employment equity and a whole lot of other issues.
Actually, I have two young people in my family, a girl who's 18 and a boy who's 22 now. From knowing them and their friends, you appreciate some of the problems that my colleague's just talked about, that it can become an abuse, and on the other hand it can become an essential part of a young person's life to get away from a terrible situation. So I certainly don't envy you in that decision-making role, but I see young people as the key to whether or not they go on social assistance, their attitude towards it and the role of the people in the system, how they deal with recipients. It's important that if young people go on to the system, they don't stay on that system, that it doesn't put them down, that they in fact learn that this is a temporary measure; this is a stepping stone to something else. Anyway, enough of that.
I wanted to ask you what your vision is of the social assistance system, what it should be or could be, if you could help us.
Ms Clement: I think there will always be a need for a social assistance system. We live in a democratic society that requires the provision of a social safety net. However, we also now live in an economic time where we're all learning to have to do more with less. I think that as the system is moving towards change, the key component is movement towards employment, full employment, in this country. That would be the ideal, but there are always going to be those individuals who require support either because of a disability or other situations over which they have absolutely no control.
The manner in which the system is revised -- I don't know what it's going to look like in a year, two years, five years from now. I know that the federal government is looking very closely at the whole of the social system to see what the safety net should look like, to look at where there may be redundancies, to look at working more collaboratively to avoid duplication. I think that's going to be a long, slow process.
In my recent graduate studies, we looked very closely at social policy. There are so many layers and implications when you look at changing social policy that it's important to have a really full hearing from all of the affected parties. I think before any change can occur, everybody's voice has to be heard in terms of making changes, what the implications are for government, for individuals, for society as a whole. My own view is it would be wonderful to have full employment. I think that's the best answer.
Ms Harrington: I certainly would agree with you. Lloyd Axworthy is in fact coming to Niagara Falls this week to speak about the future changes in social assistance, so I hope we'll get on with it as quickly as possible.
Mr Frankford: Could you perhaps comment on the extent to which the need for prescription drugs and assistive devices and other health services influences people being on social assistance? Any thoughts you have about changes which could be introduced in Ontario?
Ms Clement: Just a personal thought. It's my understanding of something that is occurring recently, and that is a program by the Ontario pharmacists looking at prescription drugs to ensure that there isn't abuse. I think that's a very good system, particularly as our population ages, and there may be assistance through various programs for prescription drugs. I think that's good not only in terms of the best use of the resources, but also for the health of the individuals requiring prescriptions and assistive devices. I hope that answers the question.
Mr Frankford: I guess I was thinking that there are circumstances in which the cost of prescription drugs is really the driving factor to get on assistance.
Ms Clement: That's my understanding where a nominal amount of assistance may be available; for example, for the working poor, someone who doesn't have any kind of plan where they're employed, but may require it, for example, if they have a child who's asthmatic and prescription drugs are $200 or $300 a month. While they may not qualify for social assistance in terms of a monthly income, they certainly need assistance in meeting that child's needs.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms Clement, for your appearance before the committee this afternoon.
DIANNE CRAWFORD
Review of intended appointment, selected by government party: Dianne Crawford, intended appointee as member, Peterborough Police Services Board.
The Chair: Welcome, Ms Crawford. If you wish, you may make a brief opening comment, or we may just start in rotation from the committee members.
Mrs Dianne Crawford: I guess I would just like to share how delighted I am to be here today. When I first saw the advertisement in the paper, I felt strongly compelled to apply and I've really enjoyed the process so far.
The Chair: Good. That's great. The government party, Ms Carter.
Ms Carter: I would like to welcome you to this committee, and I'm looking forward to having you on the board.
Mr Bradley: Oh, you're presuming. How presumptuous.
Ms Carter: You know what the statistics are --
Mr Bradley: About 100%.
Ms Carter: -- about how many people we turn down here. But I just want to say that of course I know you in your work capacity as assistant administrator at Marycrest Home for the Aged. Of course, during my time in this job, I've been into quite a few homes for the aged and I've been involved in issues concerning them. I think Marycrest does the best job on the least amount of money that I've come across as far as I can make out. Certainly you manage on a very small per diem amount and there's always a very good atmosphere whenever I go to Marycrest.
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I know that you're involved in budgeting and I know that the police services board is looking forward to having somebody on there who is able to do budgeting. I think you're going to be that person, and you seem to me to be very well qualified for that. I was just wondering what ideas you might have as to how you can help the police services board be wise as far as budgeting goes and perhaps what some of the priorities are as to where you think there might be cuts and where you would resist in making cuts.
Mrs Crawford: In half an hour?
The Chair: Or in 10 minutes.
Mrs Crawford: Well, Mrs Carter, I think there has to be a balance in budgeting. I appreciate that the taxpayers in the city of Peterborough are telling all levels of government that they're tired of increases in taxes. At the same time, that has to be weighed against community need, and I certainly see police services as a vital service. I would commend the present administration and board for the cuts they've made with regard to social contract and general budget restrictions, but I guess I also fear that there might be a limit as to how much you can cut without severely affecting the service that's delivered.
So I would certainly offer my services on the budget committee. I would be prepared to go over and once again sit before city council with a budget. I do take an interest in that and think I bring some experience. But I don't have any agenda where I'm going to go in there and cut anything or change anything in a hurry. I need to learn a great deal and I'm looking forward to that budgetary process.
Ms Carter: Okay. Thank you. I do note from the materials that we've been given in connection with this interview that the crime rate, if you want to call it that, in Peterborough does seem to have been going down, and since the number of cases solved has stayed fairly steady, that means that a larger proportion are getting solved. So that looks as though somebody is doing something right.
Mrs Crawford: Yes. I brought along a recent article from Peterborough this week noting that the 1994 crime rate to the end of July compared to last year at this time is down 10%. So I'm coming on at a good time.
Ms Carter: We have all this talk as though things were getting terribly worse all the time, yet when we look at the figures it doesn't seem so. But maybe, as I said, we have been doing something right and maybe one of those things is more community-oriented policing where the police get in touch with people and make friends instead of just appearing in a punitive guise. I was just wondering if you have ideas on that, on community policing and how the police should relate to the public.
Mrs Crawford: I did make an appointment to speak to the chief and I asked him about the history of Peterborough community police services. I guess I do really believe that it's important for the police and the community to work together to better police services. I see it as a bigger subject than strictly maintaining the law: doing some preventive stuff, getting out into the schools and doing the educational programs, and being on a lot of the committees, race relations committees and violence protocol committees, those kinds of things. That would be helpful.
Ms Carter: And do you see them as doing a reasonably good job on that already?
Mrs Crawford: I really do. I'm impressed with the Peterborough police; I really am. I think the current administration has come a long way. I haven't maybe been as involved with them as when I worked for the city, but the changes I've seen have been certainly very positive ones: community outreach, employment equity, a lot of positive things -- computerization.
Ms Harrington: A quick question. When you first sat down, you said that you saw the ad in the paper.
Mrs Crawford: Yes, I did.
Ms Harrington: And that you immediately applied.
Mrs Crawford: Well, if this doesn't sound like me, I don't know who it does sound like. "Candidates should have an understanding of policing issues, experience in policymaking and budgeting, some volunteer involvement in community organizations and knowledge of the Peterborough community." I understand you're all given a copy of my résumé and covering letter. I tried to point out in that covering letter that I do have community involvement. I've been in Peterborough 22 years and I've been very involved in the community. I certainly have had a lot of experience, 25 years' experience now, in budgeting and policies and procedures.
Ms Harrington: So when you saw the ad, it sounded like you.
Mrs Crawford: It did. It sounded like this was something that I could give back into the community.
Ms Harrington: It's just that I wondered what there was about police services that particularly attracted you. It's just the involvement with the community, I guess.
Mrs Crawford: Well, it would be a new area for me to explore after social services and after long-term care and being quite involved with the college over the past 20 years and various boards and committees. So I thought it would be a new area to get into and to bring the community's side into police services. Again, I see myself as a community representative on the police board, not an ex-constable or somebody with a lot of police experience, but bringing that community on to the board. Also, to be honest with you, I thought there should be another woman on the board. I'm glad we have one woman at this time. I don't think two would hurt.
Ms Carter: Absolutely.
The Chair: Are there any other government members? There are four minutes left.
Mr Waters: Another thing in the research that I noticed, and they suggested that we might ask you for a comment on it, is gun control. It's interesting, because I come from a riding where having a gun in your house is considered a right. I think probably some 80% of the people within my riding have hunting rifles and shotguns in their homes. I guess the question is, what's the situation in the city of Peterborough, if you could comment on it or if you're aware, and indeed how you feel about gun control? What would be your suggestion on how we deal with the problem?
Mrs Crawford: I'm sorry, I feel very uninformed about this particular subject. I don't know what the situation would be in Peterborough. I know when they've had those two amnesty occasions and people could hand in firearms without any charges, there certainly has been a tremendous response. So obviously people have some guns in their homes.
