Hansard Transcript 1988-Jun-14 | Legislative Assembly of Ontario

Ms. Bryden: Last April, the Metro Action Committee on Public Violence against Women and Children hosted a forum at the Toronto city hall entitled Stopping Rape II. It was attended by a cross-section of people working in the field, including police, health care professionals, social workers and persons working in the criminal justice field and rape crisis centres.

The committee has recently produced a five-page summary of the recommendations which emerged from this forum. The action proposals are a lot more far-reaching than the $600,000 media and educational campaign initiated in June by the government. Specifically, the summary identifies six ministries which are asked to take action to implement the proposals. I hope the minister responsible for women’s issues (Mr. Sorbara) will undertake to see that his ministry and others produce action programs in their fields immediately.

Those from the Liberal Party who spoke stated their commitment, but we have seen much talk and little action in the field of solving the serious problem of sexual assault across the whole province, also of helping the rape crisis centres and the Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic. This is what we are looking for in the way of action from this committee.

UNIVERSITY FUNDING

Mr. Jackson: The Minister of Colleges and Universities (Mrs. McLeod) had great expectations for her ministry in October. However, the Treasurer (Mr. R. F. Nixon) obviously has had another idea in April. All school year long we heard commitment after commitment from the minister. The post-secondary education community warmed to the idea of more programs but warned that all these programs came with a big price tag.

In April, when the Treasurer tabled his budget, the university community itself was told implicitly that it was now its job to find the funds to pay for ministry programs. Right now, nearly a dozen Ontario universities are carrying out fund-raising efforts. In light of the fact that it has failed to live up to its commitment in funding for post-secondary education, it is incumbent upon the government to assist these efforts in every possible way.

At the University of Toronto, for example, the government could provide a relatively inexpensive five-year capital plan which would assist the university in raising funds from alumni and other private sector sources. As well, the university might benefit from a dollar-for-dollar fund-raising effort for certain programs.

The bottom line is that if universities are going to send out into the hustings to raise money, the government is going to have to take a proactive role in assisting them in this regard.

1987 CONSTITUTIONAL ACCORD

Mr. Daigeler: Many members of this House, as well as independent observers, were very impressed by the submission of the Attorney General (Mr. Scott) to the select committee on constitutional reform. I share these sentiments and I wish to congratulate the Attorney General for an excellent explanation of the benefits and limits of the Meech Lake accord.

At the same time, I feel this document is primarily addressed to the minds of people. My concern is that we also need some initiatives that would speak to the hearts of our nation. I am sure members will agree that nation-building is not only a process of the mind and of the will but equally of emotions and feelings. My hope is that a way be found that will stir our collective pride about Quebec’s place in Confederation in a way that Expo 67 did some 20 years ago.

I invite the Prime Minister and any interested provincial government to bring together some of the leading pro-Canada voices in the Quebec referendum and to invite them on a speaking tour across Canada. As I see it, such an initiative should help to dispel some of the misinformation that still exists on the Meech Lake accord and, at the same time, to strengthen our understanding of Quebec’s legitimate expectations.

TOURISM IN NORTHERN ONTARIO

Mr. Hampton: I have before me a map, the map that has appeared in major US newspapers across midwestern United States. It was placed there by the Ministry of Tourism and Recreation, advertising tourism in northwestern Ontario.

The sad thing about this map is that when one looks at it, one would believe there are only three communities in northwestern Ontario: Kenora, Fort Frances and Dryden. In fact, the three communities which probably do not need tourism as much as the rest of the northwestern part of the province appear on this map, but the communities which are being told by this government to invest in tourism do not appear on the map. Quetico Provincial Park, Thunder Bay, Atikokan, Rainy River and Sioux Lookout do not appear on the map. All other communities which have been told by this government, “Invest in tourism,” do not even appear on the map.

This is disgraceful. If the Ministry of Tourism and Recreation is going to invest money advertising in the United States, at least it should advertise the communities that need tourism dollars and are pursuing tourism.

RECREATION TRAIL

Mr. Pollock: Last Thursday, staff of the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Kerrio) contacted me in regard to an abandoned railroad line in my riding, known as the Marmora subdivision. They informed me that the minister had a commitment in eastern Ontario on Friday afternoon but would be available to tour the railroad line in the morning. We checked our schedules and agreed to meet at Canadian Forces Base Trenton at 8:30 Friday morning.

Conditions were excellent for our flight, enabling us to view this line clearly. I am sure the minister would agree with me that this line travels through mostly rough terrain. Although the minister did not make a commitment, I appreciate his taking time out of his busy schedule to see this abandoned railroad line.

I hope the standing committee on resources development will also take the opportunity to view this abandoned line and also hear briefs from concerned citizens’ groups that would like to see this abandoned railroad line be a recreation trail.

NORTHERN STUDIES

Mr. Adams: I rise to draw the attention of this House to the importance of northern studies in our educational institutions. The north is a keystone of the heritage of Canada and of this province. Many of our colleges and universities, including those in northern Ontario, have fine records in study and research related to the north. The fields involved include native studies, health sciences, engineering, geography, biology, forestry, history and many others.

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Through this work, these institutions have contributed to the proper development of northern Canada and to the proper development of the entire circumpolar world. I urge both the Minister of Colleges and Universities (Mrs. McLeod) and the Minister of Education (Mr. Ward) to keep this important and useful area of academic work in the forefront of their minds when making decisions about education in this province.

Through northern studies, our schools, colleges and universities in this province can make an important contribution towards safeguarding the sovereignty of Canada’s north.

VIDEO DISPLAY TERMINALS

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Once one has been here for nine years, one gets a sense of déjà vu about a number of things. Reading in the paper this morning that the issue around the safety of video display terminal operators is still a hot one reminded me today that it was in 1981 that I introduced An Act for the Protection of Video Display Terminal Operators. New studies are showing that there may be a difficulty with the radiation that comes from this equipment.

My bill at that time called for total shielding and regular inspection, and the government of the day is arguing against its employees, saying that there is no problem, that we do not need to give this kind of protection.

I want the House to know that in our caucus we have now shielded all our caucus equipment. We are in the process of trying to shield the equipment in the members’ offices, because that is under the government’s authority and we are still having trouble getting it to get its inspectors in and to get us the proper shielding for our equipment that we should have.

It is time, it seems to me, that we erred on the side of caution, as I suggested we should do in 1981, that we make sure there are no emissions from these machines which are out and around, and that we do not wait for some study to show these problems are real and that the kind of problems with birth defects and with early cancellation of pregnancies do not continue.

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

Mr. B. Rae: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I want to raise with you a question arising from some correspondence that my staff has had with the Ministry of Health. We have received a copy of a letter signed by Malcolm Walker, who is the director of the institutional operations branch, sent to the 22 hospitals that had a review done of their activities.

The letter said: “This letter is to request that the report of the consultants, following the operational review of your hospital, is available to interested individuals, in order to fulfil the requirements of the freedom-of-information legislation.

“A copy of the report should be made available in the library or reading room of your institution. Thank you for your co-operation.”

The research director for the New Democratic Party then wrote to Linda Heslegrave, of the freedom of information office at the Ontario Ministry of Health, asking for a copy of each of the reviews. Mr. Rachlis got back a letter, on May 27, saying that it would be looked at. Then, on June 8, 1988, he received a letter saying, “Further to your access request under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Individual Privacy Act, please be advised that the estimated fee for the record you have requested is $650.” This letter then goes on to say, “You may request a review of this decision by the Information and Privacy Commissioner, Mr. Sidney Linden.”

Mr. Speaker, I know your ruling yesterday and I obviously listened to it with considerable interest, but I would like to ask that on agreement of the three House leaders, perhaps this question could be referred to the relevant committee of the House, which could look at this question.

I can tell you, I am not prepared to see the use of an unwarranted and unjustifiable user fee prevent me and my party from having access to information which is supposed to be publicly available.

Hon. R. F. Nixon: Put it on the order paper.

Mr. B. Rae: The Treasurer says, “Put it on the order paper.”

All I know is that with this kind of unwarranted delay, if the information is publicly available in every hospital, if it is there, why jerk everybody around for weeks on end in order to get access to it?

Mr. Speaker: Order. I listened very carefully. The member has suggested that the Speaker might, as I understood it, request that the House leaders consider the matter. I believe in my ruling yesterday I made reference to this matter and stated that it would be up to the House to decide. So you have brought the matter to the attention of the House leaders.

Mr. D. S. Cooke: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: The three House leaders did discuss this matter when the matter had originally been raised by the member for Carleton (Mr. Sterling). There was agreement by the three House leaders that this matter could be referred to the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly.

Would it not be appropriate for that to be done, since both other House leaders are here now that there be agreement that this matter be referred to the Legislative Assembly committee now?

Hon. Mr. Conway: The member for Windsor-Riverside (Mr. D. S. Cooke) quite rightly points out that we did discuss this matter when it was first brought to the House’s attention some time ago. Certainly, on behalf of the government, I am quite agreeable to having this matter referred to the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly since, in addition to this particular matter or this particular aspect of freedom of information, that committee is going to be dealing with other aspects of the freedom-of-information question later this summer.

I would be more than happy, consistent with the discussions we had at the House leaders’ panel, to indicate the government’s willingness to refer this matter out to the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly for such consideration as that committee decides upon.

Mr. Speaker: Following that discussion, I guess I have nothing further to add, other than to indicate that on a previous occasion I did rule that matters should be referred by this House. I presume that will be taken into consideration at the appropriate time.

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

LOTTERY TICKETS

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I am making this statement on behalf of my colleague the Minister of Tourism and Recreation (Mr. O’Neil). I want to inform the members of the House today that Money Match and Double Dollars Instant lottery tickets have been withdrawn from sale across the province because of a security problem. Tickets for other games, including the Lucky Match Instant game, are secure and will remain on sale.

The tickets are being recalled because the Ontario Lottery Corp. received important information this morning which allowed it to duplicate tests revealing symbols under the latex covering on the tickets. Supply of these tickets to the corporation’s distributors had been halted early yesterday morning as a precautionary measure.

Regular security testing is carried out on all OLC tickets by the official laboratory of the National Association of State and Provincial Lotteries, Barker and Herbert. The tickets for each game passed a battery of tests, including X-ray, three times. These tests did not reveal any security breach.

I am advised that the type of equipment used to reveal the security problem is specialized and used in highly sophisticated industrial applications. There are very few of these machines in Canada and they are not readily available.

The lottery corporation’s testing has always been among the most intensive on the continent. It will continue to evaluate its security testing procedures to ensure it is keeping abreast of changes in technology.

RESPONSES

LOTTERY TICKETS

Mr. Farnan: We welcome the decision of the Ontario Lottery Corp. to withdraw these tickets from the marketplace. I would like to comment, and I think it is worth reading into the record, that I think the decision is a result of some very excellent investigative journalism on the part of two Toronto Sun reporters.

I would like to point out that in tests that were demonstrated yesterday, both the Ontario Lottery Corp. and ministry officials were invited to witness the tests, which would demonstrate that with the use of X-rays you could read these numbers without scratching the tickets. Both the ministry and OLC refused to attend those tests.

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Second, as late as last night, representatives of the OLC were denying the fact that it was possible to read these tickets. It has been proved beyond a shadow of a doubt. The public demands that if there is going to be a lottery, if must be above reproach. The public must have absolute confidence that the system cannot be cracked. I think it was proved yesterday that, indeed, these two particular tickets could be read using X-rays.

I think it is also important to point out that all scratch-and-win tickets should be removed at this stage. If you had told the ministry two weeks ago that X-rays could crack this system, it would have said no. Indeed, even after the Sun had demonstrated yesterday that the system could be cracked, OLC officials were denying that it was so.

The people of Ontario and Canada cannot have confidence because, basically, we are talking about machinery that is out there. There are a variety of factors and all it requires is some fine-tuning to break the code of those other tickets. The responsible thing for this government to do would be to act now. The reason they will act on the tickets in question is that they have been embarrassed, because it has been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. But what they are doing now is saying: “We were embarrassed. We will withdraw these two tickets but we are not going to withdraw all of the other tickets.”

Let me tell the government that public confidence in the OLC with regard to scratch-and-win tickets is nilch. There can be no confidence among the people of Ontario and, of course, the people of Ontario just have to look at the minister right now and see that the Deputy Premier (Mr. R. F. Nixon) does not give two whits about the people of Ontario. He can go on and have all sorts of conversations. He does not have to listen to what the opposition says. He can simply ignore what is going on in this House. The reality of the matter is that those people who are spending one or two dollars on a system that is open to abuse will continue to do so while the Deputy Premier of Ontario does not care a whit and carries on his private conversations.

Mr. Pope: I want to say to the Minister of Tourism and Recreation (Mr. O’Neil), who has responsibility in the Legislature for the operation of this system, that once again he has bungled. This is the third time in a week we have seen bungling and mismanagement by this particular minister in his responsibilities. First, we have seen that the tickets posed a security leak. Second, we have seen the printing of tickets in the United States. Third, we have seen prizes offered that are not readily available to residents across this province.

This minister is responsible for it. It has gotten completely out of control. He has to be answerable to this Legislature for it. We now have large portions of northern Ontario that cannot participate equally in the awarding of prizes under the systems that have been implemented under his guidance and under his responsibility.

It is time the minister took his responsibilities seriously. It is time he redressed this blatant discrimination against people in northern Ontario and it is time he offered, as an alternative to commercial prizes in our lottery system, a system of passes or rebates on passes to the Polar Bear Express, to the mine tour, to the pulp and paper path tour and to tourism facilities, services and attractions across Ontario -- in eastern Ontario and northern Ontario -- and stop the bungling with the lottery system that the Liberal government is responsible for.

ORAL QUESTIONS

CAMBRIDGE MEMORIAL HOSPITAL

Mr. B. Rae: In view of the absence of the Minister of Health (Mrs. Caplan) and the Premier (Mr. Peterson), I would like to ask some questions of the Treasurer arising out of our discussions yesterday about the Cambridge Memorial Hospital. They relate, I believe, more profoundly to questions about the perceived fairness, the sense of fairness in the province about the way a ministry, which has an awful lot of power and a very large budget, uses that power and wields that power in its dealings with individual hospitals and hospital boards.

The Treasurer will have been made aware, or at least he should have been made aware, that Mr. Robertson, who is now the administrator of the board, has submitted his resignation to the board, but the board has yet to reach a decision on what to do.

Because the board has the support of the Woods Gordon study, which states very clearly that management of the hospital is not the problem and that indeed Mr. Robertson is “a highly capable individual who is well regarded by his peers,” to quote the words of the Woods Gordon report, if the board feels in its wisdom and judgement that it should not accept Mr. Robertson’s resignation, can the Treasurer give us the commitment of the government that the government will not exact any further requirements from the board other than that the board, generally speaking, comply with government policy? In other words, do we have the assurance that the board and the hospital will not be punished by the government?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: The matter was raised by a number of honourable members yesterday in question period. I said then, and I say now, that the decision as to the employment of the administrator of the hospital under consideration is a decision made by the local board.

I should say further that when the honourable member is talking about government policy, we have endeavoured in what I think is a reasonably generous way and a planned way to see that hospitals are adequately funded across the province.

As a matter of fact, the honourable members have expressed their concern that recent tax increases, particularly when related to growth in the economy, have increased the revenues of the province substantially. The honourable members would know, having read the budget, that 40 per cent of those additional revenues have been added to the budget of the Ministry of Health, a large proportion of that money being allocated to hospitals, so any thought that there is a cutback in hospital funding is erroneous.

But on that basis, we do believe that the hospitals, having entered into a budget for the allocation of funds for the provision of hospital services in the community, should do their best to live within that budget. If they cannot, they must apply to the Ministry of Health for the kind of assistance in planning and administration that is appropriate.

In the instance of the hospital in question, the Minister of Health sent in an inspector to assist the board and the administration in coming to some suitable disposition of their budgetary problems. If the board finds that it --

Mr. Speaker: Thank you. Supplementary.

Mr. B. Rae: This is very important. This is not simply a question of underfunding. What we are dealing with here is a question of the fairness of the system as it relates to individuals who work within that system.

The board had a press conference. Mr. Robertson was very vocal at that press conference in defending, from his perspective, what the board had been trying to do and what the hospital had been trying to do.

The government’s response to that was to send in Mr. Stoughton with some very specific goals in mind. What we are now dealing with is whether or not this government is prepared to recognize that it may also be wrong and that in fact the Woods Gordon report may be right.

What I am asking the Treasurer is, notwithstanding his differences of opinion with the Cambridge Memorial Hospital, can he give us an assurance today that he is not exacting or requiring or insisting on, in any way, the punishing or firing or mandatory retirement of the administrator of the Cambridge Memorial Hospital? I am asking him a very specific question. I would like a specific answer.

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I can assure the honourable member that there is no such insistence, and it does not seem reasonable that he would think there would be.

Mr. B. Rae: I am glad to have that now on the record because that is going to be very important in how the Cambridge Memorial Hospital reaches its decision. If the Ministry of Health is giving the impression that this is the requirement in order for future co-operation between the ministry and the hospital, then the hospital board is in an impossible position.

I ask the Treasurer again, can he give us the categorical assurance that whatever the board does with respect to the employment of Mr. Robertson, the government will continue to co-operate in a positive way with the Cambridge Memorial Hospital in making sure that that hospital can meet its needs?

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Hon. R. F. Nixon: I am not the Minister of Health but I am the Treasurer and I feel it is important that all hospital boards, through their own decisions and through their decisions to employ administrators, have sufficient assistance and advice so that they can live up to the requirement of operating under a balanced budget, if at all possible.

I add that as an additional phrase simply to make it clear that all hospital boards, naturally, have access to the ministry’s officials and those people who are familiar with the administration of hospitals coming under budget so that they can meet those requirements.

The decision as to whom the hospital boards employ, in Cambridge or anywhere else, is entirely theirs.

Mr. B. Rae: Perhaps it would be a good idea if those words could be taken directly to the Deputy Minister of Health, who would then discover that he is not responsible for appointing or firing every single person who works in the health system in this province.

Mr. Speaker: The question is to whom?

PROPERTY SPECULATION

Mr. B. Rae: My question, by way of an additional leader’s question, which I appreciate always, is to the Treasurer as well, because he is here and I know he will be glad to assist me.

It deals with the subject of housing. Again, I ask the Treasurer this not because I would prefer to go to him, for a variety of reasons, but because the Premier (Mr. Peterson) is not here and the Minister of Housing (Ms. Hošek) is also away today. So he gets the prize.

Interjection.

Mr. B. Rae: Watch the neck, Treasurer; I hate to see it get too red.

The question I have for the Treasurer is this: Yesterday I raised in the House the example of the tenants at 914 Yonge Street who are living in what I described as hidden condos. I would like also now to ask the Treasurer to address another problem that tenants who are being evicted are having.

Tenants in Kitchener-Waterloo, at 24 Peppler Street, and tenants at 500, 504 and 520 Kingston Road have all been evicted in order to create an empty building which is then being converted into condominiums. I ask the Treasurer, why has he not plugged the loophole in the law which allows landlords to create empty buildings which are then exempt from any protection under our laws on conversions to condominiums? Does he not realize that in failing to close that loophole --

Mr. Speaker: The Treasurer. Order. The question has been asked.

Mr. B. Rae: -- in fact he is putting these people out on the street?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: The honourable member referred to my getting the prize. I am not sure what he was referring to unless he was thinking of a prize in terms of his own presence here, in which case I know it is not Christmas. Since the question had a certain degree of detail, I would be glad to bring that to the attention of my colleague the Minister of Housing on her return.

Mr. B. Rae: Just so the Treasurer will know, he persists in saying that when it comes to the matter of speculation on housing he is from Missouri and, being only the Treasurer of Ontario, he is not aware of what is going on in the marketplace.

I would like to refer him very specifically to the example of what has been going on on Kingston Road, which is not that far a drive along through the east end from Queen’s Park. Let me remind the Treasurer that there is a 102-unit apartment complex which was sold on December 30, 1986, for $1.7 million. On September 1, 1987, the building was sold again, this time for $3.6 million, which means it increased by 114 per cent in just eight months.

