Journal des débats 1986-nov-20 | Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

That in the opinion of this House, since the state of Michigan has given approval for Detroit to build an enormous garbage incinerator without extra pollution controls, the Minister of the Environment should take steps to ensure that Ontario residents, especially those in Windsor and Essex county areas, are protected from this potential source of air pollution.

The Deputy Speaker: The honourable member has up to 20 minutes for his presentation and may reserve any part of that.

Mr. Newman: I rise today to speak about an issue that is not only important to myself and my colleagues from Windsor, but that I hope is also important to all Ontario. This is the issue of a garbage incinerator currently being constructed in the heart of downtown Detroit.

Why should this issue be so important to us in Ontario? It is important because this incinerator is located only five kilometres from Windsor and will affect the entire southwestern Ontario region.

For those still unfamiliar with this issue of the Detroit incinerator, allow me to take a few minutes to explain what is happening. Michigan is rapidly running out of landfill sites. Faced with the increasing costs and problems associated with the landfill sites, Michigan conceived the incinerator out of necessity.

In 1984, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources gave the go-ahead to a company called Combustion Engineering to begin work on a $470-million megaproject -- that is, half a billion dollars -- to alleviate the major problem the area is having with waste disposal. This trash-to-energy incinerator will have one of the largest smokestacks in the world. It will be the world's biggest garbage incinerator and will eventually have the capacity to burn up to 4,000 tons of garbage a day. Think about that. Four thousand tons of garbage each and every day.

I have an article from the Detroit News, October 2, 1986, which states that five trash-burning projects are planned. This is absolutely astonishing. Michigan has attempted to eliminate one problem by creating another. It is creating a problem that will most assuredly affect not only its citizens but Canadians as well.

The smokestack will deposit some 10,000 tons of acids, dioxins and heavy metals on the surrounding areas in Detroit. The situation will be further exacerbated by the toxic byproducts that will enter the ecosystem and will be carried to more distant parts of the continent.

For situations like this, we are hard pressed to find a reason. We tell ourselves that the Americans are our neighbours and are just as concerned as we are about the health and wellbeing of their citizens. Surely they would not let this project go ahead without adequate pollution control devices. Unfortunately, this is precisely the case. The state of Michigan and the city of Detroit have been shortsighted and have totally ignored the pleas of environmentalists and those who are concerned about the future of the Detroit-Windsor region.

What is probably the worst thing in this case is that the entire affair is predicated on a mistake, a simple case of human error. A supervisor in the Michigan Department of Natural Resources has stated publicly that the decision to approve plans for the construction was made by an employee who misread the environmental impact data. The report that the department originally received stated that the dioxin byproducts from the incinerator would cause two additional deaths per million, when in fact the incinerator will cause more than 38 additional deaths per million in the Detroit-Windsor area. The error was a result of someone in the department not understanding the difference between a microgram and a milligram.

When dealing with life-and-death problems, the error is inexcusable. What astonishes me is that even after this error was discovered, the project was still being allowed to continue without the necessary pollutant scrubbing devices. We must ask ourselves, is there an acceptable number of preventable deaths? I believe that whether it is two deaths or 38 deaths, the number is still not justified if those deaths could be prevented.

If a mistake has been committed, then it is the duty of a responsible government to correct it. I find it surprising that Governor Blanchard of Michigan, the same governor who a year ago signed an air pollution pact with the Premier (Mr. Peterson), could sanction this project without requiring the necessary emission controls. What surprises me the most about the official state position is that the Department of Natural Resources itself has stated the risks of not using adequate scrubbing technologies on the incinerator. This is a case of the left hand not knowing at all what the right hand is doing. It is simply a case of municipal lobbies having more clout than environmental lobbies.

Detroit officials convinced the governor that the increased cost of adding scrubbers to the incinerator would effectively scuttle financing for the project. This seems a little strange. The project is already costing $470 million. It is estimated that cleaning devices will cost between $17 million and $30 million. We are talking about an additional expenditure of five per cent to save 38 people's lives in Detroit and three or four people's lives in Windsor each and every year, not to mention the other deaths that will occur outside the direct impact zone.

10:10

Surely the state of Michigan and the city of Detroit do not place such a low value on human life. As early as April of this year, Windsor city council sent a resolution about the incinerator to Mayor Coleman Young himself. Windsor city council approved another resolution on May 4, asking the Ontario government to take legal action against the incinerator.

This resolution was also sent to both Mayor Young and the Detroit city council. No response or acknowledgement of either resolution has been received. Alderman Mike Ray, a member of the Windsor city council, headed the city's fight against the incinerator. City council is leading a citizens' petition drive opposing construction of the garbage incinerator without the best possible control equipment. The petition, which has more than 1,000 names at present, will be sent to various levels of government in the United States and in Canada.

Here is an excerpt from a Windsor Star article entitled "Angry Voices Are Raised At Last," showing how a concerned couple has dealt with the situation.

"`What kind of neighbours are you anyway?' A Windsor couple, Carol and Luc Dumont summed it up perfectly with that pointed question in a letter slamming Detroit's construction of a $500-million garbage incinerator lacking the state-of-the-art pollution controls. Anyone who thinks all Windsor residents are apathetic and listless in the face of the cross-border environmental hazards has not encountered people like the Dumonts.

"The Dumonts did not hesitate. They rounded up 21 other signatures and fired off a blistering letter to the US Ambassador Thomas Niles in Ottawa. Better yet, they sent copies to a host of US and Canadian politicians, including President Ronald Reagan, Michigan Governor James Blanchard and Detroit Mayor Coleman Young."

There was a time when the decision to build industrial complexes was made without reference to environmental concerns. It was usually because we did not know about such things as acid rain, carcinogens and the long-term environmental dangers of unmonitored and uncontrolled industrial emissions. I am thankful those days are over and that we are in the process of correcting the mistakes of the past.

We are passing legislation concerning pollutants and fining industries that do not comply with such regulations. We are trying to repair and rejuvenate land and waterways that have been damaged or, in some instances, destroyed because of ignorance. Today we have the technology to industrialize without at the same time destroying the environment.

The entire issue strikes me as highly contradictory. On the one hand, Detroit needed this incinerator, because all the local landfill sites were full. This seems to be the most effective and economic method of disposing of waste. However, if safety and concern about toxic landfill programs were a major factor in the decision, why is the city building an environmentally disastrous incinerator?

The Canadian concern has been articulated in the United States. The Environmental Protection Agency in the US took up the case and intervened in the courts. It demanded that scrubbers be put into the project. The builders contested this decision and were able to convince the courts of their case.

The Ontario government and the Canadian federal government attempted to assist in this process. We presented a brief that upheld the technical findings of the Environmental Protection Agency. Furthermore, our studies proved conclusively that control technologies were available and feasible and would ensure that this environmental and health disaster could be averted.

Unfortunately, the legal ball was fumbled and the Environmental Protection Agency was forced to withdraw its case. The court decided the Environmental Protection Agency had been given ample opportunity to argue its case and to ensure the best available technology was used before construction began. They failed, and now it seems that most of the conventional legal avenues to prevent this environmental crime have been closed off to us.

The American court has even issued an oral ruling granting Combustion Engineering an injunction to prevent the EPA from taking any further action. This injunction was issued on the ground that the EPA no longer has the right to contest the building permit. This is the most shortsighted ruling I have ever heard of. Think of it: the courts have stated that because the EPA did not object right at the beginning, between 40 and 50 people in the Detroit-Windsor area will have to die from cancer each and every year. Decisions of a life-or-death nature cannot be upheld because of legal bungling. Construction is not irreversible, scrubbers can still be added; yet in Windsor we are forced to sit back and watch this catastrophe take place across the river.

Legally, the residents of Windsor are a million miles away from the court system of Detroit. Unfortunately, we are physically only five kilometres away. We are captives of a system that is so narrow-minded it is not willing to spend a few more dollars to safeguard the lives of its own citizens, not to mention the citizens of Windsor.

There was a time when people who were concerned about the environment were forced to work outside the system. They were often accused of being against progress, of wanting to turn back the clock to a simpler time before industrialization. They were accused of overexaggerating the dangers of pollution. They were told we did not have all the facts and we could not prove the dangers they were talking about.

Thankfully, things have changed. We have realized environmental concerns are not limited to special interest groups. The effectiveness with which we deal with environmental problems will determine the future not only of mankind but also of every species that relies on the ecosystem for life. Myths of the past are realities of today. We know for a fact that smoking causes cancer. We are just as sure that toxic chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyls cause cancer. These are not suppositions; they are modern facts.

Everywhere we look, we see the results of ignoring environmental concerns: toxic dump sites with poorly insulated containers that have leaked and have contaminated water systems, families uprooted because their towns have been declared uninhabitable and lakes that have died because of acid rain. These environmental disasters form part of the legacy that we leave to our children. In the past, we did not understand the dangers or we did not care enough. We understand now and are taking belated measures to correct the disasters of the past. We are now playing catch-up.

The industrial world is spending a fortune to clean up the mess it has made. The least we can do is ensure that future generations will not be condemned to repeat our mistakes. We have the technologies and, compared to the cost of repairing the environmental damage, these technologies come at an extremely reasonable price.

Detroit and Windsor have had good working relationships. Every day hundreds of Windsor residents cross the Peace Bridge to work in Detroit. Our futures are linked in many ways. It seems a shame that relations between these two great cities should be strained over an issue that requires collaboration and not confrontation.

I know, and I am sure my colleagues from Essex will agree with me on this, that people in the Windsor area are not feeling very friendly towards our southern neighbours at this moment. We feel betrayed by Mayor Coleman Young and Governor Blanchard. I sincerely hope that both of them will see that the short-term gains of building an environmentally unsafe incinerator are not worth endangering the lives of regional residents.

I hope the governments of Canada and Ontario will continue to exert every pressure to oppose further construction of this incinerator without the best possible controls.

10:20

Mr. Brandt: I welcome the opportunity to join with my colleague the member for Windsor-Walkerville (Mr. Newman) with respect to the resolution he has put before the House, a resolution that I am pleased to say the members of my party and I support.

This resolution effectively asks the city of Detroit to take into account some additional factors with respect to the construction of the incinerator that is being proposed for that municipality. We are not talking about an ordinary incinerator in the case of the one that is being proposed in Michigan at present. The cost of this incinerator puts the matter into perspective when we realize that we are talking about almost half a billion dollars -- I believe it is some $470 million -- without some additional controls, which I will argue for a little later and which the member for Windsor-Walkerville commented on in his presentation, which would increase the cost ever so slightly.

We are looking at what may be the world's largest incinerator. We are talking about a waste-to-energy program that would be constructed in the heart of one of the most highly populated areas in North America. The catchment area where the normal outfall of some of the effluent from this plant would go would certainly cover the county of Essex and perhaps the county of Kent to a somewhat lesser degree. As well, I concern myself with some of the prevailing wind conditions in this area, which could well drive some of these pollutants to the north and east, placing my community and the county of Lambton right in the pathway of a very serious environmental concern.

In addition, the area we are talking about is the prime agricultural area of Canada. I am sure other areas will come forward with similar arguments, but if one takes a look at the amount of cash that is generated through the agricultural crops in Essex and Kent particularly, and only to a somewhat lesser extent in Lambton, we are really talking about the food basket, in many instances, of our great province and our great country.

That fact concerns me because in a recent study that was done with respect to the environmental impact of dioxins in our food chain, it was noted that the typical food basket in Ontario currently contains a far higher level of dioxins than is suggested to be safe or at a reasonable level. That concern can only be compounded by the addition of a plant of the type covered in this resolution and proposed by Detroit.

There are some who would perhaps argue that Ontario should not become involved in what is very specifically a Michigan and a Detroit issue. However, I call to members' attention the situation that occurred in the Atikokan area. Some time ago a Hydro plant was proposed for that area to serve the northwestern part of Ontario. The state of Minnesota, along with the Environmental Protection Agency and many environmental groups in the United States, argued, I think with some justification, that the level of sulphur dioxides that would have been emitted as a result of the coal burning in that Hydro plant would have polluted parts of the United States.

We have the reverse situation here. We have a plant in the United States that may pollute Ontario. The past instance I am citing for the members' consideration is one in which the plant was to be constructed in Ontario and might perhaps have polluted certain areas of our friendly neighbour to the south of us.

What happened as a result of American intervention in that issue? Very simply, the plant was down-sized, as my colleague the member for Kenora (Mr. Bernier) well knows. He was deeply involved in that issue at the time. The plant was down-sized in order to reduce the concerns of the residents of that area. In addition to being down-sized, the plant was required to burn lower-sulphur western coal, I believe, in order to reduce the quantity of sulphur dioxides that would be emitted.

That kind of co-operative partnership with our American friends is the kind of thing this resolution cries out for. It is not saying, "Stop the incinerator in its tracks." It is saying that when there are major concerns about sulphur dioxide, particulate matter -- which I guess in the vernacular is fly ash to many people -- and carbon monoxide discharges from that plant, as three of the pollutants that are of concern, there are technologies that can control those pollutants or bring them down at least to a more acceptable level .

I concern myself as well with the potential emission of dioxins and furans from that facility. It has been noted in Ontario -- and I mentioned the food chain problem earlier and the level of dioxin that is contained therein -- that most of the dioxins and furans that are contained in our food chain at present are in direct proportion to the percentage of the emissions generated by incinerators. I am talking both about small incinerators in apartment buildings, which burn garbage on a small basis, and some municipal incinerators.

The concern I have is that the technology has not yet reached the point where we can be absolutely certain that we have a fail-safe method. For that reason, this resolution quite appropriately calls out for additional control measures. It simply says we have some legitimate concerns here based on the history of these kinds of developments that have occurred in all other places in the world.

The technology is still, I must say, rather primitive as it relates to these kinds of incinerators. As a result -- and my friend the member for Windsor-Walkerville will find this interesting -- Sweden has for the last couple of years put a total moratorium on all incinerators. It has stopped them flat in their path. Sweden has said, "There shall be no more incinerators until we can develop the technology to a safer level."

Therefore, I support the resolution of my colleague and I do so without any hesitation whatever.

However, I have another problem I want to address in the last couple of moments relating to this resolution, and I want to address it very quickly. At present, some 15 incinerators are planned for Ontario. We cannot have it both ways, I suggest to my colleagues. On the one hand, we cannot say Detroit has an unsafe technology, which may well be even more advanced than some of the technology we are proposing in the 15 incinerators being proposed for Ontario. We cannot tell municipalities, as is the present position of the Ministry of the Environment, that they shall include a waste incineration program in their environmental planning activities and, at the same time, say all waste incinerators are unsafe or should not be constructed.

What I am arguing is that there has to be a balance in terms of the direction our government takes here in Ontario and what we are suggesting other jurisdictions proceed with in regard to the new technology.

10:30

New landfill sites are becoming increasingly difficult to find, as my friend from Simcoe knows in connection with the Pauzé landfill site. The replacement of that site is becoming virtually an impossibility in his municipality. Now he is being told he cannot have an incinerator and he cannot have a landfill site. How is he to dispose of the garbage in that fine municipality of Tiny township? I am sure we do not want to deliver it all to the house of the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Bradley). I do not think that would be the proper solution to this particular catch 22 situation.

In the few seconds remaining to me, in regard to incinerators, we have to find a technology that works. I join my colleague in supporting this resolution because I do not believe Detroit has found that technology yet. We should work co-operatively to try to find a safe technology that will work for incineration programs so that some time in the future we can get rid of landfill sites.

Mr. D. S. Cooke: I am pleased to be able to join the other members of the Legislature in their support of the resolution of the member for Windsor-Walkerville. For years, people in our community have experienced substantial pollution problems that originate primarily in Detroit. The west end of the community and the Lasalle area, Sandwich west, have experienced considerable pollution from what it known as Zug Island, a large industrial area in the city of Detroit. Even with some of the new pollution control equipment that has been put in that area, there are many days when one drives through the west end of the city and the sulphur that comes from the production of steel is so strong it is quite difficult for the people in that community to cope.

I remember when, shortly after my predecessor Fred Burr was first elected in 1967, I was involved with him in doing a survey of health concerns of people of Sandwich west and the west end of Windsor, most of which at that time was in Fred Burr's riding. We found a lot of evidence that pollution was causing considerable health problems. Almost without exception, people were having problems with coughing and lung infections and there was even a higher incidence of cancer in that area of the community than in the rest of the community.

It is fair to say that in our community we have experienced an ongoing environmental problem from Detroit, whether it be from private industry or, in this case, with the proposed world's largest incinerator, this one being a public creation of air pollution. I think it would not be an exaggeration to say it has enraged the people of our community that something like this could happen without any consideration to the people who live on the other side of the border. Obviously, very little consideration was given by the mayor of Detroit to his own people. I guess he can support this kind of incineration even though the statistics show very clearly that large numbers of people will die as a result of the furans and the dioxins coming out of this incinerator, which will not have up-to-date, state-of-the-art pollution abatement equipment.

Last year our community had a crisis; we were very concerned about the pollution problems starting in the Sarnia area with the many spills that were occurring from the chemical companies. That was a crisis in our community as well. In the past couple of years, environmental problems have been at the surface of political and community discussions in Windsor, and appropriately so.

However, the problems related to our drinking water last year did not originate in the United States. Those problems originated right here in good old Ontario. Some discussions have taken place with the Americans, and I think it is fair to say the people in Port Huron on the Michigan side feel as strongly about transboundary pollution as we do in Windsor, because the people in Port Huron have received the brunt of the pollution problems we have created in Ontario in the Chemical Valley.

Agreements have been signed between the Premier (Mr. Peterson) and the Governor of Michigan about transboundary pollution, but I gather these agreements do not mean a lot. On May 12, Dow Chemical in Sarnia released four tons of vinyl chloride gas into the air. Part of the agreement that had been signed stated that the Ministry of the Environment would notify the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, but that notification did not occur.

We have to be somewhat careful in that if we are going to criticize the Americans and, in this case, rightfully so, we have to set a better example than we have in the past. That example should begin by cleaning up some of the very serious pollution problems that exist in the Sarnia area.

However, today we are here, primarily, to discuss the major proposal for this world's largest incinerator in the city of Detroit. The incinerator will be only 4.8 kilometres away from downtown Windsor. I believe it is probably even a little closer to some sections of the community that are in my riding. We will get a constant fallout unless the appropriate pollution control equipment is put on. We will get the furans and dioxins that come out of the incinerator.

The number of cancer deaths have been calculated. The member for Windsor-Walkerville has outlined those to be 38. I am not sure that anyone can tell for sure. At one point, the calculation was 3.8. Then they found they had made a mistake in the calculation and that it was much higher than that. I am not entirely sure how many deaths will occur, but the number is substantial. In addition, other health problems will result from the incineration of garbage in this absolutely monstrous incinerator.

Some of us would like to see the governments in Detroit and Michigan go even one step further. Even with the state-of-the-art equipment on incineration, we have grave reservations about whether incineration is the appropriate way to go for the disposal of our garbage in North America. Even the state-of-the-art equipment will allow for some furans and dioxins to get into the air. That is simply unacceptable in 1986, since we know how substantial the negative effects of those cancer-causing chemicals that get into the air are on people's health.

I am not entirely satisfied with the response we have had from the Ministry of the Environment to this date. The first notification that this plant was going to be installed was officially given to the Ministry of the Environment on September 24, 1984. It notified the then Progressive Conservative government that there would be public hearings. It did not even get a response from the Minister of the Environment of the time who, I believe, was the member for Sarnia (Mr. Brandt), who just spoke. There was not even a response.

That was surely a clear reflection of the lack of concern by the previous government for protecting the citizens of Windsor and Essex from this monstrous incineration plant. There was no response at all. Even when this government took office, there was no response until April 9, 1986. That was the first official response to the people at the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, objecting to the installation of this incinerator. I dare suggest there would not even have been that response if it were not for the fact that this matter was raised in the Legislature and by correspondents and received considerable press in the city of Windsor.

However, we are at the point now where there is a need for the Legislature to go on record today as saying we are not satisfied with the response by the city of Detroit. The amounts of money we are talking about to install the state-of-the-art pollution equipment are minuscule when one considers the consequences of death if those protections are not put in place.

I would like to make two other points. One is that a little bit of politics has been played in the past number of months by the Minister of the Environment in this whole matter. Mike Ray, who is on city council in the city of Windsor, has spoken out on this matter, but it is very clear that he has been receiving information from the Ministry of the Environment that even we, as local members, have not been receiving, so that Mr. Ray can grandstand at city council meetings on Monday nights and show his great concern about this incinerator.

10:40

The reality is that we know Mr. Ray is interested in seeking a Liberal nomination in the next provincial election. To use this item as a political issue, as Mr. Ray and the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Bradley) have done, is unfortunate because it is not that kind of issue. It is the kind of issue on which the whole community should unite in opposition to such actions.

One other point I want to make is that one cannot separate this issue from the whole problem of landfill, as the member for Sarnia said. The fact is that we in Windsor ourselves have a very serious problem of not dealing appropriately with our own sewage waste, which is currently being dumped at a landfill site out in my colleague's riding in Essex North.

Some suggestions have come forward about what we should do with our own garbage as well, and we have not properly dealt with that problem. In fact, the waste management committee in Windsor and Essex has suggested that one of the possible alternatives is to truck our waste over to the Detroit incinerator once it is completed. That is completely inappropriate. We in Ontario should be setting an example of proper disposal, so that we can oppose this monstrous incinerator with credibility.

Mr. G. I. Miller: It is a pleasure for me to be able to rise and participate in the debate on ballot item 27, an item brought in by the member for Windsor-Walkerville.

It is a resolution that is very important not only to all the citizens of Windsor and district and Detroit but also to Ontario generally. It is a time when we are dealing with our environment, which knows no international boundaries. I believe this is the appropriate time to bring it to the attention of the Ministry of the Environment, which is well aware of it and has received some criticism from the former government and from some of the other members around the Legislature indicating that we have not been paying enough attention to it.

As an international matter, the resolution should be supported. Perhaps this resolution should be passed on to our colleagues at the federal level, because it is an international situation, combined with the strength of the local municipalities, which have been speaking out and encouraging that the latest technology be utilized, such as putting scrubbers on the garbage incinerators. This should be carried out.

Through the debate in this House this morning and through support from all sides -- and I assume it will be taking place -- I hope we can bring it to the attention of our federal environmental people so that they can negotiate an agreement. By that message we can protect our environment, and I believe we will be able to look back in the years to come with some satisfaction. I believe it is the first time in my recollection of 10 or 11 years in the Legislature that we have dealt with a resolution that involves both Ontario and the United States, and it is something we can be proud of down the way.

The important thing is to leave a future for our young people and to protect our health. I guess another example of where we could, should and perhaps will do so in the future is the Nanticoke generating station. It is one of the largest coal-fired stations in the world. While we have tried to improve the environment by using Canadian coal with less sulphur content to reduce the carbon dioxide and the pollution from that plant, much more work can and should be done. That plant sits on the north shore of Lake Erie, the boundary between the US and Ontario, Canada. By studying these examples, we can show we are trying to improve the environment and protect the future of our natural resources.

I know the member for Essex South (Mr. Mancini) was planning on speaking on the resolution and giving support to it this morning, but because he is on the standing committee on public accounts and voting on some matters at present, he was not able to take part in the debate.

Again, it is my pleasure to be able to rise this morning and support the resolution. We hope this debate will spark enough interest to have the city of Detroit and the state of Michigan reconsider and use the latest technology for providing clean air in this incinerator.

I noticed the member for Sarnia was critical of the waste-burning facilities that Ontario is providing at present. As a member of the government, I believe we are dealing and trying to deal with the disposing of our waste. It is a major problem and a concern to every municipality in Ontario. Should we be piling it, burying it or leaving it in huge mounds? I believe the policy of our government is to move ahead on recycling. That seems to be the direction we should be going in the future.

While many people think of waste as an end product and burying it, when it is used properly by recycling there is value there. It can be utilized a second or third time. In that way, we are creating jobs, protecting our natural resources and leaving an environment we can all be proud of. I firmly believe that is the direction we should go. I know the Minister of the Environment and this government are encouraging that.

I intend to support the private member's bill brought in by the member for Windsor-Walkerville. We hope it will prove fruitful in the days ahead and that this incinerator can be properly equipped with the scrubbers that are available at present.

Mr. McLean: I am pleased to speak on private member's notice of motion 66. In response to the resolution of the member for Windsor-Walkerville, it seems that all members of this House might easily support such a motherhood statement. After all, we would all want our constituents protected from any potential dangers that might emanate from a new garbage incinerator in Michigan or, for that matter, elsewhere in the US or Canada.

I suppose we could even legislate against a Ukrainian nuclear plant in Chernobyl. Although it does not do much good to pass laws against pollution, I am sure the Minister of the Environment will want to do something to ensure that those good residents of Windsor and Essex county are protected. Our American friends do not seem to listen very much any more, but we can do something. I am sure that is why we are all here today and will support our friend's resolution.

I have some concerns, however, over this government's real interest in matters of pollution controls and protection mechanisms. After only six weeks, I finally received from the Minister of the Environment a reply to my request for information on how the government might help a major industry in my riding to convert to a pollution-free method of production. This involved cyanide salt waste. We were not talking about some dirty water or some household garbage.

10:50

I mention this event because the slowness of the minister's reply and the content of it demonstrated to me that we cannot expect too much from this government when it comes to action on pollution abatement and control. The letter I received from the minister was simply a brochure that I could send to this constituent on how he could apply for government funds to help him in his factory.

It is a critical and life-threatening matter that should be addressed by the highest authority and something should be done about it and done now. If, however, in a more charitable vein, we might hope for some action from the government on pollution matters, let me remind the members of the problems we face every day and some solutions the government could look at.

In the first place, the bottom line of the problem is not the amount of garbage that has to be disposed of; it is what happens when one disposes of it. What does it turn to? When garbage is incinerated, there is a lot of smoke and ashes and a reduction in the size of solids that are relatively easy to get rid of, but there is also the worst potential killer in the history of mankind. It is a killer known as dioxin.

Dioxin, because of its extremely deadly nature, has come to be the word people use when they want to express the worst in man-made pollutants. Unlike other known pollutants such as DDT, for example, little is known about the makeup of dioxin. All we know for sure is that it is a deadly killer in microscopic amounts and that the major source of this killer is from incinerated garbage, from the gases that go up into the atmosphere and float around wherever the wind carries them. That wind can carry dioxin particles thousands of miles. When it rains or snows, guess what happens to this poison? It falls with the rain or snow and goes into our food chain, into the animals we raise as food, the wild animals, the fish, the plants we grow, the wild plants that our domestic animals eat, and eventually into the food we eat.

