THRONE SPEECH DEBATE (CONTINUED)
The House resumed at 8 p.m.
THRONE SPEECH DEBATE (CONTINUED)
Resuming the 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. McGuigan: I just heard some whisperings across the aisle that they are going to take me off their list for limousines.
Mr. Hodgson: The member will have to have more than three members here or he will not get a limousine.
Mr. McGuigan: I am ahead of members opposite. Shortly after being elected, the Premier (Mr. Davis) took me on an airplane trip with him to Chatham.
Hon. Mr. Snow: Did the plane hit the silo?
Mr. McGuigan: It was not there at that time; so I had a nice trip with the Premier.
Hon. Mr. Snow: Chatham is a great place. It is the only airport in the world with a silo.
Mr. McGuigan: I flew out of that airport last night.
The Deputy Speaker: The member for Kent-Elgin has the floor.
Mr. McGuigan: The head wind was towards the silo; so we flew away from the silo, but that is another subject with which I will entertain members some other night.
Hon. Mr. Snow: I think we should discuss it tonight.
Mr. McGuigan: Perhaps in the minister's estimates.
I would like to speak tonight about a problem land area in Kent county. I guess it goes back a bit in history. At one point in our geologic time, the Great Lakes were about 100 feet deeper than they are at present. As the glaciers withdrew from the southern lakes, they still covered the mouth of the St. Lawrence River. In fact, they covered all the St. Lawrence River. At that time, the water flow was down the Mississippi. There is an old shoreline that follows all the Great Lakes. It is because of that shoreline that we have a lot of fruit areas at various spots along Lake Erie and some at Lake Huron as well.
One of the most famous shoreline areas is the area south of Blenheim leading down to Rondeau Bay. It once was one of the most fertile areas in southern Ontario. If one brought a visitor to Kent county 30 years ago and wanted to take him on a tour, one would take him down the old road. There are beautiful old brick houses there -- substantial houses. They came from the profits of that land because there was never a crop failure on it.
My father was a great farmer and liked to tour on Sundays. I hesitate to tell members how many Sundays as a kid I spent touring. We would always begin or end up by going down the old road to see those beautiful crops. Today one would not do that.
Mr. Hodgson: Why would the member not do that?
Mr. McGuigan: If the member for York North (Mr. Hodgson) had an eye for farming, and I think he probably has, he would not go down there because the effect of erosion has been simply terrible.
I have to give members a bit of background. Because it is beach soil, deep sand, when the topsoil erodes, in many cases it does not erode to clay but to more sand. It is a peculiar situation for soil to suffer erosion, lose its topsoil and still produce crops. I hope the members will not get me wrong and think this is all good. It has simply allowed those people to carry on when they should have stopped and taken remedial action a number of years ago.
If one drives through that area today, one will see nearly every hillside not with a poor crop and not with a sparse crop, but bare. Weeds do not grow on them and crops do not grow on them. That land is bare and it is an ugly sight. In the case of some 25 per cent of the land in the Rondeau Bay area, all the topsoil is completely gone.
Mr. Havrot: Blame it on the government.
Mr. McGuigan: Who else would I blame it on? This government put out the 1969 report, The Challenge of Abundance. It laid out the system for the farmers of Ontario. It said: "Get big. Specialize. Go into monoculture. Do away with your cattle. Specialize in cash crops. Put your cattle into big feedlots."
Where are the feedlots today? The feedlots are broke. Feedlots all over this province are broke. The government encouraged that sort of thing. When one looks at The Challenge of Abundance of 1969, one will find it there. This government, which has been in charge all those years, has to answer for it.
Mr. Havrot: It depends on where one lives.
Mr. McGuigan: Sure it does. I want to preserve it. I am not afraid to take a few chances.
The loss on that land has been measured at 12 tons to the acre per year. Most land will suffer a loss of about three tons because there is some natural regeneration of fresh soil as one brings up a little subsoil, mixes it with some of the topsoil and adds organic matter with manures and soon. One does a little soil building, but those lands are going behind by nine tons to the acre.
This did not come to the attention of the government through the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. That is the sad part of it. The people who are supposed to be the guardians of our soil stood aside.
Mr. Havrot: Talk to your cousins in Ottawa.
Mr. McGuigan: Ottawa has a good soil erosion program. It is willing to put money into this one. The government stood aside. Who was it who raised the flag? It was the Ministry of the Environment because we were filling up Rondeau Bay and destroying one of the greatest natural bass fishing grounds in the world.
I went to Florida a couple of winters ago with my son who is a great bass fisherman. He is a tournament fisherman. We went to the St. John River which is touted as being the greatest bass fishing place in North America. The fishing was not all that good. We asked the native people, "Where is a good place to get bass?" They said, "Go up north to Rondeau Bay." They were working on old information because Rondeau Bay today is devoid of vegetation. There are no reeds in it. There is no milfoil in it.
Mr. Havrot: No shellfish.
Mr. McGuigan: I will not answer that. The member should crawl into his shell.
There is no vegetation that will support the spawning of these young fish.
Interjection.
Mr. McGuigan: A fish would not get caught if it kept its mouth shut.
They did tests on the water and decided it was because of the lack of clarity of the water. Sunlight will not go down through the water, and sunlight is required for the power supply to generate the growth of the aquatic plants. The power for the growth comes from the sun. They have a white disc they lower into the water for a series of experiments. One is supposed to be able to see this disc at about four feet down in reasonably clear water. One cannot see the disc after about 10 inches because the water is so loaded with sediment.
8:10 p.m.
We have this once great fishing area which has very poor fishing today. The people make their living from the tourist industry, which is a very big industry all along the lake. People from Detroit come there to fish, and the local people fish there. It is a big industry, but that industry is in very sad trouble because the good fishing is no longer there. The land from the Rondeau Bay watershed is moving into the bay and eventually will fill up the bay.
The ironic thing is that the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, which is supposed to be concerned with agriculture and food -- in 1962 the word "food" was added to that ministry's title -- is not concerned. They say it is the concern of the Ministry of the Environment.
We have a group of people there who as farmers realize they have a problem. But I know, as does the member for Elgin (Mr. McNeil), who is very knowledgeable about farm affairs, one does not go in and --
An hon. member: Way to go, Ron.
Mr. McGuigan: If a person wants to get anything, that member is the guy to go to. He will give the straight truth. He knows one does not go to farmers and say to them: "You must not farm in that way. You have to do it this way." Before he got the words out of his mouth, they would tell him what to do.
These people are at the point where they want to do something. They realize they have a problem. They put a brief into the Ministry of Agriculture and Food asking for funds for study. Funds are required to do these things. They want legislation and they want support.
To go back a little bit, there was a cranky farmer in Raleigh township at the turn of the century. There are a lot of cranky ones there now, including me. His name was Charlie Williams. It does not mean very much to people today, but Williams farmed on the Raleigh plains. Because of the nature of the land, the farming was not too good. The land was either too wet or too dry. That was one of the hazards of farming in the middle of the 1880s.
Mr. Williams, being a cranky man, decided something should be done about the problem of flooding. He called on the Raleigh township council for an easement. This was in the days when farmers were independent. They did not want to care for the water that ran on to the other fellow's property. His proposition was that those farmers whose waters drained under the plain should be assessed damages. Council did not agree and said it was not within its jurisdiction to adopt such measures.
He sued the township. He engaged the services of a lawyer named Matthew Wilson and instructed him to sue the township for damages. He won his case but he lost an appeal by the township. The next move was to appeal the appeal, which he did in the Supreme Court and had the satisfaction of seeing his case upheld. The township then appealed the case to the Privy Council, which was permissible in those days. Again, Mr. Williams won.
Through this one man's efforts, the Raleigh drain was built to service the plain. It stands as an unnamed monument to one man's idea. From this one act eventually came the Drainage Act, which has done so much for the economy of Kent.
I brought up that point because the Drainage Act has done a great deal for the economy of Ontario. The act is one of the jewels in the arsenal of the Conservative government. It is used a lot. The act established the principle that a person is responsible for his water. If water runs from one person's farm on to another person's farm, he can be assessed and charged. He then has to help to pay for the drainage of that water.
We have a situation today with the compaction and the change in farming practices. This government has encouraged us to go to one or two crops in very large fields. In fact, it gave subsidies to bulldoze bush lots and to take out the fence rows to create these very big fields. Five minutes after a rainstorm, the water just gushes across those fields and takes away the soil.
We need some legislation and we need programs to take care of that water on top of the ground because it does not have time to sink into the ground, go down to the tile drainage and be covered by the terms of the Tile Drainage Act. it would be interesting and it would be a challenge if the government of Ontario were to recognize this, as has been done in the United States ever since about 1935. Various states have brought in legislation to create soil conservation areas.
The type of thing I have in mind is that the ministry on a small demonstration area could make a contract with these farmers. These farmers have expressed a willingness to enter into such a contract. The terms of the contract would be that they would follow some soil conservation types of farming. They would have to do it for, say, a minimum of five years.
The province would provide technical assistance. It would provide some guarantees in money so the farmers could continue to make payments and not suffer great losses through their adoption of what in Ontario could be looked upon as experimental tactics. Really, they are not experimental at all. In other parts of the world they are well-established practices, but certainly here in Ontario they would be experimental.
We have this opportunity not to force farmers to enter into a program but to co-operate with them, and we are getting very little support from the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.
We talked earlier about moral rectitude and the problems in the world. I talked a bit about the problem of how we are going to employ people with the revolution that is going on in industry, but there are two or three other problems that are perhaps worse.
I guess at the top of the list would be the arms race. Shortly after that would be the damage we are doing to the atmosphere, the pollution of the upper atmosphere and the changes it is bringing about in weather patterns. We really think we are seeing some of those changes in some of the erosion damage that is being caused. Right up at the top of that list is soil erosion, because we as a country and as a civilization are destroying our land more rapidly than has any other civilization.
