The House met at 1330.
Prayers.
MEMBERS' STATEMENTS
ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION
Mr McClelland: The government House leader has circulated a memo stating that it is imperative -- imperative, I stress -- that the government receive passage of Bill 143 before Christmas in order to put desired waste reduction regulations into effect.
Mr Speaker, on behalf of my party I want to inform you, members of the assembly and the people of Ontario that the Liberal caucus is prepared to comply with the government House leader's wishes. We will ensure speedy passage of the waste reduction portion of the bill.
The only thing the minister has to do to ensure passage is agree to sever out part IV of Bill 143, which deals with the waste reduction measures. It is that simple. Part IV of Bill 143 can go forward, as per the government House leader's request, while the more controversial parts of the bill receive the public scrutiny they deserve.
Severance of part IV is the only way, because in its present form Bill 143 overrides every contract and every piece of legislation that is currently in place to ensure the protection of the environment. In fact, we have pointed out to the Minister of the Environment that Bill 143 would override an environmental bill of rights had she kept her election promise and had such a bill in place. It is clear that the Liberal caucus will not stand aside while the Minister of the Environment and her government endeavour to destroy, in fact steamroll over, the rights of the people in this province.
In order to help the minister and the government House leader along, later this afternoon I will be introducing for first reading a bill entitled Amendments to the Environmental Protection Act. I hope the government plans to move quickly on my bill and ensure swift passage so that the important waste reduction regulations can go into effect. It is a separate piece of legislation. The government can implement those waste reduction measures. I expect to see some action on it.
WINE INDUSTRY
Mr Villeneuve: Last Thursday marked the day when new wines made their arrival in Ontario. Vin nouveau, from Ontario or elsewhere, has never pretended to be a quality wine, but it does provide the first opportunity to sense the quality of the harvest of that year. As well, any excuse to have a celebration with large amounts of wine in the month of November can certainly be appreciated.
I think we in Ontario can appreciate the weather aspect more than the grape growers in France. Something else that can be said and appreciated is that Ontario also grows the Gamay grape and that Ontario growers and wine makers produce excellent new wines as well.
This year, Ontario's nouveau wines are available in LCBO stores from Chateau des Charmes and from Pelee Island. At least one other winery, the Hillebrand Estates Winery, has a new wine available in its own stores. I would encourage members to try these Ontario products, which are excellent, in the next few weeks, during which new wines must be consumed. They must be consumed rather quickly.
We had a very good growing season for grapes here in Ontario this summer, and the quality is reflected in the Gamay nouveau wines. We certainly look forward to other wines in the 1991 harvest.
I would like to congratulate my colleagues in the PC caucus for serving Ontario wine last night at the Ontario Federation of Agriculture annual convention.
I think all members should partake of the new wines produced here in Ontario from Ontario grapes.
RACE RELATIONS
Mr Frankford: As members know, Scarborough has a diverse and growing population. We now have over 500,000 people living there. As members are well aware, they come from all over the world and reflect all the trends in immigration over the past decades.
When you attend events in local schools, as I am sure you do, Mr Speaker, the mixture of national origins is quite apparent and it adds to the liveliness there. The numerous small plazas in my riding of Scarborough East often contain ethnic businesses, adding variety and providing valuable diversity to the local economy.
It is a sad fact of modern life that there are tensions and prejudices between groups. It is most distressing to look at France, Britain and other European countries and see violent tensions becoming part of everyday and political life there. Members may have seen the fine documentary by David Suzuki this week and observed the devastation of urban decay and racism in major US cities. The unrest caused by racism makes countries less competitive in the global economy.
I am pleased to inform members that the city of Scarborough has taken the initiative recently to set up a committee on race relations. It will be holding public hearings across the city, and tonight we will be having the first one at West Rouge Community Centre in my riding.
It is crucial for civic leaders to take the initiative in this and to develop the awareness and sensitivity needed to prevent criminal behaviour, to develop economically and to ensure equity in job opportunities for all who go through the educational system and live in our city.
CREDIT COUNSELLING
Mr H. O'Neil: The Minister of Community and Social Services has set credit counselling services in Ontario adrift by her recent announcement that 25 years of funding would be discontinued. The Ontario Association of Credit Counselling Services fears that "this may well be the end of this valuable service to the citizens of Ontario."
I want to draw members' attention for a moment to the impact of the province's withdrawal from this much-needed service. The average client at the Quinte Region Credit Counselling Service in my riding earns less than $26,000 per year, has two children and owes an average of $11,000 in consumer debt. Once funding for credit counselling is withdrawn, families in Quinte and across the province will be without the third-party mediation services of credit counselling programs and can expect, according to Richard Bauer, executive director in Quinte, bankruptcies, legal actions and the restoration of interest charges and penalties that are currently waived.
By failing to recognize the social problems associated with financial crisis in the home, the Ministry of Community and Social Services is abandoning families in Ontario at a time when credit counselling services have never been needed more. Perhaps we can convince the minister and the Treasurer and the government and the Premier to reconsider this action.
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ELECTORAL DISTRICT OF BRANT-HALDIMAND
Mrs Cunningham: The former member for Brant-Haldimand, Mr Robert Nixon, resigned as MPP effective August 1, 1991. That riding has now been without provincial representation for four months.
The former member for London North, Mr Ron Van Horne, resigned effective December 31, 1987. The by-election was held on March 31, 1988. London North went without provincial representation for three months. It was, by the way, a most successful by-election.
The most recent by-election, in Welland-Thorold, was held on November 3, 1988, three months after the former member, Mr Mel Swart, resigned. That was a most interesting by-election.
In his capacity as leader of the official opposition, the Premier stated during a press conference at Brock University, "People are entitled to local representation when the provincial Legislature reopens October 17. People want a local member." Obviously at that time the Premier thought four months without local representation was too long.
Mr David Timms is willing and able to serve the riding of Brant-Haldimand at Queen's Park. Brant-Haldimand will have been without local representation for four months on December 1. When is the Premier going to practise what he preached when he was in opposition, or is this another "That was then, this is now"?
VILLAGE OF WINSTON PARK
Mr Cooper: Recently I had the pleasure of participating at the official opening of phase 1 of the Village of Winston Park. Phase 1 is a 95-bed nursing home, phase 2 will consist of 80 retirement home suites and phase 3 will include two apartment buildings for seniors.
The overall intent of Winston Park is to offer a complete long-term care community which provides a broad range of living opportunities to serve the daily living needs, as well as health care needs, of the elderly. Beyond this, the Village of Winston Park is also intended to be a part of the Glencairn community of Kitchener-Waterloo, rather than an isolated ghetto for seniors.
The concept of continuing care for seniors is one which is only now being developed in Ontario, although it is quite well established in other parts of the world. The advantages of being able to stay in the same facility, even though the level of care which one requires may change with the passage of time, are obvious.
Such facilities, however, are hard to find, and in the Kitchener-Waterloo area they were practically non-existent until now. The Village of Winston Park will be a multilevel care community in a parklike setting, but still within the city of Kitchener. It will also, as development progresses, be a focal point for seniors in the area and will provide an outreach into the community at large.
One can imagine families where each spouse requires a different level of care as the years go by. In the Village of Winston Park it is entirely possible for spouses to be cared for in different parts of the complex according to their needs, but to be able to see each other as often as is desired without leaving the village. With the increasing numbers of elderly people in our community, the time is ripe for a project like the Village of Winston Park.
ASSISTANCE TO FARMERS
Mr Mancini: Last night my colleagues heard one consistent message from farmers at the Ontario Federation of Agriculture's annual convention: that this NDP government does not understand the crisis farmers are facing.
Yesterday the Minister of Agriculture and Food told the House that the NDP has put $119 million in new funding into agriculture. The minister must be having some problems with addition, because the money he talks about just is not there. According to the figures from the budget and the second-quarter finances, agriculture spending is up by only $48 million over last year and agriculture's share of the provincial budget has actually dropped.
Yesterday we heard the auditor's criticism of the NDP's decision to unnecessarily preflow almost $200 million in funding to the teachers' pension fund a year early. Members should think of what $200 million would have meant to the farmers of the province, to a $17-billion industry and the 570,000 jobs they support. I want to tell the Treasurer that farmers in my riding are still waiting for the NDP to make good on its promises. I am glad the Treasurer is here. I am glad he is participating. The farmers of Ontario are facing a crisis. We were promised $119 million; we got only $48 million. I tell the Treasurer: Let's add up our numbers correctly and let's flow the money to the farmers.
LABOUR LEGISLATION
Mr McLean: A growing number of businesses and workers in my riding of Simcoe East are worried that this government's proposed overhaul of Ontario's labour and employment laws will destroy the unique partnership between labour and business. It is a partnership that is necessary if Ontario is to be economically healthy and vibrant.
The Orillia and District Chamber of Commerce and about 200 businesses and individuals that employ more than 25,000 people placed a full-page advertisement in the Orillia Packet and Times on November 23. This ad states in no uncertain terms that Ontario does not need an overhaul of these laws because existing businesses cannot afford additional costs and restrictions. They suggest such amendments are unnecessary and will further damage the province's already fragile ability to compete in the world marketplace.
As well, a recent town hall meeting was held in Midland to give representatives of labour and business a chance to talk about promoting competitiveness and prosperity. The gathering suggested unions should be toned down and workers should have an opportunity to choose whether they want to belong to a union.
It was also suggested that the provincial government should stop forcing industries to leave Ontario because of labour laws. By overhauling Ontario's labour and employment laws, this government is giving prospective investors one more reason not to invest in Ontario. The people of Ontario will benefit most if the government will instead develop proposals to address job attraction and creation. Affixed to my statement is the full-page ad entitled "When is Enough Enough?"
CANADA AWARD FOR BUSINESS EXCELLENCE
Mr Lessard: Today I would like to recognize an Ontario success story. Recently I was in Windsor with Lee Iacocca to celebrate that Chrysler Canada's Windsor assembly plant beat out 42 other finalists to become the first auto manufacturer in Canada to win the prestigious Canada Award for Business Excellence in the category of quality. The real recognition for this award goes to the 4,000 employees of the plant represented by Local 444 and Local 1498 of the Canadian Auto Workers. It was their hard work and self-confidence that made this award possible.
The Windsor plant produces the Chrysler mini-van. So successful has this product been that over three million have been assembled. From its introduction, the mini-van has been produced in Windsor and is credited with turning around the once ailing Chrysler Corp in the early 1980s. Chrysler's chairman praised the plant's workers and said it was their ability to build the revolutionary new vehicle to such high levels of quality that helped bring Chrysler back from the brink. Winning this award proves that, working together, CAW members and Chrysler can be competitive and build the best.
Larry Bauer, president of CAW Local 444, accepted the award on behalf of his brothers and sisters and said the award is proof Chrysler workers can deliver and will continue to deliver quality products for the corporation. I have no doubt Windsor workers could do the same for others who may choose Windsor as a place to invest. I want to add my congratulations and share the pride of the people of Windsor for the members of CAW Local 444 and Local 1498 and the Chrysler Corp.
ENERGY CONSERVATION
The Speaker: On Wednesday, November 6, 1991, the member for Lanark-Renfrew raised a question of privilege with respect to a telephone conversation with a senior official of Ontario Hydro following a statement the member had made in the House regarding the government's policy on conservation programs. I have carefully reviewed the points raised by the member for Lanark-Renfrew both in the House and in correspondence to me. The record tends to indicate that there was nothing more than a disagreement between the member and the official of Ontario Hydro. This falls well short of establishing a prima facie case of privilege.
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STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY
TORONTO ISLANDS COMMUNITY
Hon Mr Cooke: For many decades the Toronto Islands community has been buffeted by legal wrangles and political battles. The people of the Toronto Islands community have lived with uncertainty for far too long. Will the islands be a community or a park, or will they be both? Who will own the lands? That is why I am pleased to inform the members of the House today that we have arrived at what I believe is a fair and innovative solution. To this end, next month I will be introducing legislation called the Toronto Islands Stewardship Act. The legislation will be part of an overall plan to preserve the islands community.
Previous governments have tried to find a solution to this problem but have failed. The province's decision in 1956 to turn over the Toronto Islands to Metro Toronto did not resolve the matter, and neither did the provincial legislation in 1981, but I believe the policy we are announcing today will resolve this issue and will do so in a manner that is fair to the islanders, the city, Metropolitan Toronto and the Ontario taxpayers.
The direction we are taking today would not have been possible without the skilful efforts of the former MPP for Scarborough West, Richard Johnston. The members will recall that earlier this year I asked Mr Johnston to find the fairest way to ensure the preservation of a residential community on the Toronto Islands. Mr Johnston consulted extensively with the islanders, Metro Toronto, the city of Toronto and many others. Within the 60-day mandate given to Mr Johnston, he produced a report with a creative set of recommendations. I am pleased to note that the policy we are announcing today is very much in line with the spirit of the original Johnston report.
The Toronto Islands Stewardship Act will include the following measures.
First, land comprising the residential community will remain in public ownership. These residential lands will be transferred from Metro Toronto to the province.
Second, the Toronto Islands Community Trust will be established with representation from the community and government. The community trust will manage the lands for the benefit of the residential community and the Metro Toronto public at large.
Third, we are returning to the islanders a limited right of ownership to their homes.
Fourth, island residents will be offered 99-year leases for the land. Residents on Ward's Island will pay $36,000 for their leases while each lot on Algonquin Island will cost $46,000. Those people who cannot afford the lease price will be able to join a new island housing co-op.
Fifth, the sale of these lot leases will provide about $12 million in compensation to the city of Toronto for its investment in the islands community. In addition, the city will be compensated for 50% of its investment in islands water and sewer services.
Sixth, land lease sales will be strictly regulated to ensure no windfall profits accrue to island residents who sell their houses and leases.
Seventh, the island community will be increased by up to 110 new housing units with at least 80 of the new homes managed by the housing co-operative. This will expand the community from the 250 homes that now house 650 people.
Finally, about 23 acres of provincially owned land, part of the former Lakeshore Psychiatric Hospital site in Etobicoke, will be made available as additional park land to Metro Toronto and the city of Etobicoke.
I am pleased to report that this solution comes at no cost to the province, the city of Toronto, Metro or any of their taxpayers.
To recap, the island lands remain in public ownership, island residents own their homes but pay $36,000 to $46,000 for land leases, islanders who cannot afford the lease prices can join a new island housing co-operative, lease sales will be strictly regulated by a community trust to prevent windfall profits, the city will be repaid its islands investment while Metro Toronto is compensated with park land and up to 110 new housing units will be built there.
In conclusion, any way you look at the solution, it is innovative, creative and fair. It is fair to the islands community, the municipalities of Toronto and Metro and Ontario's taxpayers. The actions we are beginning today will effectively end this dispute and enable us to maintain a healthy, vibrant islands community for all.
RESPONSES
TORONTO ISLANDS COMMUNITY
Mr Phillips: I am pleased to respond. I think everyone would like a resolution to this problem. The statement by the minister today has raised a number of questions that we will be looking at carefully.
One of them, of course, is the cost of this to the taxpayer. I realize that in his statement he indicates there is no cost to the taxpayer. We will be looking carefully at the costs that have already been put into the island by city of Toronto and Metro taxpayers to ensure this is a fair solution to all the parties concerned. I think we can all recognize as well that Metro council has raised concerns about the initial Johnston report. I am sure a government dedicated to consultation -- and prepared to invest a fair bit of money on advertising the fact that it is dedicated to consultation -- will want to ensure there is a good period of consultation with Metro council on this matter. It is of major importance to Metro residents.
There are a few other questions that perhaps the minister's statement ultimately will resolve, as we find out more about it. What is going to happen to owners of island homes who do not live on the island but may have other tenants in their homes? We want to know about that. How will the government ensure that none of these leases will be flipped? I realize there is an indication in its statement that it will ensure that happens, but we will want to know on what basis that happens.
The 99-year lease is a question. I realize it stays in "public ownership," but as we look ahead at a large metropolitan area and perhaps the need for park land in the future, is 99 years the right amount of time? Finally, how will the government solve the issue of ownership, or will it simply extend the leases?
It may not be quite as clear-cut as the minister would like us to believe today in his statement. We will want to look in more detail at the specifics behind the words, and obviously we will want to hear the comments of Metro council during the consultation period as it looks at the details of this proposal.
Mr Stockwell: It is very correct that this issue has been around for a few decades, and what has happened is that in those few decades governments could not make a decision. They could not make a decision for the residents of the island. They could not make a decision for the benefit of the people of Metropolitan Toronto, the taxpayers of Metropolitan Toronto, for public open space.
This government has made a decision all right. It is a sellout of public open space. One of the most precious issues facing the residents in Metro Toronto is public open space. The minister suggests he gives us back 23 acres in the psychiatric grounds. The member sitting next to him knows full well that this always was open space. It is designated and zoned public open space in Etobicoke. He has given us the sleeves from his vest. I can only thank God that this member did not get her way so she could develop co-operative housing on the psychiatric grounds, which nobody wanted anyway. He is just playing a shell game with the residents in Metro.
Let's go back to the original people who were expropriated from there. Those people were moved off because council made a decision many decades ago to take the public open space on the waterfront and use it for the benefit of the people. What has happened is that these people who are left on the island, mark my words, are not original islanders. They have moved in. They have gotten a piece of property for 99 years for $36,000.
They just won the lottery thanks to this government. It is going to cost them roughly $360 a year to live in their premises. By rent, that is $30 a month in Metropolitan Toronto to live on the island, to have a ferry service paid for by the Metro taxpayers to get them there and back. They have a fire service paid for. They have not paid taxes for years. They have basically become squatters. They have moved in on public park land and this government is paying them out because they elected NDP representatives.
Not once has Metro council ever endorsed the islanders, because it knows it is wrong. With this settlement, we know full well that people can look forward to moving into High Park next and in 20 years winning the lottery and living in High Park, according to the criteria of this government.
This government suggests it wants a public open space policy on the waterfront. Mr Crombie must be having very serious concerns about this decision when the government takes public property on the island and starts developing it for co-operative housing. It is absolutely unacceptable today to start developing co-operative housing in the middle of parks.
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I do not know any municipality that would accept it and I do not know any municipality in Metropolitan Toronto that would endorse this deal. They are on record as opposing the continual attack by the islanders on public property, and this is what it comes down to, public property. If this government thinks it has cut a deal that is acceptable to Metro council, may I suggest it is going to be rudely awakened when that vote comes, because Metro council will not endorse this decision either. Metropolitan Toronto residents will not endorse this decision.
If the government is going to start selling out, it should use its own money. I am sick and tired of their giving payoffs to NDP-supported wards and ridings so they can live on this land for 99 years. The member opposite knows that full well. Why does he not quote the polls last election and see how many votes he got off the island?
