Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House met at 2 o’clock, p.m.

Prayers.

Mr. D. A. Evans (Simcoe Centre): Mr. Speaker, to you, and through you to the members of the Legislature, I’d like to introduce, in the west gallery, 25 first-year law students from Georgian College of Applied Arts and Technology along with Mr. Wakman.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): Mr. Speaker, I would like to announce to the assembly that we have two groups of students from the riding of Thunder Bay. The first one is 57 students from Marathon Public School under the sponsorship of Mr. William Springer, and along with them we have 17 students from Nakina Public School under the direction of Mrs. Swanson. I hope that the members of the Legislature will join me in welcoming them here this afternoon.

Mr. Speaker: Statements by the ministry.

REFUSE-FIRED STEAM PLANT PROPOSED FOR TORONTO

Hon W. Newman (Minister of the Environment): Mr. Speaker, I’d like to make a statement on the refuse-fired steam plant proposed for Toronto.

Earlier today, Toronto Mayor David Crombie announced a proposed phase-out of Toronto Hydro-Electric’s Pearl St. steam generating plant, replacing it with one fuelled primarily by garbage.

This new plant is part of a plan connecting five existing heating systems in the central area of the city. This plant would burn 1,200 tons of garbage each day and supply a steady source of steam for heating in the area. Peak demands would be handled by existing heating systems: the Toronto Hydro-Electric system of Terauley St., the Toronto Hospitals plant, the University of Toronto system, plus the Queen’s Park facility operated by the Ministry of Government Services.

The province played a role in the preparation of this plan. The method used to calculate resulting changes in air pollution was developed by the Ministry of the Environment. An interministry committee is being established to evaluate these proposals. The committee will be composed of the Ministries of the Environment, Energy, Government Services, Consumer and Commercial Relations, Housing, Health, and Treasury, Economics and Intergovernmental Affairs, plus representatives from Ontario Hydro.

Under the chairmanship of Wesley Williamson of the Ministry of the Environment, the committee will co-ordinate the preparation of a provincial response to this proposal and eventual reply to the city. The city’s report suggests that six months be set aside for submission of briefs from all interested parties, since the report, based on five volumes of technical data, would entail extensive policy decisions and changes in existing legislation.

I would like to emphasize that this is a detailed analysis of the situation and I would like to commend the city of Toronto for its initiative in bringing forward this exciting approach. The Ministry of the Environment and the government of Ontario as a whole have tried to encourage this type of solution to waste management problems. It is heartening to note the development of proposals such as this by the city of Toronto that help accomplish resource recovery and refuse.

Mr. Speaker: Oral questions, the hon. Leader of the Opposition.

REFUSE-FIRED STEAM PLANT PROPOSED FOR TORONTO

Mr. R. F. Nixon (Leader of the Opposition): Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of the Environment if this announcement, together with the consideration that he must have been giving other factors associated with the circumstances, would now lead him to make an announcement here in the House that he is not going to approve the application from CPR to dump Toronto garbage in Hope township?

Hon. W. Newman: As I said before, Mr. Speaker, we are still waiting for a lot of technical data to come in on that site at this time. We are still studying it.

Mr. E. R. Good (Waterloo North): Supplementary: Was not 1976 the time schedule for this steam plant operation on a crash course erection programme; or what is the proposed time schedule? Will the six months study delay the construction of it until people forget about it?

Hon. W. Newman: Mr. Speaker, this is a new report which has just been handed to the city of Toronto. They have just released it this morning. We have set up an interministerial committee to study it to make recommendations back to the city.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Scar- borough West.

Mr. S. Lewis (Scarborough West): I am sorry, I may have missed it in his ministerial statement. Did the minister mention the quantity of garbage which would be used for the plant?

Mr. Good: Under 75 per cent.

Hon. W. Newman: Yes, Mr. Speaker, about 1,200 tons a day.

Mr. Lewis: Twelve hundred tons a day. What happens to the other 7,500 tons?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Leader of the Opposition.

WORLD FOOTBALL LEAGUE

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I would like to ask the Premier, who is a noted and an accepted expert in sports, particularly football, if the signing of those three well-known Dolphins by the Northmen is going to prompt him to change his public stand on this matter? Does the Premier feel that he has a responsibility as the Premier to indicate a further review of this situation, or is he going to come down, as he has said previously, on the nationalism side?

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. J. R. Rhodes (Minister of Transportation and Communications): Ask Lalonde.

Hon. W. G. Davis (Premier): Mr. Speaker, I sensed that when the hon. member for Sarnia (Mr. Bullbrook) asked me about this the other day he was really speaking in opposition to what the federal government was doing. At least that was the impression that I got from his question. My public posture, I think, has been, however, fairly clearly understood, and that is that I am a great supporter and have been for many years of the Canadian Football League. I think I have also said that, if the federal minister wishes to become involved in this matter and to restrict the franchise operation of the Northmen here in Metropolitan Toronto, that is a decision that he apparently has made and one for which he will have to assume the responsibility. It is not my intent to become involved as head of this government in that particular debate.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Lewis: Does the Premier think John Bassett Jr. will find something else to play with?

MINERAL EXPLORATION CROWN CORPORATION

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I would also like to ask the Premier if he can add anything further to the statement made by the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Bernier) when he announced over the weekend there was going to be a policy announced in the budget on April 9 which would establish a mineral exploration Crown corporation. Is there any further detail which could be provided in that regard and would it, in fact, mean that some of the tax reductions, which our natural-resource industries have been enjoying on the basis they would be used to increase their own resource explorations, would no longer be necessary?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, really there is only one gentleman who is privileged to know what is going to be in the budget statement next week. In that the Treasurer (Mr. White) is not here this afternoon but will be tomorrow, perhaps the Leader of the Opposition might put that question to him. I could only say this to him: I doubt that the Treasurer will answer the question in advance of the budget.

I can only say that the government has been considering various ways and means to develop further the northern part of the Province of Ontario, particularly the mining industry. Whether the Minister of Natural Resources actually said that it would, in fact, be in the budget, I haven’t discussed with him. I can only say that the Treasurer really is the only one who at this moment knows what will be in there for next week.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: A supplementary: In that the report said the Minister of Natural Resources said that the Crown corporation was approved and will be announced in the budget, does the Premier not feel it is incumbent upon him to bring to his colleague’s attention the fact that the matters in the budget are, in fact, privileged until such time as the Treasurer sees fit to release them?

Mr. Lewis: No, he is just flying a kite.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I don’t think, Mr. Speaker, that this is a matter which is necessarily privileged. I think, quite frankly there is some merit in consideration of this proposal.

Mr. E. W. Martel (Sudbury East): We have been pushing it for years.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I would be very surprised if the Minister of Natural Resources weren’t somewhat enthused. I think it is premature though, to say it has been approved and will necessarily find itself in the budget next week although that possibility, I am sure, does exist.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: A supplementary: The minister was either misquoted or was incorrect in making the statement?

Hon. Mr. Davis: It might have been either.

COMMUNITY COLLEGE COURSES

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Sir, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Colleges and Universities. Is he aware that at Loyalist College in Belleville the scarce assignments for certain special courses are being approved by a lottery rather than approval being given to those student applicants with the best qualifications? Has he been informed of those circumstances and is he concerned about them in any way?

Hon. J. A. C. Auld (Minister of Colleges and Universities): No, I haven’t, Mr. Speaker. It sounds like an unusual method to me.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I thought so myself. A supplementary with further details; it has to do with the selection of nursing students and if the minister could inquire into that it would be of great usefulness as far as we are concerned.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Leader of the Opposition.

KINGSTON TOWNSHIP SERVICES

Mr. R. F. Nixon: A further question of the Premier having to do with the Kingston township situation: How can he square his statement on Thursday last, that he was unaware of the association of the present Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Bennett) with the dissident group and the leader of the dissident group in the Kingston area, with the minister’s statement on Friday that he had informed cabinet of his relationship and had not participated in the discussion in cabinet while it was before that body?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, the answer to that question is very simple. I wasn’t at cabinet when that was determined.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Okay. That’s all.

Hon. Mr. Davis: And I checked.

Mr. Lewis: Touché.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Scar- borough West.

OIL PRICES

Mr. Lewis: A question, if I may, of the Premier, Mr. Speaker: How does the Premier explain the discrepancy in the intended fuel and gasoline price increases to the consumers of Ontario, between the 7.14 cents per gallon which the increase he agreed upon actually represents, and the 10 cents per gallon figure which the oil companies are now talking about?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I can’t reconcile them at all nor do I intend to. I can only say to the House that the estimates prepared by the Ministry of Energy related to the increase incurred at the wellhead price and our estimates were three cents per dollar -- I think it was -- which would mean 7 1/2 cents going to $6.50. I would assume -- and I can only assume -- the rationalization being put forward by the oil companies, that this might mean something more than 6 1/2 or seven cents, would relate to any other costs they were bearing related to the production or the manufacture of the fuel. I can only assume that; we have no way of knowing. I want to make it clear that from our standpoint the wellhead price increase should be reflected, we say, by approximately 6 1/2 to seven cents.

Mr. Lewis: Well, fine. That’s interesting. Then since Energy, Mines and Resources in Ottawa has indicated that the oil companies would be entitled to perhaps an additional one-half cent per gallon to cover the non-crude related price increase, why are the oil companies talking of a jump to 10 cents, which is up to 2 1/2 cents more per gallon than they are entitled to? And why has the government of Ontario not yet called the oil companies to an accounting for what is clearly going to be an additional ripoff of the Ontario consumer? That’s explicit in their figures.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, we have debated this here before, and I know the next supplementary question will be, why doesn’t this government employ the device of price controls on the oil companies --

Mr. Lewis: No. Certainly rollbacks on the oil companies.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I can only say this to the hon. member, that if the Ottawa figures now represent another half cent --

Mr. Lewis: Right!

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- for the non-crude increased cost as part of the oil companies’ additional cost, that’s fine, that’s their determination. Our determination was seven cents, and it still remains that. I can only assume, and I am only assuming this, that if there is something more, by one or two cents, it relates to the oil companies’ own increase in cost for other reasons --

Mr. Lewis: But I’ve allowed for the half cent.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- besides the question of the increase in crude.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Now, Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member is saying the oil companies are overcharging or adding two cents per gallon --

Mr. Lewis: Yes, I am. I am.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- that’s fine. I am sure that he will be prepared to document this, and I’ll be very interested to see that.

Mr. Lewis: Has the Premier looked at their profit statements?

Hon. Mr. Davis: We don’t have any of this documentation as of this moment.

Mr. D. C. MacDonald (York South): Supplementary question, Mr. Speaker -- double- barrelled, really: The Premier will recall that his parliamentary assistant last June recommended that the Energy secretariat should examine the question of whether or not the powers of the Ontario Energy Board should be extended to involve price review. Presumably that is now being studied in the ministry. Has the Premier or the government received any recommendation as to an extension of those powers? And if not, why won’t Ontario now -- like, for example, Nova Scotia -- give price review powers to a provincial body, to get into precisely this kind of clarification of alleged ripoff in prices?

Mr. T. P. Reid (Rainy River): Especially since they are doing it for Hydro.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I believe the minister made some observation about this, and this was a matter of internal consideration by the ministry. I don’t believe any policy determination has been made. If there is, of course, it will be announced here to the House. But at this moment there hasn’t been that decision.

Mr. Reid: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker, if I may: Does the Premier not feel it would be consistent, in view of what the government has done and is doing with the price review and justification of Hydro rates --

Mr. MacDonald: And review of natural gas prices for a long time.

Mr. Reid: -- and natural gas, that it’s surely only an extension of a rational policy to extend it to the review of gas and oil rates?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, this is a very complex subject, and while on the surface it might appear to some that it was, shall we say, a logical extension, or the same --

Mr. Reid: How can the Premier stand there and presume things?

Mr. Speaker: Order. Order.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Does the member want an answer, or does he not?

Mr. Reid: I want an answer, but I won’t get one from the Premier.

Hon. Mr. Davis: All right then. If he’ll sit back patiently, I will try to give the hon. member an answer. I think there is some degree of distinction. We are dealing with Ontario Hydro, with a public utility in the total sense of the word, whose activities are confined to the Province of Ontario --

Mr. MacDonald: What about natural gas?

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- whose task is to produce hydro at cost. We’re dealing, with respect to gas, with public utilities that are licensed here by the Province of Ontario where we do regulate rates. With the “gas” that is used in automobiles, etc., we’re dealing with oil companies which are part of the private sector, which have not traditionally had their increases reviewed, and which are operating on a national level. It’s not confined just to the Province of Ontario.

Mr. Lewis: It is time to change tradition.

Hon. Mr. Davis: And I think that while there may be some merit -- and obviously the ministry feels this, because it is looking at it -- to say that they’re on all fours with Ontario Hydro is not totally logical.

Mr. Reid: May I --

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Thunder Bay.

Mr. Stokes: Can the Premier give an assurance that any increase as a result of the recent announcement in Ottawa will be no greater in northern Ontario than it is elsewhere in the province?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I would certainly like to give the hon. member that assurance. And, certainly from our standpoint, to the extent that all that was agreed upon in Ottawa was the increase in the cost of crude at the wellhead, I can see that decision not affecting the price on any, shall we say, percentage basis in northern or southern Ontario. I can’t see where the price of wellhead crude affects that differential.

Mr. Lewis: Supplementary, if I may, Mr. Speaker --

Mr. Speaker: I think that we should alternate the supplementaries.

Mr. Reid: Is the Premier saying in effect, in answer to my original question, that he feels that Ontario Hydro, which is a public corporation, should have its rates reviewed when supposedly it is operating purely in the public interest, and the corporations dealing with oil and gas which are not operating in the public interest but in the private sector and to maximize their profits, should not have their rates and prices reviewed? And does he not feel that it’s really time, in this period of inflation, that the Ontario government got off its seat and did something about these matters -- break with the tradition?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, we are making a far greater effort to get off our seats with respect to inflation than the members opposite and their federal colleagues.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Reid: What has this government done?

Hon. Mr. Davis: I don’t want to get into a debate here on inflation, but I think there is no question about it.

Mr. E. J. Bounsall (Windsor West): Yet it’s a much tougher job.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): This government couldn’t deal with it.

Hon. Mr. Davis: If those people across the House really want to come to grips with inflation why don’t they talk to their friends and relatives in the federal government and show the world they can do something about it?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: As a last resort.

Mr. Lewis: That’s a good phrase -- I like that. It’s all-encompassing.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Now, what did the member really ask me?

The answer, I think, is very simple: No, I did not say that. All I said was the base for such a consideration or review as it relates to Hydro would in logic be different from gas.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Speaker, one last supplementary: Given the year’s profit increases of Shell Canada of 42 per cent, Texaco 30 per cent, Imperial Oil 45 per cent, BP 45 per cent, Gulf 39 per cent, Home Oil 115 per cent -- given those increases in profit structure and the announced intention of the oil companies to raise the prices by 10 cents in the middle of May --

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: He shouldn’t support them. Right on.

Hon. S. B. Handleman (Minister of Housing): He shouldn’t support it.

Mr. Lewis: -- why is the Premier not prepared to ask them to justify those increases, in the name of the Ontario --

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Lewis: Why is the Premier not prepared to ask them to justify those increases in the name of the Ontario consumer, since there is a discrepancy on the basis of the government’s own figures?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: The member for High Park (Mr. Shulman) hangs his head in shame.

Mr. J. A. Renwick (Riverdale): The Premier knows the member has got him.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Order.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Speaker, that the NDP strikes such fear in the hearts of the government I can understand.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Lewis: But I offered to calm them. The election is 18 months off, let them be calm.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Lewis: Can the Premier answer why he will not call them to justify their increases?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Of course, Mr. Speaker, firstly I didn’t say that we wouldn’t. Secondly, I would only make this observation -- and I would hope the member would be sufficiently knowledgeable to recognize that he’s dealing with national and international oil companies, but they’re dealing on a national basis. It’s fine to call them for review here in the Province of Ontario --

Mr. Renwick: But they’re selling their gas in Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Certainly they’re selling here --

Mr. Lewis: They’re selling it here in Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- but they’re selling in our sister provinces and I say with respect --

Mr. Lewis: The Premier is supporting them.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Order.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- such a review has to be done on a national basis.

Mr. Renwick: The Premier is free to do it.

Mr. Lewis: He lets them walk all over him.

Mr. Stokes: The Premier intervenes when Bell Canada makes application for a rate hike.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Order, please. Order. I’m sure that further questions will only constitute a debate on this matter. I think we’ve had quite sufficient.

The hon. member for Scarborough West.

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT OF PUBLIC WORKS

Mr. Lewis: I have a question that comes to mind as a result of the Premier’s declaration of support for Hydro. If he feels that Hydro is such a public --

Mr. F. Laughren (Nickel Belt): He doesn’t.

Mr. Lewis: -- corporation, publicly accountable, subject to review, then why will he not have tabled the engineering feasibility study done to justify the Arnprior dam? That’s also part of Hydro.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Energy (Mr. McKeough) has already dealt with this matter on a previous day.

Mr. Laughren: No, he hasn’t.

Mr. Lewis: By way of a supplementary: The Minister of Energy has thumbed his nose at the House and said that Hydro is not accountable. I’m asking the Premier, in view of his declaration about Hydro as a public corporation, will he have the report of the engineering feasibility study on the Arnprior dam tabled in the Legislature?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, that question should very properly be directed to the Minister of Energy who answered this question for the hon. member for Ottawa -- whatever it is and the islands -- some few days ago.

Mr. Lewis: What’s the point? There’s no point to asking, he has indicated the position he takes.

Mr. Renwick: Hydro is just as arrogant as the Minister of Energy.

MAPLE MOUNTAIN DEVELOPMENT

Mr. Lewis: A question, if I may Mr. Speaker, of the Minister of the Environment: Has the Minister of the Environment looked over his internal memoranda and correspondence within his ministry relating to the Maple Mountain project; and if he has, can he indicate why a memorandum dated Oct. 12, 1973, obviously worked on the premise that protection in the field of the environment would have to proceed during the construction phase of Maple Mountain; that is worked on the premise that Maple Mountain would proceed? Has the minister been informed already that it will proceed; and if so what does he know of it?

Hon. W. Newman: Mr. Speaker, I have not been informed that it will proceed. The member talks about a memo of Oct. 12; the memo I have is dated Oct. 16. I hope we are talking about the same memo.

Mr. Lewis: I guess not.

Mr. Breithaupt: He got an earlier draft.

Hon. W. Newman: I think we are; but if the member would like to check it out, check the memo he has in mind.

Mr. Lewis: I have the date in front of me for what it is worth.

Hon. W. Newman: The memo I have is of a different date.

Mr. Lewis: Okay, all right.

Mr. Renwick: How about the minister tabling his?

Hon. W. Newman: This is strictly an internal memo which recommends things that should be done. Members will recall we put out a green paper last year in which we indicated we will be bringing forward legislation to deal with matters such as this if they do proceed. This is just an internal memo with a lot of recommendations of things that should be done.

Mr. Lewis: Okay.

Mr. Renwick: That is a non-answer.

Hon. W. Newman: It doesn’t indicate anything at all. I am surprised, really, the hon. member opposite would make statements like he made in the paper, in the Globe and Mail or whatever paper it was in. If he has the same memo that I have I am surprised he would make statements like that.

Mr. Lewis: Fine. We’ll sit and wait for the ever-present announcement on Maple Mountain.

Mr. Breithaupt: He predicted the election as well.

Hon. Mr. Davis: He made statements referring to it as being dishonest. It is not dishonest.

Mr. Lewis: May I ask the Minister of Natural Resources this question: In the memo within the Ministry of the Environment it says that Lady Evelyn Lake is “a relatively large and scenic lake presently used for wilderness canoeing, hiking and hunting.” It then says: “At the same time, Lady Evelyn is considered to be the major fishing resource for the Maple Mountain development.” Nothing equivocal about that. “A marina with docking and fuelling facilities for power boats and for float planes is proposed. The potential of petrochemical and noise pollution is a concern” -- and so on.

Can I ask the minister what has his ministry to say about this intrusion on Lady Evelyn, given the policies the ministry is adopting in Algonquin Park for the preservation of lakes, precisely opposed to this?

Mr. E. M. Havrot (Timiskaming) : The member better get his facts straight. Get the facts.