I am sure all of us understand how pollutants get into our food chain, but the real problem is that we do not seem to be too concerned about it, perhaps because this poison is invisible. Yes, we have rules -- and finally, some strict rules -- but it appears that many people think rules are made to be broken, accidentally or otherwise.

I read recently that in Germany there has been a major spill of toxic chemicals into the mighty and historic Rhine river. That river is almost dead now and will remain so for many years. What a tragedy.

Similarly, in Canada's north last year, a native community in northern Ontario suffered from mercury poisoning in the fish. We know all about that. Acid rain and acid dust from chimneys have already ruined many of Ontario's lakes and polluted them with dioxins. The public is now becoming aware of the newest danger, one that has been around for many years. It has existed since man began lighting fires millions of years ago.

In 1982, dioxins were first found in the sources of Ontario's drinking water. About March of this year, for the first time anywhere, dioxin was found in our treated drinking water. It seems we cannot get away from this invisible menace. These dioxins poison us in many ways. At various levels, they cause birth defects, liver damage and cancer. It is believed that dioxins are the most toxic promoters of cancer.

In 1983, the Federal Expert Advisory Committee on Dioxins reported that the largest source of these poisons was primarily municipal garbage incinerators. Twenty-seven kilos a year of dioxins are estimated to go up in smoke from Canadian incinerators of various kinds. Multiply that by a 600 millionth of one millionth of a gram to see how much deadly poison is floating around in the air. If we were concerned about what is taking place, we might address our plans for the coming years in regard to garbage disposal methods and also the proposed Michigan incinerator across the river from Windsor.

First, as I am sure members know, especially the so-called rural members, garbage disposal is a very real problem. What do we do when our landfill sites are filled? Where do we put garbage then? Burning always seemed a reasonable and effective alternative, but maybe it is not necessarily so now.

Sweden has had a moratorium on new garbage incinerators for the past few years. California is about to institute a moratorium until it gets more information on how to handle the emissions. It is too bad that Michigan will not hold off for a while also. Maybe they would if we talked to them.

We should examine recycling garbage, as the Japanese have done. Japan recycles 90 per cent of municipal garbage; Ontario recycles about one per cent. However, burning is not totally out of the question, and there has been some major leadership from Environment Canada on this problem. Perhaps our minister should talk to the Ottawa people.

Pollution from municipal waste incinerators can be cut down by 90 per cent for certain kinds of pollutants now, but we have to use the right equipment. Major tests have been completed that have demonstrated that add-on equipment can and does work in reducing serious pollutants from the incinerators of municipal garbage.

Our friends in Michigan should be aware of these new developments in Canada. Technology does exist to remove pollutants of concern efficiently. Such technology can be incorporated into existing facilities to provide an effective removal of pollutants of concern. It can be done.

A problem exists in the township of Tiny with the Pauzé landfill site and the surrounding municipalities. The Premier has made the announcement that it will be closed in October 1987. They have set up a committee to look into it, but they have not given any alternatives. They are saying: "Yes, you have to have another site. You have to have it approved. You have to have all the environmental hearings and go through the whole process." That process is long, and it is hard to find a land disposal site in any community any more because nobody really wants to accept it.

The ministry should be giving some direction to these municipalities. It should be working hand in hand with them and setting down a criterion whereby they can say: "This is the type of landfill site that will be permitted. This is the type of garbage that will be permitted. Yes, there will be a landfill site for those five municipalities."

The Minister of the Environment has not made that happen. He has not given leadership in this direction. I say he should give leadership to help those municipalities that need the help to find garbage disposal sites.

Mr. Newman: My first words are to thank the various members who have participated in this discussion. I appreciate their valuable information, as well as the concern they have expressed.

We have a problem here that has to be resolved. It will be resolved only by the combined efforts of each and every one of us, both those who are sitting here and those in other Legislatures throughout the province and Canada.

PROPERTY ASSESSMENT

Mr. McFadden moved resolution 65:

That in the opinion of this House, the provincial government should immediately introduce tax reform measures to reduce the property tax burden on home owners and tenants.

Mr. McFadden: The current tax debate in Metropolitan Toronto about the proposed imposition of market value assessment has clearly brought into focus the need for tax reform in Ontario. It is argued that market value assessment should be applied to all properties in Ontario on the grounds of fairness and equity. Some people take the position that market value assessment, when universally applied, will magically bring peace and harmony to the assessment scene and will end all inequities in the system for ever.

In spite of such claims, the imposition of market value assessment does not and will not bring a tax heaven to Ontario. All one has to do is look at the controversy over tax assessment now raging in Mississauga, where market value assessment is currently in effect, to see that a market value scheme does not bring tranquillity or a universal feeling of equity in the tax system.

I have already spoken to this House on several occasions about the terribly negative impact the imposition of market value assessment would have in north Toronto and in similar areas of older housing throughout Metropolitan Toronto. If the system of market value assessment were imposed as proposed by the provincial government, 83 per cent of the homes in ward 10 and 75 per cent of the homes in ward 11 of the city of Toronto would face a tax increase.

In fact, the study prepared by the Ministry of Revenue on this matter indicates that 50 per cent of the home owners in these two wards would face tax increases of 20 per cent or more as a result of reassessment. This rise in taxes would be repeated in one neighbourhood after another throughout Metro. It should be remembered that these increases will be over and above the normal annual increases in taxes imposed by municipalities for education and local services.

If such a reassessment were imposed in one year, it could be devastating to many families. Even if market value assessment were implemented over four or five years, it would create a major hardship, since the effective rate of a property tax increase on a majority of such homes would be at least nine or 10 per cent each year during the implementation period.

What is even more devastating is the type of people upon whom reassessment will have a negative impact. Older neighbourhoods, which will face the largest tax increases, are the neighbourhoods where there is the highest percentage of senior citizens. At a time when the government is encouraging seniors to stay in their homes, the imposition of market value assessment will force many seniors on fixed incomes out of their homes, since a significant property tax increase, when combined with all the other increases in operating costs, will make home ownership unaffordable.

The same problem will be faced by many young families now struggling to make ends meet. A significant property tax increase, when combined with all the other expenses incurred in financing and maintaining a house and raising children, will force many young families to sell their homes at a time when there is a chronic shortage of satisfactory rental accommodation in the neighbourhoods affected.

In the face of such a negative impact of reassessment, the time has come for the province to consider tax reform that will reduce the property tax burden on home owners and tenants. Much of the controversy surrounding property taxes stems from a number of fundamental flaws in the whole concept of the taxation of property, particularly as a major source of revenue for education costs and municipal services.

Other major taxation methods apply either to income earned or to a transaction that has taken place. The largest single source of provincial revenue is personal income taxes. This form of taxation is essentially fair, because it applies to money earned by the taxpayer and is therefore related to the ability of the taxpayer to pay. If little or no income is earned, the taxpayer effectively owes no personal income tax. The same thing applies to corporation taxes, which are imposed on the net earnings of a company.

Most other taxes applied under provincial authority relate to specific transactions. The various sales taxes apply to goods purchased, from meals to kitchen appliances and from motor vehicles to gasoline. The land transfer tax is imposed when the ownership of property is transferred. In effect, the taxpayer must act by buying or selling something to attract sales or other transaction taxes.

Property taxes are very different from income or sales tax. Property taxes do not relate to the ability of the taxpayer to pay and are not related to any transaction that has occurred or any specific service that is received. For example, an elderly couple on a fixed income and living in an older home, where they may have dwelt for 20, 30 or 40 years, would pay about the same property taxes as another family with triple the income in a similar home on the same street. You could say to the older person, "Get out of your house if you cannot afford it and find somewhere else to live."

That attitude is not consistent with the compassionate and humane society we seek to build and maintain in this province. Indeed, it has been the policy of government for a number of years to encourage seniors to stay in their own homes, because they can live happier and fuller lives for longer if they are able to live independently in familiar neighbourhoods and surroundings.

The same kind of unfair circumstances arises for a young couple with children who scrape together every dollar they have to buy their first home and then struggle to keep up their payments for mortgages, food, heat, light, day care and the other necessities of life. This couple would pay property taxes similar to those paid by a couple in a comparable home on the same street with no children and making double, triple or quadruple the disposable income. This is hardly fair or equitable. This kind of circumstance also sends a negative message about our society's attitude towards family life and the priority we give to the proper raising of children.

Property taxes are not only a regressive form of taxation, bearing no relation to the taxpayer's ability to pay, but they are also imposed in a fashion that effectively works against community improvement. Because the level of property taxes is related to the value of a property, the amount of tax increases if a house is renovated or enhanced in some way. What a bizarre situation we now have where a home owner is taxed or, in essence, penalized for improving his or her house by adding a bathroom, finishing the basement or increasing the size of the kitchen.

11:10

I have met many young couples who have purchased older homes, perhaps in run-down condition, with the intention of renovating them. They go into the house and do much of the construction and decorating work themselves, with the help of skilled labour where they lack the ability to do a particular job. The couple do the work themselves because they cannot afford to hire a professional contractor to do it.

When the work is all done in accordance with the building permit, for which they must pay to receive it from the municipality, a tax assessor will show up in due course to look at the house and inspect the improvements. What happens then? The couple are not congratulated for improving the neighbourhood or helping the economy by purchasing building materials or providing employment for some workmen. Quite the contrary. They are required to pay more taxes because they improved their property. This has to be one of the most inane results imaginable in any tax system in any society. In effect, property taxes are organized to penalize people who wish to improve the quality of their homes and, indirectly, the quality of their neighbourhoods.

These various negative aspects of property taxes require us to consider the ways in which the tax system can be reformed to reduce the dependence of municipalities on property taxes on residential properties.

Originally, property taxes were relatively minor levies to cover municipal services. In the early days of Ontario, there were relatively few municipal services and a very limited system of public education. After all, it did not cost a great deal to keep a dirt road or to maintain a one-room schoolhouse. Today property taxes are expected to cover a vast range of services offered by the municipalities, together with a large proportion of the cost of elementary and secondary education.

Consider the number of services the municipalities have assumed during the course of this century, from parks to welfare, day care and cultural activities. In view of this, property taxes have assumed an increasingly heavy burden as municipal services and the education system have expanded. This, in turn, has created growing pressures and inequities on property.

It is not reasonable to expect that we could eliminate property taxes on residential properties. It is probable that property taxes under any type of tax reform would continue to represent a significant source of revenue for municipalities. However, what we must do is reduce the proportion of municipal and education costs that are to be covered by property taxes on residential properties in order to alleviate, if not eliminate, the kind of pressure now faced by home owners in many municipalities.

Reports I have read indicate that property taxes in countries throughout the world are small and, in some cases, negligible in comparison to Ontario and other provinces in Canada. I submit that this is an unhealthy situation.

The resolution before the House today seeks to have a declaration made that we need tax reform to reduce the burden of property taxes on residential properties. There are various alternatives that could be pursued, including some form of income tax geared specifically to cover the cost of local services. Whatever ultimate reforms might be considered in the end, it is surely not beyond the realm of human intelligence and ingenuity to deal with this kind of problem.

I therefore ask the House to declare its support for reform of the property tax system by passing this resolution. Then I would ask the government to get on with the job of considering and developing an alternative system that would be fairer and more equitable.

I will reserve the remaining time for further comments at the end or for rebuttal of anything else that might be stated.

Mr. Breaugh: I read this resolution with great interest when it first appeared in Orders and Notices. I examined it for a few days and I thought surely we are all in favour of lower property taxes; surely this will get unanimous consent and wonderful things will happen. However, the more I read it, the more I began to wonder what in the world the member means. Would it not be more helpful if we had a sweet, faint clue as to how he was proposing to go about lowering taxes?

I could not find it in the resolution. I will be shocked today if the Legislature does not say, "Yes, we are all in favour of lower property taxes." I will be even more shocked if somebody is stupid enough to stand up in here and say, "No, I want higher property taxes." I have not seen a politician do that in Canada since I have been involved in politics.

I was confused about precisely what was meant here and I did some research. On my desk, I found a riding report from the member for Eglinton (Mr. McFadden). On the first page, it says, "Eglinton home owners oppose market value assessment." I thought: "That is true. That is probably not news." Anybody who has had any form of market value assessment inflicted on him anywhere in Ontario knows this is not exactly what it was originally purported to be and not exactly a new, fair system.

In most municipalities where it has been put in place, the trend has been that the punishment is pretty severe on somebody who is unfortunate enough to have even a small house in a neighbourhood where property values have escalated. Tragically, it is usually the older, retired couple with a little bungalow on a street that, all of a sudden, has become trendy who pay the worst price when market value assessment is put in. God forbid that anybody should happen to have a lumber yard in a city, because that really gets zapped.

The instances of unfairness in market value assessment are pretty well documented now. The pattern for implementing it is not quite the way it was originally put forward. The pattern has been that just before a municipal election, a bill of goods is sold to a local council, saying, "This will be fairer." Although that is usually said, the critical point is, "This will put more money in your municipal coffers." Then they advise the council: "It would not be too smart for you to put out all this information. You should keep this within the council, pass your little resolutions and have it happen just after the election. You have a couple of years in there where people can forget who did this to them."

As I read further in this riding report, which I found very interesting, I found somebody else is now opposing market value assessment. Guess what? The people who inflicted Ontario with this dread disease have decided to do a recall. The people who, supposedly by law, brought in market value assessment province-wide have now decided it is a foul idea. That is despite the fact that since its inception some of us in this chamber said to the Tories, who were then in power, "This is a real dumb idea, folks."

In a sense they acknowledged it, because they originally started out with a law which said, "We are going to have market value assessment province-wide now." The outcry was so great from municipalities and citizens across the province that every year I have been a member here we passed a law which said, "But not this year." We are going to do it again this year, because on the books it says, "Market value assessment will go province-wide," but in reality nobody was stupid enough to try to inflict it province-wide because of the unfairness of the system.

I suppose we should be grateful that the Tories are born again, but I have to admit that for me it is a little hard to stomach the former Minister of Revenue, who steadfastly withstood my pleas over the years to release the studies on market value assessment. We did a study on Metropolitan Toronto and we tried everything in the book. We had oral questions, an emergency debate and written questions. We got down on our knees and pleaded with this guy to release this information.

Each day when he stands in question period now and asks the current Minister of Revenue (Mr. Nixon) to release that information, I have to admit I get a pain somewhere in my back. It is in the lower part of the back too. It hurts to see that kind of demonstration. I am not allowed to say that is hypocrisy. It is a shame I am not allowed to say that. It is pretty hard to explain that when he was Minister of Revenue and had the opportunity to make this information available to the people in Ontario, it was a sin. He could not and would not do it. He would not answer the written questions or table the documents here. He would not give us any information on it. Now he feels everybody should get the information.

I guess we have different days and different stories. I do not mind that the member has put forward a motion calling for lower property taxes and then talks about market value assessment. That is fine by me. I really do not mind that the Tories are born again on the matter. They now see the error of their ways. They have said their four Our Fathers and five Hail Marys and repented on the matter. It may be a deathbed repentance, but I do not care; I will take it in any form it comes.

11:20

It is true that when they were in government, they systematically loaded new programs on to municipal governments every year over a lengthy period. They put incentives at the front end of the programs so that municipalities would take them under their jurisdiction. They kept putting forward funding arrangements to make it attractive for municipalities to take on more responsibilities.

They had learned the political secret that the maximum political mileage -- the big buck, so to speak -- on any program in health, welfare and social assistance, housing, child care or anything we name, is right at the beginning. That is where the fun is. That is where the minister hands over the initial cheque. He cuts the ribbon on the child care centre and then he walks away. That is the cheap part and the easy part of any program. The hard part is to keep the thing going for 20, 30 or 40 years.

They also know -- they learned their lessons well -- that when a municipal council begins to run child care programs, for example, at the request of the Ministry of Community and Social Services, no one from the ministry will come to the council chamber when they start to talk about cost. The local council will have to say that it started it with startup funds from the ministry, that it thinks it is a good program but that it is tough to finance from a municipal property tax base.

They have learned the wonderful lesson of putting the responsibility on another level of government. It will be the other level of government that pays the unhappy price. The ratepayers will not likely come to Queen's Park and attack the minister. He will say he has nothing to do with it any more; it is run by North York, Toronto, Oshawa or wherever. They consistently and steadily loaded that on to the municipal level of government over the years and now the system is creaking.

We all know that the assessment program around Ontario is truly bizarre. We also know that is not the real problem. The real problem is that municipalities have that as their only source of real, local funding. They are dependent on the province, the federal government and various means to provide them with additional funds.

To do something concrete to assist municipalities, the government should provide them with some of the things the Treasurer (Mr. Nixon) has begun to do. It should tell them what they are going to get for funding next year. That does not sound like much, but it is an unbelievable thing that most municipalities never knew what moneys they would get from the province until after their entire budgetary process was pretty well locked up and put away. At least he is telling them what the pain will be ahead of time. That is one small step.

Most of us who are observers of the municipal scene would understand that the problem is chronic. It will take some time to reverse that trend. Most of the taxes in this country are hidden. Governments have become really good at hiding even municipal property taxes. I am amazed at the number of people who have no knowledge of how much money they pay in municipal property taxes; but it is readily explainable: most of them do not pay it directly; they pay it indirectly through a mortgage company. Very few people walk into the municipal office and hand over a cheque. Most of them pay it by some indirect means. They do not have the sharp, working knowledge they should have, and municipalities are wavering along, struggling under a heavy financial load.

This little resolution is not going to help very much. I am happy to see that the Tories have repented on market value assessment. I wish they had done so a little earlier. I might have changed my mind about them. I witness the pain each day as they say things they would not have said when they were the government.

I hope the government of the day is listening. There is a massive financial problem at the municipal level and it is getting worse instead of better. It requires a commitment on the part of this government to do some long-term financial planning for municipalities. I only hope that some day in the foreseeable future the municipal property tax will be what it ought to be: a tax that is limited to certain services and not an excuse for the provincial government.

Ms. Caplan: I rise today to enter this debate with considerable experience on a local council. Perhaps some historical perspectives would assist in this debate. I entered municipal council in 1978, shortly after the provincial government announced market value assessment as the be-all and end-all for a fair and equitable property tax system. The government announced the system would be province-wide and it would be implemented in short order.

That was in 1978. The announcement followed a study that was done over the years from 1963 through 1967 and an additional study after that. The Treasurer and the Minister of Revenue at that time brought this forward, really without consultation with the local municipalities, and the municipalities rightly responded by saying: "What exactly are you talking about? What will this mean? Where are the impact studies? What will this do?"

The issues of fairness and equity, clarity, understanding and justice in that system were not lost upon the local municipal councils, which were facing the financial pressures my colleague the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh) referred to.

The member for Eglinton (Mr. McFadden) stated that property tax is not in any way equated with ability to pay. It is my feeling that the motion we have before this House is somewhat simplistic. It is motherhood. It is something everyone in this House would support. We would all like to have lower property taxes at the municipal level. I say it is simplistic because it does not address any of the available alternatives.

This was debated when I was at the local municipal council. Time and again we talked about the need for better and more unconditional grants from the province, because the municipalities are funded by both property taxes and conditional grants which say, "In order to get provincial money, you must do this." Then there are the unconditional grants from the province which say: "Here is the money. Do with it as you please."

It raises the issue of local autonomy and accountability at the local level for those services that are perhaps different in that municipality from other areas around this province. That is the reason total reassessment of the province at market value was never possible, beginning in 1978.

I would like to state in this House, as I did on numerous occasions after speaking with my constituents in the east end of North York, that if one lived in North York and received the same services from the municipality -- and in 1978 the average price of a home was approximately $100,000 -- I would ask, "Do you think someone who has a home in North York valued at $100,000 should be paying the same property tax as someone else in the city with a home valued at $100,000?" The answer unanimously was yes.

I said to them, "Tell me, when you look at your tax assessment bill and see the value of your home assessed at $10,000, $15,000 or $13,500, what does that mean to you?" The answer was: "We do not know what it means. We do not know because of the complicated formula." As I investigated, I found this was established in the 1940s. The assessors came in and counted the bathrooms and determined the square footage and whether the basement was finished.

What developed in this process was that people did not understand what their assessment meant. Because they did not understand it, they assumed, in many cases correctly, it was unfair that their next-door neighbour was assessed at $12,500 while they were assessed at $14,000. They would go through the process at the local municipal level to appeal their taxes, if they chose, and I do not think it was clarified there either.

At the municipal level, from 1978 until 1985, I said, "One of the fundamental important things we must do in any taxation system, whether property tax, sales tax or income tax, is to make sure people understand how we arrive at the base, how we arrive at the calculations and what the formula means. I always supported it. I was in a minority. Four of us supported market value as a measure in the late 1970s. At that time the value of a home was $100,000; today it is perhaps $150,000. I use that because it is important to note that it does change. Generally, housing is an inflation-proof investment and one's equity in housing remains strong and firm in our great province. People understand this.

11:30

On a personal basis, we have a house in the Huntsville area and it was subjected to market value assessment. When I received the assessment notice, it made sense to me. I knew everyone in the area whose home was assessed at the same value was paying the same tax rate.

If the member for Eglinton is suggesting -- and I do not think he is -- that we do away with property taxes, then I ask, is he suggesting a municipal income tax? Is he suggesting a municipal sales tax? Is he suggesting that the local council, in setting its tax rate, not have the ability to explain the cost of municipal services, the difference of services in its municipality compared to the services in other municipalities and why its taxes are higher because of the level of services it provides?

I will speak for a few minutes about my feelings on local autonomy and local option -- I guess that is one of the words -- and the ability of a local municipality to provide the services to its constituents. This is where the whole reason for a local council comes into being because the local council can institute a program that is funded by local municipal property taxes.

Unless we have some suggestion as to how we will change the funding of municipalities, it is not enough to say there should be lower municipal property taxes. We must look at what the impact will be if we say there will be a municipal income tax. We must say what the impact will be if a local municipal sales tax is permitted. We must say how we are going to do it. I wish to point out, as my colleague the member for Oshawa did, that the Treasurer and Minister of Revenue has done for the first time what I demanded time and time again, year after year, on local council, "Give us the information as to what the grant structure from the province will be so that we can do the long-term planning that is required for sound fiscal management at the local municipal level."

It is very important that we not just have the province, Big Brother, send a cheque annually to the local council to spend. Municipal councillors must stand up at election time and say: "These are the services. This is what they are going to cost. This is what we intend to do." Unless we give them the opportunity for fiscal management and fiscal responsibility at the local level, we will create a situation where, because the councillors are not accountable for their spending, they will not have the local autonomy and strength that is important.

The Metro issue is a wider one. We could spend a lot of time debating the assessment of Metropolitan Toronto. I do not want to get into that debate, except to say that I believe people fundamentally support the policy that the services received in Metropolitan Toronto should be similar and that homes in Metro should be assessed, I would say, equally.

In closing, this motion is simplistic because it does not offer alternatives and options. It is motherhood and meaningless.

Mr. Partington: I am pleased to speak in support of the resolution of the member for Eglinton that the provincial government should immediately introduce tax reform measures to reduce the property tax burden on home owners and tenants.

"A man's house is his castle" and "In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes" are two often-quoted statements. However, in recent years it has become readily apparent that the scourge of taxes is seriously undermining the ability of many to acquire or retain a home, their castle. For most Canadians home ownership has been an important goal. Family members work hard and save their money, all in an effort to reach the goal of a family home.

Canadians, led by the promises of their federal and provincial governments, have come to regard home ownership as a fundamental component of our society, tantamount to a right. Over the past decade, however, this most laudable goal of home ownership has been under siege. Our tax system, particularly the increasing burden of property taxes, has served to undermine the dreams and hopes of many Ontario residents. Ever-increasing property taxes ensure that more and more of our families are unable to own their own homes.

Our tax system is vital from a number of perspectives. It influences our economic growth, employment prospects, international competitiveness and the distribution of income throughout society. On a more basic level, our tax system plays an important role in regulating disposable income. The tax structure of the day not only significantly affects the amount of money each of us may have or earn but it can also determine how we spend those dollars the tax man leaves us.

It is clearly evident that our current tax system places an undue burden on property owners and as a result is threatening the ideal of home ownership. It appears that the most serious flaw in our tax system, as it relates to home ownership or rental real estate investment, has arisen because the costs associated with this type of investment are paid in after-tax dollars. In effect, these expenditures attract double taxation. The most obvious and onerous example of this is property taxes, which are paid with post-personal-income-tax dollars. Those who invest their money in the purchase of a home rather than acquiring other consumer items are financially penalized as they must then pay property taxes.

To take this example a step further, those who take the initiative to upgrade their homes, perhaps by adding a room or a fireplace, or more important, in an effort to bring their homes up to current standards, find that because their homes have increased in value they must now face increased property taxes. Once again their investment of funds has attracted increased levels and amounts of taxation. Furthermore, this expenditure is not just taxed twice, once through income tax and then through property tax; instead, this investment is taxed year after year, every time property taxes are paid on this home.

A number of groups are already on record as suggesting that significant changes to our tax system are required in the housing sector. The Canadian Real Estate Association in its recent brief to the federal government emphasized the need to re-establish neutrality in the tax treatment of home owners and real estate investors. They also pointed out, for example, that home ownership is a major form of savings for most Canadian households, which the tax system must not be allowed to undermine.

Having recognized that a serious problem exists, it appears clear that the government must act without further delay to remedy this inequity currently facing home owners or those who invest in rental properties. By implementing a tax structure that provides for the deductibility of items such as property taxes or mortgage interest from income tax, the government would be removing a significant disincentive to home ownership. Indeed, the fact that United States home owners have enjoyed the benefit of mortgage interest deductibility for a number of years probably explains at least partially the different levels of home ownership in Canada and the US.

11:40

Encouraging home ownership would provide many spinoffs. First, it would relieve the excessive burden that is currently being placed on our rental accommodation stock. The inability of many lower-income families to locate suitable rental accommodation has had a serious social impact, which could be alleviated. Increased home ownership would also stimulate the housing industry and thereby create jobs.

It is estimated that each additional house generates two and a half person-years of work; so while the Treasurer may be forgoing certain tax revenues by making property taxes deductible, such a step could result in a positive net tax benefit because of the increased economic activity generated.

Furthermore, it must be remembered that home ownership is an important mechanism for saving for the future. In many instances, the equity one builds up in the home provides a significant portion of the money available to an individual during retirement years. As the pressure on our pension system increases in the years ahead, the funds generated by the sale of the family home will play an even more important role in ensuring adequate financial resources for our seniors. As well, the existence of a debt-free home provides fixed-income retirees with a source of low-cost housing that does not place an undue burden on their financial resources.