The question I have for the Treasurer is, how can he deny that there is speculation going on in the province when it is so visibly and palpably there for him to see, if only he would see it? If it is going on, why does he not do more to stop it by introducing a speculation tax in the province?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: The facts the Leader of the Opposition presents to the House I am not prepared to argue about, but he would be aware that people have made profit out of land and buildings for a long time. I did not know it was illegal to do so, but the honourable member points out areas of unconscionable profits, in his view.

The government policy, rather than moving in with the land speculation tax which he favours, is to use the strength of government and its organization to assist, with the co-operation of municipalities, and to allocate the funds in our budget year by year to strong and effective programs to improve the supply of housing, particularly in the affordable range.

While the Leader of the Opposition so far has not indicated to the House that he feels even those programs are sufficient, they do indicate one of the largest additional allocations in a budget of over $38 billion. I wish it were more effective than it is and I wish the money were larger in sum than it is, but in fact it constitutes an effective and well-administered approach to providing the housing needs in this province.

Mr. B. Rae: The Treasurer has a choice before him. He can turn a blind eye to what is going on in the marketplace and say: “It is just people making money. There is nothing wrong with that.” It is part of the system that he is so much in favour of. Or he can really ask himself the question: Why is this speculation in apartment buildings going on? The answer is that landlords believe they can drive a truck through the rent review law, they believe they can drive a truck through the Rental Housing Protection Act; and that is what they are doing.

In this instance that I have given the Treasurer, can he tell us why there has been --

Mr. Reville: This will be a good answer.

Mr. B. Rae: He is getting advice from the former Minister of Housing, now the Minister of Skills Development (Mr. Curling), so I am just waiting for them.

Interjections.

Mr. B. Rae: I think he was looking for a straw and got a brick. I am not quite sure.

I will ask the Treasurer this simple question: Can he tell us why it is that people are being evicted and put out on the street? For the simple reason that the landlords have taken over. They have bought the building and they have to get that cash flow. They are getting the cash flow by evicting people and by converting buildings into condominiums. Does he not understand that this is going on? Why does he not do something to stop it?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: Actually, I was consulting with my colleague as to whether the New Democratic Party had voted for the rent control law. The member will be glad to know that he told me they had not. Even in those days, they voted for most of those things, as I recall.

The honourable member says, “Do you know why this is so?” I guess the reason it is so is that, as I understand it, Toronto has become -- dare I use the adjective? -- a world-class city, and I think we should say so with pride. People from all over the world are locating here.

Because of the policies of this administration in opening up the business expansion in this province and in this city, people all over the world are coming into this particular jurisdiction seeking the opportunity to live in one of the finest, cleanest, safest cities to be found anywhere. On that basis, there is bound to be substantial competition.

I point out to the honourable member, who has not travelled anywhere since he got back from Beijing, that if we were to compare the costs of housing in this city with others, they would be only a quarter of what they are in New York: only half of what it costs in London; only an eighth of what it costs in Tokyo. Of course, in Beijing, you have to be a Communist to get housing at all.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

SKYDOME

Mr. Brandt: My question is to the Treasurer, whenever he and the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. B. Rae) are finished.

I would like to say to the Treasurer that his humility in suggesting that Toronto has become a world-class city in the last three years is totally overwhelming; it really is. The speed with which he has developed this community is just unbelievable
-- “unbelievable” in the context of not being believable. I want him to know that.

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My question is with respect to another world-class development in this community, which was started by a previous administration and, I might add, a project our party continues to endorse and support as long as that support remains reasonable and realistic. I speak, of course, of the SkyDome project.

The Premier (Mr. Peterson), as the Treasurer may recall, indicated that support for the SkyDome project would not exceed $30 million in terms of provincial participation. In light of the work stoppages which are going on at that site at the moment, can the Treasurer and the Deputy Premier indicate to this House whether the commitment for an upper limit of $30 million in provincial contributions to that project remains firm?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: It does.

Mr. Brandt: I wonder how that washes, as the Treasurer is the guardian of the public purse in his position, with the Premier’s statement indicating the province will have to pay if SkyDome develops money problems. He went on to say: “If the thing goes amiss, we end up carrying the responsibility. We end up carrying the liability.” Can the Treasurer explain the contradiction between the comment he has just made, namely, that the limit for provincial contributions is $30 million, and the Premier’s indicated statements, which would lead one to believe that there is no upper limit and that the government will have to fund the liability? How did that contradiction come about?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I do not consider it a contradiction, mostly because nothing is going to go wrong.

Mr. Brandt: I love these quick answers to complicated questions.

Let me ask the Treasurer if he recalls, on August 15, 1985, that the standing committee on public accounts asked the Provincial Auditor to investigate the SkyDome project in order to protect the interests of the Ontario taxpayer with respect to any open-endedness in terms of the ultimate cost of that project and any potential areas for cost overruns, such as we are experiencing now.

The chief recommendation that came from the Provincial Auditor on that occasion was that we should undertake a commitment on a fixed-price basis; in other words, we would make our commitment with that $30 million as a built-in upper limit. I would like to ask the Treasurer if that step was taken, as suggested by the Provincial Auditor, in order to protect the interests of the Ontario taxpayer. If it was not taken, why was it not taken?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I find myself in the interesting situation that, as a person who is only peripherally interested in organized sports, I am the single shareholder of the Stadium Corp. of Ontario Ltd. I inherited that from the responsibility of one of my predecessors -- in fact, the member’s predecessor -- Mr. Grossman, who now, according to the Financial Times, is employed downtown at a base salary of $500,000 a year. That is irrelevant, but it is an indication that you win by losing in this game. As I say, you win by losing in this game, but unfortunately the Leader of the Opposition loses and loses.

If there is an overrun -- and I do not believe there will be any significant one -- and this strike continues -- I go by the dome twice a day and see what is happening as I drive along and look. It is coming along very well indeed, but as the member knows, the stadium corporation has a line of credit that finances the construction based on the financing which is in place. Those additional costs, if there are any, will be taken out of the profits when it is up and running and the roof opening and closing regularly and a very good and substantial series of public programs there, including football, baseball, tractor pulls and ballet dancing. All of those things are going to be there --

Mr. Speaker: Thank you. Order.

REGULATION OF BOILERS

Mr. Runciman: I have a question for the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations. This week the minister issued a press release ordering escalator owners to check their brakes. I wonder if the minister, the great defender of public safety, can tell us why, if he wants to appear consistent with his concern for public safety, he has not asked for a new, independent assessment of the safety of the boiler produced by Miura.

Hon. Mr. Wrye: The two are not the same at all. The independent assessment has been done. It has been done by the board of review, technical experts who have indicated to me that the boiler is safe. Indeed, it not only meets but exceeds the standards. It has, as well, been done by members of the technical standards division of the ministry. In 1986, in doing that assessment, the members of that division ordered several improvements to be made in the Miura boiler which would bring it up to the very rigorous standards that we have in Ontario and would take it beyond the standards of the very safe Miura boilers that are now in operation in Japan.

Mr. Runciman: The minister mentioned the review board again. He has indicated in this House that he made his decision based on the recommendation of an inspector who accepted a substantial personal benefit -- a free trip to Japan for his wife -- from the company he was inspecting, and the minister acknowledged that.

The International Union of Operating Engineers, after the changes the minister has mentioned, says the regulatory change is an open invitation to boiler explosions and damage to life and limb. Again, following these changes, the former member of the minister’s board of review who represented the Institute of Power Engineers said, “I think there will be a safety problem.” How does the minister justify his refusal in the light of those comments and the revelations about his inspector’s conduct?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: If the honourable member is making a suggestion that the judgement of the former director of the branch was compromised, then he should stand up and say so.

I say to my honourable friend that in June 1986, following the visit to Japan, technical standards officials asked for improvements in quality control programs, and they were upgraded to the same level as those required of an Ontario-based manufacturer.

As well, in order to meet our design and fabrication standards for the boilers, we required Miura to make improvements in the following areas to meet our codes in Ontario: material control, welding quality of critical joints, post-welding stress relieving by heat treating and X-rays of critical welded joints. All of those were demands that we made on Miura and all of those demands were met by Miura. I really do not understand what my friend is suggesting, when the opposite is very clearly the case. The officials went to Japan, looked at the matter of these boilers and ordered substantial improvements.

Mr. Runciman: We are not getting any really meaningful answers. There is something seriously wrong here, and the minister is declining to answer. The minister is intransigent, despite the knowledge that the advice he received was tainted and despite serious safety concerns of experts in the field. He says the board of review was going to recommend change anyway; yet the committee’s minutes show there was no resolution to this effect, and the union representative on the board says it was never agreed to.

There are a great many questions and concerns here. Is the minister prepared to request a forensic audit of the technical assessment process undertaken with respect to the Miura boiler by the Provincial Auditor or a referral of this matter to a House committee?

Hon. Mr. Wrye: I want to say to my friend that he certainly can feel free, as can members of the third party, to get in touch with each and every member of the board of review, including those members of the board of review who represent the union in question. They came to my office in, I believe, May of this year. I could get the exact date for my friend if he wants it.

We went around the table and I asked each and every one of the six of the seven members who were there that day, including the chairman, if he considered the Miura boiler to be safe, because there had been an amount of to-ing and fro-ing in terms of the safety issue by the operating engineers union, and some concerns had been raised by one local.

Each and every member of the board of review, without exception, said that the boiler was safe. A number of them said that in their opinion that boiler was safer than other standard boilers now in use in this province.

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MASSEY COMBINES CORP.

Mr. Mackenzie: I would like to go back to the Treasurer with regard to the Massey-Varity fiasco, where hundreds of retirees have already lost their benefits in a restructuring deal to which this government was party.

The Treasurer is aware of a recent second letter from Mr. Hargrove, the assistant to the director of the Canadian Auto Workers, informing him of a purchase offer of the Massey Combines operation in Brantford. He is also, I am sure, aware that he himself has said he would like to see this property stay in production. It is one of the finest industrial sites in Canada, and a lot of people are concerned about the production and development of the rotary combine equipment which has been developed by White’s.

Can the Treasurer tell us if he is prepared to take a look at this offer, rather than allow speculators and land developers to sell this property off piece by piece and possibly renege a bit or repair the bad name of Ontario to the people and workers in Brantford?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I appreciate the honourable member’s reference to the problems that Brantford has experienced over a number of years, first, with White Farm Equipment going into receivership after a number of programs which were designed to keep it operational, and now with Massey, which really means that the face of the manufacturing capability of Brantford has been totally changed, almost as if the mines had closed in Sudbury, for example. The restructuring of the town and the buoyancy in the economy which have been re-established there were really largely under the leadership of our colleague and friend, the present member for Brantford (Mr. Neumann), who was the mayor at that time.

The honourable member also indicated that he agreed with me that it is an extremely desirable industrial site. It is located right next to the Canadian National Railway main line, close to Highway 403, with one of the most beautiful cities in North America as its general environment. It has a workforce that is well-trained, competent and certainly ready to move into any manufacturing capability that is there.

It is, frankly, my hope and expectation that within the next few weeks and months somebody -- and it may very well be Park of Cleveland, which the honourable member is referring to -- will find himself in a position to begin manufacturing there, in a way which will be very much desired.

Mr. Mackenzie: I am sure the Treasurer is aware that the Park Corp. offer, at least at present, was not contingent on provincial funding. I do not know whether he is aware that George Merrick, vice-president of the company, was more than keen to talk to both provincial and federal people when we discussed it with him at noon today. The only real assistance he has had in the last few days seems to have come from Derek Blackburn, who is arranging a meeting with Mr. de Cotret.

Is the Treasurer prepared to meet with him to discuss what might be done to make sure that this does remain a manufacturing operation and is not subject to the profits of land speculators?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I appreciate also the fact that the honourable member has directed the question to me, but I think he would be better advised to direct it to my colleague, the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology (Mr. Kwinter), under whose aegis would come any arrangements whereby assistance to any prospective employer from Cleveland or anywhere else would have to be given consideration.

Certainly, every member of this House wants to see to it that the manufacturing capability is maintained there. I well remember sitting almost exactly where the honourable member is sitting when the Minister of Industry and Tourism of the day, back in 1980, asked for our agreement to put $75 million into it along with the $125 million from the government of Canada, which was an infusion, obviously, of $200 million, to maintain the jobs and the productivity there, Unfortunately, it was not successful.

POLICE EMPLOYMENT PRACTICES

Mr. Cureatz: We have a question to the Solicitor General. I would like to point out to her the fact that --

Mr. Sorbara: Who’s “we?”

Mr. Cureatz: My new colleague and I have a question.

Mrs. Cunningham: A joint question.

Mr. Cureatz: We worked on it together. We noticed in the Toronto Star, Mr. Speaker, if I might continue?

Mr. Speaker: I am sure the honourable member, when he said “we,” meant he was going to place his question through the Speaker to the minister.

Mr. Cureatz: That is right. I knew that is what I meant.

It is reported in the Toronto Star that Todd Clarke attended his Ontario Provincial Police academy graduation ceremony. At that time, he fainted, had a seizure and was taken to hospital. Eighteen days later, the OPP fired Mr. Clarke because he was thought to be an epileptic and considered a high risk.

This insensitive approach, I feel, sets a very discouraging atmosphere for all officers of our very fine provincial police force. I am wondering if the Solicitor General might consider bringing in her own investigative report with regard to the incidents surrounding the firing, in conjunction with the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

Hon. Mrs. Smith: Let me assure the member that I share his concern if there is any problem here with the force and have already been looking into it.

I can tell the member this. We cannot discuss the individual case because it is before a court and its decision will be rendered. At that time, we will study the decision and study our own role in it.

However, I want to assure the member that the force, as a matter of policy, is indeed making every effort to employ people with different degrees of disability and to make sure they are employed in a way that is safe both to them and those with whom they work. This covers the broad range of all the jobs within the OPP. I have been assured by the top people, the commissioner, that this indeed is the philosophy and is being followed.

I would like to add, however, that there is a human element in this. I was on the board of directors of Epilepsy Ontario, southwestern Ontario division, being London. I think there is probably no disease more misunderstood by the general public and even by the so-called informed general public than epilepsy. It could well be that, somewhere down the chain of command within the OPP, there is someone who does not properly understand the nature of the disease and, therefore, has made a decision that did not reflect the true medical facts.

I will be looking into this and will be glad to report back to the member on it.

Mr. Cureatz: To the minister, through the Speaker again, we have another question. I can appreciate the minister’s concerns about not wanting to get too specific about the case at this point.

In that regard, we have a general question about some police officers in the Metropolitan Toronto area. The force has been using, it has been reported, female officers for entrapment of men buying sex. I can say that I personally find this use of female officers unbecoming to the dignity of and, hence, the respect for police officers generally.

I can say to the minister that --

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Do you have a supplementary?

Mr. Cureatz: Yes, I do, Mr. Speaker. The point is that I was hoping the Solicitor General might give a commitment to this House to approach one June Rowlands, with whom the member for Eglinton (Ms. Poole) has a passing kinship, I am sure, to suggest to her that this method of police enforcement is below the dignity of police officers --

Mr. Speaker: Order. Would the member take his seat? Order.

USE OF GOVERNMENT AIRCRAFT

Mr. Speaker: The Minister of Natural Resources has a response to a question previously asked by the member for Nipissing (Mr. Harris).

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: The member for Nipissing raised a question about the use of Ministry of Natural Resources aircraft. There was a presumption in the question, which I certainly do not agree with, that back-bench Liberal members could requisition an aircraft, which is not true.

I was very careful about this and I want the member to know I examined this carefully. I am pleased to inform him that the member for Kenora (Mr. Miclash) joined the MNR district manager and the operations manager on a routine flight to discuss winter roads and other local issues with the native communities.

[Laughter]

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: I do not find that so laughable. I am relating the facts to the member.

Mr. Speaker: The response?

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: The member cannot be laughing about something from yesterday, because he was not here.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Do you have a response?

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Hon. Mr. Kerrio: The requisition is very clear. The requisition was by J. K. Young, the district manager in Sioux Lookout. It was a routine flight examining winter roads and issues that were important to native Ontarians, if they are not important to members opposite. I think the member was well within his rights to go on the flight.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Harris: I would indicate to the minister that nothing he has said today jibes with the press release that was put out by the member for Kenora. The release that was put out to the Northern Miner indicated it was his trip. Two of the minister’s officials accompanied him and it was a ministry aircraft.

I would ask the minister to go back to the original question I asked.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Harris: I might say to the minister that it does not jibe either with what the member told the media after, that he contacted Ministry of Natural Resources staff and said, “I would like to go when you are going.” That is what he said.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Would you place your supplementary?

Mr. Harris: I would like to ask the minister if he is prepared to table the request from the ministry, which has been cooked up over the week he has had, as to why this aircraft and three-day trip were set up, if he would table that information along with the flight log and the request that went in and if he would answer the original question, which is: When did he change his policy and allow back-bench members of the Liberal Party to be able to request government aircraft at any time they want?

Hon. Mr. Kerrio: It is obvious the member is not willing to accept an answer that was well researched to be absolutely certain there was no requisitioning by a member. Let me share something with the member that is very important. He should listen carefully, and now that the man with the horse laugh is gone maybe I could put the answer. This is very important.

Northern members -- members representing the electoral districts of Cochrane North, Kenora, Rainy River and Lake Nipigon -- are reimbursed the cost of unlimited travel by airplane within their constituencies by the most economical means. I have to tell the member that this man should not be criticized but given credit for going when there was a flight that was already going to take place and not requisitioning an aircraft, which he is entitled to do.

Mr. Pouliot: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: What the minister has just said is inaccurate, sir.

Mr. Speaker: Order. What is your point of order?

Mr. Pouliot: A standing order deals with provocation and getting an inaccurate statement from the minister. The people for those four ridings have a budget of $7,500.

Mr. Harris: That’s right. It is not unlimited.

Mr. Pouliot: It is not unlimited. It has been changed recently. I happened to be one not treated equally.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Would the member take his seat?

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. It appears to have become an administrative matter.

The member for Guelph.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: We will just wait a few minutes. If the members wish to waste the time this way, we will just wait for them.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. No. There are other members who would like to ask questions.

RETAIL SALES TAX

Mr. Ferraro: I have a question for the Treasurer. The question pertains to a problem brought to my attention by a constituent of mine, and indeed I must admit I have a lot of sympathy with her concern. Specifically, the problem arises as a result of the May 2 budget changes and the calculation of provincial tax, more specifically with the calculation of Bell Canada telephone bills.

By way of example, my own bill on chargeable calls for this month was $6.59. The federal tax on it, 10 per cent, is 66 cents. The provincial tax is then calculated on the basis of that aggregate. Subsequently, in reality, the amount of provincial tax is closer to nine per cent than eight per cent, and while in isolation it is not much -- it is 60 cents here -- if one took millions of households and businesses it would result in millions of dollars.

My question to the Treasurer specifically is in relation to the fact that, certainly from my standpoint, there is lacking some logic in justifying a provincial tax on the chargeable calls and the aggregate of those calls with the federal tax -- in other words, a tax on tax. Could he comment on that?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I thank the member for giving me notice of the question because, frankly, I have been expecting such a sensible question to come from a member of the opposition but it never came. I waited and waited.

Actually the honourable member is right that it will add about $20 million to the revenue of the province this year and the reason the taxpayers know about it is because, as the member pointed out, it is specifically put on an individual’s telephone bill. The Bell corporation was good enough to include a special little folder the first time the bill included that additional tax so that everybody would know about it.

On that basis I think that, like sales tax in general, it is healthy if a tax can be up front. People understand that they are paying it in support of provincial government programs. On that basis it was levied for the same reason that other taxes were levied.

We felt that it was as fair and equitable as a tax can be and we had to have the money to pay for hospital services, for roads, for schools, for new research facilities for the opposition parties and a wide variety of funding adding up to $38 billion.

Mr. Ferraro: I appreciate what the Treasurer says. It is still not too palatable, to be quite honest; but having said that, could he indicate to the House whether it is his intention to carry on with this practice? Could he also enlighten us as to the procedure in other provinces in Canada?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: Every province that taxes telecommunications, except Quebec, taxes it in this way.

As the member knows, the sales tax at the federal level is put on at the manufacturing level at this particular time. Our sales tax of eight per cent goes on on top of that, so there is the concept of tax on tax. While the phrase itself is not a nice one and, as the honourable member points out he does not like the idea, still he pays a tax on tax almost every time he buys an item, because the federal tax is hidden; it is not up front. Most taxpayers do not believe or understand that they even pay it.

