The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

REMARKS OF MEMBER FOR TIMISKAMING

Mr. Havrot: Mr. Speaker, as you are aware, on Tuesday night of this week I made some very unfortunate and very objectionable comments in this Legislature. I apologized to this House on Tuesday night and I have since offered my abject apology to the Premier (Mr. Davis) and the two members of the New Democratic Party.

As every member of this House is aware, we tend on occasion to get a bit carried away from time to time in the cut and thrust of debate. However, I recognize that there is absolutely no excuse for the type of comment that I made on Tuesday night, and today I want to apologize once more to the individuals involved and to the House in general.

I recognize that my comments have embarrassed my Premier, my party and my colleagues on both sides of this House. I also recognize that some members of the public, specifically those of Italian origin, are especially offended by what I said, and to them I publicly retract any and all comments that they find offensive.

As I said on Tuesday night, I too came to this province as an immigrant and I too have faced over the years certain embarrassments and innuendoes. I admit to this House that while that fact perhaps led me to believe that I would have licence with respect to the odd discriminatory heckle, it should also have reminded me of just how hurtful and harmful such comments can be.

I know that this situation is especially embarrassing to my Premier, who has been so outspoken against racism and discrimination. Each and every member of this House has significant cause to he upset by my conduct. I have apologized as profusely as I can and I urge you, Mr. Speaker, and other members, to accept my apologies and my assurance that under no circumstances will I indulge in this type of misconduct again.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. McClellan: Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday night I raised a point of privilege with the Deputy Speaker and asked him to review Hansard to determine whether the remarks of the member for Timiskaming had violated the privileges of members of this House. That has been done, and Hansard shows the full enormity of the violations of privilege by the member for Timiskaming.

I am obliged, distasteful as it is to report those to the House inasmuch as the official Hansard has not been printed but I have been given a copy of the Hansard which went to the printers. It is important for the argument that I am making to you, sir, that the House be aware of exactly what was said.

Before the member for Dovercourt (Mr. Lupusella) rose to his feet:

“Mr. Havrot: Mama mia”

After the Deputy Speaker said “The member for Dovercourt has up to five minutes.

“Mr. Havrot: You can eat an awful lot of pizza in five minutes if you’re good at it.”

During the member for Dovercourt’s speech:

“Mr. Havrot: Mama mia.

“Mr. Havrot: Capicollo.”

In response to the interjection of an honourable member: “Is this the late show?

“Mr. Havrot: Absolutely not. It’s the Wop show.

“Mr. Havrot: Thatsa my boy.

“Mr. Havrot: Capicollo.

“Mr. Havrot: Atsa nice. Good for Benito Mussolini.”

And, Mr. Speaker, this is the ultimate obscenity that can be hurled against a Canadian citizen who was born in another country:

“Mr. Havrot: If you don’t like it, go back.”

The nature of the incident on Tuesday night was important. It was not an isolated incident. It was not a single epithet hurled in a moment of careless anger. If it was, a personal apology would be sufficient to put an end to the matter forever. But that was not the nature of the incident Tuesday night.

It is clear from Hansard that it was a sustained barrage of racial taunts and racial invectives which began before the member for Dovercourt rose to his feet, continued throughout the entirety of his speech, and indeed continued until the House adjourned some 25 minutes after the adjournment debate began.

I am prepared to accept, on a personal level, the apology of the member for Timiskaming. But that does not address the enormity of what happened on Tuesday night. It is not sufficient that an incident of that nature be passed over simply with an apology without the appropriate disciplinary action of this House.

The member for Timiskaming, I will say, has put to rest a certain amount of confusion as to whether or not he had apologized. While I received a letter of apology from him yesterday afternoon, I read with amazement in the Globe and Mail that he had stated: “The NDP members are making a big thing out of nothing. Mr. McClellan has written to the Premier. If that’s how low the NDP have to stoop for publicity...” It has nothing to do with publicity. It has to do with my dignity as a human being. The member for Timiskaming said in the Globe and Mail article: “get carried away once in a while, so what?”

“So what,” is the challenge to this Legislature, sir. If I, or any member of this House, were “to get carried away,” in the words of the member for Timiskaming, and walk across the floor of this House and physically assault another member, I would expect to receive the full discipline of this House. I would expect the full weight of the House’s sanctions to come against me. I would not expect to get off with an apology. I would expect to be required to apologize but I would also expect to accept the further consequences of my actions.

Unless there is any single member of this assembly who is still unaware of the kind of assault on human dignity that racial taunts and racial invective represent, let me just quote one page from Cardinal Carter’s report on page 20.

“When a person is called a nigger, a queer, a faggot, a Chink, a Paki, usually with the appropriate accompanying adjectives, he has been attacked as surely as if he were struck.”

On Tuesday night, as part of a prolonged barrage of racial taunts and invective, my colleague and I were referred to by the member for Timiskaming as Wops. We have, each of us, been attacked as surely as though we were struck. There must be discipline brought to bear.

On a personal note, Mr. Speaker, I am the grandson of Gesualdo Costabile. I am a member of the Italian community of this province. I am a member of the community that has suffered its share of racial prejudice, and with the members of my community and the members of any minority community which has experienced racial prejudice I carry the pain of that experience inside me.

I say to you, sir, I have an absolute right as a human being to be protected from racial invective in this Legislature. I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, I have the right to insist this kind of reprehensive behaviour cannot simply be passed over with an apology.

I stress again I accept the apology, but I say the incident must be effectively disciplined by the exercise of the ultimate sanction of this House. The integrity of this Legislature and the human dignity of each of its members demand that. I ask you, Mr. Speaker, to name the member for Timiskaming and to expel him from this Legislature for such period of time as you, sir, deem appropriate in the circumstances.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Does any other member wish to speak to the point of privilege?

Mr. S. Smith: I want to speak very briefly, My Speaker. Most people in this House are in one way or another members of a minority group. Most people in this House have, I think, the very same feelings which have been expressed quite eloquently by the member for Bellwoods. Therefore, I simply want to say, on behalf of people of varied backgrounds, that I want to associate myself with the remarks by the member for Bellwoods.

[2:15]

I would in your consideration, Mr. Speaker, ask you to recognize that whether these are the equivalent of physical blows or not, the business of this House and the respect that we all must hold for one another cannot proceed in any way at all with the repeated comments of the kind that were made by the member for Timiskaming. Although the apology is certainly welcome to members of this House, and must of course be accepted by members of this House, I believe that the apology by itself is insufficient and I simply ask you to take that into consideration when you are ruling on this matter of privilege.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to the statement made by the member for Timiskaming. I listened very carefully to the observations by the member for Bellwoods, and of course from the Leader of the Opposition.

I sense that the Leader of the Opposition is really saying to you, Mr. Speaker, that you should make a judgement without perhaps suggesting what that judgement should be, certainly as definitively as the member for Bellwoods.

I was not here on Tuesday evening but it was reported to me, Mr. Speaker, that the acting leader, or the member for Kitchener (Mr. Breithaupt), accepted on that occasion the apology of the member for Timiskaming; that is what I understood. This was brought to my attention some time during the course of Wednesday morning, I guess it was, Mr. Speaker.

While I had not seen a transcript nor had I listened to the tapes -- and I have become a little bit confused, as apparently there are a series of tapes that don’t always get recorded in Hansard, on which members can be talking to other members and interjections may or may not appear -- but in spite of my not having heard the tape, Mr. Speaker, there was no doubt in my mind that the member for Timiskaming had regrettably made observations which he himself has acknowledged as being offensive and which in my communication to him, as of yesterday, I have said would be seen, from my perspective, as highly offensive.

I also understand, Mr. Speaker, as we all do in this House, that sometimes during the course of debate, and it appears to happen more often in the late evening than in the early afternoon, that members -- and it is not confined to any single party -- have over the years made observations which on careful reflection, had they known they were going to appear in Hansard perhaps would regret having made them.

I made it very clear to the member for Timiskaming, Mr. Speaker, that I could not tolerate or accept, even in the environment in which we do business here, that kind of observation. I asked him to apologize immediately to the two members who were affected by those observations, and my understanding is that that instruction was carried out forthwith.

I have had the assurance of the member for Timiskaming that he does understand how this can be perceived by people outside this Legislature. He has traced for you, Mr. Speaker, his own history in this province. He has made a complete apology to the members of this House.

He is, Mr. Speaker, a member. He is also a human being. He knows he has made a mistake. He knows he has done something that he should not have done. He is doing, before his colleagues on both sides of the House, what any honourable member could do, and I say with respect, Mr. Speaker, he has done all that any member can do.

Mr. Speaker, we say the Lord’s Prayer. We say it here, some of us more regularly than others in terms of being in our place. Interestingly, one of the phrases in that prayer that we say every day relates to forgiveness. It relates to the human quality that I would hope is a part of our being. It relates to a quality that I think is important in any member of this Legislature, and that is our sensitivity to other human beings, whether they be members in this House or elsewhere, that recognizes that none of us are infallible, that we do on occasion say things and do things which are objectionable.

I would say to you with respect, Mr. Speaker, the member for Timiskaming has apologized in a very public way, in a way that I would suspect has not been easy for him, not easy in terms of his family. He has asked very simply that the members of this House accept his apology, sir, and he is saying to you that as a member he has done all he can to express in this public forum his regrets for what was said on Tuesday evening.

So, Mr. Speaker, I leave it to you, sir, in your wisdom, knowing the human frailties that exist, and I say this with respect, for at least most members of this House, to consider whether a member can be asked to do any more.

Mr. Speaker: Pursuant to the very, very unfortunate incident that occurred in this House on Tuesday night and the comments that were attributed to the honourable member for Timiskaming, my deputy, the member for Perth (Mr. Edighoffer), who occupied the chair at that time, undertook to go over the transcript, which we did in my office with the director of debates.

I think what appears in the official Hansard is an accurate account of what was said; that was the undertaking that was given to the House and to the honourable member for Bellwoods who raised it.

Under the standing orders, the only power that is vested in a presiding officer is the obligation to name a member if, during the course of debates, he says something or does something that the presiding officer considers to be out of order. The only recourse the presiding officer has is to name that honourable member, and of course there are other actions that can be taken by the presiding officer, on the advice of the House, for a member that persists in contravening the rules of the House.

Under a situation like this there is no power vested in the presiding officer other than to ask the honourable member to resume his seat, or if words have been uttered that are found to be offensive that he ask that they be withdrawn.

As I studied Hansard and the transcript of Hansard on Tuesday night, those words were withdrawn. There was an apology tendered to the House. Since the extent of those utterances have become more obvious, the honourable member for Timiskaming has communicated in written form to the members who allege to have been offended by those remarks. He has done so, and stated here before us all that he does regret having made those remarks, and has done all that is within his power to do to reconcile his actions before the House. I must, therefore, advise all members that there’s no action that can be taken by a presiding officer.

If the House in its wisdom feels, in the light of what has been said, that further action should be taken, that responsibility rests with the House, not with the presiding officer. Both the honourable member for Perth who occupied this chair at the time of the incident and I have taken all the action we are empowered to take under the standing orders.

I would like to say, however, that as a result of the incident and other occurrences in the past which might have been considered borderline -- as you will appreciate it’s absolutely impossible for presiding officers to pick up every comment and react immediately to it -- I have talked this over very carefully and at some length with my deputy and I would like to say to all members of the House that I want to make each and every member of this House aware that I have become increasingly concerned about personal attacks, either as interjections or in the course of the debate.

Members know that intemperate remarks are out of order. I am sure you share my concern that the House should always have the ability to deal with public issues in a strong and in a partisan manner. I also know that you expect issues to be dealt with on the merits of the issue and not by way of personal attack. I will attempt to enforce this rule vigorously and more forthrightly so that the important issues and the important business which are before this House can be dealt with in the high manner which the House itself has the right to expect.

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

IPPERWASH PROVINCIAL PARK

Hon. Mr. Auld: Mr. Speaker, last May I answered a question raised by the member for Huron-Bruce (Mr. Gaunt) regarding Ipperwash Provincial Park. I wish, at this time, to update my response to that question.

The honourable member’s inquiry pertained to the siting of an entrance road, which was part of the park’s facilities and the possible bad effects this road would have on wet meadow areas containing rare plant species. In May, I pointed out why the road was required and that the road does not pass through a wet meadow, but rather runs along the side of a dune adjacent to the wet meadow and that the habitat for these rare plant species has not been ruined or destroyed.

For his further information on this matter, I wish to advise that life science study work carried out this summer and fall has reaffirmed the presence of the rare plant species, including blue hearts, in the wet meadow adjacent to the entrance road at Ipperwash and in similar wet meadows in nearby Pinery Provincial Park.

The plants in these areas are doing quite well -- I sent the honourable member a photograph. My staff, in consultation with persons with expertise from outside my ministry, has developed a strategy for the ongoing monitoring and protecting of these specific areas. It’s an important task of my ministry to protect significant natural areas in this province, and my staff and I look forward to the continuing co-operation and assistance of interest groups and the general public in this endeavour.

A great deal has already been accomplished, and I can assure the member that efforts will continue towards the preservation of the natural and cultural features of Ontario.

TRIBUTES TO DALTON BALES

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Speaker, I would just like to express on behalf of the government our great shock and sorrow at the death of Dalton Bales, one of the very distinguished members of this House for a number of years. Mr. Bales was a very close friend of many in this Legislature, I think it is fair to state on both sides of this House. He is a person who made a very great contribution to public life in this province, to his own community and to those who had the great fortune of being associated with him.

[2:30]

It is very difficult for me to put into words the personal sense of loss felt by me, and I know a number of us who had known Mr. Bales for many years. I would like to take this occasion to publicly state my appreciation for his service to our province and to express on behalf of this government our profound sympathy to his wife, Iris, and to the members of the family.

To some of those members opposite who might wish to join in paying their respects to the former minister of the crown, I would say the services will be held on Saturday morning. If anyone wishes details of this, Mr. Speaker, my office would be delighted to share the information with them.

I wish very simply to state our province and our communities will miss Dalton Bales. He was a very vigorous, active and enthusiastic sort of person, one who was a great credit to the public life of this province. His loss is regretted by all of us.

Mr. Nixon: It has been correctly stated that Dalton Bales was liked and respected on all sides of this House. When he was appointed Minister of Labour I remember thinking his personality might not lend itself to such really difficult responsibilities, but I was wrong, because his moderation, good judgement and good humour meant he was respected and liked by those he dealt with there; as in his other ministries, and on a personal basis in this House.

He certainly will be missed. I must say I hadn’t spoken to him for a number of weeks, but from time to time I had seen him in this House and on the streets of the city and he was always affable and interested in public affairs as usual, and of course in personal matters as well.

I was shocked to hear of his accidental death. It is a great loss to his family and to the community. The Liberal caucus joins with the statement the Premier has made in sending our respects and condolences to Mrs. Bales arid the family.

Mr. Cassidy: On behalf of the NDP, I want to associate myself and my party with the comments that have been made on the untimely and shocking death of Dalton Bales, both by the Premier and by Mr. Nixon.

Like everyone else who worked in this assembly, I knew Dalton Bales was a politician unlike many other politicians. He was unfailingly courteous, he tended more to be quiet and effective than as noisy and vigorous as some of us have been. His memory will be cherished in the assembly by everyone who knew him for his personal qualities and his contribution to public life in the province.

His reputation relates not just to his service in the Ministries of Labour, of Municipal Affairs where I first knew him, and as Attorney General of this province, but also to his active work prior to 12 years in the provincial House in the borough of North York, with which he was associated during five turbulent years of very rapid growth in establishing a new municipality on the northern fringes of Toronto.

Dalton Bales came from a small rural community, and during the course of his life saw that rural community grow up into what is now the city of North York, with all of the problems with which he had so much to do in terms of seeking solutions, he had deep roots in that community; he had deep roots here in this Legislature, in his political calling and in the province.

Along with the representatives of the other parties, we mourn his passing and extend our condolences to his widow, Iris, and to his children.

Mr. Speaker: I would like to remind all members and other persons who may wish to express their condolences to the family of the late Dalton Bales QC that to facilitate this a book has been placed in the lobby near the main door of this building. It will be available there until Friday afternoon.

VISITORS

Mr. Speaker: I would like to bring to the attention of all honourable members of the House the presence of four distinguished visitors in the gallery. Two of them are parliamentarians from the Bundestag in West Germany, Dr. Alfred Dregger and Count von Stauffenberg. Along with them in the gallery are Mr. Robert Coates, MP for Cumberland-Colchester in Nova Scotia, and Mr. Jack Ellis, MP for Prince Edward-Hastings in Ontario. Will you please welcome them.

INDUSTRIAL INQUIRY COMMISSION ON DEPENDENT CONTRACTOR PROVISIONS

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Mr. Speaker, I should like to advise members of the House that I have today appointed an industrial inquiry commission, pursuant to section 34 of the Labour Relations Act. The mandate of the commissioner, Professor S. R. Ellis of Osgoode Hall Law School, will be to inquire into and report to the Minister of Labour concerning the application of the dependent contractor provisions of the Labour Relations Act in the aggregate-producing and road-building industries.