An hon. member: The minister better protect the lady.

Hon. L. Bernier (Minister of Natural Re- sources): Mr. Speaker, I would tell the hon. member that we are asked to comment on a number of proposals that come forward and this is just a comment that we give as we do in a normal case.

TRANSLATION SERVICE PRICES

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Speaker, one last question, then, of the Minister of Government Services: Does the minister realize that he has sent out a price list, effective April 1, 1974, for translation services from his ministry which will provide a cost per word, in the translation of English to French, of nine cents a word for general translation, 12 cents a word for specialized translation, 15 cents a word for rush translation? Is this the government’s contribution to policies of bilingualism and biculturalism in Ontario? Is this part of his commitment?

Mr. Havrot: In Ottawa it is $1 a word.

Hon. J. W. Snow (Minister of Government Services): Mr. Speaker, I am not familiar with the exact per-word rates that are being quoted by the hon. member, but I would just say this is carrying out the policy of the government and the policy of my ministry of providing these services on a charge-back basis, or a zero budget basis, for that service.

Mr. MacDonald: What does all that mean, zero budgeting?

Mr. Lewis: What does that mean?

Hon. Mr. Snow: If we do translation work for other ministries of the government, or other bodies, we charge at a rate that will cover the cost of operating that branch of my ministry.

Mr. Laughren: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: Would the minister not agree that charging for translation service is in effect a deterrent, surely, to both ministries and members of this Legislature using this service?

Hon. A. Grossman (Provincial Secretary for Resources Development): It’s bookkeeping within the ministry.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Lewis: It is bookkeeping?

Hon. Mr. Snow: No, Mr. Speaker, I wouldn’t agree with that at all. It is part of the policy of carrying out that type of service on a charge-back basis and having each ministry responsible for the cost involved for their translation.

Mr. Lewis: What about members?

Mr. Stokes: Supplementary.

Mr. Havrot: Can’t members opposite pay for something?

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, I received that notice from the Ministry of Government Services this morning. Is the minister aware that as the result of a letter I sent to the translation branch --

Mr. Lewis: To have translated.

Mr. Stokes: -- to have translated from French into English -- a letter that I received from a constituent -- I got back a reply saying they are going to charge me a minimum of nine cents per word for that translation? Am I going to pay that out of my own allowance in order to be able to communicate with one of my constituents?

Mr. Havrot: It’s cheap.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Laughren: The pressures are coming from the back row.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Lewis: The minister is submitting to the pressures from his back row; that’s why he is doing it.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Breithaupt: We can take care of it for them, if they like.

Hon. Mr. Snow: Mr. Speaker, this again, as I have stated, is the policy of the charge back within the ministry.

Mr. Lewis: Zero budget charge-back.

Hon. Mr. Snow: A zero budget charge-back for services within my ministry. These policies are set down by Management Board. We administer those policies. There are some instances of services that are provided to the member where there’s no charge for the service.

Mr. Lewis: That is quite a phrase.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Let the member’s party get a Frenchman elected. The Liberals have Roy.

Hon. W. A. Stewart (Minister of Agriculture and Food): He is not even here.

Hon. Mr. Snow: It has not been brought to my attention that this was going out to members.

Mr. Lewis: But the minister is setting a charge now.

Hon. Mr. Snow: It certainly should have gone out to all government boards, commissions and ministries.

Mr. Lewis: What about members?

Hon. Mr. Snow: I will inquire into how it came about that this went to members.

Mr. Lewis: Why anybody? Why put a charge on?

Hon. W. Newman: Doesn’t the member’s party have someone who can translate French into English?

Mr. Speaker: Order. A supplementary over there?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Does the hon. member for Scarborough West have further questions?

Mr. Lewis: No.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Minister of Housing has the answer to a question asked previously.

FIRE HAZARDS IN SENIOR CITIZEN HIGHRISE BUILDINGS

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have the answer to a question asked by the hon. member for Sudbury (Mr. Germa) concerning the installation of communication systems in senior citizen buildings. Systems of this nature are not required under the National Building Code. However, the National Research Council is considering the possibility and is now looking into the possibility of installing them.

In OHC senior citizen buildings there is a communication system between the lobby, the apartments and the resident caretaker’s unit. However, if we installed a public address system which was accessible, there could be some problem because there could be misuse and disruption and confusion. If it is not accessible, of course, it couldn’t be used under certain circumstances.

Our senior citizen housing is designed for persons who are able to care for themselves. However, we always try to consider the special needs of this segment of the population, and the safety of the tenants is of the utmost importance. I have instructed the board of directors of OHC to review the matter and to advise me as quickly as possible and also to look into the practice of other jurisdictions where these systems are mandatory, such as in the publicly supported senior citizen housing in the United States.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Minister of Colleges and Universities.

COMMUNITY COLLEGE COURSES

Hon. Mr. Auld: Mr. Speaker, subsequent to the question from the Leader of the Opposition --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Great to have him back!

Hon. Mr. Auld: -- I was going through my mail and I came across the copy of the press clipping of the Globe of March 28 and the memorandum of Feb. 1, 1974, of the ministry to all colleges of applied arts and technology requiring admission requirements.

Apparently -- and I’ll get further detail on this -- since 1966 the legislation governing requirements for nursing has specified only grade 12 plus two credits in science. Previously some hospitals apparently had a grade 13 requirement and some went with grade 12, which is that which the profession recommends and which the colleges have now adopted.

Selection is the responsibility of the colleges, and I gather that there has been a large number of applications at Belleville. I think the lottery that the hon. Leader of the Opposition referred to has to do with what the press referred to as a computer lottery. In the ministry’s memorandum, we set out assessment of the suitability, 19 years of age, likelihood of successful completion, and background, as well as the academic record. What I assume from this memorandum and the material in the press story is that there was a large number of applications, that they are being put through a computer to pick out all those who would qualify under the directive, then there would be the personal assessments and so on.

I think that what is referred to as a lottery is really a preliminary screening, and the basis of part of the problem is that the teachers of a number of people with grade 13 thought those students should have preference over those with grade 12, and the college and the ministry have said that if they have grade 12 and two science credits, which are the requirements that students would know about, then they should have the same opportunity as students with grade 13.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: It’s great to have him back.

Mr. Breithaupt: Supplementary question, Mr. Speaker: Is the minister advising us that his ministry is unable to attend to preliminary screening with a personal interest, and are these things to be done by computer in future?

Hon. Mr. Auld: Well, I am delighted to respond to that. It seems to me that computer selection of specific written requirements is a faster way of doing it than having a person go through a pile of papers. I would say that the personal assessment is still important, though, but the ministry, as I say, is not responsible for the selection other than the broad guidelines.

Mr. Speaker: I think the hon. member for St. George was up first.

WARRANTY ON NEW HOMES

Mrs. M. Campbell (St. George): Mr. Speaker, my question is of the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations. Could he advise whether he proposes to have any of his staff present at the meeting on April 8 to discuss the matter of house warranties, as requested, I understand, by the federal government?

Hon. J. T. Clement (Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations): Yes, I do intend to have staff present, Mr. Speaker, in the person of my head legal officer, Mr. Ciemiega, in the person of Mr. Graham Adams, the man who has been involved in the building code, which has been a subject of discussion between the hon. member and myself for some time, and one additional member who has not yet been selected.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Windsor West.

ADMISSION STANDARDS FOR GRADUATE STUDIES

Mr. Bounsall: A question of the Minister of Colleges and Universities, Mr. Speaker:

In light of the Canadian-American psychology graduate student admission situation at the University of Windsor, does he not think that there should be some overall, province-wide criterion of admission for graduate students, perhaps discipline by discipline, to determine whether the GREs apply or do not apply, or in what percentage? If the answer is yes to that, would he ensure that the various disciplines are brought together for the purpose of devising and deciding upon common admission standards to the various graduate departments?

Hon. Mr. Auld: Mr. Speaker, I do have a comment on that one.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Oh yes? The minister planted the question, did he?

Hon. Mr. Auld: No, but I was aware of it.

Basically, as the hon. member is aware, this is an internal matter that the university would handle. However, I am informed by the university that the process of selecting applicants for the clinical psychology programme, which is the one to which the hon. member refers -- and I understand that he was at a meeting on Saturday afternoon with some of the students -- the process of selecting applicants for that course has not yet been completed.

A subcommittee of the psychology department has forwarded its recommendations to the department’s admissions committee. I am informed that when they have been reviewed by the admissions committee, they will be forwarded for final approval to the dean of graduate studies.

There are 16 places in this clinical psychology programme, not 11 or some of the other things that one of the students indicated in the press. The subcommittee has recommended acceptance of seven students for the master’s programme and nine for the PhD programme, a total of 16.

The seven students recommended for the MA, the undergraduate programme, are all Canadians. Of the nine students recommended for the PhD programme, five are Canadian, three US and one British. Five recommended PhD candidates are graduates of the University of Windsor.

In addition, six students, including five Americans, were accepted for a makeup year to bring their qualifications to the level required for entry to either the MA or the PhD programme. However, successful completion of the makeup year provides no guarantee of subsequent acceptance into post-graduate programmes.

The subcommittee itself -- this is the one that I referred to about recommending in the first instance the successful candidates -- is composed of four faculty and four graduate students in psychology from the university. Of the four faculty members, three are landed immigrants and one is a US citizen. The four student members include one Canadian, one landed immigrant and two Americans.

Applicants for admission to the programme are judged on the basis of a graduate record examination set in the United States and marked there, I understand, and their marks as undergraduates. Their graduate record examination is given a weight of one and their undergraduate marks are given a weight of two.

In addition, applicants are required to provide two letters of recommendation from professors in their undergraduate programmes.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Bounsall: I almost dare not ask it after such a detailed reply, but I was asking in a general way because of the furore that happened to arise here in this particular situation, most of the facts of which the minister has related to the House in his answer, but not all.

Mr. Speaker: Question?

Mr. Bounsall: My question is, would the minister not ensure that in every discipline within the universities across Ontario -- as has been done in several of them -- those disciplines meet and determine among themselves what would be a final criterion for admissions of students to each and every discipline, which has not been done in the discipline of psychology?

Hon. Mr. Auld: Well, Mr. Speaker, I will --

An hon. member: Take it under advisement.

Hon. Mr. Auld: Let’s say that I’ll consider that, because I’m not really conversant with exactly what it is the hon. member is getting at.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for York-Forest Hill.

INTERMEDIATE CAPACITY TRANSIT SYSTEM

Mr. P. G. Givens (York-Forest Hill): Would the Minister of Transportation and Communications please tell us what the reasons were for the rejection by the Province of Quebec of the Krauss-Maffei rapid transit system and for the rejection by the city of Edmonton of the Krauss-Maffei system in that city from the downtown area to the suburbs? And how does he feel his posture as a salesman to the world of rapid transit hardware is affected by these two rejections by two major jurisdictions in Canada?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, first of all I think the word “rejection” is probably a little strong -- it’s just the fact that they’ve chosen some other system for some other purpose.

Mr. Breithaupt: The minister will go far.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: The truth of the matter is that in the case of Quebec we’ve looked at their programme. We knew that they were looking at the particular system that they have recommended. I point out that it has not been accepted. It is a recommendation to the government. They’ve looked at it. It’s still in the concept form. It’s an entirely different service that they want to provide. It’s actually an intercity commuter service that they are talking about and not an inner-city service.

There are all kinds of reasons, I suppose, we could lay out here, but as far as we are concerned we are going to continue on with the project that this government has brought forward --

Mr. Lewis: Blindly, expensively, absurdly.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: -- and Montreal and Edmonton can certainly continue on as they are presently doing.

Mr. Lewis: Imagine being brought down under the wheels of the train.

Mr. Givens: Isn’t it a fact that the magnetic levitation system, if it is to work, will work better in an intercity system from Montreal to Ste. Scholastique with very few stops, than it would work in Edmonton where there are many stops and which is more or less comparable to what Toronto is? And we’ve had these two rejections. How does the minister explain that?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, I am not for a moment going to attempt to explain the theory of magnetic levitation to the hon. member or anyone in this House. I don’t believe I’m competent to do so. Nor do I think the hon. member is.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Thunder Bay.

Mr. Lewis: What about ordinary levitation? What about non-magnetic levitation?

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Speaker, with respect to ordinary levitation, the expert on that is the leader of the New Democratic Party in the federal House.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Thunder Bay.

GREAT WEST TIMBER CLOSURE

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Natural Resources. Is the minister aware that Great West Timber, one of the largest users of saw logs in northwestern Ontario and a company that just completed a major expansion, is going to have to close down in May because of a lack of saw logs?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I am very much aware of that particular company. I can say to the hon. member that we have a third party agreement with a number of the major licensees in the Thunder Bay area and we have outlined to them that they must supply to Great West Timber 100,000 cunits on an annual basis. It is my understanding that this has not been fulfilled and I am meeting with the principals of the company on Wednesday next to discuss it further.

Mr. Stokes: Supplementary: In view of the fact that there are well over 200 jobs and several million dollars of capital expenditure, will the minister take steps to assure all of the people involved that the company won’t close down for the lack of saw logs?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I realize there may be certain problems related to that particular part of the question, Mr. Speaker, because of half-load regulations that may be imposed in that particular area, but I can assure the hon. member that we will use all the pressure we can muster to keep those jobs going and that operation going full tilt.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Rainy River, I believe.

GUIDELINES ON UNIVERSITY CAMPUS ACTIVITIES

Mr. Reid: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question for the Minister of Colleges and Universities. Acknowledging the minister’s concern about local autonomy in the universities, does he still not feel concerned about the actions that have taken place at the University of Toronto in the last week? I am referring to the actions of the SDS. Does he not feel concerned that the civil rights of the people on that campus have been abrogated by the actions of that group and that perhaps his ministry should set some guidelines in that regard?

Mr. Laughren: I wonder what the Liberals would do?

Hon. Mr. Auld: Mr. Speaker, the only thing I can say is that I believe in the rule of law, as I assume most students and most people do.

The activities on the campus are apparently being looked at pretty carefully and, I gather, controlled as they are supposed to be by the governing body of that university. Again, as has been traditional from the first university, the matters that the university has as its responsibility are dealt with by it. As I understand it, if universities in the past have required outside assistance in some form or another, they have initiated requests for it. This has happened in the past generally on an administrative basis or an administrative problem, but it would appear to me that the board of governors, the senate, the governing people at the U of T seem to be taking appropriate action.

Mr. Reid: Does the minister think what they are doing is appropriate?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for High Park.

ALLEGED MAFIA ACTIVITIES

Mr. M. Shulman (High Park) : A question of the Solicitor General, Mr. Speaker: In view of the OPP having completed its investigation, is the minister now able to confirm or deny the story in yesterday’s Detroit News that one Joseph Burnett of Toronto has been supplying financing for numerous activities of organized crime in the northern USA?

Hon. G. A. Kerr (Solicitor General): Mr. Speaker, there is nothing in the story that I recall or any information that I have that Mr. Burnett was involved with organized crime in washing or laundering money -- and this is what our investigation has shown at this time. We are not aware of any illegal activity conducted by Mr. Burnett in his activities as an investment broker or as a lawyer. As a matter of fact, he has also been investigated by the Law Society of Upper Canada -- of which he is a member -- and they have no reason to disbar him for any of his activities.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Huron-Bruce,

Mr. Shulman: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: All right, we will permit a very short supplementary.

Mr. Shulman: Is the minister aware of the story in yesterday’s Detroit News which says he is currently being investigated by the FBI for the very activities which the minister says he is not involved in?

Hon. Mr. Kerr: He is being investigated. There is a difference between investigation and conviction or guilt. The member doesn’t seem to know that. The member doesn’t know the rules of evidence.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. member for Huron-Bruce.

U.S. BEEF SHIPMENTS

Mr. M. Gaunt (Huron-Bruce): Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Agriculture and Food, Is the minister contemplating seizing all beef containing DES coming into the province from the United States, as Alberta has threatened to do? Incidentally, when will he answer my question of March 14?

Mr. R. F. Ruston (Essex-Kent): That is just a supplementary.

Hon. Mr. Stewart: I will have to look that question up, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Stokes: Answer the last one first.

Hon. Mr. Stewart: No, we haven’t any notion of seizing beef coming in from the United States containing DES, because neither we nor, in my humble opinion, the Province of Alberta has any right to seize that beef. All matters of crossing of provincial or international borders is a responsibility of the federal government. The health of animals branch, in this case, would be fully cognizant of it. We have assurance from discussions we have had with Ottawa that there is no beef carrying DES coming into Canada. Frankly, I took the position that the federal government should either close the border to beef which contained DES or allow our cattlemen to use it in Canada.

We are advised that the American cattlemen are not using DES because it was found to be -- it was banned illegally on a technicality but that technicality does not upset the law under which it was banned originally. The legal position, as we understand it, Mr. Speaker, is that the United States government will likely continue the ban on DES, having taken care of the rather minor technicality on which the Supreme Court found that it was illegally banned in the United States; it is a very complex legal matter.

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

Mr. Gaunt: What about my question on March 14?

Mr. Speaker: In fact, the time has been exceeded.

Hon. Mr. Stewart: I will get it for the member.

Mr. Speaker: Petitions.

Presenting reports.

Motions.

Introduction of bills.

Orders of the day.

UNIVERSITY EXPROPRIATION POWERS ACT

Hon. Mr. Welch moves second reading of Bill 1, An Act to amend the University Expropriation Powers Act.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Kitchener.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): I believe this bill is worthy of two brief comments, the first particularly because of the historic approach this House has always taken to the introduction of a bill before the House deals with the reply to the Speech from the Throne; more particularly I think it’s worthy of comment because this is likely to be the last bill to which His Honour will give royal assent.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. There seems to be a large number of private conversations taking place. It is difficult to hear the speaker.

Mr. Breithaupt: It is particularly of interest that His Honour will be called upon to give royal assent to this bill because of His Honour’s particular interest in this university. As members of the Legislature will recall. His Honour served some eight years as chancellor of Waterloo Lutheran University, the name of which was changed as a result of an Act in this last session to Wilfrid Laurier University. This is one of the further bills which will complete that changeover and I think it is perhaps of interest to the members that as His Honour’s last formal act, he will give assent to this bill, something with which he has been personally familiar, for the university he served as chancellor and, I might add, as chancellor with great distinction.

Mr. Speaker: Do any other members wish to participate in this debate? If not, the hon. minister.

Motion agreed to; second reading of the bill.

Mr. Speaker: Shall the bill be ordered for third reading?

Agreed.

Clerk of the House: The first order, resuming the adjourned debate on the amendment to the amendment to the motion for an address in reply to the speech of the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the session.

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Ottawa Centre.

Mr. M. Cassidy (Ottawa Centre): Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I thank the members of my own party as well.

Mr. Speaker, today I want to put on the record a number of comments about the Arnprior dam project of Ontario Hydro. It’s something which has been in the news off and on since last fall when it first became an issue and it’s a project which cries out for public inquiry in order to satisfy the doubts and confusions which have been raised by Hydro and by the actions of Hydro and the actions of the ministers of the Crown in relation to that project over the past few months.

This is a difficult speech to make because of the volume of material which has come in and because of the fact that, despite all of the material which has come in and the material which has been denied by the government, there are still no clear answers.

What appears to be the case, however, is very simply this. A political decision was made in 1971 to build a dam in order to re-elect the member for Renfrew South (Mr. Yakabuski); that Ontario Hydro was made the political arm of the government; that this decision was made despite the great uneasiness of many people both in the senior bureaucratic level of the government and in the planning and administration of Ontario Hydro.

But the decision having been made and the project having commenced, everybody on the government side -- including the member for the area, the Minister of Energy (Mr. McKeough), the Premier (Mr. Davis) himself, today, in refusing to table documents, and the staff of Ontario Hydro -- all of them have be- come engaged in a mass coverup because they do not want to recognize or admit that political considerations prevailed in building a dam which is otherwise unjustified. And I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the political considerations that may have motivated the dam are not justified either, that the member for the area does not make a significant contribution worthy of $78 million in investment for one re-election.

