Legislative Assembly of Ontario

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE (CONTINUED)

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The House resumed at 8:02 p.m.

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the amendment to the amendment to the motion for an address in reply to the speech of the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the session.

Mr. Runciman: Mr. Speaker, I just have to complete my remarks begun Tuesday night. I would like to commend the government on its --

Mr. Elston: I hope it measures up to the first part.

Mr. Runciman: Right.

Mr. Ruston: On a point of order: I am sorry to interfere, but I was advised at the House leaders' meeting that they checked and the member for Leeds had completed his remarks. I am not arguing if he has or has not, but I was just told that at the House leaders' meeting.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Cousens): I thank the member for Essex North. The member for Leeds had only adjourned the debate. If he still wishes to continue his presentation that is his option.

Mr. Runciman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It will only take a couple of minutes, as long as I do not have the interruptions I experienced the other evening.

Mr. Stokes: Just let us know when you are finished.

Mr. Runciman: Okay.

As I was saying, I want to commend the government on its efforts to attract tourists in the face of some very stiff competition from New York State and Quebec. More needs to be done to attract a greater share of these tourism dollars to eastern Ontario.

The natural beauty of Leeds and some first-rate resort facilities, once discovered, often bring vacationers back to eastern Ontario. But the major problem remains: other than the beautiful Thousand Islands and the Rideau Lakes there is no major drawing card, no specific attraction.

I have made a proposal to the government that could eliminate that deficiency. Perhaps most members are aware that until the 1950s Brockville was a major Canadian rail centre. At one time it had more than 1,000 people working on three railways: the Canadian National Railway, the Canadian Pacific Railway and the B&W, the Brockville to Westport.

The oldest railway tunnel in all of Canada runs right under the city from north to south, indeed right under Brockville city hall. I believe it is an ideal location for developing a first-class railway museum.

Ever since Pierre Berton -- who by the way has expressed an interest in this project -- wrote The Last Spike, the public's interest in and attachment to the railway has been growing by leaps and bounds. This sentiment is not limited to Canadians. Europeans and Americans have also found a rekindled affection for railroads and the romanticism and pioneering spirit they have come to represent.

Since I brought this proposal forward last summer several meetings have been held with the CPR and municipal and provincial officials. A few weeks ago through the assistance of the province, economic assessment experts from California spent two days in Brockville reviewing the proposal.

The CPR has been extremely co-operative, especially in terms of their offer to reinstall trackage and supply vintage railway equipment.

Interjection.

Mr. Runciman: The member for Niagara Falls missed it the other night.

This development taking place on a staged basis over a number of years ultimately envisages a train run of approximately three miles starting at the river front, through the tunnel with station stops at the city's 55-acre recreation area and the provincial-municipal conservation area just north of the city.

I urge the province in this Brockville sesquicentennial year to look favourably upon this proposal.

In concluding my remarks, Mr. Speaker, I want to commend my government on its responsiveness and commitment to helping our farmers in these very difficult economic times. This government recognizes that leadership in the agricultural sector is imperative. We have provided that leadership and I trust will continue to do so despite a lack-lustre commitment from Ottawa.

Leeds is one of the great dairying areas of the province and home base for one of North America's leading egg producers. In order for these important industries to survive in Leeds, this government must continue to do everything in its power to help them to keep their operations competitive and efficient without burdening them with an overabundance of regulation and red tape.

Our farmers are smart businessmen. They want to and are working very hard to solve their own problems. As long as we are responsive and as long as we continue to maintain a sense of security we will be able to count on them as we always have.

Thank you for your patience, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. McGuigan: I am pleased to join this debate, not to condemn every word of the throne speech but to express my sadness at some of the events I see in my own riding of Kent-Elgin and in an overall view of some of the events that are happening in Ontario and Canada.

The budget affects health care in Ontario and the ministry's handling of a nursing home in my riding has been a concern since I was elected in June 1977. Shortly after the election I was approached by a home in Dresden that had 21 beds reduced to 19. At about the same time the ministry announced that 60 new beds were to be allocated to the counties.

We asked the ministry to split the allocation of these 60 beds to bring a number of small homes up to a reasonable size. Of course we know where they went. They went into the Meadow Park Nursing Home in the city of Chatham. In the meantime the nursing home in Dresden has disappeared. One in Thamesville and Guilds have been amalgamated to a new home in Blenheim.

Mr. Kerrio: Hard-hearted Tories.

Mr. McGuigan: That is right. They do not care about older people.

Very recently, the one remaining home remaining around a former private home -- because there is a nursing home in Tilbury -- operating with 37 beds has been sold to a Mr. Don Stephens, former head of the Ontario Nursing Home Association. The beds will be moved to the city of Chatham. This will leave the east Kent townships, which includes the townships of Howard, Orford, Chatham, Camden, Zone and the towns of Ridgetown, Thamesville, Bothwell, Dresden and the Moravian Indian Reserve without a home serving their community.

It also affects the two neighbouring townships of Elgin, which form part of the riding, and there is one municipally-owned home in the town of Dutton, which is at the extreme easterly border of Dunwich township. This home is owned and operated by Dunwich township and the village of Dutton, and preference is given to residents of these municipalities. This leaves the residents of Aldborough township dependent in part on homes in Chatham or in the neighbouring county of Middlesex.

8:10 p.m.

The result of this has been to generate a wave of protest in Ridgetown and district. Those who have their loved ones in the home in Ridgetown are vehement in their opposition to the physical move of the residents to Chatham, because of the shock this will be to their health and state of mind, and also the inconvenience to the relatives in having to travel another 35 kilometres to Chatham to visit them.

While everyone agrees that Barnwell Nursing Home provided loving care to the residents, they are agreed in general that the Nursing Homes Act should be enforced and that high standards should be adhered to. They cannot see, nor can I, why the enforcement of the act automatically means these beds should be moved to Chatham. When I spoke to the supervisor of inspection, Mr. Klamer, he cut the ground from under my case when he told me the move had been approved by the Kent district health council. But Mr. Peter Deane, head of the council, told me the council approved because it was told by the ministry that, if it did not, the licence would be withdrawn and the beds would be lost to Kent county.

Mr. Kerrio: Intimidation by the Tories.

Mr. McGuigan: That is exactly what it was. The council was put --

Mr. Stokes: You have to watch these Deans.

Mr. McGuigan: This one is spelled differently from the one you are thinking of.

The council was between a rock and a hard place, between taking a kick in the teeth or one in the shins.

Mr. Breaugh: Say that again.

Mr. McGuigan: That is an old farmer's expression.

It chose the latter. I could very well ask the question, should the council, placed in a position like that, not consider resigning? What is its purpose in acting as a shill for the government to deflect the ire of the local people? I think it should resign.

There seems to be a consensus that in order to build and operate a new facility, a minimum of 60 beds are needed but, according to a list issued on February 22 of this year, by Ontario, the province of opportunity -- I wonder who the opportunities are for -- there are some 344 nursing homes in Ontario and 145 of these have fewer than 60 beds. In round figures that is 42 per cent.

In a letter to the minister, I pointed out there are two problems regarding nursing homes in rural Ontario. One is that the ministry looks upon counties as geographical units, ignoring the fact they are very large units in terms of distance, and the people of the smaller towns and village abhor the centralization of social services, such as nursing homes, in the larger centres. It was pointed out that matters of local pride, employment and convenience are real matters that should he treated with greater sensitivity.

I also mentioned another point. An allegation was made by a lady in Ridgetown, who I am told is going to be working for the new owner in Chatham. that the place was a firetrap. If this is true, then nursing home inspection reports should be made available to the public long before the district health council is put in the position of having to approve the transfer of the beds or face the prospect of having the beds withdrawn from the county. In my letter I challenged the minister, who is responsible for the people in these nursing homes, to investigate that charge of the place being a firetrap.

Further I pointed out that if a nursing home deserves to have its licence withdrawn, it seems the ministry should withdraw the licence and allow the beds to be bid upon by all prospective parties. The buyer, therefore, should put the alleged capital cost of from $10,000 to $25,000 per bed into either improved facilities or reduced costs to the consumer rather than into capitalization. Putting it into capitalization rewards rather than punishes the former operator for his or her failure to upgrade the facility to meet provincial standards.

I called upon the minister to stop the sale in the public interest, that enough beds should be awarded to Ridgetown and district and that the beds should be put up for bidding by prospective nursing home operators. I pointed out I am not convinced 60 beds is the minimum size facility as is commonly suggested. I mentioned the 42 per cent. It comes out that, at 18.5 per cent interest, that $10,000 capitalization comes to $5.07 a day. It is some 14 per cent of the daily rate of $34. If the capital cost is $25,000, as some people allege, the carrying cost becomes $12.68 per day.

I realize that in our market system quotas or licences assume monetary value. The best brains and economists have been trying to figure a way around that. They have not been able to do it so we have to face it but I ask, why should a licence that is under a cloud be allowed to be sold for such a price? This unnecessary cost is added to both the taxpayer and the nursing home consumer. If the home were so deficient it needed to be closed would not the government, the residents and the taxpayers be better served by having the licence withdrawn and sufficient beds allocated to the Ridgetown licence?

I believe we would be quite justified in allowing the beds to be moved to another Kent county community if no local person or combination of municipalities was willing to take up the licence that was offered.

I can understand that the minister, in looking at Ontario from his office here in Toronto, no doubt sees Kent county as one administrative unit. It is, of course, one unit but the one unit I represent occupies an area approximately 125 kilometres long by 40 kilometres wide. It is subdivided into one city and 10 townships, six towns and five villages. Citizens of every municipality are justly proud of their own community and strongly resent the move of their nursing home to a central community.

As members know, friends and relatives often combine a trip for social or business reasons from another part of town and from the surrounding districts with a visit to their friends or relatives at a local nursing home. That convenience for Ridgetown and district residents has been removed as have the conveniences of Dresden and Thamesville when their homes were closed and the licences moved.

I must affirm my choice of systems as the private ownership system. I know some members feel nursing homes should be under public ownership. I believe private ownership is in the long run the best system and that the present system of limiting the number of beds provides a captive market. Therefore the operators do not innovate; they do not bring about methods to try to react to that market and provide better and cheaper services.

I want to pass to other matters concerning the throne speech. I must confess I felt ashamed when I read and heard the trite, almost predictable content of that worthless document. I felt as an Ontarian and as a Canadian that the government was abusing the Queen's representative. That document might have been written for a green candidate in an election campaign. As a document for the Queen's representative to read in this chamber, I felt it had the wrong wording. They have no respect for the man and the office he holds. If words had failed the Lieutenant Governor I would not have been surprised.

8:20 p.m.