In the end, if the government thinks it has cut a fair and equitable deal, it is wrong. They have taken 99 years of public use of public park land on a very, very shrinking amount of public space on the waterfront and given it away. If they think that is a good idea, it does not surprise me, but my party and I personally will have no part of this sellout.
Mrs MacKinnon: On a point of personal privilege, Mr Speaker: The member for Essex South said, and I paraphrase here, "Members of the government do not understand the plight of farmers." I disagree. I understand farming from a personal experience. I understand farming from working on the agriculture finance review committee. I understand farming very well.
The Speaker: Would the member for Essex South take his seat please. To the member for Lambton, you do not have a point of privilege. I do appreciate the feeling which you have for the issue that was raised.
ENERGY CONSERVATION
Mr Jordan: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: Yesterday, when I asked the Minister of Energy a question regarding the $7-million, two-lightbulb campaign, in his reply he referred to myself and the people of Lanark-Renfrew as dimwits because we cannot see giving $6 away to get back $1. I would ask the minister to please withdraw that unparliamentary remark.
Interjections.
The Speaker: If I could have the attention of the House for a moment please. To the member for Lanark-Renfrew, who quite properly notified me in advance, at the beginning of today's routine proceedings, that he would rise on this particular point of privilege, I had an opportunity to review Hansard and I must tell the member that indeed, had I heard the comment that was made at the time when it was made or if the member for Lanark-Renfrew had risen on a point of order at the time, I would have asked the Minister of Energy to withdraw that personal comment.
It is our standing practice that points of order must be raised at the time when inappropriate language is used. That is in fact what should have happened at the time. I certainly would ask the Minister of Energy if in future he would be a bit more cautious about the language, the personal comments, which are directed across the House.
WRITTEN QUESTIONS
Mr Jackson: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Under standing order 95(d) -- you will recall this is the standing order which deals with response time for Orders and Notices questions -- briefly I want to suggest to you that since the election this government has persistently and consistently made it more difficult for members of this House on the opposition benches to obtain necessary information in a timely and accurate fashion so we can undertake our duties as members of this House in a variety of circumstances.
I wish the Speaker to be aware, and he will be aware, of standing order 95, which states, "The minister shall answer such written questions within 14 calendar days." Having stated that, Mr Speaker, I wish you to review order paper questions 435 and 436 standing in my name, which deal with a very simple request for information about the total number of commercial and non-profit day care centres that have been forced to close in this province since September 1990.
That request was tabled in this House on June 25, 1991. We have gone through the estimates process. We have gone through budget reviews. We have gone through a series of activities where this information has not been shared with all members of this House. I respectfully request, with the crisis facing day care, that this government should honour the standing orders --
The Speaker: Would the member take his seat, please. The member indeed has what I believe to be a valid point of order and I will review the circumstances as he has described them.
Hon Ms Lankin: Mr Speaker, I would like to request unanimous consent to introduce two special guests with us here in this assembly today.
The Speaker: Do we have unanimous consent?
Agreed to.
LUCILLE ROUSSEAU AND OLIVE ATCHINSON
Hon Ms Lankin: Thank you very much, and I thank the members opposite for their agreement to an unusual request from a minister of the crown, but I was unaware that these people would be joining us in the assembly here today. I want to take just a very quick moment to say a welcome to Mrs Lucille Rousseau and Mrs Olive Atchinson, who are visiting homemakers and who are celebrating today 30 years of commitment to caring and support for people choosing to remain in their homes. Perhaps they could just stand so we could recognize them.
I had the opportunity just minutes before question period began to meet these two wonderful women and the honour of presenting them with flowers in celebration of their anniversary of 30 years of long, hard hours of work and support to the community. I truly offer to them, on behalf of all the members of this assembly and the people of Ontario, our congratulations and our thanks.
Joining them today are Mrs Jean Young, the president of the Ontario Association of Visiting Homemaker Services, Mrs Ann Hargest, the executive director from the Ottawa area, and Marg Beatty, the executive director of the Ontario association. We certainly welcome them here, and again to the two women who are celebrating this important event I offer our sincere congratulations and thanks.
Mr Mancini: On behalf of the Liberal caucus, I would like to extend our personal greetings and our personal congratulations to the ladies visiting us today for their 30 years of dedication and service to their community. We wish them many more years of health and happiness.
Mr Jackson: Certainly on behalf of our caucus, and indeed therefore on behalf of all members of this House, we would like to send our personal congratulations to Lucille and Olive. For any member who has had occasion to visit the homes where visiting homemakers have had a presence and an inspiration and a comforting hand, it is clear that this is one of the most essential community-based services we have as a linkage to the frail elderly and to those people whose circumstances force them to live the life of a shut-in.
I would like to say, though, that both Lucille and Olive certainly represent an entire generation. For the past 30 years, they have given of their humanity and their compassion and their service. But like the generation they represent, they too some day soon perhaps will have to rely on government to continue that level of support that allowed them to participate in their community, because they themselves will become the users of the service and they will expect that we in government will ensure that this service continues.
When we look to the long-term care reform document, as we looked in fact to the care givers we talk about in that document, we hope it will be a priority for all members of this House and they can receive in return the same compassion they have given out for 30 years. We all pay tribute to you. Welcome to Queen's Park.
MEMBER'S MAILING
The Speaker: Before commencing with oral questions, at the request of the honourable member for York Centre, who raised a question of privilege on Monday last, I have had an opportunity to review the document he forwarded to me and can find no basis for a prima facie case of privilege.
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ORAL QUESTIONS
PURCHASE OF VIDEO EQUIPMENT
Mr Ramsay: Yesterday, after the Provincial Auditor's report, the Premier was very adamant in a statement he made that "There will be no abuse of the public purse in any way, shape or form." We certainly want to take the Premier at his word and therefore I have the following question.
The Premier is aware that when his government took office, his ministers and parliamentary assistants took over offices that were fully furnished, fully functional and equipped with the requisite number of fax machines, telephones and television sets. As the Premier is also aware, in June of this year, through an order paper question, we asked all the ministers and parliamentary assistants what personal office purchases of electronic equipment they made. Almost all the ministers have given their responses, and unfortunately we are very disappointed with those responses. We have found that since October 1, 1990, ministers have spent $25,000 on extra electronic equipment, including 25 new television sets and 14 new videocassette recorders.
Can the Premier tell this House and the taxpayers of Ontario if he is in agreement with these purchases by ministers? Can he also tell this House why, with his greatly increased staff, he himself has not answered this question? The Premier and the Minister of Correctional Services have yet to answer this question after it has been on the order paper for five months.
Hon Mr Rae: With respect to the second question, I will obviously take it as notice. I am happy to look into it.
I would say to the honourable member that when we arrived in office there was all kinds of equipment that was not there, to be perfectly blunt. I will have to look into the particular question the member has asked, but overall, I would say to the member, who is obviously the chef du jour, that there is a need for all of us to exercise restraint with respect to the way in which offices are handled. By and large, I think that has been the case.
Mr Ramsay: It is the first we have heard that the Premier inherited offices that were not fully equipped. I do not understand his outrage yesterday about government expenditure when today he is not really ready to answer that question.
When we look at the specific list of ministerial purchases, there is an interesting one I would like to bring to the attention of the Premier with regard to the Attorney General. The Attorney General ordered two extra television sets for his office. They were not the regular, standard-issue television sets that run for about $400; these television sets for the Attorney General were worth $719. We are wondering why the Attorney General needs two extra TV sets and why they cost $300 more than the other ones.
We would really like to know if the Premier condones these extra expenditures of the Attorney General. Why is he allowing that to happen, particularly in the Ministry of the Attorney General? That ministry is struggling with court reform and court security and is needing every dollar to provide those services.
Hon Mr Rae: When the member refers to the Attorney General, he is obviously referring to him and to members of his staff. It is not at all untoward for there to be television sets in the offices of executive assistants as well as members and ministers, with respect to being able to watch the House and follow the proceedings in the House. That is a perfectly ordinary and standard thing to do and that is the way it has been proceeding.
Mr Ramsay: I guess the question is, what is the television threshold for the Premier? How many TV sets are okay? He fired a deputy minister for having eight or nine in his office this year. Now the Attorney General has two more than the original allocation.
Interjections.
Mr Ramsay: Would the government like to listen to this point? I would like to inform the Premier of another example of his government's waste. As we speak, $260,000 of highly sophisticated video equipment sits in the north wing of this building in room 207. This has been collecting dust since March 28 of this year. It has been sitting unopened in boxes for seven months. I have the invoice for this equipment. It is $263,000 worth of equipment. The problem is that the original supplier will not take this back. What does the Premier intend to do with this equipment? Why is it sitting there? Why have we expended $260,000 on equipment nobody is using?
Hon Mr Rae: There are various caucus budgets with respect to video equipment. I am sure the Liberal caucus and, I would think, the Conservative caucus have such budgets with respect to video equipment. If the member wants us to have a general debate about those expenditures and who has what and where it all is, I would be more than happy to participate in that.
Mr Ramsay: All I can say is yes, we have similar equipment, but we use our equipment; it is not sitting in boxes collecting dust.
LABOUR LEGISLATION
Mr Ramsay: I have a question for the Minister of Labour. Unfortunately last week we received more bad economic news in the province. We know UTDC's Kingston truck plant is going to be closing in early 1992, throwing 100 unionized workers out of work. As well, aircraft maker McDonnell Douglas in Toronto may have to lay off up to 1,200 people next year. And we know the 5,000 workers at de Havilland wonder every day if they are going to have jobs in the future.
In the middle of these bleak economic times, the Minister of Labour intends to ram down the throats of the workers and business in Ontario changes to the Labour Relations Act which have, as he knows, business wondering whether it has a future in this province.
The government's inability to control the deficit and deal with the economy, which is why we designated today opposition day on the economy, has everybody in the province worried. Even the workers who are supposedly the big beneficiaries of these amendments are concerned their companies might pick up and go to the United States. Business is worried and the minister's polls show that workers are also worried. Given the poor economic times in Ontario, why bring in now these amendments to the Labour Relations Act?
Hon Mr Mackenzie: It is very clear and easy: It is simply because we want to improve the climate between labour and management in Ontario.
Mr Ramsay: This is the answer we repeatedly get from the Minister of Labour. The minister has said more unionization is going to bring a high wage and high-skilled jobs and create a high degree of competitiveness in Ontario, but his deputy minister has said he does not think there is going to be increased unionization because of these amendments. In Ontario today, industry is concerned about the potential impact of this legislation, especially in our current harsh economic times. As the minister must know, there was less foreign investment coming into Canada and into Ontario in September, as investors are now starting to think twice about investing in this jurisdiction.
These changes are not going to create any new jobs, and they are not going to save any of the existing ones. Certainly that must be our prime concern. No more workers are going to join unions, according to the Deputy Minister of Labour, and employers are thinking twice about investing here. How will these changes address everybody's concerns about how we can become more competitive in Ontario as we face a new global economy?
Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think the answer to that is fairly obvious, too. We simply have to pull together, not only management but labour in this province, if we are going to see an improvement in our economic situation.
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Mr Ramsay: I agree with the response of the minister. I wish that was what was happening and I ask him that we do that: start to pull together. These changes are not going to do that.
The minister frequently refers to the Quebec situation. Similar legislation went into Quebec. Since 1983, when that legislation was last amended, twice as many workers in Quebec have gone on strike as in Ontario.
The Premier talks about this consultation, this partnership, yet he told the United Steelworkers of America recently that he was determined to push these amendments through. How can we have this consultation when the Premier says it is going through and yet the minister talks about partnership? How can we have this partnership when it is the time to bring in business, management and labour to say, "Let's sit down and talk about redeveloping the Ontario economy together," and not just to ram amendments down people's throats?
Hon Mr Mackenzie: It seems to me there was a time when this member thought it was useful to involve or consult with workers on decisions that might affect them.
LANDFILL SITES
Mr Harris: I have a question for the Minister of the Environment. The Interim Waste Authority has been developing a long list of potential sites for GTA garbage for some time now. According to the minister's schedule, the study schedule, the document release dates, it was to be November for the identification of candidate areas and the final long list of sites. The Interim Waste Authority has indicated that it is waiting until after Bill 143 is passed before it meets this timetable of releasing the list of the potential sites.
Given that Bill 143 gives the minister the power to short-circuit the environmental consultation process, could she explain to me why she has asked the Interim Waste Authority to postpone releasing the list of potential landfill sites until after Bill 143 has been passed?
Hon Mrs Grier: There are two parts to the reason the list has not been released on the date when our initial predictions had hoped it would be. One was that in the extensive consultation which has taken place around the criteria that will govern the site search -- the environmental criteria, the kinds of lands where the Interim Waste Authority would not want to see a waste site -- all of the more extensive consultation around those criteria than has ever taken place before under a waste management master plan, we got a great deal of feedback from the people who participated in those discussions in the meetings which were held throughout the greater Toronto area. It is our intention to respond to that feedback and to look at those criteria in the light of that consultation and of the comments we got. Then the long list of sites will be prepared on the basis of the final criteria as opposed to the draft criteria which were put out initially.
Mr Harris: I would really like to understand what the minister is saying. It has certainly been indicated to us that they were not going to release the candidate areas and the final list of sites until after Bill 143, the minister's bill to limit public input, was passed. If the minister is telling us that is not the case, I would like her to be very clear on that so I can go back and report to the Interim Waste Authority: "No, passing Bill 143, limiting public input, is not the reason. If you have your site list ready, if you are on the timetable, or as soon as you have them ready, regardless of whether 143 is passed, you can go ahead and release those sites." Is that what the minister is telling this House? If she is not telling us that, could she explain why she wants the list hidden from public view before we pass the bill that limits their right to input?
Hon Mrs Grier: As the member well knows, Bill 143 contains a number of sections. One of those is the search for long-term disposal sites for the GTA, and that search is proceeding in accordance with the Environmental Assessment Act. The establishment of the process for the determination of those sites depends on the passage of the legislation, which will identify the criteria and the basis and the site search plan. There is no list at this point. The criteria were out for consultation. We are responding to that consultation and we have the legislation that establishes the site search process. When the legislation has been passed we will proceed to the next stage, which is the establishment of the long-term list. It is very clear, it is very simple and it is entirely in accordance with everything I have said since November 1990.
Mr Harris: There are a couple of things I would like to know. Municipal councils which have just been elected are having their formation meetings, as the minister very well knows. Yet she wants us to pass Bill 143, limiting their right for input and limiting the right of the residents of Metropolitan Toronto for public input, for hearings, limiting all their rights under the Environmental Assessment Act. Those are the powers contained in Bill 143. She wants us to whip this through, get all this passed, get everybody muzzled and give her all the power before she is going to meet this timetable of releasing the sites.
I believe the long lists of sites are ready, prepared, detailed and ready to be released. I am asking the minister to give the public of Metropolitan Toronto the right to know what those potential sites are before she muzzles it with the passage of Bill 143.
Hon Mrs Grier: Let me once again tell the member what is in Bill 143. There is a process in Bill 143 that gets us through the immediate short-run problem of not having capacity for waste. The member is quite right that there is no opportunity for an environmental assessment hearing in that.
The second part of the legislation establishes the process for the long-term site search in accordance with the Environmental Assessment Act. When that is passed, we will then proceed to the next stage, which is the identification of the long-term sites.
There is also within the legislation the legislative basis for the regulations around waste reduction, reuse and recycling. Those regulations are already out for discussion, for consultation, but before those regulations can be promulgated we need the passage of Bill 143.
I know it may be complicated, but there are four parts to the legislation. The member does himself and the public of this province a disservice by attempting to confuse the four.
Mr Harris: There is nothing in Bill 143 that should stop this process continuing that she released earlier in the year and there is nothing to stop the release of the identification of the sites before she muzzles the people.
STUDENT BUSING
Mr Harris: My second question is to the Minister of Education. Yesterday, the Provincial Auditor revealed that "Combining bus routes for the public and separate boards can result in the elimination of buses or substitution of more suitable bus sizes, resulting in significant cost savings." Would the minister tell us whether he intends to follow through with the auditor's recommendations?
Hon Mr Silipo: Yes, I do. I think busing is one of a number of questions where there can be a lot more co-operation between school boards than there has been in the past. I know there are some areas of the province where that co-operation exists now and where, as a result of that, cost savings have been achieved. I would be very interested in looking at the recommendations from the auditor as well as practices in place now across the province that can help us to deal with this issue more effectively.
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Mr Harris: Great answer; the same one I got a year ago when the auditor released the same information. Obviously nothing has happened in that year.
My colleague the member for Simcoe West tells me that in his riding, school buses could travel the equivalent of nearly twice around the equator every day. That is in his riding alone. Last year the auditor revealed that York region could save $1 million in transportation costs. That is just one board out of 168.
Will the minister tell us why, one year and another auditor's report later, the government has failed to look at, and in fact insist on, the sharing of services between coterminous school boards?
Hon Mr Silipo: I am not sure what the question was in the supplementary, but let me say to the member that I intend to look at this issue very seriously. I have already indicated in my discussions so far with representatives of trustees' organizations from both the public and the Catholic schools that this is an area where I not only want but would expect some co-operation. Quite frankly, I think that will come. I can assure the member that this is an area I am very interested in pursuing, and I hope that by the time the auditor's report of next year comes around, we will actually see some real differences in this area.
Mr Harris: I would like to believe that. I wanted to believe it last year when I got the same answers from the then Minister of Education.
We are spending nearing $13 billion this year on education. The auditor has once again identified cost-saving measures across the province that could save us tens of millions of dollars. Every time we look at a board, we identify money that could be better spent on actually teaching our children.
Let me ask the minister this -- last year after the auditor's report, I asked this as well; now I am asking once again. In order to ensure that we are getting the best possible education for all these tax dollars, will the minister introduce mandatory external audits of school boards?
Hon Mr Silipo: I can tell the member that in my other capacity, as Chairman of Management Board of Cabinet, we are actually looking at the whole question of how audits are being done in the broader public sector that comes under our responsibility. So rather than say yes or no to the question, I will say to him that this is an area we are looking at. We are obviously interested in ensuring that public money is well spent. That should happen as much as possible through co-operation, but if it means we need to be clearer and tighter in the rules we establish, I think we are quite prepared to do that.
PUBLIC OPINION POLLS
Mr Bradley: I have a question for the Premier. In years gone by, when the Premier's views on political ethics were significantly different than they are today, he considered the commissioning and purchasing of public opinion polls -- polls paid for, by the way, by the taxpayers of this province -- to be a cynical manipulation of the political process. Would the Premier inform the House whether his government is today and since being in office commissioning and purchasing public opinion polls?
Hon Mr Rae: Yes.