The unfair property tax burden not only affects home owners; it also hurts renters. Increased property taxes are obviously passed on to renters in the form of higher rents, notwithstanding the presence of rent controls. At the same time, high property taxes and the inequitable tax structure facing investors in the housing sector discourage the construction of rental units. This in turn has led to low vacancy rates, which also hurt those who must rent.

In short, the situation cannot and must not be allowed to continue. Home ownership must be encouraged, not discouraged. Any tax system that financially penalizes home owners must be changed without further delay. Our current tax system does not even treat those who invest in a family home or rental unit equitably; instead, it seriously penalizes those individuals year after year.

Raising property taxes and the current taxation methods for property-related investments provides an unnecessary impediment to economic growth in this province. A restructured tax system would encourage home ownership and investment in property. Not only would the purchase of a family home return to being a sound financial investment, but there would also be increased construction in the rental housing market. In the end, more people would be investing in and upgrading their own houses, acquiring an equity that would be available to them in their retirement years. At the same time, the burden on our rental housing stock would be lightened by decreased demand and increased construction of these units. Those who, for whatever reason, were unable or who did not wish to invest in a home of their own at least would be able to locate suitable rental accommodation.

The problems I have just outlined are sure to continue unabated if immediate tax reform does not occur. This situation cannot last any longer. The government must act now, and act without further delay.

Mr. Warner: We are discussing property tax and the entire property tax system. Of course, we all know who put it in place. We also all know that the Tories, when they were in power, with respect to the property tax system, accomplished for tenants and home owners about the same thing as Colonel Sanders accomplished for the chicken population.

What we have in Ontario with respect to property tax, quite frankly, is a mess. I do not think any reasonable person could say the tax system is fair. It is not fair. There have been fumbling and bumbling attempts to bring in some form of market value assessment. I respectfully suggest that, rather than debating whether one street or the next has the right amount of tax levied on it or whether the market value system is reasonable and fair enough to extend across the province, we should start by taking a look at the basic structure.

The basic structure has three components, the first one of which I always thought was the basic reason for a property tax; it is a tax for water, hydro, police services, fire protection, ambulance services -- the basic services provided to property. The previous government decided that was not enough. They thought: "Why do we not load a whole lot of other things on the tax system for both home owners and tenants? Let them pay for social programs. Let them bear the cost of education." The city of Toronto does not receive a single penny from the province for education. It pays the whole shot itself out of the property tax. The city of Scarborough is not much further ahead; l think a grand total of eight per cent of its education costs comes from the province and the other 92 per cent comes out of the property tax.

The government's idea was to load the system of day care service, public health -- whatever program we want to name -- on the property tax. That was the Tories' approach for 40 years. Now, sitting in opposition, they suddenly realize they have created a monster, and they want somehow to slay the monster. The best we have before us this morning is, "That in the opinion of this House, the provincial government should immediately introduce tax reform measures to reduce the property tax burden on home owners and tenants." That is it. That is zippo. That is not very helpful.

I try to be a normal, reasonable person. As most people in the House realize, I am not given to mean and vicious attacks on other members of the assembly, but frankly I would have expected a great deal more from the member for Eglinton.

An hon. member: Particularly with the kind of trouble in his constituency.

Mr. Warner: I fully realize the pressure the member is under from his constituents, many of whom want him to resign. Surely to goodness he could have come up with something a little more helpful.

For example, a few years ago, in what some would have described as a somewhat transparent attempt to purchase seniors' votes, they introduced a property tax cheque. Not the credit: all of us under the age 65 fill out a little form and we hope to get a few dollars back from the province through the property tax credit, and seniors are entitled to up to $500. That was issued in an election year. However, that amount has not been altered in 10 years; but does the member for Eglinton include in his suggestion that we should alter and enrich the property tax credit to seniors? No.

Is there anything in the member's resolution to say we should ensure that the province's share of education tax is at least 60 per cent? No. Is there anything in his resolution to say social services are the responsibility of the province and thus should be removed from the property tax? No. Does he suggest only services to property should be the basis for property tax? No, he does not.

Unfortunately, we are being asked this morning to support something that is nothing. I am puzzled as to what this resolution is going to accomplish. I would have been a little happier had the member for Eglinton stood in his place and said: "I apologize on behalf of the Conservative Party for having created this monstrous mess. Now I have a series of items that will correct the mess we created." I listened very carefully to the member for Eglinton, and I did not hear a single apology. I did not hear one acknowledgement that he and his little band from the Royal Ontario Museum created this monstrous mess and were prepared to address each item in the mess that was created. I am really disappointed.

11:50

Property tax reform is a serious matter. If the government of the day has the political will, it is going to take a long time to unravel this and to bring in the reform measures that are needed to clean up the system. I suggest that at the bottom of it are two basic principles that must be addressed but are sadly lacking from the resolution. One is that a tax on property should be for services. The other is that whatever system you introduce must be fair to individuals and surely should reflect in some measure their ability to pay. We do not do that in our tax system, but that is what we should be addressing.

Obviously, we are going to be asked whether we support this measure. It is so ineffectual that it is easy to support. However, it disturbs me that we do not have a very considerable resolution in front of us, one that itemizes step by step the reform that is needed so we can get on with the job.

Finally, the government of the day does not escape unscathed. It has been in office for slightly more than a year and a half. I have not seen a single item that would address basic tax reform. The government cannot sit idly by and say, "The Tories messed it all up and that is too bad." The government has not done a thing.

I am pleased to report that my own party has spent a considerable amount of time on this and has put together some very thoughtful documents on tax reform. These documents were not well received by the previous government and apparently are not terribly well received by the present government. We will bring in tax reform when we are the government.

Mr. Speaker: I think the member for Eglinton has 355 seconds remaining.

Mr. McFadden: Thank you for those seconds, Mr. Speaker.

I listened with great interest to the comments this morning of the member for Oshawa, the member for Oriole (Ms. Caplan), the member for Brock (Mr. Partington) and the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere (Mr. Warner). It has been mentioned that this resolution is quite general in approach. It was intended to be that way, because I was seeking to start off with a first principle from which we could move on to more detailed tax policy in the future. By submitting this resolution to the House today, I was seeking to get a declaration from the House that in principle it favours the reduction of the property tax burden on residential properties. By agreeing to that at least in principle, we can move from there to consider the ways in which it can be done.

However, I agree with previous speakers that the current system has developed over the years to meet all kinds of changing demands at the municipal level for all kinds of services that were not originally envisaged when the whole system of property taxes was evolved decades ago.

I would suggest that from here we should move on, perhaps by referral to a select committee of this House, to a standing committee or by whatever other means is available, to consider all the alternatives that would be available in the tax system to achieve this objective. There could be a whole variety of those, but I would like us today at least to declare our support in principle for reducing the property tax burden on residential properties. From there we can move more specifically to the ways in which that can be done.

With regard to the whole market value assessment scheme, this is private members' hour, and I should tell you, Mr. Speaker, I was never in favour of a compulsory imposition of market value assessment throughout this province. I felt it would create some very severe dislocations and hardships in neighbourhoods throughout this province. I remain convinced there should never be a compulsory imposition of market value assessment in Ontario. I would prefer us to look instead at ways to reform the property tax system.

Some of the serious problems that have been referred to by the honourable members here have evolved over the past number of years in particular as demands on municipalities for services have gone up and as the demands have gone up for government generally. The anomalies have developed as the price of property has inflated so dramatically over the past 10 years.

As the member for Oshawa has stated, you can have a situation where somebody in a very modest home winds up living in an area that is subjected to extremes of property speculation or in an area that is particularly attractive to live in for reasons that in no way relate to the home owner who is living in that modest home. Yet if we went to market value assessment, those properties would experience sudden and dramatic increases in property taxes.

As I mentioned in my remarks to this House, I have no illusions about the difficulty of achieving some kind of tax reform that would make the system a little fairer and a little more equitable. I also do not believe we can eliminate property taxes altogether, because very clearly they are needed for local services. Our problem now is an imbalance in the system that has to be remedied.

I support the concerns raised by the member for Oriole with regard to local autonomy. I would not want to see a reduction of the tax burden on residential properties lead to any form of destruction or undermining of the autonomy of our municipalities, because the kinds of services that municipalities are delivering should properly be in local hands, and the municipalities, as far as is possible, should have the taxing power to deliver those services.

It is a very delicate balance we are seeking to develop here in Ontario, and I hope this resolution can be a first step towards a system that would be fairer and that would reduce the overall tax burden on residential property.

DETROIT INCINERATOR

Mr. Speaker: Mr. Newman has moved resolution 66.

Motion agreed to.

PROPERTY ASSESSMENT

Mr. Speaker: Mr. McFadden has moved resolution 65.

Motion agreed to.

The House recessed at 12 noon.

AFTERNOON SITTING

The House resumed at 1:30 p.m.

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

GOVERNMENT AUTOMOBILES

Mr. McLean: There is a very important statement that I want to make today. I had hoped there would be more than five members on the government side to listen to it. In fact, I would like to have some ministers here to listen to it because it pertains to them. Is there a quorum, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: The member has asked for a quorum count. There is a quorum.

Mr. McLean: Some time ago, I asked the Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Fulton) a question pertaining to the number of persons in the provincial government who have automobiles assigned to them. The question was: How many civil servants and members have cars assigned to them? This is basically a simple question, and I was looking for a straightforward and uncomplicated answer. This week I received a reply that there is apparently not enough time to reply to my question and that I must wait until January 15, 1987, for a reply. I had asked the question some months ago.

It is rather odd that a minister of transportation does not have at his fingertips on a computer printout a listing of such major assets as the government automobiles and the ministers, members, those in the civil service and other government employees to whom they are assigned.

AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE

Mr. Swart: On Tuesday the Minister of Financial Institutions (Mr. Kwinter), in answer to a question from me, said that the Manitoba public insurance plan will lose $4 million this year and that premiums in British Columbia for one million motorists will rise by $1 to $25 and for 250,000 drivers by $25 to $50.

He neglected to mention that the premiums in BC had dropped by six per cent in the previous two years. He also neglected to mention that in the same three years Ontario's rates will have increased by five to eight times as much as they have in British Columbia. He also neglected to mention that, according to his own figures in defence of the insurance companies, they paid out in claims $1.31 for every dollar of premiums and that auto insurers in Ontario lost three quarters of a billion dollars last year alone.

If the minister asks the people of Ontario whether they would rather have a public auto insurance system that increases their rates by an average of less than $25 in three years compared to the private system here that increases them by an average of $200, he will get a resounding yes. If the minister asks the people of Ontario if they want the kind of Manitoba public insurance system that has a six-year surplus of $54 million instead of a system here that says it has lost $1 billion, he will get a resounding yes. If the minister asks the people of this province if they want to get rid of the minister who defends the giant insurance companies here and bring in a minister who will implement a people-oriented public plan such as the Manitoba plan, he will get the greatest resounding yes of all.

FOOTBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

Ms. E. J. Smith: I would be remiss in my duties as a representative of the city of London if I did not offer my best wishes and strong encouragement to the University of Western Ontario Mustangs as they battle for the Canadian university football championship this Saturday.

The Mustangs have had an outstanding year, going undefeated through the regular season and beating McMaster, Guelph and Acadia in the playoffs. Two outstanding players, Blake Marshall and Matt Janes, have been nominated for national awards. Obviously, Western is living up to its tradition of excellence. A few years ago, Western faced the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds for the Vanier Cup. I am confident that this year these western birds will be no match for our eastern Mustangs.

On behalf of the Premier (Mr. Peterson), the Minister without Portfolio responsible for senior citizens' affairs (Mr. Van Horne), myself and the member for Middlesex (Mr. Reycraft), I offer my best wishes to Coach Larry Haylor and the UWO Mustangs for this Saturday. I know the House will join me in wishing them well.

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE MEETING

Mr. Pierce: I would like to bring before this House a serious injustice against the population of northwestern Ontario by the Liberal government, specifically the Premier and his cabinet. The Northwestern Ontario Associated Chambers of Commerce have been refused by the Premier enough time with cabinet to discuss their 24 resolutions at a scheduled meeting on December 1. Historically, every year this group has always had the amount of time required with cabinet to present its concerns and resolutions.

Of the 24 resolutions the Northwestern Ontario Associated Chambers of Commerce would like to present for review, the Premier and his cabinet have informed this organization that they have time to review only approximately 10 of its resolutions. The Liberal government, which is a government that says it wants to hear the concerns of the north and is prepared to be available to listen to these concerns, is actually not available.

The Northwestern Ontario Associated Chambers of Commerce represent a broad sector of the northern population. I feel they should have the time needed to present all their resolutions to cabinet. Considering the amount of time and the money each individual chamber member is prepared to spend to familiarize the Ontario cabinet with the issues in the north, I respectfully request the Premier to reconsider the amount of time that has been allocated for this group to present its resolutions.

PAY EQUITY LEGISLATION

Ms. Gigantes: Yesterday I questioned the minister responsible for women's issues (Mr. Scott) about statements he was reported to have made concerning whether private employers would have to provide equal pay adjustments in addition to annual wage increases. He assured me in this House that he had merely been explaining to business representatives that equal pay adjustments would cost employers "less than the inflationary increases that employers normally have to bear in normal market circumstances."

I have listened to a tape of what he actually said. He told the employers: "We are going to try and help you in this way by saying that, of the amount that you allocate annually to wage increases, a certain proportion should be devoted to dealing with this adjustment."

He continued: "Inflation is at four per cent. If you are increasing wages two per cent, a certain proportion of that two per cent should be directed to solving this discrepancy over a period of time."

Yesterday afternoon I accepted the minister's statement to this House that he had not told employers that workers, rather than employers, would pay the cost of equal pay adjustments. I know now that the minister was not misunderstood by the media, as he told us yesterday. Rather, we misunderstood him if we believed his words yesterday.

I believed him. I was wrong. He lied.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Would the member for Ottawa Centre reconsider the last word and remove that from the record?

Ms. Gigantes: Sir, I do not feel I can.

Mr. Speaker: I have no other choice but to name the member.

Ms. Gigantes left the chamber.

FOOTBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

Mr. Ferraro: After that performance, I was a little reluctant to stand up.

I join with the member for London South (Ms. E. J. Smith) in wishing the University of Western Ontario luck this weekend. I really want to make sure the record indicates that the only reason the University of Western Ontario is there is that the most outstanding player is a Guelph boy by the name of Blake Marshall, who is leading the nation in rushing. Indeed, if he does not win the Hec Creighton trophy, that will be a real injustice.

I add my best wishes to the University of Western Ontario. In particular, I know I speak on behalf of all of Guelph in wishing Blake Marshall the best in this coming game on Saturday.

LATVIAN INDEPENDENCE

Mr. Shymko: On a more moderate tone, today I remind the honourable members that November 18, last Tuesday, marked the 68th anniversary of the proclamation of independence of Latvia, which was recognized by the British government in November 1918.

I had expected the Minister without Portfolio responsible for citizenship and culture (Mr. Ruprecht), the Minister of Citizenship and Culture (Ms. Munro) or perhaps the Premier (Mr. Peterson) to make a statement in the House on this occasion. We have had proclamations to that effect in the past; we have had statements from ministers in the House. I just hope the tradition of the resolutions that are binding on all Premiers to proclaim these days, passed some years ago by this Legislature, will continue.

Therefore, I remind honourable members that these special days are very important in reminding us of the cause of freedom, justice and peace for which these peoples proclaim their states independent and democratic.

Mr. Foulds: On a point of privilege, Mr. Speaker: As a graduate of the University of British Columbia and in the interests of Canadian unity, I think there should be some expression of support for the UBC team at the football game this weekend. I want to indicate that this Legislature is not a narrow, parochial, provincial legislature.

Mr. Speaker: That is certainly a new point of privilege. It is very interesting information. The Minister of the Environment.

Mr. Andrewes: Give the minister 30 seconds to catch his breath.

Hon. Mr. Bradley: First, I appreciate the opportunity to be able to breathe because, as the members know, the weather conditions today are such that it is very difficult to move quickly.

Mr. Stevenson: If the minister were to clean up the air in Ontario, he would not be so winded.

Hon. Mr. Bradley: All these disparaging remarks from my friends on the other side give me an opportunity to catch my breath.

13:41

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY AND RESPONSE

MISA PROGRAM

Hon. Mr. Bradley: Last June, in tabling our white paper on the municipal-industrial strategy for abatement, or MISA, I advised the House that a committee drawn from the public would be established to provide advice on the program's regulations.

Today I am pleased to announce the membership of the MISA advisory committee. The committee will help ensure that MISA achieves our objective to choke the flow of toxic contaminants into Ontario's waterways.

We have assembled for this committee some of the finest, independent, technical and environmental people in Ontario. We have chosen people with expertise and experience, some of whom have been forceful critics of the government.

The committee chairman is Douglas Hallett. Dr. Hallett is an environmental biologist, biochemist and analytical chemist. He brings to this committee a wealth of knowledge and experience and a passionate concern for Ontario's environment and for the health of future generations. The vice-chairman is Toby Vigod, counsel with the Canadian Environmental Law Association. Ms. Vigod possesses expertise in environmental law and a history of dedicated service in this field.

The remaining members are Monica Campbell, a toxicologist at the University of Toronto; Harvey Clare, a retired environmental protection co-ordinator for Imperial Oil Ltd.; Dr. Paul Hebert, professor of biology at the Great Lakes Institute in Windsor; Dr. Donald Mackay, a University of Toronto professor in the departments of chemical engineering, applied chemistry and the Institute for Environmental Studies; James McLaren, a consultant who specializes in environmental engineering and policy management, and Kai Millyard, a researcher with the Pollution Probe Foundation.

I am confident that the advisory committee will serve as an effective complement to the eight joint industry-government technical committees, four of which are already in the preregulation consultation and pilot monitoring phase, and to the municipal-government technical committee.

The advisory committee will review the draft monitoring and abatement regulations formulated by the technical committees and provide advice and recommendations to me on their contents.

In addition to the members I have named, a rotating industrial representative from each sector will be a member of the advisory committee when the matters pertaining to this sector are being reviewed. This will apply to the municipal sector regulations too. As well, a public member will be named to each of the joint technical committees.

We expect our MISA program, and thus our environment and the people of Ontario, to benefit from the committee's contributions and advice.

I know their views, along with the excellent work already under way in several of the technical committees and within my ministry, will help this government turn the tide at long last against water pollution.

Mr. Andrewes: We would like to respond in some detail to the minister's statement but, like the minister, the statement arrived quite late. However, I believe my colleague the member for Mississauga South (Mrs. Marland) is prepared to respond in some greater detail.

Mrs. Marland: In trying to catch up with the minister catching up with his own breath, I am trying to follow his statement. I recognize that the purpose of the municipal-industrial strategy for abatement is, as it says, to choke the flow of toxic contaminants into Ontario's waterways. I do not know whether Ontario's waterways are limited to those that flow out of Ontario; I wonder whether they also include those waters that flow along the northern shores of Lake Ontario.

That is a problem for me, as the member for Mississauga South. The entire southern boundary of my riding is the north shore of Lake Ontario. Will the minister see that a concern about the condition of the water of Lake Ontario is addressed by MISA? Although Ontario's waterways contribute to the problem, certainly no less a contribution is made by what is coming out of the northern shore of New York state and the Niagara area.

Mr. Rowe: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I wonder whether I might seek the unanimous consent of the House to acknowledge an important event for a moment or two.

Mr. Speaker: Is there unanimous agreement? Agreed to.

GRANTING OF EXIT VISA

Mr. Rowe: All members of this assembly will recall the case of Kaisa Randpere, the young child kept from her parents in Soviet-controlled Estonia. I am pleased today to inform all members of the House that last evening little Kaisa was granted an exit visa and will soon be reunited with her parents.

We in this House sometimes feel that many of our efforts are in vain. I want to take this opportunity to say to my colleagues, not only have our voices been heard but also our efforts have not been in vain. I thank all my colleagues who wrote to the Soviet Union on behalf of Kaisa, urging that country to reunite her with her family.

As well, I thank all members of the media who assisted greatly in making this case so well known, not only throughout Ontario but also across our great country of Canada. As an honorary member of the committee to free Kaisa, I personally thank all those in the province who participated in one way or another to help reunite this little girl with her parents.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I want to join with the honourable member in expressing our joy at this news. I remember very well when the matter was of direct concern to many members of the Legislature.

If I may, I will take a moment and inform the honourable member that I had the extremely interesting experience, not of visiting Estonia but of going to Latvia, which was referred to in a statement a moment ago. Latvia is suffering similar circumstances in the oppression of some minorities, particularly some of the Jewish people in that area. At that time, along with a group of people from Canada, we visited a number of Jewish families.

I sincerely hope the announcement the honourable member has made to the House and which was greeted with so much joy by this House is a further indication that the government of the Soviet Union is relenting on some of its oppressive policies. I believe there are many indications that this is so. I, for one, will be looking for further announcements of the type the honourable member has made to this House. We earnestly hope for them.

Mr. Rae: It is important for us to remember that the victims of oppression are not nameless and that one of the great friends of totalitarianism is the attempt to erase names, identities, memories and families. The kind of campaign we have been involved in as a Legislature on behalf of little Kaisa is an indication of our determination as a people to remember the victims of oppression inside the Soviet Union and to continue to take whatever action we can to make sure they are remembered and, as in this happy case, successfully reunited with their families.

RELEASE OF REPORT

Mr. Andrewes: On a point of privilege, Mr. Speaker: This morning, at a press conference in the media studio, I was able to obtain a copy of a draft document entitled An Act to amend the Nursing Homes Act. I understand this document has been shared with members of the media and members of the New Democratic Party. I find my privileges have been offended, because neither this party nor its critic has been able to access this document until this morning at a public press conference.

Mr. D. S. Cooke: I want to make the point to the Conservative caucus that the government has not shared that document with us. We released the document a few weeks ago when we came upon the document from other people. It certainly has not been the government that shared any of that information with this party.

Hon. Mr. Elston: Each of the parties knows we have been consulting rather widely in this matter. We have been meeting with a number of community-based groups and people interested in the needs of the nursing home sector. It may be of some difficulty to the member who speaks on behalf of the official opposition when he acknowledges that it has no friends with respect to that group. The people had indicated they got the information through some of the groups with whom we had been sharing the information and from whom we had been collecting their returns.

I can tell the honourable gentleman we will in due course release the approved amendments to the Nursing Homes Act from our point of view and bring them to the Legislative Assembly in their final form. The material that was released today was not the final form, which we will share with all members of the Legislature. I am sure the member will be happy to support them in every respect, because he will want to advance the rights and benefits to the nursing home residents.

Mr. Speaker: Having read many of the previous Speakers' rulings on very similar points of privilege, I must say that on previous occasions Speakers have responded to such a point of privilege by stating that the Speaker has no responsibility for what takes place outside this House and have on many occasions suggested it possibly would be common courtesy, if there were announcements, etc., made outside, that other members should be informed. However, it is not up to the Speaker to make that decision. The only thing I can say is that I cannot consider it a point of privilege.

Mr. Andrewes: Common courtesy is perhaps the proper terminology for it. The minister is becoming as unctuous as the Attorney General (Mr. Scott).

13:53

ORAL QUESTIONS

NURSING HOMES LEGISLATION

Mr. Andrewes: My question is to the Minister of Health. Now that we have had an opportunity to review this document, which again is clearly labelled a draft document, section 17b of the draft amendments to the Nursing Homes Act calls for the appointment by the minister of a nursing home residents' representative who shall report to the minister. Does the minister not agree that for an advocate to be truly free and to act on behalf of residents of nursing homes, the advocate must be independent of the ministry?

Hon. Mr. Elston: From my point of view, advocates, those people who have at heart the interests of the residents, can perform in a number of fashions and in a number of forums. From my standpoint, the draft which the member is reading from provides one of those options. We will be considering it in the final form of legislation here in the Legislative Assembly. For the member to presume that draft speaks to the final shape of the amendment is presumptuous.

I think all of us will want to move rather quickly when we have the Nursing Homes Act amendments in front of us. Since the honourable gentleman has already obtained a copy of those amendments in that form, I am sure he will provide me with written submissions with respect to what his interests are on the various sections. I will welcome those. When the proper time comes, I am sure we will have several people who will want to provide us, through committee, with input to make the legislation very good in the interests of the residents of the nursing homes of the province.

Mr. Andrewes: The minister's flexibility is somewhat heartening. On the other hand, perhaps he will have to access our documents by the same method that we access his.

Clauses 2(a) and (b) of this draft bill set out the role of the proposed nursing home residents' representative. I fail to see in any of these sections a mechanism whereby the residents' representative can take a complaint on behalf of a resident, have it adjudicated and have that decision enforced. Can the minister describe how the proposed amendments to the Nursing Homes Act will provide a mechanism to respond to complaints lodged by residents through the residents' representative?

Hon. Mr. Elston: We have a number of ways already of adjudicating those complaints. There is the inspection process, and if there are more serious violations, there are opportunities to access through the courts. The member knows that.

The reorganization of the nursing homes branch will provide us with a much quicker way of getting access to the difficulties that cause complaints to be lodged in the first place. All of us would like to see an enhanced role for the residents' council to provide some building up of the opportunities to achieve early resolution of the problems that may persist in the nursing home where the complaint originated.

Mr. Andrewes: The minister is a complete captive of his bureaucrats.

Mr. Speaker: Is that your question?

Mr. Andrewes: Does the minister not agree that the time has come to implement an Ontario-made patients' bill of rights, an independent office of patient advocate with adequate financial resources and an effective mechanism for enforcing the provisions of the patients' bill of rights that is independent of the Ministry of Health?

Hon. Mr. Elston: The honourable gentleman will probably acknowledge that because this deals with the residents of nursing homes, it cannot be fully independent from the Ministry of Health in terms of a bill of rights. The bill of rights, or whatever might be included in a later draft, might very well be nothing but independent because those rights go with the resident. I cannot see how the bill of rights can be tied to the Ministry of Health, but if the member will provide me with his thoughts on that, I will be pleased to consider them when the final draft is brought forward.

LOW-INCOME WORKERS

Mr. Shymko: I wanted to address my question to the minister responsible for women's issues (Mr. Scott) or to the Minister of Labour (Mr. Wrye). In their absence, I am stuck with asking the question of the acting Minister of Government Services.