In less critical times, a bit of central-government bashing is part of the game. But not today when some 1.2 million Canadians are unemployed, when some 28 million people in the industrial world are unemployed, when war is near at hand in the Middle East, when the free world's economy is in tatters and when oil supplies are in the hands of a few men and subject to political events beyond our control, when politicians from both the right and left are marching to drummers who are outdated and represent failed systems, and at a time when this world so desperately needs co-operation and leadership.

We do not need political divisiveness, but the government has survived on that for 40 years, and they continue to go back to the well. The times demand some statesmanship. It was right for the government in the past and they continue to do the same, but I submit that they will face a more sophisticated electorate. And as Ontarians reap the harvest of the present policy of fed-bashing, they will eventually put an end to this practice.

The Ontario government is not alone in this by any means; it is happening all over Canada. In Newfoundland, the Premier recently won re-election on the issue of oil rights. Even if there is oil there it will not affect the financial future of that province for many years. In the meantime the people are suffering because they lack a provincial fish marketing policy. They know it works from the example set here in Ontario.

In Quebec we have a provincial government dedicated to the separation of that province. If Quebec eventually decides that its best interests lie with Canada, its treasury has been looted in the name of anti-Ottawa policy. We find today that the government of that province is even at odds with its own people because it has not been able to deliver policies that work to the benefit of those people.

This government gave encouragement to those anti-Ottawa forces in Quebec, even while the former Minister of Industry and Trade, now the Minister of Health (Mr. Grossman), was pleading for a common market. Members should read his speeches. He points out that 14 per cent of our manufactured products are sold in Quebec as well as a great many agricultural products.

This government has no great philosophical aversion to French language rights in Ontario. They are moving every day towards French language -- in the Legislature, French translations of our laws, French language in certain courts. In fact, the French language is there in many practical and proper ways but it is always short of recognized status. They stop just short enough to use the issue in election campaigns in those parts of the province where they know they can avoid the real economic and social issues and harvest a small but decisive percentage of votes. We do not hear the member for Chatham-Kent (Mr. Watson) campaigning on an anti-French basis because he has a big French population in one of his townships.

Mr. Foulds: Who is the member for Chatham-Kent?

Mr. McGuigan: We will show the member the next time around.

The Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs (Mr. Wells) makes great statesmanlike speeches on the subject of language rights. Members should read them.

Mr. Breaugh: Why?

Mr. McGuigan: That is what I wondered. He makes speeches about Quebec-Ontario co-operation, but one would think the conclusion of the speech was written by another speech writer because it bears no resemblance to the opening remarks. He always stops short with no co-operation on language rights.

The process is also working in the west where there is a worrisome group of people who have openly advocated western separatism.

Hon. Mr. Wiseman: Who wrote that speech?

Mr. McGuigan: I wrote it myself, as I write all my stuff.

Mr. Riddell: He is quite capable of writing his own speeches. We don't have the privilege of having speech writers. Only the Tories --

The Acting Speaker: Order. The member for Kent-Elgin has the floor.

Mr. McGuigan: Members have seen a side of my temperament that I did not often show during the past election. It amounted to one of the greatest assaults that has ever been mounted on an opposition member and we turned him back. I felt so angry and so upset on the occasion of the throne speech at the tawdry methods that were used. We have these candidates of separatist feeling in the west. When one looks at the railways and the Crow rate they are talking about out there, any rational person would say it was time to phase out the Crow freight rates.

Mr. Ruston: The member for Leeds believes in 115 years.

Mr. McGuigan: It is 85 years exactly since the Crow rates were brought in. Any person would say it is time for it to go. The separatists Out there are using it. Perhaps they will use it successfully. Mr. Pepin says that although grain accounts for about 20 per cent of the railways' work load, it provides for only 3.5 per cent of railway revenues. He says that if the rates remain unchanged the railways would lose $2.4 billion in the next four years. The released figures show that shipments of coal and potash to the west coast will increase much more dramatically than will grain shipments during the next few years.

In 1980 about 10 million tons of grain were shipped to the west coast. By 1990, it is expected double that amount will be shipped. Shipments of coal will have increased during the decade from 14 million tons to 53 million tons. Potash will increase from 3.6 million tons in 1980 to nine million tons in 1990.

That is to say nothing of the huge demand for Ontario products that will be developed because of that economic activity. Think of the trucks from Chatham, Oakville and Windsor, the diesel locomotives from London, the rail cars from Thunder Bay and the steel for rails from Sault Ste. Marie and Hamilton that activity would generate. Think of the consumer goods from small plants all over Ontario. Those things can be thwarted by small-minded provincial politicians.

Mr. Kerrio: Pygmy-minded people.

Mr. McGuigan: I am afraid we have some of them here. I find it sad that a country such as ours which has so many advantages is taking the low road and undermining the destiny of this country. Setting aside the spectre of our natural advantages, the tremendous advantages of soil, forest and mines, we have the advantage of history in this country. We are not marked with a legacy of hatred from bitter civil or religious wars, the memory of which dooms so many countries almost forever. We see those events happening at this very moment.
I am sad this government would take one step to thwart the rich heritage of democratic parliamentary government by side-stepping the criticism of an honest and hardworking opposition. I include the other opposition party as well. They are hardworking people. The government is resorting to the easy way out by using such documents as the throne speech to put the blame on other people outside the Legislature who are not here to set the record straight.

The government is quick to use the monarchy in ways which suit it, such as state dinners for the Queen or the pomp and ceremony of next Saturday when it will wax eloquent over the patriation of the new Constitution. When it comes to political advantage, the government uses the Queen's representative in a mean and small manner.

I noticed that the throne speech at long last devotes some attention to agriculture, an industry that is so important to any potential we have here in Ontario to replace imports and export food. It is realizing the farming industry is a renewable industry. It produces a renewable product.

While it requires a great deal of capital, it does not require the billions of dollars that are necessary to finance a nuclear plant or a thermal generating plant. It does not require the billions of dollars of follow-through money necessary to finance and sustain the high-technology industries so often cited as being our great opportunity.

Our industry requires money and attention. But in relative terms it is a small amount of money, measured in millions and not in billions. And the government is mighty tight-fisted with even a million.

8:30 p.m.

Because of its relative dollar requirements and its increasing productivity, the industry contributes to fighting inflation. Inflation in our food products is less than in our input costs, and we are mainly in the black only because of our increasing efficiency. That increasing efficiency is threatened. We need to maintain the profitability of our industry to prevent the flow of capital out of the industry.

When a farmer goes bankrupt, capital flees to a higher-paying industry, most likely to an energy-related industry. We have to maintain the flow of young, good managers, well trained people in industry. There has been a flow in recent years to agriculture. But, alas, I fear we face an outflow under the present weak prospects in Ontario.

It is not all this government's fault. World markets and conditions are not the best for agriculture. But other provinces have realized the value of their agricultural industry and have encouraged and sustained the industry.

We welcome the new minister. He has stepped boldly into a strange field. We hope his lack of hands-on experience will be balanced by his ambition and recognized ability in other fields. He has the opportunity to bring vitality to a ministry that has been drifting since the days of Bill Stewart. There are a lot of good people in that ministry just waiting for a chance to show their stuff.

Last summer, the then minister called a conference here in Toronto to consider what should be done about growing criticism of marketing boards which was appearing in the urban press. I congratulated him for his initiative. But not one member of the government party spoke candidly and openly on the subject; they made political speeches about co-operation and not rocking the boat. I spoke up and said I was concerned. I felt that one or two boards had taken a narrower view than their mandates called for and that they could do with some supervision by a council of boards and senior ministry people.

The meeting was a waste of government money. But it did evoke a great response from senior ministry people. They know the problems. They are as dedicated as I am to continuance of our marketing board system, and they recognize the benefits to both producers and consumers.

I read an editorial in a Calgary paper which said the agricultural minister was gunning for the "old boy" network of Ontario Agricultural College graduates. I say to the minister that he or any other minister can probably shake up that ministry and produce positive results. Those fine men and women in his ministry chose an agricultural education because they love the industry and the people in our system. From my contact with them, I believe they are eager to show what can be done if we give them leadership.

I also say to the minister that there is some apprehension in the industry that he and his deputy have been appointed to tear down the structure of Ontario agriculture, built at such cost and so cherished by most in the industry. I think he must move boldly to dispel such fears.

I could not help but notice a quote from one of his officials in a US publication. The publication is called Focus and is put out by the packers. It was commenting on Canada. It said:

"William Doyle, assistant deputy minister of the marketing division of the Ministry of Agriculture, Toronto, said: 'It is a well-known fact that consumer prices rise substantially when produce is imported into Ontario and drop when local producers enter the harvest season. The longer you extend the marketing season, the longer you extend the moderating effect on prices to consumers. As a result, the provincial government has increased its involvement in agriculture.'"

Why did he feel that he had to go hat in hand to the Americans and give that reason as to the involvement in the Board of Industrial Leadership and Development program in agriculture? Why did he not have the courage to say that Ontario agriculture has been neglected, that it needs restoration and that this government is standing on its feet and looking out for the interests of Ontario agriculture? We will pass that off to the federal Minister of Agriculture, who does that very thing.

I call on the minister to take bold steps and remove these apprehensions that we have, because we want to see him succeed.

One of the symbolic things he could do, I suggest, would be to buy a good cowboy hat -- they are on sale right now -- and wear that hat and indicate to the people of Ontario that he is the Minister of Agriculture and Food.

Mr. McKessock: The cattlemen have given him one.

Mr. McGuigan: Why does he not wear it? He could start a trend that would help an industry in the riding of Wellington South. He is a good size; he could wear it well. I would like to see him do that and indicate to the consumers and producers of Ontario that he is going to take hold of that ministry and run it for the benefit of the producers, the consumers and all the people of Canada.

Mr. Elston: Mr. Speaker, thank you for recognizing me on this, roughly the first anniversary of my entry into the Legislature, close to the anniversary of my first reply to the throne speech. I am somewhat dismayed by what has occurred -- perhaps I should say what has not occurred -- over the past year.

I first rose in this House a year ago to let the people know that the riding of Huron-Bruce was made up of a very noble composition of agricultural interests and industries surrounding that great occupation, and sprinkled in there as well were the small businesses that were growing at a good rate until last March. They were working hard. They were doing it on their own.

I am somewhat concerned by the fact that since that election a year ago -- at which time the government party promised great things and indicated to the voters of this fair province that there was nothing wrong with the economy, that there was nothing that would go wrong and that there was nothing but bright promise for the people of Ontario -- they have reneged on the promise they showed to the people. We have had nothing but layoff after layoff from small businesses. We have had nothing but failures of those thriving farm industries.