I don't personally like firearms. I have a fear of firearms. I wouldn't want one in my house. I think they're dangerous. I think they should be controlled. At the same time, I don't have an answer how you deal with hunters and people who think they have a right. I suppose they have a licence and they have to pass exams, but this isn't likely the element we need to be worrying about. It's how do you keep illegal arms out of the reach of people who potentially could cause the problems, and I don't have an answer to that.
The Chair: Any other government members?
Mr Cleary: Welcome to the committee. Is employment equity a problem in Peterborough on the police force?
Mrs Crawford: Is it a problem?
Mr Cleary: Yes.
Mrs Crawford: Well, we have 103 sworn officers at this time; 10 are female. That's only 10%. If the population is about 52%-48%, then I guess there is a problem with employment equity in Peterborough. However, I would say that they've come a long way. I know for a fact 15 years ago there was an unwritten policy at the Peterborough police station that they just didn't interview women and they never hired them. So they now have 10 excellent female constables, and with the current act, there'll be more.
Mr Cleary: Do you have an auxiliary police force there too?
Mrs Crawford: No, not that I'm aware of.
Mr Cleary: Do you think there's room for an auxiliary police force?
Mrs Crawford: I'm sorry, I couldn't answer that question.
Mr Cleary: I take it that you will have three provincial appointments?
Mrs Crawford: Yes, the five-member board, three provincial and two city.
Mr Cleary: I guess following some of the conventions, some municipal people would like to see the breakdown of the police commission reversed so they would have more control. What are your views on that?
Mrs Crawford: I don't have a problem with the present breakdown as long as those members truly represent the community. As I said, that's one reason I'm here. I suppose the municipality has a concern, because they feel they pick up a large portion of the budget. Even when I was a municipal employee, I remember the mayor and some politicians voicing concern. They just felt they were a rubber stamp when the budget came in front of them, that they had to provide the money for the services, where if they had a larger proportion of members on the committee, I suppose there would be an impression that they might have a better chance of watching the expenditures.
I guess I would think that I could fairly represent the municipality too. I was one of their senior employees for a long time and I handled a very big budget.
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Mr Cleary: Every time we turn on the TV or the radio or read the paper, we hear a lot about use of force by police officers. Is that an issue in Peterborough?
Mrs Crawford: No, it doesn't seem to be. Very few complaints: 28,000 calls last year and 32 complaints, so there doesn't seem to be much criticism against the police force and much evidence of a lot of force being used or being necessary.
Mr Cleary: We hear them talking about issuing new weapons to police officers. Do you think that's necessary in Peterborough?
Mrs Crawford: Very, and it's going to happen. In fact, it's in the budget and the officers, as of last month, have started to take the additional training and will be issued the semiautos and also the new armour.
Mr Cleary: All right. It's all yours.
Mr Bradley: Okay. My question would deal with just an interesting thing I wanted to follow up on. You said you thought there was a need for another woman on the police board. Why did you say that?
Mrs Crawford: Well, if we believe in employment equity, then we can maybe spread it beyond employment situations and look at appointed positions too. If women make up more than 50% of the population, perhaps they should be better represented on all committees and boards and employment situations. I think that we do bring a different perspective.
Mr Bradley: See, I would say that to me there should be three or five women, if you want, but I always get a little queasy about people saying, "We've got to have so many women on," as though that makes the board, and then you start getting -- not in your case, obviously, from your credentials, but you start putting people "because we've got to have a" whatever "on." As I say, my view would be that you should have five. If you have five --
Mrs Crawford: If they're the best candidates --
Mr Bradley: If the five best people are there, let all five be women.
Mrs Crawford: Philosophically, I agree with your position. I think employment equity has a role to get us to where we should be. But if it means that the best candidates are always overlooked and if it means today in Ontario that white males who are well qualified can't buy a job, then that's unfortunate.
Mr Bradley: I don't know what the toughest bar is in Peterborough because I haven't been in any bars in Peterborough that I can remember, but do you believe that a police officer should be able to break up a brawl in the toughest bar in Peterborough?
Mrs Crawford: Yes, I do, but I wouldn't send them in lone-handed. I would make sure he had a couple of buddies with him.
Mr Bradley: So then you would want to ensure that all candidates who would be candidates for a police officer position would be able to break up that brawl?
Mrs Crawford: That's right.
Mr Bradley: That's good to hear too. Sometimes when I ask commissioners that, they say, "No, they should be able to write tickets or something," but not necessarily break up the brawl. That's interesting to hear that as well.
I was also interested in your reaction to the police getting bigger guns and all that.
Mr Jackson: Can we rephrase that?
Mr Bradley: Better guns and so on.
Mrs Crawford: I just think we should send them out there with the best equipment and the best training that we can find the money for.
Mr Jackson: Good for you.
Mr Bradley: You can remember the days when the police would show up at the domestic battle and then they wouldn't lay charges because by the time they got there -- and this usually was a situation with the wife -- the wife or the spouse was so intimidated or for some reason didn't want to press charges, and then the police started to press charges after a while regardless of that. What is your general view on that? Should they automatically press charges, or what should happen?
Mrs Crawford: Yes, I think they should. I can understand why some wives are afraid to, so I think that if the evidence is there, certainly the police should. I understand the new policy on domestic violence in fact assures that's going to happen, but Peterborough's had that kind of a policy for a long time. If the evidence was there, the charges had to be laid. Also, I just wanted to inform you that there's a new position in Peterborough, wife assault coordinator, so that there's someone specially trained to assist women who are having domestic problems.
Mr Jackson: What gender?
Mrs Crawford: It's a male.
Mr Bradley: Should the police automatically assume when someone claims violence, in this case, let's say kids -- it could be of various ages -- should the police effect an arrest in these cases when the kid says, "I just got beat up by my father," or mother etc?
Mrs Crawford: No, I think the important thing here is evidence, not hearsay and not getting in the middle of some quarrels, but thoroughly investigating, getting all the facts and then making a decision.
Mr Bradley: What about police chases?
The Chair: Thank you, Mr Bradley.
Mr Bradley: Very good answers.
Mr Jackson: I concur. I haven't even asked you a question. I'm very pleased with your answers so far. But on the same line of questioning, right now you would be aware that the SIU has certain authorities to investigate officers, and the police officers in this province have expressed concern that there's a double standard, that they do not have the right to protect themselves in those investigations. I wonder if you have any opinions or views on the right of a police officer or an employee to have legal counsel, or if they're automatically impelled through legislation to present immediate written deputations.
Mrs Crawford: I guess I'd like to see a balance. If any other witnesses are available to testify, use the other ones. If there isn't anybody else, then yes.
Mr Jackson: That's a very good answer. As you know, Ontario does not have a victims' bill of rights and the evolution of victims' rights has been very slow to evolve. In fact, we're the last province, with Alberta, that doesn't have this legislation in place. However, the Police Act gives a scant, one-short-statement reference to victims or rights. What are your views about victims' services and the degree to which Peterborough, with respect for its size and its resource base -- how do you feel about strengthening victims' resources through police services in your jurisdiction?
Mrs Crawford: Okay. September 1, Peterborough Examiner, "Crime Victim Offered Comfort and Practical Help," and now I'm really pleased to announce that in Peterborough city as well as the county, there will be some victim crisis assistance and a referral service available. I would like to see it funded. Even though it needs a solid volunteer base, I think there should be some funding for a coordinator, just to support the volunteers, screen them, recruit them, but this is a good step, I really do believe, towards ensuring there are some victims' services.
I think appointing that one officer for coordinator for wife assault is a good idea. The YWCA in Peterborough city and county area certainly needs to be commended for the services that it's put in place: the Crossroads transitional houses, which I know the city police do use when they need to provide accommodation for some victims.
Mr Jackson: One of the recommendations that was contained in a piece of legislation I tabled many years ago was that victims of sexual assault have the right to be interviewed by an officer of the gender of their choice, and in conversations I've had with police associations and chiefs of police in Ontario, one of the ways of speeding up the employment equity targets is to implement that as a policy, so it becomes much in the way school boards have to protect teachers' positions because of what's constituted as program protection, they can't lay off certain teachers because no one else can provide French, we'll say. Police could act in a similar fashion. My jurisdiction in Halton was the first in Ontario, one of the first in Canada, to embrace this policy, and it has helped them with their employment equity goals.
I wonder if you are predisposed to looking at that as a policy for the police services of Peterborough because there are some concerns about the proliferation of police officers acting in the capacity you've set out, but who have arrived there for a variety of reasons, if I might just leave it at that .
Mrs Crawford: Well, I haven't given much thought to it, and it's likely something that I'm going to have to learn more about, but I guess my first reaction maybe is that I would like to support our chief's position that the constables be generalists, that they all receive adequate training and that they all could respond to certain situations, and that if anyone had a concern they could have another constable, but not necessarily by gender, assigned to support them.
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Mr Jackson: There are all kinds of assaults occurring in our communities, and domestic assault certainly is one of the most serious forms of it, but I appreciate that you've highlighted that as a priority area.
