Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House met at 2 o’clock, p.m.

Prayers.

Mr. V. M. Singer (Downsview): Mr. Speaker, in the east and west galleries today are 130 students from Downsview Collegiate accompanied by several of their teachers. Downsview Collegiate is another outstanding secondary school situated, strangely enough, in the riding of Downsview. Half of the students live in the riding of Downsview and the other half live in the riding represented by my friend, the hon. member for Yorkview. So, with your permission, sir, I will introduce 65 of the students and perhaps the hon. member for Yorkview can introduce the other 65.

Mr. Speaker: I recognize the hon. member for Yorkview.

Mr. F. Young (Yorkview): Mr. Speaker, I would simply add my welcome to the words of the hon. member for Downsview and welcome those students who are here today from Downsview Collegiate. We hope they have a good visit and we hope the Legislature will give them a royal welcome.

Mr. Speaker: Statements by the ministry.

Oral questions. The Leader of the Opposition.

CSAO NEGOTIATIONS

Mr. R. F. Nixon (Leader of the Opposition): Perhaps the Chairman of the Management Board of Cabinet could report on negotiations, such as they are, with the Civil Service Association. Can he now tell us when he expects to introduce the amendments to the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act which seem to be of such primary importance as far as these negotiations are concerned?

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman may or may not know that the negotiators are at the table as of about this hour with regard to the wages and other financial settlements. There is, in fact, a blackout on the news until we meet again with regard to legislative changes. I assure him that will be very soon.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Supplementary: Since the minister indicated to us here in the House on Oct. 8, I believe, that there would be amendments, is the delay simply to give the ministry an opportunity to discuss the content of those amendments with the Civil Service Association, or are the amendments prepared and will we expect to see them sometime this week?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: It is very difficult because of my commitment to the CSAO, but that matter is under discussion. I will report immediately I can; I expect this week.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Wentworth, a supplementary.

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): Yes, thank you. Might I ask the minister whether the recent advertisement in the local newspapers regarding the position of the CSAO and the government was put there by a number of people, including John Robarts and Colin Brown, and whether this was done with the approval of the government?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I have no idea who is responsible for the ad. I can assure the hon. member that the government is not involved.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions? The hon. Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Singer: Is that Colin Brown again?

Mr. Deans: That’s Colin Brown; that’s who it is.

Mr. Singer: Yes, that would be my guess.

ECONOMIC SITUATION

Mr. R. F. Nixon: In the absence of the Treasurer (Mr. White), I wonder if the Premier would mind if I put a question to him on economic matters. What response is the government making as far as the economic indicators are concerned, which are indicating rather dramatically a downturn in the level of business activity and an upturn in unemployment in the province, much of it a spillover from the problems the United States is experiencing, particularly in the automotive industry? Is there any thought that before we adjourn for Christmas there might be a full statement on the economy, either by the Premier or by the Treasurer and Minister of Economics, perhaps accompanied by a mini-budget or some new approach to budgeting which would meet our requirements, as it appears the economic situation is changing?

Hon. W. G. Davis (Premier): Mr. Speaker, I think, really, the leader of the New Democratic Party asked a somewhat similar question last week. I observed then that we were keeping a very careful eye on it and that I didn’t feel any interest would be served by speculating, particularly on the side of there being a serious recession. I think I observed then, Mr. Speaker, that quite obviously some things happening in the United States might have some impact here. Of course, we are all concerned about the automotive industry.

I don’t think, Mr. Speaker, there is any thought of a mini-budget or something of that kind, because at this stage it is really too early to determine just what the effects may or may not be. It’s fair to state, from our standpoint, as I explained to the Leader of the Opposition, that it’s something of a contradictory situation where as a government we are endeavouring to take the heat out of some aspects of the economy to try to come to grips with inflation, while at the same time as we are not anxious to see any increase in unemployment as a result of this. We have postponed a number of capital projects because we think this is one area where perhaps the economy can stand a slight stabilizing effect, except in the field of housing. When it comes to the automotive industry, Mr. Speaker, here once again it’s a complicated matter for government, and I think government at all levels, because we are dealing with an area that is somewhat specialized.

If, for instance, in the construction field there was a real tapering off in the private sector or in housing, then as a matter of government policy we could move ahead with some government programmes. I think there was general consensus amongst all the Premiers and the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance that at least for a period of time we would try to restrain government expenditure in this field, and it’s a point of view expressed directly or indirectly by the Leader of the Opposition in some areas. Once again it’s not a case of introducing programmes of that kind to offset what unemployment may or may not occur in Windsor or in Oshawa in terms of the people working in the automotive industry, because they are not interchangeable.

Mr. Speaker, I can only assure the Leader of the Opposition that we are in constant touch on the economic situation. We are all concerned, but at the same time in any relative sense things in this province are relatively healthy. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t problems on the horizon, and from our standpoint we’ll continue to watch the situation. But I really don’t think it would be proper to say in the next two weeks that there would be something of a mini-budget, because I question what a mini-budget could contain that would come to grips with a problem that I think really is very premature in defining it and certainly as it relates to certain segments of the population.

As to whether some comprehensive statement on the economy between now and Christmas might be helpful, I’ll certainly discuss that with the Treasurer. I think that most of the information really is known to a lot of us, but certainly I would be prepared to discuss with him whether such a statement might be helpful to members of the House.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: A supplementary: Since the Premier indicated in his first sentence or two in answer to the question, that there were speculative attitudes on a possible recession, would he not consider that it would be useful for somebody with the stature of the Minister of Economics, who has access to all of the indicators and how they apply in the province, to make such a statement, particularly in regard to the construction industry, since even over this last weekend there have been further indications that in Metropolitan Toronto the level of employment in the construction industry, both for housing and for major construction, is on the way down?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, there might be some purpose in this. The reason I am reluctant to speculate -- once again, I am no economist; and I make that abundantly clear. I think it is fair to state, though, that things of this kind are sometimes a state of mind; if enough people start saying we are going to have problems, sometimes these prophecies become self-fulfilling. The average consumer senses this. You can create an artificial feeling of economic difficulty -- I don’t say that it’s not all real; don’t misunderstand me -- but I’m very reluctant to become one of those who, in order to grab a headline or two or to create concern, is prophesying that we are going to have a major economic problem.

Mr. Deans: It is hardly in the Premier’s best interests.

Mr. Singer: He certainly uses the same technique if he wants to push it the other way.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Well, Mr. Speaker, I have always been an optimist and I will continue to be an optimist.

Mr. Singer: Yes, even if it gets him a headline.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I think it’s very important for the leaders of government in this province and in this country to retain optimism and confidence, because I think that kind of thing is important.

Mr. Singer: Based on fact -- based on fact.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Davis: The members opposite may not think so, but I happen to believe that.

Mr. J. A. Renwick (Riverdale): Mr. Speaker, by way of a supplementary question, would the Premier give consideration to speaking with the leaders of the automotive industry in the province of Ontario to cushion, somehow or other, the direct impact of the sudden, precipitate layoffs that are taking place in the automotive industry in the United States? Is that not a feasible matter which the Premier or the Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Bennett) could act upon at the present time, rather than to have it occur in the way in which it is occurring at this time?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I must confess I have had one or two informal conversations. I don’t want to appear to be making any brief on behalf of the automobile industry in this province, except to make this observation: I think it is fair to state that they are as anxious to minimize this as any one else. I’d be quite prepared, or one or two of the ministers, to have further discussions to see if there is any way to minimize this further.

I think I’m right in reflecting that they are just as anxious to do this but, of course, they are in the position where they can’t operate in isolation because of the automotive pact. I think most people would say that over the period of years it has been in effect, we have been something of the economic beneficiary and, of course, because now the very close relationship between the industry here and the United States, and with what we know is happening there -- it’s quite apparent to all of us -- it does have an impact here over which the companies here have no direct control. But certainly, I would not be reluctant to chat with them at all or have one or two of the ministers talk to them.

We are in the fortunate position where, for a period of time at least, the impact on those individuals involved in the industry itself certainly is not as great in economic terms as it was five or 10 years ago. What concerns me, of course, is that while their position is protected to a certain extent in an economic way, the sub-suppliers or those developing components for the industry, which is widespread across Ontario, don’t have the same degree of protection as it relates to the incomes to be paid to these people. Certainly, Mr. Speaker, I would have no reluctance in doing this. But without appearing to interpret the industry, I think they are as concerned as we are to try to minimize this as best they can.

Mr. Speaker: Does the Leader of the Opposition have further questions?

Mr. Young: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: This will be the final supplementary.

Mr. Young: Again a supplementary to the Premier: Has any discussion taken place in respect of pricing of the automobiles at this point, in view of the very great profits --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. That is far removed from the original question. Does the Leader of the Opposition have further questions?

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Yes. Is the member going to enter into an argument here?

Mr. Young: No.

Mr. Speaker: It can be a new question.

Mr. Young: This is dealing right with the whole matter of the layoffs.

Mr. Speaker: Yes, but it has nothing to do with the original question, the way it was posed.

ACUPUNCTURE

Mr. R. F. Nixon: I’d like to ask the Minister of Education if he has statutory authority to exercise control over an institute known as the Occidental Institute of Chinese Studies operating out of Weston, Ont., which offers a correspondence course or 31 home-study lessons in acupuncture leading to a certificate.

Hon. T. L. Wells (Minister of Education): Mr. Speaker, I believe I do not have statutory control over that.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Supplementary. Can any kind of an organization supposedly operating in this province just put an ad in the paper under these circumstances granting some kind of a certificate signed by somebody that makes people acupuncturists? It may be a problem for the Minister of Health (Mr. Miller), but it is obviously a problem for education as well.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I believe that my colleague, the Minister of Colleges and Universities (Mr. Auld), has been studying this matter, not in the light of the acupuncturists --

Mr. Deans: At the college?

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): He’s taking a course, is he?

Hon. Mr. Wells: -- but of many courses that are given. I believe the course for practical nurses was discussed not so long ago in this House. There are many education courses that are given and ads that are put in the paper over which certainly I have no control. I don’t know what position he has arrived at, but I know he has been studying that matter.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions.

This is the final supplementary.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Wouldn’t the minister think that he should have statutory control over this sort of an offering?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, the statutory limitations of my responsibility are the elementary and secondary schools of the province. I don’t believe that this would fall into either of those categories, so I don’t think that I should have any statutory control.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions?

Mr. D. C. MacDonald (York South): It’s pretty elementary, some of this stuff.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Is it elementary?

Mr. Speaker: The member for Wentworth.

ELECTION POSTPONEMENT

Mr. Deans: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Premier. Would the Premier consider having some amendments introduced to the Municipal Act which would have allowed the Treasurer, or whoever happened to be responsible for municipal affairs, to have postponed the elections in the Windsor area as a result of unprecedented conditions -- or in any other area, should those kinds of conditions occur in the future?

Mr. Renwick: Let’s just have it in the summer instead of December.

Hon. A. Grossman (Provincial Secretary for Resources Development): No, it’s been cancelled in Toronto. We are not having an election today!

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I haven’t discussed this with the Treasurer, but I think it’s something that is worthy of consideration, and I will do so.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions?

Mr. F. A. Burr (Sandwich-Riverside): Supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: Supplementary. The member for Sandwich-Riverside.

Mr. Burr: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question of the Premier. In view of the fact that because of the very serious snowstorm and icestorm in Windsor today, the early radio announcements said that the polls would be open tomorrow, and in view of the fact that now the city clerk says that only those polls that did not open on time today will be open for nine hours tomorrow, and in view of the fact that scarcely any voter knows whether his own poll opened on time today or not, and therefore will not know whether it will be open tomorrow --

Mr. Singer: Question.

Mr. Burr: -- and in view of the fact that probably --

An hon. member: Come on!

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. There is quite a bit of build-up to this.

Mr. MacDonald: A very complicated situation.

Mr. Deans: It is very difficult.

Mr. Burr: -- and in view of the fact that travelling to a polling booth in Windsor today is very hazardous --

Mr. Deans: Almost impossible.

Mr. Burr: -- will the Premier intervene to ensure that all voters in Windsor will be able to vote tomorrow, as originally announced on the radio?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I have a note here. The mayor of Windsor has been in touch and has been informed that there is no deferment possible under the Act and no extension of election except as provided in Section 67. I would read to the member Section 67: “If by reason of riot or other emergency” -- and this is not a riot in Windsor --

Mr. Deans: It may be yet.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- but I would think, being a non-lawyer at this moment, I would describe it as being an emergency.

Mr. MacDonald: That is very perceptive.

Hon. Mr. Davis: The section continues:

“-- the voting at the polling place is not commenced on the proper day or is interrupted after being commenced and before the lawful closing thereof, the clerk or deputy returning officer, as the case may be, shall hold or resume the polling on the following day at 11 o’clock in the forenoon and continue the same from day to day until the poll has been opened without interruption with free access to voters for nine hours in all.”

This has been communicated, as I understand. There can be no announcements, either, of any results until the nine uninterrupted hours have taken place. I don’t know from this note, Mr. Speaker, in answer to the hon. member, just what will be finalized in Windsor, but it’s quite obvious some form of communication is going on and they are trying to resolve it; but I can’t help the member beyond that.

Mr. Deans: Could I ask a supplementary?

Mr. R. F. Nixon: If the Premier is going to review this matter, why not look at it in terms of changing the polling day for municipal elections to a time of the year when campaigning is going to be a little more convenient and, also, voting will be a little more pleasant for the people?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I have no strong feelings on this. I can only go through the discussions that have taken place over the years. We all know what the arguments are. You could have the elections, perhaps, in September or October. You then run into --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Those are both good months for elections.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Yes, well, I found October to be, from my standpoint, a very excellent month for elections.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): Try it again.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: September, June --

Mr. T. P. Reid (Rainy River): Any month is going to be bad for the Premier.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I found June not a bad month either; thinking back to 1959.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: The Premier does go back.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Oh, yes, I go back to 1959. I do, indeed. And September. In fact, the more I think of it, they all have been relatively good months provincially.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Well, I was elected in January; so let’s try one then.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Well, no; because the weather would be poor in January.

Mr. Breithaupt: But the results would be good.

Hon. Mr. Davis: One wouldn’t have the same freedom and access to the electorate. But I think, Mr. Speaker, the argument has been once again that if you have the elections in October, what position is the council in that has the responsibility for the balance of the year? What happens for the two or three months prior to that? There’s also the problem of the municipalities being on the calendar year in terms of finance. Certainly I am not averse to considering this. I know it has been explored on a number of occasions, but I have no objection to having another go at it.