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to call your attention and the attention of the House to the fact that the investment we are discussing today, on the Arnprior dam, is very significant in size. It began somewhere around the $40-million mark -- I’m sorry to see the Minister of Energy leaving; I hope he will return for the rest of this speech -- and it is now estimated to be $78 million for the Arnprior dam. That happens to be equal to $10 for every man, woman and child in the Province of Ontario. Or, at current interest rates, it’s equal to something approaching $1 every year, in interest alone, for every man, woman and child. Or $4 or $5 a year in Hydro rates for every family in the province.

We’re not talking about a small investment. We’re not talking about a few miles of black-top in order to get a member re-elected and that kind of patronage. We’re talking about a lot of money, Mr. Speaker, and it’s a lot of money that’s being wasted.

I want to make it clear too that from the very beginning Ontario Hydro’s determination to go ahead with this dam has been closely linked with the government. And the government has consistently been involved in the decision-making about the Arnprior dam from the day it was originally announced to the time that it was confirmed by the then Provincial Secretary for Resources Development (Mr. Lawrence) and on until today.

Back on June 6, 1972, the provincial secretary announced that an analysis had been done by Hydro, that the information had gone forward to the government, that one of the conditions for Hydro going ahead was that it had to have the blessing of the province and, in effect, that the province was giving its blessing. He implied at that time that people in government, including the environment, water resources management, recreation and agriculture people in the provincial government, had been involved in assessing the project. He promised that chronic problems of erosion on the Madawaska River, upstream of the Arnprior dam, would be eliminated and that the lake behind the dam, about 10 miles long, would provide a valuable new recreational resource for the Arnprior area.

The themes, Mr. Speaker, are consistent through the piece, that is that the dam would provide power, it would correct an erosion problem on the Madawaska River and it would create an important new recreational resource in that particular part of the area.

Well, Mr. Speaker, during the election campaign itself, I can recall raising my eyebrows at the announcement of an $80-million dam in one particular area, particularly since it was known that Hydro had admitted on a number of occasions that that particular dam was marginal in economics and therefore not justified. However, there were other things that pressed, particularly the affairs of my own riding and mv own city, and it was not until the fall of this year that I became closely connected again with the questions of the Arnprior dam.

I may say that although people in the area were expressing concern, in letters and by other means, to the Minister of Energy and to other ministers, generally the member from the area was not particularly bothered, and he was keeping everybody else in line. I guess it’s fair to say that up until recently the people of Renfrew county have not felt that they really could get action through the political system and therefore they weren’t anxious to try.

It’s probably fair to say, as well, that of the people of the area directly affected two groups stood to benefit from the proposal for the dam regardless of whether it was justified or not. One group were the cottage owners along the river, some of whom were upset by the proposals. They were quickly bought out by Hydro at fairly generous prices and presumably went to establish themselves in cottages elsewhere where there was not a regular fluctuation of water levels over the summer.

Another group were the municipal officials, the businessmen, the merchants and people like that -- the governing group, if you will -- of the town of Arnprior, a town of 8,000 within whose limits the dam is being located.

Now, Mr. Speaker, whether you establish a new factory, whether you start a major new economic development that will create jobs forever and ever, or whether you build a dam, any expenditure of $40 million, $50 million or $60 million within the town limits of Arnprior obviously has short-run benefits. This is what the people of the area could see.

I think it is fair to say they didn’t feel it was for them to assess whether or not Hydro really needed this particular project. After all, didn’t Hydro have a very good reputation for being pre-eminent among electrical utilities around the country? Hadn’t it been in business for a long time? Didn’t it really know what it was doing? Wasn’t it the custom that one simply accepted what Hydro said as gospel?

I think that’s a fair kind of summary of the opinion that many people in the area had of Hydro. And, as far as the merchants and businessmen in the area were concerned, if it meant extra business for a few years that was great. That was fine. I’m afraid that as far as the rest of us in eastern Ontario were concerned, the fact that $80 million was going to go into this particular project when the provincial government wasn’t willing to spend a nickel on economic development throughout most of the region, we were rather slow to cotton on to that particular insult to eastern Ontario on the part of this particular government.

At any rate, one dark, rainy, late evening in November I was asked on a very urgent basis to meet with some representatives of farmers from the Arnprior area and we did meet in a cafe in Perth. It all sounds rather clandestine but at any rate their concerns were so urgent that they decided that they would come down and see me directly rather than wait for a few days until they could find me in Arnprior, or in Ottawa.

You know, Mr. Speaker, a number of charges about misrepresentation have been made against myself, in particular by Hydro and by the government, over the course of the debate over the Arnprior dam since November. I want to say that of all the information that has come in about the Arnprior dam the very best and most accurate information was that which came from the local field man for the Federation of Agriculture and from the one or two farmers that he had with him about what they had gleaned informally about the Arnprior dam and what was then raising their concern and the concern of farmers in that area. They gave me about six or seven pieces of information on the dam all of which were fit subjects for concern and all of which proved to be deadly accurate. Not only that, but the information they had was consistently much more accurate than much of what has come since from Ontario Hydro.

They told me that the estimated capacity of the dam had been reduced by 10 per cent from 87,000 kw to 78,000 kw. They told me that the power output from the dam would be available for only two to four hours a day because of limited reservoir capacity. Now Hydro had never said anything else, but certainly the implication when the project was announced in this House was that it would be available day and night.

They told me that similar dams in other parts of the province had cost considerably less. And, in fact, when we checked we found that the Lower Notch dam in the riding of the member for Timiskaming (Mr. Havrot) which was completed only three years ago, had cost about $75 million, was producing power for many more hours per day than the proposed Arnprior dam and had approximately three times the capacity of the Arnprior dam for something less than the same amount of money.

They told me that about 2,000 acres of agricultural land would be flooded by the dam and that hundreds of additional acres would be taken from production because of creek diversions, railway locations and other projects connected with the dam. That was accurate and in the context of 1974, now that people have become much more concerned and much more aware of the dangers and loss of agricultural land everywhere within the province, obviously it is a matter for concern such as it may not have been three or four years ago.

They told me there was no action planned by Hydro to prevent erosion of the banks of the proposed new lake which would be made behind the dam but that the banks of this lake would be made of Leda clay, the same material which is currently being eroded to a certain degree by the Madawaska River because of the changes in its levels. As they pointed out, the safest way to protect that clay from erosion is by ensuring that the banks are heavily wooded. The banks of the new reservoir would be bare and Hydro crews were then already engaged in taking the timber from the banks of the existing river where they would be flooded.

They told me the construction contracts on the work to date had been let to C.A. Pitts Ltd. without any open tendering. That happened to be correct and they were aware of a certain amount of hankypanky between the consulting engineer and the contractor; that has turned out also to be deadly accurate in view of the conflict of interests involved in having the president of Pitts sit on the controlling company in the Acres group which controls the engineering company which, in turn, has been recommending that contracts be let to C.A. Pitts. It is a full circle situation and one that would not be tolerated to any extent under the conflict of interest rules which now apply both in cabinet and to senior bureaucrats within the government.

Mr. Speaker, let me try to put down in the records some of the chronology behind the project. I am glad to see that the member for Renfrew South is here to listen to this. May I say I would be happy to provide copies of anything I quote from in this Legislature to any members of the Legislature who seek it. We do not believe in the kind of policy of exclusion and of suppression of documents which is practised by the government.

The dam was announced in 1971, about two weeks before the election, by Mr. George Gathercole who was then and still is the chairman of Ontario Hydro. It was stated at the time that the dam was being announced in response to complaints from cottagers and farmers about erosion along the 10-mile stretch of the river between the Hydro dam at Stewartville and the town of Arnprior.

If one wants to go back into history a bit, sometime in the early 1960s Hydro decided to redevelop the Madawaska River, a river with a fairly substantial vertical drop but not too substantial cubic footage or volume of water, into a river which would be used for peaking power. In other words, it would be used for power at the times of peak demand such as between 4 o’clock and 6 o’clock when everybody is turning on the lights in winter, cooking on the stoves, the factories are still running and the streetcars and subways are drawing a lot of power. That was Hydro’s intention and, in fact, over the course of the 1960s it redeveloped or developed three sites, I think it was, upstream on the Madawaska River in order to create a very sizable amount of power. I believe the programme in those three dams amounted to something like 330,000 kilowatts, or 330 megawatts to use the language of the trade.

When that redevelopment of the river was proposed two other dams were suggested to be part of it. One was Highland Mountain, I think it is, which is somewhere up in the bush country along the Madawaska River and has not, to this date, been developed for economic reasons; and the other was at Arnprior itself, a mile or two from the place where the Madawaska River joins the Ottawa River. That particular site, which would develop about 80 megawatts or an additional 20 per cent or 25 per cent of the peaking capacity of the river, was examined on a number of occasions by Hydro, but on each occasion was judged to be uneconomic and therefore not justified. In fact, to this day, Hydro says that “considered alone, the Arnprior dam is uneconomic and should not be proceeded with.”

Now Mr. Gathercole went up there and in response to the complaints and so on, he said: ‘We are going to build a dam and it is going to cost $50 million. But we have to be sure that there are adequate footings, we have to be sure that there is municipal consent and we have to have the approval of the government.”

I guess in the chronology I had better continue on this line first and then come back to those particular points that were raised by Mr. Gathercole.

The issues raised by the dam were, I would say, not clear at that time. I have mentioned the kind of frame of mind of people in Renfrew county. I believe it is fair to say that at that time the farmers were not aware they could get anywhere in fighting with Hydro and that they had consented to being trampled and having their rights trampled by Hydro in every comer of the province, for year after year after year, and there wasn’t the same concern as now with agricultural land. I suspect that there may have been an assumption, too, that Hydro, as a kind of big brother, a big daddy in Ontario, would be reasonable in its compensation to the farmers. I think it is fair to say, too, that had Hydro come in within six months after the initial announcement and made generous and reasonable offers to the farmers, including offers for all of their land where they would have farms split up and that kind of thing, probably most or all of the farmers would have consented and they would have sold out to Hydro and there, quite likely, the matter would have rested. The power of the purse would have led us to a situation where Hydro was going ahead with a fait accompli.

In fact, though, Hydro played the most incredible games, games that the member for Scarborough West (Mr. Lewis), the member for Huron-Bruce (Mr. Gaunt), and other members have described, in offering ridiculous amounts of compensation.

It came in, it had sent its appraisers in, it told the farmers to make an offer, it wouldn’t make it clear what on earth it was doing and to this day, Mr. Speaker, almost none of the farmers involved have settled. I believe about three or four of the farmers with any appreciable amount of land which is to be taken over by Hydro have, in fact, settled.

Hydro settled very quickly with the cottagers, offering them sums of up to $4,000 or $5,000 for their acre or so of land. But the farmers then found that Hydro was offering them $100 or $200 an acre for land that had equal cottage potential as the developed land on the other side of the river had they decided to go ahead and allow cottages on their land.

One of the issues, which is a very specific issue which needs to be raised, Mr. Speaker, is that the protections of the Expropriations Act that were meant to apply to farmers and everybody else don’t appear to be applying in this particular case.

Hydro is going ahead by force majeure, has now had built or has contracted for $15 million worth of construction work on site, and the intent and I think the effect of that work will be to flood land owned by farmers which it does not currently own, nor to which it has currently applied expropriation orders.

Hydro has been very delinquent in applying those expropriation orders in order to even indicate its intent. The farmers in the area, who were guaranteed under the Expropriations Act a hearing of necessity into the desirability of having that particular project, haven’t yet had their day in court. And at the time they have their day in court -- because it is clear they are going to go ahead to a hearing of necessity -- they will be confronted with a fait accompli in the form of $6 million, $8 million, $10 million or maybe $15 million worth of work carried out by Hydro on the dam with the clear intent of taking over their land.

Now it’s my understanding that when the Expropriations Act was amended several years ago, the protection of the hearing of necessity was not meant to be after the fact but before the fact. It was not permitted, for example, for a municipality to build a road on land for which a hearing of necessity had not been held when that hearing of necessity was applied for. And clearly, if the municipality brought its bulldozers on to somebody’s land to build a highway without ownership of that land, then the owner could go ahead and seek an injunction for trespassing and kick them out.

In this particular case, it’s a bit more complicated. Hydro is not physically trespassing on the land which is threatened by flooding from the dam that is currently being built. It is doing it morally, if you will, but it is not doing it physically. And when the farmers got together with their federation in order to decide to take legal action --

Mr. R. Haggerty (Welland South): Hydro had the support of the cabinet, though.

Mr. Cassidy: Oh, of course. It’s clear that Hydro intends to flood that land. It’s clear that Hydro intends to take that land.

But when the farmers consulted legal counsel, they were told that if they went to seek an injunction from the courts to stop Hydro building the dam on a temporary basis, to get the project stopped now, and if they were then subsequently found to be in the wrong by a higher court or at the time that a permanent injunction was being sought, then Hydro could claim not just damages but double damages against the farmers for halting a project where the expenditure was of the order of, say, $25,000 or $30,000 a day.

Mr. D. C. MacDonald (York South): Sounds like blackmail.

Mr. Cassidy: It is blackmail. It means that for every day that the farmers successfully stopped the project by a temporary injunction, they were at risk for maybe $50,000 or $60,000 in double damages. And no matter that the courts might be unlikely to do that, that risk was obviously too great for farmers to take when in fact the whole net worth of the farmers affected might be, let’s say, only $1 million, and the net worth of the one or two farmers who might actually bring this suit might be no more than a day or two days’ double damages that Hydro would pursue.

It was very clear from the actions of Hydro up until that point that Hydro was going to stop at nothing in order to get those farmers. If it requires the ruining of a farmer, if it required bankrupting him and taking every penny he had in order to teach the farmers in the area a lesson, it was clear that Hydro was quite willing to spend $50,000 or $100,000 in legal fees and go right up to whatever court was necessary in order to seek those kinds of damages in order to punish farmers who chose to try to take out an injunction.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Cassidy: Therefore, when it comes to the procedure that allows, say, an industrialist to go running into court for an ex parte injunction to stop picketing in a legal strike situation -- the procedure that is so often on the side of people with power in this society -- it turned out that when people who were affected by the actions of a powerful body like Hydro wanted to use the same procedure, they were penalized to the point where they simply couldn’t do it. There was no legal recourse that the farmers could safely take, Mr. Speaker, until the time that Hydro finally deigns to take out expropriation orders.

I have checked into the Act, and the Act says specifically that the Minister of Energy has got to give his approval before those expropriation orders can be issued. I have been unable to find out whether in fact even that approval has now been given. And it may be that Hydro is planning to flood the land without even having sought general approval from the minister, although it is clear and obvious that the minister when asked is willing to give it.

If one wants to sum up the attitude that is represented by this on the part of Hydro and of the minister himself, it is to say that this is simply a matter of money as far as the corporation and the government are concerned. As far as they can see, any problem in the province, where people object to the actions of government, can be reduced to money and nothing more. Therefore, all it needs, according to the thinking of the minister and his people and the corporation and their people, is to find enough money to pay off the farmers so that they’ll stop riding on Hydro’s back. And, of course, if the farmers do settle, then the local opposition effectively ends and presumably Hydro can go ahead.

My experience with the farmers, though, is somewhat different. They are saying, “It doesn’t matter what we are compensated, we don’t want to move. We want to see compelling evidence that Hydro has no other course but to do this particular project, which involves resolving an erosion problem by simply flooding out every last farmer and cottager whose land was being eroded or stood in danger of being eroded.”

Mr. Speaker, the next thing to look at in the chronology is to ask what did Hydro do in order to get people in the area involved, in order to sound out their feelings and in order to let them participate in considering the alternatives? After all, even at $50 million, this was considered to be a marginal project, and the price has been escalating every time the cash register rings. If it was marginal at $50 million -- I don’t care what has been happening with the cost of fuel and other things like that -- it can’t be anything more than marginal at $80 million, and I would suggest that it is grossly uneconomic.

Until the Minister of Energy went up into the area in January of this year, at which time in his mind the project was a fait accompli, there had been no public meeting with people of the area to acquaint them with the facts of the project and to seek to explain what it was all about; how Hydro was going to proceed; what the benefits to the area would be; and, for that matter quite honestly, what the disadvantages to the area were going to be.

Mr. D. J. Wiseman (Lanark): What about the liaison committee?

Mr. Cassidy: We’ll talk about the liaison committee as well. The member for Lanark points out that there is a liaison committee. I happen to have a letter from the chairman of the liaison committee that I intended to read a bit later during this speech. A liaison committee has been established since the summer of 1972, and that liaison committee includes the reeves of the three townships involved, plus the mayor of Arnprior. As I understand it, that body has met in camera.

The editors of both the newspapers involved in Arnprior have sought again and again to be present at meetings of the liaison committee and on almost every occasion they have been rebuffed. It is only in the last few weeks, as the Arnprior question became more of an issue and as Hydro realized just how badly it was alienating people in the area and in the province, that on one or two occasions journalists have been able to attend the liaison committee meetings. Yes, there has been a liaison committee, Mr. Speaker.

However, Hydro has never sought or received approval from the councils of the three rural municipalities affected, that is, the townships of Pakenham, McNab and Fitzroy. It has not, nor has it sought, approval from the regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton, which has territory affected; from the county of Lanark, which has territory affected; or from the county of Renfrew, which has the largest portion of the territory affected.

The liaison committee tended to be muzzled because its members were told that information they were receiving was confidential, or that some of it was confidential, and they were enjoined not to go and talk around in the area. I’m afraid, as a fact of life in the area, if people are told that there isn’t a tradition of rocking the political boat, therefore people would be very wary of disregarding the instructions that Hydro had given.

Mr. Speaker, let me go on now and talk about some of the facts that I have received from Hydro. I want to say -- the member for Simcoe Centre (Mr. Evans) was here a few minutes ago, but I don’t see him now -- that at the initial few contacts between myself, as a sort of spokesman for people in the area and as a concerned member of the Legislature, and the hydro commission were maybe not always completely as -- what’s the word I want? -- as satisfying on both sides as one would have liked but at any rate they were cordial. The member for Simcoe Centre sought to be helpful in providing information and the same is true of Mr. Tyndale, one of the project engineers, and other people who were involved. This, in fact, was the case up until approximately the end of January. Over that period of time as well I want to say that, with some difficulty and gradually, there was nevertheless, a flow of material about the project which has come forward and which has provided much of the underpinning for this particular speech.

One of those documents which came in attached to the letter from the member for Simcoe Centre related specifically to the costs. It gives you very graphically, Mr. Speaker, a picture of what has happened to the costs of this particular project.

In September of 1971 when the hydro com- mission first gave its general approval for the project, the estimated cost was $51.5 million. In March of 1972, after some preliminary investigations had been carried out, it was $60.3 million. In late 1973, it was $78 million.

Then there is the introduction of the possibility of a plus or minus five per cent margin for error. And clearly, in view of the escalation of costs, that would be plus five per cent, at the very least. This particular undated memo says that the estimated total cost of the project is now $82,742,000, as compared to the work order estimate of $60.3 million.

What is illuminating about this document as well, Mr. Speaker, is that in addition to documenting an increase of $22 million or 37 per cent, it also states that the engineering costs were going to be more than previously estimated because of the soil problems encountered, but that they would remain at approximately the same percentage of total cost. The estimated increase in engineering costs is $4 million out of a total increase of $22 million. Now, that happens to be 20 per cent, approximately, of the increase in cost.

If what is stated here is to be believed, that means that the engineering costs overall are of the order of about $16 or $17 million. That is pretty high, and I asked Hydro about that and their people say no, that is too high, and talk in other figures. I am afraid I can’t recall whether it was $8 million, $10 million or $12 million that Acres Consulting Services stands to receive in engineering costs for the work that it will carry out for Hydro on this particular project.

I think it is interesting, though, that the sum is that high, because Acres has been consultant to Hydro on this project from the very beginning. One of the things that I have been most critical about is that nowhere does it appear that an adequate study of the alternatives was ever carried out.

One wonders whether there was not some kind of a conflict within Acres there because of the fact that they stood to make $8 million or $10 million or $12 million if they went this route and built a dam -- whether or not people needed it -- that therefore it was in their interests to go along with a political decision made by the government to protect the hon. member for Renfrew South; whereas the alternative meant $500,000 or $1 million in fees which would allow them to advise the government that there was just no way that it should go ahead with this gross misuse of money and that there were other and there were cheaper alternatives.