Finally, if I may, a question around seniors. I'm intrigued and pleased about your background because there are two areas of serious crime in this province around personal assault, and elder abuse is one of them, which we're now just scratching the surface of. Some are saying that we're today at elder abuse where we were 12 years ago with domestic violence in this province.
Are you familiar -- and if you're not I'd like to send you some material -- with a new program we developed in Halton called SALT, which is Seniors and Law Together? It's quite an involved community-based program. I would certainly hope that because of your particular expertise and interest undoubtedly, and your exposure to elements of it in an institutional setting, which you would not have escaped if you've worked -- and I notice from your résumé your background in that area.
This is a whole area that's requiring attention, both physical and fiscal abuses that are occurring in the community, and it's a very strong and important role for the police to play and to serve and protect in that. Do you have any comments in that area?
Mrs Crawford: I'd be very interested in receiving that literature, Mr Jackson, if you'd be so kind as to send it to my attention.
Mr Jackson: I have your address. I will send it to you.
Mrs Crawford: Thank you.
Mr Jackson: Thank you very, very much.
Mr Sterling: I just want to wish you all the good luck. I think it is wise to have a significant representation by both genders on all police forces, because I think that one of the things that I've learned over 17 years being in politics is that you need --
Mr Conway: Is it that long?
Mr Sterling: Yes, it's been that long -- you do need the point of view of both genders in dealing with the problems.
Interjection.
Mr Sterling: I'm happy that there's more balance coming to the board with your appointment.
Mrs Crawford: Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you very much, Ms Crawford, for your appearance before the committee this afternoon.
Mrs Crawford: May I ask one more question?
The Chair: Yes, certainly.
Mrs Crawford: I know that there is going to be a training session, and maybe it's called a seminar, coming up in early October for new board members. It'll be held in Sarnia. So I was wondering what the process is now. I understand you'll be voting at the end of the day. How long would it be until I receive official notification, because if I am appointed, and I sincerely hope I am --
Mr Bradley: Oh, you will be.
Mr Jackson: You will be.
Mrs Crawford: Thank you.
Mr Jackson: You got 10 out of 10 today, just for the record. I want you to know that.
The Chair: Your appointment becomes effective as soon as this committee votes on -- I'm being corrected.
Mr Jackson: Why don't we vote now?
The Chair: I always thought this committee was very powerful. This committee will be voting on the appointments at the end of this afternoon. Nancy is here from the appointments secretariat office, so maybe you could ask her for the rest of the information.
Mrs Crawford: Thank you very much.
REMI LABONTÉ
Review of intended appointment, selected by third party: Remi Labonté, intended appointee as member, Advocacy Commission.
The Chair: Welcome to the committee this afternoon. If you wish, you may make a brief statement to the committee, or as you've been observing, we can just start right into questions.
Mr Remi Labonté: Maybe just an opening remark. I think this legislation is well overdue and I'd like to commend the government for putting it forward.
The Chair: Thank you. We will start this time with the third party.
Mr Sterling: As I explained to another advocacy commissioner, or potential advocacy commissioner, this morning, I voted against Bill 74, because I view this as an unbelievable intrusion into the private affairs of citizens by the state and equate it to social engineering and think it's very, very dangerous for a democracy or any government to get involved in it.
Mr Bradley: Other than that, do you have any strong opinions?
Mr Sterling: No, I don't have any strong feelings about it.
I'm very concerned about who these advocates are going to be. Because they are going to go out and they're going to have significant power over individuals who are vulnerable in our community, I'm very, very concerned that we have people who are evenhanded. What qualifications do you propose to put forward as a commissioner for an advocate to operate in the province of Ontario?
Mr Labonté: Good question. The way I see it, as our first step as commissioners, if we want to make a guideline on how we're going to train these advocates, we should be looking at all the advocates who are going around the province and pick from all the advocates, people who are advocating, and try to implement the best system possible.
Mr Sterling: But what characteristics, what professional qualifications do you see as being necessary for this job?
Mr Labonté: I don't know, because I do know some very great advocates who are not professional as lawyers or an institution like that. To be an advocate, I don't think you have to be overqualified. I think you have to know the cause that you're advocating for and know the act that represents that cause and just do your work representing your client. That's why it's very hard to tell you if we should all choose a lawyer to become an advocate under the commission. I've got a problem with that, a serious problem. To individualize myself, I don't have a degree in philosophy, but I believe I could be a great advocate on numerous causes.
Mr Sterling: Remi, your response concerns me, because you talk about cause, and that is what I am concerned about, because as far as I'm concerned, what causes are you going to tell the advocates to put forward?
Mr Labonté: I mean by cause, people are advocating out there for many causes. I don't know what kind of term you want to use. I use cause. The best I know is, I've been advocating for injured workers for numerous years, and that's a cause, the WCB. I'm involved in another one too. So I don't know. I call this a cause. I don't know what you want to call them, but I think we're advocating to change those institutions for the better for the people we represent, who are the people that the act's supposed to help.
Mr Sterling: One of the very significant parts is that the advocates under this legislation, of course, are going to be advising people who are vulnerable as to whether they should or should not undertake medical treatment under Bill 109. What are you going to do when you instruct advocates who are advising young women as to whether or not to have an abortion? What are you going to advise them to do in advising this young woman?
Mr Labonté: That's a tough issue, the abortion issue. I don't know. It's a pretty tough one. If the life of the young woman is involved, I think you should advise to get an abortion. If her life is not involved, I don't know, you've got the question of religion involved in there, you've got all kinds of questions. I couldn't answer that question, to be honest with you.
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Mr Sterling: Do you think you should have an advocate who believes in abortion on demand?
Mr Labonté: I believe that we should have some very trained and qualified people regarding abortion. That's what I believe.
Mr Sterling: But if somebody comes to you and says, "I'm a member," of either the pro-life movement or the other side of the argument, do you believe they should be disqualified from being an advocate?
Mr Labonté: I couldn't answer that. Sorry, I couldn't answer that.
Mr Sterling: How did you find out about this particular position?
Mr Labonté: This was a very long process and my name was put forward by some group that I represent. That's how I got involved a couple of years ago. This was a very long process that took over two years, and I was very proud to be chosen. I think I can bring something to the commission.
Mr Sterling: Okay. Do you have any idea of what kind of training you will recommend for advocates who are hired?
Mr Labonté: That's a very hard question, because I never had a chance yet to sit with the other people and decide what kind of training we'll be doing. From my point of view, like I mentioned earlier, we should be in contact with all the groups out there advocating for some cause and take their advice and come to an understanding of some kind to put our training forward.
Mr Sterling: Have you any idea how you're going to police advocates? In other words, if an advocate is out there and you get a complaint, for instance, from the parent of a young person who an advocate has advised and the parent is very dissatisfied with what the advocate has done -- particularly this will come up almost immediately in terms of schizophrenic patients.
Mr Labonté: Definitely we will have to put in place a kind of even process where those advocates would be accountable for their acts. Definitely this has to be put in place. I don't know how we're going to put it in place, but I know one thing, that I will be pushing for that. Something has to be put in place if an advocate steps out of line that we could -- you know.
Mr Malkowski: I just want to follow up with some comments. First of all, I'd like to congratulate you on the appointment. You just talked a little bit about a characteristic being somebody who fights for a cause, and I think that's a real criterion. That's something that we are looking for too. I think you're talking about natural advocates, people who meet criteria such as that, so I think that in fact that was a very apt description. Taking a look at your résumé, obviously you are somebody who has fought for the cause of various people.
One of the things I'd like to ask you is, when you talk about representation, you talked about fighting for a client, following the instructions of the client. Can you tell me your vision of advocacy? What do you see as an important part of advocacy for vulnerable people? How do you envision the whole process of advocacy for vulnerable people?
Mr Labonté: I think the advocate has to put forward a program that will protect and also advise vulnerable persons of their rights. It's a hard question. That's all.
Mr Malkowski: Okay. Do you feel it's important for vulnerable people to have informed choices, have the information available to them, and as a commissioner, what do you feel vulnerable people need to know in terms of their rights?
Mr Labonté: Yes, I believe all the information should be provided to those persons in any form. If it means in the form of pamphlet or any form, that should be the commission's first mandate, to provide all the information regarding the issue that --
Mr Malkowski: Just for the record, I feel that you're totally qualified for this position and I feel that you do bring a lot of knowledge. Thank you very much.
Ms Carter: I'd just like to follow up, I guess, on what Mr Sterling raised, you know, the whole question of, is the advocate going to be for or against abortion or whatever.
It seems to me this is showing a lack of understanding of what we're trying to do here. There's this concept that the advocate is a tremendously powerful person who is going to manipulate vulnerable citizens and impose their opinions on whatever the situation may be, whether it's abortion or something else, whereas I think the way it's seen, certainly on our side of the House, is as something where what is to be respected is the opinions of the vulnerable person, and the job of the advocate is to carry out the wishes of that person, regardless of whether the advocate thinks they are right, regardless of whether they think that is what is "good for" that person.