Hon. Mr. Ashe: No wonder, with the fiscal policy of your colleagues in Ottawa.

Mr. Elston: We do not expect the Minister of Revenue to understand too much about economics. He has not done very much with respect to the property tax rebate system which he so unably reorganized.

In any event, we have suffered a loss of farm production in our area because of the decline in the number of viable farm operations, particularly in the livestock end of agriculture. I am discouraged that every report I read in the business journals indicates that by all the leading indicators Ontario is slipping ever closer to the abyss of bankruptcy with respect to the thriving economy it used to have.

I cannot say I was very pleased at the time to see the generalities and vagueness of the throne speech that opened the House in 1981. I have to admit I was awed by the whole situation. I was awed by the fact that I was here for the first time. I took it at its face value and in the spirit of the situation as perhaps leading to some promise. But I am afraid I saw the promise slip away with respect to those general and vague words that were outlined in the throne speech of 1981 at our first session.

I am utterly appalled and dismayed with the edition that opened the second session of this parliament. There is nothing in this throne speech that leads me to believe there is any vision at all left in the government of Ontario, because it refuses to do the things that ought to be done for this province.

They have refused to follow the lead of those other provinces which have taken hold of the very serious financial situation that a lot of the business and agricultural sectors of other provinces experience. They have refused to acknowledge that there are solutions they could implement, and I cannot but condemn the writers of this script for failure for the province of Ontario. It is not a very happy document that we have.

I have a number of areas I would like to comment on with particular reference to my own riding.

Roughly a year ago I mentioned that we had the opportunity of a lifetime in the riding of Huron-Bruce to develop the Bruce Energy Centre. In the last election campaign, the Premier (Mr. Davis) came to the riding I was then contesting for my party and dropped off a good-sized cheque to help in the development of the Bruce energy centre, promising $10 million -- he can come back tomorrow and the day after; we will take him for $10 million any day -- but since then there has been hardly one visible sign of movement towards the development of an energy centre that would take advantage of the availability of volumes of waste energy currently going down the drain at the Bruce nuclear power development.

I am sorry to say we have been rewarded with a couple of studies and now, when we appear to most need the jobs at that facility, we are given another study to look into the feasibility of putting in a harbour at the Douglas Point area. That study has to be done with the co-operation of the federal government.

Perhaps it is worth while noting that in this speech from the throne, after a long number of paragraphs condemning the federal government for everything it is not doing, we come back to the bottom line of that whole opening portion, which says the future of Ontario jobs, policies and programs to help us get back on the rails depends on the financial support of the federal government. We will take their money, but we will give them their lumps and we will not admit they are helping us in any way. I think that is appalling. I condemn them for that and for writing the piece of garbage that was delivered to this House at the opening of the session.

I notice, after having been promised some development at the Bruce energy centre during the election campaign last year, that there is a wee bit of information in the speech from the throne which says there will be further development of greenhouses. I think that is a worthwhile development. The problem is that the bits-and-pieces approach to development in that area is causing serious harm to the original private movers of that whole concept.

The delay that has resulted from the entry of the Ontario Energy Corp. into the overall planning of the project is causing the financial ruin of the people who had the vision to come to the Ontario government in the first place to say they had an opportunity to provide jobs for the people in Huron-Bruce and in Ontario in general. The delays placed upon these individuals is unconscionable.

During the campaign I said that I supported the initiative that developed the concept of the Bruce energy park. I still support the initiative and energy of those fine individuals. Not all those individuals are of a particular persuasion that would lead them to support me at election time, but I was pleased when I found out the extent of the private initiative involved. I am not pleased with the way in which that initiative is being strangled.

Private initiative is being and has been stalled by the Ontario Energy Corp., which through the acquisition of some oil company is building an empire that is providing jobs for some people in a province far away from here, when it could be directing $650 million to the development of energy parks, not only at Bruce but possibly also at other locations in the province, to provide jobs for the people of Ontario.

We could be keeping at home some of the people who are leaving this province, using the cheaper energy, getting away from the requirement for the fossil fuels which are shipped in from those western provinces and providing a great ingredient for the recovery of our economy and alleviate some of the suffering people really are experiencing, not just in my riding but all over this province.

I could go on at length about the things that have not been done on an economic scale, and I could go on at length about the deficiencies in the throne speech. I want to mention, however, two or three things that are particularly important to me now, since I have taken over the portfolio of critic of the Ministry of the Environment.

I note there is a small portion in the throne speech talking about doing some things in an environmental forum; however, there is a lack of specificity in regard to the environment. In this 28-page speech there is only one paragraph, on page 19, that addresses itself to the environment at all.

I am upset that there have not been more things said about cleaning up the environment. The Minister of the Environment (Mr. Norton) announced that he was declaring a war on acid rain almost a year ago. With that declaration of war, one would have thought there should have been some development in the stalemate by this point. If we look at the throne speech there is nothing happening at all. Instead, all we got was a statement that Ontario Hydro would reduce emissions by 50 per cent by the year 1990 and that Hydro would provide leadership in the reduction of contributions to acid rain.

If we check the record, it should be pretty easy for Ontario Hydro to reduce emissions 50 per cent by 1990, because over the past number of years it has been doing nothing but increasing emissions until it has peaked at this point in 1982, and in 1983, 1984 and 1985 we are going to go ever higher. Presumably it will have an easy task, because it will have many tons of emissions to work with; and the larger the numbers, the easier it is to reach the 50 per cent figure.

We have Hydro installing some scrubbers on two coal-fired generating units, but one cannot really call that leadership. We have Hydro buying those scrubbers from the United States after it had an opportunity to develop that technology here. It sent the developer away to the United States. One can hardly call that leadership.

If we look at it, Ontario Hydro has got to be leading us on a goose chase through the wilderness of environmental decay.

It is necessary to talk a little bit about acid rain and Ontario Hydro. Acid rain is without doubt the most serious environmental concern we have in this province today. We have contributions not only from the facilities here in Ontario but also from the United States.

I want to note that with the exception of the lnco plant in Sudbury, Ontario Hydro is the leading emitter of those pollutants. On top of being in second place, there are plans to sell electricity to General Public Utilities of New Jersey. Through that export, if it is approved and takes place, we are going to add an additional load on the emissions produced by Ontario Hydro.

We know that Ontario Hydro is currently under a government control order to reduce emissions causing acid rain; in fact, by regulation dated February 13, 1981, Hydro was called upon to reduce emissions by 42.5 per cent by 1990. If one compares that with Hydro's suggestion, the 50 per cent figure is a great cause.

However, in spite of the control order, the 1981 forecast was for an emission of 509,000 metric tons per year, which was 24 per cent greater than the actual 1980 figure. During 1982, those emissions are going to grow to 590,000 metric tons, which is a 44 per cent increase over the 1980 level.

8:50 p.m.

Using 1980 as the base year for comparison, Hydro will be reducing emissions by 4.9 per cent by 1985 and by only 36 per cent by 1990 -- considerably less than the 50 per cent which has been constantly referred to by the Minister of the Environment and the chairman of Hydro. The figures they have used do not bear up under the scrutiny of the people who are really taking a long and hard look at the emissions caused by the proposed sale to the GPU group in New Jersey.

Surely the lakes and lungs and legacy of this policy demand a better leadership in the reduction of the contributions to acid rain. We are not getting them.

I would like to go on longer about the problems of the acid rain; however, we have other serious environmental concerns. In particular, I have to mention the Stouffville situation. There are no comments in the throne speech relating to the Stouffville matter, which has been an ongoing one now for some time.

There is no mention either of any other locations where potential contamination of ground water might render the water nonpotable. We would expect that there would be some concern with this very precious resource in view of all the difficulties we have been finding surfacing all over the province.

It is interesting to note that on March 9, 1982, just hours before the throne speech was delivered, the Minister of the Environment held a 90-minute press briefing on the differences between the MOE testing and private testing conducted for concerned citizens of Stouffville in relation to the wells located near the Stouffville dump.

During the briefing, the minister made the following statement: "Those people who choose to make loose-lipped allegations about the integrity of either the minister or the staff of this ministry may find themselves accountable."

He discredits his office as Minister of the Environment when he threatens a slander action on the people of Ontario. He ought not to do that. He ought to look after his role of protecting the people of Ontario from the dangers of pollution.

If we take a closer look at the documentation available and do in-depth research using primary sources, we find the minister was making certain allegations that cannot be fully substantiated from that press conference.

The controversy surrounding the Stouffville dump in the recent past has been embroiled in the questions of process mismanagement by the ministry. The ministry was created to assist in the protection of the environment. Its role is not to be an adversary, but that is the position it has taken.

I might add that if we look over all the last year's activities of the government of Ontario, the one thing that goes throughout the whole process is the development of a political process of confrontation. This confrontation causes turmoil, political confusion and suffering among the people of Ontario trying to take their minds, I suppose, off the inactivity of the government when it comes to dealing with the severe financial problems we are suffering in this province.

It is of interest to note there are no comments whatsoever in the throne speech about what is going to happen with liquid industrial waste management. It seems to me that the Ministry of the Environment has always had the need to deal with the disposal of liquid industrial waste but it has managed to set up a corporation which it has spirited off into some small corner of a government building somewhere in this fair town, I presume, never to surface again until some time way down the road when the controversy has died out.

It appears that the Ministry of the Environment has completely divested itself of any responsibility for dealing with this very serious matter. We cannot let them duck out of the responsibility which they have to the people of the province.

One would have expected in the throne speech a commitment of some sort coming up with a way of monitoring the disposal of liquid waste in Ontario. We know of the difficulties we have been experiencing over the past several months. We know of the problems with court injunctions regarding landfill sites that were not licensed to accept liquid waste. We know there are millions of gallons of liquid industrial waste being dumped annually into eight specific landfill sites which, by regulation in December, have been allowed to stay open even though their original mandate was not to accept these materials.

The then Minister of the Environment, Dr. Harry Parrott, promised in 1978 that the landfilling of liquid waste would cease as of December 1, 1980. It is now April 15, 1982, and the practice still continues. I might add that not only is that practice continuing but also we have, in the prime mover of the Ontario Waste Management Corp., an individual who says there is no problem in a time frame term of reference in dealing with that problem. It seems there is an extreme difference of opinion between the former Minister of the Environment and the current chairman of the Ontario Waste Management Corp.

I might note, with some degree of sadness, that the new campaign Dr. Chant is on in trying to determine the candidate sites has led him to discover that the original consultants' reports, which were initially tabled with respect to the location of liquid waste disposal areas, were notably deficient in their research. In fact, they were so far deficient that he has decided to completely ignore them and do his own consultant work starting from square one.