I understand that this policy may very well change, according to the Minister of Finance for Canada as he contemplates a federal sales tax.

I should also say that this change will be a section in the Retail Sales Tax Amendment Act that the Minister of Revenue (Mr. Grandmaître) has already introduced. We will certainly get to debating that, and I hope approving it, at an early time.

RADIOACTIVE SOIL

Mrs. Grier: I have a question for the Attorney General. Last week the Attorney General appealed a Supreme Court decision that held the province of Ontario liable because it had sold homes on McClure Crescent in Scarborough to people who were living on that radioactive soil. It was in July 1987 that the court found the province liable and since then the residents have had to hire appraisers and actuaries to determine the amount of damages.

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The actual filing of the order for damages was last May, but the decision that the Attorney General is appealing is the finding of liability and not the damages themselves. Can the Attorney General explain why he did not file an appeal last August after the Supreme Court decision came down? Why has he waited until now to make that appeal?

Hon. Mr. Scott: I thank the honourable member for the question. It would not be usual, although possible, to file an appeal until the judicial determination as to liability and damages has been made.

While the determination as to liability was made some time ago and the determination as to damages was made more recently, the damages have not, as yet, been quantified, and we are now in the process of doing that.

The issue of an appeal was always present. We determined, I think last week or the week before, that this was an appropriate case to take such an appeal.

Mrs. Grier: I am sure the Attorney General will forgive us if we voice the suspicion that it was not convenient, perhaps, to appeal last August because of events which were due to transpire last September. In other words, during an election campaign they wanted the people in that area to feel that they were going to be compensated by Ontario.

The Attorney General’s appeal says nothing about the quantity of damages, merely about the fact of liability. Why has the Attorney General put the people on McClure Crescent through yet another delay and additional expense in trying to determine what their damages might be? Why is he refusing to let somebody get on with dealing with a problem that has been around for 20 years?

Hon. Mr. Scott: The honourable member approaches the merits of the matter. She will want to understand that, when this government came into office, we offered to purchase these houses, and 30 of the 40 people to whom offers were made accepted the proposition.

Some people elected, as they were perfectly entitled to do, to sue the government for their loss of profit. If they had lost their cases, they would feel perfectly entitled, and I would indeed encourage them, to appeal. It is an important issue. We lost the case, acting for the taxpayers of the province, and we have the right to appeal.

My honourable friend, in a cynicism that was not typical of her when she was in municipal politics, assumes that there is some connection between the judgement as to liability and the election date, and the judgement for damages, which was later, and the appeal date. That is completely unwarranted.

It would not have been practical to take an appeal if the court had decided, for example, that there was liability but no basis to award damages. In that case, we would have won the case and no appeal would have been necessary.

It was not that there was only one course open to us to postpone the matter. It was an important matter to postpone because, until a decision as to the basis of damage was given, it might have been that we would have won the case.

So I encourage the honourable member to do what I try to do every day, and I am sure what other new members of the House try to do every day, which is to persuade ourselves that not all decisions are made cynically and in the interests of a private purpose but that some of them are made in our best efforts to take the interests of the public and the taxpayer to heart.

FUTURES PROGRAM

Mrs. Cunningham: My question is to the Minister of Skills Development. The Futures program in the colleges across this province has been slashed by $43 million, according to recent announcements by his ministry. Would the minister explain to the House what criteria he used to justify this cutback?

Hon. Mr. Curling: Thank you. I was feeling a bit neglected over the week that I have not had any questions addressed to me. I am very pleased that I got a question to respond to.

I gather too that, yesterday in the House, the honourable member stated that my budget was cut by $500 million. I immediately want to have a talk with the Management Board because I do not think even the entire government was cut by that much. I am glad, though, that she stood in the House today to correct that, without referring to the mistake she made yesterday.

I also want to correct her that the Futures program was not cut by $43 million. Of course, there was a reduction in the amount of money that was allocated to the Futures program. As the member knows, the economy is booming and employment is buoyant here. Because of that, the client group we are dealing with has less demand to be served.

Mrs. Cunningham: I am happy that the minister took the opportunity to not answer the question. If I have made a mistake, it is because I cannot get answers to the questions. If I am using incorrect numbers, it is because I cannot get the answers.

I will ask the question again then; perhaps he can answer it specifically. How much money was cut from the Skills Development program in the last few weeks across this province? Where did it happen and what is the minister doing with that money to help programs across this province to help young people and adults become more skilled and employable?

Hon. Mr. Curling: Of course, if the question is asked properly, then we can respond properly.

I will state it again, and I know the great interest the honourable member has in this program. I thank her very much for recognizing the fact that it is a very important program, a program that has seen tremendous success. Of course, we were dealing with those youths who had difficulty in transition from school to work. That rate was pretty high. As a matter of fact, youth unemployment has dropped almost to a third. About 25 per cent of the youth now find jobs in other areas. Therefore, we were not serving that client group of people who now have work, so there is no necessity for us to have that type of budget.

On the second part of the question, of course, if there is a reduction in the amount of money given to any budget, we do not keep that money. We give it back to the Treasury and then it is redistributed. It was $30 million that was cut from that area.

NUCLEAR SAFETY

Mrs. Stoner: My question is to the Minister of Energy. The Atomic Energy Control Board, the federal regulatory agency, has ordered a study of the incidence of leukaemia among children born near the four nuclear facilities in this province, including Ontario Hydro’s nuclear generating station in Pickering. Dr. Rosalie Bertell of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health has identified potential health effects of long-term exposure to low-level radiation, including depressed white blood cell counts, asthma and allergies in children, mild mutations in newborns, miscarriages and still births.

I would like to know what the minister’s views of the AECB study are, whether the province will be participating and whether AECB will be encouraged by this government to expand the study to look at other potential health problems such as I have just outlined.

Hon. Mr. Wong: I would like to thank the honourable member for her question. The Ontario government ministries and agencies will certainly be available to offer whatever assistance is available to the study.

As all members of the House know, Dr. Kenneth Hare recently released his report on nuclear safety in Ontario. He looked at the evidence as to whether the operation of Ontario Hydro’s nuclear reactors had any discernible effect on health. None was noted, but he did caution that it is perhaps a little too early to be sure that latent cancers would not appear in some workers at some later date.

In addition, Professor Hare commented on the basis of a thorough study done in the United Kingdom in 1987, on pre-1955 nuclear establishments, I believe, that there was a significant increase in leukaemia among young persons living close to some nuclear establishments. It was on the basis of this study in the UK that Professor Hare supported, and the Ontario government will assist, the recently announced study of the AECB of the incidence of leukaemia in children born within 15 kilometres --

Mr. Speaker: Order. That seems like a fairly comprehensive response.

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Mrs. Stoner: I have a supplementary question for the minister. Is the government doing or planning any further study to look specifically at the potential health effects of the exposure to low-level radiation?

Hon. Mr. Wong: AECB, Ontario Hydro and Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. have conducted studies for approximately 30 years. These ongoing studies have been linked with international scientific and nuclear studies within the world-at-large community. We will await the results of the AECB study before contemplating any further studies.

TRANSIT SERVICES FOR THE DISABLED

Mr. Allen: I have a question of the Minister of Transportation. The minister will know that the Ontario Advisory Council for Disabled Persons and the Ontario Advisory Council on Senior Citizens have put two major recommendations before him with respect to transportation for the disabled, namely, that the provincial government make a commitment to develop a fully integrated transportation system to meet the needs of all Ontario residents and that the provision of all provincial funding for transportation be contingent on criteria for a fully integrated transportation system being met.

To date, those recommendations have been entirely ignored by the minister and his ministry. His recent announcement of $50 million for a special, separate transportation system for the disabled was in an entirely other category.

The minister may remember the promise of the government in the election was for $84.1 million for accessible transit for the disabled. Will he stand today and tell us that he will shortly be offering the balance of the $84.1 million for major projects to make conventional transit accessible for the disabled in Ontario?

Hon. Mr. Fulton: I do not think there is a government in the history of this province that has ever done as much as we have for the disabled community. I have worked very closely with my colleagues, the Minister without Portfolio responsible for senior citizens’ affairs (Mrs. Wilson) and the Minister without Portfolio responsible for disabled persons (Mr. Mancini) and others in providing a number of transportation initiatives to assist the disabled and the frail elderly, as my colleague would know. He would also know that the $50 million is only part of the $84 million announced last August.

Mr. Allen: If the $84 million is there, it is interesting that the minister asked for only $59.3 million from the Treasurer to cover a promise of some $84 million.

He has a ban at the moment on grants being used in municipal transit systems for major accessibility projects. He has no legislated minimum accessibility standards in conventional transit. He has done nothing to make GO Transit and intercity transit accessible. Recently, he put a hold on the Toronto Transit Commission’s plans for elevators in the Yonge-Bloor station and on the new Harbourfront line.

It would take $3 million a year for five years to make the major interchange stations in the TTC system elevator-accessible for the disabled.

Mr. Speaker: Place your question.

Mr. Allen: Will the minister now commit himself to begin that program immediately, starting with the Yonge-Bloor station, which is currently under renovation? That is a perfect time to do it.

Hon. Mr. Fulton: I think the member is wrong on a number of points. We have initiated some of those very studies with respect to elevators and so on. He would also realize that mine is not the only ministry that spends part of that $84.1 million. There are others which have other responsibilities with respect to the disabled.

In fact, we have put on the road 30 per cent more buses than previously existed in this province. We have accessible taxis now available for the disabled, starting in the city of Sudbury earlier this year -- another promise kept. We are expanding the guidelines for eligibility and access and we are expanding funding to towns under 10,000 that were never considered in the past.

I think this government has a very good record of working with the disabled, a record we can be proud of.

UNCONDITIONAL GRANTS PROGRAM

Mr. Harris: My question is to that bane of all Ontario taxpayers, the Treasurer, and concerns that woeful and sorry document, his budget. As a result of this budget, the city of London will pay an additional $607,000 a year in provincial taxes; the city of Windsor, an additional $744,000; the region of Sudbury, an additional $135,000; Waterloo region, $355,000 extra; Durham region, about $250,000 more; and Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry, an additional $100,000.

The Treasurer knows his last budget increases to provincial taxpayers the provincial tax bill for Ontario municipalities anywhere from $100,000 to $480,000 and that annualized cost of additional taxes can run as high as $600,000. Can the Treasurer tell us, in line with his Premier’s 1982 commitment and letter of how he felt about how municipalities should be treated when the sales tax base was broadened --

Mr. Speaker: Question?

Mr. Harris: Can he tell us by how much he intends to enrich the 1988 unconditional grants to compensate municipal taxpayers?

Hon. R. F. Nixon: I was just looking in my book here, which has all the answers, and notice that I left my budget-on-a-page somewhere else.

Mr. Harris: Here is the letter from David Peterson. I can send this letter over to the Treasurer if he wants to know his position.

Hon. R. F. Nixon: Very good. I will refer to that in the supplementary, if I may; but with respect to the actual amount of increased funding for municipalities, while I do not have the exact number just in my mind, the honourable member who has read the budget and perhaps remembers it more clearly than I knows it is a very large expansion of funding for the municipalities.

Mr. Harris: Inadequate.

Hon. R. F. Nixon: The honourable member interjects the word “inadequate,” which seems surprising to me because he must also have read that above and beyond that, the revenue from the additional one cent per litre gasoline tax is shared between provincial highways at about $60 million and municipal roads at an additional $40 million.

While I am aware that putting sales tax on cement and asphalt products particularly, plus the one per cent increase in sales tax, means the municipalities are paying more, I believe that this is compensated for and then some by the enrichment of the grants on a wide spectrum of areas of assistance, which includes, of course, school boards.

Mr. Harris: I see time has expired. I will carry my supplementary over to tomorrow.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you. That is very nice of you.

PETITIONS

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION FUND

Mr. Adams: I have a petition, which is addressed as follows:

“To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

“To amend the Teachers’ Superannuation Act, 1983, in order that all teachers who retired prior to May 31, 1982, have their pensions recalculated on the best five years rather than the present seven or 10 years.

“The proposed amendment would make the five-year criteria applicable to all retired teachers and would eliminate the present inequitable treatment.”

Mr. Speaker: Order. I wonder if I could have the attention of all members. There are many private conversations. They may be necessary, but they are very noisy and other members wish to present petitions.

RETAIL STORE HOURS

Mr. Miller: I have a petition addressed to the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario concerning Sunday shopping as follows:

“We, the undersigned citizens of Ontario, residing in the region of Haldimand-Norfolk, support the intent and recommendations of the all-party committee of the Ontario Legislature and the ruling handed down by the Supreme Court of Canada rejecting wide-open Sunday shopping and recognizing the need of a common pause day for family nurture.”

It is signed by 27 constituents, members of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, Hagersville, and was brought to me by the Reverend Frank DeVries.

Mr. Speaker: Once again, there are many private conversations that make it difficult to hear.

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION FUND

Mr. Cureatz: I have a petition to the Honourable Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, which reads as follows:

“We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

“The proposed amendment would make the five-year criteria applicable to all retired teachers and would eliminate the present inequitable treatment.”

I have signed the petition.

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RETAIL STORE HOURS

Mr. Campbell: I have a petition, which reads as follows:

To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

“We are opposed to open Sunday shopping and want to retain a common pause day in Ontario.”

The petition is signed by a number of residents of the Sudbury district.

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION FUND

Mr. Furlong: I have a petition, which reads as follows:

“To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

“The proposed amendment would make the five-year criteria applicable to all retired teachers and would eliminate the present inequitable treatment.”

It is signed by 200 Ontario residents.

ROUGE VALLEY

Mr. Faubert: I have a petition as follows:

“To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“We, the undersigned, beg leave to petition the parliament of Ontario as follows:

“Whereas the Rouge Valley system contains an abundance of natural beauty and sites of historical importance and archaeological significance; and

“Whereas the Rouge Valley system is a unique oasis of nature found within the boundaries of Metropolitan Toronto; and

“Whereas the Ontario government has indicated its continuing commitment to the environment through its generous support programs towards preserving the Rouge Valley system and the Carolinian forest, and the historic and archeological sites contained within;

“Therefore we, the undersigned, hereby petition the government of Ontario to give every consideration to the various alternatives available to them to ensure that the Rouge Valley system be preserved so that future generations may have the opportunity to enjoy them; these alternatives include a provincial park or a national heritage park.”

The petition is signed by 49 Ontario residents. I have signed the same and I present it for the consideration and positive action by the government.

RETAIL STORE HOURS

Mrs. Marland: I have a petition to the Lieutenant Governor in Council, signed by an individual opposed to Sunday shopping, Barbara LePage of Walden Circle. I have another petition on the same subject, to use the words of the petitioner, in “vehement opposition to wide-open Sunday shopping.” I will not read the rest of the petition. It is signed by Robert G. M. Kelly, MD, who is also in Mississauga.

Mr. Speaker: Once again, I would remind members that it is not necessary to refer to the people who have signed the petition.

INTRODUCTION OF BILL

CITY OF NORTH YORK ACT

Mr. Polsinelli moved first reading of Bill Pr58, An Act respecting the city of North York.

Motion agreed to.

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS IN ORDERS AND NOTICES AND RESPONSES TO PETITIONS

Hon. Mr. Conway: Before orders of the day, I wish to indicate that I have laid on the table the answers to questions 272, 273, 274 and the response to sessional paper P-17 standing in Orders and Notices [see Hansard for Monday, June 20].

POLL

Hon. Mr. Conway: As well, I have placed on the table a public opinion poll relating to Foodland Ontario’s operations.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

RETAIL BUSINESS HOLIDAYS AMENDMENT ACT (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 113, An Act to amend the Retail Business Holidays Act.

Mr. Cousens: I have had a chance to think about what I was saying yesterday, with a small, 20-hour break from this place, and I want you to know, Mr. Speaker, that I am as convinced now as I ever was that this government is absolutely wrong to be bringing in these changes which will affect the future of Ontario by opening up Sundays wide open for shopping and work and will change the fabric and the family life of this province in a way I oppose strongly.

If I was strong yesterday, I want to be stronger today, and I think that is going to be the spirit of the people of Ontario if this government continues to ram through its stupid, backwards legislation. It is undermining the family; it is undermining the home; it is undermining the values that make this province strong. I think it is time the government went back and reviewed it in the light of what is being said in this House.

There have been petitions. Today, members of the government presented petitions. Are they reading them themselves or are they just words that come out of their mouths? I know the people of Ontario, not just from my riding and the ridings that are represented by our party but from ridings right across the province, condemn this government for so singlehandedly reversing the trends and the roles that the province has had versus the municipalities. They are shoving the problem over to the municipalities. In the municipalities, there is going to be a domino effect, and soon this province will be wide open on Sundays.

Why is there not one person across the floor who will stand up on his own two feet and go against the Premier (Mr. Peterson) on this issue? Are they all just following the leader? Why do they not stand up and think for themselves? The fact of the matter is that there has been some comment that the member for Kitchener-Wilmot (Mr. Sweeney), the member for Kitchener (Mr. D. R. Cooke) and the member for Waterloo North (Mr. Epp) might all have a different opinion from the government; and also that the members for Peterborough (Mr. Adams), Guelph (Mr. Ferraro), St. Catharines-Brock (Mr. Dietsch), Kingston and The Islands (Mr. Keyes), Cornwall (Mr. Cleary) and Sudbury (Mr. Campbell) are all not in favour of this. Why do they not stand up and come forward like men and ladies and say they are not in favour of it?

Mrs. Marland: It is because they are weak in the knee.

Mr. Cousens: Are they weak somewhere? Why is there not going to be another group from within the Liberal Party that comes forward and says, “We represent the people of Ontario?”

Mr. Black: Quit misleading the public and tell the truth.

Mr. Speaker: I would ask the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay to withdraw that comment.

Mr. Black: I withdraw the comment.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you very much.

Mr. Cousens: At least the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay was awake. It worries me that all the words that we have to offer on this bill in this House are not having any impact at all on the government. That is the regrettable part. Its mind is made up, and it almost makes a mockery of the committee hearings that are going to be held for eight weeks this summer.

What good is it going to be for the people of Ontario to come to that committee when the government has already determined its agenda? Why have those public meetings? I think it is a good idea. It would be a better idea if the government were prepared to amend this bill, to amend its thinking, to change its ways, to allow itself to be confronted with the feelings and the thoughts that the people of Ontario have.

I have so many letters and so many statements from people that should be part of the record of this House as to the feelings and the thinking of people who are opposed to Bill 113 and to the thrust of this government in imposing this wide-open Sunday working capability on the people of Ontario. “What Peterson’s government is proposing” according to Henry Frietag, “is a disgrace. It will destroy the principles of our free democracy. It will make a mockery of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It will promote distrust between municipalities.”

I would like to quote further from another. It is from an architectural firm, and I would like to put on record some of this person’s thinking.

Mr. Ballinger: Read the bill first.

Mr. Cousens: I have read the bill and I wish this honourable member over here, who has so much to say but so little to think, would come along and do a little bit of reading as well.

This constituent of mine said: “For what it is worth --

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order. it might be an appropriate time to remind all members of standing order 24(b): “When a member is speaking, no other member shall interrupt him, except on a question of order.” I am certain the member will direct his remarks through the chair.

Mr. Cousens: It is a good idea, Mr. Speaker.

I am quoting from my constituent. He says: “For what it is worth, this is one constituent who does not believe we have to bow to pressure exerted by the lobbyists for large store chains and merchandisers. I believe in Canada what we have is a very unique situation, in that we have a day of rest for everyone, excluding, of course, essential services such as police, firemen, nurses, etc.

“To change the present laws, as I see it, will only further corrode the fact that Sunday to many people is a day of worship. But more than that, it is a day in which families can get together. We have had enough corrosion of the family unit without adding to it by supporting such a negative policy as open Sundays.

“The people who will have to work on Sundays or lose their jobs are not in a position to speak for themselves, and I think the politicians have to stand up and be counted.”

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I am prepared, and I am prepared to be counted. I believe that this constituent is speaking for far more of the people of this province than the David Peterson government.

I would like to make one more comment because yesterday, as I was closing off my remarks, I was commenting on free trade and how the people here want to keep Canada and Ontario different from the United States. This is a point made by one of my constituents. I do not have his permission to quote his name, so I will not, but from his letter to me, he says:

“In North America, in Canada, and particularly in Ontario, we desperately need some sign that commercial activity has not become our institutionalized religion. Allowing retail activity to go on virtually nonstop would give a priority to commerce that it does not deserve.