I'm just trying to think of a possible case here. You might have, for example, somebody who was pregnant and didn't want to be and was being pressured by one side or the other, whichever, either to have an abortion or not to have an abortion. That person could conceivably call an advocate and say: "Look, can you put me in touch with a different point of view on this or tell me what to do, because I just feel I'm being pressured here." The job of the advocate then would be to find contacts or information that would give that person a fuller picture.
I just wonder what comments you have on this whole view of what an advocate's job is going to be in practice.
Mr Labonté: I believe it's just like you mentioned. If the person is able to express themselves, I think the work of an advocate is to provide all the information, guidelines to the client -- I call them "client" -- or to the person.
The advocate that we're talking about will be under certain kinds of guideline criteria under the commission. They should be able to advise them the proper way. If not, they will be responsible for their acts, so I imagine in this case --
Ms Carter: I think we are looking at a basic incomprehension here. I know I was sitting on a different committee that was having hearings on long-term care, and there was one gentleman who had presented and he made some comment afterwards about how, "We're doing everything that's possible" -- this was from a care giver's point of view -- "we're making sure that everything about the care these people are going to get is perfect, there's quality control, we're upgrading it all the time, we only employ the very best people with the very best qualifications," period. In other words, he didn't see that the crucial thing is that however perfect an operation may be, the consumer always has to have an input. You cannot ultimately decide what is perfect for somebody else and then just impose it on them. To me, that guy just didn't get it, and I think that's part of the problem we're having with advocacy as well.
Anyhow, once this commission gets going, you're going to have a lot of very onerous tasks to carry out. You're going to have to decide what sort of people you're looking for and how they're going to be trained, and I just wondered if you have any ideas on what sort of direction things might move in.
Mr Labonté: Again the question of training. It's a good question. The legislation is a fairly new one. I've just had a chance to review it on numerous occasions, but nowhere in the legislation are they showing us how we're going to train people.
Ms Carter: We don't want to tell you. You've got to decide.
Mr Labonté: I know that, and that's why I mentioned earlier on the only way I believe, and that's my own opinion, is that we should go out there to the public and seek information from the people have been doing it for numerous years. Like, I know if we're looking for advocates for WCB information, come see me and I will give you probably the best advice you could find and probably be some good guidelines. I'd also be able to provide you some guidelines how we should reprimand advocates if they do something wrong regarding this subject. But to be honest with you, I cannot provide you information on all the issues out there. My knowledge is on maybe four or five issues, and that's it.
But I honestly believe, if we want to put a good program forward, go to the public, because they are the consumer and they know the problem. Go directly to the source and they will tell you the problem, and go to the people who represent those people. I believe we could come out with a good training.
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Ms Carter: In other words, you're going to keep in touch with the grass roots at all times and not make abstract decisions about what's right and what's wrong?
Mr Labonté: No, no, definitely. I think the source of the problem is right there. Go to the source, go to the consumer, people who need representation and people who represent them.
Ms Carter: So you'll be looking for people who are able to do that, to keep listening and to keep an open mind. Is that what you're saying?
Mr Labonté: Yes.
Ms Carter: Okay. Thank you very much.
Mr Waters: I guess I'd like to go back to how you got here. As I read in the research material, there was an Appointments Advisory Committee created, and indeed to get even to where you would be short-listed or anything, first off somebody would put your names forward, a group that you've worked with or whatever, and when you look at how the committee or how the commission is structured and what it says about indeed the makeup of the committee, that would have had to have been taken into consideration. So it was a group of people, in your case probably a group of injured workers or something of that nature -- and I honestly don't know who that group was -- that put your name forward that brought you to the short list which ultimately brought you to here. Is that correct?
Mr Labonté: Yes.
Mr Waters: Okay. Until today, I wasn't absolutely clear on that.
The other thing is, I guess my feeling is that as an advocate, one of your jobs would probably be to empower people, to give them the information and indeed assist them.
I look at some people in my community who are psychiatric survivors. I can think of this one lady. Four years ago, it was difficult for her to go out of her home. Her husband dragged her into my office, and I look for a particular reason, and I look at her four years later -- she's been working with a number of community groups, with our local situation as it is. I have Penetanguishene Mental Health Centre next to my riding, so we do have a few things there. I see this woman now, who is very much self-sufficient, has moved out into the community in general and actually has something to add to the community, very much. I guess that's what I mean by empowering people.
Do you not see the commission as something that will bring people along so that indeed, instead of being seen by the majority of society as a cost or somebody who's been injured and is sort of placed on the scrap pile, we can bring these people back into the mainstream and they become assets, where they all wanted to be to start with? Do you not see that that's what your job is as a commissioner? How you're going to get to that -- but ultimately that would be what your job would be?
Mr Labonté: Yes, definitely. I think we could get to that by providing rehabilitation or lots of information. If you provide lots of information to people, they're bound to get out of their problem and get better and get on with their life. I've seen that in the past. Like the example you've given, I saw it on numerous occasions.
Mr Waters: I want to be clear on how you get the information to them, though, because not all of these people are capable of sitting down and taking the written word and reading volumes, as we get -- our paperwork every day is stacks like this -- of information and working that through. I also see this act as having people out there who can sit down with groups or with individuals and assist them somehow in a personal way of bettering and understanding their rights and indeed that life hasn't come to an end, you're just thrown on the scrap heap, that there is a future for you. In some cases, that means an individual discussion with a person to help them, but you can't always do it in the written word. I just wanted to make that comment and ask if you had anything that you wanted to add after.
Mr Labonté: Yes, you're right. On many occasions we cannot directly bring the information, but to the best of my knowledge, I think there are ways of communication out there for any disability that I know of, so I think it's a question to use those tools and we will reach those people. To give you an example, for deaf we could use sign language, blind we could use Braille language.
Mr Cleary: I just have the one question for Mr Labonté. The definition of vulnerable person contained in the legislation, Bill 174, how do you intend to ensure that this will not lead to extremely high implementation costs or probably service inadequacies or potential abuses of authority granted to advocates under the proposed legislation, 174?
Mr Labonté: Sorry. I didn't understand the question.
Mr Cleary: You understand vulnerable people?
Mr Labonté: Yes, no problem.
Mr Cleary: The definition of vulnerable persons contained in the legislation, how do you intend to ensure that this will not lead to extremely high implementation costs? There are three parts to it.
Mr Labonté: Definitely I think the commission will have to make some guideline of some kind so that those people are not abused.
Mr Cleary: How about service inadequacies?
Mr Labonté: Same thing. I think a guideline will have to be put in place that service will be provided to such an extent, and I don't know which extent. I don't have a clue.
Mr Cleary: What about potential abuses of the authority granted to advocates under the legislation?
Mr Labonté: That question always comes along. I had it on numerous occasions last month. The only answer I usually give to a colleague who asks me that question is that there will have to be in place a kind of even process. A straight way of saying it is the advocates will have to be accountable for their acts, simple as that. Finally, maybe in one institution somebody will be accountable for their act. The most I know, nobody is accountable for their act.
Mr Cleary: Were there lots of people asking you the same question?
Mr Labonté: Yes. That question, and it's very hard to answer and I don't know the answer. The only answer I've found is that people will have to be accountable. I don't know how many advocates the commission will put forward, but those advocates will have to be accountable for their acts and that will have to be clear in the guideline when they are hired that those things are said.
Mr Conway: Mr Labonté, I'm happy to see you and interested in your responses to my colleagues. I look at your résumé and you have clearly got a breadth of experience that I think will certainly give you a good background for the task at hand.
I share some of Mr Sterling's concerns about this whole business, and of course one doesn't know how to verbalize those concerns because it's very politically incorrect to do so. I think this is going to be an extremely sensitive and potentially explosive issue facing the community. I recognize from fairly long years of experience both as a legislator and just as a citizen, some of the problems that have brought us to this point. I don't doubt that everybody's going to be operating with the best intentions, though I think we're going to find some very conflicting views of humanity and government and the relationship between citizen and government.
I listened to the member for Peterborough. She's a bright, well-intentioned individual but I just don't see the world the way she sees it. She's probably more right than I am, but I have seen some cases where government advocates -- the public trustee comes to mind, but there are others. There has been a real proliferation, I might add, of government advocates at a whole variety of levels in the last 20 years. Sometimes the results are not bad; sometimes the results are just unspeakably counterproductive. It seems to me that much of that has to do with the sensitivity of the person doing the intervening and the acceptance of the community about the need for the intervention.
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I think I have to agree that there are some scandals, cases, that cry out for action, and the current government's response has been the Advocacy Act with the attendant commission. The chair of the commission I know well. He is a very interesting fellow. I've been watching the room today and I'm going to ask you a question that is not impertinent, but you might find it a bit impertinent. Do you know David Reville?
Mr Labonté: I met him for the first time half an hour ago. I never saw him before.
Mr Jackson: And what do you think of him?
Mr Labonté: Do you want me to answer that?
Mr Conway: I know David very well and I've worked with him, but I look at this panel and I look at the mandate and I can just imagine the fervour with which some people are going to go about this task, because of very deep personal convictions.