I must say I am surprised that we have not had more information from the Ontario Waste Management Corp. in relation to its findings. I hope something is brought forward soon so we can see that something is being done with that issue.

Continuing on with the issues surrounding the Ministry of the Environment, I have been disturbed by the developments in my own riding in relation to the establishment of the earthen manure storage pits. The agricultural industry has developed a very intensive operation in some areas with respect to the raising of livestock which has caused many farmers to take very difficult decisions as to how they manage to store and eventually recycle their animal waste.

One of the answers in Quebec was to actually dig a hole in the ground and to use that reservoir for the storage of those liquid wastes. We found out those efforts in Quebec resulted in the pollution of the rivers and underground water systems in some of the areas where there was an intensive use of these sorts of pits, and we found all sorts of problems developed there.

There are people who would like to try to manage their manure operations in the same way, and in the township of Grey we have a situation where an earthen manure pit has been constructed, even though there was resistance by the municipal government to that construction. We have, in that fair township, an effort by the township council to deal on a credible level in a way that is sensitive not only to the needs of the farming community but also to the requirement that we look after the great resource of potable water, which we all need.

The efforts of that local municipal government have been thwarted by the efforts of officials of the Ministry of the Environment, who in their own way have come between the people and the local officials by seemingly taking the side of the proponents in a way that seems detrimental to the maintenance of a clean environment.

9 p.m.

It seems to me this is not the way the ministry should work. The Ministry of the Environment should be available to the public to ensure that the public is able to get the very best independent advice and it should not seem to be in a position where it is actually using certain proposals as experimentation for bigger and better things. That sort of experimentation could result in the environmental pollution the people in that area fear so much.

I have received hundreds of letters -- and I have them with me here this evening -- from concerned residents of the township of Grey. They felt the Ministry of the Environment was not doing its job and was using the situation in the township of Grey to its own advantage to gather information and to say it is monitoring all sorts of new liquid waste disposal sites in the township and then coming back with some kind of data that will provide some theorist with writing material.

That is not acceptable to the people of the township of Grey. They want the Ministry of the Environment to provide them with assurances that the structure is safe and that there is no danger to the health of the people of that township. They cannot feel that way under the circumstances of this particular tragic situation.

I want to suggest to the ministry that when it is requested to give a certificate for the construction of one of these units it should not issue such a certificate until such time as all the clearances have been given by the local municipal officials. They have the right and the duty to deal with these issues, and I know for sure that the people of the townships and the local areas would be well served if the ministry would keep in mind the responsibilities of those local elected officials and work with them rather than around them. Enough said with respect to those earthen animal waste storage pits.

I want to take just a few minutes more to indicate my concern in regard to the Ministry of the Environment's dealing with the local municipalities when it comes to landfill sites. Situations in my riding have been brought to my attention where the ministry has decided it will look into the procedures of landfill operations in the area. That is a good idea, but what it has done in the particular situation of Morris township is come in and look at a landfill site that was set up under the auspices of the Ministry of the Environment in the early 1970s, and was given a certificate for operation and a procedure for operation which has been followed under the guidance of a regional office out of Sarnia.

The ministry decided it would change the area's responsibility from Sarnia to Owen Sound and all of a sudden a number of officials descended on to this particular site to try to set up a new sort of procedure for landfill, even though the municipal people in Morris township were doing what they had been told by another individual from Sarnia. It seems to me the request by the people from Owen Sound was unreasonable since it meant the expenditures of thousands of dollars at the expense of the taxpayers of the township of Morris in dealing with a landfill site that was operating under the guidelines already established by the ministry. The efforts of the Ministry of the Environment in relation to actions like this have been misguided and misplaced and cannot be allowed to continue.

I want to wind up by making two or three more comments in a general sense. There are two things I want to point out to members of this assembly.

The economic difficulties of our times have caused great changes in the constituency of Huron-Bruce. In the small towns located there we see a decline in the number of occupied buildings on the main street, buildings that housed ongoing and very thriving small businesses. We see in those towns today store after store that is empty or has a sign in the window saying. "Going out of business sale," and we have no response at all from the insensitive government of Ontario.

Other governments in other provinces have decided to take the situation in hand and at least try to alleviate the difficulties surrounding the fiscal policies that have been developed, but not in Ontario.

Small towns are suffering because it is going to be very difficult for anybody to come into a small town and think it is worthwhile to buy a building, fill it with inventory and try to compete against larger businesses established in larger centres with a lot more purchasing power than the small, independent businessman can get together.

I know of a man in my home town in his late twenties or early thirties with a family. He started out in a small business by investing $40,000 in what was commonly called around the province a five and dime store. After two years of initially good success, he fell into the difficulties of the declining economy and rising interest. Today, that individual has had to sell his store and inventory and he is out of business. Not only is he out of business, but this man's family is not supported by any means whatsoever because he cannot find a job in Ontario. No effort has been made to help this person out.

This is an example of the difficulties people of Ontario find themselves in, difficulties that must be addressed by this government. The only response I have heard so far is that the Treasurer of this fair province (Mr. F. S. Miller) is going to bring in a budget on May 13. Of course he is preparing us for another round of tax hikes. It will be a very difficult budget, following the budget of 1981 which was full of tax hikes. This budget, by the sounds of it, is going to out-tax the last one.

Another symptom of the declining economy is one that has developed on a very practical level for an individual member when he is doing his constituency work. The number of people coming into my office and requesting that they receive Ontario health insurance plan premium assistance has increased dramatically. The number of people coming into my office asking for forms or applications for this assistance has climbed astronomically.

People who have never asked for this sort of assistance before are finding themselves out of jobs. Small plants in towns in my area have had to close down. The woodworking industry in Hanover and other areas that border on the edge of my riding is sending workers home for indefinite layoffs because there is no movement in Ontario's economy. But all we are promised is a budget that will increase taxes. That is a feeble and terrible response, and it is unacceptable. It is unacceptable that the government of this province would decide to continue in such an uncaring fashion.

9:10 p.m.

I want to suggest that there should have been more in the throne speech to provide incentives for people to stay in Ontario. How can we expect this province to go anywhere if we export our people to the western provinces and who knows where? We cannot afford to do it. I come from an area where we have thrived on exporting children who were raised and educated in the area. We provided the talent for Toronto, Kitchener and London.

Mr. Nixon: Some very good MPPs along the way.

Mr. Elston: Some very good MPPs. The difficulty is that our area has learned what happens when one exports our most treasured asset -- the young people. The population of Huron-Bruce and many of the small towns, with the exception of one or two which are located directly adjacent to the Bruce nuclear power development, has stagnated and really not grown since the early 1900s. Basically that is because we have sent our children to other places to get jobs which fit the educational expertise which they have gained. It is unfortunate.

I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, if Ontario is going to do the same thing it will stagnate. The population will decline and it will be very difficult to hold one's head high when it comes to talking about the opportunities of a developed province.

I have one more comment about the agricultural sector. I welcome the opportunity of working with the new agricultural minister in dealing with the problems which are particularly critical in my area. As members know, the county of Bruce has probably been one of the hardest-hit areas in the province with respect to the decline in the red meat industry.

We have heard sincere words about the reorganization of the ministry, new priorities for the ministry, and I like the sound of that. However, if we take all year to organize and set new priorities it may be too late for a goodly number of farm people from the riding of Huron-Bruce and I find that unacceptable. We not only want reorganization and nice new terms of reference, we also want some action and I hope our new minister will get on with the job.

In relation to an old program which has been helpful to the farmers of Ontario, I urge the Ministry of Agriculture and Food to continue to put emphasis on the tile drainage programs. They are a very useful thing to the farming communities of Ontario. They are well worth the expenditure, increasing the tillable soils by immense acreage, opening up new areas of productive capabilities to a number of the farmers. I want to say the minister ought to continue to place an emphasis on these programs to sustain an increasing use of our arable areas.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to wind up by thanking you for allowing me to speak in reply to this speech. I would hope, however, that the amendment which has been proposed will be voted on in the affirmative by all members, which would really show an open-mindedness to a degree which I could not imagine. Perhaps they will take it back and rework it.

In any event, I hope the shallow words that are placed before this Legislature on the opening of the second session are not equalled by a production of shallow legislation with results that should not be mentioned to the people of Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to take part in this debate. I was checking the record and cannot recall having taken part in the throne debate for a few years. I want, first, to congratulate the Speaker on assuming the position of Speaker and on the way in which he is handling the job. I think he is doing an excellent job. Also, in that congratulation I would like to include the Deputy Speaker, the member for Durham East (Mr. Cureatz), and yourself as the Deputy Chairman of the committees of the whole House for the job you are doing. I congratulate them on assuming these positions.

What I would like to do tonight is deal with only one section of the throne speech debate. That is the section that deals with our country and the assumption of a new Constitution. I wish to do this because we are on the eve of a historic weekend in the history of this country. I think it is well to reminisce a bit and record some of the things that have occurred, some of them known to the members of this House, some of them perhaps not known to the members of this House, and to record some of my feelings and impressions about what we should be doing in the few months and years ahead.

Mr. Nixon: What are these ones we do not know about? Are these secrets about the Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry)?

Hon. Mr. Wells: No. there are no secrets. I would like to tell members a little bit about what happened.

As members know, the Canada Bill has passed the British Parliament. It received royal assent on March 29, again a historic day. It was 115 years to the day, and even to the hour, when Queen Victoria gave royal assent to the British North America Act. On April 17, this Saturday, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth is coming to Canada -- she is already here now -- and she will be proclaiming our new Constitution and the Canada Act.

Mr. Nixon: Is it true that only you and the new privy councillor will be there from the whole Legislature?

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, there will be a number of people there.

Mr. Nixon: And the Attorney General, of course.

Hon. Mr. Wells: The Attorney General? I do not know. Every Liberal I know and have talked to is going to be there, except those who are in this House.

Mr. Nixon: They are all at home on the farm.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I would suggest that the member perhaps has not been talking to the right people to get an invitation, because we certainly do not have any extra ones to hand out but I am sure there were a number around for various events.

What I would like to do is record some of the dates that I think are significant. Of course, November 5, 1981, was the date upon which the nine provinces and the government of Canada signed the accord which set the final stage of this constitutional revision in motion.

Mr. Nixon: What about the 10th province?

Hon. Mr. Wells: I will have more to say about the 10th in a few minutes. The introduction of the revised Canada Act into the House of Commons of Canada occurred on November 20, as agreed to in the accord. The third reading of that bill occurred on December 2 and was passed by a vote of 246 to 24, supported by the Liberal Party, the Progressive Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party. and the majority of the members of those parties.

Mr. Nixon: Did the federal member for Leeds vote for that?