Mr Bradley: The NDP, as members of this House will know, always had instant, perfect answers to every issue in the days when it had no responsibility for anything. Now that the NDP is the government, it turns out that the ship of state is being guided not by some kind of firm hand from the Premier or members of the government but rather by whatever puffs of today's wind catch its sails.
How much money is being spent on telling the government what it thinks and therefore not being spent on providing services to the people of this province, and why is the Premier keeping the results of these polls, paid for by Ontario taxpayers, secret and privy only to members of the NDP?
Hon Mr Rae: When I answered the first question, I said yes, because in the normal course of events there is a number of ministries which conduct opinion research of a variety of kinds, as the Leader of the Opposition well knows.
I can only to say to the member that the information is there, it is important for governments to have a sense of the direction of public opinion on a variety of subjects, and I think it is what every modern organization does. I would also suggest to the member that political parties do it. We did it as a political party when we were in opposition. I suspect the Liberals are doing it in opposition as well.
CONSULTATION COMMITTEE
Mr Harris: My question is of the government whip, the Minister without Portfolio, chairman of the Consultation Central Co-ordinating Committee, or CCCP, I guess, as it is now referred to.
I would like to ask about the secret memo that was released by the Leader of the Opposition earlier this week. Page 2 says a training session will be held on November 27 and 28 -- that is today and tomorrow -- for constituency assistants. I have contacted Kempenfelt Conference Centre near Barrie, where the NDP constituency assistants are spending today and tomorrow. They are there. Kempenfelt charges $109 per person per night, plus costs for meeting rooms, etc, and food.
I wonder if the minister would tell us how many constituency assistants are attending. Could she tell us if the original purpose is still how they and their non-partisan salaries are supposed to make the government look good? I wonder if she could tell us who is paying the costs of this and what the total cost of this exercise is.
Hon Mrs Coppen: Mr Speaker, I will refer it to the House leader.
Interjections.
Hon Mr Cooke: All members of the Legislature and their constituency offices have budgets. Those budgets for the constituency offices include the operation of the constituency offices and obviously also in-service training for the staff who work in those constituency offices.
We are not doing anything unusual at all. We want to provide good service to our constituents, and one of the ways of providing that good service is to have in-service training for our constituency assistants.
Mr Harris: First of all, let me say I am disappointed that the chairman of the committee recommending this strategy really did not know the answer or what was going on.
Second, since it is the government House leader co-ordinating this political strategy with taxpayers' dollars, I would like to say that yesterday when the Premier was referred this question, we were absolutely assured by the Premier that contrary to the original intent, once the exposure came, there would be no more politicizing of this. This was nothing any more. Taxpayers' dollars would not be used to make the NDP look good. In fact, he was going to depoliticize and make this CCCP committee non-partisan.
If this is the case, could the minister tell me why the constituency assistants of the Liberal members and the Conservative members were not invited to participate in this non-partisan workshop as to how they could better serve their constituents?
Hon Mr Cooke: I think the first point that is important for the leader of the third party to understand is that he knows as well as I do the rules of this place. Our whip, as a minister without portfolio, does not have line responsibilities for a ministry and therefore the questions the leader of the third party has asked of the whip and the comments he made are terribly unfair and unacceptable in this place.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
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Hon Mr Cooke: Members of the Legislature have a budget associated with their constituency office and a budget for their staffing here at Queen's Park. We are all allocated exactly the same amount of money. Central budgets for caucuses are allocated on the basis of a formula negotiated by the three parties with the former government in order to be fair and so that all of us can have the proper services and backup services we require.
If the opposition parties want to provide in-service training for their constituency assistants, they are quite able to do that. That is why they have a budget, and that is why we have a budget.
Mr Ruprecht: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: I think the Premier should consider withdrawing the limo from that minister until she is ready to answer the questions.
The Speaker: The member does not have a point of privilege.
Hon Mrs Coppen: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: I would just like to inform the member that I do not have a limo.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
ONTARIO ROUND TABLE ON ENVIRONMENT AND ECONOMY
Mr Wiseman: My question is to the minister responsible for native affairs. I have read recently that the Native Circle from the Ontario Round Table on Environment and Economy has reported that its recommendations have stirred some sparks from the stakeholders in this consultation process. Specifically, the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters has indicated its concern over the recommendations regarding total aboriginal management of the fishery resources in Ontario. A number of my constituents have raised this with me, and I would like to know what the government's position is with regard to this recommendation and if this is government policy.
Hon Mr Wildman: I do not have a limo either.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
Hon Mr Wildman: I would like to point out to the member that the Native Circle report is a draft report. It is being circulated to aboriginal communities across the province for consultation.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order. The member for St George-St David.
Hon Mr Wildman: I was referring to the Native Circle report to the Round Table on Environment and Economy. That is a draft report which is being circulated to the native communities for comment. The final report will not be submitted to the roundtable, I believe, until January. It is a very important draft report. It contains 70 recommendations on a wide range of economic and environmental issues such as forestry, parks, land claims, trapping, game farming, agriculture, urban development and commerce as they affect aboriginal people. But it is indeed a draft; it is not government policy.
Mr Wiseman: I wonder if the minister could tell me and the House who is on this committee so that we know in the future where the information is coming from.
Hon Mr Wildman: The roundtable, as all members will know, was established in 1988 by the previous government to look at sustainable development for Ontario. The Native Circle is a very important part of that roundtable. It is one of six task forces that report to the roundtable, which is chaired now by my colleague the Minister of the Environment.
The members of the Native Circle are Louis (Smokey) Bruyere, native consultant; Sue Anderson, the chair of the Native Women's Association environmental committee; Coreen Cachagee, chief of the Chapleau Cree; Robert Cormier, a native entrepreneur from Sault Ste Marie; Dean Jacobs from the Walpole Island heritage centre; Randy Kapashesit, chief of Mocreebvec in northern Ontario; Fred Plain, a well-known elder from southern Ontario around Sarnia; Margaret Sutherland, an environmental consultant, and Mark Krasnick, secretary for the Ontario native affairs secretariat.
PAY EQUITY
Ms Poole: My question is for the Premier, if I could have the Premier's attention. This is a householder put out by the Premier. At least I assume it is; it has his picture on it. It has his constituency address, his Queen's Park address and the emblem of Ontario, and it has a mailback to Queen's Park.
I know the Premier considers his credibility to be extremely important to the people of this province. People have to trust their Premier. Therefore, it is very important that, when he speaks or when he writes or when he causes something to be written in his name, it is accurate. I am sure the Premier would not want to mislead his constituents, to whom this brochure was delivered.
I will quote from this householder: "We have extended pay equity to cover 420,000 women who work in jobs that until now did not qualify for pay equity increases." That is in the past tense. How can the Premier account for this terrible mistake, this inaccurate information, which is in his householder?
Hon Mr Rae: The government's announcements in this regard have been made very clearly by us. It is a matter that the government has announced as a matter of policy and it is policy that is going to be fully implemented.
Ms Poole: Maybe I can help the Premier out and straighten out the facts. In December his government announced it was going to extend pay equity to 420,000 workers, primarily child care workers. He said he was going to bring in legislation in the spring. The Premier may have forgotten that he did not deliver on this promise. In October, I asked his Minister of Labour when he was going to deliver and he refused to give us a date. The Premier has not extended pay equity and this is not the truth.
While we are on the subject, not only has the Premier not delivered on pay equity, but he did not deliver on the $30-million down payment on pay equity he promised child care workers in January. What about the $20 million he promised to women's shelters in the spring? When is that going to be delivered? They have not seen a dime. What about the 30,000 nursing home residents, 70% of whom are women? When can they expect the money the Premier promised them? What about support and custody? Why has that been delayed to the spring?
The Speaker: Could the member complete her supplementary, please.
Ms Poole: I will now place my question. The Premier has talked a big storm when it comes to making promises, making big, splashy announcements in the newspapers, but then he does not deliver. When is the Premier going to deliver on these promises?
Hon Mr Rae: I can only say to the member that the government's commitments with respect to pay equity, the ones that are specifically referred to in the householder the member is referring to, are commitments that are of great importance to this government and of great importance to me personally. The government is moving ahead in all these areas and ministers will be making statements over the next while clearly indicating the decisions that the government has already made and fully intends to implement.
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CHILD CARE CENTRES
Mr Jackson: I have a question for the Minister of Community and Social Services. When she was the Minister of Education for the previous year in this province, did she know it was her mandate that there would be no new construction of classrooms while there existed elsewhere in the community vacant classroom spaces? Yet now when she has become the Minister of Community and Social Services, why is she spending millions of taxpayers' dollars to construct new day care centre spaces when there are thousands of vacant spaces in each of the communities she is building in?
Hon Mrs Boyd: I must admit that the generality of the question makes it rather difficult to answer. I would have to be very clear with the member that if he is referring to the child care spaces that are part of the mandate of the Ministry of Education in terms of capital funding, we have a commitment to communities and this will go forward.
If he is talking about new, non-profit child care centres in areas where area offices have approved the construction of those centres, where communities have demanded those spaces and where non-profit corporations exist to offer them, I would say to him he is quite right; our government has been very clear about its preference for non-profit child care.
Unfortunately, a lot of the empty spaces he refers to are also in non-profit child care centres where municipalities have lost the ability to take up the subsidized spaces which we have offered or where individuals have lost their jobs and are no longer eligible for subsidized spaces. We are very well aware that there needs to be a reorganization of how child care is delivered and it is going to be necessary for us to work with every community to ensure that existing non-profit child care is used first.
Mr Jackson: It is apparent that all government contradictions are difficult to answer and this question is no exception for this minister.
The minister indicated in her response that municipalities had been demanding that she construct these new spaces. That simply is not true. They have been demanding that the minister provide the subsidized spaces for them because they have sufficient vacant spaces. I will give the minister the statistics in York region. The minister built 377 brand-new spaces in York region. There are 1,800 families on waiting lists for subsidized spaces and there are 1,000 vacant spaces in that community where she is building.
I would like to remind the minister of a statement she made on October 19, 1990, in the London Free Press when she was first elected. She said that although the NDP opposes private day care, the provincial government will not ignore its concerns. People believed the minister and took her at her word.
Why then would she now ignore 7,000 women day care workers who are waiting for her to reverse her position on discriminating against them in private centres? Why would she ignore the Treasurer who has specifically told her and every member of the cabinet to get better value for the dollar?
The Speaker: Would the member conclude his question, please.
Mr Jackson: Why would she ignore the Premier, who has said he wants to work with the private sector and not to shut it out? Finally, according to a Gallup poll that was released today, public opinion supports them and 68% of parents are saying, "We want this government to work co-operatively with the municipal, the non-profit and the for-profit sectors of day care in this province." Why is the minister ignoring all these people with her policies on day care?
Hon Mrs Boyd: We are not ignoring all these people. In fact, as the member may be well aware, even before I came into this ministry I had had extensive discussions with all sectors of the child care community, because of course, as Minister of Education, I was also involved in terms of the availability of child care services.
This government is united. The Treasurer and the Premier and I and all of us are united, and have been for ever, in our support of the use of public money for the non-profit sector. We have not changed that policy. Nothing I will do will change that policy. The member will find that what we will do is work to ensure that the existing child care centres that now enjoy the support of public money -- we certainly do not intend to put them out of business, as I think he said, but we are quite concerned that they not proliferate. We are quite concerned that we not support additional centres that are not now receiving public money.
CLOSING OF TREE NURSERIES
Mr Mills: My question is to the Minister of Natural Resources. In Durham East, the riding is peppered with little hamlets and villages. One of those little hamlets is Orono, and that is where I live. In that hamlet we have a provincial tree nursery, and that tree nursery has been threatened with closure. It is the only homegrown industry we have left there. The furniture factory is closed; the main street is in dire straits because people have lost their jobs. We need that nursery to keep on. Can the minister tell me what he is going to do about Orono?
Hon Mr Wildman: The member for Durham East has raised a very important question. He will know that the 10 bare root nursery stocks that we have in the province are currently operating at only 65% capacity because of the changes in silviculture and the demand for container stock. He will also be aware of the comments made just a moment ago by the member opposite of the need for us to ensure that we are efficient and effective in the use of public funds. He will know this is a very difficult matter in dealing with the needs of the employees in the communities where they live.
I know the member has raised this matter with me, as the member for Kenora has raised the issue of the Dryden nursery in the House and the member for Rainy River has also raised that with me. In my own constituency we have the nursery at Thessalon. We are having to consider how we can rationalize the number of nurseries we have and the whole nursery program in light of the pressures we are all facing in this current fiscal situation.
Mr Mills: I know and I can appreciate the very grave situation the minister finds himself in. My concern, however, is for the people of Orono. What I would like to know is what I can tell the folks back in Orono tonight so they can sleep better, because they are worried.
Hon Mr Wildman: This is a very, very important question for the people of Orono and for the member here, and if the members opposite do not think it is very important, they should discuss the situation at Dryden with the member for Kenora. Then they would understand how important this is to these small communities. I know the opposition members are not interested in the situation because they do not want to hear the answer.
The member can tell his constituents that no decision has been made. We are considering all the various options, but we hope to make a decision as quickly as possible because we do not want to keep the communities and the people working at the nurseries in limbo. We are very aware of the seriousness with which this decision must be made, both for Orono and the others involved. I should tell members, though, that in the short term the people of Orono and the nursery there do not have to be concerned because we have a number of seedlings that are already being produced that must be produced for this year, so any decisions that will be made will not take immediate effect. We hope to make a decision as soon as possible so that everyone involved will know how we are going to rationalize the need as well as the capacity to produce.
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REGULATION OF MORTGAGE BROKERS
Mr Chiarelli: My question is to the Minister of Financial Institutions. Yesterday's Provincial Auditor's report cited that the ministry was not effectively monitoring mortgage brokers. Members will recall that on the very first day of this Parliament, November 22, 1990, to be exact, I tabled legislation in this House, Bill 3, specifically designed to better control mortgage brokers and financial planning firms. This bill received favourable responses from professionals, investors and consumers alike. Six months ago in this House I again pleaded with the minister to urgently control huge mortgage broker losses. Yet he has done nothing, despite close to $1 billion in consumer and investor losses over the last three years.
The minister has had legislation in front of him for over a year and questions have been raised in the House. How many more millions of dollars must be lost before the minister will act?
Hon Mr Charlton: The member is correct that he has raised this issue a number of times. He is also correct that the former government drafted legislation to amend the Mortgage Brokers Act in 1988. It never proceeded in two and a half years to pass that legislation, and that is largely the case because that legislation was not adequate to deal with the problems that have evolved in the mortgage brokers section.
We are presently reviewing the Mortgage Brokers Act with the intent to bring in legislative changes that will in fact provide the protections the people of Ontario require.
In the meantime, since the time the auditor made his report and observed our operations in the Ministry of Financial Institutions, we have better than doubled the staff who are operating the regulatory and monitoring roles in terms of mortgage brokers. The member should note that the vast majority of losses to which he has referred occurred under the Liberal administration and not since this government came to power.
Mr Chiarelli: This minister, who has been very mealy-mouthed and pussyfooting on just about every issue, has not introduced one single --
The Speaker: I ask the member to reconsider his descriptive language and perhaps select a different word.
Mr Chiarelli: Mr Speaker, mealy-mouthed or pussyfooting, which one is unparliamentary?
The Speaker: Would the member rephrase his question.
Mr Chiarelli: The consumers and investors of Ontario rely on this minister to protect them. He has not introduced a bill or an amendment in this House -- his ministry has not -- since this government has taken over.
Today's Ottawa Citizen brings up yet another OPP investigation involving a mortgage broker collapse, with $10 million in possible investor losses. The issue has reached crisis proportions. Yet the problem is not a new one. The minister has been in government for 15 months now. Why is it that he has been unable to announce any legislation whatsoever? What is the problem? I simply want the minister to assure this House that he will introduce legislation to control mortgage brokers and financial planning firms before more frauds are perpetrated on the people of Ontario.
Hon Mr Charlton: This minister has been in government as a member of the cabinet for eight months. This minister will do in one year what the Liberal government did not do in five. The member for Ottawa West stood in this House just three weeks ago advocating that this government immediately concede to the federal government and its financial reform process, in spite of the fact that the reform is going to cause regulatory problems in terms of our ability to protect the consumers in this province.
POLICE SERVICES
Mr Runciman: I have a question for the Solicitor General. In weeks past, and even this week when he was responding to a question from the member for Renfrew North, he stood in his place and assured the members of the Legislature and the public at large that the quality and level of service with respect to the OPP is fine and that the public of Ontario have nothing to be concerned about.
We have a press release issued today by the Ontario Provincial Police Association, 4,500 strong. They say, and I put it on the record, "Faced with budget cuts, a hiring freeze and redeployment of personnel, non-police and proactive duties, the association feels the safety and wellbeing of Ontario's public is in great jeopardy."
Could the minister tell us today who the public is to believe, this minister or 4,500 policemen and policewomen across this province?
Hon Mr Pilkey: I have met with the OPPA, reviewed the concerns it had, and did so many weeks ago. If the member read the press clippings as a result of that meeting, he would see the officials of the OPPA indicated that this minister had real concern and that they believed I was going to address in a very direct way the problems they indicated. It is in fact my intention to do that.
It is true that the government does face some critical fiscal restraints and difficulties. However, it will be the intention of the OPP, the OPPA and this government to try to create a circumstance where the type of protection and safety of the public that has been provided in the past will be provided well into the future.
Mr Runciman: I do not know what confidence the policemen and policewomen can have with respect to this gentleman, because he gets up in this House week after week, day after day, and says there is no problem, that the service and quality of service are fine. That is the response he gave this week to a question from the member for Renfrew North.
We know the budget was cut. We know there are drastic service reductions across this province. Part of the Highway 401 corridor in my area of eastern Ontario is not covered for significant periods during the early morning hours. The member for Simcoe West indicated no police service in significant hours. The member for Dufferin-Peel talked about police officers having to use their own cars to respond to emergency calls. There is a real problem out there. The minister does not seem to want to recognize it.
We hear rhetoric day after day. Let's see some action from the minister finally. When is he going to act and take some measures that will have an impact on this situation?
Hon Mr Pilkey: The member raises issues and questions out of this year's estimates, not the estimates that have not even arrived here yet. The OPP has had difficulty in meeting the budget estimates it had provided and which this government passed last year. I believe a lot of these concerns emanate from that.
In terms of the projections or concerns about a more deleterious type of service in the future, it is that situation I have been addressing. I do hope we are able to provide a situation in the upcoming budget, through the Treasurer and this government, that will not see many of these concerns the member raises become a reality.