I'm just thinking, given the mandate of the commission, what are we getting here? I don't know. I don't really want to maybe say any more than that, but I guess good luck. I expect members of the next Legislative Assembly are going to have quite a bit of business in this respect.
Mr Malkowski: What's the point of your question, Mr Conway?
Mr Conway: Thank you very much.
The Chair: Mr Bradley, four and a half minutes.
Mr Bradley: My question is, have you ever been a member of the New Democratic Party?
Mr Labonté: No.
Mr Bradley: Never?
Mr Labonté: Never.
Mr Bradley: Have you ever considered it?
Mr Jackson: Never considered it. Not since he met David Reville half an hour ago.
Mr Labonté: That's a straightforward question. No.
Mr Bradley: Okay. That's interesting to hear.
Ms Carter: The Liberals ask us for donations all the time.
Mr Bradley: What's that?
Ms Carter: The Liberals send us requests for donations all the time.
Mr Bradley: You certainly don't get any requests from me, because I don't.
Mr Jackson: He's got enough money, that's why.
The Chair: Let's keep the committee in order. Thank you.
Mr Bradley: My question has to deal with the question I asked this morning, and I'm interested in each of the advocate's reaction to it. The dilemma that is often faced is the dilemma of the family having a different point of view -- usually the immediate family -- from the patient in this particular case, and the family feeling that the family is doing something right for the patient as quite strong feelings, and certainly expressing them to elected representatives. What amount of consideration should be given to the viewpoint of the family when dealing with matters related to the patient's wellbeing?
Mr Labonté: Definitely the family and service provider will have to be consulted very closely. Like I was mentioning, all those guidelines will have to be made in conjunction with those people. They're the best ones to help us, because they've been doing the job for so many years and the commission is brand-new. If we want to take some experience someplace, we have to go down to the source where people are advocating for a long time on those issues. I think the service provider and family could be some great help and we have to sit down with them and listen to them. Don't push them apart.
Mr Bradley: But ultimately there may be a situation where the family point of view is significantly different from the patient's point of view and the family may believe, rightly or wrongly, that the patient, because of the condition the patient is in, is unable to make an appropriate determination. What position should the advocate take in that position?
Mr Labonté: Good question. I don't know, to be honest with you, but I know this will be a major problem for the commission -- a major problem. That's another question that I have been asked on numerous occasions in the last month. I don't have the answer. I had a mother who came to me and told me: "I've been taking care of my son for 25 years. How are you guys going to do better?" I don't know. At this point the system is too new. I don't have a clue.
Mr Bradley: If the advocates are to counter the viewpoint of a doctor, for instance, a doctor may recommend certain treatment or may offer that option -- the doctor can't always force that treatment obviously, but the doctor may strongly recommend a certain course of action and treatment -- and the patient may be very resistant to that.
How does the advocate counter that? Do you think the advocate is going to have to have medical knowledge to counter the doctor's opinion in that case, a doctor who has presumably gone through all the schooling and is supposedly knowledgeable in a specific field? How does the advocate stand up against a doctor if the advocate does not have something equal to the medical knowledge that the doctor has?
Mr Labonté: I don't believe the advocate will have to have medical training, but I believe the advocate could sit down with the doctor and voice the concern of the person they represent, because they're the best one. The doctor most of the time is with this person about 15 minutes a month. You are with them, like in my case, sometimes 15, 10 days a month, a couple of hours per day. We know from the bottom end that's what the client wants. I think there will have to be some meeting ground someplace. Lots of meeting will have to be done between doctor and patient and advocate. A common ground will have to be found someplace. How I don't know. Good question. I don't know.
The Chair: Thank you very much for your appearance this afternoon, Mr Labonté, before the committee.
Mr Labonté: I'd like to thank everybody.
JOY ENID ISAACS
Review of intended appointment, selected by official opposition party: Joy Enid Isaacs, intended appointee as member, Advocacy Commission.
The Chair: Welcome, Ms Isaacs. Do you wish to make a brief opening comment or would you like just to start with questions from the committee members?
Ms Joy Enid Isaacs: I'll start with questions.
Mr Bradley: The first question I would have I guess is going to be to get your similar reaction to the question about the role of the family.
Ms Isaacs: Could I hear the question, please.
Mr Bradley: Oh, you didn't hear it. I asked a question of the previous applicant, Mr Labonté, about the role of the family. Did you hear that question?
Ms Isaacs: What is your question?
Mr Bradley: My question is, if there's a conflict between a family and a patient, how much credence should be given to the family's viewpoint?
Ms Isaacs: In my conflict resolution experience, you listen to both sides, and because the patient most times is very much aware of their needs, then I think their needs would have to be seriously taken into consideration.
Like we all know, many times family members think they know what's best for us. Just recently I had to rescue a blind woman because her parents threw her out. They figured she could not survive in the society and they've thrown her out. I managed to rescue her and now she's functioning very efficiently, got a job, is going to work and is doing fine. So sometimes people think they know what's best for us, but ultimately we're the ones who know what is best for us.
Mr Bradley: There is a concern that has been expressed that useful treatment and perhaps urgent and necessary treatment could be delayed because of the Advocacy Commission suggesting that an advocate take the side of the patient. While the conflict goes on, the patient's physical wellbeing could deteriorate. Do you think that's a danger, and how do we overcome that?
Ms Isaacs: In real life, with or without conflicts, sometimes just waiting for the doctor's appearance, people die.
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Mr Bradley: But that doesn't really answer my question. It's true that they might wait for the doctor's appearance. That might happen; it doesn't often happen, but it can happen. I'm just looking at where a doctor has said, "This is a treatment that I believe is necessary," and she says, "We must move forward with this treatment or the patient may deteriorate badly," the patient is resistant and the advocate is there to advocate on behalf of the patient. Who is then going to be responsible legally if the patient dies or suffers permanent impairment as a result of a delay of treatment?
Ms Isaacs: Because I'm not a lawyer I won't be able to say who is responsible legally. What I would hope in guidelines is there would be some suggestion of what would happen in case of dire emergency. Because this is just a brand-new commission I wouldn't know of the exact answer to that, but I know that we would work definitely in the interests of the patient.
Mr Bradley: That is a concern. I think when the legislation passed the committee, one of the concerns that was expressed, probably particularly by members of the medical profession and perhaps from family advocate groups, was that important treatment might be delayed, consequences might be fatal, but other than that, they may simply result in a deterioration of the patient's condition. Do I take it from your answer you don't believe that's a valid concern, that it's unlikely to happen very often?
Ms Isaacs: We would hope that it wouldn't happen often.
Mr Cleary: Welcome to the committee. Just a question to follow up from my colleague there: How do you defend the decision not to include families' rights organizations in the constituent group permitted to participate in the appointment advisory process?
Ms Isaacs: To defend the decision not to include family rights' organization groups in the appointment to the advisory process?
Mr Cleary: Permitted to participate in the appointment advisory process.
Ms Isaacs: Just for clarity, if I understand the question right, you're asking me to defend an exclusion of these people?
Mr Cleary: Yes. How do you defend a decision not to include family rights' organizations?
Ms Isaacs: It's not, to my knowledge. I don't think there's a decision to exclude these people.
Mr Cleary: It's my understanding that there were.
Ms Isaacs: I'm not aware of it.
Mr Cleary: Okay. That was my question. Thanks.
Mr Sterling: I don't really think that it was your responsibility to answer that particular question. I think that has more to do with the Premier's office in terms of how they undertook interviews etc for this in appointing commissioners. At least that's my understanding of it.
How did you come to apply for this position?
Ms Isaacs: Way back in my childhood, I'd go with my grandmother --
Mr Sterling: No, I just meant in the immediate past. I mean, how did you hear about this? I'm sorry.
Ms Isaacs: Oh, how did I hear about it? All right. I'm very active in the community, and when there was the idea to establish a commission, I was involved in some of the community meetings where people spoke about the importance. I thought because of my experience, my education and my commitment to people with disabilities, having a disability myself, this was a good opportunity to apply and, when successful, contribute my skills and abilities and bring a different cultural perspective to the whole commission.
Mr Sterling: I don't know if you heard me talk to Mr Labonté about my concerns about this legislation. I've been very much involved in the committee hearings dealing with it. But I have a great deal of concern about government-hired people involving themselves with vulnerable people and advising them as to choice, and notwithstanding the view of some that the advice can be --
Ms Isaacs: I can't hear you.
Mr Sterling: Notwithstanding the view of some here that the advice can be totally objective, I don't believe that advice is objective very often, regardless of the topic that's involved. So it concerns me greatly that Bill 74, the legislation under which you are going to be appointed, doesn't even attempt to outline what an advocate is. What are the requirements of an advocate? What are the educational requirements and what training will be provided to the advocate? Can you enlighten me on what you would see as an advocate, what the qualifications of advocates are and what training you would provide for them?
Ms Isaacs: The qualifications and the training?
Mr Sterling: Yes.