Now, the second document that came to me from the member for Simcoe Centre is entitled “Madawaska River Development.” It is also apparently a background document prepared for senior officials of Hydro, possibly for the commission; I am afraid I can’t say exactly which. This report gets to the core of the whole question, which is: Was the Arnprior dam needed in order to protect the up- stream capacity of the Stewartville peaking dam, which was completed in 1969?

You see, up until 1969, Mr. Speaker, the river was run for about 10 hours a day -- if I can use some technical words here -- at a flow of about 6,000 cubic feet per second. And that was enough to give 60 megawatts of power 10 hours a day during the daytime hours when demand was greatest, from the Stewartville dam. When it was rebuilt, the capacity of the dam was increased from 60 mw to approximately 150 mw. Subsequently, instead of being run for 10 hours a day, it was run for approximately four hours a day. And when it was running, the water went gushing through there at a rate of 15,000 cfs -- instead of 6,000 cfs.

Prior to 1969 and for a period since the war, I think, the river’s level downstream of Stewartville used to fluctuate by around two or 2 1/2 feet a day because of the fact that the river was running at above its normal 24-hour pace during the daylight hours and then it was simply shut off -- they turned off the tap -- for the 14 hours from, say, 6 p.m. until sometime in the morning.

Once they began to run it for only two hours at a time and at a much greater flow of water, then the increase and decrease in water levels tended to get greater -- to what extent I am afraid I have been unable to establish and apparently Hydro has never made a hydrological survey of the lower river in order to find out itself. The scare stories that they have spread indicate that the river now fluctuates in level by eight feet or so a day. My calculations indicate that that may be as low as 3% -- more likely per- haps four or five. The fact is though that there is no clear information which Hydro has yet provided to me in response to inquiries about just what was happening with the river after they started to use this

Stewartville dam for peaking power.

At any rate, it was after that that Hydro began to get worried about possible environmental consequences -- consequences -- and public complaints from the 10-mile stretch of the river below the Stewartville dam. Not only were they worried, they showed the most tremendous kind of reaction that you have ever seen, Mr. Speaker. The only citizen’s group that’s had equal impact on the government has been the Kingston Township Ratepayers’ Association when it was led by the brother of the current Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Bennett) and came down to look for OMB information.

I am told that when Mr. Gathercole went up to Arnprior in 1971 he was presented with a petition with about 25 names on it and that this struck such terror into his boots that he went around for two hours mulling over the dam and the dam site and everything else. He came back and announced, much to the surprise of his officials, that a $50 million dam would be built. If the story is true, that means that each signature was worth about $2 million, if you will.

However, the record by Hydro itself would indicate that there wasn’t exactly an overwhelming kind of outcry at the way the river had been run. After all, it had had this 2 ft fluctuation every day for 15 or 20 years -- for 25 years I guess -- and that appeared to be reasonably acceptable in the area. They were used to something happening in the river.

Well, the official record said that Hydro had bought all the land from Stewartville to Clay Bank, about four miles of the total 10-mile stretch, because it anticipated that there might be complaints in that area. They didn’t get complaints in that area. Then it says:

“A number of complaints have been received since Stewartville began operating in the peaking mode” [that is since 1969]. “Four or five complaints have been received from the 34 cottage owners between Clay Bank and Arnprior regarding water level fluctuations, erosion and very low water levels on weekends.”

If I can say this again, Mr. Speaker -- “four or five complaints from cottage owners.”

“Minor improvements were made where possible, but generally the complainant received only an explanation of why the variations were necessary and was told that we were studying the situation.”

That is, that Hydro was studying the situation, which is fair enough.

There is no mention of complaints from farmers whose land adjoined this particular section, just from four or five cottage owners in the area, all of whom have since been bought out. Then it goes on and I quote:

“A petition signed by 36 names of residents was received from the reeve of McNab township complaining about water level variations and low water levels above Stewartville where Hydro has rights to the river frontage. An explanation of the reasons for these flow variations was sent to the reeve. A complaint was received from owners of the Arnprior marina regarding variations in water level, flooding and general difficulties in operating this marina with this marina with the daily changing flows. The commission authorized improvements to this marina property in July, 1970, at the approximate cost of $50,000 and this work has been undertaken.”

There was a complaint in the spring of 1971 from Arnprior regarding wear of their pumps because of a certain amount of particulate matter. This would be eroded soil in the river and it was wearing out the pumps on the water intake for the pumping station of Arnprior. This complaint was still under investigation at the time this memo was prepared.

Then, in the summer of 1971, Arnprior told Hydro that the sewage main across the lower Madawaska had failed twice since the new river control plan was initiated, and suggested that Hydro was partially responsible. At the time of writing, that complaint had not been settled.

In June, 1971, a law firm representing four people who had land on the east bank of the Madawaska, just near the Arnprior marina, filed a complaint with Hydro. Concerns have also been expressed regarding erosion at other areas in this vicinity -- in this vicinity means downstream from the dam currently under construction which I’m discussing today.

If I could review those complaints, Mr. Speaker, there were three or four cottagers in the 10-mile stretch between Stewartville and the new Arnprior dam who complained. They have all been bought out. The other complaints filed in Hydro’s own compendium of who was concerned came from residents of an area along the reservoir, upstream from the Stewartville dam, who were obviously not affected by the Arnprior dam or by any erosion problems on the Madawaska River in that area; from people at the marina which is downstream from the new dam and where Hydro has already spent $50,000 to give them a floating dock. In fact, Mr. Gathercole personally went to Arnprior that sunny day in October -- it was a sunny day for the member -- in order to launch or open the new docks on the marina and that was the occasion at which he announced the dam.

As for the city of Arnprior’s pumps, it was simply a matter of getting slightly better quality equipment for a few thousand dollars; I’m not sure how that one has been resolved. I know that Arnprior itself has fixed its sewage pipes. I don’t think it’s had compensation from Hydro for them but the cost of fixing those sewage pipes across the area which will be the tail race for the new dam was in the order of $10,000 or $11,000 and certainly not an expenditure which was worth $78 million to avoid.

Likewise, the other downstream problems near Arnprior are basically not particularly affected by the dam because the rationale for the dam has always been power generation, erosion problems upstream from the site of the dam and the recreation possibilities.

But then Hydro goes ahead and there are some dirty photographs here, some dirty pictures. They show dirt falling into the Madawaska River. There are three pictures which have been taken and which have appeared, I think, three or four times in the documents I have been shown concerning this particular dam.

One is of a particular property, which definitely shows a slide of maybe several hundred square feet, maybe a couple of thousand square feet, between April, 1970, and May, 1971. A second picture is of bank erosion, again maybe several hundred square feet on a bank about 25 ft high, about a mile upstream from the Arnprior site. I guess that’s it. That’s the documentary evidence, in terms of visible evidence, which was being passed around to the senior people from Hydro. At no place have they indicated where these massive slides, which apparently have been taking place, actually took place. In fact, the documentary evidence, to the contrary, indicates that about 80 per cent of the river frontage in the area affected is not prone to serious erosion. There is substantial erosion in other parts but the degree, the extent, the timing, the way in which it has accelerated and so on has never been studied, to my knowledge, in any scientific way by Hydro, as one would expect, before it committed a $78 million investment.

The report from Hydro, “People to Hydro,” goes on:

“It is the general opinion of those involved in dealing with those complaints that there will be continuing and probably increasing complaints from residents in the lower Madawaska River area which will lead to restrictions on the operation of Stewartville if measures are not taken to relieve the situation.”

That, Mr. Speaker, is the nub of the argument for expending $78 million. Although the complaints until the time the dam was committed weren’t particularly great, nevertheless the complaints were bound to get greater and therefore Hydro had to build a $78 million dam.

If I can find the document here -- I have to quote as a counterpoint to that particular judgement of the Hydro people a comment which, I must say, shocked me but which came from the environmental assessment report which was prepared for Hydro as one of the major documents connected with the dam.

On page 10 of that document the consultants state -- it may have been Acres or it may have been Hydro. I’m not sure who carried out this environmental assessment:

“Shortly after the commission announced its intention to investigate this project” [meaning the Arnprior dam] “the town of Arnprior offered their endorsement of the project, followed by a similar endorsement by the county of Renfrew.”

I might state, incidentally, that there has been no such endorsement by the county of Renfrew, according to a letter to me from the clerk-treasurer of the county. To continue:

“This indicates that the environmental ethic prevalent elsewhere in North America which abhors any river development is not prevalent among residents of the Madawaska Valley.”

On the one hand, Mr. Speaker, you have Hydro people advising their superiors that they had to build this dam, because otherwise the environmentalist complaints would be such that the operation of the Stewartville dam would have to be curtailed or cease. Yet, on the other hand, environmental consultants to Hydro were telling senior people in Hydro that there was no kind of environmentalist ethic in Renfrew county such as you find elsewhere on the continent and, therefore, they could “go ahead and damn the torpedoes” and build any kind of dam they wanted.

If that’s the case, Mr. Speaker -- in other words, if Hydro’s judgement was that the people in the area didn’t give a damn about the environment -- then one could argue -- I’m not going to raise this one particularly strongly -- that Hydro could have saved about $60 million, $70 million or $80 million by not building the dam, seeing that in its judgement the people in the area didn’t give a damn either way about the environment. Obviously, I don’t accept that and I think that environmentalist concerns are important in this whole affair.

Nevertheless, the cost being incurred by Hydro, apparently with the intention of curing an erosion problem, is gross. The alternatives have not been adequately explored. They have not been explored, particularly with people who own shorefront property and who, therefore, would have been the most likely to launch any complaints.

In other words, alternatives that might have been acceptable to people in the area in reasonable environmental terms, plus being much more reasonable in cost, were never adequately explored. Hydro’s alternative was simply to buy out the cottagers who had, in fact, complained, and to abuse the farmers to the extent that they have now protested and are fighting hard in return. In other words, it’s no different than some dictatorial government in some country that I care not to mention which takes its critics and puts them into a jail or shoots them. You simply remove the source of the problem rather than seeking to sit down with people in an adult, responsible, democratic fashion in order to work out any kind of a reasonable solution.

The environmental assessment also states that the present river downstream from Stewartville offered virtually nothing to the economy or recreational opportunities within the area. On the other hand, it said that the project for the head pond and tail pond improvement offered a great deal of social value to the area within easy commuting distance.

The area within the most easy commuting distance contains the 15,000 or 20,000 people who live within a small radius of Arnprior. They already have White Lake, they already have the Ottawa River and they have tremendous recreational facilities within a very short distance. I hope that the member for Renfrew South doesn’t go along with the judgement of the Hydro consultants that the present river valley offers virtually nothing either to the economy or the recreational opportunities within the area. I happen to consider that that 10-mile stretch of the Madawaska Valley is one of the most beautiful pieces of landscape within the riding of the member, and the riding of the member is one of the most beautiful parts of the province.

Mr. P. J. Yakabuski (Renfrew South): My friend hasn’t travelled very much in my riding. It is beautiful, but there are many areas in that riding --

Mr. Cassidy: I agree, I agree. But I am saying that this is one --

Mr. Yakabuski: He is referring to a certain section of that riding -- the lower Madawaska -- and he knows that.

Mr. Cassidy: Okay, but I am saying that this particular stretch of valley is particularly beautiful and particularly in relevance to the fact that the rest of the Ottawa Valley plain around there is flat. There is very little topography, apart from that particular valley, for maybe 15 or 20 miles to the south and 15 or 20 miles to the north. So we should think twice before replacing it with a large lake with flat banks and no trees -- providing what? Incidentally, it now is clear that the area has very little recreational potential because the shoreline is unusable for any kind of intensive recreational use for most of its length. This has been established pretty conclusively in the studies that have been prepared.

At any rate, that is a very funny contradiction. On the one hand, Hydro was so paranoid about environmentalists’ complaints that it decided that it had to move now and, on the other hand, its environmental consultant could find that the people of Renfrew county didn’t give a damn about the environment and therefore would tolerate anything that Hydro cared to bestow on them.

Mr. Speaker, in trying to go through the chronology of this thing, I guess the first thing to deal with is the comments from people in the area in terms of what they thought about it. As the member for Lanark has pointed out, the four municipalities directly affected with frontage along the 10-mile stretch of river did get together at Hydro’s request to form a liaison committee. And Mr. H. T. Cranston, the mayor of Arnprior, who was the one of the four who was still completely, adamantly, four-square in favour of the dam, wrote on Aug. 31 to the hydro commission to state that the municipalities welcomed most sincerely the decision of Ontario Hydro to construct a generating station on the Madawaska River.

It goes on to say:

“The four municipalities recognize the benefits accruing from the project, namely the formation of a new lake with all its recreational possibilities, the levelling of the fluctuations of the Madawaska River, the increase in employment in the entire area, the added effects of the necessary increase in the service industry, the assessment arising from the further development of the area.”

And then he goes on to say:

“The municipalities recognize their own responsibility to the citizens of the area in that the elected officials of the municipalities cannot abdicate their responsibilities to their citizens but can make certain that the problems that will arise will be settled in a sound businesslike manner.”

Frankly, what that means to me, Mr. Speaker, is that the people in Renfrew South were conned by the sharpies from University Ave. who came up from Hydro. Let’s look at this in detail -- and I will be talking later about the recreational benefits of keeping the valley and developing it as opposed to what will be created by the dam.

“The levelling of the fluctuations of the Madawaska River” -- well that’s open to some dispute too, because it is clear that the level of the new reservoir may also vary by as much as 2 ft a day.

“The increase in employment in the entire area” -- you know, one of the almost curious things about this is that since it is peaking power that is to be created for the grid, there will be no particular advantage to Arnprior and surrounding communities in terms of cheaper power to provide to industry. And since the plant will be run by remote control from the generating station on the Ottawa River, I think, there will not be a single fulltime permanent job created as a result of this project once the dam is actually built.

The people in the area have been told repeatedly that a great amount of the employment will be done locally, that 75 per cent of the jobs will come locally and so on. However, if that is the case, they have not seen the results so far.

I spoke the other week with the manager of the Canada Manpower Centre in Arnprior, and I said, “Are you getting the jobs for the project?” He said, “No, they are being handled by the unions. The unions are giving priority to their unemployed members from other parts of the province. We are having to tell people locally who want jobs that they are going to train up on particular skills and that may take some time and because of the risks of not even then getting a job we really are not encouraging them wildly to do it.”

Mr. Yakabuski: Pay exorbitant union dues.

Mr. Cassidy: Wait a minute. Hydro says that 75 per cent of the jobs will be provided locally, but when you get down to it you find that no arrangements have been made by Hydro, either through discussions with the unions, through discussions with the local Manpower centre or through discussions with the government in order to ensure that that particular promise is carried out. It is simply a dream. It is simply a matter of a wish which is never fulfilled, because Hydro knows the government has never done anything to actually carry it out. So therefore the bulk of the jobs are being filled by people from other areas than Renfrew county.

There is, in fact, as anybody who knows the way in which these things work, a travelling force of skilled, competent men who make their living on heavy construction projects such as this one. Some of them may be at work in the Bruce right now, and when work tails off there a bit and work picks up in the Madawaska, they will look for work up there.

A number of them worked up at Lower Notch, on the generating station on the Montreal River. Some of them I believe worked out at Nanticoke and so on. They are skilled, they are known to the contractors, they are competent, able men. I don’t even particularly object to their being hired. What I do object to though, is Hydro giving promises to local people in order to try and get their consent and support, and then in fact not fulfilling them.

In fact, if you will, it was a misrepresentation by Hydro that 75 per cent of the jobs would be filled locally. It is one of a number that have been carried out by Hydro over the course of this whole affair, which is one of the reasons as I stated before, why I feel rather resentful to having Hydro charge me with misrepresentation when I have done my best to stick to the information and facts that have been provided and when Hydro has consistently misrepresented information in order to try and bull ahead with this particular project.

The other point to be raised about the liaison committee, Mr. Speaker, is that it is fair to say that they went along when Hydro said, “Look, let’s just keep it very chummy, please. We don’t want the information to get out. After all we want to bounce ideas off you, knowing that it is going to be secure and confidential. You wouldn’t like the hoi polloi to know what all this is about, would you?” I’m afraid that the reeves and mayor said, “Yes, we agree” and they went along with that.

They did, to their credit, propose that Hydro provide funds for the municipalities affected to hire engineering help so that they could independently assess the proposals being made by Hydro. Hydro, true to its big brother image, said, “No. Despite the fact that we are spending $60 million to $80 million on this project we can’t find $20,000 in order to give you the services of a consultant for 50 or 100 days a year, or we can’t find whatever it would cost to let you hire somebody and leave them work full-time on your behalf in order that you are adequately prepared to come and discuss the problems with Hydro” -- with all of the resources that it had at its command.

It simply said, “Look, if you have a problem and you don’t have the answer, come to us.” A statement which is equivalent to the boss, who when challenged by his workers, says, “Look, my door is always open” and it is with equal amount of benefit.

They were refused in that and they didn’t go on. Mr. Speaker, Mayor Cranston has been a supporter of the project from the beginning. He wrote this letter on behalf of Hydro. Hydro then assumed apparently that if the mayor approved then everybody in the area approved. In fact, when I went to check I found out that the township of Pakenham has never received any formal kind of communication from Hydro asking for the township’s consent. The council has never discussed or accepted any motion or bylaw in regard to the dam project.

The township of McNab has no record of formal approval ever being requested by Ontario Hydro or given for the project. Lanark county council has taken no part in discussions and decisions concerning the dam.

The regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton -- well, in fact, they requested of the province that representatives of the original municipality take part in some of the discussions, specifically the task force on recreational possibilities. And had that taken place, Mr. Speaker, it may be that the regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton might have woken up to the fact that a prime recreational resource, 45 minutes’ drive from downtown Ottawa, was being squandered by Hydro, and that there was no reason for it.

But, at any rate, there was some discussion with the task force and nothing more; at no time was the regional municipality asked for nor did it give its approval.

The county of Renfrew dredged up one reference to the dam, which says that in June of 1972 the committee of ARDA intended to discuss the Hydro development at Arnprior at its subsequent meeting, but there is no further discussion recorded in the minutes.

Around about the same time, in fact, there was an expression of concern from Warden George Matheson of the county of Renfrew, who was saying to Mayor Cranston that, “Look, the priorities right now are the dam first, the Highway 417 bypass around Arnprior second -- but delayed until 1977 -- and the new Highway 17 bridge into downtown Arnprior third.” And he was saying to the mayor, “Look, don’t you think those priorities ought to be changed about?” That may have had some response because, in fact, the priorities were subsequently changed about.

That’s the amount of local involvement, Mr. Speaker. One meeting to announce the project; one committee meeting in private; one meeting with the Minister of Energy in January of this year -- and I’ll talk about that a bit later.

I want to go back a bit though to this document that the member for Simcoe Centre had sent me about the alternatives, because this is the fullest explanation of the alternatives that were considered before Hydro undertook to build this particular dam. And the importance of this is that at no time have I been able to establish that any further or deeper study of the alternatives was actually carried out.

The report to the senior Hydro people states that the following measures were investigated to reduce the effective flow variation in the lower Madawaska River from Clay Bank to the Ottawa River. One was to purchase or obtain easements on river frontages; that is, that Hydro would buy the river frontage that was affected on both sides of the river. The cost was estimated at $1.2 million if they had bought some land and bought the rest as easements; or $2 million for buying all of the land. Hydro states:

“Neither of these alternatives was considered a satisfactory solution to the problem if, in fact, it was even possible to obtain all the river frontage. We would expect to continue to receive complaints about a disregard for the environment.”

And that’s that point again -- that Hydro reacted to some kind of anticipated complaints, when elsewhere in the province it won’t even listen in situations of gross disregard for the environment. And it says that it might not be possible to obtain all the river frontage, Mr. Speaker. Now, clearly Hydro has always enjoyed expropriation powers and if it needed to use expropriation to get the river frontage, that was not any substantive kind of objection.

The next proposal was to construct a weir upstream of Waba Creek. That, they say, would reduce the maximum fluctuations in level from 7 ft to 4 ft and raise the minimum water level at a cost of about $900,000. They state that it would be a partial solution to the river level variation problems. And then they go on to elaborate:

“Although it would reduce level changes, it would prevent access up the river by boat and might increase downstream flow variation difficulties. It may also cause difficulties with ice, or be eroded by spring breakup. Further study of resulting river conditions would be required before this alternative could be considered as a partial solution to the existing problems.”