Mr. Renwick: The Premier should appoint a task force to study it.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions? A supplementary on this? Any further questions by the leader of the New Democratic Party -- the House leader, that is?

Mr. Deans: Pro tem -- just filling in.

Hon. Mr. Davis: What does he mean, pro tem?

Mr. Deans: No, pro tern -- I was just listening to what was being said to me.

DONATIONS BY QUEEN’S COUNSELS

Mr. Deans: I want to ask the Premier a question, if I may. Would he care to elaborate on his statement that prospective QCs should, perhaps, consider making retroactive donations to Progressive Conservative fundraising dinners?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I don’t think that I really said that. I was speaking to the criminal section of the Ontario Bar Association Friday evening, and I made a number of suggestions as it related --

Mr. Deans: All of them equally silly, but true.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- to a number of very important issues --

Mr. MacDonald: Apparently there’s more than one toll gate.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- which I was surprised to see even reported. I don’t think I --

Mr. Deans: I’ll bet the Premier was surprised.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I mean, what I really said that was relevant wasn’t reported -- and I can tell the member what that was, if be would like.

Mr. Deans: In whose opinion?

Mr. MacDonald: If the Premier said it, it is very relevant.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I think it was actually fairly relevant, but probably only related to the legal profession -- particularly Crown attorneys and others -- because I was barking on a little bit of personal experience. I think I did observe that, from time to time, we hear about people who really aren’t that interested in QCs, but I did observe that I sensed there probably were as many applications as in other years. This was met with some response, on the basis no one came to me afterwards and volunteered to give up his QC. I must confess no one came to me afterwards applying for one, either. I did tell them --

Mr. Deans: But was there a rush of retroactive cheques?

Hon. Mr. Davis: No, no; I didn’t mention cheques. I did observe to them that it was not necessary to have a membership card in the Progressive Conservative Party if they were applying to me afterwards.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Just helpful.

Mr. Deans: It helps.

Hon. Mr. Davis: No, I didn’t even say that.

Mr. MacDonald: He winked at the right time.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I did go on to observe -- so that this is clearly understood, too -- that there were a number of reported federal leadership candidates there. But there was one who had not been at the two previous dinners -- one Arthur Maloney, who, I see in the press, is being mentioned. I did observe to Mr. Maloney that I thought really it was grossly unfair, in that he is being reported as being interested, and he didn’t have to attend the two previous dinners and pay the $125, as did some others who probably will be candidates, not myself incidentally, who did attend the dinner.

I think that’s the only observation about membership in the Conservative Party that wasn’t reported during that very brilliant dialogue I conducted at the outset of my very important remarks.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions?

CITIZENS’ COALITION ADVERTISING

Mr. Deans: One final question: Does the Premier feel that the advertisements in the newspaper of this last weekend by the Citizens’ Coalition, headed by Colin Brown and John Robarts, could be construed by those who know politics to be the first blast in the Tory government’s attempts for re-election?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I’m constantly amazed in this House by the pro tem leader of the New Democratic Party and the very naive and facetious questions that he asks.

Mr. Deans: I’m sure he is. Would I be wrong in thinking that way?

Hon. Mr. Davis: I can only say to the pro tem leader and to what I’m sure in his mind is the eventual leader of the New Democratic Party, and I could make some personal observations about that --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: That is out of order.

Mr. MacDonald: Answer the question.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- that if I were the hon. member, I wouldn’t be in a rush at all.

Mr. Deans: Do those questions worry the Premier a bit?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Firstly, Mr. Speaker, I don’t know who is part of the Citizens’ Coalition. I think if the hon. member has some information as to who in particular --

Mr. Deans: Oh, I see. Does he know John Robarts or Colin Brown?

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- contributed to the Citizens’ Coalition, that’s fine, I don’t happen to know. I would only say this, when the Progressive Conservative Party starts its election campaign we do it during elections. We don’t do it, as people opposite do, 52 weeks of the year, in terms of publicity and the attitude they take.

Mr. W. Ferrier (Cochrane South): We look after the folks back home.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I can assure the hon. member there will be no doubt in his mind that it will be Progressive Conservative material; it will not be the Citizens’ Coalition.

Mr. Singer: Benoit didn’t seem to think so, did he?

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Labour has an answer to a question.

Mr. MacDonald: Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: A supplementary?

Mr. MacDonald: A non-facetious supplementary question: Had the Premier or as far as he knows any other member of his government prior knowledge of this advertising campaign?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I can only say that not only did I not have prior knowledge, but somebody had to phone me Saturday night. I don’t want to be misunderstood in this because our paper boy is excellent, but I didn’t see it on Saturday morning. For one reason or other, somebody had to phone me to tell me there was an ad in the paper.

Mr. MacDonald: How about all the other members of the cabinet or the Premier’s staff?

Hon. Mr. Davis: I did not know it was going to be in. I cannot speak for my staff, but I doubt that they knew either.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Labour has an answer to a question.

ARBITRATION AWARD FOR WORKERS IN DUTTON CONVALESCENT HOME

Hon. J. P. MacBeth (Minister of Labour): Mr. Speaker, on Nov. 26 the Leader of the Opposition asked me if I had been informed of an arbitration award concerning the Bobier Convalescent Home in Dutton, which appeared to create an anomaly in regard to the relationship between the legal minimum wage and rates which would result from the implementation of the award.

The award provided for an across-the-board increase totalling 95 cents per hour to be granted in three stages between June 1, 1974 and Sept. 1, 1975. This decision would result in a minimum rate for one or two classifications which would be below the minimum wage during the period Oct. 1 to Dec. 31, 1974. Clearly the minimum wage would prevail in any such circumstances.

In any event, at the request of the registrar of the Labour Management Arbitration Commission, the chairman of the arbitration board has agreed to reconvene the board for the purpose of dealing with the situation which was raised with me in a letter dated Nov. 20 from the union concerned.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Supplementary: How can the Minister of Labour justify the fact that arbitration tribunals would ever come down with such a ridiculous decision?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Mr. Speaker, I think the answer in this case, and I haven’t got all the facts so I don’t want to be held to this, is that there were very few if any people at the low category, and that in their considerations they were more concerned with the upper categories rather than the lower categories. But I agree that they should have looked at our minimum provisions.

Mr. Reid: That doesn’t cover it.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Carleton East.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: The minister ought to fire them.

CSAO NEGOTIATIONS

Mr. P. Taylor (Carleton East): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question of the hon. Premier. On the understanding that no one here on either side of the House wants to see a strike by the Civil Service Association of Ontario, but in the face of the fact that a majority of these people have voted to reject the latest offer and to approve strike action; and considering that such a strike would involve people such as the northern air service employees, staff of provincial correctional and mental institutions, highway maintenance employees, ferry operators, provincial police dispatchers and many other categories, can the Premier say whether or not his government is preparing a contingency plan to handle such an event?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the hon. member for Carleton East has not yet totally understood the rules of the House. I know he is led astray by some of his own colleagues --

Mr. Reid: Getting awfully testy this afternoon. Those surveys of his must be getting worse.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- in an effort to present a point of view at the same time as asking a question. Mind you, Mr. Speaker, some of us on this side of the House on occasion seize the opportunity to also present a point of view, but we are always --

Mr. Breithaupt: Like now.

Mr. Reid: Answer the question.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- provoked into it; we are always provoked into it.

I would only say this, Mr. Speaker, that there are negotiations going on at this precise moment and I think any statement, by myself or the Chairman of the Management Board or others, speculating on what may or may not result because of those negotiations would not be proper at this time.

Mr. P. Taylor: Supplementary?

Mr. Speaker: One supplementary.

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, as usual the Premier has not answered the question.

Mr. Speaker: Order please. Do we have a supplementary question?

Mr. P. Taylor: The question is, in the event there is a strike, which nobody wants to see, is the government preparing a contingency plan? Yes or no.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I recognize the hon. member would like us to say we consider the possibility of a strike and as a result we are planning arrangements in case there is. Mr. Speaker, there are negotiations going on at this precise moment.

Mr. Deans: And they are not being helped by the Premier or that fellow down in London; either one of them.

Hon. Mr. Davis: It is my hope that the matter will be solved.

Mr. Speaker: The member for High Park.

SEAFARERS’ INTERNATIONAL UNION

Mr. M. Shulman (High Park): Mr. Speaker, a question of the Attorney General: Will the Attorney General, in light of the new information that has appeared in the public media, now order a royal commission into the violence that has taken place in and around the SIU?

Hon. R. Welch (Provincial Secretary for Justice and Attorney General): Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that following the revelations in the media, as is the expression used by the hon. member for High Park, the Solicitor General of Canada is expecting some report following RCMP investigations. Indeed I have not seen anywhere where the possibility of a federal inquiry has been precluded following that review.

I would simply want to repeat the provincial position at this time as far as law enforcement is concerned. As hon. members know, some charges have now been laid with respect to specific incidents. What the Solicitor General (Mr. Kerr) and I have always said with respect to this matter is that if it becomes apparent this is more than simply the enforcement of the law and that there are other aspects with respect to the behaviour of officials of the union or whatever developments there may be, because of this being a federally-chartered union with the implications of involvement of other jurisdictions, if in fact a public inquiry was considered necessary it should be under the auspices of the federal Department of Labour.

Mr. Shulman: Mr. Speaker, it may be no surprise to you that I am not satisfied with that answer and I am sending you a written notice to that effect.

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Housing has a short answer, he claims, to a question.

HOUSING IN NORTH

Hon. D. R. Irvine (Minister of Housing): Mr. Speaker, on Nov. 21 the member for Thunder Bay asked if the agreement on rural and native housing had been signed with the federal government; and if so when the government would move ahead to meet the need for 2,000 or 3,000 homes in the north?

Representatives of our ministry, Mr. Speaker, and those of the federal government, have been meeting to discuss the native and rural housing programme. We are at present in the process of trying to work out a mutually satisfactory agreement. I expect the senior staff will have a recommendation for me in the near future and I am hopeful that with the co-operation of the federal government I will be able to make a decision in the early part of the new year.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Rainy River.

SAFETY AT STEEP ROCK

Mr. Reid: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Natural Resources. Has the minister received the report, from a Mr. Calder and a Mr. Morton I believe, in relation to the situation at Steep Rock Iron Mines, where it has been suggested there may be some danger to the safety of the men working in that mine?

Hon. L. Bernier (Minister of Natural Resources): Mr. Speaker, this particular matter came to our attention about Sept. 18. At that time we were informed that the company had engaged the most knowledgeable people in the business, the consultants Golder-Brenner I think --

Mr. Reid: Browner.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- Browner, yes, Golder- Browner. We issued a statement to the company advising them they must inform us on a day-to-day basis as to the conditions that were being monitored by the consultants on a 24-hour basis. This is being done, They tell me that at this point in time, from the reports received, there is no immediate danger. In fact the slide or movement there today is much smaller than the one that they had several years ago.

However, following further discussions and further concerns expressed by the union, I met with them about two weeks ago in Thunder Bay and indicated we would verify this consultants’ report by engaging two other consultants. So we have three consultants now doing the work and examining the situation at Atikokan, but I have not yet received their report. As soon as I have their report, I will be dealing with it.

Mr. E. J. Bounsall (Windsor West): A supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: One supplementary.

Mr. Bounsall: Yes, in view of the fact that there are 40 men working in the vicinity of potential rockslides, is the minister prepared to order a short-term work halt until his consultants can make a definitive report on the overall safety?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, the report I have at the present time, as I said earlier, indicated there was no immediate danger. They’re monitoring the whole movement very closely. It’s been on for some considerable time now, but if there is any danger we will move in immediately.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Yorkview.

Mr. Reid: One further supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: No, I said that was the last supplementary.

The member for Yorkview.

SALES TAX ON VENDING-MACHINE GOODS

Mr. Young: I have a question of the Premier, Mr. Speaker. On Nov. 15, I raised with the Premier the matter of raising exemptions to the sales tax, particularly as they affected vending machines, and he was going to speak to the Treasurer and to the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Clement). Would the Premier give me an answer to that? Perhaps at the same time he could indicate whether, in view of the doubling of the sales tax revenue over the last two years, consideration is being given to lowering the rate of the sales tax in the next period of time.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, since the hon. member asked the question I’ve had two or three letters from people in the industry making the same presentation. I don’t have any answer for the hon. member yet, but as soon as I do, I shall let him know or inform the House.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Waterloo North.

SALES TAX ON CHILDREN’S CLOTHING

Mr. E. R. Good (Waterloo North): Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Revenue. Can the minister tell me how he justifies the collection of sales tax on children’s clothing merely because they’re sold in the sporting goods department of a department store? I speak of children’s mitts, gloves, caps and scarves for skiing.

Hon. A. K. Meen (Minister of Revenue): I don’t know what the mechanism would be for this, Mr. Speaker. If they are children’s clothing of the normal type, they should be exempt. I think I would have to ask the member to give me some for-instances based on size and so forth as they fall under the regulations. There are certain ones that have special exemptions, as we know. I would like to have more particulars on it.

Mr. Good: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: This will be the final supplementary.

Mr. Good: My understanding is that if an article is sold in the sporting goods department of a department store it’s taxable as sporting equipment, even if it’s only used to keep children warm. Would the minister look into that and give me his philosophy behind that if that’s correct?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Yes, I will be pleased to, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Cochrane South.

LEGAL AID PLAN

Mr. Ferrier: I have a question of the Attorney General, Mr. Speaker. Is the minister considering amending the Legal Aid Act or regulations to make it possible for groups and organizations, such as the Ontario Metis and Non-Status Indian Association, which need legal help from time to time but cannot afford it, to receive it through the legal aid system?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member knows, a special task force was established to consider the whole question of the workings of the legal aid plan. It is my understanding that I will be receiving a copy of that report very soon, and I would be in a much better position to respond specifically to the question that the member has directed to me, and indeed to suggest other directions of change once I have the benefit of the task force report; and I do expect that within the next few days.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Downsview.

OHC BRIBE CHARGES

Mr. Singer: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Housing. Can the Minister of Housing advise us, as a result of the police investigation into middle management of the Ontario Housing Corp., which he will recall came about because of the remarks made by Mr. Shepherd to Judge Waisberg at the commission investigating violence in the building industry, whether or not he is aware that several contractors submitted invoices to Ontario Housing for work that was not done and in fact, submitted invoices for more work than they did, and that some of these invoices were even paid?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I’m not aware of it.