Ms Isaacs: Was there a practical question in there too?
Mr Sterling: Yes.
Ms Isaacs: From my point of view, I think an advocate would be someone who would assist a vulnerable or a senior in achieving their aims and desires and wishes. The qualifications to make that possible would be someone who's got excellent communication skills, has the ability to listen, is non-judgemental, has the ability to retain and keep secrets, is very sensitive and aware of the cultural mosaic, different terms of communication, whether it be sign-facilitated, oral, written, non-traditional, someone who could execute the wishes as instructed, someone who's got the ability to be non-judgemental. I think those would be good qualifications for an advocate.
As for training, as far as I know, there's training in process. There are mechanisms set up so that people will get the proper training and awareness they would need to execute the wishes of the vulnerable people.
Mr Sterling: If an advocate expressed a judgemental opinion in advising the vulnerable person, would you be willing to fire that person?
Ms Isaacs: As far as I know, there's a process. If an advocate has been non-professional, there's a complaints process that would be established where the vulnerable person would be able to lodge the complaint, and whatever would be the reaction or curative measures that might be taken, I think that would be the appropriate time.
Mr Sterling: So you're not saying whether or not you would be willing to fire this person on the basis of him injecting personal opinion in making a decision in this matter.
Ms Isaacs: As far as I know, I'm going to be a member of a commission. It would not be an individual assignment, that I would have that plurality. It would come before the commission or the review board or the complaints process and then appropriate steps would be taken and implemented.
Mr Sterling: Would you hire an advocate who was associated with either the pro-life or the pro-choice movement?
Ms Isaacs: I would hire an advocate who's got the qualifications like I outlined. Their individual preference would have nothing to do with their ability to carry out the job. If they've got good communication skills and they could listen to somebody who is a pro-life or not, their job is to execute the wishes of their clients.
Mr Sterling: But they're going to be behind closed doors with perhaps a very vulnerable young woman, perhaps someone who has a very low intelligence level or ability to make a decision herself. You do not think they should be excluded from that kind of a decision if it is a case of whether that young woman should abort a child or not abort a child?
Ms Isaacs: Their position is to explain the pros and cons, whether to keep the child or abort the child.
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Mr Sterling: I know what their position is, ma'am, but my concern here is that you are putting a hired person who has a strong view one way or the other behind closed doors with somebody who has an IQ of, let's say, less than 70. Do you still believe in putting that person behind that closed door with that person?
Ms Isaacs: That person who's hired as an advocate must have the ability to be impartial and not impose his or her views on the client.
Mr Sterling: In spite of the fact that they're actively involved in either one of the two movements that I mentioned?
Ms Isaacs: They should have the impartiality not to impose their views. I think that would be one of the requirements for them when they're being hired.
Mr Jackson: Ms Isaacs, I'm interested in the fact that you're currently doing work around employment equity with Metropolitan Toronto. You're under contract with them?
Ms Isaacs: The city of Toronto.
Mr Jackson: You work for the city of Toronto?
Ms Isaacs: The city of Toronto, yes.
Mr Jackson: I'm currently an advocate in my own right, legislatively defined, working on several of my constituents who work for the city of Toronto who have taken cases to the attention of the Human Rights Commission because of the manner in which employment equity has been dealt with, and they felt that they'd been harmed, and based on the copious documentation I've looked at.
I raised the question earlier today about the point at which an advocate becomes the establishment. It strikes me that there may be room for drawing a parallel comparison here, given that you're employed to implement the employment equity program. I'm not suggesting that your decisions are the ones that are currently before the human rights tribunal. I want to make that clear. I'm simply suggesting that you're working for an employer who currently has several cases under appeal and before the Human Rights Commission.
I wonder how you feel about being put in that position, knowing that, and how you'll make that transition as an advocate to this commission, realizing that you're a part-time commissioner and will continue your employment with the city of Toronto?
Ms Isaacs: Just for clarity, I'm pleased to announce that I no longer have that position. I'm now a special employment programs consultant, and that puts me definitely in the area of working with special employment programs.
Mr Jackson: So you're self-employed at the moment?
Ms Isaacs: No, I'm with the city, but I've since changed positions. I don't see my position as causing any conflict or any great concern as a special employment programs consultant. I'm doing something totally different.
Mr Jackson: Well, but you're a special programs consultant; you'd still be advising human resources, city of Toronto, on the implementation of employment factors that can give rise to issues around unfair treatment by an employer of an employee.
Ms Isaacs: With the implementation of legislation, hopefully that's acceptable in Toronto, and especially in the province.
Mr Jackson: What's acceptable?
Ms Isaacs: Employment equity.
Mr Jackson: That's not my question. We all hope that.
Ms Isaacs: Yes.
Mr Jackson: You're in a unique position. You're the third Advocacy Commission appointee we've borne witness to today and I think you're in a unique position, compared to the other two, given where you're currently employed and where decisions that a municipality makes might adversely affect its employees, and you're currently employed in that capacity. This is a form of conflict in some people's minds with respect to areas of judgement and decision-making. That's where I'm wanting to focus.
I didn't see that as an issue in the previous two persons who were before us because they were doing a similar kind of advocacy work in their communities. Yours is a more simple, straight-up employment situation, but it has come to my attention that the employer where you work has these complaints and charges against him or her, and I consider that rather serious.
Ms Isaacs: So what is the question?
Mr Jackson: It's clear that you don't understand what I'm talking about. Thank you.
Mr Malkowski: Having taken a look at your résumé, I was certainly very impressed with the qualifications you bring and I want to congratulate you on your appointment. Could you tell me a little bit about your vision in terms of advocacy and the model that you would like to see established and why you feel that it's such an important thing to have in place for vulnerable people?
Ms Isaacs: I think from the research and things that have been done, it's important that some sort of mechanism is established so that the abuse, the neglect and the exploitation of vulnerable people is lessened and hopefully eradicated. I feel that this commission, with its collective wisdom, would be able to bring about changes for the improvement of the lives of vulnerable people and seniors.
Mr Malkowski: Just in relation to accountability for the commission, do you have ideas in terms of an accountability mechanism if there are appeals? For example, individuals within provincial psychiatric institutes, if there were appeals against institutes that are actually government-run, how do you see an accountability mechanism in place so that there is no conflict?
Ms Isaacs: I feel that somehow my train of thought has been disturbed with all the whispering.
The Chair: Did you hear the question?
Ms Isaacs: I just got distracted on this side, so I'm just wondering if I could have it repeated.
Mr Malkowski: Would you like me to repeat the question?
Ms Isaacs: Please.
Mr Malkowski: Do you have ideas in terms of establishing an accountability mechanism when dealing with complaints, say, specifically against government agencies? An example would be the provincial psychiatric institutes. If a vulnerable person were to approach the commission or raise complaints regarding a government-run agency or institute, how do you see there being a mechanism in place to deal with that?
Ms Isaacs: As far as I understand, there's going to be a complaints procedure and hopefully, when the complaints are made, the investigation would be impartial. They would listen clearly to what the vulnerable person has to say, listen to the complainant's point of view and then try to see what really is the source of the problem and how it could be fixed.
Mr Malkowski: Thank you very much, and again congratulations and good luck. I certainly believe that you are a very qualified candidate for this position.
Ms Carter: You've given us some idea of the qualities that you think an advocate should have, which will obviously be something that will influence your input into the commission as to who is going to be hired, but the commission will also be responsible for establishing a system of training. I'm just wondering whether you have anything in mind as to what an advocate's training might consist of.
Ms Isaacs: I think it would be good if the advocates were taught about cultural differences, different types of communication, understanding of non-traditional ways of dealing in situations, conflict resolution; awareness of holistic approaches to life, general information on the ways different cultures meet and greet, a wider understanding of the changing mosaic in our present environment and also the way in which people divulge information. In some cultures you start from way back and come forward and in some cultures you start from the present and go back. I think a variety of all these things would be helpful.
Ms Carter: Would they not need a knowledge of how things work in society so that they can take action? Is that not going to be --
Ms Isaacs: A knowledge of the ever-changing situations that occur.
Ms Carter: I was just wondering if we could throw a bit more light on this question of families that has been raised, I believe, by Mr Bradley and all the others. It seems to me that the people whom advocates are going to be helping are going to come in all kinds of different categories. There's going to be an infinity of different kinds of cases. I guess an individual who has a really supportive family is probably not going to be in need of an advocate's services except that sometimes, and I believe this is taken into account in the legislation, the family itself can maybe be counselled and helped to support that family member or to solve problems they have jointly.
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I'm just thinking particularly about elder abuse. I am concerned with seniors and I know that elder abuse is much more of a problem than maybe we'd like to admit and it's something we're going to have to face up to. Of course, that might be in an institution, but it might be in a family. In other words, where you've got abuse it's usually going to be somebody who's in the care giving relationship who is guilty of that abuse, so in order to help the person you have to go directly to that person and not to the care givers. After all, although they're the people who give support and so on, they're also sometimes the abusers. Perhaps you could comment on that.