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CREDIT UNIONS
Mr Hayes: My question is to the Minister of Financial Institutions. I am a staunch supporter of the credit union system, both personally and as parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Agriculture and Food. I believe that legislation should be changed to allow credit unions to play a greater role in financial lending to farmers. It was therefore with some worry that I read in the Provincial Auditor's report that problems persist in resolving industry deficits, which currently amount to approximately $100 million.
As a resident of a rural community whose members rely heavily on credit unions, as most rural areas do, I am anxious to know what the minister is doing to ensure that this figure is reduced without economic hardship to the customers of the credit union system in the rural community.
Hon Mr Charlton: The concerns raised by the auditor I think would raise some serious concerns out there. I should point out to the member that the concerns the auditor raised resulted from a study conducted by my ministry that identified particular problems in the credit union movement. It is our view that those problems have largely been resolved, that there is not presently any credit union in the province in serious difficulty around bad loans. In fact, a program has been put in place to totally pay off the deficits over the next six years. Each of the credit unions in the province is presently paying into that program, and the deficits will all be handled by the credit unions themselves.
The Speaker: Motions?
Mr Scott: Mr Speaker, I would ask for unanimous consent to introduce the motion referred to yesterday respecting the honourable member for Lincoln.
The Speaker: Do we have unanimous consent?
Hon Mr Cooke: No.
Mr Scott: The government House leader says no. I guess I cannot introduce it if the government stands in the way.
REPORTS BY COMMITTEES
STANDING COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT AGENCIES
Mr Runciman from the standing committee on government agencies presented the committee's 19th report and moved its adoption.
The Speaker: Pursuant to standing order 104(g)(11), the report is deemed to be adopted by the House.
STANDING COMMITTEE ON REGULATIONS AND PRIVATE BILLS
Mr White from the standing committee on regulations and private bills presented the committee's report and moved its adoption:
Your committee begs to report the following bills without amendment:
Bill Pr81, An Act respecting the Town of Whitchurch-Stouffville;
Bill Pr85, An Act respecting the City of Toronto.
Your committee begs to report the following bills, as amended:
Bill Pr53, An Act respecting the City of Hamilton;
Bill Pr99, An Act respecting the City of Windsor.
Motion agreed to.
INTRODUCTION OF BILLS
FEDERATED WOMEN'S INSTITUTES OF ONTARIO, BAY OF QUINTE BRANCH ACT, 1991
Mr O'Neil moved first reading of Bill Pr109, An Act to revive Federated Women's Institutes of Ontario, Bay of Quinte Branch.
Motion agreed to.
AMENDMENTS TO THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ACT MODIFICATIONS À LA LOI SUR LA PROTECTION DE L'ENVIRONNEMENT
Mr McClelland moved first reading of Bill 161, Amendments to the Environmental Protection Act/Modifications apportées à la Loi sur la protection de l'environnement.
Motion agreed to.
Mr McClelland: By way of a brief explanation, the purpose of this bill is to provide legislative authority to move under the Environmental Protection Act to have regulations in place that would speak to waste reduction. It is the position of our party that the bill in this form, which substantially reflects other legislation but doubtless cannot pass in its present form in the House, is valuable and would serve a positive purpose for Ontario and its people as well as providing the Minister of the Environment with clear legislative authority to move ahead with packaging laws and regulations. That is the purpose of the bill.
QUESTION PERIOD
Mr Sterling: Before we move to orders of the day, I want to ask a question on standing orders 32(a) and 32(f). Those deal with the oral question period and the right of the opposition to ask ministers of the crown questions in this Legislature, which I feel is at the very root of our parliamentary procedures.
Standing order 32(f) says, "A minister to whom an oral question is directed may refer the question to another minister who is responsible for the subject matter to which the question relates."
Today during question period a question was asked of the Minister without Portfolio, the chief government whip, who then referred the question to the Minister of Municipal Affairs on a matter that clearly, in my view, was within the ambit of the Minister without Portfolio. I had the impression that the referral was given to the Minister of Municipal Affairs because the Minister without Portfolio was unprepared to answer the question.
I am not anxious today to hear the solution or the ruling or whatever you might determine to do with the question, Mr Speaker, but is it your view that because a minister does not have on-line duties, he or she is not responsible to answer questions in the House? Second, can a minister use standing order 32(f) to refer the question to any other minister in the House he or she chooses? I read the rules in a more strict manner. Perhaps the right of referral should only be given to another minister who is in fact responsible for that area.
The Speaker: I appreciate the member for Carleton raising this matter. There are two parts to his request. On the second part, it is quite clear that a minister has the right to refer questions to any other minister. It may indeed be the practice to refer the question to a related area; none the less, a minister can refer a question.
The first question, however, is one which deserves some further deliberation as it might be found that if a minister does not have a portfolio and does not have any cabinet responsibilities, it is not proper to address a question to that individual. I will take what you have raised under advisement and I will report back to you as soon as possible.
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MOTIONS
COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTIONS
Mr Cooke moved that the following substitutions be made to the membership of the committees of the House:
On the standing committee on estimates, Mr Miclash for Mr McGuinty;
On the standing committee on finance and economic affairs, Mr Mahoney for Mrs Sullivan;
On the standing committee on general government, Mr McClelland for Mr Mancini, Ms Poole for Mr Scott;
On the standing committee on government agencies, Mr Elston for Mr Bradley;
On the standing committee on the Ombudsman, Mr Scott for Mrs Fawcett;
On the standing committee on public accounts, Mr Cordiano for Mr Bradley, Mr Offer for Ms Poole;
On the standing committee on regulations and private bills, Mr Beer for Mr Miclash;
On the standing committee on resources development, Mr McGuinty for Mr Offer;
On the standing committee on social development, Mrs Fawcett for Mr Beer, Mr Sola for Mr Cordiano, Mrs Sullivan for Mrs McLeod.
Motion agreed to.
ORDERS OF THE DAY
OPPOSITION DAY
ONTARIO ECONOMY
Mr Bradley moved opposition day motion 2:
That, in the opinion of this House, since the government has assumed power, the province's unemployment rate has reached 9.6%, more than 286,000 Ontario workers have lost their jobs, more than one million people in Ontario are on welfare, the government has predicted that Ontario's economy will shrink by 3.3%, the deficit will reach $9.7 billion this year, and even with these predictions, the Treasurer has miscalculated twice, been forced to delay spending and ask for more federal money; therefore, this House calls upon the Treasurer to introduce a comprehensive plan for economic renewal which will get the province's economy moving again.
Mr Bradley: We are calling upon the Premier to take immediate steps to jump-start Ontario's ailing economy. Anyone who has observed the circumstances facing this province, particularly while the Premier was travelling about Europe the past couple of weeks and not in the Legislative Assembly and not in many of the communities which have been hit hard by the tough economic times in this province, would come to the conclusion that the plans which have been formulated by this government, if indeed they are plans, to deal with the Ontario economy have been certainly at the very least unsuccessful and probably at best disastrous.
We must believe the entire government will take responsibility for this, from the Premier down. Even though they have made mistakes in the past and even though the Treasurer has twice miscalculated on his predictions for the economy in this province, it is our view that he should start again, gather together his best advisers, get advice from outside the government, speak to the people in Treasury and develop a new plan of action to get the Ontario economy moving once again.
It is quite obvious to all members of this House that we are not out of the recession, the recession is going to be with us for some period of time and it is going to take some direct government action and encouragement of investment in this province not only in terms of new investment, which obviously we must have to get the wheels of the economy moving again, but in terms of making an effort to retain the investment which is here already.
Those of us in the official opposition will be outlining our views on this important subject this afternoon. We hope we can have a very useful debate that will contribute in a positive sense to getting the Ontario economy moving once again.
Mr Sterling: I had not expected the Leader of the Opposition to have so little to say. Perhaps my remarks will further amplify why I fully understand that, because when one reads the motion brought forward this afternoon by the interim leader of the official opposition, one hardly knows where to start. Clichés like you really should not throw stones if you live in glass houses or the proverbial ostrich with its head in the sand abound. Even biblical sayings like "Judge not that ye be not judged" come to mind. Most fitting in this case is the pot calling the kettle black.
Hon Mr Laughren: I appreciate that one.
Mr Sterling: I knew the Treasurer would appreciate those remarks.
We have an opportunity to debate this motion this afternoon, which basically states some unarguable facts, a litany of one-liners that each tell a horror story of human tragedy. The motion calls for the Treasurer "to introduce a comprehensive plan for economic renewal which will get the province's economy moving again." There is really no debate on that. The facts speak for themselves, and no one should debate the need for a plan for economic renewal.
This motion, however, certainly begs some questions, like why the opposition is interested in reviewing the dismal record of the former Liberal government. If one examines the premise of this motion put forward by the member for St Catharines, it is mostly based on the failures of his very own party. The former Liberal government, in which the member was an influential cabinet minister, can be held responsible, at least in a very large part, for each and every one of the stated facts that preface his motion.
For instance, it states, "The province's unemployment rate has reached 9.6%." We warned the Liberal government about strangling businesses in Ontario. We warned them that businesses would have to reduce the size of their staff if the government was intent on proceeding with an employment tax, the commercial concentration tax in the greater Toronto area, the tire tax, increasing gasoline taxes and other taxes that increased revenues by 132% in the five-year reign of the formal Liberal government.
The Liberals never seemed to get around to asking the question, and now unfortunately neither does the New Democratic Party, of why. Why would anyone want to invest money in a business venture here in Ontario in the present climate? Why would anyone want to become an employer in this province? New labour legislation put forward by the New Democratic Party is suggesting that we strengthen the power of unions and override the rights of employers. What happened to the earlier promises of consultation with business and listening to the people who do not use the well but create the well at the primary level?
The next statement in the Liberal motion is, "More than 286,000 Ontario workers have lost their jobs." That unemployment started during the last Liberal government. As we all know, unemployment goes much deeper than just the loss of a job, for it means the loss of identity, the loss of self-esteem and the loss of dreams and hopes for the future of that individual. Plants are closing and retail stores are going under. From all reports, it is likely that many of these could be permanent job losses.
Our leader asked a question many times during the last election: Why is Ontario the highest-taxed jurisdiction in all of North America, what did the Liberals do with all this money and why did they not prepare for a rainy day?
The next statement is, "More than one million people in Ontario are on welfare." That is one tenth of our population. One tenth of our people are on social assistance. They are on welfare because the system has failed them. The government has failed by not providing the climate in which business and enterprise could flourish and provide good jobs for the people of Ontario. Thousands of Ontarians now on social assistance are able to work and very much want to work, yet employers cannot afford to hire them. By linking social assistance directly to employment, as recommended in the SARC report, Queen's Park could effectively create a multibillion-dollar pool of money to put people back to work at virtually no cost to the taxpayer.
"The government has predicted that Ontario's economy will shrink by 3.3%" this year. We warned the former Liberal government repeatedly throughout the years from 1985 to 1990. We are now warning the present NDP government that our economy is going to suffer and shrink if it continually increases taxation and continues to give in to the demands of organized labour, making Ontario less attractive to investors and entrepreneurs.
"The deficit will reach $9.7 billion this year." We should really clarify this and say that, if we are lucky, the deficit will be held at $9.7 billion. The Liberals went on a spending spree of unprecedented proportions during the years they governed. They broadened and elevated the expenditure base to a point where it could not be sustained in the absence of an economic boom, except through either new taxes or huge deficits. It appears that might be the Liberal way.
They were true to form in following the federal Liberal Party between 1975 and 1984, because during that period of time the federal Liberal Party took the federal deficit from approximately $2 billion to some $36 billion annually in 1984, leaving the 1984 Mulroney government with a $200-billion debt 10 years later. That is what they started with and that is what we do not want to start with when we are voted into power here in 1995.
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In some ways, I sympathize with the government of today in that not only did it inherit a difficult financial situation, it also inherited a philosophy of "Spend your way to prosperity." Whether they will admit it or not, it should be obvious to the members of this new administration that it will not work. That brings us to the next statement in this motion today, "Even with these predictions, the Treasurer has miscalculated twice, been forced to delay spending and ask for more federal money."
In the five years the Liberal Party governed this province, there was never an attempt to look at the future and put forward a plan of vision that the people could adopt, have faith in and work towards. Likewise, today's NDP government has not put forward that same vision. Oh, it has put forward a vision. We saw it in the last election. It was a document called An Agenda for People, but once they took the reins of government, they abandoned this piece of paper as worthless and threw it aside.
I am proud of our party, the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, in that we are a step ahead of the other two parties in this Legislature. My leader and our party have put forward a plan, a vision for the future, in New Directions: A Blueprint for Economic Renewal and Prosperity in Ontario. This paper tries to address some of our economic problems. It is not perfect. It is meant to be a discussion paper, and we hope to issue volumes 2 and 3 as we are able to develop them over the coming years.
We believe that renewing the economy is the first step towards resolution of social problems, because without a strong economic base there are no jobs, no investment and no tax base to fund social programs. We are concerned about the future of this province and have demonstrated that by looking forward with a comprehensive plan, we can indeed provide a vision for the people of Ontario.
We understand that our problems in resolving social ills are directly linked to a weak economy. When there is no opportunity for employment or prosperity, people cannot contribute to their society and, instead, add their weight to the social burden carried by the rest of the population. On the other hand, when people have jobs and the confidence to invest in the economy, the size of the social burden is immensely reduced. The fewer people who need help, the more we can help.
I know from experience that when the NDP government reviews the statements put forward by the member for St Catharines today its immediate response will be, as usual, "It's the federal government's fault." The Premier and his ministers love to heap blame on the federal government in order to divert the responsibility from themselves. I want to remind members of this House that the federal government has presented us perhaps not with popular policies but with fairly clear directions and long-term policies. They have contained their spending to a much better degree than we have in this province. They are addressing the deficit. They seem to have a view towards the future. We may not like the GST, and some people do not like free trade, but it is not likely that any party, regardless of political stripe, will change these things if given the opportunity.
In contrast, the leader of the federal Liberal Party has appeared on many occasions to have nothing but apple pie on his chin. He offers platitudes and, like the leader of the third party of the House of Commons, continues to look backwards and dwells on things that basically cannot be changed.
Although the opposition motion which we are discussing today calls for a comprehensive plan for economic renewal, we have not yet seen them come forward with one when they were in government or now in opposition. Maybe they ought to listen to their own advisers. At last weekend's national Liberal convention, United States economist and writer Lester Thurow said a whole bunch when he said, "The role of government is to represent the future to the present." I think that includes a comprehensive plan for economic renewal, something that offers direction, offers a vision, something that gives us hope, something that gives investors and entrepreneurs confidence in our province.
If I may be permitted a closing cliché, not my own but from a journalist reporting on last week's Liberal convention, "The Liberal Party has been driving via a rear-view mirror." I want to thank members very much for the opportunity to debate this afternoon, but the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party would prefer to look forward, not backward, and we are doing that with our new comprehensive plan for economic renewal, New Directions. We have put it down on the table. We challenge the other parties in this Legislature to put foward their thoughts so that the people of Ontario can reflect on their vision for the future.
Hon Mr Laughren: I appreciate the opportunity to join in this debate this afternoon on the motion put forth by the leader of the official opposition. In his very brief opening comments -- and they were very brief; I know he is going to save his substantial remarks for the windup of the debate later on this afternoon -- even in those few short remarks he contradicted himself once. He talked about the Premier jaunting around Europe and in the very next sentence said, "What we've got to do is fight for more investment in this province."
He cannot have it both ways. Is he serious that we should be trying to attract new investment that creates jobs and new wealth in this province or is he not? If he is just using rhetoric, fine, let's get that on the record. But if he is serious about it, then that means we have to talk to investors in other parts of the world. Every other government leader does it. Is he suggesting that this government, the most industrialized province in Canada, ignore potential investors in the rest of the world? I think that would be irresponsible, and for the member for St Catharines to imply that the Premier was on a jaunt is really unfair. He worked extremely hard in talking to people both in terms of industrial investors and also some potential capital investors from other parts of the world. That is what came from the member for St Catharines, affectionately known as the eco-terrorist member of cabinet when he was the Minister of the Environment. I say that with affection, not with any sense of harm.
Built into the question, though, is the implication that government can solve all the problems. That is simply not the case. It never was the case and it is less the case today than it was in days gone by. That simply is not on.
The Progressive Conservative critic, the member for Carleton, had some very positive remarks to make and I appreciated what he had to say. In particular, he referred to the Progressive Conservative document for economic renewal. I cannot remember the exact name of it.
Mr Turnbull: New Directions.
Hon Mr Laughren: New Directions. That, I felt, was a very positive approach by the Progressive Conservative opposition to enter the debate on the problems facing this province. I think they understand that I do not agree with the solutions they bring forward, but that is not the point. It was a very positive approach to the problems of this province and a helpful document as well. That is something the official opposition has not yet done and I look forward to it doing something along those lines as well.
I would say to the critic, the person who really should be the leader of the third party, that when he talks about the federal debt and deficit, he is quite right. They inherited a very large debt, just as we inherited something we were not expecting. But at the present time the federal government is spending roughly 34 cents of every revenue dollar on servicing that public debt. In this province, even at the end of four years with the deficits we are adding to the cumulative debt of Ontario, we will be paying a little over 12 cents on the revenue dollar in servicing that debt.
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Mr Turnbull: The Conservatives are going in the right direction, though.
Hon Mr Laughren: I am not bashing the federal government. The member should not overreact. I am just saying we do not want to get into that same fiscal trap where we are spending a third of our revenue dollars on servicing the debt. We are very serious about that. The federal government is really in a fiscal trap at this point and we are very serious about not getting into that same trap.
When I look at the actual motion, I ask members to think about this: "Since the government has assumed power, the province's unemployment rate has reached 9.6%." Absolutely correct. It dipped down to 9.2% one month and came back up to 9.6%. That was a disquieting jump in the unemployment rate.
"More than 286,000 Ontario workers have lost their jobs." Absolutely correct. We might quibble about the number a bit, but it is over 260,000, for sure. Ontario has 38% of the labour force of this country and 80% of the layoffs in the last 18 months.
"More than one million people in Ontario" are on some form of social assistance. That is correct. "The government has predicted that Ontario's economy will shrink by 3.3%." Correct. "The deficit will reach $9.7 billion this year." Correct. "Even with these predictions, the Treasurer has miscalculated twice, been forced to delay spending and ask for more federal money." Partly correct.
Those are six points in the resolution. Any time the Liberal opposition gets five out of six on a test like this, I want to vote for it. I want to serve notice that we intend to vote for this resolution this afternoon, because if it is right that many times, five out of six -- as a matter of fact, it is partially right on number six when it says we have been forced to delay spending. That is correct. We have cut spending and we have delayed some spending. Absolutely correct.