I appointed the commission because of repeated representations made to the ministry by certain employer organizations in the trucking industry, which assert that the dependent contractor provisions of the Labour Relations Act, which came into effect on January 1, 1976 have had consequences to that industry which in their view were not intended by the legislation.

The organizations making those assertions refer to comments said to have been made by the then Minister of Labour to the effect that if practical difficulties, emerged or if the provisions failed to achieve their objectives or created unforeseen problems or hardships in particular industries, they would be reviewed.

The commissioner, Professor Ellis, will be conferring with interested parties from labour and management and will in due course be reporting the results of his investigation to me, at which time I will table his report in the Legislature.

ORAL QUESTIONS

HIGH-SPEED CAR CHASES

Mr. S. Smith: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Solicitor General. The Solicitor General may be aware that last night within a few blocks of my home a 16-year-old boy, a good student and well thought of, was killed as an innocent bystander while a passenger in the rear seat of an automobile when that automobile was hit by a police vehicle apparently travelling at very high speed, and apparently in pursuit of another vehicle also, it would seem, going at very high speed in the middle of the city of Burlington.

May I ask the Solicitor General whether he is now prepared to put an end to this kind of killing of innocent bystanders by making it very clear to the police forces in Ontario that they are not to engage in high-speed driving in pursuit of others driving at high speed, with the exception perhaps of the rarest of all circumstances, where the other driver is thought to represent a clear and imminent danger to society or to other lives, so that such chases or pursuits or followings, or whatever they are, simply cease in Ontario? I would ask also that a proper set of guidelines be issued and enforced and that those who do not abide by those guidelines be properly disciplined, and where necessary charged. When is the Solicitor General going to act on this situation?

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: I think the Leader of the Opposition, in his own unique fashion, is attempting to take advantage of what is undoubtedly a serious tragedy to mislead the people of this province. With respect to the suggestion that there is no policy with respect to high-speed police chases, even the most rudimentary amount of research would have revealed that the opposite is the case.

In view of the obvious interest of the Legislature in this matter, and in view of the tragedy that occurred a week or two ago, I had intended to make a lengthy statement in relation to the whole matter of high-speed pursuits. I will be doing so within the next several days.

In view of this recent and most lamentable tragedy, I would like to remind members of the House that on June 1, 1976 the Ontario Police Commission disseminated to all chiefs of police a memorandum dealing with the issue of high-speed pursuits by members of police forces. This memorandum was not the first policy that had ever been disseminated, of course, but was a reminder to the forces of their views on the matter, which in their view should be used as a guideline for the establishment of individual force policy. I am advised that all police forces in this province have had guidelines for some years which do follow the intent of the Ontario Provincial Police guidelines. As members know, the local police commissions do have some authority in this respect as well.

I’m quite prepared at this time to read at length from various memoranda that have gone out to police forces in this province, but I think that may more properly be the subject of a formal ministerial statement. So, subject to the wishes of the House, I’m going to leave this issue at this time; but I simply say that police do have guidelines with respect to high-speed police chases. I can assure the House that police officers generally are very reluctant to engage in these high-speed chases because they themselves are exposed to considerable risk, as well as the members of the public. Obviously, in each individual case a high degree of judgement must be utilized as to whether or not a high-speed chase is appropriate. All police officers are continuously reminded of this fact.

For us to say to the police forces of this province that they shall not engage in high-speed chases except in the rarest of circumstances is only to invite those who have no respect for the law to engage in the high-speed operation of motor vehicles -- either to escape detection, apprehension or for other reasons -- knowing that the police forces are unlikely to engage in a pursuit. To suggest otherwise represents nothing less than a very simplistic approach to a very difficult problem.

I reiterate that we will be making a lengthy statement to the Legislature, at least by the beginning of next week. The Solicitor General’s estimates will also be debated in the next several weeks, and again I would be very happy to invite the views of all members of this Legislature if they believe that we can improve the guidelines that have been laid down. I welcome their advice in a very difficult and complex matter.

[2:45]

Mr. S. Smith: By way of supplementary: When the Solicitor General decides to make this statement in the House, will he include the statistics of how many people have been killed and how many injured since the memorandum he refers to of June 1, 1976? Is he aware that there have been repeated requests since that memo for guidelines, with actual enforcement of those guidelines; that the policy minister for the justice field as recently as October 22, 1979 knew nothing of any such guidelines and hoped that the Solicitor General himself might have something to say on his return from having been elsewhere that particular day?

How many people have died? Doesn’t the Solicitor General recognize that this old chestnut about having to be able to have police chases for fear that all the crooks will decide to drive at high speeds just doesn’t hold water? In fact the social benefits of these high-speed pursuits in no way are balanced with the terrible carnage to innocent bystanders, as well as to police persons themselves. When is he going to have the courage to stand up and implement proper guidelines which will be clear to all, and to charge those who do not obey those guidelines?

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: There are guidelines. I say once again, the Leader of the Opposition in his own simplistic, but I think sometimes irresponsible fashion, is deliberately trying to mislead the people of this province as to what does in fact exist. When is he going to start to show a little responsibility in these areas of law enforcement? I think he really should be a little ashamed of himself because there are guidelines in existence. They have been in existence for some time.

Mr. Breithaupt: The policy secretary didn’t know it.

Mr. S. Smith: The policy secretary didn’t know it. You have a short memory.

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: I will certainly be prepared to share with the members of the Legislature all the available statistics with respect to high-speed chases, such as they are known. I believe that all forces do keep pretty accurate statistics in this respect. I will be quite happy to share these statistics with the Legislature, and to share the guidelines that have been disseminated in this province.

Mr. S. Smith: Point of privilege.

Mr. Speaker: Let’s not have a point of privilege every time somebody says something. The very thing that the honourable the Solicitor General has engaged in is the very thing that leads to the kind of invective that’s thrown across the floor of this House.

While the standing order doesn’t specifically preclude the use of the word “misleading,” for him to suggest that somebody over here is engaging in some kind of activities or saying something that would mislead somebody does cause problems. I think the Solicitor General has sufficient command of the English language that he could use something less offensive.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: On a matter of personal privilege, if I may be permitted to make this observation: the Leader of the Opposition chooses to preface most of his questions with, “If the government had the courage to do this,” and “would stop allowing or tolerating slaughter on the highways.” If he continues to insist in the preface to his questions on including a lot of inaccurate statements and innuendoes, then people like myself might be tempted to engage in what may very well be a rather provocative discussion.

Mr. Nixon: Respond to the Speaker.

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: The manner in which he chooses to ask the questions really leaves us very little choice, with the greatest of respect to you, sir.

Mr. Speaker: There is a way of expressing one’s view in a very accurate and precise way without being provocative, and without another member getting up and saying, “Mr. Speaker, rule on this particular word or that particular word.” I think the minister has a sufficient command of the language that he can avoid those incidents.

Mr. Cunningham: Supplementary: On the subject of policy with regard to this unfortunate tragedy, is the minister aware that the police car involved in this accident was travelling in excess of 100 kilometres per hour in a built-up area and that it didn’t have the flasher on; that when questioned on this, the official response was that they don’t use flashers “except for high-speed chases?”

If this was not a high-speed chase, what is?

Hon. Mr. McMurtry: I can only say that I heard of this tragedy only a moment or two before I entered the Legislature this afternoon. I will certainly be receiving a full report with respect to this tragic occurrence, including whether or not a flashing light was used. Certainly that is part of the policy guidelines laid down; the flashing lights are supposed to be used. Certainly if the high-speed chase took place on the city streets, I would say, without knowing any more of the details, flashing lights in my view would be warranted in the circumstances.

In fairness to everybody involved, I should have the benefit of a full report on this particular tragic occurrence before replying further.

Mr. Speaker: A new question, the honourable Leader of the Opposition. We have spent 13 minutes on this one.

Mr. S. Smith: I trust, Mr. Speaker, you are not suggesting we had to spend 13 minutes on it.

Mr. Speaker: Not at all, not at all.

Mr. S. Smith: If we could have had an answer to the question instead of some personal invective we might have spent less time on it. It is becoming a bit of a habit, Mr. Speaker.

INTEREST RATES

Mr. S. Smith: A question of the Treasurer: Today’s report by the Conference Board in Canada suggests Ontario’s economy, according to their predictions, will grow by about 1.8 per cent, which is considerably below the national growth rate of 2.6 per cent. Ontario’s real growth rate will rate, according to them, ninth in Canada, even behind the Maritime provinces. In view of the fact the manufacturing industries, for whom the high interest rates are increasingly devastating, are centred out as bearing the brunt of the problems of high interest rates in this economic reversal, are you now prepared to go to Ottawa to appear in front of a parliamentary committee -- and that is an idea, by the way, which the member for London Centre (Mr. Peterson) suggested and the Premier (Mr. Davis) thought very intriguing -- to make it very plain Ontario stands against the high interest rate policy in view of the devastatingly low growth that seems to be in store for our manufacturing industries?

Hon. F. S. Miller: Mr. Speaker, I have great respect for anybody’s prognostications. I would say the conference board’s quarterly estimates of the future have been subject to some rather rapid variation and I would suspect at this moment they are underestimating the 1980 economy of this province.

Everyone else’s views are more optimistic than theirs, as are, certainly, the ones we had. That would answer the first part of the member’s question.

In answer to the second part of the question, I am not the least bit enthusiastic about high interest rates. I have said that clearly. I have also said clearly I do recognize when something is in someone else’s domain.

I do believe governments normally deal with ministers rather than with the committees of government, although we have not yet reached a conclusion. I am quite willing to review the suggestion of the member for London Centre to see whether there should or should not be some appearance before the committee, or whether it is appropriate to deal with a minister of the crown.

Mr. S. Smith: By way of supplementary: Can the Treasurer table in this House any studies which have been done detailing the impact of high interest rates on our manufacturing industry and on the provincial economy in general?

I point out to him that on October 25 when asked about that the Treasurer said, “I can’t say that there is any study.” But the next day, in the Treasurer’s absence, the Premier said, “If the members think the Treasurer and his ministry have not already been studying the impact of high interest rates, I just want to tell them they have.”

Which one of these is true, Mr. Speaker? Will the Treasurer tell us whether he has studied the impact of high interest rates or he hasn’t studied the impact of high interest rates? If he hasn’t, why hasn’t he? If he has, would he table the studies? Why does he hesitate to share those studies with the federal government?

Hon. F. S. Miller: I think the question is the definition of the word “study.”

Mr. Nixon: The Premier is wrong.

Hon. F. S. Miller: At any point in time there are staff observations and comments upon the effects of almost any variable on the economic front.

I quoted in Hansard the other day a statement from a speech I had made that, and I think it was the first nine interest rate changes -- there were nine at that point, there are 11 now if I’m not wrong -- had an effect of about 1.25 per cent, I believe, upon the economy. The latest update I saw was 1.4 per cent. I would only suggest that the studies are not comprehensive and exhaustive ones. They are the best suggestions --

An hon. member: Guesstimates.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Guesstimates, I don’t even mind using that word in the economic field.

Mr. S. Smith: Fair enough. Then will you table them?

Hon. F. S. Miller: I don’t even mind using that word because I haven’t found any way to be sure. Therefore I simply say that I listen to a bunch of people who guess about the future and I take something of a midway course on all those guesses.

Mr. Peterson: Supplementary: In view of the fact that the Treasurer doesn’t ever express any reluctance about expressing a provincial point of view on oil pricing and several other matters that are exclusively in the federal jurisdiction, surely he has an obligation now to understand what this is doing, rather than just standing up oozing concern about the issue and in a non-committal way saying he is sort of against it but not sure.

Surely he has an obligation at this time of impending economic downturn for this province to share those studies with this Legislature, and to represent those views in Ottawa as strongly as he can and not just behind closed doors when he is having a glass of port with the new Minister of Finance. Surely he has a much greater obligation to this province. Will he table those studies and will he forcefully take those views publicly to Ottawa?

Hon. F. S. Miller: I will be glad to look at the materials I have and see what might be acceptable or usable. I don’t know how think they are. I don’t feel there is anything secret about them.

Mr. Peterson: As the minister, haven’t you read them?

Hon. F. S. Miller: I’ll be glad to go back and see what’s there and report on the suitability for tabling. I listened to the Minister of Finance as recently as an hour ago. He is in Toronto today.

Hon. Mr. Davis: The honourable member should have gone to hear it.

Hon. F. S. Miller: The word of light was being given for those assembled.

Mr. Kerrio: He’s looking for money.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Would that the honourable member had been there to listen to some of the arguments. As he said, all the pundits are safe to guesstimate what he should do but he has to carry the can.

Mr. Martel: They’re all dead.

Mr. Peterson: You don’t even carry a pop can.

Mr. Kerrio: Was he conscripted for the job or did he volunteer?

Mr. S. Smith: There was more respect for Darcy McKeough than for any of you guys.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

JOB CREATION

Mr. Cassidy: I want to return to the Treasurer on the forecast made today by the Conference Board in Canada. In view of the fact that the conference board expects that our growth rate in Ontario next year will be only half the national growth rate, and in view of the fact that the conference board is predicting manufacturing output in this province will go down next year by 2.4 per cent, since the conference board forecasts are based on a $2 increase in oil prices next year, which is an increase that is at best half what we are likely to have to bear, will the Treasurer say what specific programs the government intends to introduce in order to reverse the predicted decline in manufacturing in this province next year?

Hon. F. S. Miller: I don’t believe the conference board is right, that’s number one.

Hon. Mr. Davis: And they have been wrong before.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I have a lot more confidence in next year’s economic future than they have. Their estimates are far below any realistic estimates of what is going to happen in this province next year. We have the potential for trouble. We have programs in place, like the Employment Development Fund, that have created a lot of jobs in the industrial sector this year and we are going to continue with them.

Mr. Cassidy: Supplementary: Since the Treasurer has now had seven months to see whether he could create jobs with the Employment Development Fund, will the Treasurer undertake to start using those funds as part of an overall industrial strategy and start rebuilding key sectors of the manufacturing economy of this province, rather than holding back the Employment Development Fund as a kind of pre-election sock that he can spend to try to get votes back in the spring?

Mr. Blundy: You are never going to get them back.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I can go to a couple of the ridings represented by the honourable member’s party and I’ll tell him there’s some sock in those ridings. We are pretty well respected in them.

Hon. Mr. Davis: That’s right.

Hon. F. S. Miller: There will be some more very shortly that we will be announcing. I will simply tell the honourable member we are going to carry on as we have. One great thing this year, we estimated at the start of the year that $10 billion would be reinvested in Ontario this year. Our current estimate is $14.5 billion will be reinvested in Canadian industry in Ontario this year.

[3:00]

Mr. Cassidy: Supplementary: Since 100 jobs are just about to disappear with a bakery merger in Ottawa, since more than 10,000 people across the province are on layoff or have been laid off according to the latest annual returns from the Minister of Labour (Mr. Elgie), will the Treasurer not admit there are problems in manufacturing now and that those problems are liable to get worse according to the predicted outcome from this winter? Why will the government not undertake an industrial strategy on a planned basis to start rebuilding our manufacturing sector rather than letting it run down?

Hon. F. S. Miller: In countries where governments of the member’s ilk have had the opportunity to plan they have all gone downhill.

Mr. Warner: You can’t even say it with a straight face.

Mr. Cassidy: I had the pleasure of meeting with my social democratic friend from West Germany the other day and socialist planning works in West Germany. It works very well.

Mr. Speaker: Is this your second question?

Mr. Cassidy: And they have been in office almost as long as this government as well.

RECRUITMENT OF FOREIGN WORKERS: APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAMS

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Labour which once again relates to the importation of skilled tradesmen and the failure of apprenticeship programs here in Ontario. Is the government aware that Douglas Aircraft is proposing to import approximately 200 skilled tradesmen for its Toronto plant? Will the minister take action to see these high-paying skilled jobs are made available for Ontario workers rather than workers brought in from abroad?

Mr. Kerrio: They went there when Diefenbaker let them go.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: First of all, I was not aware of it; but had I been aware of it -- and I am sure the member knows this -- the requirements an employer must go through before obtaining permission to allow such a search to take place are really quite intensive and I have been assured, and I accept the fact, that even after those vigorous searches for skilled workers within the country there still is an impossibility at the present time to find sufficient skilled workers.

So under those circumstances it is permitted, on occasion, to find skilled workers outside the country. I want the honourable member to understand that for every skilled worker brought into this country there’s a commitment made by the employer to train workers. As a matter of fact, if my memory serves me properly for every skilled worker who has come into this country at least one other has started in a skill training program, and there have been other non-skilled employees who have obtained employment as a result of the arrival of that skilled employee.

But having said all that, I don’t think there’s anybody who argues that we need to have good short- and long-term plans to provide the skilled training for the young people of this province here in this province, and that’s what we are doing now. The efforts going on in the Ministry of Education are quite extensive. At the present time there are over 30 community industrial training councils, and by January I am assured, there willbe double that many. So there’s enthusiasm, there’s involvement and there’s commitment to provide those training facilities in this province for Ontario youth.

Mr. Kerrio: It took a long time.