Ms Isaacs: I feel the family is very important to individuals, but one of the things I realize is that sometimes families start off being very supportive and very helpful and in the course of the situation, when the condition deteriorates and after having to give prolonged care for excessive hours, sometimes the good intentions unfortunately are thwarted because they themselves have got worn down because of the sickness or whatever has happened.
Sometimes, in forms of frustration or relief, their attitudes might have changed. I think, in dealing with these situations, we take into consideration their outlook because they could have started off all well-meaning and with good intentions, and because of the prolonged illness or the deterioration, then their attitude could have changed. By that time, some of their wishes might not be in the best interests of the client.
Ms Carter: At some time the solution might be respite for the care giver.
Ms Isaacs: The possibility of just time out where maybe they could get some space and the client could have some space too.
Ms Carter: The first consideration always has to be the viewpoint of the vulnerable person.
Ms Isaacs: The vulnerable person, yes.
Mr Waters: There's been some discussion at each of the interviews with the commission about, I gather, education and whether persons should have a formal education in order to become advocates and how much formal education they should have. Having a father who sits in a wheelchair who has been there for some time, maybe I've changed my views or have been enlightened somewhat. I guess it's the old thing of, "Walk a mile in my shoes." Although I believe that an advocate, first off, should have some definite communicative skills and indeed a basic education, at the same time I think that the "Walk a mile in my shoes" is an important aspect of it. I look at my father, who would fall into two categories -- he's disabled, he's a senior -- but he wouldn't be able to fall into a number of the other categories.
Let's say you take this person I know so well and he were to apply to be an advocate. How would you train that person then to have a consideration for the other people he would be serving? You wouldn't have an advocate for each disability or each group within a region. I think that's part of what Mr Sterling was trying to get at. I'm going to phrase it in a different way and then ask for this comment --
Ms Isaacs: The way I see it, if the training is inclusive enough and it's done to meet the levels of all people, then I think it's going to be successful. Regardless of whether the person has very formal training or if he or she is experienced and the informal education is equivalent to have that person accept and understand what the training is, I think it would be sufficient.
Mr Waters: Do you see training of the advocates as being intensive -- I know that we keep hitting on this -- and long term? Really, we're probably putting the cart so very many miles in front of the horse on this, and I think that most of my colleagues would agree. But I would see it as being an ongoing situation for the entire time that they were advocates.
Ms Isaacs: "Intensive" is a relative word dealing with people with various types of abilities. For some people, two days would be very intensive, and for some, it would not be enough. I think it would have to be enough of a base so that they would have ongoing training. So you might have lots of time there. They might have to be there together for maybe two days or three days and then ongoing meeting frequently.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms Isaacs, for your appearance before the committee this afternoon.
Now, committee members, we have some business to do. The first order of business is a motion to approve the appointments for today. Mr Waters, you are moving the appointments?
Mr Waters: Yes, Madam Chair.
The Chair: The motion will be to approve the appointment of Susan Fish as a full-time member of the Ontario Municipal Board; of Pat Capponi as a member of the Advocacy Commission; of Charinee De Silva as a full-time member and vice-chair of the Social Assistance Review Board; of Judith Davidson-Palmer as chair of the Justices of the Peace Remuneration Commission; of Shirley Anne Clement as a full-time member and vice-chair of the Social Assistance Review Board; of Dianne Crawford as a member of the Peterborough Police Services Board; of Mr Remi Labonté as a member of the Advocacy Commission; and of Ms Joy Enid Isaacs as a member of the Advocacy Commission.
Is there any discussion on that motion? All in favour of that motion? Opposed, if any? Members either have to leave the room or they have to vote. If you're opposed, you have to indicate so, or you have to leave the room, but you can't remain at the desk.
Interjection.
The Chair: Sorry, you just have to remove yourselves from the desks, you don't have to leave the room. I was told once I had to leave the room.
Mr Jackson: And you bought that, did you?
The Chair: And I bought that.
Mr Sterling: One of the problems, Madam Chair, I don't object to all of these --
The Chair: All right. We may split them.
Mr Sterling: Okay, that's what I would prefer.
The Chair: If you would like to pull out any, or we can go through each one individually. What would you like to do, go through them individually?
Mr Sterling: Sure.
The Chair: All right. The first motion will be for Ms Fish. All in favour? Opposed, if any? Carried.
Ms Capponi. All in favour? Opposed, if any?
The second one, at 10:30 this morning.
Mr Conway: I abstain. I withdraw.
The Chair: I'm sorry, Sean, you have to move from the table.
Mr Conway: I'm away from the table.
The Chair: Ms Capponi is the lady at the back of the room wearing the hat right at this point, okay?
Ms De Silva. All in favour? Opposed, if any? Mr Sterling, you're opposed?
Mr Sterling: Yes.
The Chair: Thank you.
Ms Davidson-Palmer. All in favour? Opposed, if any?
Ms Shirley Anne Clement. All in favour? Opposed, if any? That's carried.
Ms Dianne Crawford; that's the police services board. All in favour? Opposed, if any?
Mr Remi Labonté, the Advocacy Commission. All in favour? Opposed, if any? That is carried.
Ms Joy Enid Isaacs. All in favour? Opposed, if any? That's carried.
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We do have some further business of the committee. The clerk has two items of business.
Clerk of the Committee (Ms Lynn Mellor): One of the selections, Mr Mark Dockstator, was made by the government party. When we contacted him, he was unavailable for these dates. Do you want to hold him over until our next meeting or do you want the appointment to go ahead?
Mr Waters: Let the appointment go ahead, Madam Chair.
Clerk of the Committee: Okay. In addition, Mr Mouammar, who was selected by the third party -- he was an intended appointee to the Workers' Compensation Appeals Tribunal -- called us Friday, September 2 to let us know that he had accepted a federal appointment and therefore would not be allowing his appointment to stand. Unfortunately, it was not within the seven days that we need to contact the alternate, who was Kerry Wadman.
The Chair: Does that mean they have a choice of still having Mr Wadman?
Clerk of the Committee: No, because we weren't within the standing orders.
The Chair: So his appointment goes ahead?
Clerk of the Committee: Yes.
The Chair: And Mr Wadman is an appointment to the Advocacy Commission.
Clerk of the Committee: In scheduling the Council of Regents, we've had a couple of requests to be scheduled in addition to those that the committee had already indicated, the people who it wanted scheduled. One of the additional requests was the Ontario Community College Student Parliamentary Association. We've had a couple of declines and we do have the spot, so if there's no objection from the committee --
Mr Waters: I would move that, if you need a motion.
Clerk of the Committee: No. I just want to run it by, unless there's a problem.
Mr Waters: I don't think there's any problem.
Clerk of the Committee: In addition, we had the Administrative Staff Consultative Committee make a request for an appearance.
Mr Waters: Do we have the time?
Clerk of the Committee: Yes, we have the time.
And we've had a third request from OPSEU. They have been scheduled and they're asking for more time. They have a half-hour appointment.
The Chair: We already had one deputation from OPSEU?
Clerk of the Committee: Yes. They're just asking for an extension of the time, not an additional --
Mr Waters: Are we giving anyone else any more than a half an hour, or group?
Clerk of the Committee: We've given the chairs of Council of Governors a half day and the chairs of Council of Presidents a half day. There is a one-hour appointment for the College Standards and Accreditation Council and one for Walter Pitman; everyone else is a half-hour.
Mr Bradley: What job does Walter have now?
Clerk of the Committee: It's not on the tip of my tongue at the moment, but I can tell you if you give me a minute or two.
Mr Bradley: He just goes from job to job.
The Chair: Is there any other group that you would like to invite that hasn't been included up to now?
Mr Waters: I have a couple of questions but it isn't on inclusion of other groups. I guess we should deal with OPSEU, which is before us now, the question of do we expand their time. I don't have any problem with that, with the exception of the fact that there's only so many that we can accommodate expanding time to. They are a very large group.
Mr Bradley: The next thing you know, the Taxpayers Coalition Ontario will want to come in.
Mr Waters: I guess that's what I'm saying, is that if it becomes problematic, then we have a problem, otherwise we have four deputations now that are going to be over half an hour, depending on the amount of time we have left. How much is left for us?
Clerk of the Committee: They were scheduled at the last of the Thursday morning, at 11:30. There's nothing scheduled Thursday afternoon.
The Chair: So we could start them at 11:30 and go to 12:30 and not sit in the afternoon, you mean?
Clerk of the Committee: Or you could schedule them in the afternoon for an hour if you want, or whatever amount of time you want.
Mr Waters: I sort of like the Chair's suggestion a bit better than the break. If there's going to be no one else, then I'd sooner run them through to 12:30 rather than run through to 12, take a two-hour break, and come back for half an hour.
Clerk of the Committee: The request that I've just given you, that's all the additional requests we've had.
The Chair: Are you happy to expand their time from half an hour to an hour, is the question, for OPSEU?
Mr Waters: I'm willing to do it, but I'm also willing to sit and listen to my colleagues from the other side, whether they want to do it or not. Or maybe give them three quarters of an hour instead of an hour, I don't know; split the difference.