We look at the problems today in Africa and at the people who are dying there. With the tremendous productive capacity we have, it is still impossible for us to transport and get food to them. That once was a thriving part of the world. We are moving faster down this road than they are.
It is difficult to stand up and talk about soil erosion when on every hand we have surpluses of food and farmers who get low prices for food. The government wonders: "Why are you talking about shortages of land? Let it go." That is what they seem to be saying.
One of the things we are doing in our research program here in Ontario is finding more and better ways to grow crops on poor land. They have an experiment at Ridgetown, not very far away from the Rondeau watershed. The object of the experiment is to see what is the possible high yield -- not yields that a farmer could expect to produce economically on his farm, but what is the potential, what is the highest possible yield one could get.
By using great inputs of fertilizer and new varieties of seeds and pesticides, they came up with a corn yield of 252 bushels to the acre. That is a tremendous yield. They think the theoretical potential today is around 600 bushels. That is a theoretical yield if everything were just perfect. But they have attained yields of 252 bushels.
8:20 p.m.
I suppose there is some value in showing what is possible and what is attainable, but it seems to me they are creating a false sense of security in the minds of farmers and in the minds of the consumers, because to attain those yields it is simply an exotic method of mining the soil.
We keep improving our yields. They are going up by about two per cent a year. But those yields are going up by using more chemicals, more pesticides, more inputs. All those inputs come from petroleum; it is the basis of the fertilizer and the pesticide industries. We live in a world that has a rapidly diminishing supply of petroleum. That is where our research dollars are going, to try to mask this insidious thing that is happening to the soils of southwestern Ontario.
It is happening in other ways, even on the flat lands. Every member here realizes that southwestern Ontario is very level, flat land. Here the problem is not so much erosion as it is compaction.
I had a drainage contractor come to me this summer -- as a matter of fact, two men came. The contractor had blood in his eye because the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Timbrell) had told him that I thought the Drainage Act needed some revision; that we needed to have the legal power to do above ground what we are now doing below ground. The chap was Eugene Kovacs, of RR 4, Chatham. He came -- and, quite honestly, I am glad he came -- to put it right to me: "What is the meaning of these remarks?"
I told him my side of the story and my concerns. In just minutes he was on my side, and he told me this story. He said he had put in a drainage system for a farmer three years ago. This was not on heavy clay land where one might expect compaction problems; it was on a sandy loam soil. He put in a complete drainage system. It costs about $400 an acre or so to put that in.
The farmer came to him in the third spring and said: "The drainage system is not working. What kind of a job did you do? My soil is wet and muddy; it is not draining."
The drainage contractor went out to the farm and said, "Let's look at it." He took a shovel out of the trunk of his car and started digging in this muddy, wet, soggy soil. It was no place to grow crops.
He said he took out one spadeful and found the ground was dry. He dug down to the tile and it was running, but the ground was dry right down to the tile. The problem is, as any farmer knows, that land has lost its organic capacity; it has lost its physical structure; it has been overcropped with cash crops and it is not draining.
Last summer, one could drive through those counties in southwestern Ontario, particularly my two counties and into Essex, and all summer long one would see water ponds in what were always good fields -- fields that I know are drained; there is tile drain in them. They never did drain. There is all sorts of expensive drainage tile underneath, but because of the heavy equipment and the type of fanning we are doing -- all encouraged by this government -- we have a soil compaction problem.
I do not want to blame all the troubles and everything that is wrong in Ontario on this government. I do blame them when they do not recognize something that is in front of them.
The farmers are recognizing it, the government's ag reps are recognizing it, and the drainage contractors are recognizing it, but the Ministry of Agriculture and Food will not recognize it, because the Tile Drainage Act and the tile drainage loans have been such a great vote-getting system. They are not interested in the long-term welfare of the land. They are interested in the long-term welfare of that party.
Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of other aspects of this problem I want to talk about, for I really have just touched on it. However, we made an agreement that we would allow other people their time.
I would love a discussion on another occasion with the Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Snow). I do not think he is much involved with the silo at Chatham. That is really a federal matter. I would be very glad to discuss it with him. In fact, I would be glad to have the minister come so I could show him around the county. I would show him some of these things I am talking about.
Hon. Mr. Snow: I have been there many times.
Mr. McGuigan: The minister is always welcome, too.
About a year ago, I sent a letter to the Minister of Agriculture and Food, asking him to come down so I could show him some of the things I have been taking about. I said if he did not want to come under my wing, I would be happy to have Ridgetown College of Agricultural Technology arrange a tour and I would just tag along to show him some of these things because a picture is better than a thousand words. He did not even answer my letter. I am not very proud to stand up and say the minister would not answer my letter.
Mr. Havrot: It must have been lost in the mail.
Mr. McGuigan: That is the type of comment one would expect from that member. I have a lot of things to say, Mr. Speaker, but I will relinquish my time to other members.
Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, the first thing I want to do is to congratulate the presiding officers in this chamber for the way they do the onerous job of keeping order, and some degree of decorum and civility among this motley lot they have to preside over, including the member who just left the chamber, which is to the betterment of all of us here.
I want to say, even in his absence, how much I appreciated the comments of the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon) when he shared his experiences with us as a result of his visit behind the Iron Curtain. Since I have been a member here, I have always thought it would be most advantageous if all members who had the occasion and the privilege of visiting abroad would come back and share with us some of those experiences and observations they may make as a result of their trips. It does tend to broaden our horizons. It gets us a little bit afield from the routine, mundane, sometimes boring things we have to do around here individually and collectively. If more of that were done, it would be to the benefit of all of us in this chamber and ultimately to the benefit of everybody in the province.
In that same connection, I want to congratulate the member for Perth (Mr. Edighoffer), who visited a little farther afield, to Nairobi, Kenya. He did share his experiences on that occasion with us. For the same reason, I am commending his colleague the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk. I think we should have more of it.
The Minister of Tourism and Recreation (Mr. Baetz) gets a little farther afield on occasion, and I hope all members of the House will take advantage of the first opportunity to share experiences such as that with us. We could compare a lot of those experiences with the way in which we order our affairs here and, as a result of the increased communications, on occasion we might even find a better way of doing things ourselves. I think that is all a plus.
8:30 p.m.
I was going to compliment and welcome the member for Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry (Mr. Villeneuve), who was here a little earlier but is not here now. I was going to remind him that some of the shenanigans he may have witnessed since he took his seat a week ago today are not the way in which we generally approach our individual and collective responsibilities around here.
This is the doldrums. It is always a dull time when one has to listen to speeches about the throne speech. Rather than deal specifically with the content or lack of content of a throne speech, most members tend to be somewhat parochial and spend most of the time talking to the folks back home, because there are precious few people listening to what goes on in the speeches delivered. I hope the honourable member's stay here will give him an opportunity to participate in a way from which we might all benefit, and certainly the people from that great part of Ontario who sent him here.
I am not going to spend a great deal of time talking about what was in the throne speech or what was noticeably absent from the throne speech. I was listening earlier today to the member for Mississauga South (Mr. Kennedy), who was reading from a prepared text. He tended to be somewhat negative in his contribution to this debate by tearing strips off the opposition, claiming we were purveyors of doom and gloom and we failed to see anything positive in what was going on, and saying he felt we could only get our jollies by being critical and negative.
Since I have been in this House, I have never at any time felt I had the right or the duty to stand up and criticize somebody else, unless I was prepared to come up with an alternative to what was being done over there. I have always attempted to do that, and I am going to continue to try to do that for whatever time it will be my privilege to serve in this chamber.
I want to deal with two specific topics in a positive way, not a negative way. I hope my comments will not be misconstrued, because I want to state here and now that the two topics I want to give my time to are ongoing, long-lasting problems I have spoken about for a good number of years.
The status quo has been tested and found wanting. I want to refer to economic development by the orderly exploitation of our primary resources in northern Ontario. I want to deal specifically with what happens when we find a gold-bearing ore body, in this case in northern Ontario in the riding of Lake Nipigon, along the north shore of Lake Superior, along the TransCanada Highway and the main line of CP Rail at Hemlo.
Three gold mines will be the result of the discovery of that ore body, one by Noranda Mines, one by Lac Minerals and the other by Teck Corona. They have defined a gold-bearing ore body that at the present rate for precious metal is valued at between $10 billion and $12 billion, and counting.
The three communities, which are almost equidistant from that ore body, about 30 miles away -- namely, Manitouwadge, Marathon and White River -- are literally tripping over themselves trying to take advantage of the economic spinoff of that mining development. They know, and everybody in this chamber and everybody in government knows, they will never have the opportunity to tax that resource in a direct way, in a way that will compensate them for the tremendous outlay of capital dollars that will be required to provide the infrastructure services such as water, sewers and roads that will be required if those three communities are going to be the bedroom communities for that work force, which will be working elsewhere but domiciled in those three communities.
Let me go back about 30 years for purposes of illustrating what I am attempting to say to this House and to the members who care to listen. Let me read an editorial that appeared in the Manitouwadge Echo. It was written by a guest editor by the name of S. W. Bridges; it was originally published in the Geraldton Times-Star. Just to set the thing in perspective, Stew Bridges was my Tory opponent in the 1971 election. Let me quote just to put it into perspective; and remember this happened 30 years ago:
"The Hemlo gold discovery has three north shore communities dreaming of pie in the sky. Marathon, Manitouwadge and White River all figure on cashing in on the great proposed gold camp. There is talk that Marathon will have a population of 20,000." It has about 2,500 now. "Manitouwadge will exceed 10,000." It has about 3,000 now. "White River appears to be picking up what is left over. It is hoped all dreams will come true. History indicates otherwise.