"And ask for more federal money" -- well, that is only partially correct. What we are demanding is what we are entitled to, because of the drop in income taxes the federal government collects for us as part of the stabilization arrangements between the federal government and the provinces. So that is partly correct, although it is not as though we are saying, "Oh please, give us some money." It is because we are entitled to that money. That is playing a little loose with the facts.
For the member for St Catharines to say the Treasurer has miscalculated twice is a bit unfair and is the only thing that gave me pause for thought about supporting the resolution. When I think of somebody from the Liberal caucus accusing us of miscalculating, that is really hard to take. When the Liberals were in office a little over a year ago, either they miscalculated or --
Mr Hope: Don't say it.
Hon Mr Laughren: Okay, they miscalculated. I am convinced the Liberals miscalculated as well when they said, going into the election campaign in the summer of 1990 and during the campaign of 1990, "There's going to be a surplus in the province of Ontario." What did the surplus turn out to be? A $3-billion deficit. That was when the recession had barely started.
I can accept criticism from the Liberal opposition, but for them to say we miscalculated twice and make that part of a resolution for an opposition day is a bit strange and is really leading with your chin. I think the leader's caucus colleagues should have told him, "Look, you can get away with this resolution, but you'd better take out the part that says the Treasurer of the day miscalculated," because nobody miscalculated more than the Liberals did when they were in government. Nobody on the face of the earth miscalculated more than they did.
I do not want to dwell on that, other than to say that we do indeed intend to vote for this resolution. It is a very factual resolution except for a couple of minor things at the end about miscalculation, and as long as we all understand and put that in perspective, then we have no problem on this side voting for something that lays out the economic woes of the province. It is absolutely correct. How could one deny what is in this resolution? It is absolutely correct.
It does call for "the Treasurer to introduce a comprehensive plan for economic renewal which will get the province's economy moving again." That seems to me to be a very positive suggestion and one on which we have an obligation to move, to take action. I want to assure members that we intend to do that. We intend to do what we can to get the economy moving again, and I think there are a couple of components to the way in which we are going to do that.
Before we break for Christmas, I want to table and make available to everyone what the economic outlook is. Following that, we want to engage in a more open budgetary process than has ever been done in this province. I do not say this in a critical way. I think the times have changed and we simply need to do that. We want to lay before the members and anyone else out there the severity of the problem. That will not be done until January because of assembling all the numbers and getting it put together in a proper package and in a form that is, if I could use the term, user-friendly so that people can debate during the pre-budget consultation the problems we face.
I think as well we want to have a different kind of pre-budget consultation. Last year, having just formed the government, we went through the exercise that had been done in years gone by. It really was more of an act of self-indulgence than it was a challenge. Groups would come in and tell us what they wanted and then they would leave. The next group would come in and tell us what it wanted, and it might be in complete opposition to what the previous group had said. Then another group would come in and say what it wanted from us. I thought that was a bit sterile and certainly did not challenge the people who were coming in. It really was, as I say, an act of self-indulgence. I enjoyed listening to them and met a lot of people I had never met before, and I think it was a good exercise. I am not bemoaning the fact we did it last year, but I think it is time for a change because times have changed, so we want to have a completely different kind of pre-budget consultation. We will see what the reaction is, but I think it is a positive thing.
We have as a government five key principles involved in achieving long-lasting economic renewal, and I emphasize the term "long-lasting" because the days of the quick fix are gone. Simply finding money for a quick job creation program is not going to solve the long-run structural problems of this province.
Last winter, when we saw the severity of the recession, we put in place a job creation strategy, an anti-recession package, as we called it, and we spent about $700 million provincially; with the contribution of local government, whether school boards or municipalities or hospitals, it came close to $1 billion, I would think. That will all be spent and those jobs will be created, and it will be somewhere between 14,000 and 20,000 jobs, we think 14,000 direct jobs and possible spinoffs of more as a result of that program. I think it was the right thing to do, having just come to government and wanting to put in place something that signalled we were not just lying down in the face of this very severe recession, that we wanted to do something about it.
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So I am glad we did that, but that anti-recession package does not help us restructure the economy of the province. What it did was take off the shelf capital works projects that had been there for some time. They were going to have to be done. This was a case of moving them up and doing them in the depths of the worst recession this province has experienced since the Great Depression back in the 1930s. I think it was the right thing to do, despite the fact that we got some criticism that we spent that $700 million, which of course directly increased the deficit.
We would have had a deficit of $9 billion instead of $9.7 billion if we had sat on our hands and not done anything at all to combat the recession. It would have been a lower deficit, that is true, but I think there would have been more unemployment out there, which in turn would have drawn on our social assistance moneys as well. So it was a mixed bag, what we did. It was something we had to do, though, and I think to have just sat and done nothing would have been inappropriate.
However, that is not the long-run solution. What we have to move to now is a strategy for long-term economic renewal, because there is absolutely no question that this province is being restructured underneath us. If we do not understand that and cope with that, it is at the peril of all of us that we ignore it.
One number I use over and over again is that in the recession 10 years ago, which was fairly severe as well, 24% of all job losses were deemed to be permanent. The balance were temporary job losses as a result of the recession. This time, two thirds -- not 24% but 65% -- of all job losses are deemed to be permanent. That tells members how profound and staggering the restructuring is that is going on underneath us. We had better understand that. That, if nothing else, tells us that quick fixes will not solve the problem and also that governments cannot solve the problem.
In a very short, cyclical recession, governments can do something such as the anti-recession package and so forth, and other governments have done it as well. But when restructuring is so profound, that kind of action for combating it simply will not work. We have to somehow get on track with a different kind of economic renewal package.
For us, economic renewal means raising the living standards and improving the working conditions of the people of the province. We cannot do that if we insist that workers earn less money, if we accept that workers must live in poorer working conditions or in a degraded environment or that there be restrictions on collective bargaining. I do not think that is the way in which we improve the lot of people in this province.
Our role as government, regardless of which government is over here, is to encourage change and to do what we can to make that happen -- to make sure that this change occurs, that everyone benefits from it, and that while we are going through a difficult period, the burden is shared fairly as well. This is going to be an extremely difficult couple of years ahead of us. If we do not fight very hard to make sure the burden of that struggle is shared, then we create divisions in society that are very undesirable and we end up with enormous gaps between the haves and the have-nots in our society. We all know other societies, some not far from here, where that has happened. I believe that is counterproductive and I think most members of this assembly, in their heart of hearts, would agree with that.
That means there are going to have to be some very tough decisions made in the next couple of years as to what we spend money on and what kinds of taxes we levy in the province. That has to be done very carefully, because while we may be coming out of the recession, we are not out of it yet and it is going to be a slow recovery. We are going to have difficulty coping with the expenditures that are already built into our budgets and into all our programs across the province. It is going to be very difficult just to cope with that.
As I indicated a couple of weeks ago, income tax revenues that have been collected by the federal government on behalf of the province are going to affect our revenue base next year by somewhere between $1 billion and $2 billion. That is how volatile those numbers are. That is one reason I have asked the federal Minister of Finance to deal with that issue at our next meeting of all the ministers and to try and create some kind of federal-provincial task force to deal with forecasting, because it hurts us all when the forecasting is off as badly as it has been. This is not just this year; it has been off by $1 billion in years gone by, too. To my chagrin, it was always on the upside for the other governments. With us, it is on the downside. That is not the fault of the federal government. They did not reduce it arbitrarily. That was simply the money that was not collected.
Nobody believed that it was happening that way. A week before I made the announcement about the income tax shortfall, Statscan was still forecasting a 7.5% increase in personal incomes in this country. At the same time, we have this enormous shortfall in income taxes collected. There is a real dilemma and a real contradiction between some of the numbers being forecast. That is really quite worrisome. I hope to raise that. I will be meeting with Mr Mazankowski tomorrow, as a matter of fact. We will be talking about some of these issues.
Another aspect of economic renewal is going to be the partnership that has developed between employers and employees. That is important if we are going to increase productivity. I know there has been a lot of talk, particularly by the third party, that our proposed changes to the Labour Relations Act will be counterproductive in this regard. I do not believe that. I expect the employers to resist this change but, at the same time, I do not believe it is counterproductive. If anything, I believe that in the long run it will be more productive and will provide a more stable industrial relations environment. Certainly the experience in Quebec, when it made these kinds of changes, was not that it caused disruptions at all; as a matter of fact, I think the opposite was the case.
In terms of having a larger percentage of the workforce organized into unions, I look at other countries. The one that comes to mind immediately is Germany, which has a significantly higher proportion of its workforce organized into unions than we do here and yet is one of the highest value added, high-wage, most productive economies we have seen for some time.
We should put it in perspective. We are not in an era where the economies that thrive will be the ones that have the lowest wages. They will be the ones that are most productive, with the most educated and best-trained workforces and the best infrastructure, in whatever jurisdiction. We are determined to make sure that happens, but it will not happen automatically and it will not happen by simply taking away the collective bargaining rights of working people.
We want to encourage more work in the higher value added goods and services sectors. That is absolutely critical. To do that we are going to need a highly skilled and educated workforce. That does not come cheaply either. But to abandon that simply would not solve the problem. It would make the problem worse.
We are going to do some innovative things with skills training, through the Ontario training and adjustment boards we are going to be setting up. More details will be coming.
We are going to try as best we can to protect and improve our social programs. That is an extremely difficult thing to do in times like this when we have revenue and expenditure problems. I happen to believe we have to use the skills and talents of all the people. When we talk about programs such as employment equity, that is to encourage the maximum potential of all people in our society, not just the people who have traditionally had the opportunities to move ahead in the workplace. We want to make sure that happens. We will all gain by that. We will all be advantaged by that.
Those are some of the principles we believe are the components of economic renewal. We have already done work in some areas. We have announced an Ontario investment and worker ownership program which will encourage workers to invest in the economy. That makes the economy more productive and experience elsewhere says that is certainly the case. It is also a source of new capital for the business community.
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We want to protect workers in difficult times. We have already announced an increase in the minimum wage. Before people start foaming at the mouth about the increase in the minimum wage, let me tell members that increasing the minimum wage to $6 an hour returns the purchasing power of people at the minimum wage to what it was 15 years ago.
That is not an outrageous increase in the minimum wage. That is how badly former governments have allowed the minimum wage to erode. We think that is fundamentally wrong and we are simply taking the minimum wage back up. We did not make it an enormous increase. Taking it up to $6 was certainly, to me, the least we could do. Very often these are women and minorities who are working at this level of pay. We think we had an obligation to do that and I am very pleased we did.
We brought into place the employee wage protection fund which protects workers who, for no fault of their own, are not paid moneys that are owed to them by their employer. That is what it does. It seems to me that too was the least we could do.
We have the office of labour adjustment to the Ministry of Labour as well to assist with workplace adjustment committees.
Of course, I mentioned employment equity because it is important that all citizens have a chance to participate in and contribute to the Ontario economy.
We have announced a $1.6-billion training agreement with Ottawa, which will go some way to developing a new system of training, which almost everyone acknowledges needs to be done. We need to bring some coherence to training in this province, and it is necessary in other jurisdictions too. We want to work with the federal government, the business community and the labour movement to make sure that training reflects the needs of various communities, not just a centrally directed kind of training.
Of course, we want to create and maintain jobs as much as we can in this province.
Those are some remarks. I trust that my colleagues will not have too much difficulty in supporting the resolution brought forth by the leader of the official opposition because, as I said, any time the member for St Catharines gets five out of six right, I am on his side and I want to vote for him.
Mr Phillips: I am pleased to join in the debate just to reflect a bit on some comments made by some of the other members already.
There was a comment made about the Premier's trip to Europe. One has no difficulty with his going to Europe. Our question is this: He is off in July, off in September, off in August, January and February; why not go then? The only reason we could see for going in the last two weeks was to somehow or other cement some deal on de Havilland. If that were the reason, we could certainly support his trip. But within hours of his arriving back, it was clear that nothing happened on de Havilland. The one possibility was that he got a quick no on it. So I would have no difficulty with the Premier travelling.
A second comment I would make is that I think the Provincial Auditor has done all of us a service by commenting on the surpluses. The Treasurer does not do himself a service, frankly -- I have a lot of respect for the Treasurer -- in attempting to perhaps be unfair, to use a term, on the deficit. The auditor says this: "Ontario has had only one surplus in the last 20 years." That was the year ended March 31, 1990. That was the final year in which the Liberal government had control of the budget.
In the five years, every single year when we were in power, the deficit was reduced and we had the only surplus in 20 years. This is what the auditor says about the forecast. Indeed, he says -- remembering again that the Treasurer was responsible for the budget for the majority of the year; I think he will acknowledge that -- "The 1990 budget which was tabled...forecast a surplus."
He says there were three major factors contributing to the variance, one being the recession, which cut revenue by $1 billion, "which was obviously not foreseen at the time of the budget." That is what the auditor says. Then there were special payments made in the budget that the Treasurer made, as it says here, for another $1 billion. Those were payments that did not have to be made in that fiscal year. The teachers' pension fund payments certainly did not have to be made in that fiscal year. Then he goes on to say that of the remaining $1 billion expenditures, the major contributing factor was the increase in social assistance payments.
So the auditor has done our work for us and said there were three components to the $3-billion deficit: $1 billion because of revenue shortfalls, major payments in social assistance and $1 billion in expenditures the Treasurer decided to make last year.
I repeat: The only surplus in 20 years, as the auditor says, was in the final year of the Liberal regime. The auditor has spelled out clearly the reasons for the $3-billion deficit the Treasurer refers to. We have an independent auditor who has now spelled it out well for us.
I will go on to my leader's motion on our concerns about the economy. There is no question that the economy is in significant difficulty. Our criticism of the government is that we do not believe we can name one major, significant thing the NDP has done in the 14 months it has been in government to get the economy rolling. Certainly the Treasurer just outlined some of the job concerns. Unemployment is running at 9.9%.
I look down the various factors of how we are going to recover from the economy. In the major employment sectors, we have difficulty in the manufacturing sector, which is down significantly and I do not think there is any indication yet that this sector is picking up. Members will realize the agricultural community is in some difficulty. Jobs are declining there. Jobs are declining in the resource sector. Transportation is down, I think, the most of any, and we know that sector continues to be in difficulty. Construction continues to struggle, particularly in the industrial and commercial sectors. The financial sector is declining. The service sector -- and this includes hospitals, school boards, colleges and universities -- is declining as well.
Where are the jobs going to come from? Right now we are at 9.6% unemployment. I do not see any sector where we can look for significant job growth over the next little while.
To get rolling, the economy is going to need some confidence in the government's fiscal plan. The problem is that this year's deficit is at $9.7 billion. Next year's deficit, as the Treasurer acknowledges, looks like it could be as much as $10 billion or $11 billion. In the following two years, the deficits will run at $8 billion to $9 billion.
The investment community, for those who are looking to invest either dollar capital or intellectual capital, says, "Listen, four years of significant fiscal woes...." By the way, all those deficits assume significant new taxes. That is our second concern. The first concern is, where are the jobs going to come from? The second concern is that the fiscal management of the province is, at very best, questionable.
It was just today that I was looking at the Toronto Star. It says:
"Bankruptcies zoom to monthly record. Consumer bankruptcies in October totalled 5,740; business bankruptcies 1,156. This is a record, up 16.4% from the same month in 1990.
"Among major cities, Toronto continued to show major growth in the number of residents collecting UI over the 12-month period."
It goes on to talk about bankruptcies and unemployment.
While the Treasurer will say that the recession looks like it is over and the economy is picking up, there are a lot of signals out there suggesting that the economy continues to struggle.
I guess it was back in April that we had a similar debate and we were urging the government to introduce a program for economic renewal. I said at the time that I thought it would only be a matter of weeks, certainly months at the latest, before the Premier and Treasurer would come to this House with a program for jobs. I fully expected that we would have seen, well before now, the Treasurer and the Premier announcing some kind of program to get the economy rolling, to create jobs. We have seen virtually nothing.
The Treasurer has said he wants to make the budget process more open. I am frankly sceptical of that. I took him at his word. Some of the members opposite were on that committee that spent the summer listening to budget comments. Frankly, it was essentially a worthless exercise. We had groups organized to come. Wherever we were, it was the same presentation. Rather than an opportunity for the public to participate, it was a stage-managed process. One of the members opposite chose to express a point of view on budget matters and voted against a budget bill he felt was perhaps not in the best interests of constituents. Talk about openness: He was then taken off the committee. That was the last we saw of the committee.
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It was ironic in the extreme that it was last Thursday, November 21, when the new Chairman was nominated, and it was the ex-Chairman's final day. But the next day, in this open process, the Treasurer sent a letter to the Chairman, the member for Lincoln, asking him to open up the budget process. Someone simply forgot to tell the Treasurer that there had been a coup and the Chairman was gone.
The reason I raise all this is that in the opposition, as we attempt to be helpful and constructive in opening the process up and contributing, we get taken a little bit for suckers. The budget process was supposed to be open over the hearings, but then we found the Premier's office busily phoning all the various places we were going and saying, "Get down there and tell them you like the budget." We thought it was going to be open. The Chairman of the standing committee on finance and economic affairs happened to vote against one bill and he is gone. He is not even Chairman; he is off the committee now. We, as opposition, would like to be helpful, we would like to contribute to the budget process, but I am a little more cynical now about that invitation than I might have been a year ago.
I want to talk now about an economic renewal plan. Surely the members opposite can accept that we should be turning our full attention to this. In fact, I took the Premier at his word. We came back after the summer break on September 23. We were not back in the House 15 minutes when the Premier got up and said: "Economic renewal is our number one priority. You will be hearing, over the next few weeks, our plan." Essentially we are still waiting for it.
The components of the economic renewal plan appear to be these, and the Treasurer outlined them. First, I will characterize them as plans that will not be implemented, at the very best, for several months. Second, I would say to the House they are as likely to be divisive as helpful. Third, they offer no hope at all to the 500,000 people in this province who are unemployed and who want to work. None of them will come into play for at least six months. We are going to go through one of the toughest winters without any sense of hope on the part of the people of Ontario.
The elements the Treasurer has outlined in his economic renewal plan include worker ownership. There is some merit in parts of that, but I said to the Treasurer when he introduced it that it is odd only unions are able to participate in this. In other provinces that have similar venture capital, other employee groups can. At the time, the Treasurer said, "No, they cannot do that; other provinces do not have it." Other provinces do have it.
The second part of the economic renewal plan, I suspect, will be announced tomorrow; if not tomorrow, certainly next week. That is going to be the training component. If there is one area I think all of us can agree on, certainly that is the need to help develop the skill level, to help in the retraining area and to help ensure there is a match between the requirements of the workplace and the skills of the individuals.
