Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House resumed at 8 o’clock, p.m.

ESTIMATES, PROVINCIAL SECRETARIAT FOR JUSTICE (CONCLUDED)

On vote 1101:

Mr. Chairman: When the committee rose at 6 o’clock there was some question of the budget. Perhaps the hon. minister has the answer to the question from the hon. member for Downsview.

Hon. J. T. Clement (Provincial Secretary for Justice): He did come back, did he?

Mr. V. M. Singer (Downsview): Oh, yes. I’ve been waiting here. I’m sorry, I got several messages that you wanted to see me.

Hon. Mr. Clement: At the back of the building?

Mr. Singer: Yes.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Chairman, when we rose at 6 o’clock the question was before me as to the amount of money actually spent in 1974-1975. I was able to provide the members with a figure up to the end of February of 1975, but I was unable to give them the figure for March of 1975. Now, I’ve since been advised as to part of the difficulty -- why there’s been a delay.

Apparently it is Treasury practice that -- the fiscal year, of course, is to the end of March -- the books are left open until May 15 before a final figure is computed. The reason for that is to give those cheques that are issued in the month of March time to clear. The books are closed, in effect, at the end of April, and the figures are available to various ministries by May 15. But I’ve had my staff, over the supper hour, compute what was spent in the month of March and for the entire year. I would like to go through those --

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. Could we have a little order so that the Chair can hear the hon. minister?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Perhaps the easiest way of doing it, Mr. Chairman, is to give what the appropriation was for that period and what the actual expenditure was. I preface my remarks by saying these are unconfirmed as of yet but they are fairly close and will be of assistance, I think, to the particular members having interest in them. I am talking 1974-1975. Salary and wages were $248,800, that was the appropriation; and the actual is $192,209.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Employee benefits: The appropriation was $19,900 and the actual was $50,556.

Mr. Singer: What was the appropriation on salary?

Hon. Mr. Clement: It was $19,900.

Mr. Singer: And you spent $50,000.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The reason for that expenditure of $50,556 is that fiscal period the former deputy minister retired and his accumulated benefits in terms of sick leave and so on were paid to him on his termination of employment.

At the time the appropriation was drawn for last year, one must remember that when the matter was debated in committee, when the estimates were handled last year, they were awaiting the arrival of a new deputy minister because the prior deputy had been transferred to TEIGA. At the time of the preparation of these estimates they didn’t know who the replacement deputy was going to be. Had they known it was the particular individual who was going to be appointed and, secondly, if they had known he was going to take his pension earlier than he had to, obviously the appropriation figure would have been increased to reflect what that cost was. That’s the reason for that.

The appropriation for transportation and communication was $16,400 and the actual was $10,797. The appropriation for services, including consultant services to be provided to the ministry, was $100,900; the actual disbursement was $29,922. Supplies and equipment: The appropriation was $15,000 and the actual disbursement $20,701. The total appropriation therefore was $401,000; the actual expenditures $304,185.

The matter which my attention is drawn to really consists of three items; one I have already touched on. The second item is the obvious discrepancy of about $70,000 in terms of consultants’ fees which were not utilized but were provided for in the estimates. I inquired into that because I am digging back into history now on a matter I was not familiar with.

The original deputy who had worked on these estimates initially and his then minister had determined that consulting studies were required and they were certainly a matter of high priority in the minds of those officials at that time. With the change of both the minister and the deputy minister -- the minister having come, I believe, in February, 1974, and the deputy minister coming some time later on in June or July, 1974 -- and I am just going by memory -- they took a look at their predecessors’ priorities and made a decision, rightly or wrongly, that those priorities were not paramount in their minds and they did not embark on certain consulting studies that had been authorized.

The third item is the supplies and equipment. There is a deficiency there of $5,700, in that the supplies and equipment appropriation was $15,000 but expenditure was, in actual fact, $20,701. The difference of the $5,701 is reflected in new office furniture and equipment purchased in the summer of 1974 to refurbish certain office accommodation for the new deputy minister when he arrived in June or July or whenever it was of last year. The appropriation was $401,000; actual expenditure was $304,185.

Mr. Singer: May I interrupt at that point? Were the figures the minister gave us about 5:30 incorrect? Was the figure of $214,899 for 11 months incorrect?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No, as I understand it, that figure is correct. That’s the figure of $214,899 and change.

Mr. Singer: Then do I understand correctly that March was a great big-spending month and the ministry spent $90,000 in March?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes. The salaries are not paid in the same months as shown here. Also, on the main matter of that $30,656, being the difference between the employee benefits appropriation and the actual, my understanding was that employee did not terminate until the end of February and the moneys were paid in the month of March which accounts for a substantial sum. This is something which I wasn’t even familiar with. That was, in fact, paid in March of this year out of the appropriation for 1974-1975.

So the member was quite correct in assuming in round figures, that the difference of, say, $215,000 up to the end of February and $304,000 to the end of March.

Mr. Singer: All right. Are you through?

Hon. Mr. Clement: I was going to continue right on.

Mr. Singer: All right. Just let me interject very briefly at this point. It would then appear that you budgeted $400,000 and you spent $300,000, so you were just $100,000 out in your budgeting for 1974-1975, and you were out similar amounts in the previous experience of this department for the previous three years; considerable proportionate amounts.

Hon. Mr. Clement: I was not out anything.

Mr. Singer: All right. The royal “you.”

Hon. Mr. Clement: The royal “me”?

Mr. Singer: Yes.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes, the royal “me” was out, but personally I was not out, because I wasn’t even in at that time, as you can appreciate.

Mr. Singer: Yes, I recognize that.

Hon. Mr. Clement: You must remember that as ministers change and deputy ministers change perhaps priorities change, and that’s reflected very positively here in a sense that some $70,000 which was approved in the services appropriation for last year was not, in fact, utilized, because my immediate predecessor’s priorities were certainly different to his predecessor’s in terms of certain consulting services that were thought to be required at that particular time and, in fact, were not used and those moneys were not expended.

I would hope to embark on what programmes I have. I would hope to be able to embark upon them, and any studies and so forth which we think we require in order to discharge the responsibilities of the ministry are included in the figure that we’re asking for this year, in terms of $474,000. I’m prepared, at this point, to give an explanation and go into those with the members, so that perhaps that will assist them in their thinking.

Mr. Singer: All right. Before you get to that I would like the minister to tell me if what he is, in fact, saying is that it’s really not unusual that a department’s estimates could be as much as 33 1/3 per cent out, because this has been the history of this department since it started. And if this is the pattern of all government departments, then if you take a budget of $8 billion and you chop off one third or add one third it really amounts to a fair sum in the finances of the Province of Ontario, and if we can translate those figures into the estimates of the Provincial Secretary for Justice, I don’t give much credence to your overall budgeting. If you’re one third out, as you’ve been every year that this department has existed -- as you were last year -- then what is the sense of the figures you bring before us at all?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The figures that I’m bringing before you this year, tonight, for the appropriations are my figures.

Mr. Singer: Oh, you’re a better fellow than your predecessor?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No, I’m not a better fellow than my predecessor. I don’t intend to make that statement at all, but I would hope that I would have the advantage of perhaps occupying this office for a calendar year period and with the same deputy --

Mr. Singer: Oh.

Hon. Mr. Clement: -- so that there is some consistency in development of policy and priorities rather than having it change part way through the year.

I do not identify with the hon. member’s submission that perhaps a third of the justice policy field and its related ministry’s budget -- $8 billion for the entire government -- is one-third off.

Mr. Singer: We will come to that later. We are dealing with the first department --

Hon. Mr. Clement: That’s right; that’s right.

Mr. Singer: -- that’s been before us. It is a third out.