"The spring of 1953 was another great mining boom. Three Geraldton men, two prospectors and a businessman, discovered copper, gold, silver, lead and zinc on or near a little lake known as Manitouwadge. This resulted in two mines, Willroy and Geco. Built around the two mines was a new, modern community of approximately 3,000. In 1954 the mining world was excited. Politicians were dreaming and speculators planned to move into the new boom town. The provincial government moved in. They promised a new, modern mining community. No more Sudburys, Kirkland Lakes or Cobalts. This was to be a planned, model mining town.
"The Minister of Mines of the day declared that Manitouwadge was going to be as big as Sudbury. It would in fact be greater than Sudbury. In another speech he stated within five years he could see 'Manitouwadge with a population exceeding Barrie, Ontario.' He was not alone.
"As the diamond drill bits ground deeper into the ground, why the town had no boundaries. Then the provincial government sent in the community planners. They had visions of grandeur. They had no problem. There was plenty of land. They could make this into a town with large residential lots and a well-planned shopping area. One planner was heard to brag that he was going to show Canadians how it was done. There was plenty of land between Lake Superior and the Albany River.
8:40 p.m.
"The Ministry of Lands and Forests, now known as Natural Resources, announced land for sale in Manitouwadge. A chap by the name of Bob Bond, who later became municipal clerk for the town of Geraldton, was in charge of selling the residential and commercial lots. The lots went on sale, not in Manitouwadge or Marathon. No, sir. They were on sale at White River, Ontario. The new proposed town of Manitouwadge was still a dream on paper. Maps drafted showed the proposed town site. They also showed a well-planned commercial area. All was strictly zoned. No mixing of commercial and residential. Even an industrial area was planned.
"The lots came on sale with a reserve bid of $1,200 for a commercial lot. The two big bidders were the Hudson's Bay Co. and Chapples. Chapples, with their main store located in Fort William, had a chain of department stores established in communities such as Geraldton, Beardmore, Schreiber and Red Rock. Chapples wanted to expand into the new community. The bidding was fierce. All others stood by and watched. No one wanted to compete. Each bidder looking for a lot wanted to be near the post office, banks and the two major department stores. Chapples dropped out. The Bay won and bought their land. Chapples was offered another location. They did not bother.
"Buying lots next to the Bay was the idea. The bank bids. The land was running too high. Many Geraldton businessmen dropped out. The reason was simple.
"First, if you bought a commercial lot, you could only carry on business; no rooms, no apartments overhead. Offices for lawyers, doctors, insurance, etc. were permissible. You were told also to buy a residential lot when you bought a commercial lot. It was a beautiful plan.
"The commercial lots were all with 17-foot frontages. What kind of building could be built with a 17-foot frontage?
"Manitouwadge had two mines, It grew to approximately 3,000 population. That was all of 30 years ago. It was the first mining boom following the Second World War. Take it easy."
That is what he is saying about the urge by the people of Manitouwadge, Marathon and White River to cash in on this great bonanza that is going to befall the people along the north shore of Lake Superior as a result of this $12 billion worth of new wealth that has been identified.
Since it has been agreed that Noranda Mines is going to have a viable mining operation and its work force is going to be domiciled in Manitouwadge, and that Teck Corp. and Lac Minerals are looking towards Marathon, let me remind the House that as a result of this newfound wealth, not one solitary penny is going to accrue directly to the municipalities that are charged with the responsibility of providing the hard and soft services that are going to be required to service that work force, first of all to make it attractive for them to move in and to convince them, after they get there, that it is going to be a good place to live, to educate their children and to bring up their families.
I discussed this with the Minister of Northern Affairs (Mr. Bernier) during the estimates last fall and suggested that some kind of heritage fund, tomorrow fund or resources development fund be set up to look after problems experienced by fast-growing communities in the north, especially this one based on a nonrenewable resource, because we know from the first day we take a ton of ore out of the ground, we are that much closer to the day when we have to walk away from it or find an alternative to the economy of that community.
The minister said, "We really do not need a fund like that as long as we have a Ministry of Northern Affairs. If any of those communities are having growing problems or growing pains, they need only come to us and we will bring in supplementary estimates."
In fairness to the Minister of Northern Affairs and his ministry, they have come up with $70,000 for the township of Marathon to allow it to employ an economic development officer for the next two years. They have contributed something in the order of $30,000 to $35,000 to the township of Manitouwadge so that it can get its act together with regard to an overall official plan. To date, that has been the extent of financial contribution from the Ministry of Northern Affairs.
As a result, I wrote a letter to the minister and sent copies to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (Mr. Bennett), the Premier (Mr. Davis) and the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Pope). I said:
"Dear Mr. Minister:
"This will acknowledge your response dated March 13, 1984, concerning assistance from your ministry for the Manitouwadge fire department." As the result of expansion, as the result of building an airport on the outskirts of Manitouwadge, they find themselves in need of another fire truck and do not have the financial wherewithal to provide it.
"You indicate the only form of help for such purposes is through generous unconditional and conditional grants from the province.
"I am sure you will appreciate the additional pressure that dormitory communities like Manitouwadge and Marathon are subjected to in their responsibility for providing infrastructure and soft services for the work forces of Noranda, Lac Minerals and Tech-Corona at Hemlo.
"Since these communities are being forced to provide serviced lots for residential, commercial and light industrial development, they will be hard pressed to recover costs from water, sewers and streets and all other infrastructure services on a user-pay principle.
"These projects will require interim or bridge financing until the municipalities are able to recover costs for these services, as well as borrowing and debenture costs. These charges will be borne by existing taxpayers until the new arrivals are in a position to make their contributions.
"The part of this whole equation that I find most worrisome is the fact that this new mining venture has identified a gold-bearing ore body valued in excess of $10 billion and the communities of Marathon and Manitouwadge have no taxing authority beyond their own boundaries. You will be aware that this deposit is roughly 30 miles from these communities and the federal and provincial governments will be the major beneficiaries in the creation of this new wealth, while the municipal governments are charged with the responsibility for providing services.
"Prior to the introduction of the resource equalization grants, we had in place mining revenue payments which were paid by the province to municipalities which were bedroom communities for a work force which was employed elsewhere beyond their boundaries.
"The same case can be made for communities like Geraldton, Beardmore, Nipigon and Schreiber, which are dormitory communities for work forces employed by the pulp and paper industries and are located outside their jurisdiction. Pulp, paper and sawmills are located in the city of Thunder Bay and pay taxes there but the timber is located elsewhere and much of the woodlands work force resides in small outside communities which do not benefit from industrial assessment.
"The value of Ontario's metallic mineral production in 1983 is estimated at $2.67 billion. On a regional basis the value of all mineral production in 1982 was as follows: Algoma, $623.7 million; Cochrane, $479.3 million; Kenora, $185.7 million; Nipissing, $49.7 million; Thunder Bay, $172.8 million; Timiskaming, $136.2 million; Sudbury, $723.8 million. Ontario's projected mining profits tax for fiscal 1983-84 is $35 million.
8:50 p.m.
"Other mineral-resource related revenues as of March 1983 include acreage fees, $528,050; miners' permits, $598,383: pits and quarries, $167,310; mining leases, $229,312; mining royalties, $1,997,744.
"The latest information available for the forest industry comes from the Ministry of Natural Resources 1983 statistics which provide a breakdown for 1981. The subsectors in the value of shipments are as follows: logging, $717.9 million; wood industries, $1.42 billion; paper and allied products, $5.12 billion.
"If the distribution of production is the same as it was in the mid-1970s, then the above figures could be broken down as follows for the northwest region: for logging, $272.8 million; wood products, $326.6 million; paper, $665.6 million. In northeast Ontario, it would be: for logging, $424 million; wood, $170.4 million; paper, $1,177,600,000.
"The MNR statistics in public accounts for the year ending March 31, 1983, indicate the following revenues: land agreements, $526,531: nursery stock, $675,846; stumpage fees, $39.5 million; timber area charges. $3.3 million.
"It is obvious that northern Ontario, with less than 10 per cent of Ontario's population, is responsible for a much larger proportion of the new wealth created on a per capita basis than any other region in the province. It also follows that many northern municipalities do not have the necessary mix of industrial, commercial and residential assessments to underwrite the cost of servicing the work force which resides within their boundaries.
"The transfer payments from the province to northern municipalities by way of conditional or unconditional grants fall far short of the financial requirements needed for the construction of infrastructure services in these bedroom communities.
"When one looks at the plight of communities such as Atikokan and Pickle Lake when their economic base is lost, it becomes obvious that a pool of capital is required to assist them in finding and establishing an alternate economic base, especially if we are dealing with a nonrenewable resource such as mining.
"The government has stated that a heritage fund or a resource fund is not needed as long as we have the Ministry of Northern Affairs. If such is the case, what commitment is it making to assist Marathon and Manitouwadge in their task of providing services for the Hemlo work force beyond the partial funding of an economic development co-ordinator in Marathon, or an official plan for Manitouwadge?
"Let me suggest that a representative group of regional directors from provincial ministries meet with the executive of the Thunder Bay Municipal League to identify specific problems and to make recommendations that could compensate northern municipalities for their inability to benefit directly from resource exploitation. The government's advice and assistance would be greatly appreciated."
Some might say, as the member for Mississauga South said earlier today, that is a negative comment; that we are being critical of the status quo. If that is the case, I plead guilty. But I do not see it that way. It is my responsibility, as a member representing a northern riding, to bring to Mr. Speaker's attention and to the attention of members of the House the consequences of maintaining the status quo where we have identified a brand-new resource with a value of something in the order of $10 billion to $12 billion. We are going about servicing people who are going to have to be attracted into that area in order to produce that new wealth.