“Indeed, I find shopping every day more of a threat to our culture, our sense of ourselves, than any free trade agreement.”

What we are faced with in this province is a confusion of ideas where people say, “We don’t want to be like the United States.” Yet by bringing in this whole business of wide-open Sunday working, it is going to make us more like the neighbours of ours to the south of the border than ever before.

There is something being maintained in our cultural values when we, as a province, can have a unique, special day for families, a day of rest, a day just to recreate ourselves and get ready for another week.

I have other letters; I have other correspondence. I could go on much longer and expound on the views of the people from my riding who have strongly supported the position I have endorsed in this House. I have brought these points forward in the spirit that, in this Legislature, we have an opportunity to speak and we have an opportunity to be heard.

I am sorry that, in fact, by virtue of the lack of movement by this government, it is highly unlikely that the people who should have heard have actually listened, and that in fact the government is just going to go ahead and shove this through. I would be delighted if one, two or three back-benchers of this Liberal government could stand up and have the courage of their convictions, have the courage to be able to set themselves apart from their party and from the Solicitor General (Mrs. Smith) and say: “We do not support this. Our constituents do not want us to support it and, therefore, we will not vote for the bill.” They can also do what some obviously do: They slip away and they are not around on the day the vote is taken. Maybe that is one way of identifying what they really think about this bill.

I would rather see these people come forward now, speak up and make their minds known so that the people of Ontario will know that it is not just a pack voting together as a block, whipped up by their very strong whip and House leader, but that in fact they are coming out here with their sense of obligation to the people of Ontario.

This is a most important bill. It has taken a great deal of time for this Legislature to be working on it when in fact we could have been dealing with other things that have to do with the economy, that have to do with our school system, that have to do with our housing in the province. There are many, many issues that are at stake in this province. Here we have had the Premier set this forward as his number one item on the agenda.

It is not necessarily the number one item when we could be dealing with other things, but because he has put it on the floor I will say this much: Here is one member who is prepared to stand up and be counted. I oppose this bill. I oppose this government. I will do everything I can to continue to fight it.

Mr. Kanter: I listened with interest to the comments and the outrage, feigned or otherwise, of the member for Markham (Mr. Cousens) on the subject of Sunday shopping. It reminds me a bit of his position on housing, where he is extremely upset in this House but not always quite so consistent in his riding.

I note with interest his rhetoric that Sunday shopping is an attack on the family, that it is worse than free trade and that he is totally opposed to Sunday shopping. But I am rather curious about something that happens in his own riding.

It is my understanding that there are a number of stores in the old town of Markham that are open on Sunday. I would like to ask the member for Markham, if he is so opposed to Sunday shopping here in this House, what measures he has taken to close down the stores that are open in his very own riding of Markham?

Mr. Pouliot: I seldom have the opportunity to agree fully with the remarks made by the distinguished member for Markham, but today is one of those occasions. We have heard the member for Markham, standing like a soldier at his post, like a sentry at his post and, while he was reminding this House of the need for Ontarians to prepare themselves physically and mentally for the task ahead, some members, among them the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay (Mr. Black), choosing to make a mockery, nothing short of a mockery, of standing order 24(b).

I would like to remind the member that if decorum and good manners are to be the order of the day, that is the very opposite of this kind of style, method and approach when words of wisdom, nothing short of this, were favouring the colleagues of the House.

The member for Markham has chosen, in a fashion better than I know 94 members of this House would have been able or would have chosen to have the courage to do, to share with us, through the consensus, through the spiritual leadership of the many Christian and other well-intended people in Ontario; he has reminded us with eloquence that this kind of opposition from the members of the government represents, indeed, government at its worst. He did not stand alone; his kind remarks did not go unnoticed, and I share with him in condemning the government for not having the courage to stand up and represent the constituents.

Mrs. Marland: I take note at this point that not only is the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay violating standing order 24(b); he is violating the other rule which says that no member can speak except from his own seat. This member is interjecting and he is not even in his own seat.

I feel very strongly as I rise in support of the comments of my colleague the member for Markham. It is very interesting to hear, of course, as one cannot avoid hearing, the interjections that go on in this House in spite of the rules for order and procedure, but to hear from the new member for St. Andrew-St. Patrick (Mr. Kanter) --

Mr. Ballinger: As if you’ve never done that, Margaret.

Mrs. Marland: As a matter of fact, I would tell the members who are still interjecting that I do not interject, if they observe. I wait until the two minutes, and that is the appropriate time when I use my opportunity to interject

The member for St. Andrew-St. Patrick, in rising to comment on my colleague’s speech, I suppose, is rising in his new position as journalist for the Toronto Star.

I want to recognize the fact that it is unfortunate that in the comments of my colleague the member for Markham he was as generous as he was to those members of the government who have indeed presented petitions on the floor of this House, as they were requested to do by people whom they represent. Those same people they represent now will be horrified, I am sure, to find that they will indeed be voting with their government bill, which is completely opposite to the intent of those residents and citizens of Ontario whom they represent.

Mr. Pollock: I want to compliment the member for Markham on an excellent address. He expressed himself extremely well and put his points across in a very admirable manner. He read different letters from his constituents, as I think practically every member in this House has got letters from his constituents, concerned about Sunday shopping.

Let’s face it: I feel that Sunday shopping should be left in the hands of the province. It has the police, the capability to enforce it. It should not be turned over to the municipalities. The member for Markham expressed that extremely well and he is very concerned about this particular piece of legislation.

As I say, the member for Markham put his point across extremely well. He is a credit to this assembly; there is no question about that. I just want to join my colleague from Mississauga South (Mrs. Marland) in stating what an honourable job he did in speaking on this particular Bill 113.

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The Deputy Speaker: I believe there is a bit more time left for those who may want to ask questions and make comments. If not, does the member from Markham wish to speak?

Mr. Cousens: I am honoured to have received such kind words from people from at least our party and the New Democratic Party. I have to say the member from Lake Nipigon (Mr. Pouliot) is a very honourable man. I have to say I appreciate most of all the kind words he had to say very, very much. The member for Mississauga South and the member for Hastings-Peterborough (Mr. Pollock) reaffirmed the sense of importance that this bill has and the reason we in this House have to stand strong.

This is a very small group, but we have a very large and important point to express. In spite of the fact that there is this huge majority that would try to suppress the truth and try to keep people down, there is nothing that is going to stop us from doing what we believe to be right. We are operating on principle and we are operating with a sense of mission in that we believe in what we are doing.

I would like to comment briefly on the member from the Toronto Star, the member from St. Andrew-St. Patrick and some of his comments. They are ill-founded. I would like to have a considerable period of time to go into the fact that the province presently gives rights to different municipalities to do certain things. The province is in charge and those municipalities can operate within the law. I am in favour of that principle. I am in favour of the province running things, not passing the buck over to the municipalities, which is what Bill 113 does. That is a fundamental rule.

What we are seeing is a sloughing off of responsibility. Maybe that member is one of the chief sloughers. He has not been shown to be that in other things he is doing, but here is a chance for him to give leadership, and he is not doing it. He should stand up and be the leader he is capable of being. The people of St. Andrew-St. Patrick had a great man representing them before the member. Let them have that same kind of greatness in the member. It is there, but it has not come to flower.

This is not an issue that is going to go away. It is an issue that is just starting to get us riled. The people of Ontario do not want the people of our party or the people of Lake Nipigon or the rest of Ontario to go to sleep on this. We are going to continue to fight and fight and we will win.

Mr. Ballinger: I am very pleased, as the member for Durham-York, to rise and join in this debate on Bill 113. I have always been amused since September in coming here to -- I really enjoy the bantering back and forth between all three parties, but in this particular case I am quite pleased to stand in support of this bill.

Mr. Cousens: “Quite.” Not completely.

Mr. Ballinger: I am 100 per cent in support of this bill. Unlike the previous speaker, the member for Markham, I will try to discuss the issue as I see it without going off in about 45 different tangents in every other direction to make a point that I think is bizarre in many examples that were used by the member for Markham. This issue to me, quite honestly, is one of accountability.

I am quite pleased to represent the riding of Durham-York. I think my riding represents a good cross-section of Ontario. My riding is made up of five municipalities, four of which are not open on Sunday, one of which is.

The interesting point I want to make about that is that there is no domino effect in my municipalities. The one that is open does not affect the other four which are not. The opposition has been arguing since the introduction of this bill about this so-called fear of the domino effect: that if one municipality opens, then they all must open or else they will lose market share. There are many examples in this province where that is simply just not true. My riding is one where it is not true.

Mr. Wiseman: Are you a retailer?

Mr. Ballinger: Yes, I am a retailer and a former municipal politician, and I think I understand both areas very well.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. Standing order 24(b), please; and the member shall address his comments through only the Speaker, of course.

Mr. Ballinger: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

During my short time in this Legislature, I have found it very interesting that the members of the opposition have a tendency to want to speak on behalf of all of Ontario. I would like to remind the opposition that I represent a constituency of about 80,000 people and I happen to believe that I speak on their behalf, because I am the elected member of the riding of Durham-York.

There was a by-election held not too long ago, and it seems to me that the third party has been bantering about as the reason it elected a member there that the issue was Sunday shopping. I do not happen to believe that was true at all. There are many variables involved in an election. No one issue elects or defeats a candidate or a government. There are many issues that make up whether you get elected or you do not.

When I stand here as a new member of the government, it appears to me that if you closed your eyes and listened you would hear the same response from the opposition on every piece of legislation that the government introduces. There does not seem to be any sort of individuality at all. The name of the game is, “If the government is for it, we’re opposed to it.”

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please. It seems that because of the heat in the place everyone is having a hard time, I expect, remembering standing order 24(b), all of you collectively.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. You may resume, please.

Mr. Ballinger: Since the debate started about two to three weeks ago, I guess, we have been discussing this off and on. I want to sort of recite a few of the words I have heard in here from certain members of the opposition. We have been accused of being cowardly, insensitive, arrogant and gutless. The term “passing the buck” -- what an old cliché that one is.

Mr. Pouliot: Bill, whose side are you on?

Mr. Ballinger: No, I was going to make the point that the opposition uses terminology to instil a fear and a misunderstanding in the general public out there.

This bill, compared to the previous bill and what is happening in this province, makes all kinds of sense. In fact, it is so logical that members over there obviously do not understand the logic behind it.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. If the members collectively insist upon having this kind of afternoon, it is not going to be interesting in the House whatsoever.

Mr. Ballinger: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Quite honestly, as a former municipal politician --

Mr. Cousens: Go back to it.

Mr. Ballinger: Well, you may want to say that, my friend, but I can assure you I am here for at least four years.

The Deputy Speaker: The member will address his remarks through the Speaker.

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Mr. Ballinger: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I am sorry.

In the four years I will be here, I want to assure the honourable members on the other side that I will speak when I believe I should speak on issues that affect not only my riding but Ontario. I am speaking today because I believe the bill that is being proposed by the government, with its amendments to the Retail Business Holidays Act, is logical, fair and really does give an indication of the diversification of this province.

The concern I have is that, unfortunately, the opposition members are not even willing to take a look at the proposed amendments objectively. It is really interesting about the municipal option. In the riding of the member for Durham East (Mr. Cureatz), in his own riding, one of the municipalities is open illegally and has been for a number of years.

They have been taken to court consistently and they keep opening. The reason they keep opening is that that part of Ontario and that part of the riding really reflect the market and the conditions that evolve around it. That particular municipality should be open. They are open now. They cannot be open from a legal point of view. This new bill will allow that opportunity to reflect the wants and needs of that particular community.

I cannot, for the life of me, understand why the opposition would not support the concept of local option. It makes all kinds of sense. Ontario is not a block. It is made up of all kinds of different people in communities and this bill reflects, I believe, the opportunity for the government to express and support those communities.

There was never a better opportunity than now to reflect, going into the 1990s, how we are going to support those communities. The easiest thing we can do, on this side, as a government, is just close our eyes, put our heads in the sand, sit down, be quiet and do absolutely nothing. I do not know about those guys over there, but I was not elected to come here and do nothing. I came here hopefully to contribute to a better society. I believe this bill --

Mr. Pouliot: Then change the bill.

Mr. Ballinger: Yes. I absolutely believe that. Again, by comparison, when I look at my own riding, what I see is five municipalities completely different, all working in harmony together with one of the municipalities open seven days a week, which does not and will not have any effect on the other municipalities in relation to the domino effect.

When I was on regional council in Durham with the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh) many, many years ago, we had discussion back in those days on the tourist option, whether or not municipalities within the region could or should be exempted under the provisions of the tourist bylaw. One of those municipalities applied and it was denied. That is the same municipality in Durham East that is open today. Regardless of the current law, they just decided they wanted it and needed it and they opened illegally. This bill will not only help us, it will also help them to decide.

Mr. Cureatz: What municipality is that again in Durham East?

The Acting Speaker (Miss Roberts): Order, order.

Mr. Ballinger: Scugog, for the record. I am sorry, Madam Speaker.

Again, from my point of view, as a member representing the government side, I am very honoured to have the opportunity to be in this Legislature to begin with. I am very pleased to be the member. I am very pleased to have the opportunity to support a piece of legislation that I know will, in the long run, be good for Ontario and good for the majority of constituents I represent.

Mr. Philip: I want to say that that is the best speech I ever heard the member give. I must say I always enjoy his delivery, if not the content. I am sorry he was heckled so much, because I know he never does that to anyone else.

He mentioned that the opposition had said the government was weak-kneed, cowards and buck-passers. I do not remember using the first two, but being on the standing committee on public accounts, I may have used the last one of buck-passing, which is a monetary term.

I want to ask the member if those three words are similar to using the chicken option, which is what the minister in fact called the municipal option.

Mr. Cousens: I would enjoy hearing the speaker continue his speech, especially if he were to give us some of the logic behind this bill.

He referred several times in his eloquence to the logic of this and the logic of that, but he never touched on it. Maybe he does not know; maybe no one has told him. It would be very good for all of us if this very good friend of mine the member for Durham-York -- and he is, in spite of the heckling -- could do us the favour, the honour and the service of telling us what the logic of this bill is. I do not think he knows it. I really do not think he does.

I do not want to call him something he is not, but I challenge him to give us any form of logic for this bill right now. If he is only proud to be here because of this bill, that is not a lot to be proud of.

Mr. Mahoney: I think one can always measure the impact a speech has in this House by the rancour and excitement it causes on the opposite side. In the case of the previous speaker, the member -- where is he from? Durham South?

Mr. Ballinger: Durham-York.

Mr. Cureatz: Near me.

Mr. Mahoney: He is from somewhere down by the member for Durham East.

When one generates that kind of comment and reaction from the opposition, obviously one is striking a chord. I think the sensitivity, understanding and knowledge the honourable member has of this particular bill have struck a chord in making the members opposite realize that he, for a change in this House, with all the other speeches which have been going on and which we are likely to hear -- the member for Durham East is on deck, I believe.

Mr. Cureatz: I’ve changed my mind.

Mr. Mahoney: Hi, Sam, how are you? When he comes out of the bullpen, I think we are going to hear more of the nonsense we have been listening to about how this bill is going to destroy the family and erode the way of life of Ontario’s citizens.

The honourable member here has spoken very clearly and put forward the government position, which very clearly says this is not wide-open Sunday shopping and this is not buck-passing. He has analysed the bill from the proper perspective instead of standing up and throwing scare tactics forward to the citizens of Ontario and trying to really buffalo the people of this province by telling them this is a bill which would allow wide-open shopping.

The opposition members should be ashamed of themselves for leading the people of Ontario down the garden path. This government is putting forward a bill, as the honourable member clearly outlined in his speech, which will be enforceable, which is understandable, which will allow the municipalities to determine their own fate. He did it clearly, succinctly, without buffoonery and without the nonsense we have been hearing from the other side of the House. I congratulate him on a great speech.

Mr. Pouliot: I wish to congratulate the member for Durham-York on his tone. Unfortunately, I also have to say that the member missed a golden opportunity to address the substance, the reason for the bill being presented and its rationale.

Instead, by way of a tactic or strategy, he adhered to one of the oldest methods -- it lacks class, to say the least -- which is that if you cannot talk philosophically on the rationale of the bill, you blame the opposition, the 35 humble people here who are doing their job; as opposed, on the other hand, to making a positive contribution to the House.

Look at the mandate. He reminded the House of the reason he was elected, the mandate, the terms of reference: to represent the aspirations, the will of the people “back home.” This is the seriousness that this kind of legislation deserves. “What are the people back home saying? They are not concerned about the members of the opposition. They are concerned about my response, as the member for Durham-York, to their aspirations. Am I representing them well?”

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I am always pleased, like others, to listen to the member for Durham-York. Unfortunately, the member could not resist the temptation to go for show as opposed to substance. That leaves us with, certainly, less than a passing mark in terms of the seriousness of what is being addressed here today.

Mrs. Marland: I would like to comment on the member for Durham-York’s speech. Fortunately, it was brief, because he is obviously not representing the people in his constituency; nor is the member for Mississauga West (Mr. Mahoney) who made comment on that speech. It is very interesting. In particular, it is interesting because the member for Mississauga West was a member of the executive of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario at the time that --

Mr. Mahoney: On a point of order, Madam Speaker: I would love to enter into a debate with the member for Mississauga South, but I believe her comments are to be directed towards the member for Durham-York’s remarks.

Mr. Cousens: Can’t take it, eh, Steve?

Mr. Mahoney: If I could have an opportunity to come back, I would be happy to take it and give it.

The Acting Speaker: Order. Would the member for Mississauga South please continue with her comments upon the remarks of the member for Durham-York.

Mrs. Marland: Yes, Madam Speaker, and I am commenting on the remarks of the member for Durham-York because, in fact, when comments were made on his speech, they were made by someone who was on the board of the executive of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario at the time that AMO told this provincial government, by a vote of something like 17 to 2, that it did not want the jurisdiction to regulate retail store hours in this province and that that jurisdiction must indeed stay with the provincial government.

It is particularly significant when the member for Durham-York gives us his own curriculum vitae and emphasizes the fact that he was a member of municipal council in the past. Even more so, I find it hard to understand why he would be so unsympathetic and uncaring of the wishes of those elected officials, as is the member for Mississauga West.

The Acting Speaker: Order. The member’s time has expired. That is all the time there is in reply.

Mr. Ballinger: It is really interesting to participate in a debate, elicit some comments from members on the other side and then only have a couple of moments to respond.

I would like to remind the member for Lake Nipigon and the member for Mississauga South that, as an individual, I have never adopted a holier-than-thou attitude in anything that I do. I suggest to both of the honourable members over there that I did not come in here today for a lecture, but I appreciate their comments anyway.

As far as the member for Markham (Mr. Cousens) is concerned, I do enjoy fencing with the member, but it has always been a point of mine in life never to exaggerate to make a point and I try awful hard not to do that. I will make a suggestion in the short time that I have left concerning the discussion that centres around the logic behind this legislation. Sometimes, when it is as plain as the nose on your face, you just cannot see the logic. In my humble opinion, this proposed legislation is logical.

Ongoing in this province currently are many abuses to the current act. There are people deliberately taking advantage. As a province and as a government we have constantly been in court, and then somebody gets a small fine or a slap on the wrist. The act currently does not reflect Ontario, the nature of the province that it is and the people in the communities that it represents. When this proposed bill is passed and in place, and everything is said and done, they will realize the logic of it and Ontario will settle back to being a nice, even, easygoing place to live.

Mr. Farnan: It gives me great pleasure to rise to speak on this topic. I just preface my remarks by talking a little bit about the recognition factor for politicians. The recognition factor for politicians is something we are all familiar with. Whether you are walking down the street or going to a football game, how many people will recognize your picture in a newspaper or recognize you in a grocery store? That is the recognition factor.

However, the recognition factor goes beyond that; there is a positive recognition and a negative recognition. I am sure all of the honourable members will have experienced the kind of situation where it is a lot easier to accept, for example, meeting somebody who says, “Hi, Mike, you’re doing a good job,” than “You’re a jerk.” That is a reasonable situation. As politicians, very often the recognition factor is centred around issues and the type of stands we take on issues.