I would point out first, Mr. Speaker, that that weir could be reconstructed every year for far less money than it would cost in interest to maintain the dam that is currently being built. Secondly, that the objections raised to it are objections which are worth balancing against the costs of the $78 million project now under way.

Is it worth $78 million less $900,000 in order to ensure that boats can go along a 10-mile stretch of the river rather than being confined to a four-mile stretch of the river before they have to portage around a weir? Is that particular difficulty for boats so overwhelming that the government has to spend $78 million? I don’t think so, Mr. Speaker.

Downstream, in the two-mile stretch between the dam and the Ottawa River, Hydro originally intended to let boats go right up to the foot of the dam. That was one of the advantages played to the town of Arnprior as one of the reasons it should support the project; apparently that isn’t possible right now because there is a weir there. In fact, a new weir will be constructed because Hydro found that its original intention of lowering the tail race to the level of the Ottawa River just wasn’t feasible. Without even talking about it Hydro has interfered with boat access to the foot of the dam and made about three or four miles of river front between the weir and the dam inaccessible to boats from the Ottawa River.

Fair enough; it was a decision which was obviously economically inevitable but it didn’t seem to matter to Hydro that boats were being cut off from a section of river front there. If that is the case, surely the question of whether or not boats had the full run of a 10-mile stretch of the river upstream in an area which has good boating access, particularly on the Ottawa River, could not or should not have been overwhelming.

There has been no further study, to my knowledge, of the resulting river conditions which would ensue if the weir were to be built instead of a dam. They talk about the possibility of reducing the peak operation at Stewartville in order to reduce the degree of fluctuation in water levels and to raise the minimum water level in the area of cottages downstream of Clay Bank.

The need to raise the water level for the cottages would be obviated if the cottages were not there. In other words, if one buys up the cottages as Hydro has done one doesn’t need to worry about their needs for recreational swimming and access. As far as the farmers, hikers, day-trippers and so on are concerned they are a rather different problem from the cottagers. At any rate, they state that as far as the possibility of reducing the peaking of the Stewartville plant is concerned none of the alternatives there would solve the problem completely and all the arrangements, of course, would reduce the peaking potential of the Madawaska system. They talk about the ability to bring all the capacity of the Madawaska River into full operation in a short period of time, as something which can be used to displace the need for gas or steam turbines in the Ontario or other systems.

Mr. E. W. Martel (Sudbury East): The member for Renfrew South is going to support them, isn’t he?

Mr. Cassidy: I don’t know. I think the member for Renfrew South has been notoriously quiet on this particular subject. I don’t think he has really involved himself with the people there. Possibly it will be not forgotten at the next election that when there was a local issue which affected the people of Renfrew county, particularly the farmers with whom the member has been so close -- they are very disillusioned with the member for Renfrew South, Mr. Speaker. Not only has the member not been around very often, he has not said a word -- he has not even had the guts to come out and say publicly, if he believes it, that he thinks Hydro is doing the right thing and he agrees with Hydro completely and to say that he thinks the farmers in the area are full of manure or some other substance.

If he really believes that, he ought to say it but the people in the area of Arnprior, for example --

Mr. Yakabuski: I have made my views known.

Mr. Cassidy: He has?

Mr. Yakabuski: I think I have made my views known.

Mr. Cassidy: I haven’t heard them very loudly and neither have the people in the area.

An hon. member: It is amazing how the member worries about him getting re-elected.

Mr. Cassidy: I can tell the members that the membership of the NDP in Arnprior increased by 800 per cent in the last two weeks and it was directly as a result of the member for Renfrew South.

Mr. J. A. Taylor (Prince Edward-Lennox): Eight members.

Mr. Cassidy: We are going up from there, too.

Mr. Martel: That’s called progress. We used to have only two seats in this Legislature.

Mr. Cassidy: That’s right.

An hon. member: That sounds like those 10 seats the member for Scarborough West --

Mr. Cassidy: If I can comment on that, Mr. Speaker. There is a lot of eastern Ontario where we haven’t had many members until now and it is actions by the government and actions by members like the member for Renfrew South which are alerting people to the fact that they simply cannot get political change or political action with their present representation. They very definitely need a change --

Mr. Yakabuski: The member’s mouth will not get anyone elected.

Mr. Cassidy: What is that?

Mr. Yakabuski: The member has a big mouth. That is all.

Mr. Martel: Don’t get personal.

Mr. F. Laughren (Nickel Belt): Don’t get personal.

Mr. Yakabuski: The member’s big mouth!

Mr. Laughren: Don’t get personal.

Mr. Yakabuski: Just keep it up and we are all safe.

Mr. Cassidy: Okay.

Mr. Martel: That is what Gaston used to say.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): I never heard him say anything.

Mr. Martel: Gaston used to say that, too.

Mr. Yakabuski: The member is in real trouble right now where he is.

Mr. Cassidy: Is that right? Well if the member thinks so.

Mr. Martel: The Tories have had it.

Mr. Cassidy: The Tories have had the course.

Mr. Yakabuski: Most members live in their riding. But not the member for Ottawa Centre, he lives on Toronto Island.

Mr. Cassidy: Yes?

Mr. Yakabuski: Yes; it is true.

Mr. Cassidy: Sure, I know. I live in my riding, too. I just spend a lot of time around here.

I would point out, Mr. Speaker, that the Tories have had three search committees working to find a candidate to oppose me in 1975. They haven’t found any up until now and they will be very happy to consider the application of the present member for Renfrew South.

Mr. Martel: Stay there; the member better stay where he is.

Mr. Yakabuski: The way the member marches all around the province, he won’t even hold his seat.

Mr. Cassidy: Well, Mr. Speaker, just let me go on with this document, which is obviously a key document in the whole plan of Hydro, at least in so far as information which is available to senior Hydro people and the government for making a decision and for justifying a decision once it has been made is concerned. It says toward the end that the Ministry of Transportation and Communications is planning a new limited-access highway right over the proposed site of the Arnprior dam and may pre-empt Hydro use of the site unless this project is committed now.

Well you have to picture to yourself, Mr. Speaker, a bunch of Hydro engineers who came out of university after the war, had never worked for anybody else but Hydro and for 25 years their job has been to build dams. They are nearing retirement right now, and as well Hydro has told them: “Look, we have given up building dams, we are going to be going nuclear.”

This was in the late Sixties, early Seventies. The hydraulic programme had come to an end; I think that is being reconsidered now in view of changes in the energy economy, but nevertheless at the time that the project was being considered it was felt that hydraulic projects had come to an end. The engineering team in Hydro that had built so many dams was being disbanded. That was one of the reasons why Acres was involved in the engineering up at Lower Notch, and I guess that was why they were called in to engineer the project at Arnprior as well.

So here are these guys who want to build another dam. It is in their life-blood and they find out that the site may be pre-empted, by highway engineers of all people, and that they may not get to build their dam because there is not another site on which to build a generating dam around there. So because the transportation people are proposing a $1 million bridge they rush in and say: “Come on now, we had better move quickly; and they commit themselves to a $78 million dam in order to keep Transportation and Communications from building a $1 million bridge; not thinking that maybe Transportation and Communications could be induced to spend $1 1/4 million to slightly relocate their bridge so that Hydro would still have the option of the dam at some future date.

Then they say: “If we don’t proceed now with the Arnprior generating station and subsequently want to develop the Arnprior project, then the CPR line will have to be rerouted and a new highway cloverleaf will be required; and there may be difficulties in building the dam under or adjacent to the new highway bridge.”

Well, for the sake of a cloverleaf, for the sake of having to fit the dam under the bridge, and for the sake of relocating the CPR, they decided they had better rush ahead. It so happens, Mr. Speaker, that they found that they have to relocate the CPR anyway; in fact their financial estimate includes about an extra $1 million or $2 million for further relocation of the CPR, because they found that they had to move it further than they had initially --

Mr. Martel: They are moving it to Barry’s Bay.

Mr. Cassidy: That is right; well that is not a bad idea.

Then they stated that Transportation and Communications was also planning to replace the bridge over the lower Madawaska where Highway 17 now goes into the town of Arnprior. “If Hydro wanted”, and I quote, “to subsequently widen the discharge channel from the Arnprior dam, this bridge would have to be replaced again at an estimated cost of $250,000.”

In other words, Mr. Speaker, if Hydro delayed making a decision about the dam and MTC rebuilt the bridge, then it would cost an extra quarter of a million dollars to lengthen the bridge to get it over the new tail race that would have to be built below the dam. Those are hardly compelling reasons for going ahead.

Well, let’s go on. In their conclusion they say that:

“The construction of the generating station would eliminate a number of problems and complaints mostly anticipated due to water level variations of the lower Madawaska. It would provide additional peaking energy.” [Yes it would -- but at grossly uneconomic cost.] “It has been conclude” [by Hydro people] “that if Arnprior is not constructed then restrictions in peaking operation of Stewartville will be required.” [And that, Mr. Speaker, is the statement that nowhere is proved].

“In addition, the project would provide 10 to 15 miles of shoreline on a man-made lake which would be suitable for cottages, sailing, boating and fishing. This facility should be of significant value to local residents and to the city of Arnprior.”

The shoreline is actually about 48 miles. The estimate is that something like 90 or 95 per cent of it is unsuitable for cottages and that the recreational demands to be foreseen in the area up until the turn of the century are not large enough to justify more than one campsite there. There are many areas along the Ottawa River nearby which are equally pleasant and where a new campsite of that size, or greater, could easily be built.

Mr. Speaker, let me try and get up to date now on some of the chronology. This became an issue in the Legislature I think about last November and from the very beginning the attitude of the government on this whole question of the Arnprior dam has been to seek to deny information, or to seek to cover up, or to seek to simply refuse to recognize the statements that are being made from this side of the House, both from the New Democratic Party and also on occasion from the Liberal Party. In fact, the Minister of Energy has, from the very beginning, taken the attitude of stonewalling. He will never see anything wrong with the project. And may I say that while the member from -- Simcoe North is it? --

Mr. Taylor: Centre (Mr. Evans).

Mr. Cassidy: Centre, I am sorry -- was up until the end of January very co-operative in providing information, he, too, at no time was willing to recognize that there might be anything wrong with the particular project. If anything, one might say that they, too, have been conned by the sharpies from University Ave., the same sharpies that gave us the Gerhard Moog Canada Centre.

Mr. Martel: That is why George Gathercole is singing his swan song.

Mr. Cassidy: And it’s a very long swan song, may I say. One would wish, after what I have learned from this, that Mr. Gathercole would take his flight a bit sooner. It’s the only argument I can think of why we should have a second chamber in this particular province; it would be to find a safe resting place for people the likes of Mr. Gathercole who have outlived their usefulness.

Mr. Martel: Hear, hear. I support that.

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, the first questions about the dam that I can find here are some questions that were filed by the member for Downsview (Mr. Singer), in fact, that specifically requested details of the first contract and the value of the first contract, which was not at that point even available from Hydro. Because Hydro, believe it or not, in 1973 and 1974 had a tendering procedure which came from the dark ages, in which they would not even reveal the value of winning contracts let alone do what every other government agency in this province does -- reveal the value of every tender sub- mitted and the names of all the bidders. That’s how bad the tendering procedure of Ontario Hydro was. It was quite autocratic in fact.

At any rate, on request, that information was given, justified I think by the fact that there had been a negotiated contract with Pitts, given on the advice of Pitts’ corporate relative Acres, who were the engineering consultants to Hydro. The question was also asked, though, whether the Minister of Energy or Hydro would release the unit prices in that first contract. It seemed like a reasonable kind of thing to do, in view of the fact that Pitts would obviously be bidding on the second contract and that it would know both its own costs in carrying out the first contract and also the unit prices in its successful bid, and that information was denied to every other bidder, but Hydro didn’t see anything wrong with that and neither did the minister.

I asked whether the minister could explain why Ontario Hydro was continuing to favour Pitts by making it the only contractor on the subsequent contract privy to the detailed information gained on the first contract.

The Minister of Energy said that those allegations of mine were simply not correct. Well, I am afraid that the statement by the minister was simply not correct.

Mr. Martel: The ministers nose is out to here.

Mr. Taylor: He is the most correct person in the House.

Mr. Cassidy: I suspect that my statement is as unparliamentary as the statement made by the minister -- only I happen to be right and he happens to be wrong.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Cassidy: It’s clear that Hydro was very embarrassed about this from the beginning, and in early January there suddenly came the revelation from Hydro of not only the names of the people who had been invited to bid on the second contract of the dam, which was for about $9 million or $10 million, but also, for the first time in the history of Hydro, the amounts of the bids were revealed. Believe it or not, Pitts had the inside track, as we had predicted, and its bid was substantially below the bids of the other firms that had been invited to bid.

Mr. Yakabuski: Why doesn’t the member read out those bids? Read out the figures on those bids. Tell the whole story. The member says “substantially,” but it was $7 million lower than the high bidder.

Mr. Cassidy: What?

Mr. Yakabuski: Approximately $7 million lower than the high bidder.

Mr. Martel: That’s what he said. That’s substantial.

Mr. Yakabuski: That’s a lot of know-how -- $7 million worth. That’s a lot of inside track.

Mr. Cassidy: If I may read the bids --

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Cassidy: I’m glad to know, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. member for Renfrew South is finally getting engaged in the Arnprior dam issue for the first time in his life.

Mr. Yakabuski: Just tell the whole story; don’t twist the facts.

Mr. Cassidy: The lowest bid received was tendered by C. A. Pitts of Toronto at $9.4 million. You will recall, Mr. Speaker, that Pitts had knowledge of the unit prices of the first contract --

Mr. Yakabuski: What was the highest?

Mr. Cassidy: -- and had knowledge of its actual cost, because it had been given what amounted to a cost-plus tender on the first job, in which it was able to settle the price with Hydro, some six or eight months I think it was, after it moved its equipment onto the site.

The second lowest bid was from Armbro Materials and Construction Ltd. of Brampton, $11.9 million; McAlpine of Rexdale, $12.7 million; then they go up to Peter Kiewit of Weston, $16.7 million. Pitts’ bid was $2.5 million below that of the next lowest bidder.

The hon. member for Renfrew South would probably say that it made eminent sense for Pitts to be chosen in view of that bid. What I’m suggesting is that in government and in tendering, where there are conflict-of-interest situations, these must be shown to be non- existent. It’s a matter of being seen to be free from conflict of interest, as well as being free of conflict of interest.

I’ve had some very angry reactions from people who work for the Acres consulting firm, saying: “Look, I’ve been involved in this job. I wasn’t influenced by the fact that people on the board of my parent company sit on a board with Mr. Cooper of Pitts. What do you mean that my integrity is being involved? I am free from it.”

The answer though, Mr. Speaker, is very simply that they’re not free from the appearance of it so long as there is a corporate link. And you certainly, Mr. Speaker, or the hon. member for Simcoe Centre or the hon. member for Renfrew South, would not tolerate learning that the Deputy Minister of Government Services, for example, was involved in the tendering of contracts to a firm with which he had a corporate link -- where he or his wife was a director or there was some other kind of direct link between him and that firm.

The sensible, logical, established thing to have done in this particular case would have been for Acres to say to Hydro: “Look, we cannot assess these bids because of a conflict of interest. Therefore, we ask you to either get your own staff or another consultant to come in to decide which bid should be accepted.” That would have cost $5,000 or $10,000, and it would have eliminated the appearance of conflict of interest, which is just one of the problems that has been involved. Hydro was very embarrassed, though, because of the fact that it did -- and it showed it by revealing these figures for the first time.

Hydro obviously also went along with the conflict-of-interest situation -- they didn’t see anything wrong, and the minister apparently has not seen anything particularly wrong.

The next round in this, Mr. Speaker, was the Minister of Energy’s visit to Arnprior; the hon. member for Renfrew South and the hon. member for Lanark, I think were both present. As it happened, I was able to get up; and, as it happened too, it was faithfully recorded in the Globe and Mail. I must say that the reaction of the people in the area was, to put it mildly, very negative.

Here they had been trying since June of the previous year, when Reeve Stewart of Pakenham township first wrote to the Minister of Energy, to get somebody senior in government up to Arnprior to look at the project, to look at the very serious objections, to reconsider it and to decide whether or not it should be pulled back. That’s what the people in the area wanted. They were concerned. About 80 or 90 of them gathered in the hall and the Minister of Energy said: The dam will go ahead no matter what. He didn’t just say it, Mr. Speaker; I mean to say the reaction of the local press was that the minister had struck out on that particular occasion.

My own respect for the minister went down very substantially on that particular occasion, because the rather endearing arrogance that I had known of him, when he was the Treasurer and when he was the Pooh-Bah of the government, striding over an enormous area of government, seemed to have changed to a petty autocracy in which he would brook no criticism and brook no conflicting opinions.

He went up to Arnprior, got on a helicopter, wandered around the site by air to have a quick look at it and arrived in the local hall at 10 o’clock, not to meet with the farmers but to hold a press conference. During the course of the press conference, Mr. Speaker, he let it be known that Hydro had let the contract for the dam to Pitts; and during the course of the press conference as well he made it clear that he was not there to reconsider the project, he was simply there to have a look around and nothing else.

In fact, the CP wires carried the report of Hydro’s award of that contract, Mr. Speaker. It reached me and other people in the area by telephone midway through the subsequent meeting between the minister and 80 or 90 or 100 angry farmers, towns- people and others from that particular area. By the end of the day, Mr. Speaker, the heavy equipment, which Pitts had put just off the site in the hope of getting the new contract, was rolling back in to recommence work on the $9.4 million award that it had that day.

Mr. Martel: Just as though they had never left,

Mr. Cassidy: That, Mr. Speaker, was the way in which this particular government was willing to listen to the people of Renfrew on that particular occasion in connection with the Arnprior dam project. That is a height of arrogance such as I’ve never seen, to go in to tell the press rather than listening to the people first, to have the announcement made midway through the meeting and then to have the trucks and the bulldozers rolling back on the site as the people are leaving, unhappily, to go to their homes.

He wouldn’t even stay for lunch; and it was a very good lunch, Mr. Speaker. At any rate, it was very clear that the whole thing was a cut-and-dried affair,

I had a very curious document that came to me from a broker down on Bay St. It was one of these investment reports on C.A, Pitts,

Hon. S. B. Handleman (Minister of Housing): He sent one to the member?

Mr. Cassidy: I think I asked for it. He wouldn’t have sent it to me, naturally.

But what it said was: “C.A. Pitts; good company; lots of profits ahead; doing very well; increase in workload;” and so forth. Then when you got into the details, there they had $30 million of work listed for C.A. Pitts on the Arnprior dam project. This was months before the tenders had even been called for the second phase of that particular contract.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: A pretty good fore- caster.

Mr. Cassidy: A pretty good forecaster, that’s right.

Mr. Martel: Especially if the contract had already been signed.

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, that was the last attempt that I know for Hydro to come clean --

Mr. Martel: Is Pitts in the Tory party?

Mr. Cassidy: Or for the Minister of Energy to come clean with people in the area. At that meeting, the minister, Mr. Jackson and the other people from Hydro kept insisting it was a matter of compensation and nothing else. Yet, in fact, a number of the farmers got up and made it clear they wanted to keep their farms first. If they couldn’t keep their farms, then they would argue for good compensation, but they wanted to keep their farms. The member for Renfrew South, I think, knows that.

I was concerned, Mr. Speaker. By this time I had collected a fair amount of information which indicated to me that at no time had Hydro done adequate studies to assess the alternatives to building the $78-million dam; and in view of the concern of the farmers in the area over the loss of their farmland, in view of the loss of recreational potential of the valley, and in view of the excess expenditures which would have the effect of driving up unnecessarily our Hydro rates across the province, that the whole project ought to be reconsidered.

In the Legislature and through other means I was asking the government to stop construction and to hold a full public inquiry to see what the alternatives were, and we were also seeking as much information as possible to see what the alternatives were.

Around this time, I wrote a detailed letter about the project to the Minister of Energy. I sent a copy to Hydro and I sent copies to the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Stewart) because farmers were concerned; to the Minister of Labour (Mr. Guindon) because workers in eastern Ontario weren’t getting the jobs; and to the Minister of Industry and Tourism because he is also the minister responsible for eastern Ontario. I could see there would be more advantage in spending $50 million in economic development than in building a dam that wouldn’t create any jobs after it was built. In other words, the letter had fairly wide currency.