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): On a point of order.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The member is looking at a figure here of some --

Mr. Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Deans: On a point of order. I am sorry to interrupt the minister. On a point of order, if I may, on a matter dealing with law and order, it would seem to sue there should be a quorum.

Clerk of the House: Mr. Chairman, I don’t see a quorum.

Mr. Chairman: Call in the members.

Mr. Chairman ordered that the bells be rung for four minutes.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. minister will continue, please.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Chairman, at this point, I would like to detail the programmes that are involved in year 1975-1976. We have touched briefly in our general comments with the public or regional workshops. I would like to be more specific at this particular moment.

In order to heighten awareness, and involve a cross-section of the public in justice issues, the secretariat will convene a series of workshops throughout the province. We will bring together people of all levels, such as the general public, administrative and field levels, different government and private agencies, to discuss proposals for programmes and policies that involve the justice field. Some areas which lend themselves to workshop approach would be unified family court, alcohol, native peoples and the Young Offenders Act.

The format of the workshops would vary, depending on the audience, the topic, whether it’s half day, whole day, evening sessions and so on. They would be in the form of a forum where ideas could be tested, successes and failures of programme initiatives shared, new initiatives stimulated and networks for integrated services encouraged. Also, we would like to have development seminars in the form of informal meetings of 15 to 20 participants representing target public sectors. This may be in line with some of the observations offered by the member for Downsview in his earlier general remarks. We would invite the participation of people who have a common area of interest and experience such as academics, people from law schools, schools and centres of criminology, social work schools, the Ontario Law Reform Commission, and the National Law Reform Commission. We would also invite people such as judges, senior police officers, lawyers, probation and parole people, and social workers representing various social agencies. The general topic for discussion would really be that of an integrated justice policy for the Province of Ontario.

The third type of seminar that I visualize is a management seminar. This would be for a period of one week. We would invite senior level management people I from the four ministries within the field. Subjects covered would be similar to those usually dealt with at the senior management development seminar of the Civil Service Commission. The benefit of this approach would really be to encourage a better understanding of the problems and programmes of all the ministries involved in the administration of justice so that all could take a more integrated approach to problems of mutual interest.

Perhaps the members will recall our discussing a week ago, the involvement last year in the transfer for short periods of time of people involved in policing services to correctional institutions so that each could have a better appreciation and knowledge of the problems involved with the other. There is the present UN involvement. The secretariat has, as indicated, ongoing projects and assignments involving analysis of policy submissions to the field committee, membership of inter-field and inter-ministry ongoing committees or task forces dealing with, for example, inventory of programmes and services in the north and the provincial liaison committee on justice information and statistics.

This third type of seminar is a point of contact for community groups wishing to initiate policy discussions on support of local projects. For example, there is the Weston action committee, which really deals with crime prevention and is oriented to the Downsview area. We have one in Kitchener dealing with people in legal difficulty and with the John Howard brief on probation.

Also a continuing matter of interest for the secretariat and study is a continuing evaluation of developments in the criminal justice model.

We have monthly meetings with a committee representing the seven largest Indian associations in the province regarding problems of the native peoples involved in the administration of justice.

Those are the areas in which the secretariat is currently involved or about to become involved. Because of the time of year, the UN congress which will be meeting here in September, and which has been mentioned in prior discussions, has taken the time of a number of people in the secretariat. As a matter of fact, one of the staff of the secretariat has become seconded to the United Nations in New York and is working in New York at the present time. We do not pay that person’s salary in that we don’t subsidize the United Nations utilizing this person; it is charged back and we receive full payment for that person’s salary while she is on that particular project in New York.

If the members opposite wish me to, I would like to go through the personnel on the secretariat staff at the present time and deal with them individually, but I will await the wishes of the members opposite. If they require that detailed information, I will be glad to supply it.

Mr. Chairman: I wonder if the Chair could interrupt just for a moment and recognize the Provincial Secretary for Social Development.

Hon. M. Birch (Provincial Secretary for Social Development): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. May I take this opportunity to introduce to you, and through you to the House, 15 members of the 1st Centenary Scout Troop from West Hill with their leader, Mr. Steele. Would you join with me in welcoming them to the House?

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Downsview.

Mr. Singer: Mr. Chairman, as I understand what the minister was saying in the first part of his remarks -- and I missed the first sentence -- he was explaining the $93,000 services item that he has in this year’s budget. Or was he explaining the general nature of what he is going to do this year?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The general nature.

Mr. Singer: Oh, all right. Then I would like to know, first of all, why you only spent $194,000 for salaries last year when you asked for $248,800 and why you want to put it up to $306,500 this year. There is an increase of more than $100,000. Why did you fall $56,000 short last year and why do you pick that up and add another $50,000 this year?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Chairman, as I explained earlier, there are people who have left the secretariat as a result of attrition; there is also the one particular woman I mentioned who has been seconded down to the United Nations at the present time. As these people left the secretariat for one reason or another in late autumn and early this year, and as I was made aware of my new responsibilities and the fact that I would be losing the then deputy, it was decided between my new deputy and myself to have a look at this thing and see whether we really need these people or not. The result was a substantial saving in the salaries that normally would have been paid to those individuals in 1974-1975.

Now, at this point I think we do have certainly much more of a handle on the situation in terms of programmes and priorities, and in terms of where we think we should be involved. We will, in due course, if we require staff within the limits, the frame that we are allowed, replace those people only if we require them.

I have to take this position here. And remember this: my deputy and I did not prepare this particular set of figures before the House this evening. They were prepared by my predecessor and his deputy, who obviously felt that they would require the full staff for 1975-1976. That figure was carried over from last year, plus the increments that normally would flow and account for the figure being in excess of $248,800, which was last year’s figure.

I am just taking the time of the House now to point out that we didn’t spend that for the reasons I have outlined. But we must have this figure in this year in the event that we do require these people; I cannot stand here tonight and say I definitely require these people or the thing is going to grind to a halt. I think we probably will want them; but if we don’t, we are not going to hire them just to round out the complement. There is just no point to that on a sound business basis.

That is the reason why the figure is carried forward, because when the estimates were prepared it wasn’t known that there would be any reduction in complement through attrition or any other reason. It wasn’t even known at that time that there would be a change of responsibilities from the minister and the deputy minister.

Mr. Singer: Well, I don’t know how the minister can explain or attempt to explain that he is setting a figure that may not be spent, and he really hasn’t got any idea how much he is going to spend, and he isn’t going to spend more than is there, and he might spend much less than is there, and therefore that is good business.

We are talking about the biggest provincial budget we have ever seen, $8.5 billion. If everybody else has been budgeting in the same way as you do, then they have put in a figure that they might or might not spend and they hope they won’t -- and “please be assured that we won’t spend a single penny more than is necessary.”

Why don’t you just bring in a blanket figure, $10 billion, and stand up and say: “You can be assured we are not going to spend any more than $10 billion, and we will try to spend much less. Let’s put the budget through and enough of the palaver”? And that’s the end of it.

That’s really what you are saying. That’s what your predecessor said last year. You go back and say: “Well, I didn’t really prepare these figure. My deputy didn’t really prepare these figures. These were prepared by our predecessors.” And last year the minister’s predecessor wasn’t very clear at all about who he was going to have, whether he was going to fill up this complement, and so on.

Surely, with a ministry having been in being for four years, there must be some idea in the minds of those responsible for it as to how much money is going to be required to run it. And when you are consistently out by great sums of money there is something wrong with the way the ministry is run.

Last year your complement was substantially unfilled. This year -- notwithstanding that you are saying these aren’t your figures and maybe it’s an outside end figure, and maybe we are going to hire some more -- this year you are asking to spend $306,500 for salaries, when last year you spent $194,000. You explained to me about the deputy’s pension; that is reflected later on.

