Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House resumed at 8 o’clock, p.m.

Mr. Chairman: The member for York West.

Mr. J. P. MacBeth (York West): Mr. Chairman, if I may have the attention of the House for just a moment to introduce to the House, Mr. Robert Middleton and the First Etobicoke Central Scout Troop from St. George’s on the Hill, who are with us tonight, and particularly one young scout by the name of John Keen. He made all these arrangements, and this is his third attempt, when somebody less persistent might have fallen by the wayside. Because of the House not sitting on previous evenings, two previous attempts had been cancelled. I just wanted to draw to the attention of the House these visitors tonight in the east gallery.

LAND SPECULATION TAX ACT (CONTINUED)

On section 4:

Mr. Chairman: The member for Waterloo North.

Mr. E. R. Good (Waterloo North): Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Speaking on the amendment to section 4 --

Mr. Chairman: I believe the minister has a statement to make in connection with the Act which will meet with your requirements. Is the minister ready?

Hon. A. K. Meen (Minister of Revenue): It might be helpful at this time, Mr. Chairman. I was just observing to the hon. members before we reconvened that supper hours are very helpful, indeed, in many cases. In this instance, it gave me an opportunity to review the arguments that have been advanced, and to review my own thinking to get this into as clear a context as possible.

In reference to the provisions with respect to expropriation, I think there are strong arguments on one side and the other. Frankly, I’m rather neutral. I don’t care. What we were trying to do was not to favour the speculator. It seemed to me, after seeing subsection (a) and (b) as we had originally provided -- and you have heard my arguments as to why we put those in -- that possibly there is some reason to believe they should be removed and on balance my colleagues and I decided they might come out. When I listened to the other arguments and reviewing all of this, I can see why some people might be concerned at their removal.

Mr. Good: Like the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Stewart).

Mr. P. D. Lawlor (Lakeshore): In your humility you have flexibility.

Hon. Mr. Meen: My advisers who I have to say -- and I am the first to say this -- are more experienced in the law of expropriation than I am and, perhaps, more experienced than many of my colleagues on both sides of the House --

Mr. Lawlor: Never!

Hon. Mr. Meen: In any event, they tell me that one way or the other the net result in dollars to the people is the same. If the appearance is different, if there might be some who would hold out thinking they could do better one way or another, that is another thing. If, as would appear to be the feeling of this House, my colleagues -- and I put all of us in this category as members of this Legislature -- think this would be a better bill to have the original subsections (a) and (b) included, I would be prepared to do that.

Mr. Lawlor: Yes, good.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Now, we are in an awkward technical position -- slightly awkward -- in that if we pass (a) and (b), technically they cannot be re-introduced. But under another sub-number and with the concurrence of the committee, I am advised that would not be a breach and if the members were prepared to approve the new subsections (a) and (b), to which I can’t imagine any real objection, as they appear under subsection 4 --

Mr. Lawlor: I don’t know. You have a devious subsection.

Hon. Mr. Meen: -- if the members concur with those, the last subsection as printed in the bill is (h), so there could be two new subsections, (i) and (j), which would replace the original subsections (a) and (b). If the members wish to concur in that -- I’d ask, Mr. Chairman, that we seek some expression of opinion on that -- we could proceed with debating subsections (a) and (b).

Mr. Chairman: Is this satisfactory? The member for Waterloo North.

Mr. Good: Yes, I think that is satisfactory, other than I would like to have clarified a few additional points, one in the new subsection (b). Shall we discuss the new subsections at this point, Mr. Chairman?

Mr. Chairman: It’s optional. We could discuss it with --

Hon. Mr. Meen: I think it would be helpful to deal with (a) and (b) together because they were the ones we have just touched on.

Mr. Good: Under the assumption that (a) and (b) will be reinstated?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes.

Mr. Chairman: That’s the original (a) and (b)?

Mr. Good: Yes, the original (a) and (b).

Mr. Chairman: Could we cover that first of all? Shall the original (a) stand as part of the bill? Is that all right?

Mr. Lawlor: Mr. Chairman, I’d like to say a word on it. Yes, I think it should.

Mr. Chairman: All right.

Mr. Lawlor: As we indicated this afternoon, and we were fairly hectoring about it, my reason for wishing it to stay -- and I trust it’s my colleagues’ too -- is that it will give an impetus to land banking, as I see it, in the province which the contrary would not do. It would be a positive disincentive to land banking.

We are so anxious to get land into landbanks we will agree to any mode or any vehicle whereby governmental agencies, particularly the provincial government -- and municipalities for that matter -- are able to acquire land on somewhat easier terms perhaps. I don’t mean in terms of the actual cash outlay. I mean in terms of the negotiations; in terms of the palatability; in terms of the position of a vendor having raw land or marketable land available and ready, and seeking to play with that land in a way which could be detrimental to the community if it falls in.

The first priority and the absolute attraction lie with one of the governmental agencies. This may be utilized in the realm of the public realm and with a deep social sense. That seems to make a contribution over against the deletion of the section as it presently stands, and I really do commend the minister tonight. You are showing a degree of flexibility and adaptability which is totally unnatural.

Mr. R. F. Nixon (Leader of the Opposition): He is very flexible.

Mr. Lawlor: I think of your natural state when I say that. I didn’t say abnormal. Don’t get worked up about it. Even when I give a blessing you have to look the Greek straight in the teeth.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Oh, I do.

Mr. Lawlor: There is a Trojan horse in the Legislature. Fine, as far as this party is concerned, bless you, we will accept what you want to do at the end of the section. I think it does substantially improve your legislation.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Thank you.

Mr. Chairman: Shall subsection (a) in the original bill stand as part of the bill?

Mr. Lawlor: You can’t do it that way now, I think that the minister will agree.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I agree with the hon. member for Lakeshore, sir. If I may be so bold, could I suggest that the motion might be that subsection (a) stand as subsection (j) of the bill?

Mr. Lawlor: Subsection (i).

Hon. Mr. Meen: Subsection (i). Subsection (b), if it is appropriately proposed at this time as it originally appeared in the bill, should stand as subsection (j).

Mr. Lawlor: Right.

Mr. Chairman: I am sorry, I missed part of what was said. Does that then include the original (a) and (b)?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes. If I may repeat, Mr. Chairman, I’m suggesting that your motion might be that original subsections (a) and (b) of the bill stand as subsections (i) and (j) respectively of the bill.

Mr. Chairman: All right.

Mr. H. Worton (Wellington South): Mr. Chairman, I would just like to get some clarification from the minister. During the second reading of the bill I drew to your attention some concerns expressed by members of the university in regard to their position as far as the tax was concerned. Do I understand now that 4(a) in this new printing, as I call it, of the bill, will now allow them to purchase property or dispose of property without the tax?

Hon. Mr. Meen: No, what that means is that designated land now has this as an exclusion when it is sold to an authority such as that.

Mr. Worton: This would also apply to municipalities as well in (b)?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes, it would. Let me just make sure of that. Yes, municipalities are expressly spelled out.

Mr. Worton: The universities qualify as charitable institutions, is that correct?

Mr. Lawlor: Oh, no. You are talking about something different

Mrs. M. Campbell (St. George): No, they aren’t.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Are universities covered?

Mr. Worton: A registered Canadian charitable organization, the interpretation I got from the solicitors was that this would cover universities.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I can’t answer that with any personal knowledge but we do intend to cover the registered, Canadian charitable organizations.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Mr. Chairman, why doesn’t the bill include universities per se, rather than designating them as charitable institutions? Surely the bill ought to clarify that matter.

Hon. Mr. Meen: If the university has the capacity to expropriate, then it would be included under either (a) or (b) of this section.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Under what other provisions? Why are the universities not included specifically?

Mr. Good: Not if the university wanted to sell.

Hon. Mr. Meen: We are talking here in these subsections of land being sold to these bodies, not their sale. We are dealing with the land to them. If you take a look, it says when the designated land is taken under statutory authority, or is sold to a person by whom notice of an intention to take it under statutory authority was given.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Suppose the University of Guelph wants to sell some land it has acquired and which is not necessary for its requirements, would it then be subject to the tax? I’m told by the hon. member for Wellington South that such might well be the case, that the University of Guelph might want to dispose of some property, and it would surely be ridiculous if they were subject to the provisions of this bill. They are not speculators.