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, I do not believe he did. I believe there were members from all parties who did not vote for it. That is why there were 24 votes against it. The fact is that 246 members representing a broad cross-section of the political representation and the population of Canada voted in favour of the bill on third reading. It was introduced into the Senate of Canada and there it passed by a vote of 59 to 23 on December 8. It was presented to the Queen in London on December 9, and was tabled in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom on December 22. On February 17, after a debate, it passed second reading by a vote of 334 to 44.

Mr. Stokes: Gee, there was a lot of absenteeism. They have 640 members there.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Yes, that is right. My friend has drawn attention to the fact that there was not exactly a full attendance, something which we are not used to here this House.

Mr. Nixon: What about the House of Lords? Let's get to the important part of it.

Hon. Mr. Wells: There was a committee of the whole House debating it for a couple of days on February 23 and March 3. Then there was third reading in the British House on March 8, when the bill passed by a vote of 177 to 33.

9:20 p.m.

Mr. Barlow: I was in the House that night.

Hon. Mr. Wells: My friend was in the House. Some members of our standing committee on procedural affairs were there.

Mr. Nixon: No, this was another committee.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Excuse me, this was another committee. It was introduced for first reading in the House of Lords on March 10. It passed second reading with no dissent on March 18, the committee stage with no dissent on March 23 and third reading with no dissent on March 25. It then received royal assent on March 29 and it will be proclaimed officially to take effect this Saturday, April 17. After 115 years, we are finally bringing home our Constitution.

This act is the product of a lot of hard work and a concerted effort by many Canadians. I think we have achieved a remarkable document, one which represents a reaffirmation of our nationhood, our belief in the monarchy, our belief in democratic and human rights, and our belief in our parliamentary system of government. In short, this new Constitution represents our vision of Canada. I say that notwithstanding the fact a prominent columnist of the Toronto Sun says it does not represent anybody's vision of Canada. I challenge him. I think it does represent what most Canadians feel and believe should be this country of Canada.

There have been some I have spoken to. and I know some of my friends in this House have perhaps had these same questions put to them. who have asked and wondered whether we will still have a Queen after patriation of the Constitution. The fact is that Her Majesty's position and that of her representatives in Canada will remain unaltered notwithstanding the fact the Constitution is coming home to this country and is a made-in-Canada Constitution.

We will still have a Queen of Canada and her role will be protected. I am one who believes it will be enhanced and strengthened in our new Constitution, as it should be. I believe the monarchy is an institution which continues to generate feelings of reverence and allegiance, and serves as a genuine inspiration to many of our citizens; the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon) was supposed to applaud.

The road to constitutional reform in Canada has been a long one and has known a number of sharp turns. The failures of the first ministers' conferences to reach any consensus on reform have been numerous. The first was in September 1980, only four months after the Quebec referendum and --

Mr. Nixon: Come on, what about 1971? That is when you people fouled it up.

Hon. Mr. Wells: We did not foul it up.

Mr. Nixon: Your Premier (Mr. Davis) did.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I do not want to get into a historical debate about that with my friend, but we were not the province that fouled it up in 1971. We came close then but we did not achieve any consensus. Things were put on the back burner. Discussions began again shortly after the mid-1970s. In September 1980, only four months after the Quebec referendum and a summer of unprecedented meetings and discussions where we all worked hard to come to some agreement, for the third occasion in a decade success eluded us and no agreement was reached.

As we all know, in spite of that deadlock which occurred in September 1980, the federal government decided to introduce a resolution on constitutional reform in Parliament. This resolution provided for patriation, an amending formula, a Charter of Rights, a reaffirmation of equalization, a clarification of provincial ownership and jurisdiction over nonrenewable natural resources.

That bill and that new Constitution introduced by the federal government in the Parliament of Canada was considered clause by clause in public hearings over a three-month period. That must be recorded as one of the significant milestones that were passed as we arrived at this constitutional agreement because, contrary to what some people seem to believe about this constitutional package, this was a time when Canadians from all walks of life, as well as their elected people, had an opportunity to have real input and to have their say on what would be in this Constitution. If we were to look at the Hansards of those meetings, we would find many suggestions were made and many changes made to the constitutional package by the House of Commons and Senate joint committee.

During this period only Ontario and New Brunswick supported the federal government on its resolution and constitutional package. The other eight provinces were opposed and in April 1981 they announced an alternative known as the accord of the Group of Eight.

Mr. Nixon: The Gang of Eight.

Hon. Mr. Wells: We like to call it the Group of Eight, but colloquially it was known as the Gang of Eight's accord and it had within it the amending formula known as the Vancouver amending formula. It had no charter of rights.

Another important event was on September 28, 1981, when the Supreme Court of Canada met and handed down its decision. It declared that the action by the federal government to forward its constitutional resolution to the United Kingdom Parliament would be legal, but that traditional constitutional practice or convention in Canada required that such action be undertaken with the approval of a significant number of provinces. The words "significant number" were not defined. The most important aspect of the ruling was that it determined for the first time that the unanimous approval of all provinces was not necessary, something which many constitutional and other experts in this country believed was a requirement.

Following the Supreme Court decision, I think an attitude of concern was also developing -- I am casting for members the background to the November 5 meetings last fall after the Supreme Court of Canada decision and so forth. At the same time certainly I sensed, as many of us did, that there was an attitude developing in the United Kingdom. Even among members of the House of Commons and the House of Lords who were sympathetic to the federal resolution, a number began to believe they were being asked to make choices with regard to constitutional reform that, in their view, more properly should be made in Canada, and that whatever the traditional constitutional convention as indicated by the Supreme Court of Canada might be, it should be followed.

Mr. Nixon: Wasn't the advice that they were supposed to hold their noses and pass it?

Hon. Mr. Wells: No. We did not give them that advice. Word of this attitude on the part of those in Great Britain was seeping back to many of us here in Canada, and I am sure to all governments, including the federal government.

Mr. Nixon: Seeping back? Some people went over to get it.

Hon. Mr. Wells: We went over, but the attitude I have just indicated was not always the public attitude put forward. That is what I am trying to stress. The concern that the package as it was might not be passed was certainly being expressed privately, I believe by many.

Another interesting circumstance was occurring in the summer of 1981. Public opinion polis were showing that a majority of Canadians across the country favoured protection of their basic rights and freedoms in the Constitution. In other words, they favoured some kind of Charter of Rights.

One particular indication of this attitude was contained in a poll published by the Canada West Foundation in the latter part of October 1981. That poll called into question the opposition of a number of provincial governments to an entrenchment of the Charter of Rights. In other words, the people in many of the provinces of western Canada were in favour of some form of Charter of Rights whereas their governments were very strongly opposed to any Charter of Rights in the Canadian Constitution.

At the same time, there was developing in many parts of Canada, including Ontario, a feeling that the constitutional battles, arguments, discussions and confrontations had to be settled by means of a compromise that would be good for Canada. What was required was a compromise package that could be broadly supported by most governments who would be discussing it.

9:30 p.m.

People were saying, "We want you to sit down and talk. We do not want you to come out and tell us you cannot agree." I think that idea forms a very important backdrop to the events of the first week of November 1981, because it was against this background that the Prime Minister of Canada, after talks with the provinces, decided that a first ministers' conference would be held. So at 10 o'clock on the morning of November 2, 1981, in the Ottawa conference centre, such a conference was convened to find a solution to this long-standing constitutional problem, a solution that would allow us to bring home a Constitution which would contain those things most of us felt Canadians wanted and expected to have in it.

After three days of formal private meetings -- and many informal meetings which took place during these days and nights -- the conference again assembled before the television cameras in the main conference hall. This reassembly was on the Thursday, and it was time to report to the Canadian public on the outcome of the private discussions.

I would say, having been there personally, that of those many commentators and newspaper people who were there, very few had given the meeting much chance of success. I think there was a real sense of shock in the room when they learned of the historic agreement that had been reached on November 5, 1981.

Mr. Nixon: Was Brian Peckford really the author of that agreement?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Brian Peckford was one of the authors.

Mr. Nixon: Roy was the other.

Hon. Mr. Wells: It was authored by many people.

At this point, though, having indicated that historic agreement was reached and announced on Thursday, November 5, in the conference centre. I want to backtrack for a minute. I want to draw the attention of the House to a series of events I think was crucial to that accord. I would like to draw attention to what I believe was a really crucial role played by the federal Progressive Conservative caucus in this whole process.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Wells: This must be very much underlined, because it was the Progressive Conservative Party's determined fight in the House of Commons which I believe made the Prime Minister re-evaluate his decision to push for the vote on the constitutional package before the Supreme Court brought in its decision. Because of the concerted action of the federal Progressive Conservative caucus and the kind of fight they put up in the House, the situation came to the point of the government of Canada agreeing not to call the final vote on the constitutional package until the Supreme Court of Canada had reported.

That of course led to the report which I indicated earlier. And that led to the call for the November meeting which led in turn to the accord which had nine provinces and the federal government agreeing on a constitutional package, a much more desirable situation than we were facing at the time of the fight in the House of Commons when the Progressive Conservative caucus was engaging in its procedural tactics to bring about some other resolution of the problem at that time.

The accord that was arrived at in November was a true compromise. As part of that process it was necessary, for instance, for Ontario to accept changes in the existing federal Constitution to which it had previously been very vigorously opposed. We accepted changes in both the amending formula and the Charter of Rights that we had opposed very vigorously since we supported the former federal package.

No compromise is perfect. In Canada, I think we have learned by long experience that we cannot aim for absolute perfection. Our goal has been and always will be to compromise when that compromise is truly in the national interest. That is what, I believe, occurred on this event. For the Premier of this province (Mr. Davis), I think this agreement was the fulfilment of a real personal dream that went back to that initial first ministers' conference when the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk was also there.

It is probably the realization of a dream on his part, I hope, and for all of us who have been concerned over the last 10 years with some kind of renewal of Canadian federalism. This now represented the fulfilment of at least part of that dream we all had. Ten years and countless meetings later, we, particularly the Premier of this province, have had that intense satisfaction -- not particularly, but specifically. I want to underline that because I regret that in many of the press stories this has not been emphasized enough. But I think the crucial player in all this was the Premier of Ontario. The role he was able to play --

Mr. Breaugh: Oh come on.

Mr. Nixon: Peckford. Even Peckford outclasses him. He must be a source of tremendous embarrassment to you all.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, perhaps the minister would permit a question?

The Acting Speaker: Is this a point of order or of personal privilege?

Mr. Renwick: No. It is just a polite question.

The Acting Speaker: No. It is not a time for a polite question. You will have an opportunity to present your position but it is not a time for polite questions.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, will you please not shout at me. I can hear you.