I also sought a meeting with senior people from Hydro in order to discuss statements I had made in the letter. By this time it began to appear to me, and in fact I had had information from Hydro, that the power coming out of this project was going to cost something like 50 mills a kilowatt hour. A mill is one-thousandth of a dollar or a tenth of a cent. For the sake of comparison, the revenue that Hydro gets from its industrial and municipal consumers -- municipal utilities -- for the power it sells to them is between seven and about nine or 9.5 mills. In other words, the power coming out of this project was going to cost anyone from five to seven times the price at which Hydro actually sells its power to retailers and to industrial consumers.

On the face of it, something might be wrong. At the very least, in view of the marginal prospects of the project, one deserved better than to be fobbed off with bland assurances such as we had from the Premier today that Hydro really knew what it was doing. All of the evidence indicated that Hydro didn’t know what it was doing, that it was hell-bent on building the dam and not hell-bent on looking at all the alternatives to see whether something couldn’t be done much more cheaply in order to resolve erosion problems on the river to the satisfaction of the people concerned, while still preserving the peaking use of the dam upstream.

Then there was a very funny kind of succession of things where the chairman, Mr. Gathercole, said: “Yes, of course, you can meet and we will have our technical people there. All of your difficulties can be explained and sorted out.” I was to get it sorted out from the member for Simcoe Centre’s office at such and such time on such and such a date, early in February; around Feb. 3, 4 or 5, I can’t remember. That meeting was set, was confirmed by letter and then was cancelled at the last minute. Not only was it cancelled, but a week or so later when my secretary phoned the member’s office to find out whether they had managed to get their people together for the subsequent meeting that had been agreed upon, she learned directly from the member for Simcoe Centre that he hadn’t been aware of it, or wanted to continue the idea of the meeting.

Finally, once that one was resolved, and there was certainly an implication that Hydro was doing its best not to meet, on Feb. 25 I think it was -- no, it was a bit earlier than that, around Feb. 24 or 23 -- I was invited down to the member’s office to meet, not with Mr. Gathercole because he didn’t want to get involved -- he only started the thing off and he left it to other people to pick up the pieces -- but, with the now president of Hydro, Mr. Gordon; with the member for Simcoe Centre; with a Mr. Morrison, director of generation projects; and with the man who has been most intimately involved with this particular project, Mr. Jackson, Mr. Morrison’s boss; and with two or three other people who were concerned with property and public relations.

I don’t want to go into that meeting in any detail. In fact I would wish that everybody involved could just forget that meeting, because frankly it was a fiasco. It was a disaster.

I had sent material to Hydro and said, in effect: “Can you comment on this, please?” We arrived and I said: “What are your comments?” And they said: “Oh, we didn’t bring your letter to the meeting. We will go and get it.”

Then when we had the five or six-page letter, Mr. Morrison said: “You have been misrepresenting what we are doing. You say you don’t know whether it is for erosion control or for generation of electricity. In fact it is for both.” So I said: “I don’t know which it is for. Is it for erosion control or is it for electricity;” because I hadn’t been very clear about that?

At no point was it possible to get any substantive answer from Hydro. At no point was there any effort by Hydro to explain this craziness that power was going to cost 50 mills per kilowatt hour from this particular project, according to figures that had been sent to me by Mr. Gathercole. At one point they said: “Look those figures are irrelevant, here are our figures” -- and proffered figures in a form which I’m afraid is not possible for a layman to understand unless the working papers are provided.

I was told that they didn’t want to give information because it wasn’t possible for a layman to understand. Yet we live in a system of government which says that lay people in the Legislature and in the cabinet will make the decisions on the advice of the experts; and I would have thought that applies to Hydro as much as it applies to other subjects. Certainly one notices that a number of lay people have been appointed to the board of directors of the Hydro corporation, because that tradition applies within business and within public corporations as well as within politics and within private business.

Having been told I was misrepresenting things, I was then told by Mr. Morrison that he should take legal action against me; he was really very up tight. At the very end of the meeting, Mr. Speaker, the president, Mr. Gordon, indicated that he supported the comments that had been made by this particular rather foolish senior executive of Hydro.

Over an hour-and-three-quarters all I could gather was that Hydro didn’t have any studies of any depth on the present or the future course of erosion along this stretch of the Madawaska. There are the erosion problems of the dam reservoir -- and that’s pretty important. If you are going to build a dam to solve one erosion problem by drowning it, you ought to know whether the sensitive marine or Leda clay which surrounds the reservoir will still be subject to erosion, and if so by how much.

Now the reports that have come in indicate generally that there will still be stability problems. There will be an improvement from the present erosion problems, okay; but by how much nobody knows, because the studies haven’t been done. They just say: “Don’t worry, boys, it is going to be better; and if it isn’t better we can spend a bit more money to stabilize the banks of the new reservoir.”

At one point Hydro referred to this as being a final solution to the erosion problems. But more recently they indicated that it is only a partial solution, that the lake level will fluctuate by up to two ft a day. Some of the people admit that there may be wave action, which will add to erosion.

There will still be some erosion problems, but there is no detailed study about what those erosion problems might be. There is no model of what would have happened in the way of erosion if you leave the river as it stands, or with some minor improvements. There is no model of what that would be, and there is nothing about the costs and benefits of alternative schemes of river management.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I believe the reason Hydro was covering up right now and refusing to present any further documents is simply because they haven’t got them -- they don’t exist. Because it is a political dam. It was brought in to re-elect the member for Renfrew South. They didn’t do --

Mr. Yakabuski: That’s a lot of “you know what.”

An hon. member: What!

Mr. Cassidy: They didn’t do their homework.

Mr. Martel: It is called “oompah.”

Mr. Cassidy: That is right.

Mr. Yakabuski: That is just stupid. The member for Ottawa Centre just doesn’t know the facts.

Mr. Cassidy: I hope the member for Renfrew South then, who appears to know the facts, will try and elucidate to the Legislature during the course of this Throne Speech debate.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: How can he be elected if nobody is in favour of it?

Mr. Cassidy: Well, I call on Hydro and the government and the member for Renfrew South to get up in this Legislature and provide evidence that this is not a political dam. Because all of the evidence that we’ve had so far indicates --

Mr. Yakabuski: It is not a political dam.

Mr. Cassidy: -- that since it is not good for anything else, Mr. Speaker, it must be for political reasons.

An hon. member: The vote got him elected.

Mr. Cassidy: Another thing is, though -- look, I’m a noisy kind of individual as a politician.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Martel: That’s better than some of the deadweight over there.

Mr. Cassidy: On occasion I get a bit nasty with the members opposite, the ministers and people like that. If somebody gets angry with me, Mr. Speaker, in this Legislature for example, that’s fair enough. If somebody gets angry with me as a private citizen, that’s fair enough. But it raises certain questions in my mind when in the presence and with the support of the now president of a large public corporation, a senior executive threatens a member of this Legislature with legal action if he continues to voice criticism of a rather controversial decision or set of decisions by Hydro. It seems to me that is a deliberate attempt to muzzle this Legislature.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: A member is privileged inside the House. Privilege ends when a member walks out the door.

Mr. Cassidy: It’s a matter of concern for the member for Carleton, the member for Renfrew South, the new parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Agriculture and Food and everybody else on the government side of the Legislature as well as people in the Liberal Party and in my party. When people in a government agency seek to threaten legal action against one member of the Legislature, the rights and privileges of all members of the Legislature are affected.

Mr. Martel: That was Ross Shouldice, the Tory bagman.

Mr. Cassidy: It’s an aspect, though, Mr. Speaker, of the very defensive way in which Hydro has reacted to the criticism of all this.

Mr. Yakabuski: Maybe if we had the other side of the story, the member would be defensive.

Mr. Martel: Why doesn’t that member give the other side of the story?

Mr. Cassidy: I asked Mr. Morrison --

Mr. Yakabuski: The other side of the story is that perhaps legal action should have been taken against the member for Ottawa Centre.

Mr. Martel: Then stand up and give it to us.

Mr. Cassidy: All right; I would suggest the member for Renfrew South join in this debate. I have asked the people from Hydro; okay, the member says I am misrepresenting. Give me chapter and verse; I have not had chapter and verse.

They could’ve written me a letter if they felt like it; they could’ve told me in my presence at that particular meeting. I have not had it. I have done my best to try to stick to the facts that are available on the public record; or where I have had to work out facts and figures on my own, to indicate and to provide to those who are interested the means by which it was arrived at.

Mr. Speaker, in this affair not only has Hydro reacted very defensively but also the government has. It was during the course of that meeting that I asked for an engineering feasibility study on the Arnprior dam which had been prepared in July, 1970, for Hydro. I have a letter from Mr. Evans in response to a letter of mine concerning that feasibility study. I said: “Could I please have any overall feasibility studies?” Through some mistake that came through to him as, “Could I have a regional feasibility study?” He was puzzled by that; I am puzzled by it. Anyway he said, “We haven’t got that, but we do have the following studies: Two technical; “Community Impact;” “Environmental Impact”; and “Development Engineering.” He said: “You can have any one of them if you ask.”

I subsequently asked. I thought that by accident the engineering study didn’t come to me and I say that quite honestly to the member for Simcoe Centre. I thought it was purely by accident that the engineering study did not come to me at the time of the initial request. At any rate, I phoned up in early February to say: “I forgot to get this or you forgot to send it to me. Can I please have it. I was told I would get it when I would go over to the meeting with Mr. Evans.

I asked for it at that time. I was told by Mr. Gordon himself that I had had all the information I was going to have and he was damned if I was going to get any more. That, of course, was the advice he gave to the Minister of Energy as well, that no further information should be given.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): That’s not very civil.

Mr. Cassidy: That’s not very civil and it suggested that the engineering study is a much more important document than, in fact, I thought. The other documents I have had --

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Cassidy: -- indicate inadequate study and juvenile or puerile thinking as in the quote from the environmental study I read a few minutes ago. The only thing they indicate really is that Hydro didn’t do any adequate homework.

Maybe the engineering study is being suppressed by the government because it exposes the fact that there were alternatives which were rejected by Hydro because they would have cost only $1 million or $2 million and wouldn’t have led to the re-election of the member for Renfrew South.

Mr. L. Maeck (Parry Sound): As soon as the NDP wins the next election, the member will be able to get that stopped.

Mr. Cassidy: That’s right. I see, the member doesn’t think it should happen now? Let him think about it.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Cassidy: I went and actually had an Interview with the then Provincial Secretary for Resources Development.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Cassidy: -- in order to talk about this particular project. This was as a follow-up to the letter. I thought that since he had announced the project in 1972, he still might be involved in it; but as we know the then Provincial Secretary for Resources Development hasn’t been involved in very much. I had an hour’s interview with him in his very pleasant office here in this building, at the end of which he said he was sorry but he could not get involved in the questions being raised by the farmers about the Arnprior dam because they owned land that would be flooded by Hydro and therefore, said he, they had a conflict of interest.

He would not get involved because the farmers who were objecting had a conflict of interest. This is like suggesting that the government will never listen to the labour movement about labour legislation because obviously workers have got a conflict of interest in talking about labour legislation. I suppose the government won’t listen to tenants in talking about landlord and tenant law because tenants have a conflict of interest.

Mr. Martel: They listen to doctors, though.

Mr. Cassidy: They listen to doctors, that’s right. Of course it doesn’t make sense; it’s totally inane.

Then he went on to say: “But of course, if you had a broker who was concerned about the bond ratings for Hydro or some fellow from the University of Toronto who knows what our experts know, then we’ll listen to him.” But he wouldn’t listen to people who were directly involved.

Mr. Speaker, the response from the other members was most illuminating. The Minister of Agriculture and Food didn’t want to go to the defence of his own people and he simply said he had forwarded copies of my correspondence to the member for Simcoe Centre. The Minister of Labour said he had referred it to the member for Simcoe Centre, and his letter was dated a day later than the letter from the Minister of Agriculture and Food The Minister of Energy has sent my correspondence to him about this affair to the member for Simcoe Centre. The Minister of Industry and Tourism said the facts would be thoroughly reviewed. He advised that as recently as Feb. 12 a meeting had been held on the subject and the contents of my letter were taken into consideration.

Clearly there was a joint decision by people in the cabinet who might have been involved that they were simply going to join in the cover-up by not replying and by not looking into the facts, but by taking the words and opinions of the member for Simcoe Centre and of the people from Hydro as gospel. So as a consequence, among other things there has been no examination by those people, those ministers, in view of the valid questions raised about the Arnprior project. Further information has been suppressed by the government as far as members of the Legislature are concerned. That was confirmed today after a paean of praise to Hydro by the Premier himself. It appears that the government has simply taken the view that we shouldn’t have the facts.

Well now what’s curious about that, Mr. Speaker, is the fact that the flow of information has not been cut off completely. In fact, on one hand we had the Minister of Energy speaking to the municipal electrical association a while ago about the Arnprior dam and saying that he had reviewed the facts and found that Hydro has not failed to be guided by public policy and therefore he had concluded it would be inappropriate to interfere. If any damage existed to the local farmers, said the minister, then the correct procedure was an appeal to the courts rather than to the ministry. That was the Minister of Energy on March 5.

It was only days later, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Energy, the new Provincial Secretary for Resources Development (Mr. Grossman) and the Minister of Agriculture and Food were holding a meeting with representatives of the Federation of Agriculture. In other words, the minister was not saying privately what he was saying publicly.

During the course of that meeting, I understand, Hydro changed its tune as regards compensation and now the sky is the limit. It has decided under prodding from the Minister of Energy -- who apparently is still interfering, or is involved -- that Hydro will try to buy the farmers out because it simply can’t afford to keep on with the kind of flak it has been receiving on this particular subject.

Not only that, Mr. Speaker, I understand that certain documents from Acres and from Hydro have been given to the Federation of Agriculture concerning the Arnprior dam. I would suggest that is also a matter of concern for members of this Legislature -- if we don’t get the documents, such as this feasibility study, and yet other people get them. I have no objection; I think it’s probably a good thing that that document goes forward to the Federation of Agriculture. What I resent, Mr. Speaker, is the fact that that same information is not being given to the Legislature; that Hydro and that the Minister of Energy and that the whole government are playing games with this Legislature when they are meant to be accountable to the parliament of the Province of Ontario.

Mr. Speaker, let me talk very briefly. I don’t know if I can finish this by 5 o’clock or not; I’ll do my best, though.

Mr. Martel: No, give it to them.

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, I have said that Hydro has misrepresented the situation. Let me give you a few examples, Mr. Speaker. One example is simply the statement that Hydro has had the approval of the local communities, and the fact is that apart from the council of the town of Arnprior that is not the case. It has had a letter from the mayor of Arnprior saying that the other three municipal heads agree, but it has never even asked the other municipalities to be involved.

In an article in Hydro News, Mr. Speaker, Hydro summed up the opposition to the dam by referring to one 86-year-old farmer who didn’t welcome Hydro’s property assessors -- implying that only old fogies, people in their 80s and 90s who were sort of tradition bound, could oppose themselves to progress.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. R. G. Hodgson (Victoria-Haliburton): Oh, come on.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, in this document on the Arnprior power project, which is sent out to every schoolboy or anybody else who inquires about the particular project --

Mr. Yakabuski: Tell the truth now.

Mr. Cassidy: -- Hydro refers --

Mr. Yakabuski: What about the municipal councils? Did they pass resolutions objecting to the project?

Mr. Cassidy: No, they did not pass resolutions, but they --

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Yakabuski: So they did not object. Evidently they approved of the project.

Mr. Cassidy: They have never been asked by Hydro for their opinion and Hydro itself simply said: “Look we want these guys on the committee; and that is it, baby, that is it.”

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Cassidy: The whole public participation in that area by Hydro has been a total disaster. The whole public participation has been a total disaster.

Mr. Yakabuski: Finally, the frustrated Lanark Liberals saw an opportunity to raise hell, it’s that simple. Straight politics.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Cassidy: It is a bunch of farmers who are frustrated because they can’t get justice from this government; and their problems in getting justice --

Mr. Yakabuski: How many of them haven’t reached an agreement?

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Cassidy: Their problems in getting justice from this government are paralleled by farmers in other parts of the province, are paralleled by welfare recipients, are paralleled by tenants, are paralleled by any number of people. The entire population of the north has been trying to get justice from this government for 30 years and hasn’t been able to get it.

Mr. Havrot: Well we have got a comedian in the House.

An hon. member: The member is wasting his time.

Mr. Cassidy: Boy, the hon. member for Timiskaming should wait until we get going on Maple Mountain, because the mistakes they made --

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order; order please.

Mr. Havrot: The member is the biggest mistake one could make.

Mr. Yakabuski: You know, some of his own members fear for his re-election.

Mr. Cassidy: Is that right? Okay; occasionally I fear for it myself.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Cassidy: I will grant to the hon. member there is still a strong Liberal contingent in my riding, but we hope to dispose of them in the next federal election.

Mr. Speaker, since the hon. member for Renfrew South wants to talk about public participation, I want to say that today I was before the Energy Board seeking their permission to --

Mr. Martel: He is not a fighter though, like some people.

Mr. Havrot: Pardon?

Mr. Martel: He is not a fighter like some people.

Mr. Speaker: Order, order.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Mr. Cassidy: At the Energy Board this morning, Mr. Speaker, I presented a motion to submit to the Energy Board a dossier on the Arnprior dam and on the implications of the dam for Hydro’s management procedures and financial policies.

One of the things that came up there was a discussion that was held in the last couple of days of the Hydro hearings, phase one, before the Energy Board, at which time the general manager of Hydro was being questioned by counsel from Pollution Probe. The questioning from counsel for Pollution Probe was on public participation.

And what was said at that time, Mr. Speaker, by the Hydro people, was: “But of course we have a commitment to public participation. We have learned our lesson and for the last two or three years we have been doing it. Look at the Solandt inquiry into the transmission lines. Look at what we are doing up at Nanticoke or other places.” Then the Pollution Probe counsel said: “If that is, the case, why has there been no participation with the Arnprior project?” Right away, Mr. Speaker, counsel for Hydro was on his feet and he said, “I object” --

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Cassidy: He didn’t want it discussed, because Hydro is paranoid about this particular project and it knows of the way in which it has failed with any kind of meaningful public participation.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, in its representation to the Ontario Energy Board, Hydro stated:

“In keeping with its policy of informing or communicating with the public, Ontario Hydro is engaged in holding public meetings to ascertain the views and feelings of local citizens’ groups and municipal officials with regard to the impact which projected facilities might have on particular localities. There is increasing interaction between Hydro and the government and between Hydro and the community in the planning process.”

They talk, in other words, a fairly good game about the way in which they want to encourage public participation.

The chairman of Hydro, on Jan. 18, sent around an outline of its programme for the participation of citizens in the expansion of electric power facilities. He said that Ontario Hydro has pioneered the programme, implying that this has already been under way for some time. The letter states specifically that the procedures were intended to be flexible in their application, that greater participation of the public in planning would occur with respect to those projects in which there was a strong public interest indicated and this would be modified for projects less controversial.

Well I have to ask you first, Mr. Speaker, what project is there in the province right now that could be more controversial among Hydro generating stations than the Arnprior project? Second, where else, on the face of the evidence available so far, is Hydro going to spend so much -- $70 million still to spend -- to get so little in actual return?

If Mr. Gathercole is sincere in stating that the participation by the public will increase in areas where there is great public interest indicated, then clearly Hydro, without pressure from the government, should agree now to suspend the work on the Arnprior dam, to look at the alternatives, to hold an inquiry and to get the local community participating in looking at the alternatives.

Well, Mr. Speaker, when one looks at the brochure they have sent around about procedures for public participation -- and one has to assume this is current Hydro policy -- one finds that after public announcement of the route or the site -- this would be in 1971 in this particular case -- there then should have been meetings with the public and with special interest groups. But they haven’t been held.

There should have been internal study to identify alternatives; that study does not appear to have taken place. There should have been continued meetings with the public and special interest groups to talk about the alternative generating sites and to provide details of environmental factor ratings and to provide economic comparison of the alternatives. As far as I can see. that economic comparison has not been validly done, even for internal use within Hydro.