Mrs. Campbell: Nobody else is either.

Hon. Mr. Meen: They would not, if they qualify as a registered Canadian charitable organization within the meaning of paragraph (c), subsection (8) of section 110, which is the new section I was just proposing to add back in. Mr. Chairman, the hon. members are confusing --

Mr. Lawlor: Yes, I think that is right.

Hon. Mr. Meen: -- the old paragraphs (a) and (b) with the new paragraphs (a) and (b).

Mr. R. F. Nixon: It is difficult to keep track without a programme.

Hon. Mr. Meen: All right. But the hon. member for Lakeshore has indicated that I have demonstrated some flexibility in trying to accommodate the views of this House.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: All right, you said that we were morally responsible, that’s all.

Hon. Mr. Meen: You try hard, anyway.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: We appreciate your confidence --

Hon. Mr. Meen: All I’m suggesting is -- Mr. Chairman, I don’t know where we are at this moment -- that we go back to deal with the question of incorporating old subsections (a) and (b) of section 4 as subsections (i) and (j) of the bill.

Mr. Lawlor: That is what I thought we had done, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman: I think the intent is clear.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Let’s just make it clear. The minister intends to include universities?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Under what?

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Don’t you know?

Hon. Mr. Meen: The minister intends to include a registered charitable Canadian organization. If the university qualifies under that and has applied --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Don’t you know?

Hon. Mr. Meen: I wouldn’t know whether a particular university qualified. I couldn’t tell you. I happened to go to the University of Toronto. I’m sure it qualified, but I don’t know whether other universities would or not.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: It must be charitable if it took you.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Mr. Chairman, I think, really, that we should not gloss this over. I must admit to the minister that I am perhaps as innocent of this as he is, but he is the minister, and he has said that the universities would not come under the umbrella of this Act if they are registered charitable institutions. Can he assure us that the universities are, and if not, why don’t we include them per se?

Hon. Mr. Meen: -- or if they had the capacity to expropriate I am sure that they would qualify.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: All right, if you say so. That is good enough.

Mr. Chairman: The meaning is clear on this four-sided amendment?

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Chairman, I am puzzled at this point as to where we are. We have now gone into a discussion, I take it, of old section 4, subsection (b). I understand we have been invited to address ourselves to both the new subsections (a) and (b). Is that correct? Is that what the minister’s suggested. It just occurred to me, and I’m just asking this, if on the new (b) --

Hon. Mr. Meen: The new (b)?

Mrs. Campbell: -- the new (b) where it provides for the exemption for land disposed of by a municipality -- as I say, I want a clarification -- are we discussing both of these new sections together?

Mr. Lawlor: No. One at a time.

Mr. Chairman: We can do it whichever you wish. We’ve got it about four different ways right now.

Mrs. Campbell: My suggestion was, in order to try to overcome this problem, would it not be possible to treat all of those agencies, which have the power of expropriation, in the same way that you are dealing with the municipality in the new (b)? Would that not correct or clarify the intent insofar as universities are concerned?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Mr. Chairman, I am advised that my assessment of this is essentially correct; that every designated or recognized university does not necessarily qualify. They must apply and be recognized. This provision that we are proposing to incorporate would exempt those which are qualified. I’m not going to go out and say yes, these all qualify, or these don’t all qualify. The designation that we’ve chosen to propose here is those that have qualified as registered Canadian charitable organizations under the Income Tax Act.

Mr. M. Shulman (High Park): Why don’t you write all the universities in?

Hon. Mr. Meen: We could.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I really think that the minister should do that, because the provincially assisted universities must surely all have the same powers, and for him to indicate that some have qualified and some have not is just unacceptable. I’m sorry to bother you about this, but you’re bringing forward a piece of legislation which could very well require amendment next week if you let it go this way.

Mr. Shulman: It will anyway.

Mr. Good: Mr. Chairman: I think the one point that must be made is this. We can only approve of old subsection (b) because the minister has included the new subsection (b), which means disposition by a municipality. Your old bill did not exempt property disposed of by a municipality.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: To a municipality.

Mr. Good: It exempted property sold to a municipality. So we can only accept old (b) because you have included new (b). When we look back to the old (a) section, which excludes property expropriated by an expropriating agency, we therefore have excluded property that would be bought by a university. But what we are asking is why we see nothing in here which excludes property sold by a university. This is what our problem is, because you can’t discuss the old sections without looking at what you have provided for in new sections. Our amendment would have stated, in the old original bill, land disposed of “to or by Her Majesty in the right of Ontario.”

Mr. R. F. Nixon: That would have been a nice, simple way to do it.

Mr. Good: But you have chosen to do it differently by saying that designated land disposed of by a municipality is exempt. Your old bill went much further than that when you were talking about land disposed of to Her Majesty in the right of Ontario and Hydro and all the rest. But you have included the municipality yet haven’t said a word about other institutions.

Hon. Mr. Meen: We have a broader definition of “municipality,” of course. I am sure the hon. members are aware of this definition that “municipality” includes all boards and commissions.

Mr. Good: Yes, but your definition doesn’t include “university.”

Hon. Mr. Meen: But the subsections (a) and (b) that originally appeared would be (i) and (j) in 4, if the hon. members agree, dealing with, and homing in on, the seemingly heavy-handed approach of a government agency or other body that had the capacity to expropriate, to wield a club over somebody by the process of negotiation with the eventual threat of expropriation, or by the actual process of expropriation. As I say, we had some misgivings about all of that.

So, if we put those in, we have looked after the acquisition. Then, if we go back to the new (a) and (b), in which we talk about (a) “where the designated land is disposed of by,” or “by way of gift to an organization,” we have caught it in both directions there. And when the designated land is disposed of by a municipality, I think that takes care of the other side of the municipal coin.

Mr. Good: Mr. Chairman, the definition of “municipality,” if you go back to the definition, includes local boards, school boards, secondary school boards, municipality elementary school boards; but there is nothing here to cover a university.

The case in point is that the University of Guelph has been left a piece of land many miles from its original campus, and whether or not it will ever be used is questionable. Should they wish to dispose of this piece of land, it would be ridiculous to think that they would be subject to tax as a provincial tax-supported university. I think it is simply a matter of adding the word “university” to the word “municipality.”

Mr. Worton: Mr. Chairman, the thing that concerns me is that the University of Guelph, in some cases, has had property contributed to them by donors. Then in some cases, they want to sell it, to exchange it for other property. The city of Guelph, like many municipalities, has been purchasing property for industrial purposes for 20 years now, and they want to be clarified on their position that when they buy a farm and put in the services and sell it at cost, they are going to be clear as far as this tax is concerned. It is just as simple as that. I understood from our conversation earlier that there was going to be consideration given to this.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Well, the first subsection (b) as I was proposing, provides for when the designated land is disposed of by a municipality. That would be in there.

Mr. Worton: That is fine. That looks good.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes, they would be clear on that.

Mrs. Campbell: And the university?

Hon. Mr. Meen: No, I am not prepared to discuss this. I think hon. members have to realize that there are various types of universities, and some are established --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: No, there are not. There are provincially assisted and others.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Some are established under grants enough that if they qualify as a truly charitable organization, they can register under the section in the federal Income Tax Act. They can apply for registration and be qualified, and if they apply and are registered, then they qualify as a charitable institution. That has been the approach I am making to bring in the major organizations to which this section should apply.

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Chairman, could I try to clarify this? If one looks at the old section 4(a), we are dealing there with land which is taken under statutory authority. This is what we are dealing with there. Under that section I would assume that the universities with power to expropriate would be covered. Is that correct?

Hon. Mr. Meen: That would be my assessment, yes.

Mrs. Campbell: Because they have a statutory authority. Then what I don’t understand is why we have to rely on this particular wording in section 4(a), “a ‘registered Canadian charitable organization’,” when it comes to sale. Why can we not use the same authority covered by “municipality” in the new subsection (b) and extend it to those with the authority to expropriate? Incidentally, I don’t see where we are including Ontario Hydro, for instance.

Mr. Good: It is in the old bill.

Hon. Mr. Meen: It is in subsection (b).