Mr. Singer: By way of a supplementary, could the minister undertake to investigate, particularly to ascertain whether or not, in at least two instances, moneys were demanded back by one of his officials from one of these contractors, which money in fact was reimbursed and has since gone back through the books of Ontario Housing? Having ascertained that, what is he going to do about it?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Mr. Speaker, I’ll ascertain what the exact situation is.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Sandwich-Riverside.

ELECTION POSTPONEMENT

Mr. Burr: I would like the Premier to clarify the answer he gave me a few moments ago. When, in the event of an emergency, polling may resume or be continued on the following day, Mr. Speaker, does this mean that all polls must be reopened or only some?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I don’t want to interpret the statutes because I might be in error. I would only say to the hon. member that a gentleman who is far more knowledgeable than myself -- and I will introduce the hon. member to him -- is sitting under the gallery; he, or somebody from the ministry, has been in touch, I assume, with the mayor. If, as soon as the question period is over, the member would like me to introduce him to Mr. Bell, I shall do so. He will give the member a much better opinion than I might here in the House.

Mr. Deans: Does that mean that all the bars will be closed until such time as voting is completed?

Hon. Mr. Davis: I don’t know.

Hon. Mr. Welch: That is an emergency.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Rainy River.

ANICINABE PARK OCCUPATION

Mr. Reid: I have a question of the Attorney General. Is it true that the province is going to be paying the extraordinary costs associated with the holding by the Indians of Anicinabe Park in Kenora this summer? Will the government be paying those extraordinary costs, particularly for overtime policing? Can the Attorney General give us an up-to-date version of what the situation is in regard to the park?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I haven’t got the details with me, but if the hon. member will allow I’ll see that he gets particulars of that. Some of the extra costs borne by the municipality were in fact to be covered by the province, related specifically to the municipality’s portion of those costs. I’ll be very glad to get the hon. member further details.

Mr. Reid: A supplementary, if I may, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: One supplementary.

Mr. Reid: Realizing the extraordinary circumstances of what took place in Kenora this summer, could the minister give us his feelings about legitimizing the kind of association that was there in that park this summer, on association that really didn’t represent anyone other than its own particular viewpoint?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member is asking for a full report on the handling of that particular situation, I’d be very glad to give one. I don’t think there was any -- to use the expression of the hon. member -- legitimization of organizations. We were dealing with individual human beings. It was a highly charged period of time emotionally with respect to that particular matter. I think everything that was done was done in the best interests of the people of that community, and indeed, particularly the best interests of a number of young people who were in the park at the time.

I’m quite satisfied that the hon. member has access to all this information because his brother was being consulted daily by the federal minister with respect to that situation as well.

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

ONTARIO SECURITIES COMMISSION

Mr. Shulman: A question of the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations, Mr. Speaker: Will the minister override, or make them withdraw, the new policy announced by the Ontario Securities Commission in which they say they may cancel the registration or any registrant without a hearing if he has been charged -- not convicted, but charged -- with a criminal offence?

Hon. J. T. Clement (Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations): Mr. Speaker, I will discuss it right at the end of this question period with the chairman. I’m not aware that such a directive went forth and I will take it up with the chairman.

Mr. Shulman: It went forth.

Hon. Mr. Clement: I haven’t seen it.

Mr. Renwick: It has.

Mr. Speaker: Any further questions? The member for Kitchener.

NORTH PICKERING

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Speaker, a question of the Minister of Housing: Can the minister provide a list of the appraisals done on the North Pickering farm properties -- the second appraisals done by Mr. Ted Ozog? Can he advise us the number of properties that were so valued and the amount of fees that were paid?

Hon. Mr. Irvine: Yes, Mr. Speaker. It will take some while but I’ll look into it.

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

LIQUOR REGULATIONS DURING WINDSOR ELECTIONS

Mr. Bounsall: A question of the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations, Mr. Speaker, in his capacity in connection with the Liquor Licence Board and its regulations and rules: As the municipal elections in Windsor are likely to run over two or three days, could he advise us on the state of openness of not only the drinking establishments in Windsor, but the Canadian National trains running into Windsor; would those trains be dry from Toronto all the way to Windsor?

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. S. B. Handleman (Minister without Portfolio): Soberest City in Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Speaker, maybe I should take the hon. member for Windsor West over and introduce him to the legal expert underneath the gallery at the same time the Premier takes his colleague from Sandwich-Riverside.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Is he referring to Mr. Wishart?

Hon. Mr. Clement: I would think, Mr. Speaker, that under the Liquor Licence Act, if municipal voting is being conducted then the bars must be closed in that area where the municipal election is being held, during the time the polling stations are open.

Insofar as the train is concerned, I wouldn’t think that the same laws would apply. I stand subject to be corrected, but I don’t think that Air Canada, if a flight is coming into Windsor, would discontinue serving alcoholic beverages because the flight happens to be stopping off at Windsor airport.

Insofar as the establishments in the area where the municipal elections are being held are concerned, yes, they would have to be closed during balloting hours.

Mr. Bounsall: Supplementary.

Mr. Speaker: One supplementary.

Mr. Bounsall: The minister is aware that the trains are dry today across the province. I just wonder where the dividing line comes in a municipality in which the election still continues.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Speaker, I am aware that the trains are dry today because municipal elections are generally being conducted across the entire province today, save and except where there have been acclamations or there is no balloting. I am directing my answer to the member’s question as to what would happen tomorrow in the event that some of the polls must remain open because of the matters discussed here earlier in question period.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Rainy River.

SAFEGUARDS FOR DANGEROUS SPORTS

Mr. Reid: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Community and Social Services. Does the minister have a task force looking at the whole range of sports in the Province of Ontario, particularly with a view to coming up with some kind of guidelines that could be laid down to regulate sports where there may be some danger to life, such as Lake Ontario swimming and that sort of thing?

Hon. R. Brunelle (Minister of Community and Social Services): Mr. Speaker, we haven’t got an overall task force but, as the hon. member knows, in view of the tragedy of Neil McNeil I appointed a task force composed of representatives of our ministry, coaches, and other associations. That task force will report before the end of January with recommendations as to what safeguards and regulations should be established for future long-distance swims.

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

CANADIAN KODAK DISPUTE

Mr. MacDonald: A question of the Minister of Labour: Is the minister in a position to give an up-to-date report on the state of negotiations at Kodak, particularly as it relates to his ministry’s involvement?

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: Mr. Speaker, I don’t have a report this afternoon on that. I know that some progress was made last week, thanks maybe to the minister from York South, who took a trip out there.

Mr. MacDonald: The minister from York South, thank you.

Hon. Mr. MacBeth: The member for York South. I know that he was interested in it, and I understand they made a little progress toward settlement last week. I should have checked on that this morning but I spent all my morning over at the Workmen’s Compensation Board.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Downsview.

AID TO JEWISH SCHOOLS

Mr. Singer: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Education, is the Minister of Education now in a position to give us any further information about the possibility or probability or improbability of the integration of the Jewish parochial schools into the public school system in North York?

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, Mr. Speaker, I am not really in any position to give any further indications than what I mentioned to the hon. member last time he asked the question. I think that the position of the Ministry of Education and my position have been indicated to the North York board. Really, in a nutshell, it means that if there were to be aid paid to the Jewish parochial schools they would, in fact, cease to be Jewish parochial schools and would become part of the North York educational system.

As I understand it, the North York board has a feasibility study it asked someone to do, which has just been made public today, and it is going to look into it. I don’t know what is in that study, as I haven’t seen it yet. Presumably after they have studied that and looked at those recommendations that Dr. Partlow has come up with, they will talk to us about it. But the basic principle is still there.

I don’t think we are looking for a way to pay public tax money to private schools, but if there is a way of integrating them into the North York educational system, well then, naturally they would qualify for grants.

Mr. Speaker: The oral question period has expired.

Petitions.

Presenting reports.

Motions.

Introduction of bills.

Orders of the day.

THIRD READING

The following bill was given third reading upon motion:

Bill 62, An Act to provide for an Ontario Building Code.

Clerk of the House: The 21st order, resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 155, An Act to incorporate the Algonquin Forestry Authority.

ALGONQUIN FORESTRY AUTHORITY ACT (CONCLUDED)

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Thunder Bay may continue his remarks. I believe he had the floor when we were last considering this matter.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A week has gone by since we last spoke about Bill 155, an Act to provide for the setting up of the Algonquin Forestry Authority. At the time I sat down at 10:30 p.m. last Monday evening, I was talking about the private woodland supply in the area which has come to be known as the 50-mile periphery outside of Algonquin Park. I was referring, Mr. Speaker, to that portion of the minister’s opening statement that dealt particularly with private woodland supply, in which he stated that approximately 44 per cent of the 50-mile zone outside the park is presently held by private landowners -- that is 56 per cent of the area outside the park is Crown land and 44 per cent is privately-owned land -- and the entire area within the 50-mile periphery of the park was five to six times larger than the area within the park.

Now the area within the park is approximately 2,910 square miles; so the area that we are talking about on the periphery of the park and within a 50-mile radius of the park, is approximately 17,460 square miles. Now on the area that is in private hands -- I want to quote from the minister’s own statement at this point. And he says:

“1. Only 10 per cent of woodlot owners stated that selling timber was the purpose of forest ownership.

“2. Forty per cent of woodlot owners have never undertaken any kind of woodlot activity, such as planting, cutting, pruning, protecting, etc.

“3. Sixty per cent of woodlot owners have never sold any forest products.”

Now this, Mr. Speaker, flies in the face of statements made by the ministry over the years: that under the aegis of the Woodlands Improvement Act, great strides have been made by the Ministry of Natural Resources and formerly the old Department of Lands and Forests, to encourage greater utilization of an area in the province that does lend itself to the propagation, the regeneration and the production of hardwoods, which is traditionally the predominant species in that particular area. For the minister and officials of the ministry to be saying that they were making great strides in encouraging and in assisting private woodlot holders to become actively involved in regeneration, reforestation and making better use of land that is ideally suited for the reproduction of a forest crop; for them to be saying that on one hand and then using the opposite argument to state that for the three reasons that I have just quoted, they don’t lend themselves to this kind of production, is a clear admission that the Woodlands Improvement Act, indeed, hasn’t worked to the extent the ministry and the minister would have us believe.

I have done a little bit of research, Mr. Speaker, since we spoke on this subject a week ago. I find this area has a much greater productive capacity if managed properly. It is an area where soil conditions and climatic conditions are much more conducive to the reproduction of a tree crop, whether it be conifers or the hardwood species that were spoken of and alluded to in the Pierpoint report. I find there has been severe neglect and complete indifference on behalf of the ministry, not only to encourage the owners of private lands within the 50-mile periphery of the park; not only have they failed to do that with regard to the 55 per cent of that land that is in private hands, but they have completely abdicated and neglected their responsibility for proper regeneration and reforestation to make the 56 per cent of the area within a 50-mile radius that is Crown land much more productive.

Just to give some idea of how productive a realistic forest management policy could be in that area, I want to refer to something that is being done in the Maritimes by that great free-enterpriser, K. C. Irving. I am told that he has many thousands of square miles of productive forest land under cultivation where he expects, and those who are in the industry say he is going to get, a complete crop rotation within 30 years as a result of proper forest management. He hasn’t engaged the services of a forester in order to co-ordinate these efforts for a rotation of 30 years. He has hired a horticulturalist, somebody who really believes that growing trees as a cash crop is something that is a worthwhile undertaking. He hasn’t hired a forester. He has hired somebody who is genuinely interested and concerned in getting the best strains possible in keeping with climatic and soil conditions.

It has been stated by people who are much more knowledgeable in this field than I am, that he will indeed get a 30-year rotation of crop as opposed to the 80- to 100-year rotation we get in our boreal forests of northern Ontario; and a little bit less than that, I suppose, in the St. Lawrence-Great Lakes area that we are concerned about when we are talking about the periphery of Algonquin Park.

As a result of developing the various strains and of spraying herbicides to guard against pestilence, and through a process of fertilization, there is every indication that he will get this kind of regeneration in much more profusion and much greater abundance than anything we have been able to accomplish here, whether it be in northern or southern Ontario.

What I am trying to say, Mr. Speaker, is that in relation to the area outside of Algonquin Park, which admittedly is five to six times greater than the 2,900 sq miles within the park, the present dilemma of the industry, which is dependent to a large extent on the timber and fibre values within the confines of the park, has come about as a result of complete neglect and their inability to carry on good forest management policies.

I had occasion to speak and to engage in dialogue in a panel discussion in the city of Thunder Bay just two weeks ago today, when Mr. Art Herridge appeared on a panel with other people who were knowledgeable in the business, including a representative of industry. Mr. Herridge had left the panel to catch a plane back to Toronto, but the spokesman for industry said that neither the industry nor the ministry ever attempted in a serious way to undertake proper forest management policies. Earlier, in answer to a question that was put to the panel: “Can we afford proper forest management?” I think Mr. Herridge was quoted as having said: “We can’t afford not to undertake proper forest management.”

Mr. Speaker, when you get the deputy minister making a statement like that -- which is one I heartily concur in -- and then you get a spokesman from industry saying, we’ve never really tried it in a serious way, so how do we know whether we can afford it and how do we know whether it’s going to bear fruit or not; when you get somebody who is a major spokesman for the forest products industry in the Province of Ontario admitting that we’ve never attempted proper forest management in a serious way, it is a condemnation, of not only the ministry but the industry itself. In many jurisdictions the industry takes its responsibility for renewing the crop much more seriously, making it, in fact, a rotation crop that can be sustained on an annual basis forever and a day if we talk about production at the level of what has come to be known as the allowable cut on a sustained yield basis.

All of these things we’re talking about with regard to the setting up of the Algonquin Forestry Authority are made necessary by a lack of commitment of either the industry or the ministry to ensure that our forest industry and our forest resources are maintained at a realistic allowable cut on a sustained yield basis. Since this problem came to the fore, with the unveiling of the Pierpoint report, they have introduced new dimensions into the debate.

When my leader led off last Monday in this debate, he alluded to the terminology that is used quite regularly in the report and which has come up from time to time in this debate, that is available cut. This is a term I have never seen before any time I have undertaken to study the forest industry. Had it been something that was a valid yardstick, a valid term to be used generally when speaking about our renewable resources in the forest industry, I think I would have come across it. This is the first time, to my knowledge, that anybody has ever tried to throw a smoke-screen over the inventory in the forest products industry.