How can that minister justify his government's concern about pay equity and sensitivity to women's issues and minority issues when right under his own nose, his government refuses to apply even the principle of equal pay for equal work in its shameful exploitation of immigrant Portuguese women? They are paid only $5 per hour to clean members' offices in the Whitney Block and the Frost Building, while the staff in the Legislative Building clean offices, do the same work and are paid $9.01 per hour. How can he justify this shameful exploitation?

14:00

Hon. Mr. Conway: I know it is a stormy day, but to have my friend the member for High Park-Swansea start his question by lamenting that he is stuck with me is not an encouraging sign.

Mr. Davis: Stop playing around and answer the question.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Conway: I am trying to respond to the question. If the member for High Park-Swansea could contain his exuberant colleagues the member for Scarborough Centre (Mr. Davis) and the member for Cornwall (Mr. Guindon), it might be easier.

I would like the opportunity to check very carefully the information that the honourable member has so dispassionately put before the assembly. My experience with this kind of information is that it bears very careful scrutiny and examination. I will be very pleased to assure the member that, in my understanding of the practices of the Ministry of Government Services, we are very fair; we apply the fair labour practices of the Ministry of Labour. However, I give the member an undertaking that I will receive his information and look very carefully to understand what precisely is going on.

Mr. Shymko: It is unbelievable that after two years the minister is saying he will try to find out about or check on this issue. He knows very well he is contracting out these jobs in a shameful way whereby contracting-out policy has become a means of social and economic injustice reminiscent of the 19th-century sweatshops. He should stop posturing with his sanctimonious statements. Let him explain to me why half the salary --

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Was the question, "Do you agree?"

Hon. Mr. Conway: One could be provocative and say that, given the practices of an administration of which the member counted himself a supporter from 1981 to 1985, that position from that member on that side is nothing short of breath-taking.

If the honourable member was unhappy about the contracting-out policy his Conservative administration embraced with an increased enthusiasm in the early years of the 1980s, I am sure he made that point to his colleague the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Grossman), who was then the Treasurer, to say nothing of what he might have offered to his friend the member for Muskoka (Mr. F. S. Miller).

We in the ministry are ensuring that we provide the fairest possible treatment; and not just to our permanent complement, we also see that those contracted-out employees are employed in accordance with the fair labour practices of the Ministry of Labour.

I repeat that I will take the member's question in his speech as notice; I will check it against the facts and report back to him.

Mr. Shymko: The Minister of Labour has just arrived. Maybe he can answer the question more fully.

Having discovered the so-called $400 million in the minister's coffers, even when he contracts out one would think that when one has Bill 105 on pay equity, when one has a private member from Hamilton East trying to redress social injustice, they would at least find some money to give equal pay for equal work for these few women. This bill will not redress it.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I am at a loss. Are we talking about Bill 105? Was that a question?

Mr. Shymko: I said in my question that there is legislation before this House addressing the issue of pay equity.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Is the minister aware of that?

Mr. Shymko: I am upset because you did not allow me to complete my question.

Mr. Speaker: I could advise the member of the time.

Hon. Mr. Conway: The best response I can offer to the histrionics of the member for High Park-Swansea is the one I have already given. This government has ensured that those employees who are working within the government on a contracted-out basis are working within the fair labour practices of the Ministry of Labour.

I repeat that I will take the member's submission this afternoon, review it very carefully and report back to him shortly. I do not want to see the apoplexy of my good friend from west Toronto continue in this almost-Christmas season.

WORKERS' COMPENSATION

Mr. Rae: I have a question for the Minister of Labour. In fact, I have several questions for him. I am sure the minister is aware of the testimony given today by Mrs. Larcher, a 77-year-old widow from Timmins whose husband died of lung cancer. He was a gold miner for several decades in Timmins.

Literally hundreds of women and children are in the same position as Mrs. Larcher, without any form of compensation whatsoever after their husbands have died of cancer. Dozens of miners with lung cancer are still alive and receiving no compensation at present. The ministry has had studies for more than a decade indicating the relationship between exposure to substances underground and cancer.

Given these facts, can the minister justify to this House the incredible delay in affording compensation to the survivors of miners who have died of cancer?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: There are two issues here. There is the issue of whether a causal relationship, an occupational relationship, has been established. In presenting the second Muller report, it was made clear that we had reached a point in Dr. Muller's findings where there was a relationship. The next issue then becomes the criteria that ought to be established, whether they should be that anyone who worked underground in gold mines or uranium mines or mixed ore mines at any time and for any length of time during the past 50 years ought to receive compensation for certain kinds of cancer or whether there ought to be limitations and standards.

That is why the findings of Dr. Muller have been sent to the Industrial Disease Standards Panel, which has representation from business, from labour and from the scientific community. The panel has set about trying to define what criteria, if any, and exactly what standards ought to be set. It was to the panel that this unfortunate widow spoke -- last Friday, I believe, certainly last week. I look forward to hearing the findings they come up with.

Mr. Rae: The minister has been in office for a year and a half. During that time, scientific information to the representatives of those widows and those survivors has systematically been denied by his ministry. They have been denied access to reports they had been promised literally months ago. The minister has failed to meet even the most modest request for information and assistance.

Given that incredible litany and the core fact that to date no one has been compensated, can the minister tell us why he should not simply submit his resignation, since he is clearly not capable of doing his job in Ontario?

14:10

Hon. Mr. Wrye: With all due respect, it was either the honourable gentleman or his colleague, my friend the member for Sudbury East (Mr. Martel), who in the spring of this year was on his feet about the Muller study, which was being peer-reviewed, demanding that the peer review extend to a representative of the United Steelworkers of America union. This minister stood up and said we would gladly do that and open up the peer review system.

I believe the leader of the third party is referring to an allegation in a letter I have received from Mr. Gerard, which I read on my way to question period, an allegation that copies of the Muller study, the original draft, the peer reviews, have not been made available to the steelworkers union. I was not able to get in touch with my officials to find out whether that is so and, if so, why it should not be given. I believe it should be given and I do not mind saying that. I will communicate that to my officials on my return from question period.

Mr. Rae: One can conclude one of two things: either the minister is utterly incompetent or he is intentionally denying information to people who are entitled to that information. Whichever of these is true, it is the view of our caucus that the minister should resign. The minister is not doing his job on behalf of the working people of this province and we intend to show that today in the Legislature.

In 1986, we have had 2,000 accidents a day in Ontario, the highest accident rate in the history of this province. This year, for the first year, we have had a death every working day. Given this miserable record and the minister's failure to enforce the law and to do what needs to be done to make sure that employers are brought to heel and that we finally get some safety and help for the working people of this province, why does the minister not do the decent thing for once and submit his resignation today?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I do not intend to submit my resignation because I think this minister, on behalf of this government, has done more in the first 17 months of this administration to enhance health and safety than was done in many, many years. We on this side do not take a back seat to anyone on that side, in the official opposition or in the third party, in our care and concern about working people in Ontario.

I just came back from a luncheon speech to a group of electrical contractors. I reminded them very forcefully of their obligations and reminded them that the lost-time accident rate in this province remains unacceptably high. That is one reason my colleague the Treasurer (Mr. Nixon) has given me an immediate increase in construction safety inspectors. The fact that we have --

Mr. Martel: The fact is that you have fewer than they had in 1981. Do not come here with that nonsense.

Mr. Speaker: Order, the member for Sudbury East. New question, the member for York South.

Mr. Rae: So that it is clearly on the record, the comments made by my friend the member for Sudbury East are worth repeating to the minister. There are fewer inspectors with him as Minister of Labour than there were in 1981. Let that fact stick with the minister for a while.

SEVERANCE PAY

Mr. Rae: Let us move on to another area of the minister's responsibility, the whole question of severance pay and what happens to workers who are laid off, fired and victimized as a result of bankruptcy.

When the former Clerk of this Legislature was asked to retire, the Premier (Mr. Peterson) stood in his place and said there was such a thing as normal commercial practice with respect to people who are laid off, that it was normal commercial practice for people with these high executive jobs to be paid a year, two years or three years of severance.

How does the minister feel about the tens of thousands of employees who are not covered by the 50-employee rule and who receive for severance a double goose-egg, nothing, in Ontario, for workers who have been there for 20, 30 and 40 years. He is a member of a cabinet that paid out $2 million in compensation to one individual and tens of thousands of dollars to other senior civil servants. What about the ordinary working people? What is being done for them?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I would have thought the honourable member would have acknowledged to the House and to the people of Ontario that on Tuesday this Legislature gave third reading to Bill 128. It is the only piece of legislation in the whole country that I know that seeks to undo the very regressive actions of the federal government, actions that will make a reduction in severance pay provisions useless, reductions that deem severance pay is deducted dollar for dollar from unemployment insurance.

Consequently, as this government prepares to move forward with new innovations and new standards on severance pay, we feel it is important that we become the first jurisdiction in Canada to ensure that severance pay will actually be paid to workers where it is deemed appropriate.

Mr. Rae: The minister is telling us he is proud of the achievement of the Liberal Party in bringing this province up to the level that it achieved in 1981, 1982 and 1983 under Russ Ramsay when he was Minister of Labour. That is the record on which he is standing. It does not do anything for people who do not get any severance pay.

Let us look at another area where the government promised something and has not delivered, where it has done absolutely nothing. On November 25, 1985, a report of Donald Brown, QC, which had been delayed since June 1983, was issued. Dr. Brown was appointed in June 1983 as the sole commissioner to inquire into wage protection and insolvency situations. Here was the Minister of Labour speaking last year: "`Mr. Brown recommends that actual wage arrears, vacation pay and some benefits be protected by amendment to the Employment Standards Act,' Labour Minister Wrye noted."

Mr. Speaker: The question, please.

Mr. Rae: What has the minister done in the past year for those workers who have been laid off and left out on the street without back wages because of bankruptcies? He has done absolutely nothing. Why does he not resign in the face of that fact alone?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: We can talk about a lot of individual circumstances within the Employment Standards Act, but it ought to be pointed out that this is exactly the problem. The government has decided to move forward with a package of amendments that includes the first two instances the leader of the third party has raised. When they are ready to go as part of a package of amendments to the Employment Standards Act, they will be presented to the Legislature.

When those amendments are presented, I know the leader of the third party and his colleagues will be pleased with the progress we have made in terms of severance pay and protecting workers and their pay in terms of bankruptcies, and that he will be pleased with the very progressive reforms that will put Ontario on the leading edge of employment standards anywhere in the country.

Mr. Rae: Can the minister explain the suppression of information, the failure to produce the Coopers and Lybrand report on health and safety, the suppression of information to those groups that want to represent workers that have not had it and the failure to do the things that were promised, such as protecting workers who were fired, laid off or the victims of bankruptcy?

Can the minister possibly justify a year and a half in which none of those problems was addressed when, at the same time, more people are being killed on the job today than on May 2, 1985? More people are being injured today than there were on May 2, 1985. Are those facts alone not sufficient for the minister to submit his resignation and let someone who really wants to speak for working people in this Legislature do the job?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I stand in my place and say this province has moved forward with legislation -- and it is the only jurisdiction to do so -- to protect workers in terms of their severance pay, and the leader of the third party stands up and says it is nothing. It is more than the Premier of Manitoba has done for the working people of Manitoba. Let us not pretend this province has done nothing.

We are about ready to come forward with reforms and new legislative achievement in a number of areas. I am sure that is why we are getting some of these questions. With regard to the Coopers and Lybrand study and the McKenzie study, Mr. McKenzie has almost completed his study and it will be released in due course.

14:20

ALCOHOL ON OPP BOAT

Mr. Sterling: On Tuesday I asked the Solicitor General (Mr. Keyes) a question regarding his use of Ontario Provincial Police boats. We have not seen him since that time. Yesterday I asked the Attorney General (Mr. Scott) a question, and now he has vanished.

Mr. Speaker: A question to whom?

Mr. Sterling: I will ask the Treasurer. Perhaps he can give us some answers.

This morning we contacted the OPP in Kingston, and they indicated to us they would not forward the logs of the OPP boat that was used by the Solicitor General this past summer. We then contacted Superintendent Jack Burke here in Toronto and asked him for those logs, and he referred us to the Solicitor General.

Does the Treasurer think it is fair that when the Solicitor General is under investigation by the Attorney General and by the Metropolitan Toronto Police, we should have to go to him for information about his own activities?

Mr. Gillies: That is like judging your own case.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I did not call the honourable member the judge; I called him the executioner, he may remember.

I will respond to the honourable member by saying he is correct in that the matter is under investigation by the Metropolitan Toronto Police. I think comments from me dealing with the matter would be inappropriate at this time, but it seems to me that when the report is available all that information will be a part of it.

Mr. Sterling: Under the conflict-of-interest guidelines of the Premier (Mr. Peterson), to which he does not seem to have paid very much attention before, it states:

"While holding an office, it will be the responsibility of the individual minister to ensure that whenever a matter involving a personal beneficial interest comes before the ministry for which the minister is responsible in a matter involving the discretion of the government, the minister will request that a colleague be officially appointed to act for the ministry concerned for the purpose of dealing with that matter."

Will the Treasurer, House leader and acting Premier indicate who has been appointed to act on behalf of the Solicitor General in this matter?

Hon. Mr. Nixon: No one. The Solicitor General continues to do his duties, as is his proper responsibility. A review of the matter has been ordered by the Attorney General. It is being undertaken by the Metropolitan Toronto Police. If anybody knows of any other circumstances that should be included in that investigation, I expect he will let the police or the Attorney General know about it.

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

Mr. Martel: I have a question of the Minister of Labour, that fount of all generosity. Since February 20, 1986, on March 7, on May 13, on July 18 and this fall, I have attempted to obtain in writing, by telephone and by raising the matter in the House the number of convictions against corporations and workers in Ontario. Despite five attempts, we have not been given that information. Can the minister tell me why we are not getting that information if he is doing so much for the workers of Ontario?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I know the honourable gentleman had asked for that statistic. I do not have statistics for this year. I do have the 1985 conviction statistics. As the member asks his supplementary, I will see whether I can find the exact ones. However, I believe what will be significant will not be the 1985-86 statistics, but ultimately how those compare with 1986-87, since most of the earlier statistics predated charges we made. I remind my friend, the leader of the third party that the new prosecution policy did not come into effect until November 21, 1985.

Mr. Martel: The new prosecution policy is like the new information policy. We never get it.

Since the minister talks so tough about his new prosecution policy and about having no more repeat orders -- he said in this House in November of last year there would be no more repeat orders, there would be prosecutions -- can he tell me why, under three sections in his annual report, his ministry has decided the information on number of repeat orders has been dropped? It used to be there with the Tories, but this minister has got away from it. He is not going to show any repeat orders because he has removed that statistic from the annual report for which he is the minister responsible, not the fellows before him.

Can the minister tell why they are now writing information, writing suggestions and writing new numbers so that they do not have to write or rewrite orders?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: With all due respect, that last part of the question is a little vague. I would have to check for my honourable friend -- and I am sure he is accurate -- but we did state we were not going to be repeating orders. We stated that in November. I would have to check with those who put the statistics together, but I assume we have put them together since we now issue only one order. There are no repeat orders and the 1986-87 annual report will reflect that fact quite accurately.

I return to the first question. A total of 241 persons were convicted at trial in fiscal 1985-86. The total number of counts is 305, since some persons were convicted on more than one charge; 157 employer-owners were convicted on a total of 199 counts, 56 supervisors on a total of 75 counts and 28 workers on 31 counts.

RABIES PROTECTION

Mr. Callahan: Now that the snow is on the ground and we have had a summer with a number of rabid animals having been reported, I would like to address a question to the Minister of Natural Resources.

Mr. Rowe: Did you get bitten?

Mr. Stevenson: There is a treatment for you.

Mr. Callahan: It sounds as though there are some rabid animals across the way.

How successful has the inoculation been over this past season? Does the minister have those statistics? How effective has it been?

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: It is a serious problem. We have taken to dropping bait from aircraft, and we have had to increase the dosage to be sure it is effective. In Huron county, there has been a great deal of research going on in this matter and the results will be forthcoming. When they come, I will share them with the people on the other side.

TARIFFS ON SOFTWOOD LUMBER

Mr. Pope: I have a question for the Minister of Natural Resources. It appears the Globe and Mail gets more information than the members of this Legislature are entitled to. On October 20, the minister stated he was distancing himself from the national position on softwood lumber. He also indicated he would fight vigorously for Ontario's interest in the softwood lumber countervail in Washington. Since that time, more than 900 Ontarians have lost their jobs because of the countervail.

Can the minister indicate to me when Blake Cassels and Graydon was instructed to file a notice by this government and when that notice was filed?

14:30

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: To answer the questions in order, the numbers we are talking about in relation to jobs lost are numbers to which I cannot relate. Many industries have said this was a result of the countervail; others said it has not had any impact on exports. That remains to be seen. I do not think the honourable member has the kind of information to which I can respond, nor do I.

As to the Ontario government's position in this matter, it has been unequivocal from day one. We decided we were going to fight the countervail with everything we had at our disposal. This member has suggested he participated in the countervail fight last time and won. The member did not participate in any meaningful way. A couple of ministers went down there and talked to the Department of Commerce, but in reality the fight was won because it was an entirely different playing field they were on.

There has been considerable change, particularly as a result of the introduction of Sam Gibbons's bill, which changed the whole world of subsidy as it related to the United States. The new commitment by many politicians in the US to go to a protectionist route has led to an entirely different forum. He knows that full well. The Ontario position is a good one. The unions support it, the forestry ministers support it and the federal government is leading the way in that matter.

Mr. Pope: This minister has continued in the same vein as the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology (Mr. O'Neil). He did not even answer the question. When orders do not come in for Ontario lumber, people are laid off. The orders are not coming in for Ontario lumber, and 900 people in northern Ontario are out of work.

Will the minister confirm that only yesterday, in a letter dated and received yesterday by the Department of Commerce, the Washington law firm of Hogan and Hartson filed a notice on behalf of Ontario?

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: The notice the member is talking about is not to participate in the way he is trying to define. This registration is only to get the information that is placed there and to let us be a party to what is going on. The position of the Ontario government is to stand four-square behind the federal government. This is an international trade matter. The member knows that. He is just trying to build this up into something other than it is.

That is not the case. It is an international trade matter. There are more pressures than ever before on Canada-US relations over this matter. The federal government is leading in the fight on this countervail. We are supporting them, but there are some differences with other provinces. That shall not happen with Ontario. We are looking at protecting the lumber workers here, and those involved with many other natural resources, because the Americans are threatening the sovereignty of Canadians; they are threatening to come over here and tell us how we should run this country. We are not going to accept that.

Mr. Pope: You filed yesterday.

Mr. Davis: You have trouble standing flatfooted, never mind four-square.

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: You are putting on a big act.

Mr. Speaker: Order, minister, member for Cochrane South and member for Scarborough Centre (Mr. Davis). We will just wait. The member for Cochrane South has already asked a supplementary.

Mr. Pope: There are 900 out of work, and you filed yesterday.

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: That goes only so far.

Mr. Pope: You will see how far it goes.

Mr. Speaker: Once again, I will just wait. There are a lot of members who want to ask questions.

WORKERS' COMPENSATION

Mr. McClellan: I too have a question for the Minister of Labour; it has to do with his failure to reform the Workers' Compensation Board. I am sure most members of this assembly have in their offices every week injured workers who have 10 per cent to 15 per cent pensions from the WCB because of the continued use of the meat-chart approach to giving workers permanent pensions. At the same time, these workers are totally disabled and qualify for full disability benefits under the Canada pension plan.

How can it possibly be that, a year and a half after he took office, the minister has failed utterly to reform the WCB? He is sitting on the Weiler report; he refuses to release it. If the minister is not prepared to bring legislation into this House to reform the WCB, why does he not step aside for somebody who will do that job?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I know the honourable gentleman deals with a lot of injured workers in his riding and as the critic for his party. I know he cares very passionately about the cause of injured workers. I think the member would want to ensure that when we move forward in terms of the protection of injured workers and moving off what he calls the meat chart, the permanent partial disabilities, we do so the right way.

The honourable gentleman will know the proposal that was rejected in Ontario in 1983 is one that has been adopted in a number of other provinces in this country, and so we must move to something different.

Professor Weiler has delivered a draft report. I indicated to the member in the House and to all members the other day that we are waiting for Professor Weiler to give us a brief update on one issue he did not speak of in his report. I felt all members would want to see his views on that issue. Then we will table his report. With his report, we will be tabling some technical documents, some of which were not ready until early this fall, and that is the reason for part of the delay. However, I want to get on with the reform as soon as we have a proper reform to move to.

Mr. McClellan: On November 6, I asked the Minister of Labour to explain why the report of the internal investigation into allegations with respect to the WCB rehabilitation centre in Downsview, an inquiry that is being conducted by the man against whom the allegations have been made, the director of the centre, had not been released even though the time for the inquiry was up. That was on November 6. It is now November 20.

Very simply, is the minister as afraid of the bureaucrats in the WCB as he is of the bureaucrats in the Ministry of Labour? Have they got him just as bamboozled as his ministry officials?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I was speaking with the honourable gentleman privately, and he asked about the timetable on the report. I am told we are about two weeks away from the final report. Evidence was taken from a number of witnesses, transcripts were gathered of that evidence, and it took some while for the transcripts to arrive in Toronto after being transcribed by court stenographers in Windsor.

In correcting the member, I want to indicate to the House that the charges are not against Dr. Kummell. There are a variety of charges in terms of impropriety and misconduct at Downsview, and I am as concerned as any other member, more concerned than others.

I would have thought that the honourable gentleman, in the preamble to the question, or perhaps his friend the member for Hamilton East (Mr. Mackenzie), would have acknowledged that a new regional office opened in Hamilton this week and that one will open in Thunder Bay next month and another in Ottawa next spring. This government --

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I am not recognizing the member for Sudbury East (Mr. Martel) for a supplementary.

PROPERTY ASSESSMENT

Mr. Polsinelli: I have a question for the Minister of Revenue. The minister will be aware that the Metropolitan Toronto council on October 29 passed a motion endorsing in principle section 63 market value reassessment for Metro Toronto.

Mr. Stevenson: The member just carried it down to him 15 minutes ago. If he is going to stage this, he should do it with a little class.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I appreciate the information from the member for Durham-York (Mr. Stevenson). I had not recognized him for any comments.

Mr. Polsinelli: It seems the official opposition can provide us with some lessons about what class is. We will be prepared to listen after the session.

I say again, the Minister of Revenue is well aware that Metro council on October 29 endorsed a motion that a section 63 reassessment be applied in Metropolitan Toronto. The minister will also know, and it is my understanding, that Metro council has asked for release of the Metro-wide reassessment study that was done in 1980.

The motion that was passed by Metro council also called for the province to deal with a number of other issues. What issues remain outstanding? How is the minister prepared to handle the issues Metro council has put on the table? Specifically, is the minister prepared to release the study that was done by the province in 1980?

14:40

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I thank the member for his question and recall with you, Mr. Speaker, those days both of us remember when, before any question could be asked, we had to give written notice to the cabinet ministers before 12 noon. That was in the bad old Tory days.

The member who asked the question is correct. He will recall I tabled the letter from the Metro chairman, which indicates the council does not require the specific lot-by-lot information based on 1980 impact studies. The letter from Metro that was tabled specifically asks for an up-to-date impact study. I have asked the officials of the Ministry of Revenue about their capability in this regard. They indicate an impact study based on 1984 values will be undertaken early in the coming calendar year; it should be completed by the spring of 1987. I can assure members that when it is completed, it will be put in the hands of the Metro chairman so the impact may be assessed in the way that the chairman and the members of Metro council see fit and so they can move forward to a Metro-wide reassessment.

In response to an earlier question, I showed the member my response to the tabled letter. Since the members are anxious to know about the letter the member brought down to me, I now table both copies.

Mr. Polsinelli: I appreciate the Treasurer's response that a new impact study is going to be undertaken. I ask the Treasurer to give an assurance to the House today that the actions of the previous government are not going to be undertaken by our government. I ask that once that study is completed in 1987, it be tabled not only with the Metro chairman but also in this House for the information of all members of this assembly.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: My view is that once it is completed, it should be put in the hands of members of Metro council, since it affects the assessment of properties in Metropolitan Toronto. I believe it should be left up to them whether to make it public.

Mr. Gregory: I guess the title of the last question could be "I Love You Truly." It was a real sweetheart question, and it was a sweetheart answer too.

TRUCKING INDUSTRY

Mr. Gregory: I have a question for the Treasurer; it is a sweetheart question too.

Members and employees of the Ontario trucking and truck manufacturing industries are gravely concerned about this government's intention to reintroduce the full seven per cent sales tax on trucks and trailers on January 1, 1987. Representatives of these industries have made both written and oral presentations to the minister on this matter since it was first proposed.

Presentations were made at the standing committee on finance and economic affairs, which met last Thursday and again today. Will the minister agree to accommodate the very reasonable and workable recommendation of the trucking industry that the tax be phased in over three years?

Hon. Mr. Nixon: Ontario is the only jurisdiction that has a sales tax that does not apply to heavy trucks. The exemption was introduced in 1982, when the present member for Muskoka (Mr. F. S. Miller) was the Treasurer, because the substantial downturn in the economy was hitting the trucking industry very hard. It is our understanding that sufficient prosperity has returned to the economy in general that the sales tax can be reimposed; it would involve a revenue in the full year of about $65 million.

It is my feeling that the current provisions of the bill should be maintained, but we have had presentations in the committee on finance and economic affairs from a number of trucking companies as well as others concerned with the bill. Those matters will be considered by me and by the staff of the Ministry of Revenue before the bill is brought before the House.

I have given an undertaking to the members of the committee that if there are any amendments -- and frankly, I expect there will be -- the members of the House will have plenty of notice before the bill is called.

Mr. Gregory: In a recent letter from the sales manager of one of this province's truck manufacturers, I was advised, "A trucker would have to drive 23,000 additional miles and would have to work an extra nine and a half weeks to pay the tax." I was also advised by him that if the proposed full reimposition of sales tax goes ahead as planned, his firm will be forced to shut down for three months. Numerous others have relayed the same message to the Ontario Trucking Association and to me.

Again I ask and urge the Treasurer to agree to phase this tax in over three years, as has been requested by the thousands of firms and individuals in Ontario's trucking industry. Will he give us that commitment today?

Hon. Mr. Nixon: For reasons I have already referred to, the answer is no.

WORKERS' COMPENSATION

Mr. Mackenzie: I have a question for the Minister of Labour. This morning I had the delightful experience of spending half an hour with Mrs. Jean Larcher, the 77-year-old widow of a Timmins-area gold miner.

Mr. D. R. Cooke: Is that why you didn't show up for committee?