It is not surprising then that people will meet us and say, “You know, I like the kind of stand you’re taking on this issue” or “Overall, you’re doing a good job, but I can’t live with you on this particular issue.” Politicians generally, I suppose, know they are in trouble when people recognize them, know the issues they are standing on and say, “You know, I can’t support you on this issue.”

I want to say to the House today that, in relation to this issue, I would like to express my own personal experience among the constituents in Cambridge. When I meet people on this issue, they like the stand that I have taken, they like the stand that my party has taken and they like the stand that the Conservative Party has taken.

They say to me: “You know, we really appreciate the fact that the opposition parties fought hard and got this bill into committee. We really appreciate the fact that there is going to be another series of hearings through the summer and we really hope that, as a result of these hearings, the people of Ontario will have another opportunity to express their views.”

They really hope that the government will listen to their views, reflect upon their views and then say: “Maybe we read this wrong. Maybe we should look at this again and perhaps our earlier decision should be changed. Perhaps we should try to work with all of the parties in the Legislature.”

Would it not be marvellous for the people of Ontario if the government showed the kind of leadership that said: “Look, the people appear to be pretty much in the majority in opposition to this. Let’s work with the opposition parties. Let’s sit down with the New Democrats and the Conservatives. We know the present system has flaws, but let’s really sit down and try to iron these flaws out. Let’s improve the system, let’s make it work, but let’s not go contrary to the will of the people.”

That public recognition factor, as I said, reflects around issues. When I sent out a householder on this particular issue, I had over 7,000 replies from the people of Cambridge. Out of 32,000 residents’ homes that the householder went into, there were over 7,000 replies. The response of the people of Cambridge to that householder was over 80 per cent to say that they disapproved of the course of action that the government was taking.

I had a public meeting to which representatives of every sector of the community were invited -- the chamber of commerce, the business associations, local labour unions, church groups and consumers -- and all these groups represented said that they were opposed to this particular option.

All Liberal members in the Waterloo region and in Guelph say they are personally opposed to the Sunday shopping option, and I know there are many Liberal members who share the view of those colleagues in the Waterloo and Guelph areas. I know it is difficult for them. For discipline the government says, “Look, we expect everybody on side on this issue.” I know there can be denials of this, but the actual manner in which these individuals are behaving in their community is evident. There is either a silence on the issue or there is a kind of assurance to the people, “Well, you know that personally I am opposed to it, and I hope that all municipalities will refuse the option; but you know, we have to give everybody the option.”

I know people are in trouble personally, in terms of party loyalty, doing what they think is right and doing what reflects the will of their community. If the government were to say, “We will rethink our situation,” I think it would free up those members of the government who are having that difficulty, because it is always a very difficult thing to go against the wishes of the party when it sets down a decision like that.

I do not wish to reiterate much of the argument in opposition to the municipal option, but I would like to put it in the context in which I opened my remarks and in the context of how people will perceive us. All church groups in Ontario are on record as saying to the government: “Please stop. Don’t go through with this.” I am going to read very briefly from the policy statement of the Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops, March 23, 1988:

“Sunday for Christians is the weekly celebration of the resurrection of the triumph of life over death, of peace and reconciliation. Not all Ontario citizens share this perspective, but all participate in an ordered rhythm of life which consecrates Sunday to rest and family sharing.”

When I meet my constituents, they will say to me: We support your position because we really feel we would like to keep Sunday as a day of pause. We would like to keep Sunday as a special day. We would like it to be different. We know that society is changing. We know that there are more people working on Sunday. But why must we hurry up the process? Why must we make more people work on Sunday?”

I think there is a positive recognition factor there, and I think all members of the government and all members of the opposition parties will know what I am talking about. When they meet people, the people say to them: “On the issue of Sunday shopping, I agree with you. I like what you are doing.” Sometimes, because they like or respect the member personally -- and I am sure that is true of many members of the government -- a lot of people who would disagree do not say it to the member face to face. They might say it in their home, at work or in a social setting, but they will not say it to a member; sometimes, I believe, because they like and respect the member personally, for that reason they do not bring up the issue.

But I can tell members, when they know that they are on side, when they know that you are standing up to the protect that common pause day, when they know that you are fighting this municipal option, which we all know will ultimately lead to a greater amount of shopping on Sunday -- whether or not it is going to be wide-open Sunday shopping, which is my belief, I think every thinking member of this House will agree that under the municipal option there is going to be an increase in shopping, a great increase in shopping, much greater than exists at the present time.

My friends, I think people will say to us, “I like your stand because your stand is going to save me from increased taxes.” We know that it is not just the opening of the stores. We know that other services will be affected, for example, whether it is transit or police. We know that the equipment in these stores, whether it is fans or cash registers, all has to be serviced. If it breaks down, you cannot simply wait; you have to have a technician come out on call. We know that we are not just talking about the workers in the stores; we are talking about all the support services.

What is happening then is that the number of people involved, the number of people who are being affected, is spreading out more and more. These people are saying to me: “Mike, I like your stand. I like the stand of your party, because you’re going to save me from increased taxes.”

I think they are also saying, in terms of the quality of life: “Mike, I like your stand because it gives me that extra day with my family. I am a single mother. I have a child. That child is a latchkey child six days a week.”

Under this law there is the possibility, there is the potential that there will be additional pressures put on those families, and they are saying: “We like your stand. We like the stand of your party. We want the government to listen.”

My friends, the store owners themselves are saying to the government, “We don’t want this law.” The municipal politicians are saying, “We don’t want this law.” But I put it in the other framework again, because I want to stay with the theme I developed from the very beginning.

Municipal politicians are saying: “Mike, we like your stand. We’re opposed to the option. We’ve made it clear to the government.” The Association of Municipalities of Ontario has made it clear to the government. Workers say: “We like your stand. We like the stand of your party.”

There is no need to increase the amount of time that people have to spend at work. Let’s also understand that it is not just convenience, because we know that in other jurisdictions where this option has been applied, while the stores may be open on Saturday and Sunday, they have closed during the evening during the week. In that circumstance, people who, say, traditionally work from nine o’clock to five o’clock are now being forced to do their shopping on Saturday or Sunday, where they previously could have done it during the week.

I do not know why the government took this route. I really do not. There is a tremendous agenda in terms of providing for the needs of the people of this province. There is much important legislation that has to be brought forward and addressed. I do not think that the great issue of the day is Sunday shopping.

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When I go down to the market on a Saturday morning and I am talking to the people of Cambridge, they do not say: “Mike, when is the Sunday shopping bill coming through? Oh boy, I hope that’s through soon because I really want that.” There is no urgency to this. Indeed, the reality is that the majority of Ontarians do not want it.

When we look back at the all-party committee, it actually recommended against the municipal option and its consequence of open Sunday shopping. When we look back at the statements of the government during the election, I ask myself: “Why does the government do this? Why does it want to antagonize all of the good people of Ontario, the church groups, the labour groups, the consumers and the families? Why do they want to do this?” I cannot really understand why.

I am very grateful that the government actually agreed to the hearings of two months over the summer, during the months of August and September. As a member of the committee that will be hearing the delegations of the public, and as an individual who will be away from my family for a considerable amount of time listening to those delegations and will be in the company of many members of the government and of the Conservative Party, we are going to invest two months of time listening to the people of Ontario.

I am grateful to the government for saying: “We will go back. We will take a second look at this. We will listen once more to the people of Ontario before we come to a resolution.” That, I hope, is what is happening. When I go out and I meet the residents of Cambridge on the street and in the marketplace, I want to be able to say to them: “This government is an honest government. This government is coming back to listen to you. It is sending a committee across the province. I am part of that committee. We want to hear what the people of Ontario are saying.”

I want them to have a feeling that when they raise their voices, when they bring their concerns and when they state their position, the government will listen; that the government will not use its majority simply because it is a majority, that it will not use its majority simply because it wants to be stubborn, that the government will not use its majority simply because it has not got the courage to say, “Hey, on second thought, this is not the right road to take.” I want to tell the people of Cambridge that.

At this moment in time, I have to admit to the government members, it is difficult for me to say to the people of Cambridge, and hence to the people of Ontario, that that is actually what is taking place, that that is actually the process we are undertaking.

It would be absolutely wonderful if the Premier and the minister were to stand up in this House and quite categorically say: “Look, we as a government are the government of the people. We are going to listen to the people, and in terms of Sunday shopping we are going to implement legislation that reflects the will of the people. We are not going to ram through something that we have a fixation with.”

I would love to be able to say to the people of Cambridge that this is the case. Certainly there could be no clearer message if the Premier were to stand up in the House and if the minister were to stand up in the House; then the message would mean something. But, my friends, the tragedy of it is that I have sat through a debate this afternoon in which I have heard really antagonistic shouting and interjections from both sides of the House. I have heard entrenched positions. The government is saying: “You guys don’t know anything. You don’t see anything.” I have to be honest and say that there have been similar remarks made from this side of the House about the government.

But, my friends, I think the reality of the matter is that this is an issue which does not have to be partisan. It really does not have to be a partisan issue. It is a people issue. It is an issue on which we, as the composite body of this House, can actually go back to the people of Ontario and say: “Look; as Liberals, as Conservatives, as New Democrats, this really is a committee that has been sent out to listen to the people of Ontario. Your voice really does count. What you say to this committee actually means something.”

My friends, that to me would be remarkable, an absolutely remarkable statement on the part of the government. I think it would go a long way for the people of Ontario, for the people of Cambridge; no question about it. By golly, I have to say the people of Cambridge need something which can give them some reassurance about this government.

Let me say that if the government would take this course, we would all benefit, because the public perception of politicians and politics is that we are all locked into such partisan straitjackets that we cannot communicate with each other on a thoughtful, real level. If, indeed, we simply go into these hearings as a façade, what a tragedy, what a way to treat the public of Ontario, the very people who elected us.

Every one of us, whether we are Liberal, Conservative or New Democrat, was given a trust by people who really want to believe in us. Simply being in a straitjacket and shouting abuse at each other across the House will not increase their confidence in us.

There is an opportunity on the Sunday shopping issue. Instead of using it as a partisan issue, we can snatch opportunity out of conflict. We, as legislators of all three parties, can say: “We’re going into these hearings. We’re going to listen to the people of Ontario and we are going to draft legislation that reflects the will of the people as it is presented to us in the course of those two months of hearings.”

I want to have confidence in the government. I can say the people of Cambridge want to have confidence in the government. The people of Ontario want to have confidence; they want to have confidence in all of us, and the way we are acting on this issue does not give them confidence.

I say to the Premier and I say to the minister that they should show leadership and tell the people of Ontario that this committee actually means business. We are going to listen and act on what we hear instead of listening and then doing whatever the hell we like. If we do that, we will have set about a real change in the manner of proceeding.

I am going into the committee hearings this summer. As a member of this committee, I can meet the people of Cambridge at the marketplace and I am going to tell them that I am happy the government has set up this tour of the province so that we can hear the people. I am going to tell them I want to believe it is real, but I would feel much better if the Premier or the minister actually made such a statement.

To the members of the government who have questions -- and I know there are those who have questions -- I would say it is a tough decision to make, but maybe they have to go into the marketplace and maybe they have to listen.

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Mr. Pelissero: I would just like to make a couple of comments with respect to the comments of the member for Cambridge around Bill 113.

First of all, I too held a forum in my riding after the legislation had been tabled. Just as a point of information, I was wondering if in fact his forum was held after Bill 113 had been tabled.

Second, I do not see anything inconsistent, either with my position or with any of my colleagues’ positions, in being in support of a common pause day and at the same time supporting this particular piece of legislation. I do not see anything inconsistent with that at all.

With respect to increasing shopping and the domino effect, I think the member for Durham-York addressed some of that in his remarks in terms of the perceived domino effect. Currently, the municipalities have the right, by their own mechanisms and by whatever means of justification, to use the tourist exemption. Indeed, some municipalities choose to do so and some municipalities choose not to, and we are not seeing a domino effect across the province because of that.

I think this proposed legislation, with its increased fines, is better protection for the tenants in malls and better protection for the retail workers, where there currently is no protection. Its increased fines are more enforceable and a lot more effective than what we currently have.

The one message that I take from the proposed piece of legislation, Bill 113, is that in fact, with some exceptions, the stores are closed across Ontario.

Mr. Kanter: I appreciate the relatively temperate tone of the member for Cambridge and I am pleased to hear that people like his stand. It seems to me if that position is shared by members of the regional government in his area, then very little will change. It may be that some of the openness in the Cambridge area will have to be reconsidered. The farmers’ markets, which are now open throughout the year, and some of the stores may have to close, but basically the direction will be in the area of more closing rather than more opening.

I would like to speak briefly on the question of worker protection. I know that is a matter very dear to the heart of the member for Cambridge. He referred, for example, to the woman who might be working six days a week now.

I think it is very important to point out and to emphasize -- and if necessary, to re-emphasize -- that that woman, that employee will have more protection under our bill than she has now. About a third of the retail workers in Ontario are now subject to working on Sunday; after this legislation is introduced, and only after this legislation is introduced, will that particular woman have the right to refuse unreasonable work.

Finally, I want to comment on getting down to business. That was one of the themes of the member for Cambridge. He said that it is time to stop being partisan and rhetorical and time to get down to business.

This debate has gone on for about a week and a half. I would suggest that many, if not all, of the major points have now been raised. If the member is sincere in his desire that we get on with business, I would respectfully request that he try to convince his colleagues, and perhaps those in the third party as well, to pass this legislation here and get on to committee, where we will be able to hear people throughout various parts of Ontario.

I think he has a certain responsibility, as do members of the third party, to get on with business. That means passing this bill through this stage so we can get on to the committee stage and listen to the people out there in Ontario.

Mr. Black: The member for Cambridge speaks with eloquence and with sincerity, as is his wont, and we are impressed over here. We have heard the message he has had to say and we appreciate the manner in which he has spoken. He has raised the level of the debate to a new level, and we appreciate that.

But I want to tell him that it is a two-way street. When we talk about sincerity and when we talk about honesty, it must come from both sides. It should not be a partisan issue. I agree with him; I think all members of this House would agree with him when he says that. But he must share those views with other members of his party and other members of the third party who continually fail to tell the people of Ontario the real truth about this legislation.

The real truth, and I think one that all of us recognize, is simply this: that the legislation does contain a provincial position which identifies that stores will be closed on Sunday. That is a fact and that fact should be clearly stated by members of the opposition as well as by members of the government.

The second point that should be made very clearly -- and I know the members of the New Democratic Party and the Conservative Party will want to say this across this province when they go to committee this summer -- is that we already have a form of local option through the tourist exemption, and the members across the House know that to be true. It has not destroyed Ontario society, and what this act does is simply to provide that same option under the heading of a local option in language which is much clearer. It is fairer legislation. It will benefit all the people of Ontario.

Finally, I want to say to members across the House, let’s have honesty, let’s have sincerity, let’s avoid partisan politics. We will support them in that, but let’s tell the whole truth as it is when we go out in committee to the people of this province.

Mr. Laughren: I was not intending to get into this debate this afternoon. However, when I heard my colleague the member for Cambridge speak, I felt I really should, because the other members in the chamber I do not think were listening to my colleague the member for Cambridge very well.

What he was really saying is what the Attorney General (Mr. Scott) was saying, and the Attorney General said, when he was talking about the prosecution of Paul Magder, who was open Sundays when he was not supposed to be, that retail workers really have no protection out there, that it is not an equal fight when you put the retail employee up against the retail employer.

The Attorney General made a very passionate and eloquent plea on behalf of the retail employees. He said, “In the world out there, let’s not kid ourselves: the employee is not an equal opponent to the employer when it comes to whether or not he has a right with respect to having to work on Sundays.”

Hon. Mr. Mancini: What do you mean? It doesn’t work?

Mr. Laughren: As a matter of fact, the Minister without Portfolio responsible for disabled persons (Mr. Mancini) should go back and read what the Attorney General said, because he said that even if the government passes legislation, it is not going to work.

Hon. Mr. Mancini: He hadn’t seen the bill at that point.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Laughren: Well, I think that the people who were criticizing my colleague the member for Cambridge had better think twice about what they are saying, because what they are really doing is making fun of their own Attorney General, who understood very clearly one day that the government could not protect retail employees against Sunday working if the employer wanted them to work, and the next day, of course, when the cabinet decided there was going to be Sunday shopping if the municipalities so desired, the Attorney General suddenly decided there was protection for retail employees. Some day I would like to get inside the head of the Attorney General, just for a few minutes mind you, to find out what he really thinks about this issue.

The Deputy Speaker: Would the member for Cambridge wish to respond?

Mr. Farnan: Very briefly, Mr. Speaker.

It is a final plea. I listened to the comments and I heard the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay, who summed up my anxieties most succinctly. He said, “Let’s get out and tell the truth to the people of Ontario.” Unfortunately, the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay is saying, “Let’s get out and tell our truth to the people of Ontario,” and on the opposition side --

Mr. Black: Just the plain, unvarnished truth.

Mr. Farnan: Excuse me, Mr. Speaker, but on the opposition side there is the idea, “Let’s get out and tell our truth.” What I was trying to say to the members today was, let’s get out and listen to the truth of the people of Ontario. Let’s get out and listen --

Mr. Pouliot: What did you say?

Mr. Farnan: Excuse me, Gilles. “Let’s get out and listen to the people of Ontario. Let’s get out and listen to the church groups. Let’s get out and listen to the workers. Let’s get out and listen to the mothers. Let’s get out and listen to the families. Let’s get out and hear the truth of the people of Ontario, for goodness’ sake.” It makes absolutely no sense for the government to say, “We’re going to use these two months of hearings to get out and convince the people that what we think is right for them,” or for us to convince the people that what we think is right for them. What we have to do as a body of legislators is to go and listen to the people. They know what is right for them. Then let us legislate what they believe to be right.

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Mr. Wiseman: I was going to say that I am pleased to get up and speak on this piece of legislation, but really I would have hoped I would not have had to.

As a retailer for 40-some years -- and my family, by the way, is all in the retail business yet -- I feel I have earned the right to speak on something which will affect their future and their families and all the rest of it that goes with family values.

I feel also that having been chairman of the Canadian Retail Merchants’ Association in the area I represent prior to getting into politics also gives me some background and gives me some reason to get on my feet today and say what I think of this particular piece of legislation.

To make sure that my own personal feelings were not overriding those of my constituents, I put out a brochure, at which time I asked them to answer a number of questions. One of them was -- were they in favour of this piece of legislation. As of today, we have had many -- not like the member for Cambridge; I do not have the exact number, but it was the best in the 18 years I have been here, and for a number of years we have had the privilege of having mailings go out two or three times per year.

This, along with Bill 30 and Bill 7, rates right up there at the top as one on which I have received an awful lot of replies. It does rate even higher in percentage than either of those other two bills which I have mentioned: 85 per cent of the people of Lanark-Renfrew are opposed to this bill. Never before, as I said, have I ever had that many people in my riding that strongly opposed to something.

Mr. Speaker, you will know, coming from the part of eastern Ontario that you do, that the people in the Ottawa area rallied around the retail merchants and did something -- not only in the Ottawa area, but in the smaller areas out in eastern Ontario, and I am sure it is just the same right across the province; they got together.

The largest group of retailers I have ever heard of met in the city of Ottawa -- perhaps some from your riding were there as well -- to let the government know and let the members who were there know their feelings on this bill and the possibility of even thinking about Sunday opening.

The Progressive Conservative caucus some years ago had a committee similar to the one to be set up this year, only this year it will be all parties represented on tour of the province for the couple of months to listen to people.

All the churches in my area have been violently opposed, with the exception of one, which I should mention. That was the Seventh-day Adventists; they celebrate Saturday instead of Sunday. All the other churches were solidly against this piece of legislation.

The staff in the three stores which we own as a family knew I was going to be on here this afternoon and said: “We don’t want to work on Sunday. Please do whatever you can to stop it.”

One of the members this afternoon -- and I believe it was the member for Durham-York -- was over and we spoke when one of the other speakers was speaking, after he had spoken in the House and mentioned that it did not have a ripple effect. Why I wanted to give a bit of the background and where I am coming from is that I know it does have a ripple effect. I know he has been a retailer, but I do not think he has been a retailer as long as I have. I know that in the towns in and around where we have the businesses, they watch closely at Christmastime or other times of the year to see what those people are doing; then they follow suit. If one town in my riding of Lanark-Renfrew or in the Prescott area, where we have a store, decides to open, I can tell members that they will all follow suit.