Mr. Cassidy: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: The minister has stated that for each skilled worker brought into this country there is at least one worker who is taught his skill by the company concerned. Can he then explain why it is that using the facilities of this government for the selective employment service Douglas brought in 30 skilled workers in 1978 and 24 skilled workers in 1979, but today has only 10 apprentices in its entire plant out of a total of 2,000 employees? Why should we now permit Douglas to go abroad looking for workers when their apprenticeship record before 1978 was abysmal and when they have made no appreciable improvement since then?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Mr. Speaker, if the member wants the exact details of the arrangements with Douglas, I would refer the question to the Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Grossman). But before doing that I want it clearly understood what our commitment is and that is to provide short- and long-term facilities and counselling and labour market information that will allow Ontario youth to be trained in this province for the skills we desperately need. But with regard to the specific arrangements with that company I would refer the question to the Minister of Industry and Tourism.

Mr. Conway: My question is to the minister in his second incarnation, minister of manpower.

Since it has been many months since he was created minister of manpower, and since he indicated in his response to the leader of the New Democratic Party that this was a government with enthusiasm, involvement and commitment with respect to finding jobs for the young Ontarians, can he indicate what specific skill training strategies he, as minister of manpower, has initiated on behalf of the young people of Ontario in the months now since he has been made minister of manpower?

Mr. Warner: Name one.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Far be it from me to suggest that the member for Renfrew North is ever wrong about anything. I am an admirer of his and so it would be beneath my dignity to suggest that he ever is wrong. But he well knows that the Ontario Manpower Commission came into being on August 1. It has been diligently and very vigorously evaluating all the existing programs and will shortly be making recommendations

Mr. Peterson: How many young people have you employed?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: In addition to that, many things have been going on and much co-ordination has taken place. The employer-sponsored training programs are working, they are becoming more numerous, and I think that is an avenue that offers great promise.

Mr. S. Smith: Promises, promises.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: In addition to that, there have been at least two or three new apprenticeship trades in the industrial sector that have been regulated, and several more are being planned. I am sure the member, living as close as he does to Ottawa, will have noted there was a bill introduced in the House of Commons in Ottawa recently which will allow us do make better use of adult occupational training funds. So there is lots of activity going on, and I want to assure the member of that.

Mr. di Santo: Supplementary: How can the minister say this government is providing short- and long-term programs for apprenticeship in this province when in Metropolitan Toronto at this time there is only one course at Centennial College for auto mechanics and there is only a prospect for one further course next year, in January; and when we know that the apprenticeship program is not attracting a high number of young unemployed in the province?

When will the government come down with a serious plan which will provide a serious apprenticeship program in the province, which by the way was promised a long time ago by his predecessor?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: I didn’t say that short- and long-term strategies were in place; I said they were being developed.

With respect to the question the member asked relating to auto mechanics and the courses in Toronto --

Mr. Warner: It sure is taking a long time.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: -- I am afraid that is a question the Minister of Education (Miss Stephenson) will have to answer, and I would refer that to her.

Mr. Sweeney: Given that the countries from which these skilled labourers are being imported have mandatory ratios of apprentices to skilled workers as a condition of operating in those countries, when is the minister going to put in place legislation of that sort in this jurisdiction?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: As the member knows from the mandate given to the commission, they have been asked to make recommendations about those very matters. Those are the issues that are being evaluated at the present time.

PHYSICIAN IMMIGRATION

Hon. Mr Timbrell: On Tuesday, the member for Grey (Mr. McKessock) asked the Premier (Mr. Davis) questions concerning the government’s policy towards allowing doctors to immigrate into the country.

Since July 1975, the federal Department of Immigration has restricted entry of physicians into Canada to positions of need for which qualified Canadians are not available. This is done in co-operation with provincial authorities.

In Ontario, the decision concerning need and support for intending physician immigrants is made by the Ministry of Health, and we advise the federal authorities accordingly. The policy in Ontario is to consider these applications on an individual basis. This is done by a committee consisting of representatives of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the College of Family Physicians, the Ontario Medical Association and the ministry.

Regions designated as medically underserviced are given special consideration. For a number of communities, arrangements have been made to support physicians who are eligible for a licence in the province and who are willing to provide service for an agreed period.

Mr. Speaker, I’m informed there are three practising physicians currently in Durham and one practising outside of that town. However, I understand there is need felt in the community for another general practice physician and that Mrs. Wight, the administrator of the Durham Memorial Hospital, has recently contacted my ministry’s underserviced area program to discuss some form of financial assistance.

Dr. Copeman, the head of the program replied to Mrs. Wight on October 30 and has asked to meet with her to discuss the situation. If the only feasible solution should be special support for an immigrant physician that may well be possible under this policy.

Mr. McKessock: Mr. Speaker, to the minister: In view of the fact that it’s hard to obtain doctors in rural areas, even in southern Ontario, would he consider, after a community has been trying to obtain a doctor for one year and has failed to do so, putting them on the underserviced area program that he has for northern Ontario with financial assistance?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, we do have communities in southern Ontario covered on the underserviced area program. It is about that that Dr. Copeman has written to Mrs. Wight indicating he would like to meet with her.

Mr. McKessock: With financial assistance?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Under the underserviced area program.

Mr. Speaker: I’d like the assistance of honourable members. Some honourable member has sent an inquiry to the ministry to the table, specifically to the Minister of Colleges and Universities (Miss Stephenson). We don’t know from whence it came. The member didn’t put his name on it. Would he please enlighten the table?

STEPHEN TRUSCOTT

Mr. Stong: In the absence of the Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry) I have a question of the Provincial Secretary for Justice concerning the Stephen Truscott case.

In light of the revelations brought to our attention over the weekend in an article by Mr. Trent, would the minister give this House his assurance that the matters set out by that author will be thoroughly investigated and that the results of that investigation will be shared with this House so that members can consider appropriate methods of compensation in the event there has been a miscarriage of justice?

Hon. Mr. Walker: I’m sure that the Attorney General would go on to answer the question more directly, but I am aware that the Prime Minister of Canada has indicated that the government of Canada may well be investigating the matter. If that’s the case I think the investigation will be shared with members of this House.

HEALTH SERVICE CHARGES

Mr. Breaugh: I have a question for the Minister of Health. I’d like to ask him if he’s in agreement with this patient information card which is handed out to patients at St. Michael’s and a few other clinics by a group of physicians called, Anaesthesia Services -- they are opted-out physicians charging above the Ontario Health Insurance Plan rate.

Is the minister in agreement with this statement that there is no hospital or government regulation that requires prior notification to the patient of this legal action?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, it was drawn to the attention of that particular organization of anaesthetists some time ago, if not months ago, that that does not reflect the position of the Ontario Medical Association. I’m told that that’s been revised accordingly.

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, supplementary: As of noon today that is still their position and practice. In fact as expressed by their office manager, “It is not considered ethical to discuss the billing arrangements with the patient just prior to an operation.”

It was her understanding that the anaesthetists at large had been exempted from the rule that all physicians should notify patients ahead of time.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, I’m sure that the physicians are certainly aware of the position of the medical association. They’re also aware, I’m sure, of the facility provided by the medical association to deal with any individual issues here.

It’s clear; the member has been asked repeatedly, I know, to make use of that service, I understand; there is a mechanism there. I can tell the member that I’ve been aware of that for some time, and immediately upon becoming aware we prevailed upon the medical association to make it clear to their members, yet again -- in this case these particular members -- what is involved in the agreement of March. I was told that it had in fact been corrected. I can tell the member that I’ve not had any particular complaints from that hospital.

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, could I have a final supplementary on that? The minister is obviously aware of this case. As of noon today the practice persists. They obviously have taken a position directly opposite to the minister’s personal point of view, and perhaps the view of the OMA. What is he going to do about it?

[3:15]

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I thought we had, in fact, corrected it. If that’s not the case --

Mr. Swart: Well he told you that.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: With respect, the member has made a statement, and I have found in cases involving the Wellesley Hospital, the Blind River Hospital and elsewhere --

Mr. Wildman: What are you going to do about it?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: -- sometimes assertions members over there make aren’t entirely accurate.

Mr. Warner: You’re not going to do anything.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I will look into it. We were aware of it and thought it had been corrected.

Mr. M. N. Davison: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Provincial Secretary for Justice. In view of the Minister of Health’s statements of March 29 that the patient should know in advance if an additional charge is to be made by a physician, and if the patient is not so informed the patient should not be obliged to pay that charge, and in view of the fact that collection agencies are now hounding citizens in Ontario to pay such bills, will the Provincial Secretary for Justice please inform all the collection agencies in the province of Ontario that it is government policy that they are not -- repeat not -- to attempt to collect from any health care consumer a surcharge levied by an opted-out doctor unless that doctor has informed the patient in advance?

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, that’s not a question I’m prepared to answer. I would suggest it be dealt with by the Minister of Health.

Mr. M. N. Davison: Mr. Speaker, if I may ask a supplementary to the super minister who is supposed to be in charge of consumer protection, but who appears to throw consumers to the Minister of Health instead, would he or his subordinate minister, the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Drea), at least take some action to make sure that no consumer in the province of Ontario who is caught in such a position will adversely have his credit rating affected by such a thing, when he is simply following the advice of the Minister of Health?

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Health dealt with that the other day and we will be guided by his direction.

BURNING OF PCBS

Mr. Kennedy: Mr. Speaker, I have a three-part question of the Minister of the Environment.

First, does the minister know as yet the date of the court hearing with respect to the Mississauga bylaw which bans the burning of PCBs? Second, would the minister confirm there won’t be any burning until this legal matter is settled?

Finally, in the light of our discussions over the last six to eight months, and the liaison committees that are in place, and representations by people in the area and ratepayer groups, would the minister ensure that regardless of the two foregoing points, there will be no burn until there has been ample opportunity for discussion with these groups to hear their opinions and expressions with respect to this very important sensitive and controversial issue?

Hon. Mr. Parrott: As of yesterday, I wasn’t aware a date had been set to finalize this, but I hope it will be soon. I can inform the member on a day-to-day basis. There is no doubt we will not proceed until that question has been addressed in the courts and finalized.

On the third part of the question, the words “ample time” give me a little difficulty in responding, for this reason: I know we have a liaison committee which has met many times. I have made a commitment that it will continue to meet as I think it is important that it does. However, for it to go on indefinitely might be more than I can promise. Certainly that committee will continue to meet and receive the views of the residents, I think that is awfully important.

As the member knows, I have met with the committee on one or two occasions, and I am prepared to do all of that. I think it is important in the process that we do try to get all that information out. I would say if this should go on for another six or eight months, then that is a time limit beyond which I think discussions would not be fruitful.

Mr. Kennedy: Supplementary: As the minister knows, there are 14 ratepayer groups with an umbrella organization over the whole 14, and we met with Mr. Clarkson and Mr. Carroll.

Would the minister give that group a chance to make a presentation to the minister and his technicians to discuss the matters of storage, transportation and handling, whether the TAAGA 3000 is ready and these concerns that aren’t now known generally to the people in the community? We would like to have them informed before any further action is taken in any direction. This process wouldn’t take eight months provided we can get the co-operation of this group, which I know we can because we have been getting it.

Mr. Wildman: If you already know, why are you asking?

Hon. Mr. Parrott: I understand we had some of those items for discussion on an agenda of that committee but they ran out of time -- I think it was near midnight when the committee adjourned -- and they are to reconvene that meeting. As much as it is humanly possible to do so, we will try to give all that information to the committee and to the various ratepayer groups prior to a burn, yes.

Mr. Kerrio: Supplementary. Is the minister satisfied that with the technology available PCBs can be burned at Mississauga and sufficiently high temperatures attained to do it safely? Does he have that kind of information yet? If he doesn’t when will he share it with the House?

Hon. Mr. Parrott: I am really pleased that question should come forward, Mr. Speaker. In my personal opinion, from what I have been able to read and be briefed on, there is no doubt it can be done. However, the purpose of the test burn is to share with the people of Ontario precisely that information. We’re not asking for permission to burn PCBs; we’re asking for permission to prove or disprove the safety of burning PCBs, and that will hinge on that test burn.

We believe it’s a terrible significant event in the final solution to this problem. I have to accept the reality of the situation that if it fails -- in other words, if the safety is not proven -- we have a very serious problem. I hope it will prove safe, but we’re conducting the tests strictly on the basis of trying to find out one thing: can they be destroyed permanently and safely? I hope the answer is yes. I think it is.

HUNTING LEGISLATION

Mr. Ruston: A question of the Minister of Natural Resources: Is the minister considering amending the Game and Fish Act to allow municipalities more autonomy, particularly where local conditions may require shorter seasons or temporary suspension of hunting activities to allow game to regenerate?

Hon. Mr. Auld: Mr. Speaker, in connection with municipalities and game, the only things we’re working on at the moment are revisions in the fees they charge for licences for things like pheasants that they propagate themselves. As the honourable member knows, in many cases, if not all, we consult with the municipalities -- the counties generally -- in terms of season times and we are rarely in disagreement.

If there is a specific area about which the member is concerned, I would be delighted to look into it for him. But without giving it great thought, it would seem to me we could get into a pretty complicated and fragmented operation if different people were setting different seasons all over the province.

Mr. Ruston: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: The minister’s regulations now require that a municipality sell at least 200 non-resident licences. If they do not, the municipality is automatically open to everyone. It’s just not feasible in a semi-builtup area and we have many of them in southern Ontario. Would the minister agree?

Hon. Mr. Auld: I will pursue it and I will be back.

Mr. O’Neil: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the minister could confirm or deny statements that have been, made that some of the provincial parks may be opened up for hunting.

Hon. Mr. Auld: I can confirm that some have been --

Mr. Conway: That would be like the good old days.

Hon. Mr. Auld: -- some are still closed and some are now open for possession of firearms, but not hunting, because of hunting areas nearby.

PRICING OF BILL COPIES

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Mr. Speaker, several days ago the member for Cambridge inquired about the differential price for the French and English editions of Bill 70 in the government bookstore. To adequately answer his question I must provide a bit of information about the practice normally followed in the printing of bills.

Bills that are sold in the bookstore in the same format as all members receive them are ordered for the bookstore and the government publication centre as additional quantities to the normal legislative printing contracts. As a result, there are no special typesetting or binding requirements for these bills.

However, bills also exist and are sold in what’s called the office consolidation form with covers, marginal references and, if necessary, indices, cautionary notes and other things. These additions and resulting obvious typesetting and binding charges are reflected in the selling price of this office consolidation bill.

Bill 70, as it is currently sold in English in the government bookstore, is available in what I have called the bill format, just as the member and I saw it here at the time of printing, while the French translation is in the office consolidation form. Thus there’s a difference in price for that very reason.

I should also note that there’s a price differential between bills and office consolidations that are for sale even if they were just in English. In other words, the bill would have been the same price and the office consolidation would have been the higher price in English alone.

The price of a bill is based on a standard scale that relates to the number of pages in the bill, while the price of an office consolidation is based on the cost of producing that consolidation. I should note that these costs do not include any translation costs incurred and thus translation costs are certainly not absorbed by the purchaser of the office consolidation.

Further, the member asked when the regulations for Bill 70 would be available in French. As he is no doubt aware, Bill 70 received third reading on December 15, 1978, and was proclaimed on October 1. The French version of the bill, in its consolidated form, became available in May 1979. The regulations under Bill 70 have only recently been finalized and were published in the Ontario Gazette of September 29, 1979. I can assure the member that the regulations will be and are being translated into French, but I can’t give him a precise date when that translation will be completed. However, in the meantime excerpts from the bill have been produced in several languages for posting in work places.

Finally, I am sure that the member will be interested in knowing that the office consolidation of Bill 70 and its regulations in English is currently in production and should be available in the book store in three parts next month.

Mr. M. Davidson: A supplementary, Mr. Speaker: I don’t know. I looked very closely at those bills and the only thing that I saw that was any different was one had a red cover on which is about a quarter cent piece of cardboard with a little typing on it.

Regardless of the number of pages, does the minister not believe that we in this province should be providing to the working people in this province pieces of legislation passed in this House at the same price no matter whether it be in English or in French?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Mr. Speaker, the member must have misunderstood.

Mr. Kerrio: How about putting it on the Half-Back program?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: I made it very clear that the office consolidations, which will be sold in the book store in English and French, will be the same price. It happens that the bill, arising out of the bill that was passed in this Legislature, was offered in English at a lower price because it was already set and typed for this Legislature’s purposes. So there is no suggestion of any differential in the price, or any unwillingness to provide it in both languages.

AMBULANCE SERVICES

Mr. Sweeney: I have a question of the Minister of Health, Mr. Speaker. Given that the Kitchener-Waterloo ambulance strike has now been going on for eight weeks, and given that we now have documented cases of near fatalities -- as a matter of fact the manager of the hospital says it’s only by a healthy dose of good luck that we haven’t had one -- does he have any plan, any action to facilitate a settlement of this strike?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to say that whatever reports the member has had to make, that kind of a statement is not based on fact.

We are monitoring the situation on a daily basis. Services are available to assist in emergencies from surrounding ambulance services under the terms of the Ambulance Act and all the reports I’ve had to date indicate that the labour-management dispute to date has not inconvenienced -- sorry, there’s no question it would inconvenience some people, especially with transfers -- it has not put at risk the life or limb of any people. We have been able to keep up responses to emergencies. At this time there is no plan to intervene in the dispute.