Mrs. Campbell: Yes, but on the sale by. So I would suggest that if we could look at it from the point of view of those institutions, boards, commissions or whatever that have power of expropriation, then surely they would be included as having been excluded under subsection (b) if one added to the municipalities those referred to in the old subsection (a) and (b). Would that not be feasible?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Mr. Chairman, I must confess to not following the argument entirely. I think we are able to have our cake and eat it, to use the expression, if we include the contents of the old subsections (a) and (b) and the new subsections (a) and (b). Under the old subsection (a), we have, “designated lands being taken under authority either by agreement or by any person under statutory authority.” So Ontario Hydro is picked up there in its acquisitions.

Mrs. Campbell: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Then, “when the land is taken or disposed of [both, in other words] to Her Majesty in right of Ontario, a Crown agency within the meaning of the Crown Agency Act, a municipality, Ontario Hydro, Her Majesty in right of Canada ...” and so on. So it seems to me that we have everything covered there.

Mrs. Campbell: That is correct.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Then when we take a look at the other side of it, “when the designated land is disposed of by, or by way of gift to [this is the new way] an organization that is, at the time of disposition, a ‘registered Canadian charitable organization’ within the meaning ...” and so on.

Let me just dwell on that for a second. There are some universities -- Oxford University, for example, would be a recognized university but it would be scarcely be one recognized as a Canadian charitable organization. And there are other private bodies that would probably qualify under our colleges and universities requirements, but who nevertheless, for whatever reason, have not sought to be qualified as a registered charitable Canadian organization. So we have limited this to those who do, in fact qualify under subsection (a). Then, under subsection (b), we have brought in municipalities. So it seems to me that we have everything covered by all four of those subsections.

Mr. Good: Coming, but not going.

Mrs. Campbell: Could I ask then, is Ontario Hydro a registered Canadian charitable organization?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Hardly.

Mrs. Campbell: Then how does the minister cover when Ontario Hydro goes to sell?

Mr. Good: It is not covered.

Mrs. Campbell: This is what I am trying to get at. I don’t see why this reorganization --

Hon. Mr. Meen: In that case, Mr. Chairman, I think the Act does not apply to a Crown agency of this sort; and there would be no tax payable by the agency --

Mr. Shulman: Where does it say that?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Gosh, I don’t know whether that is under the Interpretation Act or where it is, but in fact that is the law. The tax would not apply to the Crown in this instance. I think that is basic common law.

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Chairman, just one more thing. I recognize that various universities have been instituted under different charters with different clauses and with different powers. But surely if they are public bodies with the power of expropriation, having been enabled to expropriate, I would suggest with the greatest respect, they ought to be able to dispose of the land without the tax.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I just said so.

Mrs. Campbell: Oh. Well, then, could we incorporate that in (b) to make it clear?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Mr. Chairman, it would be redundant.

Mrs. Campbell: They are not a charitable organization just because they can expropriate, are they?

Hon. Mr. Meen: No, no. There are lots of organizations with the capacity to expropriate that wouldn’t be classed as charitable organizations.

Mrs. Campbell: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Meen: But it would be redundant, I am advised, simply because the tax does not apply to the Crown. So it is not necessary to exempt a Crown agency.

Mrs. Campbell: Yes, but the university isn’t the Crown. It has a special charter. The old (b) is (j).

Mr. V. M. Singer (Downsview): I’m sorry. I am 20 minutes late and I should have known better.

Mrs. Campbell: For the sake of my colleague who is here and whose help I am seeking, perhaps I can just go over this briefly. Under the new (b), which is confined precisely to disposition of land by a municipality, it seems to me that not all universities are registered Canadian charitable organizations. But, correct me if I’m wrong, I believe that all universities of which I am aware in this province have the power of expropriation under their different charters. I believe that this is so. I know it is for Toronto, but I’m not too familiar with others. But it does seem to me that they are still --

Hon. Mr. Meen: I won’t make the obvious comment.

Mrs. Campbell: The University of Toronto is not, as I understand it, an emanation of the Crown.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Nobody ever suggested it was, I suppose.

Mrs. Campbell: Well then, this is where I’m coming back to it. I’m saying that if you have a body such as a university with the power to expropriate, would it not be logical and reasonable to say that under subsection (b) that expropriating body would have the same right of disposition as a municipality has, without having to look to the definition of a registered Canadian charitable organization? Have I made myself clear on this?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes. Except that I think we would want to include in our definition a lot of charitable Canadian organizations that didn’t have the power to expropriate.

Mr. Good: Yes, which you have.

Mrs. Campbell: I’m not excluding them.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I don’t think the hon. member is suggesting, Mr. Chairman, that we remove the reference to charitable Canadian organizations.

Mrs. Campbell: No. No.

Hon. Mr. Meen: She’s suggesting perhaps that we extend the authority beyond that to all bodies that have the capacity to expropriate. I’d like to reflect on that, but if we’re going to ruminate on all of these things we’ll never finish up this bill. I think that there may well be some areas in which we could consider an extension.

Mr. Good: Redefine “municipality” and “university”.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I have carefully limited the grant of this provision to such charitable organizations as are registered. You know, there are other kinds of charitable organizations which are recognized as such but not registered.

Mrs. Campbell: I’m not trying to change that, Mr. Chairman.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I would think that we could take a look at it and see if there’s some merit in doing this, without opening the bam door.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Or without standing down the subsection.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes, I’d rather not do that, too.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I am sure you would rather not.

Mr. Singer: The hon. member makes a very good point.

Hon. Mr. Meen: If the hon. member concurs with this, I think we could take a look at it. But at the moment, I think I would suggest with respect that we leave that subsection alone, as I was proposing the amended new (a), and we’ll see how that works over the next few months.

Mrs. Campbell: Oh no, Mr. Chairman. I’m sorry. I can’t see that I could personally sit here and say this is one more thing we’re going to sit around and think about for months. I would like to understand whatever the thinking was that would put the universities, whatever their various charters would be, into such a position as, in my opinion, is indicated in this statute. I am sorry, but I would personally ask that this be stood down unless we can have an answer, because I don’t think our universities, which are public, tax-supported bodies, should be placed in this kind of a position.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: We agree.

Mr. Singer: Right. Good point.

Mr. Good: Amend the definition of municipality.

Mr. Gaunt: Amend the municipality to cover universities, and you have got it solved.

Hon. Mr. Meen: That is going a little far, though, on that definition. I know that sounds like an easy way out. If we recognize -- just let me think out loud -- that under the taking of lands, we get down to “Crown agency.” If “Crown agency” includes a university, then we have got the protection of subsection 4(b), old 4(b), for acquisitions. Then on the dispositions --

Mrs. Campbell: Isn’t it covered under the old 4(a) with respect to having statutory authority? That’s the acquisition portion, but it’s the old (a) that covers them, not the old (b), on acquisitions.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Well, if they have the capacity to expropriate, of course, they are under (a).

Mrs. Campbell: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Meen: And I don’t know whether all universities have the capacity to expropriate. But if they aren’t under (a), they are under 4(b) as a Crown agency.

Mrs. Campbell: I see, all right.

Hon. Mr. Meen: So we have picked them up one way or the other there. What I am wondering about is on disposition, and what I said earlier I repeat -- that the Act does not bind the Crown to the payment of tax. So that you don’t have to then, if the university is a Crown agency. Then the tax would not be exigible against a university on the sale, and you therefore don’t include it specifically, because under the law it is included inferentially, if that is the word. So, I think we’ve got the university one way or the other, to the member for St. George, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Good: You have got them coming, not going.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I regret this rather devious route of argument, but I think we’ve picked it up on both sides.

Mrs. Campbell: Well, could I have clarification? Is the minister saying that for acquisition, they are either under the old (a) as having the power to expropriate or under the old (b) as a Crown agency?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Subsection (b) as a Crown agency, yes.

Mrs. Campbell: Yes.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Under the new (a) as a charitable institution.

Mrs. Campbell: Or under the new (a) as a charitable institution.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Right.

Mrs. Campbell: Well, I don’t know when a university -- I am sorry I have to plead ignorance of the law -- is a Crown agency. It was not my understanding that they were Crown agencies. If that is the case and the minister can assure me that that is the case, then I am not so concerned. My understanding was that there is a very definite difference in their charters, and surely the University of Toronto would be horrified to find that it was suddenly a Crown agency. But I am not sure of that. But if it is not passed under a Crown agency or a charitable institution -- oh, here, they are giving me a definition -- ah good! Ah, thank you for the clarification. A university under the Crown Agency Act is a Crown agency. Now that is all universities? Manufacturing-company or agency owned, controlled or operated, I see. I am sorry, thank you.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Avanti!