It suggests that available cut is about 30 per cent of the allowable cut, when one deducts the limbs, the tops and the stumps. This is the first time I’ve ever heard this new dimension enter into any dialogue, whether it be with the ministry or whether it be with the industry or whether it be with anybody from any of our forestry schools who was academically inclined and was talking about proper forest management I’m wondering at this point in our history why it was necessary for Mr. Pierpoint to allude to a set of terms completely foreign and alien to all of the discussions that have gone on before. I think this makes all of the data in the Pierpoint report suspect from the very beginning.

I am wondering, Mr. Speaker, whether or not Mr. Pierpoint and people in the timber branch felt if they brought in a new dimension, some new terminology, the opposition would just say “Oh, we have come a long way. As a result of the operational cruises and as a result of the introduction of this new terminology the ministry and the industry have left us far behind, and maybe we had better not be too critical of the kind of figures that are used, either by the ministry or those contained in or quoted by the ministry from the Pierpoint report”

It borders on dishonesty, Mr. Speaker, when things happen in this way. I have heard the minister in many speeches across the province, and I have heard his predecessor, the member for Cochrane North (Mr. Brunelle) when he held this portfolio; and never once have I ever heard anybody allude to the available cut. it is common knowledge they don’t use tree stumps in the production of wood fibre; it is common knowledge that they don’t use limbs in the production of fibre; it is common knowledge that they don’t use tops. So why does the minister introduce something that is completely irrelevant into a debate of this kind? I am saying it borders on dishonesty to suggest that we would be so naive that they would think that by the introduction of this new dimension we were going to be given a snow job. I think it is an insult to the intelligence and the integrity of the opposition for government members to think that they would get away with that kind of gobbledygook.

The Ontario Professional Foresters Association made a submission to the Ministry of Natural Resources in 1972, imploring the ministry, in co-operation with the private land owners, particularly in southern Ontario -- where those lands are much more productive for those species that we are particularly concerned about; the hard maple, the yellow birch, and the conifer, particularly white pine -- to embark upon a programme that would provide for a much greater production of wood fibre, Not only did they do this -- those whom the minister listens to and has an ongoing dialogue with in this particular field -- but the Ontario Economic Council suggested three or four years ago that the ministry undertake this kind of thing. Had these admonitions been heeded -- even much earlier than that, when it was so obvious that this particular phase of the forest industry had been neglected -- I think we would be in a position now where we could see the light of day and we could, in a realistic way, phase out the multiple-use concept in Algonquin Park.

After listening to the parliamentary assistant, the hon. member for Parry Sound (Mr. Maeck), after having listened to the member for Victoria-Haliburton (Mr. B. C. Hodgson), after having listened to the member for Hastings (Mr. Rollins) and to the member for Renfrew South (Mr. Yakabuski) -- and I presume they know what they are talking about when they are talking about the availability of wood fibre in the area they have responsibility for -- and after hearing them say unequivocally that there isn’t sufficient fibre outside of the park to sustain the industries within the periphery of the park, I realize that when they say that it is a clear indication and a clear admission that either there isn’t sufficient fibre or the minister hasn’t been keeping a realistic inventory as to the various species and the various age classes that are available to meet the needs of the many industries that we are talking about on the periphery of the park.

The minister made available a directory of primary wood-using industries in Ontario in 1973, and I’m told that there are some 140 industries on the periphery of the park; some of them one- and two-man, very small operations; and some of them quite major operations. I’m suggesting to the minister through you, Mr. Speaker, that if that is in fact the case, what has he been doing for the last 33 years? Does he feel he had so much cushion and so much elbow room that he could afford to neglect the regeneration and the repropagation of those species that are so badly needed by those industries of which he speaks?

I think if he had undertaken a proper programme of forest management we could be standing here, on Dec. 2, 1974, realistically looking at a phase-out of timber operations in Algonquin Park so that he wouldn’t be violating those values which people hold so near and dear.

I’m not suggesting, nor is my party suggesting, that starting tomorrow morning at 8 o’clock the minister should cut off all timber operations in Algonquin Park. I think it could have been so if he had accepted the responsibility that was given to him for proper forest management rather than forest mining or outright forest exploitation. I think that we could have moved now, had he started early enough.

But the game isn’t lost yet. I think it is realistic for he and his ministry, and those people who are knowledgeable in forestry, to make the commitment that at some time in the future -- and I don’t know what that time is -- he could say: “We can cease the mining of our timber resources in Algonquin Park.” I think it’s completely realistic that he do that.

How is he going to accomplish this? Well in many of the ways I have suggested since I have had the pleasure and the privilege of speaking about proper forest management as the critic for the New Democratic Party in the debates in this Legislature. It’s all on the record. I have tried to make a comparison of what has gone on in other areas where they are genuinely interested in and genuinely concerned about proper forest management and are using this resource in an agricultural sense rather than mining it and then just hoping that, in some fashion, nature will renew itself in the kinds of species that the industries have come to expect will be available.

That might have been all right many years ago when we were using 10, 20, 30 and, within the last thee or four years, up to 50 per cent of the available fibre, or the available -- or rather allowable cut, not available cut -- on a sustained-yield basis. In the past the minister has always had a 40, 50 or 60 per cent cushion within which he could make all the mistakes he wanted to make. With few exceptions, he was able to get away with it and was able to trade licences with prime licence holders to meet the needs of people who were engaged in producing specialty products. He had that elbow room in the past, in southern Ontario as well as northern Ontario. By his own admission, he doesn’t have the elbow room any more and the mistakes and the errors of commission and omission of the past are coming back to haunt him.

To suggest that out of a complement in his timber branch of something in the neighbourhood of 700 he has 192 professional foresters, and that is a realistic complement for the monitoring of what’s going on in the forest industry in the Province of Ontario for the planning and the scrutiny of management plans submitted to his ministry by the prime licence holders and for the proper management of the Crown management units, is no longer good enough; it isn’t good enough because he doesn’t have the elbow room that he enjoyed even four or five years ago.

I don’t know whether it’s a matter of budgetary constraints and that really he would like to double the complement of foresters he has on his staff; I don’t know whether it’s because they are so busy acting as administrators, so busy pushing paper in the various offices of the timber branch, not only here at Queen’s Park but out in the regions and in the districts; but I’m telling the minister -- and the people in the ministry themselves will tell him -- that he doesn’t enjoy the elbow room he once had.

It is the minister, at this point in our history, who is the one who has to stop the buck-passing. He is the one who has to establish some priorities. He is the one who has to sit down with his cabinet colleagues and insist he get the type of personnel, a sufficient number of people and a commitment for the expenditure of a realistic number of dollars, in order to get back into the ball game.

By his own admission, he is only reforesting about one-third of the areas that are being harvested every year. Sure one can make the claim that nature helps; and nature, by its usual intervention, might reforest in a natural way up to one-third of the remaining two-thirds. But when we harvest millions and millions of acres, and a third of those go untended and grow up in weed species or undesirable species, to me and to many people who are concerned, we feel this isn’t proper forest management.

Now the minister, Mr. Speaker, said his ministry was going to undertake a realistic forest management programme, a realistic programme of silviculture and regeneration. This was announced about two years ago. We thought, at long last, this minister and this ministry was really coming to grips with the very major programme of proper forest management in the Province of Ontario.

We find the commitment during the present fiscal year is an additional $2.1 million for this programme. I’m sure if the minister is honest, he’ll say that this doesn’t much more than keep up with the inflationary trend for goods, supplies, services, wages and administration in the timber branch at the present time. I really don’t see any evidence, Mr. Speaker, that there is any commitment, any long-range commitment, to come to grips with those vast areas throughout the province that are going untended; where there is no regeneration and where we are not getting the kind of production that we are going to need in order to sustain ourselves and our relative position in world markets.

This is the situation in all of the province, but more particularly in the area that we are talking about and the area that’s alluded to in Bill 155.

It has been stated, Mr. Speaker, that there will be 3,100 jobs lost if logging is phased out in Algonquin Park. I don’t think we need lose one job in Algonquin Park. I don’t buy all of the arguments that were contained in the summation that was given by my leader last Monday, but there is a lot of truth in the statistical analysis that he made in doing his critique of the Pierpoint report.

I don’t accept for one minute all of the conventional wisdoms that are contained in the Pierpoint report. I suggest it was not possible, in the time allowed, to have done a realistic operational cruise on an area that contains 17,460 square miles, which is the area within the 50-mile periphery of the park. In saying they have done that in a few short weeks this summer, and have come up with all of the age classes and all of the species that are available, I think the ministry is just trying to give us a snow job. I know when I asked for an inventory of a particular section of prime licence holdings in northern Ontario, they don’t get me those answers in a few short weeks over the course of a summer to justify the introduction of a bill such as this; but really, it takes a long time and a lot of hard work; a lot of flying, a lot of ground analysis, a lot of cutting, a lot of sampling.

The minister is not kidding me when he suggests that he can do a realistic analysis of the groups -- the dominant species, age classes and all of this -- just by a cursory examination as is contained in the Pierpoint report.

I suppose, Mr. Speaker, I could go back and make some comments on the interventions into this debate by various members on the government side. Maybe I should cover just one or two just to indicate how serious this situation is.

I want to refer to page 5690 of Hansard when the hon. member for Victoria-Haliburton had the floor. There were numerous interjections when my leader said that in his opinion, based on his analysis and his breakdown of the Pierpoint report, there was sufficient timber outside the park to make up far any values that were cut inside the park. Of course quite naturally, the hon. member for Victoria-Haliburton denied that and said there wasn’t. And, to quote the member he said:

“Name the area; sell us where the resource is.

“Mr. Lewis: Ask the minister to name it, he knows where it is.

“Mr. R. G. Hodgson: He’s going to have a hard time naming it.”

Now what he’s saying is that he -- the member for Victoria-Haliburton -- questions even the figures contained in the Pierpoint report. Because he goes on to say:

“I want to know where it is. And I hope the minister will tell me, because I don’t know where it is.”

He goes on to say further: “I agree with the member; but I want to ask him this: How much do they know about their own resources?”

And he’s referring to the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Bernier) and how much he knows about the inventory, the various age classes and the various species contained within that area that we are referring to within a 50 mile periphery of the park.

He says: “All right, what if I do question that? I’d like to know where all this timber resource is.”

He says further: “I’m telling the members that I don’t know of any companies -- and I’m associated with most of the people who are in the industry through safety work, I talk to them two or three times a year, I hear them asking for more timber -- and I don’t know where this timber is. I want the Crown to tell us; because I don’t think there is enough for the existing companies in this 50-mile radius, let alone those companies which operate in Algonquin.”

He also went on to say, Mr. Speaker, that within a matter of 15 to 20 years the yellow birch species, because of some problem of die-back or something like that, will be nonexistent.

The member for Parry Sound said that also. He said that we might as well cut it because it’s not going to be there. He said -- and I quote the. hon. member for Parry Sound:

“There will be no yellow birch left in 15 or 20 years anyway, because they are all dying, and that’s the reason they should be cut now. As far as I am concerned, if we are going to allow trees to die, man may as well make use of the resources as have them die.”

You know, that is a condemnation of this ministry. If there isn’t a viable source of this species in the Province of Ontario, it is a clear indication that either the minister doesn’t know what is going on in the forests or he is up against a problem his biologists and foresters can’t solve, and he is willing to let one of the prime species that is supposedly so badly needed, particularly by the veneer industries, disappear on the periphery of the park.

When the minister gets up and replies, perhaps he will say that some of the things being said by his colleagues just aren’t in keeping with the facts. I hope he will say that.

I have talked to ministry foresters. I have also talked to foresters associated with the industry; and while they don’t know the answers to all of the problems they do know the answers of many of them; and given the opportunity they would like to prove to this ministry that they can engage in proper forest management, given the time, the money, the resources and a commitment on behalf of this ministry, which is wholly and solely responsible for regeneration and proper forest management. It is no longer the responsibility of industry, although I think they should have some input too. But the minister has relieved them of that and has taken on the sole responsibility for proper forest management in the Province of Ontario.

Frankly, I think the minister has fumbled the ball. If he doesn’t know what the problems are, if his ministry hasn’t the ability to solve many of the problems in the forest industry today, I think he should be frank enough to stand up and say so. But I don’t believe that’s the case at all; I don’t believe it for one minute. We have a lot of dedicated people working in this ministry and, if given an opportunity to undertake proper forest management, they would do so.

Hon. L. Bernier (Minister of Natural Resources): The member’s leader didn’t say that.

Mr. Stokes: I am saying it.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He said they were corrupt.

Mr. Stokes: No, no. He apologized for having used strong language.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: It’s on the record.

Mr. Stokes: He apologized for having used strong language. I don’t believe for one minute that the people in this ministry are corrupt. I think they have been negligent in the absence of a proper forest management programme in the province at the present time. And I think if the minister is honest about the whole thing, I think he will say, on reflection, that his ministry has been negligent.

When I said he had all kinds of elbow room in the past, that was the case; he could afford, I suppose, to be a little less vigilant in the past. I don’t think he can do that now; I think we have got to get back into the ball game. I think that if the minister does the things we have been suggesting, it will be possible over a number of years -- and I am not going to play the numbers game; I am not going to say five, eight or 10 years -- to get out of the park and make this piece of legislation obsolete.

I think one good thing can be said; if we are going to continue to exploit the timber values in Algonquin Park, I would like to see it operated, controlled, supervised and managed by somebody within the Ministry of Natural Resources. I really believe that would be a step in the right direction. If the minister set down a set of guidelines for the 18 licence holders in the park and said: “Okay, go to it. Cut your 17 million cu ft, but do it in such a way that you don’t upset the environmentalists and those seeking a wilderness experience,” I don’t believe for one minute that they would do it in a fashion that would be acceptable. I don’t think even the people within this ministry would do it in a manner that is completely acceptable.

All right The minister had a problem; he had to effect a compromise, and this is what we have got now. But I really believe, Mr. Speaker, just as sure as I am standing here, had there been proper forest management in the past, I could be standing here and saying right now: “You can get out of the park because you have done your job on the periphery of the park.” But I can’t say that. I have to say, because of the neglect and complete indifference of both the industry and this ministry to husband, to manage and to farm those areas within a 50-mile periphery of the park, the ministry finds it necessary to violate the values that are inside the park.

I am saying right now, Mr. Speaker, through you to the minister and to all the people in this timber branch under the gallery, if the ministry undertakes a realistic programme of silviculture, reforestation, regeneration and proper forest management, it will see the day it could walk out of the park and say: “It is no longer necessary for us to violate the values that we have in the park at the present time.”