If we do not get our act together, first, we are not going to attract the professional, skilled and semi-skilled work force needed to exploit that resource in an orderly fashion. If they do not do that, we are going to have shack towns, unattractive ghettos, an environment no one will be proud of, an unsatisfied work force and an eyesore.
There is no doubt in anybody's mind that if we are going to attract the kind of work force that is going to be necessary to do the job of exploiting that mineral wealth, to provide a profit for the shareholders, to give a decent wage to the work force and to have due regard for the environment, it is going to take money, expertise and commitment. It has been estimated that when those three mines get going, there are going to be about 10,000 tons of tailings a day coming from them. Those tailings have to be taken care of to make sure they do not foul up water courses in the area and we do not unduly impair other values such as the quality of water, fishing, forestry, all of the things which are affected by human intervention in a multiple-use concept. It is going to take money. It is going to take expertise and a commitment on behalf of all concerned.
It is not enough for the Minister of Northern Affairs to say: "If you need some help, come and see us. We will bring in supplementary estimates and somehow we will get the job done." We are talking about a megaproject. We are talking about megabucks, and collectively, led by that government over there, we have a responsibility to assist those communities to do all of the things that are so essential if we are going to call ourselves world leaders in terms of orderly exploitation of a resource. We have a responsibility to leave the environment just a little bit better than we found it.
All of this takes planning, expertise, dedication and a good measure of concern by a government which claims to have the expertise, which says it is a world leader in creating an economic climate that is second to none anywhere.
I hope the Provincial Secretary for Justice (Mr. Walker) and the member for High Park-Swansea (Mr. Shymko) have been listening to what I have been saying for the last half hour. If they had the privilege of being the member for Lake Nipigon. would they treat this problem any differently from the way in which I have treated it?
9 p.m.
I have not been negative. First, I am inviting the rascals over there to be aware of the problem. I have the responsibility to bring something of this import to the government's attention. It has a profound effect on the lives of everybody in Ontario and everybody in Canada. I did not put it there, it happened as a result of volcanic action five million years ago.
I want to tell the members I had stock in the very property when I used to be employed by the Canadian Pacific Railway. It was called Lake Superior Mining Corp. Ltd. They knew there was something there but they did not positively identify precisely where it was, so the company lost its charter. I am using the certificate as wallpaper. Now we have a resource there of $10 billion or $12 billion and still counting.
I was one of the original free enterprisers and I lost.
Some hon. members: Come on over.
Mr. Barlow: Tossed right out of the party.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Robinson): Order.
Mr. Stokes: The members cannot tell me anything about a commitment to the future of northern Ontario or Canada. I was involved in that exercise long before the members even knew what it was. What I am saying is that it is just unfortunate. We have the Provincial Secretary for Social Development (Mr. Dean) and the Provincial Secretary for Justice here. I am sure I have convinced them my argument is worth while.
I would love it if the Minister of Northern Affairs, the Premier, the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (Mr. Bennett) and the Treasurer (Mr. Grossman) were here because we in northern Ontario will be creating that for the benefit of everybody in Ontario and Canada and we want some help from those people to do it right. We do not think it should be done on the backs of existing residential taxpayers in those communities. I think the members would agree with that.
The same thing would apply to Detour Lake. We do not have any members from northeastern Ontario here, but the members who are here will know a substantial ore body has been identified. I do not think it is as big or as rich as Hemlo, but it is very significant.
The dormitory communities that will be charged with providing services for the work force at Detour Lake will be Cochrane, Timmins and the communities near by. Those communities are entitled to the same consideration and the same assistance in the creation of that new well for the work force that will be domiciled there, but they do not have the ability to tax that resource.
I want to speak of one other problem, namely, our inability to attract a qualified work force of professionals in the medical field. I am sure those members who read the Globe and Mail on a regular basis, much more carefully than I do, will be aware of a series of articles that ran about two weeks ago.
One dealt with the plight of the town of Smooth Rock Falls in trying to attract a doctor, or a sufficient number of doctors, to look after the medical needs of that community. There was another about Fort Frances where they are much better off in the number of doctors they have been able to attract. The third in the series was about Pickle Lake, a small community in my riding, the most northerly community one can drive to in Ontario. It is even north of Moosonee latitudinally.
This is for the benefit of those who are not aware of what goes on in a small northern community that lacks the ability to attract medical practitioners, the profound effect it has on a community that has just lost its major economic base. A Belgian mining company spent $110 million up there, and then the price of copper went down. For economic reasons they had to close down the mine. The people who are left behind lack the ability to attract and retain a doctor except on a locum or rotating basis.
A young person by the name of Caitlin Kelly wrote the following article from Pickle Lake: "You can't miss the ravens. Squawking like rusty doors, they wheel and glide over the town and clog every treetop. They perch on the two-and-a-half metre snowdrifts and the green tile roof of the 10-room Pickle Lake Hotel, their croaks one of the town's only sounds.
"Pickle Lake was once home to 1,200 people, a quarter of them employed by Umex Ltd., a Belgian company, which in 1976 invested $110 million in a copper mine here. The company built two handsome two-storey apartment buildings, a mobile home park and houses -- most of which now stand empty.
"In April 1982, copper prices were forced so low by South American competition that the mine was closed. Today a skeleton staff of nine employees keeps the mine ready to reopen when prices rise.
"'We don't see that happening in the near future,' says mine manager Don McKelvie.
"The 500 people remaining here wish it would. Most now work for Austin Airways, Hudson's Bay Co -- the town's only grocery store and retail outlet -- or Kovol Transport. They're pinning their hopes on a gold find being developed at Opapimiskan Lake, 225 kilometres north. But work on a winter road began there in November; it will take another six months to complete, and another year before the mine is ready."
Am I interrupting the members over there?
Mr. Gordon: No, the member is doing fine.
Mr. Stokes: Okay, just so we know.
The Acting Speaker: Order.
Mr. Stokes: "Pickle Lake is, literally, the end of the road -- one can drive no further north in Ontario. It takes 90 minutes to fly in from Thunder Bay by Twin Otter plane over rocks and trees punctuated by stretches of snow-covered lakes. The snow on the lakes bear snowmobile tracks, the only sign of human life.
"For Dr. Catherine MacHattie, however, Pickle Lake seems like a metropolis. She had come for a month from La Ronge, Sask., where she has been homesteading in the bush with her husband and two children.
"There she lives without electricity, running water or refrigeration; here she has sole use of a comfortable four-bedroom trailer. She is paid $1,400 a week by the underserviced area program of Ontario's Ministry of Health.
"A tall, lean woman, Dr. MacHattie grew up in a Toronto suburb and studied medicine in Toronto. Yet she has spent most of her working life in small or remote communities in northern Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Ontario.
"She prefers the freedom and the mobility of a locum (locum tenens means 'you hold the place' in Latin and refers to a temporary medical assignment) responsible to a community for a week, a month or a year.
"Pickle Lake and the nearby town of Armstrong are the only two communities in Ontario whose isolation and tiny population make it impossible to attract a full-time physician." The only other one, Armstrong, happens to be in my riding, too.
"The UAP supplies the towns with a series of rotating doctors from its roster of 450 who are willing to travel wherever needed.
"The reception desk of Pickle Lake's medical clinic, built by the Ministry of Northern Affairs five years ago and operated by the UAP, bears witness to the turnover. A slip of paper taped to the front informs patients, 'Our doctor this week is Dr. C. J. MacHattie.'
"Nurse Connie Lake has worked in the clinic since it opened, watching doctors come and go, watching the frustration and resentment build in townspeople forced to tell their stories over and over and over again. She has become the focus of town hopes for caring, consistent medical care -- and she is moving away this year.
9:10 p.m.
"She came to Pickle Lake when her husband, Reg, now town clerk, was transferred by Hudson's Bay Co. from Winnipeg. She loves the fresh air, the curling and the social life. But her oldest son Wayne is 14 and, like all Pickle Lake teenagers, must leave town to attend high school." There is none there. "Ms. Lake hoped to send him to a boarding school in Winnipeg, but could not afford the necessary $10,000.
"Asked her opinion of health care in Pickle Lake, Ms. Lake is guarded. She admits it offers little challenge to a doctor and prefers instead to proudly show the clinic's tiny laboratory -- capable of doing simple blood and urine analysis -- X-ray unit, darkroom, emergency room and waiting room. An incubator is also available and a full set of handmade baby clothes, to be given to any woman who gives birth in town, as five have over the years.
"Most pregnant women go to Thunder Bay or Winnipeg two weeks before delivery, but treatment with a series of different doctors falls far short of the ideal.
"'Changing doctors during pregnancy is not good,' Dr. MacHattie says. A pregnant woman should first visit the delivering physician and use the local doctor for her routine care, she says. That would require two trips at $130 each to Thunder Bay instead of one for a pregnancy without complications.
"She admits there are problems for both physician and patient inherent in the locum system.
"The most basic, and for patients with chronic conditions such as diabetes, epilepsy, psychiatric disorders or heart disease the most crucial is the inevitable lack of continuity. Patients resent repeating their histories to that week's doctor, but failing to mention a drug allergy, for example, could prove fatal.
"In response, Dr. MacHattie demands a greater self-awareness and frankness from patients. 'If you've got 10 people in the waiting room, you don't have time to go through their charts. You have to rely on them to tell you whatever is important.'
"Patients have to be understanding, she says. 'There will be some doctors you like and others you don't. I think you have to bank on that. Put some money aside for emergencies, especially if you have kids.'
"In her first week here, Dr. MacHattie called the air ambulance service in Sioux Lookout three times -- for a baby with a hernia she could not reduce, for a woman with internal bleeding and for a car accident victim who needed X-rays and 24-hour observation.