So, In fact, leaving out the former deputy’s pension and the accelerated payments because of his retirement, you are asking to spend 50 per cent more for salaries than you did last year. Can you tell me where the 50 per cent salary increase comes this year from actual last year?

Hon. Mr. Clement: If the vacancies are filled, then that will bring those figures up. I take it from what the hon. member for Downsview said he would think that the estimates last year were most appropriate if, in fact, the $70,000 or so had been spent for those consultant studies, which were authorized in the estimates last year. But because of a change of priorities in the minds of someone, it was not spent. Surely you are not suggesting that those amounts should have been spent so that the discrepancy was much smaller and, therefore, it would indicate a more accurate forecasting. I know you are not suggesting that, because it is just not good sense to do that. Those moneys were there. A case was made at the time by the then minister in demonstrating --

Mr. Singer: We didn’t believe the case was made.

Hon. Mr. Clement: -- in demonstrating his needs and priorities. As the responsibilities changed, those priorities and needs changed and the moneys simply were not spent.

If we were able, at this moment in time, to say, “We need X thousands of dollars” and be dead on, but it turned out that some studies or some financial requirements were needed in addition and I came back here for supplementary estimates, you would be the first to suggest I didn’t know what the hell I was doing because I’m out. Particularly with these amounts, to be out $100,000 would appear, percentagewise, a tremendous discrepancy because the total dollar sum is so small compared to other ministries.

Mr. Singer: It is, too.

Hon. Mr. Clement: I will not, nor would my predecessor, expend moneys on projects which are not in the priorities of one’s mind at the time. I’m telling the House and the member for Downsview that the expenditures involved here, the projected costs, are within my terms of priorities and I'm simply going to require these moneys in order to carry out these things.

It was only a matter of a few hours ago that the member suggested we should have policies and we should come out and be definite in certain areas. In order to do that we must be factually sound; we must consider all arguments. In order to do that we must obtain the information, the best that’s available, in order to develop a definite position. I hate to say it but these things do cost money and I’m simply here before you tonight to explain that these are the amounts of money we require. If this House says, “No, we’re going to cut you by $100,000” or whatever amount might be selected, I would be hard-pressed to come back here and make a case for supplementary estimates for the reasons I’ve already outlined.

Mr. Singer: The minister’s halo is shining brightly; it’s glowing and it’s tight and it must be giving him a headache. I’m not impressed by the argument at all. Could you tell me, item by item, and quite apart from all the falderal you’ve surrounded this with, how you make up $306,500 in salary? What is your complement and what is each person on that complement -- if it’s full -- going to be paid? Hopefully, the total somehow will add up to $306,500.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Chairman, I would like to go through these figures. There is the secretary to the deputy minister and a separate secretary to the deputy minister.

Mr. Singer: A second secretary?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No, the secretary to the deputy minister.

Mr. Singer: That’s one.

Hon. Mr. Clement: That is one. She is in a classification earning a minimum salary of $10,590 to a maximum of $12,390.

Mr. Singer: Is she there now?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes, she is there now. I’m telling you of people who are there now, not of vacancies which exist.

The executive co-ordinator is on the senior payroll and therefore is not shown on the list I have here.

Mr. Singer: So there is more here than there is?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No. He’s within the complement of the ministry approved by Management Board or Treasury, which is 14. At the present time there are nine people including the two I have just named.

Mr. Singer: Let’s do that slowly. The complement is 14?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The complement is 14.

Mr. Singer: That’s supposed to be taken care of by the $306,000 figure?

Hon. Mr. Clement: That’s right.

Mr. Singer: But you only have nine?

Hon. Mr. Clement: I only have nine as of tonight.

Mr. Singer: Yes, so you’re five short.

Hon. Mr. Clement: So I’m five short.

Mr. Singer: Which is about what you were a year ago. In fact, last year you were seven short.

Hon. Mr. Clement: As of tonight the complement is nine.

Mr. Singer: Yes, it’s picking up.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Taking them in order there is the deputy minister; there is the executive co-ordinator on whom I’ve already touched.

Mr. Singer: What are their salaries?

Hon. Mr. Clement: They’re on the senior payroll list. It’s not a published figure. They are senior payroll people.

Mr. Singer: Is it included in the $306,500?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes.

Mr. Singer: Oh, it’s a secret figure, is it? It’s in public accounts or will be in a year and a half.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Well, it shows in public accounts. Yes, it is shown in public accounts.

Mr. Singer: I would like to know how we make up this $306,500?

Hon. Mr. Clement: All right. Perhaps we can do it this way if you’ll just bear with me for a moment. There is a secretary --

Mr. Singer: To the deputy minister? We covered her.

Hon. Mr. Clement: To the deputy minister. All right. There is the executive co-ordinator. We’ve already touched on him. Moving on, there’s a secretary --

Mr. Singer: To the executive co-ordinator?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Sanderson’s secretary, who is the secretary to the executive co-ordinator. She is a secretary 5 paid in a range from $9,412 to $11,020. Then, there is an administrative officer, classified as an executive officer 2, paid in a range from $16,546 to $20,235. There is a secretary to him, who is a secretary 3, paid in the range from $7,708 to $9,014. There is a policy development officer, classed as an executive officer 3, in a range from $22,087 to $27,888. There is a policy analyst.

Mr. Singer: Does the policy development officer have a secretary?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No. It’s a pool.

Mr. Singer: Oh dear, how could that happen?

Hon. Mr. Clement: There is an executive officer class 1, in a range of $13,855 to $16,232. A research analyst, classed as administrative assistant class 2, from $10,590 to $12,390; and there’s a communications adviser, paid $13,750, who is a contract employee. There’s a secretary --

Mr. Singer: The contract employee -- is that $13,750 in now?

Hon. Mr. Clement: That’s a fixed sum. That’s included.

Mr. Singer: Yes, but is that in the $306,500 or is --

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes.

Mr. Singer: That’s open?

Hon. Mr. Clement: That’s in it. And the final employee of the secretariat is an additional secretary paid, in round figures, $175 per week.

Mr. Singer: Is that 11 people you’ve told me about?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Nine.

Mr. Singer: Nine?

Mr. P. D. Lawlor (Lakeshore): Well, I got 11 too.

Mr. Singer: I have 11, yes.

Hon. Mr. Clement: We have nine employees in the ministry, and two contract employees.

Mr. Singer: That makes 11.

Hon. Mr. Clement: It makes 11. The one secretary whose salary I just gave you at roughly $175 a week, it’s $174.13.

Mr. Lawlor: You mean she is contract?

Hon. Mr. Clement: She is contract and the communications adviser is contract.

Mr. Singer: So really, the figures you gave us about a complement of 14 and a staff of nine, really means a complement of 16 and a staff of 11 at present?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No. We’re entitled to have 14.

Mr. Singer: Yes, but you had two on contract who apparently don’t count somewhere.

Hon. Mr. Clement: They’re short-term. I’m talking about permanent employees of the ministry being nine in all.

Mr. Singer: In the group you just gave us the total was 11.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes, but two are on contract and their terms will be expiring. The communications adviser’s contract will be expiring in July and the other one is a temporary secretary, the $175 per week one.

Mr. Singer: If my arithmetic is any good at all it looks something like $125,000. Granted, you said you had five more somewhere, but how do you get up to $306,000? Unless you have a co-ordinator who gets $100,000 and a deputy minister who gets $100,000. If they are getting that much, maybe those are the ones you didn’t tell us about.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The vacancies that exist at the present time consist of three executive officers class 3. These are vacant at the present time.

Mr. Singer: What would they get if you could find them?