[3:30]

Mr. Sweeney: Supplementary: Given that the operators of the service have indicated they’re going to bring in strikebreakers; and given that the leader of the union there says there’s no way that this will be negotiated -- it’s gone too far -- is the minister not concerned that we’re facing a confrontation situation in the provision of health services that could be very dangerous?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I’ve had no indication of the kind of things the honourable member says. I suspect that kind of an allegation perhaps does contribute to the kind of situation he’s suggesting we should try to avoid. My concern is that true emergencies be dealt with as well as possible and that the life and limb of any individual in that area is not put at risk. I’m satisfied with the reports I’ve had on a daily basis from my ambulance branch --

Mr. Swart: You’re satisfied with anything in the health field.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: -- that with the assistance of the surrounding ambulance services we are able to continue to meet the emergencies.

There no question that people involved in routine transfers are being inconvenienced. They’re having to make any number of alternative arrangements, through family and friends, taxicabs -- whatever. That’s an unfortunate aspect. In terms of true emergencies, my advice is that we are keeping up with the demands and the needs in that community.

Mr. Breithaupt: Supplementary: Since the term “healthy dose of luck” is ascribed to the executive director of the hospital and since I have an example of a 91-year-old lady who was very much confused because of the difficulties of the transfers -- and I realize routine transfers are a problem -- would the minister not agree that since eight weeks have gone by now that the strike has been on, and since according to a recent press comment there apparently has not been any further discussion since a 30-minute session on October 4, a month ago, can the minister advise what involvement his ministry would have to encourage negotiation to proceed, with the hope that if the parties are at least discussing their differences there might be the opportunity for settlement?

I’m sure my colleagues in the area --

Mr. Speaker: A little crisper, please.

Mr. Breithaupt: -- are all deeply concerned.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: The honourable member will understand that we are, of course, reliant upon the assistance of the Ministry of Labour to keep the parties talking. I’m assured that is happening. They are doing everything possible under their authority to effect that. The member may want to ask the Minister of Labour about the involvement of his ministry.

My responsibility under the Ambulance Act is to ensure that we do have a capacity to meet the true emergencies. Members may be interested to know I'm told that only about 30 per cent of the calls an ambulance service receives are actually emergencies, which is an interesting statistic in itself. Our responsibility is to make sure they are met. Fortunately, as I say, the regular reports I've had are that with the assistance of the surrounding services around the member’s region we are able to do that.

LABOUR RELATIONS: ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE

Mr. Mackenzie: I have a question of the Minister of Labour. Given the controversy that’s raged over the last few weeks at York Steel, can the minister tell us why sections 56 and 58 of the Labour Relations Act, which prohibit employer interference with the workers’ right to organize a union of their choice, are disregarded or defied with such impunity?

Is he aware of the deliberate attempt by management to impede and deny the right to organize through anti-union leaflets, anti-union notices -- of which I have some here attached and stapled to employees’ punch cards -- through arrests for petty trespassing of those trying to organize, and through the use of Cavalier Intelligence and Protective Services Limited, Mr. Jack MacDonald’s legions, currently of Radio Shack infamy?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: No, I wasn’t aware of the information the member tells me, but he knows and I know there are avenues for redress within the Labour Relations Act for inappropriate activities.

Mr. Cassidy: They don’t work.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Yes, they do work. At the present time, as the member knows, in the area of certification there are two criminal charges before the courts. I’d be interested in receiving the information he has.

Mr. Cassidy: So is York Steel.

Mr. Lupusella: Supplementary: Is the minister also aware of the constant use in the same plant of electronic surveillance upon the workers for 60 hours a week and the presence of security guards as a means of intimidation? Will the minister intervene immediately to end this type of police state at the plant which interferes with the workers’ rights to organize a union of their choice?

Finally, when will the minister be able to introduce legislation to control the electronic surveillance, now that the discussion paper on the subject has been released by the ministry?

Hon. Mr. Elgie: To date, we have received several responses to the discussion paper, some of which came from members. The comments have been very good comments and have seen the paper as a good review of the problem.

As a result of the review process that is going on, I would expect consideration will be given to legislation because, as the member knows very well, I share his concerns about oppressive surveillance and the dehumanizing aspect it can produce in certain situations.

Mr. Warner: Do something then.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: As far as that is concerned, I think we will have to await that review process.

EMPLOYMENT DEVELOPMENT FUND GRANTS

Mr. Bradley: In the absence of the Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Grossman) and the Premier (Mr. Davis), I will direct this question to the Deputy Premier.

Since a number of employees of firms which have received assistance from the Employment Development Fund have expressed concern that these funds might be used to transfer job opportunities from one area of the province to the other, would the Deputy Premier undertake to request that the Minister of Industry and Tourism table forthwith in the House the agreements between the Employment Development Fund officials and the companies which are receiving the grants to allay these fears that have been expressed to me?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I am sure my colleague from St. Catharines would understand that I couldn’t make an undertaking such as that. However, I would be very happy to draw his concerns to the attention of the Minister of Industry and Tourism.

Mr. Bradley: Supplementary: In view of the fact that the member for London Centre (Mr. Peterson) asked this same question on June 5, 1979, and that the first two words of the answers from the Minister of Industry and Tourism were “very shortly,” would he not agree it would be appropriate for the minister to table these as soon as possible in the House?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I am not sure whether the minister was talking about his height or about the answer. However, I will draw that to his attention as well.

REPORTS

STANDING RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE

Mr. Villeneuve from the standing resources development committee reported the following resolution:

That supply in the following amounts and to defray the expenses of the Ministry of the Environment be granted to Her Majesty for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1980:

Ministry administration program, $6,815,200; environmental assessment and planning program, $18,978,000; environmental control program, $243,600,000; and waste management program, $13,896,000.

STANDING GENERAL GOVERNMENT COMMITTEE

Mr. McCaffrey from the standing general government committee presented the committee’s report and moved its adoption.

Your committee begs to report the following bill without amendment:

Bill Pr10, An Act respecting the City of Hamilton;

Your committee begs to report the following bill with certain amendments:

Bill Pr8, An Act respecting the City of Hamilton.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. McCaffrey from the standing general government committee presented the following resolution:

That supply in the following amount and to defray the expenses of the office of the provincial Auditor be granted to Her Majesty for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1980:

Administration of the Audit Act and statutory audits, $2,360,000.

STANDING ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE COMMITTEE

Mr. Philip from the standing administration of justice committee reported the following resolution:

That supply in the following amounts to defray the expenses of the Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations be granted to Her Majesty for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1980:

Ministry administration program, $4,972,000; commercial standards program, $11,700,000; technical standards program, $6,748,000; public entertainment standards, $8,703,000; property rights program, $19,855,000; registrar general program, $3,270,000; liquor licence program, $6,838,000; and rent review program, $1,821,000.

STANDING MEMBERS’ SERVICES COMMITTEE

Mrs. Campbell from the standing members’ services committee presented the committee’s report and moved its adoption.

Your committee having met to review the provisions of messenger services to members of the Legislative Assembly recommends that the services of the sessional attendants available to each party caucus be maintained throughout the year.

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Speaker, may I speak briefly to this motion? I would just like to explain that the committee was of the opinion that in view of the fact that more and more members are sitting more and more frequently during the off season, it is important that such services be available to them and any existing services have been found to be inadequate.

On motion by Mrs. Campbell, the debate was adjourned.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

CO-OPERATORS LIFE INSURANCE ASSOCIATION ACT

Mr. Lane moved first reading of Bill Pr24, An Act respecting Co-operators Life Insurance Association.

Motion agreed to.

FAMILY LAW REFORM AMENDMENT ACT

Mr. Breithaupt moved first reading of Bill 159, An Act to amend the Family Law Reform Act, 1978.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this bill is to clarify that a parent may obtain enforcement of an order for support of a dependent child under section 27 of the act, I will be taking my private member’s opportunity on November 22, to have the House debate this bill.

CITY OF WINDSOR ACT

Mr. B. Newman moved first reading of Bill Pr21, An Act respecting the city of Windsor.

Motion agreed to.

ASSUMPTION CHURCH CEMETERY ACT

Mr. Bounsall moved first reading of Bill Pr29, An Act respecting the Assumption Church Cemetery.

Motion agreed to.

HONING CORPORATION LIMITED ACT

Mr. Cunningham moved first reading of Bill Pr23, An Act to revive Honing Corporation Limited.

Motion agreed to.

[3:45]

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ON NOTICE PAPER

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, before the orders of the day, I wish to table the interim answers to questions 308, 311, 316 and 321 and the answers to questions 304, 305, 306, 310, 314, 315, 317, 319, 322 and 323 standing on the Order Paper.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

GOVERNMENT PURCHASING

Mr. Jones moved resolution 32:

That in the opinion of this House the government consider adopting a procedure of payment to suppliers to the government of goods and services of a value of $100 or less whereby the government enclose an executed blank cheque with the purchase order to the supplier.

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member has up to 20 minutes and if he wishes to reserve any of it for a response, he can notify the table. The honourable member.

Mr. Jones: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to reserve five minutes at the end of my comments and the comments of the others in joining the debate, so as to sum up what I feel to be an important issue and particularly today.

We have all heard, in recent days in this House, comments and concern from all parties as to the effect of interest rates -- to name but one factor that is having a very considerable impact on small business and small merchants, that is making things increasingly difficult for them to carry on their accounts receivable, and the cash flow that’s so vital to them.

So, Mr. Speaker, it caused me to turn to the fact that the operations of government necessitates, as we all know, many small purchases. As an example of that -- March 31, 1978 -- as one looks at the public accounts, one sees that no less than some $248 million were spent on supplies and equipment by individual ministries, some of which were in the $10 million and $20 million range. Of that approximately a half of the million invoice-oriented payments processed annually by this government involved purchases for a few hundred dollars or less. It occurs to me, Mr. Speaker, that governments have to recommit themselves in today’s climate to promoting the interest of the private sector, and particularly small business.

I am mindful the House has dealt recently with this philosophy, but today in this resolution I would like to put a specific proposal where this government could have what is considered by a lot of small businesses across this whole province to be of considerable assistance to them, particularly in this climate today.

I know that our Premier expressed opinions recently, as we looked into the 1980s at a recent conference that our party held. He said in his remarks, “I want a province where moneys that fuel our economy are left in the hands of the individual wage and salary earner, and in the hands of small businessmen and investors and the farmer, to use as they see fit to build their own lives and thereby to build our province.”

I can only endorse those ideas, and I am certain that philosophy is shared by the great majority of this House. It is in that spirit I propose this resolution today and ask for the support of the House.

This resolution, as it says, is concerned with the payment procedures as they apply to supply contracts of a value of $100 or less. These invoices I was mentioning and the cheques that flow from them tie up a large chunk of time and add to the considerable paper burden we have been trying so hard to reduce in recent years. I am not at all sure it is necessary for this to be the case. Payment by postdated cheque has become a fairly common business practice.

We have all been in the situation where, on the basis of trust, a cheque is issued that leaves the amount blank and that specifies it is not to exceed so many dollars. This is similar in conception to the practice I am proposing today. In fact, it is a procedure to which other jurisdictions in North America and beyond have recently turned. It has been, of course, instituted in many corporations, both large and small, with considerable effect.

I want first to outline briefly our payment procedures as they now exist. The processing of payments is one of the more fragmented of all elements in purchasing, I am speaking in the context of this government, of course. Usually, a single payment will cross several hands and involve actions by the user ministry, the Ministry of Treasury and Economics and the Ministry of Government Services.

When an invoice is received, the ministry staff must first match it with the purchase order. Then they check that the goods have been received, verify the price is as agreed and all conditions have been met. The invoice must then be approved, and all steps must be taken and recorded, and then of course the invoice is sent in most cases, or many cases, to the ministry’s head office which is so often in Toronto.

I would ask the members to remember -- and I am sure most of them realize this -- many of these small purchases will be made at a branch office, at that level. In turn there will be a whole process as they come down through to Toronto, and back and forth across the distance that is part of Ontario.

Mr. Wildman: What happens if the goods are damaged?

Mr. Jones: The ministry head office will assemble the record, all its invoices, possibly recheck them, and then approve the expenditure. This information then, as I say, would be sent to the Ministry of Treasury and Economics where the expenditure is considered in the light of the estimates. The cheque is authorized to be issued, and usually, the Ministry of Government Services does so. Finally, the cheques are mailed and a copy of the remittance is filed.

As you can see from this process, the payment cycle may involve several different people, several mailings, both internal and external, and many different functions.

This procedure is certainly necessary for large invoices. Is it really necessary or desirable for purchases of a few hundred dollars or less?

Mr. Wildman: Yep.

Mr. Jones: The member says, “Yep.” Is that a suspicion of the small businesses that for the most part are involved in these invoices under $100? I don’t think the small businessmen of Sudbury are any different to small business across the whole of this province. They work in an environment of trust and we certainly found that on this side of the House as we worked out programs with them. They have an investment. They are taxpayers, so they are clients as well as suppliers in most cases.

Mr. Wildman: COD.

Mr. Jones: I believe this proposal could help us in these situations to proceed with a greater efficiency.

I don’t wish to have it misunderstood or to imply our government or the public servants who operate within this government do so in an inefficient manner, but I am just saying this government in itself, by its very nature, is large. In fact, it is a multibillion-dollar operation, and as such, I suppose, it makes an easy target for criticism. I do believe we must look at this with some detachment and some kind of perspective, because we are dealing in public funds and we have to have some safeguards in that system.

Someone may charge, and I hear a rumble over there from Sudbury, that the people will cheat on the amount they insert on the blank cheque they receive before they even deliver the goods. But the experience of the many companies using the system I propose is based on trust of the suppliers. It has proved successful. There’s very little likelihood of a person trying to cheat in this system.

Mr. Ziemba: Would you do that?

Mr. Jones: Yes, as a matter as fact we do. In one business where I had the privilege of being part of the founding, as it happens we do indeed issue a blank cheque to expedite small claims in an insurance climate.

I can remember in the select committee that all members did propose one appraisal form, and appraisal centres came from that. Rather than putting people to the inconvenience and expense of going from one body shop to another for appraisals and eventually submitting three and having them checked, one is made up.

Please remember that’s happening across the province. It was demanded by the Legislature that members of that committee cut out a lot of waste and add convenience to the consumers of the province. It’s actually happening now. So of course there are a lot of examples.

I think we would find that most people like to support a system of this nature because they appreciate saving taxpayers’ dollars and their own money on that paperwork. The businessmen that are the suppliers in this case recognize ravings and do support such a case.

People do feel good about being trusted. I hear the members’ giggles. I heard those giggles when we proposed the Ontario Youth Employment Program. It has since gone on to serve, by and large, the small business community of this province.

The members have always claimed, certainly in campaign rhetoric, that they support small business. They are the largest users of that program. It was a big success again this year. Small business and farmers by and large take advantage of that program. It has been a tremendous success with 44,000 young people working under it, 23 per cent of them going on into permanent jobs. It was something addressed in the question period of this Legislature earlier on this afternoon. Those are absolute facts. That was because we did what we proposed to do in that legislation; we did trust the private sector and didn’t tie it up in red tape as other programs in other areas have. Red tape is detrimental and those other programs weren’t as successful as OYEP.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution embodies this government’s desire for satisfactory customer service of its own customers, and so set an example for the rest of the community. Maintaining working capital in good order is a problem of small business. If we espouse to support them in these particularly troubled times we need specific proposals to assist them.

It is not really necessary that we limit this amount to $100, as stated in this resolution. It may well be that another figure of perhaps $200 is more appropriate and may work better and even serve a broader sense of efficiency.

Mr. Wildman: Like $500,000.

Mr. Jones: But regardless of what this amount is, it is my feeling small business would welcome this proposal, since it goes a long way to satisfying some of their concerns about dealing with government. I hope the members of the opposition party will agree and support this resolution. I think it is justified on the significant savings it would represent in paper alone.

It goes without saying that small business is vital to growth. We have to support and protect its interests. We know small businesses become large businesses. They provide the advantage of interfacing with larger suppliers. We read recently here an article by John Meyer. As a former proposer of bills and regulations, the member for Victoria-Haliburton (Mr. Eakins) should know of the interest of small businesses.

[4:00]

John Meyer wrote recently in the Metropolitan Toronto Business Journal, the journal of the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Toronto, September issue, “Small businesses are emerging at an accelerating rate, providing new goods and services and providing more efficient delivery of conventional goods and services.”

In addition he wrote, “They are vital to economic growth as a future replacement for traditional businesses whose time has passed, or as seed-beds for new technology or even as the agencies by which to keep the competition between larger businesses honest.” And we know that to be true, those of us who have been involved in private-sector small business.

I believe we cannot ignore any possible step we might take to promote the viability of our small business enterprises. Many of the important innovations we have come to take for granted arose from those situations where someone was working on his own, or with a few others, possibly trying to develop a promising product line or perfect an invention. There may be some truth to the notion that most of our really creative enterprises tend to be in that area of small business.

It is within the spirit of the foregoing that I believe with all the rapid technology, much of it starting with small business, we have to be watchful and supportive of the small and medium-size enterprises. We have that opportunity, as so many of them interface with government in their purchasing, to stimulate and assist them at this time with the capacity for some innovation of our own, to seize an opportunity to assist them.