"To her annoyance, her requests were not automatically granted. The dispatcher in Sioux Lookout makes the ultimate decision on whether to send the plane. The plane took three hours to arrive for the woman with internal bleeding. She had to pay the heavily subsidized $22 cost and faced another 45 minutes by air to Thunder Bay.
"Ms. Lake says the clinic borrows a commercial aircraft and pilot from Austin Airways or Air-Dale Ltd., a freight charter service if an ambulance is not available.
"A patient whose condition is not considered serious enough to warrant an ambulance or its alternative must pay the $130 return air fare to Thunder Bay.
"Loretta Simpson, who has terminal cancer, flies to Thunder Bay every three weeks to receive radiation or chemotherapy treatment. Her husband Dave, manager of The Bay, says they were delighted with the quality of care in Pickle Lake until the last permanent physician left for Alberta after the mine closed.
"The Simpsons were accustomed to rural and northern towns before settling here, and Mr. Simpson says the care here was 'a big improvement' over their last home in northern Saskatchewan.
'"We definitely can't complain about the service,' he says.
"But Steven Fleming, a local ground worker with Austin Airways, does complain about Pickle Lake's health care at great length and with much vehemence during an interview in the clinic's waiting room.
"He cradled his two-year-old daughter Sherry on his knee as his wife, a native Indian, took their two-month-old daughter in for a checkup. Glancing at the reporter's notebook, he said, 'Tell them we need a full-time doctor -- and a dentist.'
"He says the high medical turnover deprives the town of good care. 'We don't know what they're sending,' he says angrily. 'We really need the services up here -- this is 1984.'
"He lived several years in Moosonee, Ontario, and says the care in that small, isolated community was far better. He can't understand a physician's reluctance to come to Pickle Lake -- or to stay.
"'If they made it attractive to a doctor, he'd stay. We've got everything -- fishing, bowling, curling, hunting, clean air. We don't have traffic jams.'
"A local woman who bore two children in Inuvik, NWT, and who has lived in northern Manitoba and Alberta is equally disparaging.
"'I hope to hell I never get sick here,' she says. She worked as a health care worker and has little regard for locum treatment.
"'These doctors don't care. They're here to hunt and fish. I'm not impressed.'
"She concedes that the clinic, which has a volunteer-driven ambulance, is good for emergency care, but says clinic treatment lacks confidentiality.
"Dr. MacHattie agrees that small-town work demands a high degree of personal skills. 'People have nowhere else to turn but to you. They have no choice.'
"'Most northern doctors I've met fall into two categories,' she adds. 'Those who are young and looking for experience and who stay for about five years and those who tend to settle permanently.'"
I am not going to read the entire article. It appeared in the Globe and Mail on Thursday, March 15, but it gives members some idea of the traumatic experiences that people have, especially those with children, when they must rely on the locums, the people who come and go, the kind of treatment that they must settle for, less than the best.
I see the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs (Mr. Wells) here. He used to be Minister of Health at one time. I think even in his private life he used to write a medical journal or was responsible for editing a medical journal.
I hear the discussion that is going on among the Canadian Medical Association, the Ontario Medical Association, the Honourable Monique Bégin, who is the Minister of National Health and Welfare, and our own Minister of Health (Mr. Norton), as to how they are going to resolve this problem with amendments to the Canada Health Act.
A letter came across my desk the other day from a Dr. Christianson, who practises medicine in Toronto. He wrote a letter to his federal member, he wrote a letter to the Right Honourable Pierre Elliott Trudeau and he wrote a letter to every member of this assembly saying what he will do if the Honourable Monique Bégin gets her way in Ottawa with the proposed amendments to that act.
It was a very well thought-out position for the doctor. It was very persuasive for someone who really does not think about the whole problem in any great detail. Never once did the doctor mention, hint about or allude to the fact that he has the privilege of practising in this great province, in this wonderful country, by virtue of the fact that collectively as taxpayers we have contributed several hundreds of thousands of dollars to make it possible for a person to be trained to practise medicine in this province and in the city of Toronto.
9:20 p.m.
He went on at great length to tell us the number of hours he works, the number of patients he has to see, what his overhead is here, how expensive it is to carry on practice in Ontario and what we collectively owe him for the practice of medicine in this great province. Not once did he ever mention the hundreds of thousands of dollars that we as a society have invested in his career.
In relation to the problem I am bringing to the members' attention vis-à-vis Pickle Lake and a lot of northern communities, I have talked to Ministers of Health in the provincial jurisdiction about our inability to attract medical practitioners to the north in sufficient numbers. They say: "Well, you have to be very careful what you are saying about the allocation of doctors in Ontario, because we really do not have a shortage of doctors. If you took the number of doctors practising in Ontario and divided it into the population, you would have about one doctor for every 600 patients."
Well, that sounds great. If every doctor had to look after only 600 patients or those who happened to become ill at any given time, we would be more than well served.
The Minister of Health says there is no shortage of doctors; there is just a maldistribution of doctors. I do not care what you call it. If we cannot attract medical personnel in sufficient numbers to communities such as Pickle Lake, Armstrong, Terrace Bay, Marathon, Nipigon, Smooth Rock Falls and literally half the communities in northern Ontario, we have a shortage.
Members know how we fund the Ontario health insurance plan; they know how we fund the health delivery services in Ontario. It is done on a socialistic basis: we all pay the same. If you are enrolled in the OHIP system in Ontario as a single person and if you live in Toronto, you pay a certain premium; if you work in Pickle Lake and you are a single contributor, you pay the same premium; it does not matter where you live. It is an insurance scheme that is equitable and spreads the risk around.
But that is not the case when it comes to the delivery system. I know of many constituents in northern Ontario who have to spend several hundred dollars for diagnostic or specialist treatment travelling from Manitouwadge to Thunder Bay or, in some cases, to Toronto when the procedure is not available locally. Unless they are transferred from one hospital to another by an attending physician and from a hospital in Toronto to an attending physician in a hospital up north, they are on their own.
I am not going to go on at any great length about this. All I am saying to those within hearing of my voice is that the problem has existed for a good many years and it continues to exist. It is not going to go away until we collectively, and the Minister of Health specifically, address these problems.
We have some very dedicated doctors; we have some very dedicated nurses and others in the health delivery system. But there is a maldistribution. We pay our way and more, and we do not get the level of service that everybody in Ontario is entitled to.
Getting back closer to my opening comment, we in northern Ontario are responsible for the creation of more wealth, more real dollars on a per capita basis, than anybody in Ontario; but when it comes to the delivery of services, we are second cousins. We do not think that is fair.
I felt it was my duty and responsibility to bring it to the attention of this government and those who chose to be here to listen to the debate on the speech from the throne. I want to assure the members that everything I have said tonight is not negative. It is not gloom and doom. It is inviting the government to take advantage of opportunities available in the north, to get involved in a positive way, to be a genuine part of the creation of that new wealth and to make sure the people directly responsible for the creation of that new wealth in northern Ontario are as well served as those in southern Ontario.
Mr. Barlow: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the honourable member from the north explaining the northerners' problems to us. We in the south have problems too. I know what the member is saying, and I certainly agree with everything he says.
Mr. Shymko: Oh, oh.
Mr. Barlow: Almost everything. Let us not get carried away.
I was particularly pleased to see the government's initiatives in this year's speech from the throne. I would like to recognize that it did reconfirm its commitment to the development and enhancement of high technology for medium and small-sized companies.
There were many initiatives in the speech: initiatives on youth employment, skills training, high technology, export development, the economy, community improvements, advances for women, agriculture, education, justice and many other topics. I would like to spend a few minutes tonight talking about the initiatives in high technology.
The innovation, adoption and diffusion of new technology within our industrial sector is the key to our future. This government recognizes it is essential that all of our business enterprises be on top of technological innovation if they are to find incentives and initiatives to reduce operating costs, increase productivity, create competitive products and achieve higher profitability. If our firms do not modernize their production processes, if they fail to join the technological revolution that is sweeping the industrial world, they will be left far behind.
Canadian businesses, particularly those in manufacturing, are facing the greatest productivity challenge this country has known since Confederation. Many of our manufacturers use outdated, noncompetitive manufacturing tools and equipment. This is in stark contrast to their foreign-based competitors, predominantly those in the United States, Japan and West Germany, who have invested heavily in modern computer-aided design and manufacturing equipment, robotics and electronics.
For example, we are told Japan is currently utilizing about 30,000 programmable robots, whereas in Ontario we have installed only about 400. That is a large contrast.
Mr. Kerrio: If he could get them to vote for him, he would have a lot more.
9:30 p.m.
Mr. Barlow: We are working on that. They are programmable.
In addition, the worldwide application of computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing, or as we more commonly recognize it, CAD/CAM, will increase by about 46 per cent this year. In Canada the increase will be in the range of 37 per cent. As a result of their initiatives, foreign manufacturers are increasingly more efficient than Canadian-based competitors and can sell higher-quality goods at lower prices in Canada and throughout the world.
In Ontario, we have no choice but to embrace this new technology so we can enhance our competitiveness and thus make new strides into the world market. The government's emphasis on assisting small and medium-sized firms in the use of new technology has a sound basis. Studies have shown smaller firms are substantially more innovative as compared to the larger enterprises. Small businesses form the backbone of our economy; they are the principal source of new jobs in our province.
A study conducted by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business concluded that Canadian manufacturing companies with fewer than 20 employees create jobs at 20 times the pace of the larger companies. It is through these smaller companies that Ontario's economic future will be secured.
It is always worth while to examine the jurisdictions where progress has been made. In Sweden, where the manufacturing sector is similar to our own, production is dominated by smaller firms using flexible manufacturing systems. These firms produce a number of products that must compete on the world market. However, the Swedes have made remarkable strides in increasing efficiency through the use of robots. In fact, on a per capita basis, Sweden has the largest number of robots of any country in the world. The net result is that Swedish industries have ensured their survival.