Hon. Mr. Clement: They are the same as the other executive officers class 3, $22,087 to $27,888; and two secretaries class 3, $7,708 to $9,014.

Mr. Singer: So that’s $66,000 plus $15,000. So that is maybe $81,000, eh? That brings us up to about $200,000.

Hon. Mr. Clement: I was just listening to your computation there as you spoke out loud. The $66,000 would be on the low side. It could be as high as $81,000 on the high side.

Mr. Singer: What puzzles me is that last year we went through this same thing with the member for Lincoln (Mr. Welch) who had your job before you, and he also said if we are going to hire people and we are short six or seven or eight -- I have forgotten, it’s all here in Hansard -- we are going to spend all this money. Well, the year has gone by and you’re still apparently five short and you’re still, as my arithmetic goes -- and I haven’t got the figures and my instant mental calculator is not very good -- it seems to me you are still $100,000 short of the figure you are asking for. It doesn’t make very much sense to me, just putting in a rough figure off the top of my head for the deputy minister and the executive co-ordinator.

Be that as it may, can you tell me what the executive co-ordinators qualifications are? How long has he been with the department? What is his educational background and his business experience?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes. He is a graduate of the University of Toronto.

Mr. Singer: In what?

Hon. Mr. Clement: An engineering bachelor of applied science, 1948, and a master’s in business administration, 1953; nine years in industrial engineering in the paper, knitting and structural steel industries; 10 years in the faculty of the school of business, University of Toronto; five years in management consulting, specializing in computer applications, systems analysis and management information. Would you like to know any of his professional affiliations?

Mr. Singer: Yes, I would.

Mr. Lawlor: Ah, Vern, for heaven’s sake, come on.

Mr. R. Haggerty (Welland South): Welcome back, Pat.

Hon. Mr. Clement: He is a member of the Institute of Public Administration of Canada; the Association of Professional Engineers of Ontario; a former member of the Canadian Operational Research Society; the American chapter of Industrial Engineers; a former member of the business administration advisory committee, Mohawk College. He joined the public service on May 1, 1972, as a director of the programme analysis of justice with TEIGA, or Management Board, I should say, and was appointed executive co-ordinator in this secretariat July of last year.

Mr. Singer: All right. Now, what are your qualifications for your administrative officer? You have one presently on staff, is that right?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes.

Mr. Singer: What are the qualifications of that person?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The administrative officer has 26 years’ experience with the public service. He deals in a good number of areas particularly --

Mr. Deans: On a point of order, I don’t think we should continue with this law and order debate until we have a quorum.

Mr. Chairman ordered that the bells be rung for four minutes.

Mr. Chairman: We now have a quorum. The minister may proceed.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The question which was asked was on the responsibilities of the administrative officer. He is responsible for accommodation and services, personnel and budget control for the secretariat. He compiles information for the deputy minister. He composes routine correspondence for his signature; does all normal administrative duties in connection with the operation of an office. He deals directly with citizens and, in some instances, members of the House dealing with complaints relating to the justice policy field. He forwards them to any operating ministry should the area of complaint or inquiry concern a particular ministry. He attends the House, researches replies and forwards material required by questions asked on the order paper. He assures that material tabled in the Legislature or material prepared by the secretariat is forwarded to members of the House and the mailing list. His total years of experience in the public service, I think I mentioned it, are 26.

Mr. Singer: You have a policy development officer. Can you tell us about him, please?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The policy development officer has a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Toronto in sociology and political science and a master of arts degree from the same institution. She has a background in the insurance industry, having worked for a company here in Toronto, in terms of negotiating settlements and dealing with matters of general insurance claims dealing with automobile, theft, fire and general liability.

For three years she was a research associate in the department of social pathology at the Clarke Institute and undertook research in the areas of juvenile delinquency and child victims of sexual offences. For a four-year period she was a consulting sociologist with the Community Guardian Co. in Toronto. This is a community and prevention-oriented private security company under contract to Ontario Housing. She participated in policy planning, development and research, staff employment and development, in co-ordination of training programmes and liaison with social agencies and community groups.

She has been a visiting lecturer at community colleges and universities, part-time instructor -- instructress, I guess -- at Ryerson Polytechnical Institute. She has been involved in conferences and workshops, belongs to two professional associations --

Mr. H. C. Parrott (Oxford): Mr. Chairman, I wonder if the minister would allow me to rise on a point of order?

Mr. Chairman: A point of order.

Mr. Parrott: When the bells rang -- I am almost out of breath --

Mr. Deans: You are out of breath.

Mr. Parrott: As a matter of fact, I am out of breath. I left immediately to come from my office to the House. This is absolutely the fastest journey I have made. It is not possible to get from there to here in the amount of time required to answer a quorum call. I resent that, when we had that quorum call a while back, there was some publicity in the papers. I was sitting in my office, not able to get here, and it resulted in publicity in my riding which I think was unfair. I think we should do something about the rules which are considerably out of date.

Mr. D. H. Morrow (Ottawa West): I agree.

Mr. Parrott: My point of order is that if we are going to have a quorum call, I think we should have it for 10 to 15 minutes at least. I can’t make it in less -- and I defy anyone to come with me now -- by the time you catch the elevators. It is a considerable distance to the 6th floor of the Mowat Block.

Mr. O. F. Villeneuve (Glengarry): It is amusing to them.

Mr. Parrott: It is not to those of us, Mr. Chairman, who are working. I am wondering, sir, if you will take it upon yourself to go to the rules committee of this Legislature to extend the amount of time for a quorum call. I think those of us who have offices far removed from this chamber should have the same privileges as the other members of the House.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. According to the standing orders, the quorum call -- I would like to respond to the point of order.

Mr. Deans: He is on a point of order.

Mr. Morrow: I am speaking to the point of order, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman: I will listen to the point of order.

Mr. Morrow: I think I am in order. I would like to add to what the member for Oxford has said, which is excellent; we’re all in agreement with him. I would like to add one further thing to what he has said and that is that when a committee of this House is sitting it’s an extension of this House and, therefore, the members should be counted as present, as if they were sifting in this chamber. If there are 16 people here and there are seven over there the total is 23. It is, I think, high time that these particular rules should be changed because they are idiotic and leave themselves open to --

An hon. member: Abuse.

Mr. Morrow: -- in my view, abuse.

Mr. Deans: Mr. Chairman, of course, I would be quite delighted to engage in any discussion surrounding changes of the rules. The quorum rule is not the most outrageous of all and I would like to suggest to you that since we are paid to be here it ought not to be too difficult to maintain a simple number of 20 in the Legislature. Not everyone has his office in the Mowat Block; I apologize if it’s difficult to get here but there are 117 members and 20 out of 117 is a very small number.

It seems to me to be quite reasonable to expect, when we’re debating a matter such as the justice estimates, which is obviously of extreme importance to every citizen of the Province of Ontario at a time when there is a great deal of concern among the citizenry about justice and its application, that there would be 20 people here to listen to it. I don’t think we should start making apologies for each other or for ourselves for not being here. That’s what we’re paid for. This is our job. If you want to be out of the House you make arrangements with someone else to be here in your place. In any caucus, all --

Mr. B. Gilbertson (Algoma): Get away from all that nonsense.

Mr. Deans: -- that is required is that there be a minimum --

Mr. Morrow: I suggest the member speak of his own caucus. He only has 14 per cent -- three out of 21.

Mr. Deans: I am going to, but in order to maintain 20 per cent of the total -- 20 members out of 117 is something around 17.5 per cent.

Mr. Morrow: You have 14 per cent here.