The Acting Speaker: I am just using my speaker.

Mr. Renwick: Perhaps in accordance with the tradition of the assembly, the minister would permit a question.

The Acting Speaker: The minister will permit a question. You may proceed.

Mr. Renwick: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question to the minister is put, as always, in the utmost good faith to him.

Does the minister believe that an amending formula and a Charter of Rights constitute the renewed federalism which was promised to the people of Quebec who voted against sovereignty- association in the referendum in Quebec?

Hon. Mr. Wells: My answer to that would be, yes. I believe the package contained here represents the beginnings, not the ultimate ends or the perfection that we believe could be achieved in renewed federalism. But it represents an improvement and an advancement. Certainly, as far as I am concerned, it is an affirmative answer to that renewal we promised to the people of Quebec.

I feel that way. The honorable member may feel differently but I feel this package does allow me to say, yes, this represents some advancement in renewed federalism in Canada.

Before the member for Riverdale asked the question, I wanted to say to the official opposition House leader and whip that I had promised I might only be about 40 minutes. I would say the way we are going now it is going to take a little longer.

I do believe that I should share this little story with the members. I can recall on the Wednesday evening, November 4 -- that is the Wednesday evening before the accord was signed; it was signed on the Thursday -- sitting around the table with some of the Ontario people and the Premier. It was around 10 o'clock, we had brought in some takeout Chinese food from a little restaurant down the street from the hotel and we were eating out of the boxes. A telephone call came and the Premier retired to the bedroom of the suite to talk for a while. As the call was going on, someone mentioned that it was the Prime Minister of Canada.

About 20 or 25 minutes later, the Premier returned. He did not tell us who he had talked to or anything about the discussion. But I remember the one thing he said was, "You know, you can mark down 10:40 p.m. If it all turns out okay, it probably happened at 10:40 p.m. on this Wednesday evening." That was the result of a call between our Premier and the Prime Minister of Canada.

9:40 p.m.

That was not the whole happening. All I am trying to say is that one of the crucial players in this whole accord was the Premier of this province. I pay tribute and credit to all party members of this House who had, through thick and thin, taken a bipartisan approach to this. We had all supported the previous federal government's constitutional proposals. We had all, by and large, stood up for them, although some may have disagreed with parts. There had been a fairly nonpartisan approach to the whole thing.

The point is that all of us who had been in any constitutional discussions share some satisfaction and pride in what happened that week in November. It was the culmination of much effort. Achieving a consensus was of paramount importance.

I indicated a few minutes ago that people were saying when we went into that meeting we could not come out with another failure. It could not be another conference that was aborted, as many of them were. As far as achieving something in a renewal of federalism, a new Constitution, patriation of our Constitution, something had to happen.

It was necessary, at that time, as a means of restoring Canadians' confidence in our political institutions. Too many people were beginning to say our political institutions could never come up with decisions, we could never get agreement. Some kind of consensus and agreement was necessary to restore Canadians' confidence in their political institutions and to remove a dark cloud that would continue to hang over a number of other issues if deadlock remained the order of the day.

I will not get into details. I do not have time to deal with my thesis that lack of constitutional accord was also contributing to many of our economic problems and was preventing us from coming to grips with some of them.

In a very personal sense, having been at the discussions in that week in November represented one of the proudest moments of my political life, of anything I have known. It was a time when I felt we were taking another very important symbolic step in the development of this country. We were adding to a flag and a national anthem, both of which came out of much controversy -- particularly the flag. While some may still object to the flag, I think we have all come to love, respect and revere the flag of Canada and our national anthem which we sing with pride. Now we are adding a truly made-in- Canada Constitution.

This Saturday, April 17, we will be celebrating this major milestone, as the Queen proclaims this Constitution. But it really is neither a beginning nor an end of our efforts to strengthen Canada -- and here I will in a more detailed way answer my friend the member for Riverdale (Mr. Renwick). What we have achieved is not the end and it is not just a beginning but it is probably more of a beginning than an end. When all is said and done, we still face, as we did when we began this process a couple of years ago, the possibility of Quebec separating from Canada, Constitution or no Constitution.

As the Toronto Star said recently in a lead editorial that was entitled "Separatism Looms Anew": "If the PQ government is re-elected for a third term with more than 50 per cent of the vote, the government will assume it has the right to declare Quebec independent, delegates to the party's biennial congress decided on the weekend. And even if the PQ wins with fewer than half the votes cast, the party will nevertheless claim a mandate to hold a referendum on independence. It's a heads-we-win, tails-you-lose gambit."

That is, I think, ironic, not to say frustrating and disappointing. We all remember the Quebec referendum. One week after the whole country breathed a sigh of relief over the outcome, all the governments started to work in a series of meetings and efforts which would demonstrate to Quebec once and for all that all Canadians meant what they said: that a "no" vote would not just reaffirm the status quo; we were going to show our fellow citizens from Quebec we were serious about our commitment to them in the Canadian confederation.

So we launched into this two-year Constitution-making period I have been talking about. I guess, as one who participated in it, many of us thought after we got into it that it would never end or that we would never come to any kind of meaningful agreement. But as we now know we did come to an agreement on a new patriated Canadian Constitution.

However, having reached that point, who feels left out? Quebec. The very province we were jointly trying to accommodate is isolated to some degree yet again. I think it is important to say it is isolated by the choice of Mr. Lévesque and his Parti Québecois government to be sure, but it is isolated nevertheless.

I guess we would have to say this is a very frustrating chain of events. Through the constitutional exercise we have aroused the parochial and regional feelings of the west and the east on issues ranging from oil and gas to fishing rights. We have confused and perhaps even disillusioned the average Canadian everywhere who could have been forgiven for thinking we could have been better off solving things like unemployment, inflation and other problems rather than worrying about constitutions. We have left the very target of the whole exercise, the province of Quebec or at least its government, feeling isolated now and out in left field.

So I ask, what now? I would like to put it very straight tonight. Our efforts to keep Quebec and Quebeckers as an integral part of Canada must continue. Our new Canadian Constitution I believe will give us something fresh to build on, but we cannot afford to throw up our hands in despair and say Quebec will never be satisfied. Some people I know are quick to say, "Let them go." We cannot afford that. The name of the game is continued compromise and working together.

I believe if the day ever comes when the people of Quebec decide they want to separate from Canada, then we can kiss Canada goodbye. The separation of Quebec would be the first step in a slow-moving, yet I believe very real, chain reaction that would fragment forever this northern half of the continent that we call Canada. None of us would likely see this whole chain of events occur in our lifetime, but I think that end result would occur over a number of years.

I am firmly convinced that just as the provinces joined Canada one at a time after our country's formation in 1867, we could run a risk of seeing, over the course of time, the step-by-step breakup of the country if one province like Quebec decided to opt out.

9:50 p.m.

Some will say that is too dramatic. I do not think that is too dramatic. I am more convinced than ever that all Canadians and the governments we elect to represent us must recognize the situation for what it is today.

We cannot afford to throw up our hands in despair and say we can do nothing. Now is the time when we must bear down, as we have done so often before, and do what we can to make sure that our friends in Quebec stay with Canada and that Canada stays a united country.

By this, I do not mean giving in to every demand of René Lévesque and his separatists; far from it. I do mean, however, that we must continue to be conciliatory and accommodating, with the end being to demonstrate as best we can the mutual advantages to all of us, Quebeckers, Ontarians and other Canadians, of maintaining a strong Canadian nation.

Many of us have had the good fortune to travel in Europe. One of my colleagues mentioned his trip to England, and I know my friend the House leader has travelled in Europe many times. We have been through countries like Switzerland, Germany, France and Belgium, and we have been able to witness firsthand the interaction of various language groups.

We have seen the development of the European Community with its multilingual bodies like the European Parliament. These are all a vivid reminder of the healthy diversity that is present when different linguistic and cultural groups exist shoulder to shoulder, sometimes -- though not always -- divided by political boundaries. So too they are a reminder of the potential that exists in such situations for rivalry and even distrust and animosity.

Anyone with any social sensitivity at all has observed these things in travel abroad, and I am sure you have, Mr. Speaker, as you travelled abroad. Therefore, it is natural now to let our thoughts return home to North America where on so huge a land mass we are blessed with a sense of stability and common interest that comes from the fact that we have only two international boundaries dividing our political jurisdictions on a land mass much larger than Europe.

Here in Canada, just as in Europe and elsewhere in the world, we have a built-in diversity arising from language and cultural differences. It is a diversity that can and does enrich the lives of all those who are able and willing to experience the interaction in positive ways.

However, it is a diversity that has the potential for animosity and divisiveness, as I have said, and we have had some examples of this. We have had some experience in this regard. But we have here a diversity that is worth preserving in its own right, and worth preserving in this province for defensive reasons also, as a very important key to keeping Canada as one, well into the future.

I am sure the members of this House all know Robert Stanfield. He is a man whom I always felt would have been an outstanding Prime Minister of Canada. A few years ago, in a speech in New Brunswick, he gave more evidence of this feeling that many of us had about him with a very thoughtful analysis of some of the choices that now lie before English-speaking Canadians.

Among other things, Bob Stanfield said this: "Accommodations must be reached. They are not likely to be reached if a substantial proportion of anglophones believe that Canada is basically an English-speaking country outside of Quebec -- that it would have remained so if politicians had not stirred up the French, and could be restored to such if only politicians would stop catering to the French."

Here we are, a few days before our long-sought- after Constitution is proclaimed, with a feeling among many Canadians that finally we will have a period of calm. But I am standing here in this House tonight to say that in many respects things have not really changed at all. As far as Quebec is concerned, we have to keep doing more of the same; there has to be more give and take, more patience and more willingness to demonstrate an understanding of the concerns and hopes which have been emanating from Quebec since 1867 and earlier.

There is no doubt that the Parti Québecois is still firmly committed to Quebec independence which, I emphasize, sometimes makes it difficult to keep our thinking straight. But through all the noise which arises from the PQ, let us remember first that there are many French-speaking Quebeckers who remain strongly committed to Canada. However, we know they continue to have some very legitimate expectations.

Essentially, what these boil down to is one simple but fundamental request; that is, that English-speaking Canada demonstrate its acceptance of the French fact in Canada, of the fact that more than one out of four Canadian citizens have French as their mother tongue.

We are being asked, very simply and sincerely, to acknowledge first of all that Canada is officially a bilingual country -- and the new Constitution does that -- and that the francophone minority has special needs to ensure the survival of its language and its culture.

In terms of attitudes, this seems to me to involve two things: a sense of security and a sense of respect. Because they are a minority, francophones in Canada constantly need tangible evidence of our sensitivity and our awareness in this regard.