As a retailer still connected with the business, I can tell members that when they say, as my colleague the member for London North (Mrs. Cunningham) said the other day, that costs will increase to the consumer, they are dead on. They will increase. The other thing is that --

Mr. Reycraft: Why don’t we just let them open four days?

Mr. Wiseman: Yes. Anyway, I am sure that many of the people who have been connected with retailing will agree with my colleague from London and myself -- who, I believe, have earned the right to speak as retailers -- that prices will go up.

The other thing is that if you open on Sunday, I think an injustice is being done to the people who are purchasing, because they are probably going to be dealing with part-time help. They are paying full cost for the product but getting someone who is not as experienced as the regular staff to look after them.

I will say that we did have a grocery store in one of the largest towns of my riding, in Smiths Falls, and they tried to defy the law and stay open on a couple of different Sundays. I spoke to a chap who knew the manager really well. Even though they had approximately $7,000 extra in sales that day, they actually went in the hole because of paying the overtime to the staff. A large store like that had to do much more than $7,000 in order to make ends meet.

Shopping centres: We are not in a shopping centre, as a retail business, but we came pretty close to going into the Quinte Mall. One of the reasons that kept us out of the Quinte Mall was that, as a small retailer, we had to do exactly what the mall owners wanted that particular mall to do. If they said, “Stay open seven days a week,” you had to stay open seven days a week. I believe I have heard it said in the Legislature by others that it is in the contract that you stay open seven days a week.

Mr. Neumann: This bill changes that.

Mr. Wiseman: My lawyer friend from Brampton probably knows; he has maybe written up a few of these leases for people, but it is right in there. In talking it over, we decided that we would not go into a mall because we did not have the say in that or other matters.

Mr. Neumann: The bill corrects that.

Mr. Wiseman: No way.

Mr. Neumann: It does.

Mr. Wiseman: No way.

Interjection.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Wiseman: Anyway, I have been around the Legislature for over 18 years. I may be naïve about the way things worked around here even after those 18 years. I know I was when I first came, but I have always felt that government, whether it was us when we were the government or whether it is this government over there, would listen to the people. When the people told them that they were going down the wrong road, they would be gracious enough to say: “We made a mistake. People really do not want that, so are going to back away from it.” It is not that they are a weak government for doing that, I really think they are listening to the people.

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I spoke to a group last night in the great riding of Lanark-Renfrew, and some of the people who were there were from the riding of the member for Renfrew North (Mr. Conway). This subject came up. I can tell the member for Renfrew North that there are an awful lot of people in his riding who feel the very same as the people in mine and some from the surrounding ridings who happened to be at that particular meeting feel.

They said to me: “Doesn’t government work by consensus? If they see they’re going down the wrong road, don’t they have the presence of mind to say the people do not want it and back away from it? I thought that was the way we did it.”

As I said before, because of being a retailer and being in for so long -- and my feelings were probably a little stronger than those of some other members who are not in that field -- I did not want to impose my feelings on the rest of the riding.

Mr. Laughren: It never stopped you before, Doug.

Mr. Wiseman: Thanks. But I felt that to be a good representative of the riding, you have to show that you are representing your people, every time each and every one of us is back in our riding on the weekends, or whenever that time may be, we are trying to get a consensus. We should be following that consensus. It would keep us out of a lot of trouble.

The people know that at the last election the Premier was quoted at different times as being in favour of a common pause day. He wanted to keep the family values and all that Sunday has come to mean to all of us over the years. Since then, for whatever reason, he has backed right away from that.

I can tell members that things have come a long way from the time when I was a boy and my grandparents -- on Sunday, you did nothing but go to church twice, and read the Bible in the afternoon. You never played with the kids or anything. Now we have let our children go quite a piece from there and, as parents, we have gone quite a piece away from there. As the member for Cambridge said, I hate to see us going down that fast track so fast, not listening to the people.

I would like to see the Premier reassess his position on this. Knowing some of the members across the way for the number of years, as I have, sitting on committee and travelling with them on select committees and so on, I am sure that their consciences must really be bothering them to vote for a piece of legislation --

Mr. Laughren: Name one.

Mr. Wildman: I would not put them on the spot -- but voting for a piece of legislation that they, in their heart and soul, really are not firmly in favour of. I think if the Premier cannot see it in his heart to move away from this piece of legislation, which everyone is opposed to, then I think he should give his members over there a free vote to vote their conscience.

Going back the 18 years I have been in here, you win some -- maybe you get a school for your riding, maybe you get a factory for your riding -- but there are certain issues that come along, like Bill 7 and now this bill, that interfere, as far as I am concerned, with family values. This is one of them.

I walked away the day we voted on Bill 7 thinking it would come back to haunt us, and in fact at that particular time I felt strongly enough about it that if our leader had not given us a free vote I would not have been standing on my feet here now talking to the Legislature. I felt that strongly.

I am sure there are members across the floor who feel just as strongly on this issue as I did on that one, and I hope -- not that we want to see any of them resign over not being able to vote their conscience, but I am sure there are some of them over there who feel the very same way on this particular bill.

I have listened to quite a few speeches on this, and I hope and pray that when the committee goes out this summer it does not go out with a closed mind, it is not just speaking -- some of the older members will know that when I was on that side I often got into a little bit of mischief because I did not always follow the party line. If I found that the party was not doing what I thought it should, I had the guts to say so.

For those people who may be worrying about getting into cabinet down the road and everything, worrying that if they say a certain thing they will not get there because the Premier will remember, I will just tell them they are in here for such a short time and then they have to go back to the ridings they represent and look those people in the face and say, “Whatever it was we did through the years we were here we did because we believed in it and we believed it was right.” Our conscience will not come back to haunt us if we follow that rule.

Like I said, I had to do that when I sat on that side of the House, and I would encourage people to vote their conscience regardless of what they are whipped into doing. Hopefully, when they go out into the community this summer, they go out with an open mind and listen to the people. I am sure they will get the same results our committee got and I am sure they will get the same results as the people from Lanark and Renfrew and the other people in eastern Ontario -- with whom you are familiar, Mr. Speaker -- are giving to us all. Let’s do our jobs and reflect in here what our constituents want us to do, rather than what the government tells us to do.

Mr. Callahan: I have not spoken on this matter, and I do not intend to speak to the substance of it, in light of the fact that I am very likely chairing the committee that will be hearing it. But I do want to draw to the attention of the member for Lanark-Renfrew (Mr, Wiseman) a fact that he could not have overlooked had he read the legislation before he spoke on this issue. This is referring to his comment that his family was not prepared to set up a retail practice in a mall.

Clearly, he would understand section 5a, which reads as follows:

“A provision in a lease or other agreement that has the effect of requiring a retail business to remain open on a holiday” -- and holiday is including Sunday -- ”is of no effect even if the lease or agreement was made before the coming into force of this section.”

Although I have a great deal of respect for the member for Lanark-Renfrew, I think that clearly indicates that when he was asked to speak on this matter he had not even read the bills, because that is a very positive plus and it is very clearly stated there in the legislation.

I just draw that to his attention. One would hope that when we do go out on the road the legislation will in fact have been read by all members of the committee, because I think it is unfair to state that to the people of this province in advance and perhaps mislead them. I know it was not done intentionally, but I would suggest it clearly shows that the member, in speaking to this issue, had not read either Bill 113 or Bill 114.

Mr. McLean: I want to just comment on my colleague’s remarks when he talks about the effects it will have across the province. I have to say that nowhere in section 5a, which was just referred to by the last speaker, does the word “Sunday” appear. Perhaps he should have a second look at the legislation. Maybe he would then agree with my colleague on what he is saying because I am sure my colleague is saying what the people across this province are thinking.

Interjection.

The Deputy Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Velshi: I applauded the speech of the member for Lanark-Renfrew. What I applauded was his sincerity, but I must question one or two things that are not too clear in my mind.

I think there are two different issues that we are talking about, that the member spoke about. One was Sunday being a religious holiday for Christians. I must agree with that. I have no quarrel with that when he says, “We want to remain closed on a Sunday because it is a Christian holiday.”

But when the member talks about family values, I am a bit uncomfortable with that, because I was brought up in a family where family values mean daily family life, where you get up and you have breakfast together. In the evening, you have supper together and you pray together.

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When they talk about family life for Sunday, then I object to that, because I object to the fact that we are relegating families to Sundays only. The next stage is that we forget about Sunday. Sunday is family life, and we will get into Mother’s Day and Father’s Day and we will think of our families on only one particular day of the year. I think that is what we are going to.

If we are talking about family life, I think it is wrong for our members to propagate the fact that Sunday is the only day for families. On that basis, if we separated the two issues, I would agree with the member if he stood up and said it is a Christian holiday and Christians object to it. I think it is fine, and I would go for it. I am a Muslim; Friday is a holiday for me. I live in a society where Friday is a money-making day, and we go with that also. We have to fit in with what is going on. But for them to say that six days are for money-making and the seventh day is for family life, I do not agree with that. I support this bill for that reason.

Mr. Callahan: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker
--

The Deputy Speaker: On which standing order, sir?

Mr. Ferraro: Standing order 22(b).

Mr. Callahan: Standing order 22(b). I thank the member very much. The member indicated the word “holiday,” which is referred to in section 5a, does not refer to Sundays. That is clearly wrong, and if he had read the legislation he would understand that.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. Other questions and comments? If none, does the member for Lanark-Renfrew wish to respond?

Mr. Wiseman: I would like to respond to the member for Brampton South and say that I have read the legislation, and I take “holiday” to mean any day other than Sunday, once this legislation is in place, and the Sunday is any other day. To say I have not read it is wrong, and I am sure the member would agree.

Another member mentioned Sunday as a family day; all of us here know that we would love to be with our families. We would love to get up and have breakfast with them every day of the week. We would love to be home for lunch and we would love to be home for dinner seven days a week, not just on Sunday. But Sunday around our house has come be a day when everybody gets together, everybody goes to church and, in the afternoon, everybody does something together as a family. That is what I meant when I said “family day.” If we are lucky enough and fortunate enough to be able to do that seven days a week, so much the better.

Most people who are in business, going back to my own, leave early in the morning. The kids go off to school. Living in the country, they are bused, and dad does not get home until after six o’clock. My daughter or my other son is back after six o’clock, which is the way most businesses are. By that time, they have maybe an hour or two with the kids before they go to bed.

That does not give much time for father to influence the family, but Sunday is a day when he can. He has the time to spend and to play with the kids and for them to get to know dad a little better. We know that, as members of the Legislature, because we are faced with that every week.

Mr. Neumann: I rise with pleasure to address the issues related to Bill 113, and I will comment on the need for change to the current legislation, a bit of an outline of some of the improvements to the legislation which will come about once the bill is passed, making the Retail Business Holidays Act more enforceable and fairer to all. Finally, I will conclude with some remarks on the role of the municipalities in all of this.

First of all, with regard to the need for reform, the present Retail Business Holidays Act has been abused in the past and has some difficulty with regard to its enforcement.

We have situations on occasion where stores have opened on the Sunday, have been charged, paid the fine and continued to open on the Sunday. We have other situations where stores are regulated by the size of the retail operation and, for all intents and purposes, should not be open on the Sunday, but then rope themselves off to a smaller area or, as in one situation in our municipality I know about, they perhaps divide the store into two and operate almost as two just to get around the legislation.

There are a number of anomalies and a number of problems with regard to the present legislation, and this government has the courage to face that and the courage to bring about reform.

To support my contention, I would like to quote another member of the Legislature: “The legislation that currently exists in the province is somewhat bizarre and reflects the difficulty in achieving a consensus about this matter ... It” -- that is, the current legislation – “has created a number of fairly bizarre situations in which stores next to one another and in approximately the same business, are treated differently in terms of holidays.

“I always find it difficult when dealing with a piece of legislation that is not understandable. In fact, I think one of the prerequisites of a good piece of legislation is that it make sense to people. There is no question that the Retail Business Holidays Act does not make sense to people.”

This was the member for Riverdale (Mr. Reville) speaking in the debate when the Retail Business Holidays Act was last amended, an amendment which provided that bookstores be allowed to open across the province. You can see, Mr. Speaker, that the spokesman for the third party at that time recognized there was a need for an amendment to the current legislation. I noted, in reading the debate back in February 1987 that members of the official opposition and others from the third party also supported change at that time and the need for reform.

The government has brought about this proposed bill to make the legislation fairer and more enforceable and has done so in a way which provided for considerable input from the citizens of Ontario. The Solicitor General (Mrs. Smith) made a statement in the House last December indicating the need for change, and she indicated that there would be a review of the role of the municipalities as part of any new bill to be implemented.

Considerable time elapsed, several months, between the initial announcement and the tabling of the bill in April of this year, and during that time we heard input from a lot of citizens across Ontario. While the government could have gone with a proposed approach, which would be to repeal the Retail Business Holidays Act totally and turn the matter completely over to the municipalities, in listening to the citizens of Ontario, it was decided not to go with that approach. It was decided to maintain the Retail Business Holidays Act, to strengthen it, to reform it, to make it more understandable, clearer and more easily enforceable.

The government is open and accessible and willing to listen to the citizens. I might add that, as part of this process, over the few months between the time the intent of introducing a bill was announced and the time the bill was tabled, members of our caucus and, I am sure, the members of the other two caucuses considered the input and deliberated on this. At least in our caucus we were provided the opportunity for considerable input to shape this particular bill. It seems to puzzle some of the members of the opposition and the third party that members of the Liberal caucus support this bill. We were consulted as to the shape of the bill. The bill reflected many of the concerns raised by the citizens, and we believe that the present legislation is eminently supportable.

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I would like to quote a couple of items from petitions presented in this House. For example, here is one petition that was presented. The “whereas” reads: “Whereas the Premier and other members of the Liberal government have stated the government’s intention to repeal the Retail Business Holidays Act and to dump this responsibility in the laps of the municipal governments, who have already indicated they do not want it.” Well, it is clear that the bill before us does not repeal the Retail Business Holidays Act; it maintains the act in force. It maintains and strengthens the legislation.

Second, the petitions often quoted the select committee on retail store hours, which toured the province. The select committee’s first recommendation was often quoted by members of the opposition and members of the third party. The very first recommendation said, “The primary responsibility for the administration of the Retail Business Holidays Act, or other legislation related to holidays, should remain that of the provincial government.” Well, the Retail Business Holidays Act is in place and Bill 113, which is an amendment of that act, not a repeal of that act, maintains the primary responsibility for enforcement with the provincial government.

So the members can see that the bill before us does address the concerns raised in this House with the petitions that have been tabled and perhaps helps to explain why members of our party fully support this bill and support the clarifications to the legislation contained in it.

I would like at this time to refer to some of those clarifications. For example, the provision in the current legislation which deals with roping off, which has been much abused, will be clarified and will be made easier to enforce, because the square footage referred to in the legislation will have to have been the operating square footage for the retail business for the entire week and will not just be there as a temporary, roping-off situation for the Sunday.

With respect to being open on a Sunday, if a retail business is closed on a Saturday because of religious conviction, that has been changed in this bill to ensure that this is done on a consistent basis year-round and not on an occasional basis.

The definition of Boxing Day has been clarified and should end the concerns that exist every Christmas with regard to the confusion there.

With respect to enforcement, the penalties have been increased from $10,000 to $50,000, providing a disincentive for a business to open on Sunday.

More important, the provision has been added which will allow a court to order a store to be closed on a holiday, so if a merchant is charged for being open on a Sunday when he should not be open, the court not only may fine the store owner but may order that the store be closed on future Sundays. Then if the store owner persists, the store will be in contempt of court.

Convictions will also be made easier, because advertising the hours of opening on a Sunday can be admissible as evidence in the prosecution. As was mentioned by my colleague the member for Brampton South (Mr. Callahan), section 5a permits a tenant in a mall to remain closed even if the mall is permitted to open on the Sunday.

The companion bill, Bill 114, will provide protection for workers. I would just like to mention that in researching for this speech, I read through the Hansard of the debate on the previous amendment to the Retail Business Holidays Act back in February 1987. I noticed there were speakers from the Progressive Conservative Party and speakers from the New Democratic Party. I looked with care and did not see any reference to protection of retail workers in that debate.

I found it very interesting, because the official opposition, the New Democratic Party, very often comes forward as the defender of the workers and yet its members strongly supported the extension of Sunday openings to bookstores all across Ontario. So I was interested to read whether, in the second-reading debate of that amendment, they had raised any concern about the small-bookstore owner being required to open on a Sunday out of competition with other stores, or whether there was any concern for the protection of the workers who might be required to work in those bookstores.

There was no such concern raised by the members of the official opposition. The only passing reference to it was a comment that they understood that the union supported it. I know of many, many bookstores across Ontario and --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. A point of order.

Mr. Breaugh: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: The standing orders are pretty clear about imputing motives. I listened with some care and with some interest to what the member for Brantford (Mr. Neumann) had to say.

I am trying to be as polite about this as I can. I recall very well when the bill on extending retail stores hours was put through here. I recall some of the discussion with the House leaders at that time. The government very much wanted the legislation. We had had a fairly good discussion in committee and it was generally agreed that there was no need for a long debate.

If we allow the member to proceed this afternoon, saying that with each and every bill that comes before us, we need to reiterate the entire policy of the New Democratic Party, we will do that. But it will make this legislative process a very slow one.

If he wants to tell us why he supports the bill, that is fine. But I am not really interested in listening to a litany of whether we did not put on the record, during the course of every single bill, every single policy of the New Democratic Party. It does seem to me that that is coming awfully close to imputing motives.

Mr. Neumann: I do not believe that is a point of order. The only point I am making is that the last amendment to the Retail Business Holidays Act occurred in 1987. I carefully looked through the debate at the time and there was no concern raised then. When the right to open on Sundays was extended to bookstores across Ontario, I did not see any concern raised in the speeches, which I have in front of me, about the workers who would be required to work on Sunday.

As I was saying, the companion bill, Bill 114, provides for protection of retail workers. I am proud of the fact that this party has introduced that bill as well.

I would like to conclude my remarks with respect to the role of the municipalities in this process. The present legislation provides for municipalities to determine Sunday openings within their municipalities under a tourism designation option.

We know there are numerous examples right across Ontario of this happening. In fact, there is one in our area, the village of St. George, which has been open for some time now. Of course, we know of Windsor, Niagara Falls, Sault St. Marie and other examples across Ontario. The municipalities have had a role already in determining Sunday openings.

The problem is that the implementation of this provision is sometimes clouded because it is not always clear that the motivation is pure and simple tourism. Sometimes it is difficult to determine whether the reason for the opening is tourism or not. As an example, in our area, I mentioned that the village of St. George is open on Sunday. Is it any more of a tourist destination than the town of Paris? It is pretty hard to distinguish.

What this bill does is clarify the role of the municipality. It does not force the municipality to open on Sunday. As I mentioned, the primary responsibility remains at the provincial level, with the province providing the basic framework, putting forward a stronger and clearer bill and maintaining the responsibility for enforcement.

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No municipality is required to enact the bylaw. However, municipalities do have the option, as they currently have the option, to regulate store hours Monday to Saturday. Once this bill has been passed, they will have the option -- should they choose not to agree with the standards in the provincial legislation, they may vary the standards to suit local conditions.

That could go either way. It could be that a municipality in this province might decide it favours more closings than are required in the provincial framework law. It could pass a bylaw to make Sunday more of a common pause day. If it decides to open up a section of the community for whatever reason -- maybe related to tourism or for some local circumstance -- it can choose to do that as well.

However, I would like to make it very clear that this bill does not require the municipalities to do that. It gives them that option should they so choose, to suit their legislation locally to local circumstances. This means that each municipality will be able to respond to local needs.

I think it is an indication of the confidence this government has in the role of municipalities across Ontario, the confidence we have in them to make decisions, as they have done for many years in regulating store hours Monday to Saturday.

Mr. D. S. Cooke: Even though they don’t want it.

Mr. Neumann: I hear the member saying they do not want it. Well, if they do not want it, they do not have to make a change. They can accept the provincial framework. The provincial government maintains the responsibility for enforcing the current bill and the amended bill once it is carried and becomes the law of the province.