Mr. Deans: Let me go on -- 17.5 per cent. All that is required is that we, in order to hold up our end, have five members present; the Liberals have five members present and the government has the remainder. I think there is nothing unreasonable about that. When you get down to sit as you did just a moment ago --

Mr. Morrow: The member’s party had three members in their seats when we had the first quorum call tonight; three members out of 21.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Deans: Finally, to the point of order, I might say to you, sir, it isn’t the opposition which stands or falls on the basis of the votes which take place. It’s the government’s responsibility to maintain a quorum for the purposes of supporting its government member. The oppositions job is not to keep a quorum here in order that the House should be able to continue to operate.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. I think we’ve had quite a bit of discussion on this point of order.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): Yes, Mr. Chairman, I believe we have but surely, we can put our point of view forward to you. I know one of our members has spoken somewhat on it but it’s difficult for me to stand or sit here, day after day and night after night and listen to that sort of self-righteous nonsense; absolute nonsense.

Mr. Deans: Funnily enough, you were not here even at the time.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: He likes to appear to be pure to all things -- to all people, and make it appear that his party is the only one. His critic isn’t even here. If his critic was here, I would take what he’s saying. He’s not the critic and he’s only here tonight, sitting in his place, in order to call quorum votes. That’s all he’s doing.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Deans: On a point of order.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. The Chair would like to make one or two comments concerning the point of order.

Mr. Deans: I rise on a point of privilege.

Mr. Chairman: State your point of privilege.

Mr. Deans: My point of privilege is this: I want to make it clear that I’m here tonight because I consider it my duty to be here, as I am almost every night. The government House leader was not here on either of the quorum calls.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. I would like to deal with the point of order. The Chair has to abide by the standing order of this House. I’ve listened with a great deal of interest to the point of order raised by the member for Oxford and the discussion to that point of order from the other members of the committee.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Very valid, too.

Mr. Deans: I agree. Let’s change the rules.

Mr. Chairman: However, I would suggest that if there is any indication from any of the members that they would like to discuss a change in the House rules, this is a matter to be taken up with the Speaker and dealt with by the proper committee in the House.

Mr. Parrott: Pardon me, may I ask then, Mr. Chairman, the correct procedure? Will you take that to the Speaker or is that required in another form?

Mr. Chairman: I would suggest that the hon. member raise the point with the Speaker himself.

Mr. Parrott: I shall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. At least it is now on record.

Mr. Chairman: I believe the hon. minister was commenting when the point of order was raised. Would you continue, Mr. Minister?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes. I think we were at the point where the member for Downsview said he found everything in good order. I was just about to sit down when my colleague from Oxford raised the point of order. I just completed mentioning that, the policy development officer, classed as an executive officer 3, is a member of certain professional associations and is the authoress of several publications dealing with her particular area of interest.

Mr. Singer: No. The next one is an executive officer class 1. What are the qualifications? What does that person do?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The executive officer class 1 is a graduate of the University of Manitoba and for three years was a research officer in the Ontario government caucus office. In that particular area of responsibility she prepared and wrote various matters of information, including press releases, research and preparation of private members’ public bills, and prepared reports and background notes on specific issues. For one year she was an executive officer for a former minister. She joined the secretariat as a policy analyst in October, 1972.

In her present responsibilities, she does justice policy analysis, which consists of regular analysis of cabinet submissions to the field committee to provide effective cooperation of all pertinent inter-ministerial and inter-field information and evaluation.

With reference to special projects, she prepares all reports, correspondence and cabinet submissions relating to same. She is involved in inter-ministerial committees which consists of participating and preparation of reports, such as the report dealing with drinking and driving in the Province of Ontario. In that particular publication and study, she was an adviser to that committee on that particular subject.

She has participated in other inter-ministerial committees, particularly in advisory work regarding the medical consent procedures for the mentally retarded and minors. She has, and is, participating in inter-ministerial field committees working in long-term justice policies.

She also works in a liaison capacity with community groups, government agencies assisting the federal government, and various Ontario ministries to co-ordinate community requests for joint federal-provincial funding in areas of crime prevention and diversion. In relation to her responsibility with government ministries and agencies, she has assisted with justice-related projects, such as the proposed OECA series on law, in co-operation with the National Law Reform Commission and the Ontario Justice ministry.

Mr. Singer: Would it be fair to say, Mr. Minister, that in the complement of 11 people at present there, there’s no one with any legal training?

Hon. Mr. Clement: That’s true.

Mr. Singer: And would you care to predict when the missing five might be hired -- or any of them?

Hon. Mr. Clement: An ad for a policy analyst appeared a week or two ago and I cannot tell you when the other vacancies will be filled. I cannot at this point tell you they will be filled by the end of May or the middle of June.

I will be quite candid with the member. We are proceeding very cautiously in this area with a mind to expenditure, with our minds turned to complement. I think it is incumbent upon a minister and his deputy and administrative people not to utilize all the funds that are available if you don’t need them; if you need them, they are there. But you shouldn’t try and justify or rationalize the use of them because they are there and dissipate them. So I think I speak on behalf of my deputy to assure this House that we are proceeding very cautiously in this area, and if we don’t require these people in our estimation then we simply won’t hire them.

I may be back here next year explaining why we didn’t utilize all the funds that were appropriated this year. I tell you I would very much like to be in that position rather than coming back later on for supplementary estimates or trying to rationalize the expenditure of all the funds because this House made them available to me this particular year.

Mr. Singer: This item for services, $93,800; does that include physical services or is that the hiring of outside people for specific studies? Is that what you were referring to a little earlier?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The item for services, $93,800?

Mr. Singer: That’s right.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The services that are included in that particular figure include consultants’ fees, mailing, advertising, meals and accommodation, printing, space, travel, temporary employees, and miscellaneous.

Mr. Singer: And the equivalent item in the fiscal year 1974-1975 was $29,922, am I right in that?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes, the actual was $29,922.

Mr. Singer: Can you tell me why it is anticipated it should roughly multiply by four this time?

Hon. Mr. Clement: The reason for that growth, Mr. Chairman, is for printing, consultants and the involvement with the United Nations Congress to be held this autumn.

Mr. Singer: Do you have a budget for the United Nations Congress?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes. I don’t have a budget item for it, but we have provided for temporary help and printing in connection with that particular conference.

Mr. R. F. Ruston (Essex-Kent): Mr. Chairman, on that point if I might just inquire: That is the one where the Ministry of Correctional Services is involved and they had, I think, $535,000 for promoting this convention here in August. Is that the one, the United Nations Congress?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes.

Mr. Ruston: And you also have some activity in it? You have some money in your budget for this? The Ministry of Correctional Services has $535,000. About how much do you think yours will be?

Hon. Mr. Clement: About $20,000 to $22,000.

Mr. Singer: That’s of this $93,800?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes.

Mr. Singer: One would have thought that with a small complement like this over the three or four years and your having spent $20,000 last year for supplies and equipment, that maybe you are adequately supplied and equipped by now. Are you renewing offices, buying more machinery and so on?

Hon. Mr. Clement: No, but we are still using stationery and that sort of thing.

Mr. Singer: I think that is all I have to ask specifically.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Well, obviously we are not replacing all our office equipment annually.

Mr. Singer: Mr. Chairman, as I said at the beginning of my remarks, I’m not satisfied that this department is serving a useful function. I think its budgeting has been loose and sloppy. There’s very little indication that it knows from year to year what it is doing. I think the supportive departments have large enough budgets to be able to do the things that are outlined here by this minister or a year ago by his predecessor. I think the validity of my motion that the estimates of this department be reduced to $1 speaks for itself.

Mr. Ruston: Very good point.