This government is taking heed of the advances made in other jurisdictions, such as Sweden, and is tailoring its programs and policies to assist our industries in obtaining a competitive edge. The government's commitment to assisting our industrial sector is evidenced by the many programs and initiatives that have already been instituted.
One such initiative is the creation of our six technology centres, which are now recognized worldwide. They assist firms in putting new processes to work and focus on the needs of smaller manufacturers in specific sectors. They perform four basic functions, namely, increasing the awareness of high-technology issues among businesses, providing practical advice to manufacturers on the selection and use of technological equipment, providing a focal point for technological training and serving as a source of up-to-date information.
In their initial year of operation, the technology centres have performed their functions very well. A recent survey indicated that 96 per cent of the high-tech suppliers were aware of our centres. Additionally, awareness factors within the educational and business communities were found to be at 98 per cent and 73 per cent respectively.
Hon. Mr. Walker: That is because of our openings.
Mr. Barlow: That is right. By all means, the openings were what set the pace for the whole technological world.
During the past year, these centres have helped more than 125 firms to increase their manufacturing efficiency and develop new products. In the Ottawa area, the Ontario Centre for Microelectronics has assisted in the establishment of five new companies. A total of 245 persons have participated in training courses held by the centres.
Mr. Kerrio: Mr. Speaker, I cannot hear this gentleman speak with all that noise over there.
Mr. Barlow: That is all right. I will try to speak over them.
In particular, some of these intensive specialist courses have been carried out by the Ontario Centre for Automotive Parts Technology and the Ontario Centre for Microelectronics. The centres have also lived up to our expectations as a primary source of information. One of the main mandates of all the centres was to act as information outlets.
Hon. Mr. Walker: They are a worldwide success.
Mr. Barlow: Absolutely. I already said that.
On-line information retrieval systems have been developed in each of the centres, and they have been used for 53 searches on a fee-for-service basis. Of particular interest to me is the Ontario Centre for Computer-Aided Design and Computer-Aided Manufacturing, which we have located in the city of Cambridge in the great riding of Cambridge.
The potential benefits of the application and use of CAD/CAM technology are far-reaching. It can reduce the time spent on product designs; it has implications for improving the management of inventory, manpower and process control; and it can assist in determining energy-efficient manufacturing methods.
In combination with effective management, advanced manufacturing methods can result in lower production costs, improved product quality, the elimination of dangerous and repetitive jobs and a substantially increased ability to compete in world markets.
Since opening in February 1983, just a little more than a year ago, the CAD/CAM centre in Cambridge has been visited by more than 10,000 people and has conducted 10 workshops with more than 400 clients in attendance.
Mr. Van Horne: So what does that mean?
Mr. Barlow: It means that more than 400 clients have learned of the advances in and the availability of CAD/CAM to them in their industrial applications. This centre has also assisted some 50 firms to assess the feasibility and plan the application of advanced manufacturing technologies.
Last week, at the CAD/CAM centre in Cambridge, Tech-Expo '84 was conducted. It was a major technology exposition, which included industry, community and public events. As well, a new addition to the centre was officially opened by the Minister of Industry and Trade (Mr. F. S. Miller).
Mr. Kerrio: Who is that?
Mr. Barlow: The member for Muskoka.
Mr. Kerrio: If you are going to give him a commercial, say his name.
Mr. Barlow: That is right. I might as well give him the whole thing. He is not even in his seat so that I can really build up on it --
Mr. Kerrio: Say his name anyway.
Mr. Barlow: -- however, I am telling you who it was.
An addition was put on the centre, almost doubling the centre after only one year. The facility was thought to be large enough when it was rented in the first place; however, we now have an almost double-sized centre in Cambridge to conduct the affairs of CAD/CAM and to introduce CAD/CAM to the industrial sector of Ontario.
One of the most important functions of our tech centres has been to foster a co-operative working relationship not only between industry and government but also between companies themselves. We must realize --
Mr. Van Horne: You are saying government goo-goo, government gaa-gaa.
Mr. Barlow: No. This is not one of those situations; this is assisting people where they want it and where they need it.
We must realize that as we strive towards finding our place in the world economy, the competition does not stem from other companies or other industries. Rather, as the Minister of Industry and Trade so aptly said:
"The competition is from other economies, other nations where the various sectors are pulling together to win. This is the new reality of international competition and it requires new rules of co-operation and consensus. Competition in world markets is a team sport."
9:40 p.m.
One example of companies pulling and working together is also occurring in the riding of Cambridge. This really did occur in the shoe industry prior to the opening of the Ontario Centre for Computer-Aided Design and Computer-Aided Manufacturing.
Cambridge is famous for its shoe industry. Four shoe manufacturers combined their talents and abilities and formed a joint computer-aided design system. The shoe industry is fiercely competitive, but these firms realized the enormous potential application of a computer-aided design system. They also realized no one company could buy the system and make it pay. Consequently, these far-sighted companies overcame their differences and developed a workable arrangement whereby all four of them could benefit. It has been extremely effective and useful.
By mutual agreement, this system was installed at Conestoga College of Applied Arts and Technology in the riding of Kitchener-Wilmot. I am sorry the member is not here to hear that plug for his riding. It was put on neutral ground so the competing companies could deal in some area that is not one of their own.
Each company can transmit data concerning the size and style of a particular line of shoe over the telephone directly into the CAD system. The computer then translates the data into patterns that can be used back at the plant. Every year, as the new fall, winter or spring lines are designed, they go through this. The CAD system has enabled them to compete in the worldwide shoe market.
This process of pattern design, which used to take up to three weeks, now takes only one day to develop for a particular style of shoe. Achieving this kind of productivity increase and co-operative effort is essential to Ontario's industry as a whole.
This government realizes it has a responsibility to industry, one that includes providing the broad infrastructure required to sustain economic growth. This government also recognizes it has a role to play in encouraging financial investment in our technological future.
To this end, the government has been actively working with private financial institutions, venture capitalists and the banking community to broaden their understanding of industry requirements and to emphasize the urgency needed. We must ensure we are not left behind in the technological revolution.
I recall at the opening of the CAD/CAM centre just over a year ago a sign on one of the displays said in big, bold type: "You missed the first industrial revolution. Do not miss this one." That is the age of high technology.
Dr. Gerhardt Meinch, who was at a recent conference on investment technology here in Toronto says, "Twenty-five years from now, 90 per cent of the work force will be employed in industries that do not exist today." To some, such a thought could instil a very real feeling of insecurity. We are entering an era of rapid change and fundamental shifts wherein we will find jobs, invest capital and use our resources. It is universally accepted among leading economists that only nations that adapt to these changes will remain prosperous and stable.
However, I have no such feeling of insecurity, Mr. Speaker. I know you have the same air of confidence in the Ontario Centre for Robotics in your own riding. I know this government is up to the challenge of providing the leadership required and the initiatives necessary to ensure our place in the world of tomorrow, just as we have for the past 40 years in this province.
For these reasons, I strongly support the adoption of the throne speech and I am convinced all members will do the same.
Interjections.
Mr. Barlow: I thought that would get a rise.
I think Ian Macdonald, chairman of the Innovation Development for Employment Advancement Corp., a government agency, expressed it best when he said there was a feeling not so long ago that Ontario's best economic years were behind us, but that that kind of assessment does not take into account our position in the heartland of Canada, our tremendous people asset and our base of strong institutions, both government and private. We need to mobilize those strengths. When we do, I think we will see that our best years are ahead of us.
Mr. Mancini: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to be able to try to respond to the throne speech that was presented to the House on March 20, 1984.
Mr. Van Horne: That is a tough job,
Mr. Mancini: My colleague the member for London North says it is a tough job, and I have to agree with him. It is a very tough job when I have to respond to such a vague document that covers 28 pages.
Mr. Van Horne: It is so full of holes one does not know which ones to shoot at first.
Mr. Kerrio: It is so full of holes that a fisherman could use it for a net.
Mr. Mancini: That is right. I can recall late in the afternoon, after His Honour was finished reading the throne speech, I received a call from the reporter who works for the Windsor Star here in the legislative gallery. He said, "Remo, what are your comments on the throne speech?" I sat back, thought for a moment and said, "You have heard the old saying about a chicken in every pot." He said, "Yes." I said, "This throne speech is a chicken bone in every pot. It is mighty thin."
I always enjoy this part of the parliamentary process, not so much because of the document the government puts forward, not so much because of the throne speech itself, not so much because of the formal activities that surround the opening of the Legislature -- the shooting off of the cannons and the 200 guards standing at attention waiting for His Honour to come forward and step down from the horse-drawn carriage -- not so much because of that, because after one has seen it several times or has been here long enough to have watched the process several times, it does not have the excitement it had originally. I enjoy it simply because it gives all members the opportunity to hear other members speak at length and speak about things that are close to and dear to their hearts.
I always enjoy the remarks that are made by the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon). Somehow he is able to put together sentences and paragraphs with his knowledge of the history of this province and his tremendous experience. I do not think I have ever heard a throne debate speech he has given that I have not really enjoyed.
9:50 p.m.
I want to use the time I have for two purposes. One is to follow the old tradition of talking about one's riding and the second is to make a response in a limited way on the policies of the present government.
I am going to try very hard not to be negative. I do not want to condemn the government for its inadequate policies, for the things it does not wish to grapple with or for the way it tries somehow to paper over all the problems we have in the province. I do not want to be totally negative. I am going to give the government some suggestions.
I am also going to mention some of the very good things that are happening in Ontario. The first thing I want to mention is the visit of the Queen and the Pope this year. I am really thrilled the Queen of England is going to visit our great province this year and Pope John Paul II is also going to visit our province and our country.