This government has a large number of high-calibre programs in operation to help the business community. Many of us are familiar with them. There have been the recent tax initiatives out of the last budget. We managed to change the Venture Investment Corporation Act last year. We have entrepreneur and innovative centres at work, and some advisory capacity from the Ministry of Industry and Tourism working on equity advice, debt capital, et cetera. We have consultation services, overseas trading offices and so forth.

I am today proposing this resolution, which I hope members opposite will support in the spirit in which it is offered. Let us not lose the opportunity. I urge this House to vote for the adoption of this resolution to help cut down our own costs and paperwork and help our suppliers maintain financial viability by sending these payment voucher forms forward with the orders for under $100, without the step of invoice-processing, negotiable upon satisfactory receipt of goods or services so ordered. I believe we would be performing a very real service to a very vital part of our society, namely, our small businesses. So I ask members not to attach suspicion where it ought not to be attached --

Mr. Wildman: Put the question.

Mr. Jones: -- and I urge the House to support the resolution.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: The honourable member has four minutes remaining.

Mr. Jones: Thank you.

Mr. Ruston: Mr. Speaker, I don’t know if you are aware of the fact, but it is 36 years and 87 days since the Progressive Conservative Party was elected to power in Ontario. And today they bring in a resolution of this calibre. I must say that after 36 years and 87 days I am a little disappointed.

It seems strange we would debate a motion of this type. I am not against paying bills on time or against something that would simplify the paying of bills, but to think a government could be in power so long and have to bring in such a resolution -- I think the member would be doing more good if he were to do something with regard to the way the Workmen’s Compensation Board pays some of its claims. People can be in dire straits and not get a claim through.

The member might even do away with the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education and save the taxpayers millions of dollars, as the former Treasurer recommended not too long ago. That would be a good resolution.

The government could have supported my resolution of June 21, 1979, for doctors to be paid at least 30 days and not sometimes have them wait 90 days. In Saskatchewan the doctors get paid every 15 days.

Mr. Wildman: Good government in Saskatchewan.

Mr. Ruston: There are a lot of things the government could do, if it wanted to bring in something worthwhile.

This resolution might save a fair amount of paperwork, I’m not worried that the gist of it is satisfactory. The problem I can see with it is if the government sends an order for so many cartons of this and so many cartons of that and it comes to under $100 and the supplier doesn’t have the full amount of the order, does he fill out the cheque for the full amount of what the order is for, or does he just fill out the cheque for the amount he is sending and the rest is on back order?

Mr. Bradley: Government by blank cheque.

Mr. Ruston: That’s a possibility that could very well happen. I understood there are a few places in the global network of the United States and Canada that have a similar method of payment, but this is one of the problems they have run across, the back-ordering and how to handle it. You are trying to save paperwork but if you have a back-order situation it could be you will be spending as much time making sure all the merchandise has been ordered and all the merchandise has been received. There could be some problems.

It just shows it is a tired old government. We have no one to blame but ourselves, all of us in Ontario. We have let them sit over there and they have kept withering away. We can see that the withering is pretty well done, because they’ve lost all their initiative and just don’t know what to do.

The member who brought in this resolution is young and aggressive and is looking for a higher place in that side of government, but I think he’s working for a tired old government that is not going to go very far. If the payment of bills is so bad, as I assume it must be, that he has to bring in this resolution, I must say that things are getting pretty bad.

I would have no objection to supporting the resolution. I was just advised that one of my colleagues wishes to speak on this. I had some remarks here, but I’m going to let him speak.

Mr. Ziemba: I’m amazed that a member of the free-enterprise party, the Conservative Party, would bring in such a resolution. It’s totally irresponsible; not only totally irresponsible, but bad business. This will go down in the history of the Ontario debates as the carte blanche resolution. That is, send out taxpayers’ money with a blank cheque and let the suppliers fill out their own blank cheque.

You talk about $100, and you’re willing to amend that. How high up will you be prepared to amend it? What will be the ceiling you’ll trust suppliers with? Half a million dollars?

Mr. Jones: You don’t trust these small-business suppliers?

Mr. Ziemba: I’m surprised to hear the member for Mississauga North, who is a small business man himself, bring such an irresponsible resolution before this House for consideration.

If he were talking about bringing in something that would help small business, we could support it, as we have in the past. It’s too bad the member for Victoria-Haliburton (Mr. Eakins) has left the House; he brought forward a small-business bill that all members of the House supported. Whatever happened to that bill? That had some meaning to it, but this legislation is just chicken feed. It’s penny ante; it doesn’t amount to much.

By bringing it in, what the government is admitting to us and to the people out there is that the Tory government is a bad credit risk. It’s so damned slow in paying its bills, it’s become a problem and it’s willing to send out blank cheques to try to get around that. Why doesn’t the government pay its bills on time?

This is going to come as a real jolt to the business community. Up until now there have been rumours about how inefficient the government was and how slow it was in paying its bills, but now it has stood up and admitted it. The government has admitted it is a bad risk.

Mr. Jones: We never said we were a bad risk.

Mr. Ziemba: I’m just flabbergasted that this government has allowed such a resolution to surface. You talk about the public relations out there, Mr. Speaker. People are now going to be very concerned about even dealing with the government.

Mr. Ruston: The Minister of Government Services (Mr. Wiseman) isn’t even in the House.

Mr. Ziemba: Shame.

Mr. Jones: He’s around.

Mr. Ziemba: Another thing, Mr. Speaker, there are four Tory members. They’re outnumbered.

Mr. Jones: No, they aren’t.

Mr. Ziemba: Obviously it shows that the member’s colleagues are so ashamed of this resolution they can’t even sit around to listen to the debate.

We’ve had all kinds of resolutions or bills about small business go through this House. Every time one of them goes through I get phone calls. I’m sure other members do too. They say, “How does this apply to me? I’ve got a small business, how do I get anything out of this small business development corporation?”

Over the past four years there is not one businessman I could tell that, somehow, this new government bill would apply to them. There wasn’t anything in it for them. It’s all propaganda that comes out of here.

Mr. Jones: Here the member has the figures. It’s 50 per cent of all those who claim it.

Mr. Ziemba: It turns out that the big corporations are using it to buy up smaller businesses and only the people who have the money to speculate are able to take advantage of the $300 tax kickback that goes along with it.

This bill is neither fish nor fowl. It’s not going to help the small businessman. If anything, it’s going to hurt the government because, as I say, it’s an admission that this government is a bad credit risk.

The other bill that we debated last year -- the member for Victoria-Haliburton is back in his place -- was supported by all three parties in the House. I remember the intense lobbying that went on at the time. I had business friends phoning me all hours of the day and night. They were saying, “Please, you’ve got to support this bill. It means so much to us.”

Mr. Wildman: Nothing much has happened with it, though.

Mr. Ziemba: It was such a motherhood bill that we all supported it. We were all so happy to see it pass second reading. Finally, what happened to it? Nothing. It was buried.

What about the Canadian Federation of Independent Business? They sent out propaganda to all businesses, to 60,000 members. They said, “We finally got something through for you small businessmen. Aren’t you happy that you pay your dues every year? Look at this. We supported the member for Victoria-Halliburton’s bill. We got it through.” Whatever happened to that bill? Not a darn thing happened. This government then comes in with this phoney little resolution.

The state of small business is very precarious these days, Mr. Speaker. That’s a shame because there are more jobs created in the small business sector than in any other.

Mr. Jones: That’s what we want to preserve and build on.

Mr. Ziemba: One of the reasons is the high interest rates. No business can survive today borrowing money at 15.5 per cent.

Mr. Wildman: Bring the bill to third reading.

Mr. Ziemba: In the old days, 20 years ago, you could get money reasonably, but ever since then it’s been getting higher and higher. These days the numbers of bankruptcies are going up and I predict that there’s going to be an awful lot of panic selling this Christmas, or shortly after. Businessmen will want to clear their shelves because they can’t hold on to merchandise and because it’s costing them 15.5 per cent to hang on to it.

Mr. Wildman: The Tory government in Ottawa is responsible for that.

Mr. Ziemba: We see a trend that is encouraged by this government towards monopoly control. Look at the corner drugstores. Whatever happened to the corner drugstore? It’s gone the way of the corner grocery store. Their numbers have been cut in half over the past 10 years.

Again, there is a 50 per cent reduction in gas stations. Why is that? We’re told, first of all, that there are economies of scale involved. If you have a self-service station and have a high volume you can cut down on the cost and sell cheaper. You can, for a time, until you squeeze out your competitor and then the prices go back up. Now they’ve squeezed out all the corner gas stations.

I’ve got eight fewer gas stations in my riding -- it’s not a very big riding -- but that is eight fewer gas stations and each one of them employed three or four people. All those jobs are lost and, now, customers have to go to self-serve stations. Most of them don’t bother checking their battery or their oil. Engine repairs are more costly as a result. People aren’t being served well.

And, what has happened to the price of gasoline? It’s gone right through the roof. It’s gone to over a buck a gallon whereas before a lower price was held out as a carrot to get us to go along with the self-serve gas stations.

I guess this party pushed more than the other two for Sunday closing of stores. It was a real problem back in 1975 because the large chains were open on Sundays. It became a problem both from the customers’ point of view and the workers’ point of view. Neither organized nor unorganized workers liked to work on Sundays. They wanted a day of rest and this government brought in a bill that this and the other parties supported to provide that day of rest. We see that bill being undermined by the municipality of Metropolitan Toronto. Mayor Mel Lastman unfortunately, has gone on record as supporting wide-open Sunday selling.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I wonder if the honourable member would relate his remarks to the resolution.

Mr. Ziemba: Yes, you’re absolutely right, Mr. Speaker. I’ve got all kinds of great ideas for small businessmen.

[4:15]

Mr. Jones: Oh, you have? We hadn’t noticed.

Mr. Ziemba: It’s just sad that we’ve got $200 million for big business, for corporations that don’t need it. They get our money and then they thumb their noses at us. What is the small businessman going to get? A blank cheque for up to $100. As the previous speaker pointed out, what happens when there’s a back-order or perhaps two back-orders, as is often the case? What an incredible backlog of paperwork the member is going to create with his resolution.

What is he going to have? Half a dozen blank cheques going out with each order in case it isn’t filled at the time it is placed? I think this resolution is totally irresponsible. It’s not only bad business practice, but it’s an admission on the part of the government that they are poor payers.

Mr. J. Johnson: Mr. Speaker, I’m very pleased to have the opportunity to participate in this debate today and to speak in support of the resolution put forth by the member for Mississauga North. I would just question the member for High Park-Swansea. He seems to be opposed to everything that we introduce on this side of the House in support of small business and then he pretends that he’s such a strong supporter of the business community. When we introduce some legislation, they say it isn’t any good and if we don’t introduce anything, the same thing applies.

Mr. Ziemba: What happened to the bill introduced by the member for Victoria-Halliburton? Where is it?

Mr. J. Johnson: I think he should accept the fact that once in a while we come forth with a good idea and support it in principle. This resolution will certainly benefit the small-business community that deals with the government and it may even have an impact beyond that. Every farmer, retailer or manufacturer who deals with government agencies will have some of their accounts, if not all of them, paid in cash instead of 30 or 60 days as is the case now.

This resolution might have an impact beyond government purchases and cash payments. What I mean by this is that perhaps other companies and individuals might follow the example of the government and return to the almost forgotten method of paying accounts with cash. Today our society has developed a philosophy of paying for everything possible on easy-to-obtain but hard-to-repay credit. This resolution is a step back in the right direction -- cash purchases.

I feel I can speak with authority on this resolution, which will be of assistance to the small business community, for several reasons. The first is personal experience. I’ve spent over a quarter of a century in small business and I think I know the problems of small business as well as anyone in this House. When I started in business many years ago, there was very little personal credit. Customers paid their accounts in cash or by cheque and merchants received 30, 60 or 90 days dating.

Mr. Wildman: COD.

Mr. J. Johnson: But today the tables have turned. Customers buy on credit and merchants have a maximum of 30 days dating. They can no longer afford to carry many accounts receivable, especially at the prohibitive interest rates in effect today.

Second, I served as president of my local businessmen’s association and also as president of the chamber of commerce. Through my participation in these two organizations, I know the principles set out in this resolution will be strongly supported by these groups.

Third, having the privilege and honour to represent the great riding of Wellington-Dufferin-Peel, I represent 21 individual municipalities with hundreds of small business enterprises -- farmers, retailers and small industries. I know that they too will welcome this resolution.

I contacted the general manager of the Retail Merchants Association of Canada (Ontario) Incorporated, John Gillespie, and requested his opinion of this resolution. Mr. Gillespie stated that he could speak for his association, which has 4,000 members. He stated quite clearly that he thought it was an excellent resolution and congratulated the member for Mississauga North for presenting this type of legislation.

I'd like to quote from Mr. Gillespie’s letter, if I may, “Speaking on behalf of over 4,000 independent retailers in the province of Ontario, Mr. John Gillespie, president of the Retail Merchants Association of Canada (Ontario) strongly supports the resolution made in the House by Terry Jones, MPP for Mississauga North.

“The principle of enclosing a blank cheque with orders for $100 or less from the provincial government to independent retailers will most certainly be a boon to the smaller businessmen in the area of receivables. This system would assist the retailer in enhancing his cash flow and reducing costly receivables.

“The retail merchants’ association endorses this resolution as a small but important step that the government of Ontario can take in easing the interest burden already unacceptable to the small retailer. With the current cost of borrowing money to cover inventory and receivables, many small businesses and their employees will just not survive.”

Mr. Speaker, we hear a lot in this House about the minimum wage. What I like about this resolution is that it serves on behalf of a large and important group of hard-working people who often work 60 and 70 hours a week for less than the minimum wage. I am talking about the self-employed, the men and women who run their own business with no employees, or perhaps two or three people working with them. These people are the backbone of this province’s economy. They deserve every break this government can give them.

Mr. Speaker, the intent of this resolution is also in the spirit of the goal of deregulation.

Mr. Wildman: It sure is.

Mr. J. Johnson: This was introduced to this Legislature by the Provincial Secretary for Justice (Mr. Walker). I think this government has made significant progress toward that regard and I welcome a further step.

It is my understanding that an extremely high percentage of government purchase orders falls into the classification that would be covered by this resolution and half a million has been mentioned. If this is so, then think of the tremendous amount of paperwork that will be eliminated, not only for the suppliers, but also for the government. The dollars saved in paperwork will likely go a long way to pay for any lost interest to the government for what might be construed as prepayment to the suppliers.

I might just mention that the member for Mississauga South (Mr. Kennedy) has introduced a private member’s resolution which will be debated in the near future. It deals also with this same problem. I believe it is item 33. It is a resolution that the government declare an annual small-business week in Ontario; the week to supplement and support the present small business activities that are ongoing throughout the year and to include seminars, information sessions, meeting with government, bankers, business consultants and to discuss other related matters that would assist both existing and potential small business in management, financing, production and marketing, as well as offering assistance towards increasing opportunities for small businesses.

In closing, may I say that in today’s business fieid, with high interest, bureaucratic red tape and paperwork and postal service that is anything but efficient, I personally feel the resolution of the member for Mississauga North is a sign of a return to sanity. It deserves the support of every free enterpriser in this House.

Mr. Eakins: I rise to speak briefly on this to this crowded chamber. I only hope the quorum bells don’t ring before I finish.

I want to commend the honourable member for bringing forth his resolution and providing an opportunity for the members to discuss something which I believe is very important to us all; the need to look into and improve the small business sector of Ontario.

The honourable member has recognized that a problem does exist. I am sure we all agree there, not only for amounts under $100, but also for payments of much larger amounts to suppliers of services.

The introduction of this resolution should very well serve to make the government aware of the need for an all-over review; the need to speed up payments to the small-business sector; and the need to make more opportunities available for the small-business people to be able to bid and receive contracts and subcontracts for goods and services. Improvement in the processing of payment is long overdue.

With this consolidation we must also find a way to make sure many of these suppliers are paid when the contractor goes into bankruptcy and can’t pay the local suppliers and yet a particular ministry has received the goods and services. Such has happened on a number of occasions in my riding. I want to point out that at Bark Lake in Haliburton county a contractor has gone into bankruptcy and many of the local people are waiting for payment for goods and services which they have already supplied. I don’t think it fair that these people, who have a very limited income and limited opportunities for earning, should have to be left without any assurance they are going to be paid for the service they have already rendered.

Looking into this resolution today, I think this is one area for which we should perhaps say to the honourable member we should be looking at amounts over $100. I agree the resolution gives us the opportunity to put forth these remarks.

Mr. Wildman: Even Leo doesn’t hand out blank cheques.

Mr. Eakins: I would suggest we should look into how we can better treat the people who have given these goods and services to the province of Ontario and to that particular ministry in good faith.

I believe what we require is a small business act for Ontario. The member for High Park-Swansea has spoken in this regard. Certainly, the context of this resolution could form a very valuable part of it.

You’ll recall, Mr. Speaker, it was about two years ago when I introduced that small business act into this House.

Mr. Wildman: It takes a long time to get to third reading.