We will be looking carefully at that plan as it is announced, particularly in what I call the governance area, because I suspect this plan will have a budget of perhaps $700 million to $1 billion and I hope that in the governance, the management of this plan, it is seen as a partnership among all the parties and not simply organized labour and business.
The Labour Relations Act, I guarantee all of us, whether we like it or not, is going to start a firestorm out there and, just at the time when we want to get the economy rolling, as I have said before, the two major groups that are going to help to put out the fire are going to be in a battle. That just does not make sense.
To conclude, I would say to the government that it must get on with putting forward an economic recovery plan. They cannot wait for the six to eight months of this plan, and the plan they have proposed will not work. We need from the government a new economic plan, one it will announce before Christmas, to get things rolling, or else we are going to have a long, difficult winter for the 500,000 people who would like to work but cannot find jobs right now.
Mr Carr: I am pleased to enter the debate this afternoon and add a few points I hope will be helpful to the discussions. I think all sides agree on one thing, as I look at this Liberal motion. Certainly Ontario is definitely in trouble. Our economy is being battered by high taxation, high unemployment and low productivity. As we sit here today, our social structures are being stretched to the limit because of soaring costs for health, education and welfare, and some of the other problems that are facing us, the issues of crime and poverty, seem to be responding faster than we can compete and keep up with them.
In spite of all this, as we all know -- and we should take a little bit of time to count our blessings -- we in this province still have one of the highest standards of living of any of the people on this planet, but our time is very limited. As these pressures continue to grow, many of the social programs we care about are in jeopardy. All the things we care about, the health care, the education, the environment, the good roads, all the things we cherish in this province do not depend upon the compassion of government; they do, however, depend on having a healthy and prosperous economy to support them.
As I sit here and look at this economy that historically has had 40% of the jobs and 50% of the manufacturing capacity and ask, "How did it happen. Why are we in this situation?" I think the answer is very clear. Governments at all levels and of all political stripes have been overtaxing, overspending, overgoverning, overregulating and being oversimplistic in their approach to public policy for far too long. Quite frankly, what we have done is sacrificed long-term fiscal and economic planning to political expediency.
One of the problems we have, as we look at it since 1985, is that during the period of growth where we had the largest growth of any of the industrialized world with the exception of Japan, we had 50 tax increases -- 50 tax increases since 1985, with the bulk of them coming between 1987 and 1990.
In 1985 this province had a 10% cost advantage versus Quebec and was very competitive, in a Conference Board of Canada report, versus Germany and the United States and Japan. Now as we sit here today, after five years of the programs and the spendings of the Liberal and the NDP governments, we sit in the most highly taxed province in Canada, the most highly taxed jurisdiction in all North America. The problem has been very simple. After 1985 in this province, we began taxing and spending like there was no tomorrow, and now, unfortunately, tomorrow has arrived.
It has been referred to, and I want to touch very briefly on it in my moments that are left, because I would like to leave some time for my colleague the member for Etobicoke West, that we have put together what is called New Directions: A Blueprint for Economic Renewal and Prosperity in Ontario.
I had the pleasure of being up in Thunder Bay yesterday to speak to a Rotary Club luncheon and spoke about this, and a lot of groups, people of all political stripes, came up and said: "We're very pleased. We finally have a political party that is attempting to do something in a non-partisan manner."
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I say to the members opposite and to the members of the Liberal Party and to the members of the public that if they would like a copy in a non-partisan manner they can call my office, Oakville South, and I would be pleased to get them a copy. As we say in this document, it is not a political document. Our economic problems are far too pressing to play political games. Some of the ideas in here may be perceived as Conservative ideas, but they are based more on reality than they are political philosophies.
I will say that a letter that is at the beginning of this by the leader of our party, the member for Nipissing, says it best: "It is my sincere hope that the other politicians and interest groups can put aside their partisan feelings, step back from their political agendas and join with us in the search for the new directions which will lead us to a more stable and prosperous society."
There are some programs in here that we have talked about. If members look through the index, we talked about the taxation matters; we talked about the wage subsidies to link social assistance programs to jobs; we talked about jobs retraining, training and apprenticeship programs; a moratorium on the minimum wage increase; what we would do with the Labour Relations Act, and some of the things we would be talking about in terms of the budget process which, as all parties have agreed to here today, has been a disaster.
We talked about some of the programs, and I was fortunate enough to introduce the sunset clause and the private member's bill which would have had a board or a commission review any spending program over the last period of its mandate to see if it could be streamlined or improved or it would be terminated. We talked about many ideas in here that hopefully will get us on the road back to prosperity. I would encourage all members and the Treasurer, who has said he is pleased that a political party is doing that, to see me for a copy.
I will say very clearly that the problems are very simple. I have in my hands a copy of a document from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. They say the problems facing this province are directly as a result of this Premier and this New Democratic government. When we look at it, quite frankly the total tax burden and the total regulations in this province are making it uncompetitive.
What we are hoping to do is to offer some concrete proposals to reduce some of the costs so that we can give some opportunity for tax relief. There is one fundamental principle that I think is clear now more than it has ever been in our nation's history: If we cannot compete we are going to lose markets, and when we lose markets people lose jobs. It will not matter what political party is in at any particular time. If we are unable to compete, this province will be in serious trouble.
We put some of these ideas together. That has been confirmed by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Technology. They did a survey of businesses asking, "What are some of the problems out there?" I received a kind reply from the minister saying that the big problem that has been identified is taxes at all levels. The businesses and industry in this province are saying the federal tax system, the provincial tax system, the municipal charges and taxes are strangling this province.
I say to the members opposite and to all the politicians and to all the groups that we need to come together because, as this government has found out, the money does not fall from the sky. All those programs that we care about are in jeopardy if we do not have the economy to support them.
In closing, I would like to say that over the last five years we have faced many problems in this province. The tax situation is driving businesses out in record numbers. It is my hope and my intention that we will be able to come together in a non-partisan manner to reduce the spending in this province so that we can provide opportunity for the province to get back to being one of the most prosperous and one of the best places in the world to live.
That is a commitment members have from the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. I hope all members of the public and all members of this Legislature will work together so that we can head in a new direction and restore economic renewal and prosperity in Ontario.
Mr Jamison: It is a pleasure to speak to this motion today. There seems to be some debate, depending on which side of the floor you are coming from, on how economic renewal should take place. Some say everything should be cut and the people best able to lead the economy and the wealthiest in our society should take charge and the others fend for themselves.
I believe there is quite a difference of opinion on where our economy should be going and how we should move to get it there. But I believe you cannot lose sight of the social impacts in this province today that have people suffering quite severely. At the same time you have a segment of people, a segment of this House, who would rather see those people suffer more at the expense of their own wellbeing for those who already have.
I would like to turn to the economic agenda of this government. This government has a priority of economic renewal. In doing this, the government needs and wants the support of business and labour. Our objectives are straightforward. We all want prosperity; there is no one in this House who does not want prosperity. That prosperity must be sustained, the needs of all players in our economy must be met, considered and represented in a very balanced way. That means not just the quantity but the quality of economic growth is of great importance to the future of this government and this province.
Broadly defined, our strategy is to seek to co-operate with the business community in pursuit of our mutual goals of increased productivity, adaption and innovation of advanced technologies, enhancement of workers' skills, innovation of the workplace -- innovation in organizing the workplace and production and process that goes on there. Tomorrow will belong to those businesses which build on a foundation of technological innovation, a highly skilled workforce and high value-added products.
To achieve this we must co-ordinate all the resources at our disposal. We must pull together business, labour, community groups, environmentalists and development specialists and have them work in co-operation with one another, build that air of co-operation. We should recognize the advantages we already have in our infrastructure and in our skilled workforce. But work needs to be done, and the Treasurer spoke about a major investment in that area. Now we must make the resources work for us and improve on those resources.
Renewing our economy must be the central focus of our work as a province. Our goals are simple and straightforward: jobs, training and investment. Canada's economy dramatically underinvests in training and research and development. Workers can buy into change when they see the opportunities for retraining and lifelong access to education. We are proposing a partnership for training with Ottawa and the funds have started to flow. Canadian workers are willing to make sacrifices when they know they are being treated fairly.
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Power and responsibility go together. Increase trust, create mutual self-confidence, stop the sense that every dispute is about survival itself. These are all ways to promote stability and a better industrial relations climate. Investment capital must be innovative and timely. We heard the Treasurer speak to that. The organization of government must be mobilized in a more creative way to deal with the challenge of economic renewal.
We will continue to work to effect change in federal policies, especially in the area of exchange rates, which seem to be hurting many of our industries today. When I meet with them as parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology, that is a pivotal concern of theirs.
At the same time, we are determined to ensure fair access for our products to the US market. All of us in this House are aware of the restrictions that have been arbitrarily placed on many of our goods in what is supposed to be a free trade atmosphere. We understand that the deal was certainly a flawed one.
In many ways the small business community is going to lead the way out of this recession. The figures really speak for themselves. Since 1987 small business has generated 75% of all the new jobs in Ontario. A full 33% of the province's labour force is employed by firms with fewer than 100 employees.
As the Premier announced on August 9, I have been asked to take on special responsibilities for small business. As the Premier stated, the economic situation makes it essential that government and small business work effectively together. I take that challenge up as a very serious one.
I would like to go on from here to just round out my remarks by saying that economic renewal means raising living standards and improving working conditions. The days of the dollar-an-hour wage and the five-cent cigar are gone. Some people would like to see them back, but they are not coming back, as far as this government is concerned.
The Ontario government believes that the ultimate goal of economic renewal should be to improve the quality of life for the people of this province. We cannot improve the quality of life by forcing workers to accept lower wages, poorer working conditions, a degraded environment and restrictions on collective bargaining. Instead, we must improve productivity and our standard of living by aiming at a high-wage, innovative and high-quality-oriented economy. That is the vision this government has for the future of Ontario. We need co-operation to get there.
I would like to say at this point that the level and degree of rhetoric from the opposition benches over trying to accomplish that is incredible at times. The task in front of us is a large one. This government is prepared and ready to take on that challenge, with the co-operation of every sector of our society, and we will succeed.
Mr Brown: I rise today to speak briefly about the state of the northern economy and the uncertainty and devastation invading and intruding into the lives of people who live in the north.
I want to set for the House the backdrop, the situation. We have experienced over 2,700 layoffs in the forestry sector. We have experienced 4,000 layoffs in the mining sector. We have seen the layoffs ripple through the entire northern economy, causing layoffs in the related and subsidiary industries and the service sectors. We have seen the unemployment rate skyrocket and the general welfare case load increase by 40%. Nine mines have closed. Close to 60 sawmilling operations have closed. The pulp and paper industry is in great difficulty. There is close to a 20% increase in bankruptcies. Small business startups are at one third of the rate in southern Ontario. The number of prospectors has decreased by about 20%. In short, times are not good in the north. In fact, I would suggest, and my constituents tell me, that we are not just in a recession, we are in a depression.
Against this backdrop, what has the NDP government done, and, more important, what does it plan to do? It tells us the anti-recession fund will restart the northern economy. In fact, the anti-recession fund is largely smoke and mirrors. The total anti-recession fund is $700 million; $700 million of supposedly additional capital dollars. My friend the Treasurer, the member for Nickel Belt, has told us that this government is going to cut $600 million to $700 million in capital expenditures from the provincial budget this year. You do not have to be a mental giant or an accountant to figure that out. What this government has done is nothing. The net result is zero. What this government has done is substituted a convoluted, perhaps politically expedient way of providing moneys to our communities.
The money has not been targeted to the areas that need it the most. It has been a kind of shotgun approach to the north, mostly dependent upon who had a project that was ready to go. It had nothing to do with an agenda. It had nothing to do with a plan. It had everything to do with who could do it now. Well, communities appreciated it. The communities in my riding that have received funding appreciated it. But many of the communities are asking if it would not have been better for priorities to be pursued, for there to be a plan, for there to be long-term jobs created.
I do not know, and perhaps the minister can tell us, how many long-term, permanent jobs are going to come out of the anti-recession fund and how many permanent jobs are not going to occur because of the budget cuts to the normal capital expenditure of this province. I would suggest that we are going to lose more jobs than we are going to gain in terms of permanent, good, well-paying jobs when we substitute an ad hoc program for a serious look at the priorities of this province.
We have to ask, where is the plan? Where are we going from here? We have to ask what the NDP government, the socialist government, is doing to create employment in northern Ontario, to make us industrially capable of moving into the 21st century. I think northerners will find that a policy of high energy prices, of increasing the price of moving our goods to market, of increasing the price of having our mines and our pulp and paper industry being able to compete -- their electricity prices will go up by 44% over three years because the price of gas is going up. The taxes on gas this year are going to increase by 30% for an area that depends more on energy than any other part of the province because of distance, the nature of our industries and of course our climate. So that very important energy component is making us uncompetitive. We are wondering what an NDP government that promised equalization of these prices is doing to further our competitiveness.
My whip is telling me that I have only a minute left. No, he says it is even less than that. In short, I just want to quote the words of Canadian Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers president Rick Briggs: "I think it is time that the NDP stopped apologizing for getting elected and started getting on with their mandate."
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Mr Stockwell: First, I think it is important that the numbers and the items listed in the orders of the day by the opposition be highlighted quickly: The unemployment rate has reached 9.6%, more than 286,000 Ontarians have lost their jobs, more than a million people in Ontario are on welfare, the government has predicted Ontario's economy will shrink by 3.3% and the deficit will reach $9.7 billion -- and even with these predictions, the Treasurer has miscalculated twice since his budget and has been forced to delay spending and ask for more federal money.
This is a rather damning list for a government that is only in its 15th or 16th month. It is discouraging for the people of Ontario, and I am certain it has to be very discouraging for people who are in this government caucus. The predictions, the promises and the issues they outlined during their election have simply fallen by the wayside. It is "abandon ship" when it comes to the issues they ran their election on. They are faced with a very difficult time. Clearly it is a very difficult time to be a socialist in government, because all the needs, all the indicators and all the economic strategies dictate a ship to be guided in one particular fashion: reductions, restraint and re-organization. Socialists have a very difficult time dealing with those issues in the best of times, let alone in a recessionary period like today.
We sit on this side of the House and we are made promises about economic plans for renewal. I ask the members opposite, where are their economic plans for renewal? Where were these plans that were promised to this House oh so many months ago by the Premier? We have not got them, because they simply do not know what to do.
It is very clear in my mind that they have a very difficult time understanding what to do with their Treasurer. I like the Treasurer very much on a personal basis, but he has recklessly helped ruin this economy in Ontario. They will stand in their places and defend the decisions they make, but the indicators do not bear out their policy, their positions and their statements. They are suggesting that they are doing the best for the economy, yet we have unemployment rates and job losses and people on welfare like we have never, ever seen before. The question that needs to be asked of this government, and the reason this issue was brought forward today by the official opposition, is what do they plan to do about it?
What plans we have seen come forward from this government include a new labour law, a law that will do nothing but drive more businesses out of this province; a piece of legislation where they will not even examine the impact on job creation. We know full well they will not examine the impact, because there is no job creation. We have unemployment reaching unprecedented heights, and they are introducing labour laws that will drive more businesses out of this province. They should explain why their government considers this a priority when the people of this province consider job losses the greatest priority. There is no explanation.
I am certain we will have members stand up across the floor and mouth the party line and tell us what a wonderful job they are doing. The difficulty everyone in this province faces is that after they have made these speeches, these numbers do not change. There are still nearly 10% of the people unemployed and a million people on welfare.
The numbers do not change because there is no leadership being offered at Queen's Park today. The leadership we hear about is an approach that maybe some union can get tax breaks or benefits from the taxpayers to buy out insolvent companies. Who came up with that brainwave? This is going to jump-start the economy, to have unions buy out insolvent companies with taxpayers paying the bill? That is so hopeless, it is hard to believe they classify this as some process to jump-start the economy. The way to jump-start the economy is to build in some surety for the investors, the entrepreneurs, the creators of wealth so they may reinvest in the province.
The same thing gets shouted back for 15 months. They yell about free trade. They yell about the high dollar. They yell about all these programs that are driving them into the ground. For once, the ladies and gentlemen opposite should take responsibility for their actions. They are a government. It is time they stood up and said, "Here's what we plan to do to get us out of this economic spiral." They do not. They simply shout back a bit of rhetoric marked down by some backroom NDPer that is going to solve this crisis. We hear, "GST, free trade, the high dollar." My friends should do something besides parroting some union boss down on Bay Street.
Mr Hope: Bay Street?
Mr Stockwell: Those are the only people who can afford to work on Bay Street today. Unions are the only ones that can afford the rents any more. All the businesses are closing and moving. Bay Street is going to be the biggest union organizing hall in Canada, because all the private investors, all the wealth creators are moving. Why are they moving? Because we have 9.6% unemployment, 286,000 workers who have lost their jobs, a million on welfare and a 3.3% reduction in the economy in this province.
If there are no real ideas coming forward from opposite me in this House, then why do they not grasp some being offered from this side? Why do they not take some of the ideas that have been put forward in our policy directive, New Directions? Why can they not at least examine these alternatives and maybe implement them?
The government must admit one thing. Their ideas and their 15 months have basically been a failure for economic revival. They must admit that. The numbers indicate it. There are more people out of work in this province than since the Depression. There is a shrinking in the economy that we have never seen before. I am not making these numbers up. These are the numbers that come before this House. What do we do? We are going to have to live with this government for three years. They should adopt some concepts we are putting forward from across this House.
Their labour law is not going to produce one job. If they think it is, let them tell me how it is going to produce jobs. If they are telling me this new Labour Relations Act is going to produce jobs, let them explain how and show me. They refuse to do even that. Why? Because it does not produce any work. The people in this province are begging for work and this government is driving businesses out of this province.
Free trade is another one they always chime in about. We have businesses in this province moving to Quebec and Manitoba. What the hell does free trade have to do with that? Nothing. Why? Because there is economic hope in those provinces. Those provinces are trying to attract industry; they are not driving it out.
Business people come to meet with me in my office. They tell me their concerns and I express them in this House. They have concerns about the labour regulations. They have concerns about the $9.7-billion deficit. They have concerns about the shrinking employment opportunities. All I get back from the government is, "GST, free trade and the high dollar." That is not an answer; that is an excuse. The government was not elected to make excuses; it was elected to govern. They should start governing.
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Hon Miss Martel: The Treasurer took a great deal of our time on this side, so I will do the best I can in the short time I have. But I do want to say in response to the last member's comments that he should come to my part of the world and find out about the effects of the high value of the Canadian dollar, because it is killing industry in northern Ontario. It is nothing more or less than the high value of the Canadian dollar which has affected our traditional industries and wiped out jobs all over the place. He should come to our part of the world and see what it is like and see the impact of federal monetary policies.