They have done it in all of the national parks right across the country with the exception of one, not only under Liberal administrations in Ottawa but Conservative administrations in Ottawa. They haven’t found it necessary to violate those values in those national parks. I don’t see any reason why the minister can’t make a commitment when he is winding up this debate to say that we can see daylight and we can prove not only to the Algonquin Wildlands League but to everybody who would like to think so that there are 2,910 square miles of good recreational land they aren’t going to have to share with pinewood users in the Province of Ontario.

I think the ministry can do it in a fashion that can ensure not one job will be lost. It can make better use of that area that is 17,460 square miles on the periphery of the park. If the ministry manages that in a way it is capable of managing, with good husbandry and in a way that horticulturalist would do it and not somebody that’s using mechanized logging, I think that not too many years from now we can stand up, or somebody who is here in our stead can stand up in this Legislature and say: “Thank heavens they had the foresight to do something about it.” Not only the people in southern Ontario, but the literally millions and millions of people who will be using that park in the next 40, 50 or 60 years will be able to say: “Thank heavens they had the foresight and they had the courage to do something about it.”

That’s what should have been done 30 or 40 years ago. It wasn’t, but the game isn’t lost yet. If there is a serious commitment to proper forest management in the Province of Ontario, let’s start today, so that maybe five, 10 or 15 years from now we can say: “We no longer need an Algonquin Forestry Authority. We have got all of the requirements we need outside of the park.” If the minister does that he will have done something worthwhile.

Mr. Speaker: Does any other hon. member wish to take part in the debate? The hon. member for Windsor West.

Mr. E. J. Bounsall (Windsor West): I wish to speak to this Act to incorporate the Algonquin Forestry Authority, Mr. Speaker, primarily to correct some of the impressions that may have been left by the member for Renfrew South in his remarks on it last week. He was implying he had met with various workers, various loggers in the area of Algonquin Park and they were convinced we were not concerned with the jobs of loggers in Algonquin Park.

In fact, it seems he did nothing to change this attitude among the loggers. I want to make it very clear, Mr. Speaker, that we are most concerned with the jobs of loggers in Algonquin Park and do not want a single one of those loggers to become unemployed or even suffer a reduction in his work. We are just as equally concerned with all the employees engaged in the woodworking industries that flow as a result of that logging, the furniture industries and so on.

We would support this bill, Mr. Speaker, if this was a bill which, as well as establishing the authority, had as one of its objectives and principles the phasing out as far as possible of the logging in this provincial park and replacing the Algonquin Park cut by cutting in the vicinity around the park. The detailed dissection of the Pierpoint report by the hon. member for Scarborough West (Mr. Lewis) was presented in this House last week, in which, from those figures, he was able to show to his satisfaction, that sufficient cut of all kinds was, in fact, available in the immediate vicinity of that park. There may well be a continued discussion and dialogue among various people about how one can interpret the Pierpoint report in terms of whether there is sufficient material outside the park to replace that material inside the park. We’re quite interested in the minister’s response to that.

But one of the objectives and principles embodied in this bill should have been for the Algonquin Forestry Authority to replace as far as possible all that logging that’s occurring in the park, or as much of it as possible, in another area outside that park. Their thorough search may reveal that one would not be able to replace it all. One might find that one could only replace two-thirds of it, or one-half. But it should be given to that forestry authority as their responsibility to make the surveys and to make the shifts as far as possible outside of that park.

It may not be possible to eliminate it all, but as one of their directives they should be directed to eliminate it as far as possible. By elimination to an area outside the park, we are saying by so doing they would protect the jobs of each one of those loggers. They simply do not close down an operation of logging in that park until they have found an area which would provide equivalent employment outside the park to all those loggers formerly engaged in that park, and that they should make that shift so that there was no loss of source of supply to all those persons engaged in the various industries flowing from the timber provided from the cut. This is what our stand is on this bill.

The leader of our party, by looking very carefully at the figures in the Pierpoint report, can convince himself that all of it can be replaced. This may not be the case. But the principle of removing it from this park as far and to the maximum amount possible, without the loss of one single logging job or the loss of one single job in the woodworking industries that flow from it, is the one that this party is interested in.

Proper forest management will require that there would always be some logging in that park. Removal of the storm-damaged trees and so on, as the hon. member for Renfrew South referred to it in one specific example, would be a quite appropriate, and in fact needed logging operation in that park, with the construction of whatever forest trails and forest roads were necessary to get to those storm-damaged areas. That would be a proper function for continued logging in that park.

In fact, proper forest management, the manicuring and culling and removal of that storm-damaged material -- even if all normal commercial logging operations could be phased out of that park -- would probably be sufficient to keep all those loggers in the town of Kiosk, for example, who are solely related to and dependent upon logging in the park, fully occupied in that task.

Mr. Speaker, I am no forester myself. I know very little about the forest industry; I am willing to learn a lot more about the forest industry. But I want to make it very clear that our party has never said the government should get rid of jobs in the logging industry, or in any other associated industry with respect to this Algonquin Park authority. One of their jobs must be the phasing out of logging operations, the replacement of logging operations in the park by logging operations in the vicinity, so that the workers employed in the park need not travel much further, if any greater distance, to their place of employment than they do at the present time. And, also, that there be not one worker displaced in the commercially-related industries depending upon the timber. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Algoma.

Mr. B. Gilbertson (Algoma): Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a few comments. From experience, I know that some of the things that we have heard are really not realistic. It is pretty good to have a theory and try to tell the loggers and the lumbering people just how to do things and where to cut logs and where not to cut logs.

Mr. W. Ferrier (Cochrane South): The ministry is doing that all the time.

Mr. Gilbertson: As a lumbering operator, there is something that I don’t agree with as far as the policy of the government is concerned. It is not very popular sometimes, to get up and disagree with the policy of the government, but I know that policies can be changed from time to time, as warranted. I can’t agree with a policy where you can’t go within 500 ft of a lake. I flew down this morning and the visibility was quite good. I was looking at all the lakes there are; and then the ministry stipulates you can’t touch timber at all 500 ft from a lake.

Mr. Speaker, I think this is something we should take a second look at. These trees have taken maybe 100 to 150 years to grow; birch veneer, for instance. They are not meant in most cases just to grow up for a naturalist to come along and say, “Well, this is beautiful, we are not going to touch this.”

I believe in having reserve areas where you can have some virgin timber standing, but I also think that this timber was grown for a purpose, and we should cut it if we need it. I think it is the same as the farmer putting in a crop of corn or a field of grain. When it gets to maturity then it should be cut, if we need it.

I believe in selective logging. I think we should cut down to a certain diameter, and then not go any lower than that. We know how many years it takes for a tree to grow to a certain size. I think we should try and stick by such a policy. I’m sure it could be the policy of the government to say, “Well, all right, you can cut to a certain dimension -- whether it is 14 in. or whether it is 12 in.

For a tree to grow to be 12 in. in diameter will probably take 100 years, especially in the area where I come from. Further north, it takes quite a bit longer.

I think it is wrong when we try to implement legislation that will change the timber regulations for those people who have grown up in the woods. It is their bread and butter.

It is easy for people who come from a big city, say Metro Toronto, to view things differently. Some people are just interested in taking a little walk through the forest from time to time to watch the birds and see the animals, but they are not dependent on the forest. For others, it is their bread and butter.

I feel that as far as Algonquin Park is concerned there is an awful lot of acreage in there. When I think of some of the opposition members, with due respect for their knowledge, and what they’ve said about logging and lumbering, I think they’re way out in left field in some respects.

Mr. R. F. Nixon (Leader of the Opposition): At least you say it better than the member for Renfrew South (Mr. Yakabuski).

Mr. Ferrier: He even wants to mine in provincial parks.

Mr. Gilbertson: If there’s gold in them thar hills and we need it, let’s dig it out and use it.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Mine it.

Mr. Stokes: That’s not even government policy.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: How much virgin timber do they have on St. Joseph’s Island?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Gilbertson: There are times when I think a member of this Legislature can get up and express his views.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Certainly.

Mr. Gilbertson: And I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if the minister is listening to me very intently and is saying: “That fellow maybe has got something on the ball. Let’s just look at our legislation.”

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Oh, I wouldn’t go that far.

Mr. L. A. Braithwaite (Etobicoke): He is smiling, too.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I always am.

Mr. G. Samis (Stormont): Keep it up.

Mr. Gilbertson: Mr. Speaker, it might be deviating from the bill just a little bit, but --

Mr. Stokes: What dimensions did the member cut over the weekend?

Mr. Gilbertson: -- I think of Lake Superior Provincial Park, north of Sault Ste. Marie, for instance. I’ve had lumbering operators come to me and complain: “They want us to go up on those bluffs where there isn’t any timber. They give us permission to go up there and cut but not to do down in the ravines close to the rivers and so forth. That’s where you find the good timber.” One can’t blame the loggers and lumbering operators for wanting to get in there and cut where there is timber.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: No, one can’t blame them.

Mr. Stokes: The member is unreal.

Mr. Gilbertson: I would say, Mr. Speaker, to the ministry that it should do selective logging and go right to the lakes. There might be a nice big tree that eventually is going to be falling over into that lake and then there would be a real scream about letting those beautiful trees fall over.

Mr. Stokes: That’s contrary to government policy, too.

Mr. F. Young (Yorkview): The member is getting into trouble now.

Mr. Gilbertson: Let us utilize the forest which God has created and given us. In many cases if you do selective logging you don’t have to replant. There is very little replanting done in hardwood, as I understand it; it’s mostly in the softwood species. But let’s do selective logging and take care of those smaller trees. We have millions of them up in the area where I come from. There’s beautiful maple, which is very small and hard and would make wonderful material for furniture and different commodities.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: All the good stuff was cut out long ago.

Mr. Ferrier: There is an alternative to Algonquin Park, then.

Mr. Gilbertson: Another thing I would like to say is that one thing we should stress more is to process our material further. Instead of just making one plank out of it and drying it and sending it wherever it’s needed -- down south, or across the border or wherever it is -- we could cut dimensioned stock and process it further, making components for furniture and different things like that which are needed. That would take up a lot of the labour force.

Mr. Ferrier: The minister is turning a deaf ear to that suggestion, though.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: These guys want to cut out the jobs.

Mr. Gilbertson: Do we really know how much resources we have?

Mr. Stokes: That is a good question.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: That is a good question.

Mr. Young: That is what we have been asking.

Mr. Gilbertson: Do we know how fast we are utilizing it, how fast it’s disappearing, and whether it is going to be replaced? Is logging and lumbering just going to phase out because it isn’t economically feasible to operate any more?

Mr. Stokes: What about those millions of trees the member was just talking about?

Mr. Speaker: I wonder if the hon. member would redirect his comments to the principle of this bill, please.

Mr. Gilbertson: All right, Mr. Speaker. I’ll try to do the best I can. I was just really speaking from practical experience.

Mr. L. Maeck (Parry Sound): If he does he’ll be the first one who has.

Mr. Gilbertson: I haven’t gone into all the details but I notice the opposition members sometimes get way out and don’t stick to the principle of the bill --

Mr. Maeck: Quite right.

Hon. A. Grossman (Provincial Secretary for Resources Development): You are discriminating, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Gilbertson: -- but I would say that we need to have a good look at how much we utilize, how many sawmills we have operating, and what area they cover. For instance, if a sawmill puts out 50 million feet a year, how much of an area does it take to keep that sawmill going? I’m sure this is something that we need to have a good look at.

I think we have some very good foresters. They have done a pretty good job over the years but one can always improve. One is always learning. When Ford made the Model T car, it wasn’t like it is today. But through experience over the years -- and I think that is the same way with our logging policy -- we are learning. Naturally, the ones who are going to get most criticized for it are the people in the government. I feel, generally speaking, the government has done a pretty good job over the years. I’m sure that they are having a good look at all the pros and cons of the --

Mr. Ferrier: They are not processing that timber up in the member’s area though.

Mr. Gilbertson: -- Algonquin Park situation. I am sure that with the able minister and his staff we will come up with a solution.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Listen, the member has a job. He is third assistant deputy whip.

Mr. Gilbertson: It may not be 100 per cent, but it will be an improvement. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. minister.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In winding up this particular debate on the setting up of the Algonquin Forestry Authority, it is fair to say during the course of the past several hours you’ve been literally bombarded, inundated and swamped with figures, percentages and statistics, all relating to Algonquin Park. I think there has been a lot of confusion by the members of the opposition.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: So what is new?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: They have chosen on many instances to ignore some of the information we’ve provided them with. They have twisted some of the information we’ve given them in good faith.

You’ll note, Mr. Speaker, when the bill was introduced, I knew that certain members of the opposition were concerned about the availability of wood within a 50-mile zone of Algonquin Park. In our ministry we took it upon ourselves to do a very in-depth study; we took a very close look at the situation. On tabling that bill on the Thursday, I gave the members of the opposition a copy of the Pierpoint report as a courtesy, saying, “Here, this is the statistical information. These are the facts.”

We went on with the debate and second reading on the following Monday, so that the opposition did have an opportunity to look into all the points. Rather than my tabling it on the Monday afternoon when we started the debate, I tabled it with the bill four or five days earlier. It was a courtesy and we were criticized for it. We were criticized that we didn’t do it weeks and months earlier.

Mr. Ferrier: The ministry people were going to meet with the opposition but didn’t.

Hon. Mr. B. Bernier: With all due respect to the members who were expressing a very sincere interest and a real concern for Algonquin Park, I thought it was the thing to do. But I am sorry to say, Mr. Speaker, that information was not taken in the method it was given.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: It wasn’t appreciated.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: It was distorted and twisted and in fact, made very, very confusing.

Mr. Ferrier: The minister just took that position to justify his stand.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: In fact, I would have to say to you, Mr. Speaker, that last Monday afternoon when the leader of the New Democratic Party rose and took off with some great words of what he thought were wisdom --

Mr. R. F. Nixon: He said the ministry was corrupt.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Yes, I am going to get to that point in a minute. I think if you will read Hansard, Mr. Speaker, you will find out he was so confused and so mixed up he had to call a press conference two days later to try to straighten out the situation.

Mr. J. A. Renwick (Riverdale): That is not correct and the minister knows it. That is gratuitous.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Because he didn’t know what he was talking about he didn’t interpret it right. And he’s still confused.

Mr. Stokes: I hope the minister will tell us why Pierpoint used the 30 per cent factor.

Mr. Renwick: The report was sell-serving, and the minister knows it.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please, the hon. minister has the floor.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I gave the members opposite the courtesy of listening to them intently and I would hope they would do the same for me.

Mr. Renwick: He is abusing the privileges of the House.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Oh come on! The member for Riverdale was talking on his feet as he was walking in.