Mr. Singer: It is interesting to note that when we had quite an issue with the minister’s predecessor a year ago about an extra ministerial salary, he hastened to assure us he was only drawing one. This minister -- well, I won’t even put it on the record what you are really doing, and I won’t accuse you of it. But it is interesting to note that after the fuss last year and the other minister’s assurance that he was only drawing one salary, they took that out of the estimates. So this department hasn’t even got the statutory estimate for a minister. But you produced a new thing: you produced a parliamentary assistant at $5,000. I think it’s unfortunate that there is no one of legal training in the complement of this department and that the parliamentary assistant hasn’t got any legal training. I don’t know that putting a parliamentary assistant in a department that doesn’t do very much is much of a help. So, Mr. Chairman, my motion stands and as soon as you are ready I’d like it to be put.

Mr. Haggerty: We will divide the House on this one.

Mr. Singer: Yes.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Wentworth.

Mr. Deans: I’m not going to ask for a quorum this time.

In your present portfolio, the one we are now dealing with, do you deal with policy matters related to both the administration of justice and to law enforcement within the entire justice field? In other words, does this policy secretariat deal with both law enforcement and administration of justice as a matter of policy?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes, it really does. It deals with law enforcement in the sense of the policy department, and with administration of justice in terms of courts and correctional institutions.

Mr. Deans: Good. I understand this was raised with you at some point in the afternoon, but I want to try to get it clear in my mind. I’ve received a number of communications from law enforcement agencies across the province, and certainly from outside of the province, with regard to the whole matter that’s before the federal government, the matter of capital punishment.

As a policy matter, it seems to be very high in the minds of many of the law enforcement agencies of the Province of Ontario. It’s certainly being raised frequently enough by a great number of people. I know the member for Downsview made reference to it earlier today.

I know that the government frequently makes representations to the federal government on matters which effectively fall outside of its jurisdiction but which in fact affect the enforcement of a variety of different laws within the Province of Ontario.

I know, for example, that when this particular minister was the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations, he made representations to Ottawa about matters which related particularly to Ontario but required federal jurisdictional changes.

I know also that the Minister of Housing (Mr. Irvine) frequently makes representations to his counterpart at Ottawa to try to get changes in the federal policy that will satisfy the needs and the direction of the Province of Ontario. I think that’s probably true of a great many ministries right across the entire cabinet.

Given that there has been a tremendous amount of feeling and representation put forward by the police and the police commission of the Province of Ontario, given that their views are fairly well known with regard to the enforcement of capital punishment and given that it is a matter which is of some concern to people -- some are in favour, some are against, but nevertheless it is a concern to almost everyone in some way or other -- let me ask you is it the intention of the Province of Ontario on behalf of the police associations and the police, or on behalf of the Province of Ontario through the Minister of Justice, or on behalf of the people of Ontario through the Minister of Justice, is it the intention of this minister or the government, to make any representation of any kind with regard to either the current situation with capital punishment, or any likely changes, or any thought of changes, in the near future or in the distant future?

Hon. Mr. Clement: I am not aware of this government, as a government, making any formal or informal submissions on behalf of the people of this province in relation to the subject of capital punishment. I don’t think there is any consensus. I know there is no consensus on this very high profile and certainly current issue today. It becomes an emotional issue in the minds of many people. Who knows whether it’s right or whether it’s wrong?

I have personally had discussions with the federal Minister of Justice on this particular subject. I think there are, of course, two fields of thought, plus a range of people in between who say that all murderers should hang and those who say they shouldn’t. I think the concern many people in the province have is that the law now in the Criminal Code relating to punishment for capital crimes is death by judicial hanging and that the intervention of the federal government by commuting sentences, which apparently has been carried on for some 13 years, is, in effect, changing the written law.

There is a field, or a group of people, and I think a fairly sizeable one, that says if it is going to be changed, instead of doing it by that route, why don’t you amend the Criminal Code and then apply it?

I have not received any formal submissions from any law enforcement agency or police association relating to this particular matter. I certainly have had many discussions on this subject with constituents, and police belonging to various associations. In answer to your question, I would have to say it is my impression and belief right now that the government of Ontario is not going to make any formal policy submissions to the federal government on this particular subject.

Mr. Lawlor: What is your personal decision?

Hon. Mr. Clement: My personal decision? I don’t believe in capital punishment. I don’t intend to get into a long harangue, but I will tell you this, that number one, it doesn’t stop murderers; and number two, I have been in a jail on a night when a capital punishment sentence was about to be carried out. It was the most obscene and gross thing I have ever been involved in in my life. I didn’t stay for the execution itself. I couldn’t.

Mr. Deans: Well, I don’t want to pursue it. I am frankly personally pleased to hear you say what you did.

Mr. D. M. Deacon (York Centre): You have got the guts to say it.

Mr. Deans: I wish the government would take a position too, but that’s beside the point. I want to ask you a question then, given that the anxieties that are felt in the community are real, and they are real.

Anxiety is generally a reflection of something that is happening. In this case, there is no question that the community is anxious about the degree of violent crime that takes place. I don’t deny that for one minute. Do you intend to make any representation in regard to the way in which cases are dealt with, and sentences are meted out? There is a feeling, whether right or wrong, that the sentences that are given out in crimes that appear, at least on the surface, to be crimes of extreme violence, going all the way to murder, are really not in relationship to the crime itself.

Let me try to focus it as I see it. You understand I am not a lawyer.

Hon. Mr. Clement: You are talking about punishments.

Mr. Deans: Yes, I am talking about punishment -- given that we agree we’re not going to hang anybody if we can avoid that. It seems that the public are very concerned about what they see to be very light sentences -- sentences which don’t carry much weight. I’m not talking about incarcerating people forever, although in some cases that may be necessary. I’m not only talking about murder. I’m talking about in crimes of violence; crimes that could well have been murder, given one more blow or one more kick or one more stomp.

Has there been a study conducted by Ontario into the degree of crimes, as is put forward by witnesses and expert opinion, and the magnitude of the sentences handed out? And has there then been a study conducted as to the length of time that the sentence actually is in force? And has there been a study of the actual rehabilitation efforts that take place?

It seems to me that the anxiety of the public could well be met if there were some changes in attitude by the government and by the courts to crimes of violence. I look in the paper every day and I find that there always is one, two or three crimes which could well have become murders. I often wonder at the sentence that is handed out; whether or not it’s really appropriate to the crime. I’m curious to know what kind of study is being done in that regard and how we publicize the actual effect of the penal system so that the public will try to understand what the penal system really does to people.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The role of the Attorney General as I understand it, at least the way I perceive it, is that I am seized constitutionally with the responsibility of the administration of justice in this province and in the administration of justice.

I believe that it would be most inappropriate for me, or for any law officer of the Crown, to attempt -- even if I had the audacity, which I don’t -- to influence any member of the bench insofar as generally what a punishment should be for a particular crime or, in particular, relating to a specific individual.

The bench has traditionally, in the free world, been independent and is bound under the theory of precedent, or stare decisis, to follow the direction of superior courts.

The Supreme Court of Canada and, in this province, the Court of Appeal, have assessed in their wisdom the appropriate punishment that should follow in a given set of circumstances. The provincial courts and county courts, of course, are bound by those decisions to give some form of order and hopefully some form of standardization within certain latitudes in relation to punishments.

Now, if I felt, or the government felt, that punishments being meted out by the courts were inappropriate, I would think the proper course of action that I should follow, on behalf of this government, would not in any way be to approach the bench as a whole -- I’m not suggesting that you’re saying that -- but one would have discussions with the authority responsible for the administration of the Criminal Code, so that the punishment sections would, I suppose, hopefully be amended or increased or dealt with, with a minimum period of imprisonment for certain types of crimes.