Mr. Eakins: It was supported very well by all members of the Legislature. I fully appreciate there were some parts of that small business act that needed to be amended. I made those amendments in accordance with the comments made by the members of the House at that time and circulated them to all members. I was very much encouraged by the late Minister of Industry and Tourism who at that time assured me it would come before committee that fall. Unfortunately, this was not able to come about because of the circumstance which we all very much regret.

I just want to pay tribute to the late minister for the interest he gave to the small business act. A few months after the introduction of that act he called together the people who would be involved and interested in it, the various associations which have been mentioned here today -- The Canadian Manufacturers Association, the Retail Merchants Association, the Chamber of Commerce of Ontario, and the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. When we sat around the table and discussed the merits of that small business act, I think all were generally agreed it was a very good act and it had a great deal of merit. I feel had the small business act come before committee, many of the problems could have been resolved and I believe on an all-party basis there is a very good possibility today we would have had a small business act in Ontario.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: And this resolution would be included?

Mr. Eakins: Yes, I was just going to say that, Mr. Speaker, and I appreciate that. This resolution would form a part of that.

I just want to say I feel the discussion today -- and I appreciate the member’s introducing the resolution -- has given us an opportunity to comment on this. I would hope from this discussion perhaps we might be able to enlarge on the resolution and certainly resolve many of the problems which the small business people are encountering today with slow payments, late payments, and sometimes no payments. I commend the member for Mississauga North for the introduction of this resolution.

[4:30]

Mr. di Santo: Mr. Speaker, I think this is one of those resolutions that doesn’t mean anything because it doesn’t address the real problem the member wants to tackle. It’s also in a certain way a waste of time for the members of the Legislature.

The member for Mississauga North is trying to tell us that by giving a blank cheque to the small businessmen who are suppliers of the government, we are really trying to solve a problem which is much broader, a problem that has been created and has been developed the 36 years in which the Conservative Party has formed the government of this province. If there are late payments or if there are no payments, as the member for Victoria-Haliburton says, if the small businessmen are suffering because of red tape, that is the result of 37 years of Tory government in Ontario. We do not solve that problem by giving the suppliers of the government a blank cheque.

I think this resolution doesn’t address the real issue, the plight in which small businessmen in the province find themselves. It is because of the hick of a serious policy, because of the lack of a serious commitment of this government towards the small business community of the province.

My colleague, the member for High Park- Swansea, has illustrated quite eloquently why in Ontario the small businessmen are not only suffering but why they are suffering the consequences of the lack of a clear policy on the part of the government. With this resolution, we do not solve the two major problems that small businessmen have. One is the red tape and, as I said, that’s the result of the bureaucracy created by this government -- along with the federal government, to be fair.

Mr. Jones: You just read this resolution again.

Mr. di Santo: It isn’t anybody’s fault if the small businessmen are not paid on time, if the payments are delayed. It’s the fault of this government and with this resolution that problem is not solved.

Above all, it does not solve the most serious problem: This is the government’s purchasing policies which do not favour the small businessmen of Ontario.

Last spring the small business act introduced by the member for Victoria-Haliburton passed second reading and was endorsed by the House. Why is it that the government doesn’t introduce the third reading of the bill if the government is really serious about small business then?

We have been raising in this House question after question about the purchasing policies of the government of Ontario. We raised the case of the microfilm recording company, a Canadian company -- actually an Ontario firm -- which produces documents on microfilm. We brought up in this House that this company, which is a competitor of American and multinational corporations like IBM, is producing products which are cheaper than the competitors’ products, is competitive on the market, and they have asked the provincial government that they be accepted as a bidder. Today only four ministries are buying products from this company, an Ontario company with research and development in Ontario -- small businessmen, only 22 people. The government of Ontario buys from such small corporations as IBM or 3M at the higher prices.

We raised in this Legislature -- and the member for Mississauga North should know that -- the multimillion dollar resource recovery plan in the Peel region and what happened in that case. The plant was sponsored by nobody else but the Ontario government and Reed Limited. What did the Canadian companies say in that case? That they were not given enough time to prepare the bids and the contract went to Grumman Ecosystem Corporation of New York.

Just to give you another example of how serious the Conservative government is about the small businessmen of the province of Ontario, I would like to bring another example to your attention, Mr. Speaker, and in this case it is the Ministry of the Environment. They had to build a pollution-control system at Nanticoke. There was a Canadian company, Canadian Applied Technology, that is known not only in Canada but in the United States, because it had provided pollution equipment to different US states, and the Ministry of the Environment chose an American company to provide the pollution control equipment, with no explanation, neither on technical grounds nor on economic grounds.

This is the real problem. The problem is that the Conservative government haven’t got a serious purchasing policy which will work in the interests of the small businessmen of Ontario and, above all, in the interests of the people of Ontario, because you know the small businessmen are those who create more jobs in Ontario and in Canada.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business -- and I think its figures are accurate -- say that 80 per cent of the new jobs are created by small businessmen in Canada, but the government goes along with the increase in the interest rates and you know what that does to the small businessmen, Mr Speaker. That creates bankruptcies, because most of the small businessmen, especially the new small businessmen, get no help from the small business development corporations of Ontario. If the member looks at the record, he will see they get no help whatsoever from the Employment Development Fund. Of the $5 million which has been given by that fund in order to create employment in Ontario, very little went to the small businessmen and most of it went to big corporations.

The small businessmen are suffering the consequences of the high interest rate and there are many bankruptcies. The honourable member should look in his own backyard in Mississauga and see how many small businessmen in every sector are going bankrupt. He can look at the list of the bankruptcies. The manufacturing sector is a service sector.

The credit policy of this government is disgraceful and is not doing anything for the small businessmen of Ontario. For the member to suggest that by giving them a blank cheque he will resolve their problems is totally ridiculous and he knows that. That is why I said this kind of resolution wastes the time of this House.

Mr. Kennedy: I commend my colleague for bringing this forward because it points up --

Mr. Wildman: Did you say you commit him?

Mr. Peterson: This is the silliest resolution that has ever come before this House.

Mr. Kennedy: -- it points up one of the problems faced by small business.

Mr. Wildman: It is a carte-blanche resolution.

Mr. Peterson: It’s just silly.

Mr. Kennedy: What we really need, and the whole thrust of this, is to expedite the payment of bills, large or small --

Mr. Peterson: Expedite it then. Don’t go around handing out blank cheques. Don’t be silly.

Mr. Kennedy: -- but particularly small, in order that the business of the community, employment and so on can be sustained through prompt payment by government.

Mr. Peterson: This is just silly.

Mr. Kennedy: I’m somewhat concerned about shooting blank cheques around, but my colleague has pointed out the safeguards that would be built in.

Mr. Peterson: You’ve been shooting blanks for years over there.

Mr. Kennedy: My colleagues have spoken of this government’s commitment to small business. The opposition parties haven’t been so lavish in their praise, but they know down in their hearts that Ontario never had it better. Our business community has expanded. As our business community and commerce go, so go our standard of living, the health of the province and the many benefits we enjoy because of a healthy economy.

Running a small business isn’t an easy task. When I visit and discuss this with small business or big business people in my riding, they point out some of the difficulties -- the forms that need to be filed and the frustrations they have --

Mr. Peterson: Why don’t you do something about it then?

Mr. Young: You’re the government.

Mr. Kennedy: -- in conducting business efficiently and so on. One of these things is the delay in payment.

Mr. Peterson: Speed it up then. Don’t go handing them blank cheques. That’s silly.

Mr. Kennedy: Don’t get so excited. The member for London Centre was not here to hear all the speeches that were made, several of which were good while others weren’t so hot. I don’t need to isolate them or tell the member which were which. If he reads Hansard, he’ll know.

Mr. Peterson: I heard it all.

Mr. Kennedy: You heard it all, did you?

The resolution points up the problem. I would far rather see a re-examination of the payment process. It seems to me that if it isn’t in place now there could be a division in whatever the department is that pays and grants authority whereby a shipment as it’s received can be checked and matched to the invoice and a cheque issued right on the spot. I don’t know how feasible this is, but we certainly don’t want to open the way for hanky-panky or putting an extra zero on the cheque and this type of thing.

Mr. Peterson: You won’t have much time. You won’t have another 36 years.

Mr. Kennedy: I reiterate that my colleague from Mississauga North, the sponsor of the resolution, has pointed out that this safeguard is here. I wonder though if it might escalate if there was a $399 invoice and if four separate invoices might turn up from the same firm. Here again, I wouldn’t think that could occur because an order is an order and I don’t see any difficulty that way. But, by and large, I favour the stepping up of procedures.

The member for Wellington-Dufferin-Peel mentioned the resolution I have on the order paper, which I think is a very interesting one and which will be coming up for debate. It is about item 35, which I estimate would come up maybe next March or April. This asks the government to establish a small business week. During that week, as well as at other times throughout the year, in meetings involving government agencies, banks, consultants and others involved with small businesses, there would be the opportunity to bring forward through seminars and by resolution such suggestions as this that point up the problems.

I mentioned that the government should launch the week. I have an idea for the launching of the week. Next year happens to be a leap year. It isn’t because of any marital change I anticipate or anything like that, but why not, as has been done in history -- it’s not unique but it would be now -- declare a tax holiday for that 366th day for small business? In other words, if the bottom line is that taxes are $3,660 --

[4:45]

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Kennedy: -- there would be a day’s credit where there would be no taxation, a $10 credit to give some encouragement, a little flair and acknowledgement to the role that small business is playing.

I commend the member for bringing this forward. We’ve had a good debate here and I hope those who can assist small business will respond by overcoming the problem he brings forward.

Mr. Jones: I appreciate some of the comments introduced into the debate. However, I totally missed the point raised by a couple of members. I appreciate that the member for Essex North (Mr. Ruston) was hoping we could have used this time today for Workmen’s Compensation Board, the Ontario Institutes for Studies in Education and some other things, but he did finally get to talk about the resolution.

He did agree with the member for London Centre (Mr. Peterson), who came in with some interjections kind of late and who said he had been listening to the debate outside. I appreciate the comments of the member for Essex North when he said he could see how it would relieve some paperwork. All businessmen who have come from that background know how important it is to find ways to resolve this problem.

It is not the action of a tired old government if someone from the other side should get up and suggest we take a look at where we might have paper backlogs and try to find a way we can help expedite payments, not for a paltry sum, but as I said in my opening remarks, to do away with half a million invoices. That's not small potatoes; they represent large and important sums to a great number of small business people across the province.

The member for High Park-Swansea (Mr. Ziemba) talked about how we were irresponsible. He was way off target and he missed the whole point. He started into his rhetoric about how this government was a bad credit risk; I missed entirely what he was trying to say there. He wanted to blame us for corner drugstores disappearing I and some of the gas stations that have evaporated in his riding. He totally missed the point.

I would have thought that as a former merchant he would have -- and maybe right now he will be biting his tongue -- argued with the member for Wellington-Dufferin-Peel (Mr. J. Johnson), who seconded the resolution, when he quoted the comments of the president of the Retail Merchants Association of Canada -- no small group -- as he spoke for their 4,000 members. In the resolution he sent to us he used the words, “Admittedly this is a small step forward, but an important step.”

That group certainly doesn’t think the resolution is frivolous or a waste of this Legislature’s time. To them it is pretty important. So I thank the member for Wellington-Dufferin-Peel for his comments.

I also thank the member for Victoria-Haliburton (Mr. Eakins). I think all of us here appreciated his reminding us of the service given to us by the late Minister of Industry and Tourism, the honourable John Rhodes, how he did have an appreciation of the concerns of small business and how he advanced them. I feel comfortable that this same spirit, which was epitomized in the response of the honourable John Rhodes, continues on this side of the House, in this party of the government.

Mr. Speaker: The time for this item has expired.

Mr. Jones: I ask the members for their support. It is not a carte blanche, as some referred to it, but rather, seeing as the suppliers are known to the government person in the various towns, this is an opportunity to get rid of a lot of the in-between paperwork, save money and assist small business. men at this particularly difficult time for them.

FISCAL PLAN ACT

Mr. Van Horne moved second reading of Bill 145, An Act to provide for Fiscal Planning in the Government of Ontario.

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member has up to 20 minutes. If he wishes to reserve some time, he may notify the table officers.

Mr. Van Horne: I do serve notice to the table officer that I would like to reserve five minutes for concluding remarks.

This bill is another attempt to draw to the attention of the government the need for more adequate fiscal planning in the affairs of our province. This is a theme I have repeatedly stressed since I became a member of this Legislature in 1977. The theme is repeated to constantly remind the government of the need for good planning in the affairs of this province, not just now, not just next year, but for many years to come.

In so far as the specifics of this bill are concerned, we are asking that the years to come be at least five. Certainly this is most incumbent on us as members of Her Majesty’s loyal opposition. Beyond that, of course, it is the duty of all elected members -- government, opposition, third party -- to exercise vigilance over all aspects of finance, both revenue and expenditure, and, beyond that, the programs related to revenue and expenditure; that is, what actually happens to the moneys.

Items similar to this bill have been brought before us many times in this Legislature. Frequently, these bills are summarily discarded by the government. Certainly my private member’s bill of May 24 of this year, An Act to provide for information relating to the Financial Cost and Economic Impact of Government Programs, is an example of a of a bill that was summarily discarded.

Mr. Peterson: Great bill. This government needs it.

Mr. Van Horne: I introduce Bill 145 an Act to provide for Fiscal Planning in the Government of Ontario, with a degree of optimism, even though it may not pass this time, it will serve as a further reminder to the government of the need to plan.

Mr. Peterson: Think positive, Ronnie think positive.

Mr. Van Horne: In a sense I am optimistic, or positive as my colleague from London Centre suggests, because I know if it doesn’t happen this time it will next time or the time after. I’m optimistic enough to think there are enough people in this Legislature with enough common sense to get their heads together and agree that planning is necessary.

I’m a little unlike the former leader of the third party. It was reported in an article in the Star yesterday headed “Insight” that to the member for York South (Mr. MacDonald) it is the principle which is important, the principle being that everything should be open unless otherwise designated, instead of the other way around. The article goes on to say he is willing to wait a while longer, knowing that something is coming down the stream. In this instance, that something is the Williams report.

His patience comes from longevity of service and perhaps greater wisdom -- in both instances greater than I have. But by the same token, I am optimistic that if we don’t do it today, it’s a sensible enough idea that it will be done.

I don’t know if the government is doing any forward fiscal planning, therefore I’m not prepared to wait quite as long as my colleague and the former leader of the third party. I think the government should move ahead with such planning right now.

My urging is not isolated. One has only to look at the Lambert report released earlier this year to find similar urging. I would ask all members present to consider the argument provided by the Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet (Mr. McCague) in his comments of October 19, in which he excuses the government of Ontario from some aspects of that particular report with the rather vague argument that its provisions don’t really apply to Ontario.

Let me quote just a few lines. I’m quoting from Hansard, page 3668, where the minister says: “Naturally, not all of the proposals the Lambert commission has made are relevant to our situation. Provincial legislation and the practices of this House respecting financial administration differ from those at the federal level. In many respects the report is the prescription for someone else’s ailments.”

Surely comments like that can’t go by without some kind of criticism from me or from my colleagues. When we look at a budget deficit in this province, as huge as our deficit is this year, and when we look at programs whose costs have spiralled out of all control, we must agree that there is need for the Treasurer of this province (Mr. F. S. Miller) to take Bill 145 and its provisions and see that they are implemented as quickly as possible.

In looking elsewhere for support for my comments I find it in the words of J. J. Macdonell, auditor general of Canada, when he spoke in this Legislature only a few weeks ago to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. He said that Parliament was close to losing control of the public purse and that there was a breakdown in the chain of accountability from the bureaucracy, to Parliament, to the voters. I submit that this bill helps to re-establish the chain of accountability just mentioned. It does so by following a very simple way.

It is proposed in the bill that when the Treasurer presents the budget of the government of Ontario to the assembly that he submit a five-year fiscal plan. The plan would provide information on the estimates of revenue for each of the next five years. It would set out expenditure ceilings for the next five years. It would indicate the expected budgetary surplus or deficit over the next five years. It’s a very simple mathematical exercise.

I’m sure that my grade two, little seven year-old at home could take this and add up the pluses, add up the minuses and get the difference between the two and come out with basically, the same kind of program. But planning as simple as this appears to be beyond the desire -- and I’m not saying beyond the reach -- of our present government.

In addition to the provisions I have just laid out before the members, there is a further demand that the plan be referred to a standing committee of government finance and the economy. This, of course, would be something new to this legislature.

The committee to which I just referred, which by the provisions of this bill would be called the standing committee on government finance and the economy, would be different from our present committee structure, though in some respects it would be similar. It would be similar in that it would have representation from all three parties and that it would report to this assembly periodically or, as the bill says, from time to time.

It would be different in that it would have an overview of the finances of this province different from the overview of any other existing committee of this House. I think it bears repeating that there is at this time no committee of this House, including the public accounts committee, that has an overview of the expenditures, the revenues and the plans of this government. That is wrong. This bill rights the wrong.