Mr. Mackenzie: She also lost three more of her family. Is that not important enough, jackass from --

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Mackenzie: I apologize for that remark. My remark was provoked.

Mr. Speaker: I just wanted to make certain of it.

Mr. Mackenzie: Jean Larcher, as the head of a group of approximately 44 widows of miners who have died of cancer in Timmins, knows that without the peer review of the Muller study, without the second phase of the Muller study and without the nominal roles of all the workers from the board, they cannot establish any of the claims for the workers.

Inasmuch as this information has not been made available, despite requests for almost a year, can the minister tell me what we should say to Mrs. Jean Larcher?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I would think the honourable member would want to get his facts right first. The fact is that peer reviews were not completed until some time this summer; so it has not been almost a year. Let us be clear on that in the first instance.

I have already made a commitment that I would speak to my officials on my return from the House today about ensuring that the draft, the final report and the peer reviews of the Muller study are made available to the representatives of this widow and others, including the United Steelworkers.

I had a conversation this morning with Mr. Gerard, the director of district 6, and he raised this matter with me. In my conversation with Mr. Gerard, and in the letter he hand-delivered to me, he also raised the issue of nominal roles.

I apologize to the honourable member and to the House. I had a luncheon engagement at which I was speaking to a group on health and safety matters. Consequently, on my return from the House this afternoon, I will take that issue up with the board.

Mr. Mackenzie: Given that it took as long as three to five years in the uranium mines to establish some of the landmark cases, and we have not yet established one in the gold mines; and given that there are several hundred widows of gold miners who died as a result of exposure, which the Muller report clearly indicates is the cause, can the minister tell us why nothing has happened to protect those women -- he knows this has been an ongoing fight for years -- and why they do not have the necessary pensions and are living in the kind of poverty that was outlined by Mrs. Larcher? Why, with that kind of record, does the member sit in this House as Minister of Labour? He should be ashamed of himself and resign.

Hon. Mr. Wrye: Let me say for the seventh time -- and if there is one more question, there may be an eighth time; I do not know how long it will take for this member and the members of the third party to understand -- that the Industrial Disease Standards Panel is assessing the Muller report to establish the criteria that are appropriate in the granting of compensation.

For the first time, we have the opportunity to move from an unscientific finding to a scientific finding. Very often in these very difficult cases, the kind of progress that the honourable member and I want takes some time, but we ought to give the Industrial Disease Standards Panel the time to do it right. The members on the standards panel who support labour, Mr. Gagnon, Ms. Jolley and Dr. Chong, would want the time to do the job properly.

14:50

CORN TARIFF

Mr. Stevenson: I have a question for the Treasurer. Farmers in his riding and mine are delivering corn to elevators today for about $2.16 a bushel. If we subtract from that figure drying charges of 25 to 30 cents, trucking charges of about 15 cents a bushel and, for some, custom combining charges, many of these farmers are not getting back their out-of-pocket costs just for seed, fertilizer and so on. How does the minister expect the farmers in our ridings to compete against the treasuries of the United States and the European Community?

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I noticed in Farm and Country, which arrived on our kitchen table yesterday, that the Canadian price for corn is a bit higher than the world price, indicating that the matter is at least as bad as the honourable member describes.

He will be aware, however, that the federal government has a stabilization program that returns to the farmers 95 per cent of the average price of corn over the last five years and that Ontario has an additional program that adds five per cent on top. As a matter of fact, that legislation was passed during the last minority Legislature back in 1975.

This really means there is some protection. It really means the federal Treasury and, frankly to a lesser extent, the provincial Treasury will be called upon to assist the farmers under those special circumstances. As well, the federal government has placed a protective tariff on imports of corn from the United States, which we hope will have some effect in buoying up the price.

The fact remains that there is a surplus of corn on the world market, and because of the competition between the European Community and the United States dealing with matters that the member is very familiar with, we are in a particularly difficult situation.

It is expected that farmers will receive between $3 and $3.15 a bushel if they are participants in the program, but in the long run the situation continues to be difficult.

Mr. Stevenson: The current situation has been triggered by the passage of the US Food Security Act, as the Treasurer well knows. That act was brought into effect between the Treasurer's first and second budgets. His last budget gave the lowest percentage increase to agriculture of any of the past three budgets in Ontario. How many hundreds of millions of dollars does the minister intend to award to Ontario farmers to face this new crisis, which has come into existence during the time between his first and second budgets?

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I do not find the question unreasonable. The honourable member will know there has been a substantial increase in the allocation to the agriculture budget in the province. He will also know that the federal government announced, just about the time of the Saskatchewan election, that an additional $1 billion would be allocated to farmers across Canada.

It is our hope that the federal government will participate in the improvements that are planned in our funding program for agriculture, which I am sure the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Riddell) will be discussing in this House some time in the next few weeks. He is with the Premier (Mr. Peterson) in Vancouver at present, but I know he is deeply concerned about this and he and his other colleagues in cabinet are working on it.

Mr. Speaker: The time for oral questions has expired.

Hon. Mr. Bradley: You should extend the time so the Minister of Labour (Mr. Wrye) can answer more questions.

Mr. Martel: He is giving such good answers we will support that, Mr. Speaker. Ask the minister why he is forcing the withdrawal of the Windsor bill, which is a health bill.

PETITION

PROPERTY ASSESSMENT

Mr. McFadden: I have a petition addressed to the Legislature and to the government, signed by 1,800 residents of Ontario. It is worded as follows:

"We, the undersigned, are opposed to the imposition of market value assessment on Metro Toronto by the provincial government. The higher property taxes for many north Toronto home owners, as a result of market value assessment, would pose a tremendous financial hardship for many individuals, particularly those on fixed incomes, single-parent families, seniors and low-income workers.

"The people of Ontario are already paying too much in taxes. The increases in property taxes under market value assessment, caused by escalating land prices in Metro Toronto, would not result in a corresponding increase in municipal services. The imposition of market value assessment on Metro Toronto by the provincial government will not only cause financial hardship for many people, but will also have a destablizing effect on neighbourhoods and families in north Toronto. We urge the provincial government not to impose market value assessment on Metro Toronto home owners."

Mr. Speaker: Before I call for further petitions, I would like to inform the members that many of them are having private conversations, and it makes it very difficult to hear what is taking place within this chamber. I may continue for a while longer, unless I can have your attention.

REPORT

STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE AND ECONOMIC AFFAIRS

Mr. D. R. Cooke from the standing committee on finance and economic affairs presented the following report and moved its adoption:

The committee begs to report the following bill without amendment:

Bill 26, An Act to amend the Retail Sales Tax Act.

Motion agreed to.

Bill ordered for committee of the whole House.

Mr. Gillies: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: Today is the deadline for my colleague the member for St. George (Ms. Fish) to introduce her private member's bill. I wonder if I might ask for unanimous consent of the House to present it on her behalf.

Mr. Speaker: There has been a request by the member for Brantford for unanimous consent to introduce a private bill on behalf of the member for St. George. Is there unanimous agreement?

Agreed to.

Mr. Gillies: My colleague is away ill. I know she will appreciate the courtesy.

INTRODUCTION OF BILL

ELECTION FINANCES AMENDMENT ACT

Mr. Gillies moved, on behalf of Ms. Fish, first reading of Bill 153, An Act to amend the Election Finances Act.

Motion agreed to.

15:00

ORDERS OF THE DAY

ONTARIO LOTTERY CORPORATION AMENDMENT ACT (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 115, An Act to amend the Ontario Lottery Corporation Act.

Mr. Speaker: I believe the member for Simcoe Centre adjourned the debate.

Mr. Rowe: I would like to begin my remarks today, as brief as they are, by reiterating that our party has always protected and will continue to protect the integrity and reputation of the Ontario Lottery Corp. Having said that, I would like to say our party also believes in the basic, democratic right of any group or individual to be heard. That right is not being given with respect to Bill 115.

This industry brings more than US$60 million into Ontario annually and contributes close to US$40 million directly to the coffers of the Ontario Lottery Corp. The loss of this US$40 million alone would seriously undermine many social, cultural and recreational projects and programs in Ontario. Currently, the industry is creating 100 new jobs in Fort Erie by the end of this year. These jobs are being created with the help of the federal job training and employment program at a proposed subsidy by the federal government of close to $80,000.

The industry has attempted to deliver a message to the Minister of Tourism and Recreation (Mr. Eakins) regarding his proposed plans for 1987, but the minister has refused to listen to the job development program by the industry. Recently, the government announced that the head office of the Ontario Lottery Corp. will move to Sault Ste. Marie to create some 112 new jobs. The Ontario ticket purchase services industry plans to create 100 jobs for Sault Ste. Marie alone in 1987. Plans call for an additional 100 jobs to be created in the Windsor area and possibly in the Cornwall area.

Over the years, this industry has been instrumental in helping the small, charitable lotteries to market their tickets. Most recently, they helped the renowned institution, the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair, by assisting in selling its lottery tickets. In the past three weeks, the industry has sold more than $50,000 worth of tickets that will go directly to help the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair. Does this sound like a fly-by-night operation?

They have committed themselves next year to an even higher amount of sales for the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair. These are firm commitments that the industry wishes to make to the minister. The industry has experienced growth and success based on continued, responsible service to the United States and international consumers; yet the minister has refused to acknowledge the plans of the industry and its commitment to the continuing development of jobs in Ontario. He has even been unwilling to meet to discuss the matter.

Here are the facts as I understand them. In recent legal hearings, the Ontario Lottery Corp. presented 6,900 pieces of correspondence concerning the ticket purchase industry in this province. It has shown that more than 3,300 pieces were general inquiries from Canada and other countries about ticket services. There were 2,800 pieces that were general correspondence from the US, including requests for winning payouts and lottery tickets to be sent to the US clientele. There were 490 that were general inquiries about where to get tickets and mail order operations. Fewer than 150 pieces of correspondence could remotely be considered by the lottery corporation itself as complaints. I understand there are none outstanding to date.

I noted with interest the remarks of the Treasurer (Mr. Nixon) last evening as we adjourned the debate. He stated that he hoped we could deal with this bill today and finish it up, that it was an important bill but that it should not be time-consuming. One must wonder why the government is so intent on rushing this bill through the House. Is it only the government that wishes to push it through or is it a political whim of the Minister of Tourism and Recreation that this be one of the major accomplishments of his year in office?

When one listens to media reports with respect to this issue, there have not been a great many stories of late about the supposed problem of which the minister speaks. We in opposition must wonder, therefore, why the government is in such a hurry to jam this piece of legislation through the House. It is legislation that will affect the livelihood of more than 500 people, many of them employed right here in Metropolitan Toronto, people working for companies that have not been extended the courtesy, the kindness, and more important the democratic right, to be heard.

We must ask ourselves why the minister for more than six months constantly refused to meet with the very people this legislation could put on the unemployment line. What are the minister and the government afraid of?

The value of exporting a good lottery product has been recognized by other provincial governments. Understanding the power of direct access to millions of US consumers, the British Columbia government designed its 1985-86 lottery tickets with a very strong Expo tourism message. In fact, BC's last instant lottery ticket was called the tourism ticket. I happen to have some samples I would be glad to share with the minister. Millions of these tickets and descriptive pamphlets with the BC and Expo tourism message found their way to the US market, and the result was a record-breaking Expo.

Finally, I want to quote from a letter, dated September 12, 1986, written by the Minister of Tourism and Recreation to the industry association: "The passage of the bill will follow the normal legislative process, and when the House resumes for its fall sitting I expect the bill to be passed to committee for review. That is the time for submissions from you and your colleagues."

I can only remind the minister, a man I know the industry respects, admires and takes at his word, as we in this House do, of that and hope he will live up to this promise, refer this matter to committee and let the people who have not been heard put their case forward, all 500 of the people who rely on this industry to work.

Mr. Hayes: I stand in support of Bill 115, which is probably long overdue. While I am on my feet, I want to compliment not only the minister for bringing this forward, but also my colleague the member for Welland-Thorold (Mr. Swart), who has raised several times in this Legislature the issue of abuse in dealing with lottery tickets.

The previous member spoke about jobs being lost, but I think the thing we have to look at is how people are affected and hurt by the lack of enforcement of the act that we have had in the past. To give members an example, in 1984 the Ontario Lottery Corp. became aware that the lottery ticket mail order business had expanded enormously. They determined that several companies were buying large quantities of lottery tickets for resale through the mail for a fee or markup.

All the corporation's licensed distributors, retailers and agents were instructed to cease sales to all individuals and companies believed, on reasonable grounds, to be involved in mail order operations. Those who refused had their terminals disconnected. As a matter of fact, the Supreme Court of Ontario forced the corporation to reconnect the computer terminals that were so disconnected.

The mail order companies have been able to obtain lottery tickets from authorized agents by purchasing them in other provinces and spreading their business sufficiently so that the number purchased from any one agent is within normal range and does not arouse suspicion. Then they resell these tickets at markups normally ranging from 69 to 190 per cent.

15:10

I am going to be very brief on this. I compliment the minister again for bringing forward this bill. This is one loophole it is really necessary to close. We stand in support of Bill 115.

Mr. Cureatz: It gives me some pleasure to stand in my place this afternoon to participate in this debate. I have not had the opportunity, Mr. Speaker, to say what a fine job you are doing in your capacity as Deputy Speaker. I also add that it is indeed unique in terms of the television coverage we now have in the assembly. I know the Treasurer is more than excited about having the opportunity to have his face flashed across Ontario to those homes that receive this broadcast.

Before we get into details on aspects of Bill 115, I would like to say that while listening to the debate in this chamber I have noticed a whole panorama of individuals who have gone unnoticed to date in terms of the new television broadcasting. First are our translators who are so ably sitting, patiently whiling away the hours listening to the extensive debates that take place in these chambers. I personally congratulate them for what sometimes appears to be and is a rather tedious and laborious job.

In addition, for those who have not attended the third floor, which is somewhere up there, there is a lovely panelled area half enclosed in glass where the operators of the wonderful cameras reside. At the outset, it was no doubt very exciting for them to manipulate the cameras with remote control, with some space age, Star Wars type of manipulation, to focus in on all of us here.

Interjection.

Mr. Cureatz: I am coming to the point.

Has anybody else thanked those individuals up there? I bet not one member of the assembly has taken the time and effort to say thank you to those individuals.

[Applause]

Mr. Cureatz: That is right. It took me, the humble member for Durham East and former Deputy Speaker of these chambers, to realize that. I know the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh) feels it was an oversight that he has not thanked them also because it was through many of his own colleagues' persuasion that television coverage was brought into this chamber. I actually think it was a good idea, and I am looking forward to the comments from the member for Oshawa to thank those individuals who are at this moment humbly hiding away up on the third floor listening to our debate.

For those members who are not present, I have full confidence that they will be getting copies of my words and over some bedtime reading this evening or some time over the weekend before they snuggle down, they will feel extreme remorse that they missed the opportunity to thank the translators and those individuals who are now operating the cameras. Before the Christmas session is over, I am confident each individual member of the assembly will be thanking those individuals who are now and will be, goodness knows I guess for the life of Ontario, focusing those cameras that are across from us.

With those few words in mind, we want to turn to the specific aspects of this legislation. In regard to this legislation, Bill 115, it has come to my attention that as we watch the television coverage, the name of the individual who is speaking and his or her constituency are flashed across the bottom of the screen. Sometimes the particular bill in question is mentioned, but no one is speaking in regard to what is taking place, other than the individual member's address on the item before the Legislature.

The point I want to bring out in regard to Bill 115 in the general comments, before we look into the specifics, is that I think the standing committee on procedural affairs should re-examine what is taking place with the television coverage. I mean this in all sincerity. There should be some consideration -- believe it or not -- of the possibility of having a colour highlighter who interjects periodically to bring everyone across Ontario up to date on what exactly is taking place in the debate, who the member is, what party he belongs to and why the party is for it or against it.

If we are going to have full and adequate coverage to relate to the people on bills such as Bill 115, we should consider something else instead of having a mere flash of the individual speaker who is participating in the debate. I must confess from time to time even I, in my humble few years of experience in these chambers, turn on the television set in my office, albeit ever so seldom, because my obligation to these chambers is enormous and I am usually present so I can hear all members participate in the debate. However, the odd time when I am in my office and listen to debates such as the one on Bill 115, I am often concerned that people across Ontario do not have the full opportunity of understanding the legislation as we do with the explanatory notes.

For instance, for the benefit of those who are watching at home, by good fortune, whiling away the hours at 3:18 p.m. on November 20, 1986; they are probably curious as to what exactly this bill is all about. I think the standing committee on procedural affairs should give some consideration to having a colour highlighter to bring up those items that would make sense to individuals who tune in. Believe it or not, I can warrant that not everyone sits in front of the television hour after hour to get a full appreciation and understanding of the milieu of these chambers from day to day.

For instance, today, if they tune in on Bill 115 and they want to have an appreciation and understanding of what is taking place, I am embarrassed to say it just might be that they could not comprehend, even with my explicit remarks, what the legislation is all about. We could have an individual who, along with our television broadcast, could explain Bill 115 for 10 or 15 minutes or even a half hour. We know from the explanatory notes the purpose of this bill is to prohibit persons from engaging in a business that involves the sale, distribution and advertisement of lottery tickets unless authorized by the Ontario Lottery Corp.; and secondly, there is a penalty of $50,000 or imprisonment for a term of not more than one year, or both, as provided in section 4.

Even for us humble members, reading the explanatory notes sometimes does not make a heck of a lot of sense. How do we find out exactly some specific aspects of the bill? I have to tell those viewers at home there is a lot of legislation that comes before these chambers and not every member is attuned to the specifics of each individual piece of legislation, never mind the detailed aspects of paragraphs.

Mr. Mancini: Speak for yourself.

Mr. Cureatz: Do not get me going. I say to the member for Essex South (Mr. Mancini), I feel I am speaking on behalf of myself and him. I think he will be following this debate very closely. I know those wonderful people who receive coverage in Essex South would be more than willing to have a better understanding of what takes place in these chambers. One way of doing that is to have a person who, in the lulls of debate, is able to participate so that there could be a fuller explanation of what is taking place in the chamber. I am looking forward to consideration of those aspects of our newly devised television coverage.

More specifically, we have some concerns about Bill 115. For those at home who are whiling away some spare time and wondering why we on this side of the Legislature are concerned, I want to say that notwithstanding my admiration for the minister -- who I feel very profoundly does an excellent job in terms of his capacity, both in a past reincarnation when he was a critic in the opposition and now in his position as a minister of the crown -- I have one or two concerns, especially since it has been indicated that members of the third party are supporting the legislation. That really makes me quake in my shoes. As a result of that quaking, I have to take a look at one or two items as to why we are concerned. At that time, I will allow other members to participate in the debate. I understand there is a whole lineup of people who want to express concern.

15:20

Notwithstanding the move the present government has made in terms of moving Lottario and Wintario, we have some concerns. It is our understanding that with the passage of this legislation there could be well more than US$60 million that will not find its way into Ontario, US$40 million of which would go directly to Ontario's coffers. There is the resulting spinoff. There is the possibility of losing 1,000 jobs in Ontario in the passage of Bill 115.

Those little items by themselves give us a tiny bit of concern. With his reams of staff and all the input from the various back-benchers on the government side, I am confident the minister has thought through this legislation very thoroughly. The person who really runs everything over there is the Treasurer. No doubt he was sitting up late at night after he got White Farm and he had the use of that free combine to harvest those white beans. That gave him the opportunity to have some free time so he could devise a fancy piece of legislation that would eliminate approximately 1,000 jobs in Ontario.

With the process that takes place in this chamber and with the possibility of this legislation going to committee, I am confident there will be full and adequate debate so we can review some of these considerations. With the transcript of the debate in committee, I know the Treasurer, as he is driving back home -- he is not driving back home; actually his driver is driving him back home in the government limousine. I remind all honourable members that if I heard one speech in this chamber, I heard a thousand when he continually criticized those government limousines with the yellow lights. He was always worried that they were going to zap him. I am often curious whether he has those same yellow lights in his limousine. I wonder who he is zapping nowadays. It is evident that under Bill 115 he is zapping the possibility of 1,000 jobs in Ontario.

With those few humble remarks, I now will take my seat and enjoy the debate as it continues. We are very confident that the minister, as enlightened as he is and as fine a fellow as he is, representing the fine area of Victoria-Haliburton -- minus Manvers township after the next election -- notwithstanding the pressure he is getting from the members of the third party, will see his way and will realize that perhaps this is not the procedure he should be taking in terms of this legislation. After the debate in committee, he will feel much more comfortable and will realize the error of his ways.

Mr. Breaugh: I want to welcome the member for Durham East (Mr. Cureatz) back to the chamber. He has not been here for quite a while. It must be tough to run a law practice and be a member of the Legislature at the same time. To give him a quick update, there has not been a procedural affairs committee here for the better part of a year. He might be interested in the fact that we do not sit in the evenings any more either. There are a couple of things such as that which, with frequent absences he is liable to overlook. He might overlook the fact that the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly would appreciate any comment from any members on televising the proceedings or on the standing orders or on anything else.

Very quickly, perhaps he might help us. The one thing he forgot to tell us in that last little ramble was whether he was for or against this bill? That would help us.

Mr. Cureatz: I am very flattered that the honourable member has brought to our attention that I have had the opportunity of being associated with a law firm. As he well knows, a number of members of this assembly are associated with law firms. I can think of the Liberal member for Brampton (Mr. Callahan). There is another member in this assembly who is associated with a very fine, outstanding law firm. That law firm has the name of Sack, Charney, Goldblatt and Mitchell. They are at 26 Dundas Street West. Who, everyone asks, is associated with that law firm? None other than the honourable leader of the third party, the member for York South (Mr. Rae). I am trying to keep up with the leader of the third party, so that I too can be associated with a law firm. I do not want to be left out.

Mr. Breaugh: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I did ask the member to tell us whether he was for this bill or against it.

The Deputy Speaker: That is not an appropriate point of order. Back to the debate.

Mr. Swart: Nobody in this Legislature will be surprised that I rise to support very strongly the bill before us. I am considerably surprised at the tone and the content of the debate coming from the Conservative party on my right. When this was raised by myself in this Legislature, when they were on that side of the House, never once did they defend the very questionable type of action that was taking place with regard to the sales of these lottery tickets outside this country. They never defended it. In fact, they indicated they were taking steps to stop it. They never did, but they indicated in this House that in principle they were in favour of the content of this legislation. Now they rise today and somehow or other seem to be defending this practice. I am quite surprised that they do so.

The matter of what was taking place with regard to the Ontario Lottery Corp. tickets was first brought to my attention back on October 29, 1984. That is more than two years ago. There is no question that the lottery corporation knew about it before that time, but it was brought to my attention by a letter from a woman in Hamilton, Ontario. I would like to read the letter she wrote to me.

She wrote: "Enclosed please find material sent to my mother, Mrs. Louis Bronstein of Denver, Colorado, by the Financial Freedom Group. She thought that I had put her on their mailing list. Upon reading this material, I was appalled that our country would allow such material to be sent through the mails.

"You will notice by looking at the highlighted areas that this group sells a $1-Canadian lottery ticket for $US2, making approximately $1.50 Canadian profit for each ticket sold. In addition, subscribers are asked to send an additional $US2 to cover the cost of mailing. Nowhere in the material does it say that the ticket sells for $1 Canadian.

"A very nice racket, I would say. I am amazed that this group has been endorsed by the Metropolitan Toronto Better Business Bureau. As a concerned Canadian citizen, I wish to register my extreme displeasure and urge you to investigate this organization."

That was signed by Marjorie Baskin, 50 Sanders Boulevard, Hamilton.

After I got that letter, I did investigate this practice. After some investigation and discussion with great numbers of people in the Ontario Lottery Corp., who themselves disapproved of this practice and who themselves said they had tried to stop it, I was convinced that it should be stopped, that something of an unsavoury practice was taking place.

I got promotional material not only from there but from elsewhere as well, and everything that Marjorie Baskin said in this letter was true. In no place on this did it say the ticket was worth only C$1 in Canada. In fact, it was misleading in stating that in the United States they would not have to pay income tax on this. Of course they have to pay income tax on this money in the US. The whole promotional material left a great deal to be desired.

After doing that investigation, I raised this in the House with the then Conservative minister, who agreed with me it was a practice that should be discontinued. That is why it surprises me so much now to see the Conservatives rising to indicate that somehow or other they are supportive of this practice continuing. Let me say too that anybody who knows anything about American law knows it is the clear intent of American law that this should not take place.

15:30

Mr. O'Connor: That is not right.

Mr. Swart: Yes, it is. The law says you may not order tickets through the mail. You may not send Ontario Lottery Corp. tickets through the mail in the United States. You may not order them; you may not send them. It is illegal to do that in the US.

They have now got around that by not ordering any tickets at all; there are no tickets involved. All you are doing is ordering a certain number. It is the clear intent of the postal law of the US that they cannot send or order tickets through the mail, and anyone familiar with it will know that is the case.

We must also recognize that because of this situation, it is impossible to police the lottery corporation and the sales of these tickets. It is impossible to police whether people who order numbers are assured that those numbers do get into the draw and that they will get their prize if they win. I am not suggesting the people operating these businesses did not pay off winners. I am suggesting it is impossible to know. It is impossible to police when there are no tickets. We must recognize that.

I do not think it is a bit unfair to read into the record an article from the Globe and Mail. Other members of this Legislature, particularly those who may think I am voting against this bill, should also read this Globe and Mail article, which is dated Saturday, January 18, 1986. I have no way of knowing whether this is correct, but it is an article by Yves Lavigne of the Globe and Mail:

"Employees of the mail-order lottery ticket firm in Mississauga, Ontario, that says it failed to process an entry that could have been a winner in last Saturday's $10-million Lotto 6/49 draw have claimed thousands of dollars in lottery prizes over the past several years.

"The most frequent claimant, Ontario Lottery Corp. records show, is Esther Budharam, who also uses the name Esther Priess. She is the wife of Ernest Priess, sole director of 468560 Ontario Ltd., which operates under the trade names of Winshare Club of Canada and Financial Freedom Group." Winshare is the firm that says it failed to process a US customer's 6/49 number. A Winshare spokesman did not return calls yesterday to explain whether the employees had won the prizes or picked them up for the firm's US clients.

"Mrs. Budharam was an authorized ticket agent of the Ontario Lottery Corp. at Toronto's international airport until last February, when officials discovered she had violated lottery corporation policy by selling tickets to her husband's mail-order firms. She claimed the prizes while employed as a ticket agent.

"Mrs. Budharam claimed 80 Lotto 6/49 prizes worth $123,734.70 in 1984.