Mr. Renwick: Justify the bill.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Anyway, Mr. Speaker, during the debate last Monday the leader of the New Democratic Party stood up, twisted the facts and distorted all the issues in the Pierpoint report. But he took off after the members of my ministry.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, are you going to let him get away with that?

An hon. member: Yes.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He called them corrupt --

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order --

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He called them dishonest --

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order -- will the minister sit down?

Some hon. members: Oh, oh.

Mr. Ferrier: A point of order takes precedence over anything else.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Has the Speaker recognized you?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Riverdale wants to raise a point of order.

An hon. member: Yes, this will be a good one.

Mr. Renwick: The point of order is that no minister of the Crown is entitled to call the leader of the New Democratic Party or any other member a person who has distorted and misled, because what the minister is really saying is that my leader was gratuitously twisting what the minister had to say. Now, is the minister going to say that or not?

Mr. R. F. Nixon: Well, the leader called the minister corrupt. What about that corruption?

Mr. Ferrier: He withdrew it.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: I do not see that as a point of order. The Chair did not really interpret it the same as the hon. member for Riverdale.

Mr. O. F. Villeneuve (Glengarry): A pretty good performance by the member for Riverdale.

Mr. Speaker: Will the hon. minister continue?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, the record will show how viciously the leader of the New Democratic Party took after the members of my staff and myself personally. In fact, at that point in time I thought to myself, we should have television in the Legislature.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: That was the time when the minister should have got up on his feet and defended his staff.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I will defend them; we have the facts here to defend them. But I thought then we should have television in this Legislature to let the people of the Province of Ontario see how this man acts and hear what he says in the Legislature.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: It was a pretty effective speech.

Mr. Renwick: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I think it should go right across this province --

Mr. Renwick: That’s exactly what we want.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- and then the people would have a better idea of the type of leader --

Mr. Renwick: We have been the ones advocating television in the Legislature. It has been the government that has been refusing it.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. minister will continue debating second reading.

Mr. Renwick: We will take our chances; don’t worry.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Anyway, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member did apologize for those remarks, for which I thank him, because I do have a great respect for the members of my staff. They do a terrific job, as I’m sure all members of the House will agree, in dealing with the renewable and non-renewable resources of this province. Certainly the Pierpoint report is just one of the many reports of statistical information that have been brought out to clarify the misunderstandings and to bring the issue to a point.

Mr. Renwick: It is one of the few that the minister has ever let see the light of day.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, during the last week I have had the opportunity of going through Hansard, and I have pulled together replies to the various questions, many of which were repeated by the members who took a very active part in the debate. At this time I might express my appreciation to the Conservative members from the Algonquin region, who are very knowledgeable about the situation as it relates to Algonquin Park and have a very sincere concern for the area and, of course, for those 3,100 jobs.

Mr. Stokes: I hope the minister will answer their questions. They didn’t know where the timber was going to come from.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Having heard from those men who are so close to the scene, Mr. Speaker, I think you would have to say that here are people who are on top of the facts, who know the issue and who know what is good for their area and for the Province of Ontario. For those comments, I would like to express my thanks to all of them.

Mr. Speaker, you might say that setting up the Algonquin Forestry Authority is a three-pronged initiative. First, of course, it deals with the master plan in terms of recreation and the way that the park will be managed to provide for present and future use. In addition, as a second point, we established the provincial parks council, which provides a mechanism to deal effectively with changing public needs and values as we move ahead in time. The final act was the setting up of the Forestry Authority itself, which provides for the health of the forest and the economic viability of the region, which will be and must be maintained.

I’d now like to deal with the very specific points that were brought up. Many members referred to the desire to have the entire 3,000 sq miles of the park reserved for recreation. This was a very strong point put forward by the leader of the Liberal Party and by many members of the New Democratic Party.

I would point out, Mr. Speaker, that the master plan provides for increased use and for the projected demand that will be put on the park as it relates to recreation. The recreational needs of people and the special natural qualities were uppermost in the minds of the planners when they set up zoning in the park -- and this is the first provincial park to go that distance where we actually zone specific areas for specific purposes in the park.

The capacity of the park for recreation related to waterways and lakeways -- and I think many of the members from northern Ontario realize that that is where the recreation really takes place; it’s not half a mile or three-quarters of a mile in the bush, it’s on the waterways, on the rivers, on the lakes, and on the shoreline. I note the member for Algoma made some remarks with regard to our restrictions as to cutting down to the water’s edge. And I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that is the reason that we want to retain that recreational value along those shorelines and those waterways.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: A thin layer of cosmetic.

Mr. Renwick: God, yes. Catherine the Great did that on her grand tour of Russia.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Most people who go camping don’t go back half a mile or three quarters of a mile to camp; it’s on the shoreline, and that’s where the intensive recreational opportunities take place.

As I pointed out, for the first time now in a provincial park we have recreational zones; we have primitive, natural and historic zones set aside exclusively for recreation. Of course, in addition to this we have considerably increased the number of canoe routes in the master plan complex.

The remainder of the park, of course, after the recreational needs are met, is dedicated to multiple use, and that’s where we get into the real economic benefit that cars be derived from Algonquin Park. For example, Mr. Speaker, research shows that 17 per cent of interior users want a pure wilderness experience. Now that’s 17 per cent of all those people who go into the park, want a true wilderness experience.

Mr. Gilbertson: They like to drive in on the logging roads.

Mr. Renwick: Where did that figure come from?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: The present demand that we have provided for in the park is about 40,000 user-days, and our zoning --

Mr. Stokes: That’s like saying 100 per cent of the loggers want to cut in the park.

Mr. Renwick: Where does the figure come from, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Our zoning, Mr. Speaker, in the primitive zone provides for 100,000 user-days, and the demand today is only about 40,000, so we have built in an additional safety factor of 2½ times to make sure that those 17 per cent --

Mr. Ferrier: They are going to have to make it three times.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- of the people will have the opportunity to experience a wilderness experience.

Mr. Renwick: Where did the 17 per cent come from?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: And, Mr. Speaker, you are aware that the Frost committee recognized the dilemma for Algonquin Park, and that of course the existing and projected use demands and the proximity of the urban centres --

Mr. Renwick: I think it was 16 per cent, as a matter of fact.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- do not allow the whole park to be managed as a wilderness park, so therefore that great leader in the Province of Ontario labeled Algonquin Park “the average man’s wilderness.” That philosophy is there and we are maintaining it.

I think I have to make it very, very clear, Mr. Speaker, that the park is for people, for all the people --

Mr. Stokes: And 75 per cent of it is for logging.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- and I think it is fair to say that in my ministry we have a real appreciation for the recreational demands of the people of the province. We have something like 117 provincial parks now that we maintain, and we administer also, dealing with the conservation authorities. We are very much aware of the recreational demands placed on the resources of this province by the people of this province. So I think it’s important that this point be brought up because we are the ministry and we have the personnel to do the job in that particular field.

I also want to make one point, Mr. Speaker. When we talk about the logging in Algonquin Park and I talk about the advisory committee under that very able leader, the late Leslie M. Frost, we must remember the committee itself was made up of a broad cross-section of people. We had members of the Legislature from all three political parties. It’s interesting to note that when the report did come down and made certain recommendations with regard to logging, it was supported by all three political parties. There was no minority report filed.

I think it’s important, Mr. Speaker, to remember that the government must also be conscious of, and even more responsive to, the basic needs of the province’s population that are being met by the resource-oriented industries. We must guarantee that we have respectable incomes. We must guarantee that we have steady employment, and, of course, along with that go stable communities and the like.

Algonquin Park, when managed properly, can supply both recreational opportunities and the forest products for the wood-using industries in that particular area. The Algonquin Forestry Authority, operating under the guidelines of the master plan, is one mechanism that will allow the park to continue and to improve its contribution to the wide range of Ontario’s people.

Another point we would like to talk about is the thing we hear so often about the loggers moving into Algonquin Park, causing complete destruction, the devastation that they leave, and some members even use that word “raping” of Algonquin Park. I think it’s safe to say that the simplistic notion of saving Algonquin Park from the logger’s axe has a great deal of emotional appeal. It sounds like a neat, simple way of preserving Algonquin Park forever as a park, by disallowing the logger to go in there. However, I think we must point out that the forests of Algonquin, the standing timber, cannot be saved for ever. A forest is a living, dynamic community. Past maturity, it stagnates and dies. Left to nature’s recycling process, the overmature forest is subjected to wildfire, to wind, to insect and disease that often affect very, very large areas -- and we have some of those areas in Algonquin right now -- and generally, of course, wildlife have little place in an overmature forest.

Through very careful management and selective cutting, which many members have touched upon, much of Algonquin’s old growth timber is removed to make room for new forests that are aesthetically pleasing and which provide for all the benefits of a healthy forest, including recreation and wildlife.

It is widely accepted, Mr. Speaker, that there need be no real, significant conflict between the production of wood and recreational pursuits such as fishing, hunting, sightseeing, picnicking, camping, canoeing and so on.

Also, I would like to point out there’s a certain mystique of wilderness that a forest must remain untouched to provide wilderness or the illusion of wilderness to satisfy the desires of a relatively few members of our society, when, in fact, the wilderness areas of Algonquin so revered by many have not been untouched by man but are the result of 100 years of logging and before that the periodic burning by Algonquin Indians. I think that’s a point we must remember, that logging has been going on in Algonquin Park for the past 100 years.

Mr. Renwick: We understand that

Hon. Mr. Bernier: And people say to me, “It’s a wonderful forest.” It’s a wonderful forest because the forest has been managed. It has been cut on a selective basis --

Mr. Renwick: It is not as wonderful as it was 40 years ago.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- and that is the difference. A view of Algonquin has been projected of wanton waste and destruction; raped by loggers. This is absolutely false, Mr. Speaker. Algonquin presents a pleasing picture of green, vigorous, healthy forest --

Mr. Stokes: Why is the minister intervening then?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- completely clothing the landscape.

Mr. Stokes: Why is he setting up this authority?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: To make it even better.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Stokes: If they have done such a wonderful job, why does the minister have to take over?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: To continue that and see that it goes on.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: There’s always room for improvement.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. minister has the floor.

Mr. Renwick: Come and see how it used to be on Red Rock Lake and see where it is today.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I think the member for Thunder Bay made some comment with regard to national parks; that the federal government, under the --

Mr. Renwick: The government thinks Algonquin Park is a place to drive through, that’s the problem.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- leadership of the Liberal Party, was banning logging in the national parka. I would just like to read copies of a memo that was sent to me from a very renowned forestry expert and he --

Mr. Renwick: Give us his name first. We will decide how renowned he is.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: It’s E. S. Fellows, if that’s any help. E. S. Fellows. I am sure he is well known to the members.

Mr. Renwick: We’ve always thought of him as a very renowned expert of the forestry industry for most of the lumber companies.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He is very highly respected.

Mr. Renwick: Yes.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: And he is doing some consulting work for --

Mr. Renwick: For most of the lumber companies.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He is a forester from Fredericton, NB, who has toured Canada on many occasions and he is very, very knowledgeable. In fact, he spoke at the 1966 national forestry conference at Montebello, Que., and this is what he had to say about some of these national parks as it relates to forest management:

“Cape Breton National Park: Loaded with budworm infestation; at least 30,000 acres destroyed; and a serious source of infestation to surrounding Crown lands in Nova Scotia.

“The Riding Mountain National Park: Overmature vegetation and resultant lack of understorey, resulting in serious erosion problems in the White Mud watershed.”

Mr. Stokes: How many thousand acres of jackpine did the ministry cut in Algonquin Park because of budworm disease?

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: It goes on:

“The Banff and Jasper national parks: Overmature decaying forest in a seriously unhealthy state, with danger of insect and disease infestation spreading outside of the parks.

“The philosophy of the national park service is to allow fire to burn the overmature timber, rather than to harvest the resource or provide jobs and useful timber, although when fires occur, the philosophy is simply not realistic to practice.”

Now, that’s what he says. We have another one here: The Wood Buffalo National Park in Alberta. This is what he says about that particular park:

“Approximately 25 million board feet of timber are cut each year in that particular park, and this is the only national park that has a commercial logging operation. The province would like to acquire the park and maintain logging if national parks policy for preservation forestry is pursued.”

Mr. Renwick: The minister is in the pocket of the lumbering industry and we know it. Let him not try to kid us about it. He knows it is apologia.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: So you see what’s happening there, Mr. Speaker, with regard to our national parks.

Mr. Stokes: Well, we’ve had Tory governments in Ottawa when it was the policy not to cut timber in national parks.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. minister has the floor.

Mr. Renwick: Has the minister read the “Politics of Development in Ontario” yet, and what has happened?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Order!

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, don’t you want a free exchange?

Mr. Speaker: We’ve had that.

An hon. member: No.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: They’ve had their opportunity.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: That’s not an exchange. It’s a steady flow from the other side.

Mr. Renwick: It is cut and thrust.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: It is too much cut.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, in our provincial parks system we have three very large wilderness parks to meet the need for a wilderness recreation.

Mr. Stokes: Here we go.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: We have Quetico up in northwestern Ontario. We have Killarney Park; and then we have the Polar Bear Provincial Park. These are primitive parks --

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): The minister must admit they are not as readily accessible as Algonquin.

Mr. Ferrier: They are for polar bears. How many times has the minister been there?

Mr. Renwick: How many dollars does one need to get in there?

Mr. Deans: How does the minister expect the people to get there? It’s not as easy for the poor people to get there.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I would point out to you, Mr. Speaker, that these three parks --

Mr. Renwick: Rich people and polar bears are the only ones who survive there.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- cover over seven million acres of Ontario’s land. Killarney and Algonquin both provide primitive zones in close proximity to the great majority of Ontario’s population in southern Ontario. So that we have in the middle of Algonquin Park, a primitive area similar to that in Killarney and in Quetico.

Now Mr. Speaker, the other question that came up on numerous occasions was: Is there a supply of wood outside Algonquin Park sufficient to satisfy all the industrial requirements?

Mr. Renwick: Yes.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: We said no. Our management staff said some time ago that there wasn’t, on their first-hand knowledge and examination. They looked at it and said, “No, there was not.” Our research people, under the very able direction of Mr. Pierpoint, confirmed this by an independent, objective study tabled in the House about 10 days ago.

Mr. Deans: How can that be independent when the minister’s research people confirm what his ministry says?

Mr. Renwick: It is absolutely impossible for him to be independent.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. minister has the floor.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I’m going to go through the points. We just had a member of the NDP say that my ministry should look after the logging in Algonquin Park.