[5:00]

Obviously, too, this bill would require reconsideration of the present estimates process. The estimates process, as we all know, is that way in which we go through an almost totally useless exercise of reviewing the financial needs of each ministry, because in reviewing we very seldom, if ever, change the numbers. We very seldom, if ever, get to the numbers until after most of the money is committed or spent. In other words, even though we have the estimates process this House really does not have control over the money and how it is spent.

By and large then the estimates are really a policy-checking process. It’s a time or a place at which a member really can raise issues of local concern. How often have we sat through the estimates to listen to the member for wherever talk about a drainage ditch, or a person who lost his or her licence, or a program that didn’t come to fruition in the community because the funds weren’t there? Really, in terms of the various committees sitting in to review the money of a ministry and the way those moneys are spent, I would submit that the estimates exercise is one which is creaky, which is old, and which should either be thrown out or revised immensely to give the members some more ability to direct the financial affairs of this province.

Let me just for a moment reflect on a few examples of unplanned government spending which are prime examples, or proof positive, that such a piece of legislation as this would be beneficial to the citizens of the province in that if the bill had been in place happenings such as this would not have been allowed to go on unquestioned.

Let’s take a very brief look at the Urban Transportation Development Corporation and how much it has cost us. Let’s take a look at the Niagara Escarpment Commission, established in 1973 at an estimated cost of $100,000 to $200,000 a year, but which in the last four years has cost $1.5 million, on average, per year.

What about the Ontario Land Corporation? The Ontario Land Corporation, called by Mr. Best in the Star not too long ago “a 1974 buying spree,” cost us $311 million and is presently costing the taxpayers of Ontario $28 million a year in carrying charges.

Minaki Lodge -- how much has that disaster cost us? According to the Sun, in an article I have here --

Mr. Wildman: Sixteen million, isn’t it?

Mr. Van Horne: -- dated October 21, the heading says, “Minaki Lodge Gets $20 Million Boost.” That’s $20 million in addition to what? How many millions more are going to be spent on something that is really not a viable expenditure for this province?

Those are a handful of examples and I could go on, but the point is simply this: those expenditures and many others like them are expenditures which should not have been allowed to carry on year after year after year.

I have a few concluding remarks. I get the strong suspicion that the member for Oriole (Mr. Williams) is ready to leap into action --

Mr. Wildman: No, you keep on.

Mr. Mancini: Leap maybe, but very little action.

Mr. Van Horne: -- to tell us of all the wonderful things the government is doing and therefore submit to us that this bill is no good. I would submit that these examples of loose spending come as a result of this lack of planning and also as a result of the way the budget is presented to us each year; very briefly, a budget of two parts, a budget statement followed up by budget papers.

These are fine as far as they go -- and I haven’t the time to get into the examples in the book but what happens here, time after time in the charts et cetera, is that we go back to 1976. But we go forward only to this fiscal year. There is no forward planning, I say to the member for Oriole (Mr. Williams). There is no planning in the budget process. That’s part of what is wrong. The government is great with hindsight, but it has no foresight.

Mr. Williams: You haven’t read the budget obviously.

Mr. Mancini: The member for Oriole doesn’t understand it, anyway.

Mr. Williams: Read what’s between the two covers.

Mr. Van Horne: Mr. Speaker, let me conclude and save a few minutes for rebuttal.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: The honourable member has four minutes remaining.

Mr. Laughren: I guess there is no doubt in your mind, Mr. Speaker, that I would be rising to support this bill. Of course, I wouldn’t presume to speak for all of my colleagues, this being a private member’s debate. But I will tell you, when I saw this bill on the Order Paper, and picked it up and read it, my reaction was one of disbelief. I had a very eerie sense when I picked up the bill and read: to think a five-year plan would come from a Liberal in Ontario I would not have believed it. This smacks of economic planning; it really does. I would not have believed it possible, as long as I stay in this House.

Mr. Williams: You’re mad for being stupid, Floyd.

Mr. Laughren: What this bill implies is that the economy out there needs a little bit of direction now and again, and perhaps needs the oar dipped in the water just occasionally to keep the canoe on a straight line.

Mr. Peterson: You don’t use oars in a canoe, Floyd. No wonder you are in such trouble.

Mr. Laughren: What do you use, a paddle?

Mr. Peterson: You’re rowing your canoe; you’re supposed to paddle it.

Mr. Laughren: Well, whatever, Mr. Speaker. It does imply that the Liberal member has decided there needs to be a little bit of direction; and I find that strange.

Mr. Kerrio: I would have made it a six-year plan. We’ve had too much of those plans.

Mr. Laughren: Can you imagine, Mr. Speaker -- and I am supporting this bill; I want to make that clear. I come here to praise it, not to damn it.

Mr. Peterson: Don’t criticize it then.

Mr. Laughren: Can you imagine fiscal planning from a party that believes in a free market? That the free market should make the economic decisions that take place out there? I find that truly remarkable.

Mr. Kerrio: We were just getting ready to say something nice about you.

Mr. Laughren: I find it very strange that fiscal planning would come from a member of the party that believes the natural course of events, the invisible hand of the market, will really look after the problems, and all we have to do is to keep down government spending.

I was following the member all the way through his speech until he got to the end, and somehow came to the conclusion that fiscal planning involved restraining government expenditures and little else. I find that difficult to countenance.

Mr. Peterson: Fiscal planning is not necessarily fiscal planning.

Mr. Laughren: I find it very difficult that fiscal planning would come from a party that really wouldn’t want to interfere with what is going on out there, not even to the extent of ensuring that the economy out there is not totally controlled and owned by people outside our jurisdiction. I find that very strange.

The other thing I find strange is that, even though the bill states very specifically that it is to deal with estimates of revenues, expenditure ceilings and budgetary surplus or deficit, it doesn’t deal at all with any of the factors that would affect those conditions -- nothing; there is nothing. There are no goals in the five-year fiscal plan that the member would implement in Ontario. How can one possibly have any kind of five-year fiscal planning without goals attached to it? It doesn’t make any sense whatsoever to have that kind of fiscal plan. It doesn’t make any sense at all.

Mr. Peterson: A fiscal plan is a fiscal plan.

Mr. Laughren: If the member is prepared to say a fiscal plan should have within it certain goals to carry it through the next five years to ensure that we achieve those goals, then it would make some sense. But I come here to support the bill, not to debunk it.

Mr. Kerrio: It’s pretty hard to understand what you’re doing.

Mr. Laughren: I am just trying to make some positive suggestions.

Mr. Peterson: I’m glad you told us you were supporting the bill.

Mr. Laughren: All I am saying is that while the idea of a five-year fiscal plan is not original -- I think I have heard the expression before -- it is not a bad idea to have some fiscal planning in Ontario.

Mr. Peterson: Joseph Stalin, the father of your party, invented it.

Mr. Laughren: I wouldn’t make any references or links between the member for London North (Mr. Van Horne) and Joseph Stalin. I wouldn’t do that, Mr. Speaker. I wouldn’t even mention their names in the same breath. That’s why I stopped and took a different breath when I said what I did.

But, Mr. Speaker, can you imagine a hollow five-year plan? A hollow five-year fiscal plan? We will be the laughingstock of the world. Here we have a fiscal plan that’s empty; there’s nothing in it.

When he replies, I would ask the member for London North what model he used. What model did he use when he was thinking about this fiscal plan?

Mr. Mancini: You socialists would take away everything.

Mr. Laughren: What model did he use to launch the Liberal Party of Ontario into its great leap forward?

Mr. Kerrio: I know your five-year plan.

Mr. Mancini: We understand your five-year plan.

Mr. Kerrio: We know your five-year plan: nationalize everything; pay for everything. Take from the haves and give to the havenots.

Mr. Laughren: There had to be a model. But, looking at this bill, I couldn’t even guess whether it was a Chinese or an Albanian model. Maybe it was an Alberta model. I have no idea. But surely the member was inspired by some kind of model he obtained somewhere.

I support this bill because --

Mr. Kerrio: You have to keep reiterating that, because it becomes quite a question.

Mr. Laughren: -- I couldn’t disagree with any bill that says we need a fiscal plan for Ontario. But if this bill goes to committee -- and at this point we don’t know whether it will or not -- I hope the honourable member will accept some amendments which will make the bill that much stronger.

I’d like to suggest to the honourable member that we have some very positive suggestions that would make this a good bill.

Mr. Mancini: We can imagine what you have up your sleeve.

Mr. Laughren: I am telling the honourable member, and I am very serious about it, I can’t imagine a fiscal plan which didn’t include the following things in order to make it worthwhile. Otherwise, if it is sent to a committee it would be just like a general budget debate during the year and it won’t bear any fruit at all.

A five-year plan should contain commitments to help us achieve the goals. So goals are needed to start with; I would list a few of them:

First, I think there should be a goal of very carefully selecting particular sectors that need rebuilding. I could list any number of sectors.. For example, the machinery sector in Ontario is in a bad state. I think of mining machinery, food processing, electronics and electrical products, which are specific, relatively high-technology and important sectors in the economy of Ontario that need rebuilding. They should be selected in a five-year fiscal plan. Pick one at a time. Quite frankly, if they could pick one every five years, we’d end up with a healthier economy a lot faster than the way it is happening now. This five-year plan would be a beautiful opportunity to say we are going to put an enormous effort into rebuilding, for example, the auto parts industry or the machinery industry in Ontario.

Perhaps a second goal would be the reduction in the level of foreign ownership in particular sectors of the Ontario economy. The destructive aspects of foreign ownership are becoming clearer and clearer as we see the outflow of interest and dividend payments year after year, which is the source of much of our problems from high interest rates to the amount of inflation. There is an enormous opportunity to build that into a five-year plan.

What about mineral processing? If we can increase the amount of mineral processing in Ontario in the five-year period, we have done ourselves a long-run favour, because there is an enormous amount of new wealth to be created by further processing of minerals.

I have no quarrel with the specific levels of provincial debt revenues and expenditures in the bill. But they should be tied into other things that are going to be attempted. For example, if a crown corporation is going to be created to do mineral processing because it’s not being done by the private sector, it may very well affect the level of provincial debt over a five-year period or perhaps even longer. That should be part of the five-year fiscal plan as well. Specific levels in the balance of trade on auto parts, for example, should also be part of the five-year fiscal plan.

The reduction in the level of Ontario Health Insurance Plan premiums over a period of five years should be included. Perhaps specific taxation goals such as -- I hope -- the reintroduction, of the succession duties should also be included. Of course, the Liberals may have to serve notice of a change in position on an issue like that, which might bother them.

Notice should be served in a five-year fiscal plan that certain parts of the resource sector will be brought into the public sector to achieve provincial goals. Job creation and apprenticeship programs should be built into a fiscal plan like that. I was looking at a chart on housing starts the other day, and it looked like a yo-yo had traced it. Perhaps even specified social goals could be implemented over a five-year period. Although it does cost some money, the implementation of legislation creating equal pay for work of equal value would do something for the women in Ontario.

[5:15]

Mr. Deputy Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Laughren: Thank you. In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, God forbid that we should continue to drift. I support the idea of a fiscal plan for the province. We saw the Treasurer debunk Conference Board in Canada statistics today without ever saying what his statistics were. I commend the member for London North for bringing in the bill, and we will support it. I hope he will support our amendments when they go to committee.

Mr. Williams: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to participate in the debate this afternoon on the bill before us, sponsored by the member for London North.

I must say that I think there’s one area in which we have common agreement. In areas of fiscal planning and accountability, one has to direct oneself to this type of planning on a long-term basis. I don’t think there is any doubt about that. The day of the rural municipalities, of the small public bodies and governments that were able to deal with relatively simple issues involving very little capital expenditures or programs that required long-term involvements as far as financial investment was concerned, is long gone.

I believe the member for London North. In the past, I have served on municipal councils or school boards in urban areas where it has become quite apparent that, even at the municipal level, you have to have financial integrity and viability to provide meaningful continuity to government programs. It can only be brought about by long-term considerations. It used to be that municipalities were limited to one-year terms so they didn’t have the statutory authority to even plan programs involving expenditures beyond their terms of office. Now, with the two-year plans, it does afford some opportunity for local municipalities to do a bit of medium-term planning.

One of the major arguments in favour of extending the two-year term, which exists in the larger urban areas such as Metropolitan Toronto, is to achieve this end purpose of having a continuity in planning, fiscally and otherwise. I know from my own personal experiences on the Metropolitan Toronto corporation that many of the programs we dealt with before committees were formulated on the basis of three-year programs at the beginning of the terms of those councils. That is probably one of the strongest reasons why I would subscribe to reintroduction of the three-year term.

There are two criticisms I have with regard to the bill before us today. I think they are indeed valid criticisms. First, the sponsor of the bill has clearly stated that there has been no long-term fiscal planning by this government.

Mr. Wildman: You have proved that in the north over and over again.

Mr. Williams: With respect, as I said a few moments ago in an aside, the member obviously has not read recent budgetary presentations by not only the present Treasurer (Mr. F. S. Miller) but also his predecessor, the Honourable Darcy McKeough. It is quite apparent that long-term fiscal planning and considerations are paramount to maintaining fiscal integrity.

There is no question that, technically, the budgets presented have to direct themselves in a specific way to a 12-month fiscal period. Notwithstanding that, it’s quite apparent -- and you don’t even have to read between the lines -- that in the budgetary process one has to look beyond a 12-month period. It is well known, and it would be naive to think otherwise, that our own economists in the Treasury, as well as outside economists and other people who are knowledgeable in the fields of finance and economic matters, are consulted and their considerations taken into account --

Mr. Peterson: Parliament never looks at them.

Mr. Williams: -- not simply to have their views as to what the next 12 months will produce, but indeed as to the longer-term ramifications and considerations of tying either to turn off the financial tap or to prime the pump, to use the common vernacular.

Lest there be any doubt that this cannot be substantiated -- and I think this is something that the sponsors clearly and perhaps intentionally overlooked today -- the fact is that it is spelled out quite dearly in recent budgets that long-term planning was an integral part of the budgetary process.

Mr. Wildman: You never implement any of the plans.

Mr. Williams: I need only direct the member to the 1977 budget presented by the then Treasurer, the Honourable Darcy McKeough. At that time, it was explicitly stated -- in fact, it couldn’t have been stated more clearly -- that the budget was not designed to deal simply with the immediate 12-month period for which he was immediately accountable; it projected the possible revenue deals that were anticipated over a three-year period, not just the 12-month period to which he was addressing his budget. A significant part of the budget, through a budget paper to which the member referred earlier in speaking about the structure of the budgets presented annually by the Treasurer -- a whole budget paper, in fact -- is devoted towards a balanced budget.

While there may be ridicule and criticism directed at the fact that the ultimate may not have been achieved, the Treasurer at that time clearly spelled out that they were endeavouring to plan at least for a specific three-year program of financing. I think the member has conveniently overlooked that fact. I think by simply reading these budgets, one can clearly see that his allegations do not stand up under factual assessment of the current budgets.

The member has also made reference to the Lambert report, the recent federal government publication emanating from the Royal Commission on Financial Management and Accountability. The previous speaker asked the sponsor of the bill as to the source of his material for the substance of his bill. Obviously, he has drawn heavily on the Lambert report, which stresses heavily the need for long-term financing and the five-year program.

Mr. Peterson: Very responsible thinking.

Mr. Williams: In referring to the Lambert report, as he did, the member himself suggested it would have equal application here in Ontario. With that, Mr. Speaker, I must disagree, because one simply has to look at why the Lambert report and the royal commission were set up.

It was in 1976 that the federal Auditor General issued a stinging indictment of the federal government, by reason of the fact that it was grossly mismanaging the public purse at the federal level.

Mr. Kerrio: You people ought to know all about that. Your numbers aren’t so good, you know.

Mr. Williams: The Liberal government of that day was so set back by this indictment, which had never been so strong in recent years, that it set up the royal commission to try to temper the situation. It was quite apparent at that time, and the Auditor General clearly said, that things were out of line, that they had lost control. The increase in the public service was accelerating at an unprecedented rate. The same was true of federal expenditures. At the time, the Prime Minister of that day was saying, “We will curtail spending; we will keep the civil service to a reasonable level,” and he was going in exactly the opposite direction in terms of implementing action.

Mr. Mancini: Who was saying that, the Premier of Ontario?

Mr. Kerrio: Bill Davis was saying that.

Mr. Williams: By contrast, in Ontario I simply have to point out that in the past three-year period this government has constrained its spending by $1.2 billion and has reallocated $900 million to other areas where it felt greater priorities had arisen in the interim.

I think one can clearly distinguish where there has been responsible and accountable fiscal planning as contrasted to what’s happened at other levels of government and jurisdictions.

My last criticism is simply that ironically, at the last private members’ hour, last week, the member got up and protested loudly that one should not block legislation before this Legislature. Yet here he brings before us a bill that is so fundamentally central to the whole democratic process --

Mr. Deputy Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Williams: -- where the party system and control by the government in power is vested solely in the government; that he would try to refute that with this type of legislation, I suggest, is ludicrous.

Mr. Kerrio: Clean up your act.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Williams: If ever a bill aspired to be certainly this bill should be. I encourage my colleagues to do so.