"Other prizes claimed by Mrs. Budharam include:

"A $100,000 Wintario prize claimed in August, 1981, on a ticket she sold herself. The odds of winning the prize are one in 1,333,333.

"A $10,000 Super Lotto prize claimed in February, 1982, under the name of Esther Priess. The odds of winning this prize are one in 400,000.

"A Super Lotto car claimed in July, 1982, on a ticket she sold herself. The odds of winning the prize are one in 8,000.

"A $10,000 Super Lotto prize claimed in January, 1984. The odds of winning the prize are one in 8,000.

"Other employees of Winshare/Financial Freedom Group have claimed lottery prizes:

"Edna Ames, the firm's membership secretary, claimed a $15,388.60 Lottario prize in March, 1982. The odds of winning the prize were one in 543,000. The ticket was sold by Merchants Fair, a ticket agency owned by Ester Budharam. Mrs. Ames also claimed a $5,000 Super Lotto prize in June, 1985. The odds of winning the prize were one in 27,777.

"Karen Heynsbergen, who gave the same telephone number as Winshare, claimed a $3,409.90 Lotto 6/49 prize in October, 1983, on a ticket bought at the airport. The odds of winning the prize are one in 54,200.

"Maxine Weatherall, who also gave Winshare's telephone number -- "

The Deputy Speaker: Order. The member is not supposed to read at length. I presume he is not going to go on very much longer from the same document.

Mr. Swart: No, I am not. However, I think you will also recognize we may quote from documents that are pertinent and will agree this is pertinent to the matter before us.

The Deputy Speaker: Yes. You may quote from it, but do not read verbatim at length.

Mr. Swart: If I am going to read this, I have to read it verbatim. This is a quote. It continues:

"Norman (Chubby) Gallagher, a resident of Presque Ile, Me., said in a telephone interview yesterday that he has bought lottery tickets from Winshare for more than two years. The company solicited his business through the mail.

"He said he placed a telephone order on December 18 for a 6/49 ticket with winning numbers 4,12,21,40,42,45. But the company says the date was three days past its deadline. Winshare requires lead time to process numbers because many customers pay by mail."

I will conclude there because that is the end of the quote I wanted to read.

I do not know whether what is in this paper is right. I do not know whether the odds they talk about are right. I have no way of knowing. I do not know whether any special favours were given in this company or whether there was any finagling on this whole thing. I am not making any accusations, but I know that when you have this kind of operation and when you have these kinds of situations arising, as legitimate as they may or may not be, the simple fact is that when the people selling the tickets are seen winning the prizes, it discredits the Ontario Lottery Corp.; it discredits it in the US and in Canada.

I had literally hundreds of people contact me about this after they saw that in the paper. I do not think we can afford that kind of publicity, whether legitimate or otherwise, about the Ontario Lottery Corp. and the other lotteries it administers on behalf of the Interprovincial Lottery Corp.

There is no question that it is contrary to the intent of US law that we sell these tickets in the US, as clearly as it is the intent of the US lottery corporations that they do not sell their tickets here. We have an obligation to respect people in the US who may buy these tickets; we have to ensure not only that they get the returns on those tickets but also that there cannot be any system in this province whereby people in the US can be ripped off. They are not being ripped off, but they can be under this system, because we cannot police it. We have to respect the government of the US and the lottery corporations in the US.

Although I have no objection to this going out to a committee for some discussion, I must say it is somewhat unusual. We are not going to have the details of it discussed in committee. There is a matter of principle here, which is whether we are going to permit lottery tickets to be sold outside this country by a private corporation that we cannot police. When there is a principle such as that, I am not sure what the purpose is of sending it out to committee. However, I am one of those who likes to have the public have its full say on these things; so if it is the wish of the House that this go out to committee, I will go along with it.

I want to say, on behalf of myself and my party, this is so much a matter of principle that it does not matter whether it stays out in committee for six months and we hear all kinds of delegations; when it comes back into this House, I and my party will be voting in favour of this bill.

15:40

Mr. O'Connor: I have a question for the previous speaker. I would like to ask him, based entirely on his last comment, whether he means that whatever he hears in committee, no matter how reasonable or how rational, he has made up his mind; he has predetermined his decision and does not want to be confused with facts. If we get to committee, he is going to vote the way he wants to vote regardless of what anyone says. Is that what he means?

Mr. Swart: I thought I made it clear that this is a matter of principle. We know what the principle is, and the Conservative members know what it is. They endorsed in principle what is in this bill when they answered the questions in this House. It would not be the first time the Conservative party flip-flopped on principle, but we in this party do not.

Mr. O'Connor: I welcome the opportunity to make some comments on Bill 115, An Act to amend the Ontario Lottery Corporation Act. I have listened carefully to the debate to this point, and I think many good points have been made, not the least of which were from the member for Durham East. Although he may not rise to his feet in this chamber all that often, the quality of his erudite and articulate remarks more than make up for the lack of number of times he may speak to us. I listened with intensity, and he had many good points to make.

Hon. Mr. Elston: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: I wish only to request that the speaker identify whether he is speaking on behalf of the new Progressive Conservative Party or the old one, so we can determine whether there is a change of position or principle on this bill.

The Deputy Speaker: That is not an appropriate point of order.

Mr. O'Connor: I am somewhat concerned about the direction in which the debate on this bill is going. I and this party are in favour of fairness, honesty and a system of policing any industry, trade or business to ensure that the people it serves, or attempts to serve, are protected. That is a different goal, and one for which we stand, from the one that some of the members opposite are attempting to attribute to us, which is that we are in some way against this bill and thus against ensuring honesty and protection for the public in Ontario and in places outside it.

I am also concerned and a bit surprised at the somewhat remarkable stance taken by my friends to the left, who proclaim long and loud that they are in favour of the working man and of the production and maintenance of jobs in Ontario. Notwithstanding that apparent stance they have told us about so often, they are prepared to do away in one fell swoop with some 1,000 jobs in a thriving and growing industry in this province. In my riding, for instance, there is a thriving business which employs some 80 people on a full-time basis, primarily younger people, who are involved in the telephone marketing of lottery corporation tickets, into the United States primarily but also to other areas. If this bill passes, they will be instantly unemployed.

I am concerned with the approach of the government to solve what I see as a relatively minor problem. Sure, there are some bad apples in this industry. There have been difficulties with respect to certain operators. They have been well documented by my friend the member for Welland-Thorold, who read at length from a newspaper report about some people who appear to have misused their position and perhaps been involved in some kind of fraud. The matter is before the courts and it has not yet been determined whether that is the case.

Mr. McClellan: What's a little fraud among friends? What's a little fraud now and then? After all, there is a black market.

The Deputy Speaker: The member for Bellwoods (Mr. McClellan) is seated a little too close to the member for Oakville (Mr. O'Connor) to interject.

Mr. O'Connor: I am concerned somewhat about the attitude of the government towards the problem it perceives. It is a baby-and-bathwater attitude. The government is going to get rid of an entire thriving young industry because one or two or a few people in the industry perhaps are abusing their positions of authority.

To quote from today's edition of the paper my friend the member for Welland-Thorold quoted from, I read this morning in the Globe and Mail of an incident where a bank manager in Etobicoke was recently charged with theft of $459,000; a bad apple in the barrel of bank managers in Ontario. Using the same government theory to deal with a problem such as that, they would close down all the banks in Ontario because there are a few people who steal from banks.

Mr. Rowe: Better fire all the bank managers.

Mr. Breaugh: Now they want to nationalize the whole banking system. This is awful.

Hon. Mr. Eakins: We are talking about the authority of the Ontario Lottery Corp.

Mr. O'Connor: If there are problems in the industry, the answer is to regulate the industry better and to legislate better controls on the people involved in the industry.

Hon. Mr. Eakins: They are not employees of the Ontario Lottery Corp.

Mr. O'Connor: We should license these corporations and require them to submit monthly reports and audits of the number of tickets they sell and to whom, to ensure the prizes are being properly distributed. Why are we going to get rid of the entire industry for the sake of a few people who are abusing it?

Hon. Mr. Eakins: You are talking about employees of the lottery corporation. You are talking about two different things.

Mr. Rowe: You are hanging an elephant with a mouse.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. The minister and the member for Simcoe Centre (Mr. Rowe) are interjecting.

Mr. O'Connor: He is welcome to interject. He is with our party.

The Deputy Speaker: Interjections are out of order.

Mr. O'Connor: I welcome his assistance in this debate. The minister is berating me from across the floor that in effect that is not the reason he is bringing in this bill. I understand that is one of the reasons.

The other reason, as is set out in his letter of September 12, 1986, to the Ontario Ticket Purchase Services Association, which was previously referred to, is that it may be illegal in some of the states into which the lottery sellers are distributing their tickets. I understand that is a question that is not settled at present. It has not been clearly enunciated by the courts in the US that it is illegal. In fact, there is opinion at a very high level within the US Attorney General's department that it is not illegal.

What is happening is that the people in the US are not ordering lottery tickets, nor are they being sent lottery tickets. They are being sent numbers and they are making orders, the transaction for which takes place here in Ontario. The contract takes place in Ontario, and therefore the laws of the US are not being broken. At least the question is one that is at issue. It is one that is being reviewed and is not clearly, as the minister attempts to state in his letter, something that is illegal in the US.

The number of jobs involved in Ontario -- being more than 1,000 -- and the amount of revenue derived by the Treasury of the province have been well documented by the member for Simcoe Centre. I need not go into that. I simply make the point that in its attempt to solve a problem in an industry, the government is overreacting. It is bringing in a bill that will have a serious impact on a small and thriving industry in Ontario, which employs approximately 1,000 people. Surely the government should rethink its approach in regard to dealing with the problem.

In chatting with the minister briefly this afternoon, prior to the debate getting under way, I was delighted to receive his assurance that the matter would be referred to a committee where, in accordance with his commitment to the Ontario Ticket Purchase Services Association in his letter of September 12, it would have the opportunity to present submissions.

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I am happy that the minister has agreed to do this and that he will live up to his commitment in this regard. Through this process, he will be quite surprised to learn something of this industry: that the vast majority of those involved in it are honest, hardworking people who provide employment for a number of Ontarians and that there are many other ways, which will be suggested to him during the course of these hearings, in which the problem of the few dishonest persons involved in the situation can be handled. As I suggested before, this might be through licensing or an auditing process of the government.

I will not get into the full measures that are available at this point, but I suggest that even the member for Welland-Thorold, after sitting through some of these hearings, might have occasion to change his mind, if he listens carefully, and revert to the traditional position of his party, which has been to promote and produce jobs for people in Ontario, particularly for younger people, who are the ones primarily involved in this industry.

I reiterate that a number of people in my riding rely on this industry for their income. I speak on their behalf in this Legislature. I encourage them and members of the industry to take the opportunity to attend before the committee to make their views known.

Mr. Swart: From the comments of the member for Oakville, I take it that he supports in principle the marketing of tickets by the private sector in the United States and elsewhere, even though the laws in the US say one cannot send these through the mails, even though a person cannot get a ticket; and even though the previous government, the party the member belongs to, had said it was a practice that should not continue. It is quite amazing to see this flip-flop and the unconcern for the principle behind this and for what in fact has taken place.

We in this party are concerned about jobs, but that does not mean we support black market operations. We did not support them during the war years when an awful lot of people were employed in the black market. It does not mean we support wide-open prostitution, which provides employment for a lot of people. There has to be a principle involved here. I am amazed that the Conservatives have flip-flopped on this whole matter of principle and are only worried about some of its details.

Mr. Hayes: I want to get a little clarification from the member for Oakville. He made a statement that the Americans were not buying the tickets, that all they were buying were numbers. Is it the opinion of the member that if one can find a way to get around the law it is morally correct?

Mr. O'Connor: As I said in my initial remarks, we are in favour of a free enterprise system. We are in favour of it being done honestly and fairly. In the course of entering into a business or occupation, the public in this province and outside this province should be well protected. All I said in my remarks was that there are ways other than banning the sale of these tickets altogether by which this end and these goals can be achieved, while maintaining the level of employment that this industry generates in Ontario. It is nothing more and nothing less than that. Those are admirable goals, and I stick by them.

Mr. Breaugh: I was not going to speak on this bill, but I feel compelled to. I never did understand why the Tories, when they were in power, made the nationalization of the numbers racket one of their top priorities. I never did understand why this was at the top of their list of things they should nationalize, but they did it. As I recall the arguments when they did it, they said the reason they had to nationalize the numbers racket was very straightforward. They could not leave it in the private sector, because they were encountering too many problems with private bookies, numbers runners and various odds and sods. They had to nationalize it to make it squeaky clean. Now I hear the argument coming from some of them that they want to privatize it again.

I do not quite understand what is going on here. To be fair, the Tories in their presentation so far have given us both sides of the issue and a fair amount of middle ground. They have argued for the bill, they have argued against the bill and they have argued that we should not take any position on the bill. I was interested to notice that today they were adamant about the idea that the bill ought to go to committee; yesterday they mentioned not a word of that. I noticed it took all of two seconds for one of their members -- not the critic but another of their members -- to come right down there and ask the minister whether it would be okay to send this to committee, and he said, "Sure." That is all it took. They could have done that yesterday, or they could have done it last week by letter or by phone. If they had wanted a committee stage and public hearings to the bill, they could have done that.

I am fascinated by the arguments that are being used. I have some sense that we have discovered not only what kind of business they are in but also what the price is today: 1,000 votes. I sense a funny argument at work here. I would accept the job argument if I felt there were good, long-term jobs in that sector of the economy, but in my experience -- the member can correct me if I am wrong and he will, I am sure -- most of the organizations that are functioning in terms of this bill are what we would call boiler-room industries; that is, a bunch of young people are put in a room somewhere with phones and they canvass sales. That is the process they use. Those jobs are not long-term jobs; they are short-term jobs. They are minimum-wage jobs, and they are not exactly what would be called a career profession. Some of us would even go as far as to say the people who run those operations are very exploitive of their employees. At the public hearings, we will want to hear precisely the nature of employment that is being proposed there.

We also have to address ourselves to this vexing problem. I know the previous government took the numbers racket and made it decent in Ontario. Numbers are sold all over the province. In every corner store now we have more people selling numbers in Ontario than they have doing so illegally in the US. It is done up front, the government backs it and all of that. There are simple assumptions that people make when they pay what some would call the fool's tax by buying a lottery ticket. People assume they not only can buy a ticket here but also can win and actually get the prize. We know from the mail order operations that is not quite a guaranteed thing. We already know that mail order operations have run into a succession of problems in not selling tickets; they do that very well. The problem comes about if somebody should be fortunate enough to win. They have adopted a remarkable defence. They cannot find the ticket the person bought, they are not sure who bought it, they are not sure what the number is or they are not sure whether it is legal to deliver the prize to a state in the US.

I am not sure what is going on here. Am I hearing the good old Tories in Ontario arguing that this practice is worth supporting? Am I hearing the Tories in Ontario, who used to argue that we had to nationalize the numbers racket to keep it clean, arguing today that they now want to privatize it to get it dirty again? Are they saying they want lotteries in Ontario to be run by the private sector? Are they saying they want businesses to function in Ontario in ways that are, at the very least, questionable on legal grounds in the US?

When we put lotteries in Ontario, the big argument was whether such things as the Irish sweepstakes were legal in Ontario. For many years, our police forces were not sure about that; a number of them sold the tickets, but they also arrested people for buying tickets. That kind of practice, that questionable section of the law as to whether lotteries were legal, caused us a lot of aggravation.

It was said when the lotteries were brought in: "That is the end of lotteries in the private sector. We will now regulate, control and monitor lottery sales and prizes very strictly." There have been ongoing questions as to whether the Ontario Lottery Corp. through the years has actually done that in quite the way it was purported to be done. None the less, I do not think there is much question that there is very little in the way of vice left in the lottery corporation; it is a publicly run corporation, it publishes an annual report and it is subject to investigation by committees of the Legislature. We monitor that as well as we can.

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I have no problem with this bill going out for hearings. I have no problem so long as that is seen to be something that is not short and sweet and so long as an appropriate length of time is allocated in one of our committees so the groups who want to make submissions can.

It seems to me that if the lottery corporation wanted to, it could license certain people to run mail order businesses as they now run the lottery businesses at little corner stores or whatever. I caution the government before it gets on that road that this is precisely where the problem began. It is going to have some difficulty with that. It may be able to ensure that whoever is selling those lottery tickets by mail is still around afterwards. One of our problems has been that by the time a problem occurs and the government goes back into the private sector to investigate who did not deliver a prize, or who did not buy a ticket on behalf of some consumer in Georgia, the doors are closed; the company is not in business any more.

That is going to be the start-and-finish problem with this. If the government is to allow the private sector into the numbers racket, the private sector is going to have to accept the idea that it cannot be a fly-by-night operation any more; it must be something that will be there when the prizes are distributed. The government will have to find a mechanism. I am not sure how it is going to do this. I am not sure how it will take tickets sold to American citizens, perhaps legally, perhaps not so legally, and adjudicate who wins the prize or who was at fault.

Are we expecting, for example, couples to fly up from Atlanta to go into Ontario courts to adjudicate whether a business in the private sector in Ontario did them wrong'? Are we going to provide them with legal fees and transportation costs up here? We do get into a lot of problems. Perhaps we should take the member for Brampton (Mr. Callahan) and have him do something useful. He could wait out at the airport and represent these people. He could carry their baggage or something such as that. He would lose the baggage, we all know that, but he would be out of our hair for a change.

I think it can go to committee. The problem, though, is a straightforward one. There has been a change of stance on the part of some members here. I suppose that is legitimate. I do think the government has moved to solve a problem that has been around for a fair while now and is not easily solved. If somebody wants to go to committee and provide the techniques whereby all these previously unresolved difficulties can now get resolved, that is fair game; I do not have any problem with that. But, since I have heard a lot about the job side of this, I am very interested in the nature of the jobs that will be provided.

It is pretty easy to come in here and run off about 1,000 jobs in the private sector. Again, I may be wrong, but I do not know of too many people who have long-term employment at decent wages with decent working conditions in that field of endeavour. The numbers racket traditionally, since time began, has not been exactly a place of career employment opportunities. It began on the streets, and it is pretty much still there. It has been cleaned up and sanitized a touch, and I suppose it is now so accepted by the people of Ontario that we will never be done with it; but there are problems.

We will support the bill. We think it attempts to resolve a problem. We are happy to have it go to committee on the understanding that people will get an opportunity to come and make presentations to resolve problems that the government perhaps thinks cannot be resolved. They will have their chance to do that. On that basis we will support the legislation.

Hon. Mr. Eakins: I am not going to comment for long. I have no objection to this bill going to a standing committee so that we can have representations. I think it will be very interesting, with some of the comments we will want to make in defence of Bill 115; it is one I fully support.

The member for Oakville has likened some of the people in the business to people who work in a bank. Anyone who works in a bank is an employee of the bank, but anyone involved in the lottery corporation must be authorized by the Ontario Lottery Corp. The people who are operating are operating outside. As far as I am concerned, the Ontario Lottery Corp. is going to keep control of that.

The bill before the House today is designed basically to maintain the confidence in and integrity of the lottery games so that the future of the games can be secure and healthy. I do not want the Ontario Lottery Corp. to be under a cloud of suspicion in any way. We have an obligation to ensure that its profitability is neither affected by nor rides upon any operations outside the Ontario Lottery Corp.

I point out that the status of the Ontario Lottery Corp. is very clear. It has been before the courts three times, and they have ruled in support of the Ontario Lottery Corp. If there is further information that should be revealed, I have no objection to it going to committee. I am quite pleased to have it go before a standing committee to be dealt with.

Motion agreed to.

Bill ordered for the standing committee on resources development.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: We have three committee reports we thought we might deal with this afternoon, if possible. The first one has to do with the Ontario trade review. Is it the thought of members that this perhaps be done later? I see some nods.

REPORT, STANDING COMMITTEE ON THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for adoption of the recommendations contained in the report of the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly on appointments in the public sector.

Mr. Breaugh: When I presented this report from the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly some time ago, it was at the end of a rather lengthy process. The basic idea was that members on all sides, I was told, wanted to find another way to handle appointments in the public sector. The task given to the committee was fairly straightforward. What had been acknowledged as simple, pure, raw, old-fashioned patronage was no longer appropriate for the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. A new system had to be put in place. The characteristics of that as it unfolded were relatively straightforward.

First, and this is a major accomplishment, there would have to be a known process. The people of Ontario had a right to know and understand how appointments were made in the public sector. Many of us who have been around here for a while know the sad truth that in the previous administration there was no known process. No one really knew how appointments were made. Some knew how some appointments were made, and some had an inkling of how others were made. It was rumoured that some were done right out of the Office of the Premier, some up at the Park Plaza Hotel, some from various ministry offices and some on recommendations from the heads of Tory riding organizations. There was never in one place at one time a system to be examined.

The first thing we tried to do was simply to establish a process. That we did by saying the guiding principles here would be very straightforward. Every person in Ontario is eligible for this and as many people, as many sources, in Ontario can put forward suggestions for appointments in the public sector. At the committee level, we talked a great deal. We all knew municipal councils, school boards, social agencies, special interest groups, ethnic organizations, sports and cultural groups would be able to identify for us people who would be good appointments in the public sector, people who had some expertise in a particular field, people who had some demonstrated ability to administer, to regulate, to monitor, to advise the government. It is very difficult for any of us to corner that market, and we should try to tap into as many of those resources as humanly possible.

To that end, we said something should happen, something that seemed relatively straightforward but had never happened before. In this huge black book I have on my desk, for the first time in the history of Ontario, is a list of all the appointments that are made by order in council. I want to point out at the beginning that the appointments made by order in council are not all the appointments by a long shot. Some of us who have been examining government agencies in Ontario would hazard a guess that about a third of the appointments made by the government are done by order in council.

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The reason we made that a gathering point was that if it is to be done by order in council, it is generally considered that it is an agency that will be around for some time. Its role in life is reasonably clearly understood; it is there to advise the government on particular matters, to regulate a particular industry, profession or something of that nature or to administer something such as a parks commission.

The terms of reference for appointments by order in council are rather well understood. As part of our deliberations, we said: "This should be understood a little better. We need to do this type of collation for all these appointments in the agencies. We need to have the agencies write little, precise definitions of their mandate, what they do and what expertise one would need to serve on their particular commission." It is not dramatic stuff, but it would put a little more light on what that agency does and who might properly serve on that.

We recommended a process that would have that put in what is called the Ontario Gazette, which is the record of proceedings in and around the Legislature having to do with regulations, orders in council and things such as that. It is not a widely read magazine, but it is available in libraries and in municipal clerks' offices. It has a circulation around Ontario that is relatively constant in most communities. We suggested that, and I think that is one thing that will happen.

Second, we wrestled with the problem of how we would make people aware that these appointments are done. The committee went to the municipalities to look for a little help here. The municipalities have a technique, because they too make appointments to various agencies and commissions in their locale. Most of them do a very straightforward thing; they put an ad in the paper once a year. Usually it goes in, say the Oshawa Times, about this time of year; it is a simple announcement that says: "The Oshawa city council will be making appointments to these 12 agencies in January. If you are interested, make a submission. Write us a letter or do a résumé." Some have devised a form to fill out; so if they are using computers, for example, that helps. For some people who are not accustomed to writing a lot of letters and résumés, a little form sometimes assists them. It does not mean they would not be good people on the advisory committee or the regulatory agency; they may just not be used to sitting down and writing long job applications as part of their work and life experience. The techniques recommended on that side of the report are relatively straightforward.

We said there should be a group of people, not directly in the Premier's office but at arm's length from that, who would collate all this information. For example, if the Oshawa city council recommended someone to sit on one of these agencies, a year from now the city council should be able to find out whether that agency has an opening coming up, whether the government has decided not to appoint that person or whether it is going to recommend that that person be appointed. It should be able to track them through the process, as should members and in a sense people who have put their applications in.

People who have submitted applications should be able to go to a member of the Legislature, for example, and ask: "Did they lose my application? Is there an opening coming up? Is there any chance that I am going to be appointed, or have they discarded that?" Within certain reasonable rules and regulations of the process, there should be a way for them to plug into the system and see where their application to be appointed to one of these agencies would be, whether the government was likely to make an appointment in the near future and who actually got the appointment in the end.

All we asked for was an openness to the system. In the main, when we did this we tried to find the practical, the pragmatic, the easy way to do this. To my mind anyway, the committee's recommendations in this regard are all very straightforward things that could be done now; some are actually happening to a degree. However, to make the one little distinction, for example, in the government's reply to the committee's report, when we said, "Put an ad once a year in newspapers around Ontario," we did not mean the government ought to send out some press releases. We meant the government should notify people, as we do when our committees have hearings, when we have a bill that is going out to committee for hearings or when we have somebody who is gathering up information in preparation for a report. We do not want a big ad campaign; there was no talk of that in the committee, and that was not part of it.

We were trying to establish that there should be a bit of an arm's-length relationship. At no time did the committee ever say the government does not have the right to make the initial appointment. We accepted that flat out. All we argued for was a known public process, some fairness and access to it, and that the government always has the right to choose from that list. I have been in politics long enough to know that any government will have a tendency -- let me put it this way -- not to appoint its known enemies to a lot of regulatory or advisory commissions. We do not expect that. We simply expect some fairness.

It is a recognition that on our councils, school boards and social agencies are a lot of people who could do this type of job very well. They are not really known to us because they are not part of the political process. They do not belong to anybody's riding association. They may never have run for a public office and may have no intention of ever doing that. But that is not to say they do not have the ability and should not be considered for this type of appointment. The recommendations of the committee were framed in that context.

In the committee, we wrestled with the idea of review for some time. After the government takes the initiative and suggests an appointment, part of what we were told we should be doing is to provide for a review process. This is a little sticky.

Even that well-known radical Brian Mulroney in the Parliament of Canada now accepts that some of the appointments made by the federal government will be subjected to a review by a committee of the House of Commons. There will not be a lot -- not as many as perhaps I personally think is appropriate -- but some. The concept of a legislative committee in a parliamentary system reviewing nominees for appointments in one of these agencies is established.

The sad fact is that this committee recommended that, and the federal government picked up and acted on it before Ontario did. That is a little sad, but that is not the first time that has happened.

I have another sticky problem for the government's concern. None of us on the committee had an inclination to spend all our time reviewing appointments to agencies. I, for one, think that would be a colossal waste of time. When we talked to people in other jurisdictions where that is an accepted fact of life -- for example, in the American congressional system, in all the states we talked to -- they all agreed by and large that the actual review by a committee was not too useful. What was useful was the principle that it could be subjected to a review.