Mr. Renwick: The minister doesn’t understand the English language.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Now, when we get the ministry to do a report, the members opposite say it’s no good.

Mr. Renwick: Language is supposed to be for communicating, not for talking to ministry people.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, the leader of the New Democratic Party tried to destroy the credibility of the Pierpoint report in this House. As I said in my opening remarks, by holding a press conference it is completely clear that the member for Scarborough West does not understand the data or the analysis that was given to him in that report.

Mr. Renwick: It is completely clear that he does understand it.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Specifically, at one stage or another during his juggling -- and that’s what he was doing with the figures --

Mr. Renwick: That’s not so.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Even his research girls were embarrassed during that debate last Monday.

Mr. Stokes: No way. That is entirely false.

Mr. Renwick: Oh, come off it.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, the member for Scarborough West -- and I will just number the points -- has failed to differentiate between the gross total volume and the net merchantable volumes that were listed in that particular report. He has made direct comparisons between these two values, as if they were the same thing. And that, of course, is completely wrong.

Mr. Stokes: What about the 30 per cent available cut?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He has treated allowable cut and actual cut as if they were the same thing.

Mr. Renwick: Come on.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I’ll get to that point, just wait a minute. He has miscalculated percentages by using wrong data by which to divide other data.

Mr. Renwick: Who wrote this?

Mr. Ferrier: Probably Mr. Pierpoint.

Mr. Renwick: Yes, this is an independent analysis of the statement by the leader of our party.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: The members don’t want to hear it.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Pierpoint wrote that, eh?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please! The hon. minister has the floor. Order, please!

Mr. Renwick: We want to know who wrote it. Mr. Speaker, Mr. Fellows was identified. Why doesn’t the Minister identify the author of what he is now reading?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, he has totally ignored the vast differences in quality between hardwood pulpwood and hardwood veneer.

Mr. Renwick: Who wrote this?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I did this myself on the weekend.

Mr. Renwick: No wonder the minister is tired.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I am tired.

He has accused us of omitting data from the report when the data is really staring him right in the face, if he would just look at the appropriate tables in that report.

He has stated that there are mathematical errors in the data when the standard mathematical procedure for rounding out the nearest significant figure has been used. I think his nine-year-old daughter was supposed to have made some calculation, but it was just a rounding out of the figures.

He has stated that all of Pierpoint’s figures are based on the operational crews, when in fact the report states clearly that they are based on the forest resource inventory.

He has compared percentage values from the Pierpoint report with those given by industry, when in fact they are percentages of quite different things.

He even tries to have his cake and eat it, too, by taking a percentage given in terms of gross total volume, recalculating it in terms of net merchantable volume, and then reapplying this new value to the gross total volume again, which is completely distorting the whole picture.

Mr. Speaker, because of his mistakes, Mr. Lewis has given this House wrong figures and wrong conclusions.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I think the hon. minister should refer to the member as the member for Scarborough West.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: All right, the member for Scarborough West has given this House wrong figures and wrong conclusions. For example, he erroneously concludes that “something is profoundly out of kilter” and the figures “are just not accurate” --

Mr. Renwick: The minister didn’t write that, and he knows it. He wouldn’t have written “Mr. Lewis” in those remarks -- he is misleading the House.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Mr. Speaker, the minister is trying to give some details.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. minister has the floor.

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, will you tell the Provincial Secretary for Resources Development to stop interjecting?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: He is giving details. If the member doesn’t want to hear them, he can leave.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- when he compares 635,000 cunits gross total volume with 340,000 cunits net merchantable volume. In fact they are exactly the same thing expressed in two different units, and are completely accurate.

He erroneously tries to reduce a calculated deficit of wood from 5.2 million cu ft to 2.6 million cu ft by subtracting material that cannot be subtracted.

He erroneously gives a figure of 26 million cu ft when it should be 16 million cu ft.

He erroneously gives a value of 10 per cent when it should be over 16 per cent, using his deficit figure, and 32.5 per cent using the correct deficit figure. And it goes on and on and on, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Villeneuve: Terrible.

Mr. Stokes: Tell us about the 30 per cent available cut -- that’s the one.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: That’s next. That is coming.

It was interesting, Mr. Speaker, that the information in the letter that the member for Scarborough West referred to that we had given him on allowable cuts in a 50-mile area was given to him about six months ago, but it was only two or three days after he threw those figures around the House that he phoned my staff. He wanted a confirmation of what the units in the data were given and how they were given, and he wanted an explanation of those figures and the data. I thought that was very, very strange. Six months after he had spelled out the report and the facts and the figures, then he confirmed the data.

Mr. Renwick: That was in response to Pierpoint and the minister’s self-serving data.

Mr. Stokes: Those were self-serving figures that the minister was using.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: He wanted to know in what units the data was given. He didn’t know that after all this time.

Mr. Deans: No, he wanted to be sure he was right.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Well that’s one way of looking at it, I suppose.

Mr. Deans: He wanted to be sure the ministry understood.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: But I think it is of greater concern, Mr. Speaker, that even after we did correct him he went on a step further and persisted in misusing the data during a press conference on Nov. 27 to give the people of Ontario a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts.

Mr. Ferrier: That is wrong!

Mr. Stokes: Not so!

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I think it is fair to say that --

Mr. Deans: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order --

Mr. Speaker: Does the member have a point of order?

Mr. Renwick: Will the minister have the courtesy to take his seat?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. minister has the floor. He does not give up the floor until I say so.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, on another point of order, you don’t rule this House. You don’t run the place. You speak with our voice, not his voice.

Mr. Deans: On a point of order, if I may, I would expect, Mr. Speaker, that when a member of this House rises in his place and accuses another of misrepresentation you, sir, would rise and correct it.

Mr. Renwick: That’s right.

Mr. Deans: It is totally improper within the rules of the House to attribute to a member that he misrepresented facts.

Mr. Renwick: Deliberately misrepresented.

Mr. Deans: I ask that you require of the minister that he withdraw the statement, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I’m sorry, I did not hear such a statement which was deliberately made.

Mr. Renwick: It is your job to hear it. That is what you are there for. That is what your business is. That is why you are the Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. There have been so many interruptions that it’s been difficult to hear, I must say.

Mr. Renwick: There was no interruption at that point in time. You are derelict in your duty as Speaker.

Mr. Deans: Further to the point of order, I ask that you require of the minister that he go back, since he’s reading, and that he reread the paragraph immediately prior to my point of order in order that you can ascertain what was said.

Mr. Renwick: That’s right.

Mr. Speaker: Can somebody quote me exactly what was said?

Mr. Renwick: The minister can. He is reading it.

Mr. Deans: He said that the member --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. It would be improper, quite so, if --

Mr. Renwick: Let’s adjourn the House until we get the instant Hansard and he can read it then.

Mr. Speaker: No.

Mr. Stokes: He said he was deliberately misrepresenting --

Mr. Renwick: That he was deliberately misrepresenting.

Mr. Speaker: Okay. I’ve had that confirmed.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. G. Nixon (Dovercourt): How many leaders have they got?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I understand the words “deliberately misled the House” were used. Would the hon. minister please withdraw those remarks?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I didn’t say that, Mr. Speaker. I said there was a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts.

Mr. Renwick: That’s right, a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I would ask the hon. minister to withdraw those words.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Okay, Mr. Speaker, I will withdraw them reluctantly.

Mr. Renwick: What did the minister mutter under his breath?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I said I would withdraw them.

Mr. Renwick: All right, what else did the minister say?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, the members, I’m sure, are anxious to know about the 30 per cent figure that we used in the Pierpoint report. I must make it clear from the outset that this is 30 per cent of the gross total volume. If members have the report there, they can just follow me as I’m reading it.

The hon. members will remember from the chart that was given them that the Pierpoint report stated:

“Tops, stumps and the cull reduced the gross total volume from 100 per cent to approximately 55 per cent depending on the forest type. The remaining amount [and that is the second graph] is then called the net merchantable volume, but many industries still cannot use all of this because of the species which may be unsuitable, may be too small, the area may be inaccessible and for various other valid reasons. Our experience shows clearly that the industry in the Algonquin region can utilize at the mills 30 per cent of the gross total volume of the local forest stands. This can also be expressed as 56 per cent of the net merchantable volume of these stands.”

Mr. Stokes: We weren’t able to find one industry that admitted the gross was 30 per cent. We weren’t able to find any.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Of the net merchantable volume we say it should be 56 per cent and they say 40 per cent, as I understand the report.

Mr. Stokes: Why is the minister using 30 per cent in his calculations?

Mr. Deans: They were saying ranging up to 90 per cent.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Wait a minute. It’s 30 per cent of the gross total volume. That’s where the confusion comes in.

Mr. Renwick: There’s no confusion at all.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: That’s where the confusion comes in. Just let me finish. The industry calculates wood recovery as a percentage of the net merchantable volume shown in their timber cruises and their cruises often readily ignore the small trees and the unsuitable species. The utilization rate used by Pierpoint -- that is, 30 per cent of the gross total volume or 56 per cent of the net merchantable volume of all the trees of all the species -- is nearly half as high again as the 40 per cent minimum estimate that was given to the NDP by the industry. This is the real, factual utilization that clearly emerges from many forest operations in the Bancroft area. That’s why we picked Bancroft to do an examination, because we had such valuable information from that particular area.

Mr. Renwick: The minister never tabled that report.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Another point that was brought up during the debate, Mr. Speaker --

Mr. Stokes: Can I ask for a point of clarification on this?

Mr. Speaker: Will the hon. minister care to answer a point of clarification?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I have many things to go through here and I think we’re running out of time but I would like to get them on the record first.

Mr. Deans: No, we have got lots of time. We will come back at 8 o’clock.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: We can answer it at some later point.

Mr. R. F. Nixon: If the minister can’t answer the question, let him say so.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I was making a point about a question the member was raising, and that was the rejection of the ministry’s operational cruise estimate which was 40 per cent of the gross total inventory volume or 75 per cent of the net merchantable inventory volume.

The instructions for operational cruising for the ministry state clearly that we “must have an estimate of the whole, i.e., all products and species. It is emphasized, therefore, that all species 4 ins, and over DBH must be accounted for.”

This is different from some operational cruises conducted by individual industries, which, for example, might tally only those trees that are 10 ins, in diameter over DBH and of usable species only.

Thus the ministry operational cruise may still overestimate the timber that any one specific industry might be able to utilize at its mill, but at least it gives the diameter and species distribution of the forest stands in case we have to do further planning for that particular area.

The 30 per cent utilization figure from Bancroft was therefore used, instead of the 40 per cent operational cruise figure, because the Bancroft figure is based on 100 per cent of all the wood cut from hundreds of logging operations for delivery to the existing industries’ mills in that particular area.

The Bancroft 30 per cent utilization figure is clearly the realistic figure to use in evaluating how much wood we have that is suitable for the present industries. I think that is important.

The member for Scarborough West also called the Pierpoint report a “self-serving document,” to which I object totally.

Mr. Ferrier: That is why the ministry got it; to justify its position.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: If we had intended that, of course, we would not have included anything about the operational cruises or their percentage relationships. Further, we would not have stayed with the low two-year average cut as the basis for calculating need and deficit. We would not have used those two low years, 1971 and 1973. We would have used the higher five- or nine-year figures of actual cut to give us a much higher deficit return.

I would point out, Mr. Speaker, that Mr. Pierpoint is an ethical research scientist. He gave me a scrupulously honest and objective report without any prejudice or bias whatever. I passed it on to this House in exactly the same way as I received it. That was a courtesy, I felt, to the members on the opposite side.

Mr. Stokes: “The operational cruise net merchantable volumes averaged just over 40 per cent of the inventory gross total volumes.” That is quoting directly from Pierpoint.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, the member for Scarborough West, like other members, did not like the term “available cut,” because it was not widely used on previous occasions.

Pierpoint called his estimate of wood that is actually deliverable to existing mills, the “available cut.” In technical and scientific reporting, it is standard procedure to establish a term, when needed. When they are doing scientific reports, if they want to express themselves in a certain field, they establish a term and give it an appropriate definition. I think that is the key. He used the term “available cut” and he defined it.

Pierpoint gave a very clear definition, both within his report and on a chart which accompanied the report; so there was no misunderstanding. He also gave a crystal-clear explanation of the difference between the gross total volume and the net merchantable volume. Of course, some members have failed to recognize the different terms, yet these statistics are so vital to the House, Mr. Speaker, that I thought I would put them on the record.

Mr. Stokes: That is a snow job and the minister knows it.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: In summary about the Pierpoint report, Mr. Speaker, it is honest, objective and realistic, and it provides the best evaluation of the wood supply that might be considered as an alternative to Algonquin Park. That alternative supply, Mr. Speaker, is not adequate.

There are several other points I would like to touch on. One is the 50-mile zone alternative, the supply of wood from private lands to the dependent industries and the operational difficulties that occur because of that.

Mr. Speaker, in my statement of Nov. 21 I outlined in detail four reasons why the 50-mile zone is not a feasible alternative source of supply for park-dependent mills. The actual lack of sufficient volumes of excess Crown wood, as reported in the Pierpoint report, was just one of the reasons for my decision. It appears, however, that the other factors which I reported have been either ignored or dismissed by many members of the House. These factors play an important part in my decision to reject the 50-mile zone as an alternative source of supply and should be reiterated at this time.

The industry of the region is already dependent upon private lands for a large portion of its wood supply but, based on a recent study of rural landowners in southern Ontario, owner characteristics and attitudes are changing. This private source of supply is not secure and cannot be guaranteed for the future as the province has little direct control of either wood allocation or forest management on private lands.

Because of my belief in the basic philosophy of private ownership and control in Ontario, I must reject the suggestion made by an hon. member that my ministry intrude on the private sector and place further regulations on these woodlot owners. However, the ministry does have private woodlot programmes designed to encourage and assist private owners in proper forest management and utilization of these timber resources. It is hoped that the ministry will be able to ensure more, nearby private sources of wood for the forest industries in the future through the forest management efforts being made at the present time. It must be remembered, however, that it often takes a long time to see positive results when dealing with forests.

Another point: The large area covered by the 50-mile zone, the checkerboard pattern of private and Crown land, and the scattered nature of the excess Crown timber, present serious operational and financial problems which limit the recovery of this wood. It must be realized that there is a limit to the amount that companies can afford to pay for the purchase, harvesting and hauling of timber. To require companies to move from a consolidated area of Crown land such as the park to an area of great operational problems such as the 50-mile zone would have ruinous effects and, of course, the cost would be astronomical.