Hon. Mr. Meen: You are entirely welcome.

Mr. M. Cassidy (Ottawa Centre): Well, the member for St. George seems to be satisfied with what’s happened. I am not very satisfied by the land of suggestions that are being made here, because not only is the net of the department being significantly loosened by the amendments about registered charitable corporations, but it now appears that universities are, in fact, in under the wire rather than out of it. And I think that before you make exemptions, any exemptions in this Act, you want to look very seriously at what those exemptions are for, and the impact that they are going to have.

If you intended to stop speculation in land, then one presumes that you would have made almost every transaction subject to the speculative land tax. However, I would say that was not the intention of the ministry. The intention of the government was simply to find a few transactions narrowly defined as speculative and to tax those. And, of course, when you start to do that, then the pressure for exemptions comes along. First it’s the charities and then it’s the churches and then it’s the Crown agencies and then it’s the people who can expropriate. All of these people get the right to an exemption either when they purchase or sell.

I’m not sure if it’s in the old subsection (a) or the new subsection (a), but I have very serious questions to ask as to whether a registered Canadian charitable organization should have any exemption from the tax apart from an instance where it receives land or property as a gift. The minister is shrugging his shoulders. He simply doesn’t understand.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I don’t understand the member for Ottawa Centre.

Mr. Cassidy: I am suggesting that gifts to a charitable corporation could be exempted from the tax, but that if the charitable organization chooses to sell land which it has been given, or which it has acquired, then I don’t see why it shouldn’t be treated like any other participant in the land market. In my experience, if you want to take universities in particular, they often behave in a similar fashion to other large land holders.

The University of Ottawa, for example, has been buying property very steadily in its area of Ottawa East in advance of need and it has been developing that land for its own uses. It has been developing that land for housing, for other purposes, and has been acting in a manner --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: That is good planning.

Mr. Cassidy: -- in a not dissimilar fashion from the Meridian Building Group Ltd. when its use of those buildings ended with it demolishing them.

If the minister travels around the University of Toronto campus he will find that exactly the same thing has taken place.

Vast tracts of housing that existed at the time the member for Scarborough West (Mr. Lewis) and myself were at that university -- toward St. George St. -- have now been razed for parking lots. This was done under ownership powers given to that particular university.

It is suggested -- I don’t know whether the minister has accepted it or not -- that any expropriating agency should have exemption from this tax. Now, I don’t agree, given the fact that Canadian Pacific Ltd., Consumers Gas Co., Union Gas Ltd. and TransCanada PipeLines Ltd. have powers to expropriate.

What on earth would we be doing in this Legislature giving the power of exemption from this tax to private corporations which happen to have the right to expropriate for certain reasons connected with public transportation?

It seems to me that if you look, let’s say, at the recent experience of St. Michael’s Hospital -- I know the member for Lakeshore has been unhappy with me for this one -- but there was the instance where the Municipality of Toronto sold to the hospital a tract of valuable land for hospital expansion -- and I’ve forgotten what the price was, $2 million or $3 million, and this was done a couple of years ago -- all of the evidence suggests that when a favourable offer came in from the private sector that the people controlling that hospital did their best to make sure that the notification to the city was buried in city bureaucracy. They did this so they could take advantage of the offer from the private sector, so the city would not be able to reconsider whether, if there wasn’t going to be a hospital extension on that site, the land might be used for some other public or semi-public purpose.

Why should the hospital, as a registered charitable organization, as I’m sure it is, have been allowed to sell that land? It was a valuable tract of land -- and the hospital made a profit of $2 million or $3 million over the course of two or three years, without tax, when any person in the same situation would have to pay a very substantial tax?

The minister may say that the land was sold for that particular charitable purpose. I mean, who is against hospitals and health? Nobody is against hospitals and health. And it is perfectly open to the Minister of Health (Mr. Miller) to draw from the consolidated revenue fund, funds that may, in fact, happen to be equal to the tax paid by that particular organization in order to further the purposes of St. Michael’s Hospital. But I don’t think the corporation that happens to be in a position to benefit from land speculation should be exempt from tax simply because it is a charitable organization.

I think this will lead to distortions in the property market rather similar, if you will, to distortions in the property market which occurred over the period of time when the one stable organization in western society was the church.

Over the period of the dark ages men lived and men died; their property waxed, their property waned. The one sure body that kept wealth together was the church and if wealth was deeded to the church or given to the church, it stayed in the church. Is this the kind of situation the minister really wishes to recreate? Is that the kind of situation he wishes to have? I don’t think that’s acceptable.

I suggest that the power of religions and charitable organizations not just to accept gifts but also to buy and sell property exempt from the tax ought to be removed from this particular Act. I suggest that the right, which apparently will prevail, of Crown agencies like the universities to be able not only to receive by gift but also to deal in land without being subject to the speculative land tax should also be removed. I would suggest, as we go through this section, that one by one the exemptions should be taken out of this particular Act until you are down to a very small list of exemptions.

The principal residence is about the only one that I can really see as being at all justifiable because the purpose of the bill, of this section in particular, should be to ensure that the land speculation we have been experiencing comes to a halt. You won’t do that so long as you build in loophole after loophole, exemption after exemption, dodge after dodge. That’s what the minister is doing with this particular section and I would recommend that he start plugging up the loopholes at the very beginning in clause (a) where it applies to charitable organizations.

Hon. Mr. Mean: I would suggest the member for Ottawa Centre might want to talk to some of his colleagues, such as the member for Lakeshore, and maybe talk to some of his farm friends, if he has any, and see what they have to say about some of the exemptions we have built in. I don’t consider them to be loopholes and I think they are very appropriate.

Mr. Cassidy: You are building speculation, that’s why.

Hon. Mr. Meen: No, we are recognizing that some of these things just aren’t speculation. What we are trying to protect against is socking the fellow with the tax when, in fact, he isn’t a speculator.

Mr. Chairman: Shall these various motions as proposed be carried?

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Chairman: All right, we will do that. Does the member for Lakeshore have further comment?

Mr. Lawlor: I would like to get around the Mortmain and Charitable Uses Act and not deal in the usual high-flown way that my colleague deals with these esoteric subjects but really get down to brass tacks.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: We have been waiting for you for a long time.

Mr. Shulman: He’s going to simplify it for all of us.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Clarify it.

Mr. Lawlor: On the new (a), which is, I think, what we are talking about --

Mr. Shulman: No, we are talking about --

Mr. Lawlor: Are we talking about the old (a)?

Mr. Chairman: We are dealing with the new (a) as proposed in the reprinted bill.

Mr. Shulman: I thought that was under the old (a)?

Mr. Lawlor: I thought the new (a) had become reconstituted as the new (i) -- the old (a) as the new (i) -- and the old (b) as the new (j). And the bluebird has become the bluejay. There are any number of possibilities in this statute; we will play the permutations.

Mr. Minister, on (a) you were referring to a registered Canadian charitable organization under section 110(8) (c) of the Canadian Income Tax Act. But then you go on -- and this is a mere matter of semantics I am concerned with at the moment -- is not a trust exempt from tax under part 1 of that Act, by paragraphs (f) or (h) of subsection 1 of section 149 of that Act? I don’t understand what you are saying.

As I read the Canadian Act, it defines a registered Canadian charitable organization as follows, “Subclause 1. A charitable organization in Canada exempt from tax under this part by paragraph 149(1) (f).” You seem to be saying that it’s a registered Canadian organization but you are going to hollow out or exempt or make an exclusion of the very thing they include as part of their definition. What yon take out, they put in; or rather what they put in, you take out. I want that clarified.

The second point is in the same paragraph: “Or a corporation or trust resident in Canada exempt from tax under this part by paragraph 149(g) or (h) or ...” and then we go on. But you have mentioned (f) and (g) as the reason for the fact that you left subsection (g). What has subsection (g) got to do with non-profit corporations of all kinds, with certain terms and conditions as to their carrying on business, the nature of the debts incurred and a whole host of criteria?

Are you saying, in other words, that if charitable registered corporations under the terms of the Canadian income tax -- that specific type of non-profit corporation -- hold, sell or take land, it is subject to your speculative land tax? Is that the design and purpose of your legislation?