They also should have determined public opinion on the evaluation of the alternatives; again this has not been done.

After the submission to the Minister of Energy, there should then have been a decision on a public hearing by the Minister of Energy in conjunction with other ministries. Yet the ministry and the government are rejecting any kind of a public hearing before the Environmental Hearing Board or before any other body.

That’s the amount of public participation that is actually taking place, Mr. Speaker. And it’s a concern because the people who got to know Hydro best from the outside were the people who did the Task Force Hydro study; among them, unfortunately, the present president, Mr. Gordon. They make a number of criticisms about the way in which Hydro has worked in the past, but then they say: “We urge that the efforts now under way increasingly to involve the public in Hydro affairs be continued.” Fair enough. I continue to quote:

“We urge this while recognizing that the procedures used will produce little in the way of positive results, in the absence of a widespread commitment to the principles involved and a response to the changing social environment by a majority of those responsible for Hydro’s operations.”

The acid test of Hydro’s commitment to public involvement over recent months has been the Arnprior dam. If you look at it, Mr. Speaker, you get the president of Hydro refusing information. You get senior executives threatening legal action. You get the Minister of Energy backing up the suppression of information. You get the minister flying in and refusing to listen to local requests that the project be reviewed or halted, and sending the bulldozers in on the day that he is there. There is clearly no commitment there, Mr. Speaker.

It is very difficult to expect that Hydro is going to change its stripes or suddenly turn over a new leaf, if that’s the way it has been behaving as recently as not just six months ago, but as recently as today when the Premier backed up his ministers on this particular subject.

Those comments about Hydro were made on Aug. 15, 1972, when the first report of the task force was presented to the ministry. At that point, there were recommendations specifically about improving the liaison between Hydro and the citizen, including establishing a channel where representation from citizens could go forward to senior bodies in Hydro, that there be talk, and that Hydro consider establishing citizens’ task forces so as to provide for citizen participation in the location of generation and transmission facilities.

If there was any commitment, Mr. Speaker, we should surely have seen some response by now. But I am afraid that we haven’t seen that up until this time.

Mr. Speaker, I want to go back to the point I was making when I was interrupted by the member for Renfrew South and that was on the question of misrepresentation. Hydro goes ahead saying it has community approval. That is a matter in dispute. Hydro says there are problems of bank erosion and turbidity in the reservoir, and it says that to provide a final solution it has decided to build a dam on the lake. It is clear from subsequent evidence that that will not be a final solution.

Hydro states that there will be 48 miles of shoreline for canoeing, sailing and other recreational uses. This was in April of last year. Most of that shore land will not be of use for those purposes. Power boats will have to be kept off the lake: and it is simply not suitable, much of it, for septic tanks, and therefore for any kind of residential work. Hydro says the peak work force of 1,600 or 1,700 will be mostly drawn from the local area -- again a misrepresentation, Mr. Speaker.

Then we get into material which was sent to me by the member for Simcoe Centre and material which has been sent to me and made available locally. Maybe the member for Renfrew South was on hand the other week when a meeting was held -- a public meeting this time -- by Hydro in Arnprior to unveil plans for development of the river front area downstream from the dam. Hydro put up a pretty terrific show. There are a swimming pool and senior citizen accommodation predicted. They are going to have -- let’s see now -- playgrounds, park benches, all sorts of facilities there.

Mr. Yakabuski: Is the member opposed to parks there?

Mr. Cassidy: Of course I am not opposed. I would have thought that that kind of development might have been one of the kinds of things that Hydro might have considered. Even steam baths, who knows.

But when you looked at the plan in detail though, Mr. Speaker, you found out the following: What Hydro had given to the town of Arnprior -- a town which recently, about a year or two earlier, had rejected in referendum a proposal for a debenture for a new swimming pool complex -- was a blueprint for a recreation area for which Arnprior would pay most of the cost. Hydro said specifically that it would provide green grass, the contours, a handful of park benches, a handful of picnic tables, and a children’s playground which cost $4,000 or $5,000.

The contribution of Arnprior would be to find funding for the senior citizen housing and the other housing, would be to find funding for the swimming pool, and -- get this, Mr. Speaker -- would be to move its sewage treatment plant to the other side of town at an expenditure of at least $1 million, maybe more, but something in that particular order. The swimming pool, in fact, would be located in place of the present sewage treatment plant. Clearly, the plan was completely unfeasible so long as there was a sewage treatment plant in the middle of it.

That’s misrepresentation, when Hydro does a great PR effort, Mr. Speaker, to try to convince Arnprior it is going to have this magnificent park -- and conceals in the fine print the fact that it’s only willing to put a few thousand dollars into anything except the grass and trees.

I have a few more comments, Mr. Speaker, but I wanted to get this matter on the record; and perhaps now is a convenient time to adjourn the debate; I so move.

Mr. Cassidy moves the adjournment of the debate.

Motion agreed to.

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ HOUR: HOUSE BUYERS PROTECTION ACT

Mr. Givens moves second reading of Bill 11, An Act to provide for the Protection of House Buyers.

Mr. P. G. Givens (York-Forest Hill): This bill establishes a commissioner of housing and provides for the licensing of builders.

Mr. Speaker: The motion is now before the House. The hon. member may proceed.

Mr. Givens: Mr. Speaker. I would like the hon. members to appreciate the fact that, in discussing this bill, I really want to discuss the principles of the bill rather than the terms of the bill section by section.

This has been a Gordian knot, a very difficult problem that people have been wrestling with at all levels of government. I understand that there has been a federal government invitation extended to the provincial Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Clement) to a meeting in Ottawa on April 8 on the question of consumer protection systems and to discuss warranties for housing in Canada. I don’t know if the minister has replied to this invitation, but that is what they are going to be discussing in Ottawa.

I do think that under the property and civil rights section of the British North America Act, this is really a matter that comes within the purview of the province. So I want to discuss these principles involved in the bill, rather than section by section, because maybe the “i’s” weren’t dotted properly or the “t’s” crossed properly; but it is the essence, the pith and substance that I wish to accomplish and I want to place before the members of this House.

Mr. Speaker, we all know that the purchase of a house by any citizen in most cases is probably the biggest investment that that person will make in his lifetime -- and particularly today. We’ve heard evidence given in this chamber that the average house in the city of Toronto is worth something in the nature of $50,000, and that within the next 15 or 20 years the average house in Metropolitan Toronto will probably be worth $100,000 -- and new houses will be worth considerably more than that.

Under the terms of our law, common law, when a person buys a house -- particularly an old house -- the doctrine of caveat emptor prevails, which means “Let the buyer beware.” And when you buy a house you’re supposed to see all the defects -- all the patent defects and all the latent defects. You are responsible. The purchaser is responsible for what he buys. It is up to him to satisfy himself that the property is in good condition.

When a person buys a new property, the law that substantially applies is that the work should be completed in a good, workmanlike manner. He sometimes buys the house as plans. He sometimes doesn’t see the house before it’s completed: or he probably closes the deal before the house is completed.

If the deal is closed and the purchaser assumes the ownership of the house, all he has left is perhaps an undertaking which is given to his solicitor on closing which enables him to have a cause of action in the law courts.

What generally happens is that the day for closing comes to pass. The person’s made an investment; he’s paid a deposit to the agent. The deposit money is impounded in a trust account which the agent is supposed to hold until the deal is closed, and generally his commission of about five per cent comes out of that deposit.

The man goes to a lawyer who searches the title. All the lawyer is responsible for are the legal aspects of searching the title and satisfying him that he has a clear title. The lawyer invariably will not go out to visit the house. In 99 per cent of the cases, I don’t think a lawyer acting for a purchaser ever goes out to visit the house.

The purchaser may kid himself that because he’s assuming a large mortgage or because he’s been approved by a large mortgage-lending company this means that somehow the mortgage company or the insurance company or the trust company or whoever the lender happens to be bears some responsibility or is conscientiously concerned with whether or not the house is in good condition. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The date for closing comes; the house isn’t really finished. The purchaser takes a look at it and he’s just about ready to have a fit because certain things have not taken place. I don’t know whether any members have ever attended a registry office on a day when a deal is closed. Generally, deals are closed on the first of the month, the middle of the month and the end of the month and when one goes down to the registry office, it’s just like going to the Calgary Stampede. There are probably as many people in the registry office on those usual closing days as at the Stampede. This does not mean one can’t close a deal on any other day but usually these are the days when the deals are closed and when one goes down, it’s a madhouse.

Usually the lawyer to whom one is paying the fee is not there to close the deal. He either sends a law student, which is like having a medical student take out your appendix, or one of these new title searchers that most law offices have -- some of the bigger offices may have several of them -- who close the deal. Of course they are under the direction or supervision of the lawyer but 90 per cent of the time the lawyer doesn’t know what’s going on when the deal is being closed. He gives his student or his clerk instructions as to how to close it and he says, “If you can’t close it, if there are things that are unfinished, get an undertaking.” The undertaking is generally worth the paper it’s written on; and sometimes it isn’t even worth that.

Of course, the purchaser has this option: or the solicitor’s clerk has this option; or the solicitor himself. He can say to the vendor-builder, “Go jump in the lake. You haven’t finished these things and I’m not going to close the deal.” In which case the purchaser, his client, feels very bad because he’s told the whole world he’s buying a house -- his family, his mother, his wife and his children -- and he’s ready to move in. He’s borrowed a first mortgage; he’s borrowed a second mortgage from a finance company and a third mortgage from Uncle Joe to pay for the furniture and he wants to move in. He’s always afraid that if he doesn’t close the deal he’s going to lose the house, especially nowadays when we’ve all heard there’s a terrific sellers’ market going on. No purchaser wants to be put in that terrible position.

He says to the lawyer, “You’re my legal adviser; tell me what to do.” The lawyer invariably says, “All right, we’ll take an undertaking from Joe Blow Construction Co. that he’ll fix the drainboard and cement up the crack in the joists and fix the plaster that’s coming apart in the bedroom and sod your lawn and grade your driveway and all that sort of thing, and we will hope for the best. If he doesn’t finish this work, God dam it, we’ll sue him! We’ll take him to court; we’ll drag him right through the courts.”

Usually, the lawyer who handles a real estate deal is a person who’s not involved in litigation practice. He generally doesn’t know how to issue a writ or a statement of claim and he wants to avoid a legal action like the plague. He takes the undertaking and he figures he’ll hope for the best. What he’s got for himself with a signed undertaking, even from the best of legal firms, is the right of action.

There are still those people, Mr. Speaker, who think that a trial in court is an impartial investigation into the truth, into the facts. Nothing could be further from the truth. We hope that it’s an impartial investigation and that justice will be done but this isn’t necessarily what happens in a court of law. As we all know, we have the adversary system and sometimes it’s a matter of how one adduces evidence, what one draws out of witnesses and what happens in court; who falls down on the job; who tells the truth and who appears to tell the truth; and who tells the truth better than somebody else tells the truth. All these things come into play. Sometimes one will institute an action and it may conceivably take two years or more before the case comes to court because the courts are so crowded today.

This man and his family have moved in and the house hasn’t been finished properly and he has no protection at all. Even under the Law Society’s errors and omissions insurance, for which all we lawyers who belong to the Law Society have been circularized, where we have to pay so much money into an insurance fund to see that clients are protected from errors and omissions that we may make, the only thing that they are protected from, by our taking out this insurance is for damages because of the lawyer’s professional negligence or because of the negligence of any other person for whose act he is legally responsible, committed in the performance of professional services for others in the insured’s capacity as a lawyer.

The lawyer is not responsible nor is the purchaser, his client, protected from any error or omission which a lawyer might make with respect to the actual completion of the physical work that is done on the house. This is something aside and apart from a lawyer’s responsibility. So he has no protection. Yet when he goes out and buys a household appliance, whether it is a vacuum cleaner or whether it is a television set, invariably he gets a piece of paper, a warranty, which says that the X company will protect him for malfunctions in this particular piece of equipment. But for the house in which he is sinking $50,000 over the course of a lifetime -- or what is probably more close to the truth, $80,000 or $90,000 or $100,000 nowadays -- he has no protection at all.

Generally, the builder is a company man who has incorporated himself and builds 10 or 15 houses in a subdivision. He has a way of disappearing after he has built the house. There is no firm that I know of in the house building business that can be considered to be in the nature of General Motors or Ford or Chrysler. No matter what one wants to say about these companies, these companies can sometimes be embarrassed, if one has a case against them, into solving the problem for one. There are no home builders that I know of that are in that position.

Of course, some of them are good builders, and reputable builders. But I’m talking about a lot of builders who are in the business who afford no protection to a purchaser at all. He is in the driver’s seat, particularly in a seller’s market. He says, “If you don’t want the house, Mr. Jones, don’t take it. I’ll give you back your money. I can sell it next week for another $2,000 or $3,000 or $5,000. The purchaser is in an awful position under these circumstances.

Then there is the expense that is involved in trying to get the house finished, in dunning the vendor-builder to complete the house properly, to build the thing in a proper and workmanlike manner. Then even after one has gone to court, and maybe got a judgement after two, or two and a half or three years, it could very well be a worthless judgement, because by this time the builder may be out of business and may be nowhere to be found and one has got oneself a piece of paper that really doesn’t mean anything.

Under its terms, this bill would provide protection for purchasers of new homes. I don’t want to talk about old homes for the moment, because that has to do with other principles of law, although the parameters of this bill could also serve the purpose of protecting people when they buy older homes.

This bill will appoint a commissioner of housing, who will administer the Act. It will provide that new homes built in Ontario should be built to the minimum standards of an Ontario building code, which we haven’t seen any signs of yet, but which the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations has promised will be forthcoming.

There is no piece of legislation which is as vital and as important and which is as emergent and necessary to be passed by this Legislature as the new Ontario building code.

Under this bill these houses are to be inspected at least four times during the construction period. They are to be warranted by the builder against all hidden defects which are described in law as latent defects for a period of five years after completion of construction. How is a person to find hidden defects when he doesn’t know about looking into the footings or looking into the joists or looking into the foundations of the building, when people today aren’t used to this sort of thing and are not equipped to be able to make these inspections on their own?

So it will protect against all hidden defects for a period of five years after completion of construction, and against all obvious defects for a period of one year after completion of construction. By obvious defects I mean what are called patent defects. When you walk in and see a crack in the plaster that is pretty serious, you can demand that it be fixed, and it should be fixed over a period of one year.

Further, the vendor, the builder of a new house, must point out all obvious defects to the prospective purchaser which will be noted on a form, agreement of purchase or sale of the house, prescribed by the commissioner.

After all, he is building the house, he has known what he has done wrong, unless he has done it accidentally, and he should be required to list in the offer to purchase -- which is the offer both the purchaser and the vendor sign, which forms the contract of the purchase or sale -- what the obvious defects are for the prospective purchaser.

Any grievances that the purchaser has for the money that he is putting into this house -- of $50,000, $60,000, $70,000 or $80,000 -- may be brought forward and heard by the commissioner, who will thereby render a decision which, if not agreeable to the parties concerned, may be handed over to a court of law as a last resort if this is necessary, if something has to be adjudicated between the parties.

And lastly -- and what to me is of vital importance -- the commissioner shall provide for an insurance fund into which all builders must contribute in the event that a builder may not be able to compensate the house owner, such as in the case of bankruptcy. This isn’t so unusual. It isn’t so outrageous. Those of us who are lawyers pay into what I call the thieves’ fund of the Law Society of Upper Canada, for defalcations and for things that lawyers do wrong, deliberately or not so deliberately, to hurt their clients, where the clients suffer damage on a client-solicitor relationship. So it is no different than it is in that case.

I think it is highly necessary that at long last the doctrine of caveat emptor, and the common law applying to fixing a house in a good workmanlike manner, should be tossed into the ashcan. The law should be revised and reformed to bring it into what is required in the present day, protection to the consumer when he buys a house and makes the biggest investment of his life. He should be protected by this Legislature. We owe it to him.

The people who will object will say this will increase the bureaucracy. I suppose in a way it will, but it won’t increase it any more than the amount of litigation that you find in the courts today on the part of purchasers who find themselves in court because of builders who have ripped them off. Reputable builders have nothing to fear about harassment. They will continue to be reputable builders. But protection must be afforded to people who suffer from those who are illegitimate in the business and who try to get away with things.

People will say, as another objection, that costs will increase, that the cost of this inspection and the cost of this adjudication and the cost of running the insurance fund will increase. I suppose it will, and it will probably be passed on to the buyer in certain cases, Mr. Speaker. But I suggest this: If you are walking along the street and you are assaulted and somebody steals your wallet or your purse and you happen to have $500 or $1,000 in it, the law goes to a great deal of --

Mr. F. Young (Yorkview): That much in your purse?

Mr. Givens: Well, this is after payday, when you have cashed your cheque and you are walking home. The law is going to spend an awful lot of money to get the police force out to find this crook, or this burglar when your house is ransacked and they take your cash or your jewels or whatever you happen to have there. You expect the law to stretch out its dragnet and then catch the burglar who has robbed you.

I don’t see any difference between that situation, to tell you the truth, Mr. Speaker, and the builder who sells a house to an unsuspecting buyer and tries to get away with this same kind of ripoff or this same kind of burglary. So I think, whatever increase in bureaucracy there may be, or whatever increase in costs there would be, that it is very essential that this kind of protection be afforded to the people who are spending thousands and thousands of dollars on the purchase of a home and are taken advantage of from day to day.

It is almost a daily occurrence. It has become so prevalent and the outcry for this kind of legislation is so universal at every level of government, that I think if we don’t take cognizance of this problem and come in with some intelligent form of legislation -- such as the bill that I presented here -- the House Buyers’ Protection Act, 1973 -- we will be doing a very serious and grave injustice to the people of this province who buy homes.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Peel South.

Mr. R. D. Kennedy (Peel South): Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to join in this debate and to commend the member for York-Forest Hill for bringing his bill forward.

I’m not so sure we agree on the details, and he made reference to that point but the fact is that it is an issue -- and an important issue. To those who have experienced confusion and concern about what is probably the major purchase in their whole lives. I think such action in bringing this forward is very timely, if not a bit late.

Regarding the bill itself, the hon. member did mention the risk of bureaucracy, and I would have to agree, on reading this most comprehensive bill, that indeed there would have to be quite an empire built to administer it.

I would like to touch on a couple of sections, then I want to make some reference to some experiences I have had. I notice by the roster of speakers, Mr. Speaker, that this is more or less a lawyers’ hour --

Mr. P. D. Lawlor (Lakeshore): Not really -- it’s half and half.

Mr. Young: He will bring some common sense into the situation.

Mr. Kennedy: -- and I feel as if I’m intruding into the adjudication of this item.

Mr. H. Worton (Wellington South): It’s nice to have some common sense.

Mr. Kennedy: Yes, we’ll bring in something from the consumer’s point of view rather than the ethereal heights of the legal profession.

Mr. Lawlor: The word is not “ethereal.”

Mr. Kennedy: In section 4(a), I can see a problem there in assessing what is reasonable. I can see someone getting hit on fairly weak grounds.

On the matter of integrity and honesty in section 4(b), I think the licensee, the builder, has to demonstrate integrity and honesty. He should need to do this whether we have a bill or not. If he has been in trouble and is reformed, well, let him prove it. We don’t want to deter a person from earning a legitimate living.

Mr. Lawlor: The government does it with respect to the rest of its licensing legislation. That’s a normal clause.

Mr. Kennedy: Oh no. No. No. There is opportunity --

Mr. Lawlor: We passed 15 bills last spring with that clause in them.

Mr. Kennedy: The hon. member for Lakeshore is very hot on this matter of appeal -- he and McRuer -- and I go along with that. But in the first part of the bill, the thrust is toward financial stability and capacity, and perhaps there’s an excessive demand in this bill for demonstrating that. A person can be poor but honest. Would the member for Lakeshore agree?

Mr. Givens: He is both.

Mr. Lawlor: My friend doesn’t care whether he can build or not, as long as he has lots of money?

Mr. Kennedy: Yes, he can have both.