Third: -- and I would like to place particular emphasis on this point, as it has been grossly ignored -- the excess Crown timber outside the park is necessary to maintain the health of the existing industry in the 50-mile zone and thus is, in effect, already committed. We have all that Crown timber committed.

Mr. Stokes: The minister’s colleague from Victoria-Haliburton says the ministry is not even doing that.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: We have more than 140 primary wood-using mills in the 50-mile zone, and others outside the zone that depend on this area for their wood supply. As evidence of the total commitment of Crown timber in the zone, new mills and major mill expansions in the area have been limited to those mills that require only the lowest grade of wood or those that are replacing existing capacity. So we have held down new mills in that area.

The viability and competitiveness of all of these mills must be protected, and to do this I must be able to provide a continuing supply of timber within a reasonable proximity of these mills. The greatest part of the zone is already committed to the industry in the form of Crown timber licences and volume agreements. In addition to existing licences and volume agreements, the excess quality wood reported in the Pierpoint report is essential to allow for fluctuations in the year-to-year wood requirements of the industry and to provide for an anticipated increased dependence on Crown timber in the total industrial supply resulting from changing attitudes of private landowners.

Several hon. members have spoken of the tight wood supply in their ridings which cover portions of the 50-mile zone. Mr. Speaker, I cannot understand the refusal of some hon. members to see the situation as it really is. The 50-mile zone is not a feasible alternative area of supply for mills now dependent on park timber. To ban logging in the park when there is not an alternative wood supply would put a large number of jobs in danger. That is very important, and many members have spoken to that point. I think all would agree that Algonquin is in a part of Ontario where jobs cannot be lightly tossed aside. Many of the members who have ridings in that particular area made this point very strongly.

Mr. Stokes: We are not tossing jobs aside or taking them lightly either.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Speaking of jobs, Mr. Speaker, I would like to spend a few moments talking about those jobs. At the time of the last regional study, the Algonquin Park region had a labour force estimated at about 53,000. The forest industry employs about 3,100 jobs directly, one-third in logging and the rest in manufacturing. For comparison, let us look at the effect -- I want to make this point to the member for Thunder Bay -- of 3,100 jobs in his particular riding. It would mean the cancellation of 595 jobs at Red Rock, 650 lobs at Marathon, 500 jobs at Longlac and Terrace Bay, 166 jobs at Weldwood of Canada --

Mr. Stokes: I am not suggesting that one job be phased out.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: -- and 1,250 jobs at the Great Lakes mill in Thunder Bay.

Mr. Renwick: Listen, we are concerned about jobs far beyond what the minister ever will be, and he knows it. That is the impact. That is 3,100 jobs. That’s what it does; that’s what it means.

Mr. Stokes: I am not suggesting one job be lost. The minister was not listening to me, obviously.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: In addition to the direct employment, there is indirect employment, Mr. Speaker, associated with logging in the park.

Mr. Renwick: He is deliberately misrepresenting the case of the members on this side of the House.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Studies have shown that each primary or basic job in a community supports as a general rule an additional non-basic job in the same local community. Local community multipliers were developed as part of an Ontario forest industry impact study in 1969. The ratio of basic to non-basic employment was found to be essentially one to one. The chain reaction of indirect job losses is not confined to the local communities where loggers and the millworkers live, as an Ontario employment multiplier is also at work. The impact study referred to above estimated the ratio conservatively at 1 to 1.7.

Mr. Stokes: How many jobs were lost when the minister accepted the report of the advisory committee on Quetico Park?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: I think that was a completely different situation. We were dealing with one licensee.

Mr. J. H. Jessiman (Fort William): There is no comparison at all. The minister knows that. I was on that committee.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: And there was an availability of supply outside the park.

Mr. Stokes: Not one job was lost.

Mr. Jessiman: That’s a different set of circumstances. Not one job was lost.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: There is no comparison between Quetico and Algonquin, because there was available wood outside the park. We recognized that, and we made the move and accepted the recommendation of the committee.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Is the member saying there would be no jobs lost here?

Mr. Renwick: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: There will. I was saying, Mr. Speaker, that this means that every logger and millworker in the Algonquin region is associated with a second job locally and with seven-tenths of a job elsewhere in the province. Only 12 per cent of the Algonquin region woods labour force comes from Quebec. Of course, this is not peculiar to Algonquin Park.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to touch on the dependence of the secondary wood-using industries on Algonquin wood. In 1973 the secondary wood-using industries in Ontario -- that is, the box factories, the furniture factories and the flooring companies -- used roughly 190 million boardfeet of softwood lumber and 230 million boardfeet of hardwood lumber. While it is extremely difficult to trace Algonquin logs, as far as these secondary industries go, we do know that 44 per cent of all the softwood and 73 per cent of all the hardwood used by these industries come from Ontario. The volume of quality logs coming from Algonquin would therefore be equivalent to 27 per cent of the softwood and 22 per cent of the hardwood lumber coming from Ontario.

So all the furniture factories and the box factories use about 22 per cent of the hardwood from Algonquin Park. In addition, in 1973 there were close to 36,000 people employed in these secondary industries. So one can see the multiplier effect. This information, Mr. Speaker, was obtained by sending more than 2,500 questionnaires to the secondary wood-using industries in the summer of 1973. So we have not been sitting still; we have been working at it.

It has been suggested by one of the members, Mr. Speaker, that the woods workers are very mobile, and that they can work 50 to 100 miles from their homes. Well, I have to point out that we have a shortage of woods workers in northern Ontario and, indeed, right across Canada I just wonder why. If it is the case that these workers will travel 150 miles, why do we have a shortage? It baffles me. But I say, too, that this type of living is not acceptable any more. The men won’t live that far away from their families.

I will just touch briefly, Mr. Speaker, on the concept of the Crown corporations, because many members touched on that in the course of their remarks.

Mr. Stokes: Is the minister going to say anything about proper forest management?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: We’ll get to that -- that’s coming.

All have agreed finally, Mr. Speaker, that the jobs must be protected. The Frost advisory committee recognized that the present licensing system would not work, and the advisory committee, of course, made the recommendation which is on page 6 of its master plan. I would just like to read into the record the general forest policy that the advisory committee recommended. Remember that this was a recommendation from members of all political parties of this House.

Mr. Ferrier: That was the first committee, not the second.

Hon. Mr. Bernier: That was the first committee, yes, and there was representation from all parties on that first committee. This is the recommendation:

“Throughout the park, all forest operations should be planned and carried out by the park administration, or under its direct supervision, and in such a manner that park values in the area do not suffer long lasting damage. It is almost certain that the continuation of the present individual timber licences will make it impossible to secure the desirable lumbering operations for the development of the park. Instead, it is suggested that the timber licensees might form a consortium for the unit operation of all lumbering within the park. Failing this, it may be necessary to form a Crown corporation to provide for such unit lumbering operations.”

Now, that was a direct recommendation of the forest advisory committee, which we have accepted.

The idea of a logging consortium is not new. As early as 1947, a report of the Ontario royal commission on forestry -- to which the member for Thunder Bay referred to many times, the Kennedy report -- recommended the formation of “forest operating companies” so that individual companies could combine and co-ordinate all woods operations carried on within designated areas. I think you will agree with that, Mr. Speaker.

One other suggestion made was that my staff should undertake logging in the park -- that we should do it ourselves. I have to say that while we have research experts and experts in the forestry itself, we are not noted as logging operators. We do not have expertise in the logging field. I don’t think we have the expertise in the ministry to go that route. One of the advantages of the authority that we will set up is that it will employ, on a contract basis, the existing expertise and the capital equipment that is presently established in Algonquin Park. Our staff in the district must be free to continue to play a supervisory and controlling role.

One member -- I believe it was the Leader of the Opposition -- suggested that maybe we should have gone the route of a commission. Well, I have to say to him that we did consider the possibility of a commission for Algonquin Park, but we rejected this approach essentially for two reasons:

1. Algonquin Park, as the advisory committee found, is so interrelated to the entire Algonquin region that it cannot be treated in isolation from that region. The master plan, for example, deals with the question of satellite development, access points, scenic roads and wild rivers, all surrounding Algonquin Park. The planning and management of these developments must be treated along with the park as a total recreational and land management system.

2. The functions to be performed by a commission in operating Algonquin Park would, in effect, duplicate the ministry’s land management activities -- including fish and wildlife, fire control, forestry, recreational and other services provided by the ministry.

It was for these reasons -- the extensive nature of the Algonquin system and the duplication of ministry services already in place -- that the concept of an Algonquin commission was rejected. I think a very logical solution was arrived at: A Crown corporation.

Just to wind up, Mr. Speaker, I would like to put on the record the objectives of the Algonquin Forest Authority. The specific objectives are:

(a) To harvest Crown timber and produce logs therefrom and to sort, sell, supply and deliver the logs to such members of the forest industry as may be dependent thereon.

(b) To perform, undertake and carry out such forestry land management and other programmes and projects and to advise the minister on forestry and land management programmes and projects of general advantage to Ontario.

Now, the advantages of such a Crown corporation over the present situation, where we have 18 separate companies logging in the park, will be obvious to all the hon. members.

First, the vesting of responsibility and the control of harvesting operations will be with one licensee -- the authority -- rather than 18 licensees as at the present time. The authority will be aware of and responsive to recreational needs. Through properly controlled cutting, the authority will be able to maintain a healthy, vigorous forest which is aesthetically pleasing and diverse and which will continue to support good populations of wildlife.

Second, the authority will achieve more efficient utilization of the individual trees marked for cutting, thus permitting more products to be obtained from fewer trees. I think that has to be recognized.

Third, the authority will be able to consolidate harvesting and transport activities in the park. This means that logging will not be spread over as much of the park as in the past and that fewer roads will be required for hauling timber.

Fourth, through the control of wood flows and prices, the government can help to ensure the continuing stability of the communities in the Algonquin region. And here again we have the members from the Algonquin region supporting us very very strongly in this concept.

Lastly, Mr. Speaker, the authority can carry out improvement or therapeutic cutting in the process of removing commercial logs and thereby improve the quality and the value of the Algonquin forest and vegetation, both for recreation and forestry purposes.

How will the authority work? The authority, functioning as a Crown corporation, will harvest forest products and supply them to the manufacturing facilities currently dependent on supplies from the park. The authority will carry out all road construction, silvicultural activities and cutting of trees prescribed by the ministry.

The role of this agency will, therefore, be operational in nature with a commercial service orientation. Given the volume of forest products it may harvest annually and the social and environmental constraints which the minister will determine, the authority will operate as efficiently and effectively as possible to produce at minimum cost for sale to manufacturing centres.

All existing licences will be terminated and replaced by a volume agreement issued by the ministry to the Algonquin Forestry Authority. As an initial target, the average level of harvesting of 15 million cu ft to 17 million cu ft of wood each year will not be exceeded during the period of plan review from 1975 to 1979. The authority will conduct logging operations through the use of local contractors and will pay normal stumpage, forest protection and forest management charges.

The authority will be directed by a board of directors supported by a professional and technical forestry staff which will be supervised by a general manager. The authority will be continually responsive to the ministry through day-to-day contact between the general manager and the park superintendent.

Mr. Speaker, that concludes my remarks. I know now that the members will want to join with me in heartily endorsing and supporting second reading of this bill.

Mr. Speaker: The motion is for second reading of Bill 155.

The House divided on the motion for second reading of Bill 155, which was approved on the following vote:

AYES Allan Auld Beckett Bernier Birch Brunelle Clement Dymond Ewen Gilbertson Grossman Hamilton Handleman Hodgson (Victoria-Haliburton) Irvine Jessiman Johnston Kennedy Lane Leluk Maeck McIlveen McKeough McNeil Meen Nixon (Dovercourt) Nuttall Parrott Potter Smith (Simcoe East) Smith (Hamilton Mountain) Snow Timbrell Villeneuve Walker Wardle White Winkler Yaremko -- 39.

NAYS Bounsall Braithwaite Breithaupt Burr Deans Edighoffer Ferrier Gaunt Germa Givens Good Lawlor Newman (Windsor-Walkerville) Nixon (Brant) Reid Renwick Samis Singer Stokes Taylor (Carleton East) Worton Young -- 22.

Clerk of the House: Mr. Speaker, the “ayes” are 39, the “nays” 22.

Mr. Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Motion agreed to; second reading of the bill.

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

Some hon. members: No.

Mr. Speaker: Which committee, Mr. Minister?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Committee of the whole House.

Mr. Renwick: Why not put it outside and get some views from the public?

Mr. Speaker: Is it agreed that the bill go to the committee of the whole House?

Agreed.

Mr. Speaker: I beg to inform the House that in the name of Her Majesty the Queen, the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor has been pleased to assent to certain bills in her chambers.

ROYAL ASSENT

Clerk of the House: The following are the titles of the bills to which Her Honour has assented:

Bill 9, An Act to amend the Ontario Human Rights Code.

Bill 62, An Act to provide for an Ontario Building Code.

Bill 82, An Act to amend the Corporations Tax Act, 1972.

Bill 129, An Act to amend the Moosonee Development Area Board Act.

Bill 130, An Act to amend the Ontario Municipal Improvement Corp. Act.

Bill 131, An Act to repeal the Ontario Pensioners Assistance Act, 1973.

Bill 135, An Act to amend the Ministry of Colleges and Universities Act, 1971.

Bill 137, the Community Recreation Centres Act, 1974.

Bill 139, An Act to amend the Judicature Act.

Bill 140, An. Act to amend the Election Act.

Bill 141, An Act to amend the Statutes Act.

Bill 142, An Act to amend the Execution Act.

Bill 144, An Act to amend the Municipal Act.

Bill 145, An Act to amend the Health Insurance Act, 1972.

Bill 146, An Act to amend the Public Health Act.

Bill 152, An Act to amend the Loan and Trust Corporations Act.

Bill 154, An Act to amend the Town of Wasaga Beach Act, 1973.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): Mr. Speaker, it has been agreed that the NDP would relinquish their position on private members’ hour so that certain staff members, and so on, would have an extra opportunity to go out and vote in civic elections --

Mr. Deans: We are just going to move it back a week.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That’s quite correct -- and that they would take their position one week from today.

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): Mr. Speaker, before we adjourn, is it the intention of the House leader to call the four bills of the Ministry of Social and Family Services this evening?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: No, Mr. Speaker. We will move to committee of the whole House on Bill 155.

Mr. Speaker: In accordance with the agreement just announced, I do now leave the Chair, and we will resume at 8 o’clock.

It being 5:20 o’clock, p.m., the House took recess.