The minister nods his head, seemingly in agreement? Can I get that on the record?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Not very readily. But let me just say, Mr. Chairman, that the subsection reading at the end, as the member quoted it, “and is not a trust exempt from tax under part 1 of that Act by paragraph (f) or (h) of subsection 1 of section 149 of the Act,” is indeed kind of complicated and difficult to understand. I wrestled with that one myself a good deal.

There’s a difficulty that comes out of designating all charitable organizations. There are some that are set up on the basic principle that charity begins at home. There is one in British Columbia, the Woodward Foundation, I think it is, in which it would appear that the settlor of the so-called charitable trust was the father; he benefited the earnings out of the trust and it’s a beneficence upon has children and family generally. That kind of trust would not qualify.

So “registered charitable Canadian organization” excludes charitable organizations that have not been registered -- that’s subsection (f) -- and, in subsection (h), charitable trusts themselves to which I have just made reference.

Over the years, I’m advised, in the experience of the federal people dealing with the administration of the federal Estate Tax Act, there has been a good deal of abuse by charitable trusts in general. We felt that at this time we should not extend this exemption any further than what I might call a genuine charitable organization, one that has qualified under the requirements of subsection (f) and has, in fact, applied and been registered pursuant to the provisions of section 110(8) (c). Hence, the exception at the end of the paragraph.

Mr. Lawlor: Yes. Are you talking about certain foundations, foundations generally, because that was my major comment with respect to the inclusion of charitable organizations in this particular section. I think that there are a good many so-called and registered charitable foundations in this country, and the only thing that’s true about them is that they are foundations. They are well founded and their foundation garments are well hidden, but the charitable aspects of their operation could very well be performed by a somewhat more charitable type of organization.

I’m not prepared to go into it tonight, but I will at some time in this Legislature, because in the past few years since I’ve been here, I’ve never heard an assessment or a real analysis of the role, function and purposes of foundations and the gratuities given out by your government, as well as the government up above, with respect to these quasi-pseudo-pretended charitable organizations.

They have become a blight upon the American landscape. The American Congress is seeking to attack them now, and they have proliferated across the border like all the miasma that goes on there and have become part of the scene in this country.

If you’re thinking to benefit, and if you do benefit any of these organizations within the terms of this particular section, then to that extent I find the section and the exemption rendered thereby unpalatable. I take it that you’re saying, in part at least, that this is precisely what you’re trying to stop.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Oh, yes.

Mr. Lawlor: My only question then is to what extent do you staunch the haemorrhage? Are there not foundations under (f) and foundations under what are called charitable trusts under (h) which nevertheless remain within the ambit of your legislation? If (g) is the one that remains within the legislation -- the non-profit organizations -- I don’t know how these foundations are designated or under what peculiar head they fall. It seems on reading the sections that a foundation might very well qualify for any of these sections. And, therefore, I suspect that your net is not going to catch the whales as they go through.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I don’t think so, Mr. Chairman. I think maybe we are getting a fairly fine mesh in the net in limiting it to the registered Canadian charitable organizations. We might have got it a good deal wider and with a larger mesh, if we had been prepared to accept charitable organizations and charitable trusts. With that expressed exemption, I think we get rid of the ones which do not have in a general, broad sense a base for their beneficence that extends beyond an area of self-service.

Mr. Chairman: The member for High Park.

Mr. Shulman: Mr. Chairman, I want to go to a different aspect of these sections, to something which obviously the minister hasn’t thought about. What bothers me about this bill in every section is that no one has thought ahead to what these sections mean. I want just to have the minister consider a hypothetical case, if he will, as to what will happen with this particular section of the Act.

Let us suppose that gremlins do not cause trouble and fairies dance and the bill works exactly as the minister dreams it will. Let us suppose the price of land and the price of housing stop going up and everything stays fine and things only continue to rise in pro- portion with the rest of the economy, in other words, with the inflation -- I gather you will agree with me we do have inflation. Let’s suppose the inflation continues at its present rate of increase, which is increasing at approximately two per cent per year. Just let’s take a hypothetical case for a moment, that it is going up 13 per cent next year.

An hon. member: It is going up two per cent an hour.

Hon. Mr. Meen: You said two per cent a year.

Mr. Shulman: Did you say two per cent an hour? Let’s suppose next year it is 13 per cent, the year after, 15, and the year after, 17.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Well, that is unacceptable, not after July 8.

Mr. Shulman: Not acceptable? It may not be acceptable to you, but that is the rate at which it is increasing. Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, the land does not increase in value other than with inflation. At the end of six years a piece of property that was bought on April 9, 1974, for, say, $25,000, just for the sake of argument, let us suppose that it is then appraised at $125,000. The most extraordinary thing has taken place. A person will be better off financially not to sell it at all but to give it away to a charitable organization.

Let us suppose you are in a 60 per cent tax bracket and suppose you go and sell your property that you bought for $25,000 on April 9, 1974, for $125,000 some time in 1980. First of all, you are going to have to pay 50 per cent special land tax on the difference between $25,000 and $125,000, which means you are going to pay out $50,000 there. Then you are going to have to pay capital gains tax to the federal government. You are going to have to pay another $16,000. You will end up paying $66,000. You will end up --

Hon. Mr. Meen: You will have $34,000.

Mr. Shulman: -- with $34,000. No, you will end up with more than that; you will end up with $59,000. Let’s suppose that you are not completely nuts. I would rather give it away. I’ll give it to a charitable organization. Let’s say I give it to the Ontario Heritage Foundation. If I’m in the 60 per cent tax bracket, I end up with more cash than if I sold it. Perhaps this is what you want. You will want ultimately for everybody to give their property to the government.

Hon. A. Grossman (Provincial Secretary for Resources Development): That’s not a bad idea.

Mr. Shulman: Maybe this is what you want, but what bothers me is that the implications of this are quite wide. Have you considered what this means? In effect, people wishing to buy private land are going to have to compete with the persons who are giving it away.

Hon. Mr. Meen: You could take it all and spend it.

Mr. Shulman: Pardon me?

Hon. Mr. Meen: You could spend it at the Hadassah bazaar. That would be a great way to use it too.

Mr. Shulman: That is all very well. This is a very thoughtful answer from the minister.

Mr. S. Lewis (Scarborough): It is rather more interesting than thoughtful, I would say. It is perhaps more revealing than it is thoughtful.

Mr. Shulman: Has anybody is your department taken the trouble to look ahead -- I am referring now specifically to this section of the Act -- to consider the implications? The implications are very obvious, that in a very few years it will be more profitable to give land away than it will be to sell it. Has the minister any comment?

Hon. Mr. Meen: I might observe the observation is interesting.

Mr. Shulman: It’s all very well to say it’s interesting. But you are the minister. You are responsible for this abomination which we are discussing tonight. You haven’t considered it. Section after section, we come to items that haven’t been considered by the minister.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Could I ask the hon. member, if he is suggesting that I remove the new provision for exemption of gifts to charities and exemption of charitable organizations from this Act?

Mr. Shulman: No I’m not. What I am saying is the section as it is drawn won’t work because you haven’t given any consideration, again, to the same thing I’ve come back on in section after section after section, and on the principle of the bill -- that is inflation. And this is going to ruin your bill, it’s going to ruin the land economy, it’s going to distort the entire investing economy in the province, and you can’t just ignore it.

I don’t have an answer for you. I am not going to say you should take it out. I am saying that this section is going to so distort the land values in this province that it will be impossible for a private person to buy a home. It’ll be impossible for a private person to buy a piece of land in the country, because it suddenly becomes far more profitable to give it to any charitable organization or give it to a university.

And, you know, this type of result is going to happen. There is no use kidding yourself. A person is going to do best for himself financially, and if it is better to give some- thing away, he will. One of your members, a former minister, here in the House, has proven that already where it’s to his advantage financially to give a piece of land away before you even started it. So you give it to the Ontario Heritage Foundation. We have gone through that. And once you have reached the 60 per cent tax bracket, and most people are in it today, because of inflation, this particular section is going to so distort the land situation in this province and the home situation in this province that the implications are beyond my capacity to understand. Perhaps the member for Downsview could help me on this.

Mr. Singer: I am sorry, I wasn’t listening.

Mr. Shulman: Or any of the lawyers here. But certainly the fact remains that in a very short time --

Hon. Mr. Meen: Ask your friend from Lakeshore.