Most of the time, when the President of the United States puts forward a name as his choice for whatever it is, the thing that is causing the political review is the fact that a review can take place. By the time it gets in front of most of the congressional committees, a lot of the sting has fizzled out of that. If the nominee turns out to be a real dud, the President is most anxious that the real dud not get in front of a congressional committee and usually withdraws the nomination before the process actually happens.

We considered having the government take one committee of the Legislature to do that, but frankly we thought that was punishment not suitable for any of the members here. Nobody wants to get involved in that.

We thought the government might take certain types of appointments and put them in front of a committee. In one sense, we did identify that. We thought it would be possible for people who are considered to be directly related to the assembly itself. It is a very short list: the Ombudsman, the Clerk, the Sergeant at Arms and a few different officers of the assembly. It is a handful, relatively speaking. That process would be a little bit different for them, because they are seen to be people who work for the assembly and not for the government.

In each of those cases, we identified them and said, "This will probably go for a review before a committee almost all the time." For example, in the appointment of a new Clerk of the assembly over the summer, we used the process that was historic -- I would not say revolutionary but historic -- in Ontario. We actually advertised the position across the country. We got a large number of well-qualified people, and we set a committee to work on choosing the person who would be recommended as the new Clerk.

In my view, the process worked remarkably well. Although I viewed it with a little bit of apprehension initially, as I think all the members did, there were members on all sides who simply wanted to say, "Let us get the best person to do this." We all recognize that the Clerk of the House has to enjoy the confidence of members on all sides. I think the process worked particularly well in this instance.

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For the rest of these appointments, we said there ought to be provision for the government to initiate the nomination process; in other words, to table a piece of paper to say that within 60 days a person is going on the Ontario Racing Commission or wherever. The members of the assembly would have a time period to consider it of 30 days, 60 days or whatever one wanted. If they thought something ought to be questioned or reviewed, they would have an opportunity to go before a committee and say, "I would like to have this nominee come before our Legislative Assembly committee, and we will review the nomination."

We dealt with the rather sticky issue of whether a committee could stop the nomination process. We recommended a technique that says yes and no. With the logistics, politics and pragmatics of it all, we have said the government has a clear right to appoint these people and the assembly has a clear right to review the process. We have said we do not want character assassination. We do not want committees of the assembly to present long reports that say, "The government's nominee in this regard is a dumb person who has been a crook for 20 years and we do not like that." We did not think that would be appropriate.

We talked to a number of American legislators who have found this to be a thorny problem over the years. They all said pretty much the same thing: "Do not get into a situation where you not only turn down a nomination process but also get into character assassination." They said that if we were going to do it, we should put in a notice that the appointment was not appropriate or something such as that. That is roughly the recommendation here, that if a committee reviews someone nominated by the government for a position and it is not happy, it should not go into a long argument about why it is so unhappy; it should simply say it is unhappy. The government, if it is sensible and sensitive, will take that as notice that it is not appropriate. That is roughly the way it goes. I do not think the review process is complicated or unwieldy.

I want to comment on the reply, which I was a little disappointed with. My disappointment was shared by others in the assembly and around Ontario. The disappointment was that in the preparation of the report, I do not think there is a member of the committee who could not point to a section of the report or to one of the recommendations and say: "I do not like that. I would rather do it some other way. I would rather be more direct. l would rather take away the right of the government to make these appointments and put it somewhere else." We can all find fault with it.

I am admitting the report is a compromise and a very pragmatic one. To put it as succinctly as I can, we took it to a level where all three parties accepted that the process was a fair and reasonable one, was not overly complicated but provided for the basics and was an open and known process. The public could have access to the process. The Legislative Assembly could have a measure of review. That is it.

I did not expect, and I did not get, rave reviews for the report, but collectively, it is a substantial alteration of the previous practices of this assembly and is much better than anything I have seen before. That is a reasonable thing.

As to the reply from the government, I was taken aback. The reply was tabled in the assembly in the afternoon. Maybe I am wrong, but I had anticipated that the government would have paid some attention to this, that a minister would have made a statement or that there would have been some recognition that the reply had been tabled with the Clerk.

I was taken aback to find it was tabled with the Clerk, as is required under the provisional standing orders, but more openly, it was tabled in the press gallery. That disappointed me somewhat. As a courtesy to someone who has spent the better part of a year trying to get consensus on this issue, it would have been nice had the government sent me and the members of the committee a copy of the government's reply before it was sent upstairs to the gallery. I am not quibbling that anyone did anything wrong. I am not quibbling about anything other than simple courtesy. It would have been wise.

Second, the difficulty I have with the reply is that there is a bit of a notion that the government has evolved its new, cleaner, more open patronage system, but it makes it very clear that it will all stay in the government's hands. The computer bank that has this list of names will be part of the Premier's office. The notice that there are appointments available will be done by government press release. These are nuances, I guess, and that is what set me back just a touch in that reply. It is not rejecting out of hand that somebody ought to do this in a more orderly way; it is saying: "We are already doing that in a more orderly way. Are we not wonderful?"

That aggravated me. Why bother to have a committee work for the better part of a year to try to get consensus and at the end of it say, "We are already doing that"? That was not the purpose. The purpose of the exercise, as I understood it, was to have a committee of the assembly set this out; then the government would say: "That is a wildly impractical scheme. Here is our idea on how to do the same thing sideways or better." That would be fair. However, for the government to take that congratulatory note in its reply did upset me.

Mr. Treleaven: "Condescending" is better.

Mr. Breaugh: I understand that.

Second, we set out to put in place a review process. In my view, probably the single most important thing for the committee to do was to establish the review process, to put some process in place for starters and to see that it was done in an orderly way. Most of us have an interest in seeing that if there is to be a review of this appointment process, it ought to be orderly and it ought to have some sense of logic to it.

It was pointed out during the committee stage when we were working at this review mechanism, "What can we do now?" The truth is, we are in a minority. In any one of our committees, if the majority of members want to haul some appointee in front of them and play catch as catch can, they will do it; they can do that right now. Some have already begun to do it and more will do it later on. I suggest that is not appropriate. I suggest there ought to be a recognized and established way of going about this. I do not mind catch-as-catch-can for members; it may not be fair, but it is part of the process. We are politicians and we understand the rules of procedure around here. We are all big little boys and girls, and we can take whatever slings and arrows anybody wants to throw at us.

The rumour is that every appointment is $70,000 a year, a limousine and a big office. The truth is that is not the case at all. There are about 40 or 50 appointments that we could consider to be full-time, well-paying jobs -- better paid than the members of the assembly, let me put it that way. That cuts them down in a hurry. The bulk of them are jobs people are doing on a part-time basis; they get a per diem and expenses and that is it .

I do not believe it is fair to haul in people who are giving of their time to help run Ontario, put them in front of a legislative committee and badger the hell out of them. That is grossly unfair. I know that is happening. I know it has happened in the past, and in a minority it can happen again. If some hot political issue develops in the next few days and the government appoints someone of some controversy, or even if it is an innocent person who is appointed but the controversy exists in the agency, the members by motion can haul that person in front of a legislative committee and there are very few rules controlling the conduct. There are no real guidelines about why that person is there. The person could be held accountable for things that he or she had nothing to do with; the person is absolutely innocent in the process.

We said, in our most pragmatic way, "Put a process in place here, one that says before the appointment is made, the government notifies the House." If we have someone we want to review, we go off to committee and say, "I would like to do this." If nobody does anything, the appointment stands and away it goes. However, if we do call in a government nominee for review, we should not assassinate that person's character. As members of the assembly, we have the right to review the appointment and test whether the person is well qualified.

From my point of view, the best part of this is that in my experience of talking to people, especially to Americans, they say that if someone is going to do a poor job of running an agency, they want to find out before they set him up to run the agency. We think a fair and reasonable test is to allow the person to be invited in front of one of our committees to talk to the committee for a while.

16:30

It might get a little hot and heavy once in a while, but for instance, if you were running the Ontario Racing Commission, Mr. Speaker, would you not want to know that the person could at least represent the racing commission in front of a committee of the Legislature with reasonable competence? That is going to be part of the appointment. In our recommendations we said that we should recognize the process, put some limits on it and not make it catch-as-catch-can. This should never be an ugly process for the public because the vast majority of people who are appointed are not going to get a lot of financial reward.

For a number of years, this committee, under another name, reviewed agencies of the government. It was a long and hilarious process to try to find out how many agencies there were and how many appointments were made. I have been at this for about eight years and I still do not feel confident that I know how many agencies of various kinds there are in the province. To give an answer to that, l have to put some qualifiers on the answer. I have to say: "We can tell you how many are done by order in council. That is what is in this big, black book and we can put a handle on that." The previous government made an attempt to find how many agencies there were. Management Board of Cabinet tried and could not do it. They hired outside consultants who could not do it. They set up a committee of their own back-benchers who could not do it. Finally, it was landed on a committee of the assembly.

After eight years of looking at it, we have a much clearer idea of who they are, what they do and what they are all about, but I cannot honestly say why the per diems are $200 for some agencies and $100 for others. For the life of me, I cannot say why the full-time people who chair some agencies get $80,000 and others get $45,000. There appears to be no rhyme or reason to it at all.

I do not know why some of the appointments to agencies are for life and some are for two years or for one year. It is not clear to me why some agencies have clear restrictions on what they do and others do not. It is not clear to me why, as to conflict-of-interest guidelines, there are clear rules on how some of the agencies grant government money to individuals and businesses, yet for others the guy leaves the room.

In our long search through these agencies we uncovered these relatively common practices. There is a basic conflict in many of the industries, such as pesticides. The previous government went through a long justification process of saying that the only people who could advise it on things such as pesticides were people in the pesticides industry. We kept saying to all the nice people who came before us: "Is there not a little conflict here? How can you come in from the private sector one day and advise the government the next?" There are long-term ramifications to that. They do not just give advice. The advice gets translated into regulations and the regulations govern that exact same industry. Is there not a need to separate that, to put a little distance in there? They said that it was the way they had always done it, but I say there is a need.

For these reasons, the review part of the process is not only desirable but also necessary. I agree that there ought to be a vehicle whereby committees of the Legislature should be able to review these appointments under controlled circumstances. I do not think it is asking too much. I do not think it is a revolutionary, unparliamentary step. Other parliaments do it. Why cannot we do it? Other parliaments have been doing it before we will be doing it. I am not making the case that this is going to be a large part of the agenda around Queen's Park. I do not want it to be and the committee did everything it could in its recommendations to make sure it will not be.

We were trying to establish the possibility of a review of a nominated appointment that is made by the government. We said that the government always has the right to make the appointment in the first instance, that the committee's right is to review it and that a reasonably legitimate and simple process should be put in place.

I do not believe we have suggested the perfect appointment process, To be honest, it is not my personal design for a process. What had me a little angry, and still does, is that the committee spent the better part of a year, off and on, trying to devise something that did not make everybody happy -- I do not want to misrepresent this at all -- but something on which everybody decided in the end, "We can live with it." It has a little something for the government, namely, the right to make the appointments in the first place, and for the opposition side there is basically the right to review the process.

More important, there is something in there for every citizen in Ontario, the opportunity to at least send in and say: "Here I am. I am in Sudbury. I think I could do a good job on this commission. I am interested in it and I want to be considered for it. I want the government of Ontario to know who I am. I will fill out a little card and I will find out from the Ontario Gazette in the Sudbury Public Library what appointments are coming up this year and I will say I am interested."

We would be able to track that through the system and say, "It is being considered and that appointment will be made in three months' time or not until next fall," and they would not be lost in the process.

We have changed the process at Queen's Park a bit. I do not want to be negative about the government's part. The government has done something that I suppose the previous government thought was revolutionary because it did not do it in 42 years. They made public a document that lists not all of the appointments, but what I would agree is a reasonable cutoff point, those done by order in council. I am not being overly critical; I am expressing my disappointment. I guess that is the way to phrase it.

I think the committee did a good job, not the world's greatest, but then we did not go out and spend a lot of money either. Basically, there were 11 members of the assembly arguing back and forth about what is fair for all sides. I believe we came up with that. I believe the committee's report on appointments in the public sector deserves better than the government's reply so far.

I note that the government has not rejected these other things either. That is fair. It just kind of kidnapped some and set aside others. I want to make a plea as I end my little part of this discussion. I want to note that a lot of hard work was put in on this whole thing. I believe the concepts are good, straightforward, honest ones that will serve this government and this assembly well. I believe we will need to use a system such as this for a little while before we really know how much of the time of the committees of the assembly it will take up.

I stated the bias of the committee that it would not be a lot of time, that it would probably be a rare occurrence when members of the assembly in committee would review a government appointment, but that the possibility such a review could take place was an important thing to have. That is really what did some good. I believe that was a useful exercise.

I do not have to ask today for the government to reconsider and adopt all of the committee's reports. Frankly, the government would not go far wrong if this afternoon, at the end of the debate, we were simply asked, "Shall the motion carry?" and that is the way we do it for a little while. We could try it on for size and see whether it works. I say that with all sincerity because there are no crazy ideas in this. There are no revolutionary thoughts. There is about a year's worth of argument among some pretty reasonable members of the assembly to try to find a process that is fair to all sides, one that is not too complicated, one the public can understand. It would be a public process for appointments. I believe it was pretty reasonable stuff, quite frankly, and I would have no hesitation in saying that if we do this, we will serve the people of Ontario well today while we still have the process under way.

However, I caution the government. They will make me very angry if they reject the review side totally. I do not believe that is appropriate any more. They could have convinced me a few years ago that in public sector appointments in a parliamentary system we do not need a review. Forgive me; it is not the government's fault. Brian Mulroney has sunk the ship on this one. In the Canadian political experience, if there ever was an argument to be made that in a parliamentary system one cannot have reviews of public appointments, the guy who took that ship to the bottom of the Great Lakes is Brian Mulroney.

No longer can a government get away with saying, "Here is one New Democrat we have appointed, one Tory we have appointed and 1,000 Liberals we have appointed." That is no longer seen by the public at large to be fair and reasonable. I know Brian Mulroney appointed Stephen Lewis to the United Nations and I know Stephen will do a great job as ambassador there. I think the Cape Breton speech was correct.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: Why do you not tell us about Ian Deans. Give us a little speech about Ian Deans.

16:40

Mr. Breaugh: All right. I will give a little speech about Ian Deans since the Treasurer (Mr. Nixon) invited it. I have no hesitation. I want to say this before I start; not everybody in my party feels this way about it. I worked with Ian Deans here. I make no apologies to anybody in this world for appointing Ian Deans to something that regulates labour matters. If I were going to appear before a labour tribunal, that federal one or any provincial one, and I walked into that room and Ian Deans sat down as chairman of that commission, I would feel we were going to get a fair shake, for one thing.

Second, he is going to know what is being talked about. He has paid his dues, in my view. I do not think he has to apologize to anybody. There are those in my caucus, and certainly in my party, who believe that New Democrats should wear hair shirts through their entire lives, that they should never get paid a decent wage and should never accept a public appointment. I am not one of them. The members who know me know I am not one of them, so I do not have any problem with Ian Deans, Stephen Lewis or anybody else.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: That is it.

Mr. Breaugh: It is not a long list.

New Democrats, Tories and Liberals can handle these jobs. That they were at one time active in the political process should not disqualify them. There are a lot of people, many of whom have nothing to do with politics in Ontario, do not belong to any political party, have never been a part of the political process and do not even know these agencies exist and may not know when it goes off to their local library in the Ontario Gazette.

This is why it is necessary that there be an advertising process, however limited, once a year. If the town of Kirkland Lake can do this, surely the government of Ontario can do it. I know it is not reluctant to advertise. I see the government advertising that is done in Ontario, talking furnace and all. That is not a bad thing for a government to do. We are not talking about a major ad campaign. Notice is what we are talking about here. We do it for everything else; we can do it for this.

I commend this report to all members as a reasonable way to proceed. I have expressed that I am sad the government kind of shoved it on to the back burner. I hope the government said, "We will do a bit of it now, but we will also reflect a bit that a year or so ago, when we first became the government, we were a little more gung-ho about this idea than we are now." That is fair. I do not want to belabour the point, but I think that is true.

Not to let the cat out of the bag here, I remember sitting in a certain hotel room. It was not I or any of my colleagues but a Liberal friend of mine sitting in a hotel room in downtown Toronto who I think said the words, "I guess we will have to have a different process for reviewing appointments in the public sector." A very educated person said that. I took him at his word in that hotel room that day.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: It was obviously not me.

Mr. Breaugh: The member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon) was wobbling off somewhere. I do nor know what he was doing.

A reasonable process has been suggested here. The government has accepted some of it. I am saying, let us accept the rest of it. It is not a big deal. It is not going to inhibit the government's right to appoint its friends to anything. All we are asking is that they be competent friends.

We are also asking that other people -- other members from other parties and other people from councils and schools boards, ethnic groups, agencies and volunteer groups -- have the right at least to put forward names. Then the government can go through the list and say: "This is a good person. We would like to take the process a bit further and here is our nominee." It is hardly a radical suggestion, folks. It is something that is reasonable, decent, appropriate and simple enough that it will work.

At the end of the day, I hope the government will allow a vote to be called, that the members of the assembly will say yes or no and that the committee report will be adopted. I commend it to the government. I think it is a reasonable and practical thing to do and I hope they will do it. As I sit down I want to tell them, so that it will not come as a surprise, that if they do not and if they turn it down, I am going to be so mad because they put me through a year's work in committee on this little thing, that they will not believe my anger.

Mr. Mancini: The member for Oshawa has literally worn most of us down by his lengthy comments this afternoon, by his numerous repetitions of the events that have occurred over the past year and his explanations over and over again of what we have done, how we have proceeded, what has happened and what has not happened. I want to let the members of the assembly know that I am not going to indulge in these repetitions and I am not going to indulge in repeating my comments six times to wear everybody down. If the member for Oshawa had talked for another 10 minutes, he could have gotten everything. He stopped too soon.

Mr. Breaugh: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I want another 10 minutes.

Mr. Mancini: He stopped a bit too soon.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Morin): The member must address the topic.

Mrs. Marland: You wish you were so eloquent.

Mr. Mancini: Mr. Speaker, I want to say to you and to my good friend the member for Mississauga South (Mrs. Marland) that she adds a great deal more to the assembly than her predecessor, who I cannot recall.

I will not take the time of the House to tell the members what they already know, that a committee has worked a long time preparing a report, that the report dealt with appointments in the public sector and that the report received a response from the government House leader. The response from the government House leader did not in any way reject the committee's report, but asked that some consideration be given so that the report could be reviewed, thought about and commented on later on.

I disagree entirely with the member for Oshawa when he says there has been some kind of reform process in Ottawa and we are not yet up to date with whatever reform process has taken place there. Other than not sitting in the evenings, other than a shuffle of some of the minor rules by which the members of the House of Commons govern themselves, there has been no reform whatsoever. What the member for Oshawa is referring to is the fact that the Prime Minister of Canada has said there may be three or four situations where a committee of the House of Commons may review who should be appointed.

That is a far cry from the reform we put in place here in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. Anyone who will take 10 minutes or so should have no trouble compiling a list of the number of things we have done in parliamentary reform as it pertains to the assembly and the rules by which we govern ourselves, such as the members' statements, the members' replies after speeches and a number of other things we have done that I do not want to get into.

I am glad the member for Oshawa stated that not everyone agreed with every part of the report. When he was commenting to the media in regard to the reply he received from the government House leader, I am not sure he indicated that quite as clearly as I would have wished he had. He was far more negative at that time than he was today. As a matter of fact, today he was almost congenial. Having worked with the member for Oshawa for a considerable time, I know he can be congenial most of the time. I do not blame him for making these strong public statements, but I do not think what he said and the way he said it at the time were identical to the way he said it this afternoon. I think that is important.

What do I want to say here today? I want to say that we have done a number of important things. We came to a conclusion as to the number, and this number can still be expanded, of officers of this assembly and other people who report directly to the assembly and how we should deal with their appointments. We had an A list and a B list; one dealt exclusively with people who are directly responsible to and work directly here in the House, and the other dealt with those who work outside with some crown agencies but who are directly responsible to the members in one way or another. We made up these two lists, and we talked about expanding the lists. Nothing of this sort has happened in Ottawa. They are not even dreaming of doing the things we have done.

16:50

It was mentioned earlier today that the publication which lists the appointments that are available and the people who have been appointed is now public knowledge. The member for Oshawa has a big black book. There is not a member here, other than the Tories a couple of years ago, who ever set his sights on the big black book or who ever knew when an appointment was going to be available. We used to read in the newspapers, if the newspapers carried the appointments, about who was appointed. Therefore, I say that making this information available to all members, having a copy in the library available to anybody who decides to walk in and wishes to take a look at it, is a pretty big step forward.

I also want to talk about how the process may evolve, how it may take place and what happens in other jurisdictions. I want to be very clear this afternoon and I do not think I am saying anything today that I did not say in committee when we were working on the report.

The congressional system of making appointments does not appeal to me a great deal. I have watched the system in the state of Michigan and I have watched it operate as it does in Washington. I do not believe for a minute that it adds to the process. What I have noticed, both in Michigan and in Washington, is that approximately six months prior to an election, when the two parties have pretty well prepared their platforms and know how they are going to run on certain issues, we start to see a little more activity from the senators and the congressmen about whom they are calling in for reviews, at what time of the day, so they can be on the evening news, and what type of co-ordinated action they are going to take.

Believe me, if it happens in Washington and if it happens in Michigan, if we embrace the congressional style of reviewing appointments, it is going to happen here, without a doubt. A few months prior to an election, the committee or whoever is responsible for reviewing these appointments, as was outlined in our report, is going to be hauling in everybody he can to cause one political embarrassment or another to the government. That is part of the political process in the US. Whether we want to incorporate that as part of the political process in Ontario is something we can debate a little further.

I will also point out something I think is important. We do not need either a majority government or a minority government for members to be able to call before a committee certain agencies and certain appointees of those agencies to review what they have done, to review their personal backgrounds and to find out how they have been appointed.

We have a rule in the assembly that, once 20 members sign a petition that says, for example, "We want the Ontario Human Rights Commission annual report referred to the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly," it is automatic. That report goes to that committee. The chairman of the agency has to appear, as does anybody else the committee wants to see. It has been done in the past on a number of occasions.

We have always to some extent, although perhaps not to as great an extent as we should have, in some way reviewed their political appointments, who they are and what they have tried to accomplish over a period of time. That option is still available to us. The estimates procedure is another option that is still available to the members if they wish to use it, along with the procedures of question period and other situations in the House that allow members to try to obtain information on appointees, such as who they are and what they are doing.

As of June 26, 1985, we have made a definite break with the past, a division of substantial proportions that will not allow this Legislature to return to the days prior to May 2, 1985. We have changed the rules of the House and we have changed what has gone on here. It is impossible for any government to return to those days. It is not possible.

The member for Oshawa and others say, "You appoint one or two Conservatives and one or two New Democrats and then you appoint 2,000 Liberals." The facts are not that way. He knows the number of people who have been appointed. I do not have to list them. We have talked about some of them in our committee meetings. He knows that a substantial number have been appointed from Windsor, from Essex and from every part and region of this province. People have been appointed regardless of political affiliation. That has taken place. Some of the appointments are for up to three years; some are for not quite as long.

I find that people in my own community now are asking for more balance on certain commissions such as the police commissions. We are trying to give them that balance. Before May 2, 1985, every single member of every single police commission that operated in the constituency of Essex South had a direct affiliation with the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. It was absolutely shameful to have an organization as important as a police commission, which oversees the operations of the police, one of the most important public bodies in our community, controlled unanimously by one political party. That was shameful and it can never be changed on the record books. It is there for everyone to see.

Sometimes I wonder about the impartiality of the Deputy Speaker, who interjects all the time. I do not think he should be interjecting all the time when he is Deputy Speaker. He is here to enforce the rules; shame on him.

Mr. Treleaven: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: If the member for Oxford (Mr. Treleaven) interjects, it is as the member for Oxford. I shook my head at the member. I did not interject.

Mr. Speaker: I remind all members that all interjections are out of order.

Mr. Mancini: I want to tell the member for Oxford that he is the Deputy Speaker of this House. Whether or not he says he is the member for Oxford, he above everyone else should set an example for the rest of the members. He above everyone else should show the members that interjections, such as I make myself on rare occasions, are perhaps not agreeable with the rules we govern ourselves by.

17:00

I was talking earlier about police commissions, before I was rudely interrupted by the Deputy Speaker, the member for Oxford, through his interjections and point of order, etc.

Every single appointment to the police commissions was of one political persuasion. I have now changed that. Now we have people from all political parties on the police commissions, and we have received nothing but congratulations from the municipal councils and the community as a whole. We have put an equal balance and we have shown some fairness that had never been shown before. We did not have to do it, it did not have to be done and it was not done because of political pressure. It was done because police departments are important to the community and the community must be reflected on the agencies and the boards that govern the police departments.

In conclusion, I want to say to the members of the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly who have worked along with the chairman very diligently and who, I believe, have come to some sort of a consensus, we worked hard during the past year. I do not think our work will not be considered in any way as duly effective work, things that this assembly may completely disregard. I do not think that is going to happen at all. We have worked well. We have an approach here that we have to consider with some thoughtfulness.

We should consider the points I made in committee about list A and list B, because there is room there for members of the assembly to have some significant input. If we are not concerned about the minor appointments that the member for Oshawa was talking about, if we do not have time to do it anyway and if we are not willing to subject any committee to the kind of work it would entail to review all the minor appointments, then the people we put on list A and list B become very important. If we had to review every position mentioned on lists A and B, that in itself would be a considerable amount of work.

I cannot close without saying that it was the Legislative Assembly committee, our members, working together, alone, without interference, that hired a new Clerk for the Legislative Assembly.

I want to ask my friends across the floor: Do they think that would have happened under the old government? I do not think so. I think what would have happened was that the evening before the announcement, around 6 p.m., the member for York South (Mr. Rae) and the member for London Centre (Mr. Peterson) would have received a telephone call saying, "Gentlemen, I want to inform you that as of eight o'clock tomorrow morning we are announcing whomever to be the new Clerk of the assembly." That is the way it would have happened, and they know that. We have made substantial steps forward.

I know that they feel there is more we can do and I think there is more we can do. I just say to the committee, we have worked well over the past year, let us continue to have our dialogue. Let us keep working together and we can continue to improve the system.

Mr. Sterling: The report that the Legislative Assembly committee has prepared is probably one of the finest reports that either that committee or the standing committee on procedural affairs, its predecessor, has ever prepared.