There are couple of things I want to go back to, and one is the five principles the Treasurer outlined in his discussion here today. I want to talk about how, in the last year in northern Ontario, some of the things we have been doing have fitted into those policies and how we hope the work we do will continue to fit into those.
Specifically on the first comment the Treasurer made, "Economic renewal means raising living standards and improving working conditions," I want to tell some of the things we have done in the north in the last year. The Ministry of Northern Development and Mines put about $40.8 million in terms of anti-recession funding into the north: 60 localities and 90 native communities received funding. I say to the member for Algoma-Manitoulin, as I said to him in the standing committee on estimates, that 80% of the funding under our ministry was allocated to those communities by August. We have already created 3,000 person-years of work.
Our money has been allocated; our communities have benefited in northern Ontario. There is no doubt about that in my mind. That went into community infrastructure, which we believe is going to be absolutely essential. As northern Ontario pulls out of the recession, those communities will have the basic infrastructure in place. They will be able to attract and retain people. We think the local purchase of goods and services and the local employment that has created has been absolutely phenomenal and very helpful in northern Ontario in the last year.
Carrying on from that, $210 million of that $700 million went to northern Ontario. A full 30% of the anti-recession funding went to a portion of the province that has been very hard-hit by the recession and very hard-hit by ill-thought-out federal monetary policies. In total, we had money that went into waterfront development, schools, roads, recreational facilities, correctional centres, day cares, shelters and group homes. I know those are things the Tories do not care about, but they are certainly important in my part of the world, and that is why we funded those kinds of things. That has been a tremendous benefit to the people of northern Ontario. When I travel -- and I do travel in the part of the world I represent -- they are nothing but very grateful that this money has come back to be used in their communities for their local people for local purchase of goods and services.
A second program we introduced, because we saw a very desperate need for it when we came to power and there are many small communities in northern Ontario that cannot raise the necessary funding to put in place municipal infrastructure, was a new program called the small communities improvement program. We put about $1.5 million in place that allows communities with less than a population of 2,000 and all of the native northern bands to apply. That money is used for minor capital improvements in terms of municipal infrastructure -- again, libraries, day cares, community centres, all important kinds of things the Tories do not care about. I understand that.
But in this year we have allocated about $1.5 million to 38 communities, all of which had, again, local purchases of goods and services this summer and this winter and local people being put to work. I know the Tories do not care about putting local people to work, but we do, and that is why we did it. We are very pleased with this program; it is a phenomenal success. We have waiting lists, but we will put it in as a permanent program within our ministry because we know there is a need and because we know it fits into our overall economic renewal strategy in terms of providing local employment and making sure the economic infrastructure is in place in small communities in our province.
I wish the private sector would join us. In some of these cases they did and in other cases they did not. So we have picked up the shortfall and we are putting in place what the private sector, in some cases, has not wanted to do.
In Elliot Lake -- I am glad the member for Algoma-Manitoulin is here -- we put $15 million into that community, again as an effort to try to diversify an economy that has to move away from mining, that needs another structure in place and another kind of economy in order to survive in the long term. The $15 million that went into that community went into infrastructure: the airport, the drug and alcohol treatment centre, the retirement living program, all important programs for people in those communities. All of those people in the communities will benefit from drug and alcohol treatment that will occur in northern Ontario, not across the border. Again, a lot of local people are put to work and a lot of local goods and services purchases are being made.
In terms of the northern Ontario development agreement, I want to point out that with regard to helping working conditions in northern Ontario, the mining sector in particular, a big portion of the money that has been put aside in the agreement will be allowed so that industry can come and work with government to develop pilot projects in order to improve health and safety in the mining sector in Ontario, look at new ways to meet environmental controls and new ways to increase productivity. We are very pleased that we will put proposals out. The mining industry has also agreed it is an important program, because it will be able to come and look at new programs to increase productivity and ensure health and safety in the mining sector and look at ways in which we can deal with environmental problems in some of that industry.
Two more points, if I might: The sawmill industry has been particularly battered by the federal government, by the softwood lumber tax and the very high rate of the Canadian dollar, so that it cannot export its goods. They have been very hard hit in this last year. We responded by providing about $14 million to 12 sawmill communities that were utterly dependent on that particular industry, in order that we could both lever money from the bank and provide money ourselves so that people in those communities could continue to work and to look at new product lines over and above the traditional US market they have been selling into.
A number of those companies will now look at what else they can produce in those sawmill communities. They will now look at a different market, mostly European, in order to change the pattern of their sales and to ensure that we have a long-term viability of those sawmills, not just one that has been dependent on the US market. We are very pleased to participate in that.
Finally, in terms of the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corp, which is directly mandated to deal with the development and expansion of small business in northern Ontario, I can tell members that in the last year, from October when I became minister until the end of September, we allocated over $62 million from that fund. That was the entire $30 million which we were given under statute in this year, and it picked up all the money that was left in excess and not spent in the first two years the program was developed.
In terms of responding to northern need, in terms of responding to northern business need, in terms of responding to northern communities that have been hard hit by the recession this year, I think we have a very good track record and one I am proud of as Minister of Northern Development and Mines.
Following up on the other four principles the Premier talked about, the government's role in economic renewal is to both encourage and manage change. There is no doubt that in the part of the world I am from, there has been tremendous change in the last year. I hasten to add that the restructuring, particularly in the forestry industry, is not over yet and we will see some more difficult times this winter. But in communities like Elliot Lake, Kapuskasing and Atikokan, the government has worked with business, the unions and community leaders to manage the change in those communities and in their traditional industries as best we could. No Tory or Liberal government would have done what we did in Kapuskasing; of that I am absolutely convinced. Nor would they have done what we did in Elliot Lake; I am absolutely convinced of that. I am very pleased that in each of those communities --
Interjections.
The Acting Speaker (Mr Villeneuve): Order, please. The honourable member for Sudbury East has the floor and interjections are out of order.
Hon Miss Martel: I want to say that it has been a very profitable experience for our ministry, because we have worked directly in each of those communities with all the people who had a direct interest in maintaining employment and ensuring that all the people in the community had the best opportunities for employment. As a government, we were able to work with them directly through many hours of negotiation and work. There was a great deal of hardship on some days, but at the end of the day there were very successful changes in those communities. We will ensure that there will be long-term economies and diversification in those economies, particularly in Elliot Lake, which is a move away from what we have traditionally known in northern Ontario.
We intend to continue that work. In Sault Ste Marie, in particular with respect to Algoma Steel, we are now working very directly with the community, the banks, the Steelworkers and the company in order to look for positive solutions in that case. We will not walk away from those communities. I can tell members that in Sault Ste Marie, the federal government sure as hell did walk away from that community. It would not even give that community money in order to stave off the banks and allow negotiations to continue. That is the kind of commitment the Tories have to workers in Ontario.
One more thing in terms of mining: We are trying to create partnerships between the mining industry and native communities in particular, because there has been a great deal of fear and uncertainty between those two communities for a number of years. The ministry has developed a road show where we go into native communities in particular and start to explain to them what the mining industry is all about, what mining really means, how it can be a good development tool for their communities and how we can transfer expertise and skills to them to develop the resources on their own reserve lands. We are having great success in dealing with a number of communities.
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We have encouraged the Ontario Mining Association and the prospectors and developers to have their own negotiations and discussions with first nations in particular, and those discussions are beginning. They have been very fruitful to date and are beginning to undermine some of the fear and suspicion that has existed between mining companies in the province and the first nations. We are working as best we can in the Mines side of my ministry to facilitate that dialogue and discussions.
The third principle: Partnerships between employers and workers are important for productivity. Again, I want to focus on the worker ownership legislation that will be critical in Kapuskasing and Sault Ste Marie. It is very forward-looking on the part of this government that we believe enough in workers that we will allow them to run their own plants. I know that is very difficult for other parties to deal with, but I can certainly say we are proud, as a social democratic government, that we believe in workers enough to know they can run companies in their communities. They can be profitable, they can make a contribution and I will be very pleased to support that legislation when we move it through this House.
There is no doubt that traditionally in northern Ontario no government has looked at value added in either the forestry or the mining sectors. The interesting thing is that we really have to look at value added in both traditional mining sectors if we are going to move away from a traditional dependence which we have always lived on in northern Ontario, and that traditional dependence has certainly increased the dramatic and very negative effects we have felt during this recession because we have not made that move away from those traditional industries or looked at how we can have value added in those traditional industries.
Therefore, we will have two discussions going on in my ministry. The Ontario Mining Association, the unions involved in mining and, on the forestry side, the sawmills, pulp and paper companies, people involved in waferboard and the respective unions have agreed that they will deal with us in terms of value added in both the mining and forestry sectors. We are looking forward to kicking those off at the beginning of the new year.
Again, my colleague the Minister of Natural Resources talked about the forest industry action group and the chair, who was announced yesterday. That group, which I met with recently, will be looking at value added, particularly in the forestry sector. I can say that through the heritage fund as well we are looking at approving a plan which will allow for export marketing of our wood products into a European market, which we have to get into because we cannot continue the traditional links we have with the United States and deal with the Canadian dollar problem as we have in the last number of months. We are promoting that through the heritage fund.
A couple of companies are interested in exporting their wood products to Europe and we think that would be a tremendous benefit to the people of Ontario in terms of expanding our markets and our production.
Finally, in terms of ensuring the protection and improvement of social programs, I want to point out two things: During the anti-recession funding, particularly in northern Ontario, we spent a great deal of money to train native alcohol and drug treatment workers who can work in their local communities because we recognize the problem there. Most important, this year is our winter roads program, an ongoing program in the ministry which allows access by road into native communities over the winter. We will move millions of dollars worth of goods into those native communities this year, particularly in construction, so that next spring they will be able to use a lot of the money that came through the Ontario native affairs secretariat this year to develop housing on reserves, in six bands in particular.
I want to say that I am proud of our record over the last year. It is a record my colleagues have been very supportive of. There is no doubt that the restructuring in the forestry industry in northern Ontario in particular is not over. That is why we are very encouraged by the work that will be done to create the forestry team. The Ministry of Northern Development and Mines will be very encouraged to participate in that and will want to do that.
I can tell you that what we have learned in terms of economic renewal -- and it has been very important to us in the last year -- is that it is only going to come if there is a partnership among labour, business, municipalities and this government. In the communities I have worked in during the last year and in the communities I represent, that has been very much the pattern of what our ministry has been involved in and we will continue to do that. Thank you.
Mr McGuinty: The member for Sudbury speaks with conviction. I think it is important to recognize though that speaking with conviction does not always make one right. On that basis, I am going to proceed with some comments.
A number of people have asked me why is it that this government is having problems dealing with the economy. I think it is important to understand the baggage this party came to power with. This New Democratic Party is one which for decades has bashed business, landlords and the rich. All those, interestingly enough, were referred to in the Agenda for People. They actually used terms like "the rich," as if somehow by virtue of being rich you are evil. They attacked landlords as well, as if somehow by virtue of being a landlord, there is something wrong with that, and as if somehow by being involved in business, there is something inherently wrong with that.
I think it is important to recognize that in order to bring a fair approach to government you cannot advance the cause of any particular interest group. You cannot advance the cause, for instance, of tenants. You cannot advance the cause of labour.
Interjections.
The Deputy Speaker: Order, please. The member for Sudbury East, you have your chance to debate. The member for Etobicoke West, I would ask you to be patient.
Mr McGuinty: I think it is important the government understand that the only cause it is supposed to be advancing day in and day out is the public interest. When you advance the cause of the public interest, it requires that you treat landlords, tenants, labour, business, environmentalists and developers fairly. There is an obligation to respect their rights and to ensure that the public interest at all times comes first and foremost.
I want to take the time to address the fundamental problem, of course, which began at the outset when the Treasurer introduced his first budget. That deficit of $9.7 billion hangs around our necks like a millstone. The Treasurer and this party have staked their political reputations on maintaining this deficit at that $9.7-billion level, as if somehow that were something to be proud of. That size of deficit is completely out of step with modern economics and modern thinking in regard to these matters. It is out of step with the initiatives that have been taken by other provinces and by the federal government.
There may have been a time when that kind of deficit was acceptable, but certainly from speaking to the people in my riding of Ottawa South it is no longer acceptable. I can recall during the campaign speaking with an elderly lady at the door. She said to me, "Why is it that if governments don't have money, they spend it anyway, but if I don't have money, I don't spend it?" The analogy is not perfect, but there is a tremendous kernel of wisdom there that we should not overlook. Sometimes we lose sight of those things in this House, in this rarefied atmosphere where we discuss these things in the abstract.
I am not inferring in any way that in any particular context we do not have an obligation to look out for those who are incapable of looking out for themselves. I am not saying that at all. That obligation remains, notwithstanding the economic times. But there comes a time, of course, when a government is going to be faced, as this one is, with difficult decisions that are going to demand leadership. Those kinds of decisions are going to cause some pain at least in the short term in order to achieve longer term benefits. This government, when presented with the circumstances of this recession, took the easy way out. It piled on the debt. It gave certain privileged employees hefty raises. In short, what this government has done is aggravate a serious problem.
I want to briefly refer to the matter of Ontario Hydro. You cannot talk about the health of our economy without talking about Hydro, because it plays such an integral role, as it has historically, in the vitality of our economy.
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I think the most important symptom which tells us about the health of Hydro is the indication by the minister and the chair of Hydro that we are going to have 44% rate increases over the next three years. That is a staggering increase. I think that is fairly obvious to anyone who examines it. Obviously over the next three years no one in this province to my knowledge is going to receive a raise that will be of that size. As a result, that kind of increase is going to have a tremendous impact throughout society. We are all paying for hydro in one way or the other, even when buying a chocolate bar. As I was saying to a group the other day, the manufacturing costs of a chocolate bar incorporate some element of power costs.
My whip is telling me, as graciously as he can, that my time is up.
Mr Hope: One of the important parts is that there is only a short period of time left, as we heard the energy of the north going through. One thing I would like to keep in mind is the issue of social justice. It has to be. If we listen to the Tories and the Liberals, we get the idea that in order to have a balanced budget, social justice is at the sacrifice of the individuals in our communities.
One of the important things as we talk about amendments to the Labour Relations Act and the increases that were announced in the budget to people on social assistance is better utilization. We were listening to the opposition and its criticism about making $17.50 an hour on social assistance. That is a far cry from what is actually going on. That just tells us that a lot of the members opposite are not listening to the concerns of their communities.
One of the things in order to keep social justice in place is to look at what has happened to a lot of our workforce and to make sure we are using the proper foresight of where we are going. This economy was in a downturn a long time ago, but other governments never paid attention to the initiatives of the working people. This government has and will continue to. As the upcoming time allows, we will see a lot of changes take place in order for us to be competitive in this world marketplace.
Competitiveness is not a matter of wages that are way below the standard of living. It is a matter of improved wages, high wages, and at the same time producing a high-quality, high-value product in the competitive global market. We will do that in partnership.
Mr Offer: I am pleased to join in this debate, which I believe is addressing a most serious issue. Many members have already spoken about many aspects of the issue and the lack of this government providing some economic renewal for the province. One of the things that always troubles me when we talk about this is that people think it has to be spurred on by the recession which the province has gone through and continues to go through. The fact of the matter is that this is an issue which has to be addressed.
There was the need and a responsibility on the part of the government to promote an economic renewal. With or without a recession, the economic structure of the global marketplace was changing. Tariffs were falling. There was changing ground underneath. There was indeed a responsibility on the part of the government to meet what was happening not only in Ontario and all the other provinces in this country, but in all jurisdictions in the world. Tariffs are falling. There are new competitive mandates which have to be met. The government in this province has, day in and day out, failed to meet the demands of the day.
We have heard members on the government side speak about how much their government is doing, something about some five-part plan.I have before me a document put out not by the opposition or indeed the third party, but by the Ministry of Labour. It is put out by the government Ministry of Labour. What does it talk about? It talks about what we are going through in this province, pages and pages of people who have been laid off from work. It talks not about some amorphous five-point plan which nobody in this document put out by the Ministry of Labour has yet to see, but about employees, people affected, establishments closed or partially closed. It talks about names of businesses which, because of the inaction by the government, because they have been unable to meet the challenges of the day, are now either partially closed or have in fact closed.
Let's talk about some of those numbers. I will not talk about the names of the companies. We are talking about some real people: 79 people, 93 people, 14, 382, 9, 100, all of which add up to many thousands of people. What are we looking at? Are we looking at the employment or the unemployment in the last five years? Are we looking at the numbers for the last three years? Are we looking at the numbers in the last two years? No. This is the report for September 1991.
When members of the government stand in their places and speak about all the wonderful things they are doing, I can tell them the people who are contained in their own report would take strong issue with them. These are people who have been out of work, many for the first time in their lives, who look towards the government and say: "What plan have you put forward? How are we going to be able to meet the competitive mandate of the 1990s and beyond?"
What they are finding, as the back page says, is nothing. The government is doing nothing to meet the responsibility it should have met. This is not a matter which has come up in just the last month. It is a matter which has been before us in the last year and a half. The government has not met the issues of the day, and for that people are out of work for the first time in their lives, their options for job employment strongly reduced. This government must start to take action and stop looking at other people to blame. They have a responsibility. They should start acting now.
Mrs Sullivan: To a certain extent, I regret that I have to participate in this debate, because I believe that if the government had managed our fiscal and economic policies in a more precise and businesslike way, the debate would not be necessary at all. We know that business confidence is at the lowest ebb in the province's history, that capital investment has dried up, that heavy debt over the long and short term is a presage of higher taxes and that services are in a fast decline.
One of the things that is clear is that the government has no handle on its economic policies, on economic issues or decisions, that should affect the future and in fact the delivery of health care services. One of the things we also know is that a strong economic climate and a viable wealth creation system ensure the social system that Canadians have come to depend on, and indeed by which they define themselves.
But people throughout Ontario are concerned about the stability of the health care system and other social networks, because of the arbitrary slash-and-burn policies that this government has put in place. Those policies are clearly necessitated by their own panicky response to budget surprises and bad planning. People fear this government is well on the road to creating a two-tier system of health care. What those who work in the health care system tell me is that the slash-and-burn policies, the arbitrary cuts, will not provide the saving the government needs, because it is not approaching health care and the management of health care in an appropriate way.
I think everyone agrees, whether they are institutions, whether they are agencies, whether they are consumers, that managing costs in the health care system while ensuring appropriate delivery of services that are equitable and to which people have access is a key challenge. But the approach of this government to managing costs in such a way that people will continue to be served has been marked by amateurism, by a lack of clear expression of what it is trying to do and its refusal to involve people who have the expertise in the field to participate.