Mr. Shulman: That is not entirely his field. I’m sorry my friend from Riverdale (Mr. Renwick) isn’t here. I should hope that it’d be in your field. I am surprised that no one on your side of the House has come to you and said, “Look, this is a problem.” Here again the one thing you have ignored, the one ever-present factor in our economy which this bill completely ignores, is inflation. In a very short time, I would suspect by 1978, it no longer becomes economic to sell any property where this tax applies. Either it has to be held or given to a charitable institution. And the incredible thing is that by giving to a charitable institution, you end up with more tax in hand by giving it away than by selling it.

Mr. Cassidy: That’s right.

Mr. Singer: The member is right.

Mr. Shulman: All very well, but in the long term, maybe it’s great that the province should own all the land, and ultimately you will very quickly at this rate. Perhaps from our point of view from this party, I am not sure whether that’s good or bad.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: That’s what the member for Ottawa Centre wants.

Mr. Cassidy: Just around the cities, that’s all.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: He is coming around.

Mr. Shulman: No, but what worries me is that the implication of this has not been planned for; no one in your department has apparently considered what this means.

Mr. Cassidy: He saw the bill an hour before it came in, that’s all.

Mr. Shulman: Well, I am sorry that the Treasurer (Mr. White) never comes here to take the abuse he should be getting for his brainwave. Here we are with a ludicrous section of the Act; it’s known to be ludicrous by everyone in the field, except apparently the minister and his advisers, and you are going to ram it through. I know you are going to ram it; you haven’t listened to anything else we have said except silly little points here and there. But the major basic problems in this bill haven’t been touched. If you don’t withdraw this, the results are going to be upon you and us and everybody else’s problems very quickly.

Again I say it to the minister. I tell him at every section, as we point out the flaws in it, that you are immortalizing yourself with this bill. It is a monument to lack of fact, and once again I give you the same plea I have given every other section -- it can’t be repaired. Stand it down and rethink it.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Forever.

Mr. Lawlor: Mr. Chairman, may I just say a word on the same thing?

It is a great shame that we in the opposition are so damn dense over here that we can’t keep our blithering mouths shut. If we had an ounce of brains in the opposition we would not raise one single voice. We would sit in silence. We would let the legislation go through and --

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Lawlor: -- we would let the repercussions be visited upon their heads. They will have alienated every farmer in the province as soon as it becomes clear. There is no question about that. The whole legal profession is completely turned off, as has been proven this afternoon. And, element after element, everybody who happens to own a house with the basement rented is going to be dead against them.

What are we doing here? Why are we telling them? We must be such honourable men, just dreadfully honourable. Standing here baring our souls, correcting this legislation, giving them the opportunity to alter the face of the earth, trying to rescue the minister from his own badinage and his purblindedness. It is dreadful.

Mr. Lewis: But it is impossible.

Mr. Lawlor: We really secretly believe it is impossible; we’ve even got the thought. But why should we retaliate? Why should we try to ameliorate your wretched legislation?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: The hon. member is trying to help us out?

Mr. Lawlor: I have practically reached the stage now of just shutting up and letting you just go to perdition on your own without providing even the skids.

Mr. Singer: Mr. Chairman, the remarks of the last two members make such good sense, and we’ve been trying to say it for the past four weeks. I am surprised that it really doesn’t get through. I don’t know if the minister heard the remark of my colleague from Sarnia (Mr. Bullbrook), whether he said it out loud or whether he just said it to me, but he has been back home where he is a busy lawyer -- he was back home for about 36 hours; and he comes from a large legal firm who do a great amount of real estate -- and he said, “Nobody in Sarnia is dealing in real estate at all. The whole thing has just died. Nobody knows whether they are coming or going; are they taxable or are they not tax- able; can they possibly live with this; can they possibly not; if they put up a building, what’s going to happen; if they don’t put up a building, what’s going to happen?”

The same is true in Toronto. The minister got carried away by a peculiar headline attributed to the head of the Toronto Real Estate Board that prices, he thought, had fallen off for a few days. But if he had followed it up through the next couple of days he would have seen that a gentleman, who is, I think well known to the member for Scarborough West and a member of a large real estate firm, said --

Mr. Lewis: Donald Kirkup.

Mr. Singer: -- Kirkup, that’s the one -- the prices had shot up again. It is really amazing, the lack of thought, the lack of purpose, the lack of thrust, the lack of research that has gone into this bill. The minister is trying, painfully, manfully -- however you want to describe it -- to get something on the statute books because he has been given a task. Suddenly, here he is, the minister. He has been handed the job by the Treasurer, who absents himself and won’t defend his great idea.

There it is. And we are trying painfully to put through the bill, clause by clause, and the more the members look at any one clause the less sense any one clause makes, and every additional amendment brings new problems. I don’t know; where did the minister get his ideas? His taking out subsections (a) and (b) earlier in the debate and putting them back tonight just shows how ludicrous the whole thing is.

Mr. Shulman: They should call it the John White bill.

Mr. Singer: Your lack of getting any ruling or positive opinion insofar as the incidence of the tax goes again makes the whole thing look ludicrous. We are going to come to another section in a few minutes and I am going to read to the members a brief by a group called the Professional Home Rehabilitators Association that makes very good sense to me. But the minister will put these people out of business, and again, he will accelerate the costs of homes where people have come in and rehabilitated them. The minister is saying, “You can’t rehabilitate unless you rehabilitate to the extent of 20 per cent, and if you are going to rehabilitate and it isn’t 20 per cent we are going to charge you a tax.

Hon. Mr. Meen: No, let’s come back to the subject.

Mr. Singer: All right, but this is the kind of lack of thinking and lack of sense that the minister has got in this statute. I don’t know why we can’t get it through, Mr. Chairman, to the minister that he should take this bill back and spend another week or two rewriting the whole thing ab initio and come in with the answers.

Mr. Shulman: Six months.

Mr. Singer: I couldn’t agree more with the comments that were made just a moment ago by the member for Lakeshore. If we had any sense, we would sit down and keep quiet and let you suffer. I don’t know why we don’t let you do that.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Because you haven’t any sense.

Mr. Singer: Well, it may be we haven’t any sense, because with the way the press has been reporting this it really doesn’t make it worth our while from a political point of view.

Hon. Mr. Meen: You are absolutely right.

Mr. Singer: Except that some of us feel we have a responsibility when we come in here to see that a statute as important as this one could be makes a little sense both in pattern and in legislative custom and so on. Now, why must each section be fought so hotly and why must the minister be dragged kicking and screaming into some reasonable and logical change?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Good question.

An hon. member: They aren’t all that bad.

Mr. Singer: I don’t know, Mr. Chairman. I honestly don’t understand what the minister is trying to achieve. For goodness’ sake, take the damn bill back, gather together the best brains you have in the civil service, retain outside counsel -- we won’t even ask you how much you are paying them an hour -- get some good chartered accountants, re- write the bill and make it workable.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I’ll bet you will.

Mr. Singer: Then maybe you’ll have something which will have an effect on the housing market.

Mr. D. M. Deacon (York Centre): Mr. Chairman, it is amazing to me that a bill brought forward to tax speculative trading profits, to discourage trading in land on a short-term basis, has resulted in such a complicated and completely irrational bit of legislation. Surely the minister, as suggested by my colleague, should take this back. He should recognize it’s the short-term trading we want to avoid. Surely the minister should realize that by putting in clauses which would remove the liability for tax after a period of five to 10 years -- certainly on a decreasing scale during that time -- would achieve the end and would remove a lot of the pitfalls into which the minister is now falling because of his attempt to make this an everlasting piece of legislation. He then would have achieved what the Treasurer asked him to do; that is, bring in legislation which would discourage trading and speculating in land. That is what I feel would certainly work in the investment business and it certainly would work in this type of investment.

I urge the minister to reconsider the whole bill.

Mr. Chairman: We will place the motion. The member for --

Mr. Shulman: No. I made a certain point to the minister, I think. Does he not even intend to comment on it?

Hon. Mr. Meen: No, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Shulman: Then may I ask him a simple question? Has he considered those implications? Can I get a yes or a no at least?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Mr. Chairman, that may be a possibility. If the member thinks one can avoid this by giving away his property to charity, and if that be the case, then so be it. We have added these sections with respect to charitable organizations for obvious reasons and I don’t propose to change that. I don’t think the member has any suggestions -- in fact, I believe he indicated he didn’t have any suggestions -- as to how to get around it particularly.