I stand in support of Bill 113. I believe it is a progressive move forward: It will make the enforcement of Sunday closing easier; it will discourage people from opening illegally because of the higher penalties; it will make it easier to get convictions and, at the same time, it is flexible in that it provides for local circumstances.

In conclusion, I would like to point out that I was pleased when the decision was made to allow this bill, once it passes second reading, to go out to committee. While there has been some input from across Ontario that shaped this bill -- and I stress that this is an open and accessible government -- and the input we received through our members of the Liberal caucus helped to shape this bill, perhaps there should be further opportunities for citizens to comment prior to third reading being given.

So I support the idea of having a committee travel the province, an all-party committee, to listen to the people and indeed determine whether there are some further changes that might be considered.

I was very pleased to hear the Solicitor General indicate the other day that she is open to further suggestions. I had one I put forward to her relating to the decision-making process that a municipality might follow once it determines it wishes to pass a local bylaw.

I think there probably should be some consultation with the community and perhaps notification to adjacent communities. I was pleased to hear the Solicitor General indicate her willingness to be open to suggestions from the committee which tours the province.

In conclusion, I would say that I enjoyed the opportunity to participate in this debate. I find the bill to be, as I said, progressive, positive and forward-looking, and one which is eminently supportable, from my perspective.

The Deputy Speaker: Questions and comments? If not, do other members wish to participate in the debate?

Mr. Allen: Yes, I would like to participate in this debate. I find very few of my constituents who do not want me to participate in this debate. In fact, I find not only very few individuals, but when it comes to institutions of all kinds in my community, I also find a massive unhappiness with Bill 113 and Bill 114 and the whole record of the government in its introduction of this legislation and the purposes that appear to lie behind it.

Mr. Black: Purposes that lie behind it? What do you mean by that?

Mr. Allen: The purposes that lie behind it are quite obvious. The Retail Business Holidays Act has been clearly gutted, opened up. The previous speaker talked in sophistic terms of its being more enforceable, a framework being in place and so on. It is true the Retail Business Holidays Act still stands. It is true there have been one or two minor changes in it which in and of themselves would be an improvement if that act still stood isolated as it was previously, without the additional element of the municipal option that has been introduced into it.

The introduction of the municipal option, in point of fact, has changed the total character of the bill and has rendered it guttable by any municipality and every municipality that chooses to take action under the terms of the legislation.

As for the notion that somehow or other it is therefore more enforceable, it is only enforceable in the sense that its enforceability has been totally waived as an option by the provincial government, since any municipality that wishes to duck out from under the framework legislation can do so and can follow any number of routes to eliminate virtually every provision of it. I do not see how that is contestable.

For example, on a simple motion, the council can, first of all, create an open designation based on location, size, number of persons employed, character of business or any other criteria. A subsequent simple motion in council could alter an existing bylaw by extending the open designation to one or more stores, one or more streets, a new development or a whole town.

Second, it could change the hours of Sunday or holiday shopping in all or part of the designated open areas. Third, it could change, for one time only or for all time, whether retail employers and employees in the municipality can celebrate Christmas, Boxing Day, Good Friday, New Year’s Day, Victoria Day, Canada Day, Labour Day or Thanksgiving Day with their families. It can create open areas for some times of the year and close them for other times.

In spite of the square footage requirements in the bill for pharmacies, convenience stores and others, it can change those requirements too. The prohibition against roping off becomes meaningless in a world where individual stores can make applications to have space requirements increased for the store by a simple motion in council.

They can also get special exemptions for all types of retail business granted in the bill. While the government has listed convenience stores, pharmacies, commercial art galleries, bookstores, videotape rental stores, gas stations, nurseries, fresh-produce vendors, bars, taverns, restaurants, hotels, motels, rooming houses, laundromats and other coin-operated services, car and boat rental services and car and boat repair services as exempt from having to close on Sundays and holidays, this exemption can be altered by a simple motion in council.

Finally, any of the so-called horrendous fines that are supposed to keep everything in place and everybody marching in order in the framework legislation can be changed to a much lower amount without changing anything very much, thereby making it possible for anyone to breach any aspect of the legislation or any of the bylaws without incurring a penalty that would be prohibitive.

So the whole notion that the previous speaker put before us that somehow the Retail Business Holidays Act is rendered more enforceable is really only tenable in a very sleight-of-hand kind of argument which obscures what, in fact, in the heart of the bill it really does, namely, pawn off to the municipalities the option of regulation at virtually every level and with every respect to holiday openings and closings across Ontario.

The notion that somehow that is unlikely to be taken up or somehow will only be taken up here and there, in accord with local conditions and local interests in terms of the culture and best interests of all the residents of each community of each municipality in turn, is surely belied by most of the record of what happens when adjacent municipalities that I am aware of get into questions of store openings and closings.

In our region, for instance, we had a big debate over Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday night openings. In fact, when you went around and asked any and all of the retail operators themselves whether they wanted it in our municipality as against the adjacent one, the answer was always: “No, we really don’t want it. We can’t really see that it is going to benefit us in any real, substantial way.”

But the moment of course that the adjacent municipality moved in that direction, it became incumbent, obviously, on the retailers in the adjacent municipality to argue that in order to compete and draw people in across the boundary, they had to be open Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights. The result was that the municipality went along with that pressure and made that possible. It is a classic case and the case keeps on repeating itself.

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Whether or not the tourist exemption is used by all municipalities across the province is a slightly different kettle of fish, because not all municipalities have been as brazen as Mr. Lastman has been, for example, in arguing that perhaps all of North York might be considered a tourist area under the legislation and, therefore, everything be open by virtue of that.

There are obviously some reasons, at least some guidelines, that hang around the tourist exemption. At least there is something there to argue with. What we have, in terms of the transfer to municipalities of the local option that has opened up for municipalities to wholly move away from the framework legislation that the government says stays in place under this bill, is a quite different proposition. There is literally the opportunity of removing virtually all the guidelines that would be in place to provide any kind of systematic maintenance of a pause day for the residents of such a municipality.

I have listened to the government’s arguments with respect to this bill time and time again. I simply find it impossible to understand why, apart from the argument that the Solicitor General has put forward, we found it too difficult to rationalize the legislation for the whole province, especially in the light of the tourist exemption. Everyone I have talked to in our municipality believes that was a pure and simple copout. Hard as that might have been, difficult as that might have been, it was something that the Solicitor General and the cabinet ought to have tackled and to have wrestled to the ground.

Hon. Mrs. Smith: We did. We did.

Mr. Allen: Sure you tackled it, but then you gave up before you got through with the job.

Why it suddenly becomes easier for municipalities wrestling with those questions to resolve the issue, than for the government of the province to do so on a province-wide basis, is certainly a very great mystery to me, as it is to most of the small business people and most of the municipal representatives in my region.

Our municipality, like other municipalities across the province, has made it plain that it does not want that responsibility. It understands the pressures that it will be under. They are practised politicians. They quite understand why it is sensible and reasonable for business people to try to maintain a competitive advantage or to meet the competition of neighbouring businesses or neighbouring municipalities. They know the kind of pressure that they can come under. They do not want this option and I do not understand why the government insists on leaving it out there for them to be subject to the vagaries of the competitive marketplace and to leave statutory holidays and, in particular, Sunday exposed in that way.

Likewise, if you go around and talk to the business improvement districts in my community, there is not one of them that has a good thing to say for this kind of option being exercised by the municipality. If you go to any of the professional organizations that deal hands-on with people and who deal with family care, child care and teachers, you find a great concern among them.

For example, anyone who understands the problem of the difficulties of problem families or families who have relatively small proportions of time left to them will understand the difficulties that they have in coping with problem children, for example. You have to have some kind of family stability in order to respond and maintain a support system for children who have learning disabilities, for example. This bill, with regard to those and retail employment, could very well eliminate a large portion of the support time that families have for those children.

You talk with teachers. Teachers are concerned that parents have time with their children to work through their homework, to make certain that there is a context in the family in which there are times when that homework gets done and that the child’s welfare at school can be attended to. Teachers express their concerns about this bill with regard to its possible impact on the available family time for pursuits like that.

If you go to any of the churches in my community, you will find that virtually every one of them has either taken up a petition or has sent a letter to the government protesting what is being proposed, not simply from the point of view of religious observance, certainly, but from the point of view of the additional pressure it puts on families in terms of their available time together. Certainly, if you go to the labour community in Hamilton, you get a unanimous view of this particular legislation in most uncomplimentary terms.

Not long ago, I had a television program on this subject to which I invited a schoolteacher, a small businessman and a retail employee to come and participate in a discussion of the legislation. The woman who was the retail employee said that she had been under the circumstance of having to work successive Sundays in a particular employment she had, and how absolutely devastating she found it was, not only personally to her morale, but to her family’s sense of wellbeing and even to her own health.

If you talked with the businessman in question and asked him if Bill 114, An Act to amend the Employment Standards Act, is in any respect enforceable, he could talk to you for 15 or 20 minutes, half an hour, and list all the ways in which he could get around that piece of legislation in order to make it difficult for any worker who refused to work on Sunday to stay in his employ or to get any advancement in his employ.

The simple message, with respect to Bill 114, is that it is unenforceable, that the so-called reasonable grounds which have to be alleged in it are so broad as to make it extremely difficult to work within as an employee; and the reference to the labour relations board and so on, and to appeal mechanisms beyond the act clearly are very intimidating ones for most workers to engage in, quite apart from having to encounter the wrath or the displeasure of their own employer in doing so.

At the end of the day, when I consider this legislation and I listen to all the arguments, when I listen to the viewpoint of the public in my riding and as I hear it coming in from around the province, I find it a rather unadulterated mystery as to why the government really has insisted on proceeding in this fashion. I find no assurance at all in the arguments that the so-called ripple effect, the domino effect, will not happen. I find no assurances at all in the protections which are supposed to be given in Bill 114. I have no assurance at all that the framework legislation will stay in place, or that all of the mechanisms of enforceability in it will function. None of that, in fact, is at all certain.

I think it was about 100 years ago that Ontario small businessmen, labour, the churches in the province, began trying to get the question of working hours into a much better focus, and they went after retail closing hours, both during the week and on weekends. Eventually, they were able to ring back wide-open store openings, both during the week and on the weekends. It is really rather strange that, having secured some substantial gains for the quality of life of families in Ontario as a result in the intervening decades -- I remind members, for example, that when the Lord’s Day Act itself was passed in 1908, at the stroke of the pen, some 90,000 employees were granted, for the first time in their lives, a Sunday to themselves.

Having gained all that, what really puzzles me is why the government of Ontario at this point wants to put all that at risk, when there really is no necessity for doing so. When, in point of fact, it should be not only maintaining the structure and the framework of the Retail Business Holidays Act intact, in place, but without equivocation, should be amending it in such ways as to make the tourist exemption a more functional amendment to the act and then moving on to reduce the hours of labour of working people in Ontario to 40 or 35 hours a week as a standard matter, get rid of the 12-hour additional time that retail employers may add on to their employees on a weekly basis, which is now at their discretion, and try to open up, indeed, more time for families than is presently available.

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One of the great failures in the recent history of this province and this country came when, over the last two decades, women began moving in really substantial numbers into the workforce. Yet at the same time we did not amend the daily and weekly hours of labour of people in the workforce, with the result that today families are under much more pressure of working time. They return home more tired and less able to respond to the demands of each other as spouses, to the needs of their children, to the need for time together in families. That has been a major failure of contemporary Ontario lawmakers, employers, indeed of all of us. What we have in these two acts is something that simply will make that circumstance even worse for families in Ontario.

I close my remarks with an appeal to all members, on behalf of families in Ontario, to rethink not only this but also some other aspects of our legislation, to give families more time, to take the pressure off them. We know the kind of crisis that the family is under in our time and we need to be responding to it more creatively than we have done. These bills do not help. They simply make matters worse.

Mr. Fleet: I was interested in the comments made by the honourable member because I think he usually attempts to provide thoughtful commentary to whatever is being reviewed by this House. I found it odd that he would say there has really not been a full thinking and working through of this topic.

There has been criticism by him and other members of both opposition parties on the notion of having the tourist zone. We have said, of course, that getting rid of that was important because it did increase the fairness and enforceability. But in fact the hypocrisy comes out in the criticism that is made by the honourable member and his colleagues, because nobody is proposing an alternative definition. Nobody is coming forward and saying how he is going to do it better or different or whatever. They are merely being critical of the government.

We appreciate that all they are here for is to be critical, as best they can, and they are not really doing the job for the people that they ought to. They have not got a better alternative -- nobody has brought it forward -- and so the facts do not seem to get in their way. That is clear.

The suggestion that somehow we are going to have a collapse all over Ontario because the local option will be irresponsibly exercised by the municipalities is really just not bearing up. In fact, what we are seeing in this debate that is taking place now and will continue all the way through to the municipal election is that communities are making conscious decisions about what is appropriate.

That is the bottom line. The people are having the greatest possible input. The reason we do not propose from this side to have a uniform rule is because that would be manifestly unfair. What would be appropriate in Oshawa -- as the member chuckles away -- and what is appropriate in Windsor, Toronto and, say, Kapuskasing is not all the same thing. Each municipality is quite capable of having a discussion within the confines of the regional municipality, in the local municipalities, to decide what is best for it. Surely that is the point of the legislation. It is quite simple as a concept.

Of course, the opposition does not want to deal with the simple facts. They want to obscure the reality of what is coming forward for the sake of their own political benefits.

Mr. Villeneuve: I also want to comment and participate in the debate with my colleague, the member for Hamilton West (Mr. Allen). I happen to agree fully with him on this one. I am glad to see the member for Cornwall (Mr. Cleary) here. He was not on the select committee on retail stores hours. I find it very strange that the Liberal member who was just up, from one of the Toronto ridings, talks about hypocrisy.

I see the member for Yorkview (Mr. Polsinelli) here, who was a member of the select committee on retail store hours, a committee of this Legislature. The member for Yorkview, Brampton South, Guelph (Mr. Ferraro), the former member for Grey, the member for Lambton (Mr. Smith) and the member for London South (Mrs. Smith) unanimously agreed that we need a common day of pause -- I could read into the record the recommendations -- and they have the audacity to say that the people on this side are talking of hypocrisy.

It is sacrilegious. It is an unbelievable situation. The member for Cornwall knows very well that his mayor, a man he knows very well, the chairman of the Coalition Against Open Sunday Shopping --

Mr. Callahan: On a point of privilege, Madam Speaker: Brampton South was mentioned. Yes, the member’s leader did, in fact, tell our papers that I was opposed to Sunday shopping. I am not saying whether I am for or against it, because I have to chair the committee, but that was absolutely wrong.

Mr. Villeneuve: I am sorry, Madam Speaker. The select committee has very much on record that the member for Brampton South and the member for Guelph were part of this committee.

Mr. Ferraro: On a point of information, Madam Speaker: I wish to point out to my honourable friend that I was not a part of that committee. But the point is: am I personally opposed to Sunday shopping? I have said yes, but I believe in the municipal option. I was not on that committee and I want to correct --

The Acting Speaker (Miss Roberts): Order. If the honourable member wishes to participate in the debate, there will be further time.

Mr. Villeneuve: The member for Guelph is named among other members who served on the committee. His name is on the front page. He would rather not have it there, but it is there.

The Acting Speaker: Order. The member’s time has expired. Does any other member wish to comment upon the remarks made by the member for Hamilton West? If not, the honourable member for Hamilton West has two minutes to reply.

Mr. Allen: I am not sure it is worth two minutes in reply. If the honourable member for High Park-Swansea (Mr. Fleet) would go and ask my constituents who the hypocrites are in this particular matter, he would get a pretty ready answer. It would be the people who went into the last election and told us they were going to come forward with legislation based on the legislative committee’s report, and then turned around within a few weeks afterward and told us they were not going to go on that basis, that they were going to go for the local option, the domino theory and the whole works.

It is quite obvious that behind the whole impetus of this legislation has been a very fundamental misreading of the public of this province, the notion that somehow or other the Premier put before us, let’s say, about a year ago when he was talking about how a modern province needed to have this, that and the other thing, and included in it was Sunday shopping.

It is obvious that the modern Ontarian does not want Sunday shopping of the government’s style, and we in my constituency do not want it either. We all know where the hypocrisy lies. He does not have to tell us that one.

Mr. Cureatz: It gives me a great deal of pleasure to have the opportunity to participate in this debate. We are so excited to see the number of Liberal back-benchers in attendance. I am hoping they will listen clearly so that we may disperse to them --

Hon. Mrs. Smith: How about me?

Mr. Cureatz: Well, and one and a half cabinet ministers.

Hon. Mrs. Smith: Which is the half?

Mr. Cureatz: The one is the Solicitor General; the half is the Chairman of Management Board of Cabinet.

Interjection.

Mr. Cureatz: All right. One and three quarters. Oh. Two and three quarters.

The Acting Speaker: Order. I assume the honourable member is going to commence his speech as soon as possible.

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Mr. Cureatz: It just shows the significance that these two pieces of legislation have with the cabinet of Ontario, there being only, yes, three ministers of the crown in attendance; all the rest of the back-benchers are here, following in tow.

Interjections.

Mr. Cureatz: I say to the Solicitor General that she should just go and answer about the police commission in Metropolitan Toronto.

All the other back-benchers are here in tow saying, “Aye, aye, sir; three bags full, sir.” It is hopeless, I think now, with the Liberal back benches. I have given a number of speeches in this learned chamber, and I am trying to give them some enthusiasm, some direction, a role to play, because there is an important role that they could play here in the chamber.

I say to all the people at home that they will have an appreciation of this because they will see there are 94 elected Liberal members of parliament, a humble 17 Conservatives and a little-less-humble 19 New Democratic Party members. That is a big job for the opposition, to be speaking in terms of the kinds of legislation we have before us, namely, Bill 113.

With guiding light, I have suggested to the Liberal back-benchers that one or two of them should take some initiative and start asking questions of the front four, who are really running this place around here.

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker (Miss Roberts): Order.

Mr. Cureatz: It surprises me that none of them listens. It is just astounding that they do not realize that the four people -- the Premier, the Treasurer (Mr. R. F. Nixon), the Attorney General (Mr. Scott) and the government House leader -- are really running the show here.

I can just imagine what happened in caucus. I say to the people at home, this is how it really works with this legislation. Do they wonder how in the world we got into this position? I will tell them how we got into this position. The Premier came up with this brilliant idea of sloughing it off to the municipalities. Of course, he has this huge, massive majority government now. So he wanders into caucus one day, and he casually says, “We are going to be proceeding with what we call Sunday shopping.” Politicians like to put little labels on legislation. Of course, this is Bill 113, I say for the benefit of the Speaker so that she will not call me to order for not talking on the particular bill at hand.

He casually mentions right at the beginning of the new session after the election, “We’re going to go ahead with Bill 113, Sunday shopping legislation, and I am sure that is in agreement.” Well, there were so many new Liberals -- how many new ones? Sixty or 70? I do not know. There are so many I still have not got to know them all, unfortunately.

Mr. Reville: New Democrats as well. You should count them.

Mr. Cureatz: Yes, but they are not in the Liberal caucus.

They did not know what was going on here. I mean, the Premier just got elected with a huge majority, and our leader was defeated; we were in chaos. They all nodded politely like -- what is the term we use around here? -- seals. Is that it? That is right. They all nodded politely --

Mr. D. S. Cooke: What about Mondays and Thursdays? You’re in court, not in chaos.

The Acting Speaker: Order. The member for Durham East.

Mr. Cureatz: I say to the honourable member, court does not sit on Sunday. On Sunday, I and my wife and three children attend church regularly, and we will continue to do so, notwithstanding the legislation that is being passed.

Mr. D. S. Cooke: Is that where you line up your clients?

Mr. Cureatz: I was going to be complimentary to the great and wonderful New Democratic Party, but I can only remind the House leader, let’s go back to the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh). What did he tell us about the NDP, about the great and wonderful victory on September -- whatever it was? I say to the House leader, the party would be better served with the member for Oshawa leading the NDP.

The Acting Speaker: Order. I would remind the member for Durham East that he should make his comments through the Speaker and attempt to keep them as close as he possibly can to the bill at hand.