I was somewhat upset by the previous speaker. I did not interject when he was talking, but the whole tone of his speech, in which he tried to compare this government with a federal government and tried to say it is doing so much better than the previous Conservative government of which I was a member, smacks against what the Legislative Assembly committee was trying to do. I am really upset with the attitude that member put forward in the debate.

In some ways, this report tries to meet a growing cynicism in the public of Ontario and Canada about the political process and its system of political patronage, or what people know as political patronage. It is important from the standpoint of trying to define one part of the political process and acceptable political conduct in that process.

As the member for Oshawa pointed out, there are a number of recommendations contained in this report which various members of the committee did not agree with. I must admit that the recommendation in the report to have a collection of names put forward by an administrative body rather than have the thrust of the nominations or appointments come from the government was one I was not as concerned about as were other members, albeit I accepted that recommendation.

Political appointments can be classified in different categories depending on the function of the body to which the person is appointed. People being appointed to a quasi-judicial function, such as the Ontario Municipal Board, one of the environmental assessment review boards or any of the other boards that require a certain level of skill and objectivity, should be less political than the people the government appoints to positions that are of an advisory capacity or that deal with the management of a significant corporation, agency or body of the government which has to reflect the government's policy.

I do not think this government should be expected not to appoint Liberals to a number of significant positions. Although the people of Ontario did not elect the Liberals in the last election -- the Liberals still have fewer numbers than the Progressive Conservatives -- with the help of the New Democratic Party, the Liberals were put into government. That is a fact. Because they are the government, they should be able to reflect their new ideas or what ideas they do have, not only in what happens in this Legislature and in the committees of the Legislature, but also down through the rest of the system. I accept that. That is part of the political system.

The response the government has made on an interim basis is probably not to its benefit. I will tell the members why. I always felt that when one is trying to appoint a friend -- a Liberal in this government's case -- it is very difficult to justify the appointment. The public's perception is, "You are putting an old hack or a friend of the party into the position," and people are cynical about that appointment.

The process that the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly came to would assist the government in appointing some of its friends to some of the positions because the appointments would be reviewed. The government could say, "We appointed a Liberal to this position, but the Legislative Assembly committee, which is an all-party committee, has a right to review the appointment."

The way the system evolves now is that people who are associated with politics, be they Liberal, Conservative or NDP, are put in an almost negative position in terms of appointments. They are prejudiced either because they are in opposition or because they are friends of the government. The public has a very cynical point of view with regard to appointments that are made by the government. There are 2,500 appointments that the Legislative Assembly committee would like to review or have the access to review each year. If the government does not accept the Legislative Assembly committee's report and say these people are subject to that review, that cynicism will continue.

17:10

From another standpoint, I do not know what it is like in your party, Mr. Speaker, but in each political party there are a number of people -- let us call them hangers-on -- who seem to be there when you are in power but do not seem to be there sometimes when you are not in power. Those people are in the system not for what they believe in, either in terms of the policy of a particular party or as an individual, but for what they can get out of the system once the party attains power. Sometimes those people do not have what it takes to sit on a board or to be a member of a commission; they do not have the competence to take an appointment.

Irrespective of their competence, these people are sometimes very belligerent and straightforward and insist on an appointment. In terms of the defence of a government, I would have loved to have had a review process in place when, as a minister, I was dealing with the Niagara Escarpment Commission, because I had all kinds of recommendations coming from people about who should or should not be on that commission. As the minister, I would make the recommendation to cabinet, and cabinet would approve it.

It would have been much easier for me as a minister at that time to have been able to say, "Are we going to put forward so and so, who happens to have some affiliation with our party, when this individual is not competent and does not understand what his job is to be?" I would have preferred to have a review process whereby anybody in this Legislature could have had the opportunity to challenge that individual. I could then have said to the individual or to the people who were proposing that individual, "This person will be subject to a pretty rough go if there is a smell that he is not competent and able to take up this job."

The other advantage of a review process that I do not think has been pointed out by the member for Oshawa is that once you have a review process, not only is the Legislative Assembly committee, or any other committee that would be reviewing the appointment, aware of the qualifications of the individual, but there would also have to be a definition of what his job was to be once he served on a board or commission. In a number of commissions and agencies we have reviewed during the past five or six years, we have tried to create a memorandum of understanding about what a particular agency or commission was to do.

I can recall having some influence in the past over recommendations about people who might sit on a local conservation authority. I see the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Kerrio) here. I would get a call from an individual who I thought had some skill and was supported in the community to sit on a conservation board. The individual would ask me, "What am I to do once I get on the conservation authority?" Quite frankly, I did not have a description of what his job was to be.

The spinoff of having a review process would be to force the government or the agency to describe what the appointee was to do once he sat down there and did his job.

It is clear in some cases what members of a board or a commission should do. What each agency and board was to demand of the members would become more crystal clear if in fact the review process were in place. If a person were in front of the committee for an appointment it was considering, the question the committee would try to match would be, "How does this individual fit into the job he is being placed in?" The job qualifications would have to be put on the table as well as the individual's qualifications. Therefore, I see a very definite benefit in matching those two factors.

I am going to yield the floor shortly, but I would like to comment on the government's response to the recommendations. I am not satisfied, as the chairman of our committee was not satisfied, with the number of recommendations that have been accepted by the government and what it has done to date in this whole area. There is a statement in here that since some of these recommendations, particularly the ones relating to review, would entail a significant departure from parliamentary tradition, the government wishes to examine them further.

I think we are going through a period of evolutionary change within our parliamentary structures in Canada. We have had the Charter of Rights. In the Legislature, we have subjected ourselves to another overall document, which says we cannot legislate in certain ways any more in this place. We had one piece of legislation, Bill 30, that was subjected to a Supreme Court test of whether that legislation would stand after that test.

In Orders and Notices, we also have Bill 34, which is a piece of legislation that deals with freedom of information and privacy. What we are saying in that legislation is that a minister can be ordered to release information. That is a significant departure from parliamentary tradition as well. It will be the decision, I predict, of this Legislative Assembly to go to that.

This process, while it may be a diversion from the British parliamentary tradition we have known in the past, is one that is necessary now, because of the cynicism which, as I have mentioned before, exists in the public mind with regard to political appointments.

I guess the largest lesson to be learned in terms of political patronage should have been learned from the most recent federal election. I believe a great part of the result of the election, which so disastrously defeated the federal Liberals, was based on the patronage appointments by Prime Minister Trudeau as he was leaving. If those appointments had been subjected to some kind of review process, we might have had a different federal government or a more balanced House of Commons.

We must take a step towards a review process, or at least a trial of a review process; if it does not work, then it does not work. If we are spending all our time in a committee, as the member for Oshawa said, dealing with review processes, and members of the Legislature are engaged in a scathing or undue examination of a person's private life when it has nothing to do with the appointment in question, then we should withdraw the process.

What we learned during the past year, when we talked to legislatures in the United States, was that the processes there improve the appointments and take away a great deal of the cynicism in the public view that a person is there only, to put it in an Ontario context, because he or she is a Liberal, a Tory or a New Democrat.

Once the review process is put in place, if this government so chooses, I believe some of that cynicism can be lifted. That will be a benefit to a Liberal politician, to an NDP politician and to a Conservative politician, because we are all politicians. If the people do not have faith in the structures we have and in the fact that we are willing to try to overcome that cynicism, we are all in trouble as politicians.

17:20

Mr. Warner: I appreciate the opportunity to participate in this debate. I wish to say at the outset that I found the committee work a very positive experience. The committee members worked well together. In my opinion, the chairman of the committee, the member for Oshawa, did a superb job of attempting to reach consensus on items; so there were very few votes.

The structure we used is a very good one, and I commend it to other committees. The process we used was to collect as much information and to have as wide a discussion on a variety of points as possible and to try to find common ground. When that was not possible, we had a vote. As long as there was a possibility for some common ground, we continued to seek it. The result was that we produced what I think is a first-rate document. The major credit for that goes to the chairman. I, for one, appreciate his direction.

There are a couple of areas I would like to speak on for a few moments. We should remember how this item got to the committee. The New Democrats put it there. It was part of the accord; it was one of the items to which the Liberals agreed. As a basis upon which they would form the government, they agreed they would reform the patronage system. We want to make sure it is clear in everyone's mind how this reform item got to the committee. We put it there.

Why was it necessary? That should be painfully obvious to most if not all the people in this assembly and, I suspect, to most of the folks throughout Ontario. In large part, the 2,500 appointments were all part of the political structure of the Conservative Party and deeply entrenched: library boards, public health boards, police commissions, harbour commissions -- you name it; go down the list. How did people get on them? The Conservatives put them there.

We have not touched the liquor store jobs in this patronage system, but they were always part of that infamous Conservative patronage system. I remember all too painfully that when I was first elected, some of the first people to come into my riding office were people who were unemployed and seeking jobs. They wanted to know if I could get them jobs in the local liquor store. Naturally, I had to tell them: "I cannot. Go see a Conservative MPP, because that is how you get a job in a liquor store."

Mr. Callahan: I do not believe that. That never happened. That would never happen in a Tory government.

Mr. Warner: The member lives in wonderland if he thinks that never happened.

Mr. Mackenzie: He must have been a Tory before he joined the Liberals.

Mr. Warner: Yes. There is a Tory speaking for you.

The patronage system was well entrenched. The first credential was not ability to do the job; it was not even interest in doing the job. The first credential was connection with the Conservative Party. In some cases, as it turned out, that was the only qualification.

It was clear as well that the agencies, boards and commissions are not reflective of the makeup of this province. They are not reflective in terms of gender balance or of the multicultural nature of our province. We could drag one absurd example after another before us; I choose only one for illustration.

I think we all acknowledge that the Royal Ontario Museum reflects appropriately the history of our province. It prides itself on having a unique collection of native artefacts in an attempt to capture some of the history and spirit of the native people of this province and believes it is a leader in the country in this regard. We discovered it had not a single native person on the board of directors. I would have thought that would be an intolerable situation; to the former government, obviously it was not.

We knew there was a need for reform. We should make no mistake about it. As my friend from Manotick indicated, the public of this country wanted change.

Mr. Callahan: They got it.

Mr. McClellan: You are no change.

Mr. Warner: I meant a real change.

Mr. Breaugh: Why do you not go out to the airport and await your appointment?

Mr. Warner: At the end of the runway.

The Acting Speaker: Order.

Mr. Warner: There are hecklers on both sides. I am used to it. I get heckled in my own caucus.

The public in this country wants a change. I think it is fair to say they were unhappy with the avalanche of appointments that came about at the end of the Trudeau era. They are equally unhappy with the little party of appointments that was created by the Mulroney government. The Mulroney appointments were no better than the former Trudeau appointments in terms of political patronage. The people in this province and throughout the country want a change, and I applaud that.

What the committee is trying to do, and has succeeded in doing in its report, is to identify that we have the opportunity for a totally different approach. We can inform the people of this province what positions are available, what qualifications are required, what remuneration, if any, is there and what the job involves. These appointments range all the way from an appointment that involves one meeting a month to something that involves a daily job for which there is a high salary -- all the way from no remuneration to $70,000 a year; it is a huge range.

I would think that the members of this assembly, to be fair and reasonable, would want the general public to have an opportunity to participate in the things that affect the daily lives of their communities. For example, there are many people in our communities who have an intense interest in the operation of the public libraries. I am sure they would be delighted to serve on library boards. Some of those people might not belong to any political party and might not have a great interest in a political system. Should they be precluded from serving their community? I say no.

17:30

It is incumbent on us to make sure the people of Ontario know these appointments are available. Unfortunately, this is where the government's response is somewhat shortsighted. They say news releases will be sent to the community and ethnic media, which will eliminate the cost of newspaper advertising and distribution suggested by the committee. Baloney, quite frankly. As the member for Oshawa pointed out, this government advertises everything and sundry quite widely. There is nothing to prevent the government from advertising appropriately in newspapers and in local libraries.

I assume one of the things to be done is through the computer system that most of our libraries have now availed themselves of. The information should be in the computer bank available to the libraries so that ordinary citizens can go in, find out the appointments that are coming up and what is involved in those appointments and know how to apply for them. That would help to depoliticize the system of appointments.

I want to make it very clear that there are two types of appointments. One type, into which we might put libraries, conservation authorities and so on, is of a less direct political nature than certain jobs such as being chairperson of the Workers' Compensation Board, which is a paid job. In that type of job, the government obviously wants a person who is going to carry out its policies and philosophies. I have no quarrel with that; it does not matter who forms the government of the day. That government has a right to select the individuals in whom it will have confidence to carry out its policies.

I respectfully suggest that such other appointments as appointments to library boards should be depoliticized, and that average, ordinary citizens should have an equal opportunity to serve on those boards, even if they have no political connection. We have a chance to do that if the government accepts the recommendations of the committee. That is why I was very surprised and disappointed in the comments of the member for Essex South (Mr. Mancini).

After I listened to his speech, I understood why he then got up and left the chamber. To suggest for a moment this report proposes a congressional style of appointments is crazy. It does not. I do not know how one can read that into it. It is ludicrous to suggest that there is an automatic review of all minor appointments. There is nothing in the report that says that. What the report does say is that the Legislature has an opportunity to review appointments.

We are talking about approximately 2,500 appointments. I would guess, for the sake of argument, that upwards of 95 per cent, 97 per cent or 98 per cent of those appointments would probably not be questioned. Why? Because the very nature of the process, in that a review is possible, says both to the government and to the person applying that they had better be a bit cautious in applying.

In other words, if you have something in your background of which you are not terribly proud and you know a review is possible, you also know your deep, dark past will be exposed. Therefore, that suggests caution. It also suggests caution on the part of the government. It is going to have to be very vigilant about whom it appoints. I respectfully suggest that means there will be very few reviews done, and that is probably a good thing. That mechanism is available. Should there be a mistake somewhere along the line and someone slips through who really should not be there -- I cannot imagine there being a mistake; we are all perfect, right? -- then we know the review mechanism is there.

I wish to turn to the government's response to another section which I find a little puzzling. On page 4, it says a secretariat is currently in place within the cabinet office which receives and collates applications for appointments --

Mr. Callahan: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: There are now four Conservatives in the House and seven New Democrats. Surely there is something in the standing orders that requires you to declare that the third party is the official opposition and the Conservatives are the third party.

The Acting Speaker: That is not a point of order.

Mr. Warner: I accept the point of order. If it is based on quality, we are the government.

On page 4, it says the secretariat receives and collates applications for appointments and that a data bank supervised by civil servants is already established in the office to assist in the orderly processing of applications. It also says the cabinet office is continually working to improve the system.

That misses the point completely. We want to make sure that there is a data bank of information coming in, to which there will be some access by the committee that is empowered to review the appointments, and that the data bank is available to the rest of the province in terms of what jobs are available, what the qualifications are and the remuneration, if any. Apparently, the government did not quite understand our suggestion; perhaps we did not explain it well enough.

Another point that troubles me is at the bottom of page 7 in regard to the set of recommendations involving the Legislature reviewing the appointments. They say: "However, since they would entail a significant departure from parliamentary tradition, the government wishes to examine them further." I will try to control my tongue on this one, but with respect, there is no significant departure from parliamentary tradition. It has been mentioned by the government member that we already have a mechanism for reviewing appointments. It does not happen to have been used terribly often, but it is available. We are simply suggesting we streamline that.

The very last item I wish to bring to the attention of the members and especially those of the government is a Toronto Star editorial of November 17, which expresses some of the things I have already mentioned. The last paragraph states:

"But the government's written response to the recommendations has been less than we expected. It says they `would entail a significant departure from parliamentary tradition' and that it `wishes to examine them further.' William Davis couldn't have said it better."

We need to pass this report of the committee and get on with significant reforms and resist any attempts by those on the government side who wish to retreat to the William G. Davis way of running a patronage system.

17:40

Mr. Treleaven: I did not realize there would not be a member of the government party taking part.

May I say first it is too bad that the member for Essex South is not still in the House. I could refer him to Erskine May and many ancient traditions which state that when the member for Oxford is standing in his place and in his seat, he is the member for Oxford. He is not the Deputy Speaker. He has no other capacity, and he may represent his constituents of Oxford as he sees fit and as every other member of this House may do.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Treleaven: Am I off topic?

Mr. Speaker: I wonder whether this has anything to do with the report before the House.

Mr. Treleaven: It was just that the member for Essex South took umbrage at my shaking my head at him and muttering under my breath.

Mr. Breaugh: It was the rattling noise which accompanied that.

Mr. Treleaven: The member for Essex South could claim so.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The member did get up on a point of order, I believe.

Mr. Treleaven: No. This is debate.

With regard to the report at hand, the committee spent a year and a half -- the chairman said a year, but I believe it was closer to a year and a half -- and many dozens and scores of hours on this. If this report is either voted down by the government or adopted but allowed to gather dust on the shelves, it will be a long time before the committees can be stocked by members wishing to carry out such useless work. They have a lot of other work, and they do not need to spend a year and a half on a useless exercise.

When we started off on this exercise, on this report, there was cynicism in the committee. There was some cynicism and scepticism directed at Progressive Conservative members on the committee. However, that cynicism lasted for only about the first day. After that, the Liberal and NDP members on the committee realized and recognized that the Conservatives were serious. We recognized that it was a new day and that a new system was necessary. From that time on the cynicism disappeared. We worked as a team, as the NDP members stated.

It was rather discombobulating when I went to Charlottetown --

Mr. Callahan: That is unparliamentary.

Mr. Speaker: I will check on that one.

Mr. Treleaven: A member of each of the parties went to Charlottetown with the Clerk to the recent meeting of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. One of the topics was appointments in the public sector. I had the honour to be the lead speaker representing Ontario on this topic, ably assisted by the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere (Mr. Warner) and the member for Chatham-Kent (Mr. Bossy). We all agreed on the presentation. Our presentation was basically the report of the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly, and it was well received. The ideas were well received. We received many compliments from many of the other provinces. It was therefore a shock when we returned. We climbed off the plane on a Wednesday night at six o'clock, came down to Queen's Park to our offices to work and in the mail waiting for us was the government's rejection of the report.

In deference to the member for Essex South, I am on topic. He was stating that the present government is adding balance -- and my hand is over my heart when I say this -- to local committees. In my riding, since June 26, 1985, no one but a Liberal has been appointed in the county of Oxford to anything. There have been past campaign managers, the past president of the Oxford Liberal Association, past city chairmen -- even two jobs to one.

Mr. Warner: It hurts.

Mr. Treleaven: No. It does not hurt, but it is just a funny balancing that seems to be taking place.

Perhaps now I might mention this reply of the government to our report. The report is in three parts, with some relative motherhoods at the beginning, in the first four or five sections, some relative motherhoods at the end, in the last four or five sections, and the guts of the whole report in the middle, recommendations 8 through 15. That was the heart of the report. Generally speaking, we had fairly quick agreement in the committee on the ones at the beginning and the ones at the end. The government deigned to say, "These may have something to them, and yes, we will agree to a motherhood one here and a motherhood one there," but on recommendations 8 through 15, which took the tough slugging in the committee, the government said: "No, thank you. We like it the way it is. We like it the way it has been for years."

Mr. Callahan: You are admitting it.

Mr. Treleaven: Although interjections are out of order, I do not know what the member for Brampton (Mr. Callahan) means I am admitting.

A new day dawned on June 26. The committee recognized that and therefore, with our hands over our hearts, we all dealt with this process. The government said: "No, it is not a new day. Thank you, no. We like the trough the way it was." It has proceeded to fill it with Liberal seats. Nothing has changed.

In summary, I have the same editorial my friend the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere had. Nothing has changed. I do not believe the government has the will to change the system even if this report is carried and the recommendations are thereby given some legitimacy. I predict it will gather dust on the government shelves, and we will not see any change at all in the system. Many of us who have spent one year and a half on this will be very frustrated.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I have listened to the comments of the members with great attention and believe they have been uniformly worth while. Actually, I felt quite badly when I realized the disappointment of the members at the government's response, which was couched in the nicest possible phraseology. As a matter of fact, we even ended up saying, "The government thanks the committee for its work and for its helpful and constructive recommendations."

While members may feel that was a condescending dismissal, I must draw to their attention that we really were saying we need to give the recommendations further consideration. If members believe that is a dismissal of the work the committee did and a statement by the government that we are not considering the recommendations in a serious way, they are wrong.

I will be perfectly frank. We were aware of the work. The report was available in good time. One of the rules that came from the same committee was that the government was to respond to the House within a certain number of days. Those days elapsed before the kind of positive decision the members opposite had been expecting could be reached.

Perhaps I should tell members what government is like. It is a very busy place. There were a number of occasions when it might have been possible for a group of government members whom I meet with regularly to consider this. When it was raised, there were always many other pressing matters -- lunch; no, other pressing matters. I am being truthful as I always am in this connection.

It is an important report, and I seriously congratulate the members of the committee. I myself was a bit hurt when I saw some cockamamy draft motion in the name of the member for Scarborough-Ellesmere floating around, calling for members of the government to be called to the bar, imprisoned in the tower and their fingers cut off. I thought, "He is trying to send me a message such as `Merry Christmas' or something like that."

However, I want to say in a more direct way that the government is proud of its record of appointments. If one were to ask any disinterested but knowledgeable person in this jurisdiction, there would be no complaints about our appointments.

17:50

Mr. Treleaven: Boo.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: One might find some Tory in the back streets of Woodstock who would say, "You are appointing nothing but Liberals," but anybody who knows anything about anything knows that is not correct. It is hard to find a Tory in Oxford, and the member knows that. That is why he is getting so aggressive in his actions around here.

The decision was made early in the life of the new government that we would table the information on all order in council appointments. It is two huge volumes, which we update every six months with each of the appointments: who holds the job, what the teen is and how much money he or she is getting. There are people who are tearing out those pages from the library, I presume, and waiting for the vacancies to come along. There are lots of jobs there. The members have all very wisely pointed out that most of them are really service jobs, where people in the community work for practically no money at all, sometimes with only expenses paid and often not even that. They carry substantial responsibilities and are sometimes subject to criticism, fair or otherwise.

At the other end of the scale, there are a substantial number of very important jobs, such as the chairmanship of Ontario Hydro, although no one is indicating there is a vacancy there or anything like that. We could list them. We know what they are. Having heard this debate at length, I am a little weary, and I am not up to attempting to list more than one. The Premier has gone on record as saying he will actively seek, by the proper tabling of a resolution, the advice of the proper committee of the Legislature for appointments of that senior type. The chairman of the Workers' Compensation Board is another that comes to mind immediately.

Somewhere between the hundreds of order in council jobs at one end, which have already been discussed, and the senior ones, there is a grey spectrum -- I will not say of importance, because the jobs are all important, but of graduation.

A cursory review of the recommendations led some people in government to feel that the procedure would be more complex than we could cope with and that there would be a possible two-month delay following any order in council appointment, although I saw that the committee did its best to remove any possibility of a committee of the Legislature needlessly delaying these matters. As I read it, it looked to me as if the committee members had tried their best to move around any legitimate objections that might be brought forward.

On the other hand, it is complex. The government feels that its appointment practice has been fair and open and that the public knows about all the jobs, what the salaries are and when the jobs will become vacant. We feel we are moving in the right direction.

One of the things that cut me a little was the view expressed by the member for Oshawa that the response was self-congratulatory. Frankly, I feel we have done a good job and we have made a concerted, measurable effort to make the appointments correspond, in their ethnic spectrum, to the community more closely than they have in the past. We have tried to make the appointments of men and women roughly equal, if possible.

I have even heard some people who are making recommendations express their concern that in an effort to do this, we obviate the appointment of other people who are of the wrong extraction or the wrong sex or who are in the wrong place at the wrong time. My own experience is that having an identifiable Liberal tag is anything but a benefit for people seeking office by appointment on the basis of an order in council.

Mr. Callahan: Quality.

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I will respond to the interjection. It is quality; it is an individual who can be defended. The point is, do not be afraid to defend him before the appropriate committee.

We are close to six o'clock. There is no point in my attempting to talk the motion out. It is not my intention to do that. I believe the report should be accepted by the House. It recommends certain things to the government that we have made clear we are not prepared to do at this time, but I assure the House that the government is looking on the recommendations positively. If we can get to a time when we can give it the urgent consideration it needs -- and we will -- then we will.

I want to point out that acceptance of the report does not give the members of the Legislature any substantial new prerogatives. All the members know that by their motion they can review anything in the committees they choose. That is true in a minority situation. It is true in a majority situation. The members act as they choose, and the majority rules. I understand, however, the need for acceptance of a procedure that will be readily understood not only by the members of the House but also by the residents and taxpayers of Ontario.

I want to conclude my remarks by once again thanking the members of the committee and asking them to read our response, inadequate though they may think it is, in the terms that it was presented. We feel we have not had time to come to a definitive conclusion, but we hope to do so in the foreseeable future.

Mr. Callahan: I rise in the few minutes remaining to indicate that I am very pleased with the approach my government has taken. I notice no one has ever put in Orders and Notices the people whom I have had the opportunity and privilege to recommend for various positions. I have always taken the same position as my Premier and my government.

My riding is not unique, but it is a riding where, prior to a couple of years ago, many of the appointments were made on the basis of which party card one had, who one was and which party one belonged to. I am quite happy and relaxed to find now that when someone asks for consideration of an appointment, I no longer have to say, "Which party do you belong to?" I can say: "What are your qualifications? Send me a resumé and I will be happy to recommend you for that appointment."

All I have to say in closing is that today in Ontario a new wind is blowing through this province. The beneficiaries of that are the people of Ontario.

Motion agreed to.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Hon. Mr. Nixon: I would like to indicate the business for the coming week.

On Monday, November 24, we will consider Bill 7 in committee of the whole House, with any votes deferred to 5:45 p.m.

On Tuesday, November 25, we will continue with Bill 7, if required, with any votes again stacked until 5:45 p.m.

Additional business for Tuesday, if time permits, and Wednesday, November 26, will be from the following list of bills: Bill 14, oleomargarine; Bill 127, surveyors; Bill 139, model law; Bill 112, pollution penalties; Bill 108, insurance; Bill 9, Ministry of Skills Development.

On Thursday, November 27, we will consider the following committee reports on conflict of interest matters: orders 50, 52 and 53, with any votes stacked to 5:45 p.m.

On Thursday morning, we will deal with private members' public business standing in the names of the member for Hamilton East (Mr. Mackenzie) and the member for Waterloo North (Mr. Epp).

The House adjourned at 6 p.m.

20 novembre 1986