Mr. Shulman: Yes, I did.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Except he’s busy suggesting I withdraw the bill. That’s about the only suggestion he’s made and obviously I am not about to do that.

Mr. Shulman: Well, that was only as a token of friendship. My suggestion the other day -- and we are going right back to the beginning since you have forgotten it apparently -- was that you have made no provision at the beginning for inflation. If you had done that, each section would have followed along with some sense; as it is, each section for that very reason makes no sense.

I am perfectly willing to accept the minister’s explanation which is that presumably this possibility has now been considered. For the minister’s own sake, for the government’s own sake, even for the Treasurer’s own sake, don’t you think perhaps some consideration should be given to what this will mean in a very few years? You can brush me aside, you have the votes to do it; you’ll jam this through, but the implications in such a short period of time are so horrendous for the whole ownership of real estate in this province. Perhaps this will make my colleague from Ottawa East very happy -- I suppose it will -- but ultimately, very quickly, there is going to be no privately-held land.

Mr. Lewis: Ottawa Centre.

Mr. Shulman: Ottawa Centre, sorry. Surely, as a minister of a Conservative government, presumably dedicated to free enterprise --

Mr. Lewis: There’ll be fewer principal residences.

Mr. Shulman: Yes, there’ll be some principal residences less.

Mr. Lewis: Only those who live on Russell Hill Rd. can retain theirs.

Mr. Shulman: Not necessarily. Even people who live on Russell Hill Rd. are going to be in some serious trouble if they make the mistake of buying a retreat in the country and moving there. Some day Russell Hill Rd. will become a second residence and if some- one who lives on Russell Hill Rd. makes the mistake of renting it out --

Hon. Mr. Meen: Then they can hold it for 10 years.

Mr. Shulman: Ten years and then give it to charity.

Mr. Lewis: Are you creating a shambles?

Mr. Shulman: I should be annoyed with the minister, except it’s really one of the more comic things that has happened. There are a few people who are happy, mind you. Some of the lawyers are already beginning to lick their chops, you might say, with visions of the huge fortunes.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Shame.

Mr. Shulman: They’re trying to figure out what it means.

Mr. Singer: They’re running around in circles.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: But you charge for it.

Mr. Shulman: A few lawyers --

Mr. Singer: Yes, running around in circles is a most expensive operation.

An hon. member: I wonder what chops they’re licking.

Mr. Shulman: The lawyers who have dealt in real estate over a long period of time are becoming a little disturbed, because if everything ends up in the hands of charitable institutions they’re not going to have anything to trade back and forth.

I can see this section going through, and I know we can’t stop you. I know it isn’t getting out to the public because no one is paying attention up there. But it is going to seep out over the next year or two, and as the implications of this specific section get out, you are going to rue the day you ever met the Treasurer.

Mr. Lawlor: It’s a great bill! It’s one of the best bills we have ever seen in this House.

Mr. Lewis: As I listened to the member for High Park over the last number of weeks --

Hon. Mr. Grossman: You are convinced.

Mr. Lewis: -- my understanding is that there is nothing to redeem this bill. It is absolutely beyond redemption. Nothing can save it. Nothing can rescue it. That seems to be the unanimously held view on the opposition side of the House. Therefore, withdraw it.

Mr. Shulman: And by a number of your backbenchers too.

Mr. Lewis: Doesn’t that now make sense to you? What is it about this obsession, this fixation of yours that you insist on pursuing a bill which will so conclusively do you in? We had the same land of difficulty in our caucus that the Liberals clearly had in theirs, but we found it easier to oppose in principle. That aside, we had a discussion about clause-by-clause, and the general view of the caucus was that we oppose every blessed clause because every single one of them is either destructive or incomprehensible.

So, on what grounds does one support it? Then, as is normal in a political caucus, because we’re all engaged in the crazy debates that impose themselves on this legislative club, people started asking, “What about amendments?” We came to the conclusion that no amendment could rescue the unintelligibility.

Mr. Lawlor: That’s true.

Mr. Lewis: Then you made some amendments, and we were proven conclusively correct, because every single amendment you brought in screwed up this bill a little more. I’m using the vernacular because I’m afraid to use any Latin words that relate even incidentally to the bill. I’m relinquishing my high-faluting tones and I’m telling you, buddy, it won’t work. Okay? It ain’t going to wash.

I really think we’re faced with an almost insuperable dilemma over here. We want to oppose every clause because none of the clauses makes sense. The amendments are of very little use. It would be easy just to say no and force them to vote after vote or, indeed, not to debate it. We walk into the chamber, and as soon as we walk through the door, the metamorphosis begins. You can can be outside chattering amiably with friends as human beings; walk into this place and you’re legislators. The posturing begins. Take a look at me.

Hon. Mr. Meen: We’ve noticed that.

Mr. Lewis: I understand the process. I’m part of it, day in and day out. I live my blood life in this place. But I’m telling you that in this instance --

Hon. Mr. Grossman: You oppose the bill when you don’t understand it.

Mrs. Campbell: I hope the provincial secretary understands it.

Mr. Lewis: -- it’s impossible to do otherwise, because what we know, and what hasn’t yet impregnated itself upon your consciousness, is that this bill is doing terrible damage around Ontario. It’s doing far more damage than anything within it can possibly retrieve.

You’re not invoking a speculative land tax. You’re drying up real estate transactions. You’re not lowering the price of housing. You’re escalating it. You’re not gaining revenue for the Province of Ontario. You’re becoming a laughingstock.

Mr. Singer: You’re not even winning any friends. You’re losing them.

Mr. Lewis: I’m not an entrepreneur, obviously, but I can tell you, from the calls I’ve had and the mail I’ve had, that the commercial and business community thinks you have lost your senses, that you can go for five or six weeks with this chaotic subterfuge, meaningless in itself but causing so much damage. I don’t understand why you persist in it.

I echo the words of my colleague from Lakeshore. I echo the words of the member for Downsview. You could do yourself some assistance if you withdrew the bill for a week or two and attempted to make it salable. But I must say, on balance, that this single piece of legislation is the most incompetently drafted piece of legislation in the last decade. You can’t mention another bill which has been as emasculated as this one in the process of going through. I’ve been here longer than you have, Mr. Minister.

I’ve been here an eternity, and there has not been a bill in this House in my eternity that has been eviscerated the way this one has been. Not one. And not a bill so poorly handled; not a bill in which the minister had to change so many clauses; not a bill that the minister had to retreat from so often; not a bill that the minister couldn’t understand its contents. What’s wrong with you? When you see that that’s the position at this point in time, you withdraw me bill because you know that it’s socially destructive. You’re just not achieving your aims.

Mr. Shulman: You’re ruining the real estate market.

Mr. Lewis: So we have our debate, and it would go on. That’s why we’re locked into this seemingly endless combat with you. Not because we want to be. Not even simply on the merits of the clauses themselves, but because the bill is hopeless in terms of your objectives.

I ask you a question on this clause, or on any other, for that matter: Can you give the Legislature of Ontario one example that has come to your attention of a significant block of land in this province being sold in order to avoid the impact of this speculative land tax?

As the minister responsible, can you give us -- after more than five weeks of this bill -- one example of a major land transaction in this province which has been completed in order to avoid this tax?

Mr. Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Lewis: All right. To a charitable corporation, or from a charitable corporation, or any other? Right within the confines of this bill?

Mr. Chairman: Not that general --

Mr. Lewis: And I want an honest answer.

Mr. Singer: It may not be in on this section, but, my goodness, it’s relevant.

Mr. Chairman: It’s not relevant to second reading.

Mr. Lewis: It isn’t relevant to second reading? It is as relevant to this section as any other.

Mr. J. E. Bullbrook (Sarnia): Worst bill since you’ve been in the Legislature.

Mr. Lewis: Give me one example under this --

Mr. Singer: The member for St. Andrew -- St. Patrick (Mr. Grossman) has been in this Legislature longer than anybody.

Mr. Lewis: No. I want from the minister --

Mr. Bullbrook: The NDP has spoken more on this bill than anybody else. Don’t you point at me.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I wasn’t even pointing at the member.

Mr. Bullbrook: Were you pointing at the member for Scarborough West?