I have been told the Queen of England will be spending some time in the county of Essex and the city of Windsor. The people of our community are quite impressed by the fact that the Queen of England will spend some time in our fine community. I am told the mayor of Windsor had some responsibility for convincing Her Majesty she should come to Windsor in view of the fact that the mayor of Windsor is originally from London, England, I believe. If it was her representation that convinced the Queen of England to come to Windsor, I congratulate the honourable mayor and say it is a fine thing.
Hon. Mr. Walker: She is the Queen of Canada too.
Mr. Kerrio: We already said that over here. You are way behind the times.
Hon. Mr. Walker: Are you trying to give us a message, Remo?
Mr. Mancini: I think about a year ago you got a message.
Mr. Speaker: Order.
Mr. Mancini: As a Catholic, I am absolutely thrilled Pope John Paul II is coming to Canada. As a citizen of this province and this country, I am absolutely thrilled Pope John Paul II is coming to our land because he is a man of peace, a man of hope and a man who has spread goodwill all over the world. We can certainly use whatever goodwill Pope John Paul II can bring to our country.
Mr. Shymko: He almost cancelled because of a leadership convention. He told us he was a good Liberal.
Mr. Speaker: The member for Essex South has the floor.
Mr. Mancini: It was mentioned in the throne speech that the general economy of Ontario was improving. I was quite interested and I took note of how much credit the Ontario government was trying to give itself for the lowering of the inflation rate, for the increase in productivity and for the increase in --
Mr. McNeil: In spite of what your federal cousins have done.
Mr. Mancini: I am sorry?
Mr. Kerrio: Those federal boys have done it all. You have hung on their coat-tails.
Mr. Speaker: Order.
Mr. Mancini: The provincial government tried to take credit for the lowering of interest rates, the general improvement in the productivity of our province, the improvement of our exports and the lowering of inflation.
It was this government, when we were in trouble, that tried to deflect every single problem to Ottawa. Now, when things are improving, this selfish government is trying to take credit for every good thing that has happened. The members across the floor cannot have it both ways. They cannot run for cover in hard times and then come out when the sun is shining and say, "My goodness, isn't it a great day?" They cannot have it both ways.
When we had high interest rates we proposed a policy to help farmers, small businessmen and home owners. They rejected that policy. When we had high inflation --
Mr. Shymko: Who did it? You tell us.
Mr. Gillies: You tell us who did it. The Liberal Party of Canada, your cousins in Ottawa.
Mr. Speaker: Order.
Mr. Mancini: They rejected the policies we put forward, and they savaged poor old Charles Joseph Clark. They savaged the poor former Prime Minister and then they hid in the dark until things started to improve and, lo and behold, we have a document dated March 20 and, my goodness, they try to take credit for some of the good things that have happened. We will not let them do it.
Interjection.
Mr. Mancini: They should not be so touchy. The truth hurts.
The member for Lake Nipigon (Mr. Stokes), who always delivers a fine throne debate speech, talked about the north's resources. It has been over the past --
Interjection.
Mr. Mancini: Yes, as a matter of fact the member for High Park-Swansea (Mr. Shymko) was one of the victims of this government's attack on Charles Joseph Clark. He was one of the victims.
I want to, just for a moment, touch on the Hemlo gold fields in the north: a tremendous resource for our province. There is untold wealth in that region which will be mined and used, I am sure, for the benefit of this province.
When the people who wanted to develop Hemlo needed money and capital, they had to leave this province. They had to go to the Vancouver Stock Exchange to raise money to develop the Hemlo gold field in this province. I say, "Shame on the Conservative government of this province."
Where were they? Where was the Minister of Tourism and Recreation (Mr. Baetz) when people wanted to develop the Hemlo gold fields? He was part of this government which said, "There is nothing we can do." They found people in Vancouver who were interested in discovering gold and in trying to discover resources that could be used.
This example of the Hemlo gold fields is typical of many of the reasons we cannot forge ahead in this province. We have it all, yet we cannot seem to put it together to lead the way for our country and for North America.
As I was going through the throne speech, I noticed that on page 8 the government states it is going to reinforce the ability of industries and mature workers to meet and master change. That is a very nice statement. It gives people heart. Before we can accept this statement at face value, we have to look at the government's record.
How has it done so far in retraining people in our province? How has it done so far in retraining injured workers? How has it done so far in retraining people who have lost their jobs from complete or partial plant shutdowns? How has it done so far in matching skills training with jobs available? It has done a lousy job.
When this simple statement in this throne speech which says the government is going to reinforce the ability of industries and mature workers to meet and master change is compared to the past record of the government, it gives solace to no one, let alone members of this assembly who just want to take a few moments and see the facts for what they are.
I visited a hospital in Windsor not too long ago. I met with the executive director, toured the hospital and met with some of the physiotherapists there. I went over some important matters with the executive director as to how they affected my constituents. These same matters affected everyone else in Windsor and Essex county and I am sure these same problems are occurring all over the province.
10 p.m.
What was the problem I am talking about? The hospital was short of physiotherapists. I said, "Fine, go out and hire some physiotherapists." He said, "Mr. Mancini, we cannot hire any physiotherapists; there are none." I said: "What? Do you mean to tell me that in Ontario, with all the community colleges we have and with all the bluster we hear from this government about training and preparing people for jobs in the marketplace, we have no physiotherapists?" He said, "That is correct." I said, "Where are you going to get your physiotherapists?" He said: "We already have contracts that we are going to sign in the next week. We are importing five or six from England."
That is the record of this government. It cannot deflect that to Ottawa, although I am sure it will try. That is the record. Then they try to tell us they are going to reinforce the ability of industries and mature workers to meet and master change. They have no idea whatsoever how they are going to retrain those people.
It is not the intention of this government to make major changes and to face the major changes happening in our economy. Its intention is solely to hire the best pollers -- people to take polls -- to hire the best advertisers and in one way or another to have a public relations campaign which will get them through the next election.
That is the only intention this government has -- to hire people to do polls and public relations. The once great Conservative Party of Ontario has turned itself into a public relations firm. After 40 years of being in office, it is no longer a political party. It is one huge, wealthy public relations firm.
It states somewhere in the speech from the throne -- I cannot recall which page -- that this government --
Interjection.
Mr. Mancini: Is the Provincial Secretary for Justice (Mr. Walker) saying something? I cannot hear him; I am sorry.
Mr. Speaker: Just continue on with your speech, please.
Mr. Mancini: I have never criticised the minister for spending those hundreds of thousands of dollars for speechwriters and I do not intend to start now.
It says in the throne speech that the government of Ontario is going to try to attract more tourists. That is an honourable ambition. I commend the government of Ontario for wanting to bring more tourists to our province. That means jobs and that means dollars. It helps the economy roll.
How are they going to attract those tourists to our province? Are they going to attract the foreign dollars by putting a sales tax on hamburgers and a cup of coffee? Are they going to attract those tourists by allowing the ripoff on Highway 401 to continue? Bonnie and Clyde would be proud of what is happening on Highway 401.
One crosses by the bridge or the tunnel from Detroit to Windsor and gets on to Highway 401. As a tourist, one says: "God bless Canada. I am here. Things look great." One pulls into the first service station and one says: "My God, the gasoline is anywhere from 10 cents to 18 cents a litre more than it was in the city of Windsor. Gosh, as a tourist I think I am being ripped off."
One goes inside. We are all familiar with what the service centres are like in our province. I do not have to go into great detail about the high cost of food, poor class of service and the tremendous cost of gasoline.
Is that how we are going to attract more tourists? Has the Minister of Tourism and Recreation ever raised his voice on one occasion about the ripoff on Highway 401? Has he ever said one word about that problem? Has he ever sent one letter to his colleague the Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Snow) about the very unfair cost of gasoline on Highway 401? The Minister of Tourism and Recreation is working to bring the tourists here while he is working to send them back. That is exactly what is happening.
Interjection.
Mr. Mancini: That is right, and the Minister of Transportation and Communications is winning. We talk about bringing tourists to our province. Does the Minister of Tourism and Recreation know what the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Pope) is doing? He has dramatically increased the fees for nonresident fishing licences.
We are very fortunate in the Windsor-to-London area because we have the opportunity to attract a great number of fishermen from the Detroit, Michigan, area where five million people reside. Fishing is a very good pastime for many of these people. They enjoy coming to Canada, to Amherstburg or Bell River and other places, to fish and spend a day in our country, spend whatever dollars they can in the course of that day and then go home and possibly come again later on in the week or the following week.
The fees charged by the Ministry of Natural Resources are going to prevent many of these people from coming. Instead of having a one-day fishing licence so tourists can come and enjoy the facilities we have to offer -- the restaurants, the taverns and the reasonably priced gas in Windsor compared to the Highway 401 service stations -- we do not offer that. We tell them if they want to come to Canada to fish they have to buy a licence which is good for four consecutive days. We do not care if they can only stay for four hours. How is that helping the tourism industry of our province?
Did the Minister of Tourism and Recreation raise one word of objection to the Minister of Natural Resources? I would like him to listen for only a moment. I know he is having a big confab with the government House Leader (Mr. Wells), but he told us in the throne speech that tourism is important, and we want action, not just words.
We want to know if he raised his voice just once and if he talked to the Minister of Natural Resources on only one occasion. Has he written only one letter about these one-day fishing licences? He is not even looking up; so he is not interested. I have to assume he has not written any letters and has not talked to the minister. This talk about bringing tourists to Ontario is nothing but another government public relations ploy.
Mr. Conway: The minister should pretend it is 1975 and he is a Liberal again.
Mr. Mancini: Yes. The fact he was a former Liberal certainly got his attention. Now that I have directed some comments to the Minister of Tourism and Recreation, I want to ask if it is true that he has sent letters to the people who operate the Lottario machines telling them that if they participate in a sports lottery pool with the national government of Canada he will remove those machines from their premises?