As the social and cultural homeland of the vast majority of French-speaking Canadians, Quebec, we are also asked to recognize, has its own special responsibility and therefore may have particular requirements that other provinces do not.

I believe that too often we have found ourselves hung up on phrases such as "special status," "dualism" or something else. What we have to ensure is that Canadian federalism in the future is flexible and supple enough to accommodate Quebec and the special characteristics of other regions also.

When we stop to think about it, several provinces, including Manitoba, Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island, as well as Quebec, already have some degree of special status based on the terms under which they entered Confederation.

Quebeckers, and I mean federalist Quebeckers, clearly have a legitimate case that continues to require our consideration, and personally I see nothing for any of us to be frightened of.

The Canadian dimension includes as part of itself the Quebec dimension. Without it, we would never have come into being as a nation. It remains today as an essential part of our Canadian identity to ourselves and to the world. An important aspect of this dimension today, as in the past, is language policy. Listen to what a distinguished Canadian said about this important aspect.

Mr. Nixon: Name him first.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No. I am not going to name him first. I am going to let the honourable member listen to the words this distinguished Canadian said.

Mr. Roy: Another quiz program?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Yes. See if you can get this now.

Mr. Nixon: R. B. Bennett.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No. This distinguished Canadian did not die in a bathtub, because he is still living.

I begin the quotation: "Now, to those, and I don't think they are numerous, who keep on talking about what they think would be the gain to Canada of elimination of the second official language, I have only this to say, that they are whittling at the foundation of Confederation, because apart from that section of the British North America Act, there would have been no Confederation and without it today Confederation would not have survived."

Mr. Roy: John Robarts.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No. You do not win. Someone else can ring a gong. The member would probably never guess who it is, but it was in an address to the Empire Club of Canada on April 4, 1946, by the Honourable Donald Fleming, who later became Canada's Minister of Finance.

Mr. Nixon: God rest his soul.

Hon. Mr. Wells: He is still living. At that time he was a very brand-new member of Parliamont, I believe. They were very profound words that he said. If members are interested, they can read his whole speech of 1946 to the Empire Club. Many of the things he said ring very true today.

10 p.m.

The province of Ontario -- its government and its citizens -- has a special responsibility in all this. As the most populous province and as the province that is, so to speak, at the very core of Confederation, we have to show maturity and leadership. We have to show the way.

I know that many of our citizens have grown weary of hearing this, but our responsibility and challenge in this province, and I say this very sincerely because I believe it, is to demonstrate continually to the people of Quebec, in a whole variety of ways, that we accept them and understand their feelings and aspirations and that we are able and willing to continue to listen and react to those feelings in tangible ways.

As I said a few minutes ago, it is not a simple thing to achieve how to get that message through to the people of Quebec, as distinct to getting it through to the Parti Québecois government.

At Queen's Park, we have spent more time than I can remember trying to come up with ways to get the message through. Sometimes we feel that it is futile; that no matter what we do it never seems to be enough or, worse, that nobody seems to really care. But deep down we know it is the only answer and our only long-term hope. So we keep on going one step at a time, doing what we can and, surprisingly, seeing some payoffs, not only from Quebec but also right here in our home province of Ontario as well as down east and across the west.

For ourselves, we must never forget that with more than 500,000 Franco-Ontarians, we have almost as many French-speaking residents in Ontario as the total populations of provinces like New Brunswick and Newfoundland.

In truth, we can look back with pride over the past 10 or 15 years in Ontario to see what tremendous strides have been taken in the area of services to our French-speaking residents.

Mr. Roy: Easy.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, I am not going to be easy, because we can look back with pride at what we have achieved.

We have made strides which have been in themselves a major benefit, I believe, not only to Franco-Ontarians but to all the people of this province. We have also made strides which have demonstrated to people elsewhere in Canada that Ontario is able and willing to show the kind of Canada-first leadership that is so badly needed in this country.

From next to nothing, we have built a thriving French-language secondary school system that now serves more than 30,000 francophone young people all across this province. This, of course, is in addition to the 74,000 pupils receiving their instruction in French at the elementary school level.

We have seen a steady increase in the number of English-speaking elementary school children who are at last getting a real chance to begin to learn French as a second language at a level that will enable them to grow with the language and in a way that will be meaningful and lasting.

Since 1979, there has been a guaranteed right for anyone in the province to a criminal trial in French. As of this month, the civil courts in Metropolitan Toronto and the francophone regions of the province will be able to operate in both languages. In the last few years we have built a capacity to provide a range of French-language services in virtually all the offices of the Ontario government in those areas of the province where the bulk of French-speaking Ontarians reside.

I have not got it here, but when we get into the estimates I would like to read to my friends a little paragraph from Max Yalden's latest report, because there is a very interesting thing in it that I think indicates in the Essex county survey they did that in the Ontario government services the francophone capacity exceeded that of the federal people in Essex county by quite a broad extent.

Mr. Roy: That's great, but you guys held back for seven years.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No. There is the problem. The honorable member keeps trying to cast the idea that nothing is ever done over here, when slowly and steadily --

Mr. Roy: It is done grudgingly.

Mr. Nixon: Kicking and screaming.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Slowly and steadily it has continued to be done. We have never been dragging; it has all moved ahead.

Mr. Roy: I would like to go and celebrate the weekend with you on the Constitution. Why didn't you guarantee the rights there?

Mr. Speaker: Perhaps you can do that.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Slowly and steadily we are guaranteeing and doing those things that will serve these people in this province. There is a tendency in this House and elsewhere to criticize this government for the constitutional obligations and the comprehensive legal framework or legislation it has not accepted. What is unfortunately ignored are the real moral obligations we have accepted and the comprehensive programs we have been and are developing.

Mr. Nixon: They have been reluctant.

Hon. Mr. Wells: We have never been reluctant.

Mr. Nixon: They have never been granted as a right.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Let me ask something. It is very interesting. They have a couple of members from Essex county. Have they ever put one foot inside the new French-language school in Essex county?

Mr. Nixon: Did your candidate support those schools?

Hon. Mr. Wells: I do not care whether or not my party's candidate supported the school. This government, with the assistance of the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk, voted for a bill which his colleagues voted against. His members in Essex county boycotted the opening of the school. He wants to have it both ways. He cannot have it both ways. I am pleased --

Mr. Nixon: Don't talk like the Premier.

Mr. Roy: Ask how your friend Mitchell got elected.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I am sure we will get back to that when we deal with it in the estimates.

I am pleased to report this government's capacity to fulfil its program commitment has been greatly increased in recent months. What is more, our progress and our organization have attracted the provinces, I am happy to say, of New Brunswick and Manitoba, which have come here to study our system and what we are doing for the Franco-Ontarians. because it is the kind of thing they want to emulate as an example of the way in which they can effectively deliver French-language services.

In addition to the core of people in the office of the co-ordinator working full-time on French- language services, there are now French-language service co-ordinators in the ministries of Health, Community and Social Services, Tourism and Recreation, Citizenship and Culture, Labour, Municipal Affairs and Housing, Consumer and Commercial Relations and in the Ministry of the Attorney General.

As I said earlier, this government has built on its existing guarantees to provide a criminal trial in French to anyone in the province and by extending its bilingual services in the civil courts as of this month. This capacity will now cover areas containing more than 80 per cent of the francophones in Ontario.

The translation of selected statutes is proceeding quickly. More than 70 of the most important statutes are now available in French, including the Highway Traffic Act and the Education Act. I am happy to report that the French-language College of Agricultural Technology in Alfred opened its doors last September and is now providing specialized instruction to more than 50 young Franco-Ontarians.

Mr. Nixon: We owe a good deal to the member for Prescott-Russell (Mr. Boudria) for that.

Mr. Roy: You should brag about opening an office in Brussels as well.

Mr. Speaker: Would the member for Ottawa East allow the minister to continue?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Don't worry, we will get to talking about that in the estimates too.

The French-language secondary school in Penetanguishene, l'Ecole secondaire le Caron, is now completed and the official opening will take place on April 22. I can assure Franco-Ontarians and this House that the government's policy and budget commitment to the expansion of French-language services is a high-priority one. Our commitment is real. We are determined to ensure that it is based on a solid capacity to deliver. We shall continue to build and expand, steadily and without diversion, the foundation carefully and firmly built primarily over the past 15 years.

10:10 p.m.

Our primary motivation shall continue to be the justice of providing more and better services for Ontario's French-speaking population and for all people of Ontario. I believe it would be an error to proceed as if every action was in response and reaction to the Parti Québecois. Such has never been the case in the past; I suggest to this House that it should not be in the future.

Mr. Roy: Unfortunately, you are wrong there.

Hon. Mr. Wells: If the member will wait a minute to hear what I have to say now.

Having said that, all of us must be acutely aware in this present environment that our actions and our words can be and often are taken as signs of intent and commitment, particularly throughout the rest of Canada.

Personally, I strongly believe that what we do in Ontario will -- and I emphasize and underscore the word "will" -- ultimately have a major bearing on the long-term political outcome in Quebec. Yet, as I said earlier, it is sometimes very frustrating to get the message through, no matter what we do.

Mr. Nixon: Your actions in the past have quite a lot to do with it.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Let me say this -- and I was there so I can personally report this firsthand -- at the meeting in Montreal a few years ago, even as Premier Lévesque was reading a council of ministers of education report on French-language education in Canada, I recall that he looked at it and said he was surprised to learn the kind of job Ontario had done in the area of French-language education, and that most of the francophones who wished French-language education were served in Ontario.

Mr. Nixon: Yes, but you were kicking and screaming.

Hon. Mr. Wells: We said that we had told him that and he said, "I know you said that, but I was never really sure." The report proved it to him. That shows how hard it is to get the message across.

Mr. Roy: That is because of the actions of the Premier (Mr. Davis).

Mr. Nixon: As long as he is Premier there will be no French rights, only favours; not rights but favours.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, no, no; the Premier never said that.

Mr. Nixon: Sure he did.

Hon. Mr. Wells: The Premier would support the words that I have just said. What we have done --

Mr. Nixon: Where was he when the bill was before the Legislature? He was down in a press conference saying that as long as he was Premier --

Mr. Speaker: Will the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk please allow the minister to continue.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I spoke on the bill and the member is welcome to read my speech again.

Mr. Roy: And the Premier pulled the rug out from under you.

Hon Mr. Wells: No, he did not. The Premier is one of the great friends Franco-Ontarians have in this province. Over the years, heads of various Conservative governments have laid the foundation for the fine things that have been done. I challenge the members to join us in getting the message through to Quebec instead of always putting through a negative message.