Mr. Lewis: You might stop pointing.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I didn’t even know the member was here.

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): Don’t you know pointing is rude?

Mr. Lewis: I don’t point. You stop pointing. Gesticulate. Mr. Chairman --

Mr. Chairman: We’d better stick to amendments.

Mr. Lewis: I understand what you’re dealing with, man, and I’m asking the minister a question on this clause -- I’m giving you an opportunity -- or on any other, I want you to tell the House now, 5½ weeks after the speculation land tax was introduced, of one land transaction anywhere in Ontario which has been completed in order to avoid this tax, which is precisely what the Treasurer said would happen.

That’s why he would collect so little money. This tax would cause the immediate changing hands of land in order to avoid its imposition. You tell me of one transaction outside the exemptions and loop-holes you’ve provided which has been completed in order to avoid the tax! Name one that has taken place anywhere in the province -- this clause or any other clause.

All right, you can’t answer that question because there isn’t one. If there was one you would be trumpeting it all over the province. I’ll ask another question. In this clause or any other clause, give us one example of where houses are coming on the market more cheaply in the 5½ weeks since the Act was invoked in the House. Give me one example -- any one.

Hon. Mr. Meen: I can’t give the hon. member chapter and verse on this --

Mr. Lewis: I’m not asking for chapter and verse. I’m asking for one example.

Hon. Mr. Meen: -- save to say the listings are enormous compared with last year at the same time. The rate of increase in listing is 2½ times --

Mr. Lewis: And I want one example where this Act has had effect on either a land transaction or has reduced the price of housing.

Mr. Shulman: Everything is at a standstill. The price hasn’t come down.

Hon. Mr. Meen: That happens to be part of the problem. It’s the opposition from over here that is slowing up this Act.

Mr. Shulman: What? We are responsible, are we?

Mr. Singer: Holding it up?

Hon. Mr. Meen: It has cast doubt on all these transactions. If we could get this bill through I would think that the business community would have a much better notion of just where it’s going.

Mr. Singer: Nonsense. Is this garbage going to convince them?

Hon. Mr. Meen: In any event, Mr. Chairman, this whole debate is completely off the section.

Mr. Lewis: One of the reasons we can’t get the bill through is that you can’t decide from line to line what you mean.

Mr. Bullbrook: Or section by section.

Mr. Lewis: You’ve got an amendment for every blessed clause. The storm that is raining on your heads, sir, you deserve. This bill is no testament to anyone. You know you might have another go around. I can’t appeal to you. I appeal to a more elegant and senior member of caucus, the Provincial Secretary for Resources Development. You have been in this cabinet for a long time. Why don’t you sit down and have one more go around on this bill and decide whether or not it is worth it.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: We will as soon as you pass it. We will see if any amendments are left to carry.

Mr. Chairman: The member for High Park.

Mr. Shulman: I want to pursue another matter --

Mr. Bullbrook: Five sections have been stood down, five of them. Can you imagine that? It’s stupid.

Mr. Singer: We’ve got 23 pages of amendments, amendments to the amendments, deletions, insertions --

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. We are dealing with certain amendments at this time.

Mr. Shulman: I want to come briefly back to the point I was making before, because I want it quite clearly on the record since I didn’t complete it. It was brought to me by some real estate people that a piece of property was bought this year or last year for $25,000. By the time it appreciates to $125,000, if you sell it you will end up with $59,000 in cash. If you give it away, you end up with $75,000 in cash.

Mr. Bullbrook: Right. That is a beautiful example.

Mr. Shulman: Now that’s the sort of nutty result that is going to come out of this particular section. Well, all right. The distortions that will come from that, the minister will find in due course. But let’s leave that for a moment. I want to ask the minister about something that took place during the question period and it applies to this section I think. Perhaps the minister can advise me.

Mr. Bullbrook: We were going to get to that later, but this is great.

Mr. Shulman: Well, it’s true,

Mr. Bullbrook: Sure, it’s true, definitely.

Mr. Shulman: Ultimately, anybody who sells land is crazy. Give it away -- you get more money that way. It’s -- what is it, Fancy World or Alice in Disneyland or --

Mr. Singer: Alice in Wonderland.

Mr. Shulman: Thank you. Well, the Wonderland in Alice.

When we were debating -- and I am not digressing, Mr. Chairman -- during the estimates the other night of the Minister of Government Services (Mr. Snow), the minister said the cost of land would continue to rise since this bill was brought in, and I asked the Minister of Housing (Mr. Handleman) about that and he said not to worry because in a few days he was going to make another announcement, presumably of some other law, which was going to bring the price of land down. I think we have a right to know what that announcement is, because obviously that will affect this monstrous bill.

If there is some secret announcement that you are holding until after this bill comes through, would the minister be kind enough to tell us what other brainwave you have that you are about to bring down, because that may very well affect this clause and many other clauses? What is the other announcement that is to come? Would the minister let us in on that? Well, you had better get an answer or we will never get off this section.

Hon. Mr. Meen: No further announcements from my ministry.

Mr. Chairman: It appears to me that the question really has very little to do with this, if anything.

Mr. Shulman: Well, it may very well have, Mr. Chairman, I beg your pardon. The minister’s bedmate -- pardon, seatmate -- his colleague, says not to worry if this bill isn’t working so far because there is another great announcement coming, and the minister won’t tell us what it is.

Hon. Mr. Meen: Well, if he was purporting to speak for me, I don’t know what he was speaking about.

Mr. Shulman: You don’t know what he was speaking about?

Mr. Lewis: He was speaking for himself. He would not purport to speak of you or for you. There is a certain thing called guilt by association in this legislation.

Mr. Shulman: Mr. Chairman, I am not sure whether I should be pleased or annoyed. If, in fact, there is some other bill from another branch of this government and one minister doesn’t know what the other minister is doing, this speaks a great deal for the problems that we are having and perhaps for the problems that the minister is having. I wonder if the minister would mind overnight consulting with his colleague and finding out what legislation he is bringing down that is going to affect the price of land, because the two may not mesh any better than this one meshes with reality.

Mr. Chairman: Those in favour of Mr. Meen’s motion as moved this afternoon that section 4 be amended by adding the new (a) and the new (b)?

All those in favour will please say “aye.”

Those opposed will please say “nay.”

In my opinion, the “ayes” have it

Shall we stack this?

Mr. Bullbrook: No way. No stacking.

The committee divided on Mr. Meen’s amendment which was approved on the following vote:

Clerk of the House: Mr. Chairman, the “ayes” are 38, the “nays” 21.

Mr. Chairman: I declare the motion carried.

Hon. Mr. Meen had also moved that the old sections (a) and (b) should be renamed (i) and 0).

Mr. Deans: No, Mr. Chairman, I refuse. It is now after 10:30 and there will be no more votes tonight.

Mr. R. D. Kennedy (Peel South): Put the question, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman: Well, we can place the question very quickly.

Order, please.

Mr. Lewis: No. We will challenge your ruling.

Mr. Deans: There will be no more votes tonight.

Mr. Lewis: Well, your leader, or more accurately, your puppet is in Peterborough. Nobody did a job on me today that the Minister of Energy did on his leader.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Look what the member for Lakeshore did.

Hon. W. D. McKeough (Minister of Energy): Stand up together again.

Hon. Mr. Winkler moves the committee rise and report.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please.

Motion agreed to.

The House resumed; Mr. Speaker in the chair.

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Speaker, the committee of the whole House begs to report progress and asks for leave to sit again.

Report agreed to.

Mr. S. Lewis (Scarborough West): That vote took one hour and 20 minutes to call. Thank God there wasn’t any overtime.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): The hockey game isn’t over yet. Mr. Speaker, before I move the adjournment of the House, I would like to say that tomorrow morning, as announced, we will proceed with the consideration of the estimates of Government Services. On Tuesday next we will proceed with the consideration of Bill 25 and Bills 65, 51 --

Mr. V. M. Singer (Downsview): Forget it. Bill 25 will be enough.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: All last year I heard about the inconsistency of announcing business in advance. Would you mind if I let you know?

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): Tell me, I am listening.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: We will have Bills 65, 51, 52, 9, 44, 35, 37 and 39. If that is not enough, I shall announce some more later on.

Hon. Mr. Winkler moves the adjournment of the House.

Motion agreed to.

The House adjourned at 10:55 o’clock, p.m.