But section 10 makes reference to the inspector going in to seize the books and accounts and so on. Unless the member has some other qualifications in mind, and with all respect to the abilities of the building inspectors I know, it is a pretty professional person who will be needed to go in and make a meaningful assessment

The five-year period mentioned in section 21, the warranty section, is really the key to the purchaser having that protection. Five years is a fairly long time, and often we can’t catch the builder or the sub within five days after he has done his work; I don’t know how we’d get him after five years.

My few comments in summary are that I think that this bill goes too far, it’s pretty harsh and it would require a bureaucracy to administer. And I would like to think that we can get a more simplified method of ensuring quality workmanship.

The city of Mississauga has been involved with this and I have had correspondence from disappointed, disgusted purchasers. The city of Mississauga came up with something through its building inspector, based on the two problems we seem to have.

I am not aware that there have been a great many bankruptcies. I think this type of builder is gone, as the small builder is, and anyway if there have been bankruptcies I haven’t heard of them. The complaints they do get are about shoddy workmanship and that the builder will not deliver the home on the promised completion date.

This is reflected in a report by the commissioner that suggests we establish a firm completion date and failure to fulfil that contract would bring a levy of $30 a day against the contractor. The other provision, to make sure there is quality workmanship, so when he does come back to get it done, is a $1,500 hold-back. Maybe the sum isn’t important, but it seems to me some provision such as this would avoid all the dragging through the courts which the hon. member mentions.

We had a court case a couple of weeks ago based on violation of the local building bylaw. It went before a court and I don’t believe the builder offered a defence, at least not a legal defence. He appeared himself and the JP, a sitting justice, slapped a $500 fine on him. He now has that under appeal and it will go to the county court, as I understand it. So you may get the fine in, as the hon. member may very well say, but this doesn’t do anything for the poor purchaser who is still left with defective workmanship.

I have a couple of letters here explaining some of the problems. They are minor in that they don’t come within the terms of the building bylaw -- for instance, the porch railings are not properly installed, or the cupboards are crooked, or the paint is the wrong colour or there is no paint at all, things as those, which aren’t covered under the bylaw. This is what bothers people. They go in on the expectation that they will have certain things. But they aren’t there. I wrote to these builders Oct. 29 and I still await a reply. I am not going to get one. Whether there has been remedial action taken I am not sure. So those are some of points that are raised.

When this resolution came forward it interested the Toronto Builders’ Association. I will say that they were rather receptive to it; they weren’t hostile. They did think that this practice of optimistic estimates of completion dates could be misleading and they didn’t object that provincial legislation might be brought down. They squealed a bit on the suggestion that they would have to provide a hold-back or a licence or some such fee as that.

There was a suggestion there would be a $50 fee to cover inspection costs, and they pointed out that if there are 7,000 homes built, this multiplied by $50 is $350,000, which is going to cause great escalation of house prices. Do the members know what those 7,000 homes might sell for? If my zeroes are right, something like $280 million, and they are talking about one-tenth or one-fifteenth of one per cent. They can change a levy even for the permit or for the installation of one of the services, water or sewers. They can change those levies. There is no validity to that argument at all.

It seems my time has run out, Mr. Speaker. I had some other notes here but I think the remedy could be in the areas I have discussed -- a possible hold-back fee, or maybe the insurance fund would be the answer. I can see a little bit of difficulty with the fund -- just that it takes time and a certain amount of work to make it effective and finally resolve the problem. A person has to put a claim in and get it inspected and all of this. I think money seems to have a very, very effective effect, if I can use that term, in bringing this into line. Maybe this, along with the fact that the loser would pay the costs, would ensure there would be no frivolous claims and there could be a reasonable meeting of the minds. Certainly Mr. Speaker, the situation isn’t satisfactory now and I think action should be taken.

Mr. Speaker: The hon member for Lakeshore.

Mr. Lawlor: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, Mr. Speaker, that if the hon. member who introduced this legislation were ever initiated into an Indian band, I would give him the high recommendation to designate himself Chingachgook. He is truly the last of the Mohicans.

The tenor of his remarks, the general slant in the House by and large, is that he like Chingachgook, wishes to live in some kind of remote and primeval forest and espouse, as the archpatriarch, all things connected with the free-enterprise system. But when the shoe pinches -- even if you wear Dacks -- then suddenly they come forward with some monstrosity whereby to rectify a very great evil indeed. No one questions the impact of the chicanery of house builders and the very machinations they send both their clientele through and in which they involve themselves. We are up against them all the time.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): Aided and abetted by the legal profession.

Mr. Lawlor: It is the legal profession that seeks to rectify and straighten these things out, except for that portion which represents these beggars. But I wonder if this is the way to do it. I would like to scout the legislation and spend a few moments on it.

I am sure that if the member for York-Forest Hill saw legislation which was as onerous and intricate and bureaucratic as this introduced in the House, he would be the first on his feet to find it obnoxious and basically repellant. I can only point out in bemusement and irony that these curious twists occur in this House. Consider the clause that the hon. member mentioned a few moments ago, clause 4, with its very great emphasis upon the financial integrity -- the position and capability from a financial point of view -- of people in the building game and the inquisition that would go on in that particular respect.

But that’s not what bothers me. He sets up a commission of housing under governmental auspices which is to inspect every new house in this province. That would, I suppose, include condominium units, co-operative apartments, apartment buildings them- selves, and not just residences as far as I can see. There are literally thousands and I would hope there would be a darn sight more -- and there would be were this government not in power. But the figure of 7,000 was mentioned here, and I am sure that doesn’t cover all the condominium units in the Metropolitan area of Toronto alone and that’s 28,000 inspections.

In other words, you are going to get a little contingent --

Mr. Kennedy: That is just one municipality.

Mr. Lawlor: -- a little contingent! A very massive contingent indeed -- of inspectors, a bureaucratic paraphernalia of such girth, depth and height that it would be quite appalling. It may be necessary at some time to call it into being, but other nostrums have been put forward and not mentioned in the course of this debate. The Conservative member for Peel South sees it very fit to ignore the negligence and total irresponsibility of his own government.

In 1968, as one of the first steps in the work of the Law Reform Commission of this province, they moved and brought forward to this House and to the consideration of the government a report called “Trade-sale of New Houses; the Doctrine of Caveat Emptor.” Where are the proposals? They were far more modest proposals that are made here. They didn’t involve a monstrous spawning of the bureaucratic structure as the present proposals do.

I give the member great credit for having the social conscience and the sense that this is a great affliction in our midst. It is, but we don’t want on the whole to cure the disease by a form of diarrhoea. It just doesn’t help in that way.

If you look at the nostrums contained in the report -- I have fundamental disagreements with this document too, but it concerns special kinds of trades which are defined very acutely in the legislation in new houses too. The hon. member’s legislation, while it fails in terms of scope to provide in a deliberate way, except in certain of its paragraphs, a coverage for and a protection for the older houses -- leaving that aside -- the same fallacy exists within the dimensions of these particular recommendations. In the course of these recommendations, six different approaches were outlined and most of them discounted.

The first discount was precisely the overtures being made by the hon. member for York-Forest Hill today. The first was registration of builders. The second was inspection during construction. The third was insurance. Let me pause there because I think there is validity in the insurance concept and in a fund being set up.

As has been pointed out, the amount of money is not really inflationary in terms of the overall market. That would give some repository, some defence and some place to which people could advert, instead of necessarily going to the courts, in order to get some relief from what builders pull on people. The fourth is quality control by mortgagees or guarantors. The fifth is warranties implied by law and the sixth is obligations imposed by statute. This commission comes down squarely on the last, the sixth, that is obligations imposed by statute, dismissing all the rest.

If I may just advert to what was said in 1968 by the commission, which gave it some thought, and which, I think, are very sage proposals. They run through a preamble in which they say that the free enterprise system would be placed in jeopardy. I would have thought that the Law Reform Commission was above these particular policy considerations but it does go to the trouble of quoting some benighted judge who is in favour of that particular system.

Then the members got down to practical matters and said this was not enough; a registration scheme would have a number of practical drawbacks affecting its advisability. For instance, as a result of the number of builders, the amount of new house construction and the sheer size of our province, the inspectorate which would be required to make a registration scheme work would have to be very large. The registrar or the body charged with the duty to register builders, discipline them and, in proper cases, suspend or revoke their registration would be fixed with an enormous and highly contentious task. The programme that would probably have to be undertaken would involve first the registration of any and all applicants and then a systematic weeding out of those builders who did not keep up whatever standards were required. The result of this would probably be a good many appeals from the registrar’s decision with consequent additional expenditure of public and private money. The commission said, “At this stage such a drastic solution does not recommend itself.” What recommended itself in their case was a retention of the court apparatus but strengthening the position of the individual if he is forced into the court.

I would think, in my rather narrow practice of law, that we ran into this situation with new houses once every 50 houses, maybe. There are all kinds of contentions with the others, I admit, but I mean really a crux case; a case where one wants to take it to court. Maybe it is even less than one in 50; one can usually bring them to heel by talking.

Mr. Kennedy: It is one in 10 builders.

Mr. Lawlor: If one can’t one has to resort to the courts. The trouble at the moment, and it is not very much rectified in the proposed legislation, is the warranty involved.

There ought not be a warranty concept at all first of all because that involves damages only. It ought to be a conditional concept that the house is such and such so that the contract can be rescinded. If one doesn’t want to rescind it one can go on suing for damages and get it. Their recommendations contained precisely the kind of conditions which would be imposed. A new house built should be fit for habitation -- that would be one of the terms, not an implied warranty term but a statutory obligation.

Mr. Speaker: There are 60 seconds remaining.

Mr. Lawlor: Members would be pleased to know that the other three major proposals would very much strengthen the hand of a plaintiff and would keep most cases out of court as it exists at the present time. Please, I say to the government, let it bring in its own legislation and it won’t have to adopt some monstrosity in order to rectify a great ill.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for St. George.

Mrs. M. Campbell (St. George): Mr. Speaker, following the member for Lakeshore and his passionate and impassioned speech on this matter is very difficult. There is no question that legislation of this kind is not an ideal. Certainly, on a clause by clause provision, I think the proposer himself made it clear that he was speaking to a principle.

At this point in this province we are heading into a situation of homelessness. Certainly in some areas this is very clear. When we’re facing that situation, to talk about other forms of legislation, to talk about the long road to legislation which will protect the individual without setting up any kind of bureaucracy and to talk about all of the things that could be done, which after 30-odd years of this government haven’t been done, seem to me to be speaking of an ideal rather than, with respect, facing the situation as it is today.

Much has been said by all of the speakers up until now about the matter of new houses. I would like, if I may for a moment, just look at the situation as it exists in some of our major urban areas, and particularly this one, where we have a new type of entrepreneur who is buying up old and existing stock and renovating it.

I am concerned deeply about the standards of renovation. I’m not suggesting these people are not doing a good job for the most part. But when one knows what the construction was in a city such as this where we had row housing with open third floors; when one tries to find out what provision is being made for firewalls between those third floors on renovations; when it isn’t too clear that this is a requirement; and when we’re faced with the fires we’ve been faced with, it seems to me that we have to take some steps -- not ideal perhaps -- to indicate that we are concerned about the person who is purchasing property, not at an inflated value but at an inflated price in our market today and who has literally no protection.

Many of them have no alternatives, because there isn’t a sufficient stock of housing they can afford available in an area where they feel, for one reason or another, they must live. It is to be hoped, Mr. Speaker, as time goes on, if we get an enlightened government in this province that is concerned about the scarcity of housing and prepared to service land so that people can get building lots at prices they can afford to pay and can curb the inflationary effect of the policies of this government, this will no longer be such an urgent requirement because people will have choices.

When we come to the five-year warranty section, it takes some time as a rule to find the hidden defects in a building, particularly if one is not very expert in the building of houses or in any of the trades that go into the building of houses. I am reminded of a time some years ago when my mother who was one of the first women builders in Toronto was completing 18 houses in the north end of the city of Toronto and was having a great deal of trouble with inspectors. Across the street, a gentleman was building a pair of houses. While he had taps in and he had other equipment in his house, he had nothing connecting either sewers or water in his house nor did he insulate the roof.

This is the kind of thing that, of course, ought not to happen with the usual inspections of a municipality. But in those days there were elements of choice. Today there are not.

I too am concerned that our building code has not been brought forward other than in a draft form, because I don’t know what provisions there will be in this whole new area of rehabilitation of existing housing. But I would have to assume, at this point in time, that this code will have sufficient enlightenment that these various matters would be covered, and that people would not have to rely on the fact that they’ll take it at any price and in any circumstances, because they have nothing else they can do to provide housing for their families.

Mr. Speaker, it is true that those of us in this caucus have been opposed to the escalation of bureaucracy, and it may seem somewhat illogical for us to support this. But in a time when this is probably the one investment that a person makes, it is desperately important that there be some protection.

I was interested the other day in looking at an area in Toronto which used to be a pocket of blight. It was called Trefann Court. I think most of the members have heard about it. There are properties selling there today at $70,000. For the poor? No, of course not. The poor are gone because of our policies, but the people who are there, who are going in, nevertheless need housing, too. And they simply have to have some protection while we await the philosophical direction of a government which, up until now, has not been concerned with curing the disease of a lack of housing, but rather has been concerned with looking at the symptoms of it.

Mr. Speaker, I support this bill in principle. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Fort William.

Mr. J. H. Jessiman (Fort William): Mr. Speaker, it’s a privilege for me to rise and make some comments on this bill. To start out, I think the hon. member for York-Forest Hill has got a damn good bill here. It needs possibly some modifications, very few amendments.

One amendment I’d like to suggest to him is that a short form of specifications be attached to an offer of purchase so that the purchaser will know about the basic items involved. This would also be evidence at any subsequent hearing before a referee or re- view board.

It’s a fact that most people buy a basic house but actually expect a custom built house. I agree with the hon. member in his preamble that the suggested short form could be part of the deal. In this way purchasers would be assured that they would receive in good faith exactly what they paid for.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I’m not going to attempt to go item by item, or clause by clause, through the bill. It’s been very well handled by the hon. member for Lakeshore, in his jolly criticism, and also the hon. member for Peel South. I think his bill is very timely, Mr. Speaker, because in the Thunder Bay Times-News of March 28 there is an item out of city hall that says:

“The city HVDA president John Budick touched on a proposed nation-wide home warranty setup presently being studied by the federal government.

“Ottawa planners have been looking into putting a form of warranty on new homes for over a year. Now Mr. Budick says it will be at least another year or a year and a half before such a plan would be avail- able to prospective home buyers at the municipal level.”

It goes on to say:

“The city building inspector, Mr. Bert Lambert, was also present at the meeting and he said Urban Affairs Minister Ron Basford has already proposed legislation on warranties or, as Lambert put it, certification.”

It’s very timely having this bill brought before us today. But I must say, Mr. Speaker, that before we guarantee a house we have to build one -- and we in Thunder Bay certainly don’t have a hell of a choice in houses. I’m going to refer to statistics that have been produced for me over the last year and records of land acquired by Ontario Housing Corp. in Thunder Bay (Fort William and Port Arthur), the location of the land, the size of the land and the year it was bought.

We bought 6.67 acres in 1967, in 1968 2.90 acres -- this goes on -- 1.83 acres in 1970, 1.85, 1.60 and 3.50 acres in 1971 and in 1972 we hit the jackpot; we bought 158 acres for Ontario’s proposed HOME development programme -- and 37 lots in 1973, with an additional 0.85 acres pending development.

Over the same period of time, Mr. Speaker, we built 46 units of senior citizen housing in 1969, 48 units in 1970, none in 1971, none in 1972, and 181 units in 1973.

Mr. Stokes: Not a very good track record.

Mr. Jessiman: I’m not very happy with it, really. It starts at the local level, I might say to you, sir.

The same article reported on March 28 that we are planning 600 housing units for Thunder Bay. The corporation presently hopes to build 200 to 273 senior citizen residences. Seven hundred new units in 40 northern Ontario localities also are expected, and we are looking to start up to 600 new housing units in the city over the next 18 months.

Mr. Speaker, I think we would be lucky if we could build houses the way we are building reports. Here are some from the Advisory Task Force on Housing Policy; Working Papers, volume 1; “Land for Housing and Housing Assistance,” “Government and Housing; Public Participation Programmes,” “Background Report, The Housing Production Process in Ontario.”

Might I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that about five years ago in the city of Thunder Bay we extended the city water line at a price of $158,000 or $168,000. The Ontario government assisted the city of Thunder Bay to extend this water line to the then municipality of Neebing to the industrial farm, which housed some 100 detainees, a herd of cattle and many acres of potatoes and what not. But since that time, 1,200 acres of this 1,800-acre plot have been declared surplus. I would suggest to you, sir, that we’ve got lots of land to build on; it is owned by the government and it is damn well time we started building houses on it. Thank you, sir.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Windsor West.

Mr. E. J. Bounsall (Windsor West): I would start out, Mr. Speaker, by assuring the member for Peel South that I too am not a lawyer and will be giving a consumer’s view. Maybe that was why, not being a lawyer, I was so surprised when I received my first constituent case with respect to house building, one which I could hardly believe.

This constituent phoned me up and said his roof wasn’t tacked down to rest of his house. I thought I wasn’t hearing him right. I went out and, sure enough that was the case. This was a house at 6170 Wales, in Windsor.

Both the man and his wife were in a situation where both of them were working during the day at places from which they could not phone. They could not phone the building inspector in order to get a hand in seeing that some of the things were rectified.

I don’t have the time now to detail the many and various rotten occurrences with respect to this house. But let’s just say there was water everywhere. The eavestroughs didn’t slope to the downspouts; they all sloped to the middle. The roof wasn’t tacked down at any point. The wind would blow it up and the wind and rain had soaked the plywood. In fact, the plywood was warping. It was warped as much as 3 in. or 4 in. Ho took me up to the roof of one portion of this tri-level, and you could bounce up and down 4 in. or 5 in. on various parts of the roof -- so on and so forth.

So there is a very great need in this area, which the bill speaks to and where action drastically needs to be taken.

The question is how best to rectify it.

Just in the few minutes left, let me say, speaking in detail to the bill I am a little bit worried about the large bureaucracy which this bill would engender. It would require four inspections per house and a gigantic team of inspectors would be required under this Act.

I am convinced the cost of these inspectors and the cost of this bureaucracy, should we set up a thing like this, should not be paid from public funds. However, the insurance scheme that’s set up in order to rectify the programme should, in fact, be a sufficient collection and assessment scheme on all builders in the province to pay for the entire bureaucracy.

In this way we could get the builders who know how to build and are in the field building, to exert influence and pressure on other builders who they see are doing shoddy work because it will come out of their pocket if it is allowed to continue.

I would suggest this is one way, if we are going to have this bureaucracy or something like it, to pay for it and deal with it.

In fact, I would suggest a somewhat different system as well to reduce the bureaucracy. You would only deal with complaints, not those nine out of 10 completed houses which the buyers find satisfactory.

The other point that I had on the bill when I first read it was the preoccupation that the bill seemed to have with the financial structure and the financial capabilities of the builders or the developing company rather than the product -- the house or the apartment or the condominium or the co-operative. In the bill there is the power to go in and seize and search the financial documents and books in the middle of the night. There is undue stress placed on this rather than the product, when it comes to the clause-by-clause reading of the bill.

And finally, the caveat emptor principle of “let the buyer beware.” In this bill it applies only to new housing and on first sale. The let-the-buyer-beware principle was not going to be applied to all of the older housing without any rectification or assessment on the sales of those homes -- and, in fact, applies after the point in this bill. So a guy doesn’t get licensed because he built a poor house; so he is fined $2,000 if he builds another. His profit is more than that. He keeps on going till they finally jail him -- if they finally jail him.

Well, the need is great, Mr. Speaker. I don’t think this bill meets the need but it certainly is valuable to have thoughts of this sort put before us so that we can discuss them, and yet again make clear to the public that the need is there and some good way must be found to fill it.

Mr. Speaker: This completes the private members’ hour.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): Mr. Speaker, before I move the adjournment of the House, I would like to say that tomorrow we will be dealing first with Item No. 5, Bill 13. And then we return to the Throne Speech debate. I have also reasonable agreement that we will sit tomorrow evening to accommodate those who wish to participate in the Throne Speech debate prior to the introduction of the budget.

Hon Mr. Winkler moves the adjournment of the House.

Motion agreed to.

The House adjourned at 6 o’clock, p.m.