Mr. Peterson: Mr. Speaker, I must say I’m quite flabbergasted by the last remarks of the member for Sleepy Hollow. His circuitous logic to try to justify the government’s blocking this bill -- and of course we fear the worst because they always block progressive bills and indeed have made a mockery of this private members’ hour -- it disturbs me very much. The logic just expressed by that member, as in other remarks in his speech, escapes me completely.

Mr. Williams: I realize it’s over your head.

Mr. Peterson: I want to compliment the member for London North who, since he was elected here, has worked very hard to bring in mechanisms and devices to encourage economy, efficiency and effectiveness in government spending. He realizes, as do other people on this side of the House, there’s no one way to do that kind of thing.

The whole thrust of this bill, like the thrust of other bills he has introduced over a period of time in this House, is to reverse the onus; to provide counterweights to the incredible power of government to mismanage the economy and government spending. It’s only when we get some kind of accountability back into this Parliament, when all members -- back-bench members and opposition members -- can have a real input into the spending process and fiscal process in this province, that we are going to have any kind of responsibility or accountability. There are many aspects of that.

Bringing any kind of control on government spending is almost like moving an elephant in full flight with a series of pea-shooters. Even though a lot of people are shooting at him, it still is difficult to change his course. We just hope through a series of devices -- one of which is being discussed today -- that eventually enough collective countervailing pressure can be brought about on the government to bring more accountability and to make sure those people charged with the stewardship of the public purse are doing the most responsible job they can possibly do.

The public accounts committee is one way of doing that, but there are major structural problems with that. We review a report that’s ex post facto. It’s a year late at best. Yes, we have an opportunity to review what the auditor has brought before that committee, but it’s too late.

It is just like the estimates procedure, which in many respects is a waste of the time of this House. I am very much hoping the committee headed by the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh) is going to come up with some major and important recommendations on how we can make that estimates procedure more responsible and more responsive to this House. But there again, we are discussing expenditures that usually have already taken place and it turns out to be general policy debates on a number of meaningless issues. They really are a waste, to my judgement, of some 400 hours of the time of this House and its committees.

In the suggestion of my colleague from London North there is an excellent, before-the-fact device to get some handle on government spending; that is, forcing the government to reveal its plans in a five-year forecast, using current taxing assumptions and all the prevailing information at the time.

We realize that no one is perfect over a five-year period; even our friends to the left are not that perfect over a long period of time.

Mr. Kerrio: They don’t know what they’re doing next week.

[5:30]

Mr. Peterson: What’s important is the establishment of that committee on government finance and the economy, which will become an important, functioning, integral part of this House, and that is something we do not have now.

We have structural problems, apart from the budget debate, which has become another meaningless sort of debate in this House; the speeches made late at night when no one is here and nobody pays any particular attention to them. One structural problem is that members of this House are rarely in a position to sit down, around a committee table, and discuss the two sides of the budgeting process; not just the expenditures, which we discuss in estimates and in public accounts to some extent, all after the fact, but also the revenue side.

It is a disturbing fact to me that far too many members of this House have what I would call a management bias when it comes to making a decision. The government cannot look only at the expenditure side; it must also be forced to look at the revenue side. How often do we as back-bench members of the government party or as opposition members, go into the estimates and suggest cuts in expenditures? Usually, the thrust and the onus of that debate is to spend more money -- for a bridge in our riding, more in social services, or whatever happens to be our cause of the day. That is the normal procedure in estimates.

Nowhere in the current system do we collectively sit down and analyse all sides of the fiscal plan of this province. One of the very difficult things we all encounter when we analyse efficiency, effectiveness and economy in government is the standards we employ. We all make up our own standards -- abstract, some more abstract, some less abstract -- using our own particular expertise to make a judgement on what the government is doing.

It is my view that we are going to have to force the government to bring some objective standards to this House for full and complete discussion of both sides of the balance sheet of this province. That is not done now. When the government is forced to make a five-year plan, all members of this House can say the year after, “That didn’t happen,” or “It did happen; well done boys,” or “It didn’t happen; why didn’t it happen?” These would be updated on an annual basis and, in my judgement, would force a measure of responsibility on all members to take very seriously the budgeting problems and the long-term problems of a jurisdiction such as Ontario.

It is a known fact that precious little attention is paid by the government process to the problems this country and this province will have five years, 10 years and 20 years from now. I don’t think many members would disagree with that.

Just look at the whole pension crisis, for example. It is one of the major problems we face in terms of refinancing from this government, and virtually no attention has been paid to it. There has been no committee assessment of those kinds of problems.

One could argue from a straight, crassly political point of view that politicians are punished for taking a long-term view. It is pretty difficult to take the public mind ahead five and 10 years to something that is going to affect people then, and say, “We must worry about it now.” But we must worry about it now. There is no other organized group or institution of society that is charged with the responsibility for what is coming in the future to the same extent that government institutions are, and I include the government of Ontario.

This provision is not the only one. It is just one of a number of devices suggested by my colleague’s bill, by other members of my party as well as by colleagues from other parties. It is just one more device to bring some responsibility, to take the long-term view of some of the very serious problems that face this province.

I ask the member for Sleepy Hollow not to encourage his colleagues to stand up and veto this bill.

Mr. Laughren: The member for Sleepy Hollow?

Mr. Wildman: He is asking for the Headless Horseman to come in and veto the bill.

Mr. Peterson: We have all talked about accountability in this House. We have all talked about providing a more important role for the back-benchers and the non-cabinet members. This is one way we can do it. We can question officials in the Treasury; we can take the long-term view. I think it is important to know what is going to happen five years from now.

He referred to the 1977 budget. Members will recall that it was just before an election, and they will recall the mood of that time; it was one of concern about governing spending. Certainly that was one of the major issues of the day, an issue that the government tried to co-opt. The then Treasurer, Mr. McKeough, in his wisdom, said, “I am going to balance the budget in 1981, and here is how I am going to do it.” You will recall that was a fundamental part of the campaign in 1977, part of the great manifesto of the Conservative Party: “We are going to balance the budget in 1981.”

He went; they brought in his new little friend from Muskoka. After he had looked at the books for a few months and wasn’t exactly sure what he was going to do, he said: “We are going to balance the budget in 1984.” I suspect in another couple of years, when pressed, the next Treasurer -- whoever that may be -- will say: “We’ll probably balance the budget in 1987”, and so forth and so forth.

One of the problems we have, and it’s seen daily in this House, is that we have a Treasurer whose position on any given issue is unknowable. He’s the classic two-handed Treasurer. On the one hand, he listens to this group of economists; on the other hand, he listens to the other group of economists and somehow ends up with no position, down the middle, some time. There’s evidence of that every day in the House -- on interest rates, on oil prices, or whatever. A charming fellow, Mr. Speaker.

I say, to the credit of the last Treasurer, at least we always knew where he stood. He took strong stands. He wasn’t afraid to lay out his position.

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Peterson: I’m just going to finish my last sentence, Mr. Speaker, if I may. The government must be forced into this kind of discipline; it is the only discipline a Legislature like this can exercise over a government. It is a good bill, and I would urge all my compatriots in the House to support it.

Ms. Bryden: Mr. Speaker, I’m not sure if the member for London North has been struck on the way to Damascus, but it is a pleasure to see him introduce a bill that embodies what is basically a socialist idea.

Mr. Kerrio: Perish the thought.

Mr. Peterson: Lambert is a socialist.

Ms. Bryden: The NDP has been advocating planning for a great number of years. It’s the only sane way to anticipate problems and to be ready to meet them. It’s the only way to overcome the deficiencies in the free market system. It’s the only way to adjust to major disruptions in the economy which occur when things like world oil prices suddenly increase at frightening rates. It’s the only way government can give leadership to the economy and maximize our overall wellbeing in this province.

But in the past this government has always taken the attitude that planning was dangerous socialist dogma and that the government’s role was simply to react to crises and to pick up the pieces after the event. And look at the mess we’re in now as a result.

However, according to the member for Oriole, it appears that the provincial government has been engaging in planning in the closet.

Mr. Kerrio: They don’t know what’s going to happen next week.

Ms. Bryden: It seems as though everybody is getting on the bandwagon these days. The Lambert commission, in March 1979, came out with a report that recommended virtually the same thing as this bill proposes.

Just last week, the Economic Council of Canada in its latest annual report urged greater openness in fiscal planning and suggested a mid-term fiscal plan should be prepared for submission to Parliament and to the public. Perhaps the Conservatives feel they should get on the bandwagon too.

In fact, if they block this bill, we can only conclude they still really do not believe in democratic planning, which involves not just navel-gazing in back rooms but also giving the public an opportunity to comment on the plan as well as giving the members of the Legislature an opportunity to debate the plan,

In that context, I hope the member for London North envisages in his bill that when the fiscal plan is referred to his new standing committee there will be full public hearings on that plan.

Citizens’ groups and public interest organizations should have the same opportunity to comment and participate in the discussion as corporations do. This may involve some public funding to make it possible for those groups to appear so that a variety of views can be presented. We may have to have some time limits on the public hearings if the annual consideration of the fiscal plan is to become part of the budgetary process. But I hope the time available will be divided fairly between the different points of view and act limited to those, such as lobbyists and lawyers, who can provide lengthy briefs at great expense, which they later deduct from their income tax.

I believe that the member’s concept of a fiscal plan is a fairly broad one. It would include projections of both revenues and expenditures under given assumptions and the current tax structures. However, I think there is one particular type of data that should be included in his fiscal plan. I would like to propose it in case he has not considered it and ask that he consider adding it as an amendment to the bill if it goes to committee. What should be included, I think, are estimates of what have come to be known as tax expenditures.

In a recent publication of the Canadian Tax Foundation, the term “tax expenditures” is defined by the author, Professor Roger Smith of the University of Alberta, as follows: “Those provisions in the income tax which result in lower income tax revenues owing to the preferential treatment of certain economic activities, income or individuals tax revenues forgone, because of the special provisions, are in many ways similar to direct subsidies and may be viewed as expenditures made through the tax system or ‘indirect expenditures.’ ”

While the author does not imply that tax expenditures are necessarily a good or a bad thing in terms of achieving our fiscal and social goals, he does make a plea for publication of tax expenditure details as part of the budget. I also suggest it should be part of a fiscal plan.

He makes his plea on these grounds:

“Canadians should be fully aware of those provisions in the income tax law which result in preferential treatment of certain individuals, economic activities and forms of income. And we should know the magnitude of revenues forgone because of these provisions.”

The publications of tax expenditures in the budget has been done in the United States and West Germany for 10 years, and is to start in Britain this year. So it is not an entirely new concept and does not seem to be causing any problems in those jurisdictions. In fact, I think the practice has been praised as providing legislators and the public with full knowledge of what kind of subsidization is going on through the tax system.

The Canadian Tax Foundation publication, to which I referred, produced estimates of the amount of lost federal revenue from tax expenditures in 1975. They came to $13.2 billion, which was more than one third of direct federal spending of about $33 billion in 1975, the year for which the calculation was made. If similar figures had been compiled for the 10 provinces, it is likely that several additional billions would be added to the total of tax expenditures.

[5:45]

While there may be disagreement on what you define as tax expenditures and what items you include in the total, the fact remains that there are substantial sums being handed out to individuals, organizations and companies through the tax system which are not reported directly to Parliament and the legislatures. They are expenditures just as much as direct subsidies and grants are expenditures. Since one of our goals as legislators is to have a “chain of accountability,” as the member for London North mentioned, these must be included in any consideration; otherwise, there is a break in the chain.

The elected representatives at the moment do not have an opportunity to vote the amounts that go into tax expenditures each year, nor to examine how much is spent by this route nor to see to whom it goes.

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member has half a minute.

Ms. Bryden: In closing, I will ask the member for London North to consider an amendment of this sort and perhaps to comment on it in his windup remarks.

Mr. Van Horne: Mr. Speaker, I’ve enjoyed the debate of this past hour, and I would like to respond to a point or two made by the member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Laughren) and his colleague the member for Beaches-Woodbine (Ms. Bryden). They have suggested that they would have amendments to make if this piece of legislation were passed on to committee. Certainly it would be most reasonable that amendments be made to this. That, of course, is part of the function of the committee process.

The member for Nickel Belt asked what kind of a five-year plan we might have. I would submit to him that other existing plans cannot be superimposed on Ontario, and therefore we would have to have an eclectic type of plan, one which would meet the needs of our province on a year-to-year basis.

He did follow up with some specific suggestions for rebuilding the economy and applying first effort to machinery, as an example, or reducing foreign ownership or increasing the mineral processing industry. All of these are commendable. I would submit that, if we get that far, obviously we would have to set certain priorities. All of the suggestions made are good.

In so far as the comments from the member for Oriole (Mr. Williams) are concerned, I got the impression that I was caught in a revolving door. I first heard words of support and then ended up hearing words which really detracted from that support and reflected moreover on the function of private members’ hour. After listening to him, I came away with a sense of frustration and confusion.

I can’t let pass without comment the observation he made about the planning that’s evident in the Ontario budget. He did submit that there is evidence of long-term planning. He had to go back to a budget of the former Treasurer, the former member for Kent-Elgin, the Honourable Mr. McKeough, to find some evidence -- limited albeit -- of long-range planning.

I would submit to him and to other members present that, if one takes a look at the 1979 budget, one will find also very limited evidence of long-range planning. The only real evidence I can find is in budget paper A, table 6, which does project, up to 1985, future shifts in Ontario’s labour force. There is also one other limited section of only a few pages, which looks forward to the shape of fiscal policy in the 1980s. There is some very limited reference there to the forward look of Ontario budget planning. Other than that we really don’t have any evidence,

That, I hope, proves the case of Bill 145; that it is needed, it should be accepted, it should go to committee and it should become part of the machinery of the province of Ontario.

Mr. Kerrio: There is no way men of integrity will block that bill.

GOVERNMENT PURCHASING

The House divided on Mr. Jones’s motion of resolution 32, which was negatived on the following vote:

Ayes

Auld; Ashe; Baetz; Belanger; Bernier; Brunelle; Cureatz; Eakins; Gregory; Hennessy; Hodgson; Johnson, J.; Jones; Kennedy; Kerr.

Lane; Leluk; Maeck; McCaffrey; McGuigan; McMurtry; McNeil; Newman, W.; Norton; Parrott; Ramsay; Rollins; Rowe.

Smith, G. E.; Taylor, J. A.; Taylor, C.; Villeneuve; Walker; Watson; Welch; Wells; Williams; Wiseman.

Nays

Blundy; Bounsall; Bradley; Breithaupt; Bryden; Campbell; Charlton; Conway; Cooke; Cunningham; Davison, M. N.; di Santo; Edighoffer; Epp; Foulds.

Germa; Gigantes; Hall; Isaacs; Johnston, B. F.; Kerrio; Laughren; Lawlor; Mackenzie; Martel; McEwen; McKessock; Miller, G. I.

Newman, B.; Nixon; O’Neil; Peterson; Philip; Renwick; Ruston; Smith, S.; Sweeney; Van Horne; Warner; Wildman; Worton; Young; Ziemba.

Ayes 38; Nays 43.

FISCAL PLAN ACT

The following members having objected by rising, a vote was not taken on Bill 145.

Auld; Ashe; Baetz; Belanger; Bernier; Brunelle; Gregory; Hennessy; Hodgson; Johnson, J.; Kennedy; Lane; Maeck; McMurtry; McNeil; Newman, W.; Norton; Parrott; Ramsay; Rollins; Rowe; Taylor, G.; Villeneuve; Watson; Welch; Wells; Williams; Wiseman.

-- 28.

[6:00]

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to standing order 13, I wish to indicate to the House the business for tomorrow and next week.

Tomorrow morning, the House will go in committee of supply to consider the estimates of the Office of the Lieutenant Governor, the cabinet office, and the Premier’s office.

On Monday, November 5, the committee of supply will meet in the afternoon and in the evening. They will consider the estimates of the Office of the Lieutenant Governor, the cabinet office and the Premier’s office and, when those estimates are finished the estimates of the Ministry of Revenue.

On Tuesday, November 6, in the afternoon, we will consider legislation, second readings of Bill 77 and Bill 127, and there will be no House meeting in the evening of Tuesday, November 6.

On Wednesday, November 7, the justice, resources development and general government committees may meet in the morning.

On Thursday, November 8, in the afternoon, it will be private members’ public business, first ballot item 3 standing in the name of the member for Bellwoods (Mr. McClellan) and followed by ballot item 4 standing in the name of the member for Durham East (Mr. Cureatz). In the evening the House will debate the motion for adoption of the report of the standing resources development committee on the Pickering B station steam generators supplied to Ontario Hydro by Babcock and Wilcox Canada Limited.

On Friday, November 9, the House will go into committee of supply to consider the Ministry of Revenue estimates.

Mr. Speaker, with the consent: of the House, I would like to make two procedural motions.

Mr. Speaker: Do we have the consent of the House to revert to motions?

Some hon. members: Agreed.

MOTIONS

STANDING ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE COMMITTEE

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that on Thursday, November 8, the standing administration of justice committee be authorized to meet in the evening instead of the afternoon and the standing resources development committee be authorized to meet in the afternoon instead of the evening.

STANDING RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that the standing resources development committee be authorized to meet in the evening of Monday, November 5.

Motion agreed to.

The House recessed at 6:04 p.m.