Hon. Mr. Baetz: Is this question period?
Mr. Mancini: I just want to know because I want to make a comment on it.
Mr. Speaker: Will the member please go ahead with his speech.
10:10 p.m.
Mr. Mancini: If it is true, he can nod his head. He interjects when he likes. If this is true -- and I have reason to believe it is -- that is one of the most objectionable things I have ever heard a minister do. Into the middle of a dispute between two governments, he is putting someone who has no reason to be involved in that dispute whatsoever, a private entrepreneur who for one reason or another has been selling Lottario tickets so the government could use these millions of dollars to make itself look good once every two or three weeks on television as it hands out these $4-million cheques. I must say I was really touched when the minister kissed that little old Italian woman. I really was.
For the minister of one government to threaten an entrepreneur who is conducting business on behalf of the province because he or she may do business with the government of Canada is really disgraceful. If the minister has sent that letter, he should send each and every one of those people an apology. They do not belong in the dispute he has with the government of Canada. They are out there slugging, trying to make a living. They are out there paying those horrendous sales taxes this government has imposed. They are out there trying to sell those Lottario tickets so the government can look good. I am really disappointed the minister has chosen to inject innocent people into a dispute he has with another government, our government of Canada.
Hon. Mr. Baetz: When did you buy your last Ford at a Chrysler dealership?
Mr. Mancini: The minister asks, when did I buy my last Ford at a Chrysler dealership? My wife drives a Chrysler. It was bought from a Chrysler dealership. I drive a Ford. It was bought from a Ford dealership. The car I owned before my Ford was a Chrysler I bought from a Chrysler dealer in the area. I have never owned a foreign-made car. I have always owned a car made by the United Auto Workers of America. My father drives a Chrysler, my three brothers drive Chryslers and my brother-in-law drives a General Motors car. I do not think the minister's record is as good.
Mr. Gillies: Are they all Liberals?
Mr. Mancini: Yes, they are all Liberals. Why would the minister question me about the kind of car I drive when --
Mr. Speaker: Interesting as this may be, this is supposed to be reserved for the reply to the speech from the throne. The member for Essex South has the floor.
Mr. Mancini: Mr. Speaker, if you feel I am somewhat wide-ranging in my comments, it is because the government's 28-page throne speech is wide-ranging and therefore I have to try to cover as much of it as possible as best I can. When someone tries to imply I do not drive a car assembled by the United Auto Workers of America, I think it is important that I clear the record. Why he would think that, I do not know.
Agriculture has tremendous potential for our province, but we need a Minister of Agriculture and Food who is going to fight in cabinet for the farmers, for all farmers. Since the present minister has taken over his portfolio, it appears to me the amount of money allocated to that ministry has slipped somewhat from past years.
In the throne speech, I was very surprised to see that the government of Ontario is going to appoint an advisory council to provide independent advice to the government of Ontario. I am offended by those particular terms. If the government wants independent advice, why does it not talk to the Ontario Federation of Agriculture? Does it not consider the federation independent? Does it not consider its advice appropriate? Why does the government not talk to the greenhouse marketing board? Does it not consider them independent? Does it not feel their advice is worth listening to? What about the fruit and vegetable growers?
It is shocking to me that this government would appoint an advisory council on agriculture to give it independent advice when the farm community has several organizations that are independent and would be more than pleased to give this government advice as to how they could settle some of the difficult farm problems we have today.
Mr. Elston: If they would listen.
Mr. Mancini: If they would listen.
I know why there is going to be an independent advisory council on agricultural matters.
Mr. Kerrio: To take the pressure off the minister, what else?
Mr. Mancini: No. I am not quite sure that is it. There are some people in the Conservative cabinet preparing themselves to run for the leadership.
Interjections.
Mr. Mancini: Yes. There are some people over there who are preparing themselves to run for the leadership.
Mr. Conway: Is that what Yuri Shymko has been doing?
Mr. Mancini: He has been trying unsuccessfully.
These people may be surprised when the Premier (Mr. Davis) decides to stay; however, I am not getting into that debate.
It appears, from this humble view, that this advisory council is going to give a certain minister the power to appoint certain individuals. One would consider that after these individuals are appointed they might feel obligated or they might feel they owe the appointer something.
If by chance there is a Progressive Conservative leadership convention between now and whenever the next provincial election takes place, it may be that some of these appointees may feel obligated to go to a particular convention to vote for a particular appointer.
That is something I have surmised. Maybe I am being cynical. Maybe the Minister of Agriculture and Food truly wants independent advice. But if the minister wants independent advice about the agricultural farm community or about the industry, there are already several, well-qualified, independent organizations which would meet with him any time he desires.
We heard from this government that it is interested in affirmative action. We have heard it has some kind of five-year plan. We have heard the Minister responsible for Women's Issues (Mr. Welch) will be attending a conference; more of his proposals with which we are not familiar will be put forward.
We are told there will be improvement within the next five years. One area that needs improvement dramatically is the school system.
About a year ago I was asked to be a guest speaker at the Essex County Women Teachers' Association annual banquet. Before I went to the banquet I checked several of the school boards in the province to find out how things were shaping up as far as senior positions were concerned and how many of these senior positions were being filled by women. I am sorry I did not bring these figures with me tonight.
10:20 p.m.
Since the government has recently tabled figures which show how few women are principals and vice-principals, we all understand the message. I do not need those exact and specific figures I used that night about a year ago. It was shocking to me. I did not realize how few women principals and vice-principals we had.
I told the Federation of Women Teachers' Associations of Ontario that night, along with the senior officials of the Essex County Board of Education who were there, that if we continue to allow only men to be principals and vice- principals, then the students in the classrooms will believe it is normal and it is the way things should be.
The young boys will believe that they, their brothers, their uncles or their fathers can hold executive offices such as vice-principal and principal, offices of responsibility; on the other side, the young girls will come to believe it is normal that they, their sisters, their aunts or their mothers should not hold these offices. If we convince these students during their school years that this is the way things should be, it is going to take a long time to correct the problem we have.
We need role models and we need to show the community as often as we can and in a proper fashion that anyone who is capable of holding that type of job can do so.
I say to the Minister responsible for Women's Issues that he has done a poor job in this area. I specifically say to the Minister of Education (Miss Stephenson), who is usually referred to as the czarina of all education in this province, that she has had this portfolio for some time now and she has had no effect whatsoever in changing that particular problem and in being able to convince school boards that qualified women should be given positions of responsibility.
There is no one in this House who can or would try to defend the government's record in the classroom area. No one in this House, no one even on the Conservative side, would dare to try to defend what has not happened over a number of years.
A few days ago the government House leader introduced a bill in the House that would provide for a pension for the Ombudsman, who has recently been appointed. I met Mr. Dan Hill on a couple of occasions before when he has visited Amherstburg.
Amherstburg is the home of the North American Black Historical Museum. We are proud to have the black museum in our town. We are proud of the tourists it attracts. We are proud of the distinguished black people it attracts from all over. We are proud of the distinguished and hardworking black people who make up the board and who have pushed for this museum. We are proud of the fact that this black museum will educate those who attend it in the rich history and culture of black people in our province.
I happened to meet the new Ombudsman in that museum. I have great respect for the new Ombudsman; I believe he will do a dynamic job and will look after the interests of people who cannot defend themselves. But for the government to introduce a bill that would guarantee him a pension after five years' service, I find unacceptable. We are going to pay Mr. Hill top wages, possibly $80,000 a year; he will be provided with a car and maybe with other perks. The government of Canada has allowed for very generous registered retirement savings plans. With the salary this Ombudsman is getting, he could easily divert some of those funds into such a plan. For us to pay such a salary and introduce such a bill that would guarantee a person would receive a pension, I find somewhat unacceptable; but I guess the majority may carry the day.
On occasion I have an opportunity to meet with people who are involved with alternative schools. In my constituency we have the Mennonite school in the township of Mersea. The school serves a large Mennonite community which has distinguished itself for hard work and community service. This school receives no assistance from the provincial government for any of the educational needs it provides to the students.
This school is a member of the Ontario Association of Alternative and Independent Schools, an organization that is lobbying the government of Ontario for funds to maintain schools like the Mennonite school. I support its request. The education the students receive at the Mennonite school is equal to the education provided anywhere in our province.
I know the member for Brantford (Mr. Gillies) has attended a seminar sponsored by this organization of alternative schools, and I know he has looked favourably upon the possible funding of these particular schools, such as the Mennonite school and probably other schools with religious affiliations. He is a member of the government party, which has a vast majority in this House. If he is serious about supporting these schools to some degree, he should not just go to meetings and try to cover for his government.
Let us be a little more outspoken about it. Let us write some open letters. He and I should get together and cosponsor a private member's bill if he is serious. I think that would be a very good idea. If he is not serious, if he is just going to attend these meetings and do the best he can to deflect any criticisms from the government, I do not think that is fair. These are good people. They approached the government in good faith. If there is nothing there, they want to be told there is nothing there and not to be encouraged to run around in circles.
The Deputy Speaker: I just remind the member to have a mind to the clock. Would this be an appropriate time to move the adjournment of the debate?
Mr. Mancini: Yes. I just say again to the member for Brantford that we should cosponsor a bill, he and I, which would provide funding for alternative schools.
On motion by Mr. Mancini, the debate was adjourned.
BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, before the adjournment of the House, I would like to indicate the business for tomorrow and next week.
We will continue the throne speech debate tomorrow morning, on Monday and Tuesday afternoons and Tuesday evening, Thursday afternoon and evening and next Friday. It has been agreed we will have the vote on the motion to accept the throne speech on Monday, April 9, at 5:45 p.m.
The House adjourned at 10:30 p.m.