I have shared with the federal Minister of Justice, as recently as last week, the concern of the Metropolitan Police Commission voiced in the contents of a letter which was sent to me over the signature of the chairman. The letter set out a number of armed robbery offences in the city of Toronto with the punishment opposite and a brief description of the offence. The chairman has publicly been recorded through the media as having certain very definite views along these lines. I’ve passed that on to the federal Minister of Justice, Mr. Lang, for his consideration.

I really am of mixed emotions, personally, as to punishments. It is so easy to read in the press the description of an offence and to look at the punishment and feel it may not appear to be fit and proper.

Mr. Deans: That is why I am asking.

Hon. Mr. Clement: I wish I had the wisdom to resolve these things in my own mind but the members must remember that criminologists, particularly penologists, after hundreds of years are still not ad idem as to the purpose of putting someone in an institution.

Is it to reform that particular individual or is it to deter others who would act the same way or is it a blending of the two? So, you have three sides to that coin and I suppose as long as you have human beings you will have at least those three, if not additional positions.

I personally feel that some of the concerns exhibited in the letter received by me from the chairman, Judge Bick of the Metropolitan Toronto Police Commission, were valid. It was not an emotional letter. It was a factual letter and he set his opinions out very strongly and I felt obliged to forward that on to the federal Minister of Justice for whatever weight that might have.

Many municipalities -- just touching another area for a moment -- have been passing resolutions for the past number of months asking that the federal government review and alter the Bail Reform Act. Those things, as I have received them, I have sent on with my own observations on behalf of the policy field. I touched on them later on this afternoon.

That is the role, as I see it, in dealing with these matters. The member obviously can appreciate the difficulty in trying to get the sentence to meet the crime. There are those who say, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” and that could be interpreted as not literally an eye for an eye, but equality -- a fair penalty for an unfair offence.

Mr. Lawlor: Not a purely vindictive theory of sentencing.

Hon. Mr. Clement: There is a certain amount of vengeance, I suppose, that beats in the hearts of all of us, particularly when a crime is of a very tragic nature or involves children. No one really suggests that there be capital murder or capital punishment carried out if a man is killed as the result of a gunfight with a fellow hood. Nobody really gets too excited about that unless bullets fly all over the place. But, bring an innocent party or a youngster in as the victim, and human beings, being what they are, react very strongly. And I can’t really be that critical: that’s the way men and women are to me.

Mr. Deans: My own personal view, of course, is neither here nor there, I suppose, but I don’t happen to think murder is necessarily the worst crime. There are other things that happen to people that are worse than being killed, In fact, perhaps if they had been killed it would have been better.

What bothers me, really, is the anxiety in the public, that’s all. It’s an unfocused sense that there is a problem; they see it daily; they don’t know how to deal with it; they have to trust the minister to lead. If the minister tells me, as he does, that he too is ambivalent, that he too doesn’t really know where to go in the thing -- and I can understand that as a human being -- then we’re in trouble. We all have these problems. I have them, everybody has them, But, if the minister is saying to me, “I don’t understand either,” then we are really in an awful state because somebody somewhere has to make decisions on these things.

I can appreciate that sometimes -- and I’m not suggesting you’re doing this -- it would be easy, being a provincial member, to say that’s a federal responsibility. That would be the way out, to just walk away from it. The fact of the matter is it’s the public of Ontario which is worried and we’re charged with the responsibility of policing in the Province of Ontario at one level or another.

If you have a public which doesn’t feel that the law is being administered fairly and adequately that public, at some point, is going to go to the opposite extreme. I always worry about extremes in justice. The public anxiety will some day be reflected in a return to the very worst forms of punishment. It won’t be rehabilitation they’re concerned about. It won’t really be the safety of the public at large. Rather it will be the kind of vengeance and vindictiveness that my colleague and you talked about rather than any attempt at all at rehabilitation.

What I’m really thinking about are two different things. On the one hand we have this review of violence in the media which, to all intents and purposes, falls completely out of the jurisdiction of the Province of Ontario. Yet we carry it out. We conduct the study. We attempt to come to some conclusions. Hopefully, we’re going to make recommendations to the federal government with regard to the effect that has on people in general and young people in particular.

On the other hand, we seem reluctant to take official positions on things which are of vital concern to a great many people across the province. There isn’t a consensus. I suspect that if you sat here until you were 90 there wouldn’t be a consensus. There never will be a consensus. There will always be people who are at either extreme on this thing.

I think their anxieties are real. I would like very much to see the Province of Ontario take some lead. If you’re going to study anything, at least provide some statistical background information with regard to the sentencing which does take place and the magnitude of the crime as it really is rather than as it’s reported; and talk at some length, I would hope, about the rehabilitative nature of the penal institutions. Again, it seems to me as I look at it, and I’m no expert in this field, believe me, that rehabilitation in penal institutions isn’t very high on the list of priorities. I think it could be better more at the younger end.

I’m delighted I we’re not sticking kids in training schools any more because it didn’t do any good. At the same time, throughout the system, we have to try to offer them and provide them with the support, the guidance, the education, the opportunities which will keep them from returning to whatever it was they were involved in. I have a notion that by the tune a person gets to the point of committing a murder, particularly if it’s a repetitive criminal act, rehabilitation is virtually impossible, whereas at the younger age limits it might be much easier. We don’t spend nearly enough money there.

It reminds me very much of the educational system in Ontario. We spend all of our money at the post-secondary educational level and we spend very little of our money at the primary level. It would seem to me the same sort of thing ought to be the case when dealing with people who break the law.

We should be devoting much more of our time, effort and finances to trying to cope with the younger elements in society who do happen to get out of line and trying to provide them with all the support necessary -- to the extent of one-to-one if you have to -- in order that they don’t grow into the kinds of people who commit the crimes which cause us to have this anxiety and cause us to end up with a tremendous debate raging right across the country as to the suitability of capital punishment as a means of dealing with a crime of violence.

I would much prefer to see an entirely new focus in the entire ministry, that focus being on young people in society and how we deal with their particular problems.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Mr. Chairman, I listened to the member’s observations. We too are concerned, particularly with the diversion of juveniles from the court system. That’s why I touched on, earlier, the juvenile programmes which are already under way or about to embark. The section 8 matter, of course, has already been debated in the House, and there was a genuine concern there that children were in fact being put in a type of institution without having been convicted of committing any offence. I think that’s a step in the right direction.

I omitted, in my prior discussions with the member, answering your inquiry as to the statistical data that’s available. Quite frankly, there isn’t that much available. There are bits and pieces, but there is not a central agency that would give the statistical data that we believe would be of very very great value particularly to the justice policy field.

Mr. Deans: Why don’t you do it?

Hon. Mr. Clement: We are looking into that right now, and it’s one of the areas that my analysts are having a look at right now in order to come up with a proper information accumulation system. Not only to accumulate it, but to determine what you do with it afterwards. Hopefully, you utilize it so that you can see areas that you’re heading toward and if they are beneficial areas then, presumably, you continue in that direction. Or if not, then you would modify a programme or alter it so that you could get back on the rails again.

It isn’t much satisfaction to anybody in this House or to the general public to read that last year there were X thousand people, or an average of so many people a day, in a penal institution in Ontario. What does that mean? In relation to what? In relation to last year is that an upswing or a downswing? What is it compared to five, 10 or 20 years ago?

Mr. Deans: Why are they there?

Hon. Mr. Clement: Why are they there? What is the nature of their offences? We really don’t have the statistical base that I think would be very helpful to the people of this --

Mr. Singer: That’s a fascinating admission, in line with one sentence you had in your opening statement.

Hon. Mr. Clement: No, we don’t have the wide statistical base that I would like to have in order to carry out the responsibilities on my shoulders.

Mr. Singer: You said something about the percentage increase of people in the Don Jail.