Mr Bradley: If it's not interfering with anybody else, I have no objection. If it meant you bumped the Canadian Federation of Independent Business or one of those --
Clerk of the Committee: They've declined.
Mr Bradley: -- totally objective people, I would say that's different, but if there's nobody there, there's nobody there.
Clerk of the Committee: All the business-oriented people have declined to appear.
Mr Bradley: If people are interested, then let them come in.
The Chair: Okay, then let's have OPSEU for an hour starting at 11:30 on the Thursday morning.
Mr Waters: I guess the other question, Madam Chair, is, do we have agreement from the other side to run through to 12:30 rather than breaking it up?
The Chair: Does everybody agree to sit until 12:30 on Thursday, rather than come back in the afternoon? I would think so.
There is to be a subcommittee meeting following this meeting to make selections of the next review appointments.
Mr Waters: I have a couple of questions. One is some information that's been forward and it's the Collège Boréal, with Jacques Michaud. The thing was that we have a Raymond Guindon from the college who is the person who's supposed to be coming forward. It's my understanding this person hasn't been there for some time now.
Clerk of the Committee: What happened with the presidents and the governors -- I spoke to the association and with discussion with them and Mrs Witmer, because she had identified those people, they suggested the other person coming forward.
Mr Waters: Jacques coming forward?
Clerk of the Committee: Yes, and they're coming as a group, so they indicated him as a representative. Mrs Witmer has gone along with what they had suggested.
Mr Waters: The other question I would have is, who is Penny Milton?
Clerk of the Committee: Used to be Penny Moss. She had been a member of the Council of Regents.
Mr Waters: Okay.
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Mr Sterling: Madam Chair, before the committee goes, there's one issue that's just sort of struck me. I don't normally sit in these hearings but I'm sitting here primarily because of my interest in the Advocacy Commission. One of the concerns I have about the process that is going on here with regard to the advocacy commissioners is that, number one, we have ones who are being interviewed at a later time being present while another advocacy commissioner is in here. The other part is that we have the next head commissioner, Mr Reville, who's sitting through all these hearings, who's going to be interviewed tomorrow as well.
I just find it horribly not beneficial to members of the committee to try to weigh the commissioners one against the other or to have a consistent line of questioning for each commissioner if they are sitting in the audience and obviously schooling themselves in terms of the questions that might be posed. I also noticed that before the last commissioner was questioned, Mr Reville stepped outside with her, I suspect to coach her in terms of the response to questions which had been previously asked.
I guess when I pose questions to people that are particularly for that job, I want to get their honest personal reaction to the questions I ask. It is a position which requires, in my view, a great deal of originality and I want to get that personal response.
I just pose it as a question. I know Mr Reville is in tomorrow morning. Are there any other advocacy commissioners tomorrow?
The Chair: Just to give you the technical answer, the process is, of course, that these appointments have been done as part of a public meeting process. It would be up to the committee if they decided that they wanted to hold the process in camera, but at the moment there is nothing to preclude what you've observed taking place today.
In fact, today you've been watching it, but I'm sure if I were an appointment, I would spend time ahead of time anyway with people who are knowledgeable about the agency that I was appointed to. I may not do it out in the hall on the day of my interview, but I would want to do homework on it in any case. So I don't know whether changing the process makes it any different, but I hear what you're saying.
Mr Sterling: Let me respond in two ways to that. Number one is that during my brief experience as a solicitor and barrister, when you went to many civil trials, or criminal trials, although those were public hearings, a judge would say to people who were going to be witnesses, "You are excluded from this room," and I would instruct other people in there not to talk to the other people about what transpired in the courtroom prior to their giving testimony. Okay? I'm just saying that.
There are significant differences between what we're doing here and a trial, but we are trying to elicit true responses or unbiased responses from people in this room.
Number two is that I guess part of my measure of the qualifications of an applicant would be, how much work did they put into this interview which we are undertaking here? The reason I voted against Mr Labonté today was I felt that he had not put a great deal of time into thinking about some of the questions, talking to people, preparing himself adequately for this interview which took place here.
I just think it reflects poorly on an applicant who does this as a last moment preparation in order to come before this committee because I believe that the commissioners to this Advocacy Commission under Bill 174 are going to be extremely powerful people.
So I don't know. I just throw that out. I don't know how it struck other people today.
Mr Waters: On the issue, first off, with Mr Labonté --
Mr Sterling: No, let's not talk about him.
Mr Waters: Well, you brought him up --
Mr Sterling: Okay. I'm sorry. Go ahead.
Mr Waters: -- specifically so I would answer that. One of the reasons we're doing the Advocacy Act is to allow these people to have advocates and to be an equal part of our society. They are not at this point in time; most of them are intimidated. That gentleman, if you looked at his CV, ran a business, is a well-known advocate, got here because the people he worked with put his name forward through the system.
Obviously, and indeed I checked, I said he was extremely nervous and intimidated, and he was. Those of us who sit on the committee on a regular basis see this of highly qualified people who come before us all the time.
But on the overall issue of allowing them in the room while other people appear, I'm also sitting on resources development in my spare time right at the moment. I sit there, as I do in many committees, and I watch people from both sides of the argument sit there day after day in advance and then prepare not only their possible answers to questions but even their submissions to the committee based on what they've heard in the committee. I would think that you would have to change the entire committee structure within the government to do that, and you would have to have everything in camera.
Mr Sterling: Well, I don't agree.
Mr Malkowski: Just to add to that, I think we have to keep in perspective also that English was not Mr Labonté's first language. He's a francophone. I think that you're judging him perhaps inappropriately. If you take a look at the experience on his résumé, it's very different.
I think that it's inappropriate maybe or I guess it disturbs me that you would name this one person specifically. We've had a lot of people come forward and I think it's offensive, really. Often it's difficult to give people the equal opportunity to speak.
If you're talking about standards, then I think technically I would like to know whether or not -- maybe I can ask the Chair -- it is appropriate to specifically centre one individual out in this way. I would think that isn't technically very appropriate.
Mr Waters: If I might, Madam Chair --
The Chair: No, excuse me. Mr Malkowski asked me a question. In fairness to Mr Malkowski, my answer would be that I do not control the debate and comments of committee members. If it's something that is contrary to our standing orders, then I would make a comment, but in this case I don't have a comment to make about that reference.
Mr Waters: Very quickly, and I know Mr Sterling is full of words of his own, I don't think he used this as a slam at that gentleman. It was just that the name was there and it was someone who was here today. I wouldn't at all accuse Mr Sterling of anything of that nature, and I don't think that Mr Malkowski would either. In fact, if we want to pursue this, I would suggest that we go off the record for a while. But I really don't think there's any need for pursuing it unless Mr Sterling believes so.
Mr Sterling: I just want to say to Mr Malkowski, I'm a big boy. I've been here for 17 years. I don't mind saying what I believe and calling a spade a spade, and I found that particular candidate ill-prepared to come in front of this committee.
Now, there may be excuses for him. Fine and dandy; I understand that. Notwithstanding those problems, that was my judgement and that's what we're here for, to make hard calls and vote on particular matters. Otherwise everything's nicey-nicey in this room and in this Legislature and nobody ever comes to any hard decisions. So I don't apologize for that.
I guess I was more concerned with the process. I just find it a little bit warped because of the fact that we are dealing with a number of advocacy commissioners at the same time. I would have liked to have got their first reaction to the questions, and I would have liked to have had, as I have done in terms of hiring or being involved in the appointment of some of the legislative officers -- when we do that, we ask them a consistent set of questions. Of course, I don't equate this process to other committees' process, where you are not, in effect, hiring somebody. You're looking at their qualifications or their suitability for a job. So I look at this quite differently than I would somebody involved in public policy or in another committee.
Notwithstanding that, I don't expect the committee to change its process, necessarily. I just find that probably we would have better answers if we followed something like I suggest.
The Chair: I don't think we need to keep going around this. The point is that the committee conducts its business as the committee wishes, and the only alternative to your concern is for us to be in camera. As a matter of fact, today was unusual. We do not usually have a number of the same agency appointments, one following the other, as we did today. So I think unless there's anybody who feels desperate about saying anything more -- and you're not going to have support for moving in camera, because I saw the reaction to that anyway.
Mr Sterling: It wasn't a question of that. I guess if you're faced with that situation again, Madam Chairman, you might want to consider asking people who are involved with the same kind of appointment to step outside while other witnesses are asked questions. That might be a consideration in the future. Let's forget about it.
The Chair: I would have to take directions from the committee on it. Anyway, if there is no further business for the committee as a whole --
Mr Malkowski: I would like an opportunity to respond. I wasn't being critical of your opinion, Mr Sterling. I was simply talking about standards in terms of people being involved in this process. I recognize the concerns you're raising and I certainly view you as a big boy. That wasn't the issue.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr Malkowski, for that clarification.
The committee stands adjourned. We will start the subcommittee meeting immediately.
The committee adjourned at 1632.