Mr. Cureatz: Back to how the legislation came before us: Of course, all these new Liberals were unfamiliar with the process; so they all thought: “Well, I guess the Premier knows what is going on. We’ll all nod politely, and we’ll carry on with the legislation.” But it is not until a few months later when finally all the Liberal back-benchers get all the riding offices organized. Do members know what started taking place? All the phone calls came in from the concerned constituents that they have in their ridings about the proposed legislation, Bill 113.

We have heard time and time again about the municipal option. The learned chairman of the standing committee on administration of justice, whom I am going to have the opportunity of serving under come August and September, indicated it is up to the municipalities. I want to bring to his attention -- and if he could stand up on a point of order I would appreciate it -- what it says here under explanatory notes, the head notes.

I ask in reference to the municipal option, what happens where it says, “the Lieutenant Governor in Council will have similar powers with respect to territory without municipal organization.” Does that mean the cabinet is going to make the decision whether there should be Sunday shopping in those unorganized municipalities? If that is what it means. I am going to be more than interested to see what the decision of the cabinet is going to be when those unorganized municipalities come forward to the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Mr. Eakins) and say, “Will you please bring us in or pass the appropriate regulations for the legislation to allow us to be open on Sundays?”

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Cureatz: Then the heat is going to be on the government for sure, not for a lot of the back-benchers who represent a good part of southern Ontario, but for the members for the north, possibly, where there are a lot of unorganized municipalities. It is going to be interesting to see the decision because it is going to rest now with the front four. What are they going to do in terms of making the decision in regard to Sunday shopping in those municipalities? Well, that is the opening gambit.

Of course, we want to bring to the attention of people back home that we are discussing Bill 113, which, among other things, indicates that the penalty for illegal Sunday openings is increased from $10,000 to $50,000, which is indeed very onerous. But, of course, the municipality has the option of passing the appropriate bylaw, I say to the Solicitor General, to decrease that to whatever amount it wants.

Actually we are not discussing Bill 114, but, of course, I too follow the lead of our own House leader, who is trying to organize it with the government House leader as to how these pieces of legislation are going to pass. My NDP colleagues very clearly brought forth some of their concerns, basically that the so-called protection for Sunday workers “encourages but does not force retail employers to work out co-operative arrangements for Sunday work that take into consideration people who prefer not to work on Sunday.” That is the companion legislation, which in theory we are not discussing at this moment, but I am sure in an effort for us to leave these chambers for the summer recess, so we can go on to particular committees, that will be passed in conjunction with Bill 113.

I thought we could, as Bud Germa, the member for Sudbury a long time ago, used to say, do a little walk around town, a little kaleidoscope of what has been in store for all the Liberal members in regard to Bill 113, the Sunday shopping legislation.

I was listening with great interest yesterday when my learned colleague the member for Leeds-Grenville (Mr. Runciman) got into an interesting discussion with my almost seatmate, the member from Eglinton (Ms. Poole), who is not present at the moment, about the comments of the Premier. As Eric Dowd has indicated, “Advice Offered to Students on Safe Sex has Premier Treading on Unsafe Ground.” That debate between my colleague and the Liberal member over on the rump side of the House was interesting, to say the least, and it did get confused between Sunday shopping and sex. I want to say that in terms of my comments, we are going to relate specifically to Bill 113.

The first things that has been brought to my attention are comments from across Ontario. Some of the members from western Ontario might be familiar -- and of course I know the Liberals would be -- with Waterloo Regional Sundays for People, an interesting pamphlet that has been produced, no doubt at great expense, by grass-roots people out in that part of Ontario -- not quite as far as the Solicitor General’s riding, but getting into western Ontario -- a pamphlet expressing their concerns about Sunday shopping.

I say to all the Liberal members, as proud as I have been of their speeches -- and they have been stalwart; the member for Brantford (Mr. Neumann) stood up in his place and did the best he could trying to defend the position of the government -- all of them know, in their heart of hearts, that this has been a tough one for them in their constituency offices. It has been a tough one.

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I will tell them, it is going to be my job at the next go-around, in 1990 or 1991, to remind all my constituents that I do not remember the Liberal candidate in my riding talking during the campaign or putting out her pamphlet, as none of them did, about the legislation in regard to Sunday shopping. Did they say that? I think they did not and I do not think any other Liberal member across the way -- as a matter of fact, I will be quoting from the Premier (Mr. Peterson) about his comments on Sunday shopping during the election campaign.

Well, that was from Waterloo, a little walk through Ontario. How about the recent by-election? Shall we refresh all the members’ memories -- and I say this to the people at home -- about the recent great victory of the member for London North (Mrs. Cunningham)?

Mr. Callahan: Where is Dianne? Did she go home or what?

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Callahan: I am just checking where the member for London North is.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. I am just checking to find out if the members remember standing order 24(b). That is what I am checking.

Mr. Cureatz: Mr. Speaker, I sincerely appreciate your intervention to keep this large, disorderly, arrogant Liberal government in tow. They are not allowing the free speech of the few humble opposition members that are here. I appreciate your intervention.

I say to the people at home that we just had a by-election and it was purported that we were going to lose, that the poor, downtrodden Conservative Party of Ontario did not have a chance. Why? Well, it was in the Premier’s backyard, in London. Why? There was also the Solicitor General, who I believe is the first woman Solicitor General in Ontario, for which I give her my congratulations.

Two powerful people in terms of running this Liberal administration were hands-on with the people in that particular riding of London North. They knew what was happening and they were going to be successful, notwithstanding that the previous member, Ron Van Home, for whom I had a great amount of respect, came out with a few unsavoury comments about the large Liberal administration.

I ask all the Liberal members --

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Cureatz: Did we win the by-election? Did we win? Yes or no? How about the member for Brampton South (Mr. Callahan): Did we win the by-election?

The Deputy Speaker: Order. Do you have a point of order?

Mr. Haggerty: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: Under the rules of debate a member cannot persist in needless repetition. I suggest that is what the member has been doing here for the past 15 minutes.

Mr. Wildman: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker: It is true that any member is not supposed to have needless repetition. But there are those of us who believe that this member is doing the best he can to get it right.

Mr. Callahan: On a legitimate point of order, Mr. Speaker: It has been a tradition of this House that a member --

The Deputy Speaker: Under which standing order?

Mr. Callahan: A member is not permitted in the tradition of this House to refer to another member who is absent from the House. I speak of the member for London North who is not present in her chair. The member has referred to her on numerous occasions. That is contrary to parliamentary procedure.

The Deputy Speaker: Before this long series of points of order, I was about to remind the member to address his remarks to the chair and not ask other members questions.

Mr. Cureatz: I appreciate the learned comments from the member for Brampton South who is so free and easy with the keys to the Don Jail.

I just want to say that we won the by-election, and one of the major issues that was brought forward in that campaign was Sunday shopping.

The learned members, all those Liberal back-benchers, are concerned about needless repetition. Let us carry on to another learned colleague of mine, the member for Northumberland (Mrs. Fawcett) and her constituency report. I want to say that I have great respect for this member, the first Liberal member elected in that riding in how many years?

Mrs. Fawcett: Fifty.

Mr. Cureatz: Fifty. See, I give credit where credit is due. Mind, there are a few too many pictures in here for my taste but, listen, all members have their own approach.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Cureatz: Mr. Speaker, I want to review the pamphlet with you just briefly because it ties in interestingly with Bill 113.

The Deputy Speaker: I was about to ask you.

Mr. Cureatz: “Agriculture and Food” is one section, “Natural Resources” another section, “Youth” another section, “Tourism and Recreation” another section, “Budget” -- if members can believe the member for Northumberland wanted to say anything about the budget -- another section. “Legislative Page Program” is good and worth while, and I think “Congratulatory Scrolls and Official Messages” is worth while. That is the conclusion of her pamphlet.

Do members know what? This is how astute she is; this is how crafty she is. There is not one mention of Bill 113 and the Sunday shopping legislation in downtown rural Ontario. She did not put this on the front page of the Joan Fawcett Report. She did not say, “I am supportive of Sunday shopping legislation in Cobourg, Colborne, Brighton and Castleton.” Give me a few other names. Not once did she mention it.

The Deputy Speaker: Order. You have a point of order? Under which standing order?

Mr. Laughren: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: Sterling Campbell didn’t either.

Mr. Cureatz: The point of the matter is, I say to the people at home, fear not, some of your representatives, albeit they are Liberals, are indeed against this particular piece of legislation and are shying away from it as fast as they can. They are hoping it is going to be over and done with in a few short months, way before the next provincial election, because they know the heat they are receiving in their constituency offices over Sunday shopping.

What kind of heat are they getting? Here is an interesting letter that I got from the Right Reverend Terence E. Finlay, coadjutor bishop of the diocese of Toronto, area bishop of Trent-Durham. Here are some of his concerns about Sunday shopping. Interestingly enough, a present resident of my riding of Durham East, he will be taking over the archbishop’s position within a year or two. Here is the concerned letter he has to “Allan Furlong, MPP, Durham Centre.”

The member is not here. I have a great respect for the member for Durham Centre. I have known him for a long time. But I want to tell the House what the Right Reverend Terence E. Finlay says:

“Thank you for your Queen’s Park report, April 15. The new proposed legislation still does not deal with a common day of pause for society in Ontario. History, whether it be religious or secular, convincingly affirms a need for a regular time for rest from routine activity for the wellbeing of society.

“Frankly, the proposed legislation appears to be an example of passing the buck” -- this is from the future archbishop of the Anglican Church, my church, which I attend from time to time, in Port Perry – “rather than respecting the large mandate which the people of the province of Ontario gave the present government to manage effectively and responsibly the life of Ontario.”

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Cureatz: I find very interesting, as much as I respect the member for Durham Centre, the kind of passing-the-buck response that he gave to the future archbishop of the diocese of Toronto.

Of course, in conjunction with the member for Durham Centre, we could also include some of my thoughts as the representative for Durham East, taking in that portion of the town of Whitby. And what does the town of Whitby say out in the Durhams?

Mr. Cousens: What do they say?

Mr. Cureatz: I am glad the honourable member asked me for it. Do members know what they say? I say to all the people at home watching and making dinner, the people out in Whitby say no to Bill 113. They do not want this legislation. I have a feeling the moms and dads who are flicking the television channels and who have just stumbled across me for a few moments and who have had a hard day at work trying to make a living, paying the mortgage, getting the kids off to school or baseball practice or soccer practice --

Mr. Cousens: Looking forward to Sunday off.

Mr. Cureatz: Yes. They are looking at television and saying: “Gee, who is that guy talking? He doesn’t want us to be working on Sunday. Why do all those Liberal back-benchers want us to be out working on Sunday?”

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That is what they are saying and they are going to be thinking on the next go-around, 1991 -- do not worry, the Premier will not even tell members opposite about the election either. They are going to be on pins and needles and he is not going to call in the caucus. No, here is what he is going to do. I can picture it. It is the same thing he did on Bill 113 and Sunday shopping.

He is going to call in the caucus and say, “Now, members of caucus,” in his humble, little way, with his head down, “Now, what are the people out there thinking?” That is what his line is. I can just picture him at that table at the caucus. “Tell me, what are the people of Ontario thinking?” Of course, Steve Baloney will stand up, and he will have something smart to say and someone else will have something really sarcastic to say.

But do members know what? He will already know what the people of Ontario are thinking. He will have done a poll. Hershell Ezrin will evaluate the poll, and they will make the decision. He is just stringing those people right along, hook, line and sinker, just like he has done with Sunday shopping. He is not going to tell them about the election, just like he has not told them about Bill 113 and they have swallowed it.

I give them all credit, some of them who have been standing in their places and trying to hold the party line, even though their heart of hearts is not in it.

What did I hear some of the members say that the city of Oshawa had to say about Sunday shopping? Did I hear that call? Do the members know what it has to say?

Mr. Cousens: What do they have to say?

Mr. Cureatz: I am glad the member asked me. Here is what the city of Oshawa has to say: “Whereas the province of Ontario has tabled legislation to allow the regional municipality to allow or reject the extension of Sunday retail shopping in Durham” -- do the members know what the region has said? Is everyone listening closely? I bet this sounds very similar to all the members’ municipalities in the ridings that they represent. I say to the member for Durham-York, this sounds a bit familiar, since he was so proud to say that he was a member of regional council out in Durham. “Be it resolved that the region of Durham does not support the extension of Sunday retail shopping in the region of Durham.” They are saying no to those members, and I am trying to explain to them, as I make my way in progression across this great province, that there are people and elected politicians --

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: There are a lot of interjections, but if the member would address his remarks to the Speaker, he might solicit fewer interjections. May I remind him for the nth time, please?

Mr. Cureatz: I will very humbly bow to your request for at least a couple of minutes.

I say to the member for Durham Centre (Mr. Furlong) that he was very proud to talk about the municipal option, but the municipalities are saying no, N-O, just like all of the other hundreds of groups across Ontario. I am going to be going through some of them to show the kaleidoscope.

Really, the embarrassing point is that the government members all know it. They are getting the letters and the phone calls on Bill 113, and they have blinders on. The Premier has sucked them into this position. We on this side and in the New Democratic Party would be in terrible shape if the Premier stood up and said: “You know what? I’ve made a mistake. Forget the Sunday shopping business. We’re going to go with the select committee,” which I will bring to everyone’s attention. If he said that, we would be in big trouble.

What would our position be? We would have to capitulate. We would have to say the Premier and the other Three Ponypeople of the Calamity finally did the right thing. I, for one, would say that. I would say: “By golly, I give credit to the Premier. He made a mistake. He admitted it. He is not going for this Sunday shopping.” No such luck, even in the event of the huge, massive numbers of petitions that all of us have received.

How many members have stood up in the Liberal caucus and have read petitions about being opposed to Sunday shopping into the record? I know exactly what the members have done. They have a copy of the Hansard. They made sure they got a copy of the people who signed the petition with their addresses on it -- well, if they have not, they should be doing this; I am giving them little tricks of the trade -- and they will be sending a copy of Hansard back to all the people saying how they dutifully followed through, as their representatives, reading the petitions in regard to Sunday shopping, pretending all the while to those people that they are against Sunday shopping by reading the petition. The fact is, they are following the party line and being told to pass the legislation, and they are not supportive of it. Not one of them yet has the guts to stand --

An hon. member: Larry says if this thing ever happens --

Mr. Cureatz: Well, did Larry say something against Sunday shopping?

Mr. Villeneuve: Yes.

Mr. Cureatz: If that is true, then maybe one of the members has finally stood up in his place. He will probably get elected back in his riding.

I gave that speech a long time ago, and I will give it again before this term ends. Not all of those members are going to make it back this time around.

The Deputy Speaker: Through the Speaker.

Mr. Cureatz: They all know that, and it is about time some of them had enough gumption to cut out a bit of cloth of their own so that they could be distinguished in their own communities that they are against this Sunday shopping legislation, but the Premier is hitting them down like bowling pins and they are falling for it. They should do something on their own, take some initiative so that it can be recognized in their own communities that they are against something.

How about the Citizens for Public Justice? A comment in terms of my first question. Later on in my remarks, tomorrow, I want to quote my response when the Solicitor General stood in her place way back at Christmas -- I have the Hansard here; I will read it to her -- and read a five-page statement about the proposed legislation on Sunday shopping. I stood up then in my capacity as a member responding to a minister’s statement and said to her: “It’s going to be chaos across the province. You don’t know what you’re doing. You’re opening a Pandora’s box.”

Strangely enough, I have been getting some letters. From time to time, people listen to my comments, and they congratulated me on that stand way back when it was first introduced. Some of the members want to know what is taking place across Ontario. Do the members know what they have to say in the township of Casimir, Jennings and Appleby, a small community?

Mr. Cousens: What do they have to say?

Mr. Cureatz: Here is what they have to say. I am glad the member asked me.

“Please be advised that on April 11, 1988, the council for the corporation of the townships as read, ‘Be it resolved that council for the corporation of the townships voices its objections against the local option to wide-open Sunday shopping.’”

It just surprised me to no end when the member for Durham Centre stood up in his place and talked about being the elected representative for his particular riding and gave no recognition of the fact that there are politicians at the municipal level who have been duly elected in their positions and who have been telling the government time and time again that they are against Sunday shopping.

I have to say from my own humble riding of Durham East, which I have had the pleasure of representing for a good number of years --

Mr. Cousens: How many years?

Mr. Cureatz: Twelve. Thank you very much.

“Enclosed please find a petition from the Solina Women’s Institute opposing Sunday shopping.” I say to the member for Brampton South (Mr. Callahan) that I want him to come up and speak to the Solina Women’s Institute about why he is in favour of Sunday shopping. You spoke to the Lions Club in the village of Newcastle, but I will tell you, you did not talk about Sunday shopping that day because if you had, they would have driven you out of town: a Liberal coming in and talking about Sunday shopping. You should be ashamed of yourself. Not only do you give the key for the Don Jail; you talk about Sunday shopping. I am embarrassed for you.

The Deputy Speaker: Again, through the Speaker, please.

Mr. Cureatz: Here is an interesting comment I want to bring to everyone’s attention, from a humble constituent who took the time to write a letter. We all have had handwritten letters which we acknowledge sincerely.

“In all discussions regarding Sunday openings, I have never heard any mention of commission sales people. It is always taken for granted that those sales clerks working Sunday will be paid for time worked. This is not always so.”

What about those people? I have not heard the Solicitor General stand in her place about those kinds of people. I want to say to the Solicitor General, as time is drawing close to an end, that we would like a little further discussion. Possibly she can explain in her two-minute response, as I am the critic for her portfolio and had the opportunity of serving as parliamentary assistant over on the magic 13th floor or whatever it is in her block over there. We will be interested to see what she has to say about commission sales people.

How about the United Church of Canada? I had the opportunity of having lunch at the Albany Club this afternoon. Who was there? None other than the present archbishop, Archbishop Garnsworthy. The Conservative Party tangled with him in 1985, as I remember.

Mr. Breaugh: And did so well.

Mr. Cureatz: And did so well, as the member for Oshawa very kindly pointed out. I do not want to tangle with him, and I sure do not want to tangle with the United Church of Canada, but does the Liberal Party of Ontario want to tangle with the United Church of Canada?

Mr. McGuinty: Never.

Mr. Cureatz: Never. People at home, I heard one, little, quiet “never.” That is right: never. Do the members know what they say? The official board of the Smithville United Church has asked me on its behalf “to express concern over the issue of Sunday shopping.”

The evening guild of the Anglican Church Women, the Church of Ascension, in my community of Durham East, Port Perry -- some of the members have got letters like this from their quiet little congregations, handwritten. Do they not bring tears to their eyes? Does it not reflect, in their heart of hearts, something about the manner in which the front four are ramming through this legislation?

An hon. member: No.

Mr. Cureatz: It does over here. One of the Liberal members says it does not. Well it does to me, and I will just conclude by saying, we hereby voice our strong objections to Sunday store openings for shopping, and to the decision of the Ontario Liberal government to place responsibility for --

On motion by Mr. Cureatz the debate was adjourned.

The House adjourned at 6:01 p.m.

June 14, 1988

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

SEXUAL ASSAULT

UNIVERSITY FUNDING

1987 CONSTITUTIONAL ACCORD

TOURISM IN NORTHERN ONTARIO

RECREATION TRAIL

NORTHERN STUDIES

VIDEO DISPLAY TERMINALS

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

LOTTERY TICKETS

RESPONSES

LOTTERY TICKETS

ORAL QUESTIONS

CAMBRIDGE MEMORIAL HOSPITAL

PROPERTY SPECULATION

SKYDOME

REGULATION OF BOILERS

MASSEY COMBINES CORP.

POLICE EMPLOYMENT PRACTICES

USE OF GOVERNMENT AIRCRAFT

RETAIL SALES TAX

RADIOACTIVE SOIL

FUTURES PROGRAM

NUCLEAR SAFETY

TRANSIT SERVICES FOR THE DISABLED

UNCONDITIONAL GRANTS PROGRAM

PETITIONS

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION FUND

RETAIL STORE HOURS

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION FUND

RETAIL STORE HOURS

TEACHERS’ SUPERANNUATION FUND

ROUGE VALLEY

RETAIL STORE HOURS

INTRODUCTION OF BILL

CITY OF NORTH YORK ACT

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS IN ORDERS AND NOTICES AND RESPONSES TO PETITIONS

POLL

ORDERS OF THE DAY

RETAIL BUSINESS HOLIDAYS AMENDMENT ACT (CONTINUED)