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The Minister of Health has said that there is a $5-billion waste level in the health care system. If she believes that, then she has the responsibility to say where it is and how she will fix it and according to what standards health care will be delivered. What procedures that doctors, using their professional judgement, believe are necessary for patient care does the minister believe are wasteful? What drugs does she believe senior citizens should pay for? She has indicated that may well be on the table. What standards will she put in place in our institutions to ensure that health care services remain viable and that needed services are provided? What quotas will she put into place for transplants, for surgeries? What standards for bed closings in our hospitals?
We know that by March 1992 more than 3,000 -- in fact, 3,292 -- beds in hospitals will be closed and 4,328 jobs will be lost. In Metro, 2,900 of 15,000 acute care beds will be closed. The minister must approve, under Ministry of Health policy, each and every bed closing. But one of the things people in the hospital field are seeing is no businesslike guidelines, no businesslike approaches to these issues. Hospital administrators and boards have no guidelines and standards from the minister about where she will require cuts.
How many patient days per 1,000 of population will the minister require hospitals to provide? What average length of stay is her standard? The minister has said that hospitals must be businesslike, but I want to tell members that the minister has not been businesslike in her approach to hospitals.
There are $112 million in allocations for growth, equity and life support which should have been allocated by now which have not been made, have not been announced: $24 million for pay equity adjustments, 50% of what hospitals need, have been announced, but the guidelines for flowing those funds have not even been defined.
I want to give another example of the kind of bad planning and unbusinesslike approach and amateurishness in this government's approach to the management of taxpayer dollars. Some time ago a 5% cutback in fees to Ontario laboratories was announced as a cost-saving measure. No one in the field understood how the government chose that arbitrary number nor what cost saving it was trying to achieve.
If the government really wanted cost saving and to maintain the high quality of tests, surely it should have taken the time to discuss with those who were working in the field with the expertise to determine where indeed cost saving could be made. Perhaps sharing a percentage of the increase of utilization would have been useful. Perhaps a cap on payments would have been viable. But an arbitrary chop, with no discussion or expertise drawn on, means the government will not get what it wants.
Frankly, that kind of arbitrary decision has been made in virtually every sector of health care without consultation with those who have expertise. It is very clear mismanagement and no saving will accrue. Businesslike decisions are not being made. What we are going to be seeing is the deterioration in quality, access, efficiency and universality of health care services, and that is very much a part of the management approach of this government.
Mr Harris: I am pleased to have the opportunity today to share a few thoughts with the Legislature on the opposition day motion. The motion is one that I will support, because I believe this government is moving dramatically in the wrong direction. I note, and I will not dwell on it, but I do want to note at the beginning that they are moving in basically the same direction as the former government.
I find the motion from the Liberal Party, from the member for St Catharines as leader of that party today, a little strange in that what it is saying to the government is, "Don't do like we did for the last five or six years." I agree with them. I accept in good faith their admission of six years of absolutely disastrous government for this province under the leadership of David Peterson and many of them who are still in this Legislature.
When they talk about the deficit reaching $9.7 billion, never have I criticized the New Democratic Party for the total amount of that deficit. Nor have I criticized the New Democratic Party for all but $1 billion of the taxation levels that we have in this province that have made us the highest-taxed jurisdiction not only in Canada but indeed in North America.
We will support the resolution, and I said I would not dwell on it. I hope now that there is virtually unanimous recognition from all those Liberals who will stand up and support this resolution today; that they will admit that in fact this province is in very serious shape; that our unemployment rate, relative to the rest of Canada, accelerated to a level far in excess of what it has ever been in the history of the province; that 286,000 Ontario workers have lost their jobs and it has been taxation policies and others the Liberals brought in that have led to many of those job losses; that more than one million people on welfare in this province can be directly attributed to the massive overspending of the Liberal administration from 1985 to 1990, of the misguided policies and directions, the layer upon layer of new bureaucratic costs that have been passed on to our employers, large and small, in this province that have been a significant cause of them being uncompetitive. I suggest to the Liberal Party that it be very cognizant of that in the future.
As I noted to the Treasurer earlier in this debate, I ask the Liberal Party, in the absence of anything of its own in the way of an alternative to its misguided direction of the last five years -- and now my criticism of the New Democratic Party is that it is still heading in that direction, but it is in fast forward in that direction, and of course this is further compounding the situation that we inherited in this province in 1990.
I say to the Liberal Party that we have presented A Blueprint for Economic Renewal and Prosperity in Ontario: New Directions. The New Directions document is one that acknowledges a direction that has not been healthy for this province for the last 10 years. Some can argue with me and say it was only eight or maybe it was 12, but we present this in a very non-partisan way, in a non-partisan spirit, to suggest that here is how we have gone wrong over this period of time.
For some reason or other we changed from self-reliance, from being competitive, from rewarding initiative to suggesting and thinking that government can somehow or other be all things to all people and that a government will tax more money away from companies, from individuals and will decide how it should be spent. It has been in the name of fairness or compassion or that somehow or other government can do this more efficiently and have it spent more correctly than individuals themselves can. What a disastrous thought. It is called socialism to varying degrees, and we have seen how the greater the degree of socialism adopted by any country, any government around the world, the more disastrous it has been.
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So we have a mini-disaster here in Ontario. It has not entirely been brought on by this government. It has been a movement in the last 10 years or so. We have seen government spending go from $17.8 billion to $53 billion from 1981 to 1991. Government spending has tripled in the last 10 years, from 1981 to 1991. The inflation index for that period of time has gone up about 80%, so if we were spending today what we were spending at the levels of 1981 in today's dollars, we would be spending somewhere around $28 billion. Members may say that there are more people in this province today. They are quite right. If we adjust for that, we would be spending about $33 billion, but we are spending $53 billion.
This is why we in our party feel so strongly that a new direction is needed and why we feel so strongly that we are heading in the wrong direction, that most of this new spending has been introduced in the name of compassion. "We're going to tax it and we're going to spend it better than you" for sharing of the wealth, if you like, for sharing of prosperity. We have done this at such a level that we are threatening prosperity itself. That is why 286,000 jobs are out of this province and that is why unemployment rates are at the level they are.
We have overextended, even if one believes government can share the wealth better than individuals. We have intervened in the marketplace so dramatically in so many areas that the marketplace is not working very well in our province. I say there are some difficulties in Canada, but we have been the province that has moved more than any other province towards this massive intervention, in the highest taxation and the increasing degree of socialism, and we in turn are the province suffering the most during this particular downturn from all across Canada.
If you stop and think about it, if we could go back to 1981 and look at the situation there, was it perfect? Of course not. Were there problems? Yes, indeed, there were. There will always be problems. We are, after all, human beings. I do not know a political system or a grouping of more than one where there is total unanimity on every issue and where there will not be some difficulties in society.
In 1981, there were fewer people needing food banks, there was more and better-quality accessible health care to more Ontarians than there is today, there were fewer lineups, there were fewer waiting lists, there were fewer people waiting for subsidized housing, there were fewer people requiring welfare, there were fewer people needing assistance from government.
We have tripled spending in this period of time, but have we solved the problems we set out to solve? I suggest we have not, and that is why a new direction is required. That is why the direction this government is taking is so disastrous. If they had only learned from the lessons of what happened before they took office. The people of this province knew a new direction was required and they thought this government would provide it, but it has not. They are on the same direction, only worse. They have been a great disappointment to me.
An hon member: That does not surprise me.
Mr Harris: That does not surprise the member, but the government has indeed been a great disappointment to the people of this province. The more it taxes, the more it intervenes and the more it tries to have government involvement, the more disastrous it is and the more unfair it seems and the more people we have on waiting lists and more people looking for food banks. Lineups for subsidized housing are longer. The waiting lists for surgery are longer. We have 4,000 or 5,000 fewer hospital beds today than we did in 1981.
If they could go back to 1981 and spend at the 1981 levels -- they cannot, but I think it would be helpful to look at it -- if they were spending at $33 billion, what could they do with the $20 billion? For one thing, they could balance the budget with $10 billion, they could cut taxes by $5 billion and still have $5 billion to improve upon the programs that were being delivered in 1981. Understand that I am talking about 1991 dollars. I am talking about the level of government involvement in 1981 and transferring it to 1991, and I am adjusting for the increase in population we have had over that period of time.
We cannot go back, but surely we can learn from what all three parties have collectively done, all of us as legislators at all levels of government, but my look has been only at provincial government figures. Surely we can learn from that and say we are going in the wrong direction and need to move in a new direction if we truly care about having universal access. That is what our party is fighting for in New Directions. We are fighting to restore universal access to one of the best health care systems in the world. We do not think our health care system is as good or as accessible today as it was even one year ago, let alone two years ago. We are fighting to restore universal access.
New Directions is a document we have put out. If we could get the government to bring it forward on the agenda, discuss it and look at it, we think -- in fact, we know -- that if we work together with the resources available to us, even with the reduced taxation level, we could have more universal accessibility to health care in this province, more universal accessibility to affordable housing, more universal accessibility to food, more universal accessibility to a quality of life I believe we all want for Ontarians.
Not only have we been misguided in these plans, as we have had government say it can do all these things and had socialism take over, but we see the tremendous unfairness that evolves in the distribution of it. Under socialism, when there is a shortage of housing, as there always is, who gets the nice apartment? Not the poor, not those without influence, not those without contacts, not those without money. That is why I believe we have more on the outside today with a socialism approach to housing.
We put our dollars into helping builders -- select builders, the non-profit ones, those who get the inside track, and select non-profit groups. There is so much profit in non-profit that it is an absolute disgrace. Who has the inside track? Who knows who? This is what is happening. Those who do not have friends in high places -- it is not money, of course, that produces this type of influence -- and those who are the weakest swimmers, which is an analogy I use, do not get in the lifeboat. It is the strongest swimmers who get in these lifeboats that government keeps insisting on building instead of teaching people how to swim.
We feel very strongly that a new direction is required from government in this province. We have never felt so confident that government is moving in the wrong direction. This government has been such a disappointment because the people expected a change. They expected a new direction. I think there is bitter disappointment among many of the 24% across this province who felt strongly enough that the New Democratic Party would provide this change that they would vote for it at the polls across the province.
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I guess those who are in the know and who have the influence, the big labour unions -- I was looking at the new directions of the Ontario Federation of Labour today -- are not disappointed, because they are on the inside. They have the influence. When there is big profit in many non-profit things, here is where the big profit goes, to those in the know. Perhaps 10% of the population is in the know now, but the other 10% who came forward and felt strongly enough that they would provide a new direction and vote for them in the last campaign -- and they do appreciate that 76% of the people did not think that enough to go and vote for them in the last campaign -- are very disappointed.
I am going to support this resolution because it is along the lines of what we have called for in our non-confidence motion to be debated next week. This motion, I believe, is very supportive of calling for a new direction. I believe the Liberal Party has missed the mark, as I said at the start, in two areas. They have not given the government the new direction. I think opposition parties in the past were able to get elected perhaps by default, by being very critical and pointing out all the things the government was doing wrong. But I am convinced that in the future, to get elected, people are going to look for something to vote for. I do not think they will see many more elections in this next little period of time that will be elections by default, the way the government was elected.
I suggest to the government and the Liberal Party that I and my colleagues are prepared to come forward with a new direction. We are prepared to say: "Not only is this what you're doing wrong, and it is dramatically wrong, but here indeed is what you should be doing. Here's a new direction that you should be heading in."
This is not today a confidence vote. This today is a vote that calls on the Treasurer to introduce a comprehensive plan for economic renewal which will get the province's economy moving again. I do not know that there is anything in this that any member of this Legislature could have opposition to. Do they not agree, I say to the members of the New Democratic Party, that it is necessary for the Treasurer to introduce a comprehensive plan for economic renewal? The Treasurer is planning to do that anyway. They know that; I know that. We are a little concerned it will be the same misguided direction, 180 degrees in the wrong direction he has already been going in. But we hope that by being constructive and by presenting New Directions, our document and viable alternatives, indeed the Treasurer will reflect on that as he charts a new course, because the old one is obviously a disaster.
I ask all members of all parties to support this resolution put forward by my colleague the member for St Catharines.
Mr Bradley: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to conclude, I believe, the debate this afternoon, a debate which revolves around the most important issue confronting Ontario at this time, and that is the state of the economy in this province.
In years gone by, we were always considered to be perhaps the fortunate part of the country, because when unemployment hit, it was always tougher in different parts of the country. We often thought of the Maritimes as experiencing extreme difficulty in tough economic times in the country, or certain western provinces that relied upon their resources.
What we have in the circumstances today is an Ontario where we are the leaders in terms of the recession and not the leaders in terms of making the economy go. We are no longer, in this particular context of November 1991, the engine which is driving the country.
There are a couple of reasons for this. The first thing we face, of course, is unemployment. Anybody who knows anything about unemployment knows there are statistics which describe unemployment to us. We are aghast at the fact that it hovers around 10%. We look at raw figures and we say it is awful that we are confronting this, but as people who have to deal with individuals in our communities across the province, we know there is a human dimension to unemployment which often is left behind. That story cannot be told in just a few minutes. We have families that break up because of unemployment. We have the breadwinners, whether it happens to be the man or the woman or the man and the woman, perhaps at each other's throats because of the fact that there is not sufficient income coming in to meet individual obligations. We have children who sometimes are subjected to child abuse because parents are at their wits' end over the economic circumstances they face.
Here in Ontario we have a very high unemployment rate. As the Treasurer himself conceded earlier in the day, we have a circumstance where the jobs are disappearing for good. I remember that Gord Wilson came to St Catharines to make a presentation. I thought it had a lot of good suggestions in it at that time. One of the facts he mentioned was that probably double the number of jobs that were lost permanently in the last recession are being lost permanently this time around. It was approximately 25% previously; it is now about 50%. I think the Treasurer suggested even more.
We must recognize that we have to turn the economy around and we have to do so quickly, but we are confronted with a deficit that is very difficult to face. When we look at why business will or will not invest in this province, I think we have to look at the deficit figures for the next few years. We are very concerned about the fact that we have a $9.73-billion deficit this year. That is enough reason for concern, but I think what concerns those who are potentially thinking of investing in this province even more are the projected figures for 1992-93 of $8.9 billion; 1993-94, $8.4 billion, and 1994-95, $7.8 billion. We recognize that is adding tremendously to the debt load of this province. In the four years for which the NDP is projecting its deficits, the debt of this province is going to increase almost as much as it has since Confederation.
I am a person who likes to be fair. I know we are dealing with larger figures at this time and I do not think the raw figures themselves are fair to use, but those figures are scaring people from investing in this province.
The second thing that is scaring them is some of the legislation being asked for or proposed by this government. Some of those bills and some of the suggestions are not unreasonable in certain economic times. Perhaps, as some would suggest, there is no good time to introduce this kind of legislation, no easy time. What I am concerned about is that the government will bring forward a number of pieces of legislation that are going to scare off investors. For those who already have their money invested in the province, there is an uneasiness. I do not see a large flight of that capital at this time -- there are layoffs, there are closings of plants -- but there are a lot of people who are now uneasy about the economy, wondering whether they should keep their money in the province or transfer it to some other jurisdiction, particularly south of the border.
When they are making those kinds of decisions, I hope this government brings about an atmosphere in this province that encourages them to stay. I hope it brings about an atmosphere that encourages people to invest in the future. We have a good workforce in this province. It has been well trained in the past, but the Treasurer himself made a rather interesting observation which I thought was very fair. He said that, whether we like it or not, the economy in this province is being restructured. It seems to me that a strong government interested in encouraging investment will bring about an economic plan that is going to encourage people to put their money into this province and bring about a situation where the taxes that come in are not as a result of new taxes but are revenues that are there because of a buoyant economy. Then we can address many of the problems we have in the province.
The Minister of Community and Social Services would not have to cut off credit counselling services across the province. I have received representations from many, including the labour council in St Catharines, which has urged the minister and local members not to have the funds cut off for a credit counselling service, a particularly essential service in the midst of a recession.
What is required is a stimulated, booming economy to bring in those revenues so the Minister of Health does not have to cut so many beds from the various hospitals, so she does not have to diminish the services that are provided in this province.
I become somewhat concerned when I see the government preoccupied with certain things such as promoting itself. It is not fair to criticize this government alone for it, but I think many people in this province thought Bob Rae and the NDP would be different from other parties. We see a secret political committee set up, using funds from various ministries to promote the government. It says, "To expand the base of support for the government and to promote it." That sounds familiar. It sounds like my previous incarnation as an opposition member. I used to criticize another government for doing that and I see the same things happening to this government, except much more rapidly.
Hon Mr Laughren: You never did it.
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Mr Bradley: The Treasurer intervenes and I should not allow him to interject.
The point we made is that the Premier and the NDP were going to be different, and I remember the speech on polls. I remember the leader of the official opposition used to say, "That is a cynical manipulation of the political process in Ontario and we do not need polls because we have all the answers." Then I asked him the question in the House today, "Are you conducting public opinion polls using the taxpayers' dollars?" and he had to admit that in fact they are doing so.
I asked the next question, "Are you prepared to share it on a timely basis" -- in other words, immediately with everybody else -- "or are you going to keep the results for the NDP only?" Remember, this is using taxpayers' funds from various ministries. His answer was that the government is keeping these polls secret.
It is no wonder people become cynical. It is no wonder people say, in a time when we require good economic planning and programs, we have the government involved in cynical political practices. As I have said on many occasions, I even used to believe the NDP was more ethical and moral in politics in years gone by, but I have had my hopes dashed and that illusion destroyed by the Premier and the members of the government.
I was concerned as well because the Treasurer is now talking about new taxes. He finally had to retreat from the tax on auto workers in many parts of the province that he developed, because the opposition asked questions day after day and forced him to retreat. We enlisted the support of the president of the Canadian Auto Workers, fine gentleman that he is, and I know many of the people in St Catharines from Locals 199 and 676 were very concerned about the tax on auto workers.
We are afraid that the Treasurer, when he keeps adjusting his figures, hoping somehow the federal government is going to bail him out -- we know that is a forlorn hope -- somehow is going to come back with yet another tax on auto workers or some other segment of the economy, attempting to disguise the tax as an environmental tax because he thinks he can sell that as a tax.
What we do not need are more taxes to drive investment out of this province. What we do not need are more taxes to send people over the border to do their shopping. What we do not need are huge deficits in this province. What we need is a well-drafted, well-thought-out economic plan, and I know the Treasurer has had lots of advice this afternoon from those of us in opposition. He has had advice from many people outside his caucus and he has some good people in the caucus who no doubt have privately given him some advice as well to develop the kind of program that is going to encourage, not discourage business from investing in this province. If we have that atmosphere in this province, I assure the Treasurer that we in the opposition will be supportive.
Motion agreed to.
The House adjourned at 1756.