Hon. Mr. Clement: Yes, I mentioned that. But there are many other statistics in relation to that particular institution that I would like to have, and I just don’t have at my fingertips tonight.

Mr. Singer: That’s what bothered us about your statement.

Hon. Mr. Clement: The Correctional Services ministry is already utilizing computer services and has some terminals in use right now. Those are the only observations I have to offer, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Deans: I have only one other comment to make. I hear the furore raging in the educational system. We talk about ceilings. We talk about per-pupil expenditures. We talk about our inability to provide a lower pupil-teacher ratio. We see kids who obviously have problems in the elementary grades in education, who become discouraged, disenchanted, who drop out -- if not necessarily physically, mentally drop out -- and who become the very kids that we end up having to deal with in the institutions.

I think it would serve the government well, taking a long-range look at the problem, to devote far more of its resources to providing the support necessary within the educational system at the elementary level, so that children who do have problems -- whether they be emotional, whether they be family, whether they be environmental problems -- can be helped when the problem first arises, instead of having to worry as much about the rehabilitation at the other end, after they have dropped out mentally or physically, and then seek alternative ways of shoring up their ego; which is really how kids get involved to a great extent.

They want to impress their friends so they do something silly and then they get caught. Then they have to prove that they’re not afraid of the law, and so they then have to do something else to prove they are not going to be bullied, and before they know where they are, they are in serious trouble.

What worries me is that we talk about rehabilitation as if it meant only at the end. It really does technically, but the fact of the matter is that as long as you are going to maintain 29 or 30 pupils to a teacher, as long as you are not going to make available sufficient funds to provide the psychological and psychiatric help that is necessary in the education system, as long as you are not going to be able to provide the additional classroom help to deal with those kids when the disturbances that they have originally show up, then you are going to have to spend an awful lot of money in rehabilitation.

I think that if you altered your focus entirely, if you used your statistical information, if you traced back through to find out what it was about that kid that caused him to get into difficulty and if you geared your education programme where they deal with these children day in and day out to try to shore it up to meet those kinds of problems, then we wouldn’t have the debate raging in society right now about the degree of crime, about crime in the streets, and about adequate police protection. Maybe I am being a bit optimistic about it, but I think over the long haul that’s the place you are going to solve your problem.

It is all good and well to study violence on television. I went to movies when I was a kid. You went to them too. Cowboys shot Indians and Indians shot cowboys and all these kinds of things happen in the street, perhaps not as vividly but they happened. We went through wars where people were shot, for God’s sake, and they were dead on the sidewalks. Bombs fell and buildings were crushed.

Somehow or other nowadays we seem to think that there is more impact. Well, maybe there is. I guess there probably is because it is in the home. But the fact is that the only way we deal with that is if we have the available services to meet those children’s needs.

If you look at the criminal element -- if that is the real word to use; I don’t know if that is the real way to describe people any more or not -- if you look at people who get into trouble, if you trace back through their history you find almost invariably that they showed distinct signs of having had problems either in the educational processes or beyond and that they could have been helped, if there had been somebody there, and if we had had the system available to help them.

I could be completely wrong but I don’t think so. I think that if you really want to deal with crime, if you really want to get down to the nitty-gritty of it and make sure that we don’t have an ever-blossoming crime rate, an ever-growing crime rate, then I think you are going to have to talk to your colleague who sits on your right or your left or wherever it is that he happens to sit, the Minister of Education (Mr. Wells), and to your other colleagues and ask them to take a serious look at whether they couldn’t devote even more of the money that’s available to the primary educational system to make sure that we try to find the kids in the early stages and give them the help that they need, give them the support and give them all the backing.

That is how you are going to solve your problem. It isn’t going to be solved by bigger and better jails, by fancier systems or by any other kind of physical plant. That is not going to do it, and it isn’t really going to be solved by two policemen in a car in Metro. That might help to keep it down in the interim period but that’s not going to solve it. It isn’t going to be solved by hanging or not hanging because there will still be murders whether you hang or whether you don’t. It likely isn’t going to be solved by longer and longer sentences because the problem stems from a much further-back ignored difficulty that some person had earlier in life in most instances, if not in all.

I think it’s time that the government stopped trying to whip up public frenzy over education and its costs and started explaining the tremendous value of the educational system and providing it with support rather than being negative about it. It’s time it began recognizing that to put more teachers in the system isn’t simply loading the system down and costing more but rather it’s providing a higher level of service which enables those kids who ultimately end up in the penal institutions to be recognized and helped in the early years. I frankly believe that’s where it all begins. If it doesn’t begin there, then it doesn’t begin at all; and that’s why I am saying that if you do it that way, in the long run you will create a better society.

It may not appear that way for some period of time; but in the long run that is where you are going to cope with the problems.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Lakeshore.

Mr. Lawlor: I just want to make some final remarks as far as I am concerned, touching the estimates in question. What has been put to you is very true. This particular ministry has been in a state of flotsam and jetsam for too long. But I trust from what the minister has said that the ship will be rigged, the decks will be washed, and the trimming will be put in order. The amounts of money spent have no relationship to that which is asked to be voted, just about total chaos has reigned thus far, and you produced out of all this largesse in public funds, precious little indeed. The major thing that has come out of it is some red book with respect to drinking and driving; and that’s all the former minister could produce last year -- and it was maintained again this year.

You are simply going to have to give greater justification to the ministry and to yourself, I suspect, for the maintenance of the ministry. If you can get some imaginative, new thinking going on -- and it has been outlined here in these estimates where the weights lie, and what must be done, and the inter-relationship -- then it is possible that the ministry could justify itself. But on this occasion and as things have stood for the past year, through no fault of the extant minister, it simply hasn’t justified itself. It has been really a waste and sink of public funds. It is a great shame.

You may not have all that much time left in office. I was thinking the other day that it may be that very shortly you will join me over here -- not in this party, of course -- and we will have to contend with that smiling fellow along the bench there. Can you imagine the dereliction that would come -- and is devoutly not to be desired?

Mr. Deans: Then again, that may not happen.

Mr. Singer: That’s pap.

Mr. Lawlor: Then we will see. Then we will see what happens. Then we will see stagnation. Then true conservatism will take over, by George. He may rant and roar in the course of the estimates, because the responsibility doesn’t lie therein. I’d almost like to see it happen, you know, just to see what would happen. My guess is it would last, at the most, 3¼ months before the whole shambles would fall in. And while the minister’s particular form of chaos has a certain dainty quality about it, his would be a total disaster.

Mr. Chairman: Does any other hon. member wish to speak on vote 1101?

Mr. Singer moves that vote 1101, item 1, be reduced from the sum of $469,000 to the sum of $1.

The committee divided on Mr. Singer’s motion, which was negatived on the following vote:

Clerk of the House: Mr. Chairman, the “ayes” are 20, the “nays” 31.

Mr. Chairman: I declare the motion lost and the vote agreed to.

Vote 1101 agreed to.

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

Motion agreed to.

The House resumed, Mr. Speaker in the chair.

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Speaker, the committee of supply begs to report a certain resolution and asks for leave to sit again.

Report agreed to.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): Mr. Speaker, before I move the adjournment of the House, I would like to say that tomorrow we will proceed with the consideration of estimates of the Ministry of Government Services. Should we conclude that consideration, we will go to the budget debate. On Monday we will return to the consideration of the estimates of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): I’m sorry. Again, I have a question. I understood we were going to complete all of the estimates of the Provincial Secretary for Justice (Mr. Clement), before we went back; that we weren’t going to open up another series of estimates before we completed what was already on the plate?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Mr. Speaker, I must inform the House leader of the NDP that, unfortunately, the minister is not available to me tomorrow.

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

Motion agreed to.

The House adjourned at 10:50 o’clock, p.m.