Mr. Roy: How can you expect that when you fight elections like the one you did in Carleton?

Hon. Mr. Wells: Do not worry about the past. The problems are here now. I am saying tonight that the signals that go beaming to Quebec from Ontario will ultimately, I hope, reach the people of Quebec. We are up against those situations where people who ought to know the realities of Ontario do not know.

I am not going to dispute that they have heard about some of the negative things, but I have run into people who have come up here and who really do not believe there is a French-language school system in Ontario.

Mr. Roy: That is your own fault.

Hon. Mr. Wells: All I am saying to the members is, let us forget about some of the negative things and start telling them we have done a great job in French-language education in Ontario.

Mr. Roy: I would love to tell them, if you would give them some rights.

Hon. Mr. Wells: What hope is there in reaching the average Quebeckers -- the men and women who can do their own thinking, who have their own views of Canada and who will continue to support federalism and oppose separatism -- if there is any evidence that the rest of Canada does not give a damn? What we have to do is get the message across, first of all through person to person, community to community, business to business contacts.

Mr. Nixon: When was the last time you asked French parliamentarians up here? Ten years ago.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I am not talking about parliamentarians. I happen to believe the message will not get through just by government to government interaction. What has got to be done is that Canadians from every walk of life from Ontario and the rest of Canada, visiting Quebec, doing business in the province, writing to their friends and their relatives, have to get the message across that we do care about them, we do want them to stay in Canada, and we do serve the Franco-Ontarian population in this province.

The message we must get across is that we are concerned, we care and we want them to stay part of Canada. We must tell them that we in Ontario want to welcome them as neighbours in our province and make them feel at home here in every possible way, and that we do give a darn about keeping Canada united.

Let us not fall into the trap of doing nothing in Ontario, when our conscience tells us we really should, because we think there is no way of getting the message through to Quebeckers. The challenge of attitudes, understanding and commitment, however, not only involves individual Canadians but also involves their governments. I think we have a right to expect all governments to make our federal system work effectively, to seek consensus and to accept compromise.

I regret that the Premier of Quebec is not attending any of the ceremonies this weekend. I regret even more deeply that he has asked the Queen's representative in that province not to attend, and I guess out of respect for the request that was made of him the Queen's representative has decided not to attend the official ceremonies.

Mr. Nixon: He is going as a privy councillor.

Hon. Mr. Wells: He is going, however, as a privy councillor, and I think that is --

Mr. Piché: Very unfortunate for Quebec and very unfortunate for Canada.

Mr. Nixon: Now we are hearing from the real voice of French Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I believe the Queen's representative should have gone to all the ceremonies. However --

Mr. Nixon: The Queen's representative should do what his principal adviser tells him to.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I want to say to my friends that this government will work with the present government of Quebec. We will rebuild the bridges -- because they have become a little tattered in the last couple of years -- between our two provinces. In our mind there is no reason the historical relationship, as my friend the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk has also --

Mr. Nixon: Since 1971 they have been betrayed.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, no, no; not since 1971, since 1976 --

Mr. Nixon: In 1971 you let them down at Victoria, and they have never forgiven you.

Hon. Mr. Wells: My friend is absolutely wrong. Those bridges were as strong as ever until 1976 and the election of the Parti Quebecois. Those bridges were there in a very strong way. They existed between men like Mercier and Mowat, Taschereau and Ferguson, Duplessis and Frost, Johnson and Robarts, and Bourassa and Davis.

Mr. Roy: No.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I tell you, yes.

Mr. Nixon: You are leaving Hepburn out of that list.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Hepburn was there, too.

Mr. Nixon: You had better believe it.

Hon. Mr. Wells: He was there too, yes.

Mr. Roy: There were no bridges built by Davis.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I have listened to the member put that proposition to this House many times and I want to say unequivocally he is absolutely wrong. There were numerous bridges between this government and the Bourassa government and the ministers of that government, and --

Mr. Nixon: The Minister of Education may have had a few dinners with the Premier.

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, no.

Mr. Roy: They went to the winter carnival once; that's not building a bridge.

Mr. Nixon: And he couldn't make it down the toboggan slide.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I will never get through to the members opposite. All I can say is they do not know and they are absolutely wrong.

The bridges were there, and they remained even after 1976 in the early days of the Parti Québecois, but once the referendum campaign started and the members on all sides of this House took the attitude they did -- and the members opposite took that attitude the same as we did, they are on record in the constitutional debate -- we all took the attitude that we really wanted no truck or trade with the policies of the Parti Québecois. All I am saying is we have to rebuild those bridges at the present time. They have become a little tattered, particularly since 1977-78.

10:20 p.m.

Mr. Roy: Premier Davis is as responsible for that as anyone.

Hon. Mr. Wells: That statement is nonsense.

Mr. Speaker: The minister will ignore the interjections, please.

Hon. Mr. Wells: How can he say that the Premier of this province, who is one of the outstanding Canadians, is to blame for something when he stands up and says the things he does that may have offended one of the persons who want to destroy and wreck this country? That is a bunch of nonsense.

Mr. Roy: Will the minister yield the floor? If I may, I will tell you how he did it. When the Premier of this province so barbarically vetoed the bill I proposed in 1978, when the Premier fights an election on bilingualism like he did in Carleton in 1979-80, and when the Premier takes the approach he has towards Franco-Ontarians in this charter, that is how he breaks down the bridges. That is why he has no respect and no credibility in Quebec.

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member for Ottawa East has had his chance to make his views known. Please let the minister continue.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I thank my friend for his interjection. I hate to tell him I seem to recall members of the Quebec government saying to me: "Look, it does not matter a darn to us whether the Albert Roy bill is passed or not. It will have no effect on us or what we do."

Mr. Roy: Sure, that's someone from the PQ saying that.

Hon. Mr. Wells: All I am saying is I have been talking about building bridges with the people, and what we do there is one thing, but the bridges with the government is a different thing. The PQ government does not give a darn and will not be affected in what it does or in its attitude by the member's bill or a French-language services bill or a secondary school in Penetang.

Mr. Nixon: Be more careful.

Hon. Mr. Wells: The government will not be.

Mr. Nixon: Why should you align yourself with separatism?

Hon. Mr. Wells: I am not aligning myself with the separatists. What I am saying is we must rebuild the bridges. I have suggested that notwithstanding our very deep and truly felt feelings towards the policies of the Parti Québecois government, it is a legitimately elected provincial government in Canada and therefore we have to rebuild the bridges with it. We will work with it as a government because we believe there is no reason that kind of historic relationship cannot be built. We will participate in it.

Mr. Nixon: The Premier has never said that.

Hon. Mr. Wells: Yes, he has. What we have to ask is that the Quebec government, as a government that was solidly re-elected last year, not on a separatist policy but on a "We will give you good government" policy, should drop its reticence to take part in only those federal-provincial and interprovincial meetings in which, as they said, vital economic interests are at stake.

The government of Quebec should act as a strong provincial government within the Canadian federal system. That is all we ask. I hope the Quebec government will take part in all federal-provincial and interprovincial meetings, that ministers will meet together and that ministries will work together.

That has not been happening and part of the response to the constitutional accord was to suggest that a number of Quebec delegations should not attend meetings. Indeed, they did not. All I am calling upon them for is to take part in federal-provincial and intergovernmental meetings as a provincial government.

We want to do that, and for our part we want them to do that. We feel that is the best way the interests of Canada can be served and I hope they will accept that. I must say I have been heartened by some of the recent statements by the new Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, Jacques-Yvan Morand, who seems to have softened the original position that Quebec would attend only meetings that were of vital economic importance. He perhaps has softened that stand. I hope they will forget about it completely and take part as they have in the past as Canadian provincial participants in all meetings, because that is necessary. It is necessary if we are to rebuild those bridges.

Mr. Roy: We will support you fully.

Hon. Mr. Wells: I knew the member would. For our part, this government will continue to work towards bringing Quebec into the constitutional consensus at some time and we are going to continue to demonstrate our commitment to the delivery of French-language services in Ontario.

In closing, while talking about the Constitution and some of the things that occurred as we worked up to the accord and talking about the challenge of Quebec because that is probably what has been uppermost in our minds after the accord, of which Quebec was not a part, there still remains with us the challenge of western Canada.

The fact is that the west has for the first time elected a western separatist. There are still feelings of alienation in the western provinces. There is still a desire for more say and more input in what happens at the centre and what happens in the federal government. There are all kinds of things that must be dealt with there and we are going to have to face and deal with those.

I believe those things can all be dealt with in a much better atmosphere and on a much better basis; the basis being the new Constitution and the second round of constitutional discussions. In those discussions, very soon, we will come to grips with the concerns of our native people, and that must be done.

I hope we will get on and deal with the division of power problems that face us; that we will take a look and come up, finally, with a proposal for a reformed upper House to replace the Senate. I hope we will be able to study the matter of some form of proportional representation in the House of Commons, something which is going to be necessary to bridge some of the feelings in this country.

On the eve of the proclamation of our new Constitution, I would like to just close with a quotation because it is well and right that we should listen again to the words of a great Canadian, who left in these words a message which well fits the occasion, and precis and summarizes the remarks which I have been making tonight. The great Canadian was former Governor General Georges P. Vanier, who in his book Only to Serve wrote these words:

"Each of us can make his own contribution to our country's unity. May I repeat what I have said so often. We are 10 provinces. I am proud of each one of them; proud of their inhabitants, but not always happy that the boundaries between the provinces at times look more like barriers than happy meeting places. Let us know one another; that will lead to understanding. I want to be known abroad and at home as a Canadian, not only as a citizen of one of the provinces. I pray to God that we may all go forward hand in hand. We cannot run the risk of this great country falling into pieces."

That is the challenge that faces all of us, and I am sure we feel it is one worthy of us accepting.

Mr. Wrye: Mr. Speaker, the hour is very late, and before the adjournment of the debate I wanted to make a couple of remarks on the speech from the government House leader and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, before returning tomorrow to my remarks on the throne speech.

I want to say I enjoyed listening to his remarks. They were as thoughtful a summary as we have heard from the government in some time on where we stand in this Confederation. All of us will be welcoming the proclamation of our new Constitution with a real sense of joy and relief, as an end to this part of the constitutional process, and hopefully, a beginning of a new era for Canada.

I do not want to be provocative, but the remarks from the government House leader should be required reading, certainly for the Premier (Mr. Davis), for the members of cabinet, the back-benchers and some of the Tories from around the province. I certainly endorse a great many of the sentiments and only wish some of the back-benchers did.

Before I get into my remarks, I notice we are very close to the end of sitting.

On motion by Mr. Wrye, the debate was adjourned.

The House adjourned at 10:31 p.m.